The Naked Now (⭑)
Everything about this episode is ill-conceived: ripping off the plot of an original series episode; doing so in the very first post-pilot episode of the new series; having all the…
Code of Honor (⭑)
"The Naked Now" is almost as bad as they come, but "Code of Honor" is even worse. This turd is on the short list for the distinction of "worst TNG…
The Last Outpost (⭑)
This is another candidate for "worst episode ever" that (like the previous episode) belongs squarely in the "what in the name of god could the writers have been thinking" category. …
Where No One Has Gone Before (⭑)
Though considerably better than the three previous episodes, this one is nevertheless still really bad. It lacks the sort of fantastically ill-conceived premise that ruined all three of the post-pilot…
Lonely Among Us (⭑)
Despite suffering from some of the same fundamental problems as many of the other episodes of the season, this baby immediately strikes one as a very different sort of terrible…
Justice (⭑)
No episode since the pilot has yet merited even two stars, but the last couple travesties prior to this one were nevertheless slightly better than the previous three. Here, however,…
Hide and Q (⭑)
This is hands-down the worst Q episode ever; much of Q's material here is so bad that not even John de Lanci can make watching it non-painful, and the premise…
Haven (⭑)
This episode sucks. The arranged-marriage story seems wildly out of place and at odds with the values and ethos of the Starfleet/Federation world; Troi seems like a volitionless pawn who…
Angel One (⭑)
Unfortunately, after two consecutive episodes that seemed to be indicative of a slight upward trend in quality, this heap of shit broke the streak. This one is another terrible, first-season…
Too Short a Season (⭑)
What a comedown from the previous episode! Here, once again, we return to structureless, filler-packed plotting, clunky exposition, painfully telegraphed foreshadowing, one-dimensional characterization, and a lame storyline that has no…
When the Bough Breaks (⭑)
This is yet another worthless waste of an episode. As usual, one-dimensionality combined with (one assumes) budget limitations lead to a total lack of believability that permeates the episode: the…
Home Soil (⭑)
While still not very good at all, this is a rather different sort of bad episode from most of the other terrible episodes of this season. I mean, it’s not…
Symbiosis (⭑)
Once again, just when it seemed like the season was, relatively speaking, on a roll (three consecutive two-star episodes!), it crashed and burned with this piece of garbage. The lameness…
Skin of Evil (⭑)
In some ways, this is the most vacuous and wanderingly pointless episode of the entire first season, yet the one major event of significance that happens in it reverberates through…
Conspiracy (⭑)
This episode is actually popular among many fans, to the point of often being cited as the best episode of first season. I can maybe understand some of the reasons…
The Neutral Zone (⭑)
This is another episode that (like "We’ll Always Have Paris") I remember quite liking as a 14-year-old, so it pains me a bit to slam it too harshly—but this one,…
Where Silence Has Lease (⭑)
This episode, for me, is a really tough call between one and two stars. It's a damn sight more watchable than most episodes in the one-star category, but it nevertheless…
The Schizoid Man (⭑)
The third of the four early-second-season Data-focused episodes, this one is, alas, a complete bomb. Its few paltry redeeming features are these: 1. Dr. Selar, though the reason why she…
Pen Pals (⭑)
It's a fair generalization, I think, that the majority of the episodes in roughly the first two thirds of this season are essentially mediocre (with a few big exceptions, of…
Samaritan Snare (⭑)
The yo-yoing inconsistency of the latter part of second season continues, plummeting all the way from the heights of "Q Who" to another low point with this clunker. When I…
Up the Long Ladder (⭑)
The thing about this episode is that—hmm, how can I put this?—it royally sucks. It's a poorly structured mishmash of elements (a thoroughly stereotypical old-worldish colony that's presumably supposed to…
Shades of Gray (⭑)
A lot of people slam this episode as the hands-down, all-time worst of the series. I definitely will not go that far, but it is, for sure, an unsalvageable waste…
The Price (⭑)
This, alas, is one of the few abject bombs of the third season; only one other episode besides it, I think, will warrant a one-star rating. It does have some…
Menage a Troi (⭑)
This travesty has essentially nothing to recommend it and is, along with "The Price," easily one of the two worst episodes of TNG's third season. Considering that it's both a…
Devil’s Due (⭑)
Oof. There is probably no other episode of TNG that seems more out of sync with the rest of the season in which it occurs than "Devil's Due," which in…
The Outcast (⭑)
This episode, I think, is widely regarded as having been well-intentioned but fundamentally flawed. I remember thinking of it in that way myself, once upon a time. Looking back on…
Cost of Living (⭑)
One is almost tempted to speculate that this episode was intended as a practical joke, as in: What would happen if we paired up our show's two least compelling/palatable recurring…
Imaginary Friend (⭑)
Which season are we in here, again? How in the world did this amateurish, ill-conceived drivel find its way into the latter part of season five—sandwiched, no less, between the…
Man of the People (⭑)
What we have here is a god-awful piece of trash. It would maybe be going a little too far to say that it feels like a first-season TNG episode that…
Suspicions (⭑)
This is a bad episode, and pretty much nothing about it works (or even particularly makes sense). There are, alas, worse episodes of TNG, and I even considered giving this…