158. The SurvivorsFORMULA: Requiem for Methuselah + The Ensigns of Command (already!) + The Royale
WHY WE LIKE IT: I'd forgotten how effective those scene with Deanna going out of her mind were. The scope of Kevin's crime.
WHY WE DON'T: Picard's prescience.
REVIEW: The Survivors offers a fair mystery between the appearance of two elderly survivors from an alien attack, a warship that appears and disappears, and a song driving Troi insane. The performances are good, the effects pretty interesting, and you really do wind up feeling a lot of sympathy for Kevin Uxbridge. So why doesn't it quite work?
I think chief among the reasons is that Picard not only guesses the mystery's solution, but from then on is as good as a chorus, explaining everything as if he's read the script. The original leap of logic is believable (though rather risky), but after that, it seems highly improbable that he would have all the facts right. A case of our being told the story rather than seeing it. Still, Kevin gets the final reveal, the scope of his crime a true shocker.
Another good element is Troi being driven batty by the music box. Those scenes are very well directed, with all her anxiety coming across quite well through sound design, lighting and camera moves. Oddly, it's the one aspect of the episode I'd totally forgotten about. Glad to have it back in my memory at any rate.
LESSON: Only divine intervention can get that tune out of your head.
REWATCHABILITY - Medium: A worthy story, even when you know what's really going on, but the script is a little lazy in how it chooses to reveal all the information, leading to a talkative last act.
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