Episode Report Card Keckler: A | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Quantum Leap of Faith of the Heart
By Keckler | Season 1 | Episode 26 | Aired on 05.21.2002
Sick Bay. Phlox scans Trip on a bed, while T'Pol paces and Reed insists that he closed both plasma ducts on the sh'pod. Wearing The Furrowed Brow Of Untimely Destruction Of A Planet, Quantum asks Hoshi, "Are you sure there's nothing left?" Hoshi, holding herself to keep from shaking, says, "We could see the colony in full magnification, sir. The ground was scorched for at least a hundred kilometers in every direction." The camera spins jerkily around in this scene in a paltry attempt to illustrate the rattled feelings of the crew, but all it did was make me take Dramamine. The acting was strong enough without it. Quantum asks Reed if the dampeners are malfunctioning, but Reed restates that he closed both ducts; if there were a malfunction, there would have been an alarm. T'Pol strides over and tells Quantum and Reed, "This is no time to be placing blame. A thorough investigation should explain what happened." T'Pol asks how Trip is, and is told that he's got a mild concussion but will be fine. Quantum asks Hoshi if she's even tried hailing the colony: "There has to be someone down there!" Hoshi says, "Sir, I tried to explain -- there's nothing left. No buildings, no trees, no people!" Quantum says, "That's impossible. There were thirty-six hundred colonists!" Convenient death toll.
Bridge. Quantum is crabby with everyone on the bridge crew because they haven't found any answers yet. There's much technobabble, with the end result being that it seems next to impossible that anything they could have done would have generated such an explosion in the atmosphere. Do I even really need to mention that Quantum's wearing yet another brow from his Edward R. Furrow collection? He orders Hoshi to call Admiral Forrest and then mutters, "This is not going to be fun," as he leaves the bridge. Yum, bitters on a sugar cube.
Quantum's Ready Room. Quantum attempts to explain the situation to Admiral Forrest -- who has consistently seemed overly thickish to me -- and ends his suppositions/excuses with, "But that's not gonna change the fact that there are thirty-six hundred corpses down there." Forrest tells him to keep at their analysis; he'll have to call an emergency meeting of the command council as well as get the Vulcans involved. "They'll have to figure out who's going to contact the Perogaan homeworld," Forrest says. Quantum juts out his chin and tells Forrest that that should be his responsibility. Forrest agrees, but tells him they need to take it one step at a time. Quantum gets self-pitying when he asks, "How do you tell all those families that --" Forrest tells him he followed all the protocols that he was given. Quantum says, "We came here to meet these people -- to learn something about them, not to kill them!" Forrest interrupts with, "You followed the protocols. You've got a crew that's going to be looking to you to figure out how to react to all of this. Don't let them down. I'll get back to you as soon as I can. I'm sorry, Jon." Forrest hangs up. Forrest is wet. Quantum sits heavily, enjoying the company of The Furrowed Brow Of Massive Slaughter And Responsibility.
Sick Bay. T'Pol expresses her concerns over Quantum's mood swings to Phlox. I think they need to declare him unfit to command. T'Pol tells Phlox that Quantum is neglecting his duties as captain, and she considers it "illogical." Phlox explains that humans have a hard time separating emotional despair from what her definition of duty is. T'Pol suggests that Phlox monitor Quantum's behavior to make sure he "remains fit for command," but Phlox explains that, while he understands her concern, it wouldn't be natural for Quantum to act any other way under the circumstances.