Star Trek: The Next Generation — 5x11 — Hero Worship

Aired 1992-01-27

SpaceOpera.com rating:3

Average reader rating:4.87

Synopsis

A troubled young boy starts to emulate Data.

Remarkable scenes

The special effects for the damaged Vico were well done.
Data fastbuilding the sculpture.
Timothy emulating Data's head movements.
Data subtly convincing Timothy to slip out of his android fantasy.
Picard, Troi, and Data confronting Timothy.
Data ordering Picard to drop the shields. I love the look on Picard's face as he struggles to decide whether or not to trust Data.

Review

A fine episode, albeit dull. It suffers from TNG attention deficit disorder; like many TNG eps, the guest character featured here is never seen again, and quickly forgotten making the whole episode inconsequential. As a stand alone episode it is successful, but frankly good television creates continuity and this episode simply doesn't. My rating is as such thusly.

4 reader comments

Overcoat appearance, I hate that damn thing. Also, it seems quite tactless of the producers to place two troubled-kid-that-doesn't-fit-in-at-school episodes back to back. It was a little irritating. Okay episode, though
by Pete Miller | 04/16/2006 at 4:30 am

Two back-to-back children episodes -- that's odd. Two back-to-back children episodes where the kid gets stuck under ruble -- that's even more odd.
Besides the obvious similarities, Hero Worship holds up do to yet another kid who acts in a believable way. Having the kid believe he blew up the ship was a brilliant idea from the writers.
The science portion of this episode falls into the typical category. Once again, they crew must do the opposite to get out of a deadly situation. Besides that, this episode is well executed. It gets a 5 due to the fact that it is not one you get out and watch over and over again. Watching a "kid" episode is not something the average viewer strives to do, especially back-to-back.
by Orion Pimpdaddy | 05/16/2006 at 9:34 pm

When Timothy asks Data about his lack of emotions, Data replies, "My positronic brain is not capable of generating those conditions." Dr. Noonian Soong must have thought it was, because he created a set of emotional subroutines for Data in "Brothers." And Lore proved a positronic brain is capable of generating those conditions in "Datalore."
The Vico must have a humongous computer core. While discussing the destruction of the Vico with Geordi, Picard punches up a side view of the Vico on a monitor. He indicates the midpoint of the saucer section with his finger and comments, "The boy was here." Geordi agrees, adding that Timothy was in the hallway outside the computer core. Geordi them points to the lower portion of the drive section to show Picard where the second away team found the body of Timothy's mother. He tells Picard she was in the computer core. Does the computer core on a research vessel stretch from the saucer section all the way through the yoke and all the way down to the bottom of the drive section?
To test the effectiveness of the phasers inside the black cluster, Picard orders Worf to fire them at maximum yield. Picard gives a firing direction of 0-0-1 mark 0-4-5. So the heading Picard gives should be directly in front of the ship and raised at an angle of 45 degrees. The next scene of the ship shows the phasers firing twice. The first time the phasers fire they shoot directly ahead, a heading that would be described as something like 0-0-1 mark 0-0-1. The second time, the phasers finally approximate the right heading. Does Worf need a practice shot to figure out how to fire the phasers in the right direction?
Under Troi's encouragement, Data visits Timothy. Of course, Timothy is alone in the room, but that's normal Starfleet procedure for a boy who's just lost his parents. (See comments for "The Bonding")
by DSOmo | 09/11/2007 at 7:04 am

"My positronic brain is not capable of generating those conditions."
I don't see a real problem here - he meant his particular positronic brain isn't naturally capable of generating emotions, not positronic brains in general (although the later could still well be the case). Dr. Soong had to write a specific program for him to be able to experience emotions, and I assume Lore had something similar, or (more likely) Data's brain was designed differently to avoid the problems Dr. Soong encountered by the more "human" Lore.
Overall, this is an ok episode. The scene that reveals that Data cannot taste food was taking Data as Inhuman Machine (which overall reached its bleakest point with "In Theory") a little too far. I thought the original idea was that Data would become more human as the series progressed, but that certainly isn't how it ended up working in practice.
by KingElessar8 | 03/20/2009 at 4:43 pm