Justice, which Michael Dorn rightly called planet of the "master race."
What Was the Per Episode Budget? How Did This Show Afford It’s Epic Scope?
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TNG became its own, that's for sure, but the first season did have the the height of the Kirk era to buoy itself with. Little competition helped - few shows existed, and Doctor Who definitely wasn't the same thing. Had the numbers not been there, I too feel certain TNG wouldn't have lasted. Audiences combined with enough people behind the scenes trying to do more than just indulge Gene's hedonism (his mandates for "Justice" and even "Captain's Holiday" and after the former's budget being depleted by all that massage and cooking oil used on set, there was no way the latter would even begin to be considered) and inconsistent beliefs of human evolution (e.g. "physical appearances aren't important anymore, we're evolved and better now" (as lampooned in "Insurrection" too) + "male pattern baldness is cured so plop a wig on this Stewart guy" = "huh?")
I'd wager season 2 had TNG doing more of its own thing, with a couple noteworthy exceptions - and season 3 more or less polished what season 2 began doing.
Season 1 did have 11001001, which is something I couldn't see TOS doing - certainly not for an altruistic reason and the Bynars' reasoning therein. Arsenal of Freedom is an early attempt to really embrace character-driven sci-fi, with Geordi at the fore. But this same story does the Riker/Bryce scene, which feels oddly reminiscent of Kirk/Finnegan from Shore Leave. But TOS wouldn't have been able to sell the arms dealing concept - not without the Klingons and an overly-contrived plot. "A Private Little War" is the closest TOS arguably got, but it's still way too dissimilar. The one with that Manheim steamroller effect with Data in 3 different time periods - TOS wouldn't try to touch it. Or if they did, "The Alternative Factor" is the most horrid thing to make a comparison from as it doesn't even come close...
Not to mention "When the Bough Breaks" and "Home Soil" - the former actually does something with the idea of families being on the ship (despite feeling a little short with just seven kids who won the candy bar sweepstakes contest of the week or whatever) and the latter explores terraforming in a way more suited to television since there's no way TOS would really bother with it. And its closest example is TWOK, with the terraforming plot used as a steping stone for Khan to wield power, moohahaha. Yes, I love the movie but its themes aren't about terraforming. Even TSFS fudges the simplest continuity when belittling David when the Genesis device wasn't tested in a cave or on a planet but inside a spaceship that was producing lots of radiation and other fun variables your regular planet wouldn't... neither movie focused on terraforming for positive-themed purposes anyhow... /rambleBramble
you do know that there are 22-23 more episodes
those in episodes 1/2, 6, 9, 13, 15, 18, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26
There may have been some modest highs, but the lows are staggering.
One bad apple.
From my understanding, it was largely ignored by The Powers That Be in favour of Voyager which was executive-meddled into near-oblivion (no character arcs, little to no Maquis/Starfleet tension, bring in sexy lady and put her in a catsuit etc)
Are you counting Encounter at Farpoint as 1 episode or 2?
Justice is an awful episode, but what’s the reason it’s racist, just because of how white and blond the characters are?
The fact that the guests and extras were cast/styles to look like a master race emphasizes the racist structure of the story: a paradise of an endogenous/ethnically uniform people, which lives in a perfect state of nature and are thus perfect physical specimens, find that their harmony and order is upended by a diverse, multi-ethnic, multicultural society. The fact that the Enterprise is involved in colonization is even raised as a possible threat to the Edo's paradise. There are few steps between this and replacement theory.
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