The Picard Thread (with SPOILERS)

Topic

The show starts this week, on CBS All Access in the US, and Amazon in most of the rest of the world.

No sign of the Children of Mars short that serves as a prologue showing up outside the US yet.

Replies

[Al-x]

Some production pictures on the set:

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Nice episode with Gujarati (Allison Pill) in red, grabbing the Rios captain for a kiss, and singing Pat Benatar.
They are spicing up her character for sure.

I don’t know. Consider:

TNG needed a boost so in came the Borg.
DS9 brought in the Dominion and Worf.
Voyager bought in 7 of 9.
Enterprise bought in the Xindi attack as it was their 9/11.

Now with Picard, they bought in Q, timetravel mission to restore things, etc.

Always a need to spice things up…
———————————–

Also, I found out that the actress Allison Pill does Broadway sometimes and sings.
So that was really her voice singing the Pat Benatar song.

• This reply was modified 2 years, 8 months ago by Al-x.
• This reply was modified 2 years, 8 months ago by Al-x.
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[Al-x]

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[Al-x]

Interesting episode …

Aside from the online fans arguing about canon and continuity violations, paradoxes… A show titled Picard would logically have scenes of Picard as the main character exploring his childhood and what shaped his mentality

It is the same storytelling formula of a streaming series, dramatic slow scenes that are setups, then all the action is saved for last few eps.

Hotwiring a sophisticated computer panel.

I liked what his mother told him as a child about seeing light now from a star that extinguished long ago and the parallel to herself.

Humanist philosophy speeches… again. That is to be expected though.

Deal with the Devil

Funny… It makes me curious and maybe some of your European members can help…

All these European manors with these secret entrances behind a false wall or bookshelf leading to some escape area…

How common were they?

• This reply was modified 2 years, 7 months ago by Al-x.
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Everybody gave up on this?

Well, Q has a heart after all…

Picard gave him a hug.

As for all the canon and continuity errors… Relax bro!

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Uncle Retrospective

Al-x wrote:

Everybody gave up on this?

I did, around episode 3 I think… it’s shit.

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Chris-S, Al-x

I got caught up with the season in time for the finale. And yeah…I though the whole thing was a pretty miserable experience….The only positive thing to come out of this season was the Redlettermedia review videos.

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Chris-S, Andy, Al-x

Al-x wrote:

Everybody gave up on this?

I didn’t but i’m not a fan of your picture dumps so I kept my mouth shut. The Finale was poor. it seems like it was done just to clean up plot threads so they can get to the TNG-centric season 3.

Well, some said it was a better fit here than the Picture thread. They were just production behind the scenes stuff. 1 pic =1,000 words etc.

So what a complicated way for Q to have Picard address his childhood trauma of seeing his mother hang herself. It contradicts a season 1 TNG episode but … Who cares?

Interesting what the Romulan woman said in the very beginning that Picard has lived his life trying to outrun feelings by doing this and that, even saving the galaxy on the E instead of addressing his own trauma. She was right when she asked what would happen if he were to stop, think, reflect and actually let his feelings catch up with him?

That is what Q made him do. I guess that is why Picard hugged him in the end.

Wesley is a Traveler and he recruited the Soong “daughter”. Now that storyline helps to explain the “aliens” behind Gary 7 in TOS… Not bad.

There are a LOT of things. The Spanish captain who stayed behind actually went through WW3, where was this Gurati Borg Queen all this time in continuity, etc…. At this point it is .. Relax bro! and don’t think too hard about all this.

 

I really enjoyed series 3, episode 1. It’s much more of a fun adventure than series 1 and 2, and Picard and Riker’s buddy act is endearing and fun, playing on their more familiar friendship from late TNG and the movies. I like that we don’t just get all the TNG cast bask at once so Raffi and Seven and Laris get some scenes, but I assume that’s the last we’re gonna see of Orla Brady until maybe the end. The pacing feels better here than in series 1 and 2, it’s still a smaller chunk of a large narrative as opposed to being a standalone story but it flows better and has a lot going on.

And… there was something hidden in the nebula in the swooshy Star Trek Logo when the Titan A flew into frame? Sorta where the Koala is in the Lower Decks one?

Oh, there was a Picard thread, it was really buried.

Didn’t like s1-2 but would like for them to turn it around for s3

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Chris-S, lorcan_nagle, lorcan_nagle

Interestingly, the show is now on both Prime Video and Paramount+ over here.

https://www.paramountplus.com/shows/star-trek-picard/

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lorcan_nagle

paul f wrote:

Interestingly, the show is now on both Prime Video and Paramount+ over here.

https://www.paramountplus.com/shows/star-trek-picard/

Apparently Lower Decks will be on both as well.

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Ben

I really was done with this show after the piss-poor season two but the positive word-of-mouth about season three convinced me to check out the first episode. I’m glad that I did! Turns out that all they had to do to get this thing to work was make it into a TNG reboot. Who knew?

Of course, this is also clearly a backdoor pilot for a Titan spin-off but we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.

The Titan captain obviously has his issues, in particular with being so discriminatory towards Seven, but I did get a kick out of Picard finding himself in the role of “obviously lying Admiral trying to commandeer the Captain’s starship”.

Let’s hope they can keep the quality up and not let this show fall off the rails again. No big reveal that Crusher’s secret son was fathered by that Sub Rosa ghost, please.

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Chris-S

Well, it’s better, but not enough to be good.

It starts off well enough, with an intro sequence that should have been done from the start.  The title card is an effective way of invoking old Trek.

After that it slowly declines. The assault on Crusher’s ship was good, though funny how well placed the crates were for a firefight.

Cosmetically, it’s nice enough but the plot is weak.  The way Starfleet Intelligence is ran, by what looks and sounds like a bot, I found hard to buy.  And what is it with all the ships in Picard being dingey, barely lit crap pits? Who’d sign up to spend years in these things? The working environment sucks.

Then there’s the mass of insecurity incarnate that is Shaw.  Dour, unimaginative, a mystery as to how he even gained promotion in the first place.

The wormhole terrorist attack was clever.  The villain ship was a good design too.

It’s … all right, but it’s weighed by the same overkill seriousness that has been with the series since the start.  Will I bother to see how it concludes? Maybe, maybe not.

Ben wrote:

The way Starfleet Intelligence is ran, by what looks and sounds like a bot,

That’s not a very honourable way to describe the person clearly on the other side of that commlink…

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Eduardo

If it’s a person on the other end, they need to be fired.

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Rocket

saga wrote:

No big reveal that Crusher’s secret son was fathered by that Sub Rosa ghost, please.

That might just save this show.

Thought that this episode was the same as the other two, with just the chemistry of Picard and Riker holding everything afloat.

If that’s Picard’s son, that’s going to be a rubbish twist.

Oh the bot for star trek security is obviously Worf with all that warrior guff.

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Eduardo

Wasn’t as hot on this episode, it felt like a lot of heel-cooling in order to hit the big moments – the Titan coming to the rescue, Picard’s announcement, all that stuff. And like, that was the big problem with Picard last year…

Ben wrote:

And what is it with all the ships in Picard being dingey, barely lit crap pits? Who’d sign up to spend years in these things? The working environment sucks.

That was something that stood out to me in the trailers. It seemed like a really poor creative choice.

I knew Shaw was going to be a drag when I saw him. IMO, that actor always seems to be playing douchey characters. so now Wesley has a brother? hmmph. Riker and Picard are a good twosome. It’s obvious the crew likes Seven better than the captain.

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lorcan_nagle

Worf beheading Ferengi instantly puts this on a whole other level from the first two seasons.

Not to mention Picard FINALLY taking charge.

Good stuff.

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Rocket, lorcan_nagle

Ok, Worf’s entry – is it enough to make up for him being a  crap boss? Not really – and the last couple of minutes were good but the rest…  They have a more substantive budget and do this with it? It’s as if they don’t know how to write something entertaining.

As for Shaw, can you imagine that guy responding to being given an actual exploration mission? He’d be complaining the entire time.

Oh and next is likely the “hey, look, we’re doing the hide-in-a-nebula / Wrath-of-Khan homage ep”.

One other thing that jumped out at me was the final scene with Crusher staggering onto the bridge, am I to buy there are no wheelchairs? That Riker couldn’t have spared her the walk by wheeling her? Trek has a weird relationship with disability.  Discovery had Wheelchair Guy but he was a background character in a handful of episodes.

Strange New Worlds is supposed to be good, right?

I think there’s more to Shaw than we’ve seen so far. Amanda Plummer’s character made a reference to his frame of mind, and the closing credits sequence has a psychological assessment pop up. A bunch of people are speculating that either he or Plummer’s character were at Wolf 359 based on another hint in the credits – the damage assessment for USS Constance gives the same stardate as the battle.

Ben wrote:

Strange New Worlds is supposed to be good, right?

I mean, it’s the “better” one…

Speculation that Shaw wound up losing his child as a result of the Borg at 359. The trauma of that would go done way to explaining his demeanor, hostility towards Seven, wanting to explore rather than engage and immediately getting it when Picard revealed he was just trying to protect his son.

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lorcan_nagle

That’d be very much this show, it’s all about personal traumas.

Well that’s nuTrek for you… all about the emotions and the crying scenes…

Anyhoo caved in after the somewhat positive buzz about this and watched the 2 first episodes… Listen I only know Picard, Seven and Raffi from the previous seasons, I’m aware of who the other geezers are because I’ve seen pictures (Oh and beardman was also in S1 briefly) but I don’t really know who they are or what’s their deal so it all falls absolutely flat on me ’cause I’ve got zero knowledge or nostalgia about it all.

I don’t know who Beverly is, or why I should care about the obvious & convenient plot twist other than the surface implications of it, I don’t know who the warrior alien is or why I should be excited for him saving the always attrocious Raffi. Speaking of which, why the fuck is Raffi back? She’s a terrible character, a terrible actress and a miserable waste of screen time… I wonder what dirt she has on someone at CBS, I can’t possibly see any other explanation for them bringing HER back out of everyone else… I swear I’d rather have Elmo back.

Anyways, yeah these 2 epsiodes weren’t as horrible as the previous 2 seasons, but I’m not seeing anything particularly great either, it all seems like the same shit they’ve been feeding us since “Disco”, but in a slightly less shitty package… for now… because I’m not an idiot and I know this is all gonna devolve into the usual pile of steaming shit… so I’m just gonna do myself a favour and drop this right now.

I think I’ll just stick with SNW, which was tolerable and even entertaining on occasion. Shit at least they’re not always being obnoxious with their feelings…

[lorcan_nagle]

Enjoyed this week’s episode a lot more than last week, stuff happened to the point that I thought Jack in the access corridor was going to be the cliffhanger and was surprised to see 15 minutes left in the episode. There was good bookending of events too, between Riker and Picard’s conversation about the turbolift early on, and Beverly talking about the danger Jack would be in if they stayed in Picard’s life vs… well, what happens to him in the episode. Worf and Raffi are a fun double act, and Jack and Seven’s scenes together worked well. Oh, and I know I was iffy on the reuse of old music in episode 1 but the Blaster Beam showing up here for the Shrike was great. More of this, please.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 9 months ago by lorcan_nagle.

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Rocket

Crikey, the turnaround this show has managed in its third season is remarkable. This was a great episode, possibly the best of all the recent Trek shows.

Amidst all the nebula hide-and-seek fighting, the Obi-Wan Worf quest, the big reveal of the enemies, the character development of Geordi’s daughter, the cliffhanger ending and all the other material they fit in here, the highlight was the conversation between Picard and Beverly. The reveal of Jack’s parentage is some hugely soap opera silliness that they had to try to get over here and my goodness did they ever manage it. Stewart and McFadden made it work and I even came around to Beverly’s side by the time it was done. Just two great actors standing across from one another, acting. Tremendous.

Kudos also to Frakes. I think he’s spent most of his acting time doing voice roles in recent years but he’s doing a superb job as Old Man Riker.

New head canon – time spent on the planet from Insurrection facilitated a later-in-life pregnancy for Beverly.

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Chris-S, lorcan_nagle

saga wrote:

New head canon – time spent on the planet from Insurrection facilitated a later-in-life pregnancy for Beverly.

It could also be general health improvements for Federation citizens too – Beverly is considerably younger than Picard, she was in her late 50s when Jack was conceived (Memory Alpha says she was born in 2324 and Picard’s and her leave to Casperia Prime was 2381), but also, the Baku planet could absolutely have given her an extra few years of fertility.

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Todd

Worf gets the prize for Bad Ass Intro.

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lorcan_nagle

Mercy kill Picard and do a Worf series, it’s the only solution.

This was, relatively speaking, not as bad as the first two episodes but that doesn’t make it good by default.

The Picard-Riker conflict felt forced and hollow. Crusher’s account of why she disappeared for 20 years was similar. And then there is the walking waste of space that is Jack.

The idea of a Changeling schism is interesting but falls apart under scrutiny.  The Dominion lost nothing much, still had its Gamma Quadrant empire, fleets of Jem’Hadar and Vorta.

What also doesn’t is that one happens to be on board Titan and happens to be working with Vadic.  How the hell is that set up? Cue super conspiracy bullcrap.

Finally, with this level of budget and EFX, how on earth do they make the space “battles” so boring? I placrle the term in quotes because it is absurdly uneven.  So much so the writers have to keep giving the Titan an escape from being blasted to crap.

Needed more Worf, a lot more Worf.

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Uncle Retrospective

Ben wrote:

Finally, with this level of budget and EFX, how on earth do they make the space “battles” so boring? I placrle the term in quotes because it is absurdly uneven.  So much so the writers have to keep giving the Titan an escape from being blasted to crap.

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Al-x, Uncle Retrospective

[Uncle Retrospective]

If episode 2 was on stage at Reading Festival, I would have thrown a bottle of piss at it. I hate “he’s your son”. Like everything in the last two seasons, it’s so fucking lazy. Like playing submarines in a nebula.
Again. And ignoring that the nebula is a 3D object. You don’t have to go through the centre to get to the other side, you can skirt around the centre while still staying in the nebula.
The Bev – Picard chat kinda worked but only because of the history between the characters carried it, the script was meh.
What’s happened Raffi? Has the actor forgotten how to act or is her dialog just that bad?
Listen, if it wasn’t for Frakes just being an utter joy to watch, I don’t think I would have made it through this. I’m not sure I care enough to go back but having this deal with the fall out of DS9 is possibly the only thing that can keep we watching.
Like the first two seasons, they’re going to just keep stringing me along with breadcrumbs of interesting plot while ignoring anything that might be good about those ideas.

Oh, Worf looks great.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 9 months ago by Uncle Retrospective.

[Al-x]

Nice video there @todd

I am glad that they are bringing in Ds9 material as TNG practically ignored the Dominion War.

How strong is Starfleet given that war and even before that Wolf 359? Do they rebuild ships that fast?

I only wish season 1 did not get rid of Data. Data would be nice now…
Picard mess-up reminded me a little of a bad move you make in chess.
Nice scene of Beverly and Picard. And Shaw is getting a little more “understandable”

IIRC, Harlan Ellison’s original script in the TOS (Edith Keeler one) had a crew member with a drug problem.
Roddenberry didn’t want drug addiction issues in the future, so it was rewritten with McCoy.
Now the ST future is not that “clean” showing addiction, seedy clubs, black markets, terrorism…

Amanda Plummer (Yolanda in Pulp Fiction) is Ok so far as Vadic… I found out her late father played General Chang.

Star Trek villains run in the family 🤣

• This reply was modified 1 year, 9 months ago by Al-x.
• This reply was modified 1 year, 9 months ago by Al-x.

Al-x wrote:

I am glad that they are bringing in Ds9 material as TNG practically ignored the Dominion War.
How strong is Starfleet given that war and even before that Wolf 359? Do they rebuild ships that fast?

The Dominion War didn’t start until after First Contact, which takes place before the halfway mark of DS9 series 5, and the war didn’t begin until the finale.

The implication is that the Federation embarked on a massive upgrade/rearmament program after Wolf 359 – there’s a half-dozen ship classes that have the same design aesthetic as the Galaxy and Nebula classes that we only see in the debris field in Best of Both Worlds part 2 (because they’re all kitbashed Enterprise-D model kits), and they seem to augment the surviving members of those classes with refits of older designs like the Miranda and Centaur, but also building more Galaxy classes and designing a half-dozen new classes of ship that are entering service by the Borg attack on Earth in First Contact – the Sovereign, Akira, Steamrunner, Norway, Defiant, and Saber classes seen in First contact are all specifically designed for combat, and most of them make background appearances in DS9 but are outnumbered by older ship classes.

The big incongruity is that 39 ships at Wolf 359 is described as a terrible loss by Nora Satie in The Drumhead, but the Federation has at least six and as many as ten fleets of 100-140 ships operating in the Dominion War, and one of them takes about 75% losses at the start of series six and is back to full strength no more than six months later.

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Al-x, Todd

Thinking about it and isn’t it a bit odd that Beverly would name her secret lovechild with Picard after her dead husband, who Picard was good friends with and was indirectly responsible for his death?  Can the Titan do psych evaluations?

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Todd, Uncle Retrospective

Really enjoyed this week’s episode again. It didn’t do a huge amount to further the plot, but was a much better hour of TV than episode 2. Good twists and turns – the bit in the nacelle control room near the end was genuinely tense, some wonderful character moments between Picard and Jack, Riker’s last scene, as well as Shaw’s continued fantastic development. There’s been some more depth added to the main plot as well with a couple of teasing moments that are intriguing, hopefully we get more on them quickly enough. And I know the lighting hasn’t been to everyone’s tastes but there’s a couple of fantastic shots of Picard’s face looming out of the darkness in here that look fantastic

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Uncle Retrospective

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Uncle Retrospective, Todd, lorcan_nagle

Easily the best episode so far.  Not without the weaknesses of the series – its tone being leaden and dour – but the level of total arse was lower, especially its finale.

Shaw and Seven starting to sort out their relationship was good.  Neat changeling transfornation effects.  A smart asteroid navigation bit.  Oh and Riker royally fucking the Shrike over with an asteroid.  Pity they neglected to show Vadic’s warp core assisted immolation.

If it can stay with its second half / finale tone for the rest of the series, then it could be seriously good.  I might even end up liking the dipshit from Chicago.

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Uncle Retrospective, lorcan_nagle

Will see how it plays out despite it being a dour, leaden mess.

That character that was in episode 5 blindsided me to be honest. 
It was nice and I am content with the closure of the character.
Halfway mark and the pace should be picking up even more.

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Uncle Retrospective

Another good episode, although I’m dubious about the Stranger Things direction they’re going in with Jack. Let it play out and see how it goes, I guess.

Worf’s half assed acting for his fake death was amusing. All part of the fun.

I’d take a Titan show that was all about Shaw trying to have a nice quiet day while other, more famous Trek characters keeping dumping shit on his lap.

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Todd, Uncle Retrospective, lorcan_nagle, Al-x

Better than ep 5, but still not as good as it should be.  I do wonder how these six eps got the rapturous response they got.  It might have helped them if they hadn’t, as I’m not seeing what’s so great here.  Nor am I seeing a break with the previous series.

There are some neat touches here though:

– The relationships between Geordi and his daughters worked.

– Shaw geeking out over La Forge being on board was fun.

– The combined Data-Lal-Soong-Lore is an interesting idea.

– As are Starfleet ships being integrated together, but you know that’s going to backfire spectacularly.

What doesn’t work:

-Vadic. Get rid of this walking void.

– The other thing is going after Riker’s family only heightens her weakness.

– Oh, and the whole vengeance angle? The Changelings have an entire goddamn space empire. That one just isn’t adding up.

Still, this ep had a slightly lighter sense to its narrative style that really helped it.

Ben wrote:

– Oh, and the whole vengeance angle? The Changelings have an entire goddamn space empire. That one just isn’t adding up.

These Changelings have left the great link, it was explained in the episode where Worf and Raffi interrogate John Connor.

And that leads to revenge for?

Sure, there’s a splinter lot that somehow became Super-Changelings.  Yeah, they’re pissed that they lost to the Alpha Quadrant.  Unless that’s it?

Feels like there’s still missing pieces with only 4 eps left.

Brent Spiner just flicking between all those characters with little more than a head tilt was a terrific bit of acting.

50-50 odds that’s actually Troi, I guess.

“Sour mead.” “Superior Klingon technology.” Worf continues to steal the show.

Apparently Kirk’s body was also in the vault, alongside notes that say he was “critically injured” during Generations and the body retrieved for “Project Phoenix”. Um, what?

It seems inevitable that the finale will require Geordi releasing the old, non-interlinked ships to join the battle. Worf and Raffi on the Defiant, Seven and Jack on Voyager, Shaw with the cloaked Titan and Picard leading everyone else on the Enterprise.

I’m down for a spin-off show, but Geordie and Riker would be occasional cameos at best.
I’m okay with the other new faces we’ve met, but Todd Stashwick and Jeri Ryan would be the driving force of this and are ‘musts’.

Something’s Gotta Be Done About the Kids: Star Trek: Legacy Spin-Off Teased by Terry Matalas – Movie Web

‘Picard’ Stars Back “Star Trek: Legacy” Spin-Off Idea – Trek Movie

‘Star Trek: Picard’s LeVar and Mica Burton Want a ‘Star Trek: Legacy’ Spin-Off Series – Collider

LeVar Burton Endorses Potential Picard Spinoff Star Trek Legacy – Screen Rant

I expected the final reveal to be the Genesis device, with all the easter eggs and references we were getting.

Then there was something that could’ve been a pic of it?

Okay, it was… _(#10 of 11 easter Eggs – Screen Rant)

The Genesis Device, first seen in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan is housed at Daystrom Station. It’s referred to as the Genesis II Device, as the original Genesis Device was detonated by Khan Noonien-Singh (Ricardo Montalban), creating the Genesis Planet. Presumably, Federation scientists had continued to work on the theoretical work done by Carol Marcus (Bibi Besch) and Captain Kirk’s son David Marcus (Merritt Butrick) in the decades that followed the theft of the original Genesis Device. Given that Spock (Leonard Nimoy) was given life again by the Genesis Device, it’s a subtle clue to Data’s resurrection later in the episode.

“What is Genesis?” – video

Now you know someone online who is very dedicated would take a screenshot and take the time to post this.

I know in the past fans of the shows would always ask questions (like the captain being on the away team) and wonder how a crew can be on a spaceship 24/7 with the same people and not get into heated arguments or fights. I guess Roddenberry’s vision was that sterile. I like it now that they are showing major schisms between the characters that they all don’t “just get along”.

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lorcan_nagle

The NX-01 is actually the refit version with a secondary hull they planned to introduce in series 5 of Enterprise.

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Al-x

[Uncle Retrospective]

lorcan_nagle wrote:

The NX-01 is actually the refit version with a secondary hull they planned to introduce in series 5 of Enterprise.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 8 months ago by Uncle Retrospective.

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Chris-S, Todd, lorcan_nagle

[Uncle Retrospective]

Didn’t like this episode as much as last, but I was a bit tipsy watching it. Still, this is light years better than the last two seasons so I’ll count that as a win. The Moriarty appearence seemed a bit pointless, but maybe it will tie back in with the really band guys, because I don’t think the Changelings are the real big bad.
And BSG has taught us what happens if you have your ships linked in the face of a technologically advanced foe. No idea why they’d want Jack Picard though.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 8 months ago by Uncle Retrospective.

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lorcan_nagle

[Uncle Retrospective]

Uncle Retrospective wrote:

lorcan_nagle wrote:

The NX-01 is actually the refit version with a secondary hull they planned to introduce in series 5 of Enterprise.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 8 months ago by Uncle Retrospective.

We’re on a comic fan message board.

Uncle Retrospective wrote:

The Moriarty appearence seemed a bit pointless,

Yeah, there was a lot of fanservice this week that didn’t add a huge amount to the story, and having Moriarty be so prominent in the trailer only for him to be a glorified cameo feels a bit bait and switch. Didn’t mind Jack and Seven’s chat about the classic ships they loved though.

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Uncle Retrospective, Todd

It was also said elsewhere:
Worf talked about superior Klingon tech but:

Why didn’t they lift the more modern cloaking device from the Defiant ship?

How does a museum have fully functional ships?

That Daystrum place… What is it? A museum and also this depository of odds and ends collected by Section 31 intelligence to weaponize.

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Uncle Retrospective

lorcan_nagle wrote:

We’re on a comic fan message board.

I was trying to be funny…..
I guess it didn’t work

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Todd, lorcan_nagle

Uncle Retrospective wrote:

lorcan_nagle wrote:

We’re on a comic fan message board.

I was trying to be funny…..
I guess it didn’t work

I was going to funny too, think the “We live in a spaceship” bit from Firefly…

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Chris-S

Al-x wrote:

Why didn’t they lift the more modern cloaking device from the Defiant ship?

The Defiant with the cloak was destroyed shortly before the end of the Dominion War, the one in the Fleet Museum is was formerly the USS Sao Paolo, renamed to Defiant shortly before the final assault on Cardassia.

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Rocket, Todd, Al-x

This was a good episode until the last section which went and wrecked it.

Vadic remains a terribly weak villain, the new Changelings? Perfect bad guys are rather boring and these are. Lore and Data were all right.

The whole Frontier Day and assembling the entire Federation fleet in one place, no one was wary of that?

I might as well see how it plays out across the last three eps.  I’m suspecting a too quick, too fast, too neat, unsatisfying resolution that doesn’t pay off what preceded it. If that doesn’t happen? That’d be nice.

“They made us to be the perfect spies, completely untraceable.”

Five minutes later…

“I’ve discovered a way to track them.”

Not to mention Picard’s big plan. “Hey, you know that psychotic changeling who has been chasing my son across the galaxy? Let’s invite her and her goons on board! Oh, and we have the unhinged android who hates me as well? Super!”

Yeah, not a great episode this week.

 

Better but still not good.

Looking at it, the show has a good budget but this long, drawn out story they’re using it on? Along with this heavy, serious style? The combination does not work for me at all.

And this ep had a load of clearly intended to be big moments, big payoffs.  The problem? It took so long to get to them they weren’t big enough.  A quicker pace, a shorter story? Can get away with lesser booms more easily.  But the payoffs here? After seven long eps? The balance was off.

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Uncle Retrospective

“Fucking Solids” was a great line to go out on. Though I was kinda expecting Vadic to just shapeshift into a space whale and fly away like Lhas there.

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Uncle Retrospective, Todd, Ben

“Monologuing Protoplasms…”

I’d have either kept the Shrike or gutted it for it’s advanced tech (like that portal thing) before I destroyed it, but that’s just me.

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Uncle Retrospective

I dunno, I rather like that the universe is about to be saved because of one android’s love for his cat.

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Uncle Retrospective, Sean Robinson, lorcan_nagle, Ben

Well, that’s that. I wish I could see what everyone else is loving about this, but for me it consistently fails to land again and again.

So Jack’s part Borg? Which renders all the red of previous episodes misdirection bullshit of the worst kind. As they knew if they went with green, people would work it out fast.

Some of it worked well, the idea that the tech was placed in Picard and it was so advanced that it was entirely undetectable. Still not seeing why a splinter group of Changelings with the Borg though.

For all I don’t like him, I didn’t want the dipshit from Chicago to be dead.  I wanted Shaw to be better.  Oh well, scratch him and, later, Shelby.

The mass assimilation was quite clever. As was the idea of old fart immunity to it.

Of course, as expected, the Frontier Day bollocks were a total disaster. Oh and Earth? Earth is fucked. Game over, man, game over.

The notion of using an older, analog ship sets up the Enterprise D, but does anyone have a plan here? Anyone? Beyond it’s the last episode, so raise Plot Shields and prime Villain Stupidity torpedoes.

More seriously, I can’t see any way for them to conclude this well in one episode.  Unless it’s more than 10 episodes?

Could this series have ever worked for me? Possibly, but it would need a different style, tone, plot bombs exploded earlier – yeah, it would have had to be very different.

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Rocket, Uncle Retrospective

This manipulating of the transporters is similar to what Mr. Sinister is doing in the latest X-titles, tbh.

Interesting… The Borg would arrogantly send one cube to do its thing. But their past defeats (Best of Both Worlds, First Contact, the Voyager finale) have them rethinking. They partnered with the rebel Changelings to do this subtle strategy.

Shaw was right when he said the real Borg are still out there.

For 8 eps, we had the shapeshifters tropes adding mystery don’t know who is who etc. and now we go back to zombies.
And… a subtle stab at the Gen Z generation under 25.

If the Borg really wanted to splat the Federation, they could do so.  A few thousand cubes would do it.

But I quite like what they did here – set up a long term plan to nab the Alpha Quadrant, while its running they assimilate numerous other species.

I’m working under the assumption that the Borg has not recovered from the damage Future Janeway did in Endgame.

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Sean Robinson, Ben, Al-x

Ben wrote:

Well, that’s that. I wish I could see what everyone else is loving about this, but for me it consistently fails to land again and again.

The big thing is that this season is so much better than the first two, but that’s no bar at all. They were terrible!
I agree with you that it’s a let down at almost every corner. They’ll do something really interesting and then just pick the most obvious plot beat to do with it.

Love the mass assimilation, it was a great crazy idea and the kind of thing that Trek should be doing, but having what felt like hours of the old crew staring in awe at the old ship was dull.

I did love that Troi was finally great in an episode though.

They’ve a lot to land on the last episode and I don’t have any confidence that they can do it. I’m also pissed off they killed Shaw. One of the few interesting characters in the Picard show and they off him. I wanted a spin off show with him learning to be less of a git while having adventures on the Titan.

The first two seasons of this show were like being force fed cold, damp broccoli. Then this third season is like getting to fix yourself a giant sundae. Is it really necessary? No, but it’s goddamn ice cream and it’s glorious.

Worf absolutely stole every scene he had this season. I hope he returns in whatever the Legacy show is going to be.

Seven captaining a crew that was, briefly, assimilated by the Borg is a neat idea. And she has her own Ensign Crusher on the bridge. Not sure that the former Titan really looks like a flagship vessel. Still, G being the seventh letter of the alphabet is a nice touch.

Did they ever mention what was going on with Riker and Troi’s other, non-dead child? Or Picard’s relationship with Romulan Mrs Doyle?

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Chris-S, Vikram

So, my thoughts on Picard series 3. I’m mixed on it overall. There’s a lot to enjoy here, the crew of the Titan are charming as hell right off the bat (though the Stargazer crew had a lot of that last year too), and the easy camaraderie with the TNG cast is fantastic – with so many moments that made me smile. Worf had at least one amazingly funny moment every episode he was in, and the banter between him and Riker was great.

But the plot has a lot of the same issues that plague the “novel for TV” format, which has plagued Picard and to some degree Discovery , especially around pacing. We’re basically looking at two stories here – 8 episodes of the Shrike chasing the Titan, and then 2 about the Borg attempting to wipe out the Federation with a bit of tape holding the two stories together. Instead of the characters proactively working everything out gradually over the entire run, most of the series run time is basically a stern chase that’s exciting but doesn’t do much except drop some clues and pad the episode count. It’s the same complaint I’ve had for three years with the show, it’s just the pacing issue has manifested itself slightly differently each time.

The other issue for me is the level of fanservice. I like a good continuity nod as much as the next fan, but I spent a lot of Rogue One rolling my eyes as the movie jammed another reference to Star Wars into my face like it was self-conscious of not having Luke or Han in it. And Picard does a lot of this too, but it’s not as outré by virtue of being an hour a week – even though there’s more fanservice in the total runtime. It’s hard for me to say that the show entertained me because it was a fun story well-presented as opposed to hitting my dopamine receptors by saying “hey, remember Ro Laren? Remember Commander Shelby?” The really egregious thing for me was pulling the camera pulling over the Titan-A/Enterprise G in both episodes 1 and 10. Do we need to call back that bit in Star Trek IV twice?

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Uncle Retrospective, Vikram

I loved it. I can’t deny the criticism and totally understand why it doesn’t work for everyone. But, sometimes I just like to switch the brain off, enjoy the spectacle, and spend time with characters that I love. And, Season 3 delivered on that in spades.

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Chris-S, lorcan_nagle

Star Trek: Picard: Our Favorite Easter Eggs From The Final Season

Where the hell did this episode come from? It was everything the other 90% of the series wasn’t.  Great pacing, good characters, action sequences, everyone got cool stuff to do.  Why couldn’t the rest of it been like this?

(Sure, plot bombs need a bit of time to be built, laid, fuse set, lit and then detonated.)

Koenig’s opening voiceover as one of Chekhov’s descendants was a great little touch.  The Titan running inteference against the fleet, while Spacedock took the brunt of the shots with “that all you got?” attitude.

The Borg super-cube was neatly epic and creepy.  The sequence with the turrets and Crusher blowing the crap out of anything and everything was excellent.  As was Data’s Death Star run. Both of those really put the budget to work with superb effects.

For all the idea of a massive Borg invasion, with grand battles between the Borg and everyone else appeals, two things count against it.  One is that it’s been done in the books. (The Destiny trilogy.) More importantly, an invasion is a very human approach.  The whole transporter assimilation by stealth, with no invasive implants needed? The more I look at it, the better it fits to the Borg.  It is subtle and efficient.  The only flaw is it was brought in too late in the series.  Also, like in Destiny, the Borg, when pushed, switch from assimilation to annihilation.

Nor does this go for paying off for the old characters at the expense of the new.  The pay-offs for both Raffi and Seven are excellent.  Shaw’s officer evaluation of Seven forms a neat final piece for his character.  It also explains quite a bit about him too.

With the cast for the Enterprise-G, and that rename really lands, they would be very stupid to not do a spin-off. It could absolutely work with an episodic structure.

The mid-credits sequence was also bang on target.  A much better portrait of Q too.

S3 of Picard is a mess of a series with a fantastic finale.

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Sean Robinson, lorcan_nagle

It was a nice entertaining season where we saw the old crew a few characters who came back.

As for Jack… It is only the beginning. Is that trial ever going to end?🤣

Renaming the “hero” ship Enterprise and giving all the credit and glory to that name.
Why didn’t they rename Voyager for that matter?

They have material to set up another show, but given some Paramount “freeze” in production, I wouldn’t expect another live action series right now aside from Strange New Worlds.