Writing in 2021, it is great to see that I am not the only person taking a retrospective look at Star Trek, the Next Generation. When this series was first released in 1987, a little less than twenty years after the end of the Original Series, many people thought that, without Captain Kirk and his crew, it couldn't really be Star Trek. However, original creator Gene Roddenberry, was fully invested in the casting, writing and overall look of the new series, so let's see how it shaped up:
Coming of Age: a classic interweaving of two stories, neither of which were thought capable of standing up on their own. I'm not so sure.
The hostile inspection by a slightly creepy Star Fleet representative was clearly meant as a forerunner to Conspiracy, aired later in the season. By jettisoning the B story and having the new Captain and crew admit to the occasional mistake or lack of confidence, this episode could have been made to feel much more ominous.
On the other hand: Wesley's competitors were an interesting bunch and the tests they were put through properly challenging. Certainly, this too could have made an interesting stand alone episode. We know now that young Mr Crusher went on to fail to get into Star Fleet on multiple occasions, then got involved in an ugly conspiracy that cost the life of one of his classmates, quit Star Fleet in a huff towards the end of the series and then, mysteriously, fetched up back in uniform in the film Nemesis. I hope the other recruits did better.
(Senior Trekker scores every episode with a 5)