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I'm a little confused by what I see on Wikipedia.

The wikipedia article for Patrick Stewart says he appeared in 176 episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation. The wikipedia article for the series says there were 178 episodes. Which two episodes did Stewart/Picard not appear in?

I know Wikipedia may not always be the best place for information but I'm trusting it in this case :)

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    Are we counting the final episode of Enterprise?
    – Valorum
    Commented Dec 17, 2016 at 14:04

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Patrick Stewart appeared in every episode; there's a discrepancy in how those two pages are counting.

Star Trek: The Next Generation aired 176 episodes. However two of those episodes, the premiere episode "Encounter at Farpoint" and the series finale "All Good Things...", were feature-length episodes. As originally broadcast, and as they're present on official home media releases, they were each about two hours long; that makes them hard to syndicate (typical network scheduling in North America doesn't like shows longer than an hour), so re-runs of each are typically split into two parts.

This is also apparent from Wikipedia's list of the show's episodes; the tables number each episode, but the series premiere and series finale each get two numbers (click to embiggen):

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    As an aside, I recall in my youth seeing the M*A*S*H series finale in five parts. That's just criminal
    – Jason Baker
    Commented Dec 16, 2016 at 21:02
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    They're only two hours after adding in commercials. ;) I believe they're about 1 hr 20 min without them (40 min per episode).
    – jpmc26
    Commented Dec 16, 2016 at 21:37
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    @jpmc26 respectively 1:27 and 1:32 according to my DVD (or 43-45 minutes for a regular episode). But they occupy a two-hour network timeslot, so I'm content to admit the simplification
    – Jason Baker
    Commented Dec 16, 2016 at 23:05
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Per Memory Alpha:

Patrick Stewart (Captain Jean-Luc Picard) and Jonathan Frakes (Commander William T. Riker) are the only actors to appear in every episode of the series.

That being said, Picard only had a single (pre-taped) appearance in TNG: Thine Own Self as the actor Patrick Stewart was doing a one Man "A Christmas Carol" show in London at the time of filming. His appearance was mandated by his contract and it's likely that they simply recycled cut footage from another episode to insert his single line.

PICARD: What's the last thing you remember?

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    There had to have been at least one episode with no Picard, only Locutus.
    – Spencer
    Commented Dec 17, 2016 at 0:34
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    @Spencer - Alas, no. He was Picard at the start of the first episode and Picard at the end of the second episode.
    – Valorum
    Commented Dec 17, 2016 at 0:35
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    So, check-mate Borg! Our Captain is protected by his contract! The best anti-assimilation weapon ever :)
    – Edmund Dantes
    Commented May 28, 2019 at 12:01

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