I hereby declare Disc 1 of this season one set to be the Star Trek endurance test. These episodes (Including the "Groundbreaking pilot that started it all!") are some of the worst Star Trek stories ever created.
Encounter at Farpoint
Originally written to be an hour long premiere, DC Fontana and Gene Roddenberry were forced to make it into a two hour episode. You know your writing initiative is crap when the stuff you throw in to pad the episode out (The character of Q) is more interesting than anything else in the story.
The Naked Now
Cool continuity reference aside, this episode cements Wesley as the show's number one demon who must die. I still laugh out loud whenever Wesley shows off his voice recording device to Geordi. "It's pieced together from words he's used over the intercom. With this, I can pretend he's ordering me to take the Enterprise anywhere." So he secretly records EVERYTHING Picard says over the intercom, and he uses it to pretend he's ordering Wesley around..... This is less like Wesley trying to experience working on the bridge and more like some strange, stalking fetish he has going on with Picard. "It never happened" I agree. Oh, and Wesley gets put in charge of Engineering when no one else qualified is around.....
Code of honor
Racism, sexism, bad arithmetic, forced plot points, and Wesley doing what he shouldn't be doing all make up what should be considered TNG's worst episode of it's entire run. We have a hostage situation, an epidemic that will kill millions, no captain on the ship, yet somehow Riker joyfully welcomes Wesley Crusher to take control of ops, one of the most fundamental and essential positions on the ship...
And seriously, I honestly cannot wait to finally watch it all in HD!
