Customer Reviews

Star Trek - The Next Generation, Episode 141: Tapestry [VHS]

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I am no major fan of Star Treck, however I watch it when I can, and thank the lord I did! This was by far the best episode of Star Treck Gen. to ever be showen. The story line is complex and gripping and it realy ilustrates an important fact of life... You have to take chances. In this particular episode "Q" gives the Captain a chance to re-live a part of his life, which indirectly lead to his death, but also helped him become the captain of the Star Ship Enterprise. This was a truly fantasic episode and strangley ironic. SO RECOMENDED!

I must comment on this wonderful episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. It involves my favorite , and probably most other Star Trek fans' favorite character, the abominable "Q". In this episode, Capt. Jean-Luc Picard faces death for the first time (and the last time) in my favorite Star Trek series. He perishes on the sick-bay table from a fighting accident and goes to heaven to meet.....who else than God himself, Q! Q welcomes him with open arms (actually, an open handshake) into his eternal world and Capt. Picard is surprised to see him, and does not believe the heavens is run by HIM! But, it is, and Q gives him a chance to make changes and right the "wrongs" that he did as a younger man.....a cadet fresh out of the Academy. This is to relieve Capt. Picard of any regrets that he had when he was alive, so Q doesn't have to hear him...."whining and complaining through time!" "How much time?" says Capt. Picard. "Eternity", replies Q! Q is humorous and witty as usual in this episode and transports him back in time to his Academy days. It is at the point in time just before he got stabbed through the heart by a Nausican where he was transported back to....to his dormitory room. If he can manage NOT to get stabbed through the heart, Q would bring him back to the present day. All of this is REAL, not an illusion that Q made up for his amusement. After many a disillusionment and losing his former friends from the Academy, he DOES manage not to get stabbed through the heart by that Nausican, and is brought back to the present day. But it's not the present day that HE remembered! In his NEW "afterlife", he is just an ordinary crewman serving under Capt. Thomas Halloway as an astrophysics officer! He doesn't like this one bit, and asks Comm. Riker and Counselor Troi if he can be more.....like captain of the ship. Comm. Riker replies, "....We'll see"!. Funny. Capt. Picard mumbles to himself my favorite line that he gives in this episode, "All right Q, you made your point. Having a good laugh now?" He then goes into the turbolift to give his assignment to Lieut. La Forge and is brought back to heaven by Q. He and Q have a one on one confrontation with Q giving him a verbal war of how good he has it now...."with a real heart beating in your chest!" Capt. Picard admits it was a mistake, and that now...."I would rather die on that bed than live the life I just saw!" Q grants him his request and Capt. Picard is revived on his sick-bay bed chuckling at his experience! Was it a dream, or was it a real after-death experience?

I have seen every episode of every Star Trek series ever made and I think the message and the lesson of Tapestry is the best of the best. The entire Star Trek saga is filled with great human stories and lesson of value, but the main theme of Tapestry is that we have all made mistakes and we have all left people, places, and unfinished business behind us. But when it is all said and done--they are as much a part of who we are as anything we can claim as an accomplishment. I might add that one of the greatest things about the Next Generation Series is the interaction between Q and Picard. Every episode with them together is a classic, and Tapestry is that interaction at its best.

This one shows how if Picard never got into a bar room fight in his acdemy years...he would have never taken chances that would have led him to be a starship captain. Q shows Picard what would have happened had he not taken the big risks that led to his career. I love the scenes with him in a blue starfleet tunic as a researcher for the Enterprise. Another priceless scene is when he asks Riker how he can gain advancement in his career. He essencially gave Picard the brush off. You could see his career was going to be one of redundant reports and endless monotony.

This one is a keeper. It's the ultimate Picard episode that gives you a lot of insight into the character.

I am an avid Trekkie fan, so I recognise the good stuff. This is about how Picard is fatally injured on a diplomatic mission and Q's intervention when is starts going to heaven. When Picard confesses that he wishes he could live his youth over again so that he would not need his plastic heart which was partly responsible for Picard's death. Q lets Picard pull on one of his tapestry threads, but Picard's tapestry starts to unravel....... A good effort.

Great episode - brimming with Neitzsche's concept of eternal recurrence - Star Trek TNG seems to find philosophically pregnant themes like this often, to its credit!