Skin of Evil
Commander Riker leads an away team to rescue Counselor Troi and Lieutenant Prieto after their shuttle crashes on a desolate planet, but they confront a malevolent shape-shifting entity, Armus, who feeds on cruelty and threatens their survival, forcing the crew to face devastating loss and moral defiance.
The USS Enterprise travels on impulse power through the Zed Lapis sector to rendezvous with Shuttlecraft Thirteen, returning Counselor Deanna Troi from a psychology conference. When an emergency transmission reveals that the shuttle suffers a catastrophic systems failure and is losing power near the uninhabited planet Vagra Two, the Enterprise crew scrambles to respond. Despite Engineering’s urgent efforts to restore warp drive, the shuttle crashes, and contact is lost. Commander Riker assembles an away team including Tasha Yar, Dr. Beverly Crusher, Data, and Geordi La Forge to beam down and locate survivors.
The away team encounters a sinister, black, viscous mass that moves with eerie intelligence and blocks their path to the shuttlewreckage. This entity reveals itself as Armus, a malevolent and shape-shifting creature capable of generating force fields and absorbing energy. Armus mocks and attacks the team, killing Lieutenant Yar in a brutal and senseless act, feeding off the phaser energy directed at it. Attempts to rescue Yar fail, leaving the crew devastated and enraged.
Within the shuttlecraft, Troi struggles with the creature, sensing its emptiness and rage. Armus reveals that it is the discarded 'skin of evil' left behind by a race of titans who cast off their own malignancies. It feeds on hatred and suffering, yet denies any need or purpose beyond cruelty. Throughout tense negotiations and confrontations, the crew wrestles with Armus’s sadistic games. Riker is pulled into Armus’s viscous form and momentarily lost, intensifying the stakes.
Captain Picard beams down to join the away team, engaging Armus in a psychological duel. Picard refuses to submit or be baited by the creature, embodying the indomitable human spirit and compassion that Armus cannot comprehend. Using careful timing coordinated with Worf and Wesley, the Enterprise monitors fluctuations in Armus’s energy field to execute a precise transporter rescue of Troi and Lieutenant Prieto, narrowly avoiding Armus’s grasp. The shuttle is destroyed from orbit to prevent Armus from escaping its desolate prison.
The episode culminates in a somber memorial service aboard the Enterprise honoring Lieutenant Yar’s life. A holographic recording reveals her heartfelt reflections on friendship, courage, and the meaning of chosen family. The crew confronts grief and loss, while Data contemplates his own sense of emptiness without Yar’s presence. The narrative explores themes of evil as an externalized, rejected force and the strength of human connection, dignity, and resistance in the face of senseless cruelty. Armus embodies pure malevolence and alienation, while the Enterprise crew demonstrates resilience, sacrifice, and affirmation of life’s worth even amid darkness and despair.
Events in This Episode
The narrative beats that drive the story
The Enterprise, on impulse power for maintenance, faces a sudden crisis when Counselor Troi's shuttle suffers catastrophic systems failure and crashes on the desolate planet Vagra Two. Despite Engineering's frantic efforts to restore warp speed, the shuttle is lost, plunging the crew into anxious uncertainty. Commander Riker leads an away team, including Tasha Yar, Dr. Beverly Crusher, Data, and Geordi La Forge, to locate survivors on the planet's barren surface. On Vagra Two, the team immediately encounters a sinister, black, viscous mass, Armus, which eerily moves with malevolent intelligence to block their path to the wreckage. This inexplicable entity reveals its sentience and ability to manipulate its environment, actively preventing any approach to the shuttle. The team's initial attempts to bypass or understand the creature prove futile, establishing Armus as an immediate, inexplicable, and formidable obstacle. This act masterfully sets the stage, introducing the core conflict, the immediate threat to Troi and Prieto, and the terrifying, unknown nature of the antagonist, Armus, whose very presence defies Starfleet's understanding and capabilities, immediately raising the stakes from a routine rescue mission to a perilous confrontation with pure, unadulterated evil.
As the Enterprise cruises on impulse power through the Zed Lapis sector, Captain Picard logs the routine mission to rendezvous with Shuttlecraft Thirteen, carrying Counselor Troi. The crew enjoys a …
As the Enterprise cruises on impulse power due to maintenance constraints, the crew eagerly anticipates the shuttlecraft’s arrival carrying Counselor Troi. Suddenly, an emergency transmission crackles through: Lieutenant Prieto reports …
As the Enterprise accelerates at warp speed toward Vagra Two, the crew rigorously scans for signs of the crashed shuttle carrying Counselor Troi and Lieutenant Prieto. Initial sensor sweeps detect …
Amidst the tense aftermath of a shuttle crash on the barren planet Vagra Two, Captain Picard commands the Enterprise to warp swiftly to the location, insisting on full operational readiness …
Commander Riker leads an away team consisting of Tasha Yar, Dr. Beverly Crusher, and Data as they beam down near the buried shuttle on the desolate, rocky surface of Vagra …
On the barren, dusk-lit surface of Vagra Two, Commander Riker’s away team approaches the buried shuttle crash site with urgency. Their progress is halted by an enigmatic black viscous mass—Armus—whose …
Commander Riker leads the away team—Tasha Yar, Dr. Crusher, and Data—to the shuttle crash site on the desolate planet Vagra Two, only to encounter a mysterious black, viscous mass blocking …
Following the initial encounter, Commander Riker attempts to negotiate with Armus, but the entity's sadistic nature quickly surfaces, revealing its true malevolence. Armus, reveling in its power and the fear it instills, brutally attacks and kills Lieutenant Tasha Yar with a flick of its finger, absorbing phaser energy directed at it, leaving the away team devastated and enraged by the senseless act. Dr. Crusher's desperate attempts to revive Tasha in Sickbay prove futile, confirming her death and cementing the crew's profound grief and outrage. Simultaneously, within the crashed shuttle, Counselor Troi senses Armus's malevolence and engages it in a psychological confrontation, discerning its emptiness and need for suffering. The crew, reeling from Tasha's senseless death, resolves to return to Vagra Two, driven by the imperative to rescue Troi and Lieutenant Prieto, understanding that Armus deliberately spared them to bait the Enterprise. This act escalates the conflict from a mere obstacle to a deeply personal vendetta, defining Armus as a force of pure, irrational cruelty and galvanizing the crew's determination despite immense loss.
Commander Riker attempts a measured negotiation with the malevolent entity Armus, appealing to its sense of reason to allow passage to the injured shuttle crew. Armus coldly dismisses these pleas, …
In a harrowing confrontation on the desolate planet Vagra 2, Commander Riker attempts a peaceful negotiation with the malevolent entity Armus to gain access to the injured shuttle crew. Despite …
The new away team returns to Vagra Two, cautiously approaching Armus, who continues to cover the shuttle, maintaining its sadistic control. Inside the shuttle, Troi intensifies her psychological confrontation with Armus, probing its vulnerabilities and sensing its deep-seated loneliness and rejection, forcing it to acknowledge its origin as the 'discarded skin' of a race of titans. This disturbing revelation, though offering a glimmer of understanding into the creature's nature, does little to soften its cruelty. On the Enterprise, Worf and Wesley begin to detect crucial fluctuations in Armus's energy field, correlating them with its emotional states, a potential weakness. On the surface, Armus continues its sadistic games, denying access to the injured, stealing Data's tricorder, and cruelly tormenting Geordi by moving his visor, relishing their frustration. The tension culminates when Armus suddenly envelops Commander Riker, pulling him into its viscous form and threatening the lives of all survivors if the Enterprise attempts to beam them up, leaving Riker's face terrifyingly pressed against the creature's surface. This act deepens the antagonist's lore, raises the emotional stakes, and traps a key character, pushing the crew to the brink of despair and forcing Picard's hand.
Armus, the malevolent entity born from the rejected remnants of a titan race, slithers over and completely encloses the damaged shuttlecraft where Counselor Troi and the unconscious Lieutenant Prieto are …
Trapped in the crippled shuttle enveloped by Armus’s malignant presence, Counselor Troi endures a harrowing psychological assault as Armus coldly confirms Tasha Yar’s senseless death. Their exchange reveals Armus’s cruel …
Trapped and injured inside the crippled shuttle on the desolate planet Vagra 2, Counselor Deanna Troi confronts the malevolent entity Armus, who taunts her with the brutal news of Lieutenant …
In the observation lounge, the Enterprise crew grapples with the raw shock and grief over Tasha Yar's sudden, senseless death at the hands of Armus. Beverly Crusher vehemently defends Tasha’s …
In the tense aftermath of Tasha Yar’s senseless death, the Enterprise crew grapples with shock and grief as Beverly Crusher vehemently defends Yar’s innocence and Riker channels his rage into …
In the observation lounge, the Enterprise crew wrestles with shock and grief after Tasha Yar's sudden, senseless death at the hands of Armus. Commander Riker channels this outrage into decisive …
Within the claustrophobic confines of the shuttlecraft, Counselor Troi confronts the malevolent entity Armus through a tense, probing dialogue that exposes the entity’s profound loneliness and rejection. By invoking human …
Within the claustrophobic shuttlecraft, Counselor Troi probes the malevolent entity Armus through a psychological confrontation that exposes its deep-seated loneliness and rage as the abandoned remnant of a titanic race. …
Captain Picard beams down to Vagra Two, joining the away team and confronting Armus directly, escalating the stakes to a personal duel of wills. Worf and Wesley, from the Enterprise, continue to monitor Armus's energy fluctuations, confirming that its field weakens when it is 'provoked' by emotional or intellectual challenges, providing a crucial tactical insight. Picard engages Armus in a tense psychological battle, refusing to be baited or submit to its sadistic games. Armus attempts to force Data to kill Picard, then himself, but Data's logical defiance and lack of fear frustrate the creature, revealing its inability to comprehend or control true sentience. Picard, embodying the indomitable human spirit, defiantly declares that the Enterprise crew will no longer 'amuse' Armus, asserting their dignity and freedom in the face of pure evil. He turns his back on the creature, challenging it to do its worst, a profound act of non-submission. This act of defiance, combined with Armus's frustration at its inability to break the human spirit, causes a significant energy fluctuation, leading Armus to violently expel a traumatized but alive Commander Riker, signaling a critical shift in the power dynamic and a partial victory.
Commander Riker confronts the sadistic entity Armus in a fraught negotiation marked by the entity's mocking cruelty and merciless control. Armus demands formal politeness from Dr. Crusher before grudgingly permitting …
Inside the shuttlecraft, Counselor Troi urgently communicates Ben Prieto's deteriorating medical state, revealing the severity of his injury and the group's desperate need for immediate aid. Meanwhile, outside, Dr. Beverly …
In a tense standoff outside the crashed shuttlecraft, Armus taunts the away team with cruel manipulation—denying Beverly medical aid unless she begs, then withdrawing permission; violently tearing off Geordi’s visor …
In this tense confrontation outside the crashed shuttle, Commander Riker attempts to reason with the malevolent entity Armus, seeking to understand its demands and negotiate a path to save the …
Commander Riker returns to confront the malevolent entity Armus with a mix of defiance and diplomacy, seeking to negotiate despite the creature's cruelty. As tensions escalate, Dr. Crusher demands access …
Aboard the Enterprise bridge, Worf and Wesley analyze the fluctuating energy patterns of Armus’s forcefield around the crashed shuttle. They discover that the entity's seemingly invulnerable shield weakens precisely when …
On the Enterprise bridge orbiting Vagra Two, Captain Picard and Lieutenant Worf analyze the fluctuating energy field of the malevolent entity Armus, identifying a critical weakness when it is emotionally …
Within the claustrophobic shuttlecraft, Counselor Troi senses Commander Riker’s suffering and pleads desperately with the cruel entity Armus to cease its torment, steadfastly refusing the dark bargain it offers. Armus’s …
Captain Picard unexpectedly beams down to join the beleaguered away team and directly confronts the malevolent entity Armus, who mockingly acknowledges Picard’s arrival and reveals a haunting, transient vision of …
Captain Picard unexpectedly beams down to confront the malevolent entity Armus, who has captured Commander Riker and the away team. Defying Armus’s sadistic manipulations, Picard refuses to engage in the …
In a tense confrontation aboard the desolate planet, Armus seizes control of Data’s phaser, forcing him into a sadistic threat against Captain Picard and himself. Despite this coercion, Data’s calm …
Captain Picard arrives at the shuttle crash site and confronts the malevolent entity Armus, who cruelly manipulates and threatens the away team. Despite Armus's sadistic provocations—including forcibly turning Data’s phaser …
In a tense confrontation within the shuttlecraft, Captain Picard arrives to face the malevolent entity Armus, who torments the captured and blackened Commander Riker. Armus attempts to manipulate Data against …
Following Riker's expulsion, Picard orchestrates the final rescue, sending the rest of the away team back to the Enterprise, then confronting Armus alone to gather more critical intelligence. Armus transports Picard into the shuttle, where Troi confirms that confronting Armus's rage and neediness causes its energy field to fluctuate, solidifying the tactical plan. Armed with this knowledge, Picard returns to Armus, engaging it in a final philosophical debate where Armus reveals its full, tragic origin as the discarded 'skin of evil' from a race of titans, an entity of pure negativity. Picard, however, refuses to accept Armus's self-definition as pure evil, asserting the enduring strength of human compassion and spirit, effectively denying Armus the validation it craves. Coordinated with Worf and Wesley, the Enterprise executes a precise transporter rescue of Troi, Prieto, and Picard during a critical dip in Armus's energy field, narrowly escaping its grasp. The shuttle is then destroyed from orbit, permanently trapping Armus on Vagra Two. The episode culminates in a somber, yet hopeful, memorial service for Tasha Yar, featuring a poignant holographic message from her, celebrating friendship, family, and courage. Data's contemplation of his own sense of emptiness and understanding of grief provides a powerful emotional and thematic close, affirming human connection and resilience in the face of senseless loss.
On the desolate surface of Vagra 2, Beverly Crusher and Captain Picard urgently assess the severely burned Commander Riker, confirming his survival despite the brutal acid-like damage inflicted by Armus. …
After Commander Riker is found alive but severely burned, Dr. Crusher confirms his critical condition. Despite the imminent danger posed by the malevolent entity Armus, Captain Picard insists on securing …
After the harrowing rescue of Commander Riker, whose skin bears the toxic scars of Armus’s cruelty, Captain Picard commands an immediate beam-up of the away team to safety. Yet, in …
Captain Picard materializes on the desolate planet Vagra 2 to confront Armus, a malignant entity born from the discarded 'skin of evil' of a vanished titan race. Through a taut …
In a tense climax on Vagra 2, Captain Picard confronts the malevolent entity Armus, engaging in a philosophical duel that reveals Armus’s origin as the discarded ‘skin of evil’ from …
In a tense final confrontation on Vagra 2, Captain Picard engages the malevolent entity Armus in a philosophical exchange revealing the creature's origin as a discarded 'skin of evil' left …
The bridge crew solemnly gathers in the Enterprise’s pastoral area to honor Lieutenant Tasha Yar’s memory. Captain Picard opens the service by reading from her living will, setting a tone …
During the solemn memorial service in the Enterprise’s pastoral area, a holographic projection of Tasha Yar delivers a deeply personal and poetic farewell to each crew member, reaffirming her love …
In the Enterprise's pastoral area, the crew gathers in solemn remembrance of Lieutenant Tasha Yar. Captain Picard opens the memorial with measured gravity, then activates a holographic recording of Tasha …
In the Enterprise’s pastoral area, the crew gathers to honor the fallen Tasha Yar through a holographic recording she created before her death. Each member confronts her personal tribute, revealing …