The Saddest Thing Data Ever Said Is In This Overlooked Episode Of Star Trek
The "Star Trek: The Next Generation" episode "The Game" (October 28, 1991) begins with Commander Riker (Jonathan Frakes) on vacation on Risa, having enjoyed a wild sexual fling with a woman named Etana (Katherine Moffat). The opening scene depicts Riker and Etana prancing about a hotel room, giggling in post-coital bliss. During their play, Etana introduces Riker to a V.R.-style video game that latches over his ears and beams images directly into his eyeballs. The game involves using your brainwaves to manipulate animated discuses into awaiting purple funnels. If you insert a discus successfully, the game rewards you by stimulating the pleasure centers of the brain. Riker is instantly hooked.
Perhaps predictably, the game is more sinister than one might initially assume. It will later be explained that playing the game erodes the brain, kind of hypnotizing a player, leaving them in a highly suggestible state. Those who play the game urge others to play, and soon the entire central cast of "Next Generation" is working together to take over the Enterprise at Etana's behest. It will be up to the visiting ultra-nerd (and video game skeptic) Wesley Crusher (Wil Wheaton) and his new friend Robin Lefler (Ashley Judd) to get to the bottom of the conspiracy.
The android Data (Brent Spiner) is immune to the effects of the game, meaning he will need to be deactivated for Etana's plan to work. Dr. Crusher (Gates McFadden) lures Data to sickbay to accomplish this sinister act. Her act of subterfuge was to ask Data to recalibrate a medical tricorder, while she snuck up behind him to turn him off.
Right when Data was being deactivated, however, the emotionless android was in the middle of mentioning that he would be happy to help.
Data said he was happy. Wait a moment.
'I would be happ--'
Data, one should recall, endeavored constantly to be more human. He studied human emotions closely, trying to emulate feelings he never experienced. Data did possess curiosity and was often baffled, but his emotional expressions were distant and mechanical. Very occasionally, Data did appear to express something like a human feeling, as in "The Most Toys" (May 5, 1990) when he was so outraged by an evil criminal's lack of remorse that he seemed to feel murderous hate. Although Data had no emotions chip (it was stolen by his evil brother, Lore), there were constant implications throughout "Next Generation" that his programming could evolve to incorporate them.
In "The Game," Data was asked by a friend and colleague, Dr. Crusher, to help out with a medical task. Data, incapable of being annoyed or haggard, explained that he was perfectly capable of altering a tricorder in a hurry, doing it merely because a friend asked for a favor. In fact, he says "I would be happ–" right when Dr. Crusher shuts him off. It's possible that Data, in that moment, actually achieved a moment of genuine, friendly, Platonic happiness. He felt happiness! That's astonishing!
Sadly, because Dr. Crusher was operating under the game-influenced manipulations of Etana, she was too focused on her wicked task to notice what Data said. Ordinarily, Dr. Crusher, a compassionate figure, would have immediately noted that Data claimed happiness. It's unbearably tragic that Data's first-time joy went unremarked upon by his peers — peers who are familiar with his quest for humanity — because of a trifling brain manipulation.
Naturally, Data will be reactivated before the episode ends ... but he doesn't remark on the happiness he may have felt. Indeed, he seems to have no memory of it.
Data forgot he was happy
"The Game" concludes with the entire Enterprise crew under the influence of the game, with Wesley and Robin Lefler being the final two people on board to be brainwashed. However, it seems that being caught was part of their plan to escape, as they had revived Data unbeknownst to the crew. The climactic finale sees Data, newly conscious, breaking onto the bridge with a specially programmed strobe, constructed to undo brain manipulation. Once he cures the senior staff, he explains that Wesley revived him and he quickly found a solution to the problem. Wesley, Robin, and Data saved the day.
But here's the thing: Data doesn't mention his brief flash of happiness. Indeed, in being deactivated — and having some wires in his android brain severed — he seems to have lost all memory of his time in sickbay. He was happy for a brief, glimmering moment, and a game-based conspiracy undid his memory of it.
Data would eventually be given an emotions chip (in the 1994 film "Star Trek: Generations"), and would finally be able to laugh, hate beverages, be afraid, and cuss. But all those developments came at once (and, frustratingly, relegated to a feature film's B-plot). His emotional evolution seems to have been stymied by the events of "The Game." It's likely, by Data's own words, that he had evolved to the point where he could experience happiness. Sadly, thanks to the timing of his feeling, and the circumstances of his realization, no one was paying attention and he cannot remember it.
That's so very, very tragic.