Deanna "What's a containment breach" Troi? Awesome.

I think Betazoids are much, much more powerful telepaths than Vulcans.

It does, on the other hand, open up some terrifying possibilities when you consider trying to invade a place filled with people who can make you think that you're on fire just by looking at you.

With Coombs as Riker and Yaphet Kotto as Picard, just how different would TNG have been?

Oh, and @Ron:disqus , I gotta disagree with your characterisation of Mirror Hoshi as just being a slut.

See, I'm torn. On one hand, I agree that Harry Kim was far better integrated into his show than Mayweather into his.

"I hope nothing goes wrong during my official tour, Captain Sisko. As you know, I am the President of the Federation."

No, they do not fare well at all. Most of them don't come off much better in TNG, with the exceptions of Tomalak and the defector from the episode of the same name.

I don't think she was full of bullshit. I think she was exactly right that Gene wouldn't have approved, and she was committed to carrying out her late husband's vision. Nothing wrong with that, in and of itself.

The Obsidian Order
"If you have nothing to hide, you still have everything to fear."

Spoiler Warning

As we discussed last week when we were talking about Section 31, once again the Federation benefits from its reputation of dimwitted openness and honesty.

To be fair, I think Picard genuinely believes that.

One area they definitely would have improved: basically all the TNG movies felt the need to make Picard into Action Man for reasons beyond all understanding, and that (in my opinion) is one of the major causes of their diminishing returns.

I agree. I can't imagine anyone with Vreenak's background would be so enraged at simply being lied to—he works in the Romulan Senate where they serve lies for breakfast in the canteen.

The thing in Cryptonomicon was a direct lift from Operation Mincemeat, which not only actually happened but lead to the beautiful confirmation telegram to Winston Churchill: "Mincemeat swallowed whole."

It's on Hulu.

Okay, "movie-star handsome" works fine. Like, the best-looking man you've seen this month.

Yeah, women really don't go for tall, muscular cops with chiseled good looks who were heroically wounded in the line of duty.

As presented, yes. That's why, ideally, the writers would give the assistant a role to play that wasn't simply being revealed as the bad guy.