LogFAQs > #972489071

Episode 2: Realm of Fear

Seems perfectly safe to me.

Picard evaluates some risks. Still has unwavering trust in his staff.

Almost seems like a dick move for Riker to shove Worf on the transporter first. At least, he goes second. Decent to Barclay.

La Forge gives praise where its due and is getting a bit too familiar with Barclay's anxieties. Encouraging as he can be, even though it's slightly strained. Sees that Barclay has something to get off his chest. Calls Troi to sort it out.

Worf doesn't fully believe Barclay.

Crusher does her job.

I like that Troi, in a small way, confirms Barclay's fears about dematerialising and, then, uses that to try and help. Shocked by his rapid progress. I didn't mention it last episode, but I've noticed Sirtis' tan. Must have been a good honeymoon. Definitely getting frustrated with everyone disregarding her advice. Relieving Barclay of duty almost seems as much out of anger, as for his own good.

Data is astute enough to recognise that Barclay's having a bad time of it.

Been too long since I've seen O'Brien. Continues to be immaculately professional. Delicate with Barclay's anxiety and tries to help through sharing an anecdote of his own. Almost offended by Barclay's list of potential problems a transporter can suffer. Politely sees through Barclay's bullshit, but remains sympathetic to him.

So, Barclay has a fear of transporters. Makes sense. Some fantastic acting as he sweats, pants and generally has a breakdown in the cold open. His development from other episodes has clearly taken, though, since the old Barclay would've probably been too meek to speak out. Schultz is doing amazing work with his acting. Every facial expression and twitch of his body speaks to a man whose not only suffering from his condition, but whose also dying inside from a mixture of anger and embarrassment over it. Somewhat appreciated O'Brien's attempt at help, but might as well be giving an aside glance to the audience when he turns his back. His fear of irrationality keeps him dancing around mentioning the thing he saw and bringing up psychosis clearly sets up his fears of being mentally unwell; a fear that his suddenly glowing arm doesn't help. Begins obsessively checking his body and basically blows up at Troi. Picks up enough confidence to tell Picard that there is something there.

Star system is beautiful, even if it is stock footage. That scene in the cold open with O'Brien meticulously beaming over everyone is brilliant at making such a mundane part of this universe seem downright nasty. Constantly focusing on Barclay's agony helps a lot too. Seeing inside the transporter haze is not only a treat, it proper highlights how uncomfortable the experience must be. Seeing the creature during his return was fairly spooky. When Barclay wanders into ten forward, I fully expected Guinan to show up. The sequence of Barclay hearing all the symptoms and immediately reacting is disturbingly funny. I'm assuming the Cardassians are playing some sort of season arc role because otherwise that's a very weird scene to have.

The transporter is clearly an analogy for flying. The comment about it being the safest way to travel makes that far too obvious to ignore. As someone who recently flew between countries for the first time in nearly 20 years (which is a little sad now that i think about it), I can admit to having had some trepidation about the process, although my issue was less about the aircraft itself and more the security procedures. A sort of "I know I've done no wrong, but what if they think I've done wrong?" along with basic unfamiliarity of the specifics of how an airport functions due to it being a while.

I find it mildly interesting that many of Barclay's objections are pretty close to the usual "very clever" problems that certain audiences find with the technology. While it's probably true that any remotely similar device would be a nightmare in real life, I don't find stating it to be the incredibly intelligent point so many believe it is. The fan theory that almost every main character is dead and that we've been following successive generations of identical clones isn't a deep observation, it's lazy edgelording. I've mentioned before that certain fans of any given work really make me question really make me question what they see in it. Because if your takeaway from transporter technology is not that, in the utopian and idealistic world of this show, they've discovered a means to solve the continuity of consciousness problem, but is instead that the Federation mass executes billions on a daily basis, then, you are clearly not seeing what I am and are almost certainly not seeing what the creators intended. This is not grimdark and if you desperately want it to be grimdark, fine, but try to be more imaginative about how you get there than a lazy unoriginal "zinger".

I may not like his debut much, but Barclay is a fine character who definitely deserves to show up once a season or so and this is both a good showcases for him and a decent look at phobias besides.

Onto Man of the People.