The Doctor creates a holographic family to come home to, but when Kes and Torres meet them they are unimpressed: he has created a "too perfect" family. He allows Torres to adjust the program, and immediately things start going downhill; his wife is harried and overworked, his daughter is a brat, and his son wants to run away and kill people and be a Klingon. Things spiral out of control when his daughter is injured on the Paresi Squares court (field?) and sustains a fatal head injury. At first the Doctor cannot face the program anymore, but eventually he builds up the resolve to see it through.
There is also a B-plot about Paris getting lost in an astral eddy, but it exists entirely to fill up time and give the Doctor a chance to rant about people taking unnecessary risks (in connection with his holographic daughter's own injury). Not much of substance there, but the special effect is reasonably cool I guess.
I'm... this episode is trying really hard. I know the heart's in the right place, but it just doesn't do anything for me. These are Fake Problems. If they introduced a character for the Doctor to get attached to, one that isn't just a simulation of a character, maybe I could get behind that. Now, maybe it's just not for me; I'll admit to seeking out a certain amount of escapism in my entertainment. Life is hard enough, real life is real enough. I see people die. I see families mourn their loved ones. I honestly don't really need that in my entertainment too - especially when it isn't even real for the not-real characters I'm watching.
None of the quotes in memory alpha suggest that this next part of my reaction is actually what the writers are going for, but this episode feels like a jab at TNG. Part of Roddenberry's requirements for Trek was that there was not supposed to be serious conflict between the members of the crew. That's hard for a lot of writers, considering that it seems to be a rule that drama means that people have to behave unprofessionally towards each other. I've even seen it be argued that not having conflict between the major recurring characters is a flat-out bad thing. I loved every minute of it. The TNG crew was composed of professional people acting appropriately; an example which I strive to emulate and encourage in my own life.
Not that I didn't also love Battlestar Galactica, which is all conflict all the time among everyone forever. And I also loved DS9, which I feel strikes a careful balance between disharmony and behaving like adults: there were disagreements between people with radically different world-views, but the characters were good about acting maturely about it. Voyager has walked an odd line, with its premise including a band of terrorists as part of the crew, but not actually utilizing that idea very much. They typically will try to include some internal discord, but then back off at the last minute, or even just forget all about it. That the writers seem to have backed off in terms of their use of intra-crew conflict is probably all the evidence I should need to see that this plot isn't really a dig at TNG, but it still feels that way.
Watchability: 2/5
Bottom Line: I'm sure there are people out there for whom this episode is a favorite. I think I can understand that, and I'll even give it a couple points for that, but it really just isn't for me.
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