OVEG: False Profits

Foreward: This episode could have worked, it really could have. I mean, you had one of those rare opportunities for following up a story where it actually made sense: Ferengi are stuck in the delta quadrant, Voyager is stuck in the delta quadrant, it's a perfect excuse for the two to collide. However, this story was doomed for one simple reason: the writers and their tendency to jump straight to the most obvious conclusions. Coupled with yet another Way To Get Home That Can't Work and this episode tanks.

Let's talk about the Ferengi for a minute, because they take to the extreme a common problem with Trek. The Ferengi were introduced to us in The Last Outpost, and they were, in a word, ridiculous. I mean, this was pretty much on the level of propaganda like "Slap a Jap" from World War II, with the Ferengi leaping around like ape men, making weird animal noises while noble Riker stood tall and proud alongside the guardian. This scene is about as subtle as a tactical nuke.

Roddenberry's politics were clearly at work with the Ferengi: they were greedy, imperialistic, sexist, and untrustworthy... they were out and out compared to "Yankee traders." In other words, it was a charicature of what was wrong with America. However, in a kind of reverse Springtime For Hitler, this vision of the evils of society as Roddenberry saw them was so over-the-top that it backfired. It was so absurd, that we didn't see the Ferengi as the inevitable result of our capitalist society, we saw them as ridiculous little imps hopping around and acting like they suffer from a mental impairment. This is the great enemy of the Federation, the cast from Quest For Fire? No, I don't think so.

Well, it's no surprised that the Ferengi were dropped, as they proved a completely impossible threat to our heroes, like the Kazon (nice to see nothing is ever learned). Instead, they took the description of the Ferengi from this episode, that they represented the worst aspects of Yankee capitalism, and ran with it.

That, in a nutshell, is where Trek consistently goes wrong. It takes one concept and runs amok with it. In this case, all of Ferengi society revolved around the acquisition of profit, so much so that it even was a part of their beliefs in the afterlife. You can sum up Ferengi society as: everyone's greedy and the women are slaves. And the problem is, that's not a culture, that's a farce... not as bad as the ape men in space, but still farce. What's worse is that every society in Trek is pretty much like this: Klingons are warriors, thus everything in their society revolves around the glories of war and honor and all that rubbish. The Kazon, as we've established, are just a weak knockoff of this. The Hirogen, as we'll see, are all about the hunt. Trek takes a fact, or a couple related facts, and creates entire societies out of them - societies that are absurd, when you come down to it.

Imagine, for a moment, that Raiders of the Lost Ark was actually a Star Trek two-parter. What would the Germans be like? Well, in the movie they were devoted to the acquisition of the Ark as a weapon, and willing to do anything to get it. They were prepared to kill their own men in the name of the cause. They had all the real weapons of war: tanks, trucks, warplanes, submarines. The Germans of Trek would clearly be regimental, their citizens devoted fully to their war machine, practically to Borg-like extremes. Germany would be thoroughly mechanized, a land of smoke and steel. And this would have been part of the long history of their people. There'd be no room for a revolutionary like Martin Luther, or a composer like Ludwig van Beethoven, or a philospher like Nietzsche (well, okay, bad example). There would be no Germans working against the Nazis, there would be no flood of scientists out of Germany, and there's no doubt the Germans would have been the first to develop an atomic bomb. And when they were defeated, they wouldn't go on to produce something as cute as a Volkswagen Beetle - no, their society would struggle under enemy control to return to their old ways.

You see the problem? You take a few superficial elements and try to extrapolate a society, and you don't get a society, you get a charicature. There is no depth, there's no realism. The Ferengi society shows this. Can a species that wants profit so badly it'll screw each other over actually remain a mystery to the Federation for so long? Yankee capitalists weren't enigmatic, they went out looking for people with valuables in the hopes of getting them by handing out some worthless junk. The Ferengi would've been pounding on the Federation's door at the first opportunity. (In a recent novel, it was retconned that the Ferengi of this time feared the Federation was insane because they shunned profit... I suppose that's not entirely invalid... and so all that reputation was a trick by Zek to keep the Federation away until they knew enough about them. I still don't buy it.)

This is the sequel to the TNG episode The Price, which believe it or not was the fourth Ferengi episode ever made. Before this we had the aforementioned The Last Outpost, and the other season one episode, The Battle, where we find Picard's old ship, the Stargazer, where Picard had battled a Ferengi vessel (though he hadn't known it at the time) and killed the son of the captain who returned it. It's all to get revenge for what Picard did, and this presents the Ferengi in a far more ruthless light than they come to be without falling back into the austrolopithicine antics. Still, their behavior for the most part was such that you could really plug just about any alien into the story and it would change little. We didn't see the Ferengi again until near the end of season two, and they were for the most part still violent thugs as they attack the Enterprise during a war game. Their next appearance is in season three with The Price.

The Price: This episode has two real plots to it. The first is that Troi is tense and apparently needs a good humping. The other is about the Enterprise hosting a chance for various governments, including the Federation, to bid for rights on the Barzan Wormhole, supposedly the first stable wormhole ever discovered. One of them is a negotiator for the Chrysalians named Devinoni Ral, who looks human but is actually part Betazoid. He's the one to solve Troi's need to, as Dr. Crusher puts it, make her toes curl.

Daimon Goss shows up uninvited to make a bid on behalf of the Ferengi, along with two underlings, Kol and Doctor Arridor. They are still ruthless, as Arridor does some medical stuff to allow Goss to use basically untraceable poisoning to take the Federation's lead negotiator out of the game, forcing Riker to step in. Ral uses his empathic abilities to manipulate the other negotiators to try to win the contract. Meanwhile, concerned that the wormhole may not be as stable as everyone thinks, Picard sends Data and Geordi to go check it out in a shuttle, and Goss insists that Arridor and Kol check it out in a Ferengi shuttle too. This scene, by the way, has some very bad model work; it seriously looks like the kind of stuff they pull on Mystery Science Theater 3000. They fly through, but they find they're not in the gamma quadrant as expected, but in the delta quadrant. Geordi's convinced the whole thing is unstable and tries warning the Ferengi, but they think it's a trick and thus are stranded after Geordi and Data's shuttle escapes and the wormhole flies away. Turns out the other end isn't stable and flies all over the place, making it useless.

While all of that was going on, the neogitators were cut down to Ral, Goss, and Riker, and Ral conspired with Goss to have the latter pull some crap to convince the Barzan that the Federation would invite too much violence if chosen so that Ral would win the contract. It works, but Troi exposes Ral's abilities, and this combined with the fact that he just bought a useless wormhole kind of ruins his day, though not as much as Arridor and Kol, who are trapped on the other side of the galaxy with no peep from home for seven years...

Description: The episode opens with Voyager coming across evidence that a wormhole once existed nearby, so they head in to investigate. They determine it was here six months ago but disappeared, apparently heading off somewhere else. Janeway speculates that what might be happening is that one end is fixed while the other is "wagging around the Delta Quadrant like the tail on a dog," making this Janeway's worst analogy to date. Thank God they don't go the Parallax route and try to create subspatial dog chow to attract the wormhole back, although it's not far off from what they eventually try. While she tells Harry to scan the hell out of the area, she asks if there's anyone around who might be able to give them some info. Tuvok says that there's an M-class planet with a Bronze Age society, but there's evidence that someone there used a replicator recently, which means it's time to do some Pretending To Be The Locals.

So Chakotay and Paris head down, and without needing to break out the Play Doh, because they look just like humans, and remarkably clean humans at that. The two are waylaid by a bard doing "Song of the Sages." If you've ever heard Loreena McKennitt's beautiful rendition of The Lady of Shalott, well, then the bard's song sounds like a pre-school Christmas pageant. He tries to get them to pay to hear even more of this horrible little poem sung a cappella in a manner like William Shatner's The Transformed Man, but is shooed off by a merchant trying to sell them crap. They leave him behind too for the moment, getting some readings from the nearby temple that suggests that's where it's coming from. Before they can head inside, the merchant comes back and says that without wearing their ears they can be fined, so they trade Tom's shoes for some ears to wear. Thankfully it's just jewelry, not big foam ears or anything like that. There's a vaguely uncomfortable moment as Chakotay refers to them as a fetish, but thankfully he's using the term to refer to an object that's a symbol of reverence, not, you know, things like sucking on toes or getting spanked while dressed like a school girl.

We briefly cut back to Voyager to handle the technobabble plan: the other end of the wormhole keeps jumping around faster than Voyager could catch it, so instead they'll need to figure out some way to pull the wormhole back here. Oh, of course, what an obvious plan. Why not just use that to pull yourself to Earth, so long as we're doing silly things. The only thing to make the plan more absurd would be for the top of Voyager to open and reveal a giant magnet with "ACME" written on the side.

Back on the planet, the door to the temple opens and out come the Ferengi, much to Chakotay and Paris' surprise. They do some typical Ferengi things, then have one of the locals come up and begin begging for help for his sandle shop. More Ferengi acting like Ferengi again, with "Exploitation begins at home." *sigh* And for a moment, I actually hoped that the Ferengi were going to invest in the sandal shop, even if it would be more like loan sharking than anything else, but these are not cunning business men, they're idiots. Instead they sell him a copy of the Rules of Acquisition - um, and why would a sandal maker of the Bronze Age know how to read? Who knows, but he pays for the book and the Ferengi head back into their vault.

This is where charicature comes in again. You're stuck on a world in the Bronze Age where the locals think you're divine and you have a replicator, so what do you do? If you're a Ferengi, your goal is to be rich, but what does that mean? In this case, they live in a vault with beautiful girls, a toady, and are surrounded by money. That's it? See, that's the writers' problem, they seem to think that for Ferengi, money is an end unto itself, which is silly. This is the same as Scrooge McDuck swimming through his room full of gold coins, except that was a cartoon for children, and this is supposed to be a program to make adults reflect upon themselves. What's even worse is that they're surrounded by money that is only valuable because it's what the locals use as money. What's to stop them from simply replicating money? Now, economically speaking, it would be bad because it would devalue the currency, but what would it matter if all it was doing was just sitting around? And even if it doesn't, what would that matter to the Ferengi, who seem content to drive the local economy into the ground by hoarding all the money?

What exactly you could actually do in that situation is limited because we don't know much about how a replicator works. Contrary to what some might like to think, it's not a magic goodie creator, it's a machine, and machines have to obey the laws of physics. We know that it must require some kind of power source and that it must use raw materials (conservation of matter and all that), but the details we don't know; however, the Ferengi likely knew as they kept it running for seven years and were content to waste it on books for the locals. So any wealth you had would be to keep the replicator functional (buying whatever could be used for raw materials), and to get anything the replicator can't make. Some of the obvious things are things too big to replicate (like your home) and services (servant girls and guards). So money can be used towards an end in many cases - just having a replicator doesn't mean all your desires can now be met. So the Ferengi would have a reason to want to acquire wealth, but it would be to use it for something.

This is how the story could actually have worked. What the Ferengi should have been doing was exploiting the people while simultaneously benefiting them. Remember the Yankee traders that were the descriptions of the Ferengi originally? Guess what was generally their viewpoint towards the people they were exploiting? They were seen as a source of cheap raw materials and as a market for the finished goods. It even went all the way to the top; the purpose of colonies was to provide materials and in turn be consumers for the goods of the mother country. Yet they still wanted the goods or else they wouldn't have purchased them. Even today, part of the reason in the U.S. that illegal immigration is tolerated is because they work for low wages and still serve as consumers; yet they do this because even with such an awful situation they still are better off than they had been. I'm not in any way justifying exploitation, but the point has to be remember that exploitation doesn't automatically mean someone's worse off, just that they're not receiving what they deserve. So the Ferengi can not only become rich, they can increase the standard of living of the locals. Not only does this create a moral dilemma for Voyager (can you remove the Ferengi without causing the fall of their civilization?) but it gives the Ferengi a chance to actually be something to take seriously. When we actually see the Ferengi try to be something threatening, it's when they have weapons. How about actually doing so when it would make sense?

So Paris and Chakotay report back and explain that the Ferengi have convinced the locals that the Song of the Sages is about them and used it to exploit them. They're so evil, taking everyone's money while giving back so little. The irony of this is that we're talking about Star Trek here, so here's a little dose of reality: for the low, low price of a hundred bucks retail, you could (originally) buy Season 2 of Voyager on DVD, where you got stuff like Twisted, Innocence, and Threshold, oh, and if you want to know how the last episode ends, drop a hundred bucks on the next season set. The Ferengi are looking at Trek and hastily taking notes.

Anyway, Tuvok explains the events of The Price, though with a few details wrong (the Ferengi weren't pulled in trying some trick, they were left on the wrong side when they didn't listen to Geordi). Janeway says that she won't stand by and allow the Ferengi to exploit the locals. Tuvok points out, however, that the Ferengi are not part of the Federation, so are not bound to the Prime Directive, and what's more, the Prime Directive does prevent Voyager from getting involved. However, Janeway does a bit of twisted thinking so that she could say the Prime Directive doesn't apply, and they can do what they like. What a piece of work, she bends over backwards here to let them get involved, yet when it's a case of a sentient species becoming extinct she's completely inflexible. Our hero, ladies and gentlemen: a woman who thinks exploitation is a worse crime than genocide.

So we see the Ferengi doing what they do, counting their money, getting an ear-massage from beautiful girls, and berating their toady. They get beamed up in mid-beratement, and Kafar (the toady), in an amusing bit, takes a moment to relax a little amongst the wealth. On Voyager, Janeway confronts Kol and Arridor, saying that she plans to take them back, but Arridor protests. He says that by snatching away their gods, the locals will descend into despair and darkness. It's a bit that's completely over the top in its absurdity, reminiscent of the DS9 episode Prophet Motive (Trek loves their homonyms) when Quark asserts that without greed civilizations would starve to death. The Prophets dismissed that as non sequitur silliness, because they aren't idiots. Janeway, however, is, and beams Kol and Arridor back down.

With that settled, it's time for the magic meeting room, to figure out what to do about the Ferengi. It's hard to believe that the prospect of getting home has been so shoved into the background in this episode, especially given how dangerous the delta quadrant has proven of late. So the crew discuss how to get rid of the Ferengi without scarring the people (whatever), and decide that the Ferengi must leave voluntarily to do that. This leads to the line they just had to put in "We have to out-Ferengi the Ferengi." Why do you do this to me? This episode is like being continously beaten with a rubber chew toy: it stings, it's annoying, and it's humiliating all at once.

Well, we cut down to the vault, and Arridor has modified the matter-anti-matter generator to set up a field to stop them from being beamed out. There's a knock at the door and it's, God help us all, Neelix disguised as a Ferengi. He's pretending to be the Grand Proxy, who serves as the official representative of the Grand Nagus. What follows shows that the writers are idiots (as if you needed more proof), as they talk up all the profits of this world from their exploitation. These so-called profits, however, are all in the form of local currency; it's Monopoly money, useless anywhere except here. If the Ferengi actually acted the way they were supposed to, like exploitive capitalists, the concern for the valueless money of the locals would have been absent, and instead a discussion of the use of the planet as a source of raw materials, and the people as a source of cheap labor and as consumers - that's their real value. And the thing is, I never studied economics in college, I just know the f**king obvious!!!

So what actually happens is that Neelix tells the Ferengi that the Nagus is recalling them, that they have to make a speech about them being delivered back to the spirit world, and that all the money is being appropriated. While he's outside with all the money, the Ferengi turn to the Rules of Acquisition to try to find the way out of this problem, but none apply, so they decide to just kill him. Well, I'll give them this, it's not another lame charicature, although it does seem, oh what's the word, oh yes, stupid. If this actually worked, my mailman would have perished years ago - just killing the messenger wouldn't solve the problem. But then, why start thinking now, just roll with it, I guess. Besides they're plotting to kill Neelix, that's usually a reason unto itself.

So Neelix comes back and the Ferengi pull out swords, leading to Neelix demonstrating those combat abilities he learned in Jetrel: scream like a little school girl, even one not getting spanked. This is the "man" who was offended he was excluded from the defensive simultations, cowering in fear before these two. Let me emphasize that point: Neelix is cowering in fear before Ferengi! I think there's no doubt that we are witnessing the most cowardly act performed by any Trek character whose name is in the main credits. As if that weren't bad enough, Neelix quickly spills everything to the terrifying Ferengi; watching him is one of the most pathetic things I've ever witnessed. I am so impressed, Neelix: even after nearly destroying Voyager with cheese, getting people kill with your non-existent survival skills, and leading the Voyager crew into a Vidiian trap, you still manage to show there's entirely new ways to be useless I hadn't even thought of. You're like on the cutting edge of uselessness, pioneering new ways to annoy people and fail at the simplest tasks. The Ferengi send him back to tell Voyager to leave them be, and then celebrate their victory as Neelix slinks off. I can't wait to see how Kes tries to spin-doctor this into a demonstration of courage. I don't think it's a coincidence that in half a dozen episodes, she's dumping his ass.

Neelix comes back to Tom and Chakotay, and admits only that they know he isn't the Grand Proxy. Yes, Neelix, know shame, your constant companion. While they try to think of a new plan, the bard comes back, singing badly for them. They also pull the eyepatch-on-the-wrong-eye bit in an attempt to put the most pathetic characters into one episode ever. However, Chakotay has the idea of hearing how the Song of the Sages ends so that maybe they can find a way to send the Ferengi back. As payment, he wants Chakotay's shoes. Erm, I'm starting to think I was wrong about the fetish remark earlier; this is starting to get more foot fetishism going than a Tarantino film.

Fortunately, this does at least bring us closer to resolution, and they decide it's time to complete the prophecy. Thus Neelix comes out and declares, "I am the Holy Pilgrim!" in a way that sounds less like a religious icon and more like a mascot. "I am the Holy Pilgrim, and with lightly-sugared shredded wheat, I'm part of this complete breakfast!" The people are soon riled up and the Ferengi soon come out onto the set, I mean, the village square, and argue that it's not time for them to go yet. However, Voyager does some stuff and the people see them as portents, and that it's time to send the sages back. Kafar -the abused toady- relishes this and takes the closing of the song literally (ascending to heaven on wings of fire) by preparing to burn the two Ferengi and Neelix at the stake. Oh, maybe this episode will have a happy ending after all.

Chakotay and Tom ask about what's preventing them from beaming out, and the Ferengi decide life is more valuable than the Monopoly money they have and tell them. Tom can't shut it down so Chakotay (ha! I actually had to fix this because this is so Janeway a move I actually typed her name by mistake) shoots the matter-antimatter generator with his phaser. So you have a device mixing matter and antimatter and decide to just blast it until it's broken... in what universe is this not a horribly, horribly bad idea? The whole damn village should be ascending on wings of fire after that move, or at least should receive a gamma burst Bruce Banner would envy.

Instead this works and they're all beamed up, along with the Ferengi shuttle, which Chakotay is good enough to tell the Ferengi so they'll know where it is. Chakotay passes them off to a security guard and tells him to put them in secure quarters. However, less than a minute later, the security guard is found with a concussion and the Ferengi have escaped. Oh come on... overcome by two Ferengi who haven't done a days work in at least seven years? They then override Tuvok's security and get into the shuttle bay and blast their way out. Is there no one in this episode who isn't totally humiliated or useless?

As bad as all that is, it manages to get even worse - really. The Ferengi have done this because they want to head back and beam up their Monopoly money, and Voyager is hell-bent on stopping them. The coming of the wormhole prevents a tractor beam from working, so Voyager tries beaming them back, but the targeting scanners are, of course, out of phase. Also, the Ferengi's shields are up, but that doesn't matter this episode as you can apparently beam through shields this week. Arridor figures if they're getting screwed by technobabble, they can use technobabble to get themselves out of it, so they use a graviton pulse to stop the transporter. This not only stops that, but it sucks the Ferengi into the wormhole while simultaneously destabilizing it so that it flies off, and now there's no way to use the ACME magnet to bring it back because the other end's now messed up too. You know what, after all the idiocy of this episode, they deserve it. Beam up whatever dignity you might have left and slink back to the alpha quadrant, losers.

Rating: 3

Stupid Neelix Moment: No contest, his chickening out in the vault. There he is, cowering in terror and spilling his guts faster than a Romero movie, and all to two Ferengi! How do you not just put a phaser to your own temple after that?

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