The Inner Light

"The single best hour of television" someone said. This is the only episode where one truly feels what Jean-Luc feels, especially as he returns to the Enterprise.

It's been almost twenty years now since I first saw "The Inner Light," and I still think it's the best episode of any Star Trek series. The writing, acting and direction are nothing short of brilliant. I was sitting there on 8 Sep 1966 for the premiere of what we now call Trek Classic, and I have never seen them do better than "The Inner Light." Hence, it gets a perfect 10 from me. Whoever called it TNG's "City on the Edge of Forever" was not mistaken, although I think the edge for "best ever episode" goes to "The Inner Light."

It seems odd, really, that the best episodes of Classic and TNG are more or less Star Trek in name only. The Trekkish trappings are all there at the top and bottom of both episodes, but in the middle we get a wonderful story about these characters, who in each case are far removed from their normal time, place and circumstance.

What an achievement this episode was. Writing about this has made me miss the series all over again.

The best episode of TNG ever. I have never bought a video of any episode of any TV series. However, I came across this one a few years after it was shown and bought it just so I could watch it anytime I wanted. Getting a lump in my throat just thinking about it ! I agree with the overall opinions of others the episode and Patrick Stewart should have received an Emmy. I have seen some of his Shakespearian roles and the character he portrays here is as close to, if not as good as some of the roles he has played on stage. As a matter of fact, there are times throughout the scenes on the planet, it seems as though they are acting out the roles on a stage, rather than on a TV set. The entire cast of the people on the planet deserve credit for their efforts and acting abilities.

Can't believe it took twenty years to watch this. I'm always leary when people state things like "One of television's finest hours" (which was stated in a review for Deep Space Nine's the Vistor). I thought that episode was good, not great etc. Also a movie like the Godfather tends to have people state that it's one of the best movies ever. Which I thought it was just good also. I had my guard up before this episode. This episode was simply amazing and could be worthy of the "One of television finest hours" mantra. The music at the end stays with you. And you can feel Picard's difficulty of having to adjust to his former life. You know it's good when it inspired me to write my first review.

This is my favourite episode by far of ST:TNG and it makes me emotional thinking about it, let alone watching it. It must be something that I hold dear that it links with; maybe the idea that as humans we have such a short time on this earth and the best we can hope for is to be remembered, and remembered fondly. We should all hope for such a beautiful journey through life, to cherish the ones we love and to be cherished, and to be gifted that experience, especially for a character such as Picard who's devotions are so often selfless, to have that experience of having a life with such shared experiences gifting him the guilty pleasures of familial love at an intimate level, is a beautiful thing.