Paul Sorvino as Nikolai Rozhenko.I have the pleasure, at this moment, to be watching one of my favorite episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation, "Homeward." It's not the best-written or best-directed episode of the show, but it does have some special meaning for me.
While the episode was by no means a classic, it was indeed a fine tale. It involves Worf's human brother Nikolai (played by Law and Order's Paul Sorvino) violating the Prime Directive in order to prevent a race from going extinct due to a planetary catastrophe. While the morality tale doesn't quite work, it does have some good family interaction between Sorvino and Michael Dorn.
The reason this episode resonantes with me is that it first aired on Jan. 17, 1994, the date of the Northridge Earthquake in Los Angeles -- about which I blogged recently. While other channels in LA showed non-stop images of death and destruction, KCOP Channel 13 took a break and showed "Homeward." It was a soothing distraction on what was otherwise a very stressful day, and to this day I am grateful to KCOP for showing the episode.
