Spoilers Star Trek: Picard 1x04 - "Absolute Candor"

I love the series. The only disappointment is the way Oh and Rizzo characters are written and acted. They are mustache twirling and threatening whoever they are talking to in every scene. The writing has been mostly fantastic but Chabon needs to clean this part up.

 

Picard didn't know that (Elnor was still in a huff just before he'd left the nuns).

Elnor just showed up out of nowhere.

 

He ragequit?

 

I think the show runners are framing the show as a very personal journey for Picard, which is why it may feel slow for some.

No doubt it will spawn at least one spinoff around Rios (who returns to Starfleet) or Soji.

 

Apologies, I thought he held his comm badge to his ear but from watching it again on a larger screen, it turned out he had a ear piece in. I don’t know why he just didn’t wear his badge. He had it on at the beginning.

 

I saw it more as an act of desperation (resignation) followed by despair, he knew he couldn't even attempt it without the Federation/Starfleets help and couldn't believe they would go back on their word.

Not just to him but to the Romulans as well.

When the truth comes crashing down and he finally sees the truth.

 

That’s what I don’t understand. The Galaxy is more than the just Federation. Ask one one of the other powers to help. Sure it’s a long shot but he’s Picard. He has the power to persuade people with speech.

 

I tend to so it as well, but thinking over all the ways resigning could be interpreted, I think it's at least worthwhile to consider it as something more selfish.

 

I saw the scenario as Picard betting on Elnor following him and deliberately putting himself in danger and forcing his hand. Elnor represented his guilt personified and if he couldn't find redemption in his eyes then his quest was over anyway. It was already very clear by this point that his reasons for going there were not purely practical and could well run counter to good sense, so why not view the escapade through that lens?

Everything Picard is doing is about his own demons. There's no pragmatic reason to risk so many lives for the sake of a girl he has never met and knows nothing about, but he is finally facing up to what he, at least, sees as a failure and displaced in wasted anger for years against Starfleet.

In one moment he brought several facets of his failures to a head, with the Romulan people, with Elnor and with himself, much as he did by bringing Raffi into the fold. They are all people he abandoned in one form or another when he went into self imposed exile and his redemption wouldn't be complete if he didn't face that and, just maybe, get another chance in their eyes as well as his own.

 

Indeed, working on the assumption that Picard is without flaw would make a very dull and predictable arc. Far better that we see a decent man working to make up for the past than a perfect one the universe let down.

 

Indeed, it may be that what Picard "learns" is he must live with the shame.

 

Agreed but there are better ways to do that by not changing his character on that scale.

 

Best compliment you can make!

You are right about comparing to Stranger Things. It definitely played a role in the structure of the season. But you are wrong in your question. This IS the story, we’re 4 episodes into it. And this is what we’re going to get.

It really didn’t look like it.

Shhh, those are fighting words

Lol, F8 was not sentient.

 

The Romulans reaped what they had spent centuries sowing (mistrust and strife) in the Alpha and Beta quadrants, its not a surprise really that no one wanted to help them, plus there are not that many civilisations besides the Federation that are big enough to even attempt it.

Even the Federation/Starfleet was split on whether to do it or not with the attack on Mars being the final nail in the plans coffin, it is a colossal undertaking and it no doubt caused serious political instability within the Federation.

It didnt seem like it was selfish to me, it felt like an act of desperation followed by despair when the resignation was accepted.

As is often the case Picard only ever saw what he wanted to see until that day when he was forced to face it, would not surprise me if he had a mental breakdown over it.

Like I have said before, its easy to take the high road when everything is going your way.

 

At first, I thought so too. I am though reminded of an episode of some sitcom--I can't remember which--where the husband quits his job after a disagreement with the boss. He marches home, announcing his resignation triumphantly. The wife asks him if he did anything that would make it difficult for them to hire him back. Their circumstances had changed (was she pregnant?) that would make being unemployed extra difficult.

If it is just a matter of explaining Picard's separation from Starfleet, than resigning for his principles is a sufficient explanation. If the story is driving toward Picard coming to terms in some deeper way with what happened, then how his resignation affected other people--both actively and passively--is still front and center.

 

In what sense?

 

How was his character changed exactly? It's still Picard

 

I just don’t see Picard giving up that easily. Plus agreeing that the attack on Mars was just a malfunction makes him look very gullible. It was just too coordinated to be so.
He’s obviously a Synth.

 

What was the point of freezing the hologram? Didn’t work anyway since the fire was still going.

 

I think the penny finally dropped for Picard and he felt what it was like to be alone after so many decades within Starfleet (a bit like how a Borg drone feels when they are disconnected), he felt like Starfleet had abandoned him as well as the Romulans (which they had) just when it mattered the most.

It must have been quite the eye opener.

The show is definitely all about his personal journey and recovery from those events, its also going to end up being about finding the truth about what really happened.

Ultimately Picard doubled down and lost, possibly for the first time in his career and that has got to leave a mark, losing Data was a big hit on him but abandoning the Romulans must have been the last straw.