Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra! The Most Annoying Aliens in the Universe
Having grown up with the REAL Star Trek (well at least the re-runs in the 70s) I always viewed Star Trek: The Next Generation as a bit of a dodgy scam designed as a fundraising scheme for Paramount. Although like some sad junkie I found myself watching pretty much every damn episode! And being in the tech scene I’ve discovered like attracts like, and much to my horror a mention of the Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra! episode always seems to rear its ugly head.
Above: The episode has been immortalized in filksongs!
Unlike the original Star Trek series which resorted to reusing backlot sets to revisit the Romans or Great depression, the Star Trek: TNG writers would often take the lamest premise and extract an entire episode out of it. Usually this would take the form of a bad holodeck experience, but with the Darmok the writers started getting into Monty Python territory without being aware of it.
Above: Here’s a video of the actual episode with that pathetic tea drinking excuse of a Starfleet officer! Were it James T. Kirk he would have solved the language barrier with his fists like a real commander…
The result is the most unintentionally annoying set of aliens I can think of in the history of science fiction that I can think of. And making matters worse these aliens even goofy to match their obsession with folklore. Yet that said “being the best at something” pays off sometimes, and the fact that these aliens ares so irritating has made them haunt my cranium all these years later, which is a bit of an achievement.