Spoilers Star Trek: Picard 1x08 - "Broken Pieces"

Discussion in 'Star Trek: Picard' started by pst, Mar 5, 2020.

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Rate Episode 1x08 "Broken Pieces"

  1. 10 - Fenris Rangers

    57 vote(s)
    24.3%
  2. 9

    93 vote(s)
    39.6%
  3. 8

    48 vote(s)
    20.4%
  4. 7

    19 vote(s)
    8.1%
  5. 6

    7 vote(s)
    3.0%
  6. 5

    6 vote(s)
    2.6%
  7. 4

    1 vote(s)
    0.4%
  8. 3

    1 vote(s)
    0.4%
  9. 2

    1 vote(s)
    0.4%
  10. 1 - Power Rangers

    2 vote(s)
    0.9%
  1. cooleddie74

    cooleddie74 Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    The Greg Cox Eugenics Wars novels begin, I believe, in 1970. Khan was conceived and born in that year if I'm not mistaken and there was an accelerated growth program that allowed him to reach maturity and look like 1960s Ricardo Montalban by the time he seized power over his empire in South Asia and the Middle East.
     
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  2. Thomas Elliot

    Thomas Elliot Commander Red Shirt

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    It's not the number of times you've responded but how you respond, ignoring what one of the show's writer's said and even contradicting yourself at times. You said it could be completely random that it would be a group of all-women and that it shouldn't imply anything at all, yet you also said it could be evidence of ceremonies that are segregated by sex. I merely wanted to know if there was a reason. You went on a rant that it doesn't matter. You went on a rant that it doesn't matter. One of the writers of Picard, Michael Chabon said that Romulan society is matriarchal and Rhiansuu hint at that as well. Okay, that might be why they portrayed Oh's group as all women. To convey that idea without having to actually say it. An example of show, don't tell. Yet you still insisted that the scene couldn't possibly have any meaning, when it seems like there's evidence that it might.
    But you keep going on and on that it doesn't matter, an same gendered group is totally coincidental, etc etc. If a writer is trying to convey a group being random, they'd probably have them be an uneven mix of male and female. If not, it might be for a particular reason related to the story, maybe it's an internal bias on the part of the writer, or maybe it's supposed to reflect society at the time (ex old movies showing US soldiers as being all-male VS. movies set in modern times showing US soldiers being made up of men and women soldiers).

    From where it was in TNG? I'd say it's arguable. I don't recall "bad-ass" women being a focus in TNG. It was male-centric in that regard. We got plenty of typical alpha-male scenes with Riker unbelievably taking down a Klingon officer that's towering over him, Worf being the #1 bad-ass who takes takes out the evil Duras and avenges his mate after she was put in the 'fridge. He's also depicted as a stereotypical male, closed off from his emotions and stoic. Klingon warrior culture itself was heavily male-centric that evoked Japanese bushido. Women were shown early on being soldiers in that S2 Riker episode, but after that it seemed like it was a male-centric warrior culture. And I think Picard was portrayed as a reckless bad ass in his youth, and even got a John McClane episode. And Picard was the patriarchal figure to the entire crew, and who mostly lectured everyone else about the moral thing to do.
    Now we have a show where we see a female-centric warrior sect that evokes Japanese bushido. The #1 bad-ass initially is Dahj/Soji who has all the great hand-to-hand combat scenes, and takes all the bad guys in superhero-like fashion. The second one is Elnor, who's a man but was raised by an all-female warrior sect, and who is sensitive and soft at times. And now Picard is now the one being lectured too and put in his place, mostly by women.


    I never said it was a political message about women "speaking truth to power/Picard." That's you inserting your own assumptions into the conversation and assigning what you think is my intent.

    I never said that was the focus of the series. You're creating strawman arguments.

    That's interesting. So you're argument that Riker was lecturing Picard in the same way as Troi, but if it happened prior to Picard uncharacteristically giving shit to Soji about her fears, then apparently Riker's lecturing was ineffective whereas Troi's was successful, because after Troi told Picard off, his second round with trying to convince Soji went better.


    And I rewatched that scene where Soji is telling Deanna that she can't be sure of anything, her voice is shaking, she's about to cry, and tells Deanna that she can't trust her and especially not Picard, and then Picard interrupts and is basically and insensitive asshole to her. Holy shit was that out of character for him, whether it be TNG Picard or PIC Picard.
     
  3. Thomas Elliot

    Thomas Elliot Commander Red Shirt

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    TNG was the original SJW show of it's time. That awkward episode that was supposed to deal with the subject of homophobia. The climate change episode about warp drive. The McCarthy hearing. Great show but it could be very cringey at times with it's lack of subtlety.

    And I have to take issue with "forcing SJW rubbish in my Star Trek."
    They're not forcing anything. If they were tampering with old TNG episodes ala George Lucas, okay, that would be forcing something into Star Trek. But this is new series for a new generation of viewers. Yeah, they want the Star Trek fanbase to be on board, but they want to create a new fanbase too. And while you might dislike it, or I may think it's a little too on-the-nose at times, others might not even notice those things, and others might think it's great and more relatable.

    I have an old Omni Magazine from 1991. There's an article titled "Boldly Going Nowhere" written by Melinda Snodgrass, a former Star Trek executive consultant. This is what she said about TNG at the time:

    "...And there are apparently no emotions. All of which combines to create a stultifying forty-seven miniutes in front of your television. The essence of drama is conflict and there's none to be found in the new Star Trek....[TOS] was swashbuckling, far better entertainment than ST:TNG, which reflects the stodgy, self-righteous Reagan-Bus New World Order."

    Every iteration of Star Trek is apparently going to feel un-Trek like to some people.

    I have at least three gay co-workers. I think they're just trying to either have it representative of society, or reach a segment of viewers who belong to the LGBTQ community. Which I don't see that there's anything wrong with that.

    I haven't watched DSC but if that's the case, it might be a little too obvious that there trying to be progressive or something to that affect. However, Star Trek takes place in the future and has always been something that showed humanity being better than we are now. So while it's common to have a majority of men on the police force or in the military, in Star Trek's future, maybe it's the reverse, which wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing either. And maybe the producers are trying to go after the female science fiction/action adventure audience. Superhero films are very popular with women these days so they're trying something new, or better, reacting to a trend of women in more prominent action roles.


    I hate to see Picard portrayed so out of character at times, but it doesn't hurt to do something different for the character considering we got 7 solid seasons of the character that are still easily available on many streaming platforms.

    Is this really how you feel or is this just something you heard from someone else? Because I've heard this exact same language used by people, usually YouTubers, with their own socio-political agenda.
     
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  4. Kpnuts

    Kpnuts Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    That was really weird. Almost as if it was an excuse for Troi to condescendingly lecture Picard for what felt like the next 5 minutes about how to treat women right. His comment was really out of character and out of the blue. Same with him mistreating Raffi and never checking in on her after she was kicked out of Starfleet.

    There's a big difference. They were trying to tell a story. It wasn't subtle but it didn't need to be, it was the main focus of the episode.

    Do you work in a team of 7?

    Forcing and tampering are two separate things. I'm willing to bet that in the season finale of Picard, if they show the advanced AI race, it will be led by a female being. They'd be on a role after the Qowat Milat, Zhat Vash Admonition group, Head of Starfleet Security, Big boss of Freecloud and leader of Coppelius, may as well keep it up.
     
  5. Kpnuts

    Kpnuts Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    I'm all for being progressive, but not to the extent these Trek shows go. Like I said, if we're talking secondary characters outside of the main Discovery crew in season 2:

    Female:
    Georgiou
    Cornwell
    Detmer
    Owo
    Airiam
    Nhan
    L'Rell
    Amanda
    Doctor Kashkooli
    May
    Admiral Patar
    75% of the Enterprise bridge

    Male:
    Leland
    Sarek

    The only other non-main-crew male character in a Stafleet uniform was the white guy who got killed in a fiery explosion as he was condescendingly lecturing two women on how to do their jobs properly.

    Come on.
     
  6. CorporalClegg

    CorporalClegg Admiral Admiral

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    If we average the old casts, it comes out to more than 2:1 in favor of men.

    Given the ratio of men to women amongst the population, the law of averages suggests it would eventually swing the other direction, assuming all things being equal.

    But then, all things aren't equal, are they?
     
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  7. fireproof78

    fireproof78 Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    Nope. Sauce for the gander is not sauce for the goose in this instance.
     
  8. Thomas Elliot

    Thomas Elliot Commander Red Shirt

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    I can't comment on DSC because I only caught a brief bit of a mirror-universe episode and it wasn't very good. I probably won't watch it any time soon either.
    If it as bad as people say it is, I don't let it bother me. All good things come to an end, right? I personally don't want Star Trek to go on forever. I grew up on TNG and I felt like it offered a great counter to the negative entertainment I was consuming at the time. I enjoyed it immensely and by the time the whole thing wrapped up I felt like I had this epic, life-time adventure with this group of friends in the span of a mere 7 years.
    DS9 was okay, but more like off-brand Trek at the time.
    Voyager sucked.
    Oh but wait, I hadn't even seen the TOS films! I saw those as an adult and loved them all. The odd numbered ones suck? No way, they were all great. So in my short life I already got my fix of two grand scale Star Trek epics featuring two completely different eras and generations.

    I think it was maybe a remedy to give Troi some strong character moments, considering how her character was treated in the past. She got raped by Shinzon in the movies, and made to carry an unwanted child in TNG. She was in low-cut spandex for the majority of the series and is constantly mocked these days for making useless observations.
    It was a little eye-rolling for me but whatever.

    I can't see Picard not inquiring about her or checking in on her after all that. But in order for him to have this arc they need to change his character. The old generation who has to learn from the younger generation what they/he did wrong, but who also has wisdom they can benefit from.

    But to be fair, TNG was episodic, and this is like one, single story.

    Close to that, yes.

    I would imagine that this advanced AI race might be analogous to having a non-binary approach to gender. Something that has some basis in our current culture and also conveys the notion that this race is truly different from our own and even Soji's synth family. Or maybe they'll just be some shutterstock gifs.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Mar 25, 2020
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  9. cooleddie74

    cooleddie74 Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    Your pain runs deep. Share it with us!!!
     
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  10. AresB

    AresB Commander Red Shirt

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    Alexander Siddig said once in an interview, that if you saw a black person speaking with an Arabic person in any other TV show in the 90's, they were doing a drug deal. In DS9, they were the Captain and the Doctor speaking of the business at hand and doing their duty for the welfare of the station. They're not defined by what they are, but what they do. That goes for the new series as well.
     
    Last edited: Mar 25, 2020
  11. Awesome Possum

    Awesome Possum Moddin' Admiral

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    Looks like you're trying to find a problem that isn't really a problem outside of your head. The second season adds Captain Pike, Spock, continues to develop Tyler, and gives Saru a ton of character development. But you ignore all that because there's a lot of female characters too. This is completely irrational obsession and it's ruining your ability to enjoy media, it's not good for you.
     
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  12. cooleddie74

    cooleddie74 Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    Ironic that you complain about no strong male characters when THE LEAD CHARACTER THAT THIS SERIES IS NAMED AFTER IS A STRONG MALE CHARACTER. But continue.
     
  13. Kpnuts

    Kpnuts Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    That was great. If the Discovery producers were in charge, they'd have introduced seven Arabic characters.
     
  14. Kpnuts

    Kpnuts Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Keep missing the point, it's hilarious :lol:
     
  15. cooleddie74

    cooleddie74 Fleet Admiral Admiral

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  16. Makarov

    Makarov Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    Soji was kind of an ass in this ep

    Picard was assimilated and also lived an entire fake life in the inner light and even he didnt start being a jerk and mistrusting everyone like Soji did in this episode
     
  17. Cyrus

    Cyrus Vice Admiral Admiral

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    you are gay and complaining about 3 gay characters on Discovery (and apparently OK that there were no gay characters on any of other Trek shows)? Interesting! If Discovery had 3 Persian characters you wouldn't see me complaining, I would be thrilled.
     
    Last edited: Mar 26, 2020
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  18. fireproof78

    fireproof78 Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    Good!
     
  19. Thomas Elliot

    Thomas Elliot Commander Red Shirt

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    But again, if the series is to take place, far off in the future, wouldn't it be more likely that majority of a Federation crew wouldn't be overwhelmingly white or "western"?
    So if they had seven Arabic characters on the bridge, I might think the producers are trying to appeal to the growing Arabic population in the U.S. When you're able to see what the producers are doing, for commercial purposes or otherwise, it runs the risk of taking you out the story for a bit.
    However, to someone else, it's like, great. Not the same Hollywood, majority white/culturally western people being depicted as the heroes. And taking it a step further, it might help others get more into the this fantasy story. 400 years from now, maybe Arabic characters, or whatever group, might be represented more in one particular situation or organization. If anything, that's more realistic in a way. If you look at the tech jobs from 60 years ago, you'd probably see mostly all white males. Now, the tech industry is so much more diverse and you might see a particular ethnic group represented much more in your group, at work, or in the industry itself.
    While TOS is great, it failed in its depiction of the future by having all the captains be men.
     
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  20. fireproof78

    fireproof78 Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    What needs to be reiterated is TOS was good for its time. Star Trek is can rest on its laurels all it wants but culture and society has moved on.
     
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