Star Trek: The Next Generation (TV Series) A Matter of Time (1991) User Reviews

Enjoyable.

[planktonrules · 8/10 · 22 November 2014]

The Enterprise is dealing with a planet undergoing global cooling--a popular theory that was popularized by many of the folks who later popularized global warming. The ship is trying to figure out a way to reverse the cooling--when out of nowhere, a weirdo researcher who identifies himself as coming from the future arrives on the ship. He butters up the crew and tells them that he's here to see THE Enterprise --the one that is such importance to the history of the Federation. The Captain seems to accept this very readily and allows the guy to stay aboard and observe this mission. He also allows the guy to administer questionnaires to the crew and ask them questions. Unfortunately, changing the planet's climate is not easy--and the Captain is worried he'll destroy it in the process. And, unfortunately, this researcher is NOT exactly who he claims to be.

Matt Frewer was a good choice to play the time traveler, as he has had a long history of playing goofy characters---and this one is rather goofy. All in all, the show is inconsequential but also enjoyable-- with a nice ending.

Entertaining with flaws

[shiny_bubble · 6/10 · 1 September 2019]

This was an entertaining episode, but I did have some issues with it.

I think Picard was way too welcoming of the time traveler. He allowed him too much access without knowing for sure if he was who he said he was. Also he asked the crew to "extend him every courtesy", even though the time traveler's condescending, demanding, in-courteous attitude, made him undeserving of any courtesy. Seeing this run rough-shod over the crew without much resistance took some of the enjoyment away from this episode.

Another issue I had was Picard's decision to risk the entire population of the planet (in the many millions), to save the lives of thousands. Unless the odds of destroying the planet were astronomically low (which I don't think they mentioned one way or another), I think this is a bad decision. How can you risk the lives of so many to save so few? If the planet ended being destroyed imagine the guilt Picard would have lived with. I think the planet should have ended up being destroyed which would have exposed what a terrible decision Picard made. But maybe that should be a theme for a different episode.

Overall, this episode was about this character who was condescending and obnoxious to the crew, and as the viewer, you couldn't wait to see him get his comeuppance. His comeuppance finally came with a very satisfying line by Data who was held captive in the time traveler's shuttle (until it was realized that stolen phaser he had been threatening Data with had been deactivated): "I believe the door to your shuttle can be opened from your fingerprints whether you are conscious or not".

A Sillier, Filler Episode That Stays With You

[frankelee · 6/10 · 17 September 2020]

Max Headroom comes aboard the Enterprise as a time traveler from 200-300 years in the future to watch as they attempt to save a colony world from destruction. Matt Frewer chews the scenery around the Enterprise, not as a mustache twirling villain, but as an unbelievably annoying cad. Without spoiling anything, you know something's got to be wrong with this guy within seconds. That unsubtle approach makes this episode clearly marked out as a light-hearted one, even though a planet faces total destruction, you're not supposed to take things too seriously here.

Still it's an episode I remember watching the first time, way back when it aired on an actual broadcast, likely thanks to Frewer's ridiculous professor and the somewhat interesting twist at the end.

An episode on time.

[russem31 · 25 April 2006]

ST:TNG:109 - "A Matter Of Time" (Stardate: 45349.1) - this is the 9th episode of the 5th season of Star Trek: The Next Generation.

As the Enterprise heads toward Penthara IV where an asteroid collision occurred that created a dangerous dust cloud threatening the inhabited planet, a mysterious stranger named professor Berlingoff Rasmussen (played by Matt Frewer - "Max Headroom" himself) suddenly appears on the bridge of the Enterprise. And he says he's a future historian from the late 26th century!

As the crew struggles to save the planet, Picard and crew are skeptical about Rasmussen's claim that he's from the future. And of course things are never what they seem in Star Trek!

Trivia note: Rasmussen notes that Data is the "Model T" of androids, with Data correcting him that he's actually the "Model A" since he was built second after Lore! Worf also notes there were no phasers in the 22nd century, with Riker noting that warp coils weren't invented yet. Picard recalls Khan Singh, and, Data is listening to 4 music cues at once!

Had potential but overall just meh...

[stevenjlowe82 · 6/10 · 3 June 2023]

This episode always struck me as odd overall. Obviously the time travelling dude wasn't who he appeared to be I kinda got that from the off. I was then kind of intrigued by who or what he was and then what were his true motivations for boarding the Enterprise. I say kind of as personally I didn't like the character and his performance came across like a pound/dollar store interpretation of Q with none of the charisma.

Alas when we got to the end of the episode it was somewhat of a let down imo, just a con man really which I guess I should have seen coming. What bothered me also was how accommodating some of the crew, well Picard & Crusher mainly were towards him. Welcoming him on board and giving him free access to roam around the ship no questions asked. They seemed to buy into his story a little to easily imo. All except Troi but this was never really followed up. They had one interaction where you could tell Troi wasn't buying what he was selling and that was it. I would liked to have seen Troi push his buttons more and look into his story, he was clearly uncomfortable around her. The writers constant inconsistency with her character has always really bothered me.

Time travel plus reading historical records makes for plausibility

[mikepaul-3 · 9/10 · 5 April 2011]

This was on TV the other day, and while it's been a while since the 2008 review knocking the script, I'd like to take a moment to explain how it would work.

1) Steal a ship from the distant future.

2) Go through its records, looking for something interesting, and stumble across the stories related to the USS Enterprise. The computer on that ship would be far better than anything the Enterprise had so there'd be far more capacity in a far smaller space.

3) Select an adventure of theirs that worked out OK but had no record of you being involved since that was a different time-line, and decide to get involved so you can steal technology that is more relevant to where you came from than the stuff you stole already. After all, there must be a reason that the ship you stole can't provide schematics on building items from the past (or just replicate them) like if they were banned when peace broke out everywhere.

4) Study up enough on All Things Enterprise so that it'd seem like you were looking back at the crew from the future, and when ready, go to that time. This lets you know things like how Data is an android.

5) Screw up badly enough to lose your ship, but not enough to screw up what the Enterprise crew was supposed to do. Lack of a future report from this time-line, detailing how you screwed up, ends up being a bad deal for you.

6) While sitting in whatever prison-like structure you end up in, think about yourself in another time-line, reading (if you are lucky enough to hit the related time-line) passages about your failure from the newly-created time-line's distant future and deciding that perhaps another adventure would be better to meddle in...

A guest from another time

[Tweekums · 7/10 · 27 June 2015]

On the way to help the people of Penthara IV deal with a global cooling crisis The Enterprise notices a small temporal distortion shortly before encountering a small one man ship. Its pilot comes aboard and identifies himself as Professor Berlingoff Rasmussen; an historian from the 26th Century. Picard accepts his claim and allows him to talk to the crew and give the crew questionnaires to fill in. He is fascinated with everything he sees; commenting on things that were of particular historical interest. While he is very keen to ask questions he refuses to answer any claiming any knowledge of the future could change it. Counsellor Troi senses that he is hiding something more though. Meanwhile attempts to solve the problem on Penthara IV go seriously wrong threatening the lives of thousands; Geordi offers a solution but calculations must be precise or it could cause a calamity that would kill all twenty million people on the planet; a real dilemma for Picard! He asks Rasmussen what history says he did and what the result was but he refuses to answer claiming that to do so could change the history of his time.

This episode has some interesting ideas but it also features a really annoying guest character. Rasmussen is overly extrovert; gushing over every detail he sees and Picard is shockingly accepting of Rasmussen's story… even claiming that his credentials check out even though a person from the future can have no credentials! The drama on the planet leads to the usual talk about the moral questions that would arise if one could go back in time and prevent something bad happening… we even have that awfully cliché question about whether one would stop Hitler's actions given the opportunity. The twist at the end is quite fun if a little far-fetched… much like the episode as a whole… if you can get past the plot holes and aren't too irritated by Rasmussen.

The long con

[Mr-Fusion · 7/10 · 16 April 2017]

'A Matter of Time' is a time-travel story, but with one caveat: it's really more about the consequences of knowing the future instead of actually moving through the fourth dimension. Cue the ample deliberation around a conference table scenes, a hallmark of this show.

But there's a key element that really breathes life into this: Matt Frewer, playing a historian from another time. The man relishes his role and adds a charming sense of guile to his scenes. We know deep down we can't trust him, but the guy sure is likable.

All of this is happening while the Enterprise is trying to save a planetside colony from its own geologic imbalance (which lends its own tension) but for me, this all rides on the historian character.

Lesser casting might've crippled this episode.

7/10

A Step Backward, or Is It Forward?

[Hitchcoc · 6/10 · 1 September 2014]

Matt Frewer (nee, Max Headroom) is one of the most annoying presences on film that I have ever seen. He has starred as Sherlock Holmes in a series of poorly made episodes, and here appears as a time traveler. He is a hyperactive man, Rasmussen, who supposedly has returned from a future time to authenticate history. He arrives in a unique spacecraft and the crew immediately believes his story. He butters up Picard and runs around the ship, getting in the way. Troi is the only one who has no time for him and believes he is a phony baloney. While he travels through various areas of the ship, we see him stealing small but significant objects and pocketing them. While he does his thing, Picard and his crew are working with a planet that his dropped into an ice age due to an atmospheric blackout They must come up with a way to create a greenhouse effect. Otherwise, everything will die off. There are a series of risky moves that must be made, and at one point, Picard enlists the help of Rasmussen, who refuses him help. This has a satisfying conclusion, but it is bothersome that the crew was so quick to accept this man.

Time traveler

[bkoganbing · 7/10 · 3 June 2020]

This episode has the Enterprise on a mission to save a planet from the consequences of an asteroid crashing into an uninhabited section of the planet. The dust clouds raised threaten a nuclear winter type phenomenon.

Geordi on the ground with their leading scientist Stefan Gierasch work on one solution and when that compounds the problem work toward another solution hat will need pin point timing and accuracy.

While all this is going on a man with a futuristic ship beams on the Enterprise bridge Matt Frewer a quirky sort claims to be a historian from the 26th century here to see events. Picard and others suspect there's more to him, maybe less depending on your point of view.

Frewer's quirky character and the race to save the planet make this a good entry.

The Crew Ask No Questions of This Stranger...

[Samuel-Shovel · 4/10 · 2 April 2020]

In "A Matter of Time" a human claiming to be a historian from the future on a mission to study the Enterprise tags along as the team tries to save a planet recently hit by am asteroid that has irrevocably changed their atmosphere. The thrift store version of Jim Carrey in this episode is chewing up so much scenery that I'm surprised that there were still sets left over after he left the show.

This swarmy character ruined any enjoyment I might have gotten from this episode. Even without him, the script makes zero sense to me. The crew just takes this man's claim at face value through the entire episode. The only thing that tips him off is that the man is a kleptomaniac. Otherwise, they would totally buy it! Everyone is acting far more stupid than they normally do, something that always bugs me. Don't dumb down your characters for a plot; make your plot smarter.

REVIEW 2022

[iamirwar · 6/10 · 14 September 2022]

Reaching Penthara IV after an asteroid wreaks havoc of catastrophic proportions, the Enterprise crew deals with trying to save the planet. It's the dust cloud left by the asteroid that is the real concern. Could a temporal distortion have anything to do with what's going on?

This episode first aired on November 16, 1991. At the time of writing, that was almost 31 years ago. Of those of us old enough to remember that time, watching this episode now is comparable to something we might have watched in 1991 that was first aired in 1960. The Andy Griffith Show, or My Three Sons, or Route 66. Many shows in 1960 were Westerns and it was usually the case that they also had an influence on other shows of that period.

Similarly, in 1991 we get science fiction shows that tend to follow the format more closely linked to the soap-opera's that were very much in vogue at that time. So we shouldn't be surprised when watching some of these shows now, they tend to focus too much on the crew-related behaviour to certain issues, rather than having anything to do with science fiction. Unfortunately, I tended to phase in and out of this episode at different times, as the show seemed a little unsure of what aspect of the story it wanted to focus on... even saving the planet took only a moment, before we were back with trying to figure out who the historian was, and what he wanted. I didn't really care.

This Episodes Clue: Mayor Jason Hobart.

Time Travel HAS to make more sense

[makiefer-87128 · 6/10 · 19 February 2024]

A time traveller. Never mind from the 26th or 23rd century. Picard should ask the mystery man whether he would like Deanna Troi sacrificed, or the entire ship steered into that exploding sun. Because, if you can travel through time, that can only mean you are God. Q, in other episodes, could have faked his omnipotence using holo simulations. In this episode, the TNG meets the actual Almighty. Jokes aside, as a TNG writer, you absolutely can't allow individuals to master time travel. It destroys all logic. That also means no 'Section 31' Star Trek spin-off. No organisation can supervise unauthorized time travel. From then on, Star Trek would become a nonsensical DC universe.

"Oh, I picked the right day. You'll see."

[classicsoncall · 7/10 · 17 February 2024]

I wasn't as annoyed about the Rasmussen character as other reviewers here, as much as I thought how gullible Captain Picard (Patrick Stewart) was to take the guy at face value without much questioning. As Professor Berlinghoff Rasmussen, Matt Frewer reminded me a lot of Robin Williams with his hyperactive personality and then I read how Williams himself turned down the role to portray Peter Pan in 1991's "Hook". Williams would have been a treat.

Anyway, Rasmussen claimed to have arrived from three hundred years in the future, so right away, you had to expect the Enterprise crew to pepper him with questions about things to come. Turns out he was more of a con man, looking to cash in on his real calling as a struggling inventor, by filching various gadgets from the Enterprise with the idea of 'inventing' them when he got back to where he came from, two hundred years in the past! All of these time references didn't seem to jive properly with the Enterprise's Starlog dates, but they're confusing enough, so that's as much as I can say about that.

Meanwhile, the crew was trying to prevent the planet Penthara IV from experiencing a nuclear winter due to the devastation caused by an asteroid hit. Never was there more a blatant violation of the Prime Directive, but at least it was for a good cause. Fortunately, the Captain's decision turned out to be the right course of action to solve the planet's problem, without having to rely on help from a phony time traveler. Now that I think about it, if Rasmussen WAS from the future, I guess he could have figured out somehow where the Enterprise was in order to come aboard, but since he was from the past, how would he even know about it?

An annoying time.

[thevacinstaller · 5/10 · 3 April 2021]

I didn't like the Rassmussen character or the plot design in this episode. It would have had far more impact if he was played as empathetic and charismatic with the ending reveal coming off as a shocker instead of something the viewer had figured out long before the reveal in the episode. The Rassmussen character was written to be 'quirky' but I just found him annoying and grating throughout the episode.

There's a wonderful episode that could be developed using this type of plot but they missed the mark in this episode.

A forgettable episode and that's before you turn your brain on and think about how easy it would be for the time traveler to just show up on earth and purchase/replicate the items he needed without showing up on the enterprise and having to pick pocket all these items. Why the Enterprise? Picard asks the question and you know what ---- I need an answer for that because this makes no damn sense.

One of the weaker episodes

[alsation72 · 1/10 · 6 December 2012]

Read this if you already have the synopsis of the episode or better still just watched it. This is my opinion on this particular episode.

Why on Earth would the Rassmussen character go through all the bother of pretending to worship historical figures and pretend to know the outcome of the current dilemma when all he wanted were some future technology "relics" that they seemed happy to give him anyway?

Why wouldn't he simply ask straight away for examples of 'antique' technology and get the hell out of there, instead of stealing things while doing his annoying act of pretending to know all future events?

The writing is terrible simply because the protagonist in the episode makes decisions no logical person could possibly make. A clever thief would have limited his contact with the crew, requested 'antiques' and left.

Weak, weak, weak!

It's like a really bad tribute to back to the future part 2.

[amusinghandle · 5/10 · 10 March 2024]

Rassmussen is an annoying character and I would wager he was designed to be that way. I really don't like this character ---- I don't like the quirks, the quips, the commentaries ---- Maybe that's my problem and not the episode itself?

There is a brief hint that this windbag could potentially have a relationship with that golden age beauty --- beverly crusher? Come on? I know this is science fiction but there is no way that a seasoned doctor is having a relationship with this giant dork/knob.

Why the enterprise? How? He's from the 22nd century, right? How did he gain knowledge of the enterprise? Did he just push the 'go' button and somehow ended up in the 24th century and then just adapted as needed?

Why not replicate the goods? Why not use a flash drive to gain information instead of questionnaires?

That's the problem with time travel episodes ---- You can really get bogged down in details if the writers do not find a tricky way to side step such questions.

I say that you should have designed the character to be likeable and have the reveal be a bit of a punch to the face for the viewer. You could even go another complete direction and have the time traveler act like a star trek superfan and make a hilarious meta commentary on the absolute insanity of the true trek diehards.

Typically, TNG episodes are elevated by the guest stars but this is one of the rare cases where the performance / character design completely kills the episode for me.

timeline inconsistency

[ShogaNinja · 4/10 · 24 October 2008]

As far as I know this is one of the first episodes written by Rick Berman himself. With all the mistakes you think he would have known better. It is after the death of Gene Roddenberry that Berman is now at the helm of Star Trek, and there are some obvious growing pains.

When the time traveller historian known as Rasmussen(Max Headroom/Lawnmower Man 2) claims to be from the 26th century( That's 2500-ish) he creates a plot hole. The Star Trek Timeline which was established off of an episode in the 2nd season I believe should put us circa 2367-9. somewhere in there. He claims to have come back nearly 300 years, yet the maximum would be 230 years which is nowhere near 300 years. Apparently math in the distant future is shaky.

I realize that back when this was aired there was less common knowledge about volcanism, asteroids, and global warming, but when the Captain has to ask Geordi why volcanic eruptions are bad on Panthera IV it's taking it a little far. Picard should know a hell of a lot more than that about the situation. He does spend his time mapping class M planets after all. How they save the planet is all theoretical and based on technology that doesn't exist(yet) so I cannot say whether that would work or not, but it seems like the work of a terraformer, not a flagship.

Furthermore even the slightest change in the past can have the colossal impact on the future. Say Beverly needed that Neural Stimulator in a coming injury, and because she had to have another replicated someone influential dies prematurely. The best course of action for time travelers is to never travel in time in the first place. It's just too risky - they would not, could not interact with such a person or accept them with open arms. Death is the only option.

When Rasmussen takes Data into his ship there is a major problem here. Why would the captain allow him to enter a vessel he doesn't fully understand. He would lose control of the situation. They would escort Rasmussen to the brig or some sort of quarters and strip search him with the aid of a tricorder. While inside, rambling on about his plans like any cliché villain he supposedly holds Data under guard of a phazer yet he takes his thumb off the trigger several times, looks away, messes with his ship...all ample opportunities for an android to move with inhuman speed and disarm/disable the guy. The way they disable the devices was a little too convenient.

Besides, if he WAS from the past how could he have known ANYTHING about Picard or the crew such as their names or anything at all? Or even that Data was an android? In the 21st century there was no warp coil as they knew it. 2063 is the year Cochrane made his first flight in the Phoenix and made first contact with the Vulcans. In the rest of the 21st century nothing more than a warp probe is launched. In fact during half of this century Earth is wracked in World War III and nuclear winter. Soldiers were addicted to enhancement drugs as is detailed the first time the crew encountered Q, it was a barbaric time. There was no way to tell what the future held. There was no way he could have conducted any sort of travel in space without knowledge of it, no would there be any reason for him to suddenly appear light years from the surface of earth in dead space 300 km from the Starfleet Flagship either. Wouldn't he just be in the future on Earth? A simple quiz about the 22nd century would have proved this guy a fake in 5 seconds. Name 10 alien races that were known in this century. GO. How about questions about the Enterprise. What is the fastest warp factor we can achieve safely, GO! No answer? Shoot him! What if because he never made it back to his time he didn't invent the things that could have theoretically resulted in the invention of starships and therefore damaged the present? What happens to the time machine when it goes back in time, adrift, a derelict for any to find and wreak havoc with.

Since there was no record of his existence why didn't they just vaporize him or blow him out of an airlock just for fun? Lock him in a holodeck medieval torture program indefinitely.

This whole episode is utter trash that should have never been put into production. It's just another filler episode on the way to bigger better things. There are simply too many of these filler episodes. Rick Berman needs to stick to production because as a writer he is a noob. I realize that at this point he is all alone, and new at it, but he should have planned for Gene's eventual departure at his advanced age long before this. They should have had the entire series written by this point like we do today. Sometimes it feels like the seat-of-the-pants, fly-by-night kind of pulp fiction writings detailed in a certain episode of DS9. :)

One more thing ILM makes me mad. The atmosphere of most planets is over 600 miles above the surface granted re-entry isn't noticeable until around 75 miles, the atmosphere is still there! The Enterprise according to ILM just sits right next to solid spheroid planets devoid of topography or water half the time, mere dozens of miles above the surface, and yet denies the natural orbit that is stable and easy to achieve around 250 miles above a planet of Earth's size. The Bussard Ramscoop collectors do collect Deuterium fuel for free at warp speeds, but you would tend to want to save wherever possible. It's called efficiency. Another thing, battles in space happen in 3 dimensions not 2.

A Senior Trekker writes.................

[celineduchain · 5/10 · 8 February 2022]

The Fifth Season of TNG contains some remarkably strong episodes while continuing to push the boundaries of what could be achieved within an episodic television format. It is notable for the tragic loss of its creator, Gene Roddenberry, who died on 24th October 1991 at the age of 70. His influence upon the positive depiction of humanity and diversity in Science Fiction endures to this day. Senior Trekker continues to score all episodes with a 5.

This was a pretty good vehicle for the eccentric talents of Matt Frewer despite having originally been written for Robin Williams who would, no doubt, have made it into a very different episode indeed. Not everyone liked this scene-stealing space con-man and Gates McFadden made such a good job of telegraphing her derision, one could almost wonder if this theatrically trained actress was rolling her eyes behind the scenes.

Occasionally, the Next Generation tinkered with time travel (Yesterday's Enterprise, Captain's Holiday, Cause and Effect) but always trod a very carefully observed path to avoid anything that might involve altering the continuity of the series. Later, Deep Space Nine was to have a lot more fun with the Department of Temporal Investigations and both Enterprise and Discovery had to rely heavily on time travel to offset the writing difficulties which beset any series conceived as a prequel.

This particular story, however, escapes any contamination of the timeline by having the time traveller turn out to be from the PAST. It conveniently overlooks the fact that his genuine from-the-future ship was catapulted back to where he found it enabling the possibility of untold damage to the time line.