The wheel of ‘when does my character get a story’ comes up Riker, and he’s drawn back into a shadowy incident from his past.
It’s odd to remember that back in Season 1 the idea of Star Fleet admirals being bad was one that could only be explained by alien possession. Now we can have admirals having shadowy agendas without that overhead, and the show is better for it.
There’s quite a bit going on here, from a treaty that might well be an unwise restriction against a hostile enemy, to Riker’s struggling with his own decisions and the consequences of them.
The only downfall is that the episode carries things a bit too far, making the inevitable return to the normal setting at the start of the next episode just a bit more jarring than usual.
Star Trek does not do ‘played for laughs’ that often, but the Captain Picard Day sequence was fantastic stuff.
304 down, 433 to go.