Troi is seriously one of the least likable characters on the Enterprise. I didn't mind her at all when I was a kid. I didn't find her attractive either, I didn't even consider that they might be using her as a sex symbol. As an adult, when I watch TNG, I'm struck by how completely useless she is to the episodes. She exists to reiterate the subtext that the audience is already aware of. "He's hiding something." "He's angry." She's a waste of time and effort on the show.
So it makes sense to give her an episode to develop her personality a little. Except this episode just proves that she doesn't belong on the Enterprise at all. She's startlingly unstable, and seriously unqualified as a counselor.
After Troi loses her empathic abilities, she starts getting really… bitchy with everyone. She gets offended for no reason. The idea is that she feels like she's suddenly at a disability because she can't pick up on emotions anymore. I can understand that the situation might be disagreeable to her, but it's hardly new. There are many species that she has difficulty understanding, several life forms she can't read at all, and she deals with Data on a regular basis. This isn't because she's upset on a personal level. Her behavior is because she's a jerk.
The other storyline, which involves some strange 2-dimensional space creatures having sucked the Enterprise into their field, is strange, but it also just doesn't seem to matter. They bring the Enterprise to the brink of being sucked into a black hole, but it never feels like it matters. Most of the story is dedicated to Troi, and she still isn't written well.
And I seriously don't like Guinan much. But usually I can just ignore her. This time, I couldn't stop staring at her lack of eyebrows. And after a bit of research… it looks like Whoopi shaves her eyebrows. Wow.
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