• Welcome! The TrekBBS is the number one place to chat about Star Trek with like-minded fans.
    If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Spoilers Picard 1x1, "Remembrance"

Rate the episode


  • Total voters
    473
Spoilers, so ye have been warned.

Visually? Gorgeous. Just gorgeous. The cinematography may be the best thing about this series so far.
Emotionally? Nostalgia hits hard right away, and I did cry more than a few tears as those memories bubbled to the surface.
Thematically? Relevant to the state of the world now, which is a very good sign if you're Star Trek.

I don't care much about canon, or anything like that, so if they play a little fast and loose with it that won't bother me at all. That being said, it is nice to see them touch back on the memories of what came before, and it looks like we have a nice little mystery on our hands. I love a good mystery. The first episode did what it needed to do. We know where Picard is now, we know parts of what happened to get him here, and we're starting to see the show runners fill in the spaces piece by piece, but doing it in a way that feels natural. Not once did I think "that seems convoluted," or "this feels too odd to fit the story." Everything seemed to flow from one scene to the next, and after the first 20 minutes, the pieces had started creating a broader picture. I'm going to assume that we were to draw the conclusion early on that Dahj was either synthetic in part or in whole, and that Picard's connection to Data was going to play a role in the story.The pilot sets up why Picard is on a new mission, why he's, unofficially, coming out of retirement, and I think it works. So we know where to go.

We know where we've been, we know where we are, we know where to go.
So far, so good.

Quibbles: Eh, few. I give pilots extra leeway because they're having to find their feet, and that takes time. Still, if I have quibbles, it's with Isa Briones, the woman who plays Dahj. It's not really her fault, but her scenes with Picard are a little rough for me. I chalk that up to a younger, newer actor being in the same presence as someone with Patrick Stewart's skill and ability. On the other hand, Alison Pill's Dr. Jurati seems right at home with Stewart, and I put that to Alison's much better honed skills. It was really good to see her, by the way. She's a very good actor, and I like seeing her in the Star Trek universe.

So I would say this was a very good first start. Since "very good" isn't an option, however, I will vote "Excellent," for the excellent decision to make this show happen.
 
The only little nitpick I have is when Picard says that millions of lives were at stake when the supernova was going to blow. The writers need to think bigger. A star going supernova close to Romulus would threaten billions if not trillions of lives.
 
They did everything correctly. The nods to the fans were endearing and were not done in an annoying or intrusive way. Everything I had hoped they'd address gradually over the course of the entire series was done perfectly in a single episode: they referenced the last episode of TNG, tied in the ending of Nemesis, and incorporated elements of the god-awful J. J. Abrams movie in an amazing way that makes sense. Speaking of making sense, the Federation is flawed in a very believable way that both avoids mustache twirling and ties perfectly into their history of being after Data. The story is engaging, the acting and the characters both old and new are great, the music, special affects, action scenes and fighting choreography are all stellar, the wring is solid, and Captain Picard is still 100% Captain Picard, except that now he drinks decaffeinated Earl Grey (like I said, the nods to the fans were ENDEARING). I had incredibly high hopes and, to my pleasant surprise, I'm not disappointed at all.
I loved the first episode of Picard. It's the best Star Trek movie I've ever seen, and I can't wait to see more.
 
Oh, and another thing...remember how the first time Dahj was attacked, one of the attackers requested the other "use English?"

I know there are a lot of Romulan refugees now, and some of them may prefer to use English instead, but that really seems to suggest to me that some of the assailants are not Romulan, but human.

I would assume that English is still referred to as English, even to alien species. As seen with Picard speaking French, there are still multiple human languages in play in the 24th century.

I took that piece of dialogue to mean, "don't let them link it back to us Romulan's!"

I quite enjoyed this, but I'd still like a more traditional Trek show. I'm hoping a Pike series will fill that niche.

I think the time of "traditional Trek" is over. And good, because there's 700 episodes or so of that already...we'd just be getting the same thing, and recycled stories, but with new CGI.

Yes, could be. And a very similar thing could partly explain what happened in S1, with the firing of Bryan Fuller. I'm not saying the writers on Discovery are bad, just that the writing is bad. The reasons for that could be many, including as you say, the writers' hand being forced by all of this political BS. Hopefully, we're reaching some kind fo steady state here and things will stabilize.

Fuller's firing meant they actually fleshed out the story a bit more before going into the stuff he wanted to do. The mirror universe stories were meant to start in like the 4th episode, rather than the 9th that they bumped it to in the final version, once Fuller was gone.

Well, I watched most of it this morning. CBS All Access dropped signal twice. And what the hell is with all the commercials? I'm paying to watch commercials?

CBSAA gives you two price options, no? One with commercials, one without?

So Discovery is akin to some CW show or JJ Abrams show that makes it up as they go along and Picard will be like, a good show?

I don't know why, but I thought we'd at least get 24 hours past the release of Picard before the bitching about Discovery would enter the conversation. It's been out 10 hours, and already we're getting throwbacks to the DS9/VOY bitching when they were both on air at the same time.

Let's hope that people who enjoy both Discovery and Picard can safely enjoy reading these threads, without thinking they're being baited into debates comparing the two.

She hasn't done much else before this because she's still very young, but if her acting in this episode is any indication, I suspect Isa Briones (Dahj + a dual role) is destined for a long career. She delivered some emotional scenes, and partnered well with Stewart. I hope this is a breakout role for her.

I loved her, after this first episode. Incredibly humble in all her interviews, too, and just seems to love having the opportunity to do this show. I think she'll be the one to go on to big things after this show is done.

Just realized that Dahj's boyfriend is Xahean, like Po from Discovery.

Hadn't even noticed that. Great touch.

I wasn't blown away by this. It's a Discovery type show, I mean that there are a lot of mysteries set up in this that won't be paid off until somewhere down the line.

Serialised television. That's the nature of the beast, these days, and I'm incredibly grateful for it.

5/10

Some quality acting saves otherwise mediocre writing, pacing and storytelling. It is just the first episode. Long way to go. A 2nd season is already on tap so I am happy to stay tuned but not off to a good start. A 5/10 is generous.

Gosh, we're all entitled to our opinions, but I honestly find this a crazy take. I dare say that it doesn't seem likely much will change about the show that will bring it to your liking, though.
 
"Excellent". Nice callbacks, but not too many. Picard's bitterness during the interview...wow, he really nailed that.

I agree the cinematography was top notch. I felt the quality of such stuff on DSC was a bit lacking, but not here. WhyTF is that?

This episode alone was worth getting CBSAA for myself.
 
Well, they did mention at one point that the rescue armada's original intent was to relocate 900 million Romulans.

Even now, Earth has a population of 7.53 billion. 900 million Romulans does seem like a small figure. I suppose one could gather that the Romulans would be able to do some relocation of their own and if other civilizations joined in the efforts, it could be a reasonable number. I still question the idea of building an entirely new "armada" to do this job, but whatever.
 
Both also present dodgy science as their backbone of the series contexts, in Picard's case, the idea that Data can be wholly reconstructed from a single positronic neuron in the same way that in Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy suggested you could extrapolate the entire universe from a single piece of fairy cake.

I signed up only to answer this

Its possible to clone the same human being using just one cell. We have literally done this with animals already, and there numerous examples of it is in trek. If it can be done on a human there is no reason why it couldn't be done on android.

Sorry its real. I know you want to bash it as much as possible,
 
It improves on the second viewing. I still need to see more to love it, but I like it. I never even liked Discovery, so I have hope that this will restore my faith in new TV Trek. I felt a little more emotional the 2nd time with the Data angle, too. There are some plot holes but we have 9 episodes for everything to be fully explained. If what the critics say is true and we stay Earthbound and slow paced for the next two episodes at least, that's okay with me. I'll let everything unfold.
 
I signed up only to answer this

Its possible to clone the same human being using just one cell. We have literally done this with animals already, and there numerous examples of it is in trek. If it can be done on a human there is no reason why it couldn't be done on android.

Sorry its real. I know you want to bash it as much as possible,
Reconstructing Data's personality from one neuron strikes me as far different than cloning an animal. That animal would not possess the same memories as the source material.

It's not a one to one comparison.
I think the time of "traditional Trek" is over. And good, because there's 700 episodes or so of that already...we'd just be getting the same thing, and recycled stories, but with new CGI.
I think that it is OK for traditional Trek to be over right now. I think it is time for something new and to, dare I say it, boldly go, even if it isn't for everyone.
 
Even now, Earth has a population of 7.53 billion. 900 million Romulans does seem like a small figure. I suppose one could gather that the Romulans would be able to do some relocation of their own and if other civilizations joined in the efforts, it could be a reasonable number. I still question the idea of building an entirely new "armada" to do this job, but whatever.

While not explicitly stated, I read the 900 million as "the number the Romulans won't be able to get out themselves after they do their own thing."
 
Even now, Earth has a population of 7.53 billion. 900 million Romulans does seem like a small figure. I suppose one could gather that the Romulans would be able to do some relocation of their own and if other civilizations joined in the efforts, it could be a reasonable number. I still question the idea of building an entirely new "armada" to do this job, but whatever.

Its very unlikely that the future earth would have a population in billions. If you consider that human beings from earth are going to spread out into the Galaxy, into ships and different colonies combined with how few children there are in the trek universe. In the entire TNG cast, there are only two parents with 1 child each. If you expand that out, Sisko only has a kid, Tuvok has kids but thats it

I think its pretty safe to assume that the birth rate in the trek universe would be something like 0.5 or less. Not to mention that the Romulans are not native to the Romulan system,
 
"Excellent". Nice callbacks, but not too many. Picard's bitterness during the interview...wow, he really nailed that.

I agree the cinematography was top notch. I felt the quality of such stuff on DSC was a bit lacking, but not here. WhyTF is that?

This episode alone was worth getting CBSAA for myself.
I paid $13 to see Picard, and felt like I got my money's worth. That's about the highest compliment I can give. :lol:

Reconstructing Data's personality from one neuron strikes me as far different than cloning an animal. That animal would not possess the same memories as the source material.

It's not a one to one comparison.

I think that it is OK for traditional Trek to be over right now. I think it is time for something new and to, dare I say it, boldly go, even if it isn't for everyone.
Fractal cloning. Most likely completely made up science, but the use of "fractal" in that description matters:

Dictionary said:
Fractal

An object whose parts, at infinitely many levels of magnification, appear geometrically similar to the whole. Fractals are used in the design of compact antennas and for computer modeling of natural-looking structures like clouds and trees.

So it's stretchy enough to work just fine.
 
Reconstructing Data's personality from one neuron strikes me as far different than cloning an animal. That animal would not possess the same memories as the source material.
.

Dahj literally did not have Data's memories. She had it in her programming (Likely inserted by Maddox) to find Picard if she is in trouble.

Did you watch the episode?
 
Even now, Earth has a population of 7.53 billion. 900 million Romulans does seem like a small figure. I suppose one could gather that the Romulans would be able to do some relocation of their own and if other civilizations joined in the efforts, it could be a reasonable number. I still question the idea of building an entirely new "armada" to do this job, but whatever.

Population is actually more likely to decline as the quality of life increases, not increase. Very few offsprings are in the trek universe, and almost no large families.
 
5/10

Some quality acting saves otherwise mediocre writing, pacing and storytelling. It is just the first episode. Long way to go. A 2nd season is already on tap so I am happy to stay tuned but not off to a good start. A 5/10 is generous.

The correct number is 6/10.
 
If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Sign up / Register


Back
Top