Picking a favorite Star Trek episode is like picking a favorite child. I mean, it's easy, but you have to pretend it's a hard decision! Seriously, picking the best episode of "« Next Generation"» It's really difficult because there are so many good episodes. But one of my personal favorites has always been "Progeny," the episode in which Data creates a daughter. The story offers a real emotional rollercoaster, with plenty of light humor in the beginning. Later, when Data fails to prevent his daughter's death, it's almost impossible to hold back the tears.
«"Progeny" is, simply put, a wonderfully written episode. It began as a spec script by Rene Echevarria, and it was so good that he was hired as a staff writer. «Next Generation» . However, his script required help from others, including veteran screenwriter Melinda Snodgrass and Next Generation showrunner Michael Piller. The main thing they needed to correct was that Echevarria's original script focused almost entirely on Data's daughter, rather than the show's main characters. Ironically, newly minted staff writer Echevarria made the same mistake that was ridiculed in the infamous Star Trek fan fiction that gave us our beloved internet term: "Mary Sue.".
The data gives out a new character.
While Rene Echevarria's original script was very good, it was very different from what we eventually saw on screen. First, he called it "Blood Ties" instead of "Offspring." Second, the episode focused much more on Data's offspring than on Data himself. As recorded in «Star Trek: The Next Generation - Mission Continues» , Michael Piller said the script "wasn't really about our people at first. It was really about a brand-new, exciting female android that Data had created in his own image, and all the attention was focused on her.".
Knowing it wouldn't work on television, Piller gave Echevarria some sound advice: "It's not about a guest star. It has to be about one of our people. It has to be about Data. It's not so much about Data's child, but about how Data deals with parenthood." This not only deepened the character of our favorite android but also made the story more relatable for viewers at home. As Piller told his new writer, "Everyone will be able to understand and empathize with the challenges he faces as a parent of a newborn child. Especially when that child is threatened by all sorts of outside forces.".
Computer: Disabling Fanfiction Algorithms
It's no surprise that Piller's writing advice was sound; what else could you expect from one of the franchise's best screenwriters? What's surprising about all this, however, is was The fact that Echevarria made the same mistake that was noted in a famous (some would say infamous) fan fiction story. Back in 1973, Paula Smith wrote a short story, "A Star Trek Fan's Story," for the fan magazine Star Trek. » Menagerie . This story featured a character named Mary Sue who was practically perfect : She was the youngest, the sweetest, the smartest, and the most capable in the fleet, and was instantly admired by such famous characters as Kirk and Spock.
What many don't realize, however, is that the entire Mary Sue idea was originally intended as a parody. Smith was tired of reading Star Trek fan fiction, in which female writers (almost all of it written by women) created impossibly perfect characters into which they inserted themselves. Her own story was intended to expose these writers and also to give a name (Mary Sue) to the vile character types they constantly created. It's fair to say she succeeded in her task, even too much Well, more than half a century later, fans around the world use Mary Sue as a derogatory term for annoyingly flawless characters.
That's exactly what René Echevarria did with the script that would become "Progeny." In the original version, Data's daughter is an incredibly interesting new character, and everything and everyone in the episode revolves around her. In the reworked version, she is used to reflect Data's rocky path to humanity and his evolution as a character. However, even the broadcast version of this episode retains one of the original, largely forgotten Mary Sue tropes: a new character who everyone mourns after their sudden death!