Star Trek: Picard (CBS All-Access)

[Dobber]

So here are my 2 cents on the whole Titan thing. The Luna class Titan did exist, not only was it in LD but there is a model of it in the conference room in the previous episode showing the history of the the Titan’s (like the Enterprise lineage models seen in the D and E).

I believe this is a new ship and not the Luna class refitted into something new. Maybe the whole Neo constitution class just finished refit or something.  So Riker commanded the Luna class Titan,  It was destroyed or retired and then he briefly commanded this Titan…maybe only for the shakedown cruise…before stepping down. Possibly due to his child’s illness. 🤷🏻‍♂️ This would explain why his music is in the computer and why he has an affinity for the ship.
 

I too would’ve preferred either a different name all together or at least a different registry for this new Titan. There are plenty of legacy names that are continued in Star Fleet that use new registries. The carryover registry should only be for VERY special ships like the Enterprise, but these new show runners seem to be going nuts with every name that has come before must now be continued with an A,B,C etc. Honestly, I kind of wish it was only the Enterprise that had that honor but it is a big fleet so 🤷🏻‍♂️
 

Chris

Edited February 28, 2023 by Dobber

[Hikuro]

7 hours ago, Dobber said:

So here are my 2 cents on the whole Titan thing. The Luna class Titan did exist, not only was it in LD but there is a model of it in the conference room in the previous episode showing the history of the the Titan’s (like the Enterprise lineage models seen in the D and E).

I believe this is a new ship and not the Luna class refitted into something new. Maybe the whole Neo constitution class just finished refit or something.  So Riker commanded the Luna class Titan,  It was destroyed or retired and then he briefly commanded this Titan…maybe only for the shakedown cruise…before stepping down. Possibly due to his child’s illness. 🤷🏻‍♂️ This would explain why his music is in the computer and why he has an affinity for the ship.
 

I too would’ve preferred either a different name all together or at least a different registry for this new Titan. There are plenty of legacy names that are continued in Star Fleet that use new registries. The carryover registry should only be for VERY special ships like the Enterprise, but these new show runners seem to be going nuts with every name that has come before must now be continued with an A,B,C etc. Honestly, I kind of wish it was only the Enterprise that had that honor but it is a big fleet so 🤷🏻‍♂️
 

Chris

I believe it was said that the computer systems and a few other things of Riker’s Titan was placed into the new Titan.

[Dobber]

19 minutes ago, Hikuro said:

I believe it was said that the computer systems and a few other things of Riker’s Titan was placed into the new Titan.

Was that stated officially? I know the guys at Trek Yards said that but they also believe this is the same ship refitted so as much as I like their channel they lost me on that one. Lol

Chris

[Seto Kaiba]

8 hours ago, Dobber said:

I believe this is a new ship and not the Luna class refitted into something new. Maybe the whole Neo constitution class just finished refit or something.  So Riker commanded the Luna class Titan,  It was destroyed or retired and then he briefly commanded this Titan…maybe only for the shakedown cruise…before stepping down. Possibly due to his child’s illness. 🤷🏻‍♂️ This would explain why his music is in the computer and why he has an affinity for the ship.

That would make more sense.

Not much more... but enough to not be an especially glaring bit of bad writing.

 

45 minutes ago, Hikuro said:

I believe it was said that the computer systems and a few other things of Riker’s Titan was placed into the new Titan.

That doesn't really make sense to me in practical terms.

Putting aside basic practical aspects like the sheer size of starship computer cores and the fact that you'd essentially HAVE to disassemble the ship to get to them... if a starship is so badly damaged that it's judged to be beyond repair, why bother attempting to salvage parts from it?  It'd be one thing if they were salvaging parts and materials that couldn't be replicated for use on other ships of the same class, but isolinear circuitry can be (and is) produced via replicator.  Come to that, why reuse battle-damaged 20+ year old computer systems for a brand new ship with a completely different design?  Surely technology has advanced in that time and installing computers designed for that class of ship would be much less problematic than adapting ones from another class entirely.

(There's also the more practical question of how the computer cores survived whatever cripplied the Titan intact enough to use... the engineering computer core is usually placed between the warp core and navigational deflector, and the primary core or cores are typically either in the core of the saucer or towards the rear of it near the photon torpedo magazine.)

[pengbuzz]

Frankly, they really need to call this the Neo-Constipation class; it's totally full of crap.

[sh9000]

 

 

[Dobber]

9 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

That would make more sense.

Not much more... but enough to not be an especially glaring bit of bad writing.

 

That doesn't really make sense to me in practical terms.

Putting aside basic practical aspects like the sheer size of starship computer cores and the fact that you'd essentially HAVE to disassemble the ship to get to them... if a starship is so badly damaged that it's judged to be beyond repair, why bother attempting to salvage parts from it?  It'd be one thing if they were salvaging parts and materials that couldn't be replicated for use on other ships of the same class, but isolinear circuitry can be (and is) produced via replicator.  Come to that, why reuse battle-damaged 20+ year old computer systems for a brand new ship with a completely different design?  Surely technology has advanced in that time and installing computers designed for that class of ship would be much less problematic than adapting ones from another class entirely.

(There's also the more practical question of how the computer cores survived whatever cripplied the Titan intact enough to use... the engineering computer core is usually placed between the warp core and navigational deflector, and the primary core or cores are typically either in the core of the saucer or towards the rear of it near the photon torpedo magazine.)

Agree with all this, however I will say that the Luna class Titan may not have been destroyed or damaged beyond repair. It is not unheard of in real world navies for even brand new warships to be mothballed after a relatively short career,  looking at you Zumwalt class frigates, much less a modest career of some 20+ years. Again, I agree with you, just being objective and “trying” to make sense of the info we’ve been given.🤷🏻‍♂️

My personal main gripe is the registry number with the -A. Too many ships are now having legacy registries. It reminds me of an interview I heard with Matt Greoning (the creator of the Simpson) he once gave guidelines for his writers and animators to just remember to not “out-Simpson the Simpson” That’s why no other characters have the same style of hair and such. Trek is now CONSTANTLY out Kirking and Enterprising the TOS crew and ship making them much less special when they are supposed to be the gold standard for Starfleet. 

Chris

Edited March 1, 2023 by Dobber

[sh9000]

 

[pengbuzz]

Starting to feel sorry for Shaw there...

[Seto Kaiba]

15 hours ago, Dobber said:

Agree with all this, however I will say that the Luna class Titan may not have been destroyed or damaged beyond repair. It is not unheard of in real world navies for even brand new warships to be mothballed after a relatively short career,  looking at you Zumwalt class frigates, much less a modest career of some 20+ years.

This is a fair point, and one I hadn't properly considered.

 

15 hours ago, Dobber said:

My personal main gripe is the registry number with the -A. Too many ships are now having legacy registries. It reminds me of an interview I heard with Matt Greoning (the creator of the Simpson) he once gave guidelines for his writers and animators to just remember to not “out-Simpson the Simpson” That’s why no other characters have the same style of hair and such. Trek is now CONSTANTLY out Kirking and Enterprising the TOS crew and ship making them much less special when they are supposed to be the gold standard for Starfleet. 

IMO, the only one that's really inexcusable is the Titan-A.

Kathryn Janeway's Intrepid-class USS Voyager was a ship so ridiculously out of its depth that the fact that it made it back at all is flat amazing, never mind with most of its crew, the majority of the Maquis crew they went chasing at the start of their misadventure, a Borg kill count that dwarfs every other Starfleet ship's record combined, the destruction of most if not all of the Borg transwarp network, and the head of the Borg queen to boot.*  She EARNED that letter.  It's not unfair to assume that, by the 32nd century, Starfleet would've had so many ships that a couple dozen displayed such uncommon valor that they were rewarded with their registry numbers not being retired.  Even the Discovery's letter makes a moderate amount of sense, since Starfleet effectively broke the Discovery down to the spaceframe and rebuilt her with modern technology and needed to cover up the fact that the ship and its crew were illegal time travelers.  

The Titan-A doesn't really make sense, since we know what the previous USS Titan was up to and the bits we've seen haven't exactly been remarkable.  They don't reward ships which went to the breakers due to obsolescence or battle damage with continuation of their registry... not even if the captain doesn't want to bother remembering a new registry.  It REALLY doesn't make sense given that the series keeps acting like the Titan-A and Titan are somehow the same ship.

 

* Prior to Picard retconning the network and Borg collective back into existence because why not?

[sh9000]

 

[Rhubarbarian]

I have to admit I enjoyed the first two episodes of season 3 as dumb cast reunion material. My partner and I finished S1 but stopped S2 after the first couple eps, and after those two seasons even the schlocky S3 was comparatively pretty decent (or at least, the A plot was; not even Worf could salvage the B plot with Raffi). Crusher was also my favorite from TNG, so it was nice seeing her on-screen again.

Episode three was so bad, though. I went in with basement level expectations and Picard still found a way under them. The gravity portal gun probably would have made for a great stupid episode of Lower Decks, because it made me laugh out loud every time it got used.

[pengbuzz]

1 hour ago, Rhubarbarian said:

I have to admit I enjoyed the first two episodes of season 3 as dumb cast reunion material. My partner and I finished S1 but stopped S2 after the first couple eps, and after those two seasons even the schlocky S3 was comparatively pretty decent (or at least, the A plot was; not even Worf could salvage the B plot with Raffi). Crusher was also my favorite from TNG, so it was nice seeing her on-screen again.

Episode three was so bad, though. I went in with basement level expectations and Picard still found a way under them. The gravity portal gun probably would have made for a great stupid episode of Lower Decks, because it made me laugh out loud every time it got used.

Yeah; they may as well have gone with the "Super-Duper-I-Win-You-Lose-HaHaHaHaHa-Gun" for that episode.

[sh9000]

 

 

[Seto Kaiba]

It'll be interesting to see if the writing in Discovery's newly-announced-to-be-final 5th season will be as dreadful as this obviously phoned-in mess.

I'm sure it sounded better in the writers heads, but having Will Riker tell Picard...

Spoiler

... that he hopes he'll get to experience fatherhood some day...

... is insensitive to the point of bordering on cruelty.  Jean-Luc Picard is not just chronically single and unlucky at love, he's the last living member of his family.  It's even harsher in the episode's in-story hindsight, since the real Jean-Luc Picard died back in season one...

Spoiler

... without ever learning he had a son...

... and the character we have now is an android programmed to believe it's Jean-Luc Picard running around creeping everyone out.

 

Beverly Crusher's... motivation... makes little to no sense in context or out.

Spoiler

OK, so she broke up with Picard.  Fine.  Their relationship was so dysfunctional that that's not particularly surprising.  But she got pregnant, and then decided that the smartest thing to do was to... *checks notes* ...resign her commission, run off into the lawless hinterlands of space, and raise the child alone without ever once bothering to inform Jean-Luc that he had a child, and then spent twenty-plus years worrying that her child would be assassinated?  

This whole premise is WTF from start to finish.

Jean-Luc Picard did NOT have that many enemies in or after Star Trek: the Next Generation.  TNG was too episodic for Picard to have a recurring antagonist besides maybe Q.  He was a master diplomat, not someone with a ton of enemies.  Moreover, who was out there nursing a grudge intense enough to want to murder someone who may be his son but not so intense that they would take a swing at the man himself?  Jean-Luc Picard spent most of the intervening time as a civilian practically living alone at his family's vineyard in La Barre and he seems to have dealt with exactly ZERO assassination attempts in that time.  Clearly Beverly will never make it in Starfleet security, if her idea of a safe life was living on the run in a rickety starship in lawless space instead of on one of the most secure worlds in the Federation protected by her status as a celebrated and highly placed Starfleet officer.  She made the dumbest decision possible in her situation.

 

 

The way the Titan-A gets its arse handed to it at the end of the episode is just embarrassing.  That is some yakity sax-level dumb.  

[Rhubarbarian]

59 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

The way the Titan-A gets its arse handed to it at the end of the episode is just embarrassing.  That is some yakity sax-level dumb.  

It was so, so stupid. The starship equivalent of "stop hitting yourself!"

[Thom]

5 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

 

The way the Titan-A gets its arse handed to it at the end of the episode is just embarrassing.  That is some yakity sax-level dumb.  

Yeah, I don't get that either. Yes, knowing after the fact about the portal device robs Titan of much of it's offensive punch, but even before then they were all acting as though the ship was made of glass. Titan is well armed, with phaser strips and blisters on the saucer and torpedo launchers, and though the Shrike may be packed with weapons, the biggest weakness of Titan's crew is that they were so easily cowed. The Shrike can't fire all those weapons at once and, in fact, having all those weapons on board could make the Shrike a powder keg just waiting for the right spark, but they don't even try.

I put that hesitance to act off on Shaw, and was expecting more when Riker took command, but even he decided not to use the ship to its full potential. Not until it had already been badly damaged did he decide to follow Picard's urging and attack. And it might even had worked if not for the portal device. Which, I think is really cool! In theory, the Shrike doesn't actually need any offensive weapons at all as long as it has the portal device, not if any weapon fired at it can be redirected right back at its launcher.

Something also important to note, Riker is captain, not Picard, so the responsibility is his when he takes an action. Blaming Picard at the end was actually pretty petty, especially when you are left with no other choice but to attack. 

[JB0]

9 hours ago, Thom said:

In theory, the Shrike doesn't actually need any offensive weapons at all as long as it has the portal device, not if any weapon fired at it can be redirected right back at its launcher.

Oh, that's BRUTAL with phaser fire.

They're supposed to be matched to the frequency of the shields so starships can fire out through their shields.  If you can send them back by thinking with portals, it'll be landing on an effectively unshielded vessel.

...

Assuming that's canon this week, of course.

[Dobber]

Some good in this episode, but overall my least favorite of the 3 shown so far. A lot of head scratching logic that has already been stated. My biggest dislike and strangely also like was the Picard/Beverly confrontation. Dislike because, F*** Beverly, that was an atrocious thing to do, with the most asinine logic (as @Seto Kaiba pointed out above). No apologies, no shame…she is officially my least favorite character now even surpassing Picard after being ruined by Sir Patrick in his first 2 seasons 🤦 But I also strangely liked the scene, because Picard actually stood up to her instead of rolling over and understanding because…woman.  He had a backbone. 
 

Chris

Edited March 4, 2023 by Dobber

[Thom]

3 hours ago, JB0 said:

Oh, that's BRUTAL with phaser fire.

They're supposed to be matched to the frequency of the shields so starships can fire out through their shields.  If you can send them back by thinking with portals, it'll be landing on an effectively unshielded vessel.

...

Assuming that's canon this week, of course.

Hadn't even thought that, but you are right. Although I think the same would apply to torpedoes, seeing as they too have to pass through the shields, and I am pretty sure I saw them impacting Titan's shields when they were redirected. Oh the conundrums! 

I think the writers of these shows should visit some forums and go through thread histories, at least once.

3 hours ago, Dobber said:

Some good in this episode, but overall my least favorite of the 3 shown so far. A lot of head scratching logic that has already been stated. My biggest dislike and strangely also like was the Picard/Beverly confrontation. Dislike because, F*** Beverly, that was an atrocious thing to do, with the most asinine logic (as @Seto Kaiba pointed out above). No apologies, no shame…she is officially my least favorite character now even surpassing Picard after being ruined by Sir Patrick in his first 2 seasons 🤦 But I also strangely liked the scene, because Picard actually stood up to her instead of rolling over and understanding because…woman.  He had a backbone. 
 

Chris

I can see Beverly's perspective in this. Yes, Picard was able to retire and live a peaceful life afterward, but at the time things sounded extremely dangerous, and I wouldn't fault any pregnant woman for wanting to protect her child. As has happened, she has lost both her husband and first son to Starfleet and exploring. So I can understand that.

What I would fault was never telling him after the first year or so. Fine, she told Jack who and where he was, but she must have left a lot out if Jack decided never to see him on his own. In that, Picard is correct, he should have had the choice himself.

All in all, I prefer Captain Beverly Picard of the USS Pasteur over this version.

 

 

 

 

Edited March 4, 2023 by Thom

[sh9000]

 

[Roy Focker]

9 hours ago, Dobber said:

Some good in this episode, but overall my least favorite of the 3 shown so far. A lot of head scratching logic that has already been stated. My biggest dislike and strangely also like was the Picard/Beverly confrontation. Dislike because, F*** Beverly, that was an atrocious thing to do, with the most asinine logic (as @Seto Kaiba pointed out above). No apologies, no shame…she is officially my least favorite character now even surpassing Picard after being ruined by Sir Patrick in his first 2 seasons 🤦 But I also strangely liked the scene, because Picard actually stood up to her instead of rolling over and understanding because…woman.  He had a backbone. 
 

Chris

I agree. His life was filled with too much danger and excitement for her to deal with. I guess I can understand that logic. She did lose her first husband and life on the Enterprise D was pretty dangerous for her and Wesley. Maybe she didn't want put another son through that. What life did she end up choosing for them? Why a life danger and excitement acting as renegade medical doctors.

Don't understand why decided to make Jack only around 20 years old. The actor is 34 years old. Maybe he could pass for 25 but nope doesn't look 20. Did you know 34 years ago is pretty close to the time of STNG second season. The season where Beverly wasn't on the show. Jack's birth year being the second season would have made perfect sense.

[Dobber]

Yup, that’s why her “reasoning” isn’t very logical. Then Jack being seemingly mad at Picard for not being there….blame your mother for that.

Chris

[Thom]

9 hours ago, sh9000 said:

 

Very interesting. I love the design of the Titan, but they talk about bringing the Luna class forward to this, and it's just not there. They are two entirely different ships.

But that;s been discussed. What wasn't and is glaring, is no mention of Bill Krause.

Bill Krause AKA Admiral Buck, created the Shangi-La, a TMP version of a Connie-variant.

According to him, he was then approached by STP in order to update the design and use as the hero ship.

Yet no mention is made on this clip? Interesting.

[Seto Kaiba]

3 hours ago, Roy Focker said:

I agree. His life was filled with too much danger and excitement for her to deal with. I guess I can understand that logic. She did lose her first husband and life on the Enterprise D was pretty dangerous for her and Wesley. Maybe she didn't want put another son through that.

Not wanting to raise a child aboard a flying disaster magnet like the USS Enterprise is one-hundred percent reasonable in and of itself.

Beverly Crusher's reasoning, however, is even more completely insane than it appears at first glance.  

First... how did Beverly get pregnant?  Contraceptives exist in Star Trek and as of Deep Space Nine contraceptive injections administered to men seem to be the norm.  Kassidy Yates got pregnant by her boyfriend Benjamin Sisko because he forgot to get his scheduled injection from Dr. Bashir despite repeated reminders.  Captain Jean-Luc Picard's physician at the time was none other than Dr. Beverly Crusher.  He would've been going to HER for contraceptive injections while in a relationship with her.  Given that the two broke up while taking leave together on Casperia Prime, it's unlikely that they were planning to start a family together.  That means Beverly either got pregnant as a result of her own professional negligence... or through deception.  Neither of those is a great look.

Second... she decided to keep the pregnancy secret from the father.  While there's typically no legal obligation to inform the father of the child, it's still kind of a scummy move on Beverly's part.  It raises some awkward ethical questions especially given the above-mentioned problems WRT contraception.

Third... while remaining aboard the Enterprise and trying to raise a child there would not be a healthy environment, neither she nor Jean-Luc Picard remained on the Enterprise for more than a few months after Jack's conception.  Jean-Luc Picard took a promotion to Admiral that came with a shore posting to Starfleet Command on Earth.  Beverly Crusher's options were by no means limited.  She had almost two decades as CMO of the Federation flagship and could easily have arranged a shore posting for herself almost anywhere, including Starfleet Medical's headquarters in San Francisco.  There's not really anywhere more secure than Earth, and in the very shadow of Starfleet Headquarters no less.  That she'd had her son educated on Earth for an unspecified span of time and then took off into lawless regions of space on a secondhand decommissioned medical support ship in search of "safety" is gun-eating madness.

Fourth... for someone supposedly so concerned with her son's well-being, she's done a stellar job of raising him.  His criminal record makes Quark look like a rank amateur.  He's wanted under at least four separate aliases throughout Federation and non-Federation space... and not for little stuff either.  If you zoom in on his rap sheet as it comes up, he's wanted on Archer IV for possession of unregistered weapons, on Bajor for possession of unregistered liquors, on Minas V for fraud, and distribution or possession with intent to distribute of illegal firearms and/or controlled substances on planets as diverse as Risa, Betazed, and Cardassia Prime.  And that's just the highlights!  There are at least two more aliases we don't get to see rap sheets for!  Her little Jack, who she was so desperate to protect from everything, is a massive piece of **** who runs guns, sells drugs and bootleg liquor, and defrauds people.  While Jack seems to resent the absence of his father, his behavior and sheer list of outstanding warrants suggests that his mother was probably just as absent from his life as Jean-Luc was.  

 

 

3 hours ago, Roy Focker said:

Don't understand why decided to make Jack only around 20 years old. The actor is 34 years old. Maybe he could pass for 25 but nope doesn't look 20. Did you know 34 years ago is pretty close to the time of STNG second season. The season where Beverly wasn't on the show. Jack's birth year being the second season would have made perfect sense.

Jack's conception and birth is dodgy enough as it is.  

Making him thirty-four and having Beverly conceal his existence from both his half-brother Wesley AND his father Jean-Luc for five years aboard the Enterprise-D and then another decade or so aboard the Enterprise-E would be even more monstrous than what she's already done and make her a consciously absentee parent when they're busy guilt-tripping Jean-Luc for unknowingly being one.

[JB0]

4 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

His criminal record makes Quark look like a rank amateur. 

Quark resents that. Amateurs have criminal records, professionals don't get caught.

[pengbuzz]

5 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Not wanting to raise a child aboard a flying disaster magnet like the USS Enterprise is one-hundred percent reasonable in and of itself.

Beverly Crusher's reasoning, however, is even more completely insane than it appears at first glance.  

First... how did Beverly get pregnant?  Contraceptives exist in Star Trek and as of Deep Space Nine contraceptive injections administered to men seem to be the norm.  Kassidy Yates got pregnant by her boyfriend Benjamin Sisko because he forgot to get his scheduled injection from Dr. Bashir despite repeated reminders.  Captain Jean-Luc Picard's physician at the time was none other than Dr. Beverly Crusher.  He would've been going to HER for contraceptive injections while in a relationship with her.  Given that the two broke up while taking leave together on Casperia Prime, it's unlikely that they were planning to start a family together.  That means Beverly either got pregnant as a result of her own professional negligence... or through deception.  Neither of those is a great look.

Second... she decided to keep the pregnancy secret from the father.  While there's typically no legal obligation to inform the father of the child, it's still kind of a scummy move on Beverly's part.  It raises some awkward ethical questions especially given the above-mentioned problems WRT contraception.

Third... while remaining aboard the Enterprise and trying to raise a child there would not be a healthy environment, neither she nor Jean-Luc Picard remained on the Enterprise for more than a few months after Jack's conception.  Jean-Luc Picard took a promotion to Admiral that came with a shore posting to Starfleet Command on Earth.  Beverly Crusher's options were by no means limited.  She had almost two decades as CMO of the Federation flagship and could easily have arranged a shore posting for herself almost anywhere, including Starfleet Medical's headquarters in San Francisco.  There's not really anywhere more secure than Earth, and in the very shadow of Starfleet Headquarters no less.  That she'd had her son educated on Earth for an unspecified span of time and then took off into lawless regions of space on a secondhand decommissioned medical support ship in search of "safety" is gun-eating madness.

Fourth... for someone supposedly so concerned with her son's well-being, she's done a stellar job of raising him.  His criminal record makes Quark look like a rank amateur.  He's wanted under at least four separate aliases throughout Federation and non-Federation space... and not for little stuff either.  If you zoom in on his rap sheet as it comes up, he's wanted on Archer IV for possession of unregistered weapons, on Bajor for possession of unregistered liquors, on Minas V for fraud, and distribution or possession with intent to distribute of illegal firearms and/or controlled substances on planets as diverse as Risa, Betazed, and Cardassia Prime.  And that's just the highlights!  There are at least two more aliases we don't get to see rap sheets for!  Her little Jack, who she was so desperate to protect from everything, is a massive piece of **** who runs guns, sells drugs and bootleg liquor, and defrauds people.  While Jack seems to resent the absence of his father, his behavior and sheer list of outstanding warrants suggests that his mother was probably just as absent from his life as Jean-Luc was.  

 

 

Jack's conception and birth is dodgy enough as it is.  

Making him thirty-four and having Beverly conceal his existence from both his half-brother Wesley AND his father Jean-Luc for five years aboard the Enterprise-D and then another decade or so aboard the Enterprise-E would be even more monstrous than what she's already done and make her a consciously absentee parent when they're busy guilt-tripping Jean-Luc for unknowingly being one.

So basically, they've now done the same thing to poor Dr. Crusher that they did to Picard and the rest of the gang: turned them into repugnant doppelgangers who are shattered shadows of their former selves.

If the TNG crew ever saw what became of them in the Picard era, I'm sure they'd consider collectively agreeing to detonate the ship!

[Dynaman]

It's Star Trek, Tech Today, gone tomorrow (for the contraceptives).  Or as JMS would say "Tech exists at the level of plot".

[Thom]

I don't mind these characters having human failings, as that is what they are after all. It's just that the writers are doing it very bluntly and ham-fisted (may mean the same thing...) I look back on the episode 'Inner Light' where Picard lived that entire life on that dying planet. Coming back from that would leave anyone devastated and traumatized, but the writers at the time treated it very poignantly and intelligently. 

The choice to do it this way on STP leaves a sour taste where Beverly is concerned, which is not handling the character very well at all. That's why I really wish Jack Crusher was just a clone of her dead husband, leaving Picard with the more noble option of defending a friend and her 'son,' even though he is no blood relation to Picard.

And reading up on the episode, this left Picard with a strong desire to have kids, which makes one wonder why they didn't carry this over? Should have given him a big family.

 

Edited March 5, 2023 by Thom

[kalvasflam]

16 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

First... how did Beverly get pregnant? 

 

transporter

[Seto Kaiba]

11 hours ago, JB0 said:

Quark resents that. Amateurs have criminal records, professionals don't get caught.

Quark gets caught all the time, and has a rather extensive criminal record.

His saving grace throughout Deep Space Nine was that, on most of the occasions where his criminal ambitions exceeded relatively petty crimes, his co-conspirators either died (e.g. Rao Vantika), did something that allowed him to claim he was a victim rather than a co-conspirator (e.g. Pallra and Verad), or he was conveniently shielded from prosecution by the connections his business partners had to the Bajoran government (e.g. Hagath and Gaila).  A few other times mentioned in the series, he only avoided prison himself by turning on his partners as the state's witness for the prosecution (e.g. Fallit Kot).  Apart from his brief stint as an arms dealer, Quark's crimes tended to be relatively innocuous stuff like buying and selling stolen goods and the occasional bit of smuggling.

Jack Crusher, on the other hand, seems to be a rather more hardened and callous criminal than Quark if the list of criminal charges filed against him is to be believed.  He's wanted for transporting and selling illegal weapons, controlled/banned substances, and bootleg liquor.  It's weirdly indicative of what an arsehole he must be that he's managed to end up as a wanted criminal on Bajor and Cardassia Prime.  Like, those two planets don't agree on much but they both agree that Jack Crusher belongs behind bars.  Unless there's been a major overhaul of the justice system on Cardassia, he'd better hope the Bajorans catch him first or he's going to have a VERY bad time.  One must wonder what other worlds Jack's wanted on... Nausicaa?  Qo'nos?  Edo?  Probably not Ferenginar, at least... his antics are practically boys-will-be-boys stuff there.  Maybe we'll find out he's wanted by the Dominion too.  Y'know, collect the complete set of galactic powers with inhumane prison systems.

 

10 hours ago, pengbuzz said:

So basically, they've now done the same thing to poor Dr. Crusher that they did to Picard and the rest of the gang: turned them into repugnant doppelgangers who are shattered shadows of their former selves.

If the TNG crew ever saw what became of them in the Picard era, I'm sure they'd consider collectively agreeing to detonate the ship!

Yeah... though admittedly Dr. Crusher's grasp of medical ethics was always more than a little questionable throughout Star Trek: the Next Generation.  

So much so that it got lampooned in Lower Decks episode "I, Excretus" with one of Tendi's simulations titled "Medical Ethics".

 

5 hours ago, Dynaman said:

It's Star Trek, Tech Today, gone tomorrow (for the contraceptives).  Or as JMS would say "Tech exists at the level of plot".

True, but if the audience's memory is better than the writer's it becomes a plot hole... one with significant Unfortunate Implications.

 

3 hours ago, Thom said:

I don't mind these characters having human failings, as that is what they are after all. It's just that the writers are doing it very bluntly and ham-fisted (may mean the same thing...) I look back on the episode 'Inner Light' where Picard lived that entire life on that dying planet. Coming back from that would leave anyone devastated and traumatized, but the writers at the time treated it very poignantly and intelligently. 

The choice to do it this way on STP leaves a sour taste where Beverly is concerned, which is not handling the character very well at all. That's why I really wish Jack Crusher was just a clone of her dead husband, leaving Picard with the more noble option of defending a friend and her 'son,' even though he is no blood relation to Picard.

And reading up on the episode, this left Picard with a strong desire to have kids, which makes one wonder why they didn't carry this over? Should have given him a big family.

Having human failings is fine... but what the writers have done here is just make everyone 100% miserable all the time.  Nobody is allowed to be happy.  Ever.  Because the writers think Misery = Drama.  

So, of course, Jean-Luc Picard is a whiny, manipulative old man who's spent over a decade sulking over something that wasn't his fault because It's All About Me, Riker and Troi are burnouts who went to live in the space boonies rather than seek treatment for depression (despite one of them being a therapist), Data's so disgusted with it all that he opted to stay dead, Beverly's been living off the grid for decades in some sort of bid to be Galaxy's Worst Single Mom, Worf has already been through so much that I'm kind of afraid to find out what they've done to him since then.  Did Geordi just... win at life compared to everyone else by having an apparently not-dysfunctional family and healthy career?

[pengbuzz]

16 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Jack Crusher, on the other hand, seems to be a rather more hardened and callous criminal than Quark if the list of criminal charges filed against him is to be believed.  He's wanted for transporting and selling illegal weapons, controlled/banned substances, and bootleg liquor.  It's weirdly indicative of what an arsehole he must be that he's managed to end up as a wanted criminal on Bajor and Cardassia Prime.  Like, those two planets don't agree on much but they both agree that Jack Crusher belongs behind bars.  Unless there's been a major overhaul of the justice system on Cardassia, he'd better hope the Bajorans catch him first or he's going to have a VERY bad time.  One must wonder what other worlds Jack's wanted on... Nausicaa?  Qo'nos?  Edo?  Probably not Ferenginar, at least... his antics are practically boys-will-be-boys stuff there.  Maybe we'll find out he's wanted by the Dominion too.  Y'know, collect the complete set of galactic powers with inhumane prison systems.

Makes me wonder if the rest of the Q will show up to complain about his crimes against them?

"How many times have I told you...DON'T PROVOKE THE BORG??!!"

*I STILL  crack up over that line from Voyager!!!*

 

16 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Yeah... though admittedly Dr. Crusher's grasp of medical ethics was always more than a little questionable throughout Star Trek: the Next Generation.  

So much so that it got lampooned in Lower Decks episode "I, Excretus" with one of Tendi's simulations titled "Medical Ethics".

And yet, she had the nerve to call someone else out on their medical ethics in the episode "Ethics" S5 E16 (Ironic, huh?)

 

16 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Having human failings is fine... but what the writers have done here is just make everyone 100% miserable all the time.  Nobody is allowed to be happy.  Ever.  Because the writers think Misery = Drama.  

So, of course, Jean-Luc Picard is a whiny, manipulative old man who's spent over a decade sulking over something that wasn't his fault because It's All About Me, Riker and Troi are burnouts who went to live in the space boonies rather than seek treatment for depression (despite one of them being a therapist), Data's so disgusted with it all that he opted to stay dead, Beverly's been living off the grid for decades in some sort of bid to be Galaxy's Worst Single Mom, Worf has already been through so much that I'm kind of afraid to find out what they've done to him since then.  Did Geordi just... win at life compared to everyone else by having an apparently not-dysfunctional family and healthy career?

And warning his daughter about Picard and company?

Not to mention Wesley winning in the end by practically becoming a Q and traveling the galaxy without Picard and his mopey bunch?

That would be funny come to think of it: Picard starts whining about something, and Wesley pops in to say:

"SHUT UP JEAN-LUC!!!"

Edited March 5, 2023 by pengbuzz

[JB0]

45 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Quark gets caught all the time, and has a rather extensive criminal record.

Yeah, well... Quark always did think he was much hotter crap than he actually was.

[Seto Kaiba]

34 minutes ago, pengbuzz said:

Makes me wonder if the rest of the Q will show up to complain about his crimes against them?

"How many times have I told you...DON'T PROVOKE THE BORG??!!"

*I STILL  crack up over that line from Voyager!!!*

That was a beautiful line... made all the better by John de Lancie's Q being the one to deliver it.  

 

34 minutes ago, pengbuzz said:

And yet, she had the nerve to call someone else out on their medical ethics in the episode "Ethics" S5 E16 (Ironic, huh?)

That's the very episode that Lower Decks was spoofing with the "Medical Ethics" simulation:

If Lower Decks is canon - and in this case I dearly hope it is because this is hilarious - Dr. Beverly Crusher's lack of professionalism is apparently so widely known that one of her very worst lapses of medical ethics is the basis for a standard Starfleet training simulation.  Even funnier, this particular ethics test was apparently so appallingly easy for trained Starfleet medical personnel that the drill administrator had to scrape the absolute bottom of the barrel (the crew of the USS Cerritos) AND tweak the difficulty level to find someone capable of actually failing it.

Finding someone who could do as bad a job of respecting a patient's culture and wishes as Beverly Crusher required not only finding Starfleet's worst of the worst... but cheating too.

 

34 minutes ago, pengbuzz said:

That would be funny come to think of it: Picard starts whining about something, and Wesley pops in to say:

"SHUT UP JEAN-LUC!!!"

... I want this for the final episode of this series.

 

5 minutes ago, JB0 said:

Yeah, well... Quark always did think he was much hotter crap than he actually was.

So does Jack Crusher, apparently... 

All in all, I'm tempted to call BS on Beverly's claim that she's out in the middle of ****ing nowhere on a decommissioned old medical courier ship she got from Starfleet Medical on the sly for fear of her son being assassinated by people who hate Jean-Luc.  Somehow, knowing about Jack's criminal background, it strikes me as rather likely that she and he keep to remote regions of space because they know if they landed in any major port they'd be arrested and extradited to any one of more than a dozen planets with outstanding arrest warrants for her son and she'd likely face criminal charges herself as an accomplice to his crimes or at least an accessory to his resisting arrest.  

If it weren't for the currently-vague hints of a conspiracy to destroy the Federation that can somehow only be foiled by a bunch of senior citizens so out of shape that they need to worry about reduced bladder capacity (yes, this is actually in the show), this would read like an episode of Cops or maybe Dog: the Bounty Hunter.

Maybe Vadic really isn't involved in the conspiracy at all.  Maybe this really is just her, as a top flight bounty hunter, attempting to collect on Star Trek's second attempt to get a Han Solo from Wish.com.  

[Thom]

2 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Having human failings is fine... but what the writers have done here is just make everyone 100% miserable all the time.  Nobody is allowed to be happy.  Ever.  Because the writers think Misery = Drama.  

So, of course, Jean-Luc Picard is a whiny, manipulative old man who's spent over a decade sulking over something that wasn't his fault because It's All About Me, Riker and Troi are burnouts who went to live in the space boonies rather than seek treatment for depression (despite one of them being a therapist), Data's so disgusted with it all that he opted to stay dead, Beverly's been living off the grid for decades in some sort of bid to be Galaxy's Worst Single Mom, Worf has already been through so much that I'm kind of afraid to find out what they've done to him since then.  Did Geordi just... win at life compared to everyone else by having an apparently not-dysfunctional family and healthy career?

Well, I've already said I don't think all of them are miserable. Just two, Seven and Raffi. At the beginning, Picard is in no way near miserable. He's bored. He's yearning for a new adventure, which is one of the reasons he's going with Laris. Bored, not miserable. Riker and Troi are clearly having some problems, but he does not look or act miserable, maybe a bit stressed and looking for a distraction. Better to go with Picard than risk a trip to Risa. And it seems they've come to grips, as much as any parent can, with the loss of a child that happened over a decade go. Neither one seems to depressed, as seen in the first season, where in fact they looked quite happy and content. And Worf isn't miserable at all. He's full into the Zen-thing.

As for Jack Crusher, yes he's a criminal, but as we saw in that flashback the trading of illegal booze was to get medical supplies to a beleaguered world. I would go along that thread to say that all the other charges were also to further that ultimate goal. He does what he has to for a bigger purpose, even if that upsets what constitutes local law enforcement. I'd hazard a theory, that a lot of the pressure to arrest him may be from people he's made enemies of while doing that as, again in the flashback, those people on the planet were being allowed to die off in order to open up a claim for that world. People who do that won't like it when their nefarious plans are thwarted, so he's made enemies. Hence the price on his head and Varis hunting him for it. He actually comes off more as a Robin Hood-type figure, instead trading booze and guns for medical supplies.

48 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

...

All in all, I'm tempted to call BS on Beverly's claim that she's out in the middle of ****ing nowhere on a decommissioned old medical courier ship she got from Starfleet Medical on the sly for fear of her son being assassinated by people who hate Jean-Luc.  Somehow, knowing about Jack's criminal background, it strikes me as rather likely that she and he keep to remote regions of space because they know if they landed in any major port they'd be arrested and extradited to any one of more than a dozen planets with outstanding arrest warrants for her son and she'd likely face criminal charges herself as an accomplice to his crimes or at least an accessory to his resisting arrest.  

If it weren't for the currently-vague hints of a conspiracy to destroy the Federation that can somehow only be foiled by a bunch of senior citizens so out of shape that they need to worry about reduced bladder capacity (yes, this is actually in the show), this would read like an episode of Cops or maybe Dog: the Bounty Hunter.

Maybe Vadic really isn't involved in the conspiracy at all.  Maybe this really is just her, as a top flight bounty hunter, attempting to collect on Star Trek's second attempt to get a Han Solo from Wish.com.  

We know from what she said herself, that when he was younger they were on Earth for a time. Jack went to school in London. Then I'm just assuming that life happens from there, as Beverly got into more humanitarian missions transporting medicines and that, with the threat of assassinations either not materializing or diminishing, Jack just followed in her footsteps.

That in no way excuses her for never telling Picard about his son, but that's what I've gleaned from what they've shown thus far.

Edited March 5, 2023 by Thom