Spoilers Star Trek: Picard 3x02 - "Disengage"

[TRON JA307020]

The Vulcans made Kirk & Spock fight to the death in "Amok Time." Talosians imprisoned various races with the idea of using them as slaves to reppopulate the planet. Kirk wanted to let the Klingons die in "Undiscovered Country." A huge swath of Federation "leadership" plotted to assassinate the President of the Federation to prevent peace from breaking out. The Crew turns on Spock in "Galileo Seven." How many times did Kirk, or Spock, or Data, or the TOS/TNG crew disobey orders or steal a ship, or stop some fascist Admiral or judge from a nefarious plot? I've lost count.

Aliens were frequently not very enlightened. You had ultra-powerful beings up to no good: "Charlie X", "The Squire of Gothos," "Who Mourns For Adonis?", and "Catspaw." Not to mention Klingons & Romulans.

We have a renowned federation doctor lobotimizing patients in "Dagger of the Mind." We have a Starfleet officer go homicidal when he gets ultra-powerful "Where No Man Has Gone Before." A mass murdering tyrant in "Conscience of the King." And those are just off the top of my head.

People pushing the nuTrek distopia/abondoning Gene's vision thing just need to stop. It is laughably inaccurate. On both counts. The future was never utopian and free of conflict, inside the Federation or not. And NuTrek has not abondoned Gene's optimistic take.

But there has to be conflict for good drama. It has come from various places:

1) Inside the character. Kirk in "The City on the Edge of Forever."

2) From an external threat. Romulans in "Balance of Terror." An alien superpowerful being in "Charlie X."

3) Within the Crew: External/Alien Forces. "Where No Man Has Gone Before." "The Enemy Within." "The Naked Time."

4) Within the Crew: Actual. "The Galileo Seven." "The Menagerie."

5) Within The Federation: Alien Influence. "Conspiracy."

6) Within the Federation: Actual. "The Undiscovered Country." "The Drumhead."

Both Roddenberry Trek and the NuTrek deal in all of the above. Albeit in different proportions.

The main diffetence is that in older Trek (mostly episodic) the threat gets wrapped at the end of the episode and everything resets. Whereas in NuTrek (most serial) there is a threat that looms over the whole season and does not get resolved until the end. So the whole season seems darker and doomier (though some of DS9 & ENT were this way).

And it is frequently a Federation/Galactic level crisis. Light/campy episodes are hard to do with the Sword of Damacles about to fall.

I will say I think NuTrek leans heavily into personal/internal conflict. But man, do they heap a tangled web of loss/trauma improbably inflicted by a small group on each other that they have to continually work with.
Especially Disco.

Why ate you even counting Gary Mitchel? The guy was charged by the charge fe got from the great barrier. How about Charlie. He wasn't raised by humans but instead by bodiless aliens. Star Trek has never been perfect and yes there have been bad people that were crazy or mad but on the whole the society was closer to a idealized societythN what we have been getting lately especially in STD or Picard. I mean Picards mom committed suicide. She couldn't get any help. There are drunks and drug addicts in starfleet and 7 kills a unarmed woman begging for her life. Sorry butthe society as a whole seems closer to 21st century earth than the 25th. Also the civilian clothes look like they been bought at a 21st century Walmart. Lol

 

[fireproof78]

Why ate you even counting Gary Mitchel? The guy was charged by the charge fe got from the great barrier. How about Charlie. He wasn't raised by humans but instead by bodiless aliens. Star Trek has never been perfect and yes there have been bad people that were crazy or mad but on the whole the society was closer to a idealized societythN what we have been getting lately especially in STD or Picard.

We don't have a big enough picture of either society to declare one ideal or the other. It's all assumption. All we have is the very narrow scope of our protagonists, which doesn't begin to explore the whole of Federation society.

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[Tuskin38]

Bringing back the topic on swearing in Star Trek for a second, I was rewatching The Voyager Home and someone in the Federation council chamber yelled 'pompous ass' at the Klingon Ambassador as he left the room at the beginning of the movie.

She couldn't get any help

She refused help, that's different.

7 kills a unarmed woman begging for her life.

Seven of Nine wasn't in or working in the Federation when she did that.

Also the civilian clothes look like they been bought at a 21st century Walmart

So do the ones in The Voyage Home. Well, they look like contemporary clothes of the 80s.

There are drunks and drug addicts in starflee

Where are the drunks? And we haven't seen Raffi do drugs on duty unless required for the mission.

 

[Greg Cox]

What should be done is not having any customs regarding how last names of couples or families should be. Just let everyone do their own thing. If a wife wants to take her husband's name, she can. If a husband wants to take his wife's name, he can. If the married couple want to hyphenate both last names, they can. If they want to keep their last names exactly as they were, they can do that too. Same sex couples can figure out which last name to use as the family name, or they can hyphenate or just keep their last names as is. Likewise when kids come along, the couple can work out between them which last name they get, if it's hyphenated or whatever.

Just let everyone take their own individual approaches to their marriages instead of dictating traditions that should be upheld.

I still remember this one dude, from years ago, who insisted on addressing a married colleague by her husband's surname -- even though she had deliberately chosen to keep her own name.

Apparently he felt strongly that tradition and custom trumped her personal preferences, so that she was "Mrs. Jenkins" whether she liked it or not.

The sheer douchebaggery there was jaw-dropping.

 

[NCC-73515]

They also have smiling, excited Vulcans in TVH congratulating Kirk at the end

 

[Danja]

Jae is Raffi's handler?


Holy Small Universe Syndrome, Batman!

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Seven of Nine wasn't in or working in the Federation when she did that.

And Bjayzl deserved it.

Besides, what she did to Icheb proved that she'd be willing to do it to anyone else. Seven was therefore justified in killing her. To prevent the threat.

 

[DaveyNY]

Bureaucrats & Politicians care more about their laws than about helping people.


I think the tradition is silly.
We need new traditions for Last-names.

How about, if you marry, you hyphenate and add on your partners last-name to your existing last-name.

Ergo <Your Last Name>-<Partners Last Name>
Both Marriage Partners have to do that to their existing last name.

Any Children will create a new original Last-Name that is a Composite or Derivative or Anagram or Portmanteau of both parents Last name.

Wouldn't that be cool?

Married women in NY State can already do that.
I've known many RN's who have done just that through the years.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Any Children will create a new original Last-Name that is a Composite or Derivative or Anagram or Portmanteau of both parents Last name.

Wouldn't that be cool?

Jack Noseworthy (the actor) would agree.

His husband's last name is Trujillo, and their son has the name...Truworthy!

 

[Greg Cox]

Regarding the progress and evolution of the Federation, it's worth remembering that progress is seldom an unbroken upward trajectory; at best, its two steps forward, one step backward. Even if you're generally ascending overall, there are still going to be rises and dips, relapses and backlashes, and if you get complacent, you may find yourself losing ground and having to climb the same hill all over again.

That's not pessimistic or dystopian; that's just the way it works.

To quote Picard himself: "We think we've come so far. Torture of heretics, burning of witches, it's all ancient history. Then - before you can blink an eye - suddenly it threatens to start all over again."

(From TNG no less.)

 

[NCC-73515]

I was wrong. The most relevant part was not the Ferengi design, or the face acting, or Vadic. What matters the most in this episode is... last names.

 

[fireproof78]

I was wrong. The most relevant part was not the Ferengi design, or the face acting, or Vadic. What matters the most in this episode is... last names.

Welcome to Trek. Paying attention to innane details for decades...

 

[New Kid 99]

I was wrong. The most relevant part was not the Ferengi design, or the face acting, or Vadic. What matters the most in this episode is... last names.

Yeah, it's weird. I'm checking this thread to see if anybody else caught some of the major clues dropped in this episode and everybody is talking about.... last names.

That's cool. Passions take us where they take us.... but there's an elephant in the room and no one is talking about it.... I can barely believe it.

 

[Richard S. Ta]

At least last names is better than ‘I didn’t enjoy it because I don’t know how to set the brightness properly on my television’.

 

[Kamen Rider Blade]

Jack Noseworthy (the actor) would agree.

His husband's last name is Trujillo, and their son has the name...Truworthy!

Sounds like a beautiful new last name.
Very unique.

Jae is Raffi's handler?

He's a contact / information broker to seedier folks in the underworld.

Holy Small Universe Syndrome, Batman!

Makes you wonder why she married him in the first place.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Regarding the progress and evolution of the Federation, it's worth remembering that progress is seldom an unbroken upward trajectory; at best, its two steps forward, one step backward. Even if you're generally ascending overall, there are still going to be rises and dips, relapses and backlashes, and if you get complacent, you may find yourself losing ground and having to climb the same hill all over again.

If Starfleet has simply lost its way, become complacent, and needs to be gently nudged back on the path to righteousness, I can definitely get behind that.

I hope they haven't openly become evil, though. THAT I cannot abide. Starfleet doesn't do a heel turn.

 

[Kamen Rider Blade]

I hope they haven't openly become evil, though. THAT I cannot abide. Starfleet doesn't do a heel turn.

I think you're thinking of the Confederation StarFleet.

StarFleet might be edgy or borderline tweener.

But I can't see StarFleet going heel.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

I think you're thinking of the Confederation StarFleet.

Oh hell no. I actually LIKED the Confederation Corps. They're the Terran Empire with BALLS!

But the difference is, the Corps was (presumably) always like that. They were evil from the get-go. Starfleet, OTOH, was created to be a force for good, and should continue to be so. There's a difference between "playing it safe" - which, IMHO, is understandable, given how much of a pounding Starfleet has taken from the Borg and the Dominion - and openly turning heel.

If PIC implies that Starfleet is evil because it isn't perfect - I would definitely have a problem with that. Indeed, in S1, Picard said that "perfect is the enemy of the good". You can be good and still have flaws that can be fixed.

 

[Commander Troi]

Yeah, it's weird. I'm checking this thread to see if anybody else caught some of the major clues dropped in this episode and everybody is talking about.... last names.

That's cool. Passions take us where they take us.... but there's an elephant in the room and no one is talking about it.... I can barely believe it.

Cool. Let's do it. What elephant did you notice?

 

[New Kid 99]

Cool. Let's do it. What elephant did you notice?

Jack Crusher has lots of aliases. Spends a lot of time on the fringe. Probably hangs out with other characters who hang out on the fringe. Chaotic good types.