The Top Five Star Trek: The Next Generation Episodes

Star Trek: The Next Generation, the best series of the Star Trek franchise outdid itself with memorable episodes. Here are the five best:

Best of Both Worlds

Any loyal viewer of Star Trek: The Next Generation felt a chill down their spine at the conclusion of The Best of Both Worlds Part 1. I was young enough when this episode was my first experience ever with a season-ending cliffhanger, and boy, was I mad. But I was also half relieved: Jean-Luc Picard's abduction and transformation into "Locutus of Borg" was terrifying.

It was all the more horrifying because of how dignified a character Captain Picard was. A love of archaeology, detective mysteries and classical music, and above all a deep and resounding intelligence were all wiped away in the space of an hour (not to mention much of the Federation fleet in the second hour). And in that moment the Borg became the quintessential Trek villain, surpassing even the Klingons and the Romulans in their sheer antipathy for anything...well, for anything.

Subsequent TNG episodes and the latter half of the Star Trek: Voyager series would water the Borg down considerably, but they are never more terrifying here, nor is there any point at which Gene Roddenberry's utopic Federation so threatened.

Chain of Command

Recalling The Best of Both Worlds, Chain of Command illustrates that some of the best episodes of Star Trek: TNG came when Captain Picard's soul was at stake. This episode which had Picard interrogated by a vicious Cardassian warden was superb in execution and performance. Both Patrick Stewart and his replacement Captain Jellico, an obnoxious bureaucrat of an officer turn in first-rate performances, but directors Robert Scheerer and Les Landau deserve incredible credit for painting so compelling a portrait of Picard's agony.

All Good Things...

The finale of the show was as magnificent as its high points, with the meddlesome Q returning to "guide" humanity to salvation. Taking place in three different time-lines, featuring Picard as the new Captain of the Enterprise (circa Encounter at Farpoint), Picard in the present-day, and - movingly - Picard as a retiree, the show not only highlights the strength of the Captain but the devotion he inspires among the crew. There's a typical high concept puzzle to be solved, but there are so many emotionally satisfying moments, that you could hate the plot and love the episode. But how could you hate it with John de Lancie's ever-charming Q running amuck? Oh, and I mentioned Picard as a retiree...the future version of the Enterprise? NO joke.

The Inner Light

Another show made memorable by the amazing acting of Patrick Stewart, The Inner Light uses a nifty science fiction concept to tell a largely non-science fiction drama, was ingenious. Seeing Picard as a family man who lives out his life on a dying alien world is fascinating in context to his usual brooding persona, but positioning him as a loving father and grandfather makes him one of the most fully fleshed out characters in science fiction - even television history.

It may be slow for lovers of Borg and Q episodes, but it is definitely worth a second look if you have overlooked it. It is gripping.

Yesterday's Enterprise

It's got everything: action, time travel...and the return of Tasha Yar. The Enterprise, plunged into an alternate universe wherein they are engaged in a gritty war with the Klingons due to the appearance of a temporal rift, all that plays second-fiddle to Denise Crosby's triumphant return and heroic sacrifice to end the war and the faulty time-line. It's almost hard to watch, even as a single episode, such is the emotive power of the script and the marvelous and moving performances of the actors.