10 Star Trek: The Next Generation Episodes That Were Almost Completely Different
2. Tapestry
I'm just going to lay this out in one sentence - Tapestry was originally pitched as Star Trek's version of A Christmas Carol.
Yes, you read that right, Charles Dickens' immortal 1843 novella, later perfected by The Muppets, that tells that tale of a crotchety, twisted old miser who is visited by the ghost of his former business partner, and the spirits of Christmas Past, Present and Yet to Come, who transform him into a kinder, gentler man.
Picard was Scrooge, Q was Marley, and they would revisit Jean-Luc's childhood, the moment he took command of the Stargazer, and the death of Jack Crusher. Before we go any further, if the producers of ST:P are reading this (and we know you do), please make this the entire premise of Season 2 and I will forgive everything about Et in Arcadia Ego: Part 2
Sadly they hit a brick wall with this idea when nobody could conceive a sufficient motivation for Q randomly showing Picard moments in his life. Eventually the notion of Jean-Luc dying a death that would have been preventable if he'd lived a different life came up, and the script slowly began morphing from there. The end result isn't a million miles away from Michael Caine asking this rabbit what day it is, but nonetheless my soul physically aches that they didnt' go down this route.
“There's more of Earl Grey than of grave about you, whatever you are!”