You are correct. The supernova travelled faster than predicted and destroyed Romulus before Spock could complete his mission.
I'm pretty sure that if Gates McFadden had been there, the person taking the video/pictures would have pointed it out. And she most likely would have mentioned it on her Twitter or Facebook page.
Also, CBS insisted that STO include the whole back story of ST'09 in the game. I rather doubt They will be ignoring it now.
They've made a big deal out of announcing who the Actors are joining the show. I can't imagine that having an original member of Picard's crew show up would be left out of those kind of announcements.
They've made a big deal about announcing the REGULAR CAST, which is: Patrick Stewart and miscellaneous others (who?). Who cares what non-Trek actors will be in the mix. I can't imagine them blowing the surprise about TNG guest appearances. I think they're banking on the nostalgia factor to keep eyes glued to the show. That's the Trek formula, e.g. TOS --> TMP and other movies. Think All Good Things if it were actually done this many years after the series ended. TLDR: there is no way this show will not bring back key TNG characters integral to Picard's life (Riker and Bev, most importantly -- unless either or both are dead and that's part of his crisis).
Unless they are hiding her guest spot. If she is in it I suspect it would only be for a cameo or extended cameo. Whether they can hid this till the premiere is unknown. Guess it depends on how good they are at keeping secrets. She might be credited under some other name than "Dr Crusher" or hidden some other way. Jason
I'd be shocked if TNG folk won't appear at some point. They'll want to put in some fan pleasers, Stewart is starring and Frakes is one of the directors! patience, my children, patience.
As I mentioned earlier, if they're not going to include anyone from Picard's past, and only anecdotally mention his history because it's "not about that", what's really the point of making it about Picard? Introduce someone new who is at a crossroads in the twilight of his life. If it's well written, it'll carry itself. It's been said he's dealing with a huge personal crisis in the post-Romulus era. I can't imagine it's only because he misses Spock or those good times in the Romulan Senate chambers. Let's be real here. As Trek has taught us: nostalgia sells. That's why the TMP era films were so successful. Also more recently (with the same production staff as Picard), remember how quickly Discovery went from being "standalone" to becoming the Enterprise/Pike/Spock show.
Oh jeez... If that was the reasoning for the weird mash-up that instead happened, gives me even less confidence they are going to handle this right. To be quite honest: They should have gone for it. You either do a reboot. Or don't. Don't half-ass two things at the same time. Full-ass one thing. Yeah, this part right here is the problem. Because quite frankly, beyond some surface level, it just isn't. It's a weird hybrid, where they pull out pictures of the original crew to get people nostalgic, but Nimoy-Spock recognizes Pegg as "his" Scotty, Khan has a vastly different backstory, the Enterprise is stardestroyer-size and all the universe-rules work differently. And yes - IF the Kelvin universe returns - I want that return to FULLY COMMIT to that, too! NOT some half-assing again, where they recreate some parts of it, but not others, and others get influenced retro-actively by the new series, and Michael Burnham gets shoved in as Spocks sister and so on... Just. Fucking. commit. fully.
If it was wouldn't someone have snapped her? If you've got a surprise cameo why film it out in public?
Let’s see, female with long blonde hair and civilian clothes seen from the rear with absolutely no view of her face. Yep, that’s Gates McFadden all right.
Not sure if its been posted. Here is the video clip from which we saw the first "official" Picard pic: Edit: Lol, I guess it's been posted couple days ago.
Every time I see that shot with Picard alone in the crowd, I hear the theme from Curb Your Enthusiasm kick in.
He is sporting the Larry David look, now that you mention it. Maybe the real title of the show is Curb Your Trek-thusiasm (not to be confused with the "Everchanging Trek-thusiasm" thread).