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| Admiral Jean-Luc Picard (retired) uncovers a conspiracy... |
Star Trek: Picard was a highly awaited show. Boasting the return of Patrick Stewart to an iconic role, and with award winning writer Michael Chabon in charge of the story, the series promised much. Pre-release promotion indicated that the series would offer storytelling that was intelligent and adult, while still providing plenty of fast-paced action for genre fans. Basically, Picard would satisfy old-school fans and new ones alike.
That was probably always going to be a tough promise to live up to, so it's little surprise that the results were a bit... mixed.
"NO LONGER STARFLEET":
Though the series' premiere suffers from uneven pacing, there is much promise in the initial episodes. Science fiction generally is written as a reflection of modern society. That's very much the case here; released in a divided time in which many feel pessimistic about the future, Picard presents a decaying Federation that is moving in the wrong direction.
The series opens with a sense of disillusionment. Picard has renounced Starfleet, condemning them for turning their back on their own ideals. "They were no longer Starfleet," he angrily proclaims during an interview. When he later goes to a Starfleet admiral for help, she throws that interview back in his face and tells him that Starfleet "is no longer your house," all but dismissing his concerns as the fantasies of a senile old man.
The first half of the series follows up on this. Absolute Candor shows us the Romulan refugees left to fend for themselves after Starfleet decided not to continue lending aid to their one-time enemies. The contrast between the hopeful refugees shown in an opening flashback and the bitter, angry ones seen in the present brings home the consequences of this. Even Stardust City Rag - the season's most standalone episode - reintroduces a Seven of Nine who has joined a vigilante outfit to try to keep some semblance of order in territories that Starfleet abandoned.
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| Romulan refugee Ellnor resents Picard for abandoning him. |
A DROPPED THREAD:
This is an interesting thread, even just as a background to the main action. Unfortunately, it's all but completely dropped midway through the season.
The second half of the season barely references the changes in Starfleet since the TNG era. Only Broken Pieces remembers it, and then only long enough to tie up some plot issues. Other than that, this might as well be the Starfleet of the 1990s series. In that same episode, the previously dismissive Admiral Clancy promises Picard her support, and neither Picard nor his crew ever seem in any doubt of it. The finale then sees Starfleet represented by the friendly face of William Riker... which oddly echoes Star Trek: Insurrection, in which Riker also secured a reversal of a prior Starfleet decision entirely off screen.
I would have preferred the series to have kept alive the idea of a Starfleet that Picard couldn't necessarily count on. As much fun as Riker's cameo in the finale was, it might have been more interesting if Starfleet had arrived at the android planet with the same goal as the Romulan fleet: to try to curtail a threat. Then Picard could have been left trying to negotiate with three potentially hostile parties: the androids, the Romulans, and Starfleet. That might not have left much time for climactic action scenes... but it would have been more of a piece with the start of the season.
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| Picard visits old colleagues Will and Deanna Riker. |
AN EFFECTIVE BALANCE OF STORYTELLING AND NOSTALGIA:
The greatest strength of Star Trek: Picard's first season is in how well it manages to feed nostalgia for the TNG era while still retaining its own identity as a very different series.
The series' opening scene features Picard playing poker with Data on the Enterprise - spiritually picking up exactly where the final scene of TNG's finale left off. It quickly becomes apparent that this is a dream sequence, and Picard is left waking up to his current life and situation, which is very different than his days as a starship captain.
The next several episodes focus on furthering the season's story and on introducing the new characters. These characters work well for the most part. Santiago Cabrera's Capt. Rios emerges as the standout; but all of the new regulars are well-played, and every character gets at least a few good moments throughout the season.
Even as Picard develops its new cast, it continues to drip-feed nostalgia from 1990s Trek. Episode Two references Picard's former crew members and explains why he won't just turn to them for help. Episode Four ends with the return of Seven of Nine, arguably the most popular character from 1990s Trek series Voyager. Episode Seven, Nepenthe, plays the most directly to TNG nostalgia, with Picard visiting old colleagues Riker and Troi and spending an entire episode as their houseguest.
This last should be a complete momentum killer, an episode-long wallow in nostalgia. However, the script makes it work. Not so much in the cutaways to Rios and the other crew members, whose scenes mostly feel like an intrusion - but in the primary material, with Picard, Soji, and the Rikers. Though these scenes have a pleasantly relaxed atmosphere, the focus remains on Picard's efforts to gain the trust of the traumatized android Soji. By putting story and much character emphasis on Soji's trauma and her wariness of Picard, the episode manages to balance the demands of being the fan-pleasing "Riker/Troi episode" against those of being a part of this series.
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| Picard has a conversation with Data that sums up the season's themes... just in time for the rest of the episode to undermine it. |
THE ENDING (YES, SPOILERS IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN IT):
While Picard's finale was far from perfect (Example: Seven's plotline ends with her having a catfight against a character she never previously met, in order to avenge a character with whom she never shared a second of screen time), it was satisfying overall, particularly with regard to Picard's character journey. The man who had started the season as a bitter shell of his former self ends it making an impassioned plea about the responsibilities of being alive. He does this fully expecting it to be his last act, and it is a fine ending to his season journey. Had this been Picard's end, it would have been a substantially more fitting than the one Kirk received.
Then the last 10 - 15 minutes wrecks it by transferring Picard's brain into an android body.
It's not that there isn't dramatic potential in this. Earlier in the season, we see again the scars of Picard's assimilation by the Borg. He almost collapses when he beams onto The Artifact, the dormant Borg Cube claimed by the Romulans. He admits to Seven that he's never felt 100% human again after his experience of being Locutus of Borg.
In short, this should be Picard's greatest horror come to life: He is now something not quite human. Entirely without his consent, he has been "assimilated" by Dr. Soong. And there might be potential in that, except... the ending downplays this entirely. It's spelled out in painful detail that Picard is entirely unchanged. He's exactly as he would have been, with exactly the remaining life span he would have had, minus the terminal disease that's been hanging over him all season. And Picard is entirely OK with it, voicing not even a single reservation.
The whole thing feels like a cheat. Not only does it cheapen the sacrifice Picard was willing to make; it undermines the sentiments Data made just one scene earlier, in which he notes that the value of life is that it ends and that "a butterfly that lives forever is really not a butterfly at all." The entire structure of the season was that this was Picard's last adventure, and he explicitly states that he's giving his life to Soji and her people. By reversing that sacrifice so clumsily, it undermines much of what went before.
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| Narek manipulates Soji in the season's best episode. |
THE CURSE OF A TEN-PART MOVIE:
To an extent, many of my issues with the season have to do with the structue of most modern series, particularly those made for streaming. Star Trek: Picard is less a television series than it is an elongated movie. Like a movie, most of its efforts go to furthering its central plot - one main plot that covers the entire season.
There are a couple breaks from this. Absolute Candor focuses on the displaced Romulans. Stardust City Rag comes close to being a standalone, centered around a sting against a dangerous criminal. But those are the only two exceptions. The rest of the season is centered around Picard's efforts to save Soji (and later, her people) from the Romulans.
I recognize that this kind of long-form storytelling is one of the advantages television has over movies. Stories can cover more ground, involve more characters, and deal with more complexity than can be fit into a 2-hour movie. At times, Star Trek: Picard makes this work. The Impossible Box, in which the various threads finally come together, is an excellent episode, easily the season's best, and its success comes in large part from it being able to pay off what was set up by previous installments.
However, I worry that the focus on long-form storytelling has led to neglect of television's other advantage: Its ability to pause and tell stories that are intimate, personal, and even small. This is far from a fault unique to Picard - but when everything is focused on showing some large-scale epic, then there isn't time for people sitting in a room talking, working through a conflict or a moral quandary in a quiet, contemplative manner.
I enjoyed (most of) Picard. But I didn't award a single "10," and I can't help but wonder if part of the reason is that everything had to fuel the plot. I think back on some of my favorite past Star Trek episodes, and so many of them are unimaginable in the framework Picard has employed. I can't imagine this series ever having room for episodes such as: Tapestry, The Inner Light, Duet, The Visitor, It's Only a Paper Moon, or Mortal Coil.
Again, that's more a comment on the trend of shows in general - but if there's no longer room for small, quiet storytelling gems, then I'd argue that more has been lost than has been gained.
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| Picard, back in command. |
SEASON TWO WISHLIST:
Given that Q was in every promo for Season Two, I'm not going to feign total ignorance of what's to come. I know that Q will return, and I know that the next season will deal with some alternate universe shenanigans. I've managed to remain unspoiled beyond that.
My biggest hope is that they take what I felt was a disastrous ending and turn it into an asset. I do not want to see it overwritten - Please no "Q handwaves it away" solution. Instead, make use of it. I still feel that Picard should be greatly troubled by what was done to him. Take as a starting point that Picard, who has stated that the Borg left him feeling less than fully human, now actually is other than 100% human. I don't like that it was done; but since that route was taken, I hope they follow it and make something interesting out of it.
I also hope that they continue to make good use of the regulars they have established. I actually quite like Picard's cast. Even the underused characters have potential, and all of the actors are at least competent. I'd love to see more of Picard's ex-Tal'Shiar housekeeper from the first three episodes; the actress was terrific, and I was actively disappointed when she didn't return later in the season.
I would also love for the series to revisit the idea of a Federation that has gone slightly wrong. That was one of the strongest elements of the season's first half, and I feel it was a major missed opportunity to drop that thread for the second half. If they could pick that thread back up and do something with it, I think it could be potentially interesting.
IN CONCLUSION:
"Potential" is a word that comes to my mind a lot when thinking about Picard's first season. There was a lot of potential here for a fine show. Unlike some, I found this to be an enjoyable season; I'd rank it above at least three seasons of TNG (and I think Trek fandom sometimes forgets how uneven much of TNG really was).
That said, this season only occasionally realized its potential. The ideas were present for Season One of Picard to be a remarkable piece of television, and there are glimpses of that in Maps and Legends, The Impossible Box, and Broken Pieces. The rest of the time, however, the series contented itself with being merely serviceable.
It was still better than three of the four TNG movies, mind you... But I'd like to see that bar set just a bit higher than that.
Next Season: Season Two
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