Star Trek: Thread Space 9

[Adami]

So one thing I really felt from the most recent episode is that Picard represents what Star Trek used to be.

7 literally says that he's essentially an foolish old man (but lovable) and doesn't want to show him how his world is completely dead.....right before she shoots and explodes someone for pure vengeance. So yea.

Picard is also hardly a character anymore. After the first few episodes, he's just kind of....there? He's not really doing anything, he's not very smart anymore, and everyone else is 5 steps ahead of him and he can't see it. He trusts everyone immediately. It's just getting worse the more I think about it.

The last episode involved harvesting Borg parts, a group of vigilante assassins to kill them, a firm confirmation that the Star Trek world is purely capitalist again, a reinforcement of the idea that hope is for idiots and the world functions on pure cold blooded goal oriented behavior, killing whomever gets in your way to get what you want, and ugh, I'm so depressed thinking about this.

THIS is the show Sir Patrick came back for? THIS?!?

Star Trek had a very cool formula and model for everything up til 2009. The Federation (and humanity) represented hope, idealism, what we could become if we overcame our base instincts. And then they'd use other aliens to as allegories for who we are in real life. They'd confront and you'd see that, in the end, the hope and promise of humanity can overcome our baser instincts. If you want to go Freudian, the Federation was kind of like the Superego, the alien races not part of the Federation were the Id, which caused the viewing audience to become and strengthen the Ego. Which is healthy.

This Star Trek? It's flipped it almost. Humanity is now a mirror for modern humanity. The federation is a mirror for our current government. So instead of hope persevering in the face of adversity, you just have heartless, cold, cruel characters in a heartless, cold, cruel world and that's it. That's not Star Trek. That's just modern typical dystopian sci-fi.

Seriously, replace Picard with someone else and a few words here and there and you'd never have a clue this was a Star Trek show. Not a clue.



Edit: Soup dude, this isn't meant to dissuade your love of this show, at all. I am glad you like it, and hope you continue to love it. So I hope you don't read this as anything more than my own personal issues with it. If I am the only person who feels the way I do, that's cool. So I'm glad you love the show so much. I wish I did. I really do.

Speaking of, I still hold that some characters are great. I'm really like Juan Solo quite a lot. (and yes, I am surprisingly proud of that name I just came up with).  And the Romulan ninja orphan whatever isn't bad yet. Though I can't quite figure out what accent he's doing.

[jingle.boy]

I’m starting to get there with ya Adami. This was a pretty bad episode, that just introduced 2 new mystery subplots - Raffi’s story, and Abigail’s. Picard was a secondary character this episode. The gore and swearing seems to be solely for the sake of “look, we’re not on network TV, so let’s do something a borderline R rated”. I’m fully expecting a tit-flash before the end of the series.

“Modern dystopian Sci-Fi” is exactly it - simply with a bunch of throwback nods to TNG and Voyager.

[soupytwist]

Edit: Soup dude, this isn't meant to dissuade your love of this show, at all. I am glad you like it, and hope you continue to love it.

It's all cool mate. 

I'll give my take on why I'm quite enjoying it.   At it's simple level this show has consequences, something Star Trek has never really dealt with.  Actions have meaning now - Star Fleets decisions are being held accountable.   Whereas before any number of truely extraordinary things did happen, and there was no consequence.    Star Fleet in the spin off shows for me at least always seem smug, actually not altogether disimilar from the Borg - but whereas the Borg take by force, Star Fleet takes but judging a race on if it's fit to join Star Fleet (and then if it pass, it gets assimilated into it's rules and regulations!).    And what is it with all the high end Star Fleet officers being corrupt?   Admirals are notorious for being bad guys on the shows, that's not a good reflection on the organisation - you rise though the ranks, then when you reach the top you want to change it!   I guess what I'm saying is I never truely brought the utopia side.

And we only ever really saw the universe from the point of view of the federation, we rarely get to see it from outside that bubble, and what it's really like out there.  I quite enjoy that side,  and Picard is struggling to adapt - although he's been out of Star Fleet for 14 years, he's basically retired to his chateua - now he's seeing Space without the prism of a Star Fleet uniform.

The gore, the sweating I'm not so keen - I suppose it adds a realism, but it doesn't effect my enjoymenr.  The language itself is the biggest misstep for me, everyone seems to speak 21st century - that's the thing i'd change.  Oh and the incest twins, those guys yeah.....

[El Barto]

Edit: Soup dude, this isn't meant to dissuade your love of this show, at all. I am glad you like it, and hope you continue to love it.

It's all cool mate. 

I'll give my take on why I'm quite enjoying it.   At it's simple level this show has consequences, something Star Trek has never really dealt with.  Actions have meaning now - Star Fleets decisions are being held accountable.   Whereas before any number of truely extraordinary things did happen, and there was no consequence.    Star Fleet in the spin off shows for me at least always seem smug, actually not altogether disimilar from the Borg - but whereas the Borg take by force, Star Fleet takes but judging a race on if it's fit to join Star Fleet (and then if it pass, it gets assimilated into it's rules and regulations!).    And what is it with all the high end Star Fleet officers being corrupt?   Admirals are notorious for being bad guys on the shows, that's not a good reflection on the organisation - you rise though the ranks, then when you reach the top you want to change it!   I guess what I'm saying is I never truely brought the utopia side.

And we only ever really saw the universe from the point of view of the federation, we rarely get to see it from outside that bubble, and what it's really like out there.  I quite enjoy that side,  and Picard is struggling to adapt - although he's been out of Star Fleet for 14 years, he's basically retired to his chateua - now he's seeing Space without the prism of a Star Fleet uniform.

The gore, the sweating I'm not so keen - I suppose it adds a realism, but it doesn't effect my enjoymenr.  The language itself is the biggest misstep for me, everyone seems to speak 21st century - that's the thing i'd change.  Oh and the incest twins, those guys yeah.....

This is a very good assessment. While I like your point about seeing the universe from outside the prism, it seems to me that it's even more fascinating to see the bad side of the Federation while they're still the good guys. You can do a good thing and still produce negative outcomes for others. We've seen this from time to time in the ST universe. Showing the federation as the bad guys is a great idea. Actually making them the bad guys not so much. There aren't any higher morals or ethical calculus driving their actions. They're just dicks. This is the difference between Star Trek and typical dystopia story-telling. One has meaning and one is just a narrative.

Extending that to Picard, he left the organization for that very reason. They're dicks. Seems to me it'd be much more meaningful, and interesting, if he'd left on good terms, and out on his own discovered that, despite his belief that he was one of the good guys, reality tells a different tale. We're kind of seeing a little of that, but it all stems from the Federation being rotten, rather than merely arrogant.

[lonestar]

I’m starting to get there with ya Adami. This was a pretty bad episode, that just introduced 2 new mystery subplots - Raffi’s story, and Abigail’s. Picard was a secondary character this episode. The gore and swearing seems to be solely for the sake of “look, we’re not on network TV, so let’s do something a borderline R rated”. I’m fully expecting a tit-flash before the end of the series.

“Modern dystopian Sci-Fi” is exactly it - simply with a bunch of throwback nods to TNG and Voyager.

...please be Jeri Ryan's....please be Jeri Ryan's.....please be Jeri Ryan's...

Raffi's little subplot was just a mechanism to get her back on the ship with a 'nothing to lose' attitude, nothing more. I highly doubt we'll see anything of it again. As for Abigail, she was just too sweet to be true, and leading up to it, I totally saw her killing Maddox, it was fairly blatantly telegraphed to me. Still thoroughly enjoying the show, but I see the points about Picard. I think they're handling it how they should for a man whose character and in real life are pushing 80. He's not gonna get into brawls anymore, but he still has to, as 7 puts it, 'save the universe' when it needs saving.

[Adami]

Oddly enough, I too was expecting random nudity in that episode (sadly not Jeri's). Don't think we got any though.


As far as Picard goes, I doubt anyone is complaining that he isn't being physical enough. But the show is portraying him as an idealistic old fool. The rest of the show has already realized that his world is dead and they don't have the heart to tell him, so they humor him. But he's definitely an old fool in this show thus far. He's 5 steps behind everyone, isn't really doing anything (and I don't mean physically) and everyone else is maneuvering around him without him noticing.

[lonestar]

Maybe they're playing him as the idealistic old fool to set up the story for a huge crash for him?

[Adami]

Maybe they're playing him as the idealistic old fool to set up the story for a huge crash for him?

The whole show so far is a huge crash for him!

Is that what I want from Star Trek: Picard? The story about how the last remnants of what we loved about Star Trek becomes obsolete and crashes? That just seems cruel. On brand, but cruel.

[lonestar]

 

[soupytwist]

Regardless of whether you are enjoying or not enjoying Picard, can we at least be happy that Seven appears to no longer to be with that sad sack of shite Chakotay.

[ReaperKK]

Regardless of whether you are enjoying or not enjoying Picard, can we at least be happy that Seven appears to no longer to be with that sad sack of shite Chakotay.

Agreed

[Adami]

I actually liked Chakotay. I mean, not all the time, but he was an interesting idea for a character that, like many of the characters on Voyager, was neutered. He had a lot of potential though.

But yea, 7 ending up with him just made no sense at all. 7 ending up with anyone made no sense at all.

[Polarbear]

Regardless of whether you are enjoying or not enjoying Picard, can we at least be happy that Seven appears to no longer to be with that sad sack of shite Chakotay.

Agreed

I wouldn't be surprised, if we find out that both Janeway and Chakotay are six feet under at this point..

I still haven't seen a single episode of Picard, but I have caught up with the story more or less. The changing of the Federation seems to be a huge controversy in this show, but is it truly so hard to believe? We saw the Federation change before our very eyes during the TNG era. The Borg attack and the Dominion invasion caused the Federation to change, from the idealistic utopia that it is in the beginning of TNG to the entity we see in the Picard.

Remember that DS9 arc where that one admiral attempted to take control of the Federation, to change it into a more totalitarian government to counter the Dominion invasion? He failed, but the Synthetic attack on Mars could have been the thing, that allowed someone similar to succeed where he had failed.

[Adami]

Regardless of whether you are enjoying or not enjoying Picard, can we at least be happy that Seven appears to no longer to be with that sad sack of shite Chakotay.

Agreed

I wouldn't be surprised, if we find out that both Janeway and Chakotay are six feet under at this point..

I still haven't seen a single episode of Picard, but I have caught up with the story more or less. The changing of the Federation seems to be a huge controversy in this show, but is it truly so hard to believe? We saw the Federation change before our very eyes during the TNG era. The Borg attack and the Dominion invasion caused the Federation to change, from the idealistic utopia that it is in the beginning of TNG to the entity we see in the Picard.

Remember that DS9 arc where that one admiral attempted to take control of the Federation, to change it into a more totalitarian government to counter the Dominion invasion? He failed, but the Synthetic attack on Mars could have been the thing, that allowed someone similar to succeed where he had failed.

But see, we're discussing how things are being done, not simply the general concept behind what is being done. Since you haven't seen the show, you're basically just seeing that "federation has changed and gotten dark" without seeing what exactly we're having a problem with.

Is it reasonable to assume that the federation changed? Sure. But again, at that point it's not really Star Trek anymore. If you have to change the entire premise 180 degrees, then you've lost the plot of what you're doing in the first place. The reason changing the federation is annoying some of us is because it takes away everything that made Star Trek what it was and just makes this a typical dystopian future scifi show. There's dozens of those already. I don't need them to slap the Star Trek label on a typical scifi show, you know? Star Trek isn't just flying ships and fancy laser guns, it's a philosophy and outlook. If you strip away the philosophy and outlook, which Picard as thus done, it's just flying ships and fancy lasers.

[soupytwist]

I actually liked Chakotay. I mean, not all the time, but he was an interesting idea for a character that, like many of the characters on Voyager, was neutered. He had a lot of potential though.

I just found him a lazy wishy-washy mess of every native american/mystic cliche (vision quests, animal guides, meditation chants...ugh).  But yeah he was sidelined after a while, I know Beltran has gone on record saying he was just picking up his paycheck towards the end, as he stopped caring about the character.   Voyager would have been so much better if there tension between Star Fleet and The Maquis was actually allowed to develop, rather than just ending it in the Pilot, then Chakotay might have been an interesting character if he didn't just full in line...

[Adami]

I actually liked Chakotay. I mean, not all the time, but he was an interesting idea for a character that, like many of the characters on Voyager, was neutered. He had a lot of potential though.

I just found him a lazy wishy-washy mess of every native american/mystic cliche (vision quests, animal guides, meditation chants...ugh).  But yeah he was sidelined after a while, I know Beltran has gone on record saying he was just picking up his paycheck towards the end, as he stopped caring about the character.   Voyager would have been so much better if there tension between Star Fleet and The Maquis was actually allowed to develop, rather than just ending it in the Pilot, then Chakotay might have been an interesting character if he didn't just full in line...

Totally. It felt like a very odd decision to purposefully create a very tense situation and then just diffuse it after one episode.

And Voyager actually had more potential than Picard to explore some of the stuff we're at now.

The Federation is long gone (distance wise). The struggle to maintain those values in an area of space that does NOT care about them, along with a group of people on your ship who are completely disillusioned with the Federation could have been very cool explorations of the grey. But instead they all immediately got along (for the most part) and all lived up to most of the same ideals in area of space filled largely with inferior species that had no chance of challenging the Federation's values in any real way.

[soupytwist]

Totally. It felt like a very odd decision to purposefully create a very tense situation and then just diffuse it after one episode.

They were probably still zoned in on Roddenburys 'no conflict' ideology he wanted in TNG.  Also I personally think when TNG ended Voyager got all the 'safe' writers.  DS9 got all the more daring ones (Ron Moore, Ira Steven Behr in paricular) - that's why IMO DS9 is generally light years ahead of Voyager when it comes to writing and characters.

[El Barto]

Well, the first season carried a fair amount of "stupid fucking federation" sentiment from the maquis before they were all sucked in. And once Seven came aboard she never missed an opportunity to point out how ridiculous their values were.

[ReaperKK]

I actually liked Chakotay. I mean, not all the time, but he was an interesting idea for a character that, like many of the characters on Voyager, was neutered. He had a lot of potential though.

I just found him a lazy wishy-washy mess of every native american/mystic cliche (vision quests, animal guides, meditation chants...ugh).  But yeah he was sidelined after a while, I know Beltran has gone on record saying he was just picking up his paycheck towards the end, as he stopped caring about the character.   Voyager would have been so much better if there tension between Star Fleet and The Maquis was actually allowed to develop, rather than just ending it in the Pilot, then Chakotay might have been an interesting character if he didn't just full in line...

So I don't know if this is true or not but I heard on a ST podcast I listen to that VOY hired a consultant for the native american stuff and it turned out the dude they hired was a complete fraud and had no idea what he was talking to in regards to native american history and culture.                         

[Adami]

I actually liked Chakotay. I mean, not all the time, but he was an interesting idea for a character that, like many of the characters on Voyager, was neutered. He had a lot of potential though.

I just found him a lazy wishy-washy mess of every native american/mystic cliche (vision quests, animal guides, meditation chants...ugh).  But yeah he was sidelined after a while, I know Beltran has gone on record saying he was just picking up his paycheck towards the end, as he stopped caring about the character.   Voyager would have been so much better if there tension between Star Fleet and The Maquis was actually allowed to develop, rather than just ending it in the Pilot, then Chakotay might have been an interesting character if he didn't just full in line...

So I don't know if this is true or not but I heard on a ST podcast I listen to that VOY hired a consultant for the native american stuff and it turned out the dude they hired was a complete fraud and had no idea what he was talking to in regards to native american history and culture.                       

Oh god I hope so. I have rarely seen a show miss the mark to such a degree as they did with that.

[ReaperKK]

Looks like it might be true, here is the guy:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamake_Highwater

[El Barto]

They could have resurrected Sealth and given him the job and Chakote still wouldn't have been a better character. Lack of Indian cred was not his problem.

[Adami]

Shocking moment.....I mostly liked the episode.

It was character driven which was a nice change. Allison Pills character is pretty bad and the ending was very dumb. The rest of it? Not bad!

[soupytwist]

Shocking moment.....I mostly liked the episode.

It was character driven which was a nice change. Allison Pills character is pretty bad and the ending was very dumb. The rest of it? Not bad!

Yeah that was good.  The plot is moving forward now, we didn't get any huge 'infodumps' this episode.  Raffi and Rios are the standout characters (after Picard obviously) for me, liking both a lot (I can deal with the 'JL').

[hefdaddy42]

Shocking moment.....I mostly liked the episode.

It was character driven which was a nice change. Allison Pills character is pretty bad and the ending was very dumb. The rest of it? Not bad!

I liked it too.  Looking forward to next week.

[Adami]

So some more thoughts on it, both good and bad.

1) Finally giving Picard some character stuff to do. They may have overplayed his PTSD a bit, but I'm fine with it.
2) Hugh and Picard were great together.
3) Hugh is just helping people. That's it. The show, for the first time, had a good character just doing a good thing for no reason other than to be a good person doing a good thing. I shouldn't be so grateful when Star Trek does this, but it was lovely.
4) The stuff between Sushi and Hipster Romulan dude is still meh, but finally had some pay off. Took a long time to get there, but it got somewhere decent.
5) No crazy plots. It's just Picard goes to get girl, and guy tries to mind incept girl. Simple, as it should be.
6) The ending was DUMB on two different levels
6A) The super amazing star gate tech is JUST for the Borg Queen? She'll survive either way, as we've seen. The borg are 100% about going everywhere to assimilate. That tech would've just been their normal thing if they had that.
6B) Legalos or whatever staying behind. WHY?!?! How are you defending Picard who just left? You're not accomplishing anything. You're just being a plot device, not a character. Now Picard is on a random planet with a deadly robot and he has no protection. Good job numb nuts.

[hefdaddy42]

6B) Legalos or whatever staying behind. WHY?!?! How are you defending Picard who just left? You're not accomplishing anything. You're just being a plot device, not a character. Now Picard is on a random planet with a deadly robot and he has no protection. Good job numb nuts.

I thought that at first as well, but Hugh said something about taking a few minutes to power down the system after they left, so any pursuers could potentially be able to follow them through until that was done.  In which case it would be good to have someone there to dissuade such pursuit.

The concept seems a little dumb to me, but Hugh said it.

[Adami]

6B) Legalos or whatever staying behind. WHY?!?! How are you defending Picard who just left? You're not accomplishing anything. You're just being a plot device, not a character. Now Picard is on a random planet with a deadly robot and he has no protection. Good job numb nuts.

I thought that at first as well, but Hugh said something about taking a few minutes to power down the system after they left, so any pursuers could potentially be able to follow them through until that was done.  In which case it would be good to have someone there to dissuade such pursuit.

The concept seems a little dumb to me, but Hugh said it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EigIujKxDcE

[jingle.boy]

6B) Legalos or whatever staying behind. WHY?!?! How are you defending Picard who just left? You're not accomplishing anything. You're just being a plot device, not a character. Now Picard is on a random planet with a deadly robot and he has no protection. Good job numb nuts.

I thought that at first as well, but Hugh said something about taking a few minutes to power down the system after they left, so any pursuers could potentially be able to follow them through until that was done.  In which case it would be good to have someone there to dissuade such pursuit.

The concept seems a little dumb to me, but Hugh said it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EigIujKxDcE

I agree with both of you.  But, there's likely going to be a purpose for either Picard/Soji being together alone and/or Elnor staying with the crew.  I do like his catchphrase.  Also, the when do the Tal Shiar get training as dream psycho-therapists?  That was stupid.

Lastly... Adami... for as much as I agree with many of your assessments, the childish nicknames are just that - childish.  You're better than that.  Although, Juan Solo was a gem.

[ReaperKK]

I too like Juan Solo

[Adami]

I’ll give you Sushi. I’m better than that. But the Romulan characters, I honestly can’t remember their names. Elron? I dunno.

[lonestar]

Legolas got a chuckle out of me. Carry on Adami, don't listen to Chad.

[soupytwist]

I’ll give you Sushi. I’m better than that. But the Romulan characters, I honestly can’t remember their names. Elron? I dunno.

Elrond, surely 

Someone with far more Voyager knowledge than me said the 'star gate tech' thingy was in an episode of that show.  I presume the idea here being the Borg assimilated whatever race that was and took the tech.  Still doesn't explain your issue with it though (which I agree with).

[ZirconBlue]

For those who may not be aware, Wil Wheaton hosts a "Ready Room" episode after each episode of Picard that talks about some of the events of the episodes with various creators, actors, crew, etc.  One of his trivia questions was about when that tech first appeared.  (S1 or 2 of Voyager, IIRC).

[Adami]

I know ST has had star gate technology before and it wouldn't surprise me if the Borg had it too. I just thought the way the episode portrayed its use was dumb.

Also, I don't watch those kinds of reviews since they are inherently bias toward positive reviews. I'd rather watch people who have no incentive to be extra kind and supportive.


Ah well. Big reunion this week. We'll see how it goes.