I suppose Reg Barclay does fill a need. He does help real-world storylines creep into TNG, even though it makes no sense for him to be there. Mission of discovery, yes, but the Enterprise is still a crypto-military operation and, as such, Barclay has no business being there. But neither do all those kids, so this is something of a moot argument.
Anyway, yeah, the Transporter. It’s cool to really have-at-it. Of course there would be people frightened to death of it. And it makes sense that the ones who are are the ones who have problems. I didn’t quite follow how the giant nibble-worms were actually trapped Federation scientists, but sometimes I can be slow.
