But they were all solved in one episode, maybe two. If you drag a mystery out past its shelf life, like DISCO and PICARD have both done, it does neither the mystery or the shows a favor.
Spoilers Did Picard finally ''right the ship'' with Picard season 3?
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But they were all solved in one episode, maybe two. If you drag a mystery out past its shelf life, like DISCO and PICARD have both done, it does neither the mystery or the shows a favor.
I think you forgot to add, "in your opinion". And for the record, I disagree.
I'm really a bit tired of the constant serial vs episodic debate. Take or leave what you don't like I guess.
To address the first post; Highs and lows for both season of Picard for me. I wouldn't go as far to say it went so off the rails it needs correcting. So far, Good cast, check. Mysterious storyline, check. Our serial-hating friends probably won't enjoy it!
Source please, and don’t link a YouTube video,
That isn’t what you said. You said they changed showrunners. Season 3 had consistent showrunners.
I'm okay with a season-long mystery arc as long as it's well-planned and has a satisfying payoff.
The Kelpian crying over his mommy causing the 'Burn' as the season-long mystery.... that's when I realized I can't with Discovery anymore.
Picard S3 has to be better that what has come before in recent years. I'm already impressed that it's gotten many reviewers who have been critical of past recent seasons to change their tune, swallow their pride, and sing the praises of this season. Shows that there's always hope for a great comeback.
The Kelpian crying over his mommy causing the 'Burn' as the season-long mystery.... that's when I realized I can't with Discovery anymore.
Picard S3 has to be better that what has come before in recent years. I'm already impressed that it's gotten many reviewers who have been critical of past recent seasons to change their tune, swallow their pride, and sing the praises of this season. Shows that there's always hope for a great comeback.
You missed out on the great Season 4 then.
IMDb, industry articles from 2019, WGA credit rules...
I said...
I commend the reviewers for sticking their necks out with their own skeptical audiences saying they can't give something they like a bad review just because of one name on the end credits. And then using their channels to promote the season, even if Star Trek isn't the best source of views.
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Season 1 was great till it flopped like a 15 year veteran NBA guard at the end. Season 2 had promise, but never quite delivered. It still had great moments. Both set the bar high for themselves and were doomed to disappoint. Season 3 looks to be an 30 year class reunion, so it was never going to really that great. But if its enjoyable, that's all that matters.
This makes me far more, rather than less, sceptical about the show. The opinions of self-appointed “Guardians of Real Trek” (patent pending), with their checklists of “what must be” have been, at best, inane. Finding out they are happy to see the boxes on the list ticked off makes me wary, not happy.
I’ve been watching Trek for 50 years. What I want to see in new Trek is a willingness to explore new angles, even if imperfectly, rather than a simple recapitulation of “the greatest hits” (I’ve seen all of them multiple times). Picard interested me as a series in direct proportion to its dissimilarity with TNG. I’ll still watch it, but I’m less, not more, excited by “getting the band back together”(every iteration of Trek has entertained me to some degree—save Prodigy, though I don’t slag it or say “it’s not REAL Trek”—it’s ALL real Trek).
Picard is the #1 show on Paramount+.
https://flixpatrol.com/top10/paramount-plus/united-states/2023-02-21/
Now, how long it stays there is another matter.
In terms of top 10-15 streaming shows overall, that gets doninated by Netflix shows. More subscribers. 10 of the top 15 overall, and 13 of the top 15originals.
https://www.nielsen.com/insights/2023/streaming-unwrapped-2022-was-the-year-of-original-content/
FWIW, Business Insider used to publish a monthy-most streamed list via Parrot Analytics. Both Picard and SNW would make the list when new episodes were airing, but not for long after the run ended. No Disco that I could find.
Cannot find it now, but I believe I posted them in the S2 "Failure" thread if anyone wants to go digging.
https://flixpatrol.com/top10/paramount-plus/united-states/2023-02-21/
Now, how long it stays there is another matter.
In terms of top 10-15 streaming shows overall, that gets doninated by Netflix shows. More subscribers. 10 of the top 15 overall, and 13 of the top 15originals.
https://www.nielsen.com/insights/2023/streaming-unwrapped-2022-was-the-year-of-original-content/
FWIW, Business Insider used to publish a monthy-most streamed list via Parrot Analytics. Both Picard and SNW would make the list when new episodes were airing, but not for long after the run ended. No Disco that I could find.
Cannot find it now, but I believe I posted them in the S2 "Failure" thread if anyone wants to go digging.
FWIW, the posts mentioned above were in the S2 "What do we think now that it is done" thread.
For March, April, and May (1 episode) it was in the top 10 each month, in terms 9f times more streamed than average and had good Rotten Tomato scores.
March:
3rd overall. Behind Stranger Things and Mandolorian. RT of 90% = T4th behind the above 2 + Ted Lasso.
https://www.businessinsider.com/top-streaming-shows-of-march-our-flag-means-death-picard-2022-4?op=1
April:
Drops to 6th. RT score of 86% tied 6th.
https://www.businessinsider.com/top...on-2022-5?op=1#6-star-trek-picard-paramount-4
May:
Picacard down to 9th. Only 1 ep aired in May. RT score of 86% still tied for 6th of the 9. Bettering Ozark & Bridgerton.
SNW was 5th, with the #1 RT score.
https://www.businessinsider.com/top...gs-2022-6?op=1#9-star-trek-picard-paramount-1
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While I think is is certainly possible for good shows to get poor ratings and bad shows good ones, it seems PIC S2 did pretty well over the course of it's run on both counts. Despite the flaws.
I mean, everything else on thosd lists are hits. Stranger Things. Mandalorian. Ted Lasso. Bridgerton. Ozark. Wandavision. Outside the Trek bubble, the show seems pretty well watched with a solid RT score.
It is hard to argue such a show needed "righted" on a base level. It was doing well.
For March, April, and May (1 episode) it was in the top 10 each month, in terms 9f times more streamed than average and had good Rotten Tomato scores.
March:
3rd overall. Behind Stranger Things and Mandolorian. RT of 90% = T4th behind the above 2 + Ted Lasso.
https://www.businessinsider.com/top-streaming-shows-of-march-our-flag-means-death-picard-2022-4?op=1
April:
Drops to 6th. RT score of 86% tied 6th.
https://www.businessinsider.com/top...on-2022-5?op=1#6-star-trek-picard-paramount-4
May:
Picacard down to 9th. Only 1 ep aired in May. RT score of 86% still tied for 6th of the 9. Bettering Ozark & Bridgerton.
SNW was 5th, with the #1 RT score.
https://www.businessinsider.com/top...gs-2022-6?op=1#9-star-trek-picard-paramount-1
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While I think is is certainly possible for good shows to get poor ratings and bad shows good ones, it seems PIC S2 did pretty well over the course of it's run on both counts. Despite the flaws.
I mean, everything else on thosd lists are hits. Stranger Things. Mandalorian. Ted Lasso. Bridgerton. Ozark. Wandavision. Outside the Trek bubble, the show seems pretty well watched with a solid RT score.
It is hard to argue such a show needed "righted" on a base level. It was doing well.
Well, the way trends work, the next era is a direct reaction to the last. So the 2030s will be very anti-20th Century. By then society at large will be sick of what's been shoved down our throats.
That also means no Star Trek series except for Discovery (after the fact) will survive the cultural split that's coming our way.
That also means no Star Trek series except for Discovery (after the fact) will survive the cultural split that's coming our way.
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This is news?
- TNG's "Sarek" (S2), "Unification I/II" (S5) and "Relics" (S6) were some of the highest-rated episodes in their respective seasons.
- DS9's "Blood Oath" (S2) was as well and "Trials and Tribble-ations" (S5) was the second highest rated of the entire series (behind only "In The Pale Moonlight").
- VOY's "Message in a Bottle" and the Borg episodes (S4+) were also some of the highest rated of the series. A low bar to be sure with this one but...
Viewers want to see how their beloved characters they grew up with are doing years later like old friends, long after they've left the airwaves. I always like me a good crossover, too.
It's not "sad". It's human!
Precisely this. Humans have rose tinted glasses on the past, especially if the current environment is more stressful, difficult, or unpleasant. So looking to the past lovingly can be a comfort to many.
Nostalgia sells. It is what it is.
I think the idea that "moving Star Trek forward" is literally tied to what year it's set in, is a mistake. Star Trek may have had one "present" from 1991 to 2001, but that time is over. There is no one "present" in Star Trek, and a series does not "move Star Trek forward" by being set in one year or another year.
Star Trek is moved forward when a series achieves artistic success. Strange New Worlds moved Star Trek forward when it proved successful at synthesizing Original Series-style episodic action/adventure storytelling with modern television conventions of characterization, visual effects, and production design. Picard moved Star Trek forward when it successfully combined classic Next Generation characters with the modern Prestige Television format. Lower Decks moved Star Trek forward when it was able to synthesize the conventions of the adult animated situation comedy with the conventions of The Next Generation in a way that was affectionate rather than mean-spirited. Prodigy moved Star Trek forward when it combined the conventions of older children's animated adventure series (such as Avatar: The Last Airbender) with the Star Trek setting, figuring out how to introduce Star Trek as a franchise to younger audiences that may be almost completely unfamiliar with it. Discovery moved Star Trek forward when it depicted a world where trauma is understood as the common experience that it is, where mental health is understood to be a routine part of life; it also expanded upon Deep Space Nine's legacy of serialized storytelling through a modern lens, deconstructing those elements of Roddenberrian Utopianism that were actually toxic and then re-affirming those elements of Roddenberrian Progressivism that were genuinely positive and hopeful, and all through the lens of characters from communities that are today marginalized.
Every Star Trek series on the air today has been able to step outside of the boundaries of the storytelling conventions that inhibited Star Trek from growing and evolving in the 1990s while remaining respectful of and affectionate towards that legacy. They have all moved Star Trek forward, and it did not matter whether they were set in 2256, or 2401, or 2380, or 3189, or 2384, or 2259.
There was no season-long mystery in S1 of Lower Decks. There was an extremely minor season-long mystery in S2 and S3, but to say that Lower Decks is centered around that mystery is really stretching it. There was no season-long mystery at all in S1 of Strange New Worlds. The mystery of Prodigy was solved about two-thirds of the way through the first season. There was no season-long mystery in the first season of Discovery; the Ash and Lorca subplots were prominent but not season-long, and they didn't dominate everything in those episodes.
In other words, contemporary Star Trek has used a combination of season-long mysteries, mysteries that last part of a season, and completely episodic storytelling. Which is how it should be.
It's literally a franchise about exploring strange new worlds. There have always been, and will always be, mysteries to investigate. That's pretty intrinsic to the idea of a science-fiction series about exploration.
The post-production process for both Picard Season One and Discovery Season Three were disrupted by the outbreak of the COVID pandemic, as was the overall production process for Picard Season Two.
Star Trek is not and has never been only one thing. From the very beginning, it has always been a format that encompassed multiple genres -- from the whodunit mystery of "The Conscience of the King" to the slapstick comedy of "A Piece of the Action" to the romantic melodrama of "The City on the Edge of Forever" to the dark action of "The Doomsday Machine."
Having lost my grandmother about a year before Discovery Season Three aired, and then losing my mother about seven months after Discovery Season Three finished...
... It spoke to me very deeply. A story about a son's grief tearing the galaxy apart? Yeah, I'm invested. That means something to me. That's a story worthy of artistic respect.
We're already seeing nostalgia for the Aughts, which is just... astonishing as someone who was a teenager and young adult in that decade. Terrible decade. Nobody should feel nostalgia for the Bush Era.
Thank you. I am definitely a Star Trek fan who wants to see the franchise grow and evolve artistically rather than just primarily giving me the traditional formula.
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