The Most Disliked Episode of TNG - Season 2...

[Brennyren]

"The Dauphin" was pretty tolerable, as Wesley episodes go. Wesley was more relatable than usual.

The Child
The Outrageous Okona
The Icarus Factor
Up The Long Ladder
Shades Of Gray

 

[Unimatrix Q]

I take out "The Icarus Factor" because it gave us a lot of background history on Riker and his relationship with his father. And i really like the atmosphere and tone of this episode.

The Child
The Outrageous Okona
Up The Long Ladder
Shades Of Gray

 

[Sakonna]

I'll save "The Child." Marina Sirtis makes it work.

The Outrageous Okona
Up The Long Ladder
Shades Of Gray

 

[BigDaveX]

Up The Long Ladder, since the cloning subplot is at least something vaguely interesting (if very poorly executed), whereas Okona is just insufferable, and Shades of Gray barely even qualifies as an episode at all.

The Outrageous Okona
Shades Of Gray

 

[Armus]

Up The Long Ladder is an enjoyable 42 minutes of television.

 

[Farscape One]

Then the 'winner' of season 2 is "Shades Of Gray".

I'm honestly not surprised. Few episodes of TNG seem to be as hated as this one. Frankly, I'm not a fan of it, either.

Thank you all for voting. Season 3 is next.

 

[gakelly]

Okona and Shades might be the 2 worst episodes of Trek

 

[Sakonna]

I've weirdly reached a place where I do like "Shades Of Gray", but it's just because we're decades into every episode being a rerun, so this recycled footage doesn't rankle as much anymore. And sometimes my Trek viewing these days is just jumping to random scenes from random episodes, so why get worked up anymore about an episode doing the same?

And as clip shows go, the framing sequence is solid. Everyone acts the hell out of it, the planet set is excellent, the attacking vine is creepy, there's all this Frakes chest hair... there are things to enjoy!

(I guess this is what happens when you've watched BOBW and Pale Moonlight soooooo many times and just need to start finding less obvious Berman Trek to appreciate. )

 

[Armus]

I've weirdly reached a place where I do like "Shades Of Gray", but it's just because we're decades into every episode being a rerun, so this recycled footage doesn't rankle as much anymore. And sometimes my Trek viewing these days is just jumping to random scenes from random episodes, so why get worked up anymore about an episode doing the same?

And as clip shows go, the framing sequence is solid. Everyone acts the hell out of it, the planet set is excellent, the attacking vine is creepy, there's all this Frakes chest hair... there are things to enjoy!

(I guess this is what happens when you've watched BOBW and Pale Moonlight soooooo many times and just need to start finding less obvious Berman Trek to appreciate. )

I'd take Shades of Grey over Sub Rosa or Masks anyday!

 

[Farscape One]

I still maintain, and always will, that "Masks" is a highly underrated episode.

 

[Armus]

I still maintain, and always will, that "Masks" is a highly underrated episode.

I still haven't watched it all the way through. Someday.

 

[gakelly]

The acting quality of Shades is perfectly fine, the plot leaves a lot to be desired. Clip shows are supposed to be garbage. They exist simply, in most cases, to save money. Still much better than Okona.

 

[Spirit of 73]

I don't understand the hate for Okona. It's a boring Trek episode except for Okona himself, whom Billy Campbell plays quite well. I'd certainly not call it good, but I'd put it above Loud As a Whisper, The Child and Up the Long Ladder.

 

[Qonundrum]

Up The Long Ladder is an enjoyable 42 minutes of television.

I'm part Irish and the stereotypes, while alloying in certain scenes, weren't entirely godawful and the larger point of simple farm living vs a technologically-driven society deserved 2 parts to really dig into the meat of the pros and cons of both. It told enough of interest and wanting for more, but I'd almost call it an underated story. Never mind some nice eye candy.

I don't understand the hate for Okona. It's a boring Trek episode except for Okona himself, whom Billy Campbell plays quite well. I'd certainly not call it good, but I'd put it above Loud As a Whisper, The Child and Up the Long Ladder.

Campbell works wonders in some scenes but I just didn't completely buy into Okona as being outrageous -- and some of Okona's shtick was beneath "corny", it was just awful dialogue that nobody could really save but Campbell does play it with conviction so I know it could be a far worse episode, if he hadn't! But I digress, Okona is so un-outrageous that even if he somehow ended up on "The Jerry Springer Show" it would be for anything but Sweeps Week, if not the opposite of that. I like the twist that he's not the bad guy (using the trope of red herrings to deflect wasn't badly done). But this is the same story where, on screen, Goldberg and Spiner's double act is funnier than the comic hired (Piscopo), which also cements (IMHO) the story as needing another draft...

"The Child" was also a different take on finding a new life form, one that doesn't want to kill or assimilate anything on sight.

"Loud as a Whisper" had some glossed over bits but I found it to be novel, different, clever, and compelling in using mediation as a subplot. Even though the one bloke was used as a channel for lust (albeit in a different and actually interesting way.) That also reminds me, "Whisper" must have been an influence for a TV show that would start a year or two later:

 

[gakelly]

When you need to tell the viewers that someone is outrageous in the title, that isn't going to go well. Half the script was about the main characters on the enterprise slobbering all over this guy about how great he was or how they all wanted to be like him. The part where Troi is describing him on the bridge makes me want to vomit. The guy wasn't outrageous, he was just a douchebag. Wish Worf would have mopped the floor up with him.
My vote for the worst Trek show of all time, much worse than even The Empath, Catspaw, And The Children Shall lead, The Savage Curtain, and all of Voyager's crappy episodes. Never watched Enterprise.

 

[Discofan]

When you need to tell the viewers that someone is outrageous in the title, that isn't going to go well. Half the script was about the main characters on the enterprise slobbering all over this guy about how great he was or how they all wanted to be like him. The part where Troi is describing him on the bridge makes me want to vomit. The guy wasn't outrageous, he was just a douchebag. Wish Worf would have mopped the floor up with him.
My vote for the worst Trek show of all time, much worse than even The Empath, Catspaw, And The Children Shall lead, The Savage Curtain, and all of Voyager's crappy episodes. Never watched Enterprise.

That episode was definitely shit but Season one got a few that were doozier than this one, in shittiness of course.

 

[gakelly]

Most of season 1 episodes were just really boring. Home Soil, The Arsenal of Freedom, Haven, Lonely Among Us, etc. But they weren't on the same level of obnoxiousness as Okona. The Wesley saving the ship stories were usually trash. The dialogue in shows like Datalore are bottom of the barrel, but Okona is just worse because of the character of Okona and the stupid plot that he has to resolve.

 

[Armus]

^The Arsenal of Freedom was fun vehicle for the ensemble, a good story, the Enterprise visits a planet of arms merchants killed off by their own ingenuity.

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[Discofan]

^The Arsenal of Freedom was fun vehicle for the ensemble, a good story, the Enterprise visits a planet of arms merchants killed off by their own ingenuity.

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Of course, the whole thing of we're making weapons that get harder and harder to fight doesn't make much sense. When you go to war, you don't start with crude weapons and then move on to more sophisticated ones, you go immediately to the best you got, and so does your enemy. This is a pleasant episode but the least you think about it the better it looks.

 

[gakelly]

Also, when Picard says he buys the weapons, the ones on the planet disappear but the one attacking the enterprise still keeps attacking. Always bugged me.
These weapons are supposed to have wiped out an entire planet but can't take out 2 starfleet officers armed only with phasers?