History Recap / StarTrekTheNextGenerationS1E3CodeOfHonor

* ExactWords: The fight was "to the death". Not necessarily to the permadeath. Yay for Crusher, she class upped to Necromancer.
* LargeHam: Lutan. On a planet where everyone is at least a little hammy, Lutan is clearly the king.

* PunctuatedForEmphasis: Lutan's announcement that Picard shall have no treaty! No vaccine! And no Lt. Yar!

->'''Picard:''' By our standard, the customs here - their [[TitleDrop code of honor]] - is the same kind of pompous, strutting charade that endangered our own species a few centuries ago. We evolved out of it because no one tried to impose their own set of... I'm sorry, this is becoming a speech.
->'''Troi:''' You're the Captain, sir. You're entitled.
->'''Picard:''' Hmm, I'm not entitled to ramble on about something everyone knows. Carry on.

* CreatorBacklash: Several of the cast members have expressed regret over the episode, particularly regarding the DarkestAfrica aliens. Wil Wheaton has said this can be blamed entirely on the original director, who was such a horrible racist that he quickly got replaced.

* InformedAbility: Lutan goes on and on about honor, but he kidnaps a foreign dignitary, holds her hostage, wants to force her into marriage, and the only reason the other side puts up with his crap is because he's got something the other side wants that can save millions of lives, and they're at least nominally not the kind to engage in plunder on an inhabited planet even though the Enterprise ''alone'' may be more powerful than his entire civilization. He's little more than a bully and only gets by because the other side has honor, and not a warrior code kind of honor. If he tried to pull this crap with the Romulans, Cardassians, or Klingons, he's either be assassinated and replaced with someone more pliable, or they would have his head chopped off with a bat'leth and his people conquered.

* CreatorBacklash: Several of the cast members have expressed regret over the episode, particularly regarding the DarkestAfrica aliens. Wil Wheaton has said this can be placed entirely at the original director, who was such a horrible racist that he quickly got replaced.

* InformedAbility: Lutan goes on and on about honor, but he kidnaps a foreign dignitary, holds her hostage, wants to force her into marriage, and the only reason the other side puts up with his crap is because he's got something the other side want that can save millions of lives, and they're at least nominally not the kind to engage in plunder on an inhabited planet even though the Enterprise ''alone'' may be more powerful than his entire civilization. He's little more than a bully and only gets by because the other side has honor, and not a warrior code kind of honor. If he tried to pull this crap with the Romulans, Cardassians, or Klingons, he's either be assassinated and replaced with someone more pliable, or they would have his head chopped off with a bat'leth and his people conquered.

* HonourBeforeReason: Picard's lipservice why he can't simply beam Tasha back up and tell Lutan to go screw himself, since it isn't the way that they do things?! Considering that Lutan ''already'' provided him with the vaccine near the beginning of the episode and it's never said they can't replicate it, Picard really has ''no'' reason to play nice with these yahoos!
** Actually, Dr. Crusher does state in a blink-and-you'll miss it that the vaccine becomes unstable when replicated, though why they don't try to fix that aspect of the vaccine is still unexplained.

* SoBadItsHorrible: SciFiDebris gave it a 0/10 for a reason. Aside from the blatant racism and dirt-cheap production values, the episode manages to lose any semblance of direness when Tasha's opponent is revealed: on a world where everything is either black or brown, she is inexplicably sporting a sparkly hot pink AmericanGladiators leotard, complete with matching headband. Then they revealed that the fight will take place on poles (because we couldn't wait until the next episode for sexism) that look akin to a jungle gym, and their weapon of choice? Why, clunky bronze crab claws with spikes on them of course! The logical error of how Lutan is powerful despite all of his clout coming from his wife's family's money is never addressed. Or why it is negotiations are going on at all with the lowtech world, Prime Directive be damned. This would have made a bad TOS episode. As a TNG episode, it is flat-out awful.

* ExactWords: The fight was "to the death". Not neccessarily to the permadeath. Yay for Crusher.

* RecycledScript: Katharyn Powers, the writer of this episode would later reuse this story for the third episode of ''StargateSG1''. Somehow it ended up being even ''worse''.

* UnfortunateImplications: The only all-black planet in Trek is full of violent savages, and lead by a man who kidnaps Yar to force her to marry him. Err... oops? Website/SFDebris' review goes into the full details of the complete racefail of this episode (which he awarded a score of 0 out of 10, entirely for this reason).
** Repeatedly mentioned is that the culture of Ligon is similar to a great culture of Earth's history. The obvious answer would be the Nubians, and Lutan is given an artifact from the Song dynasty. So are they like the Nubians (historical Western opinion: pretty good for barbarians) or the Song dynasty (we're going to admire their art and not admit they might have been better at a few things, like gunpower and compasses).
** Wil Wheaton has stated that the blame for this can be laid entirely at the feet of the episode's original director. The script was very vague about what the aliens should look like, and he insisted they be a race of [[ScaryBlackMan Scary Black Men]]. He didn't last much longer before being fired, since everyone quickly grew uncomfortable with his blatantly racist behavior.

** Wil Wheaton has stated that the blame for this can be laid entirely at the feet of the episode's original director. The script was very vague about what the aliens should look like, and he insisted they be a race of {{Scary Black Men}}. He didn't last much longer before being fired, since everyone quickly grew uncomfortable with his blatantly racist behavior.

** Repeatedly mentioned is that the culture of Ligon is similar to a great culture of Earth's history. The obvious answer would be the Nubians, and Lutan is given an artifact from the Song dynasty. So are they like the Nubians (historical Western opinion: pretty good for barbarians) or the Song dynasty (we're going to admire their art and not admit they might have been better at a few things, like gunpower and compasses)

* InformedAbility: Lutan goes on and on about honor, but he kidnaps a foreign dignitary, holds her hostage, wants to force her into marriage, and the only reason the other side puts up with his crap is because he's effectively he'/s got something they want that can save millions of lives, and they're at least nominally not the kind to engage in plunder on an inhabited planet even though the Enterprise ''alone'' may be more powerful than his entire civilization. He's little more than a bully and only gets by because the other side has honor, and not a warrior code kind of honor. If he tried to pull this crap with the Romulans, Cardassians, or Klingons, he's either be assassinated and replaced with someone more pliable, or there would be a smoking hole in the ground where his palace used to be.

* InformedAbility: Lutan goes on and on about honor, but he kidnaps a foreign dignitary, holds her hostage, wants to force her into marriage, and the only reason the other side puts up with his crap is because he's effectively he'/s got something they want that can save millions of lives, and they're at least nominally not the kind to engage in plunder on an inhabited planet even though the Enterprise ''alone'' may be more powerful than his entire civilization.

* UnfortunateImplications: The only all-black planet in Trek is full of violent savages, and lead by a man who kidnaps Yar to force her to marry him. Err... oops? SFDebris' review goes into the full details of the complete racefail of this episode (which he awarded a score of 0 out of 10, entirely for this reason).

* UnfortunateImplications: The only all-black planet in Trek is full of violent savages, and lead by a man who kidnaps Yar to force her to marry him. Err... oops? SFDebris' review goes into the full details of the complete racefail of this episode (which he awarded a score of 0 out of 10, entirely for this reason).

* UnfortunateImplications: The only all-black in Trek is full of violent savages, and lead by a man who kidnaps Yar to force her to marry him. Err... oops? SFDebris' review goes into the full details of the complete racefail of this episode.

* BackFromTheDead: Yar's opponent is killed in combat, beamed aboard the ''Enterprise'' and resuscitated, allowing her to divorce her husband and choose a new mate. Talk about your all-time backfires.

Lt. Yar is abducted by the leader of a people who abide by a strict code of honor, which requires her participation in a fight to the death.