S1E14 Angel One

Season 1 Episode 14: Angel One

Watchability: Skip
Short Answer: More campy than it is fun. But still has some classic Star Trek themes.
Notability: Nothing...?

Looking at the synopsis for this episode, it seems pretty typical compared to other plots from this season. The Enterprise finds a planet is run by a society that values women more than men. Clearly it's intended as an allegory for our own male dominated history. A fact that is explicitly called out by Picard in the first half of the episode.

Often these types of episodes present the audience with a scenario that takes the mechanic to a logical extreme. The writers take one or more of the crew and stick them in the middle of that scenario. In the episode about honor, Tasha Yar had to kill or be killed. In the episode about the death penalty, Wesley faced death row.

This week, Riker is the lucky winner. And instead of his life being in peril, he is "objectified" and sleeps with the leader of the planet. Now, I put "objectified" in quotes, not because objectification is unworthy of discussion, but because it's never really treated with any gravity. Riker seems to rather enjoy it, even cracking jokes. And the female leader even praises his aggressiveness. If the premise is role reversal, that seems unintentionally ironic...

To really make this about gender roles, I think they needed to show how the men of the planet were being emasculated. It seems like they intended to go there, but the reversal is sidelined in favor of Riker's "ladies' man" persona. It's a central part of his character, so I am not criticizing that per se. It may just mean that he was not a good pick as the focus of this episode.

Of course, I've probably over-analyzed the episode more than the writers intended. I felt like they couldn't decide whether they wanted it to be a fun episode or a thoughtful one. It was actually not bad for the first season, so I hesitated giving it a Skip. In the end, the episode is a bit slow and I feel there are better "message" episodes.

Side Note: Riker at one point during the scene with the planet's leader says "Will you respect me in the morning?" I thought it was an homage to black and white movies where lines like these were used as a wink and a nod to what was going on. I found it a bit odd and I was curious whether it plays for anyone born after 1995. I couldn't find any specific reference to it, so maybe I made that up.