[Nate the Great]

The Fiver

Riker: Admiral, I'd like to find the people who killed Captain Picard.
Chekote: I understand. I'm sure finding them will help you deal with your grief.
Riker: Grief? I'm in command of the Enterprise because of them, I'd like to buy them a drink!

Root beer, I presume. It's so cloying and bubbly and happy...

Geordi: It's strange. These artifacts look like they've been scooped off the face of the planet.
Riker: Wait, so the Borg did this? I thought we'd laid to rest the Locutus storyline.

In your dreams, Will.

Baran: What should we do with the Starfleet officer?
Narik and Vekor: Burn him!
Baran: And what do we burn apart from Starfleet officers?
Galen: More Starfleet officers!
Baran: Suddenly I am overcome by a very strange sense of irony.

This Monty Python joke needed a little more meat to it...

Narik: Aah! The ship's just kicked into overdrive! It's going to explode!
Galen: The computer seems to be infected by an Iconian virus like that one time on the Enterprise.

It seems to me that a "11001001" reference would be funnier, but whatever...

Tallera: What's your malfunction? Why are you opposing Baran?
Galen: I'm just trying to prove that I can be a shady, amoral mercenary.
Tallera: Don't give me that. I know you're just a Mary Jayne.

I'm missing some references here...

Baran: So now what are you going to do?
Riker: I saw this in a movie once. We get the command codes for the ship and tell it to lower its shields!
Baran: Sounds like a pretty stupid movie.
Tallera: It was. I much preferred the two after it.

I know this is a Generations joke, but the Wrath of Khan interpretation is also interesting when you think about it...

Memory Alpha

* Gene was adamantly against space pirates, it goes back to the series bible. Rick Berman jokingly blindfolded the bust of Gene on his desk when talking about this episode. My immediate rejoinder is that there are few plots that wouldn't work with the right writing, but unfortunately this episode does not have good writing. I remember when SF Debris complained that Gorta back in "Firstborn" had more personality in ONE SCENE than these pirates had in TWO EPISODES.
* Shankar's problem with the episode is that nobody will buy that the Captain is really dead, so we're just killing time until the Captain comes back. I agree, if we wanted to do this story it really needed three episodes and Picard wouldn't have appeared until the end of the first one to provide the cliffhanger.
* The bridge of the marauder ship is a redress of the battle bridge. Which surprised me, I thought the battle bridge was converted into other sets after "Best of Both Worlds".
* The TNG Companion speculates that Picard may have chosen "Galen" to honor his old professor. My immediate rejoinder is whether or not the TNG Companion can provide any alternate hypothesis. I mean, I want to scream "DUH!" in the Companion's proverbial face.

Nitpicker's Guide

* Phil is shocked that Data would lecture Riker about the whole "captain's place is on the Bridge" thing, then lead an away mission himself when he becomes acting captain.
* Back in "Chain of Command" when Data became acting First Officer he changed to a red uniform, but he doesn't when it happens again here. I would argue that in this episode it was explicitly temporary (Data would've asked for a replacement captain after this mission) while in "Chain of Command" it was a bit more permanent.
* Phasers don't work at warp, yet Data tries to lock phasers at warp. Oops.