Star Trek: The Next Generation: Season 2 (1988)

The second season of my most favorite sci-fi program ever hits its stride as Data plays Sherlock Holmes and the prickly Q introduces the overpowering Borg. Disc 1, Episodes 1-4: The Child (impregnated by a luminous being, Troi gives birth to a fast-maturing visitor), Where Silence Has No Lease (the ship enters an inescapable void where a soulless intellect threatens death), Elementary Dear Data (Data and Geordi, playing Holmes and Watson on the holodeck, unwittingly create a self-aware Prof. Moriarty who would escape the holodeck), The Outrageous Okona (the ship takes in a rogue smuggler who is wanted on two worlds linked by a pregnant girl as Data tries to learn standup comedy). Disc 2, Episodes 5-8: Loud as a Whisper (a deaf and telepathic mediator with his tripartite chorus takes an interest in Troi), The Schizoid Man (a brilliant if narcissistic scientist usurps Data's mind), Unnatural Selection (a genetically enhanced race of telekinetic children may be causing a rapid-aging epidemic), A Matter of Honor (Riker adapts to the challenges of an exchange post of command on a Klingon ship). Disc 3, Episodes 9-12: The Measure of a Man (Data counters a decision to disassemble and study him as Starfleet property, fighting to prove his legal status as a person), The Dauphin (Wesley falls for a girl who will unite her warring world -- yet she has a secret), Contagion (the ship takes on a destructive infection linked to a Romulan presence), The Royale (the away team becomes trapped in a recreation of a badly written casino novel and must play along to escape). Disc 4, Episodes 13-16: Time Squared (the ship finds a duplicate shuttle and Capt. Picard who is the sole survivor of their total destruction six hours in the future), The Icarus Factor (Riker is offered command of a ship but only at the hands of his estranged father as Wesley prepares a Klingon birthday celebration involving pain sticks for Lt. Worf), Pen Pals (Data violates the Prime Directive to communicate with and then save a small girl on a dying planet), Q Who? (John Delancie's contrarian Q challenges the ship by throwing them against the cybernetic hive-mind Borg). Disc 5, Episodes 17-20: Samaritan Snare (the ship is occupied by a distress call from dunderheads), Up the Long Ladder (the ship must rescue one colony of Irish bumpkins and one colony of elitist clones then reconcile the two), Manhunt (Troi's free-spirit mother -- played by Majel Barrett -- seeks a husband in Picard, Riker, and even the holodeck), The Emissary (Worf is intimate with a Klingon emissary sent to help avert hostilities from a long-frozen ship's crew). Disc 6, Episodes 21-22: Peak Performance (Picard and Riker command mismatched ships in a war game exercise that is full of surprises), Shades of Gray (Riker is infected with a deadly virus that is defeated by inciting memories from previous episodes). [Bold are best, italic are weakest.] 5 stars.