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Synopsis: The crew of the Enterprise respond to a distress call that brings them to the home world of Tasha Yar and her sister, Ishara. In this episode, when the crew of the Enterprise encounter the sister of their dead comrade, they remark how much the same they are, but they are also surprised by… Continue reading Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 4, Episode 6: “Legacy”

Synopsis: As the result of Ensign Wesley Crusher’s experiment, Dr. Beverly Crusher is inadvertently stuck in a warp field bubble. In my last post for the episode “Suddenly Human” I wrote how the determination to be true to one’s inner drive can be analogized to what James Hillman calls the acorn theory. The acorn theory… Continue reading Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 4, Episode 5: “Remember Me”

Synopsis: When responding to a distress call, the crew of the Enterprise find a human youth among the injured on a wrecked alien spaceship. In “Suddenly Human” a young boy, Jono, born Jeremiah Rossa, is found aboard a Talarian training vessel. Lt. Commander Data has discovered that he is the long-lost grandson of a Starfleet… Continue reading Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 4, Episode 4: “Suddenly Human”

Synopsis: Lt. Commander Data’s creator, Dr. Soong draws Data to him, in order to give him an emotion chip, but unexpectedly, Lore, Data’s brother takes it instead. In this episode we learn much about the android Lt. Commander Data. How he has a homing mechanism that when activated causes him to take over the Enterprise,… Continue reading Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 4, Episode 3: “Brothers”

Synopsis: In the aftermath of the fight with the Borg the Enterprise and her crew stay on Earth to mend themselves. As I mentioned in my last blog for the episode “The Best of Both Worlds, Part II,” Captain Jean-Luc Picard after his time as the almighty ego-inflated Locutus is now only Picard, a damaged,… Continue reading Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 4, Episode 2: “Family”

Synopsis: Now that Captain Picard has become Locutus of Borg, Commander Riker must figure out how to defeat the Borg and save his friend and commanding officer. In my last blog post on “The Best of Both Worlds, Part I,” I equated Captain Jean-Luc Picard to a physical manifestation of what Carl Gustav (C. G.)… Continue reading Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 4, Episode 1: “The Best of Both Worlds, Part II”

Synopsis: Captain Picard is kidnapped by the Borg and assimilated into the collective. While this may be a bit of a controversial interpretation, I believe that Captain Jean-Luc Picard’s assimilation by the Borg can be seen as a physical manifestation of what Carl Gustav (C. G.) Jung terms the individuation process. That process by which… Continue reading Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 3, Episode 26: “The Best of Both Worlds, Part I”

Synopsis: The Enterprise rescues a mysterious humanoid alien. It is perhaps fitting that I watched this episode last night, August 19, 2021, which was the one hundredth anniversary of Gene Roddenberry’s birth, as this episode is about birthing or transforming into something new. This is a thought at the core of depth psychology. Depth psychology… Continue reading Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 3, Episode 25: “Transfigurations”

Synopsis: Counsellor Troi and Commander Riker are kidnapped along with Troi’s mother, Lwaxana Troi, who is desired by a Ferengi. In “Ménage à Troi” there is an interesting relationship between the character of Lwaxana Troi, Counsellor Deanna Troi’s Betazoid mother, and the Ferengi, Daimon Tog. It can be seen as an illustration of the relationship… Continue reading Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 3, Episode 24: “Ménage à Troi”

Synopsis: Ambassador Sarek comes aboard the Enterprise to negotiate a treaty but has trouble controlling his emotions. If the Enterprise can be analogized to the human psyche, then Ambassador Sarek in this episode can be seen as taking the role of a Logos-driven conscious rational ego that has suppressed the Eros-driven irrational unconscious for so… Continue reading Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 3, Episode 23: “Sarek”