STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION
Season 1, Episode 15

11001001

Series: The Next Generation - (1987-1994)
Season: 1
Episode #: 1.15
Production #: 40271-116
Original Airdate: 02/01/1988

Writer(s): Maurice Hurley and Robert Lewin
Director(s): Paul Lynch

Guest Stars
Carolyn McCormick as Minuet
Gene Dynarski as Commander Orfil Quinteros
Katy Boyer as Zero One
Alexandra Johnson as One Zero
Iva Lane as Zero Zero
Kelli Ann McNally as One One
Jack Sheldon as the Piano Player
Abdul Salaam El Razzac as the Bass Player
Ron Brown as the Drummer

Uncredited Guest Stars
Majel Barrett-Roddenberry as the Voice of the U.S.S. Enterprise-D Computer
James G. Becker as Ensign Youngblood
Steve Casavant as Lt. Longo
Dexter Clay as an Operations Division Officer
Jeffrey Deacon as a Command Division Officer
Susan Duchow as an Operations Division Officer
David Eum as a Bar Patron
David Eum as Ensign Wright
Nora Leonhardt as a Science Division Ensign
Tim McCormack as Ensign Bennett
James McElroy as a Starbase 74 Technician
Lorine Mendell as Lt. Diana Giddings
Natalia Silverwood as a Civilian
Guy Vardaman as Lt. Darien Wallace

Stardate: 41365.9

Synopsis

The U.S.S. Enterprise docks at Starbase 74 where the Bynars, a species interdependent on computers, are scheduled to upgrade the ship's computer system.

Instead of enhancing the starship's facilities, however, the Bynars program the ship's computer to read that the magnetic containment field is deteriorating and that the entire U.S.S. Enterprise will shortly be destroyed. Unable to locate Captain Picard and Commander Riker, Data evacuates the ship and launches the U.S.S. Enterprise back into space to avoid damaging Starbase 74.

Unbeknownst to Data, the Bynars have used a computer-generated woman to lure Riker and Picard into the holodeck, where they don't hear the alert to abandon the ship. Upon exiting the holodeck, the Captain and his First Officer realize that the ship is completely empty except for the Bynars, who have taken control of the U.S.S. Enterprise.

[ Complete Screencap Index ]

Determined not to leave the ship in hostile hands, Picard and Riker program the starship to self-destruct in five minutes. But when they beam onto the bridge, they find that the Bynars are dying. After turning off the self-destruct mechanism, Picard and Riker soon discover that the ship is orbiting the Bynars' home planet. They also learn that the aliens hijacked the U.S.S. Enterprise in order to use its computer as a replacement for their own, which was their only life-support device and was destroyed in an explosion.

Sympathetic to their cause, Picard and Riker use the U.S.S. Enterprise's computer to regenerate the one lost by the Bynars, thus saving the planet's inhabitants.

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