So now we need to sympathize with the Romulans until the next twist occurs? Hmmm kay. Not impressed.
I didn't feel like I was asked to sympathize with the Romulans at all. If anything, I'm more irked at them now that I know they're to blame for escalating this antagonism. If not for the Romulan instinct to annihilate instead of engage, maybe all organic life wouldn't now be threatened.
I felt like 'Darn, the Romulans were right all the time.' I expected it but I was hoping to be wrong.
Without the Romulans the situaton would not have escalated, yes. But fact is that Sutra is evil. And if she ever had gained knowledge of the 'warning' (forgot the english term someone mentioned here) she probably would have created a situation to call the AIs and start a war.
My hope is that they are that developed to easily stop the Romulans but are peaceful otherwise. This 8 sun thing is ooooold so a lot could have happened since its creation.
If the AIs go nuts on humanoids it would basically be cheap copy and paste from Orville. I really hope it is not.
Wir, die Mirror Tribbles [MiT] haben freie Plätze zu vergeben. Kein Zwang und kein Stress, dafür aber Spaß, Discord und eine nette, hilfsbereite Gemeinschaft, incl. voll ausgebauter Starbase und täglich 700 ISM.
So now we need to sympathize with the Romulans until the next twist occurs? Hmmm kay. Not impressed.
I didn't feel like I was asked to sympathize with the Romulans at all. If anything, I'm more irked at them now that I know they're to blame for escalating this antagonism. If not for the Romulan instinct to annihilate instead of engage, maybe all organic life wouldn't now be threatened.
I felt like 'Darn, the Romulans were right all the time.' I expected it but I was hoping to be wrong.
Without the Romulans the situaton would not have escalated, yes. But fact is that Sutra is evil. And if she ever had gained knowledge of the 'warning' (forgot the english term someone mentioned here) she probably would have created a situation to call the AIs and start a war.
My hope is that they are that developed to easily stop the Romulans but are peaceful otherwise. This 8 sun thing is ooooold so a lot could have happened since its creation.
If the AIs go nuts on humanoids it would basically be cheap copy and paste from Orville. I really hope it is not.
Sutra was ambitious and an ideological hardliner, no doubt. But I don't know that the Romulans were right, given that the whole thing could be averted peaceably instead of through a winner-takes-all war for existence itself. The purpose of the AI promise to the Synthetics (I feel like we should capitalize it at this point since they have their own culture) is to be invoked once they've been threatened. No threat, no AI Armageddon.
As for ripping off The Orville, I'm reasonably confident their story wasn't entirely original or unique in the first place. There are really only so many science-fiction ideas; everything is ultimately just some variation or different take on them. Though if they are to start ripping off that show, I'd very much appreciate them starting with modeling the values of optimistic idealism and diplomacy.
I'll be damned, they did it. They built up to what I consider vintage, old school, right down to the core Star Trek. Act of nobility, set up by an inspiring call to be better than we are, and our biggest strength being that we can be there for each other. Doesn't get any more Star Trek than that. Even the stuff that was obvious (Picard sidestepping death by way of the "golem"; Soji backing out of being The Destroyer; Riker finding the extermination of all organic life a good enough reason to reactivate his Starfleet commission) felt fantastic.
This episode did what Nemesis failed to do, which is make me feel something over Data's death. The movie felt like what it was: A narrative conclusion to a real life business contract, constructed as yet another Wrath of Khan imitator. This time, though, I teared up having to say goodbye to Data. It wasn't just watching him go; it was the entire conversation he and Picard had. That was what was missing in Nemesis. Does feel weird that Picard let Data say for him that he loved him, rather than saying it himself, given that just a week ago he managed to speak the words to Raffi, but sometimes relationship dynamics make that harder than maybe it ought to be.
What I hoped going into this season was that by the end, Picard would help reset the Federation's moral compass, and I'm satisfied that he's done that. I love that scene with Rios and Seven drinking and commiserating. There's potential for a really nice relationship between the two of them; potentially a sibling-like bond (and not in that uncomfortable Romulan sibling way Narissa and Narek seemed to have). They're kindred spirits, and I think it matters that they're all-in on Picard and what he represents. It means something different than, say, Riker and Troi being devoted to him still. Seven and Raffi holding hands seems like kind of a big thing to just throw in like an Easter egg, but it'll be nice after all these years to see Seven in a mature, romantic relationship instead of being the socially awkward prom queen she was on Voyager. I'm stoked about Seven being part of this going forward!
(Is it just me, or did Patrick Stewart look and sound better in this episode than he had in several of the previous ones? Had he been playing up frailty for dramatic purpose, or had the meat of this episode drawn a little bit more out of him?)
I do have some nits to pick, though. The gizmo powered by imagination was a lazy story mechanism and I hope never to see it again and that goes double for anything that makes multiple copies of something that confuses an entire fleet. This ain't Green Lantern. Definitely bugs me that no one even had a reaction to Sutra's duplicity being exposed. No one disputed it, no one had second thoughts, no one got mad at her; nothing from anyone. That was... weird. Guess we're just leaving the xB's with the Synths? Alright, sure. What happened to Narek? (Glad he seemed to live; I really liked him.) And is Starfleet really leting the head of Starfleet Security exposed as a traitor just walk away?
Was it predictable? Yep. And I loved that it trusted itself to be. This story was never going to be resolved by a massive Starfleet v. Romulans v. Synths war. It had to be resolved by ideals and values. That's the story you tell if you build it around Jean-Luc Picard. That's the story I signed up for, and it's the story they gave, and I loved it.
I shouldn't read vague spoilers before watching something. But just so I am prepared, at the end of an incredibly depressing week in the real world. To all intents and purposes - the killing of Icheb/Hugh etc was basically a precursor for killing Picard?
I shouldn't read vague spoilers before watching something. But just so I am prepared, at the end of an incredibly depressing week in the real world. To all intents and purposes - the killing of Icheb/Hugh etc was basically a precursor for killing Picard?
Hugh, yes. Icheb, no. Hugh's death connects directly with the theme of this season being the meaning and value of sacrifice. Hugh is killed while trying to do something to save and help people. And, I think it worth noting, after having to accept watching fellow xB's murdered in retaliation for helping Picard and Soji. He paid an even steeper price than his own death.
Icheb, however, was lazily killed just so Seven would have someone recognizable to avenge.
I figured they had a couple outs with Picard himself. Since memory transfer was already on the table, it wasn't a huge surprise. I actually wondered if they might have gone something simpler like the Androids were capable of correcting the abnormality it possibly use a little Borg tech (given the cube just sitting there). Overall, I was happy with the result too (didn't hurt that they had already mentioned a second season).
I'm curious how hard it was to make the Golum, given they acted like Picard basically had stolen Soong's chance. He didn't exactly seen like he was going to drop dead. The urgency seemed more like he knew the AIs were coming and being in a robot body was just his safety net.
I think Data actually explained the Androids much better at the end. It sounded more like the neurons probably just had his core programming (e.g. Operating System), the rest was salvaged from the B4 copy.
I guess the shutdown of Sutra was a little weird. So the Androids just didn't see it (out of their view...), but no one seemed to want to explain to the rest that Sutra killed another to get what she wanted. This seemed really straight forward, maybe a least a reason to stop and think.
I agree the whole magic repair tool/holoprojector was a cheap out. They could have bypassed it all simply by not wrecking the ship and have Picard try and address the Romulans before Starfleet arrived. Nothing like a nice Picard speech about the value of the artificial life.
Something else that might have been fun would have been to have Data and Picard have some interaction before the end. Soong allowing Picard to talk to Data while he was locked up. Maybe a holo-Data interfaced with the ship helping to pilot. Might have ruined some of the end goodbye, but it is kind of interesting no one mentioned him effectively being alive until the end.
It was a little funny how many Federation ships they got together that quickly too, given historically how small quick fleets tended to be (*cough* Wolf 359 *cough* Sector 001 Borg fight in First Contact).
Overall, I was happy with it. It would be fun to see what trouble Picard and his crew can get into.
"If it wasn't for autocorrect, we wouldn't have Tuvok on a Giraffe."
I figured they had a couple outs with Picard himself. Since memory transfer was already on the table, it wasn't a huge surprise. I actually wondered if they might have gone something simpler like the Androids were capable of correcting the abnormality it possibly use a little Borg tech (given the cube just sitting there). Overall, I was happy with the result too (didn't hurt that they had already mentioned a second season).
I'm curious how hard it was to make the Golum, given they acted like Picard basically had stolen Soong's chance. He didn't exactly seen like he was going to drop dead. The urgency seemed more like he knew the AIs were coming and being in a robot body was just his safety net.
I think Data actually explained the Androids much better at the end. It sounded more like the neurons probably just had his core programming (e.g. Operating System), the rest was salvaged from the B4 copy.
I guess the shutdown of Sutra was a little weird. So the Androids just didn't see it (out of their view...), but no one seemed to want to explain to the rest that Sutra killed another to get what she wanted. This seemed really straight forward, maybe a least a reason to stop and think.
I agree the whole magic repair tool/holoprojector was a cheap out. They could have bypassed it all simply by not wrecking the ship and have Picard try and address the Romulans before Starfleet arrived. Nothing like a nice Picard speech about the value of the artificial life.
Something else that might have been fun would have been to have Data and Picard have some interaction before the end. Soong allowing Picard to talk to Data while he was locked up. Maybe a holo-Data interfaced with the ship helping to pilot. Might have ruined some of the end goodbye, but it is kind of interesting no one mentioned him effectively being alive until the end.
It was a little funny how many Federation ships they got together that quickly too, given historically how small quick fleets tended to be (*cough* Wolf 359 *cough* Sector 001 Borg fight in First Contact).
Overall, I was happy with it. It would be fun to see what trouble Picard and his crew can get into.
"Oh, so you can get together a bunch of ships all of a sudden when you want. Cool, cool." - The Romulans
I had a real Babylon 5 feeling near the end, when the two fleets were facing each other (Anyone else reminded of the Vorlon ships by the orchids btw?), and then the elder beings starting to show up.
Really glad they went another way to solve this, and didn't copy JMS.
I had a real Babylon 5 feeling near the end, when the two fleets were facing each other (Anyone else reminded of the Vorlon ships by the orchids btw?), and then the elder beings starting to show up.
Really glad they went another way to solve this, and didn't copy JMS.
In fairness, there are worse people to steal from.
For my money, there hasn't been a Trek entity that's approached the intensity with which I was engrossed with B5, since the best episodes of TNG.
Could you please continue the petty bickering? I find it most intriguing. ~ Data, ST:TNG "Haven"
Speaking of the Chitauri Leviathan-like doomsday aliens, though — it seemed like at the end, a couple of them slipped through the hole before it closed. But then nothing was said after that, so I thought I must've misinterpreted that bit.
Could you please continue the petty bickering? I find it most intriguing. ~ Data, ST:TNG "Haven"
... I started to think about it some more and I found myself agreeing with the author (who did not very much care for the episode) on several points.
One, the season's "big bads" were pretty easily (and for me, unsatisfyingly) dispatched. I didn't find Commodore Oh interesting at all, but I hoped to see more from Narissa (though I suppose she could have pulled one of her last-minute beamout tricks this time, as well). And as stated in the article, Sutra was unceremoniously taken down by a button on a remote control.
The points about much of the dialogue being overly grandiose and the denouement of the looming threat feeling incredibly rushed were also things I felt myself agreeing with.
Also, are we just forgiving Agnes now for committing a murder? Isn't she going to face charges, despite having "the Romulans made me do it" as her line of defense? For that matter, Seven just committed a murder a few episodes ago, as well — though I'm not entirely sure the rest of the crew knows about that yet.
One other thing that I read in a different article now bothers me, too. Oh had plenty of time to start firing at the planet, but kept giving orders like, "Okay everybody, get READY... but, like, don't fire yet, 'cause we've gotta give the good guys a chance to stop us, but we're gonna do this REALLY soon!" That's just poor writing/directing/editing. The Romulans, being at the point in time they had long been preparing for (for what, hundreds of years? a long time, in any case), would have done everything they could to not let it slip through their fingers, and would not have wasted a second on things like, "Prepare planet annihilation attack plan Alpha," or whatever dumb line that was. Those things would have been made ready during their flight, and the order would've been given to destroy the planet as soon as they verified where they were.
Also, Data's hair was really badly done. But at least he no longer had the pudgy face from the poker dream.
Aside from that, there were some nice touches, and I hope it continues to improve in the upcoming season.
Could you please continue the petty bickering? I find it most intriguing. ~ Data, ST:TNG "Haven"
Most was said by @Data1001. Agnes, Oh and Sutra bothered me the most except from the stupid idea that evil AIs can be stopped by interrupting the call. This was just too dumb.
It all seemed like a cut down finish to a single episode where a double episode would have been appropriate for a proper conclusion to the storylines.
But... Seven is back! So I am still looking forward to season 2.
Wir, die Mirror Tribbles [MiT] haben freie Plätze zu vergeben. Kein Zwang und kein Stress, dafür aber Spaß, Discord und eine nette, hilfsbereite Gemeinschaft, incl. voll ausgebauter Starbase und täglich 700 ISM.
I had a real Babylon 5 feeling near the end, when the two fleets were facing each other (Anyone else reminded of the Vorlon ships by the orchids btw?), and then the elder beings starting to show up.
Really glad they went another way to solve this, and didn't copy JMS.
In fairness, there are worse people to steal from.
For my money, there hasn't been a Trek entity that's approached the intensity with which I was engrossed with B5, since the best episodes of TNG.
Oh, I agree. But the Fantasy solution that worked for B5 would have worked less well for Picard.
Just reactivated my CBS All Access to binge watch Picard. I quite enjoyed it. But personally, I think I would’ve preferred it if they had left Picard to die in peace, and the series end there. It would’ve been a nice way to finish off the characters story arc.
Oh, there are irksome points a-plenty just in "Et in Arcardia Ego, Part 2". My top 5:
Giving Jonathan Frakes a special guest star credit in the beginning undermined the surprise of seeing him with the fleet. Sub-problems: Dude just lets Oh split despite her betrayal of the Federation as head of Starfleet Security? And can't be bothered to stick around and participate in the first contact dialogue with the Synthetics or even just hang around for an hour or so to make sure the Romulans don't come back as soon as their sensors show Starfleet has split? Did he need to get back to take a pizza out of the oven? Lastly, he may be a Starfleet legend, but why was the most advanced starship ever put into service under the command of a reservist? Plus, having him on hand when Picard died would have imbued it with considerably greater heft.
Just where the hell did Narissa come from? Didn't she leave the Artifact to join the Romulan fleet? She clearly wasn't with them when they arrived; she had to have Narek bring her up to speed. Had she just been hiding in the Cube the whole time? What became of Narek? Last we saw, the dude was in the crowd when Sutra and Soji were confronted. Then... Nothing. Dude's just gone without anyone saying anything about the treacherous Romulan disappearing. Seems unlikely he was beamed aboard a Warbird; if he was, I never saw it or heard anything about it.
Speaking of the Cube, did anyone think to leave the xB's with any kind of direction or support? Seven went from being their Queen to joining Picard's La Sirena crew without any remark whatsoever about why she was abandoning the xB's. Didn't Elnor pledge himself to the lost cause of the xB's, and not to Seven?
Seven tells Rios she killed Narissa because it bugged her that she was still alive, but she was also trying to kill Seven at the moment. Seven didn't seek her out, and it was clearly self-defense. I can understand feeling remorse over taking it on herself to be judge, jury, and executioner on Freecloud, but killing Narissa seemed on the level. I would appreciate if she later came clean to Picard about what she did on Freecloud, though.
Alton Inigo Soong exposes Sutra as responsible for killing Saga in front of everyone, and no one says a single word about her confession or him deactivating her with a remote control. (Why would he even be permitted to have such a thing?) Seriously, not a single person says, "Wait, you mean we were gonna bring about the annihilation of all organic life because our fear and anger were stoked by a lie? Maybe we should reconsider this." Or "Wait, did he just turn her off?" Nada. Synths just don't give a damn, apparently.
"I saved your life so you can save ours" is a really strange pitch from Picard. I know this season was written and filmed last year, but quid pro quos have been out of fashion for awhile now. I appreciated the gist of his speech, that we thrive when we work together and have each other's back, but that was a strange way to appeal to Soji's conscience.
Isn't it weird for Picard to have Data point out that mortality defines humanity just before cheating death by being resurrected in a new robo-body? Does that mean Data is more human than Picard now? Is Picard now basically undead?
And lastly, Jurati. I guess "The mind meld made me do it" defense worked so well she got the charges dropped altogether? And everyone on La Sirena is cool with that?
These are an awfully lot of qualms, many of them rather serious narrative problems, and they do undermine what I found a generally gratifying conclusion to this season's story. I still dig it, but I've dropped it in my season rankings to #5 as these have continued to irk me.
No, just freed from his brain disease. He will still die naturally (well, as naturally as possible for a synth) when the time has come.
And yeah, as you said: Many narrative problems for sure with the first season (also that Seven/Raffi out of the blue thing). Also I wonder where the next one will go where basically nearly every plot (apart from questions like where is Narek etc.) has been wrapped up...
I realise a couple of years have passed (many more for Picard due to the events of The Inner Light ) but I'd sure be pissed if I were Ira Graves ghost.
Big Picard speech that episode after Ira uploaded himself into another body...
"Graves, every man has his time. Every man, without exception. But you’ve cheated."
I guess when it comes to our own time it's different?
I realise a couple of years have passed (many more for Picard due to the events of The Inner Light ) but I'd sure be pissed if I were Ira Graves ghost.
Big Picard speech that episode after Ira uploaded himself into another body...
"Graves, every man has his time. Every man, without exception. But you’ve cheated."
I guess when it comes to our own time it's different?
Great episode by season 2 TNG standards btw.
I will say this is slightly different.
First, Picard didn't make the choice, it was actually made for him.
Second, with the exception that it was going to be Alton's body, he didn't "steal it". Graves straight up took over Data's body. No more Data, just Graves. He effectively killed Data to preserve his own life. Graves basically saw his life more important than Data's. And as mentioned before, it wasn't even Picard's choice.
The Golum has a lifespan, Data did not (no expiration date, per se). They basically gave Picard a few more, pain free years (at least in reference to the brain abnormality).
So while I get what you were trying to say, I think the scenario was different. They weren't trading one life for another, to preserve their own.
[Edit] Grammar and added a little more.
"If it wasn't for autocorrect, we wouldn't have Tuvok on a Giraffe."
Wait, wait, wait. If the Federation was so divided it risked collapse over helping the Romulans evacuate their homeworld and not die, why the hell did they abolish the Neutral Zone?
Speaking of "PIC" — I'm not terribly fond of that, but I certainly don't want to go the "STP" route, since that's never been a part of the naming convention for any Trek series' 3-letter abbreviations. Not to mention that that abbreviation just encourages the people who insist on calling Discovery "STD" ("Haha, it's named after a disease, hardy-har-har!").
Maybe "PCD" instead? But that doesn't really sit terribly well with me, either — I think it would just lead to confusion (whereas "PIC" makes it seem like I'm talking about a photograph). I'm sort of at a loss... perhaps "JLP"?
So, it seems like "PIC" is now the accepted abbreviation. That's what Memory Alpha and some other Trek sites (e.g., Ex Astris Scientia) use, and it does follow the established naming convention for Trek television (3-word titles shortened to the first letter of each word, and 1-word titles shortened to the first 3 letters of the word).
However, there has been discussion about how the upcoming animated series, Lower Decks, would be abbreviated, since we haven't had a TV series with just 2 words before. "LOW" is the most popular choice, but "LWD" is also being tossed about, as is a departure from the 3-letter naming convention, namely "LD" — which is, of course, utter blasphemy. Blasphemy and desecration! 🤓
Could you please continue the petty bickering? I find it most intriguing. ~ Data, ST:TNG "Haven"
Too much to quote and respond to by now, but Raffi wasn't just some lackey in Starfleet. She held high security clearance. You don't get that without being entrusted with being able to either collect sensitive information, analyze it, and/or figure out what to do with it. The Romulans were a particular bee in her bonnet; that's why Picard's bait for her is that he knows they have operatives on Earth. She went all "Fox Mulder" at hearing that. She's not new to this subject; she knows it as well as anyone in the Federation. She's just now getting her hands on the kinds of things she could only suspect before.
Also, if you're going to connect Picard to Garak somehow, surely O'Brien is a likelier link than Sisko. It would still have felt like too small a sandbox, though.
There's analysing, and there's analysing.
The information she had at hand in no way allowed for those conclusions to be reasonably reached.
Where they handed out as conjecture, that I could get behind, but they were handed out as fact, which just doesn't sit well with me at all.
I think the last ep should've be named Do Androids Dream of Electric Cthulu...
Never really thought I'd see the day where Trek would borrow from both H P Lovecraft and Philip K Dick at the same time, all we we really need now is for one of the offspring of the cyber Great Old Ones to have fallen out of the portal, landed in the Artefact, and in S2 we can see Ron Perlman as Hellborg smoking Rios' cigars.
I see Freecloud now as being a hat-tip to the LA of Blade Runner, given the Zhat Vash were Romulan Blade Runners.
S1 was fun, but at times too reminiscent of other franchises - the final closing credits may very well have stated that the Guardians of the Federation will return - and I'm hoping S2 dials it back a bit.
It was nice to see that the resolution wasn't some big battle too, but the Federation reawakening to it's responsibilities.
There is still something to be said for Eddington's accusations of how the Federation behaves in DS9, and whilst they were doubtless meant as a cocked snook to the likes of Richard Arnold, they ring true, and I would like to see that revisited one day, possibly in S2 of Picard where it would appear the Federation taking stock of itself would belong.
I realise a couple of years have passed (many more for Picard due to the events of The Inner Light ) but I'd sure be pissed if I were Ira Graves ghost.
Big Picard speech that episode after Ira uploaded himself into another body...
"Graves, every man has his time. Every man, without exception. But you’ve cheated."
I guess when it comes to our own time it's different?
Great episode by season 2 TNG standards btw.
I will say this is slightly different.
First, Picard didn't make the choice, it was actually made for him.
Second, with the exception that it was going to be Alton's body, he didn't "steal it". Graves straight up took over Data's body. No more Data, just Graves. He effectively killed Data to preserve his own life. Graves basically saw his life more important than Data's. And as mentioned before, it wasn't even Picard's choice.
The Golum has a lifespan, Data did not (no expiration date, per se). They basically gave Picard a few more, pain free years (at least in reference to the brain abnormality).
So while I get what you were trying to say, I think the scenario was different. They weren't trading one life for another, to preserve their own.
Comments
I felt like 'Darn, the Romulans were right all the time.' I expected it but I was hoping to be wrong.
Without the Romulans the situaton would not have escalated, yes. But fact is that Sutra is evil. And if she ever had gained knowledge of the 'warning' (forgot the english term someone mentioned here) she probably would have created a situation to call the AIs and start a war.
My hope is that they are that developed to easily stop the Romulans but are peaceful otherwise. This 8 sun thing is ooooold so a lot could have happened since its creation.
If the AIs go nuts on humanoids it would basically be cheap copy and paste from Orville. I really hope it is not.
Sutra was ambitious and an ideological hardliner, no doubt. But I don't know that the Romulans were right, given that the whole thing could be averted peaceably instead of through a winner-takes-all war for existence itself. The purpose of the AI promise to the Synthetics (I feel like we should capitalize it at this point since they have their own culture) is to be invoked once they've been threatened. No threat, no AI Armageddon.
As for ripping off The Orville, I'm reasonably confident their story wasn't entirely original or unique in the first place. There are really only so many science-fiction ideas; everything is ultimately just some variation or different take on them. Though if they are to start ripping off that show, I'd very much appreciate them starting with modeling the values of optimistic idealism and diplomacy.
I'll be damned, they did it. They built up to what I consider vintage, old school, right down to the core Star Trek. Act of nobility, set up by an inspiring call to be better than we are, and our biggest strength being that we can be there for each other. Doesn't get any more Star Trek than that. Even the stuff that was obvious (Picard sidestepping death by way of the "golem"; Soji backing out of being The Destroyer; Riker finding the extermination of all organic life a good enough reason to reactivate his Starfleet commission) felt fantastic.
This episode did what Nemesis failed to do, which is make me feel something over Data's death. The movie felt like what it was: A narrative conclusion to a real life business contract, constructed as yet another Wrath of Khan imitator. This time, though, I teared up having to say goodbye to Data. It wasn't just watching him go; it was the entire conversation he and Picard had. That was what was missing in Nemesis. Does feel weird that Picard let Data say for him that he loved him, rather than saying it himself, given that just a week ago he managed to speak the words to Raffi, but sometimes relationship dynamics make that harder than maybe it ought to be.
What I hoped going into this season was that by the end, Picard would help reset the Federation's moral compass, and I'm satisfied that he's done that. I love that scene with Rios and Seven drinking and commiserating. There's potential for a really nice relationship between the two of them; potentially a sibling-like bond (and not in that uncomfortable Romulan sibling way Narissa and Narek seemed to have). They're kindred spirits, and I think it matters that they're all-in on Picard and what he represents. It means something different than, say, Riker and Troi being devoted to him still. Seven and Raffi holding hands seems like kind of a big thing to just throw in like an Easter egg, but it'll be nice after all these years to see Seven in a mature, romantic relationship instead of being the socially awkward prom queen she was on Voyager. I'm stoked about Seven being part of this going forward!
(Is it just me, or did Patrick Stewart look and sound better in this episode than he had in several of the previous ones? Had he been playing up frailty for dramatic purpose, or had the meat of this episode drawn a little bit more out of him?)
I do have some nits to pick, though. The gizmo powered by imagination was a lazy story mechanism and I hope never to see it again and that goes double for anything that makes multiple copies of something that confuses an entire fleet. This ain't Green Lantern. Definitely bugs me that no one even had a reaction to Sutra's duplicity being exposed. No one disputed it, no one had second thoughts, no one got mad at her; nothing from anyone. That was... weird. Guess we're just leaving the xB's with the Synths? Alright, sure. What happened to Narek? (Glad he seemed to live; I really liked him.) And is Starfleet really leting the head of Starfleet Security exposed as a traitor just walk away?
Was it predictable? Yep. And I loved that it trusted itself to be. This story was never going to be resolved by a massive Starfleet v. Romulans v. Synths war. It had to be resolved by ideals and values. That's the story you tell if you build it around Jean-Luc Picard. That's the story I signed up for, and it's the story they gave, and I loved it.
Hugh, yes. Icheb, no. Hugh's death connects directly with the theme of this season being the meaning and value of sacrifice. Hugh is killed while trying to do something to save and help people. And, I think it worth noting, after having to accept watching fellow xB's murdered in retaliation for helping Picard and Soji. He paid an even steeper price than his own death.
Icheb, however, was lazily killed just so Seven would have someone recognizable to avenge.
Works with the story etc, but seeing Picard die tomorrow with all that’s going on is going to be mighty depressing.
I'm curious how hard it was to make the Golum, given they acted like Picard basically had stolen Soong's chance. He didn't exactly seen like he was going to drop dead. The urgency seemed more like he knew the AIs were coming and being in a robot body was just his safety net.
I think Data actually explained the Androids much better at the end. It sounded more like the neurons probably just had his core programming (e.g. Operating System), the rest was salvaged from the B4 copy.
I guess the shutdown of Sutra was a little weird. So the Androids just didn't see it (out of their view...), but no one seemed to want to explain to the rest that Sutra killed another to get what she wanted. This seemed really straight forward, maybe a least a reason to stop and think.
I agree the whole magic repair tool/holoprojector was a cheap out. They could have bypassed it all simply by not wrecking the ship and have Picard try and address the Romulans before Starfleet arrived. Nothing like a nice Picard speech about the value of the artificial life.
Something else that might have been fun would have been to have Data and Picard have some interaction before the end. Soong allowing Picard to talk to Data while he was locked up. Maybe a holo-Data interfaced with the ship helping to pilot. Might have ruined some of the end goodbye, but it is kind of interesting no one mentioned him effectively being alive until the end.
It was a little funny how many Federation ships they got together that quickly too, given historically how small quick fleets tended to be (*cough* Wolf 359 *cough* Sector 001 Borg fight in First Contact).
Overall, I was happy with it. It would be fun to see what trouble Picard and his crew can get into.
"Oh, so you can get together a bunch of ships all of a sudden when you want. Cool, cool." - The Romulans
39 ships destroyed at Wolf 359 - Federation decimated for a generation.
Fast forward to the battle to retake DS9 - half the fleet and the Klingons can’t make it so they ONLY have 600 ships...
Really glad they went another way to solve this, and didn't copy JMS.
In fairness, there are worse people to steal from.
For my money, there hasn't been a Trek entity that's approached the intensity with which I was engrossed with B5, since the best episodes of TNG.
Could you please continue the petty bickering? I find it most intriguing.
~ Data, ST:TNG "Haven"
Could you please continue the petty bickering? I find it most intriguing.
~ Data, ST:TNG "Haven"
https://whatculture.com/tv/star-trek-picard-finale-review-3-ups-and-5-downs-from-et-in-arcadia-ego-part-2
... I started to think about it some more and I found myself agreeing with the author (who did not very much care for the episode) on several points.
One, the season's "big bads" were pretty easily (and for me, unsatisfyingly) dispatched. I didn't find Commodore Oh interesting at all, but I hoped to see more from Narissa (though I suppose she could have pulled one of her last-minute beamout tricks this time, as well). And as stated in the article, Sutra was unceremoniously taken down by a button on a remote control.
The points about much of the dialogue being overly grandiose and the denouement of the looming threat feeling incredibly rushed were also things I felt myself agreeing with.
Also, are we just forgiving Agnes now for committing a murder? Isn't she going to face charges, despite having "the Romulans made me do it" as her line of defense? For that matter, Seven just committed a murder a few episodes ago, as well — though I'm not entirely sure the rest of the crew knows about that yet.
One other thing that I read in a different article now bothers me, too. Oh had plenty of time to start firing at the planet, but kept giving orders like, "Okay everybody, get READY... but, like, don't fire yet, 'cause we've gotta give the good guys a chance to stop us, but we're gonna do this REALLY soon!" That's just poor writing/directing/editing. The Romulans, being at the point in time they had long been preparing for (for what, hundreds of years? a long time, in any case), would have done everything they could to not let it slip through their fingers, and would not have wasted a second on things like, "Prepare planet annihilation attack plan Alpha," or whatever dumb line that was. Those things would have been made ready during their flight, and the order would've been given to destroy the planet as soon as they verified where they were.
Also, Data's hair was really badly done.
Aside from that, there were some nice touches, and I hope it continues to improve in the upcoming season.
Could you please continue the petty bickering? I find it most intriguing.
~ Data, ST:TNG "Haven"
It all seemed like a cut down finish to a single episode where a double episode would have been appropriate for a proper conclusion to the storylines.
But... Seven is back! So I am still looking forward to season 2.
Oh, I agree. But the Fantasy solution that worked for B5 would have worked less well for Picard.
Maybe that was the initial plan. Before they got the green lights for a second and even a third season...
Giving Jonathan Frakes a special guest star credit in the beginning undermined the surprise of seeing him with the fleet. Sub-problems: Dude just lets Oh split despite her betrayal of the Federation as head of Starfleet Security? And can't be bothered to stick around and participate in the first contact dialogue with the Synthetics or even just hang around for an hour or so to make sure the Romulans don't come back as soon as their sensors show Starfleet has split? Did he need to get back to take a pizza out of the oven? Lastly, he may be a Starfleet legend, but why was the most advanced starship ever put into service under the command of a reservist? Plus, having him on hand when Picard died would have imbued it with considerably greater heft.
Just where the hell did Narissa come from? Didn't she leave the Artifact to join the Romulan fleet? She clearly wasn't with them when they arrived; she had to have Narek bring her up to speed. Had she just been hiding in the Cube the whole time? What became of Narek? Last we saw, the dude was in the crowd when Sutra and Soji were confronted. Then... Nothing. Dude's just gone without anyone saying anything about the treacherous Romulan disappearing. Seems unlikely he was beamed aboard a Warbird; if he was, I never saw it or heard anything about it.
Speaking of the Cube, did anyone think to leave the xB's with any kind of direction or support? Seven went from being their Queen to joining Picard's La Sirena crew without any remark whatsoever about why she was abandoning the xB's. Didn't Elnor pledge himself to the lost cause of the xB's, and not to Seven?
Seven tells Rios she killed Narissa because it bugged her that she was still alive, but she was also trying to kill Seven at the moment. Seven didn't seek her out, and it was clearly self-defense. I can understand feeling remorse over taking it on herself to be judge, jury, and executioner on Freecloud, but killing Narissa seemed on the level. I would appreciate if she later came clean to Picard about what she did on Freecloud, though.
Alton Inigo Soong exposes Sutra as responsible for killing Saga in front of everyone, and no one says a single word about her confession or him deactivating her with a remote control. (Why would he even be permitted to have such a thing?) Seriously, not a single person says, "Wait, you mean we were gonna bring about the annihilation of all organic life because our fear and anger were stoked by a lie? Maybe we should reconsider this." Or "Wait, did he just turn her off?" Nada. Synths just don't give a damn, apparently.
"I saved your life so you can save ours" is a really strange pitch from Picard. I know this season was written and filmed last year, but quid pro quos have been out of fashion for awhile now. I appreciated the gist of his speech, that we thrive when we work together and have each other's back, but that was a strange way to appeal to Soji's conscience.
Isn't it weird for Picard to have Data point out that mortality defines humanity just before cheating death by being resurrected in a new robo-body? Does that mean Data is more human than Picard now? Is Picard now basically undead?
And lastly, Jurati. I guess "The mind meld made me do it" defense worked so well she got the charges dropped altogether? And everyone on La Sirena is cool with that?
These are an awfully lot of qualms, many of them rather serious narrative problems, and they do undermine what I found a generally gratifying conclusion to this season's story. I still dig it, but I've dropped it in my season rankings to #5 as these have continued to irk me.
No, just freed from his brain disease. He will still die naturally (well, as naturally as possible for a synth) when the time has come.
And yeah, as you said: Many narrative problems for sure with the first season (also that Seven/Raffi out of the blue thing). Also I wonder where the next one will go where basically nearly every plot (apart from questions like where is Narek etc.) has been wrapped up...
I realise a couple of years have passed (many more for Picard due to the events of The Inner Light ) but I'd sure be pissed if I were Ira Graves ghost.
Big Picard speech that episode after Ira uploaded himself into another body...
"Graves, every man has his time. Every man, without exception. But you’ve cheated."
I guess when it comes to our own time it's different?
Great episode by season 2 TNG standards btw.
I will say this is slightly different.
First, Picard didn't make the choice, it was actually made for him.
Second, with the exception that it was going to be Alton's body, he didn't "steal it". Graves straight up took over Data's body. No more Data, just Graves. He effectively killed Data to preserve his own life. Graves basically saw his life more important than Data's. And as mentioned before, it wasn't even Picard's choice.
The Golum has a lifespan, Data did not (no expiration date, per se). They basically gave Picard a few more, pain free years (at least in reference to the brain abnormality).
So while I get what you were trying to say, I think the scenario was different. They weren't trading one life for another, to preserve their own.
[Edit] Grammar and added a little more.
So, it seems like "PIC" is now the accepted abbreviation. That's what Memory Alpha and some other Trek sites (e.g., Ex Astris Scientia) use, and it does follow the established naming convention for Trek television (3-word titles shortened to the first letter of each word, and 1-word titles shortened to the first 3 letters of the word).
However, there has been discussion about how the upcoming animated series, Lower Decks, would be abbreviated, since we haven't had a TV series with just 2 words before. "LOW" is the most popular choice, but "LWD" is also being tossed about, as is a departure from the 3-letter naming convention, namely "LD" — which is, of course, utter blasphemy. Blasphemy and desecration! 🤓
Could you please continue the petty bickering? I find it most intriguing.
~ Data, ST:TNG "Haven"
There's analysing, and there's analysing.
The information she had at hand in no way allowed for those conclusions to be reasonably reached.
Where they handed out as conjecture, that I could get behind, but they were handed out as fact, which just doesn't sit well with me at all.
Never really thought I'd see the day where Trek would borrow from both H P Lovecraft and Philip K Dick at the same time, all we we really need now is for one of the offspring of the cyber Great Old Ones to have fallen out of the portal, landed in the Artefact, and in S2 we can see Ron Perlman as Hellborg smoking Rios' cigars.
I see Freecloud now as being a hat-tip to the LA of Blade Runner, given the Zhat Vash were Romulan Blade Runners.
S1 was fun, but at times too reminiscent of other franchises - the final closing credits may very well have stated that the Guardians of the Federation will return - and I'm hoping S2 dials it back a bit.
It was nice to see that the resolution wasn't some big battle too, but the Federation reawakening to it's responsibilities.
There is still something to be said for Eddington's accusations of how the Federation behaves in DS9, and whilst they were doubtless meant as a cocked snook to the likes of Richard Arnold, they ring true, and I would like to see that revisited one day, possibly in S2 of Picard where it would appear the Federation taking stock of itself would belong.
Fair points. Thank you.
Star Trek: Picard - 7 Ups & 5 Downs From Season 1:
https://whatculture.com/tv/star-trek-picard-7-ups-5-downs-from-season-1
Could you please continue the petty bickering? I find it most intriguing.
~ Data, ST:TNG "Haven"