Star Trek: Picard (CBS All-Access)

[pengbuzz]

5 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Sort of.  Starfleet's "mildly military" nature was present from a fairly early point in Star Trek's development due to, ironically, the influence of Gene Roddenberry.  A lot of inspiration for the organization was drawn from the US Navy from the outset - which is why almost every Constitution-class ship in TOS are is named for a World War II-era aircraft carrier - but Gene would paradoxically insist it was not a military organization and then liken it to the (US) Coast Guard (which IS one).  He'd also contributed to a number of stories where Starfleet were depicted as responsible for the Federation's border security (e.g. TMP) and even the general defense of the Federation in wartime (e.g. TOS "Errand of Mercy").

EDIT: Perhaps one of the most blatant items being that the initial Starfleet Tech Manual Gene was so proud of contained things like Starfleet DREADNOUGHTS.

Meyer and Moore essentially just acknowledged what was already there... that one of the many hats Starfleet wears is that of the Federation's de facto military, though the organization isn't explicitly military in nature like its counterparts in the Klingon Empire, Romulan Empire, Cardassian Union, Dominion, etc.

 

Gene wasn't a particularly consistent fellow even when he was in good health, TBH.

Some creators can get that way with their creations; they become a retreat for them from the world in general, and as such, end up being shaped a bit differently in their minds each time they "visit". I suspect Gene was very much that way, and it required his "vision" being filtered through those who were not as connected to that vision being shaped on a whim. Hence, it took those under Gene to keep Star Trek any sort of consistent, and when Gene was allowed carte blanche, that's when stuff would get weird.

(I see much of that now in Star Wars, but that's another discussion)

 

6 hours ago, Lexomatic said:

IIRC, the more overtly militaristic take on Starfleet was introduced in Wrath of Khan by director Nicholas Meyer. The original series wasn't clear on Starfleet's mission, or whether it had peer organizations within the Federation with complementary functions, and later productions haven't improved things -- so people (writers, audience) tend to fall back on contemporary analogs. Is the Enterprise like the U.S. Navy, or the U.S. Coast Guard, or the research voyages of Captain Cook or the HMS Beagle from the British Navy? Or some novel combination that lacks single-planet parallels? The UFP might be like the UN, but the UN doesn't charter research ships.

I like how Starfleet was portrayed in WOK (at least what we saw of it): just enough military and exploration.

 

6 hours ago, Lexomatic said:

Pike's line from the 2009 movie, "the Federation is a humanitarian armada," is the worst of the lot.)

That's kinda like saying "We're a peacekeeping force" or "it's a civil war" (both of which are non-sequiturs). Way to go, Pike!

 

6 hours ago, Lexomatic said:

Gene Roddenberry had dementia in his last years, and some directives delivered by his lawyer may have been

initiated by his lawyer. That's a whole other sordid kettle of fish.[quote/]

His absence was increasingly noticeable as TNG progressed from Season 1. Sometimes I wonder what he would have made of the TNG movies past Generations (probably would have had a stroke over them!).

 

7 hours ago, Focslain said:

Ouch and VI is my favorite of the movies. I'm guessing that the militaristic faction was originally the majority in the Federation instead of just a small group as in the final cut?

I didn't like TUD because I felt it got a little too away from the exploration (just my opinion). In all fairness though, since Starfleet's purpose seemed to vary even from TOS' episode to episode (and movie to movie), pinning it down in my mind may be a bit off.

 

14 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Star Trek VI was the one where Gene was preparing to sue and died before the lawsuit could be filed

Ah; I thought you had said the "last couple". My mistake.

 

 

Edited February 25, 2020 by pengbuzz

[JB0]

9 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

According to Shatner, after viewing the theatrical cut of the film, Gene Roddenberry had his lawyer start preparing a demand for a further fifteen minutes of material to be cut from the film.  He passed away two days later, and the demand went undelivered.

What I read is that part was going to be over people expressing anti-klingon sentiment, not militarism. He felt people in Trek were beyond judging others by their genetic heritage. Especially James "I have never trusted klingons, and I never will" Kirk.

 

 

The Undiscovered Country is a good movie, though. And a good Trek story, too. 

[Lexomatic]

1 hour ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Starfleet's "mildly military" nature was present from a fairly early point in Star Trek's development

Certainly, TOS TV-Starfleet was a uniformed service, heavily armed, with military-style discipline and justice -- but the Enterprise seemed to do a lot of exploration, diplomacy and planetary relief. (Which might be "let's give the characters something interesting to do" more than "we have a coherent vision of Starfleet's charter".) By "overtly" I refer to the more formal uniforms, and Dr. David Marcus's poor opinion of them. Lest we retread old ground:

• https://www.reddit.com/r/DaystromInstitute/comments/2fxpg9/what_is_starfleet_military_paramilitary_or/
• https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Starfleet#Military

(The Genesis Project wasn't under the auspices of Starfleet, was it? That implies a UFP-parallel to the NSF, or at least a subcommittee of the Federation Council. They did have assistance from Starfleet's Corps of Engineers. Are there private firms that can hollow asteroids? Either (a) security reasons, or (b) writer Harve Bennett et al couldn't think of a name for such an entity.)

This might be attributed to a change in directors, to perceived demands of feature films vs. TV, or some kind of UFP geopolitical shift in the decade-plus between the TV's "five-year mission" and TWOK.

[Seto Kaiba]

8 hours ago, pengbuzz said:

Some creators can get that way with their creations; they become a retreat for them from the world in general, and as such, end up being shaped a bit differently in their minds each time they "visit". I suspect Gene was very much that way, and it required his "vision" being filtered through those who were not as connected to that vision being shaped on a whim. Hence, it took those under Gene to keep Star Trek any sort of consistent, and when Gene was allowed carte blanche, that's when stuff would get weird.

George Lucas was the same way from the outset in Star Wars's development... what he wrote was not readable, let alone filmable.  He was a great idea man, but he needed writers, editors, and producers holding his leash and hammering his ideas into something people might actually watch.

 

 

5 hours ago, JB0 said:

What I read is that part was going to be over people expressing anti-klingon sentiment, not militarism. He felt people in Trek were beyond judging others by their genetic heritage. Especially James "I have never trusted klingons, and I never will" Kirk.

It was both, really... he wasn't happy with some core TOS characters being depicted as racist, and he was also unhappy with the idea that a militaristic Starfleet might actually WANT to go to war with the Klingons.  The latter is reportedly why Rene Auberjonois' character, Colonel West, ended up on the cutting room floor.  He was the one who, in meetings with the Federation President, was vocally agitating for armed conflict with the Klingons.

 

 

5 hours ago, Lexomatic said:

Certainly, TOS TV-Starfleet was a uniformed service, heavily armed, with military-style discipline and justice -- but the Enterprise seemed to do a lot of exploration, diplomacy and planetary relief. (Which might be "let's give the characters something interesting to do" more than "we have a coherent vision of Starfleet's charter".) By "overtly" I refer to the more formal uniforms, and Dr. David Marcus's poor opinion of them. Lest we retread old ground:

• https://www.reddit.com/r/DaystromInstitute/comments/2fxpg9/what_is_starfleet_military_paramilitary_or/
• https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Starfleet#Military

(The Genesis Project wasn't under the auspices of Starfleet, was it? That implies a UFP-parallel to the NSF, or at least a subcommittee of the Federation Council. They did have assistance from Starfleet's Corps of Engineers. Are there private firms that can hollow asteroids? Either (a) security reasons, or (b) writer Harve Bennett et al couldn't think of a name for such an entity.)

This might be attributed to a change in directors, to perceived demands of feature films vs. TV, or some kind of UFP geopolitical shift in the decade-plus between the TV's "five-year mission" and TWOK.

Like I said, even under Gene Roddenberry's immediate control the Federation Starfleet seemed to wear a LOT of hats.

Most of the assignments we see the crew of the Enterprise undertake are diplomatic or scientific in nature, but we do also see a wide array of other stuff like border patrols, wartime planetary defense, managing interstellar cargo shipments, law enforcement operations, coordinating interstellar colonization, etc.  If there was a thing you needed a government agency to do, they did it.

[renegadeleader1]

2 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Most of the assignments we see the crew of the Enterprise undertake are diplomatic or scientific in nature, but we do also see a wide array of other stuff like border patrols, wartime planetary defense, managing interstellar cargo shipments, law enforcement operations, coordinating interstellar colonization, etc. 

Remove the words planetary and interstellar, and you basically have everything the US Navy has at least done once this past year... With the exception of colonization. You'll have to look at the Royal Navy circa 1600-1800s for that.

[Dynaman]

11 hours ago, renegadeleader1 said:

Remove the words planetary and interstellar, and you basically have everything the US Navy has at least done once this past year... With the exception of colonization. You'll have to look at the Royal Navy circa 1600-1800s for that.

And a Royal Navy captain was expected to be the top Diplomat at remote spots since he was often the most senior level official around - and no way to get instructions from others.

[Lolicon]

Just watched episode 5 of Picard. A bit behind because of work and lost some motivation due to the poor pacing of the first few episodes. It didn't help that the trailer made it look like yet another campy "crew dresses in local disguise to pull off some ridiculous mission" episode.

And while the episode definitely had its goofy moments of levity, I actually enjoyed it, mostly. Great seeing Seven again and how much she's changed over the years, and the scene with her and Picard at the end was fantastic.

I kinda wish they had gotten the original actor back for Maddox. That guy was so weasely and sniveling and I wanted to see how he is now after 30 years. Oh well. 

But rather than write a long-winded review then congratulate myself for how clever and influential I think I am, I'll let this guy do it for me, as he mostly mirrors my own thoughts on Picard:

(Summary: Like Picard, some bad stuff, don't care for Soji and Ethan-Peck-Spock-lookalike Romulan dude, etc.)

 

Edited February 27, 2020 by Lolicon
spelling

[Seto Kaiba]

1 hour ago, Lolicon said:

I kinda wish they had gotten the original actor back for Maddox. That guy was so weasely and sniveling and I wanted to see how he is now after 30 years. Oh well. 

He's gotten out of acting, AFAIK... he's been the director of theater arts at the California Institute of Technology since '07.

Kind of a shame they didn't get him back, he doesn't seem to have changed much.  Here's his staff profile from TACIT: http://tacit.caltech.edu/about/brian

[Seto Kaiba]

It's that time again... Jean-Luc Picard and his intrepid band of ridiculous cliches are off to a retired Borg cube in "The Impossible Box".  

 

The Good

Spoiler

Hey, so... for the first time in a while we're NOT opening on a flashback.  

Sure, it's a generic nightmare sequence instead, but it's better than "Welcome to the Exposition Dump".  Unfortunately, it also means we have to watch the low rent beardy-Spock knockoff and Miss Generic 2399 flirt awkwardly.  It's like watching Ben Stein romance a haddock.

The rather stilted exposition aside, we actually get what may be this show's first decent bit of acting when Picard is asked by RomuLegolas how he feels about visiting a Borg cube.  Patrick Stewart does a half-decent job of actually conveying the post-traumatic stress disorder that Picard would no doubt suffer from after a violent assimilation by the Borg and everything that he'd suffered through as Locutus.  Really, this is what we should've gotten after The Best of Both Worlds.  

Hey, for the first time in this series someone is ACTUALLY happy to see Jean-Luc Picard.  It's Hugh.  The most likeable and compassionate character by an enormous margin in this series is a former Borg drone who just wants to help people.  He's genuinely kind, caring, and wants to improve the lives of others.  Despite his grim surroundings, he feels like a character out of the Star Trek we know and love rather than this hateful thing it has been twisted into.

 

The Bad

Spoiler

Romulan society in previous shows was never depicted as being this secrecy-obsessed.  So, apparently now Romulans have three names... a public name, a name they only use among family, and a name they only use with their lover.  Soji asks what Narek's real name is, and he essentially leaves in a huff.

Dr. Obnoxious lies to Picard about how and why Bruce Maddox died.  This was kind of a nonsensical part of last episode... if the idiots on Freecloud were going to sell the Most Wanted Bruce Maddox to the Tal Shiar for megabucks, why did they beat him to death BEFORE they could sell him?  That doesn't make any sense.  They HAD him, captured him without any kind of a fight.  Why ruin their investment and piss off the Romulan Ministry of Knife-You-In-The-Back by beating him to death when it was the Tal Shiar's desire to interrogate him.

We couldn't come up with some new VFX for the ship's computer library?  The records he calls up are stills from older Star Trek episodes, like the Continuing Committee from "Inter Enim Arma Silent Leges", the Borg Cube from First Contact, and Hugh's closeup from "I, Borg".  Then a bunch of screenshots from previous episodes of Picard, and then a screenshot from "The Best of Both Worlds"... but flipped horizontally for some reason so we can see him freaking out through the hologram.

Dr. Obnoxious does one useful thing, at least... she puts her finger firmly on why Star Trek: Picard isn't Star Trek.  It's hollow, hopeless, and lonely.  It's a future of misery and despair, with no light or life to it.  These characters are miserable 24/7 and literally every decision they make just makes them more miserable.  Only RomuLegolas seems to know how to have fun or even smile sincerely and everyone else treats his moments of levity like they're offensive.

Narek and his sister fight over a Romulan rubik's cube, then have some more freakish vaguely incestuous dialog while they argue about how he wants to get his leg over Miss Generic in order to access what she knows without sending her into the killbot frenzy that her sister went into before dying.

We get a rather clumsily executed scene of Soji calling her mother and starting to realize that something is VERY wrong with the whole idea, as the angle gets progressively more dutch as the scene goes on.  If it'd gone on much longer, John Travolta would've sauntered in and asked her if she was out of her head-bone.  She follows it up by tearing through her quarters and scanning every photograph and possession she owns, discovering it's all fabricated at the same time 37 months ago.  

There's a lot of reused footage from Star Trek: First Contact and Star Trek: Voyager in Picard's traumatic episode aboard the Borg cube.  You'd think after all they did to splurge on Borg makeup for the ex-Borg they could've at least done some new shots.  

 

The Ugly

Spoiler

Dr. Obnoxious is apparently so little affected by having murdered her lover, Dr. Bruce Maddox, that she's immediately getting frisky with Rios?  Oh, and she has a superpower... the ability to sense mistakes while she's making them.  Great dialog.  Just, absolutely fantastic.  She's so broken up about murdering her lover that she decides to let Rios help her test her bedsprings.

Raffi's back on the space drugs and as caustic as ever.  This show was so much better with her offscreen and not talking.  I guess her character growth didn't last very long.  She's dragged out of her quarters and a drug binge to blackmail a Starfleet officer into giving Picard diplomatic credentials to visit the Borg cube.  Violating the Neutral Zone is apparently still an act of war despite moderately thawed relations after the dissolution of the Romulan Empire, so Picard basically just risked a war with the Romulans for his own vanity.  Predictably, she gets the credentials but her friend now hates her so she goes back to drinking and abusing space drugs.  Somehow, this was mistaken for a scene meriting a triumphant excerpt from the TNG theme.  Nobody on the crew seems to care that she's a self-destructive substance abuser with a death wish, they applaud instead.

The important Romulan meditative ritual space is... a redress of the crew quarters set full of cheap IKEA floor lamps where you walk a line on the floor.  This whole sequence where Narek is trying to squeeze Miss Generic for information through a lame bout of psychoanalysis is just exasperating.  Congratulations, you're now watching a low-rent version of Black Mirror thanks to Soji's memories being doctored to conceal her nature as a synth.  She freaks out, he flat out tells her she's not an actual person.  Narek's locks her in the room with his little puzzle box, which emits a hilariously bad red smoke special effect... apparently they were too cheap to spring for an actual fog machine or something.  Miss Generic literally punches her way through the wood floor, and lands in front of Hugh and Picard.  After some really awkward rushed dialog, they find their way to the Borg Queen's personal chamber and it's conveniently got a transporter (the spatial trajector from early Voyager) that has interstellar range... except now it's a generic portal.  Picard and Miss Generic go through, leaving Hugh and RomuLegolas behind.

 

Next episode, Jonathan Frakes cameos as Will Riker... 

All in all, this episode wasn't something I could call "good" with a straight face... but it was definitely less terrible than the previous few.

[JB0]

4 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

We couldn't come up with some new VFX for the ship's computer library?  The records he calls up are stills from older Star Trek episodes, like the Continuing Committee from "Inter Enim Arma Silent Leges", the Borg Cube from First Contact, and Hugh's closeup from "I, Borg".  Then a bunch of screenshots from previous episodes of Picard, and then a screenshot from "The Best of Both Worlds"... but flipped horizontally for some reason so we can see him freaking out through the hologram.

Using old Star Trek scenes as stock footage ensures you know that this is real Star Trek, just like you used to watch, and that you should love it because it gives you the nostalgia feels.

[tekering]

3 hours ago, JB0 said:

Using old Star Trek scenes as stock footage ensures you know that this is real Star Trek, just like you used to watch, and that you should love it because it gives you the nostalgia feels.

Using stock footage to cut corners and save money ensures you know that this is the real Star Trek.  

[JB0]

12 minutes ago, tekering said:

Using stock footage to cut corners and save money ensures you know that this is the real Star Trek.  

That too!

[renegadeleader1]

9 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Hey, for the first time in this series someone is ACTUALLY happy to see Jean-Luc Picard.  It's Hugh.  The most likeable and compassionate character by an enormous margin in this series is a former Borg drone who just wants to help people.  He's genuinely kind, caring, and wants to improve the lives of others.  Despite his grim surroundings, he feels like a character out of the 

Star Trek we know and love rather than this hateful thing it has been twisted into.

About that...

You know he's as dead as a doorknob now right? No way this show lets a character like Hugh who is a well meaning altruistic throwback live. His ass will be dead by the end of the next two episodes.

[Dynaman]

7 hours ago, tekering said:

Using stock footage to cut corners and save money ensures you know that this is the real Star Trek.  

What?  A clip show already???  "Shades of Grey" here we come!

[Seto Kaiba]

8 hours ago, renegadeleader1 said:

About that...

 

  Hide contents

You know he's as dead as a doorknob now right? No way this show lets a character like Hugh who is a well meaning altruistic throwback live. His ass will be dead by the end of the next two episodes.

 

... I hate that you're probably right.  He's too good for this sinful Federation.

 

2 hours ago, Dynaman said:

What?  A clip show already???  "Shades of Grey" here we come!

Not a clip show, just a lot of onscreen graphics in this episode are really blatant screenshots from previous shows.

[Dynaman]

1 hour ago, Seto Kaiba said:

 

Not a clip show, just a lot of onscreen graphics in this episode are really blatant screenshots from previous shows.

Just a joke based on both things being used to save money.

[Lexomatic]

Under "what are the writers thinking?", TrekMovie quotes a lengthy statement by producer/showrunner Michael Chabon in which he explains the show's treatment of violence and aspirational-future. The comment thread immediately asks "where's the evidence that you successfully implemented any of these ambitions?"

• https://www.instagram.com/p/B8zgFwsA25r
• https://trekmovie.com/2020/02/24/star-trek-picard-showrunner-michael-chabon-responds-to-more-fan-questions-plus-frakes-interviewed-and-more/

 

[Dobber]

His explanation for the “dark” tone makes zero sense. He’s just talking in long winded circles. As the one comment points out there is no explanation for the nonsensical plot devices used either. Kind of glad I haven’t watched the last 3 episodes. Not sure if I will.

Chris

[pengbuzz]

21 hours ago, Dobber said:

His explanation for the “dark” tone makes zero sense. He’s just talking in long winded circles. As the one comment points out there is no explanation for the nonsensical plot devices used either. Kind of glad I haven’t watched the last 3 episodes. Not sure if I will.

Chris

His explanation comes under the heading of "stunningly and embarrassingly full of s***".

Honestly, this series is so bleak and dystopian, I'm expecting the season finale to be all the main characters pulling out phasers/ disruptors/ swords/ knives/ shillelaghs/ etc. and committing suicide.

Think The Happening meets Star Trek.

Edited February 29, 2020 by pengbuzz

[sh9000]

 

[Seto Kaiba]

On 2/28/2020 at 7:47 PM, Dobber said:

His explanation for the “dark” tone makes zero sense. He’s just talking in long winded circles. As the one comment points out there is no explanation for the nonsensical plot devices used either.

All told, it's a bunch of pretentious logorrhea that boils down to a "no, except yes" in response to the very first point about having not made Star Trek a grimdark dystopia full of senseless violence in order to be trendy.  He says that wasn't what they did, but follows it up by basically admitting in a very circuitous manner that that's EXACTLY what they did.

These schmucks want to write Star Trek as Game of Space Thrones... for all the senseless violence and sex they can, because that sold so well until Game of Thrones's final season.

 

4 hours ago, pengbuzz said:

Honestly, this series is so bleak and dystopian, I'm expecting the season finale to be all the main characters pulling out phasers/ disruptors/ swords/ knives/ shillelaghs/ etc. and committing suicide.

Can't be... that would be a happy ending, with death as a release from a life of endless suffering and disgrace in this hell Michael Chabon has wrought.

I fully expect Jean-Luc Picard will die, and that La Sirena will be renamed Picard in his honor to allow the series to continue without its most expensive cast member.

Edited March 1, 2020 by Seto Kaiba

[pengbuzz]

14 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

All told, it's a bunch of pretentious logorrhea that boils down to a "no, except yes" in response to the very first point about having not made Star Trek a grimdark dystopia full of senseless violence in order to be trendy.  He says that wasn't what they did, but follows it up by basically admitting in a very circuitous manner that that's EXACTLY what they did.

These schmucks want to write Star Trek as Game of Space Thrones... for all the senseless violence and sex they can, because that sold so well until Game of Thrones's final season.

 

Can't be... that would be a happy ending, with death as a release from a life of endless suffering and disgrace in this hell Michael Chabon has wrought.

I fully expect Jean-Luc Picard will die, and that La Sirena will be renamed Picard in his honor to allow the series to continue without its most expensive cast member.

AKA Game of Phasers.

 

Yeah...you have a point.

[sh9000]

 

[renegadeleader1]

On 2/28/2020 at 2:10 PM, Seto Kaiba said:

... I hate that you're probably right.  He's too good for this sinful Federation

Well... That took one episode. 

[Seto Kaiba]

4 minutes ago, renegadeleader1 said:

Well... That took one episode. 

Is that a spoiler for tonight's?  If so, you've made me sad.

[tekering]

43 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Is that a spoiler for tonight's?

Not much to spoil, really.  It's mostly a lackadaisical vacation in paradise with the Rikers.

[Seto Kaiba]

54 minutes ago, tekering said:

Not much to spoil, really.  It's mostly a lackadaisical vacation in paradise with the Rikers.

Riker's got a kid too, huh?  So does this mean we're gonna see Dad!Riker wandering around his space cabin in cargo shorts, sandals with socks, and a fanny pack?

Given how depressing Star Trek: Picard is, I have to wonder if we'll find out Will Riker's accidental twin Thomas died in a Cardassian prison or something.  Or maybe the trauma will just get sillier and we'll find out Will Riker was hounded out of Starfleet by a malfunctioning replicator that wouldn't stop putting horseradish on his prime rib.

[Mommar]

1 hour ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Riker's got a kid too, huh?  So does this mean we're gonna see Dad!Riker wandering around his space cabin in cargo shorts, sandals with socks, and a fanny pack?

Given how depressing Star Trek: Picard is, I have to wonder if we'll find out Will Riker's accidental twin Thomas died in a Cardassian prison or something.  Or maybe the trauma will just get sillier and we'll find out Will Riker was hounded out of Starfleet by a malfunctioning replicator that wouldn't stop putting horseradish on his prime rib.

Come on, is there anything more depressing than a fat Riker anyway?

[Chronocidal]

41 minutes ago, Mommar said:

Come on, is there anything more depressing than a fat Riker anyway?

Do you really want to tempt the fates by asking that?  That's like offering to hold their beer for them.  

[Seto Kaiba]

44 minutes ago, Mommar said:

Come on, is there anything more depressing than a fat Riker anyway?

After seven seasons and three movies of "Will they or won't they?", a lot of fans would be depressed as hell if it turned out Riker and Troi didn't have a happy marriage.

[Dynaman]

1 hour ago, Seto Kaiba said:

After seven seasons and three movies of "Will they or won't they?", a lot of fans would be depressed as hell if it turned out Riker and Troi didn't have a happy marriage.

Not if they found out Troi and Worf had a happy marriage instead.

[Seto Kaiba]

22 minutes ago, Dynaman said:

Not if they found out Troi and Worf had a happy marriage instead.

... marrying or even dating Worf is a serious occupational hazard in Star Trek.

The guy's had two legal wives murdered, and in the relaunch novelverse just dating him was as sure a death sentence as putting on a red shirt to beam down with Kirk, Spock, and McCoy.  At least one of his girlfriends got vaporized by a Breen commando unit.

 

[Mommar]

2 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

After seven seasons and three movies of "Will they or won't they?", a lot of fans would be depressed as hell if it turned out Riker and Troi didn't have a happy marriage.

If Riker can no longer step over the back of a chair what’s it all for anyway?

[Dynaman]

56 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

... marrying or even dating Worf is a serious occupational hazard in Star Trek.

The guy's had two legal wives murdered, and in the relaunch novelverse just dating him was as sure a death sentence as putting on a red shirt to beam down with Kirk, Spock, and McCoy.  At least one of his girlfriends got vaporized by a Breen commando unit.

 

So safer then the average gold shirt guy.  In Star Trek that is about as safe as you get.

[Seto Kaiba]

So... Star Trek: Picard is trying to be intellectual today.  Episode 7's title is Nepenthe, the mythical medicine from The Odyssey that cures your sorrows by making you forget them using laser-guided amnesia.  I think after this season is over, we'll all be wanting a serving to forget this awful mess of a show.

 

The Good

Spoiler

... at first I was going to complain about the assertion that a tractor beam could scramble a ship's systems.  Then I remembered where the La Sirena is.  That's a BORG tractor beam, and their sh*t DOES screw with shields and other things.  Counts as Shown Their Work, for once.

Is that a Hirogen there, among the de-assimilated Borg drones watching Hugh get held at gunpoint?

The fine old Star Trek tradition of minimalist alien life rides again... instead of gluing a horn to a small yappy dog, this time the horn has been glued to a garden-variety rabbit.

Beautiful.  The rabbits are lethally poisonous to boot and they're called bunnicorns.  Did the writer forget they weren't writing for TAS there for a minute?  Riker's daughter is a goddamn treasure "No, I left the venom glands in so we can all puke black bile and die".  I'd still keep one of the damn things as a pet.

 

The Bad

Spoiler

So... I'm still not really clear on why Miss Generic 2399 and her identical twin sister have super-strength, super-speed, super-reflexes, and all the other stuff we normally associate with a wholly-artificial Soong-type android like Data, Lore, Lal, B4, etc.  They're bio-androids.  Unlike the models created by Noonian Soong, they're not made out of supertough composites over a metallic frame... they're made out of meat and bone just with a positronic brain wired up to their normal meatbag nervous system.  Miss Generic 2399 should not be able to just punch her way through a hardwood floor in a matter of seconds.

We open with another flashback... this time to a few weeks ago, when Dr. Obvious met with the Tal Shiar agent who somehow managed to get the job of Director of Starfleet Security without a background check.  The sunglasses still look incredibly stupid.  

Wait, Romulans can mind-meld now?  Commodore OhNo shows Dr. Obvious what will happen if synthetic life is allowed to exist... which seems to be a few random shots of Earth being attacked and a few upset people.  I feel like some of this is recycled footage from Star Trek: Discovery season two, while the rest of just people making somewhat silly faces at the camera.

Did Narek's sister forget Romulans have literal mind-reading technology for interrogations?  Tech that the Tal Shiar is literally famous for?  What was the point of rounding up a half dozen ex-Borg and gunning them down in front of Hugh?  I'm used to the Tal Shiar being intelligence amateur hour even by Alpha Quadrant standards, but Narek's sister's just BAD AT HER JOB.  It's an excuse for the writers to throw in some gratuitous violence.

Picard and Miss Generic 2399 arrive at Nepenthe by spatial trajector and are immediately held at arrow-point by... a kid wearing pinecones on her head?  Apparently Riker and Troi's kid. 

Here, we instantly come up with another really obvious problem with the Tal Shiar's plan.  If they really wanted to find synthetics so badly, why not just hire some freelancing Betazoid telepaths to screen people?  It took hundreds of operatives years to figure out that Miss Generic wasn't what she seemed... Troi sussed it out in under a minute and she's not even a very powerful telepath.

Oh hey, someone FINALLY realized Dr. Obvious is acting strange... and all it took was her saying "why don't we just not go pick up the guy who chartered this entire mission in the first place?".  

Riker is MUCH sharper than Picard.  It takes him only a few hours to figure out the entire plot so far.  He too decides to give Jean-Luc Picard a brief The Reason You Suck speech about his arrogance, just for shiggles.

... and Troi gets a The Reason You Suck speech to deliver to Picard too.  This one's MUCH longer than Riker's.  This show can't seem to decide whether Jean-Luc Picard should be Jean-Luc Picard or not.  Early on, its answer is "No and go f*ck yourself old man" and now Troi is chastising him for being insufficiently Picardy.

Pairing up RomuLegolas and Hugh was a bad idea.  Real bad.  You've got two stoic drama queens who don't talk like normal people... it's like an audiobook version of a bad fanfic.  Everyone's wearing black leather too, so it's like a bad EDGY fanfic.  All that it's missing is for RomuLegolas to start deflecting disruptor bolts with his sword like a Jedi Knight (or the Romulan Ninja he very obviously is).  Hugh is killed as an afterthought, hit by a casually thrown throwing knife to the neck while his killer apparently has a hair trigger transporter fast enough to dodge throwing knives.

Rios proves he's wrong genre savvy, expecting the strung-out druggie to be the Romulan agent instead of the squeaky-clean doctor who's been acting increasingly suspicious and guilty for like the last week.  He gets called away because Narek is back, and for the second time in a row leaves the mentally unstable and clearly depressed doctor alone inside his sickbay.  She immediately replicates a neurotoxin and tries to kill herself.  Whatever happened to replicators being unable to replicate poisons?  Now she's in a nice friendly soap opera coma and won't have to act for a few episodes.  IMO, that's an actual improvement to the character.

 

The Ugly

Spoiler

Wow... Jean-Luc Picard, master of grace and tact, Ladies and Gentlemen.  It's hard to imagine someone so stupid used to be a master diplomat and strategist.  After all this show of pussyfooting around the idea that Miss Generic is an android, he ACCIDENTALLY brings it up in conversation by telling Riker's daughter that his new friend is Data's daughter.  WHOOPS.  He then proceeds to make it much worse by immediately pointing out that her memory, identity, and everything else are fake.

... well THAT was unexpected.  Riker's house has its own shield generator and perimeter sensor net, because of the Kzinti.  The f*ck.  Apparently also capable of scanning for cloaking devices.  Google Home apparently has one hell of a featureset in the future.  I'm not sure what's worse, the dialog in this whole scene or the idea that the Kzinti are both still a thing and an actual threat to someone.  These are the same aliens who lost so many wars with Earth that they aren't even allowed weapons anymore as of 2270s.  Really, I kinda wanna see a 25th century Kzinti, just to see if they're still rocking that lavender and lilac combo from "The Slaver Weapon".   Look at Chuft-Captain, he's man enough to wear pink.  Are YOU?

 

GOD F*CKING DAMNIT!  WHY CAN NOBODY IN THIS SERIES NOT HAVE SUFFERED HORRIBLY BETWEEN NEMESIS AND NOW?  Why do the writers have this obsession with the idea that misery equals drama?  So Riker and Troi are traumatized by the death of their son and now live in perpetual fear that something will happen to their daughter.

Turns out, hey hey, our boy Jean-Luc Picard is somehow indirectly responsible for the death of Will and Deanna's son because the ban on synthetic lifeforms included medical technology that could have saved his life.  Yaaaay.  If he'd stayed in Starfleet to expose the Romulan involvement in the attack on Mars and fight the ban on artificial life, then Riker's son would've lived a long and happy life.  Whoops.  Nice job breaking it, hero.  Also, why are positronic matricies magic now?

I hate this show.  I hate it so much.  Hugh, the only character here who actually seemed to recognize they were in a Star Trek show and behave accordingly, is dead, and in his dying words he treats his optimism like a flaw.  

Next episode seems to involve some ominous future portents of synthetic life, something going awry on the Borg cube, and a lot of senseless killing.  Yay.  Also, Seven's back to growl more threats.