Spoilers Did Picard finally ''right the ship'' with Picard season 3?

Season 3 is fine but Season 1 will always be the best for me and I'm annoyed we're not following up on any of its plots.

 

After the past two episodes, I would say yes - let's see if that keeps up for the remaining six.

I will continue to enjoy the first season, however, and sigh that Narek received no ending.

 

They resolved or comfortably put into stasis most of the plot points for Season 1 (there's a settled, growing planetary community of ex-Borg and androids, with something very scary and very old implied to be lurking in the wider Universe). Season 2 was about getting rid of or putting into stasis a lot of Season 1 characters, leaving a bad taste.

I'm really liking Season 3 so-far and it carries over a lot of the emotional character threads introduced in Season 1 (like Raffi calming down, Seven fitting in on her own terms, and Riker's family wrecked by his son's very, very premature death).

 

I think it's important to note that in a lot of ways the first four episodes told a coherent story with complete character arcs. Not a full season arc, but a well-constructed Act 1. This is a great indication they're gonna stick the landing IMHO, since we haven't just been jerked around and teased as was the case in some other seasons of modern Trek.

 

They wisely ditched the bizarre pacing and padding that gravely affected PIC's S2 (and DSCO's S4 to a lesser extent) when it actually fucking felt like 4 episodes' worth of storyline fitted into 4 actual episodes, and not 4 episodes of character/plot development stretched out into 10 episodes.

 

Well, we're judging on half of a season... S2 started out pretty decent too and then went off the rails. So it's a little early to tell but I do enjoy what we got so far mostly. As a Niner, it is so nice to see DS9 lore get some love and acknowledgement. I felt the same with the prominent Trill plotline in DISCO. If DS9 won't get the PIC treatment, more of this then. :P

I think S3 did "right the ship" for me in one regard but not in an anti-S1/S2 regard. I had a lot of issues with them, but they were punctuated with decent enough moments. S2 was all over the place and ultimately pointless in the grand scheme of things, but as a personal story for Q and Picard? It was beautiful. I would say the same for S1 with Data's official farewell.

What I do like is it did move away from the gross overcompensation of "THIS IS NOT GOING TO BE TNG S8!!!!!" that S1 and to a similar degree S2 had going for it. I never expected a S8, especially since they made it clear from the get go. I knew this would be a more personal journey rather than a standard crew exploring space fare. But I did expect/hope for something more along the lines of S3 (what we got so far at least) in terms of balancing TNG with this being a swan song for the character of Picard. What I did not expect was Sir Patrick Stewart redoing Charles Xavier in "Logan" with a Star Trek skin over it.

So if this truly going to be the end of TNG forever? Yes, I am glad that S3 is making a more concerted effort to balance old TNG with the final and personal journey of Jean-Luc Picard. No pun intended but it's the best of both...

 

Yeah, as I noted in the weekly reviews, they're really avoiding classic mystery box writing this season. Sure, there are mysteries, but it's not mystery box writing as we understand it.

Classic mystery box writing for TV is essentially raising a mystery within the first 1-2 episodes, and not actually solving it until right at the end. Thus the middle of the season is spent on nothing of importance. Maybe pointless sidequests (DIS Season 4) or maybe not even that (PIC Season 2).

Essentially all of the mysteries which were unveiled in the first episode this season have been answered now. We know why Beverly contacted Picard. We know who was hunting her. We know who's son Jack is. We know who Raffi's handler is. We know who launched the terrorist attack on M'Talas Prime. We know why Shaw is an asshole.

But, as each plot point is resolved, new ones are being added. Why is Jack Crusher so important to the Changelings? What the hell is up with his visions? What the hell was going on with Vadic's hand? Who is her handler? So we have further reveals to look forward to for the next six episodes.

This is how you do a well-paced story. Like, if it's a book, every chapter needs to both resolve some issues, and introduce new ones. Similarly, in a well-paced TV show, each episode needs to provide forward momentum - solving a bit of the arc, but also complicating things further.

 

Totally agree, though there are still a few holdover issues aesthetically speaking that I really wish they'd rectified.

Ba-dum tsssssshh!

 

We got a band of pirates/mercs lead by Vadic and they're working in concert with a group of rogue Changelings (impersonating everybody from hustlers to Starfleet), but is Vadic a full Changeling herself or a merged/hijacked hybrid? Is her mook crew mercenaries with their own culture (they got their own language) or biomechanical synths akin to the original Jem'Hadar? Who is the asset, Admiral Picard or his illigimate son? Why is Jack Crusher getting a specific ominous vision? How will Worf and Raffi's plot intersect with the crew of the USS Titan, etc?

 

Will Picard and company survive? Tune in nice time, same Trek time, same Trek channel!

 

https://twitter.com/terrymatalas/status/1634306984827850752?s=46&t=GJ4lIGndtLwuph_LJO2AJw

 

I thought Season 2 descended into complete stupidity by Episode 2, with all the Confederation nonsense.

I could buy that as perhaps a fantasy world created by Q to teach Picard a lesson, but they wrote it as an actual alternate timeline.

For starters...if the 2020s were altered that drastically from the original timeline, Picard, Seven and all the others shouldn't even exist in this new timeline. It was very Akiva Goldsman-esque writing. Assumed the audience wasn't very bright, and wouldn't care how thin the 'logic' of the narrative is.

 

Or, it's a time travel story inside Star Trek were people literally end up in parallel timelines with the same people!
I do not like Season 2, or Q, but thin? Really? This is Trek time travel and parallel development BS 101

 

Tell that to the Mirror Universe.

 

The Mirror Universe wasn't an altered timeline. It's a Mirror reality of the Main Trek universe, the mechanics of how it mirrors the main Trek universe are currently unknown.

Whereas what happened with Picard S2 followed the internal time travel 'logic' and rules of the series...

Something is altered in the past, and history plays out drastically different. We've seen it happen this way plenty of times in Classic Trek.

From a scientific POV, the likelihood of Picard, Seven, Rios, and all the others being conceived (as they are) in a timeline that's so drastically altered...400 years prior, is pretty stupid. It's CW Flash silly.

 

As opposed to the Mirror universe which is pure science, right?

Altered time lines can be big, and can be small. Temporal mechanics can protect them or not. Back to the Future Rules also apply. Kelvin Timeline Rules also apply.

Artificial goal posts are silly. This one is now in my top 10!

 

The Mirror Universe is really it's own thing. There may be an explanation for it someday.

What we got in Picard S2 was an altered timeline that had to be corrected. Yesterday's Enterprise, City on the Edge of Forever, First Contact and many others.

If it was a branch timeline like Kelvin-verse, there would be no reason to fix 2021... as the original timeline would still exist.

It's easier to view S2 as a reality that Q constructed to teach Picard a lesson.

Things as silly as Seven conveniently being the President of the Con-Federation... very contrived.

 

Every Trek timeline operates on different rules. This one literally is "a wizard did it" type logic. So, yeah, of the issues I have with Season 2, this is far, far below on the list, and the time travel aspect has been done in multiple different ways.

 

Timeline? This is no time to talk about time! We don't have the time!... What was I saying?