“The Vengeance Factor”
Written by Sam Rolfe
Directed by Timothy Bond
Season 3, Episode 9
Production episode 40273-157
Original air date: November 20, 1989
Stardate: 43421.9
Captain’s Log: An away team beams down to a research station that’s been looted, the two scientists in charge of it rendered unconscious by multiple phaser hits. Crusher finds blood that turns out to be Acamarian, which means that this and other raids were performed by the Gatherers, a group of Acamarian nomads who have been travelling in packs, raiding outposts and bases.
This is the farthest out the Gatherers have gone, and they’ve been hitting Federation bases. Picard travels to Acamar III to get Sovereign Marouk to try to get the Gatherers to return to their homeworld. A century ago, the Acamarians were engaged in vicious clan warfare. The Gatherers left Acamar to get away from those feuds. Now Acamar is a world of peace, and Marouk has been convinced by Picard to try to bring the Gatherers home.
Marouk brings some aides on board, and the Enterprise goes in search of a Gatherer clan. The sovereign’s cook, Yuta, is a pretty blonde, so of course Riker totally hits on her. She makes a meal for Riker, and he tries to seduce her to only partial success.
Riker, Worf, La Forge, and Data beam down to a Gatherer base, finding all kinds of detritus from all over the sector. They’re ambushed unsuccessfully, with Riker telling the group leader, Brull, at phaser-point that he’s brought Marouk. Brull and the other Gatherers look and act like rejects from an 80s heavy metal band.
Brull reluctantly agrees to sit with Marouk, and he soon comes around to the notion that this might be the right thing for the Gatherers to do. He says he’ll bring it to their leader, Chorgan and have an answer in twenty days. Picard tartly informs Brull that he plans to be as far away from Acamarian space as possible in twenty days. He offers to take Brull along, and the Gatherer reluctantly agrees.
While they’re meeting, Volnoth, an old member of Brull’s group, is approached by Yuta, who says she’s of the Tralesta clan. This shocks Volnoth, as he thought there were no more Tralestas, and then Yuta touches his cheek and he instantly dies.
Brull thinks nothing of an old man dying, but Crusher examines him anyhow. He died of a heart attack—but there’s nothing actually wrong with his heart.
The Enterprise finds Chorgan’s ship, and Chorgan immediately fires on them. Worf manages to disable Chorgan’s shields, at which point he’s willing to talk. Marouk and Picard beam over to discuss with Chorgan the possibility of the Gatherers returning home.
While the very contentious negotiations continue under the watchful and rational eye of Picard, Crusher continues to look into Volnoth’s death. He died of a microvirus that was tailored to particular DNA strands that he only shared with a tiny percentage of other Acamarians. There’s no way this microvirus is naturally occurring.
After gaining access to the Acamarian database, Crusher and Data soon learn that the last person to die of this microvirus was Penthor Mul, a Gatherer who was captured and died during his trial fifty-three years earlier. Data finds a picture of Penthor Mul, and with him in the picture is Yuta—looking exactly the same as she does now, five decades later. Upon realizing this, Riker gets a very peevish expression, though whether it’s due to annoyance at her deception or revulsion at having kissed a really, really old woman is unclear.
Both Volnoth and Penthor Mul were of the Lornak clan—as is Chorgan. And the Lornaks wiped out a clan called Tralesta. Riker beams over to Chorgan’s ship, concerned that Yuta will try to kill Chorgan, who is now the last of the Lornaks. Yuta only denies the truth for about half a second before admitting that she was one of the last five members of the Tralesta clan who survived the massacre. She was chosen to be their final vengeance: genetically engineered to live longer and carry the microvirus that would only kill Lornaks.
Riker shoots her with a phaser, but the stun setting doesn’t actually stop her, so he’s forced to use the kill setting. Chorgan solemnly declares himself in Riker’s debt, and soon there is a truce with the Gatherers pending their reintegration into Acamarian society.
Thank You, Counselor Obvious: Troi tells Riker that Brull wants to talk just with Picard and Marouk alone in order to save face—something that the viewer knew from the minute he made the request, so Troi spoonfeeding it two minutes later is overkill.
The Boy!?: Brull feels that having a teenager pilot the ship doesn’t inspire confidence. Picard just stares at him with his Stare of Disapproval until he agrees to provide Wes with the course to where Chorgan is. Later, Brull makes a vague attempt at bonding with Wes—by swiping his homework and not even pretending to understand it, before stunning Wes by revealing that he’s a father.
If I Only Had a Brain : Data opens a jammed door that Worf can’t open, and also digs up the specifics of Yuta’s background by finding an old photograph.
He also refers to campfires as “small areas of thermal radiation and carbon dioxide emissions, indicative of combustion.”
There is No Honor in Being Pummeled: Worf sees Brull’s ambush coming a mile off. In general, he’s a very effective security chief and tactical officer in this episode, which is refreshing.
No Sex, Please, We’re Starfleet: Riker hits all over Yuta from the microsecond she walks on board. He starts by going for the way-to-a-man-is-through-his-stomach cliché by asking her to prepare an Acamarian meal for him. He and Troi taste the meal in Ten-Forward, and then Troi instantly realizes that she’s a third wheel and leaves. Riker then tries to work his magic, only to watch his crest fall when Marouk calls Yuta away.
Later she goes to Riker’s quarters, but she doesn’t know how to be anything but a servant, where Riker prefers equals.
I Believe I Said That: “Your ambushes would be more successful if you bathed more often.”
Worf offering constructive criticism of Brull’s ambushing techniques.
Welcome Aboard: Joey Aresco and Stephen Lee pretty much do what they’re supposed to do as Brull and Chorgan. Lisa Wilcox is fairly bland as Yuta, though that’s kind of what the role calls for.
But the episode’s awesomeness quotient is raised considerably by having Miss Balbricker herself, Nancy Parsons, best known for her portly gym teacher in the Porky’s movies, as Sovereign Marouk.
Trivial Matters: A directorial choice by Timothy Bond wound up backfiring. He wanted to have Yuta’s disintegration reveal Picard sitting behind her. But in order for that shot to work, Sir Patrick Stewart had to sit stock still, and that meant it seemed like Picard was having no reaction to Riker shooting someone in front of him.
Make it So: “He isn’t any good at math.” I always thought of this episode as “the Attack of the Metalhead Frat Boys.” It’s entertaining to watch the goofball antics of the Gatherers on a show that is usually so staid and stolid. Unfortunately, that’s really all the episode has going for it. It goes through the plot motions with a few entertaining lines here and there, and has a nasty tragic ending for Riker, but that’s about it. Perfectly average.
Warp factor rating: 5
Keith R.A. DeCandido has written many books and comics and you can get autographed copies of several of his novels and comic books directly from him. Autographed copies of the print editions of his fantastical police procedurals SCPD: The Case of the Claw and Dragon Precinct (the latter a trade reissue of the 2004 novel) are also available for preorder. Find out more about Keith at his web site, which is a portal to (among many other things) his Facebook page, his Twitter feed, his blog, and his podcasts, Dead Kitchen Radio, The Chronic Rift, and the Parsec Award-winning HG World.
Great show and wrap up here of this episode. Not one of the better ones, but there are a lot of great ones! Sad they day it went off the air.
RIKER: I prefer equals…
YUTA: Even in matters of love?
That dialogue exchange generated a loud “DUH!” from a friend and me when we watched the episode together when it first aired.
That aside, I’ve always found this episode an entertaining guilty pleasure. I like the negotiations that Picard moderates, as well as some of the action.
One thing always bothered me, though: why did Riker have to kill Yuta? Why didn’t he just try to phsically stop her, move between her and her target? It’s not like the bug she was carrying could have hurt Riker!
I never cared for this one, and the fact that Riker killed Yuta at the end was part of why. I agree, it should’ve been possible to find another option.
Otherwise, I don’t remember much about this one, although the Gatherers must’ve left an impression, since I’ve referenced them a couple of times in my Trek novels.
Riker vaporized Yuta because tackling her wouldn’t have been very PC. ‘Trek combat trends to the impersonal anyway. It’s so much more… sanitary.
(This is also why I loved that the Klingons loved personal melee combat. Fighting has to mean more than vaporizing someone with a button push, or it starts being dangerously easy… but that’s probably a tangent too far to worry much about here. I do wish they dealt with it more in the show, though.)
Tesh @5-
Like in A Taste of Armageddon?
@Christopher Bennett
“Otherwise, I don’t remember much about this one, although the Gatherers must’ve left an impression, since I’ve referenced them a couple of times in my Trek novels.”
Well, if I recall correctly, you had the Borg wipe out Acamar, so this episode must have made SOME impression. A negative one, apparently.
@6 sps49
Thing about that one is that it was more of a schlocky horror FX trick. I’m talking more about the characters dealing with the reaction to it, like the “Loud as a Whisper” episode.
@2 don3comp, you perfectly described this episode as a “guilty pleasure.” It’s clear how cheesy it is, but it’s still fun and it has its moments…
Amazingly I’m pretty sure I’ve just seen this one for the first time ever, catching it purely by chance on an obscure cable channel. I certainly didn’t remember anything at all from it.
Anyway, I’d agree it wasn’t one of the best, and the kill scene at the end was totally shoehorned in – why wouldn’t Riker just shout at Chorgan to keep away from Yuta as she was trying to kill him, then the others could easily have restrained her, even if he had to stun her first. I did notice Picard sitting like a statue at the table at this point, and thought how odd it was that he wasn’t reacting at all.
I wonder if there are any other episodes that passed me by?
There doesn’t seem to be a lot of love for this episode. I kind of like it. Nancy Parsons delivers a homerun performance as Marouk – she displays an almost motherly tough-love towards the Gatherers and you know she has a serious fire burning in her belly.
Riker is almost beyond perverted in this episode. He eyeballs Yuta up and down several times and comes across like a sex-craved maniac upon their first meeting. Then, he does a complete 180 and says he prefers “equals” in matters of love?
The climax of this episode has always puzzled me b/c I seem to miss HOW Yuta was planning to kill Chorgan. Riker told him to “hold still; your life is in danger.” Was she planning to touch him like she did Volnoth (in which case she was well out of arm’s reach)? Did she surreptitiously poison the brandy she was giving to him? Did she have a weapon hidden on her? And how did Riker know how she killed Volnoth by touching him? Does anyone know and I just missed it?
@12 She planned to kill him by touching him. I take it that, once they figured out she was the carrier for the virus, and that merely being around her didn’t cause problems, then it was likely only transmittable via touch. (Secreting some sort of venom would be ruled out via there being no trace on the previous victim.) And there was no way for her intended victim to flee without getting closer to her, as she had positioned herself between him and the exit. Even getting up from his seat would have put him closer to her, so he couldn’t go further back in the room.
Guys, tackling her was not an option. Riker was further away from Yuta than she was to Chorgan. And all she had to do was touch him to win. And if Riker is charging to tackle, he’s not in position to stop her.
Still, that doesn’t mean his actions were the only option. The stun setting did at least temporarily disable her. He could have continued firing while arranging some other way to help. They have forcefields available for fire supression, so he could call for one to either trap her or at least section off the other guy so she can’t touch her, and then seal the room. They could also use the transporters and get the one target out of the room, or move her to the brig.
And, no, using the stun setting to get closer to her and then tackle her is not an option, either. If she can take repeated stun blasts, Riker can’t know he can restrain her. Only after her victim was out of danger could he possibly risk tackling her.
Then there’s the fact that Riker goes through multiple settings between stun and kill. Why not try any of those? We know there is more than one stun setting. Maybe one of them would have knocked her out. Sure, maybe they’d kill her, but maybe they wouldn’t. And if it hurt her, they have medical staff.
I can only fanwank it by believing that Riker was in a hurry and didn’t think his plan through. Maybe he thought moving to kill would be enough of a threat to get her to back down.
That first screencap of Riker… :) WA-HEY!
The Gatherers aren’t quite as cartoonish as their costuming (standard 1980s Mad Max rip-off routine) suggests. This prevents it from being a stuffy story about civilizing the barbarians. In a similar vein Marouk’s first idea was to borrow firepower to kill all the Gatherers and of course it’s only Yuta, not a Gatherer, who’s determined on revenge, the peace deal be damned.
I also like these stories where the Federation (as represented by the Enterprise and in turn the Enterprise represented by Picard) is the big power among little guys as choosing how to behave when you’re the big dog is not examined so commonly in stories. The queen of this planet and these pirate bosses are quite responsive to Picard’s sometimes firm statements (and actions!) about how he wants things to go but then he also demonstrates real diplomatic skill. A refreshing change from him merely bending backwards for alien diplomats and potentates.
Marouk and Chorgan also end up arguing about real issues instead of being stereotypically stubborn or enlightened about the whole thing. It’s not a big hit but a small helping of subtlety elevates this one a bit. I also like that several main cast (Worf, Data, Crusher) get some small roles instead of it being entirely a Riker episode. Do remind us they exist!
The music during the ambush scene is so cheesy. As if this was some subpar 80’s SciFi flick. Horrible!
I subscribe to the idea that the writers wanted Riker to kill Yuta so that he’d have to live with some real consquences for a change. Not the usual antiseptic, ‘nice’ ending for a TNG episode. Few and far between if you ask me.
I thought the last scene in Ten-Forward was very well done. Instead of a laboured exchange between Picard and Riker full of empty platitudes like “You had to Will. She left you no choice” and “I know, Captain. But that doesn’t make me feel any better” all of those things are left unsaid. Picard lays out to Riker orders for they’re next mission, excuses himself and then just leaves Riker with his thoughts. The last scene of Preemptive Strike reversed the roles.
19, indeed, there’s a lot in visual media that can be done without the dialogue explaining it. Sometimes if you tell your story right, it doesn’t need to be said.
I found it amusing that at 06:35 Riker says “I’ll see to that” in reference to bringing more servants aboard. He walks off and is seen getting into the turbolift at 06:53. Then Picard orders Wes to lay in the course to the whatever cluster where the metalhead fratboys likely are at 07:00. Soooo he gave Will 7 seconds to get the servants? lol
Of course, it’s easily explained by pointing out how the warp visualization didn’t occur until Riker was with Marouk and her servants in their lodging after a scene cut, which could account for the time required to do all he needed to do, but it just struck me weird to start moving away from the planet before they got the other people and stuff. I guess you could say transporters have great range and they could be beamed up even while the ship is at impulse moving away but what’s the point? The distance they gain at impulse is negligible when weighed against the soon to happen multiple-of-c velocity they’ll be going.
I guess I just overanalyze things too much hehe.
What a dumb ending. Just beam her to the brig. Done.
I happened to watch this tonight. Given all the fuss made over the brandy, I assumed she had poisoned it with the norovirus and that Riker was afraid she would fling it at Chorgan.
I’d agree with a 5 on this episode, maybe a little more the first time through. The strongest point is the negotiations, which play out believably, with Picard doing a very nice job as arbiter. The weakest point is the attempt at romance, from Riker’s initial cloying over Yuta (“down boy!”) to the final encounter that fizzles in every way. I know, it’s kind of supposed to, but the episode wouldn’t have lost anything if it’d just been cut. Overall, not a lot to complain about, but a lot of bog standard elements to the story keep it from going far.
@18 – That’s probably the one thing that stands out about this episode. The standard thing would have been for Riker to stop Yuta at the last second without killing her, or maybe even talk her out of it. It’s the sort of “gritty” end that happened more later in the series (and was common on DS9), but unexpected for TNG up to that point.
@22 – Riker wasn’t thinking on that one! Since he beams over, it’s hard to imagine any reason they couldn’t beam Yuta out, and he’s probably lucky he didn’t get shot as soon as he beamed over (Chorgun’s bodyguards aren’t the greatest, apparently). Not that it ruins the episode, but a plot hole none the less. This probably isn’t the only episode with such a “why didn’t they…”
I’m surprised so many people didn’t realize that all Yuta had to do was touch the Gatherer leader to kill him. The brandy was just a way to get close. She didn’t need it.
I like the ending and Riker having to kill her, but I think they botched the visualization of it. The stun setting clearly worked. He could have simply kept shooting her, which caused her to recoil in pain, until he was between Chorgun and Yuta. But it’s usually not worth getting caught up in small details. The scene as set can easily be imagined as requiring him to disintegrate her when she wouldn’t give up her quest for vengeance.
This is a classic episode that reinforces the “Troi is useless” meme. One of her longest lines in the show is blatantly obvious and Picard doesn’t even bother to use her during the negotiations (which, in my opinion, only shows how much more effective these scenes could have been throughout the show WITHOUT Troi).
If she has been pursuing vengeance so tenaciously for over 50 years, I find it hard to believe that Yuta would not keep a small dagger or some weaponized form of the “microvirus” (e.g. poisoned needle, capsule able to release an aerosolized form of the virus, etc.) on her person at all times (or AT LEAST when she knew for a certainty that she would end up in the same room as a member of the Lornak clan). That way, rather than determinedly-but-ineffectually stepping toward Chorgan, she could’ve taken him out from afar. That glaring lack of plot logic has always bothered me . . .
Just rewatched this one and agree it’s a 5: perfectly average. I really did enjoy Nancy Parsons’ performance. She had me chuckling every time she would lose her cool and also rubbing her temples in exhausted frustration. Lisa Wilcox was bland but still pleasant and alluring in a way that I can understand Riker going for her. The double entendre of dessert for sex is so overused on Star Trek though. And I actually shed a tear for Yuta when Riker obliterated her. You could tell how painful it was for him: to take the life of someone, while I don’t believe he was in love with, nonetheless had romantic feelings for. And I felt bad for Yuta, cold-blooded murderer though she may be. I’m also one who doesn’t believe Riker had to kill her – as others have said, repeatedly stunning her and tackling her and giving Chorgan time to move away, or simply beaming her away would have been just as effective. But killing her was definitely the more dramatic and tragic way to go. I thought Wesley was a big snob in his interactions with Brull. Not a flattering look for the young ensign. The matte painting of the caves in the opening scene looks so obviously fake in high-def. And lastly, I didn’t even notice Picard when Yuta was disintegrated because of the shock of seeing what happened to her so the director’s intended reveal to show him sitting there after she’s killed didn’t work on that level as well, regardless of whether Patrick Stewart showed any reaction or not.
Some nitpicks:
Chorgan is not the last member of the Lornack. When Yuta kills the old man, another Gatherer claims the right to his possession because he ‘is of the same clan.’
Another loss in killing Yuta is the tech that allowed her to live 100 years (since the Lornack raid) without aging. The Federation has managed to extend life quite a bit, but this tech seems far superior to theirs. Surely this would transform Federation society, yet no one seems interested in how it’s done.
Speaking of which, how long has Yuta been in service? Did no one notice she wasn’t aging? And did no one take a DNA scan of their servants? That seems a standard precaution to me. We know from other episodes that DNA samples can be used to establish age. And wouldn’t they want DNA samples anyway, in case a crime needs solving, even if just to eliminate servants as suspects? Wealthy with servants have been known to collect fingerprints from employees, just in case.
Yuta’s apparent age, of course, is quite young, probably young enough to be Riker’s daughter, yet he creeps all over her. I mean, if she were just a hologram, then no harm done, but she’s real. Of course, she’s actually very old, so maybe she’s the one creeping on the much younger Riker. C’mon, this isn’t the holodeck! Creep-o-rama!
Finally, a comment on the 80s biker/Mad Max schtick. It ruins an otherwise interesting idea: a breakaway group who come together and make their own clan, not of blood, but of common subculture. Trek regularly invents fashion for even minor characters of other species, can’t we do better for a group that features centrally in the plot?
Too many plot holes here, and this episode comes across as very dated due to the costuming.
Sorry, that last scene is just so foolish, I can’t help but post again.
Why not have Marouk pull out small, secreted weapon and kill or incapacitate Yuta? She will have saved Chorgon’s life, thus establishing trust, and simultaneously relieve Riker of having to do it. Marouk killing Yuta would also be a kind of atonement for having an assassin work right under her nose for years. Win-win-win.
Also, have it happen much more quickly, so it doesn’t reflect so badly on Chorgon’s men standing idly by, not to mention Picard sitting like a statue.
Makes much more sense.
As it stands, Riker kills a woman he could easily subdue without lethal force. Surely that would merit at least an inquest.
@28/Oji: Your nitpick is incorrect: when Yuta kills the old man, the Gatherer that finds him actually states that because there is no other Lornack present, that he has the right to claim the dead man’s stuff as the former man was the first to discover the latter man.
@29: Maybe Marouk COULD have killed Yuta but that doesn’t mean she would have. For all we know, Marouk is in total shock about Yuta betraying her and is too numb in the moment to process much beyond that. And even if that weren’t the case, having a weapon is a totally separate thing from working up the nerve to use it and take a life. Marouk is a diplomat, not a trained killer or security officer.
Very belated response to a 9-year-old comment:
@7/Bourgeois Nerd: “Well, if I recall correctly, you had the Borg wipe out Acamar, so this episode must have made SOME impression. A negative one, apparently.”
It was David Mack in the Destiny trilogy who established that Acamar and Barolia were the first worlds to fall to the Borg invasion. Greater Than the Sum came out first, but I was drawing on Dave’s existing outline. And he chose those worlds because Star Trek Star Charts put them next to the Azure Nebula, which was the Borg’s entry point into our part of the galaxy.
Besides, even if it had been my decision, it’s a mistake to assume that writers only kill off characters or races that they dislike. Often it’s the other way around — we’re meanest to the characters we do like, because we want the audience to care about their fate as much as we do.
On to a more recent comment:
@28/Oji: “Yuta’s apparent age, of course, is quite young, probably young enough to be Riker’s daughter, yet he creeps all over her.”
Whaaaa? Lisa Wilcox was 25 when this episode was made, and she looked it. Riker was 30-31 at the time of the story (Frakes was 37).
I agree that the Lisa Wilcox looks too young to be Riker’s love interest and it made the scenes between them feel less romantic. There’s not actually that much physical age difference and I’m sure they were going with the idea that it was meant to help sell her as someone beneath suspicion in the murders. Heck, when watching it with my wife, I repeatedly referred to as “Arya and the Freys.”
I feel like the episode did miss three opportunities, though:
1. Worf making some commentary on Klingon vengeance and perhaps talking with her in veiled terms about this..
2. Directly referencing Earth’s history of vendettas and blood feuds that a lot of people ignore were a real thing right up until the 20th century.
3. Not ever using the term “Space Pirate” or pirates in place of Gatherers. Which would have made the Gatherers 20% cooler.
@32:
Heck, when watching it with my wife, I repeatedly referred to as “Arya and the Freys.”
LOL.
Now you’ve ruined the episode for me. I won’t be able to re-watch it without thinking of that observation and laughing at the worst moments. XD
The phaser scene at the end made no sense, apart from Riker using deadly force while everyone else stood around, because it wasn’t a clean shot. Riker was aiming at a target with Picard sitting right behind her!
My least favorite, literally Number One most cringe-worthy line delivery from all of TNG in memory for 30+ years has been “Parthas… à la Yuta,” and this rewatch has so far done nothing to change that.
@19. David Sim — Picard doesn’t just inform Riker about their next mission but share that as a full complement won’t be needed he’ll authorize extended shore leave at the starbase where they’ll be picking up supplies, implying that his first officer should take the downtime. Riker stoically replies that he’ll pass the news along to the crew. It’s easily the best part of the whole episode.
I give this one a high 6, for the sheer energy and entertainment value of the guest cast, as well as Worf being a total mensch.
Having just rewatched it, I felt that it was probably pretty heavy-handedly obviously about Ireland, being 1990-ish, & came here to see if anyone else had commented on it. Is that just me?
@37/Matt Doyle: I never really thought of this story as an allegory for Ireland and the IRA. This season had “The High Ground” to draw that direct parallel. I think the allegory for this episode is any type of blood feud carried about between families over the ages whether in the medieval age or amongst more modern mob families.