The Silent Age (2012)

Started on The Silent Age. It's nice enough, but it feels very much like a game designed for people to play on their smartphone on the bus. The graphics are nice, kind of art deco side-on presentation. Though there's obviously some corners cut so it feels a little Flash game-y, just stuff like items fading from view rather than getting picked up. The VO is nice, but it's dialogue only (i.e. internal thoughts have no VO, Wadjet Eye style). The writing is nice enough. It starts off very Valve, with you as a janitor in a creepy research company, getting pushed into doing things by men in suits, and turns into a time-travel thing where you're flipping back and forth between present day and post-apocalyptic future. There's nothing that feels particularly fresh but it's all done well. The main problem is that it's very slow and the puzzles are very simple and dull. You spend a lot of time using stairs and lifts over and over, and it's all very linear 'get key to open door to get code to open safe to get paperclip to pick padlock to get knife to cut rope to open door'. It's almost like an idle clicker for adventure game fans. I got to chapter 3 of 11 very quickly and they finally introduced time-travel puzzles, but the only one so far has been 'open door in present so it's open in the future' which is a bit weird logically and also very dull.

It seems like it's going to be short and easy so I'll probably breeze through it until I get stuck and/or bored. Apparently it got released as two episodes initially, with the first one being free, so perhaps the second half of the game as it is now will ramp up a bit...

Some other things about this game that make it feel shallow are that inventory items always disappear when you've used them on something regardless of how much sense that makes, and you barely get to talk to other people there are a few cutscenes and a couple of 'use' interactions that get you a little chat, but that's it.

So many of the puzzles are based around locked doors or getting a light plugged in so you can see in a dark corner and find a new thing.

There's been maybe one interesting puzzle so far, where you use an apple core, leaky pipe, filing cabinet and some soil in the present to make an apple tree in the future. And there's some nice 'oh no, it was me that did that thing' or 'oh no, avoid past me' moments towards the end. But it needed another twenty of those.

Anyway, I got stuck right near the end and it seems from a walkthrough like there might be a bug because I've tried doing the thing I'm supposed a few times and it didn't let me, so I'm giving up on this game.

I watched a playthrough of the last bit, and it's terrible. You lose your time machine, so the last few puzzles are incredibly mundane things, including one where someone gives you a mug and asks you to get them some water, the solution for which is to walk back four screens to the dripping water and use the mug with it then walk through the four screens again. Then they do a big 'oh no it was you all along' causal loop twist, but THEN undo it... somehow, and kind of give you a happy ending except maybe you're going to see a drug dealer now but it's not very clear.

Rating: some nice presentation but very shallow

Nimona (2023)

It looks great, it's well-directed and it's fun enough. (Also cool to get some fully embedded queer rep and themes.)

But it also feels pretty sloppy in a bunch of areas. 

The writing has that 'if we say everything loud and fast it'll be funny' thing, plus that 'we've learnt the rhythm of this style of humour without really coming up with the clever jokes to go in it'.

The setting is a mash-up of medieval, modern day, and sci-fi future, and they needed to drop at least one of those because there's a bunch of overlap and redundancy and gags that are delivered like they're one of those 'modern day but X' Pixar jokes and yet is just 'modern day'. It feels again like they copied a joke format without understanding it, or they just didn't dare make it straight fantasy or get too close to Onward. (I don't know how close it is to the webcomic in how it handles this stuff.)

The writing is too vague when it comes to what characters know or are feeling, which is exacerbated by the 'if they just plainly said this thing' issue.

And there's a whiplash-inducing tonal shift towards the end, so most of the movie is silly gag-a-second comedy and then the last twenty or so minutes are po-faced trans allegory, story reveals and melodrama.

I think the fact that I wrote out so much instead of saying "it's shit" goes to show how frustratingly close to good this was. I was close to noting it down for recommendation to a friend's kid at one point, but I think he'd probably lose interest in it pretty much at the same rate I did.

Stick to Emperor's New Groove or Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs.

Rating: good-looking but irritatingly sloppy.

The Lost City (2022)

The humour was infantile and unfunny, the motivations didn't make sense, the characterisation was regularly inconsistent and it was so so predictable and unoriginal. Primarily Romancing The Stone (which they nod to with a convention called Romancing The Page, though I'm whether this is intended as a homage or a nostra culpa), but also a bunch of Tropic Thunder and then a hundred other movies for the rest of it.

(Also, sad to see Sandra Bullock with so much plastic surgery and then a layer of CG airbrushing on top of that.)

Rating: Bad

Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987 - 1994)

Note: most of these are my posts copied over from a Star Trek group-watch going through the entire series in broadcast order, rather than properly written reviews. 

TNG S01E01&02 "Encounter at Farpoint" Stardate 41153.7 Broadcast date 1987-09-28
So, only ten months after the latest TOS movie, this comes out. Incredibly slick, especially for a tv show, and it still gets filed as modern tv in my mind even though it's 40 years old now. I remember the first time I saw this show, I was 8 or so on a family holiday to America and it was on in a hotel room - it hadn't aired in the UK yet, and I just assumed that all American tv was mindblowingly advanced.

I'm really looking forward to this, even though I know it's pretty creaky for at least the first season. I'm so glad they kept it 4:3 and they had all the source footage for a proper remaster, including (I believe) the elements for composite shots and stuff like that.

Oh shiiit, you can see people walking about in that little dome on top of the saucer! At least in the title sequence. I don't think I've ever noticed that before.

Interesting that Alexander Courage gets a theme credit, I didn't notice any of his tune in there. Maybe it's just a legal thing...

Women crewmembers still in very short skirts BUT I think I just saw one of the few skirted crewmen, plus a crewwoman in trousers. I like that they're acknowledging the sexism of the original, but it's still pretty silly to go "see, anyone can choose to wear skirts or trousers, some people find miniskirts more practical and dignified for working on a spaceship!" instead of just putting everyone in trousers.

Worf looks almost as grey as Data!

Enjoying it so far, very pacey. I like how there's a robot, a Klingon, a psychic, and a Vulcan in engineering. Makes it feel more like this is the Federation exploring, not just Earth. (Undermined a little by Q's rant, but never mind!)

Ugh, this all feels a bit too TOS so far - a cheesy alien dressing up in Past Earth cosplay, a settlement with some sort of secret being hidden by a character actor in a goofy wig. I feel like this is going to end with Picard talking a computer into blowing itself up.

The whole trial thing is an odd choice for the first episode - we spend a bunch of time learning about a time period in which the show is not set.

Ha, something else they've taken from the movies - the security footage gets auto-edited into a handy 'previously on' format!

The pacing is all over the place. Started with the Q thing and got right into it, then went to medium intrigue, then everyone just having a chat and a quick gratuitous TOS cameo, then Q suddenly pops in to shout 'ticking clock!' and goes again, and now they're explicitly just proceeding as if the whole Q thing weren't happening. Not great to have one of your characters say out loud how redundant your b-plot is! (Is it the a-plot or b-plot? Hard to say.)

Saying all that, though, I did like the Picard/Riker stuff, getting to know our new characters and how they interact with each other. The Data/McCoy scene was sweet, too. His make-up and accent were better than I remember, and I love that he has the old buccaneer trouser and boot style. I just think it would have been better to drop Q and get to this point in the first ten minutes.

Holodeck! Data's super-strength (as well as his mimic ability we saw back in the court - wonder if that gets used ever again)! This stuff is all cool - again, would have worked nicely in a 'slowly getting ready for the first mission' opening act.

Ah, that was Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa in the court scene! Just going by "Cary-Hiroyuki", though - reminds me of how Ming-Na Wen was credited just as Ming-Na in her first stint on E.R. then her full name when she returned. Her character made the same change and commented on it iirc, must have been some sort of cultural shift I don't understand.

Anyway, episode over. I liked the resolution, those jellyfish aliens were cool. I just wish they'd kept Q back for his own episode and either used this very slender Bandi story as a way to introduce everyone in a single episode or deepened it for a leisurely TMP-paced double-episode.

Aside from that, some slightly clunky moments (mostly around Yar and Worf being idiots, that again felt very TOS for the professionalism porn to get compromised by having crew act foolishly in one way or another because it's an easy way to get some conflict or drama going) but overall enjoyed it. I especially liked Picard's awful people skills - Captain Stick-arse, more like (as in, up it).

I think that, just as I had to modulate my expectations for TOS to 'very good Saturday morning show', I'll need to expect this to have a lot of the same foibles and flaws as TOS despite the slicker presentation.

I wonder if an exec or Roddenberry insisted they crowbar a ticking clock in there to give the Farpoint story more thrills. Maybe alpha-memory will tell us.

So, turns out, to simplify only one side of the story, Q was planned for later in the series but Roddenberry took over writing the script to screw DC Fontana out of some money, and just shoved Q in there.

"This episode is the only TNG episode in which a male stunt performer doubled for an actress. In this episode, an unknown stunt performer doubled Denise Crosby's fight scene in the courtroom."
I knew it! That wig looked terrible. Weird decision seeing as it was all shot from far off and the fight scene was really basic.

Here's what I said about this episode on the forums ten years ago (!) when I was attempting a skiplist watchthrough:

It's interesting that they immediately go with the "god-like alien dressing up in period clothing" trope so familiar from TOS. So far, it feels more considered and less goofy, but also quite stilted and not very fun. I like Picard's characterisation as a grumpy old bastard, though, and I guess that matches well. With all that, though, the crew still seems to be full of people who need to be told off every five seconds for emotional outbursts. Plus ça change... I like the way they've retroactively explained the awkwardly short skirts of the female uniforms in TOS by putting some female crewmembers in trousers and some male crewmembers in skirts. Very clever!

Favourite line is Data's: "I'm sorry sir, I appear to be commenting on everything." Also, cool to see a 137 year old Bones McCoy, though he seems to have gone a bit redneck in his extreme old age, boyyy.

Very similar thoughts!

TNG S01E03 "The Naked Now" Stardate 41209.2 Broadcast date 1987-10-05.
I enjoyed this one! It's a little bit disappointing that they're still following the TOS template so closely, to the point of explicitly stating "yeah, it's just that exact same episode again", and also a bit of a rum choice to have a 'the people you know so well acting really out of character!' story as the second episode. But at least it's tried and tested, and their own version of it works well. 'Stick Arse' Picard is a great straight man, and then hilarious once he finally gets infected and starts doing all these weird little laughs and skips. I liked as well that a lot of the characters had different reactions, they weren't all just horny drunk, they also got wistful drunk or manic drunk.

I'm looking forward to this series finding its own identity a little more, but good updates of TOS episodes is also fun.

Also, hooray, Troi in a pant suit!

TNG S01E04 "Code Of Honor" Stardate 41235.25 Broadcast date 1987-10-12.
I enjoyed the start of this one, all the stuff about having to research a new species' culture and act in ways that seem unintuitive for diplomacy's sake. Then it all gets a bit silly with the death fight stuff. And boy does that arena feel cheap! It all deflates a bit at the end as well, as some previously unexplained cultural thing solves everything. Then Picard grumpily barks out a couple of orders on the bridge and that's it - it's an interesting naturalistic approach in general, but it does lack the punch of those TOS banter denouements.

It suffers from being Yar-centric, too. Denise Crosby has been pretty bad in every episode so far. She's being given some very clunky dialogue, to be fair, but she isn't able to manage it quite as well as Sirtis, say. I can't remember the full details (I guess I'll see them again when I read the Memory Alpha page for Skin Of Evil), but I'm not surprised she quit the show in frustration.

(The choice to cast the primitive, pompous species exclusively with African-American actors and style them after traditional African culture was a dreadful misstep as well. I think the episode wouldn't be so poorly thought of if they hadn't done that...)

TNG S01E05 "The Last Outpost" Stardate 41386.4 Broadcast date 1987-10-19.
I feel a pattern emerging where I enjoy the opening acts of mystery and diplomatic tangles, and then they actually come up against the aliens of the week and everything gets really cheesy and silly. As soon as they got to the planet surface, everything felt really cheap and the writing suddenly became all about slapping humanity on the back for having become so enlightened while the Ferengi jumped about like naughty monkeys from a simple morality tale. The structure just kind of falls apart, there's some vague fighting and then some stuff about joining that old empire and then the portal guy apparently doesn't distinguish between how the Federation and Ferengi have acted in the episode up to this point but then comes down on one side because of Riker passing that one test, but also he's a mind reader. It's all so messy.

Neither the Ferengi nor this ancient dead empire get properly explored.

Also some jarring tones with the comedy onboard and Geordi's characterisation as a whooping wise-cracker. I feel like if Picard's in a serious mood, the rest of the bridge crew shouldn't be goofing around with finger-cuffs.

Not an awful episode, but no real meat or identity to it.

TNG S01E06 "Where No One Has Gone Before" Stardate 41263.1 Broadcast date 1987-10-26.
I quite enjoyed this one. It's very slow and the story is slight, but the dialogue and acting is on point and the trippy 'thought dimension' discussion is deftly evocative. It gave me a TMP vibe. The sillier hallucination stuff was a little jarring, but never mind.

I find it endlessly amusing how grumpy Picard is. I'm going to enjoy watching him warm up over time. I'm also finding Wesley a lot less irritating than I expected so far - perhaps being around his age when I watched the show on and off originally made his wetness more grating to me. I'd still prefer him not to wear monstrosities like that jumper anymore, though...

TNG S01E07 "Lonely Among Us" Stardate 41249.3 Broadcast date 1987-11-02.
Colm Meaney as "First security guard"!

This felt very slight as an episode. Weird stuff happening, no one doing much about it even with their magic eyes and brains and stuff. I know Troi being useless is a common complaint, but no one else was much help in this one either.
Data's Holmes stuff was quite fun but again fairly insubstantial and didn't achieve anything storywise.
And then the delegation sub-plot, which I only realised in the last few seconds of the episode was supposed to be comedic. Someone got murdered and eaten, big laffs!

Reading the memory alpha entry.
Ah, I thought the delegates stuff felt reminiscent of some TOS stuff - DC Fontana was "inspired" by her old episode Journey To Babel. It's cool to have TOS writers on staff and it sucks how some of them got pushed out, but also if they're just going to keep recycling their own old stuff then maybe the show will improve once they're gone...

TNG S01E08 "Justice" Stardate 41255.6 Broadcast date 1987-11-09.
How could Wesley possibly have known he shouldn't have run directly at that barrier then jumped over it and crashed through that greenhouse into all those flowers?! He's only a super-genius!

Again, this is a very slight episode. They're (very heavy-handedly) covering themes of Eden and religion and justice, but without anything to say about them. And the story itself barely has any conflict or drama. Consequently, all the skin on show doesn't feel justified in some Garden Of Eden way at all, and just feels like a gratuitous viewership grab.

Looking at memory alpha, it sounds like the original story had a bit more substance to it. Also, it correctly points out that this episode is fairly similar to The Apple from TOS. I get the feeling that as long as TNG is doing 'planet of the week' episodes, it's going to keep on telling very similar stories to TOS; when it drills down into the politics and relations of established species is when I think of it as getting interesting and finding its own identity...

TNG S01E09 "The Battle" Stardate 41723.9 Broadcast date 1987-11-16.
This one is solid but bland. The Ferengi are a little more credible here than their last appearance, and everyone's doing a fine job. But the problem here is that the 'mystery' is revealed to the viewer 15 minutes in (and the basics of it are obvious about 5 minutes in) and then the rest of the episode is just watching the symptoms of it repeat until finally Wesley just notices something and solves it. What's more, it's essentially just another 'crew(member) under a hypnotic spell' episode.
At least Wes got rid of that jumper.

TNG S01E10 "Hide and Q" Stardate 41590.5 Broadcast date 1987-11-23.
Enjoying this one so far. Interesting to have a returning villain so soon, marks it out as different to TOS. Q is great, perfectly pricking Picard's pomposity. And the story is moving on quickly without giving everything away immediately.

The only weak spot so far is bloody Yar. Petulantly shouting out of turn at Q like she's Sarah in Labyrinth, crying in frustration at being zapped about by an alien (get used to it Yar, this is Enterprise mission meat and potatoes) and then coming on to the captain because he said one nice thing to her! She's like all those TOS one-episode-only crewmembers who were brought in to do something too silly or impulsive or horny for the main characters, except she is a main character and she's doing something stupid every two minutes. Even her jump over the bridge console wasn't as good as Worf's...
It's a shame they've had to revert to crappy planet exteriors after the pilot. If they could just do something better with the skies it'd really help.

I liked this one! I think this is perhaps the first one that I could call good without any major provisos. (Riker's turn to arrogant Q-like behaviour is a little fast, but they do acknowledge that in the script. And Worf's reasoning for turning his gift down seemed a little sad - I was expecting an 'I must earn it' response similar to the others - but perhaps it will end up working well with his characterisation once it develops, though I get the impression that doesn't really happen until DS9!) It keeps moving, the central conceit is interesting and doesn't feel stale, and there are lots of nice character beats and acting moments.

TNG S01E11 "Haven" Stardate 41294.5 Broadcast date 1987-11-30.
This episode was okay, but the whole thing is made out of half-hearted vagueries. Deanna seems very upset about her arranged marriage but then seems into it? Riker kind of has feelings for Deanna, enough to get jealous but not enough to do anything about, and he can't be with her because he wants to be a captain? All living beings are connected, Wyatt and plague lady (Ariana) suspected this was the case, therefore they had a psychic bond? The plague lot have the plague but aren't dead, and Wyatt is able to teleport over without being affected?

The Homn comedy is all a bit weak as well, the whole 'Silent Bob' bit and then endless shots of him drinking something and Data pulling an amused face for some reason. Again, undone by vagueness. The gong bit was good though.

The main attraction is Lwaxana, and I enjoyed her as a one-off character thanks to the way Picard and Data bounce off her. I understand she is pretty strongly disliked by the fandom, and I can imagine how repeat appearances by her would cause this!

TNG S01E12 "The Big Goodbye" Stardate 41997.7 Broadcast date 1988-01-11.
Well, this was a fun idea but it was so slow-paced. Having Picard et al stuck in the office having to just play for time until the holodeck got fixed was a really bad choice, it would have worked so much better if they needed to actually solve a murder or find a macguffin to stay alive for whatever reason.

TNG S01E13 "Datalore" Stardate 41242.4 Broadcast date 1988-01-18.
Another fairly big recurring character/bit of lore (ho ho). I hadn't realised how much stuff was getting put in place this early, even if the overall quality doesn't pick up until at least the next season.

Huh, I didn't realise there was initially a mystery to Data's origins. I like the idea that the Federation found this mysterious unique android, the only remnant of a disappeared colony, and were just like 'nice to meetcha, you can become a citizen and join Starfleet if you like'. That optimistic utopian approach.

This was a good one! Proper adventure stuff, with a light scattering of vital backstory and then the gradual reveals through exploration and environmental detail of the secret passage and the hidden base, Lore and the crystal entity.
Lots of fun with Spiner's duel performances, too. Lore is great, creepy and then full-on scary.
Then a couple of fight scenes that were fairly well executed - certainly much better than Yar hanging off a climbing frame.
It also has a nice balance of making Wesley sympathetic with the senior officers not giving him an inch of slack while also showing that he's still a kid who can't quite manage the Starfleet Professionalism that could have allowed him to get his message across effectively.
The sudden ending is a bit of a double-edged sword - the resolution of the entity and Lore feels rather abrupt, but also it's a relief that they didn't feel obliged to have a three minute epilogue.

TNG S01E14 "Angel One" Stardate 41636.9 Broadcast date 1988-01-25.
Rather a timid episode. Nothing too offensive, but nothing too bold or interesting either. They don't get their teeth into gender politics or discrimination or anything like that. Yar and Troi's reaction to Riker diplomatic outfit felt a little retrograde, too.
I like the idea of a virus that evolved to smell nice so that people breathe it in deeply, and it's quite neat how that ties in with the discussions of perfume and evolution elsewhere, but otherwise it's a rather perfunctory way to stop Riker from making a bad decision and do some mild 'people get a bad cold' comedy.

TNG S01E15 "11001001" Stardate 41365.9 Broadcast date 1988-02-01.
I really enjoyed this one! I could have spent the whole episode just watching the crew chill out and be giant nerds. Really liked the contrast between this docking sequence and the one from the pilot where Picard gruffly demands Riker do it manually, a nice illustration of how the crew has bonded already and the captain trusts them enough to let the formality drop a little. Also hilarious that 'horndog' is an explicit and large part of Riker's characterisation!
The switch to the main story worked nicely as well, mostly thanks to Spiner's performance. Amazing how he can inject emotion and drama while remaining convincingly robotic and neutral. I really liked the cybernetic theme (or at least motif) running through the episode as well, with the Binar, Data painting, Dr Crusher's research, Minuet. It's a smart touch that, much like Klingons, 'species run by a master computer' is no longer by default a villain and at least one of them seems to be in the Federation. I was disappointed when it seemed like they were turning out to be villains after all, so it was a relief that they ended up sympathetic. Really, the only bum note of the episode was Riker's immediate suspicion of the Binar, which seemed wholly based in racial or cultural prejudice. It's a shame that stuff like this or Yar and Troi getting judgemental about Riker wearing an 'effeminate' outfit is still making it into the show.

TNG S01E16 "Too Short a Season" Stardate 41309.5 Broadcast date 1988-02-08.
This is a very bland episode. It's utterly predictable from the start - the guy in old-age make-up has been specifically requested by the angry military guy to deal with some terrorists we don't see? Guess he's going to de-age and turn out to be the thing the military guy really wants! (This makes Troi's uselessness even more glaring.)
So it's just a slow grind of the specifics being revealed, no character or thematic development, and no one actively participating until the situation resolves itself. Picard is bizarrely lackadaisical throughout!
Then it wraps up with a half-arsed attempt at a philosophical resolution and some unearned smug nods. Feels pretty lazy.

TNG S01E17 "When the Bough Breaks" Stardate 41509.1 Broadcast date 1988-02-15.
My immediate guess on Riker, Troi and Crusher getting beamed down is that the Aldeans (or whatever they're called) want someone from the crew to permanently stay with them. It'll get resolved with that kid going to stay because he hates calculus and will therefore love being on an arty planet. A very TOS story, if I've guessed it correctly!

Bah, they just scanned Wesley, so maybe they want all kids, but they'll settle for that one calculusphobe? Okay, am going to stop guessing now!

This one was okay. It was very gentle, but intentionally so which is more enjoyable than an episode trying and failing to be exciting. None of the child actors were too bad or annoying, the guest stars are solid. Really the main issue is that it felt like a reheated TOS episode - liberal artist types who have forgotten the importance of getting their hands dirty, a society dependent on an ancient computer - without much to say outside of 'don't get too reliant on technology' and I guess 'look after your ozone layer'.
I did enjoy the swagger of holding off on their big model/effects shot until right at the end, when they probably could have gotten away with not doing one at all.

TNG S01E18 "Home Soil" Stardate 41463.9 Broadcast date 1988-02-22.
Another gentle one, but more successful than Where The Bough Breaks, I think. I like the idea that this can sometimes just be a chillout show - they go to a planet, find something cool and just investigate it until any diplomatic and emotional wrinkles are sorted out. Not much more to say than that, but yeah, nice. I liked the alien concept and how the intrigue all turned out to basically be 'terraformers get stressed out very easily'.
Troi was a lot more useful this episode, helping the episode cut to the chase around certain things, give little misdirects elsewhere. I wonder if this kind of storytelling efficiency ("he's hiding something, Captain, let's not waste any time wondering and just get straight down there") was something the writers expected to use her for a lot and ended up just not needing most of the time.

TNG S01E19 "Coming of Age" Stardate 41416.2 Broadcast date 1988-03-14.
Interesting to see them dip their toe into serialised stuff even though they gave themselves plausible deniability there at the end!
I enjoyed this one, another chill ep where you're just watching characters react to every day stuff like an inspection or taking an exam. I wouldn't put it on a best of, but I wouldn't advise people to skip it either.

TNG S01E20 "Heart Of Glory" Stardate 41503.7 Broadcast date 1988-03-21.
I enjoyed this one. It's story light but atmosphere strong. Very solid. Cool to get a bit of the Worf origin story and some more Klingon stuff. It's great that the whole 'Klingons entering a peaceful alliance' thing can be delved into deeper than TOS (including Search For Spock) managed to. Also a fun situation where the TOS movies are still going and will be able to keep showing earlier stages in this process. They lucked into quite an interesting storytelling structure!

TNG S01E21 "The Arsenal of Freedom" Stardate 41798.2 Broadcast date 1988-04-11.
Yeah, I enjoyed this one. Solid adventure story, with all the threads balanced nicely. I liked LaForge sweating but not breaking, and Troi heading potential crew issues off at the pass. Minor issues are that the derring-do dialogue from Yar and Riker is super cheesy, the 'exterior' sets are painfully obviously studio sets (it's a real shame they can't at least do something better with the backdrops than just a big flat colour), and I would have like Picard to figure out the 'stop it by buying it' solution rather than getting it handed to him.
Good creepy casting in Marco Rodriguez and Vincent Schiavelli.
Sidenote: I thought Logan was going to turn out to be another hologram, sewing discord amongst the enemy, he was so abrasive!

TNG S01E22 "Symbiosis" Stardate unknown Broadcast date 1988-04-18.
A strong episode! A little ham-fisted at times (the 'very special episode' conversation with Wesley, who somehow has not encountered the concept of addiction before, the smarmy acting of the Brekkians - though it was very funny how when they're shown to their quarters they immediately adopt the most smug poses possible - and some very plain exposition by Dr Crusher), but it's a great examination of the Prime Directive and very smart in how each new revelation about the two cultures forces Picard to consider his position again. It's also fun how effectively unsettling it is at this point to encounter space-goers who aren't rigorously professional and formal. I was worried that once the drug revelation came, it was going to be a 'defeat the villains' situation with Picard deciding to hell with the rules, great to see the writers and therefore Picard being smarter than that.

TNG S01E23 "Skin Of Evil" Stardate 41601.3 Broadcast date 1988-04-25.
18 mins in, I'm kind of liking it - I like the fake-outs with the martial arts contest b-plot and then the 'oh, they got Yar to the magic medical station, she's clearly going to get revived... wait, what?' moment. And redshirting a main character is a baller move, even if it was done due to Crosby wanting off (iirc).
The oil slick is a really creepy idea, and it's a cool idea to have them encounter a being who is just primal and sadistic. Also neat to have Troi there to be able to read it and psychologise it.
The big problem is that the execution of the oil creature is so goofy in every way - the CG of it moving is a bit ropey, its humanoid figure looks like a cheesy 50s b-movie creature (why even do this, it would have been much smarter and creepier to just have it stay as a slick the whole time), and the voice performance sounds like a villain of the week from a Disney cartoon. Also, maybe this will change as the episode goes on, but I don't really like it having a name, it immediately makes it feel more mundane. At the very least, it saying its name so early and formally.
Oh, also, what was with that big red cartoon splat on Yar's face after she was attacked? Bizarre decision!

Shoutout to Leyland T. Lynch, clearly a ladder-climber who has decided the way to move up is to say your full name every single time so people remember you. Such a great little detail.

Anyway, finished it, and the ending is a bit of a let down - talk to him about his anger for a minute and you're done. I like the general idea of it, Troi figuring out the weak spots and Picard manoeuvring to exploit them, but it was too rushed and simplistic. And then that Scooby Doo "NOOOO" fade-out, terrible!
The funeral was sweet, but the wham-bam defeat-funeral-cut to triumphant end credits music of the last 8 minutes or so really undercut everything. The perils of episodic tv, I guess.

TNG S01E24 "We'll Always Have Paris" Stardate 41697.9 Broadcast date 1988-05-02.
This one was okay. Never really amounted to much, either in the Picard or time-hiccup plots.
Also, that end banter was bizarre!

TNG S01E25 "Conspiracy" Stardate 41775.5 Broadcast date 1988-05-09.
The first half of this episode is great. It's mysterious and creepy, well written, performed and directed. The scene at the mine entrance with the four captains (including Michael Berryman!) is great, and there's even room for some truly funny Data business (him getting told to shut up by the Enterprise computer is brilliant). And then in that moment when the one guy grabs Riker, everything gets silly and over the top and then wraps up too quickly. All the fights are clunky (especially now you can see the stunt performers so clearly!) and these patient alien masterminds are acting like dopes and it wraps up with some goofy effects straight out of an early Peter Jackson or Sam Raimi movie. I guess to be generous to the show, a lot of stuff (choreography, effects etc) might be suffering from being made to read on a 20" CRT telly and now being watched on a 65" 4K behemoth.
I don't know if I'd want this as a full series arc or whatever they were planning, but it certainly could have supported a two-part season finale, and might have worked better that way. I did enjoy the set-up from the previous episode paying off here, though.

TNG S01E26 "The Neutral Zone" Stardate 41986.0 Broadcast date 1988-05-16.
Season finale, and an exciting episode title!

Well, all the Romulan stuff was great, and the cryonic people were fun enough, but having them both in the same episode as essentially unrelated stories just did not work at all. The latter felt pointless and the former felt underworked.
It's really interesting to see there are still big differences between this fairly modern late-80s show and telly of the past 20 years. Any sci-fi show now doing a season finale with the return of a classic villain would be making a huge deal of it, probably doing a two-parter ending on a cliffhanger etc.

Oh, looking at memory-alpha reveals that this was a first draft script and couldn't get any more work done on it due to a writer's strike. So I guess actually this is less different to current telly than I thought!
Interesting, too, to learn that this was supposed to be the start of drip-feeding the introduction of the Borg, and stretch into a two or three parter over the start of the next season, but the writer's strike scuppered all that. I always thought their intro was an odd choice.  Well, I take it all back - the show was trying to do some very modern stuff and just wasn't able to do so due to industry events.

TNG S02E01 "The Child" Stardate 42073.1 Broadcast date 1988-11-21.
I enjoyed this one. An interesting situation given a very gentle character-based treatment - I was glad they didn't go down the body horror or Evil Child routes. I also liked the mirroring of Ian and Wesley, suggesting we may as well all be aliens when we're kids, learning how the world works.
Pulaski and Guinan are okay here, didn't make incredibly strong impressions, but probably smarter to ease them in like this. (And in fact, iirc they start trying to make Pulaski into a Bones-type making jabs at Data, but it always just comes off as small-minded and cruel rather than lovably grumpy., so this is probably the better version of her.)
Fun to see Wes Anderson semi-regular Seymour Cassel show up as well, looking very much like a 1980s character actor and not a future spaceman. Genuinely good banter at the end as well, with Worf deadpanning that he will tuck Wesley in at night!

TNG S02E02 "Where Silence Has Lease" Stardate 42193.6 Broadcast date 1988-11-28.
Another enjoyable but slight episode. Very chill considering the entire crew nearly dies!
I guess I misremembered the deal with Pulaski and Data - the writers seem, in fact, to be going for a more serious representation of bigotry than the McCoy "why, you green-blooded blowhard!" style of 'hey, they're just kidding around, they like each other really' banter that didn't seem to be criticised by the show. It still feels incongruously regressive and lazy of her, though, to not even be able to stop herself from talking about him like he's a toaster.

TNG S02E03 "Elementary, Dear Data" Stardate 42286.3 Broadcast date 1988-12-05.
A very strong episode! I like the fun start with Data and Geordi, less stuffy than Riker or Picard's holodeck jaunts; the idea that their software and hardware is so advanced that a single thoughtless parameter can threaten the entire ship is amusing, and I love the absolute seriousness everyone takes it with as soon as Data gets that drawing; the mindfuck of getting helplessly lost in a small empty room because it's able to project endless space around you is effectively creepy; the ending with Moriarty becoming self-aware and therefore not a cartoon villain but a noble person was a great left-turn. Also, nice that we did get a bit of an answer on whether Data could solve a Holmesian mystery with the rando murder - Data deduced the human motive behind it as well as the method.

Honestly, the only problem with this episode is that I wish it had more time to spend on Moriarty evolving, and perhaps on some simple Data and Geordi hi-jinx at the top, maybe get Worf into a fight with some London thugs somehow - I don't know if it could sustain a two-parter, but another 15 minutes would have been nice. Perhaps they could have started in the bar discussing the idea of doing a Holmes mystery, have Pulaski interrupt and make the challenge and then get all three of them in the holodeck within the first few minutes...

TNG S02E04 "The Outrageous Okona" Stardate 42402.7 Broadcast date 1988-12-12.
Oh my god, I hate this Han Solo knock-off so much, and the show really wants me to love him.

This one fell incredibly flat for me - not charming or funny at all. Even the Data stuff felt like a stretched out version of conversations we've already seen him have.

TNG S02E05 "Loud as a Whisper" Stardate 42477.2 Broadcast date 1989-01-09.
Good episode! Another fairly chill one where the challenge is in negotiating the oddities of different cultures and species. I really liked getting to know Riva, finding him a bit standoffish at first, learning his idiosyncrasies and coming to empathise with and admire him by the end. I also liked Picard being a little more eccentric and professorial in this episode, it reminded me of Bartlett in The West Wing.
I appreciated the extra effort put into the alien planet' exteriors here - the establishing shot with lots of layers and the moving clouds, then the set cleverly keeps them in a valley and just shows little glimpses of sky and passageways for depth.
A little frustrating to not get a capper on Geordi's sub-plot, but I do like how it organically arose from the main story and that it adds a little extra layer to his character. Every time I see him now, I'll know that in the back of his mind he's weighing up the pros and cons of his visor (and apparently the physical pain it causes). I hope they return to it at some point - I know that eventually he gets rid of his visor but iirc it's done between movies and without much fanfare. (Okay, memory-alpha tells me that it doesn't really get dealt with in any depth!)
I also wondered whether the sign language was at least partly a conlang or just ASL. I recognised the sign for 'thank you'. Memory-alpha is ambiguous on this point. (According to an interview Seago did with Trek Untold, a lot of it was ASL but Spiner mixed in some conlang stuff because of the logic of this being an alien SL user, plus Seago used some Visual Gestural Communication in the scene with Troi. Very cool, and Spiner's signing was convincingly fast and precise.)

TNG S02E06 "The Schizoid Man" Stardate 42437.5 Broadcast date 1989-01-23.
I enjoyed this one but tonally it was pretty uneven, you never knew if a scene was going to be goofy and comedic or serious and dramatic, whether we were supposed to feel the peril or not. Both elements were solid, but it was hard to settle into enjoying them.
Spiner was really good, but boy was Sheppard hammy!

TNG S02E07 "Unnatural Selection" Stardate 42494.8 Broadcast date 1989-01-30.
Troi with the old "not telling the whole truth" bit. One thing I'd really like to happen at some point is they encounter someone who gives them what seems like bland exposition to get the episode rolling, but then after the call ends Troi is like "captain, that man killed fifty-two people and he's about to lure us into a laser-grid trap".

I found this one a little irritating. I thought I was settling in for another 'chill procedural' episode, but two things bugged me:
Firstly, that so many characters were ready to accept the theory that there was no connection between the 'genetically engineered to be old before their time' children and the 'old before your time' disease that a bunch of people got after hanging around with them. I know that technically the connection wasn't that direct, but still, it really compromises your slow-boil mystery story if everyone is being so thick!
Secondly, Pulaski's bigotry. She's so dedicated to making shitty remarks to Data that she's still doing it while in the throes of pain or in the last moments of ever interacting with him, pretty much on her deathbed. Maybe they're doing a very slow-burn story arc where she'll become less of an arsehole over the series, in which case they've certainly nailed the start of it, but in this episode it just meant that I didn't really care that she was going to die, as hard as the episode was trying to get me to like her. And I expect that they'll never get to finish the hypothetical arc anyway, considering how short a time Pulaski has on the show. I think I'm going to meta-head-canon her as a subtle critique of Bones from TOS and a way to make everyone eager for Crusher to come back.
Lots of other little strengths of the show that don't disappear in episodes like this and bolster them a little, though. I love all the tiny details in Picard's and Data's performances and writing, for example. And the way they write their technobabble to be just the right side of understandable from context and able to build up tension.

TNG S02E08 "A Matter Of Honor" Stardate 42506.5 Broadcast date 1989-02-06.
What an excellent episode! Mendon was perfect as the over-eager new starter, irritating everyone by immediately picking holes in stuff (a mistake I made once or twice very early in my career!), and the way the story was structured to tie this and the Klingon plot together via both the exchange program and the micro-organisms was really satisfying. It's interesting to see more Klingon cultural stuff, and see Riker's horndog and bullish personality traits serve him well. Also great to see every Enterprise crewmember doing such a great job - Riker comes up with a great plan and Picard immediately understands it, Worf is ready to stun the Klingon captain within a split-second and at the same time Data anticipates this and steps out of his way and in front of Picard, Everyone's making smart decisions and simpatico with each other. Even Wesley knows how to make sure Mendon gets his head back in the game. It's all very gratifying and even thrilling to watch.
The Klingon ship interiors were nicely executed, too, and it was fun to cut from those scenes with the red lights and smoke and Klingons puffing out their chests, to Worf on the Enterprise bridge, primly standing at his console.

TNG S02E09 "The Measure of a Man" Stardate 42523.7 Broadcast date 1989-02-13.
Another really strong episode! So many smart decisions here, like having Riker be the prosecution so that it's a matter of philosophy rather than beating some evil lawyer played by John Voight or whoever, or bringing Tasha Yar back into it and revealing how special that relationship was to Data. In fact, I have to admit I had to a certain extent been thinking of Data as a robot mimicking human behaviour, mimicking life. Reiterating that he is unique and perhaps impossible to replicate (by anyone other than Soong) as well as talking about the ineffable qualities of memory that he is absorbing really made me re-evaluate him as a character.
This episode also benefits as a whole from the show's decision to make Data pretty much a one-off so that these kinds of discussions and decisions can arise in the moment rather than be part of some worldbuilding backstory. The same choice as was made with Worf - in TNG many Federation starships may have Vulcan officers and so on, but a Klingon officer is perhaps a one-off. (I suspect the same could even be said of Spock way back in the early days of TOS, before TAS and the movies filled out the Federation with more non-human officers.)

TNG S02E10 "The Dauphin" Stardate 42568.8 Broadcast date 1989-02-20.
A bit of a flat episode. Anya is always interesting to watch, the stuff with people telling Wesley how to woo women is very funny, and I enjoyed the return of 'crew horniness' as a recognised condition that team leaders must  manage (even if it's just by saying 'oh, go home, you're too horny to work properly today'). But the sincere romance stuff is too bland and Wheaton not a strong enough actor to carry, and the civil war stuff sounds far more intriguing but basically gets ignored. I thought Salia turning out to be a thingy-morph was going to be a political twist, like she and Anya were tricking both sides into making peace, but it turns out it was just there for Wesley to get sulky for a couple of minutes. I guess all the planet's inhabitants are sparkly morph beings? It wasn't very clear.

TNG S02E11 "Contagion" Stardate 42609.1 Broadcast date 1989-03-20.
I enjoyed this one, I like the suggestion of another progenitor race (though I'm not going to accept this one as the canon correct one, as they never have any proof of it except for the root language thing which is not conclusive), and having to figure out how to deal with advanced dead systems, and they build up all the dramatic elements nicely for the climax.
I don't think I'll put this on the skiplist, though, as it's just solid rather than standout.

TNG S02E12 "The Royale" Stardate 42625.4 Broadcast date 1989-03-27.
Incredibly dull. The only thing of interest was the novel being bad and they didn't do anything with that. This could have been another faulty holodeck episode, none of the details really mattered. It also comes across as very pleased with itself for such a pedestrian entry.

TNG S02E13 "Time Squared" Stardate 42679.2 Broadcast date 1989-04-03.
An intriguing set-up but I found the future Picard's condition and behaviour a little contrived and the solution - essentially, do things differently - a little simplistic. Plus, the crew are reduced to being passive for most of the episode.

TNG S02E14 "The Icarus Factor" Stardate 42686.4 Broadcast date 1989-04-24.
This one fell a bit flat for me. I'm not opposed to a character-based episode with no real sci-fi trappings, but this one didn't have much meat to it. The Worf subplot wasn't massively funny, touching or interesting, and the daddy issues A-plot was slow and rote. I was much more interested in how each member of the crew reacted to Riker's potential departure - I think an episode revolving around that and what it told us about him and them would have been a lot more interesting.
Also, hard to take the emotional climax seriously with those outfits!

TNG S02E15 "Pen Pals" Stardate 42695.3 Broadcast date 1989-05-01.
There's a lot of dodgy ADR in this episode, and it also feels sped up in places. I had to check the Netflix playback speed hadn't got moved off normal somehow!
Another rather slight but pleasant episode. I enjoyed the parallels of Wes learning the basics of authority and Data pushing at the limits of his, and both of them learning more about human interactions.

TNG S02E16 "Q Who" Stardate 42761.3 Broadcast date 1989-05-08.
The Borg! Outside of the assimilation element, they arrive well-conceived and almost fully-formed here. I can't remember if the baby stuff gets folded in or jettisoned later, though - it seems like the implication at this point is that they're a single human-like species that uses cybernetic enhancements. Regardless, it's all very effective, a striking and creepy concept. All the design elements and visual effects are great too.
Unfortunately, their introduction via Q rather than progression on the part of the Federation, the Borg or even the Romulans really dampens the Borg's impact. They feel more like an irritant brought in to prove a point by a larger foe and escaped thanks to the same, so the energies of the episode itself are split. It's a shame when they'd even done a little bit of track-laying in a previous episode.
Gomez also doesn't have anything to do with the story, and Guinan gets a double reveal of having dealings with Q and the Borg, so it's all a bit overloaded.
So, the Borg themselves are cool, but their intro feels a bit rushed like the writers couldn't wait any longer and as an episode it's just okay.

TNG S02E17 "Samaritan Snare" Stardate 42779.1 Broadcast date 1989-05-15.
Disappointing. Cranking Picard grumpiness up to maximum and then trapping Wes on a shuttle with him for six hours is a delicious idea but they don't do anything with it, then there's some unconvincing jeopardy during his procedure and that story's done. I also like the idea of the crew getting hoisted by their own smug complacency, but at the same time they make a series of really stupid decisions to get to that point. Not doing a full scan, not sending any security personnel over with Geordi, Troi not being on bridge on the one occasion that she would have been useful, not immediately beaming Geordi back when Troi says he's in trouble, Geordi getting overpowered by one of the aliens simply grabbing his phaser and shooting him. There's complacency and then there's idiocy with a side-serving of 'why aren't there any regs in place against this stuff?'
Also, I didn't understand that ruse at all, and I have no idea how Geordi was supposed to intuit what to do! Pretty amusing as well that no one except Riker was willing to spend 40 seconds rescuing Geordi before heading to Picard.

TNG S02E18 "Up the Long Ladder" Stardate 42823.2 Broadcast date 1989-05-22.
Well, this one is pretty rough. Most glaringly, of course, there's the Space Oirish - the show does at least point out that they are Amish-style traditionalists, anachronistic even two centuries before this, but unfortunately they seem to have based their utopian vision on bad 1970s sitcoms. The mugging, the stereotypes, the pipe music, all pretty painful. But the rest of the episode is rather lacklustre as well - the Worf cliffhanger just fades away (slice of life stuff is great, but it's always a bit odd when you get five minutes of it lumped into a regular episode) as does the Riker romance, and the clone colony threat is predictable and resolves almost immediately.

TNG S02E19 "Manhunt" Stardate 42859.2 Broadcast date 1989-06-19.
Three separate story elements here, and none of them really amount to anything. It's a pretty aimless episode. I generally find Lwaxana manages to stay amusing rather than annoying, but this was pretty much a repeat of her last appearance. Might have been fun to do more with the marriage story and have her going around the ship appraising every crewmember and perhaps causing issues with another storyline. I did enjoy it when she casually revealed the fish people to be assassins - kind of a glimpse at how useful Dianna isn't most of the time!
Also a couple of odd choices in that Lwaxana doesn't know what a holodeck is, and Wes is all 'ew, gross aliens!'

TNG S02E20 "The Emissary" Stardate 42901.3 Broadcast date 1989-06-26.
Really enjoyed this one, it shows many of the strengths of TNG - good character work, intriguing alien cultures and a tricky quandary to think through. Suzie Plakson is great (again, after her appearance as a Vulcan in The Schizoid Man - apparently the writer originally wanted her to return as that character and have a romantic story with Worf!), and it's great seeing how she interacts with Worf, Troi and Picard and then how those interactions are reacted to by other crewmembers. Canny to have the idea of the old Klingon ways physically looming in the background as well, and a smart resolution to the conflict.

I'm not sure I'll put it on my skiplist as it's simply very good rather than transcendent, but it would definitely go on a second tier of 'also consider watching'.

TNG S02E21 "Peak Performance" Stardate 42923.4 Broadcast date 1989-07-10.
Oh shit, one minute in and we've already got that one character actor from Total Recall and Bogus Journey (something Shearsmith?), and Glenn Morshower!
(Okay, it's Roy Brocksmith. Have never fully absorbed that guy's name!)
OMG and I think that's one of Robert Picardo's tech team from Gremlins 2!
Yes, I had to look it up because she's only done like five things ever, but it's Leslie Neale. Wow, what a shower of minor riches!

Really enjoyed that one! The two storylines were both very satisfying and tied into each other nicely. I did initially find it irritating how flimsy a test of battle readiness the exercise seemed to be, but once it was clear that Picard and Riker were both taking a Kirk-like attitude towards it and accepting ingenious cheating as part of the challenge that solved the problem. Brocksmith is great with all his smug chirping and trilling and the Data character progression was really satisfying. I also like how Pulaski has overcome her initial prejudice but is now having to learn not to indulge in  'positive racism' either - her 'but how can a robot brain be beaten by a flesh and blood one?!' reaction had big 'all Asians are good at maths' vibes.

Another one for the 'very enjoyable but not at the heights of the show' secondary list.

TNG S02E22 "Shades Of Gray" Stardate 42976.1 Broadcast date 1989-07-17.
On the one hand, terribly disappointing to be given a clip show for a season finale. On the other, at least it means that if we ignore this one then the season went out on a respectable note with two strong episodes at the end.
I'd forgotten how hilariously transparent the cost-saving measures are on this one. They only use three small pre-existing sets, seven actors plus a couple of SAs, take up half the episode with clips and pad the rest of it out by repeating everything three times, and the villain of the week is a tree branch that wobbles a bit!
I get that sometimes 22-episode network shows had to cost-cut, but even so, just so many odd decisions here. Like, why make it the finale? Why not swap it with the previous one (or even better sneak it in mid-season)? And they choose so many duff Riker clips! The only good bit was at the end when they cut together all the ship explosions and gnarly special effects and Riker shouting SOMETHING'S GOT MEEEE. Why do a clip show at all, in fact? Why not, for example, just get a good writer in and have the characters sitting round a poker table for 45 minutes, so it's like a little one act play where you learn more about all of them, get some sad stories and some laughs in there? Do it in a single take (or five of them to allow for ad breaks) so you can act like you're showing off rather than penny-pinching.

TNG S03E01 "Evolution" Stardate 43125.8 Broadcast date 1989-09-25.
New title sequence. It's fine and probably a bit better technologically, but not (for me) as classic and nostalgic as the first one. Feels a little more random (though I did see someone on Reddit suggest that they represent stages of the universe of something like that - first a nebula, then a planet forming).
Bit cruel to start on an establishing shot of an angry red planet and then segue to an extreme close-up of Wesley's acne-ridden face! Probably no one noticed on their little CRT tellies back in the 80s though.
So, Pulaski is gone. I had started to like her by the end of the season. Pity to have her unceremoniously replaced, though I appreciate McFadden was mucked about in the first place and deserved to come back. Would have been cool if they'd killed Pulaski off for some high stakes, at least! I'll be interested to see how I take to Crusher on her return...

A dull episode overall, not much in the way of drama or philosophy. It threatened to pick up for a few minutes there when the doctor zapped them and then Data offered himself up to communicate for them, but then everything resolved peacefully and that was that.

TNG S03E02 "The Ensigns of Command" Stardate 43133.3 Broadcast date 1989-10-02.
Solid episode - Data does some human learning, Picard has a diplomatic tangle to work through, Troi is useful. Snappy dialogue from Snodgrass.

TNG S03E03 "The Survivors" Stardate 43152.4 Broadcast date 1989-10-09.
A couple of shallow observations to start: first off, I'm now skipping the title sequence every time, whereas I rarely did with the previous version. Secondly, I really like the Crushers' new hairstyles. Very retro-futuristic! Wonder if they both went to get them done together when Beverly came back.

Dammit, she restyled it for the away mission!

Always fun to see actors you know from non-genre stuff pop up, like Anne Haney from Mrs Doubtfire and Liar Liar (though I guess the latter is technically fantasy).

An interesting concept, though I felt it dragged a bit once it was fairly clear what the reveal was going to be in broad terms. John Anderson's performance in that last scene definitely raised the whole thing up a bit.
I have to say, the third season has picked some pretty mild episodes to open with!

TNG S03E04 "Who Watches The Watchers" Stardate 43173.5 Broadcast date 1989-10-16.
Just started, already some fun nerd stuff here. Cool episode title! Vasquez Rocks! Ray Wise!
I also like the 'proto-Vulcan civilisation' concept. We've seen plenty of human-like species that have evolved separately on other planets, but iirc Romulans have been the only non-human example of that. Fun to think that there might be cave-Klingons and stuff out there as well.

Yeahhh, Vulcan disguises! This feels very much like an intentional TOS-callback episode, especially when Riker and Troi walk past those rocks.

Well, a perfectly nice episode, but one of those where you've got the gist of it in the first five minutes and it really feels like it should have been under a half hour.
"This was the last episode produced during Michael Wagner's brief tenure as showrunner", apparently, so maybe the season will start to pick up a bit?

TNG S03E05 "The Bonding" Stardate 43198.7 Broadcast date 1989-10-23.
A nice classy episode. I liked how they showed restraint in not getting distracted by some planetside mystery (it seems like they were going to with those unearthed detonators, but I guess that wasn't a thing) or having the fake mom be evil, and how they touched on the effects of this incident on a bunch of characters - not just the kid, but Picard, Worf and the two Crushers. A little bit of learning for Data too.
Probably the only weak spot is the child actor - he isn't bad, per se, just a little mechanical and subdued. Better than overacting, and it works for half of the stuff the episode is doing, but ideally when a kid is the lynchpin of an episode like this you'd find one who can knock it out of the park. I think this actor played the criminal kid in Robocop 2 around this time, a role he was a little better suited to!

TNG S03E06 "Booby Trap" Stardate 43205.6 Broadcast date 1989-10-30.
Whoof, what an incredibly mediocre episode. No tension or laughs or anything. I guess it was vaguely trying to say something about not getting reliant on technology but it didn't do much with it. I didn't find the logic behind Geordi having to create a holo-sim of a slightly different room with the inventor of the warp drive in it to solve this particular problem very convincing either.
Best I can say about this one is that the model work on the asteroid field and old ship looked good, and the bottle ship scene in the transporter room was gently amusing.

TNG S03E07 "The Enemy" Stardate 43349.2 Broadcast date 1989-11-06.
Very solid episode, nothing outrageously original about it but tightly structured and well-executed. I like that it didn't pull its punches - Worf didn't give in on the blood donor thing and the Romulan commodore espoused abhorrent views about disabled children. The alien planet was always convincing, which isn't a given on this show, and the Romulans already being established as a volatile and little-seen species is really effective. I love that ship design, too. And it's cool to see G'Kar from Babylon 5 show up in different alien prosthetics!

TNG S03E08 "The Price" Stardate 43385.6 Broadcast date 1989-11-13.
This one felt a little overstuffed - lots of very abrupt scene transitions, and it took me a while to figure out if Ral and Troi had met before (this might be my fault for not paying attention properly, though!).
I think they probably could have got rid of the romance thread, it didn't really add anything and the dialogue and performances felt very stagey, very Attack Of The Clones. Ral has a very TOS face, though, good casting. And the scene between him and Riker in Ten Forward was nicely written.
I'm enjoying the characterisation of the Ferengi as infuriating, devious pricks. Feels like they're slotting into the universe a little better now.
Finally: good grief, that yoga scene - they may not have crewwomen in miniskirts anymore, but they sure do put them in spangly leotards and get them to bend over in front of a mirror.

TNG S03E09 "The Vengeance Factor" Stardate 43421.9 Broadcast date 1989-11-20.

Very cool opening. I actually had to check in the first few seconds that I wasn't accidentally watching TOS! (Apparently the large scenic background painting in the opening shot was originally from Forbidden Planet!)

A weirdly structured episode. There's the negotiation strand, the romance strand and the assassination strand and they all just progress separately and slowly until right at the end. That last scene with Riker teleporting into the negotiation room was great, but it took an entire episode of mediocrity to set up! They even had to pad with the empty calories of the Wesley sub-plot.

TNG S03E10 "The Defector" Stardate 43462.5 Broadcast date 1990-01-01.
They're not very inventive with the episode titles so far this season, are they?

Enjoyed this one! Nice and focused, a good thorny central issue with and some room round the sides for some Data learning that fits in naturally, a great guest star performance, and a returning Tomalak! Kind of a shame that Jarok couldn't stick around on the Enterprise, but that would probably demystify the Romulans too much, and that short sharp ending was very effective.

According to memory-alpha, there was a second Jarok interrogation scene which was cut, which is a bit of a shame because I think the episode could have done with more of him, but then also the majority of his time onscreen was being interrogated in some manner, so it would have needed to somehow add some different colours.

TNG S03E11 "The Hunted" Stardate 43489.2 Broadcast date 1990-01-08.
James Cromwell! I like to think that whenever an actor plays multiple roles in Trek, it's because one of those ancient ancestor races had someone who looked like them. There are probably a bunch more Cromwells running around out there that we haven't seen!

Sidenote: I don't like these new waistbands, they make the uniforms looks like cheap 80s tracksuits. The uniforms are definitely better without all those shoulder and collar trimmings, but those waistbands, ugh. Also means we don't get those officious pulling downs of the shirt from Picard anymore, sadly.

Anyway, really enjoyed this episode! Good guest performances and it's really fun to see Danar running rings around the crew, with resolution coming from Picard's tactical and diplomatic smarts. I'm tempted to put it on my skiplist, but a couple of things holding me back: the fight choreography consists wholly of 'tackle the guy by the waist then roll around a bit and hope you end up on top'; there's no ethical grey area here at all, it's very clear where our sympathies are supposed to lie the whole way through.

TNG S03E12 "The High Ground" Stardate 43510.7 Broadcast date 1990-01-29.

I liked this one, lean plot with some ethical questions to sink their teeth into, no pulled punches, hand-tipping or pat ending. McFadden was good, as were both guest stars. I guess one criticism might be that it's not particularly deep, but it's a 40 min episode of a non-serialised sci-fi adventure show so expectations must be managed!

Looking at memory-alpha, I see that many of the writers were disappointed in this episode for not have much new or specific to say and for being issue-first, all of which I can agree with; perhaps I was a little too apologetic for this episode!

TNG S03E13 "Déjà Q" Stardate 43539.1 Broadcast date 1990-02-05.

Really enjoyed this one. Genuinely funny, and giving Q a character arc that is a reflection of Data's is a smart choice. It's a little slight, I actually wouldn't have minded this being a 60 minute episode. Really my only criticisms are that if they're going to have an alien race that only appears on the vidscreen, they should make them non-humanoid, and I do wish they'd give us a bit more about the Guinan/Q thing as well!

TNG S03E14 "A Matter Of Perspective" Stardate 43610.4 Broadcast date 1990-02-12.

I haven't mentioned this in a while, but I'm continually struck by just how good the spaceship shots look in this show. They've also done a really good job with the remaster.

Anyway, I'm halfway through and this is a fun episode. Using the holodeck as CSI is a fun idea and giving us barely any objectively true information at the start of the episode so it feels like a murder mystery works well too. I'm currently thinking the wife was still there and shot her husband with a phaser through a teleporting Riker and also hitting some vital bit of tech (apparently there were two witnesses to Riker's threats, so maybe the assistant helped and she was having an affair with the doc or thought he was an arsehole or something?), or it's something to do with the thing Mark Margolis said about the Federation being grumpy at him for having ordered loads of a certain kind of crystal or something - maybe some sort of reaction from Riker teleporting right next to that generator thingy. Or a combination of the two!

Okay, finished. A bit disappointed with the solution - it relied on a bunch of [tech] stuff that the viewer could never guess and was tricky to follow even when laid out, and it never explained why the wife didn't give off any signs of deception when she gave her version of the story (I know, I know, the unreliability of memory, Rashomon, but that doesn't really work here when we have Troi and the wife's version was so different!). Plus the whole 'I said we had multiple witnesses but that's only because as an alien I count non-witnesses as witnesses' thing was a bit sweaty.

TNG S03E15 "Yesterday's Enterprise" Stardate 43625.2 Broadcast date 1990-02-19.

Fantastic episode! Really well-made - effective time-change cuts, lots of lovely dramatic framing and lighting to reflect an amped up alternate timeline - and tightly constructed to give room to the time-travel stuff, action, and a strong Yar storyline with some good supporting characters. Lovely how it even retrospectively makes Skin Of Evil work better.

TNG S03E16 "The Offspring" Stardate 43657.0 Broadcast date 1990-03-12.

Another strong one. You could argue it's a bit of a re-run of Measure Of A Man, but it was funny, sweet, engaging and heart-breaking so I'm going to be generous and think of it more as a sequel to that episode. I also really appreciated that they didn't feel the need to throw in an alien threat sub-plot or go with a Lore style storyline.

Two particularly good moments with Riker in Ten Forward and the admiral's last scene.

TNG S03E17 "Sins Of The Father" Stardate 43685.2 Broadcast date 1990-03-19.

Good start - opening on a cool shot of a Klingon bird of prey, an extended walk-and-talk single shot showing off their extended corridors set, and a follow-up to a previous episode as set-up.

I always enjoy Picard code-switching when he's dealing with different cultures, it was great to see him responding in Klingon to Worf, or putting on a Shakespearean bellow for the high council.

Really enjoyed this one - the swerve into politics and intrigue was welcome and I loved all the Klingon culture stuff. Some great establishing shots and set design, along with some cool worldbuilding. My only issue with it is that it's a little shallow - the intrigue especially is very simple and resolved quite easily, the crew never solves handling a Klingon's command methods, and we barely get into Worf's relationship with his brother (or even his nurse). I think it could have supported a two-parter.

TNG S03E18 "Allegiance" Stardate 43714.1 Broadcast date 1990-03-26.

Not a barnstormer but I enjoyed it. A pretty basic, gentle concept but well executed, especially Uncanny Picard. I really enjoyed the resolution as well, teaching these goofy aliens a lesson then telling them to piss off. Nice how the 'unspoken communication' theme was threaded through the episode as well, with poker games, dates, and then that final look from Crusher to Picard.

TNG S03E19 "Captain's Holiday" Stardate 43745.2 Broadcast date 1990-04-02.

This one is so close to being a great pulpy adventure caper-farce, but it's just a bit too slow, a bit too televisual, Picard is a bit too slow to warm up. I'm tempted to say it would have been better as a Riker episode though that would perhaps be too on the nose.

TNG S03E20 "Tin Man" Stardate 43779.3 Broadcast date 1990-04-23.

A solid one. Lots of interesting threads all working well together. I liked Gomtuu's design, especially its exterior.

TNG S03E21 "Hollow Pursuits" Stardate 43807.4 Broadcast date 1990-04-30.

A really good slice-of-life episode! The holodeck stuff is really fun, of course, but it's also interesting to see how someone with a nervous disposition would struggle in the ultra-professional, ultra-confident Enterprise environment that we enjoy weekly, and how characters like Geordi, Riker and even Wes can be dicks if they're not careful. And even though it's pretty obvious from early on that Reg will save the day by solving the engineering issue, the finale is still tense and satisfying. Schultz is great in it, and I love how he plays different versions of himself in the holodeck without going full Howling Mad Murdock.

TNG S03E22 "The Most Toys" Stardate 43872.2 Broadcast date 1990-05-07.

This one is fine - pretty slow and never goes anywhere unexpected. The continuing hints that Data might actually be feeling things and in denial about it are always interesting, though, especially when those things are less benign. Is he feeling things or are his continued assertions that he's not correct and we as viewers just really want him to have emotions so our instinct to empathise with him can be fulfilled?

Rubinek is really good here, quietly chilling. Bit of a shame his make-up only extended as far as a couple of small prosthetics and some felt-tip doodles on his temple. Seemingly fallout from the late re-casting of the role.

TNG S03E23 "Sarek" Stardate 43917.4 Broadcast date 1990-05-14.
A very gentle, touching episode, with strong performances from Lenard and Stewart. Perhaps gentle to a fault - it's pretty slight - but I'd rather a well-executed but slight episode to an eventful yet clunky and cheesy 'threat of the week' one. The latter seems to be mostly behind us now, thankfully.

TNG S03E24 "Ménage à Troi" Stardate 43930.7 Broadcast date 1990-05-28.

This one is a little half-baked - it doesn't do as much as it could with the set-up of three prisoners, two of whom can telepathically communicate with each other but not read their captors, and one of whom is William T. Riker, and it takes a while to get there with some reheated Lwaxana stuff - but the bit with Riker's message is clever, Wes' promotion is sweet and Picard's acting is fun.

TNG S03E25 "Transfigurations" Stardate 43957.2 Broadcast date 1990-06-04.

Ooof, this was a really dull episode, total filler. Loads of different plot elements going on and yet somehow incredibly slow and boring. And they just shrugged the Geordi thing off as a placebo effect which is a bit of a stretch. Also, those visible wrinkles in the Space Jesus latex suit at the end!

It's cool that they brought Henshaw back after her disastrous holo-date with Geordi in a previous episode, but as memory-alpha points out, she does have a rather incongruous 'I wish you had the courage to ask me out' energy at the top of the episode. I guess it can be put down to 24th century social patterns.

Biggest compliment I can give it is that those injury effects on the guy at the start were really gnarly.

TNG S03E26 "The Best of Both Worlds: Part One" Stardate 43989.1 Broadcast date 1990-06-18.
Amazing episode! All the stuff with the Borg is great, trying to find different ways to deal with their abilities and set-up, hiding in nebulae and so on. Bringing Riker's ongoing character arc of refusing captaincies is a great choice to add a little weight to the episode without distracting from the main action thrust. I really like Shelby, and it was fun to see Riker's heckles go up immediately on meeting her (that grudging half-invite to the poker game!) as if he's subconsciously already recognised her reflection of his internal conflict. Also cool to see Dr Crusher beaming down ready for a fight - reminded me of Bones.

Only minor quibble is that it's a shame the Borg weren't originally designed as a species that looks anything but exactly human - it weakens the impact slightly of seeing Picard (and later other humans/species) assimilated and the progression of the Borg from assimilating tech to assimilating people. It also would have helped sell the 'we want Picard as our human ambassador' idea. (Clarifying that the Federation have been preparing anti-Borg weapons because they kill people as a by-product of scooping up tech, rather than them being an invading force as such, also would have helped really hammer home that change.)

TNG S04E01 "The Best of Both Worlds: Part Two" Stardate 44001.4 Broadcast date 1990-09-24.

Hmm, that cliffhanger resolution was a little disappointing! "FIRE! Oh, it didn't work. Ah well, let's just leave, then." Like, I don't demand that they should have blown the cube up and killed Picard (though I know some fans were expecting that), but there must have been a less deflating middle road they could have found! Maybe the revelation that they've got all Picard's knowledge would have helped, if I hadn't already been aware that's how the Borg process works, and hadn't assumed it from the previous mentions of their hivemind...

I really enjoyed the rest of the episode, it was a very effective action thriller, but it didn't really do anything with Riker and was essentially just there to wrap stuff up. It's a very good ending (outside of that cliffhanger resolution!) but it functions pretty much only as that. The Guinan scene was great, though, and all the Picard/Locutus stuff was suitably scary/haunting.

Sounds like the deleted scene between Riker and Troi would have given the episode a little more depth, shame it had to be cut.

TNG S04E02 "Family" Stardate 44012.3 Broadcast date 1990-10-01.

Liking the serialised nature of the opening - recovering from the Borg incident, of course, but then also throwing in Worf's backstory and mention of that episode with his brother, plus little things like Picard picking up some books to take on holiday then changing his mind, which feels like a reference to that other episode where he grumpily went on holiday and tried to read a book the whole time.

Not sure if it's just me, but that shot of the docked Enterprise looks a bit... 90s CGI. A bit Babylon 5...

I really enjoyed this one! I had memories of the 'Picard goes to the vineyard' episode as being excruciatingly boring, but in context it works so much better. The Worf thread is hilarious and touching, it's nice to get more Crusher family stuff, and the Picard thread is a real slow-boiler but the moment of catharsis is great, especially as it's also letting off the steam of a preceding two-parter. Nice to have some location shooting as well.

The episode is perhaps a little heavy-handed at times (the music cue when Worf's parents go to the window in Ten Forward, for example, or the rather didactic post-fight dialogue between the Picards) and one could argue that it's a little contrived to have three parent-based threads going on at once, but overall a perfectly timed, well written and performed chill recovery episode.

TNG S04E03 "Brothers" Stardate 44085.7 Broadcast date 1990-10-08.
So, the classic TOS contrivance of one person being able to take over the whole ship finally returns! Here, though, Data at least has his mimicking ability, intimate knowledge of the systems and procedures, and the trust of the crew.

Speaking of his mimicry, I think this is the first time we've seen it since the pilot. I like how Picard's voice sounded slightly odd, and that showy single take of Spiner in extreme close-up lip syncing to the very long numerical code.

Anyway, this episode had a really good opening all the way up to Lore arriving, and then everything pretty much solves itself. The ticking clock of the sick kid wasn't particularly convincing anyway! The episode may have been better if it were focused purely on the character drama of Data, Lore and Soong, with Spiner essentially performing a three-hander and the crew just forced to wait it out. It does instead end up feeling like they're just setting Lore up for a future return (which seems a bit pointless to spend an entire episode on, when it only takes five seconds for him to say 'some ship found me'). What we got was nice, but it feels like a missed opportunity.

TNG S04E04 "Suddenly Human" Stardate 44143.7 Broadcast date 1990-10-15.

All the way through I was thinking stuff like "the crew are being a bit too manipulative with this kid", "using the traumatic flashbacks to show that he 'should' be returned to Earth is a bit of a cheat and the banana split thing was a bit too easy" and "this is an interesting dilemma that the writers not really sinking their teeth into", and then with that amazing shock moment with the knife they revealed that I was thinking exactly what they wanted me to. Very well played by the writers and cast - the guest actors judge it really nicely too. Definitely a stronger child performance than that Robocop 2 kid a while back, though obviously the actor here is a few years older at least. (In fact, he was just about to turn 16 when filming this - impressive, I'd guessed he was playing a few more years below his real age than that.)

Also, sidenote, I think Riker's hair is a bit longer here? Looks much better, so pretty much everyone's hair game is on point now (I think Worf's has gotten a little more wild at the ends, but I'd like to see it get a little wilder). Also liking Troi's new uniform, but I'm looking forward to Ronny Cox sorting it out once and for all.

TNG S04E05 "Remember Me" Stardate 44161.2 Broadcast date 1990-10-22.

A really cool episode, very scary concept! I was almost disappointed when it cut back to the regular universe, it felt like suddenly Beverly was being reduced to damsel status and also the mystery was gone. But she was still getting lots of cool moments and she does in the end figure shit out and get to the right spot, and I think actually that was the right place to put the reveal - just having her jump through the vortex and then Wesley give an explanation dump in the last two minutes wouldn't have been satisfying at all.

Really the only problem is that this episode works best if it's part of an arc for Wesley starting with the Traveller's first appearance and continuing on after this with him showing more powers, but afaik that never happened. Maybe Lower Decks will do something with it in their final season..! Also, could have done with Beverly getting a little more frantic, a little more Shatner in Nightmare at 20000 Feet.

TNG S04E06 "Legacy" Stardate 44215.2 Broadcast date 1990-10-29.

Data inching towards humanity is always a strong format. They didn't add much new to it here, but Spiner is so good it barely matters. I like how there's no real effort to hide from the viewer that Ishara is likely pulling some con or to delve into the specious politics of the cadres, the thing that really matters is the crew's reaction to the memory of Tasha. Picard cutting Hayne off halfway through some speech about peace at the end is a great moment.

Interesting to still be getting post-mortem Yar backstory expansion, too. I'd like to see Ishara and her major Linda Hamilton vibes again, the actor was really good and the character possibly a chance to redo the Tasha concept properly.

TNG S04E07 "Reunion" Stardate 44246.3 Broadcast date 1990-11-05.

A good episode. Always good to get more Klingon culture stuff, and I really liked seeing all the different versions/levels of it on show here. Also cool to have two different old episode threads revisited and combined. Great to see K'Ehleyr again, gutted that she died. I appreciate that they didn't have Worf pull his punch with Duras at the end of the fight, too - the writers are good with stuff like that.

Only thing missing from this episode really was a more conclusive ending to the assassination plot - I assumed that there would be one final twist where Gowron did it or Duras' man was in on a plot that neither contender was aware of, something like that, as Duras never explicitly confirmed it, and the show never goes back to Gowron for a wrap-up. Maybe there's a hidden twist to be revealed in future episodes! Much like the previous Klingon story, I feel like this could have supported a double episode, or at least a 60 minute one. The alien culture plus conspiracy always gives them a lot of meaty stuff to work with.

TNG S04E08 "Future Imperfect" Stardate 44286.5 Broadcast date 1990-11-12.

Really enjoyed this one - even though it's weakened a little by it being obvious from the jump that this must be an illusion of some nature, the details and character moments are all still effective. I thought the old-age make-up was really good, too. I clocked the Romulan plot being another illusion almost immediately, but I still enjoyed the double-twist. I like how it's a variation on the old TOS 'godlike but childish alien brings the crew to a fantasy land' but instead of going the Q direction with it, they made it more sympathetic.

Felt a little too soon after Remember Me to be doing another one of these Twilight Zone episode, really, but I suppose we're watching them at double the original broadcast pace.

TNG S04E09 "Final Mission" Stardate 44307.3 Broadcast date 1990-11-19.

The only thing that really worked here was the Picard-Wesley relationship, which moved forward a little and was quite sweet if not massively different to stuff we've seen before. The other elements all got short shrift - the garbage scow plot which is just there to say 'they can't search yet, okay now they can and they're on their way', Wesley having to get past the forcefield problem which was just solved with [tech], and Wesley caught in a precarious situation where he has to use diplomacy and backbone to keep control of the group while protecting Picard, which never actually happens because they guy just gets himself killed two minutes after the situation arises! That last one I think is where the focus should have gone; it's the kind of story well-suited to Wesley that wouldn't really work with Data, a character who otherwise has a lot of arc and function overlap with Wes.

So it winds up quite a weak send off for Wes. I can't remember the exact reasons behind him leaving the show, I think Wheaton was unhappy with his treatment? Perhaps they didn't do anything too wild like accelerate his prophesied genius thing because they thought he might come back. It's a shame they never really made much of the character.

TNG S04E10 "The Loss" Stardate 44356.9 Broadcast date 1990-12-31.

An interesting opening scene that tackles an unusual aspect of the TNG world where people supposedly are more comfortable with the idea of death - that some people might actually process a loved one's passing very fast and positively, and some people may feel a pressure to seem like they're doing that or tell themselves that they are.

Anyway, much like with the previous episode, I enjoy the character study at the centre but I wish it had been a bit more of the focus. It's a smart way to do a character-focused episode - take away one of the character's pillars and investigate them through its absence and their reaction to that - and Sirtis is really good. But the other plot thread isn't really very interesting on its own, and doesn't stand up to much scrutiny - the crew don't question some basic assumptions and don't consider the possibility that one unusual situation is causing the other one!

TNG S04E11 "Data's Day" Stardate 44390.1 Broadcast date 1991-01-07.

Another low-key Data episode, moving him forward yet another increment - Spot (perhaps a replacement for Lal?), "lunkhead", that nervous finger tap - and gives us more insight into his perception of the world, like how he thinks of Vulcans and Worf in terms of his own similarities to them. So, overall, very gentle and not dissimilar to previous episodes, but I liked it a lot! I think the balancing of the two storylines is perfectly pitched too - the teleporter mystery involves Data and his growth and it gets a proper, fun resolution (and an idea that would get play at least once more in Trek that I'm aware of), and the wedding suddenly being back on without needing a Miles-Keiko scene or someone giving a sappy explanation to Data. I liked all the mentions of other stuff happening on the ship - every day there's tournaments, festivals, births, injuries and routine scientific investigations going on, we just rarely or even mentions of it (the shift handover summary was a neat touch), just as Data has been developing friendships with different crewmembers without us learning of it, and as there are locations like the barber's that we've never seen before.

One thing, though - Data says Vulcans never lie. I remember Spock claiming this in TOS as part of some subterfuge but I thought it was then disproven in that episode... Even if I'm misremembering or I misunderstood, I'm surprised if this is something that there are no other contradictions of up to this point! (Okay, I did a quick search and according to Reddit actually yeah this is just a myth Vulcan perpetuate about themselves. Seems Data has fallen for it!)

TNG S04E12 "The Wounded" Stardate 44429.6 Broadcast date 1991-01-28.

I liked the set-up of this one, and a lot of the elements in it, but once it had the set-up in place it didn't really do much with it and then the resolution felt a little weak (outside of that final Picard scene which was awesome).

TNG S04E13 "Devil's Due" Stardate 44474.5 Broadcast date 1991-02-04.

I finally get back to the group watch and it's for the first truly rubbish episode of the season!

This is a typical TOS 'alien claims to be powerful deity, is using tech tricks, turn off the power source, job done' episode, with some sub-Q antics thrown in. The two potentially interesting fresh elements, the contract and the con artistry, are only given lip service as everything is solved by Geordi pushing a few buttons (and Picard pointing out the obvious, I suppose). They didn't even go with the standard 'oh no, the heroes have lost to the con artist, no wait THEY were doing the conning all along' twist! I was sure it was going to turn out Data and Picard were acting in the court scenes, it was so cleanly set up I'm flabbergasted it didn't go that way.

Another odd choice was not making Ardra attractive, instead going for a sort of 'Gozer/Zuul from Ghostbusters' approach. Zero chance of Picard being charmed by her, they may as well have made it Q and have him (explicitly) get a crush on Picard.

Looking at memory-alpha, seems this was a very early TOS script that got dusted off and went through about a dozen different writers, which sounds about right.

TNG S04E14 "Clues" Stardate 44502.7 Broadcast date 1991-02-11.

This one was fun, but I did feel like the mystery was too simple to support the episode - they keep revealing new little mysteries when the basics of the solution are already fairly obvious, and then instead of a bunch of 'ah ha' moments there's just the one hasty flashback to check off all the boxes. The resolution makes sense but yeah not very satisfying - might have been more interesting if they'd made the second run-through part of the mystery so you had two sets of conflicting clues or something.

TNG S04E15 "First Contact" Stardate unknown Broadcast date 1991-02-18.

This is a solid one, it keeps the various strands ticking over well and even finds time to have Riker boink his way out of captivity (that scene with Neuwirth was just perfect!). One of those episodes where there are a bunch of interesting big concepts that can end up a little pat with a 40 minute runtime - I'd really like to see them get to flesh everything out a bit more, deepen it a bit. Opening with the doctors referring to Riker as a "creature from outer space" was a really smart move and alleviates the patness a little, though, as unfortunately I can easily imagine a lot of 2024 Earthlings reacting in such a cartoonishly regressive way.

It'd be great if they could find a way to do more movies in that kind of style, without feeling the need to put a load of action in. The equivalent of an Arrival. (I'll see if I eat my words once Insurrection comes around!)

TNG S04E16 "Galaxy's Child" Stardate 44614.6 Broadcast date 1991-03-11.

Enjoyable! Two interesting threads working well together, some peril but mostly a day-in-the-life-of episode. Really touching to see Picard by turns excited and heartbroken over their contact with a new lifeform, and I love the continuing thread of Geordi being a hopelessly cringe try-hard when it comes to romance. It was a little uncomfortable when he DARVO'd Brahms on her discovery of the holodeck routine, and I think he got off far too lightly overall, but I guess he never did go full Barclay with that hologram...

TNG S04E17 "Night Terrors" Stardate 44631.2 Broadcast date 1991-03-18.

It's an interesting one, the structure is pretty flat, there's not a lot of mounting tension despite the creepy bits, but that kind of works with the story - everyone just slowly getting worn down by sleep deprivation. So it's kind of intentionally unsatisfying! I liked the solution, though, and Troi getting something to do.

Seems that the cast and crew weren't big fans of the Troi dream effects, but I thought they were pretty cool! Kinda Lynchy.

TNG S04E18 "Identity Crisis" Stardate 44664.5 Broadcast date 1991-03-25.

Solid 'weird scary hazards of beaming onto new planets all the time' episode with a cool concept and a well-paced unfurling mystery.

TNG S04E19 "The Nth Degree" Stardate 44704.2 Broadcast date 1991-04-01.

This is a good one! Schultz is great at modulating his performance so we get to see Barclay gradually become more confident and assertive without ever turning villainous, and the story matches that really nicely, showing him getting more advanced in stages until before we realise what's happening he's integrated with the ship and turned into a big laser show. And then the twist of it all turning out to be completely benign with the jolliest floating alien head ever is great, one of the few times that the crew never really affecting the plot works well.

TNG S04E20 "Qpid" Stardate 44741.9 Broadcast date 1991-04-22.

I was into lots of stuff about this one - mainly the return of Vash and her mischievous instincts for holding Jean-Luc's feet over the fire - but the Robin Hood section is a real misfire. For one thing, it takes us away from the low stakes Enterprise stuff (which I was already getting a kick out of). For another, it's a weird mix of silly fun and high stakes - we're supposed to be enjoying Worf's discomfort and the goofy costumes and Picard's derring-do, and yet simultaneously terribly worried about all their lives and all tense when Picard orders Riker to stay behind and the danger music swells. Plus, it's a little uncomfortable once people start getting stabbed - are these sapient beings that Q has brought into existence only to get run through with swords? Doing a separate holodeck episode where they all get trapped in a Sherwood simulation and Geordi immediately starts roleplaying as 'annoying bard'? Sure, great fun. But here it's a bad fit.

I like the resolution with Vash and Q, though, even if it is a little unnerving to think of those two tomb raiding across the universe with pretty much no limits. It often feels like if Picard could soften just a little with Q, get some bro energy going, he might be able to turn him into a powerful ally; Vash seems to have seen that potential immediately and capitalised on it!

TNG S04E21 "The Drumhead" Stardate 44769.2 Broadcast date 1991-04-29.

A really strong episode, and ever-relevant, but they do have to take some shortcuts thanks to the runtime, including a too-easy resolution and some on-the-nose dialogue from Picard and Worf. You know they've got too much to cram into an episode when they start after a spy has already been caught and is being interrogated!

Still, though, it's full of good performances, and the way that the admiral and her Betazoid interrogator keep on taking small seemingly reasonable steps towards a full-on witch hunt is great. All those stomach churning moments towards the end when you realise she's gone behind Picard's back and is aiming to have whole swathes of the crew declared traitors are so effective.

For a 1991 episode of episodic tv, it's fantastic. Even in 2013 when I was working through a Trek skiplist, I was bowled over by it. In 2024, for various reasons, it almost feels a little quaint.

TNG S04E22 "Half a Life" Stardate 44805.3 Broadcast date 1991-05-06.

Yeah, thought this one was great. Seemed like any old Lwaxana episode (which I don't actually mind that much, she's a fun Barclay-style spanner in the works of the ultra-polite Federation culture) with some unimportant b-plot about the sun to keep things chugging along, and then it turns into a touching mediation on aging, the impulse to judge and perhaps intervene in other cultures, how societies treat the elderly, euthanasia, death. And unlike The Drumhead, it doesn't feel rushed at any point. Some great performances too - Stiers, Barrett and Forbes are all fantastic and Sirtis gives good support.

Only real criticism I have is that those slow track in to Barrett and then Stiers in their big monologues felt a little heavy-handed!

TNG S04E23 "The Host" Stardate 44821.3 Broadcast date 1991-05-13.

This one had an interesting idea at its centre (and one ripe for trans readings, which I will not attempt!) but I felt like it didn't make much of it. The Riker-hosting was too impermanent to feel meaningful, i.e. it seemed like a pretty obvious and reasonable solution for Crusher to say 'you're in my friend's body, no nookie until you're into your new host'. (Although, of course, they do kiss at the very least, and there's no consideration of whether this was or should have been discussed with Riker beforehand.) Then Crusher just immediately gives up on the whole thing when Odan reveals their new female body but gives some excuse about how she - and maybe all humans! - can't handle the risk, which is transparently bullshit considering how her face fell faster than a turbo lift when she saw Odan's new host. And the show seems to be condoning this or at least not discussing it.

I think it would have been more interesting - and iirc DS9 did something like this in a more long-term serialised way, or wanted to but was scuppered by execs - if the change to the new host had happened half or a third of the way through the episode, so it could properly tackle the concept. Could have even had a section where Odan was just the parasite, able to last for a few days rather than hours.

TNG S04E24 "The Mind's Eye" Stardate 44885.5 Broadcast date 1991-05-27.

Solid but unremarkable. Not many twists and turns to it, or anything particularly striking. They did get me with the reveal that Kel was in on it, and Data deciding to get all his ducks in a row before acting was quite tense, but those are pretty low peaks!

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