There are many different ways that episodes/stories can be categorized: by quality, by “genre” (comedic vs. action-oriented vs. dramatic), by which character or characters (if any) is featured, etc. What I’m attempting here, though, is to sort episodes by “story type”—that is, according to what sorts of events the story revolves around, based on a reasonably concise, but hopefully sufficiently inclusive, list of categories (of which I currently have 8). For the most part, each category should at least theoretically be capable of containing strong episodes—though I’ll admit that I do have at least one category (Tech Trouble) with very little potential for quality. Also, two important notes are in order: First, what I’m considering in categorizing episodes is not merely the presence of some feature or element that is associated with this or that category, but the extent to which such elements constitute the main focus of the story—i.e., what the episode is fundamentally about, at least on a plot level. Secondly, even considering that, there will be many episodes that fall into more than one of my categories, either because they contain multiple storylines of different “types,” or just because some stories will inevitably straddle the arbitrary lines that I’m drawing between the types that I’ve identified.
Encounter with a Weird Alien
Enemy Encounter
High-Concept Sci-Fi
Outside the Trek Milieu
Personal/Cultural Encounter
Planet of the Week
Political Intrigue
Tech Trouble
This categorization scheme is inherently imperfect and should be considered as subject to change. In fact, there are at least a couple of episodes that are hard to fit into any of the current categories. As I progress through the project of writing these reviews, I add any that I find particularly resistant to categorization to the list below. There were once more entries on this list, but as patterns emerged, I tweaked or broadened some category definitions to accommodate them; thus, as of now, only two episodes warrant mention here (but of course, I haven’t reviewed the entire series yet). Weirdly, both happen to come from the tail end of season two; make of this what you will!
Peak Performance
The tactical simulation exercise pitting Riker against Picard that forms the main story focus of this episode doesn’t really fit neatly into any of my categories, although other aspects of the story do more or less fit under “Personal/Cultural Encounter” (and I’ve tagged it as such).
Shades of Grey
To the extent that this episode can even be said to feature a story, it’s “Riker gets sick, Pulaski eventually cures him.” Hmm…