Data's Comedy Simulation Crisis
Plot Beats
The narrative micro-steps within this event
Data powers up the Holodeck program and formally requests the comedy routine be reinstated while Guinan reluctantly agrees to participate, establishing the experiment's premise and their uneasy partnership.
The Holodeck doors open and the Comic, frozen from Data's earlier exit, reanimates as Data steps inside and resumes the staged exchange, shifting the scene from preparation to performance.
Who Was There
Characters present in this moment
Amused detachment masking empathetic concern
Watches Data alternately with amusement and sympathy from the sidelines, offering dry commentary that highlights the absurdity of this mechanical approach to humor while subtly encouraging his continued efforts.
- • Prevent Data from public embarrassment
- • Guide him toward authentic experience rather than technical simulation
- • Humor arises spontaneously from authentic interaction, not programming
- • Data's quest reveals profound truths about human experience
Bemused frustration shifting to reluctant mentorship
Resumes holographic existence to critique Data's approach, insisting on audience participation before introducing him with hyperbolic enthusiasm that underscores the tragic gap between Data's literal interpretation and actual humorous delivery.
- • Demonstrate professional comedy techniques
- • Humanize Data's mechanical approach
- • Comedy requires audience energy exchange
- • Physical timing is inseparable from content
Initial hopeful determination giving way to clinical disappointment upon recognizing artificiality
Programs a holographic nightclub audience, performs jokes with mechanical precision, then gradually realizes through clinical observation that the laughter is artificial and his understanding of humor remains fundamentally flawed.
- • Understand humor through systematic experimentation
- • Achieve authentic comedic performance
- • Human laughter can be reverse-engineered through observation and replication
- • Feedback from holographic subjects is valid data
Objects Involved
Significant items in this scene
Visually signals Data's attempt to replicate human comedy through costume rather than authentic expression - its exaggerated style becoming increasingly incongruous as his performance reveals deeper emotional disconnection.
Harshly illuminates Data's mechanical performance like a scientific specimen under examination, visually reinforcing the fundamental disconnect between his analytical approach and the warm spontaneity of genuine comedy.
Responds instantly to Data's commands, transforming into a holographic nightclub environment programmed to generate artificial laughter on cue - becoming simultaneously the perfect tool for Data's experiment and the clearest demonstration of why it must fail.
Generates synthetic laughter in mathematically perfect waves that progressively reveal their artificial nature as Data observes the audience's mechanically synchronized reactions to his robotic gestures.
Location Details
Places and their significance in this event
Servers as both stage and prison for Data's comedy experiment - its artificial smoke and neon providing the trappings of human nightlife while the too-perfect audience reactions screams its simulated nature.
Narrative Connections
How this event relates to others in the story
"Data's Holodeck experiment with an audience teaches him the importance of response/timing, which contributes to his accidental comedic success on the bridge when he elicits genuine laughter."
"Data's Holodeck experiment with an audience teaches him the importance of response/timing, which contributes to his accidental comedic success on the bridge when he elicits genuine laughter."
"Data's Holodeck experiment with an audience teaches him the importance of response/timing, which contributes to his accidental comedic success on the bridge when he elicits genuine laughter."
Key Dialogue
"THE COMIC: 'What, no warm up?'"
"GUINAN: 'Me, I'm "no one" and "nobody". It wasn't funny.'"
"DATA: 'It was a Holodeck audience. They were programmed to laugh at anything...'"