Line #29 Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS1E16WhenTheBoughBreaks


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/tng_whentheboughbreaks_hd_431.jpg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:"Come, child, and I shall tell you the 3,047th time I TeenGenius'd the ship out of certain disaster."]]
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4	'''Original air date:''' February 15, 1988
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6	The planet Aldea, formerly existing only in legend, uncloaks and requests help from the ''Enterprise''. Aldea's inhabitants are technologically advanced, but sterile, and want to adopt children from the ''Enterprise''. By force, if necessary. But the Aldeans are certain that sharing their advanced knowledge is a perfectly reasonable compensation for cradle-robbing! Naturally, Picard disagrees.
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8	Seven children chosen for their "special" potential, including Wesley, are beamed straight out of their classrooms and quarters. The rest of the episode concerns both their own and the ''Enterprise'''s efforts to convince the Aldeans that this really isn't a workable solution to their problems, honestly, and to subvert their technological advantage in the meantime.
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11	!!Tropes featured in "When the Bough Breaks":
12	* ApathyKilledTheCat: Wesley discovers that the Aldeans have no interest in learning how their own technology works or how to repair it.
13	* ArtisticLicenseBiology: It's actually a plot point in the following season's "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS2E18UpTheLongLadder Up the Long Ladder]]" that a population of only half a dozen people wouldn't have a prayer of forming a viable gene pool. Yet the Aldeans expect just seven children to be enough to repopulate the entire planet in the longer term. Presumably their ludicrously advanced technology has some solution.
14	* BlueAndOrangeMorality: The Aldeans seem genuinely bewildered as to why the ''Enterprise'' crew aren't happy with their terms. As far as they're concerned, it's simple -- the Federation will be getting valuable scientific and technological advances from them; surely a few kids are a fair price for that when they can always make more? And the kids are ''bound'' to get over their parents when they see the benefits of living on Aldea. They simply can't understand why either the parents or the kids would have a problem with that.
15	* BrokenSystemDogmatist: Dr. Crusher tries to explain that the shielding and machinery that they have used is what is poisoning their people and causing their culture to stagnate and die off. Radue does not believe her, claiming that their scientists would have told them of any problems ...except their scientists have basically forgotten how everything works on their planet, after centuries of neglect and apathy towards their predecessors' technology. When Rashella, his wife, tries to listen, Radue instead angrily cuts off the conversation and attempts to force the away team to transport back to the ship, only for his remote transporter to fail because of Riker and Data's tampering with the main shield controls. Eventually, Radue and the rest of the Aldeans are forced to realize that they are indeed being affected.
16	-->'''Rashella:''' Instead of the children being our hope, what if we're just condemning them to our fate?
17	-->'''Radue:''' Rashella, they're just protecting their own interests.
18	-->'''Rashella:''' As are we. But hear them out. The Captain and Doctor Crusher are saying that the very thing which has given us this wonderful world is what has caused this tragedy.
19	-->'''Picard:''' That's it. Exactly. [[EasilySwayedPopulation Your Custodian has controlled you so completely you've lost even the desire to even question it.]]
20	-->'''Radue:''' ''Lies! And the discussion is'' '''over!'''
21	* CondescendingCalmness: When Picard angrily contacts Radue about the children being abducted, he is shut down by Radue attempting instead trying to discuss payment for them.
22	-->'''Radue:''' ''[on viewscreen]'' Captain, your children are with us. My word of honor, no harm will ever come to them.\
23	'''Picard:''' Harm has already come to them.\
24	'''Radue:''' Captain, let us begin discussions regarding appropriate compensation.\
25	'''Picard:''' ''[quickly losing patience]'' Compensation?! You have stolen our children away from their classrooms, away from their bedrooms and you talk about compensation?! You claim to be a civilized world and yet you have just '''''committed an act of utter barbarity!'''''\
26	'''Radue:''' Captain, we will continue these discussions when you've calmed down. ''[He cuts communication]''
27	* DidntThinkThisThrough: The Aldeans staunchly insist that their sterility won't become a problem for the children, but they have no way of knowing that, and they end up being wrong.
28	* EasilyForgiven: Actually more of a show of character than a plot convenience. The crew had every right to leave in a huff once they got Wesley and the kids back. Instead, they get rid of the radiation leaving them infertile, giving them another chance to create a society, though likely also in the knowledge that this will give them no reason to try their child-snatching plan again in case any other spaceships happen by.
29	* EveryoneHatesMath: Harry Jr's reason for running from his father in the beginning of the episode is because he doesn't want to go to calculus class. Later, when the Aldeans begin abducting children, he's seen in the class (looking very bored) before he's abducted.
30	* EverybodyLaughsEnding: Played with. Wesley brings one of the children up to the bridge at the end so she can thank Picard for saving her. When she gives him a hug, her Tribble-esque stuffed animal sticks to his back, and the whole bridge crew has to smother their giggles as he orders the ''Enterprise'' out of orbit.
31	* ForgottenPhlebotinum: By the end of the episode, the crew of the ''Enterprise'' has access to and effective control over the Aldeans' technology, which they promise the Federation will help them learn to better understand. The incredible advances this should have reaped for the Federation itself never happen. Perhaps {{Justified\|Trope}} in the fact the Aldeans were not as advanced as they claimed and completely lacking in technical knowledge.
32	* FreezeFrameBonus: Dr. Crusher's rapidly flickering rejected diagnoses for the Aldeans' symptoms include everything from esoteric carcinogens to "bad personal hygiene."
33	* HiddenDepths: The purpose of assigning the kidnapped children to "units" is to cultivate their hidden talents.
34	* HumanityIsAdvanced: In the opening scene, Harry Jr. is running away from his father Doctor Harry Bernard Sr. because he doesn't want to go back to his class because he hates that teacher and he hates Calculus. According to the older Bernard, "Everyone needs an understanding of basic Calculus whether they want to or not." Harry Jr. is around 8 - 10 years old!
35	* HumansAreSpecial: A lesser example than usual, but Troi says that humans are "unusually attached" to their offspring. It's unclear whether Troi is serious or if she's diplomatically trying to stress how much the crew resents the loss of their children to an alien race who just don't seem to get it.
36	* ImNotHungry: Wesley convinces the children to go on a hunger strike to show they don't want to stay.
37	* InvasionOfTheBabySnatchers: A variation, as technically it's the ''Enterprise'' crew (and their families) who are the outsiders to the child-napping Aldeans.
38	* ModernStasis: The Aldeans have long since abandoned scientific study and rely entirely on the automated technological infrastructure built by their ancestors.
39	* MyGodWhatHaveIDone: When Harry is kidnapped, his father laments that the last time he saw his son, he was yelling at him for trying to skip math class. By the end, the two have clearly made up.
40	* RippedFromTheHeadlines: There's a reason why the Aldeans' problem is a deteriorating ozone layer in this episode from 1988.
41	* ScrewYouElves: Picard is incensed when the Aldeans suggest giving compensation for taking their children.
42	-->'''Picard:''' ''Compensation?'' You have stolen our children away from... away from their classrooms, away from their ''bedrooms,'' and you talk about compensation? You claim to be a civilized world, and yet you have just committed an act of ''[[SuddenlyShouting UTTER]] [[ChewingTheScenery BARBARITY!]]''
43	* SterilityPlague: What the Aldeans are suffering from. The fact that it's being caused by the depletion of their ozone layer means that the children they abduct would fall victim to this as well, making their repopulation efforts entirely futile.
44	* UsefulNotes/StockholmSyndrome: A few of the children are a bit reluctant to leave, especially when the Aldeans awaken their potential for artistic pursuits. As they soon realize though, this isn't quite enough to overcome missing their true families.
45	* TeleportInterdiction: The Aldeans have a planetary DeflectorShield that they can beam through, but the ''Enterprise'' cannot at first. After studying the shield they find a way to slip through it.
46	* TerminallyDependentSociety: The Aldeans have been reliant on their technology -- especially the Custodian supercomputer that provides for all their needs -- for so long that they have basically forgotten how everything works; all the super-advanced scientific knowledge of their ancestors has more or less been stored in a computer archive somewhere and forgotten about. Even the idea that something might, say, break down and need fixing never occurs to them. It's made more literally terminal by the fact that [[ToxicPhlebotinum their technology is actually slowly killing them]], a fact that they weren't able to figure out for themselves simply because they've lost the relevant knowledge, yet Dr. Crusher -- from the supposedly less-advanced Federation -- is able both to identify the problem and the necessary treatment in a matter of days.
47	* ToxicPhlebotinum: Turns out it's the Aldeans' DeflectorShield and [[InvisibilityCloak cloaking device]] that are causing all the trouble, degrading Aldea's ozone layer and exposing the inhabitants to ultraviolet radiation sickness. Beyond being sterile, they're quite close to death before Dr. Crusher is able to treat them and the ''Enterprise'' "reseeds" the ozone layer (somehow).

Context Recap / StarTrekTheNextGenerationS1E16WhenTheBoughBreaks