Spreads" which is played over the scene between Riker and Troi move into the pieces "Shades of Pleasure" and "Earth Boys Are Easy" which is played over the pleasurable memories. String instruments and flutes are added to "Shades of Sadness" which played over the unhappy memories, before it built to a climax in the intense memories in the pieces "Critical Condition", "Shades of Conflict" and "Final Intensities". Several scenes retained the compositions from the episodes, including pieces by Dennis McCarthy, while others by McCarthy were re-composed by Jones. Broadcast and reception "Shades of Gray" was first shown on July 17, 1989 in broadcast syndication. It was the final episode of the second season and was watched by 9.8 million viewers on the first broadcast. It was the highest number of viewers for an episode since "Samaritan Snare" some two months prior. Several reviewers re-watched the episode after the end of the series. In 2011, Keith DeCandido watched "Shades of Gray" for Tor.com, and admitted that he hadn't seen the episode since the original broadcast. He said that it was a "trainwreck" and even worse than he remembered, because other shows such as Xena: Warrior Princess and Stargate SG-1 had since done much better clip shows. DeCandido summed it up by saying that "In all honesty, they’d have been better off doing one fewer episode — the season was shortened by the writers strike anyhow — and upping the budget on one of the other 21. Just an awful, awful episode." He gave the episode a score of zero out of ten. In 2010, Zack Handlen reviewed the episode for The A.V. Club, describing the script as "god-awful" and the episode as "forced". Michelle Erica Green in her review for TrekNation called the storyline "absurdly flimsy" and that the episode "just felt lazy on every level". She cited The Original Series episode "Operation -- Annihilate!" and the Voyager episode "Resolutions" as better episodes featuring alien infections. In the list of the five worst Star Trek: The Next Generation compiled by TechRepublic writer Jay Garmon, "Shades of Gray" was listed as the worst. Garmon described it a "travesty" and that the "nicest" thing you could say about the episode was that it was the last time there was a flashback episode in the series and the last appearance of Pulaski. It was also the original choice of worst episode by Empire magazine,