Lonely Among Us
"Lonely Among Us" is the seventh episode of the American science fiction television series Star Trek: The Next Generation, which originally aired on November 2, 1987, in broadcast syndication in the United States.
In this episode, as the ship is en route to an interplanetary conference with delegates from the Selay and Antican races on board, a non-corporeal alien entity takes possession of various Enterprise crew members, including Captain Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart).
Unseen by the crew, Lt. Worf (Michael Dorn) is hit with a strange energy discharge as the ship passes the cloud, causing him to become violent.
Doctor Beverly Crusher (Gates McFadden) sedates Worf and brings him to the sickbay, but is also infused with the energy as she examines his body.
The ship suddenly begins to malfunction and Captain Picard sends Assistant Engineer Singh (Kavi Raz) to investigate the cause.
Singh is later found dead near a computer link, and Picard orders a murder investigation, considering the alien delegates to be prime suspects.
Meanwhile, Counselor Deanna Troi (Marina Sirtis) uses hypnosis on both Worf and Crusher, finding that both recall being invaded by some entity during their blackouts.
The ship suddenly drops again out of warp, and as Picard investigates the readouts at a bridge console, the strange energy transfers into him.
The original story by Michael Halperin contained a different subplot involving a problem with the dilithium in the warp drive of the Enterprise.
Another Deep Space Nine actor who made his first Trek appearance in this episode was Marc Alaimo, who played an Antican who was unnamed on screen, but referred to in the script as Badar N'D'D.
[3] Kavi Raz played Assistant Engineer Singh, although as he was unavailable for a re-shoot, in one scene he was replaced by a wig on a chair.
[8] Following the broadcast, the producers received a significant amount of mail from fans criticising the apparent cannibalism on the part of the Anticans in this episode.
[3] James Hunt thought that Spiner's Sherlock impression was "completely brilliant",[9] in his review for Den of Geek in October 2012.
He thought that the episode shared some similarities with the third season of The Original Series, saying, "By which I mean it looks cheap and appears to have been written by a child, in yellow crayon.
He too thought that the alien delegation subplot was poorly executed in a comedic fashion, and said that this "combined with the slow pace and a number of dialog scenes that can be charitably described as 'character development' (or more accurately as 'padding'), this is an unmemorable episode that shows a series still unsure of its greatest strengths."
[15] This included the first season episode "Lonely Among Us", and the box set has a total runtime of 638 minutes across multiple 12-inch optical video discs.
