Star Trek has never just been one thing. It’s a series that can embrace different genres with ease. Be it war stories, comedies, romances, or even horror. So when the topic of the scariest Star Trek episode in the canon, Screenrant tried their best to narrow down the scariest Star Trek episode out there.
Just for clarity, there isn’t really a “scary” episode, not in the way of traditional horror or a spooky bedtime story. What we could say is that there were a few that would fall under the unnerving or unsettling banners. That may be more accurate than the term “scary”.
Yet, we’ll call it scary for the sake of simplicity. Screenrant is picking “Schisms” as their most scary episode of Star Trek ever. The episode comes from The Next Generation and its sixth season, episode five, where William Riker freaks out over tiny objects, and then the whole crew realizes they were just in an X-Files episode (they got abducted).
Personally, it’s not scary. If you want to disturb someone, fear is often hard to tap into. Everyone is afraid of different things. What you should be aiming for is how to unsettle someone. How to disturb someone to their core.
That’s why it’s not “Schisms” that gives me the heeby-jeebys, it’s another Next Generation episode. This one from their first season; episode 24 “Conspiracy”.
This was truly unnerving to watch. It’s a story of alien parasites who crawl into the heads of people and take them over. Think Yeerks from Animorphs, only far, far grosser. The episode features some really unsettling imagery; namely the Admirals eating worms and bugs, and of course the now-iconic shot of the alien exploding out of the body of Dexter Remmick in easily the goriest episode so far in the franchise’s history.
It may not be spooky, but “Conspiracy” will leave you unsettled. Which is ultimately the job of a horror story; to leave you far from normal.