Favorite Episodes of Star Trek: Relics

In this article, we’re looking at Star Trek: The Next Generation. While I’m obviously partial to Deep Space Nine, I will always feel a special connection with TNG as it was my first introduction to Star Trek as a whole.

In this episode, The Enterprise picks up a decades old distress signal from a crashed ship. At first there don’t appear to be any survivors, but they soon learn that someone rigged the transporter to store their pattern indefinitely, meaning they can be brought back. Since the pattern has remained stable for nearly a century, whoever rigged it up must have been a genius. That genius turns out to be none other than Montgomery Scott, chief engineer under James T. Kirk himself. While the current Enterprise crew is honored to meet such a celebrated hero of the federation as Scotty, it quickly becomes apparent that while he may have been a miracle worker in his day, today, technology has advanced beyond his understanding, and he seems to have outlived his usefulness. While he at first feels like a useless old man, with the aide of Picard and Geordi, Scotty is shown that even all these year’s later, he’s still got it.

I know that this episode probably wouldn’t top other people’s list, but I can’t help myself. It’s great to see Scotty again (my favorite character from the original enterprise crew in case you were curious) and I’m a sucker for stories in which an old man gets one last shot to show their stuff. The late James Doohan does a wonderful job, breathing life into what would otherwise be a pretty weak script. At the end of the episode, Scotty formally retires, but not before saying it was an honor to feel useful one last time

Next time it’s back to DS9 with an episode that shows us how the horrors of war can continue to effect us, even after we’ve left the battlefield.