I'm giving Wesley Crusher a break here. You need to take into consideration that he is a teenager (insane with hormones) who was being pressured by Not Tom Paris and the expectations placed on him being a God Child. Teenagers pull some insanely stupid moves from time to time and I take that into consideration.
I appreciated the writers having the stones to have a cadet actually die in this attempted stunt. It raises the stakes and severity of the violation presented throughout this episode. Whether you feel Wesley should be expelled from starfleet and thrown in jail is a matter that warranty discussion and that's a sign this is a good episode worthy of interpretation and thought.
I thought this was great. Watching Wesley pulled in so many directions and put to the flame was great to build tension throughout this episode. I appreciated the writers making Wesley a flawed human who is capable of making a terrible judgement call when put under the right amount of stress.
We even get an angry dad Picard speech and a hilarious scene of Beverly crusher doing the classic "not my boy" scene and actually believing this had to be a computer malfunction ---- it's such a Mom thing to do and it cracked me up.
I get the fact that a cadet died in this stunt ---- but ---- the cadet did have free will and made the choice to attempt this maneuver with the same external pressure that Wesley succumbed to. What are you going to do? Throw them all in jail for being reckless glory hungry teenagers? You certainly need to spank them for this but they will all live with the knowledge that they are complicit in the death of their friend and that is something you have to live with every day.
I'm sure I could have a 45 minute podcast discussion debating this..... so, that means this is an excellent episode.
I appreciated the writers having the stones to have a cadet actually die in this attempted stunt. It raises the stakes and severity of the violation presented throughout this episode. Whether you feel Wesley should be expelled from starfleet and thrown in jail is a matter that warranty discussion and that's a sign this is a good episode worthy of interpretation and thought.
I thought this was great. Watching Wesley pulled in so many directions and put to the flame was great to build tension throughout this episode. I appreciated the writers making Wesley a flawed human who is capable of making a terrible judgement call when put under the right amount of stress.
We even get an angry dad Picard speech and a hilarious scene of Beverly crusher doing the classic "not my boy" scene and actually believing this had to be a computer malfunction ---- it's such a Mom thing to do and it cracked me up.
I get the fact that a cadet died in this stunt ---- but ---- the cadet did have free will and made the choice to attempt this maneuver with the same external pressure that Wesley succumbed to. What are you going to do? Throw them all in jail for being reckless glory hungry teenagers? You certainly need to spank them for this but they will all live with the knowledge that they are complicit in the death of their friend and that is something you have to live with every day.
I'm sure I could have a 45 minute podcast discussion debating this..... so, that means this is an excellent episode.