History Recap / StarTrekTheNextGenerationS6E6TrueQ

[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/tng_trueq152.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:350:This one is kind of a precursor to the ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'' episodes that delve a little further into the whole Q Continuum. Easy there, Q; you usually [[HoYay only get that close to Picard.]]]]

-->"With unlimited power comes responsibility."

* {{Foreshadowing}}: Picard recalls Q put humanity on trial in "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS1E1EncounterAtFarpoint Encounter At Farpoint]]". Q states, "The jury is still out on that." A few years later, the trial continues in the SeriesFinale, "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS7E24AllGoodThings All Good Things...]]"

* IJustWantToBeNormal

[floatboxright:
Series:Series/{{Star Trek The Next Generation}}\\
Episode: Season 6, Episode 6\\
Title:"True Q"\\
Previous: Schisms\\
Next: Rascals\\
Recapper: Grev]

* {{Foreshadowing}}: Picard recalls Q put humanity on trial in ''[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS1E1EncounterAtFarpoint Encounter At Farpoint]]''. Q states, "The jury is still out on that." A few years later, the trial continues in the SeriesFinale, ''[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS7E24AllGoodThings All Good Things...]]

* ShoutOut: The freak tornado incident in Kansas might possibly one to ''Literature/TheWonderfulWizardOfOz''.

* MeaningfulLook: Q gets a nice one when he talks about how he normally wouldn't care about Amanda or the crew but...

* WhatMeasureIsANonHuman: Inverted by Q, per usual. He's particularly disgusted that Amanda's parents conceived a child "and in vulgar human fashion became attached to it."

Incidentally, the story idea came from a 17-year-old AscendedFanboy; thus, the slightly Sue-ish qualities of Amanda Rogers and the utter lack of her in any other canon.

Cue Tagra IV blowing up. Q says he didn't do it, nobody saw him do it, you can't prove anything...but he might have had a hunch. Needless to say, Amanda uses her newfound powers and saves the day. More than, in fact: she completely restores Tagra IV's ecosystem to peak condition. One crisis averted, another so very, very not. Q says he knew she would do it, and now she ''has'' to come with her, or else *splercht*. Amanda decides to accept her new status as a Q and go with them. And so, with a heart-felt goodbye to Dr. Crusher and her foster parents, Q whisks her away to the Continuum.

A young intern named Amanda Rogers boards the Enterprise while they're trying to alleviate the ecological woes of Tagra IV, as, surprisingly, Al Gore had not yet visited that planet. As Riker leads her to her quarters, she wishes her three puppies were here as she makes puppy-dog eyes at the Commander...and when Riker leaves, three puppies appear!

The next day, we get more of Amanda's backstory: She's an orphan, her parents having been killed in an accident when she was young. Then, when she goes to the cargo bay, she sees a container fall right at Riker's head! But she moves her hand and the thing just barely misses him. Then after [[TechnoBabble Techno Babbling]] a few solutions for Tagra IV's environmental troubles, the warp core breaches unexpectedly, as warp cores are wont to do. As the core explodes, Amanda comes in to save the day! But how?

Dr. Crusher convinces Amanda to talk to Q again, in that motherly way she never used with Wesley. Amanda doesn't want anyone on board to treat her any differently from any other member of the crew now that she's a Q, just like any other omnipotent being would want. Q takes a more conversational tack, telling her that the Q are indeed omnipotent, and she can do anything she wants...like see her actual parents again. But, that's boring. How about using her Q powers to speed up this experiment that Dr. Crusher wants her to perform, 'cuz that's boring, too! As she's doing it, she's distracted by that bearded hunk of a man Riker, and thus ruins the experiment. When Crusher complains, Q calls her a mutt for wasting Amanda's time with trivialities...then turns her into one. [[BuffySpeak A dog, I mean.]] Amanda, chagrined, turns her back. Q, obviously, liked her better as a dog.

Once again trying to alleviate her concerns, Q gives Amanda teleportation tips, by playing Hide and Seek, where Q limits himself to "Anywhere on the Enterprise". It takes Amanda awhile to figure out that he means that literally, and finally finds him on the outside hull, as naturally, Q don't need to breathe. But they can make sound in space. Meanwhile, Data informs Picard that Amanda's parents were killed by a Suspiciously Specific Tornado, one that shouldn't have happened thanks to the Federation's all powerful weather control machine. It suddenly appeared over the Rogers home, demolished just that one building, and then vanished.

Later, Amanda's eating lunch in Ten-Forward when he sees that awesomely-built trombone-playing hunk Riker again, but he's eating with someone else instead of her. Then she realizes she's a fricking omnipotent being and, despite Crusher and Troi's warnings, whisks herself and Riker to a gazebo, the most romantic thing in Amanda's universe. Unfortunately, this does nothing to woo Riker...until she realizes she's a fricking omnipotent being and makes him love her, literally. But, of course, the artificial love proves...artificial...and Amanda puts him back the way he was. Good thing, too, 'cuz I hear the age of consent around Tagra IV is 19 (not that that would have stopped [[DawsonCasting Amanda's actress]] at all...)

Meantime, Q is summoned to Picard's ready room (because even fricking omnipotent beings can't escape the BaldOfAwesome), where Picard berates him from hiding the truth from Amanda. Q, blinded by the shine, admits that the Suspiciously Specific Tornado was the Q's doing. They allowed those two to live like humans in all ways except the one they could not tolerate: The abominably disgusting act of human procreation. They let Amanda survive because she was deemed an innocent in all this, but now Q must determine if she's fully Q or some sort of human/Q hybrid (since apparently the mere act of human procreation injects human DNA into a being). If she's not fully Q, she's fully dead.

On Tagra IV, Geordi, Riker, and the Tagrans have whipped up some TechnoBabble that might work in their situation (while, on Bill Clinton's campaign bus, Al Gore is taking notes), and are going down to fix everything, just as Picard tells Amanda that the Q might have to kill her. She, being a strikingly old-looking 17-year-old girl, proceeds to throw a Q-sized tantrum...until Q shows up and says the Q are willing to make a deal: She can live as a human; however, she can never again use her powers. She immediately chooses to live as a Human.

Cue Tagra IV blowing up. Q says he didn't do it, nobody saw him do it, you can't prove anything...but he might have had a hunch. Needless to say, she uses her newfound powers and saves the day. More than, in fact: she completely restores Tagra IV's ecosystem to peak condition. (Al Gore makes a NoteToSelf to find himself a Q one day.) One crisis averted, another so very, very not. Q says he knew she would do it, and now she ''has'' to come with her, or else *splercht*. Amanda decides to accept her new status as a Q and go with them. And so, with a heart-felt goodbye to Dr. Crusher and her foster parents, Q whisks her away to the Continuum, where she will be completely forgotten about by every Q alive when Q shags Suzie Q to make little q a few years later.

Once again trying to alleviate her concerns, Q gives Amanda teleportation tips, by playing Hide and Seek, where Q limits himself to "Anywhere on the Enterprise". It takes Amanda awhile to figure out that he means that literally, and finally finds him on the outside hull, as naturally, Q don't need to breathe. But they can make sound in space. Meanwhile, Data informs Picard that Amanda's parents were killed by a Suspiciously Specific Tornado, one that shouldn't have happened thanks to the Federation's all powerful weather control machine.

Series:Main/{{Star Trek The Next Generation}}\\

Dr. Crusher convinces Amanda to talk to Q again, in that motherly way she never used with Wesley. Amanda doesn't want anyone on board to treat her any differently from any other member of the crew now that she's a Q, just like any other omnipotent being would want. Q takes a more conversational tack, telling her that the Q are indeed omnipotent, and she can do anything she wants...like see her actual parents again. But, that's boring. How about using her Q powers to speed up this experiment that Dr. Crusher wants her to perform, 'cuz that's boring, too! As she's doing it, she's distracted by that bearded hunk of a man Riker, and thus ruins the experiment. When Crusher complains, Q calls her a mutt for wasting Amanda's time with trivialities...then turns her into one. Amanda, chagrined, turns her back. Q, obviously, liked her better as a dog.

An young intern named Amanda Rogers boards the Enterprise while they're trying to alleviate the ecological woes of Tagra IV, as, surprisingly, Al Gore had not yet visited that planet. As Riker leads her to her quarters, she wishes her three puppies were here as she makes puppy-dog eyes at the Commander...and when Riker leaves, three puppies appear!

Cue Tagra IV blowing up. Q says he didn't do it, nobody saw him do it, you can't prove anything...but he might have had a hunch. Needless to say, she uses her newfound powers and saves the day. More than, in fact: she completely restores Tagra IV's ecosystem to peak condition. (Al Gore makes a NoteToSelf to find himself a Q one day.) One crisis averted, another so very, very not. Q says he knew she would do it, and now she ''has'' to come with her, or else *splercht*. Amanda decides to accept her new status as a Q and go with them. And so, with a heart-felt goodbye to Dr. Crusher and her foster parents, Q whisks her away to the Continuum, where she will be completely forgotten about by every Q alive when Q shags Q to make little q a few years later.

The next day, we get more of Amanda's backstory: She's an orphan, her parents having been killed in an accident when she was young. Then, when she goes to the cargo bay, she sees a container fall right at Riker's head! But she moves her hand and the thing just barely misses him. Then after TechnoBabbling a few solutions for Tagra IV's environmental troubles, the warp core breaches unexpectedly, as warp cores are wont to do. As the core explodes, Amanda comes in to save the day! But how?