Amph "Engage!" - Star Trek: Picard Discussion Thread [Paramount+/CraveTV]

You get some points for that quip.

<Headbutts K2771991, followed by punch to the gut, followed by Klingon hug>

 

Guess we’ll find out next week how Elnor & his sword will fare against ranged weapons. It’s not like he has a lightsaber. Any ideas?

One nitpick I had, & this could be just an oversight from my one viewing but

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I thought it was dodgy the way Narek knew to ask Soji to “look up at the skylight, what do you see?”. While she was in a part of her dream that even she hadn’t consciously experienced before. How does that make sense?

 

and maybe also Skywalker

 

Pfft. Everybody knows Romulans are'nt Tolkien Elves, their Elder Scrolls elves

So really, his name should be a combination of whatever the Altmeri words for star and trek are - shame on you writers of STP! Off to Northwatch Keep with you all!

 

There is a reference in "Timeless" to the artifact.

"EMH: You said you'd found a way to communicate with Seven in the past. How?

KIM: Behold. Salvage component three six six nine eight. A Borg temporal transmitter.

CHAKOTAY: Starfleet Intelligence found it in the wreckage of a Borg cube in the Beta Quadrant.

KIM: We stole it."

I read somewhere that "Timeless" is one of Michael Chabon's favorite episodes

 

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I liked the refence to the Kzinti. Guess nobodys worried about paying royalties to Niven anymore

I saw Kestra being the daughter's name from a mile away as soon as the trailer where a girl's voice yelled "dad" to Riker dropped, but while I liked Thaddeus as the sons name (it's a good reference to VGR) I think Thomas might have worked better, as it would be both Riker's middle name and in honor of his "brother" - barring that maybe Kyle - Jean-Luc would have been a nice refrence to Future Imperfect, but it would be, IMO, to on the nose and tacky within the context of the show.

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You could almost say he died becuse he made a hugh-g mistake...

...okay, I'll see myself out now

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Just becuse their not going to be main charecters does'nt mean they won't show up again.

I caught anouther good reference (though I can't say if its deliberate or not) when watching The Visitor with my roomate a couple weeks ago - future Bashir talks about how how long it's been since he used a "two-demenisonal control panel," which ties in pretty well with the Mass Effect syle holo terminals that seem to be the norm in current timeframe of Picard.[/spoiler][/QUOTE]

 

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I actually thought Riker said Xindi but didn't know it was a TAS reference (also I was trying to bend my brain how the Xindi would have made it to Riker's back yard hundreds of years later)

I liked how Picard straight up admitted this crew he's with was no shakes compared to the crew on the Enterprise.

Picard suddenly playing a mean trick on Soji that it was all a simulation seemed a wee bit out of character but sometimes Picard's humour can be a bit dry.

One thing I loved was that Troi's empathic capabilities were used for plot and character stuff. When was the last time Troi's powers were actually used in a decent way? I mean, closest you get is Nemesis which is.... kinda yikes comparatively.

I actually thought Riker's family was going to die horribly for angst purposes but they made it through fine. Only killed the son off screen before we knew he existed years ago. :/ but does reinforce how awful the sythn ban was and how it affected non-synths.

longest episode ever of the show so far but I guess it was they wanted to keep in every frame of the Riker/Troi stuff and also all the plot stuff.

I miss Hugh already, his return was so great, fantastic performance actually, great build upon his first intro and a much better use/farewell to the character (even though he was brutally murdered) than in Descent.

Cool action bit when the Romulan Legolas threw the star at Evil Romulan lady but she transported away, however, wouldn't the dagger transport with her ala when that lady jumped into Kirk's transporter beam?

So 3 weeks ago when Commodore Evil talked to Agnes which was I believe 3 weeks ago we saw the scene so apparently it's been a hellova long trip. Also I was convinced the Commodore was a Romulan but unless they've figured out how to mind meld I guess she's a true Vulcan. Conspiracy!

 

I think

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what Agnes saw would probably be the potential of what is to come, interesting thought in the AV Club review, Romulan Legolas being stuck in a Queen chamber on a Borg Cube could be a be potential no-no and maybe cause the synth disaster. I'm assuming he will straight up activate the Borg Queen and things will properly promptly go to hell in a handbasket (but the Borg blowing up Earth seems a wee bit out of bounds of their usual assimilation jag)

Anyway, that aside, Dad Riker having Security Immediately implemented with a classic "SHIELD'S UP!" holler was very in-character for him, can take Number One off the bridge but you can't remove those instincts. And even before that, him just telling his kid "Stop yelling!" I thought was kind of hilarious.

 

Not surprised, it's great. Speaking of 'Timeless' which featured LaForge, I'm disappointed that through all of

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Hugh's arc on this show he didn't mention Geordie once. No reference, no asking after him to Picard. That's a pity. I would've liked their close bond to at least get a mention.

This show has flaws left & right, but it's still damned enjoyable.

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Frakes is awesome. After so many years he effortlessly slips into the skin of Riker & perfectly nails it. The scenes between he & Picard felt the most "Trek" of anything I've seen in years. Picard's "thoughts?" might be my favourite line of the series to date. Overall a very nice episode - at least while the focus was on the TNG crew.

As always, some problems though. A ghost of a previous episode inevitably reared its head. It was a glaring oversight that Jurati's problem of the EMH witnessing Maddox's murder was never addressed. That's TNG season 1 levels of shoddy storytelling. Just bcs there could be several ways for her to address it, that doesn't mean it's ok to gloss over it without ever referencing it. Here the EMH just shows up again & all is fine!

I have to watch it again but did anyone find the resolution of last week's cliffhanger ending to be underwhelming, or even non-existent? Did we even see Elnor take out those Romulans? Then there's Rizzo's very questionable logic. She can't kill High bcs he's Federation. But when he conspires with Elnor she can. Would it have been beyond her to just have killed him initially & said that he was being treacherous? Esp if such treachery gives her the right to immediately execute him herself? Also, didn't Hugh's actions along with Elnor at the end of last week constitute treachery? I thought it was a poor way for the writers to have her delay killing Hugh until their preferred time. Frankly, the mid-late seasons of TNG are far better written than this is, & we're supposed to be in a golden age of high quality tv. Still, it's tradition for Trek shows to get away to shaky starts, & there's enough gold & magical moments in this to easily get me looking fwd to each week.

 

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eh, maybe Federation and Romulan treaties are super specific what constitutes treason or not. The EMH seeing Agnes freak out should hopefully be addressed though.

I'm calling odds the Borg all wake up and start assimilating everyone in sight as next week's cliffhanger. Only likable characters left on the Artifact is Elenor and maybe that Trill scientist and a few XBs so not everyone is horribly assimilated. Them Romulan hubris needs comeuppance! Comeuppance, I say!

 

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Figures they would kill off Hugh too. At least his death (and that of the other xBs) will probably set off a big chain reaction. Bit annoying that the Romulan lady was beamed out at just the right moment to avoid being killed. With just a few episodes, I hope we soon finally find out just what the big synthetic secret the show's been revolving around the whole time. Too bad the rest of Picard's crew is still pretty naive, although Raffi is suspicious but then Agnes is perhaps too obviously "innocent" and an EMH that doesn't mention her killing Maddox. Or lethal poison that's easily accessible, but then this isn't a starfleet ship.

Wonderful to see Riker and Troi again after all these years, everyone was pitch perfect. They're happy to help Picard but also understand that whatever he's involved in, its complicated and they have to worry about their own daughter. Still, nice to see a mostly happy ending for that family.

A bit heavyhanded with the talk of a dead son who could have been saved if not for the synthetic ban but that's fiction for you (and it was nice to see Picard kept in touch with his old crew). Their daughter is nice and was a breather for Soji who is still reeling from all of this. Saving Data's daughter is one thing, trying to talk to her is a whole other problem.

So they're heading for Soji's "homeworld" next while I expect things will just get worse on the Artifact. I hope we get back to the Starfleet thing sooner or later, Picard doesn't want to frighten Soji more and I expect he and Raffi would be very interested in whatever's going on with the Romulans and synthetic but it'd be nice to be able to call in Starfleet sooner or later, now that Picard's got proof of something way bigger going on.

 

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It's funny you bring them up in relation to this; my personal headcanon has always been that the Kzinti are just anouther subspecies of Xindi who left their homeworld well before it was destroyed ("Kzinti" would just the Xindi word for Xindi-Feliniod in this case) - the Xindi Conflict in ENT is the last of the Earth-Kzin Wars mentioned in TAS (though Earth obviusly did'nt know the Kzinti were Xindi until after the fact) and Sulu's statment that it ended "two hundred" years before is him generalizing/mispeaking like Khan speaking of how long ago the 1990s were in TWOK

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The way I read it (based on what Troi said to him after) is that he was'nt playing a trick but rather misunderstood that she was being serius since he assumed that becuse he considered it an absurd idea she must have as wall - he thought she was being sarcastic, so he decided to be sacrastic right back

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When was the last time it snowed on the sun?

Nah, I'm just kidding. Deanna's a doll and we all love her.

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I know. It feels like a hugh-g peice of the show is missing now. But at least we got to see that he had rediscovered his hugh-manity

Ah, damn it, I'm doing it agian...

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I assume it has to do with how much has de-materilized so far. If I'm not mistaken Gillian* jumped onto Kirk before he had started to materlize earlier (we know from earlier in the movie that the transporter has a "buildup" before somewhat actually starts to beam, since Gillian herself starts to freak out before she's beamed the first time - she's actually quite clever for taking note of that and using it to her advantage)

*interesting fact for those who don't know - not only did Catherine Hicks play the wife of Stephan Collins's charecter in 7th Heaven, she was also a lead on the short-lived 80s tv show Tucker's Witch (which also had Alfrie Woodard in it), having replaced Kim Catrell in the role after the later was'nt picked up for the show after the pilot becuse of her...ahem...performace in Porky's.

So, Gillian Taylor married Will Decker, hung out with Lily Sloane and stole a job from Valeris

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We could have Romulan spies aboard this ship!

Perhaps Administrator V'las was the tip of much deeper, long-term operation to maintain home-grown operatives on Vulcan/in the Federation - hell, maybe Selok/T'Pel was actually a Vulcan after all, not a Romulan posing as Vulcan

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I wonder what this terrible secret is supposed to be anyway.

My guess is it's the impending invasion of the Reapers. *assuming direct control!*

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There's no Kzinti. Riker just kept walking into the living room and yelling "shields up!" and then getting sad when nothing happens so Kestra and Deanna installed real sheilds to make him happy.

They don't really have an issue with it. What they do have an issue with him is the weird way he sits down at the dinner table and how he has to linger behind them in a Captain Morgan pose while their all watching TV.


Hey guys, watcha watching?

I'm not suprised he forgot Geordie - everybody else seems to

That being said I'm still hoping for an apperance by Captain La Forge and the USS Challenger (if only becuse of the tease of the Galaxy-class in the first and second episodes got me wanting more), and the fact that Chabon apperantly likes Timeless so much gives me hope of that being a possiblity

 

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Really solid episode for the most part, the stuff with Picard and with the crew was all great (well aside from the EMH randomly forgetting about the murder he witnessed.)

Will say I’m now at my limit as far as the gratuitous offing of side characters goes. This is Star Trek not GoT.

 

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I'm basically hate watching at this point, and looking for nuggets that I can enjoy in the process. My friend that I watch with can't believe I'm gonna keep paying for CBS All Access, but as long as she can watch for free she'll stick with me.

So I listened to Robert Meyer Burnett's critique of this show recently where he talked about how casually this show treats death. I really think that is spot on. When all those ex-borg were unceremoniously executed, the only reaction my friend and I could have was, "because of course gratuitous, emotionless, narratively pointless violence." I always felt the stakes in Star Trek, but that is just gone here. I figured Hugh would die because why wouldn't he? That's how this show rolls. I felt it was basically better than expected because at least he wasn't tortured to death. Still, he mainly just spent the episode running for his life until he was successfully taken out. No clue why Elnor stayed behind, and I definitely can't stand that Picard allowed him or Hugh to stay behind. Elnor and Hugh had no plan, or for the two second they had a plan, they were being spied on and immediately outed. He ended up needing a rescue anyway. Nothing makes sense ever in this show. There's no point to anything.

I do agree with someone's point above that it was lovely to see Troi use her empath abilities. As soon as she met Soji, I was hoping that something would come of that. Very good usage for her. But then of course, it wouldn't be nuTrek Picard if everyone doesn't have a tragic backstory, so we get the new tragic backstory of the Rikers, yay! We thought it was hilariously ridiculous that their son died because of the synth ban. But I was moved when Troi told Picard she couldn't bear it if anything happened to Kestra. I'm a sucker for mama bear relationships. Speaking of which, I did love Kestra. She was a lovable character and the actress was wonderful. Her scenes with Soji were a joy.

Oh one last thing - Soji doing the Data head tilt? Come on. She never moved like that before that exact moment. Plus, isn't she mostly organic? Does she have a robotic shell in her body? I was under the impression that she didn't.

Waiting for these characters to figure out that the scientist woman is a traitor is so frustrating. I can't suspend my disbelief to buy it. Wasn't Rafi Starfleet intelligence in a prior life? That's what I recalled, but maybe I'm wrong because I didn't care to look it up. Nobody is suspicious of the woman that is clearly a basket case and that was alone with the man that should have lived when he mysteriously died? I just can't take it.

 

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I would have perferred that he died on Mars, to be honest, and then have Riker decide to retire afterwards in order to spend time with his remaining child.

We've only seen Soji for a comparativly small period of her existence so far; it's possible the head tilt is something she does all the time but we've just never had a chance to see it before now, and honestly in-universe if someone was'nt looking for it it would be easy to miss.

As for why she does it when she's a BSG-style skinjob, she's cloned from Data's positronic nuerons, so it seems highly likely she'd share some of the same traits as him.

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She was seemingly Picard's aide, and the way she treated her job/the color of her uniform in the flashbacks indicates that she was an operations officer of some sort. The recent comic has her as his XO and say she's Starfleet's leading expert on the Romulans, but that is, of course, non-canon.

 

I knew I heard it or read it somewhere. Here's an excerpt from an article:

http://blog.trekcore.com/2020/01/interview-star-trek-picard-michelle-hurd-raffi-musiker/

 

Riker and Troi served with Data for seventeen years, so they’d recognize the fingerprints of his body language in an android that he built and then Kestra says that Soji burned through a five hundred page language book in under five minutes. That’s classic Data, so they’d think, “yeah, android.”

 

Your final comment there undermines the rest a bit. Fast reading & head tilts are an android thing, not exclusively a Data thing. Riker already knew she was an android. It was lame, but also pretty minor. The writing of late has far bigger problems.

 

Deanna, I assume, probably figured she was an android basically immediately because she couldn't sense any emotion from her.

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I don't care that they figured that out. I just thought the head tilt was contrived with no build up. The actress never moved like a robot before.

 

She senses emotion from both Data and Lore, so the fact that she did'nt from Soji is likely an oversight on the part of the writers.

That or maybe Troi's abilities are just slipping in her old age

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True, she did'nt, but it could just be that we hav'nt seen her do it before - we're less then ten episodes and there's no reason to think she tilts her head all the time just becuse Data did. Honestly if they had'nt know she was an android and they had seen her tilt her head they probobly would'nt have noticed.

I could also be becuse more android abilities/traits are "activating" like they did for her sister during the raid on her apartment, just in a less drastic way

That's a good catch. Until it's put in the show though we can't say that she actually was and, even if it is, she could simply be an SI desk analyist whose feild of expertise was Romulans specificly, not an investigator (not to mention that at this point in her life she's drugged up and washed up, so she's clearly not at the top of her game)

As for the EMH not reporting Jurati, well Anges could have just fiddled with it to delete what happened from its memory - she is an engineer, after all.