1st episode is out!

Not super thrilled that we'll be getting yet another serialized sort of show, but I like what they're doing plotwise, and I'm already enjoying it more than Discovery. The central arc seems like it will pull heavily from one of the best TNG episodes, and I look forward to what they do with that.

Old man Picard is a joy to watch. He is certainly less active and less expressive just due to Patrick Stewart's age, but the sense of solemnity and gravitas that characterized all of Picard's best TNG moments is there in force. Perhaps more so now that he is the wearied regretful Admiral rather than the brash Captain.

Spoiler

Dahj/Soji... I dunno. Too early to pass judgement on her, but the actress as Dahj was painfully over-emoting in literally every scene. Hopefully she'll have better acting direction / dialogue as Soji.

 

I am really interested in seeing where they go with

Spoiler

the 'rogue' AIs/androids and Data or his succession

Those plot thread is came way too short in all the series before.

All in all, good first episode, excited for more.

 

I watched it last week on Amazon Prime. Second episode has been out for 2 days. Haven't watched it yet.

As someone that hasn't really watched Star Trek ever, apart from the last few movies, which I thought were pretty shit tbh, this was enjoyable. Don't love it yet ,but could come too.

 

Ok, episode two got me a lot more interested in this than I was. Looking forward to ep 3 now.

 

I'm cautiously optimistic. They're walking a fine balance of making actual use of established plot points and doing their own thing, and Stewart is still extremely fun to watch.

TNG has a really special place in my heart so I almost didn't want to watch this in case I hated it, but I really didn't.

I just hope they don't make Picard's age a joke. Like, yeah, obviously you have to address it and obviously he can't be running around doing backflips, but to me Captain Picard is pretty much the definition of gravitas and "tea, earl grey, decaf" is about the most I can stand in terms of undermining that.

As long as the story builds towards him being that, in whatever way it makes sense for him to be commanding 20 years later, I'll be happy. If it's about him accepting his limitations and/or raging against the dying of the light, fuck that, that might even be an interesting story but I don't want it.

 

In many respects he's a much softer character in this and I'm glad they've went that way and not down the crotetchy old lad route. He still has anger and some bitterness but his principles are clearly defined, classic Picard.

He's not the presence he was in TNG but that's to be expected and I'm cautiously optimistic we'll get at least one scene in the series that brings that back a little.

 

Again I've only watched two episodes but honestly if Picard doesn't come out of the end of this having saved the Federation from some shit so they can properly laud him then I'll riot.





He's fucking Picard.

 

Spoiler

These fuckers killed Icheb. What the fuck.

 

I just caught up with episode five and as a Voyager fan I am completely not okay with this.

 

I mean, Seven's enhancements looked a little... gummy. Still, the show has been enjoyable overall.

 

Yeah, it's weird that they actually regressed in regards to the props used to represent her Borg leftovers, I thought that several times.

Her character though is great. Throughout Voyager we see Seven become more emotional, more Annika. In Picard she's 80% badass human with traces of her old Borg habits.

 

There are definitely aspects of the show I like, but I really don't care for the overall tone and general feeling of "Not Star Trek." When we got to the point where Romulan warrior-nuns were training master swordsmen, I found myself wondering if whoever wrote the episode just saw the pointy ears and assumed they were Space Elves.

Aesthetic issues like that aside, my biggest complaint is that the Federation in Picard just feels too different from the Federation in any other show (well maybe it's like that in STD, but I haven't caught much of that). Too many things changed with too little in the way of explanation. I also feel like it's being way too transparent in trying to do commentary on modern events, which is odd since that kind of thing is a long-standing staple of Trek. Maybe it's because the old Trek series did that with a Planet/Crisis of the Week, not a season-long arc that completely altered the entire setting. "Orange Man Bad! Brexit Bad!" could make for good Planet of the Week episode or even a two-parter, but as a season-long arc it's wearying.

Also, it's a total pet peeve, but shows on streaming services really need to get over the fact that they're allowed to say "fuck" when it's not on network TV. Having all the characters go "fuck fuck fuckity fuck fuck" in a Star Trek show does not make it feel "modern" or "mature." It makes me feel like the dialogue was written by a twelve-year-old edgelord.

 

Okay, so I'm not sure what to say. We're just over the halfway point of the series, and I'm leaning toward not liking this.

I watch the episodes, and I just have no attachment to, or interest in any characters except Picard, and even he can be grating at times. In regards to the other characters, they have really generic backstories with plot threads that limp along agonizingly slowly and I'm supposed to give a shit but I really don't. And as for Picard, he's a shadow of his former self. Even when they're older, authority figures (ie. the captain of a starship) still have a sense of command, of presence. Picard just looks like a kicked dog half the time.

Spoiler: Woof

He gets reamed out by the admiral when he's asking for a ship, nagged at by his Romulan super-spy turned Irish nanny, bitched out by Raffi, and literally begs Android #2 to let him help her in the most recent episode.

And when he's not appearing weak and impotent, he's doing things that (at least to me) seem antithetical to his character.

Spoiler

He straight up manipulates Legolas Junior into killing the senator. That fucking fight didn't need to happen, but it was done so Legolas Junior would come running like a lost puppy in the most contrived manner ever.

And that's just the characterization. The ham-fisted political messaging has all the subtlety of a tank through a Wuhan disease research facility, whose debris lands in a gigantic vat of bat soup. Why is everybody in a position of power female? Did all the male senior members of Starfleet get killed in the Mars attacks?

The writing is absolutely horrible, with things happening that either don't need to happen, don't make sense, or are just too plodding and pedantic to give a shit about. Also, I would love if we got one point of view for the whole episode, instead of this bouncing back and forth between Picard, and Android #2, and the guy who looks too much like Spock from STD. Preferably keep it on Picard, because he's, you know, the titular character.

Speaking of the guy who looks like Spock from STD, why do he and his sister have some really weird Game of Thrones pseudo-incest thing happening? You can be evil spies without looking like you're trying to bone.

The accents are annoying. I still am beating my head in over a ROMULAN, someone who is supposedly from ANOTHER PLANET saying a slang term like "cheeky feckers" like she's straight out of Fair City. Where are the Starfleet Garda, me lads? Top o' the mornin' to ye, Captain Picard. Jaysus. Picard and Troi were the only people with an accent in TNG, and it sounded a lot less jarring than this. AND you have an Aussie Romulan. Why so many different accents? Surely, they'd all speak Romulan, and it would all be the same accent?

I also agree with everything @Chengar Qordath said.

Really, I don't know why I'm still watching this. Oh yeah, it's because I remember fondly watching episodes of TOS, TNG, DS9 and Voyager, and even Enterprise; and I keep hoping that if I watch one more episode, I'll see something that's more than just a momentary glimpse of the show that I miss.

Spoiler: And about The Impossible Box:

Okay, so.

1. The overlay of Locutus' picture on Picard's face was completely unnecessary. I know they're the same guy, I watched the much better source material. Again, tremendously subtle.
2. All these random relationships I really don't give a shit about either. People fuck in space, I get it. But the rate at which these things seem to happen and change is more akin to a trashy soap opera.
3. As soon as Picard said to Legolas, "I order you to stay on the ship", did anyone think that he was actually going to? Was anybody fooled by that for even a second?
4. Again, I feel Picard's PTSD was handled much better in "Family" and Star Trek: First Contact.
5. The Picard and Hugh reunion was probably the best part of the episode. Not going to lie, I smiled.
6. The Borg "aren't monsters, they're victims" - yes, just as you were. Kind of weird that you forgot about that whilst you were having your PTSD meltdown.
7. Why did Hugh and Legolas stay on the cube to fight? Seems kind of silly, especially when there was an avenue of escape right there. Hugh wants to stay behind? Why? You know what's going to happen when they catch you there, right? Torture, interrogation. More interrogation, more torture. And a nice bit of death as an aperitif. Go through the portal, you numpty.

 

I enjoyed the last episode... when Picard was on the screen. The ensemble chars are just becoming increasingly more contrived and increasingly less interesting, and that is largely in part because they've been handwaving the backstories and motivations, shoving them into stereotypes, and skipping the little character building slice-of-life-on-a-ship moments that made episodic Trek great.

I'm hoping time will remedy this, but if we use the other serialized Trek (Discovery) as an example, it's probably in vain.

Also space!legolas is super awful. Mom and Pop Romulan on Picard"s vineyard could have easily and more fulfillingly played that 'warrior' role.

 

Yeeeeeahhh. I'm forced to side with the rest of you here. I'm just not feeling it, even if I want super badly to.

I visibly cringed at the Freeport / knockoff Mos Eisley space station whatever the fuck it was, and whatever series of events got Patrick Stewart into that Bad Guy Outfit just... why.

I will say that Jeri Ryan aged fantastically and her voice and character were perfect. More human than Seven on STV, but still with just a little borg in her, especially at the end when she asked Picard about getting her humanity back, her voice actually changed a little. I'd take her over Space Legolas in a fucking heartbeat if the crew needs a badass.

Wish they hadn't signaled Alison Pill's heel turn so fucking hard.

Truly the most telling thing I can point to here when I say it's not quite working is that I watched the episode literally 10 minutes ago and I'm calling her Alison Pill instead of whatever her character's name is because I can't remember it.

I haven't watched the latest episode yet, just didn't want to after that.

All I fucking want is for Picard to be commanding, somehow. I literally don't care about anything else and these characters and especially this writing aren't doing a good job of making me.

Ugh. wanted so badly to love this.
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Thinking about it a little more, I feel like there's probably a much better show left on the cutting room floor. All I kept thinking about last episode was how... jarring it felt. Things cut together in odd, disjointed ways, and while it technically worked in terms of following what was going on, and some scenes were pretty good on their own, it never felt cohesive. The pace was all over the place, like that episode managed to feel rushed and also drag in various places, which is truly an accomplishment.

Feels like one of those things where you might watch a YouTube video 10 years later that goes into all the details and behind the scenes shit and scenes left out or cut differently and it's like "oh actually there was a great episode here".

 

That may well be, but as viewers, we can't judge the show on what might have been, or what got cut. We're judging the show on what was deemed fit for broadcast, and what has been deemed fit thus far is sorely lacking.

If anything, the removal of any hypothetical quality content should be even more damning to the production team (and I say production team because they have more producers than main cast members), since this is stuff that was cut in favour of what was shown.

 

I kept thinking, when I saw Stewart dressed in that horrendous eyepatch bad guy getup, like. How many people who had oversight on that show saw that and went "yep that's what we want to put on the air."

Truly a dark day.

 

I mean... I think that was probably all Patrick Stewart. He is IRL a pretty silly guy.