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The Crystalline Entity first appeared in the “Star Trek: The Subsequent Era” episode “Datalore” (January 18, 1988), and it served as an awesome drive of nature that the crew of the united statesS. Enterprise did not know easy methods to cope with. It was large in scale and required nice offers of power to remain alive, power it acquired by consuming complete planets of life. It might prolong a beam all the way down to a planet’s floor and basically suck up and obliterate something alive under. The Entity was an detached drive of faceless destruction, and plenty of Trekkies have in contrast it to Moby-Dick in that regard. It is not evil, however merely unaware that its consumption habits have the potential of ending complete civilizations.
In “Datalore,” the Entity had been weaponized by Lore (Brent Spiner), the “evil twin” of the android Information (additionally Spiner). Plainly Lore resented the way in which he was handled on the human colony the place he and Information have been first constructed, and he lured the Entity to come back snack on everybody. It is by no means made clear how Lore realized to speak with the Entity. Lore additionally goals to feed the Enterprise to the Entity, however he was naturally unsuccessful. On the finish of “Datalore,” the Entity sailed off to elements unknown.
The Entity returned within the episode “Silicon Avatar” (October 14, 1991), and the Moby-Dick parallels grew to become extra pronounced. One Dr. Kila Marr (Ellen Geer) was keen to seek out the Entity and research it, claiming it was an interesting, distinctive life type. Solely later did she reveal that it had attacked her dwelling planet and evaporated her son. Her purpose, she introduced, is to exterminate the Entity. It was her White Whale.
Based on the writers of the episode, as revealed in Larry Nemecek’s invaluable “The Star Trek: The Subsequent Era Companion,” the Moby-Dick parallel was fairly deliberate.
‘Silicon Avatar’ is the Moby-Dick episode of ‘Subsequent Era’
Dr. Kila Marr, it must be famous, was shocked to be taught that Captain Picard (Patrick Stewart) sought to seek out the Crystalline entity with the intention to discover a approach to talk with it, and maybe discover a approach to feed it in a manner that did not contain murdering complete inhabited planets. This was Picard’s determination after he knew it destroyed the colony the place Information was constructed, and after it killed a number of scientists on a analysis mission originally of the episode. The Entity trapped a number of of his senior employees members in a cave, and so they barely escaped alive. Picard, nonetheless, remained diplomatic by all of it, understanding that the Entity had a proper to exist, identical to any organism.
Kila Marr merely wished revenge, and her resolve strengthened when Information performed an audio recording of her lifeless son’s diary, saved deep within the android’s reminiscence. For some time, she was suspicious of Information, considering he was in league with the Entity like Lore was, however after listening to her son’s voice coming from his mouth, she discovered him to be a … silicon avatar for her son. By the top of the episode, Dr. Marr has discovered a approach to kill the creature, and Ellen Geer offers a wonderful efficiency as a girl obsessed to the purpose of doing it.
Based on the “Subsequent Era Companion,” the script for “Silicon Avatar” was a contract submission by a author named Lawrence V. Conley. The late “Trek” producer Jeri Taylor did not suppose that “Subsequent Era” must be doing “sequel” episodes at that time, however the return of the Crystalline Entity was surprising. Taylor stated:
“Of all of the characters to deliver again, who’d have thought the Crystalline Entity? […] However the ‘Moby-Dick’ premise of this obsessed girl whose son’s consciousness was saved in Information was too good to go up.”
A Moby-Dick-like mineral creature. The White Shale?
The Moby-Dick parallels have been evident from the beginning
Within the oral historical past ebook “Captain’s Logs: The Unauthorized Full Star Trek Voyages,” edited by Mark A. Altman and Edward Gross, the director of “Silicon Avatar,” Cliff Bole, talked about making the episode. He additionally recalled what adjustments he would have made, had he had an opportunity to begin over once more, Bole stated:
“I feel I might have made Marr stronger in locations and within the ending I believed we have been weak. Then once more, she was over the sting. , while you’ve solely bought 40 minutes of image, it is robust to take a personality and go all over the change and what occurs to someone. We’re doing brief tales right here. Why does she do what she does? Generally you simply haven’t got the movie time to discover it correctly. We’re promoting 9 minutes lower than the previous present. You are able to do loads of character improvement in these 9 minutes.”
By 9 minutes, he signifies that business breaks now ate up 9 further minutes of time when in comparison with the shorter business breaks of 1966, when the unique “Star Trek” was on the air.
Bole additionally famous that he was type of on Marr’s aspect, feeling that Picard’s ultra-diplomatic resolution was calm to the purpose of inhumanity. He wasn’t outraged and even angered on the Entity’s fixed destruction. Each emotional being, Bole thought, would suppose to kill the Entity. Producer Michael Piller cherished the episode’s premise, noting how shut it was to Herman Melville’s dense masterpiece, however did really feel, that it might have been dramatically stronger.
Taylor, nonetheless, cherished the entire thing, understanding the ache that Dr. Marr felt. Taylor ended up writing the ultimate teleplay and infused Dr. Marr with relatable struggling over the loss of life of her son. “I used to be actually capable of faucet into these emotions,” she stated, “and inform a narrative a few girl whose vendetta over the lack of her son ruined her.”