User Reviews

SPOILERS -

In FINAL MISSION, Picard, Wesley Crusher, and some idiot miner named Dirgo, crash land on a desert moon. The moon is uninhabited. They walk across a desert because Wes picks up an 'energy source' on his tri- corder. When they get to some caves, the three of them, now nearly dying of thirst from the heat and lack of water, find what amounts to a large drinking fountain. But of course, it's protected by a 'force-field' - which when Dirgo insists on continually firing phasers at, kills him, and ensuing rock-slide critically injures Picard.

Wesley, as usual, comes up with some 'techno-babble' way to deactivate the force-field, thereby saving himself and an injured Picard until the Enterprise eventually finds and rescues them (for most of the episode, they've been dealing with a radioactive garbage scowl that's threatening to poison a planet - so we get a nice little environmental message here as well).

Question: Why does this fountain have a force-field around it? It's a deserted moon, no life, no sign of life, except for a big protected drinking fountain. Why would anyone put that there??? Who did put it there???? Even if it was put there by someone else to have a safe water supply, it begs the question - if they left that moon, and planned to return (therefore they have space travel ability) why not just bring water with you when you return?? Also, the amount of water coming from this fountain would indicated a huge underground water source - on a desert moon. The entire concept is absurd. And why wouldn't they just use their phasers a few feet way to dig another path to this underground water source? Why play games with this absurd force-field, that for some reason, has already killed one person?

The problem here is, it was created by the writers as a plot device to give Wes something to do, be the hero, and stretch out the story.

Usually TNG explains things like this. But here, they all just shrug their shoulders, beam everyone up to the ship and fly away. STUPID.

Pentarus V, Saleninte Miners, contentious bunch of blaggards. Sounds familiar?

But first it seems that we have the farewell of Ensign Crusher to contend with. Young Wes has finally be accepted at Starfleet Academy but as a final mission, Wes joins the Captain aboard an old beat up miners-shuttlecraft piloted by Captain Dirgo of the Shuttlecraft Nenebek.

En route to Pentarus V, the port-thruster on the shuttlecraft blows, sending the craft hurtling through space to no-one knows where. The only moon within close proximity is barely a class-M type body where the average temperature is 55 degrees Celsius. Wooh, scorcher. It's a desert out there.

Meanwhile, the Enterprise have their own problems to contend with.

As I remember TNG as it first aired, I also remember a feeling of annoyance at the character of Wesley Crusher. He seemed to be that goody-two-shoes, obnoxious type that we all found annoying in just about any other show where such characters featured. To be fair, watching these episodes again, I do feel that the inclusion of the character of Ensign Crusher has provided us mere mortals with the chance to see what joining Star Fleet would be like from an outsiders perspective. This line of story would later be put to better use with the evolution of Nog's character in DS9. Of course, Nog's character would be the exact opposite of Wesley Crusher, which is probably why it worked so well.

This TNG episode begins with some great news, Wesley Crusher has been accepted at Star Fleet Academy. In fact to give him some first hand knowledge of Star Fleet's diplomatic missions, Patrick Stewart brings Wil Wheaton a mission he has to settle a dispute of some planetary miners. But the big mistake is going on one rickety old spaceship piloted by miner Nick Tate. On an Enterprise shuttlecraft I doubt they would have crashed on an uninhabited moon.

Meanwhile under Jonathan Frakes command they go to the aid of a planet that leader Kim Hamilton says is being bombarded with radiation. It's an old garbage scow of a spaceship that wandered into their planet's atmosphere and is leaking radioactive waste. The Enterprise fixes the problem and sends the scow on its intended destination.

At that point Will Ryker hears of Picard and Wesley's disappearance. All I will say is that Patrick Stewart and Wil Wheaton have some great heart to heart scenes as the two try to survive. Some of Wheaton's best acting in the history of TNG.

You should watch for that alone.

Just as we get to an episode where I didn't find Wil Wheaton annoying as Wesley Crusher, it turns out he's leaving the series! There's a poignant scene in which he attempts to keep Captain Picard's (Patrick Stewart) spirits up after suffering a broken leg and arm along with a significant head injury on Lambda Paz, a moon of the desert planet Pentarus III. They wound up there while traveling on a decrepit shuttle craft maneuvered by self described Captain Dirgo (Nick Tate), a salenite miner who was taking Picard to his planet to negotiate yet another troublesome dispute. We learn just how inept Dirgo could be when he didn't carry any food or water on his shuttlecraft, probably the biggest no-no you could commit while traveling the vast reaches of outer space. As Bugs Bunny would say, 'what a maroon'.

At least for the time being, the trio is out of reach of the Enterprise, who were summoned by a distress signal to Gamelan V because of a massive garbage scow leaking toxic radiation as it neared the planet. I had to question Commander Riker's decision to continue that mission when he learned that Picard's group went missing, although it did signal that this story wasn't going to get so dangerous it couldn't be handled. The solution to the garbage barge was pretty easy, the Enterprise simply grabbed it with a tractor beam and diverted it through an asteroid belt, allowing the barge's momentum to carry it toward a sun to destroy itself.

Back on Lambda Paz, a source of water needed by the three men, especially Picard, was shielded by a force field that wouldn't allow anyone to approach it. Leave it to Wesley to figure this one out, he cleared the force field after Captain Dirgo got himself all wrapped up and rendered immobile in a cobweb of selenium fibers. It looked like he was dead, but I don't recall Wesley probing him to make sure. For all we know, Dirgo could have been left in a state of suspended animation on a desert moon with no further hope of rescue. I wonder why no one on the Enterprise thought of checking.

Now, if it was me ----- I would take the clean starfleet shuttle instead of hopping aboard Captain War Wagon's shuttle but I guess starfleet is not for the timid, right?

This is our good bye to what is universally accepted as star treks greatest character ---- Wesley Crusher. Not a dry eye in the house, right?

All it took for Picard to truly open up emotionally was a severe concussion from being bludgeoned with rocks. I am the same way.

It's nice for what it is ---- Wesley getting the official stamp of approval from his father figure. If I view it from that perspective, I can get something out of it. My dad is one of those guys who knows everything and can fix your car, do electrical, plumbing, heating, home renovations and it meant a lot to earn his respect.

The B-Plot happened to be where the dart landed on the b-plot board that week. It did the job, I guess. It's like a bus driver who has driven the same route for 15 years ---- there's just no passion in it and it's almost like an automated process. I am not a scientist but I am pondering how far can radiation travel in space --- maybe it's super alien radiation?

They must have been desperate to get Wesley off the show to have tossed together such a poorly constructed episode. It's as if the writer picked up a book on how to write a dramatic story and then followed every guideline in that book: Put them in a bad situation (we're going to crash on a desert moon!), then make it worse (we have no water!); let them find what they need (a fountain of water!), but don't let them have it (it's protected by a forcefield!). It's the same with the garbage scow: Riker's captain is missing but he needs to save the planet; they need to destroy the barge but an asteroid belt is in the way; they need 30 minutes to tow it through the asteroid belt but radiation will reach lethal doses in 20 minutes. Such dramatic structures can work when well constructed, but in this episode they are built entirely on pretense.

--There is no reason someone as poorly-trained as Wesley would go on the mission with the Captain; perhaps if the inhabitants were cherub-faced uber geeks, but they're not, they're miners.

--There is no reason for the miners to pick up the Captain, since the Enterprise has its own shuttles.

--Geordi does a safety inspection on the shuttle, then the thing immediately begins to fall apart! Geordi is not that incompetent.

--As for the radioactive garbage scow, the only immediate threat is to get it out of the planet's orbit. Send it on any course away from the planet, go find the Captain, and then come back and destroy it.

--If they absolutely needed to destroy the scow before finding the captain, no one on board the Enterprise seems to remember that they can fly in 3 dimensions! It's an asteroid BELT. Toss the barge out of the orbital plane on a curved trajectory to the sun! Sheesh!

--The Enterprise clears the asteroid belt with 5 seconds left before LETHAL radiation exposure; at this point every viewer is rolling their eyes at the contrivances; maybe some characters' hair falling out, with that near-lethal exposure, would have made it less painful to watch.

--And then of course Wesley saves the day, but this time they don't even bother to explain how. He just says, "I think I figured it out" and we see him pushing some buttons on his tricorder and then the forcefield clears from the fountain.

The directing is just as bad.

--At the beginning, when Wesley learns he's going to the Academy, he almost smacks shoulder to shoulder with Picard, and Picard has to step aside to let Wesley pass! Captains on their ships step aside for no one, and I doubt we're to believe that Wesley is suddenly dominant over Picard.

--When the shuttle crashes, they leave an arrow to tell searchers where they went, and then they proceed to walk away in a direction that doesn't follow the arrow!

--Picard pushes Wesley out of the way of falling rocks, then stops and actually looks up at the rocks before they fall onto him.

--When the search party finally finds Picard and Wesley, Dr. Crusher gently wakes Wesley, then they have a hug, and *then* she finally checks if he's OK with her tricorder.

All of this artifice is just so we can have a touching moment between Picard and Wesley. But we learn nothing new: Wesley has always worked hard to make Picard proud, and Picard loves Wesley as a son. The only good scene in the episode is when Picard declares how much he envies Wesley going to the Academy and beginning his adventures.

First, a shuttle is sent to pick up Picard and Wesley from the Enterprise and take them to Pentarus V. But why send a shuttle? Not only is the shuttle that's sent in terrible shape, it's also entirely unnecessary, as the Enterprise has multiple shuttles, which are in excellent condition to boot. And that same rundown shuttle, which is going to be ferrying the captain of the flagship of the federation somehow passes an inspection personally conducted by the chief engineer of that same flagship? On top of that, by sending the shuttle, you're taking what would've been a 2-leg trip and making it a 4-leg one. Besides, given Picard's mission is to mediate a dispute that's expected to be contentious (Picard's word), why wouldn't Picard take along Troy? While we're at it, why wouldn't he take Worf and/or a security team? Why wouldn't the entire Enterprise go, given that captains are rarely supposed to go on away missions anyway? Of course, all this logic was ignored to force a plot line, and force it they did. Yikes!

Second, when Riker is forced to tractor the radioactive garbage freighter, why doesn't he just do it for a few seconds and then release it and move to a safe distance? They're in space; it's a vacuum, which means the freighter wouldn't encounter any resistance, and the momentum would carry it the rest of the way. There was no reason to stay close, keep tractering it, risk radiation poisoning the Enterprise crew, and risk not reaching Picard and Wesley in time to save them. Again, contrive conflict. Stupid.

Then when Picard, Wesley, and the shuttle captain are in the cave, and Picard runs to save Wesley Crusher from getting crushed (ironic) by the falling boulders, Picard still has enough time to look up at the falling boulders. Why wouldn't Picard just keep running WITH Wesley after pushing him?-he was already headed in that direction. If he han enough time to push Wesley, look up, AND see the boulders falling, then he had enough time to just keep running out of the way along with Wesley. Again, forced drama. Stupid.

Bonus: why would any species have webbing blocking their mouth? C'mon! What's the evolutionary advantage of that?-keeping you on a diet?!

ST:TNG:83 - "Final Mission" (Stardate: 44307.3) - this is the 9th episode of the 4th season of Star Trek: The Next Generation.

This is the last episode to include Wil Wheaton as the cast regular Wesley Crusher, as he finally gets accepted into Starfleet Academy and must now leave the Enterprise. So, again, Picard and Wesley take a ship together (as they did in the 2nd season episode "Samaritan Snare" - which Wesley also recounts to Picard) so that he can transfer to a vessel that'll take him to the Academy. However, the ship soon experiences a malfunction which causes an emergency landing on a desert planet that barely supports life.

It'll take Wesley's skills to save them for their predicament before the Enterprise can return from their mission "hauling radioactive garbage".

Trivia note: Picard mentions Boothby the groundskeeper to Wesley (a figure that'll be finally seen in "The First Duty" played by Ray Walston).

On his way FINALLY to Starfleet Academy, the shuttle Wesley is in crashes on a planet and he might die. On the negative side, Picard and the shuttle's captain* are also there and they might die as well because the place is a gigantic desert and they have very little water. Too bad it's not the 24th century where they could EASILY find them...no, wait, it IS the 24th century. So, no worries.

I noticed that there is a lot of hate directed towards this episode- - with extremely negative reviews here on IMDb. Are they merited? Well, not completely. Some of the 'mistakes' listed seem very nitpicky-- but there clearly ARE some mistakes due to sloppy writing. And, the bromance going on between Picard and Wesley in the cave is kind of nice to watch. Otherwise, the episode is slightly below average but at least of merit since it signals the end of Wesley as a series regular.

*Why were Picard and Wesley being transported on a piece of crap shuttle that is just days away from the scrap heap instead of on an Enterprise shuttle or some other Federation ship? This really made no sense. Also, the Captain of the shuttle is among the dumbest and least competent characters I've ever seen on the show...yet the pair ride with him?! This bothered me much more than all the other comments about the bad physics in the episode.

In "Final Mission" Picard and Wesley take another road trip. Picard is traveling to mediate on a mining dispute while Wes is on his way to Star Fleet Academy. The Enterprise continues on to investigate the cause of a toxic level of radiation on a ship orbiting an inhabited planet. Picard and Wes's road trip goes off the rails when their shuttlecraft crash lands on a moon with a desert like environment.

This episode is a series of bizarre writing decisions. Riker chooses to prioritize this garbage scow over finding Picard. Once the ship is clear of the planet's surface, just let it float around in space for a bit, find the crashed shuttlecraft, rescue Picard and Wes, and then go back and deal with the radiated garbage truck later. Why they find the need to haul it all the way to the sun before looking for their missing comrades is beyond me... I don't even really understand why Picard and Wes are in that floating junk heap to begin with.

This was supposed to be Wes's great send off but it really falls flat. Will Wheaton's acting is pretty all around bad here and poor Patrick Stewart has to pretend to be in death's door throughout this whole episode. The one pro of this is definitely the shooting on location. I realized that TOS did a lot more outdoor shots than TNG has ever did so it was a good change of pace to head out into the Mojave and wrap a short around Picard's head. It still doesn't make up for the terrible writing of the thing.

I am a huge fan of the ST Universe. I love the show and the high standard they usually keep with not having too many plot holes.

And then I saw this episode and thought " what the heck happened here?!" I agree 100% about viewing this episode like a Mystery Science Theater 3000 show because it is very poorly written and directed. It is quite possibly the most plot-hole-filled episode in all of Star Trek History.

Everything the other guy said is 100% true but he missed some crucial plot holes. It's OK, there were so many to keep up with. Mine may bear a little explanation before we begin for clarity. So here we go.

Inertia. The Enterprise overcomes inertia with inertial dampeners. A derelict garbage scow would not have active dampeners so it would suffer from inertia, thus how it got to the planet in the first place. At some point somewhere something pushed this garbage scow up to speed, and we assume its trajectory was altered as it ricocheted through myriad gravity wells.

I present you my 5 additional plot holes: First, once you have something in tractor if you let go it will continue to go without you any more. Why not go full impulse, grab the thing real quick, fling it forward and release it at a much higher velocity? And there is the slingshot gravity technique. They give coordinates in 3 dimensions and they fly in 2 on Star Trek. Some of this is ILM's fault because it's hard to hang a model vertically right? Second, I have seen them tow starships in warp before in other shows and in other episodes.

Third, If it's that easy to send junk into the sun, why didn't the people who made the scow in the first place just fly backwards at the sun, and then stop real quick with the back open, thus letting the garbage free without losing your ship? Fourth, If the Enterprise can't get near the thing, who originally could to sit on the bridge and fly the thing? Fifth, To be a captain you must own a starship or vessel or some type. A captain is a leader of men, yet he had no one under his command. Driving a shuttle, he's more like a pilot, or at best an owner/operator. Calling a guy like that captain would be like a navy captain calling a truck driver captain. Apparently this guy's character was as flat as a board and he only existed as a protagonist, and someone to hate on. Obviously his title was either fashioned by himself (we assume) or the actors were too kind to say anything about this obvious oversight.

This episode was written by Kacey Arnold-Ince who consequently has never written anything before or since.

If I was an actor on the set I would have said "write me out of this garbage, I want a personal day". It feels like the writer wrote this script on a napkin just before filming because they lost the original OR Wil Wheaton said he wanted to leave the show so they wanted to change it real quick and threw away this theoretical original and better episode.

Apparently the editors and usual team of crackshots didn't get a chance to shred this script before it was sent to the director.

It looks like a mix of of parts of Star Wars, Indiana Jones: Raiders of the Lost Ark ! and the Star Trek V: The Final Frontier ! :-D If you will watch it for first time is not so bad but if this is your second, or other, time you can bypassed it as boring after first time.

So I think the only redeemable part of this episode is Wil Wheaton and Patrick Stewart's scenes where they're alone. At the start of the episode Wes is just a d*** to Dirgo and after he dies the episode, at least at their end Wes becomes watchable. Why Riker doesn't just throw the garbage ship into the sun is never really explained either. There's no way the Enterprise cannot calculate a trajectory to just throw into the sun because asteroid fields are pretty spaced out and if for some reason they aren't then they could just move it out of the planets gravity well and throw it into the sun later after they find Wes and Picard. The fountain is never explained nor the sentry and the episode gives the worst farewell to Wes. I never felt the hate towards Wes but its clear the writers half the time just made him annoying or conveniently incompetent so I get why some people hate him. All in all an awful farewell with some good moments between Picard and Wes being the only redeeming quality of this episode.

This is one of those episodes that is amusing in how silly the entire set up and execution of the episode plays out.

I did laugh out loud with the B-Plot of the radiation ship thinking to myself --- just let inertia take over. I can let a lot go with star trek 'science' but this was just too silly to ignore. It just keeps cascading if you are sober and think about the contrivances in this episode --- 4 to 6 cocktails required for viewing.

Well, it turns out that Picard views Wesley as the son he never had? I think it could be a combination of many things ----- Maybe he is guilty about finding Bev Crusher so damn hot after being responsible for getting her husband killed and he is making up for those forbidden thoughts by being a dad to Wesley? I guess it makes sense. Pro-Tip for sucking up: Read Shakespeare, get interested in super boring archaeology, and pull down your shirt every time you stand up to get on Jean Luc's good side.

I am not a Wesley Crusher detractor ---- I laughed so many times in S1 thanks to Wesley crusher being a God child and there are at least 3 genuinely excellent Wesley episodes. There's just not much here ---- Picard thinks Wesley Crusher is a very good boy...... the end.

On the positive side of things ---- Beverly Crusher looked stunning throughout this episode and specifically so when she was chillin' in Troi's chair on the bridge.

This should be a 4 out of 10 but Beverly Crusher looking like a 40's-50's movie star shines brightly and bumps this up to a 5.

As much as I wanted Will Wheaton to 'Stand and Deliver' it wasn't his fault. He and Patrick (Gurney Halleck anyone?) Stewart did a fine acting job with the drivel they were provided...by writers that failed any and all science classes provided them by the worst in public schooling in America. Can anyone SAY 'physics' let alone apply it in any manner that could be construed as possible?

Some have already pointed out the fact that taking that radioactive scow and simply giving it a different delta V would fix the situation, BUT alleviating the drama? Unforgivable.

So we are left watching what should be a forgotten episode from Season 1, instead of a filler in the heart of the whole series. As one who is watching the entire TREK franchise in chronological order (yes, even the animated series) and also watched the series of TNG when originally broadcast, may I say this episode is eminently forgettable. That this episode was so forgettable, even though I had seen it at least once earlier, thereby having a scintilla of drama in the ending (did they beam up directly from the cave, or were they able to ambulate out? Or was it a fade out from the cave onto the bridge with a hearty and whole Captain Picard?).

May I recommend to the reader that he/she immediately watch the next episode, and hence, rinse out the bad taste left in the mouth...