Genesis

While Captain Picard and Lt.Commander Data are off chasing an errant Floton torpedo, Sick bay is is busier than usual. Dr. Crusher does some genetic therapy on Ensign Barkley's equivalent of an alien common cold.

On 21st century earth she would be sued for malpractice. What happens is she creates a virus that spreads through the ship like a wild crown fire and the crew be it human or another race reverts to the primitive.

Some of the reversions are something else. Lt.Worf's and Commander Riker's are the most frightening.

Once again androids are handy to have around in these situations. Data is impervious to these biological ailments and he does work at super speed.

One of the more off the wall TNG stories.

The people who have problems with the science and plot-holes of this episode specifically (instead of the science and plot-holes of all of the other episodes) are the fans the Simpsons would make fun of, nudging their glasses up their nose and hoping someone got fired for their blunders.

This episode is a departure from anything philosophical or deep that the other episodes provide, and instead is just FUN. I always welcome these episodes to break up the season's tone and just do whatever they want.

Sure it's not realistic, sure it's got plot holes, but you know what it also has? A well-executed change of atmosphere, well directed build-up, and just a unique, Twilight Zone-esque journey through some space silliness that, at the very least, is a joy to watch the crew indulge in as its last crazy-hurrah of the season.

I do not envy anyone who can't voluntarily put aside their elitist fanboy-ism of a serie's tropes and universe and just take something at face value, for they probably don't get much entertainment from much else.

This episode harkens back to the roots of science fiction. It's an amazing homage to the Saturday afternoon matinee science fiction classics within the framework of the Star Trek universe.

The title says it all for me. These guys know that the "powers that be" do not want to pay the high salaries of seven year veterans for another season, that they can go cheaper with "Deep Space 9" and the soon-to-be-released "Voyager." So, with the light at the end of the tunnel, why worry? The series has been picked up for a full season, and it's too late to cancel the six episodes that remain.

Let the makeup people have some fun. Cut back on the writing talent, and above all, just shelve the science books for a week. Maybe this episode with pick up a cult following like the "Rocky Horror Picture Show" or something.

Better yet, while the first and second seasons were really not that hot, STTNG has never really made a total stinker like Voyager will do with "Threshold," or STTOS did with "Spock's Brain," among others. So it's time to make one so horrible, it will be remembered forever.

Except I had forgotten it. My wife remembered bits and pieces, though it was scrambled. She though that Troi would turn into a spider (she didn't; someone else did), so I'm sure we had seen it together. But my subconscious, protecting me, had erased it totally from my memory, but after watching it a second time, said, "Sorry, Bud. This time you have to live with the memory forever." So here I am.

But it's not the end of the world for me. I actually dozed off in my chair for about 5-7 minutes of the story, and had to ask my wife what had happened.

So many STTNG episodes will be with me forever, treasured and watched again. But I have marked this one mentally. I will never watch "Genesis" again. I would watch "Spock's Brain" first.

Just watched Star Trek TNG series 7, ep 19 "Genesis": It was absolutely hilarious! I don't remember it at all from the first time around but I'm very glad I saw it now! It's so utterly ridiculous, I place it on the level of a Simpsons Halloween special: IE it was just meant as a bit of fun and is not to be considered as a real episode.

So spiders are part of human's genetic past??? And Spot the cat suddenly becomes an Iguana with a pink collar? No expense spared on SFX there!! And never has an abrupt TNG "and they all lived happily ever after" ending been so apparent as with this one! So the crew ends up joking as usual, suffering no disturbing after-effects after having just spent three days morphing "The Fly"-like, into all manner of pustulating, venom-spitting creatures and trying to rape / eat each other?!

I seriously can't decide if I love or hate this ep, at least the hilarity levels make it a memorable one. Being the final season, they had nothing to lose I guess. Why not have a laugh and camp it up with a horror parody?