Engaging The Next Generation of viewers
- Morgan Bowles
- Jul 28
- 7 min read
Recently I’ve been fortunate to have revisited and revitalized my undying love for Star Trek. Gene Roddenberry's universe created back in the 1960’s has always had a special place in my heart. The concepts, themes and ideas presented in Star Trek are extremely thought provoking and, sometimes, brutal reflections of our own society and our own humanity. For me, growing up and watching Star Trek, it’s difficult to imagine the world that the iconic show first emerged in. America in the 1960’s was a very different place than it is now. The progressive ideals presented on the show were pretty radical for the time and it was definitely an acquired taste for many audiences back then. Even the original series didn’t garner its mainstream popularity until it came back to TV as re-runs several years later.
With that said, I still love and appreciate Star Trek immensely and I love geeking out over the show's concepts, characters and episodes that hit close to home. Especially The Next Generation, the late 80’s and early 90’s rendition that evolved into what many consider to be the definitive version of Star Trek. One of my good friends recently asked me to send them a list of episodes to watch and help them get jump-started into the show. I saw this as a perfect opportunity to create my own definitive watchlist for Next Gen newcomers and help guide them into the world of Starfleet, Kingons, Romulans and the Borg!
For my list, I’ve narrowed it down to my top ten personal favorite episodes from across the whole series. It was a difficult task, but I think I managed it pretty well! Let’s hope that veteran Trek fans don’t hunt me down with pitchforks for my choices. If you’re new to The Next Generation, I’d highly recommend checking out one or all of these episodes to get started and get hooked! All of these episodes work great as individual stories as well, meaning you don’t need to have a deep character or storyline understanding to quickly pick up with what’s happening.
I also want to validate and give credits to the other amazing iterations of Star Trek, as they all deserve praise in their own right. I share a lot of love with both The Original Series and Voyager shows. Deep Space Nine and Enterprise have been on my list for ages and I’ve attempted to binge them without success. I’m hoping to change that very soon!
Without further ado, here are my top ten personal favorite Star Trek: The Next Generation episodes!
10. Thine Own Self
As fun as this episode is, it’s also just as heartwarming and insightful in a perfect Star Trek way. Data, while on a dangerous away mission to recover some radioactive probe parts, crash lands on a planet inhabited by a medieval society. As he struggles to remember who and what he is, the medieval society welcomes him in as an outsider and begins to teach him their old school ways and culture. It’s a great story with an excellent premise and no Prime Directives are broken! I think?
9. Clues
A classic science fiction mystery story using Star Trek tropes. The crew of the Enterprise encounter a spatial anomaly that knocks them unconscious for thirty seconds and sends them a mild distance away from the anomaly’s origin. The crew wakes up and goes about their normal business, assuming everything is okay, until they discover that things aren’t quite as they left them before they encountered the anomaly. Combined with the strange behaviors from Data, it’s an excellent mystery waiting to be solved!
8. Timescape
You’re gonna read me writing this a lot, but this is a CLASSIC episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation! This episode begins with Picard, Data, Troi and La Forge returning to the Enterprise from a science conference on a distant planet. They return to find the ship frozen in a weird pocket of subspace where time moves at an infinitesimal rate. Essentially, their crew and friends are frozen in space time during the middle of a battle with the Romulans! Picard and the conference crew must work together to figure out what has happened to the Enterprise, how they’ve gotten stuck and what they can do to undo the damage caused by the time freeze.
7. First Contact
I really loved this episode’s portrayal of the famed “first contact” situation that the Federation finds themselves in all too often. The crew of the Enterprise are tasked with making first contact with a new alien species that is on the cusp of discovering warp technology. The episode dives deeper into the Federation’s first contact methods and what they do to prepare themselves and the society preparing to go to warp power. Almost everything goes according to plan…
6. Cause and Effect
A sci-fi mystery thriller straight out of The Twilight Zone! After a thrilling cold open where the ship explodes, the crew of the (now intact and not-exploded) Enterprise begins to experience weird instances of deja-vu and feelings of repetition. These feelings of repetition and investigations are rudely interrupted by a wild spatial anomaly that plays a part in destroying the ship! I don’t wanna spoil too much of this episode’s plot because watching the crew deduce and figure out how they’re gonna get out of this time loop test is great television!
5. Chain of Command (Parts 1 and 2)
If you’ve got time for a two-part episode, I highly suggest sitting down and checking these two out! Picard, Crusher and Worf become drafted into a top-secret Starfleet mission to infiltrate Cardassian space and gather intelligence on their weapons development. The mission is so secretive that Picard, with no intention to return, resigns his commission as the Captain and hands control of the Enterprise over to the controversial Captain Edward Jellico. When the mission goes south and Picard is captured, he’s subjected to torture from the Cardassians while the Enterprise searches for his whereabouts. Don’t watch these if you have a weak stomach!
4. The Inner Light
Probably the strongest contender for the best TNG episode ever written, The Inner Light makes the top of many Trekkie’s definitive watchlists and I feel a tiny bit obligated to include it here. But to its own right, this episode is fantastic and makes top ten lists for a reason. In this episode, Captain Picard’s mind is hijacked by an alien probe sent from a distant and uninhabited planet. The probe gives Picard perspective and insight into a whole new life in a small village from the probe’s homeworld. This one is truly an episode for the ages!
3. The Offspring
This episode never fails to yank at my emotions and swell up my tear ducts. Data ventures into fatherhood and creates an android daughter for himself, modeled after his own robotic design. With this incredible technological feat, Starfleet command ventures to take Data’s daughter away from him in an effort to study her and create more androids. Naturally, things escalate when the subject of handing children over to the state becomes prevalent and the rights of androids in a biological society. This episode also features an excellent guest star performance from the actress playing Data’s daughter, Hallie Todd!
2. Darmok
Season five features some of the highest-rated Star Trek TNG episodes to date, and many iconic series moments. Darmok is one such moment. The crew of the Enterprise attempt to communicate and make contact with an alien race that communicates in weird, obscure metaphors and story references. This attempt at communication escalates to a sudden battle on the planet surface where Picard and the alien Captain must find a way to communicate with each other in order to defeat their common enemy.
1. Who Watches the Watchers
I always find myself fondly coming back to this episode with every rewatch of The Next Generation. It’s also on the cusp of season three of the show, where the cast and crew really have dialed in their characters and stories and the show begins to become peak science fiction. In this incredible episode, the Enterprise responds to a distress call from a Federation outpost remotely studying a bronze age proto-Vulcan society on a distant planet. Things quickly go wrong at the outpost and their cover is blown, exposing the technologically-advanced Federation scientists to the ancient aliens. What follows is a perfect blend of storytelling, acting and Star Trek themes in full swing and firing on all cylinders.
That concludes my Star Trek: The Next Generation top ten! If any of these episode descriptions caught your eye, I suggest you give them a watch! And if you like what you see from a few of these episodes, start the show from the beginning and give it a shot! I find myself returning to this iconic show time and time again, either to watch something that’ll move me or just to have a comfort show playing in the background. Star Trek and and always will be relevant and it will always reflect our humanity in the most beautiful way!
<3 morgan
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