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Ignorance of "Bliss" Is Bliss? Bliss Review by Steve Perry Airdate:February 10, 1999 Written by:Robert J. Doherty (Teleplay); Bill Prady (Story) Directed by:Cliffs of Bole Short Take: Eh. Brief Summary: A wormhole has amazing powers of persuasion. Review:"Bliss" is a Jeopardy! episode. It's as old as Trek itself. Something, be it a a molecule that makes you drunk or a Tychen's Rift, threatens the ship, and it gets in the way of the crew's thinking, making it very difficult ot make it out alive. These episodes usually aren't tremendous intellectual exercises. The joy comes from how menacing the plot obstacle is, and how clever the crew is in getting away from it. "Bliss" creates a fairly menacing obstacle, but only the escape is clever in only one regard, so it's hard to give this episode my recommendation. Two things were needed to make this section work, and we only got one of them. First, we needed an outright skepticism on Janeway's part to the purported wormhole - not only because that is common sense, but also because it makes her sudden desire to use it rather menacing. Second, we needed nice touches in the imaginary letters from home particularly since they are based on the hopes and dreams of the characters. Chakotay being professor of anthropology doesn't cut it. Add that into the fact that, unlike Timeless, no hoopla over getting home was felt here, and it's hard to say that I felt intrigued by the crew's state of delusion. It really felt like a TNG episode, didn't it? Naomi has been wonderful so far, but please don't have her and the Pinocchio character saving the ship. We had enough of that on TNG. Top that off with the fact that the solution wasn't particularly brilliant. How do you stop a monster? Shoot up its insides with antimatter (which doesn't need to be ignited) so it will vomit you up? The only nice touch was Seven being persuaded by the monster that they had escaped, when they hadn't. This at least showed that the writers were thinking, leading me to the conclusion that this premise didn't have much to float with in the first place. I'm sorry that I don't have more to say about "Bliss." It's one good line was "I am somewhat of a Renaissance EMH." Aside from that, the plot wasn't much of a sci-fi miindbender and it didn't do much to reveal more about the characters. What can I say? 26 episodes during a season, one's bound to be a snoozer that produces a snoozer review. Some short takes: - Thank goodness the Captain Ahab aspect of the guy pursuing the wormhole monster wasn't completely hammered into our heads. - I wish we got gotten a backstory o nthe beast, like how it arose in space. Maybe Tam Elbrun can help? - Poor Janeway, still in love with Mark. Rating: C Next week: a Major Star Tek Event. Batten down the hatches... | |
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