Excluding finales, what are the 5 worst episode/story resolutions in Trek in your opinion?
In choosing my 5, I've kinda tried to avoid choosing terrible episodes because most bad episodes tend to have bad endings. I've tried to go for episodes that were good but had awful endings that tainted the rest of the episode/story.
1. The First Duty
This episode made me so almost like Wesley right up until the horrible ending. I thought I was seeing Wesley begin to understand the meaning of friendship and loyalty even in extreme circumstances. But then with Wesley speaking up in the tribunal at the very end and telling the truth, it became a lame morality message "you must always tell the truth!". I was disappointed that Wesley betrayed his friends and at the end, Locarno even sacrifices himself to save the other 3 Cadets including Wesley showing the true meaning of friendship and community.
So Wesley ended up seeming like a weak tattletale who was willing to risk the expulsion of his entire squadron just because he wanted to be a good little boy and always tell the truth.
Its interesting that Ronald D Moore originally wanted Wesley to not reveal the truth, and I think I would have preferred a story about friendship and sticking together over a story about telling the truth. Still the rest of the story is impeccably written, so almost a fantastic episode ruined by a bad ending.
2. Equinox Pt 2
Coincidentally another ending that Ronald D. Moore didn't approve of. In fact in his interview about his time on Voyager, he explained in detail that he was pretty furious.
So Janeway almost kills a man and goes loco, and Chakotay apologizes to her? I mean, talk about a cop out!
3. Alliances
So the conclusion of Alliances has Janeway basically telling the crew that they've tried to shake things up once but it didn't work so that means they can never ever stray from Federation protocol ever again. Lame.
4. The Sound of her Voice
So we get to know this woman throughout the episode and then they decide to throw a meaningless sci-fi twist at the end and she's dead. Does anyone else think it would have been better if she'd just been alive? It sure as hell wouldn't have been so anti-climactic.
5. Real Life
This episode is so good until the sappy, melodramatic, out of nowhere ending. What exactly are the chances of his daughter dying within a week of creating her anyway? The ending seems so contrived and emotionally manipulative. I normally just fast forward it. On a side note, what a horrible B story this episode had.
Dishonorable mentions:
Deadlock: Harry is annoyingly nonchalant about the fact the other Voyager was destroyed and he just passed over to a new Voyager where his counterpart was blown out into the vacuum of space
These are the Voyages: Yeah its a finale, and it "resolved" the T'Pol and Trip storyline in the worst way possible.
In choosing my 5, I've kinda tried to avoid choosing terrible episodes because most bad episodes tend to have bad endings. I've tried to go for episodes that were good but had awful endings that tainted the rest of the episode/story.
1. The First Duty
This episode made me so almost like Wesley right up until the horrible ending. I thought I was seeing Wesley begin to understand the meaning of friendship and loyalty even in extreme circumstances. But then with Wesley speaking up in the tribunal at the very end and telling the truth, it became a lame morality message "you must always tell the truth!". I was disappointed that Wesley betrayed his friends and at the end, Locarno even sacrifices himself to save the other 3 Cadets including Wesley showing the true meaning of friendship and community.
So Wesley ended up seeming like a weak tattletale who was willing to risk the expulsion of his entire squadron just because he wanted to be a good little boy and always tell the truth.
Its interesting that Ronald D Moore originally wanted Wesley to not reveal the truth, and I think I would have preferred a story about friendship and sticking together over a story about telling the truth. Still the rest of the story is impeccably written, so almost a fantastic episode ruined by a bad ending.
2. Equinox Pt 2
Coincidentally another ending that Ronald D. Moore didn't approve of. In fact in his interview about his time on Voyager, he explained in detail that he was pretty furious.
So Janeway almost kills a man and goes loco, and Chakotay apologizes to her? I mean, talk about a cop out!
3. Alliances
So the conclusion of Alliances has Janeway basically telling the crew that they've tried to shake things up once but it didn't work so that means they can never ever stray from Federation protocol ever again. Lame.
4. The Sound of her Voice
So we get to know this woman throughout the episode and then they decide to throw a meaningless sci-fi twist at the end and she's dead. Does anyone else think it would have been better if she'd just been alive? It sure as hell wouldn't have been so anti-climactic.
5. Real Life
This episode is so good until the sappy, melodramatic, out of nowhere ending. What exactly are the chances of his daughter dying within a week of creating her anyway? The ending seems so contrived and emotionally manipulative. I normally just fast forward it. On a side note, what a horrible B story this episode had.
Dishonorable mentions:
Deadlock: Harry is annoyingly nonchalant about the fact the other Voyager was destroyed and he just passed over to a new Voyager where his counterpart was blown out into the vacuum of space
These are the Voyages: Yeah its a finale, and it "resolved" the T'Pol and Trip storyline in the worst way possible.
