Star Trek: The Next Generation - 5x08 - Unification part 2

    Spock and Picard argue about Spock's goal of peace between the Vulcans and Romulans.  A politician says that he's willing to support a peace treaty.  It turns out that this is all part of a plot organized by Tasha Yar's daughter to invade Vulcan.
    This two parter didn't deserve to be a two-part episode.  The plots move slowly, and probably have enough material for a tightly packed single episode.  There are still a few pleasing moments.  It's a pleasure to see Data and Spock talk, given their obvious parallel parts.  There are some strange cantina-like scenes with Riker and a musician.
    I haven't talked about Riker's plot.  Since Picard is off on Romulus, Riker has the Enterprise, and has been running around doing an investigation.  Of course, this winds up tying into Picard's plot, but even that seems a bit forced.
    While the story did come together in the end, and seemed like a reasonable finish, it still came across like a desperate episode.  There's a lot of padding, still more humor than usual, and once the villainous plan is revealed, it seems needlessly circuitous.