Spoilers Is Picard season 2 a failure?

[Charles Phipps]

In any case, Season 2's ending wrapped up everything with a nice bow and made all of the previous episodes work together in my view. It isn't something I like as much as the first season but it's a matter of degrees rather than kind and perhaps a .5 on my ratings scale.

Lots of good themes, storytelling, and weird digressions all came back together.

It's the best season finale they could have given it.

Two thumbs up.

 

[Precious Tritium]

To call it a failure to me would mean I didn’t have any fun, which I did. I still think the first 3 episodes are back-to-back bangers, and along the way there were a lot of funny, exciting and thrilling moments.

But losing Rios and Jurati in one fell swoop is a little disheartening. And the fact most of the cast got absolutely nothing to do for a good chunk of the season is just saddens me. Way too much plot and way too little breathing room. Still, all the Q stuff was fantastic and I still maintain it’s de Lancie’s best performance.

Nowhere near as good as season 1 for me, and if this is what a Matalas run show looks like, I’m not going into season 3 with a lot of excitement.

 

[James Cole]

To call it a failure to me would mean I didn’t have any fun, which I did. I still think the first 3 episodes are back-to-back bangers, and along the way there were a lot of funny, exciting and thrilling moments.

But losing Rios and Jurati in one fell swoop is a little disheartening. And the fact most of the cast got absolutely nothing to do for a good chunk of the season is just saddens me. Way too much plot and way too little breathing room. Still, all the Q stuff was fantastic and I still maintain it’s de Lancie’s best performance.

Nowhere near as good as season 1 for me, and if this is what a Matalas run show looks like, I’m not going into season 3 with a lot of excitement.

Disclaimer: I'm biased in that while I actively dislike Alex Kurtzman 1000X more than anyone involved in the TNG to ENT production run, I'm a big Terry Matalas fan, to the point I wouldn't have watched season 2, let alone signed up for a month of Paramount Plus, if he wasn't involved with this season.

Terry Matalas and Akiva Goldsman were co-showrunners for season 2, with Goldsman outranking Matalas in the credits. They most likely developed the episode to episode outline for the season together. Matalas posted on Twitter that he was basically out after episode 5 to work on the third season, where he'll be the sole showrunner (and seems to have a greater hand in production and post-production, to the point he'll have directing credits on some episodes, and brought in an editor and music composer he worked with on 12 Monkeys).

Matalas' strongest influence was likely in the first three episodes of the season. So, hopefully a good sign for you.

Cindy Appel worked on MacGyver season 4 with Matalas, and she wrote or co-wrote episodes 5, 6, and 8. 5 and 8 had some pretty decent moments. I'd argue episodes 4, 6, and 7 were the weakest episodes, and those were written or co-written by Jane Maggs, who dropped into the production credits at mid season. My hypothesis for the weakest link in the season anyway.

Interestingly enough, the season 2 finale writing credits read "Written by Christopher Monfette and Akiva Goldsman". Whenever you have an "and" and not an "&", that means someone came in and rewrote someone else's script. Monfette was on 12 Monkeys and a short lived SyFy show with Matalas. Based on the credits, it's highly likely he was heavily rewritten by Goldsman (and Goldsman infamously rewrote Bryan Fuller's script for the first episode of Discovery, so not a great track record). So even the finale can't serve as a baseline for season 3.

 

[PicardHitbyTesla]

To call it a failure to me would mean I didn’t have any fun, which I did. I still think the first 3 episodes are back-to-back bangers, and along the way there were a lot of funny, exciting and thrilling moments.

But losing Rios and Jurati in one fell swoop is a little disheartening. And the fact most of the cast got absolutely nothing to do for a good chunk of the season is just saddens me. Way too much plot and way too little breathing room. Still, all the Q stuff was fantastic and I still maintain it’s de Lancie’s best performance.

Nowhere near as good as season 1 for me, and if this is what a Matalas run show looks like, I’m not going into season 3 with a lot of excitement.

Did you like raffi in season 2?

She didn't exactly care about the whole temporal prime directive thing

 

[PicardHitbyTesla]

Disclaimer: I'm biased in that while I actively dislike Alex Kurtzman 1000X more than anyone involved in the TNG to ENT production run, I'm a big Terry Matalas fan, to the point I wouldn't have watched season 2, let alone signed up for a month of Paramount Plus, if he wasn't involved with this season.

Terry Matalas and Akiva Goldsman were co-showrunners for season 2, with Goldsman outranking Matalas in the credits. They most likely developed the episode to episode outline for the season together. Matalas posted on Twitter that he was basically out after episode 5 to work on the third season, where he'll be the sole showrunner (and seems to have a greater hand in production and post-production, to the point he'll have directing credits on some episodes, and brought in an editor and music composer he worked with on 12 Monkeys).

Matalas' strongest influence was likely in the first three episodes of the season. So, hopefully a good sign for you.

Cindy Appel worked on MacGyver season 4 with Matalas, and she wrote or co-wrote episodes 5, 6, and 8. 5 and 8 had some pretty decent moments. I'd argue episodes 4, 6, and 7 were the weakest episodes, and those were written or co-written by Jane Maggs, who dropped into the production credits at mid season. My hypothesis for the weakest link in the season anyway.

Interestingly enough, the season 2 finale writing credits read "Written by Christopher Monfette and Akiva Goldsman". Whenever you have an "and" and not an "&", that means someone came in and rewrote someone else's script. Monfette was on 12 Monkeys and a short lived SyFy show with Matalas. Based on the credits, it's highly likely he was heavily rewritten by Goldsman (and Goldsman infamously rewrote Bryan Fuller's script for the first episode of Discovery, so not a great track record). So even the finale can't serve as a baseline for season 3.

Its hard to tell the show has 30 producers lol

 

[eschaton]

Interestingly enough, the season 2 finale writing credits read "Written by Christopher Monfette and Akiva Goldsman". Whenever you have an "and" and not an "&", that means someone came in and rewrote someone else's script. Monfette was on 12 Monkeys and a short lived SyFy show with Matalas. Based on the credits, it's highly likely he was heavily rewritten by Goldsman (and Goldsman infamously rewrote Bryan Fuller's script for the first episode of Discovery, so not a great track record). So even the finale can't serve as a baseline for season 3.

It's odd to think that Goldsman could simultaneously be responsible for this script and the pilot script of SNW, which is...like at least 30 IQ points higher.

 

[gvn2fly]

Interestingly enough, the season 2 finale writing credits read "Written by Christopher Monfette and Akiva Goldsman". Whenever you have an "and" and not an "&", that means someone came in and rewrote someone else's script. Monfette was on 12 Monkeys and a short lived SyFy show with Matalas. Based on the credits, it's highly likely he was heavily rewritten by Goldsman (and Goldsman infamously rewrote Bryan Fuller's script for the first episode of Discovery, so not a great track record). So even the finale can't serve as a baseline for season 3.

I would think every episode this season got some kind of rewrite from story editors and the showrunners. That isn't uncommon. As for the credit, "A team of writers is defined by the WGA as "two writers who have been assigned at about the same time to the same material and who work together for approximately the same length of time on the material"; the work of the two writers is considered a joint contribution, not creditable to only one of them or to one more than the other. A team is credited with a (&) separating their names.

But Christopher did describe season 2 as Akiva's vision. I would say Akiva's vision/ideas were probably not bad, but the execution failed. Also interesting that someone mentioned 4, 6-7 had the same writer because those were the exact 3 episodes I liked the least this season (other than perhaps the finale). Favorite 3 were the first 3.

 

[James Cole]

Its hard to tell the show has 30 producers lol

Too many cooks in the kitchen!

It's odd to think that Goldsman could simultaneously be responsible for this script and the pilot script of SNW, which is...like at least 30 IQ points higher.

What's really crazy is they had most of 2020 to just... write. You'd think everything would exceptionally cohere together. Although maybe budget cuts and Covid restrictions forced drastic changes to the plot?

I just watched the first SNW episode. If you accept alright they've moved beyond implicitly to explicitly rebooting (at least) TOS canon, it's watchable... although highly questionable with how they handle 2020s US history -- at the very least from the this will age very quickly in 5 years not 50.

 

[firehawk12]

S2 was a two-parter dragged out over 10 episodes and still managed to not really do any of its storylines well.

I honestly don't like if I dislike it more than S1. I really despised S1, but I was just numb by the time S2 finished.

 

[gvn2fly]

Patrick Stewart (and the cast) really deserved better.

 

[eschaton]

What's really crazy is they had most of 2020 to just... write. You'd think everything would exceptionally cohere together. Although maybe budget cuts and Covid restrictions forced drastic changes to the plot?

I think that's it. I saw an interview with Stewart today that they were all ready to film Season 2 and then COVID hit, and then they pivoted to two back-to-back filming sessions. I think that Matalas's original vision ended up unfilmable due to COVID protocols, and Goldsman & co hacked it into something nearly unrecognizable over the course of eight months while Matalas tried again for Season 3.

 

[fireproof78]

Patrick Stewart (and the cast) really deserved better.

They told the story they could under the limits they had and completed it successfully, with emotional moments throughout.

Not sure that anyone deserves anything beyond that...though, I'll admit to my predilection of feeling characters don't deserve anything..

I just watched the first SNW episode. If you accept alright they've moved beyond implicitly to explicitly rebooting (at least) TOS canon, it's watchable... although highly questionable with how they handle 2020s US history -- at the very least from the this will age very quickly in 5 years not 50.

So it ages. That's fine. Art is meant for the moment not for forever.

 

[gvn2fly]

Why is there a recording in the Confederation future of Soong saying “A Safe Galaxy is a Human Galaxy.” This makes no sense with what the rest of the episodes presented. So without the launch an elderly discredited Soong helps solve climate change. How does that turn into him saying at some point in his remaining years “A Safe Galaxy is a Human Galaxy” and creating the confederation? It seems like Soong would have to be some kind of leader in first contact that went bad or something. Soong is in his 70s, First Contact is still 40 years away..so how does him solving climate change lead to that xenophobic statement and the confederation?

 

[fireproof78]

Why is there a recording in the Confederation future of Soong saying “A Safe Galaxy is a Human Galaxy.” This makes no sense with what the rest of the episodes presented. So without the launch an elderly discredited Soong helps solve climate change. How does that turn into him saying at some point in his remaining years “A Safe Galaxy is a Human Galaxy” and creating the confederation? It seems like Soong would have to be some kind of leader in first contact that went bad or something. Soong is in his 70s, First Contact is still 40 years away..so how does him solving climate change lead to that xenophobic statement and the confederation?

It could be a speech, ala JFK, about going out in to space.

Or, it could be an appropriation by Confederation leadership, like Ford was the inspiration for Brave New World's society.

 

[eschaton]

It could be a speech, ala JFK, about going out in to space.

Or, it could be an appropriation by Confederation leadership, like Ford was the inspiration for Brave New World's society.

It could be that Soong kept cloning himself and it was a later clone who said that.

 

[gvn2fly]

It could be that Soong kept cloning himself and it was a later clone who said that.

The change to the timeline and trying to prevent a xenophobic Confederation was such an important part to the season - it would have been nice if the writers actually explained how it happened and how it ties into "a safe galaxy is a human galaxy" instead of "one person solved climate change instead of a microbe"

 

[Charles Phipps]

The change to the timeline and trying to prevent a xenophobic Confederation was such an important part to the season - it would have been nice if the writers actually explained how it happened and how it ties into "a safe galaxy is a human galaxy" instead of "one person solved climate change instead of a microbe"

I mean, Soong outright knows aliens exist because of the Borg Queen.

We also had them do a nice little explanation for how Soong became famous: the shield around Earth is just a bigger version of the sun shield he invented for his daughter.

 

[ThreeEdgedSword]

Did you like raffi in season 2?

She didn't exactly care about the whole temporal prime directive thing

I thought she was written to be annoying (to me, that is) for most of the season - Seven too, to a slightly lesser degree. (I think that was because they didn't know what to do with them, and also didn't know how to handle their relationship... for whatever reason, I have my theories.) However, Rios cared even less about the timeline. Do you dislike him as well?

As for the season... I think Picard wants to be something complex and deep, and it would be awesome if it worked. As always, the problem is the execution. I wouldn't call it a total failure, but not successful, either. I think I prefer season 1, for all its faults and the bad resolution, simply because it tried to be bold and creative.

Season 2 leaves me with a lot of frustration, a bit of sadness for what could have been, and mostly relief that it's over.

 

[Tosk]

It's odd to think that Goldsman could simultaneously be responsible for this script and the pilot script of SNW, which is...like at least 30 IQ points higher.

Goldsman wrote both A Beautiful Mind and Batman and Robin.

 

[JRoss]

Welp, I think we've got our answer to this post's thesis question. Pretty darn fantastic season.