UNCUT REACTION - Star Trek TNG S2E10 - The Dauphin

It's funny that you call this episode forgettable. I couldn't remember anything about this episode and I've watched the show several times, although it's been at least 10 years since I saw season 2.

Always a very "meh" episode for me. I don't hate it, but I'm just not really interested in it. Wesley is 17 here(Wheaton 16), so I guess he comes across a little more clueless than he should, but as you said we've all been there at some point. Without a doubt the best scenes were Riker and Guinan flirting, and Worf's dating advice. Loved Guinan's "shut up kid", like it's the most action she's seen in years. Worf getting kind of lost in the moment was also pretty funny. Also the guy behind him is just doing his thing when Worf is screaming like it's just another day on the bridge. I do appreciate how Picard handled telling Wesley to stay away from Salia. He didn't chew him out or embarrass him, he just explained the situation professionally. Good leadership. Regarding Riker's claim that a terawatt is more energy than the Enterprise puts out, some have speculated that he was referring to the ship's communication alone, since later episodes give power generating stats several orders of magnitude above that.

I’ve always sentimentally loved this episode. Young love, looking back, is always ridiculous to our adult selves. But at the time, heartbreak is devastating. And monsters being a metaphor for puberty is common in SciFi and Fantasy.

“Dauphin,” the French word for “dolphin,” was the traditional title of the heir to the King of France. The feminine form of the word is “Dauphine,” and therefore fans sometimes complain that this episode should have been called “The Dauphine.” However, “Dauphine” was never used as a royal title in France because women could not succeed to the throne due to the so-called “Salic law.” In modern English, “Dauphin” is pronounced the same way as in French: “doe-fahn,” with equal stress on both syllables. In Shakespeare’s time, however, English people pronounced the word “DAW-fin,” like “dolphin” without the “l”. Modern Shakespearean performers tend to pronounce the word the French way so as not to sound ignorant of French, even though this prevents some lines from scanning properly, e.g. “And some are yet ungotten and unborn / That shall have cause to curse the Dauphin’s scorn” ("Henry V," Act I, Scene II). Salia’s planet is named Daled Four. “Daled” is the fourth letter of the Hebrew alphabet, so the planet’s name literally means “D Four.” According to IMDb, some fans have nicknamed the episode “Wesley Reaches Puberty,” but, given the name of the planet, I think an even more appropriate nickname would be the title of a 1994 TV movie: "Revenge of the Nerds IV: Nerds in Love." Jonathan Frakes and Whoopi Goldberg’s chemistry in the mock flirting scene is amazing. Wil Wheaton performed the first on-screen kiss of his career in this episode with Jaime Hubbard, who is ten years Wheaton’s senior. Hubbard would retire from acting six years later and is now a licensed psychotherapist. In later years, Wheaton would comment, “The first girl that Wesley fell in love with turned out to be a shape-shifter who turned into a hideous monster, y’know after he had exposed his soul to her. Which happened to me a lot in my personal life. And I was glad Star Trek was able to capture that parallel.” Actress Mädchen Amick, a runner-up for the role of Salia, plays Anya’s teenage girl form; she went on to great success two years later in a starring role on the surreal prime-time drama "Twin Peaks." Not much else to say about this one, except that it is much better than I remembered, and that, as you speculated, it would have benefited from a different placement in the season. Anya and Salia’s farewell scene is heartbreaking, especially considering that Salia will now be cut off from literally every single person she has ever met, but its emotional impact pales in comparison to the previous episode.

Wesley always stars in simple, sentimental, sincere stories. This was fine and I could see kids liking this.

Even though this ep may have not been everyone favorite you have to admit the writing is several notches above the firdtcseason

"Dauphin" is french for dolphin and was the title given to the heir to the throne back when France was a monarchy.

This is indeed an early morph effect... actually in the remastered this is a recreation of the early morph effect. These remastered shows really do try to preserve the look of the original FX.

On the original Lost In Space Jonathan Harris was on every episode except for the pilot and was always listed as special guest star. I suppose the billing has something to do with how much they get paid.

Alex I loved your mini rant about Muldaur :P

Guys, Muldaur was offered a spot in the main credits list and she declined. The *producers* listed her as a special guest star instead. That's a big difference from "she demanded a special credit."

Madchen Amick is 🔥 she still is at 40 something! I like to joke that Anya stayed behind to fuck Worf, hopefully as Madchen Amick. 😆

Wes had a few good episodes this one was meh

They try so very very hard to make a good Wesley episode. But there is an old Scottish saying....... You can't polish a turd...... and the episode is bad too. Okay not Scottish quoting the movie Christine but still

I bought some Fireball to join in because I knew this episode was coming. It's... I think overall I actually like it? But it gives me a headache. It's an odd one.

The old lady changeling acting like they couldn't just beam her into space if it need be (unless she somehow could disrupt transport).

So if the atmosphere of these planets is so dense that audio communications can barely get through, how is it a transporter beam with humanoid molecules can make it through?

Picard is supposed to be a french man. So it is quite embarassing that the french title of the episode is spelled wrong. "Le Dauphin" was the MALE heir of the throne when France was a monarchy. The female was called "La Dauphine". Just a letter is different, can't change much? Wrong again. Dauphin sounds like dough-fur. But Dauphine sounds like dough-finn. Fun fact: I learned this already in elementary school although I never learned french. Because the school was near Dauphine Road which was named after Queen Marie-Antoinette of France. The street had been built deliberateley for her and her entourage when she travelled through the town from Vienna to her wedding in Paris. So she was the Daupine then. Even my hometown spelled it wrong on the street signs for decades. Just like Star Trek

This episode is like a 6 at best. I completely forgot Madchen Amick was in this episode though so that makes it an immediate 10/10 for me. (Twin Peaks is awesome by the way).

Just thinking out loud here, don't mind me^^ ... Data says that one side of Daled IV is constantly dark, the other is constantly light. So it makes sense that Salia's true form is this light being. I can imagine both that these beings either live on the light side or live on the dark side and thus illuminating it - which creates a beautiful picture in my mind. The whole shapeshifter-thing is unnecessary. It would have been more interesting to give these two cultures that live in such contrasting environments specific properties (light beings .. and whatever makes sense for the others ... perhaps something as simple as shadow beings). And then show more of the challenge why it is difficult for them to actually live together or rather why there's war. Perhaps the beings on the dark side used to be light beings, too, but since they have to live on the dark side of the planet their light is defunct and they're fighting to live on the light side again. Kinda interesting to think about what that world might look like.

....and there's the Happy Ending!

"Do not be fooled by her looks. The body is just a shell." -Worf That was nice forshadowing

41:50 "It is mushroom flavored!!"

40:32 Oh gee, I totally forgot about the "I loved you!" "I love you too!" part... ugh

They are supposedly allasomorphs.

Hoo boy, here we go. A whole lot of what we like to call filler. This is one of those episodes. The only scene I really care for is Worf and Wesley, and the natural charisma between Guinan and Riker is great.

Re: actor title cards. There are whole lawsuits over such things. I know from podcasts that some Voyager actors would get annoyed if their title card was on a part of the opening credits not sufficiently pretty.

A fun episode..not the highs of “The Measure of a Man” but not the magma that is “Code of Honor”. It wouldn’t be nearly as watchable if I didn’t like Will Wheaton.

Qapla'