Spoilers Star Trek: Picard 1x10 - "Et in Arcadia Ego, Part 2"

[Gonzo]

It's not Avenger-class? https://sto.gamepedia.com/Avenger_Battlecruiser

There is talk that Chabon has confirmed Rikers ship to be the Curiosity class I (I haven't seen the message myself yet) but we may not have seen that particular ship in the episode even though we saw Riker on its bridge, I counted three distinctly different ship designs based on impulse engine and nacelle differences so even if one of them is the Curiosity class there are still at least two others, the other two could be modified sub designs of the class that Riker is commanding.

Think of it like this, if they are just placeholders then we will never see or hear of them again so it doesn't matter, otherwise we should get some details about them sooner or later.

The Starfleet ships all looked to be about the same size (300-400m at most) based on bridge dome locations and number of decks, I looked to see if there was a ship that seemed larger than the rest (Rikers ship) but couldn't see one, all of them seem to be without a neck of any kind between the engineering section and saucer with no visible deflector dish which limits the decks to about 10 in total (maybe less), about the same length as the Intrepid class but with a much smaller target silhouette if attacked from the front or side.

In the big reverse panning shot we see both fleets opposite each other with La Sirena at the front, it makes it look like La Sirena is the same size as the other Starfleet ships which can't be correct as La Sirena is only about 50m long, which means we can't use the scene as a guide at all due to not being able to judge relative distances.

Riker's comments about him being on board one of the most powerful ships could be due to them being out and out warships, which would explain why they all seem to be so similar as they would be quicker to build and require smaller crews to operate than a big Explorer.

It makes sense as it frees up the actual Explorer ships to go out and explore.

Either way I like the new ships and as they become more advanced they seem to look more organic, they also seem to be moving towards having a much lower profile due to the removal of the neck between the engineering hull and the saucer and lack of deflector dish, this I suspect is one of the major reasons why some forum members are not keen on the ships at all.

Larger Explorer ships may still have the neck and deflectors but we won't know until they show us one.

 

[susannah]

I'm back with more, longer opinions on the episode and the season as a whole.

Characters—hits, misses, and missed opportunities

• Rios is definitely my favorite character, and the finale got appallingly little screentime from him or his holoselves.
• I have really tried to like Raffi all season, but I just can't quite get there. I think if she didn't keep boomeranging so magically between drug addict depressive and actively functional, she would make more sense as a character and I would like her more. Plus, her "JL" nickname is just annoying and I'm sick of hearing it come out of her mouth. It was a lazy way for the writers to imply long history between her and Picard instead of just sticking to showing us their dis-/trust in each other.
  
• Narek's possible redemption was one of the most interesting possible storylines for the finale, one that was not adequately explored. He and Soji needed to have a better scene dealing with each other, even if she rejected his attempts to atone for his deceptions.
• It really would have been nice to see Picard's Romulans from the vineyard feature in the finale somehow. They were good characters and gave great texture to the changed relationship between the Federation and the Star Empire.

Plot mistakes, mostly having to do with armadas (can I call them flotholes?)

• If Picard's message to Starfleet was effective, and they understood that time was of the essence, why is the first thing they do to call up a retired officer from his pizza oven? I understand we all want to see Riker on the bridge, and I did enjoy that (would have more if Frakes had had better delivery, though), but it made zero sense within the universe of the series. It really should have been Clancy heading the fleet, which would have circled back nicely to her earlier conflicts with Picard.
• How the fuck is there a 200+-strong Romulan flotilla when their civilization is living in refugee camps?
• Why did we even need to have that many ships on either side for a good bit of brinksmanship at the end? I think the standoff scene would have been more compelling with just a few ships on either side.
• ...especially because you have Romulan cloaking to lend extra tension (how many more are we not seeing?), which was inexplicably completely forgotten/ignored by the writers.
• The overarching themes of mortality, personal agency over one's own body, and what it means to be alive were begging for more exploration via the lens of the Borg, and there they were in the gd season, and yet these permutations were largely telegraphed or ignored. Boo.

General nitpicking

• I read online somewhere that Jeri Ryan said she struggled to "find Seven's voice" again after so many years away from playing the role. I'm not sure she ever quite succeeded. I thoroughly enjoyed having the character and the actress back in the mix, but this Seven felt like a new character. Yeah, yeah, I know—it's been twenty years or whatever and she's been off having life experiences and they've changed her. But I didn't feel I was seeing the old Seven weathered by life; rather, I felt I was seeing a reimagining of the character.
  
• Château Picard. I realize that for most folks none of this matters a jot, but I work in the wine industry, and it was really fucking annoying seeing neo-Tuscan architecture passed off as something we're supposed to believe would exist in any part of France. Not to mention the fact that, generally, Burgundian estates do not have "château" in their name (instead, you usually see "domaine"; châteaux show up in Bordeaux), the topography was nothing like a Burgundy vineyard, and they even got the gd bottle shape wrong (again, Bordeaux invading Burgundy...that is a Bordeaux bottle instead of Burgundy bottle). Honestly, Michael Chabon—I'm available if you need a consultant.

Positives

• So fun to see the Picard Maneuver make a cameo, and it was fun how Agnes introduced it. She really seemed to have all the best moments in this episode.
  
• Patrick Stewart gave some of his best in this episode.
  
• Raffi and Elnor excepted (I really find him just to be a cartoon), I do quite enjoy this set of people and look forward to what looks to be a little like Star Trek: Firefly next season.

 

[susannah]

• The absolute best thing about Picard has been seeing some old faces show up in the weekly threads. Hi, susannah, it's been a while!

  My beloved old bête noir—hello again as well!

  I never posted all season because it seems every episode gets 10/10 by default from the majority here and I would...certainly not give any episode that score. But I don't want to be mean and mostly just don't want to debate Star Trek opinions at this point in life so I just don't post. I wish I'd liked it more!

  Exactly how I feel. Except that then I had to go and write a bunch about it anyway.
  

  Just watched. Gonna muse on this a bit, but my strongest overall impression was that this felt a lot more like a series finale than a season finale.

  Agreed.
  
  

  Zach Handlen, AV Club
  excerpt
  
  I wanted something memorably bad… What I got was just bad in the same way most of Star Trek: Picard has turned out to be bad; thoughtless, rushed plotting, meaningless twists, and bold decisions which are absolutely weightless.
  https://tv.avclub.com/all-is-resolved-in-an-underwhelming-star-trek-picard-f-1842501152

  I really enjoyed this. Thanks for sharing.

  Oh look, Seven has been hooked up again with someone out of nowhere with whom she has no chemistry.

  Totally. She deserves better. Here's hoping it at least gets fleshed out (teehee) in a way that makes sense next season.
  

  I thought the very least they could do to make it interesting is to have the reconstructed data consciousness have doubts about his actual authenticity or something a bit more philosophical about the nature of consciousness both natural and artificial. Instead it sounded like emotionalizing gobbledy-gook about things only having meaning because they don't last...which is a much overused trope when dealing with immortality IMO

  Especially after spending a whole damn season agonizing over these very issues, it was über læm of the writers to blow off this necessary-to-the-character dilemma.

  It's the 2020 and we are talking about a just aired Star Trek episode.
  
  In these grime times, it's simply wonderful.

  Yes. Cheers to that.

 

[A Killer's Dream]

One of the best episodes so far.

I loved the scenes between Picard and Data and Seven and Rios.

Strong episode for Jurati, too. Alas, Elnor was still underused.

Sir Patrick Stewarts performance was outstanding.

Riker back in the center seat was a big highlight.

 

[Gonzo]

Dammit I forgot to deduct points from my score due to the complete lack of Laris and Zhaban.

 

[Saul]

There is talk that Chabon has confirmed Rikers ship to be the Curiosity class

Yes, he said that a few times. He also said that not all ships were the same. Maybe 4 different types. Kinda like the section 31 battle.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

I read online somewhere that Jeri Ryan said she struggled to "find Seven's voice" again after so many years away from playing the role. I'm not sure she ever quite succeeded. I thoroughly enjoyed having the character and the actress back in the mix, but this Seven felt like a new character. Yeah, yeah, I know—it's been twenty years or whatever and she's been off having life experiences and they've changed her. But I didn't feel I was seeing the old Seven weathered by life; rather I felt I was seeing a reimagining of the character.

That's sort of how I felt as well: Ryan is playing a generic badass.

 

[Gonzo]

Yes, he said that a few times. He also said that not all ships were the same. Maybe 4 different types. Kinda like the section 31 battle.

I counted three but Chabon could have pulled a fast one and not actually shown the Curiosity class clearly and all we actually saw of it was Riker on the bridge.

Wouldn't surprise me if they save it as a big reveal down the line.

 

[Gonzo]

Wouldn't surprise me if in S2 we see Picard investigate the idea that the Vulcans didn't evolve on Vulcan at all.

Was a big piece of info that Narek just dropped into the fireside chat.

 

[Mr. Adventure]

According to Chabon on Instagram, there were scenes written/filmed that show Narek being taken into Federation custody, and Ramdha and the other XBs trying to form a relationship with the Synth community, but they were cut.

And now we know what two of the next Short Treks will be...

There is talk that Chabon has confirmed Rikers ship to be the Curiosity class

Designed to fight the Kzinti, of course,

 

[Greg Cox]

I wonder what stopped them using the Enterprise? Was it licensing issues or the fact they didn’t want to repeat the season one finale of Discovery again. Maybe they also thought that it might overshadow everything else.

Doubt it was a legal thing. Suspect that it was indeed those last two.

 

[Greg Cox]

So . . . why/how did Data paint a picture with Soji in it years ago? How is she his daughter? I'm really not dumb. I just get lost in long, convoluted plots.

Good question. Maybe Maddox deliberately modeled the twins on Data's painting instead of the other way around? As a sentimental homage to Data.

"Gee, this new synths are kinda-sorta Data's daughters. Didn't Data paint something on that theme years ago?"

EDIT: I see now that Xerxes suggested this already. Serves me right for replying before reading the entire thread.

 

[Mr. Adventure]

I have a question, it was probably explained and I missed it, but how did the synths know how to create that beacon? Is that still something that they would still potentially be able to do?

 

[susannah]

I have a question, it was probably explained and I missed it, but how did the synths know how to create that beacon? Is that still something that they would still potentially be able to do?

It was in the Admonition-cum-Instruction, that the gold-Soji synth got from Agnes by android mind meld.

 

[Spock Must Diet!]

I counted three but Chabon could have pulled a fast one and not actually shown the Curiosity class clearly and all we actually saw of it was Riker on the bridge.

Wouldn't surprise me if they save it as a big reveal down the line.

Evidently, Chabon had also confirmed that the ibn Majid was also Curiosity-class. The silhouette shown on Rios' case does match that of the ships in Rikers' fleet.

I don't think a lot of starship-ophiles (not all Trek fans are) will be convinced that a few nacelles and/or widget variations makes a new class out of the same basic body. Enterprise-A was still a Constitution class. Refits of other classes that affected the ships cosmetically did not generally make a new class. Fans of starships will be disappointed by that scene for a while, I think. It has been a long drought for those fans, at least for post-TNG ships.

 

[Greg Cox]

This is the old argument about the transporter.

I remember my college buddies and I staying up til three in the morning debating this very issue, way back in the late seventies.

 

[JD]

Wouldn't surprise me if in S2 we see Picard investigate the idea that the Vulcans didn't evolve on Vulcan at all.

Was a big piece of info that Narek just dropped into the fireside chat.

I thought he had just said the myths came from before the Romulans arrived on Romulus.

I really enjoyed the finale, I thought it did a good job of giving resolving things. I can't think of any major issues I had with it or anything left unresolved, I was really shocked how tightly everything was tied up. Since they went into this knowing they were getting another season, I was expecting a cliffhanger, or at least a hook for next season.
My biggest disappointment was that they revealed Data was sort of alive, and then killed him off at the end of the episode, but it was a nice way to give Picard a bit of closure on Data. At least Alton Soong is still around, so we can potentially get more appearances by Brent Spiner.
I loved Riker showing up with the Starfeelt ships, we already knew he was aware of what was going on, so it wasn't totally out of the blue. I think having another TNG character show up might have felt like nothing but fan service, but since Riker already had an established role here, it worked.
The Romulan fleet fighting off the orchids was a pretty cool action scene, and I loved Picard and Jurati using the Picard Manuever.
I was not at all surprised Picard ended up in the golem, I figured it was going to be either him or Data. I do like how they had them set it up to age and die the same as Picard would have if he didn't have the brain abnormality. That was a nice way to give them any easy out if something happens to Patrick Stewart and he can't keep doing the show.

 

[Mr. Adventure]

It was in the Admonition-cum-Instruction, that the gold-Soji synth got from Agnes by android mind meld.

Thanks, I was wondering if it was in the Admonition itself which at least lowers the possibility of a repeat.

 

[Ovation]

I loved Riker showing up with the Starfleet ships, we already knew he was aware of what was going on, so it wasn't totally out of the blue.

Meh. I would have preferred Clancy (which was, apparently, the original intent).

 

[Greg Cox]

Dammit I forgot to deduct points from my score due to the complete lack of Laris and Zhaban.

And the dog!

About Jurati: I would hope that at some point she will face justice (in some manner) for that murder and that it won't get swept under the rug too easily. Didn't necessarily need confirmation of that in the big season finale, but they can't keep kicking it down the road indefinitely.