Written by John Edward Betancourt ![]() We acquire a great many prized possessions in life. But of the many trinkets and awards and other various goodies we proudly display or hang on our wall, all of them pale in comparison to what we hold dear the most… our memories. Because those moments in time, are supremely special to us and the handful of people we shared them with and the joy and the sometimes sorrow they bring us, will never come again and we do what we can to hold onto those in our minds because their meaning and power go beyond the mere emotion we felt in the moment. For our memories also helped to shape who we are today since they taught us important and formational lessons, the kind that we take with us for the rest of our days. In fact, our memories are so important to the person we become, that we sometimes fear what kind of a person we would be without them. Because to not have the knowledge we currently enjoy, would create an incredible paradigm shift in our hearts and minds and this is such a powerful notion that it is explored in popular media often. Which has allowed for some fascinating theories to come to life. For instance, the movie, Regarding Henry, poses the theory that a complete loss of our memories would allow for us to become an entirely different person, since we are starting over from scratch. But it isn’t just dramas with Harrison Ford that ponder upon this notion, for even science fiction got into the game by way of the next episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. For ‘Conundrum’ took the time to look at a different angle in regard to this concept, by posing the question; what would we become… if we only lost part of our memories? A feat that this story accomplished by having that crew of the Enterprise lose all their short-term memories shortly after encountering a strange vessel floating about in the middle of the void and well… what the story explores past that point was quite fascinating to say the least. Because this episode poses the possibility that we likely would be able to explore aspects of our life that we’ve never thought of going after because of prior knowledge, as evidenced by the brief tryst that Ensign Ro Laren and Commander William Riker embark upon since they are no longer shackled by their grating professional relationship. But while that notion is fascinating for certain and could have been expanded to make this a supremely comedic episode, this story used that particular twist to offer comic relief from a far more powerful scenario relating to this concept. Because the party responsible for this memory wipe, ingratiated itself amongst the crew as an imposter named Commander Kieran MacDuff, and it made itself apparent, to use the crew’s amnesia to force them into a genocide situation where its kind could win a war using the power of the Enterprise. Which means that the story opted to ponder upon if we could commit to dark acts if our short-term memories were gone and thankfully the show theorized that we would likely not. For only losing a touch of our memories shouldn’t remove our deeply rooted moral core, the one that other memories helped to form, and that theory allowed for lives to be saved and for MacDuff to be neutralized. In the end however, this really is quite the satisfying story. Thanks to the fact that it really does dive into some intriguing concepts and allows for the actors to shake things up by becoming lost and confused for a little while. But in the grand scheme of things, it really is a one-off tale that doesn’t offer much more than that soft rumination on the power of our memories and that’s just fine. Because not every single episode of this series can be an outright masterpiece and there’s nothing wrong with enjoying a quick palate cleanser before tackling something far juicer and it would seem, that the series is saving the big stuff for later since we are apparently in a patch of satisfying one-offs. Because the next chapter in this saga, toys with another off-kilter concept… such as how far one might go to escape a sour situation. Until next time.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Archives
December 2024
|