Star Trek: Picard

[Cloud_S]

So in the season 1 finale (god how did this crapfest get renewed?) they dug deep into their creative depths and KILL OFF......

Spoiler

Picard

himself.... yep. But of course because you can't kill the character the show is...

Spoiler

named for

, his consciousness is uploaded into an android body. Speaking of androids, another beloved character gets the axe, even though

Spoiler

he was already dead

.... well apparently he sorta lived on... but requested to die.... so the plug gets pulled on him.

Bravo. Really bravo. It's amazing how shitty this series it.

CinemaBlend interviewed Michael Chabon, who was apparently very surprised that people cared about the characters he killed off.... I'm not sure how he can call himself a lifelong Trek fan if he formed no attachments to any character...

 

[Tetsujin]

Finale was decent outside of

Spoiler

Picard dying but not dying (but isn't the real Picard technically dead now and this is just a digital copy?) because what is even the point of that

Also uh, why is that doctor sticking around? The one who murdered Maddox? Are we uh, just gonna let that slide?

Series overall was...okay. Just okay. *shrugs*

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

Finale was decent outside of

Spoiler

Picard dying but not dying (but isn't the real Picard technically dead now and this is just a digital copy?) because what is even the point of that

Spoiler

I don't see it as being any functionally different from when Shi'ar technology was used to create a clone body for the consciousness of his alternate universe counterpart, Charles Xavier, to be transferred to following Xavier's original body being fatally infected with a Brood egg.

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

Harsh indictment: "the dark reboot that boldly goes where nobody wanted it to."

Also, an interesting interview with the showrunner. I'm glad I read this. Whatever mixed results the show ended up with, I do think it's apparent that there was a lot of love for the franchise behind it.

 

[Cloud_S]

Here's an excellent, if quite long, video summing up the failures of PIC's writing team. And no, I don't love to hate on this (seriously, it does hurt me to see what modern-day Trek has become)... but there are many valid points brought up about why it's just... bad.

I love the bit at 48min where he has a clip from TNG that proves the writers didn't care to do much, if any research:

TNG Romulan: "I know a host of Romulan cyberneticists that would love to be this close to you"
PIC Romulan: "we don't have androids and we don't study cybernetics"

 

[Tetsujin]

 

[Cthulhu]

Oh god it's the time traveling trope again

I never poasted in this thrad after actually seeing it, I'm glad I wasn't the only one that thought it was a bit cack. They lean on nostalgia for TNG but make it feel forced and awkward, like someone staring and grinning for a little too long after asking "'member such and such". Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed seeing the old characters back again, but at the same time I feel like Generations and First Contact should have been the last instances of the TNG crew. Insurrections was forgettable (I didn't remember that it existed), Nemesis was all over the place.

As for this show, they introduced new characters with either an air of "you are supposed to like this character" or "you are supposed to know / remember this", and neither worked. Elnor was a cringey mix between "noble savage" and "born yesterday" character (while you studied warp technology, I studied the blade... what is a female?). The plot had potential but was all over the place and cringe. None of the characters were convincing, not even Picard himself who just came across as permanently pained, wistful and supposedly wise, frequently staring into middle distance while trying to say something wise or profound, neither of which does the character or its actor any good.

Tl;dr wasted potential. Tune in next time when I'll open up a thesaurus on Discovery.

 

[ForceStealer]

Yeah as time has passed I've only grown more and more hostile to this show. S1 was awful, and that trailer does absolutely nothing to make me hopeful for season 2.

 

[Tetsujin]

Have not checked out season 2 yet but anyway, cast announcement for S3

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1511388196398985219

 

[ForceStealer]

Can't wait to see how many they violently murder because the writers have no other ideas about how to make drama.

 

[Lord Noctis]

They've been pretty restrained about it in season 2 so far. Of course, season 2 in general is a notable improvement over season 1 imo.

 

[ForceStealer]

I hope that holds. Haven't watched any of it, discontinued that sub after that S1 trainwreck and they're really gonna have to earn me back at this point.

 

[Lord Noctis]

That's fair enough. I can't say I hated season 1, but I probably wouldn't have finished it if my wife hadn't wanted to see it through. I probably wouldn't have given season 2 a chance if John De Lancie wasn't reprising his role.

 

[Roundhouse]

No Wesley for S3

 

[ForceStealer]

Wesley, Genesis... round just gravitates to all the fan favorites.

Spoiler

but no that is weird given how involved Wheaton is with the promotional materials

 

[ForceStealer]

 

[Roundhouse]

https://wilwheaton.net/2022/04/writing-fan-fiction-is-never-not-fun/

 

[ForceStealer]

I guess I can bump this thread for the S3 trailer that came out last month:

The remaining TNG cast coming in like a defibrillator on an already dead corpse For them alone I'll try to watch this one despite my inability to force myself to suffer through S2. $20 says they weren't able to come up with any idea for Picard and Crusher other than "they're divorced." I see we still can't tell a personal story, needs to be a galaxy-ending threat - which would actually be fine for the TNG crew's last hurrah IF the first 2 seasons had been able to restrain themselves from doing so twice already.

Some positive thoughts so I'm not a total curmudgeon:
1) I genuinely didn't expect the appearance at the end. It would be cool if the mood of the trailer there is a fakeout and he actually is coming as a friend, but that's probably giving these guys too much credit. I'm sure he'll have a violent death somehow despite being a hologram. Oh wait, positive, right. Very cool to see Daniel Davis back in this role

2) Though I would have preferred that they simply use the Enterprise-E, this new ship isn't bad. Looks like the E and the Voyager had a baby. Apparently it's a ship from Star Trek Online. Ascended canon

3) Minor thing, but I liked seeing a return to the TNG-era animation style of the ship going to warp. (the engines flash, the ship stretches, and then zooms off into the distance and disappears in a flash) All the other shows have been sticking with the JJ Abrams movie style of a sonic boom instantaneous kind of effect which I don't like as much as this one.

 

[ForceStealer]

Dim the lights, DIM THEM MORE!

 

[Ghost X]

Shows up as "video unavailable" for me. Doesn't even have one of them region locked things, so I don't think it is that.

 

[null]

"We fight or we die." "There is something coming." It's Mass Effect but, like, geriatric.

 

[ForceStealer]

Which makes sense given that the plot of season one was virtually wholesale lifted from Mass Effect.

"Is anyone you know still the person you knew?" is a very appropriate tagline for this series.

 

[ForceStealer]

So...I remain extremely wary of Lucy yanking the football away, but the first two episodes of season 3 have been like watching a completely different show.
Characters acting like competent adults in a professional setting, and not like petulant children? Whaa?! Where have these writers been?

Some excellent old-school musical cues from the franchise's past, and a Leaving Spacedock scene with a bit of gravitas that I don't think we've seen since season 1 of TNG? The closing credits use the First Contact theme, which happens to be my favorite rendition of that theme. And the show opens with a "In the 25th Century..." tag a la Star Trek VI. Why, it's almost as though someone who actually likes Star Trek is running this thing.

I have to roll my eyes at there being yet another world-ending threat, and by far my biggest complaint is that all the Federation ships are so damn dark. I said out loud at one point "Turn on the lights!" The Ferengi's seedy drug den (why is "nutrek" so obsessed with these?) was actually brighter than the Captain's office on the Federation ship. Freakin weird.
That said, if that remains my biggest complaint over the course of the season, that would be a massive improvement.

 

[Nandemoyasan]

I don't wanna spoil anything, but it's leaning into the Wrath of Khan hard, yeah. Not necessarily a bad thing, but it has been tried before. This time around, though, it seems to be doing a lot of things right.

Weirdly enough, Jonathan Frakes and Patrick Stewart have a great chemistry in this first two episodes, which is what I feel was missing from Seasons 1 and 2 (mostly featuring Picard with a cast of newbies). Add into that, that Picard himself seems ready to actually take charge of situations, which is frankly responsible for 90% of the character's likability previously (i.e., that people complained Kirk didn't act enough like a professional naval captain).

Season 1 and 2 Picard seemed locked in a loop of "do I still got it or don't I?" Season 3 Picard definitely still "has it."

Also without wanting to spoil anything, the far less stringent content guidelines of Trek these days do the whole idea of Klingon Warriors a **world** of good.

 

[Tetsujin]

It's funny how they basically gave up and jettisoned most of the new cast from the first two seasons in favor of "fuck it, nostalgiafest TNG reunion victory lap" but I ain't complaining. As of now.