Star Trek The Next Generation: Every Season One Episode Ranked From Worst To Best
8. The Arsenal Of Freedom
The very distinctive Vincent Schiavelli guest stars in this exciting episode as the holographic Minosian arms dealer, who may be best known to some as Jenny Calendar's eccentric Uncle on Buffy The Vampire Slayer, or to others as one of the circus gang in Batman Returns.
The episode shows La Forge in command for the second and final time in the Next Generation (the other time being in Angel One). It is also the first episode to show Worf at the tactical station, which he would take on full time from Skin of Evil onwards.
The episode is remembered by director Les Landau as being a triumph over adversity. Production had to be shut down on the episode as the script was being rewritten far into the production schedule. However, Landau credits the cast and crew for getting everyone through the difficult shoot. One of the issues with the script was the scene between Picard and Crusher on the planet.
Originally, it had been envisaged that Picard would be the injured party and that Crusher would confess her feelings for him while tending to him. This was shot down by Roddenberry, who wasn't interested in this sort of character development. It was subsequently written out by Maurice Hurley as well.
Despite all of this, it remains one of the more exciting episodes in the first season, and through both new and recycled footage it manages to offer something of a spectacle with saucer separation and the combat between the Enterprise and the Minosian Weapon systems.