#4 The First Duty, season 5
I'm a self professed Wesley-hater, but I want to clarify. Wil Wheaton was not the problem. Even the character of Wesley Crusher that was the main problem. I blame the writers and directors entirely. I understand that they wanted him to be a "good boy" and a proper role model but they went too far by giving him no viable teenage flaws. He always knew what the right thing to do was and he always did it with little or no prodding. He had no bad attitude or mischievous tendencies whatsoever. He was at genius level intelligence and even though his outlook was too innocent for his age, he was also somehow mature for his age and never conflicted with the other characters. The episode, "Where No Man Has Gone Before" set him up to be a unique character. And what a build up. He's going to be something amazing. He's going to be a "chosen one." He's going to be... going to be... ... ... A straight "A" student? A sci-fi Hardy Boy? There was great material all around him and he was always solid when paired with Picard, but nobody noticed until the end after he'd become a recurring character with precious little time for development.
This episode is another one of my personal favorites and, in my opinion, the best "Wesley" episode ever. There's an accident at the Academy in Wesley's flight team and one of the members is killed. When the team leader, Nick, interrupts his comfort time with his mother and Picard you see that the team is responsible for the accident and they're trying to cover it up. Where was all this great peer pressure when Wesley was growing up and being perfect from sun up to sun down? This is a much bigger deal than setting Nanites loose on the ship by accident. He'd never had any real challenges to his character development up until now and then it's like going from one extreme to the other. But this "other" is far more interesting. Picard confronting Wesley is a fantastic scene as it always is when Wesley and Picard are paired together. The ethics are solid and it's great character development for a character that wasn't even on the show regularly any more. Very gripping. This episode is so powerful that they show it at the Air Force Academy as a part of teaching about duty and ethics. If only Wesley had still been a regular on the show, some follow up could've been done. But they wasted his time on the show by making him the perfect little hero all the time. It still drives me crazy. This is such a cool episode. An episode that spawns other stories is the most impressive kind. The actor that played Nick went on to be a main character in Voayager... nearly as this character but for legal complications. And Sito would be brought back for another five star episode that's also in my list. Love it. Love it.
I also have 10 honorable mentions to match my top ten favorites, so I'll throw one in every day that I post a top ten episode. These aren't ranked
To Thine Own Self, season 7
I liked this episode an awful lot and it's actually the B story that I liked over the A story. I liked Data's adventure too as long as one doesn't think about it too hard about it because even though amnesia stories work well, the fact that Data is the one with the amnesia makes it more difficult to pull off. You know - he doesn't remember that radioactive materials are dangerous but he's somehow retained enough scientific knowledge to understand that fire isn't an element as well as the skill to build a microscope and create a cure for radiation poisoning. It's one of those 7th season stretches that is forgivable because the show and characters are so beloved at this point they can almost do no wrong. Still... it's a story that begs to have holes knocked into it.
But the Bridge Officer test angle for Troi is what makes me stand up and cheer every time I see this episode. It only takes up about three scenes in the whole show, but it's the better story. Seeing Beverly taking a command watch on the bridge gets Troi thinking about her own career and she decides she would like to get a promotion. But it's not that easy. She passes all of the technical requirements, however it concludes with a test of character that has her stumped as she repeatedly destroys the Enterprise in a holodeck simulation. She doesn't know what she's doing wrong and Riker says that he can't tell her which only frustrates her more. She even asks if it's a no-win scenario, but that's not it either and Riker is ready to fail her for the good of the ship which gives Troi the epiphany needed to pass the holodeck simulation. She has to order poor holo-Geordi to his death in order to save the ship. Ah, my heart! So, not only did it reference the Kobayashi Maru from Khan, but it built on the concept. Spock volunteered to do what Kirk couldn't or wouldn't have asked him to do and now it's a requirement that commanding officers have the fortitude necessary to order someone to die to save the ship. The Kobayashi Maru is probably still there in the 24th century as a test of character, but now there's also a more grown up test of character to go with it. Because the show has grown up too. I love it so much!
I can see there was't enough there to fill an entire episode so it had to be a side story, but this little bit goes a long way. It was another great example of the reach and impact that The Wrath of Khan had on the franchise, furthering my opinion that Star Trek wouldn't have survived without it.
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