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

[fireproof78]

It plays a lot better in the Dicaprio movie. One of the few improvements that film made.

The film takes an entirely different approach than the book. The themes are different.

Did someone actually say that to you?

The appeal to populism is quite transparent in its efforts, as well as statements like, "just accept you're in the minority. " or "yours is an unpopular opinion. "

I feel like if Jack Crusher was on any other Trek show or had any other name and any other parents, he would not being getting as many passes as he's gotten from the fanbase. Also, I hate to say it and open this can of worms, but if he'd been a daughter instead of a son I also feel like the reception would have been much different.

Indeed. Any other character would not be tolerated.

Once I realized what this season was gonna be, I just sat back and enjoyed the ride for what it was. Junk Food Star Trek. It tastes good at the time, but too much of it and you'll make yourself sick.

Indeed.

 

[gvn2fly]

What's funny to me is that Season 3 still had some of the things I hate the most about modern Trek - season long mystery boxes and a threat to earth/the federation/ This is the 7th season of Star Trek since 2017 to have a season wide threat to earth/the federation/beyond. I've seen some people on twitter and reddit say they hated when the other shows did it but are fine with it here because it had the TNG crew. No! If it's bad in those shows it's bad here too.

 

[gvn2fly]

If by righting the ship you mean a bunch of 90s cast members, familiar music, and familiar production design but many of the same writing tropes as other modern trek shows then sure.

 

[Sci]

I'll talk about the characters. As for what he salvaged, the list is long. I'd recommend you watch the RLM Review to understand what they meant by that.

I refuse to watch RLM anymore. Their misogynistic humor has alienated me.

Picard - Went from a passive, traumatized shell of his former self from the earlier seasons https://ca.startrek.com/news/the-humbling-of-admiral-picard to assertive, driven and very much a return to form for his character.

He went from being a passive, traumatized shell of his former self in Season One. That was his Season One arc. Michael Chabon is the one who brought Picard back to his assertive, driven self.

Riker and Troi - were saddled with the grief storyline in S1.

No they weren't. That story was already over for them when "Nepenthe" aired. They had moved past that, and that was what allowed them to counsel Jean-Luc. Matalas had to contrive an in-universe reason to revive internal conflicts these characters had already resolved.

And managed to repair Riker and Troi's characters

I do not at all agree that having Will say such horrible things to Jean-Luc as "you've killed us all," or having Deanna manipulate Will's emotions, constitutes "repairing" their characters. Honestly those struck me as far more disrespectful to those characters than anything "Nepenthe" established.

as they put themselves in a place where they are ready to leave Retro Prairie Hipster planet

I have no idea why Will and Deanna in S3 talked about Nepenthe like the entire planet is rural. It's a planet. There's plenty of room for there to be cities.

Data - They brought him back in a way that actually progresses his character forward

Never should have happened. Characters who have already died twice should stay dead. Bringing him back is ridiculous, it undermines verisimilitude, it's emotionally dishonest, and it's (however unintentionally) disrespectful to those audience members (like myself) for whom S1's depiction of Jean-Luc's grief over Data's death helped them process real-life loss.

Beverely, Geordi and Worf are quite different from their TNG selves. They've evolved quite a bit. Gates mentioned that Terry has given her the most to work with in her entire run with the character. Geordi (as per Levar) is portrayed in a much more flattering and respectable light here than his TNG days. And Worf has found inner peace.

I agree he mostly did right by these three characters, although I do wish he had found more for Beverly than for her entire emotional life to revolve around male characters (again).

 

[The Commander]

What's funny to me is that Season 3 still had some of the things I hate the most about modern Trek - season long mystery boxes

Was season 3 a mystery box? What mysteries remain unsolved? After Episode 9 everything was resolved and explained.

Season 2 on the other hand had a giant mystery box...the anomaly/transwarp conduit. We still don't know what it is and what its purpose was. It was just a tool to get people excited. And the myterious AI species in Season 1 was not much better.

 

[Citiprime]

Oh, most definitely. If Discovery had brought back the Borg and run a similar style of plot, and then in the final episode had the Borg ultimately beaten by a hug and a declaration of love from Burnham instead of Picard, the resulting howls of outrage from the fanbase would echo into the real-life 32nd century....

Might it be because the TNG characters are better characters and have more depth than those on Discovery? That maybe more people care about these characters and like watching their interactions with each other more than what the Discovery writers have put forward?

Moreover, Picard season 3 is not really about the Changelings, or the Borg, or the details of the mysterybox. The reason people might give some things a pass here where it would stick out like a sore thumb somewhere else, is that those details were only a means to an end with reuniting these specific characters and seeing how they’ve changed, but how they’re a family and meant to be on the bridge of the Enterprise together in the end. The themes of family and how losing contact with the people who are our “family” affects our lives runs throughout the season. So having a hug between a father and son kinda makes sense in that context, where Discovery wedging Burnham into Spock’s family drama doesn’t.

The Voyage Home is not about the mysterybox of the probe. At the end of that movie, we don’t know who sent the probe, we don’t know why the probe wanted to talk to humpback whales, and we don’t even know what the fuck the whales and the probe said to each other. None of that matters to the themes of that movie.

All the mystery of the probe serves is to set up the conditions to watch the interaction of the TOS characters, see how they work together after all of the years, and reinforce how they stand together as a family, where at the end of the movie we know why Kirk deserves to be in the captain’s chair of the Enterprise-A with Spock and the rest of them at his side.

 

[Campe]

Picard season three was flawed but passable entertainment. It broke no barriers and did nothing groundbreaking. It pulled at the heartstrings in regards to nostalgia. It was safe. If that’s what “the masses” want, more power to them. But let’s make no pretenses that this was any sort of a remarkable season of television. It really wasn’t.

 

[Sci]

Might it be because the TNG characters are better characters and have more depth than those on Discovery?

Nope.

 

[Citiprime]

Nope.

TNG gave more character depth to Miles O’Brien, a recurring role for a periodic guest star, than Discovery has with some of its series regulars like Detmer and Owosekun.

 

[Sci]

TNG gave more character depth to Miles O’Brien, a recurring role for a periodic guest star, than Discovery has with some of its series regulars like Detmer and Owosekun.

Detmer and Owosekun are not series regulars. They're day players.

ETA: Seriously. They're not part of the principal cast, and they get credited below the guest stars. By the time Colm Meaney got to be the main character of "The Wounded," he was being billed as a guest star, not a day player.

Also, Meaney got one episode in five and a half seasons of 26 episodes each, whereas DIS will have only had five seasons of around 10-15 episodes a season. DIS's episode count is so much lower that it is not reasonable to expect them to give an episode to a day player like TNG did.

And, again, the original comparison was between TNG's principal casts and DIS's principal casts. DIS has given its principal cast every bit the character development and depth TNG did for its principal cast, if not more.

 

[Campe]

And yes, if you want to bury your head in the sand about how well this season is being received, that's fine as well : )

I don’t think anyone is ignoring that the season is well-received. That doesn’t mean it appeals to all. And no, despite what you keep saying, not loving season three doesn’t make a minority option irrelevant. It makes it a minority opinion.

 

[gvn2fly]

Was season 3 a mystery box? What mysteries remain unsolved? After Episode 9 everything was resolved and explained.

It doesn't necessarily mean things were left unsolved but that there were big mysteries it took until the end of the season to be resolved..some reveals held until nearly the end (like Jack) just to prolong the mystery.

 

[gvn2fly]

Season 2 on the other hand had a giant mystery box...the anomaly/transwarp conduit. We still don't know what it is and what its purpose was. It was just a tool to get people excited. And the myterious AI species in Season 1 was not much better.

Most of the writers behind season 2 were also behind season 3. So I see it as season 3's fault for completely ignoring the conduit.

 

[HotRod]

And yes, if you want to bury your head in the sand about how well this season is being received, that's fine as well : )

Not a single person who has been critical of the season has denied its obvious success with the masses. But as someone mentioned, popularity doesn't equal quality. Some of the stupidest films ever made are huge box office hits. Does that make them the greatest films ever made? Should we hand the Oscar to Michael Bay for the Transformers films?

Plus, as I've mentioned before, it's not so much the success of the season that is turning people off, it's the deification of its production staff, namely Lord Terry Matalas, that has raised eyebrows.

It's his newfound popularity that has persons like myself, worried as to what it will mean for the future of Star Trek.

Paramount could decide to just doubledown on the nostalgia, based on the success of this season and turn the franchise inward on itself and become nothing more then a nostalgia wank fest.

Matalas has pretty much stated that those are his intentions with the franchise.

 

[Campe]

Paramount could decide to just doubledown on the nostalgia, based on the success of this season and turn the franchise inward on itself and become nothing more then a nostalgia wank fest.

Matalas has pretty much stated that those are his intentions with the franchise.

While I don’t agree with all of his choices, at least Kurtzman has a wider view of Star Trek and has a contract at least for the next two years. He is also a known quantity in Paramount running their largest franchise. Until he actually starts losing money for the company, or he decides he doesn’t want to run Star Trek anymore, I think Kurtzman will stay put.

As for Matalas, he has no experience running large franchises AS A WHOLE. I also can’t deny the popularity of his work, and as much as it grates the ears to see him constantly deifie, he’s not a bad writer at all. I just can’t see him running Paramount’s Crown Jewels at this time. Maybe in 5-10 years but not now. Let him have Legacy. One show out of five that touches as highly nostalgic fare that looks inward isn’t going to kill the franchise.

 

[Dee1891]

Did Season 3 "right the ship" for me? No I don't think so. My sister had predicted that Season 3 would end up disappointing us. And she was right.

 

[The Wormhole]

Detmer and Owosekun are not series regulars. They're day players.

ETA: Seriously. They're not part of the principal cast, and they get credited below the guest stars.

Really unbelievable there are still so many who don't seem to understand this. Like, don't people even television anymore?

 

[The Commander]

Most of the writers behind season 2 were also behind season 3. So I see it as season 3's fault for completely ignoring the conduit.

It was never supposed to be part of season 3 that's why it should have been resolved in Season 2. I guess time and budget didn't allow for more. The same reason why we got a copy-and-paste-fleet in Season 1.

 

[Farscape One]

Detmer and Owosekun are not series regulars. They're day players.

ETA: Seriously. They're not part of the principal cast, and they get credited below the guest stars. By the time Colm Meaney got to be the main character of "The Wounded," he was being billed as a guest star, not a day player.

Also, Meaney got one episode in five and a half seasons of 26 episodes each, whereas DIS will have only had five seasons of around 10-15 episodes a season. DIS's episode count is so much lower that it is not reasonable to expect them to give an episode to a day player like TNG did.

And, again, the original comparison was between TNG's principal casts and DIS's principal casts. DIS has given its principal cast every bit the character development and depth TNG did for its principal cast, if not more.

I don't know if I'd say the DISCO main cast has gotten the same development and depth as the TNG leads. Definitely not more.

I will say that TNG did put more focus on Data, Worf, and Picard and a fair amount for Riker, while Troi, Crusher, and Geordi were not given as many episodes. DISCO does seem to spread the episodes a little more evenly with their leads, though it feels like Stamets and Culber have been sidelined more in season 4.

This might be due to the different eras both shows were made. TNG era, with the longer season and episodic nature, the writers had some lead time to find who their most popular characters were and would sort of double down on them. Picard, Data, and Worf were definitely the most popular characters. With DISCO, since the season is so arc driven and all the episodes are pretty much written in advance, the writers don't have the time to make any adjustments to add for character episodes.

Put simply, the time between filming to broadcast is so huge now it leaves no room to breathe. During TNG, the time from filming to broadcast was roughly 2-3 months. (They would start filming in June/July, and would start airing the season in September.) DISCO has almost four times the distance from filming to airing.

 

[Citiprime]

Paramount could decide to just doubledown on the nostalgia, based on the success of this season and turn the franchise inward on itself and become nothing more then a nostalgia wank fest.

Matalas has pretty much stated that those are his intentions with the franchise.

From 2009 to the present, there have been 3 movies and 5 television series produced under the Trek banner. Except for Picard, all of the live-action series have been prequels (at least initially) set in Trek's past.

If season 3 of Picard is a "nostalgia wank fest," I would argue the past 14 years have been rooted in using nostalgia that turned inward. And that's fine, if you've liked that direction. But let's not pretend that Strange New Worlds isn't as much rooted in watching a set of legacy characters in a familiar setting as Picard season 3 is. The only difference is that Picard keeps the LCARS looking like it did 30 years ago.

Detmer and Owosekun are not series regulars. They're day players.

ETA: Seriously. They're not part of the principal cast, and they get credited below the guest stars.

Really unbelievable there are still so many who don't seem to understand this. Like, don't people even television anymore?

Both actors/characters have been there since the first episodes of season 1. Both have been featured in cast photos. Both actors have been in most of the episodes of Discovery (e.g., they've appeared in more episodes of Discovery than Andrew Robinson guest starred as Garak in Deep Space Nine). And both actors have had entire episodes where subplots were devoted to their characters. Yet, in all of that time, the writers of the show didn't flesh them out nearly as well as they could have except to either show them being defined by their upbringing, driven by traumatic emotions, or kicking someone's ass.

Mileage may vary, but I would argue it's indicative of how the writing in many ways failed with the Burnham character, and it speaks to the lack of depth in characterization.