And Season 5 of my re-watch is now complete! This felt like more of a step down from 3 and 4 than I remember it being, there are still lots of good episodes in their but it's much more inconsistent than the last two seasons.
The First Duty - Wesley Crusher comes back once again to haunt us all with his whiney face. And as if one irritating little git wasn't enough this episode gives us two as Tom Paris proves that even when he's not Tom Paris he's still capable of being one of the only things in the franchise to seriously challenge Wesley for the "most annoying character" title. Some good work from Picard here though in lecturing Crusher on the value of truth.
Cost of Living - Are you kidding me?! You can't follow up an episode featuring Wesley and proto-Tom Paris with yet another prime moron: Lwaxana Troi.
That said I don't remember watching this one before and, I hate to say it, this is actually a fairly decent Lwaxana episode - she actually has some redeeming qualities here. Loses points for having Alexander in it though, he needs to get jettisoned ASAP.
The Perfect Mate - Picard's failed attempts to employ Data as a kind of android cockblock result in Xenia Onatopp using her empathic pheromones to seduce him into somehow thinking that arranged marriages are a good thing.
Sometimes it feels like the writers just fall back on the prime directive as crutch to allow them to give a pass to a load of really shitty behaviour. Loses more points for reminding me that the Ferengi still exist.
Imaginary Friend - What the strawberry float is this gooseberry fool? This would have felt like a bad episode in season 1 FFS!
Kids are almost universally terrible in TNG so having a whole episode that centers on them was never going to go well but even so you'd have hoped that by this point in the series if they thought they needed a kid episode they would at least be able to make it half decent.
I, Borg - Hugh
A wonderful return to form after the last few dire episodes. Hugh's growing understanding of what it means to be an individual and the slow acceptance of him by Crusher, Geordi and Guinan is handled well as they begin to question their existing beliefs regarding the Borg and the legitimacy of Picard's plan to use Hugh as a "bomb" to infect the collective. Picard sticking to his guns out of fear driven by his experiences as Locutus makes sense as well and leads to the fantastic confrontation between himself and Hugh at the episodes climax. Probably just misses out on a top tier TNG spot but this is still excellent.
The Next Phase - Solid stuff (pun intended
) Geordi and Ro end up out of phase with the rest of the crew following a transporter incident and so are unable to be seen by anyone or even to touch anything ... except they can still travel in turbolifts and shuttles and don't fall through the floor and all sorts of other convenient exceptions! They have to find a way to get themselves back to normal and prevent those pesky Romulan's from killing everyone whilst they are at it. Ro gets pissed off that she doesn't get to hear Riker say that she was a better lay than Troi during her funeral.
The Inner Light - Another Patrick Stewart showcase, and a great one to boot. It's slow and very little really happens but it's just really well done and performed so perfectly by Stewart that you can't help but get hit right in the feels when Picard plays the flute at the end.
Times Arrow (Part 1 and Part 2) Probably the worst two part season finale/opener we've had yet. There's nothing major wrong with it exactly but its very fan-fictiony and just doesn't live up to the standards of Best of Both Worlds or Unification. Mark Twain is strawberry floating annoying as well.
So on to season 6 I go, I recall this being a bit of a mixed bag as well but possibly a bit stronger than 5 overall.