“The Last Outpost”
Written by Richard Krzemian and Herbert Wright
Directed by Richard Colla
Season 1, Episode 4
Production episode 40271-107
Original air date: October 19, 1987
Stardate: 41386.4
Captain’s Log: The Enterprise pursues a Ferengi ship that has stolen something from a Federation planet. Starfleet has never seen the Ferengi, and they pursue them to a star system. The Ferengi ship drops out of warp, and then has a power surge. The Enterprise loses power in very short order, and then are held in place by a force field. The crew assumes it’s the Ferengi doing so, even though the Ferengi take no action that they can determine—except search the ship’s computer banks.
They try to break out of the force field, to no effect, then discuss options. They finally decide to offer the Ferengi a surrender, only to discover that they’re also stuck. A probe reveals that the uninhabited planet below has both ships in a force field that is draining power. (Meanwhile, the viewer is wondering why they didn’t think of this sooner when the Ferengi ship didn’t do a damn thing after supposedly immobilizing the Enterprise.) Data does some research and discovers that this was an outpost of the long-dead Tkon Empire.
Picard and the Ferengi DaiMon, Tarr, bicker for a bit, then reluctantly agree to work together. Riker takes a team to the planet, while Picard is left on a ship that is losing power.
The Ferengi attack the away team, but Yar manages to get the upper hand. A portal from the Tkon Empire shows up to ask why they are petitioning to enter the empire, not realizing that the empire has been dead for centuries. The Ferengi try to cajole the gatekeeper—who is called, somewhat awkwardly, “Portal”—while the Starfleet people are a bit more honest. Eventually Riker and Portal bond over Sun-Tzu while the Ferengi gesticulate like lunatics, power is restored to both ships, and they all go on their merry way.
Thank you, Counselor Obvious: “I’m sensing nothing from them.” Snort. Snorfle. (To be fair, Troi actually gives Picard some useful advice in the episode. For one thing, she’s the first person to consider checking the planet.)
Can’t We Just Reverse The Polarity?: La Forge goes to engineering and winds up giving a report from there, an image the producers liked enough to give him the chief engineer job in the next season. (He also cries, “woo-WEE!” at a very loud volume for no compellingly good reason.)
No Sex, Please, We’re Starfleet: When power is restored to the Enterprise, Crusher cups Picard’s cheek and calls him “Jean,” the one and only time that diminutive is ever used.
If I Only Had a Brain…: Data gets stuck in a Chinese finger puzzle. He also tries slang to uneven effect.
There is No Honor in Being Pummeled: Worf is taken down by the Ferengi. Twice!
Welcome Aboard: Mike Gomez does a decent job as the first Ferengi we ever see, coming across as sufficiently alien. Darryl Henriques is less than impressive as the Tkon Empire Portal—the role requires more gravitas than Henriques can bring to it. But the big name here is Armin Shimerman, who plays the first of three Ferengi he would portray—Bractor in “Peak Performance,” and, of course, Quark on Deep Space Nine.
I Believe I Said That: “You see? They are demented. Their values are insane. You cannot believe the business opportunities they have destroyed!” Kayron, appalled at Federation values.
Trivial Matters: Greg Cox would show the Tkon Empire in more depth in his novel trilogy The Q Continuum.
Make It So: The Ferengi were introduced in this episode, and Armin Shimerman makes his first appearance on Star Trek, which is the only thing that makes this episode in any way noteworthy, and the former doesn’t really work. The Ferengi come across as alien, which was the intent, but they also are far too comical to be taken in any way seriously as the threat the script desperately wanted them to be.
The rest of the episode isn’t, to quote Data, anything to write home about. The tension is all but nonexistent as the Enterprise crew stand around and talk about what to do. Honestly, The Next Generation’s reputation as a show in which they have meetings rather than doing anything has its roots in this episode.
There are a few fun moments here and there—the Chinese finger puzzles, the Sun-Tzu quotes, the little kids playing in the observation lounge, the use of holographic briefing images (that would be discontinued for budget reasons), and Picard’s first use of “Merde”—but nothing to really hold together.
Warp factor rating: 3
Keith R.A. DeCandido has written a mess of stuff about Star Trek. This rewatch is simply adding to the mess. Follow him online at his blog or on Facebook or Twitter under the username KRADeC.
my favorite quark quote: “rule of acquisition #125: you can’t make a deal if you’re dead.”
The Ferengi are one of my favorite star trek races and one of the best additions to the star trek universe IMHO. Their society built on trade/capitalism is really interesting and fun. But other than their introduction, I agree this episode is mostly forgettable. Sometimes there are just too many portals belonging to long dead races in the star trek universe
As I understand it, and it is certainly possible that I heard completely wrong, the Ferengi were supposed to be the new “enemy” race for Starfleet to fence with. When it didn’t work out (primarily since they were just not scary enough in this episode), the writers invented the Cardassians. Thus the Ferengi went from creepy, alien, unintentionally funny objectivitst trolls to intentionally funny objectivist trolls.
I thought this was going to be “Arena: TNG” (similar to “The Naked Now”), but after the talky talk, phaser whips, and other bleh, I was much less concerned about watching any more TNG. Losing Gates McFadden was no help, and I was lucky to catch a few episodes before “Best of Both Worlds” put the show back on my “must-watch” list.
I stopped watching the series after seeing this episode. As sps49 said, I didn’t come back to the series until after “Best of Both Worlds”
All in all I think ST-TNG is a shining example of why you need to give a ScfiFi show a season or two to find its legs before you cancel it. In today’s TV landscape I don’t think it would have lasted 13 episodes.
It just occured to me how silly it is to use the main screen of the bridge for video communication. Just look at that huge scary face and wee little Picard… You’re just putting yourself at a psychological disadvantage! not to mention blocking your view of the outside…
Michael_GR, the hugeness of the DaiMon’s head on the viewscreen was an intentional story point — the Ferengi projected their image extra-large to make them appear to be intimidating giants, and then we found out they were really short little guys. It was basically a rehash of Balok from “The Corbomite Maneuver.” Normally, faces projected on the screen weren’t quite so big.
The problem with Roddenberry’s intent to make the Ferengi the Big Bad of TNG is that he was also using them as a caricature of greedy capitalists and deliberately painted them in a condescending way, as whiny little rodent men. Heroes are known by the quality of their enemies. If the bad guys aren’t intelligent, powerful, and impressive, then the heroes don’t seem impressive when they beat them.
And putting the Ferengi’s big reveal in an episode that was about the umpteenth ultra-powerful extinct alien race in the Trek universe was rather incongruous. What did the two ideas have to do with each other? Ultimately the story wasn’t about much of anything. I guess the idea was a story where enemies have to learn to cooperate against a common threat, but that could’ve been done with any antagonist. It’s too generic an idea for the big introductory story for the Big Bad of the series. The story introducing the Ferengi should’ve been materially about the Ferengi, with their distinct culture and attitudes driving the story.
It feels odd in retrospect that Picard has never heard of the Tkon Empire. Clearly Picard’s love of archaeology hadn’t been conceived of yet.
I remember thinking “STILL bad but better. I also remember thinking “What the hell is a Yankee Trader and these guys REALLY should be much trouble buy them off and be on your way.
I think the only thing missing from this rewatch is a mention of the holographic display in the conference room. Wasn’t it only used in this episode?
I don’t think it was ever noticed, but the most important set in TNG wasn’t the bridge, or engineering, but it was the conference room. How exciting is that?
This episode felt rushed to me – as in feeling that it had been rushed into production. I wonder how mush better the Ferengi episodes of Next Gen could have been if they’d have taken the time to develop the whole character of the Ferengi race. We finally got to learn about them through Quark, Rom and Nog in Deep Space Nine and they became a race I could enjoy seeing in episodes.
Quoth Smithcraft: “I think the only thing missing from this rewatch is a mention of the holographic display in the conference room. Wasn’t it only used in this episode?”
You mean the thing I mentioned in the last paragraph? :)
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
Thanks krad! I must be going blind!
I would have thought that it would have merited a better mention, cool as I think it is and all.
My fave quote from this ep:
“You work with your females, arm them… and allow them to wear clothing!” “Sickening.”
I still chuckle at how that line is delivered.
Worf, whilst getting pummeled by the damn Ferengi:
“PYGMY CRETINS!!!”
Now THAT’S a funny line…
“the Ferengi projected their image extra-large to make them appear to be intimidating giants”
@Christopher, if that’s true then why did Daimon Tar say that visual communication was against their custom?
Chalk it up to being yet another confusing element of the first season. The Ferengi were well conceived, but poorly executed early on. At least in retrospect. They WERE funny at least, but it’s true that they didn’t fit as an adversary. Eventually they simply became funny and lovable, particularly on DS9.
Another episode with great ideas yet poor execution, but I really liked it when it first aired. I loved the Sun Tzu connection and I loved the idea of the dead Tkon Empire and the guardian that had to be convinced that his Empire no longer existed. It was odd, that they addressed him as “Portal.”
He also had a puzzling line: “The universe exists to me to create life. I shall sleep. Until needed again.”
What does that mean? Create what life? Is he a guardian or a god? And what conditions would exist wherein he would be needed again? His empire is gone! Isn’t he needed now???
Sorry for the multiple posts, but one more thing:
I also loved the admission by Riker and Data that the Federation was flawed and that their politics didn’t always live up to their ideals, particularly Data’s line:
“They should add that Starfleet has permitted several civilisations to fall. We have at times allowed the strong and violent to overcome the weak.”
They weren’t just talking about the Prime Directive, they were freely admitting that the Federation was flawed and that there is always room for improvement. I found that refreshing.
I have to say, upon the rewatch of this, I was glad to see some of the capitalist aspects of the species were already here. All I remembered from this episode were the crazy monkey Ferengi with the lightning whips that could beat up Worf and Data. My other memories of TNG Ferengi (from such episodes as “Peak Performance”) made them seem a somewhat aggressive militaristic race. I often wondered how they went from that to cowardly, bungling businessmen on DS9.
I felt the season was going well up to this point, but this episode turned into a bit of a disaster in the end – mainly due to the inept, overly comical portrayal of the Ferengi and the cheap and lousy storyline. The finger puzzle scene was funny though.
I remember this episode. Its insane. Actually the thing that I recall most about this episode isn’t so much the premise but the weirdo Ferengi doing the jig all over the place. A far cry from the more dignified, if not underhanded and double dealing, Quark of DS9!
I may watch tonight.
I like to think of this episode as a blatant tribute to Ray Brabury. The Ferangi reek of Martians. Even their movements mimick the old space shows. Although noy directly from Bradbury, the attitude of “if we destroy them they would learn nothing” has a very Bradbury-esque feel. This isn’t my favorite episode, but I don’t hate it either. It’s a shame they couldn’t keep using the holography for briefings. That was a great idea.
How can you respect a big bad that, snivels?
I was just waiting for Quark to break out one of those whips to keep the peace in DS9. The obvious joke is to have Morn mistakenly take a hit– and topple soundlessly off his stool.
I’m only just now reading the TNG re-watch and I’m loving the analysis. I just want to add here that Michael Westmore took partial responsibility for the failure of the Ferengi as main villains. In a glossy book on the makeup effects of TNG, he mentioned that the Ferengi were meant to be the new Klingons/Romulans but that whole idea was derailed by this episode.
His admission of guilt stems from his dissatisfaction with the makeup that ultimately came out of the concept sketches. Personally, I think Westmore is being too harsh on himself. His makeup work is fine, the whole concept just doesn’t make for good main villains.
Verdantgreen: Thanks! Hope you continue to enjoy the rewatches. :)
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
An ok early episode. A few interesting moments but a lot of wasted opportunies, especially the Ferengi. LaForge and Yar are as cringe-inducing as ever here. Horrible acting by both Burton and Crosby.
Very good and interesting episode. Awesome scenography and plot and the introduction of a newm intriguing race is a huge bonus. 9/10 from me.
Agree with #2: sometimes there are just too many portals belonging to long dead civilizations in the Star Trek universe. I have always found the episodes featuring the Ferengi to be among the most collectively tiresome and uninteresting. And annoying. And what was the deal with the malfunctioning transporter? Was it ever explained why they all materialized all over the place? Blecch episode. In my top 5 worst all time.
I’ve always thought the scattering of dead civilizations shown in Trek made a lot of sense. The universe is billions of years old most civilizations must last what, tens or hundreds of thousands of years? If life “out there” is as common as Star Trek suggests, there must have been plenty of advanced races which have since gone extinct. I suppose the bigger problem with any such technological remnants would be that they’d never last as long as Trek shows, having eroded to dust long before the Enterprise came along — but then that’s not as much fun.
It is interesting that Keith DeCandido mentions the fact that Portal lacked “gravitas.” When asked what I had in mind for the character of Potal I said that I would like it if he never touched the ground. I was told that that was out of the question. I also think that the character should never have materialized beyond the image in which he first appears. And lastly, if he was the Guardian of the Tkon Empire what was the point of allowing the humans and Ferengis onto the outpost. But wait,one more thing, why weren’t the hulks of millions, if not billions of space vehicles orbiting the planet unable to escape the power of Portal. And yet one more comment, why didn’t Portal appear on both ships to encounter these potential invaders. Even without gravitas I was happy to find myself in outer space. Henriques
P.S. I am the founder of the National Organization For the Abolition of Space Travel (NO-FAST)
Our motto: We’ve lost the earth. Let’s save the universe!
If the Ferengi were to be recurring antagonists, I’m astonished at how badly it was done here. If they were to be parodies of capitalists, I’m unimpressed by how that idea is simply stated rather than being developed in the slightest.
I do like the mystery portion of the episode and the surprise when Picard realizes the Ferengi aren’t responsible for the problem after all. The changing look on his face when Bok says “unconditional surrender…is not acceptable” was a highlight.
Totally agree on this episode. Obviously the Ferengi were a big misfire, but somehow they avoid the alien-of-the-week graveyard. Maybe Paramount stockpiled Ferengi masks and makeup? Even as a kid who’d watch anything “Trek” growing up, it was a little disappointing. So maybe call it a 4 on the first watch, probably a 2 for re-watch.
There’s more than a little truth to the accusation that TNG often had meetings instead of doing anything. I’d say the two biggest contributors to that were the deliberate efforts to make Picard a more diplomatic Captain than Kirk, and also the corporate fads and such of the 80s that led the writers view conference-room scenes a little too favorably. I wish I could remember exactly how he put it, but Seth MacFarlane had a great quip during his commentary on “Cause and Effect.” Something like (crew-member): “Captain, we have an imminent warp core breech!” (Picard) “Conference room, five minutes.” A few episodes are almost bad enough to foreshadow Michael Scott and The Office, but once we get into the better episodes, it’s a far less common pitfall. Also, a number of conference room scenes generated some of the best dialog and interplay between the characters. Not that those who complain about “too much talking” are going to change their minds based on that, but TNG isn’t going to be their cup of Earl Gray anyway. And finally, for the realism buffs, there would probably be hours of boring, relatively pointless meetings every week. That was my experience in the military, I’m sure it’s even more common in corporate settings, and I doubt you could argue Starfleet would be above such things. So, when you find yourself bored with some conference room scene, just be glad we don’t have to see a half-hour argument between Worf and LeForge over postponing tactical drills so the field output relays can be re-modulated. That would be interesting compared to some meetings I’ve sat through…
@33 – UncreditedLT: More than stockpiling Ferengi makeup, the producers had banked on making the Ferengi the new big bads of the franchise, and were probably emotionally invested in them, so they tried to salvage them even if it meant heavy retooling. And I’m glad they did.
And I wasn’t in the military, but I hear you about boring meetings!
@33/UncreditedLT: As you say, there should be lots of staff meetings on a starship. And Star Trek has always shown them. If you look at the first nine TOS episodes (in production order, including “The Cage”) there’s a briefing room scene in every one of them.
We never see the boring parts. I imagine that both Kirk’s and Picard’s Enterprise spent many months star mapping and exploring planets without any intelligent life or other hazards.
Yeah, I’d heard about the plans to make the Ferangi a major adversary. Even at that, I’m still a little surprised they survived, considering that their original conception went over about as well as New Coke (or, as the conspiracy theory suggests, maybe that was part of the plan!). Until I read this, I hadn’t realized that Armin Shimerman was both one of the first Ferangi that appears, and that somehow, despite the misfire, he became the quintessential Ferangi – Quark. Some people probably caught on to that immediately, but in my defense, I’ve only watched this episode a few times, and I’m not big into DS9.
Getting back to the mundane realities, it occurs to me that life aboard a Starfleet ship would probably end up being days (heck, weeks or months) of boredom punctuated by moments of sheer terror. A trip to Proxima Centauri would take a full day at warp 9, and a more typical speed like warp 6 would take a week. Obviously the mere possibility of warp travel is questionable, and the speeds completely arbitrary, but short of a world where exceeding the speed of light by a factor of four or more is easy, you’re going to spend a lot of time between destinations. But who cares about those details: I say the more we dream about the possibilities, the more we’ll break through or find ways around those limitations.
@36/UncreditedLT: “Getting back to the mundane realities, it occurs to me that life aboard a Starfleet ship would probably end up being days (heck, weeks or months) of boredom punctuated by moments of sheer terror.”
But every now and then, they would set foot on a new planet, with alien plantlife and a strangely coloured sky and a new intelligent species, and that would make it all worthwhile.
Kirk to Zefram Cochrane in “Metamorphosis”: “We’re on a thousand planets and spreading out. We cross fantastic distances and everything’s alive, Cochrane. Life everywhere. We estimate there are millions of planets with intelligent life. We haven’t begun to map them. Interesting?”
@@@@@37. JanaJansen, exactly! I was either going to write, or wrote elsewhere, that seeing other stars and planets and everything else out there would be amazing beyond our most feverish sci-fi dreams. I also like Q’s way of putting it: “It’s wondrous, with treasures to satiate desires both subtle and gross. But it’s not for the timid.” Even if faster-than-light travel is an impossibility in this life, I still have to believe we’ll reach other systems, and that it’ll be worth it.
When I first saw the Ferangi cavorting around on the planet, my immediate thought was, “They look like those flying monkeys of Oz!” Then, when Portal’s face appeared, looking uncannily like the famous image of the Wizard himself on his smoking alter, I thought: “This CAN’T be a coincidence!”
Was I hallucinating? Or does anyone else think there might have been an intentional reference here?
I don’t know if it was intentional, but their body language definitely reminded me of those monkeys.
Maybe I missed something, but they said Starfleet never seen The Ferengi before, or made visual contact. But didn’t Picard blow up a Ferengi ship like 9 years earlier as the episode The Battle points out. Picard, while Captain of The Stargazer, blows up the ship of Bok’s son.
Butters: Yes, but there was no visual contact in the previous encounters — and Picard didn’t even know it was a Ferengi ship he encountered on the Stargazer‘s final mission.
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
Started pretty well but it all unravels with the revelation both ships are in trouble. Like “The Naked Now” this should have gone later, in this case after establishing the Ferengi. Then the episode could have been a “Day of the Dove”-style temporary allies story to overcome a bigger threat to both ships. Oh well; I’m glad to finally meet the Ferengi after hearing about them for several decades.
I was surprised that the finger puzzle wasn’t reflected more directly in the solution to the problem at hand (so to speak) — Geordi helps Data out of his the first time without actually explaining that you need to stop exerting force by trying to pull out your fingers but rather let the puzzle go slack, and the parallel of the away team admitting humanity’s faults rather than attempting to tear down the Ferengi in a mutual smear campaign is only there if you squint.
@44: not to mention the fact that both ships are themselves basically caught in a gigantic finger trap, since the more they struggle to break free, the more tightly caught they are. Just a very confused and muddled episode that seemed to constantly forget what it was doing and then try to get back on track. Nothing really pays off, nothing connects like it should, etc.
Also: given that the producers and directors and writers had so much invested in the Ferengi as TNG’s Klingons, why were they so incapable of just looking at the dailies and seeing that they were messing that up? There is obviously nothing menacing about the Ferengi the way they’re directed here. Everyone who has, in later years, selflessly taken the blame for screwing up the Ferengi (the actors, the makeup guy) is covering for the real sinners: the director and every single producer who didn’t sense that “sniveling weird cowards” aren’t scary villains.
I remember watching this when I was 13 and thinking “He’s surrendering? Again?”