What are the best seasons of Star Trek The Next Generation ?

Well, just to be accurate, Riker grew the beard before season 2. So if season 2 is where the show found its footing, then it's definitely the beard.

 

This is cool, was looking for a list of episodes that I could watch with me son.

All Good Things - watched with me son
Chain of Command
Darmok
Measure of a Man- watched with me son, this week
The Inner Light
The Offspring
Unification
Yesterday's Enterprise- watched with me son
Best of Both Worlds- watched with me son
Frame of Mind
The Defector
Time's Arrow
Preemptive Strike
Face of the Enemy
Redemption
Cause and Effect
Arsenal of Freedom- watched with me son, this week
Parallels
Time Squared- watched with me son
Coming of Age
Remember Me
Sins of the Father
Conspiracy- watched with me son
Family - love this, but somehow was the lowest rated episode of the series? How can that be.
A Matter of Honor
Reunion
Timescape
Disaster
I, Borg
Ensign Ro
Night Terrors
The Next Phase
Second Chances
The Game
A Fistful of Datas
The Battle
Ship in a Bottle
Conundrum
Evolution
Relics

That is an awesome list, but I'd add
Contagion- watched with me son
Q Who
Encounter at Farpoint- watched with me son

What else would folks add?

 

I clearly remember in the middle of season one, going on a rant with a friend and pointing out all of the things they needed to fix. They needed a consistent engineer, kill Tasha and have Worf be security officer, too many people in red why not more tan, give Wesley something to do. He and I were amazed that by the second season they had addressed nearly all of my issues and often came up with the same ideas that I did, he said it was kind of spooky like a twilight zone episode or something, but a good one! He honestly thought I must have written them a letter or something.

 

Who Watches the Watchers doesn’t get enough love. I love the concept of a primitive race of beings seeing 24th Century technology and forming a religion based on it. Imagine if we traveled back in time a few centuries, brought someone here and showed them our comparatively advanced technology. They wouldn’t understand it. They might conclude that we are gods.

 

Have you heard about burning at the stake? Witch!

 

It's funny I said this nearly two years ago. On "Heroes and Icons" last spring I watched many first and second season episodes, and most weren't so bad, and a couple were pretty good. No where near as good as the best of later seasons, granted.

 

"The Survivors" I love the performance of the lead (guest) actor.

In regards to seasons 1 & 2, it should be noted that they were affected by a writer's strike. Season 2 saw turmoil among the writing staff.

 

Season 2 has several episodes that bark but some of the episodes are very, very good. Mr. Data's character got developed with the help of Dr. Pulaski. The show was finding it's way.

 

You are right I love that episode! Actor, John Anderson, gives an absolutely stunning performance!

 

The Drumhead is one that hasn't been mentioned much, but I find it incredibly compelling, especially in today's U.S.

 

Yep, the only episode that I that actually have an official script.

 

1. Encounter at Farpoint I 1.01
2. Encounter at Farpoint II 1.02
3. Who No One Has Gone Before 1.06
4. The Battle 1.09
5. The Big Goodbye 1.12
6. Datalore 1.13
7. 11001001 1.15
8. Home Soil 1.18
9. Coming of Age 1.19
10. Heart of Glory 1.20
11. Arsenal of Freedom 1.21
12. Conspiracy 1.25
13. Elementary, Dear Data 2.03
14. A Matter of Honor 2.08
15. The Measure of a Man 2.09
16. Contagion 2.11
17. Time Squared 2.13
18. Pen Pals 2.15
19. Q Who 2.16
20. Samaritan Snare 2.17
21. The Emissary 2.20
22. Peak Performance 2.21
23. The Ensigns of Command 3.02
24. The Survivors 3.03
25. Who Watches the Watchers 3.04
26. The Enemy 3.07
27. The Defector 3.10
28. The Hunted 3.11
29. Deja Q
30. Yesterday’s Enterprise 3.15
31. The Offspring 3.16
32. Sins of the Father 3.17
33. Allegiance 3.18
34. Hollow Pursuits 3.21
35. The Most Toys 3.22
36. Sarek 3.23
37. Best of Both Worlds I 3.26
38. Best of Both Worlds II 4.01
39. Family 4.02
40. Brothers 4.03
41. Remember Me 4.05
42. Reunion 4.07
43. Future Imperfect 4.8
44. Data’s Day 4.11
45. The Wounded 4.12
46. Clues 4.14
47. First Contact 4.15
48. Night Terrors 4.17
49. The Nth Degree 4.19
50. Qpid
51. The Drumhead 4.21
52. The Mind’s Eye 4.24
53. Redemption I 4.26
54. Redemption II 5.01
55. Darmok 5.02
56. Ensign Ro 5.03
57. Silicon Avatar 5.04
58. Disaster 5.05
59. The Game 5.06
60. Unification I 5.07
61. Unification II 5.08
62. Conundrum 5.14
63. Ethics 5.16
64. Cause and Effect 5.18
65. The First Duty 5.19
66. I Borg 5.23
67. The Next Phase 5.24
68. The Inner Light 5.25
69. Time’s Arrow I 5.26
70. Time’s Arrow II 6.01
71. Relics 6.04
72. Schisms 6.05
73. A Fistful of Datas 6.08
74. The Quality of Life 6.09
75. Chain of Command I 6.10
76. Chain of Command II 6.11
77. Ship in a Bottle 6.12
78. Face of the Enemy 6.14
79. Tapestry 6.15
80. Birthright I 6.16
81. Birthright II 6.17
82. Starship Mine 6.18
83. The Chase 6.20
84. Frame of Mind 6.21
85. Rightful Heir 6.23
86. Second Chances 6.24
87. Timescape 6.25
88. Descent I 6.26
89. Descent II 7.01
90. Gambit I 7.04
91. Gambit II 7.05
92. Phantasms 7.06
93. Inheritance 7.10
94. Parallels 7.11
95. The Pegasus 7.12
96. Lower Decks 7.15
97. Thine Own Self 7.16
98. Preemptive Strike 7.24
99. All Good Things I 7.25
100. All Good Things II 7.26

That's a list of 100 recommended episodes of Next Gen that my son and I came up with a while ago. Encounter at Farpoint is a flawed and awkward episode, obviously, but you can't really understand All Good Things, which is great, without it....If you'd like the lists we came up with for The original series, Voyager, and DS9, let me know.

 

Not with 24 it isn't.

Season 3 is indeed the best season of TNG; Gene Roddenberry's diminished involvement, not a bad episode in it, and ending with one of the greatest cliffhangers in television history... what's not to like?

 

3-6 are some of the best dramatic science fiction television you're likely to ever see. Also there are some great, funny moments sprinkled throughout, too. What a fantastic cast.

 

I go by who gets the A storyline. Q, Barclay, Data, or Picard stories I'm in. I usually enjoy Lwaxana Troi. Worf, Wesley definitly no. The rest, meh.

 

Thanks for mentioning Mind's Eye. I like what most here like, but that one was not mentioned. For those not familiar with Mind's Eye, its where Geordi is captured by the Romans and brainwashed to be an assassin.

 

Yes please on the other lists!

 

I started watching the original Star Trek with my son when he was about 6 or so. He's 21 now, and a computer science major on a full scholarship at a good university. Maybe Trek had a small role? I think it probably did. Anyway, he helped me select these "best of" lists for Trek....

46 episodes out of 80 from The original series....Obviously some of these are classics, while others are "so bad they are good" lol!


Where No Man Has Gone Before
The Corbomite Maneuver
The Naked Time
Balance of Terror
What Are Little Girls Made Of?
Dagger of the Mind
The Conscience of the King
The Galileo Seven
The Menagerie part I
The Menagerie part II
Shore Leave
Arena
A Taste of Armageddon
Space Seed
This Side of Paradise
The Devil in the Dark
The City on the Edge of Forever
Operation—Annihilate!
Who Mourns for Adonais?
Amok Time
The Doomsday Machine
The Changeling
Mirror, Mirror
The Deadly Years
The Trouble With Tribbles
Bread and Circuses
Journey to Babel
A Private Little War
The Gamesters of Triskelion
The Immunity Syndrome
A Piece of the Action
By Any Other Name
Patterns of Force
The Ultimate Computer
Spectre of the Gun
The Paradise Syndrome
The Enterprise Incident
Is There No Truth in Beauty
The Empath
The Tholian Web
For the World is Hollow
Wink of an Eye
The Cloud Minders
The Way to Eden
The Savage Curtain
All Our Yesterdays

 

114 from DS9....My son took years convincing me that this show was worth watching. He was about 14 at the time. Somehow during the first run I didn't make it past the first season....

1. Emissary I 1.01
2. Emissary II 1.02
3. Past Prologue 1.03
4. Vortex 1.12
5. Battle Lines 1.13
6. Progress 1.14
7. Duet 1.19
8. In the Hands of the Prophets 1.20
9. The Homecoming 2.01
10. The Circle 2.02
11. The Siege 2.03
12. Invasive Procedures 2.04
13. Cardassians 2.05
14. Necessary Evil 2.08
15. Whispers 2.14
16. Paradise 2.15
17. Shadowplay 2.16
18. Profit and Loss 2.18
19. Blood Oath 2.19
20. The Maquis I 2.20
21. The Maquis II 2.21
22. The Wire 2.22
23. Crossover 2.23
24. The Collaborator 2.24
25. Tribunal 2.25
26. The Jem’Hadar 2.26
27. The Search I 3.01
28. The Search II 3.02
29. The House of Quark 3.03
30. Second Skin 3.05
31. Civil Defense 3.07
32. Defiant 3.09
33. Life Support 3.13
34. Heart of Stone 3.14
35. Destiny 3.15
36. Visionary 3.17
37. Through the Looking Glass 3.19
38. Improbable Cause 3.20
39. The Die is Cast 3.21
40. Explorers 3.22
41. The Adversary 3.26
42. The Way of the Warrior I 4.01
43. The Way of the Warrior II 4.02
44. The Visitor 4.03
45. Hippocratic Oath 4.04
46. Indiscretion 4.05
47. Starship Down 4.07
48. Little Green Men 4.08
49. The Sword of Kahless 4.09
50. Our Man Bashir 4.10
51. Homefront 4.11
52. Paradise Lost 4.12
53. Return to Grace 4.14
54. Sons of Mogh 4.15
55. Accession 4.17
56. Hard Time 4.19
57. Shattered Mirror 4.20
58. For the Cause 4.22
59. To the Death 4.23
60. The Quickening 4.24
61. Broken Link 4.26
62. Apocalypse Rising 5.01
63. The Ship 5.02
64. Nor the Battle to the Strong 5.04
65. Trials and Tribble-ations 5.06
66. Things Past 5.08
67. The Ascent 5.09
68. Rapture 5.10
69. The Darkness and the Light 5.11
70. The Begotten 5.12
71. For the Uniform 5.13
72. In Purgatory’s Shadow 5.14
73. By Inferno’s Light 5.15
74. Doctor Bashir, I Presume? 5.16
75. Soldiers of Empire 5.21
76. Children of Time 5.22
77. Blaze of Glory 5.23
78. Empok Nor 5.24
79. Call to Arms 5.26
80. A Time to Stand 6.01
81. Rocks and Shoals 6.02
82. Behind the Lines 6.04
83. Favor the Bold 6.05
84. Sacrifice of Angels 6.06
85. The Magnificent Ferengi 6.10
86. Waltz 6.11
87. Far Beyond the Stars 6.13
88. One Little Ship 6.14
89. Wrongs Darker Than Death or Night 6.17
90. Inquisition 6.18
91. In the Pale Moonlight 6.19
92. Valiant 6.22
93. Tears of the Prophets 6.26
94. Image in the Sand 7.01
95. Shadows and Symbols 7.02
96. Afterimage 7.03
97. Treachery, Faith, and the Great River 7.06
98. Once More Into the Breech 7.07
99. The Siege of AR-558 7.08
100. Covenant 7.09
101. It’s Only a Paper Moon 7.10
102. Chimera 7.14
103. Badda-Bing, Badda-Bang 7.15
104. Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges 7.16
105. Penumbra 7.17
106. ‘Til Death Do Us Part 7.18
107. Strange Bedfellows 7.19
108. The Changing Face of Evil 7.20
109. When It Rains 7.21
110. Tacking Into the Wind 7.22
111. Extreme Measures 7.23
112. The Dogs of War 7.24
113. What You Leave Behind I 7.25
114. What You Leave Behind II 7.26
     

 

You don't like the Worf episodes?

Love them. Sins of the Father is fantastic.

Variety is the spice.....

 

Family was my all time favorite episode. Additionally, I love Allegiance, Ship In A Bottle, Cause and Effect, The Nth Degree, I Borg, The Inner Light, Relics, Tapestry, Birthright Part 1, The Most Toys, Clues

 

I generally only watch the first three seasons of TNG anymore. The first season followed a format that David Gerrold had devised in his 1970's study of Star Trek, "The World Of Star Trek". Recommended reading for fans of TOS and TNG alike. Really like late season one run of stories from The Arsenal Of Freedom to The Neutral Zone. End of season one and start of season two were hampered by the writer's strike, and a lot of cool ideas were compromised as a result.
Season two holds my two favorite TNG episodes, Where Silence Has Lease and Contagion. My favorite type of Star Trek stories deal with encountering civilizations and cultures that are different and challenge our own. Something I feel was lost in latter seasons. The Borg were a perfect example of this concept initially. As Q said, they had no interest in communicating or understanding the Federation. All of that was lost as the Borg were adapted into a easier to understand "baddie" with a voice and latter a queen. The Measure Of A Man, Time Squared, The Schizoid Man and Peak Performance are all favorites of the second season as well as many others.
Season three is the peak year for TNG to me, with latter years becoming bland, safe and predicable in character development. As former TNG writer Herbert Wright once said, "I don't give a **** if Worf is a good single parent, I want to see cool stuff happening". Data and Geordi in particular suffer after year three, as their development stagnates or even regresses from earlier story lines. Case in point is the excellent season three story The Most Toys. Data has his belief system challenged and he must chose a action that is against his nature for the safety of others. Latter seasons ignore this development and even make data more confused by human behavior latter in the series.
Stand out shows for season three are The Survivors, Who Watches The Watchers, The Enemy, The Vengeance Factor, The Defector, The High Ground, The Offspring and my personal favorite of the year, Tin Man. The Best of Both Worlds was a blessing and a curse. It created a massive amount of interest in the show, but set in place a format that TNG and Voyager would abuse to death by ending every subsequent season in a two part story. At the end of season three, many of us thought Picard might not actually return. The best part of season four is the follow up to The Best Of Both Worlds, Family. Picard going home and confronting his brother about his morality and helplessness was the first time I like the character. Picard up to that point had been unapproachable to his crew and the fans. Now we got to see him at his lowest point and appreciate what he had to overcome to continue in Starfleet.
Season four then went on a downward spiral in terms of my personal interest. We start the "let's revisit past stories" syndrome that was safe and easy for the writers to churn out. Lore returns, K'Ehleyr returns, Vash returns, Barclay returns, and the Klingons never leave. One of the reasons I don't enjoy Discovery very much is because we still have to watch Klingon politics. I've had enough , thank you. A stand out show late in the year is Half a Life. While the guest performances are some of the best ever displayed in Star Trek, even that of Majel Barret in the best use ever of Lwaxana Troi, it exemplifies how the main characters on the Enterprise have become witnesses to the stories and not directly involved anymore. TNG went to the back burner to me when DS9 and Babylon 5 hit the airwaves. Those two shows I revisit far more than season 4-7 of TNG.

 

I'm a fan of this show, but I've never tried watching it from beginning to end. I watched it sporadically during it's initial run and caught episodes here and there, so it would be difficult for me to assess which season is the best. I don't think I even started watching the show until season 4. The first episode that really grabbed my attention was Remember Me.

 

I have watched them all over several months.
First 2 seasons have some good, (maybe half or so) some not so good.

Season 3 onwards is quite good overall.
looking back, seems the show would have Greatly benefited with shorter seasons and more time to create the episodes.
A 15-20 Episode season would have done wonders, and eliminated a lot of the "filler" or subpar episodes, many completely shipboard and with either boring or very lame stories.
That extra money saved on less episodes could then be used for more on location outdoor footage or something.

 

This is my exact opinion of post-Season 3 TNG in a nutshell too; there was a complete overhaul of writers on that show for the fourth season onward, and it shows onscreen... the main focus became less and less on exploring new worlds and cultures, and more and more on some external factor affecting the crew on some level. There were many genuinely great episodes in Seasons 4-7, but frankly, showrunner Rick Berman's moribund aesthetics made it all rather dull to watch... do they look noticeably better on the Blu-Ray releases anyone?

And no-one will ever convince me that Paramount didn't rip Babylon 5 off for DS9 (JMS continues to think so to this day, and with good reason)... however genuinely good the latter show turned out (just not a Star Trek show, in my opinion).