Star Trek: Starship Mine

Episode: "Starship Mine"

Series: Star Trek: The Next Generation

Season 6, Episode 18

Original Air Date: March 29, 1993

via Memory Alpha

The Enterprise is evacuated for a barium sweep.  The tech crew is not who they appear to be.  They are terrorists intent on stealing the ship's trilithium.  Picard ends up trapped on the ship with the terrorists and sets out to foil their plans.

Screenwriter Morgan Gendel originally pitched "Starship Mine" as Die Hard aboard the Enterprise.  It's a decent, though mostly unmemorable adventure caper.  The episode's most amusing moments emerge from a secondary narrative surrounding a cocktail party attended by the crew for the duration of the sweep.  Data learns the art of small talk from an insufferable master: Commander Hutchinson.  It was, in fact, Picard's desperate effort to get away from "Hutch" and his boring conversation that led to all the trouble in the first place.

Fun fact for the devoted: Tim Russ made his Star Trek debut in "Starship Mine" as Devor, one of the terrorists.  Russ, originally considered for the role of Geordi La Forge before LeVar Burton got the job, would eventually be cast as Tuvok, one of the principals on Star Trek: Voyager.

Acting Notes

via West Wing Wiki

David Spielberg (Hutch) was born in Weslaco, Texas, March 6, 1939.  He is not related to director Steven Spielberg.  After two years in the Navy, David attended the University of Texas in Austin.  Eventually, he dropped out to pursue acting in New York.  

Spielberg's films included Newman's Law, Christine and Alice.  Television gigs included Magnum, P.I., From Here to Eternity and The Practice.

Spielberg passed away in 2016 from cancer.