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Spoilers Star Trek: Picard 2x07 - "Monsters"

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Guy Gardener said:
First of all, irl, the Secret Service is charge of checking time travelers, not the FBI.

Second, its an immigration problem, so Picard is going to be dumped on the Mexican Border.
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Is this a U.S only thing? In France, immigrants destroy their passports so the authorities can't send them anywhere. And they somehow avoid being locked up until they give details (At least according to a French immigration official a few years ago)
In Australia, they just put them on an island in the middle of the Pacific and medical personnel can be prosecuted for speaking out about the hunger strikes and suicides there.
 
I’m learning that these season long arcs are really hard to view as standalone chapters. There’s a part of me that loves the anticipation of waiting from week to week to see what happens next but another part of me says, “Just drop the rest of the season already!” (But honestly if it was in one bingable chunk, I’m not sure if I’d be engaged as I am week to week.)

Having said all of that, in terms of JL’s arc, this was an interesting episode that was rather poorly placed. Putting him into a coma doesn’t make a lot of sense at this point. Maybe in the long run it will but it seems questionable here. Perhaps if they’d really spent more time throughout the season exploring this trauma for Picard. At least some more sprinkles throughout.

I did enjoy the Rios part of the episode and now I’m wondering if they won’t take Teresa and son into the future. That might be a step too far with the TVH references though.

The Jurati stuff is getting downright scary.
 
Yistaan said:
The revelation that the Q and El-Aurians were at war adds a very different light to Q Who where the Borg are introduced. Q let the Fed meet the Borg early to be prepared for them. The Q Continuum knew about the Borg but presumably didn't give the same help or warning to the El-Aurians and let them get assimilated.
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What about in the original Prime timeline?
 
Campe said:
I’m learning that these season long arcs are really hard to view as standalone chapters. There’s a part of me that loves the anticipation of waiting from week to week to see what happens next but another part of me says, “Just drop the rest of the season already!” (But honestly if it was in one bingable chunk, I’m not sure if I’d be engaged as I am week to week).
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I feel like we need to see how the season ends to really get the full picture. The season has some interesting elements, the confederation timeline, Picard dealing with repressed memories and fear, Borg from a space anomaly apparently needing help, Q losing his powers. We need to see how all these story elements connect. If the season sticks the landing, it might be really great.

I liked the line "the greatest teacher is our enemy". Picard's enemy are the Borg. I suspect Picard will learn something about the Borg or from the Borg. So this line will probably tie in with the Borg from episode 1.

I did like Picard saying that they need to understand Q. We've always seen Q being the one who plays games with Picard to teach him a lesson, but what are Q's motives?

I think Guinan not being able to summon Q, with the fact that Q has lost his powers, is a strong hint that something has happened to the Q Continuum. Perhaps the Q Continuum is gone? I suspect Q's ulterior motives are to save the Continuum. Maybe helping Picard overcome his fear and accept the Borg is part of Q's plan to save the Continuum?
 
I'm going to break with the developing consensus and say that was the best episode since the first two. I say this for two reasons primarily: That the format of the episode shifted considerably from the last several, and we actually begin to get some payoffs for plot threads which were dangled around in the beginning of the season.

The stuff in Picard's head was a bit of a confusing revelation once we reached the end of the story, it's true. I am glad they decided not to go for maximum trauma and make Picard's father into an abusive husband/father. But it was hard to see how this was that deep/dark of a secret in the end (although having a mother with mental illness could explain his fear of commitment). At first I was really perplexed how his "father" (who was just in his head) was providing revelations regarding what really happened, but Jean-Luc undoubtedly learned the truth regarding his mother as he got older, and just crafted narratives in his head to explain away how the mother he adored could have ended up this way. The explanation was really there for Tallinn (and us) not for Jean Luc himself, who was always aware of what had happened. I thought the "inside Picard's head" thing was enacted in a much more entertaining way than say Sloan's Brain on DS9 (though I was really missing Frakes' direction here).

Going round the rest of the plot, the stuff with Rios, Teresa, and her son continues to be well acted, a bit hokey, but ultimately heartwarming. The stuff with Seven and Raffi continues to be awful - I can't tell if they are given the worst lines (the scripting here continues to be pretty poor overall) or if it's just Michelle Hurd isn't as good of an actor as the rest. And then there's the curious decision the episode writers made to not conclude the episode at its obvious end, but append on a whole final act with Picard and Guinan in her bar. I don't know what to make of this because it's clearly Act 1 of next week, but was appended on here because...I guess episodes can't have closure or we'll stop watching?

Still, at least this episode was trying to do something other than just keep a bunch of stale B plots moving until the end of the season.
 
hxclespaulplayer said:
Is this a U.S only thing? In France, immigrants destroy their passports so the authorities can't send them anywhere. And they somehow avoid being locked up until they give details (At least according to a French immigration official a few years ago)
In Australia, they just put them on an island in the middle of the Pacific and medical personnel can be prosecuted for speaking out about the hunger strikes and suicides there.
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Things changed when Trump was in charge, and stayed changed after Biden got in.
 
Lakenheath 72 said:
As someone who has a mental disability, I am really disliking how they treat anyone with mental disabilities. They are a problem, so we move them somewhere where they can't be seen. Hell, we will lock them up in a room. They are cursed with a monster. What the hell kind of writing is this? Where is the 24th century sensibility on mental illness? There wasn't a time so long ago when people like me on the spectrum were relegated to mental asylums or into segregated workplaces because other people did not how to treat us fairly and equitably. Fuck these writers.
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That is one of my issues with this storyline.

Tuskin38 said:
I think you misunderstood the scenes.

This was Picard’s childhood brain interpreting what he experienced. Not what literally happened.
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Yes, on the surface level, Picard had to realize that monsters did not abduct his mother, and that his father wasn't a monster.

At the same time, the madwoman in his proverbial attic - pardon, basement - had to be exorcised from his subconscious. She was, however unwittingly, the real monster who threatened his liefe AND mental well-being.

Just like she was, apparently, exorcised from his life and the rest of society, albeit hopefully under more humane conditions than in the past. No hope to get better, no mind melds for her... Just erased from Jean-Luc's life.

Whatever happened, apparently nobody thought of talking to young Picard or giving him the counseling he would need. I don't think the 24th century is perfect, but I'd expect it to be a bit more progressive than ours, and even we know kids need support after such a drastic experience and change.

Maybe I'm wrong and I missed something, or we'll learn that things played out differently. So far, nothing seems to be very well thought out.

Smaller complaints are:
Raffi and Seven go to check on Jurati's whereabouts becaue they know something's wrong with her, but are in no hurry whatsoever. Sure, let's throw in some bick... bantering first!

(Oh, you want to spend old age together? Why? Because you're having so much fun now? Anyway... Although, watching them trip up teenagers might actually be fun.)

On the bright side. I am interested in finally exploring what's up with Q, so there's that.

Question: Was the counselling supposed to really have taken place at some time in Picard's life? I mean, what's with the phrase "Even your close friends call you Captain"? Raffi's called him JL for ages, and didn't Beverly call him Jean-Luc? Troi even?
 
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I like the introspection, which apparently puts me in the minority. Picard is basically saying everyone needs to process their trauma to save the world or all of time or something.

I’m not sure if all of Picard’s problems stem from the conflict between his fragile, bipolar mother, who drew him into her fantasy world, and the apparently rigid father he blamed for whatever tragic end his mother met, but it’s as good a psychological explanation as anything else. I like the young actor who plays little Jean-Luc.

I suppose they’ll deal with what’s wrong with Q in the next episode.
 
So it looks like mental illness seems to be playing an important role this season. What with Q"s rage and megalomania, Renee's depression, Picard keeping all of his trauma bottled up, and now Yvette's bi-polar disorder(?).

I have concerns that with the number of loose plot threads that need to be wrapped up in the next three episodes that most of them won't be satisfactorily.
 
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James Callis: thumbs up.

Most of stuck in the mind: schlocky but serviceable.

Everything else: oh boy. Others have summed up my sentiments well enough.

However, what in the name of Bonaparte's balls was with Guinan summoning Q like a frackin' genie after informing Picard of a Cold War between The Continuum and her people? That's just of the scale.

Remember The Borg assimilating the El Aurian race? Remember when Picard saved a wounded Guinan in a mine under 19th Century San Francisco? Remember Soran being blown to bits by his trilithium weapon?

You're telling me this very mortal race (albeit long lived and with some spooky temporal awareness) had a stand off with The Q Continuum - a race capable of effortlessly manipulating space, time and matter on a cosmic scale? Looking forward to some answers here chaps. Phew.
 
StarMan said:
James Callis: thumbs up.

Most of stuck in the mind: schlocky but serviceable.

Everything else: oh boy. Others have summed up my sentiments well enough.

However, what in the name of Bonaparte's balls was with Guinan summoning Q like a frackin' genie after informing Picard of a Cold War between The Continuum and her people? That's just of the scale.

Remember The Borg assimilating the El Aurian race? Remember when Picard saved a wounded Guinan in a mine under 19th Century San Francisco? Remember Soran being blown to bits by his trilithium weapon?

You're telling me this very mortal race (albeit long lived and with some spooky temporal awareness) had a stand off with The Q Continuum - a race capable of effortlessly manipulating space, time and matter on a cosmic scale? Looking forward to some answers here chaps. Phew.
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Except a lot of that happened only in the original Prime timeline.

Still, the El-Aurians never struck me as a non-corporeal race posing as solids.
 
eschaton said:
, it's true. I am glad they decided not to go for maximum trauma and make Picard's father into an abusive husband/father. But it was hard to see how this was that deep/dark of a secret in the end (although having a mother with mental illness could explain his fear of commitment).
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I think Tallin says something like "there is more to the story you are not telling". So I think there is more than just the mother had a mental illness. I wonder if they will say that the mother took her own life. That would definitely add to the trauma.
 
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