Who Watches the Watchers 

A proto-Vulcan culture worships Captain Picard and prepares to offer Counselor Troi as a sacrifice.

Director:

Robert Wiemer

Writers:

Gene Roddenberry (created by), Richard Manning

Stars:

Patrick Stewart, Jonathan Frakes, LeVar Burton

Cast

Episode complete credited cast:
Patrick Stewart	...	Capt. Jean-Luc Picard
Jonathan Frakes	...	Cmdr. William Riker
LeVar Burton	...	Lt. Cmdr. Geordi La Forge
Michael Dorn	...	Lieutenant Worf
Gates McFadden	...	Dr. Beverly Crusher
Marina Sirtis	...	Counselor Deanna Troi
Brent Spiner	...	Lt. Commander Data
Wil Wheaton	...	Wesley Crusher (credit only)
Kathryn Leigh Scott	...	Nuria
Ray Wise	...	Liko
James Greene	...	Dr. Barron
Pamela Adlon	...	Oji (as Pamela Segall)
John McLiam	...	Fento
James McIntire	...	Hali
Lois Hall	...	Dr. Mary Warren

Storyline

The "Enterprise" is to provide technical assistance to a 3-man anthropological field team on the planet Mintaka III, which is observing, in hiding, the Vulcanoid Bronze Age native population. When the holographic hiding place is ravaged by an explosion, the landing party and its advanced technology are observed by two natives, one of whom, Liko, gets hurt badly and is beamed up for life-saving treatment; Picard orders his short-term memory wiped out to prevent a breach of the Prime Directive, but that fails as Commander William Riker and Counselor Deanna Troi find out, after they are beamed down again, temporarily altered to resemble Mintakans, to look for missing anthropologist Palmer. The culture now revives an abandoned belief in a supernatural overseer, worships the Picard, and soon considers offering Counselor Troi as a human sacrifice.

---

Plot Keywords:

primitive culture | anthropological field team | equipment failure | camouflaged observation post | cultural contamination | 

---

Genres:

Action | Adventure | Mystery | Sci-Fi

---

Certificate:

TV-PG

Details

Official Sites:

Official site

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

14 October 1989 (USA)

Filming Locations:

Paramount Studios - 5555 Melrose Avenue, Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA

Company Credits

Production Co:

Paramount Television

Technical Specs

Runtime:

45 min

Sound Mix:

Stereo

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

The "who watches the watchers" quote is sometimes incorrectly attributed to Plato. Although one of his debates in The Republic has a similar theme, he never writes anything that could be translated into that line specifically.

---

Goofs

The Mintakans believe Picard to be a god. Liko shoots "The Picard" with an arrow to prove he is immortal. After Picard falls, Nuria reveals Picard's (red) blood on her hand to prove his mortality to Liko. The Mintakans are described as "Proto-Vulcans" which means that they have GREEN blood. Revealing that Picard's blood is red would greater add to the belief that he is a magical or mythological being.

---

Quotes

Nuria: You have taught us there is nothing beyond our reach.
Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Not even the stars.

---

Connections

Referenced in Star Trek: The Next Generation: Allegiance (1990)

---

Soundtracks

Star Trek: The Next Generation Main Title
Composed by Jerry Goldsmith and Alexander Courage

User Reviews

If it upsets the fundamentalists...

The outrage of Christian extremists is the best testimony of this episode's necessity and of its continuing validity, 22 years after first airing.

Sadly, fundamentalists will always miss the point. Rather than realise the foolishness of resorting to extraordinary explanations when easy ones are unavailable (as the Mintakans briefly do, believing "Picard is a god" to be the only explanation to the feats they've witnessed); they'll claim outrage and talk of "offense".

"I'm offended" is the newest way dogmatic people have found to avoid thinking, and they'll ride it out for as long as we tolerate it. They'll make up oxymora like "militant atheism" to defend the dogma, because it's easier to throw nonsensical accusations than to actually start being rational about something.

Religious shows can be counted in dozens, atheist shows are pretty rare (there's Star Trek, Star Trek and, at a push, maybe Star Trek), yet that's already too much. Any view that contradicts the precious dogma is anathema, it must be purged from our screens!

Of course, they do look for opportunities to be offended, as often as possible. If atheism is so intolerable, so vile to them; there's an easy solution, one I personally adopt towards all religious shows: not watching.