Man of the People
- FIRST SHOWN (US)
- 5 October 1992
- ON
- First-run syndication
- STARDATE
- 46071.6
- DIRECTED BY
- Winrich Kolbe
- PRODUCTION NO.
- 229
WRITTEN BYWritten by Frank Abatemarco
A celebrated peacemaker comes aboard to negotiate an end to a bitter conflict, but after she joins him in a private ritual, Counselor Troi starts to change in alarming ways.
Red alert: the full plot, ending included. Haven't watched yet?REVEAL SYNOPSIS
The Enterprise rescues the Lumerian ambassador Ves Alkar after an attack on his transport and carries him to peace talks. Travelling with him is an elderly woman, Sev Maylor, whom he calls his mother. When she dies suddenly, Alkar refuses a post-mortem and asks Troi to join him in a funeral meditation. Soon afterwards Troi becomes hostile, reckless and openly seductive, and she begins to age at a startling rate. The truth is that Alkar keeps himself serene by pouring his darker emotions into a chosen woman, who withers and dies as his receptacle, and Troi is now his victim. Crusher fakes Troi's death to break the link. When Alkar tries to bind himself to a new woman, the process goes wrong: he ages rapidly and dies, while Troi makes a full recovery.
- 01Frank Abatemarco has sole credit, but the script was a group effort by the whole writing staff, with Abatemarco doing the final draft.
- 02It was rushed into production when “Relics” had to be pushed back to fit James Doohan's schedule.
- 03Lucy Boryer plays an Ensign Janeway, the surname later given to Voyager's captain.