Changes: The Host (episode)

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A Trill ambassador is on-board to mediate a dispute, and falls in love with Dr. Crusher. When the Trill's host is killed, the symbiont has to be temporarily joined to Commander Riker to continue the negotiations – and the affair.

Summary

"Dr. Beverly Crusher, Personal log, stardate 44821.3. Began an analysis today of the respiratory problems being experienced on the beta moon of Peliar Zel . Finally got an actual letter from Wesley, topped the class in exobiology, but he's still struggling in ancient philosophies and... there's someone new in my life."

The USS Enterprise-D is en route to Peliar Zel to mediate a critical dispute between the Alpha and Beta moons. A Trill ambassador, Odan, is aboard to mediate the negotiations. He and Dr. Crusher have initiated a romance and quickly fallen in love. However, they keep it to themselves and when Data nearly walks in on them when they are kissing in the turbolift, they become a little nervous.

When the negotiations are to begin, Odan insists that he disembark to the planet only by shuttle, rather than by transporter, even though he is aware that many radical factions may try to block the negotiations by any means necessary. When the shuttle with Odan and Riker launches, it is attacked by an unknown ship from one of the moons, seriously injuring Odan. Riker barely gets back to the Enterprise in one piece.

When Odan is returned to the ship, Dr. Crusher and the medical staff learn that the Trill are a joined species, a symbiont and a host, and this was the reason why he did not want to be beamed to the surface – it would have killed the symbiont. Not even Dr. Crusher was aware what Odan really was. Odan's host body dies of the injuries, even though the symbiont being Odan is still alive. The Enterprise contacts the Trill and they say that they will send another host in 48 hours. However, as Dr. Crusher explains, the symbiont cannot survive long enough for the new host to arrive. Though no Human has ever hosted a Trill symbiont before, Riker volunteers to be a temporary host, both to save the Trill symbiont and continue with the mission.

On a personal level, Dr. Crusher feels confused and betrayed, since Odan still loves her, but the Odan Dr. Crusher loves now lives in Riker's body – a Riker she has known for many years as nothing but a good friend. She avoids his advances while he attempts to reconnect with her, even though the new Odan reiterates that even though his body has changed, he still loves her.

In a later conversation she has with Counselor Troi in Ten Forward, Dr. Crusher wonders what it was that she loved about Odan: his eyes, his hands, his mouth... but those things are all gone and if that is all there was, then she should mourn him and go on, but she knows that it was more than that for she felt completely free with him, unguarded, at ease with herself; there were so many things that made him special to her, and she wonders where they are; whether they are still here, alive in Will Riker. She simply has a hard time accepting him in this romantic capacity and asks Troi for advice. Deanna tells her about the first man she ever loved, her father, who was strong and tall and chased away the monsters from under her bed and sang to her and kept her safe. And he went away. What she wouldn't give to hear those songs again, and even though she never will, she still can feel his warmth and his love, as though he were there with her. So she tells Beverly that if she can feel those things from the man they know as Will Riker, she should accept that love and go to him. After this, Dr. Crusher finally reconciles her feelings and reunites with Odan in his quarters.

Despite increasing symptoms of rejection from Riker's body, Odan carries on, and manages to prevent an inter-planetary war by successfully mediating a settlement between the highly distrustful delegates from the two moons. Odan insists that he be removed from Riker regardless, if the new host has not arrived in time. Dr. Crusher removes the symbiont in time to save Riker, and the new host, Kareel, arrives just in time to accept the symbiont. This new host, however, is female, and so the love between Dr. Crusher and Odan comes to an insurmountable obstacle for Crusher. She confesses that she still loves Odan, but she is not accustomed to these kinds of changes. Maybe it is a Human failing, she states, but she simply "can't keep up" with them; she can't live with that kind of an uncertainty. She goes on to say that perhaps some day, Humankind's ability to love won't be so limited. Kareel Odan says that she understands and, kissing Crusher's hand one last time in the same way that she used to do, she affirms that she will never forget her.

Log entries

"Captain's log, stardate 44824.4. Governor Leka and the representatives of the two moons are ready to transport on board. We have learned that they each have troops massed and are ready for combat if this final effort at peace is not successful."

Background Information

The symbiotic species known as the Trill make their first appearance in this episode. They were later featured in more detail in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, though aside from the existence of the symbiont, the Trill featured in this episode share no resemblance to those of DS9 (physically or otherwise).
Unlike future hosts of Trill symbionts, Riker's personality appears to be completely gone while joined. This could be due to the fact that Riker is Human and not Trill. Trill must possess the mental pathways to maintain the personalities of both the host and the symbiont. As in the case of the Dax symbiont, all hosts in later Trek episodes not only maintain their own memories but also inherit the experience of past hosts. Trill hosts are also trained to resist being overwhelmed by the symbiont.
Curiously, Odan refuses to be transported in this episode, and Dr. Crusher affirms the notion that using a transporter would damage the Trill symbiont. This limitation is never touched upon again in any follow-up episode in Trek canon, as Jadzia, Ezri, and others use the transporter freely.
This episode shows the Enterprise barbershop also has a salon area.
This episode was the first Star Trek episode directed by Marvin V. Rush. Rush, a directory of photography on projects in and out of Star Trek, was instrumental in shooting the episode so Gates McFadden's late-term pregnancy was always hidden.
Jeri Taylor contributed significantly to the writing of the scene in Ten Forward where Troi advises Crusher to accept her feelings for Odan.
The graphic on Picard's monitor before he has his conversation with Odan is from "Night Terrors".
This is the only episode of TNG in which an officer on the bridge asks the computer what time it is.

Video and DVD releases

Original UK VHS release (two-episode tapes, CIC Video): Volume 49, 8 June 1992
UK re-release (three-episode tapes, Paramount Home Entertainment): Volume 4.8, 1 October 2001
As part of the TNG Season 4 DVD collection

Apocrypha

In the novel Forged in Fire, the radically different Trill appearance seen in this episode was a mutation caused when a Trill colony was visited by Klingons carrying the augment virus - however, the Trill saw no pressing need to "restore" their appearance as the Klingons did, and by the time of the story (2290 - 77 years before the episode) they had been accepted back into Trill society.

An earlier host of the Odan symbiont appears in Kristine Kathryn Rusch and Jill Sherwin's The Lives of Dax short story "First Steps".

Links and references

Starring

Also starring

LeVar Burton as Lieutenant Commander Geordi La Forge
Michael Dorn as Lieutenant Worf
Gates McFadden as Doctor Beverly Crusher
Marina Sirtis as Counselor Deanna Troi
Brent Spiner as Lieutenant Commander Data

Guest stars

Uncredited co-stars

Michael Braveheart as Martinez
Tracee Lee Cocco as Ensign Jae
Buddy Daniels Friedman as a Bolian barber
Robert Harper as Lathal Bine
Joyce Robinson as Ensign Gates

References

Alpha moon; Alphans; Ancient Philosophies; balso tonic; barbershop; Beta moon; Betans; Betan ship; Bolians; colgonite astringent; Crusher, Wesley; exobiology; global warming; governor; Hawking; laser scalpel; lemon tea; magnetospheric energy tap (magnetosphere); metrazene; Peliar system; Peliar Zel; Peliar Zel natives; five card draw; rose; shuttlecraft; soccer; Stefan; Taggert; transporter; Trill; Trill diagnostic tool; Trill transport; Troi, Ian Andrew

Previous episode:
"Half a Life"

Star Trek: The Next Generation
Season 4

Next episode:
"The Mind's Eye"

@@ Line 21: / Line 21: @@
 |         bFeatureLength = 0
 |         nSerialAirdate = 19910513
-|                 wsDate = 44821.3 ([[2367]])
+|                 wsDate = 44821.3-44824.4 ([[2367]])
 |     aNextReleasedInAll = The Mind's Eye (episode)
 |     aPrevReleasedInAll = Half a Life (episode)