10 Greatest Star Trek Courtroom Episodes

It will come as little surprise to anyone who has watched Star Trek over the years that it often tackles the more serious topics that humanity faces in an open dialogue. The courtroom is one of the best places to manage this, as it is designed to host the most serious debates on the nature of life, the law, and the rights of the individual.

Star Trek walks a fine line. Telling analogous stories via the courtroom isn't easy - one has to balance between engaging the audience in the debate, and forcing them to watch characters stand on a soap box. Let us be clear, there is no franchise innocent of that - Star Trek among them.

Here, we have attempted to collate some of the best episodes that put our favourite characters in positions of legal jeopardy, which may include scenes of high emotion and tension, told through the Trek lens. It's also safe to assume that in a list that sees alien cultures imposing their legal will on our regular characters it's a foregone conclusion that yes, Chief O'Brien will suffer.

The First Duty is a favourite here at TrekCulture, as it not only contains that excellent dressing down by Captain Picard, but also introduces Robert Duncan McNeill to Star Trek. The courtroom drama concerns the accidental death of Joshua Albert.

This episode stands out as it shows the veneer of brilliance being stripped away from Wesley Crusher, who had been introduced as the genius child in the first season. While his character had grown beyond this, there were still few moments of him doing anything particularly wrong.

The cover-up of Albert's actual cause of death is something no one at the time saw coming. It still stings, more than thirty years after its initial, when Picard truly shows his disappointment in him. The climax of the episode sees Locarno stand up and take responsibility for being the ring-leader, earning him a swift dismissal from Starfleet Academy, and setting the stage for a man who looks awfully like him to end up piloting the USS Voyager.