Spoilers Star Trek: Picard 3x01 - "The Next Generation"
- Thread starter Commander Richard
- Start date
7/10.
Okay, generally, yeah, love it. Great to be back. I love that they haven’t completely ignored what’s happened or brushed off what’s happened in seasons one and two. The cast was amazing and certainly have come back into their respective grooves. Shaw is an interesting foil and I’m sure there will be more to him as we go along. I’m a little uncertain how I feel about Bev’s kid, but willing to give it a chance. If it was simply that, I think this would be a 9/10 for me.
But as I feared, the memberries are a little too much for me. The music, the props, the opening title card, the callbacks. There’s using continuity as a tapestry and then there’s pointing out every detail of said tapestry. It gets a little too much in the end. I’m hoping that they lay off of it a little bit but I’m doubtful.
Oh and M’talas Prime? That’s annoying. Would have taken it down a full point but I’m feeling generous this morning.
ETA: interesting that other that Stewart, it appears the TNG cast will be listed as special guest stars. I figured since they made a big deal about them coming back they’d all be in the “main” cast. But instead, it’s simply Stewart, Ryan, Hurd and Speelers. Maybe it’s just because they’re not all going to appear in every episode.
Okay, generally, yeah, love it. Great to be back. I love that they haven’t completely ignored what’s happened or brushed off what’s happened in seasons one and two. The cast was amazing and certainly have come back into their respective grooves. Shaw is an interesting foil and I’m sure there will be more to him as we go along. I’m a little uncertain how I feel about Bev’s kid, but willing to give it a chance. If it was simply that, I think this would be a 9/10 for me.
But as I feared, the memberries are a little too much for me. The music, the props, the opening title card, the callbacks. There’s using continuity as a tapestry and then there’s pointing out every detail of said tapestry. It gets a little too much in the end. I’m hoping that they lay off of it a little bit but I’m doubtful.
Oh and M’talas Prime? That’s annoying. Would have taken it down a full point but I’m feeling generous this morning.
ETA: interesting that other that Stewart, it appears the TNG cast will be listed as special guest stars. I figured since they made a big deal about them coming back they’d all be in the “main” cast. But instead, it’s simply Stewart, Ryan, Hurd and Speelers. Maybe it’s just because they’re not all going to appear in every episode.
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Yeah I almost feel like they were gonna use the original Titan then decided on Neo Constitution after scripts were locked and filming had started then came up with this idea. There’s no reason for the -A if it’s the same ship refitted. Not a deal breaker but……really reaching a bit.
Overall, great start! I've been way too into every little pre-release tease there is, and a consequence of that is always that my first actual watch feels more focused on the letdowns, but that's just part of my journey with Trek. 
I was shocked Shaw has been teased as a character we'll love. For sure it could happen, but if it does it'll be the most implausible swing in opinion since Damar. It wasn't the amount of contempt Shaw had for our heroes, it was how it was expressed, there was no subtlety to that writing. A career focused guy who's all about proper procedure can get his point across without needing to be as nakedly aggressive and disrespectful to superior officers as Shaw was here. He didn't feel even a little like a person, but he felt a lot like a carefully constructed plot obstacle.
I also didn't buy Seven in this situation. I simply don't believe the character we know submits to things like being forced to use a name she doesn't identify with and all that.
It's funny, both are problems of working too hard to put our heroes on their heels. Obviously drama demands things be difficult, but this far into the narrative, we've seen them earn so much status. I wish they had found cleverer ways to work that in, rather than pushing to make them underdogs at every level.
As someone who thinks the features are generally Trek's weakest link, I was surprised at how much I loved the movie vibe. It felt so rich and lush, you just want to sink into this world. The score especially I thought was gorgeous. I would buy this score.
I was pleasantly surprised how well-written Laris was and how well it honored their season 2 story. It made me wish she was coming along for the whole season -- there's some Garak-like potential in this character that was barely touched.
As teased, it was awesome to see Beverly in this new light. Can't wait to see more from her.
I was shocked Shaw has been teased as a character we'll love. For sure it could happen, but if it does it'll be the most implausible swing in opinion since Damar. It wasn't the amount of contempt Shaw had for our heroes, it was how it was expressed, there was no subtlety to that writing. A career focused guy who's all about proper procedure can get his point across without needing to be as nakedly aggressive and disrespectful to superior officers as Shaw was here. He didn't feel even a little like a person, but he felt a lot like a carefully constructed plot obstacle.
I also didn't buy Seven in this situation. I simply don't believe the character we know submits to things like being forced to use a name she doesn't identify with and all that.
It's funny, both are problems of working too hard to put our heroes on their heels. Obviously drama demands things be difficult, but this far into the narrative, we've seen them earn so much status. I wish they had found cleverer ways to work that in, rather than pushing to make them underdogs at every level.
As someone who thinks the features are generally Trek's weakest link, I was surprised at how much I loved the movie vibe. It felt so rich and lush, you just want to sink into this world. The score especially I thought was gorgeous. I would buy this score.
I was pleasantly surprised how well-written Laris was and how well it honored their season 2 story. It made me wish she was coming along for the whole season -- there's some Garak-like potential in this character that was barely touched.
As teased, it was awesome to see Beverly in this new light. Can't wait to see more from her.
That was odd, especially given how explicitly they've been discussed as season 3 regulars in the lead-up.
AGREED. It felt wrong and kind of disappointing to use that fanfare for a non-Enterprise ship.
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They might have not been allowed to use the actual Titan since that is in Lower Decks. There is some weird thing about shows only allowed to use certain ships. The vfx artist tried to add a Parliament class ship in the fleet last season but was told to remove it.
I’m t might be so they don’t have to pay the artist from Lower Decks royalties.
Might also be the case that they didn’t use it to give Lower Decks exclusivity on its creative.
One tiny bit of writing in this I absolutely could. not. stand. was the retconning of new events into BOBW.
First, it gives me TATV flashbacks, not good.
Second, it was so weird how Picard jumped to assimilation as soon as Riker referred to him as "incapacitated", like that was the only time he had been incapacitated! Why not when he was abducted again by the LoreBorg, or abducted by the "Allegiance" aliens, or tortured by the Cardassians, or shut down by Bok's mind control device, or the probe from Kataan, or possessed by the "Lonely Among Us" energy cloud, or incapacitated by the flu while in orbit of Angel One, or or or... just come up with a better line there, the existing one does not sync at all with what we've seen of their lives.
First, it gives me TATV flashbacks, not good.
Second, it was so weird how Picard jumped to assimilation as soon as Riker referred to him as "incapacitated", like that was the only time he had been incapacitated! Why not when he was abducted again by the LoreBorg, or abducted by the "Allegiance" aliens, or tortured by the Cardassians, or shut down by Bok's mind control device, or the probe from Kataan, or possessed by the "Lonely Among Us" energy cloud, or incapacitated by the flu while in orbit of Angel One, or or or... just come up with a better line there, the existing one does not sync at all with what we've seen of their lives.
You can sort of see Shaw's point of view though. If a retired Admiral, and a Captain with no command, suddenly turned up on the Enterprise D, and told Picard to change his orders, and go to a completely different region of space just on their sayso, I can't see him automatically going along with it.
D
Depends on if conception was when Bev was missing in Season 2 or Post Nemesis……I hate the whole Scrappy Doo concept if that’s indeed what they do here.
Does anyone know if they'll put the first ep up on their YT channel for a limited time like they did with SNW?
Hadn't thought about S2, that fits better. If true though, that's a hell of a big secret she managed to keep quiet!
In my days working on a TV franchise, something like this actually became one of my rules of thumb for measuring a new showrunner. If that first script shows up, and he has written a shout-out to himself into it -- RED ALERT. I knew then my new boss was an arrogant nightmare and I was in for a world of shit.
So I felt so sad when I saw M'Talas Prime! Heavy sigh and "he comes off so well in the press..."
I was actually thinking how often we saw that very same scenario -- admiral shows up with mysterious commands Picard doesn't feel great about following, but he must, and then there's a push-pull as the story unfolds. I was wishing this had given us more the reverse of that -- Picard can take control, but it's not ultimately his ship and there's limits to how far he can push these people etc. It's harder to write, but done correctly I think it's the richer and more truthful story.
This is from the new trek logs:
"Launched in 2402 under the command of Captain Liam Shaw. Work began on a refit using the original Titan space frame, however, with the development of cutting-edge propulsion technology, the Titan’s design changed mid-construction and a new ship took form. As per tradition, Starfleet engineers affectionally designated it as a refit having kept much of the original Titan’s internal components. The Constitution III was designed to cater to a close support envelope at sub-light speeds, namely in and around densely populated solar systems, as witnessed by its overpowered impulse engines. To date, the new Titan has the largest sub-light power-to-geometry ratio in the fleet."
"Launched in 2402 under the command of Captain Liam Shaw. Work began on a refit using the original Titan space frame, however, with the development of cutting-edge propulsion technology, the Titan’s design changed mid-construction and a new ship took form. As per tradition, Starfleet engineers affectionally designated it as a refit having kept much of the original Titan’s internal components. The Constitution III was designed to cater to a close support envelope at sub-light speeds, namely in and around densely populated solar systems, as witnessed by its overpowered impulse engines. To date, the new Titan has the largest sub-light power-to-geometry ratio in the fleet."
So, the Titan-A is a refit of Riker's Luna class Titan. But the changes were so drastically that they called it "Titan-A". Only some internal components are left from Riker's ship.
Am I right?
Am I right?
I literally rolled my eyes and mumbled, “How pretentious can we be, Terry?” (It was 4am, I was watching on my iPad and my wife was sleeping.)
