Happy 25th Birthday, Star Trek: The Next Generation

Don’t you feel old now, huh?

That’s right, Star Trek: The Next Generation premiered 25 years ago today, the first truly original addition to the franchise amidst years of reruns and movies with the original cast. It was a huge experimental moment for syndicated television, a breath of fresh air for sci-fi, and… kind of a hard episode to watch, actually. “Encounter at Farpoint”, like most of The Next Generation‘s inaugural season, really doesn’t hold up very well.

Of course, if you’ve read this far, chances are you know the history well enough already, so let’s just skip the preamble rather than waxing nostalgic any further. There’s bound to be enough trumpeting of virtues going on elsewhere; we here at Caffeine-Fueled would prefer to celebrate the only way our booze-addled Friday night brains know how: YouTube clips, and lots of ‘em!

So sit back and feast your eyetounges on these memory pops!

Picard Can’t Sleep

Data’s Access Code From Hell

Worf’s Dating Advice For Wesley

Q Is Mortal Now + The Original Facepalm

Worf Objects To All This Nonsense

Worf Objects Again, This Time More Strongly

Riker Has Had Enough Of Your Shit

Data’s Lifeforms Song

Worf Delivers Keiko’s Baby

Data’s Crazy-Ass Dreams

Worf Being Talkative

The Creepiest Thing You’ll See Today

Captain Picard Day

Data’s Klingon Ritual Challenge

Riker vs. Klingon Women

Data Trolls Everyone With Small Talk

Q Is God Now

Worf Takes Care Of Data’s Cat

Picard Gets Some With Shakespeare

Einstein Sucks At Poker

Picard Lawyers The Sheliak

Fine, Here’s A Serious One: The Defector

Data’s Beard

Q’s Mariachi Band

Finally, Here’s Q’s Special Parting Gift