The Best of Both Worlds

The shock to the images of kidnapped Picard and his birth as Locutus were a shock at that time. The episode remains, in my case, exemplary portrait of dictatorship. And a great exercise of build of tension. After decades, I feel the cold metal and the blank terror and the asimmilation of a great character in an universe in which the individuality is lost. So, a special episode.

ST:TNG:74 - "The Best Of Both Worlds, Part I" (Stardate: 43989.1) - this is the 26th and last episode of the 3rd season of Star Trek: The Next Generation.

The Borg are back! The last time they were encountered was 7000 light years away in the 2nd season episode "Q Who?", with Starfleet thinking they'd have more time to prepare. Regardless, the Enterprise goes to intercept - with Elizabeth Dennehy as Commander Shelby. She has more than the Borg on her mind, wanting to replace Riker who has been offered command of the Melbourne. As tensions mount between Riker and Shelby, Picard is captured by the Borg!

Watch this part I of an exciting two part episode. You won't be disappointed.

Trivia note: Riker is offered his 3rd chance of commanding a starship. Also, we see the poker game again (this time Wesley joins in on the fun). And Whoopi Goldberg makes another appearance as Guinan.

The first two seasons of Star Trek: The Next Generation ranged (in quality) from dreadful to uneven. There were some good stories being told and the characters were progressing somewhat, but nowhere near on a consistent basis. Fortunately, this Third Season is where Next Generation establishes itself as a very quality product.

Perhaps the biggest difference in this season is that there is a noticeable decrease in "clunker" episodes, as there really aren't any eps that are truly atrocious (a fairly common occurrence in the previous campaigns). Clearly, the writing was improved.

Another thing I liked about this season was that the stories were so varied. From single-arc mysteries to Data (Brent Spiner) creating offspring to over-arcing Roman plots, Season Three had a little bit of everything in a very nice mix. Of course, the return of the Borg at the end of the season may be the highlight, as Captain Picard (Patrick Stewart) faces his greatest challenge yet. Basically, some great diverse storytelling and pacing.

I'm not going to summarize or review specific episodes here, but suffice it to say that Season Three is when Next Generation really makes the leap from "not sure this is ever going to come around" to "this is quality television". I hate to point fingers or cast aspersions, but the common rhetoric for this change is that Gene Roddenberry was less involved in the scripts by this time. While Roddenberry was a great world-builder (not unlike George Lucas of Star Wars fame), his week-to-week scripts or ideas tended to be rather pompous or high-minded. They either really worked or crashed-and-burned magnificently. So, while the decline of Roddenberry was obviously something that no one in the Trek universe wanted to see happen, it may have unintentionally allowed the show's writers to "loosen the bonds" a bit, working out for the better.

Bottom Line: If you can hold out until this Third Season, you'll become hooked on Next Generation, as this is when the character development and stories finally entertain on an almost every-episode basis. My exact star rating would be 4.5.

Now that is how you do a To Be Continued! Wow! This is an amazing cliff hanger, even though I have already seen it, it still hits hard. This episode is kind of a slow build, most of the first half is about setting the stage, but things really get exciting in the second half, and by the climax I was on the edge of my seat. All of the characters are great in this, but, I think I'd say Riker is the MVP. When the pressure is on he shows that he would make a great Captain in his own right. They don't make tv shows like this any more. The Borg are terrifying villains. I love it.

This is it folks. The greatest part one of a two part cliffhanger in television history. Everything about this episode changed tv forever. The scope, the music, the acting, the menace, the special effects. It has it all. Not only that, but this episode spawned other great tng episodes (Family right after this one for example), plus the best TNG movie, and some of the best content on voyager (and mostly gave us Seven, the best part of voyager). Before BOBW, no one had ever seen a cliffhanger as crazy on tv as this one. I remember seeing this when o was 10 years old and my jaw was on the floor!!!!!