Star Trek The Next Generation season 1 -- 6.9/10
I like that they jump ahead 80 years or so and imagine how the technology will advance, while keeping the back history. I like that the red alert sound is reused, the away mission planets have that TOS horizon-glow, and the instrumental interludes are classy. Recycling whole episodes, not so much.
Unexpectedly, I found most episodes clunky and left me dry. The pilot feels long, there's a Q episode where he talks about having them play a "game" against some army but eventually it revolves around Riker getting Q powers, and the Ferengi ship's bridge is just a white screen like they forgot to build the set! Then there's weird 80s stuff like the running episode or the other one where these superpowered aliens kidnap all the children on board.. because they want to preserve their culture and can't produce any offspring of their own. I don't know if that's a specifically weird 80s thing? Were impotent couples kidnapping children back then or something? I don't feel like rooting for the alien kidnappers, and I'm not rooting for Wesley to be rescued; since I don't get what the message is supposed to be, it just comes off as creepy.
The holodeck is awesome and some other special effects are ahead of their time, but the first season is only memorable in that it, one, plants the seeds for future episodes to mine: Q's power, doomed aliens attempt to preserve their culture, holodeck goes haywire, debating whether a life form is sentient, etc; and two, for establishing a few interesting characters.
Also the unintentionally funny, (or intentionally?) funny moments make it worthwhile, but the running episode, "Justice", is pure lol. The Enterprise looks at this new planet to see if it'd be any good for spring break tourists, and it turns out that everyone is healthy and runs everywhere they go, and everyone is friendly. Worf approves with a "Nice planet!" that is so deadpan I can't believe it didn't win an Emmy.
Of course once they learn that capital punishment is the punishment for all crimes on this planet, they immediately need to find Wesley to warn about it, because even though he's supposed to be a child-genius, he's actually a terrible human being. That's not what they say, but it's so obviously implied, and then proven by the next scene where he falls while trying to catch a ball, that the Picard facepalm is truly understood.
A scene begins with the camera zooming out on this stuff.. WTF
Oh, and there's this other episode, "Symbiosis", wherein a whole planet of people need a steady supply of this 'medicine'....
S.1 is disappointing but lolworthy