The Dauphin by: Scott Rubenstein and Leonard Mlodinow and directed by: Rob Bowman

“The Dauphin” is written by: Scott Rubenstein and Leonard Mlodinow and is directed by: Rob Bowman.  It was produced under production code 136, was the 10^th episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 2, the 36^th episode overall, and was broadcast on February 20, 1989.

 

“The Measure of a Man” was the best episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation thus far, so it only feels fitting that the immediate next episode is one that does not work.  “The Dauphin” takes its title from a French word meaning the heir apparent to the French Throne.  It also etymologically comes from the same words as dolphin.  Louis XVI was referred to as dauphin before ascending the throne.  Likewise, “The Dauphin” is an episode about Wesley Crusher falling in love with an alien princess who is meant to unite her planet while being transported on the Enterprise.  That is the plot.  No real B-plot, the conflict coming from Salia’s protector Anya being overprotective.  That and the massive twist that the aliens don’t actually look human and have only taken human form to fit in during transport.  When it is revealed of course Wesley just rebukes her which feels really out of character for, well any Star Trek regular cast member, but especially Wesley considering how many aliens he’s met at this point.  Much of his own plot in this episode is taking relationship advice from practically every other member of the crew who will speak with him, including Worf who is a Klingon and therefore not human and someone Wesley should apparently be repulsed.  There’s also a long history of problematic tropes involving queer, usually trans or gender non-conforming, characters not deserving love because they are the other and when they seek it they are rejected through repulsion.  Scott Rubenstein and Leonard Mlodinow are likely not intending bigotry, but still the tropes are just being used.  The episode isn’t helped by the fact that Salia is incredibly underwritten and young actress Jaime Hubbard has little chemistry with Wil Wheaton.  Star Trek: The Next Generation is a show that does not know how to use any younger cast member and while Wheaton at the very least has experience under his belt and knows how to take Rob Bowman’s direction.

 

The entire episode does also suffer from being generally underwritten, something that is becoming a problem in this season of Star Trek: The Next Generation in general, with a lot of scenes just progressing so slowly because we have to reach a 45-minute runtime.  Rubenstein and Mlodinow are not only the writers of this episode, but the script editors as well, a position they would leave before the season was over.  There’s a sense that neither of them are television writers, especially since once again “The Dauphin” is the only episode either of them contribute to the series.  The pair would script edit two further episodes before leaving the series entirely and that’s probably for the best.  This really is an episode where almost nothing happens:  Salia has an overbearing protector played by Paddi Edwards who was the eels in The Little Mermaid.  That’s at least a fun enough performance.  There is exactly one genuinely amazing character scene stuck in the middle of the episode.  When Wesley asks for advice from Riker and Guinan, Jonathan Frakes and Whoopi Goldberg are allowed to flirt for about three minutes.  Frakes and Goldberg have this impeccable chemistry that really sells how suave Riker is and how Guinan can easily fall under his spell, as could anything, and just as quickly as it starts, it ends and was all an act by two people who know each other well and have separately been in love.

 

Overall, “The Dauphin” is another example of a bad episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation that suffers because there is nothing there.  What is present in the episode has been done before by basically every other television series with a child character, and likely better in so many other places.  The performances are particularly weak, the messaging is accidentally quite hostile in places, and the script is padded by two writers who don’t actually have a ton of writing experience.  3/10.