Devil's Due (S04E13)
Airdate: 4 February 1991
Written by: Philip Lazebnik
Directed by: Tom Benko
Running Time: 46 minutes
For many of today’s ‘trekkies’, Star Trek: The Next Generation was their first and, for a long time, only Star Trek. The Original Series, with its brightly coloured uniforms and more theatrical style, often felt like a distant, somewhat quaint curio from a bygone televisual age. Yet, even relatively late in TNG’s run, the foundational DNA of Kirk and Spock’s adventures could not be entirely denied. A prime example is Season Four’s Devil’s Due, an episode whose concept originated with Gene Roddenberry in the early 1960s for TOS, was later developed for the unproduced Phase II series, and finally found its form three decades later. This lineage alone makes it a fascinating artefact, a bridge between the franchise’s two most iconic eras, though one that ultimately struggles to escape its derivative nature and the weight of its own contrivances.
The plot begins conventionally enough: the USS Enterprise-D responds to a distress signal from Ventax II, where a Federation science station is besieged by a panicked populace. The station’s head, Dr. Howard Clarke (Paul Lambert), explains the cause: a millennia-old Faustian bargain. The Ventaxians believe their long epoch of peace and prosperity was purchased from a powerful entity named Ardra, with the price being enslavement upon her return. Now, with geological tremors rocking the planet, the populace is convinced the time of reckoning has arrived. The episode efficiently establishes this premise, presenting Ventaxian society as an enlightened, pacifistic civilisation now paralysed by superstitious dread—a classic Star Trek setup where rationality must confront primal fear.
Captain Picard and Data meet with the Ventaxian leader, Acost Jared (Marcelo Turber), just as a striking woman (Martha Dubois) materialises, proclaiming herself Ardra. Through a series of demonstrations—triggering tremors, shape-shifting into a monstrous form—she asserts her claim. Jared, and seemingly his people, are swiftly convinced. Picard, embodying the series’ sceptical humanist core, remains deeply suspicious. This scepticism prompts Ardra to confront him on the Enterprise itself, where she amplifies her displays of power and even attempts a rather blunt seduction of the Captain. Martha Dubois, as Ardra, clearly relishes the role, and costume designer Robert Blackman outfits her in a suitably exotic, vaguely sinister ensemble that would not have been out of place in TOS. Her performance is a highlight, blending theatrical menace with a sly, playful arrogance.
Picard’s counter-strategy forms the episode’s legalistic core. Still unconvinced but adhering to Ventaxian law, he proposes formal arbitration to settle Ardra’s claim. Data, as a purportedly objective android, is appointed arbiter. This sets the stage for a courtroom drama, a staple of the franchise. The drama heightens when Ardra, interpreting her contractual rights literally, makes the Enterprise itself disappear—a clever trick meant to symbolise her taking possession of all assets in orbit. However, the resolution hinges not on Picard’s rhetorical prowess but on a technological deus ex machina. Chief Engineer La Forge, investigating at Clarke’s station, discovers anomalous energy readings that unravel the mystery: Ardra’s ‘powers’ are an elaborate hoax utilising a hidden spacecraft, holographic projectors, and inertial dampeners to simulate supernatural phenomena. Picard then turns the tables, using the same technology to stage ‘miracles’ of his own before Data, logically, rules against the imposter. Defeated, Ardra vanishes with a vague threat of a future encounter, a hollow promise never fulfilled.
Devil’s Due is seldom ranked among TNG’s great, or even particularly good, episodes, and there are substantive reasons for this. Firstly, it flirts uncomfortably with the supernatural. Although it ultimately employs Arthur C. Clarke’s famous adage—that any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic—the imagery, including Ardra briefly adopting a classic devilish visage, veers into fantasy. For some purists, this feels tonally inconsistent with the franchise’s science-fiction bedrock, a charge also levelled at the animated series’ The Magicks of Megas-Tu.
Secondly, the episode can be seen as a clumsy exploitation of fin-de-siècle anxiety. Aired in 1991, its depiction of a society crumbling over a prophesied apocalyptic reckoning resonated with contemporary fears, be they the approaching millennium, the Y2K bug, or broader cultural unease. The impressive matte painting of a chaotic, burning Ventaxian city serves as a potent stand-in for these apocalyptic anxieties, but the allegory feels somewhat unsubtle and dated.
The most damning criticism, however, is its overwhelming sense of familiarity. The episode feels like a lesser, pedestrian variation on the ‘omnipotent adversary’ trope perfected by Q. Writer Philip Lazebnik does acknowledge this within the script, having Picard briefly compare Ardra to Q before dismissing her as something different and less powerful. This meta-commentary, however, does not erase the derivative aftertaste. The resolution is particularly unsatisfying; Picard’s victory relies not on his intellectual or diplomatic skill, but on Geordi’s off-screen technical sleuthing. It is a solution handed to him, rather than earned by him, lacking the cathartic payoff of, say, outwitting a true Q.
Yet, taken on its own terms and divorced from the lofty standards of TNG’s golden age, Devil’s Due is a competently executed piece of television. Director Tom Benko maintains a steady pace, and the production values—from the Ventaxian sets to Ardra’s effects—are solid for a weekly series of the era. Martha Dubois’s performance is genuinely entertaining, a welcome burst of theatrical villainy. The core idea of using the legal protocols as a weapon against a fraudulent myth is a clever one, even if its execution is simplistic.
Ultimately, Devil’s Due is a passable, if deeply unremarkable, instalment of Star Trek. It functions as a historical footnote, showcasing a concept that outlived its original series. It provides a serviceable, moderately entertaining conflict with a clear moral about scepticism and the dangers of collective hysteria. However, its reliance on a tired narrative template, a contrived resolution, and its occasional tonal missteps prevent it from rising above the level of a curious, somewhat anachronistic diversion. It is the kind of episode one enjoys without admiration, a testament not to TNG at its ambitious best, but to its capacity for producing adequate, formulaic television when inspiration was in short supply.
RATING: 6/10 (++)
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