LogFAQs > #973581317

Episode 10: Inheritance

A surprisingly big family.

Picard advocates the truth, which i agree with.

Riker has absolute faith in Data.

La Forge encourages his friend. Very interested in embarrassing stories.

Worf does his job.

Crusher breaches medical ethics again, but she at least resisted it and, i suppose, if its someone as decent as Data asking...

Dont agree with Troi's opinion.

Data's as shocked as an android can be at meeting his mother. Confused and naturally cautious, but its really the android equivalent of fear he's experiencing. The relative lack of emotions makes Data's reactions come across as very childlike and you can see slight embarrassment in the attempt to set him up with Troi, modesty over praise for his art and an almost betrayal at being abandoned. He also has some subtle reactions to Tainer's affectionate touching. Notices something off, but disguises it with a smile. Telling Tainer that Soong loved her is a great moment.

Tainer is a warm hearted soul and overjoyed to meet her son. Nostalgic over Data's childhood. Her face drops and her voice gets very shaky when she hears of Soong's death and Data's pseudo rejection isn't any happier. Like any interfering mother, very interested in his love life. Broken over never meeting Lal and it wakes up a lot of her guilt. Gives a passionate speech about loving her kids. I kind of feel the episode would be better if she were legit.

A pretty delightful, quiet discussion between mother and son makes up most of the first act. Lot of hopeful music when Data returns to her. I'm glad that a few callbacks, like Lal, made it in. Both musical duets are beautiful. The second one makes it very obvious that Tainer's an android.

The question of whether to tell Tainer the truth isn't much of a question for me. Yes, it will cause distress, but beyond the point that she may inadvertently discover it anyway, there's the matter of her having the right to know what she is. The argument against coming from Troi, who's supposed to be the one who helps with emotional pain, is a small misfire in this episode. I find the discussion over Tainer resisting Data's creation, abandoning him and yet having sincere pride in him interesting. Because I believe Sci-fi issues are only worthwhile if they can stand in for real world issues, the nearest equivalent I can find for this is the issue of abortion. The Soong's first three children were non viable and effectively died during birth. Lore had a known condition and the need to dismantle him could be seen as analogous to abortion. The fear over Data then takes on the angle of potentially losing another kid or, worse yet, doing it yourself. Even if that's quite a stretch, I'm impressed by how well Tainer is treated. It seems that most of Data's best qualities stem from her, which is sort of nice to see, although it does push Soong out of the equation a little.

Another of those bleeding heart stories I love so much. Really liked this.

Onto Parallels.