Nerd heaven

Star Trek Generations had a lot of hype to live up to. Not only was it the first time we would see the next generation cast on the big screen, but it would also have the long-anticipated meeting of Captain Kirk and Captain Picard. But, it was also going to be one of those infamous odd-numbered Star Trek movies. So, could it hold up to the hype?

Let's dig back into this movie and see how it holds up.

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Welcome to Nerd Heaven

I’m Adam David Collings

The author of Jewel of the Stars

And I am a nerd.

This is episode 23 of the podcast.

Today we’re talking about Star Trek Generations.

Generations had a lot of hype to live up to. Not only was it the first appearance of the next generation crew on the big screen, it features the long-anticipated meeting between captains Picard and Kirk. But, it was going to be one of the infamous odd numbered Star Trek movies.

So could it live up to the hype?

What did you think of this movie when it first came out?

My overall experience with it was a positive one, and yet, I found myself re-writing it in my head, coming up with alternative stories.

Let's see how it stands up.

The description on Memory Alpha reads

"Two captains. One destiny."

In the late 23rd century, the USS Enterprise-B is on her maiden voyage, and Kirk is no longer in the captain's chair. The ship must rescue El-Aurian refugees from a mysterious energy ribbon, but the rescue seemingly costs Kirk his life. Seventy-eight years later, one of the El-Aurian survivors leads the crew of the Enterprise-D into a deadly confrontation with the Duras sisters as he plots to re-enter the paradise of the ribbon that nearly destroyed him years prior.

The Screenplay was written by

Ronald D. Moore & Brannon Braga

The Story was by

Rick Berman & Ronald D. Moore & Brannon Braga

It was Directed by

David Carson

And it first appeared in cinemas on the 18th of November 1994.

Make it so.

The opening credits were reasonably effective for this movie.

I quite like the musical score that Dennis McCarthy created for Generations. Not as memorable as Goldsmith’s score for First Contact, but better than what he did on the TV show.

I remember watching the names go by. I knew Kirk was going to be in this movie, but I didn’t know if anyone else from TOS would appear, so I was very excited when James Doohan and Walter Keonig’s names appeared.

The bottle of champagne floating through space makes you think of the chateau Picard wine, suggesting that we’re starting in the 24th century. So the reveal of the Enterprise 1701-B was a shock. I nearly wet myself when I saw those original series Wrath of Khan uniforms.

I love how this movie starts in the 24rd century. It feels like it picks up straight after Star Trek 6. And that’s what I really wanted. To start in familiar TOS movie era and then transition to The Next Generation.

It’s not surprising that they got the TOS movie aesthetic spot on, because a lot of the same people who worked on TNG worked on the later TOS movies.

The presence of the news reporters was kinda cool. We’d never seen anything like that in the star trek universe, but it made sense to me that by this point in time, the name Enterprise was famous enough that the media would be present at the launch of a new ship with the name. And the TV style reporters felt like that fit in better in the 23rd century than they did in the 24th.

Still, I cheered when Kirk told the reporter to “turn that damn thing off”

John Harriman gets a lot of flack for being a pathetic captain, but I’ve always maintained that most of the problems were because he was completely un-equipped. Starfleet sent him out without half his crew, and half his equipment non-functional.

I don’t blame Harriman for that. The ship was doing a publicity flight. They weren’t even supposed to leave the solar system.

And yes, he’s a little green, and sometimes hesitates, but he doesn’t have the decades of experience that Kirk has.

And what I really like about him, when the moment comes, he swallows his pride and asks for Kirk’s assistance. He doesn’t have many resources, so of course he should use the one resource he does have. Kirk’s experience.

In my head canon, I’d like to think that Harriman went on to be a great captain, worthy of the legacy of Kirk and Pike. 

And I LOVE that they use the TOS movie warp effect and viewscreen sound. Those are the little details that a non fan wouldn’t even notice, but they mean so much to me.

It’s noticeable that these scenes are being written by TNG writers. The dialog is particularly TNG sounding, specifically in relation to the use of technobabble.

The CGI effects for the nexus ribbon look awesome. Even today it stands up as a really cool looking effect.

The use of el aurian refugees fleeing the borg was a pretty cool idea. And the brief appearance of both Soran and Guinan on screen during this part of the movie is important, because it ties it in to the main 24th century section.

I assume that most people listening would be aware that the script was originally written for Spock and McCoy, not Scotty and Checkov, which is why Checkov is suddenly running sickbay. This kinda works for me because I can believe that as a former security chief and first officer, he’d have had some medical training. 

But his line “You and you, you just became nurses,” sounds very much like a McCoy line.

When Harriman gives Kirk the bridge, I like how he hesitates just for a minute, savouring the chance to sit in the captain’s chair, before realising  that’s not his place.

It also makes sense that Harriman was going to go. He feels pretty useless on the bridge of his ship right now, especially with Kirk there. But Kirk sees potential, maybe even some familiarity in the young man, telling him that his place is on the bridge of HIS ship.

And then the ribbon hits, blowing kirk out into space. And just like prophesied in Star Trek 5, he died alone. Ok, maybe prophesied is too strong a word.

I knew this couldn’t be the last we’d see of Kirk. I knew he shared screen time with Picard in the trailer. Still, as Scotty and Checkov race to deck fifteen, I held my breath. No. It couldn’t be.

They couldn’t let Kirk die!

I still felt that loss.

OF course, we have a continuity problem here, because when Scotty beamed aboard the Enterprise D in the episode relics, he said “I bet Captain Kirk has come out of retirement.”

It’s hard to know how to fix that.

And then we jump forward 78 years into the future. And this is a little jarring because it starts off on a sailing ship on the holodeck. If you weren’t familiar with the Next Generation you’d be really confused by this. 

Worf is definitely due toe promotion having served on the Enterprise D for 7 years, over 6 as security chief.

And I like that they would celebrate an event like this on the holodeck.

This is the kind of sequence we’d never have had on the TV show. And it looks great in it’s widescreen high definition glory.

I found the attitudes of the crew quite hypocritical in this scene. When Riker removes the plank, plunging Work into the cold water, everyone laughs. Crusher says it’s all in good fun. But when Data pushes Crusher in, everyone is horrified. And Crusher, who advised him to live in the moment and have some fun is angry at him.

WHAT?

Maybe I’m too much an android myself, but I don’t see the difference.

We don’t know what’s in the message Picard gets, but Patrick Stewart sells it very well with his acting. We know something terrible has happened.

This movie has a very different visual look to it than the TV show. They’re very close to a star, so there’s an orange tint to everything, including the exterior shots of the enterprise, and the inside of the ship, that orange light coming through the windows.

And I REALLY like this. IT looks fantastic, and reminds us that this isn’t a TV show anymore. It gave the whole thing a more cinematic look that I really appreciated.

Also, I love the new com badges. Keeping the old uniforms helped give us something familiar to hold onto, but changing the com badges showed that we have moved into a new era.

Picard is already showing clear signs of some kind of emotional trauma. Troi is sending it, not that she really needs empathic abilities for that! But I love the look on her face. Nice non-verbal acting from Marina Sirtis.

The transporter beam has been changed for the movie. Similar enough that it’s not too jarring, but different enough that it feels more ….. movie-ish.

And as we see Soran’s face peeking through the rubble, we see our first connection between these otherwise very disparate stories.

They do a great job with the dead romulan, of making it realistically gory but with green blood instead of red. Green blood is something that could easily come across as cheesy. But it doesn’t.

So given his failure to understand humour, and Crusher’s reaction to his attempt (Which I don’t blame him for, because I don’t understand it either), Data has decided to install the emotion chip that Doctor Soong created for him, which he got from Lore at the end of Descent.

The chip suddenly looks a lot bigger than last we saw it.

In Descent, Data didn’t install the chip because he was worried that emotion might lead him to harm others. His friendship with Geordi was too important to him.

In this movie, his reason for not having used it until now is a fear that it might overload his neural net.

I understand the need to not ask too much of the audience in a movie. They want to sell as many tickets as possible. They don’t want to rely on people having seen every episode of the TV show. I make this work in my head by saying that there were two reasons Data didn’t use the chip. Geordi mentions the technological one because he is an engineer, responsible for Data’s maintenance, and because honestly, he had more faith in Data’s humanity than even Data does.

So this is one of the controversial elements of the movie. Some people didn’t like the addition of emotions to Data. Some just found his behaviour after installation to be extremely annoying. Michael Piller lamented the chip when he came to write Insurrection. He liked the pinocchio aspect of Data’s character and thought it a shame that movie audiences never got to see that side of Data.

To me, personally, I’m a fan of character development. I hate it when writers chain themselves to the status quo. I like the worlds in my stories to change, and the people that inhabit those worlds to change even moreso.

So, in my opinion, this was a good time for Data to install the chip, to take his character to the next level.

Picard’s ready room and ten forward both look awesome with the new lighting. I love it!

So Data tries a drink offered to him by Guinan. This is the first example of his odd behaviour with the chip. I will admit that Data does get a little annoying in this movie, especially when he’s cracking jokes and laughing maniacally on the station, but this works for me. Data is new to emotions. He has no idea how to deal with them. Can you imagine suddenly, a lifetime of emotions, related to all of your memories, suddenly flooding into your system. I don’t think I’d handle them any better than Data does. Imagine experiencing fear for the very first time. It would be crippling. Yeah, in my opinion, this stuff is all very nicely done.

Data’s jokes here are not supposed to amuse us. They certainly don’t amuse Geordi. We’re seeing the whole thing through Geordi’s eyes.

So we apparently El Aurians have some mild telepathic abilities. Soran is able to see Picard’s pain. He senses it is related to fire and burning. He understands that Picard is struggling with issues of regret and things not done.

This makes it very easy for him to manipulate Picard into allowing him onto the station.

I can buy that El Aurians have these kinds of senses. It’s probably what gives them the reputation for being such good listeners.

You’ll notice that over the course of this movie, the crew slowly transitions from the traditional TNG uniforms to the newer DS9/Voyager uniforms. This makes sense to me because this IS a time of uniform transition.I wonder if there are any rules or guidelines regarding when they should wear particular uniforms.

Now we come to one of the most powerful scenes in the movie.

Picard is looking through his family photo albums and Troi comes to see him. This is a wonderful character scene for both of them. I love this scene because it gives Troi the chance to actually matter. Something that didn’t really happen in any of the other TNG movies. Troi actually gets to be a counsellor.

We learn that Picard’s brother Robert and his nephew Rene have tragically burned to death in a fire.

This is heart-breaking to hear. Doubly so because we met these characters back in the fourth season episode family.

Patrick Stewart’s acting in this scene is absolutely phenomenal.

This scene is the thematic and emotional heart of the movie.

I’ve heard it said that the theme this movie is trying to explain is essentially a copy of the aging theme in Star Trek II. But I see a lot of difference between the two.

In Star Trek II, Kirk was basically having a mid-life crisis. Filled with the regret of the loss of the glory days. Feeling like he could never get those days back again.

Picard’s experience is very different. Picard never lost his glory days. He’s living the dream right now. He’s captain of the Enterprise. Picard’s issue is all about legacy. Yes, Picard is aware that he is aging, that there are “fewer days ahead than there are behind,” as he puts it.

But that doesn’t bother him so much. He takes comfort in his family legacy. The family will go on. And Rene is very much like Jean-Luc. He is the closest thing he has to a child of his own, and to Jean-Luc, that is quite enough. He’s content with that.

But now that legacy has been stolen from him. I’m sure there are other members of the Picard family alive. Cousins, second cousins. Extended family. But the line of Maurice Picard, of Robert and Jean-Luc, that is gone. And there is no longer any hope that this can be changed.

Time has been cruel to Picard. It has taken away his hopes for the future.

I love that this film, with everything else that’s packed into it, still takes the time to explore some weighty emotional issues with it’s characters. Well done, I say. Well done.

And I love the transition from Picard talking, to the sudden implosion seen through the window.

Having spoken with Troi, Picard is able to switch his professionalism back on.

So, a nice touch, Soran is working with the Duras Sisters, rogue Klingons. This is cool because it allows the movie to have a familiar traditional bad guy, the klingons, that fans of the original series and movies would be familiar with, even though in this time, the klingons are our allies.

To fans of TNG, these are familiar popular characters. To other viewers, they’re just Klingons who are clearly meant to be villains. It works on both levels.

The actors that portray Lursa and B’etor do a great job of portraying their characters.

I like the little moment when Soran waves his hand in front of his face, suggesting the Klingons don’t smell so good. Just a little bit of visual story-telling.

Crusher identifies Soran’s past and figures out Guinan likely knows him, since she was on the lakul with him back when Kirk rescued them. 

Why is crusher doing biographical research on him?

Anyway, this is handy because Guinan is able to give Picard more information on his enemy.

I like Guinan’s quarters. They look kind of exotic. Lots of candles.

I’ve always liked the character of Guinanan, and in this movie, Whoopi Goldburg shows us a rarely seen vulnerable side of the character.

Strangely, Goldbuerg is not credited in this movie. I wonder why.

The Enterprise D model that flies by is, I believe, the same model used for the TV show. And yet, in this shot, it seems weightier. It feels like a big heavy ship. Is it the camera used to shoot it? The widescreen aspect ratio? I’m not sure.

The new stellar cartography set is really cool, with those massive screens that encircle them. I remember feeling quite impressed by it when I first saw this movie.

This scene pulls double duty. It is an exposition scene where they find out what Soran’s plan is. But at the same time, it does some really nice character stuff with Data and Picard.

Both of them are struggling with their emotions. Picard just has a little more experience to draw on than data does. It’s good stuff.

Speaking of Soran’s plan, it’s a bit dumb. But we’ll come to that a bit later.

I understand why the Duras sisters are willing to exchange Geordi for Picard, even if Picard is beamed down to Soran’s location. They want to use his visor to spy on the ship so they can destroy it. But why doesn’t Picard suspect their surprising agreement?

Veridian III looks amazing. This was all shot at the Valley of Fire State Park, and man it looks awesome. Especially shot with the cinema cameras and rendered in high def on blu-ray.

Such rugged beauty, so exotic and alien looking. I can’t say enough good about this location. It’s fantastic.

So Soran is willing to destroy two stars, and at least one entire planet populated by people. Just to divert the nexus ribbon to a place he can enter it. When Picard asks why he doesn’t just fly into it with a ship, Data’s excuse is that any ship that has approached the ribbon has been destroyed or damaged. Soran says his plan is the only way.

But we know this isn’t true. Yes, Soran’s ship might be destroyed, but….he’ll still end up in the Nexus. We'll shortly have proof of that when we see Kirk in the Nexus. He was blown out into space and sucked into the nexus by the ribbon. Pleasantly, that means all those lakul survivors that Scotty couldn’t save also ended up in the nexus. That’s nice.

The whole thing comes across as a bit convoluted. I understand the writers of this movie were under extreme time pressure, so I can understand why this is what they came up with, but I do acknowledge that it doesn’t really work for me.

But what does work is the character stuff between Picard and Soran. I like how Picard calls back to the borg. Soran’s perspective is almost convincing. We’re all going to die sometime anyway, so is it really so bad that I make it happen a little earlier for a few people so I can experience an eternity of joy?

The Duras sister’s plan is kind of clever and works for me. They’ve modified Geordi’s visor to transmit what he sees, and they see the shield nutation frequency on a panel.  That allows them to get through the enterprise shields and actually inflict damage.

But this leads into what I consider to be the first really big negative in this movie.

This battle between the Enterprise and the bird of prey is pretty weak, and honestly, not a great way for our beloved ship to go down.

It always struck me as silly that the Enterprise takes shot after shot, through its shields, yet they get one single torpedo hit on their ship and the whole thing blows up.

The whole sequence feels very weak and pathetic.

The biggest issue, as others have pointed out before me, is that it’s all solved with technobabble. If you want to go into more detail on this, just listen to the youTube Lorerunner rant about this scene.

And do you notice that the shot of the bird of prey exploding is a recycled shot from Star Trek VI? I did, even back in the day. The budget must have been really tight for them to have done that.

Although, in the director’s commentary, David Carson talks about watching them shoot the destruction of the Klingon Ship, so….I’m not sure what to make of that.

And so, the writers decide to do what had only been done once before, They’re going to destroy a much-loved Starship Enterprise. It made sense to do this.

Firstly, it added bigger, more intense stakes to the movie. They’d never have done this in the show.

But more importantly, it allowed them to make a new Enterprise for subsequent movies. Remember, these sets were created back in the 80s for a standard definition TV show. They did some good stuff in this movie to make the Enterprise D look good on the big screen, but the Enterprise E was made for the big screen, and as I said in my First Contact video, it looked fantastic.

Sadly, the destruction of the Enterprise D was done very badly. It lacks the thematic and emotional resonance that the destruction of the original Enterprise had in Star Trek III. It is lost because of a battle they should have won with a silly little old bird of prey.

However, after the loss of the stardrive section, the whole battle thing is redeemed, in my opinion by a truly amazing sequence as the saucer section crashes onto Veridian III.

First off, let me say that Data’s swear word got a lot of audible laughter from the theatre when I first watched it, and yes, I laughed too.

The crash landing looks amazing. Seriously, I could just watch this sequence all day long. IT’s spectacular. The Enterprise has never felt so big. So weighty. The way it cuts through the trees and scoops up dirt from the surface of the planet.

Man, I can’t say enough good things about it. I Love it.

It blew me away in the cinema, and it still blows me away now. This may just be the best visual sequence out of any Star Trek movie.

And then, after all the firstworks, we have that silent moment as Troi tells Data he’s ok. And the sad music starts to swell, as we come to fully realise that the Enterprise, our Enterprise, is gone.

So Picard tries to stop Soran, but he fails. The probe is launched. The star is destroyed. While it doesn’t make sense for the sky to dim so immediately, it IS a beautiful visual image of the ribbon travelling through a near sun-set sky.

And then when the shockwave hits Veridian III, we get another cool visual - the destruction of Veridian III, which honestly, rivals the destruction of Vulcan in Star Trek 2009.

This next bit is a little disorienting, but it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that Picard is in the Nexus, and he is living out his greatest fantasy.

Picard is married and surrounded by a big bunch of kids.

It’s a shame his wife is a random nobody, rather than Crusher. But I do note that Picard’s wife looks somewhat similar to crusher.

This all ties in thematically with Picard’s terrible loss, and the stuff he talked about with Troi.

As Picard looks at the Christmas tree, he sees what appears to be an exploding star on one of the Christmas baubles. I always assumed that this was an image of Veridian III exploding, that it was the Nexus’s way of reminding Picard of what it had cost for him to be here in this paradise. Kind of a nasty passive aggressive jab to prick his conscience. This would also imply some intelligence behind the nexus.

While this all seemed super obvious to me, apparently not everybody thought so, as there have been discussions online about what it’s all about.

What do you think?

The sudden appearance of Guinan doesn’t entirely make sense. The whole concept of an echo, a part of herself she left behind isn’t well developed and not that well explained.

But it serves as a mechanism for some exposition and introduces us to the fact that Kirk is alive and well, after all this time, in the Nexus himself.

Picard is apparently able to travel from his own fantasy into Kirk’s.

Finally, after all these years, we get to see Kirk and Picard share the screen together.

It’s not exactly in the setting we might have hoped it would be, but it was still exciting to see them together.

It’s a shame they invented the woman antonia, instead of using Carol Marcus, who it should have been.

We can speculate that this moment in Kirk’s life takes place some time between The Motion Picture and Star Trek II. There’s quite a period of time there where Kirk wasn’t happy with his career. I can imagine he left Starfleet for a time and then decided to return, even if it meant resuming his former position as admiral.

Unlike Picard, Kirk is fully embracing this fantasy. I don’t think the movie has really given us enough background to what he’s dealing with. Picard’s character arc in this movie works. Kirk’s not so much.

 At this point in the movie, my feelings are that I liked what we got, but I would have loved something different. Kirk never gets to see the Enterprise D. He never gets to meet any of the rest of the crew. I would have liked to see Kirk and the crew of the Enterprise A come face to face with the crew of the Enterprise D. I would have liked to see those two crews work together. Of course, bringing together that many characters would have been a challenge, and would have given few of them a satisfying role.

Generations was put together quickly, and I believe the writers, Ronald D moore and Branon Brage weren’t entirely happy with it themselves. There’s no doubt that with more time for writing, this movie could have been something much greater, but there’s still a lot to like in what we actually got.

So Kirk  quickly realises that nothing in the nexus matters. He gives Picard a speech about never leaving the bridge of his ship and they return to Veridian III just before  Soran destroys the star.

IT seems silly that they didn’t give themselves more time. That could have chosen anywhere anytime.

Now that the writers had brought Kirk into the 24th century, they have to decide what to do with him. IT wouldn’t have made sense to send him back and rewrite all that established history. They could have left him alive in this new time period, and at the time, I was in favour of that, but over time I’ve come to agree that it made good sense to kill Kirk in the climax of this film.

But is Kirk’s death fitting?

Hmm. Not entirely, but I don’t think it’s as bad as some people make out.

First, let’s acknowledge that it was originally much worse. Before they showed this to test audiences, they had Kirk shot in the back by a dying Soran after remarking that the 24th century isn’t so tough. Obviously, that was not just a terrible idea, but an insulting one.

They wisely went back and re-shot this sequence with a new death, in which Kirk has to risk his life to get the control pad. 

I’ve heard some say they think Kirk should have died aboard the Enterprise. In space.

But I don’t know. This seems a very Kirk way to die.

Kirk was always beaming down to rocky planets like this and getting into fist fights. It seems fitting that this would be the way he would die.

So I’m with it.,

It was still sad to see Picard bury his predecessor, realising that we’d never again see Kirk.

Kirk’s moment of death is extremely well acted by William Shatner. Possibly his best acting moment.

And the music does it’s job well here too.

So having experienced 261 distinct emotional states Data is beginning to learn how to control his emotions, rather than allow them to control him.

Which of course makes perfect sense.

The data we’ll see in the next movie will be less annoying and more human.

Good character development, until Insurrection and Nemesis mess it all up.

But those tears, ugh. That was silly and didn’t work for me.

As Picard rummages through the ruins of his office, looking for his photo album, he tosses something over his shoulder, showing complete disregard for it. This was terrible. This object had tremendous scientific and archeological significance, not to mention huge emotional significance as it was given to him by his old mentor, professor Galen. That really annoys me.

So, that was Star Trek Generations. Despite its flaws, I really like this movie.

And I hope you have enjoyed revisiting it with me.

So, that was Star Trek Generations. You know, there’s actually only one Next Generation movie that we haven’t talked about on the podcast yet. And that, of course, is Insurrection. So I will be doing an episode about that at some point in the reasonably near future.

Now, if you like Star Trek, then don’t forget that my series of books, Jewel of The Stars, is very Star Treky in nature, it’s actually about a cruise ship in space on the run from an alien amarda after Earth has fallen to an invasion. You can actually read the entire first episode, completely for free now, going to wattpad and searching for Jewel of The Stars by Adam David Collings, or you can pick it up in any ebook format from the major retailers for 99 cents. And it is also available in paperback.

Well, next episode we’re gonna be doing something a little different. I’ll be talking about the movie Stargate Origins: Catherine, so I’ll see you for that in two weeks time

Live long and prosper

Make it so.

Who doesn't love Lord of The Rings? It was that epic story that birthed a genre. I've been using the Walk To Mordor app and a pedometer to re-tract Frodo and Sam's legendary journey from Hobbiton to Mordor. As I go, I'm also revisiting the movies and the books. In today's podcast, we talk about the beginning of the story, up until Buckleberry Ferry. So grab some lembas bread and let's go on an adventure!

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Transcript

Welcome to Nerd Heaven.

I’m Adam David Collings, the author of Jewel of the Stars.

And I am a nerd

This is episode 22 of the podcast.

Today is the first installment of my Lord of The Rings, Read, Walk and Watch series.

If you’ve been following my content anywhere, you’re most likely aware that I’ve been doing a walk to mordor challenge. 

Using a pedometer, and an app on my phone called Walk to Mordor, I enter the distance I’ve walked at the end of each day, and the app tells me how far along the legendary journey from the Shire to Mordor I have travelled. There are lots of milestones along the way.

From time to time, I’ll be doing one of these episodes where I dig into the story of Lord of The Rings, discussing it as far where I’ve walked, drawing from both the books and the movies.

I’m not really going to be comparing the book and movie, I’m just going to be drawing from both.

In this installment, I’ll be talking about the beginning of the story, up and until Buckleberry Ferry

Lord of the Rings Part 1 The Fellowship Of The Ring was written by J.R.R Tokkien.

It was first published in 1954.

The movie was written by Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens, and Peter Jackson.

It was directed by Peter Jackson

And first released in cinemas on the 19th of December 2001.

The description on IMDB reads

A meek Hobbit from the Shire and eight companions set out on a journey to destroy the powerful One Ring and save Middle-earth from the Dark Lord Sauron.

So. Let’s go on an adventure.

My first experience with Lord of The Rings was seeing Fellowship of the Ring at the cinema. I hadn’t read the book prior to this, and was blown away by the epic scope of the story.

So I’m not a hard-core lifelong Tolkien fan. There are many people who cold run rings around me in terms of their knowledge of the lore of Lore of The Rings.

So I’m not doing this as an expert, just a nerd geeking out of a story that I think we can all agree is pretty darn awesome.

Both the book and the movie start off giving us backstory and setup, but they do it in very different ways. The prologue to the novel reads somewhat like a non-fiction book written in universe. No book would ever be published today if it began this way, but there is a certain old-fashion charm to this prologue.

While the book focuses on the smaller details, the history of hobbits, and how Bilbo came to have the ring, the movie delves right back to the creation of the ring and the first battle with Sauron. Important aspects of the world that the books keep a mystery for now.

I think both were the correct choices for the given medium.

See, I said the point of this wasn’t to compare the two, but given the different ways they start, it’s kind of hard not to.

This opening sequence for the movie sets up the stakes from the beginning. We know how powerful, and how dangerous this ring is. So when it comes into Frodo’s possession, we already fear for him. These sequences were great to watch. This movie was pretty revolutionary in it’s use of CGI to create huge armies.

It was the feat for the eyes when it first came out, and is still impressive today, although no longer unique.

I like the sense of wonder you get as history become legend and legend became myth over 2 and a half thousand years.

The extended version of the movie actually follows the prologue of the book more closely. Narrated by Bilbo.

I only saw the extended version about a year ago, so it’s still pretty new and exciting to me.

The set for Hobbiton is awesome. I’ve always loved it. You can’t watch this and not just want to be transported there.

And of course the music! It fits the visuals so well and has got to be one of the most memorable pieces of movie music ever. I love it.

The new scene where Bilbo has a panic attack because he can’t find the ring is a nice touch. IT shows the addictive powers that it has over those it owns.

Bilbo and Frodo kind of represent two different responses to the amazing World Tolkien created. Bilbo is tired of living in the idyylic shire. He wants to go and travel, to experience advanture again.

Frodo also has some interest in adventure, but he is still in love with the shire. And who wouldn’t be? I can identify with both of them. I’d want to go and see the whole of Middle Earth. But I’d want to know the Shire is still there to return to. If there’s one thing the story shows us at the beginning, it’s that life in the shire is very very good.

One of the best things about being a hobbit would be how much they love food.

They also like drinking beer and smoking pipe weed, neither of which interest me, but I loooove food.

Bilbo has some genuine regret about leaving Frodo behind. He’s the only family that Bilbo actually likes.

Biblo’s behaviour regarding the ring stimulates Gandalf’s suspicions straight away.

He doesn’t know the full story, but there’s definitely something off about it.

The ring hadn’t been used in decades. When Bilbo uses it to escape, he doesn’t seem to suffer any effects. No scary flaming eye staring at him. But that moment of usage is probably what first gets Sauron’s attention. The ring calls out to him after all these years. Now he must retrieve it.

And so, Golumn is captured and tortured.

I like the scene in the movie where Gandalf is researching the ring. I know it’s just him reading to himself, but it adds a real sense of history.

Life continues as it always has back in the shire. They eat, they dance, they sing. It’s a truly joyful moment when we see them in the pub.

And then Gandalf shows up to share what he has learned with Frodo.

For that one moment, when Frodo says there is no text, I think Gandalf thinks maybe, just maybe he was wrong. But when Frodo says the Elvish writing has appeared, his face just dropped.

So this trinket that Bilbo passed on to Frodo is the one ring. Such a significant and ancient thing. While both Frodo and Galdalf must be feeling a lot of fear and dread in this moment, there’s got to also be a profound sense of wonder that they’d be feeling as well. I know I would. Which, I suppose, is a problem, because it’s just another thing that makes the ring more enticing.

This discovery about the ring comes in parallel with Gandalf learning of the return of Sauron and the regathering of forces at Mordor. Even the hobbits are talking. They know something is brewing in the wider world.

We learn here that the ring is basically sentient. It has a consciousness. It thinks. It has desires. This is because Sauron poured part of himself into the ring. It’s like a piece of his consciousness possessing the inanimate object. Without that, this is just a piece of gold like any other.

When Frodo learns the truth about the ring, his first impulse is to hide it. It’s actually impressive how quickly he formulates a good plan. “Nobody knows it’s here. We just bury it and never speak of it again.” That’s a good plan, and it could have worked, maybe for thousands more years. Except that it’s too late. Because of Golum. Sauron got to Gollum first and has told him exactly where to find the ring. Shire. Baggins. That will take the enemy literally to Frodo’s front door.

This is the point in the book where we get an interesting discussion about mercy, a discussion that happens much later in the movie.

Frodo wishes that Bilbo had just killed Gollum back when he found the ring. If he had, their problems would be over. They could hide the ring and Sauron would probably never find it.

It actually comes across a little callous, just how quick Frodo is to wish death upon another, even a creature as wretched as Gollum.

Specifically, Frodo says “It’s a pity that Bilbo did not stab that vile creature , when he had the chance.”

And Gandalf replies “Pity? It was pity that stayed his hand. Pity, and mercy: not to strike without need. And he has been well rewarded, Frodo. Be sure, that he took so little hurt from the evil, and escaped in the end, because he began his ownership of the ring with pity.”

Frodo admits he has no pity for Gollum, and that it is because of his fear. And isn’t that so true of fear, and the things attitudes it leads to. He says Gollum deserves death.

“Deserves it,” Gandalf says. “I dare say he does. Many that live deserve death . And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death and judgement  For even the very wise cannot see all ends. I have not much hope that Gollum can be cured before he dies, but there is a chance of it. And he is bound up with the fate of the ring. My heart tells me that he has some part to play yet,  for good or ill, before the end; and when that comes, the pity of Bilbo may rule the fate of many.”

I really like this conversation. As for myself, I value things like mercy and compassion, so I love what Gandalf says.

At this point, Frodo just wants to give the ring to Gandalf. He doesn’t want any part in it.

And Gandalf immediately refuses.

It is far too great a temptation for him.

The ring has great power, and if he possessed it, he would want to use that power for good. But the ring would work great evil through him. 

This isn’t just a question of power corrupting, something I don’t take as a given.

The ring itself is evil. It has its own will. So the ring doesn’t just represent neutral power.

To me, the ring has always been a pretty strong representation of temptation and sin.

This is seen thematically through the whole story.

Gandalf doesn’t believe he has the necessary willpower to resist that temptation when it comes, and he is very wise to recognise that, so he chooses to excercise that willpower now, and refuse the ring. Better never to possess it.

But what does that say about Frodo? He wants Frodo to keep it. He worries that it will be a great burden to Frodo, of course, but I think he recognises a moral strength in Frodo that most lack, including himself.

And then they realise that Sam was outside the window, and we get that awesome amusing line “I ‘aint been dropping no eaves.” I love that line. It’s not some witty one-liner, it’s just a statement that comes out of a genuine simple misunderstanding.

Gandalf warns Frodo to never put the ring on. It’s use will draw the attention of Sauron’s servents. It wants to be found. And that’s chilling. Anyway, we’ll see how that goes in the future.

And so, here is where my walk actually begins.

Frodo and Sam leave Bag End. That’s the starting point on my walk to Mordor app.

It’s taken this long just to get to the starting point.

But it’s been well worth it.

So within less than a page, we hit my very first milestone. Tookland. It’s just a sentance they says they passed through tookland. This is where Pippin’s family are from.

From here on, the order of events is a little different between the movie and the book, but they both follow the same points. My Walk to Mordor app obviously follows the book.

As they’re walking through a paddock, Sam stops. And he says “This is it. If I take one more step, it’ll be the furthest from home I’ve ever been.”

I like this recognition of the significance of this moment. It’s not an expression of fear, or anxiety, about being so far from home. It’s simply an acknowledgement of something that feels significant to Sam.

I understand this.

I went on my first cruise a few years ago. I was 39 at the time, and I’d never been outside of Australia. This would be my very first time setting foot in another country. I felt like Neil Armstrong.

I remember that morning at our first port, Noumea, the capital city of New Caledonia. I stepped slowly down the gangway toward the soil of another nation.

I say soil, but it was actually concrete. It was a dreary industrial port, but that wasn’t the point.

This was a significant moment for me. Unfortunately, the staff were hurrying us on to get a photo, so I didn’t really get to stop and really take in that moment, savour it, like Sam is doing here.

Even before Saruman is revealed to be evil, there are hints. Isenguard looks very dark and creepy. Sauramon looks at Sauron, and his armies, and he can find no logical way to defeat him. Faced with what he believes is inevitable defeat, he believes the only option left is to join Sauron, because it is impossible to oppose him.

Gandalf accuses Saruman of abandoning reason for madness. But it could be argued that Sauramon’s choice here is governed by pure reason. Cold unfeeling logic. Absolute pragmatism.

Gandalf has one thing that Saruman lacks. Faith. That there are forces in this world other than the forces of evil, that even in the face of seemingly impossible odds, there is still reason to hope. That even a hobbit, could, in fact, oppose the will of Sauron.

It’s illogical. It doesn’t add up mathematically.  But choosing faith is a preferable option to him than giving in to the evil.

And I really love that about Gandalf.

Also, I gotta say, what was Tolkien thinking, naming Sauron and Saruman such similar names. And given that Saruman  ends up working for Sauron. That’s really on the nose. One of the first things a modern author is taught is not to give characters names that will get confused with one another. Try not to even have two main characters whose name starts with the same letter.

Then we reach my second milestone, the encounter with the black rider.

The movie does an especially good job of this. It’s so creepy. Frodo senses something off about the black rider before he even appears. He is, of course, a ring wraith. It’s such a tense moment as it stops near the tree they’re hiding under and sniffs.

Frodo is really tempted to use the ring to hide. Even though Gandalf warned him not to. It takes Sam to keep him from doing it.

If he’d put it on, it would have all been over. The rider would have sensed the ring more strongly and kill them then and there.

My next walking milestone is a meeting with the elves at the 65 km mark. That’s a fair chunk of walking. And Frodo still hasn’t even left the borders of the shire.

At this point in the book, Frodo is getting worried about Gandalf, who was supposed to show up for his farewell party, but hasn’t been heard from.

In the movie, the encounter with the elves is brief, Frodo and Sam spy them in the distance but don’t actually make contact. They are already aware that the elves are heading to the harbour, leaving middle earth forever. This makes me think of, and is very likely the inspiration for, the first ones from Babylon 5, going beyond the rim and leaving our galaxy. It’s a powerful trope. It’s like all the magic is leaving the world.

Sam says it makes him feel sad. I get that. Sheridan expressed a similar feeling in Babylon 5. Delenn’s response was “now we make our own magic.”

The last milestone I’ll talk about in this episode is Farmer Maggot’s field.

In the movie, Farmer Maggot’s field is where they finally meet up with Merry and Pippin. Keep in mind that this is further than Sam has ever been from home. Keep in mind, they’ve travelled two nights and at least one and a half days. My Walk to Mordor app says it’s 98 km from Bag End. But they find Merry and Pippin casually here stealing crops. It doesn’t quite add up. Have those two travelled two days and slept under the stars two nights just to come here and steal some carrots? It sounds like they do this almost every week.

By the way, it says a lot about hobbits that they so love raw vegetables they rebellious young hobbits would steal vegetables with such glee. It’s not just junk food that they take delight in. They love their vegies too.

Of course, in the book, they go and have a drink with farmer maggot. The stealing of crops is just part of Frodo’s childhood backstory.

The main point of all of these encounters seems to be to remind us that the black riders are dangerous and to re-emphasise that they are actively searching for Frodo.

But there’s a little moment I like when Frodo says “I’ve been afraid of you and your dogs for over 30 years. It’s a pity as I have missed out on a good friend.”

And that’s so true, isn’t it. Fear can make us miss out on all sorts of things, including friendships with people who may not be at all as we feared them to be.

Also, I’d like to point out that while Frodo, Sam, and Pippin got to ride all the way to the ferry in Maggot’s wagon, I had to walk all that way!

Anyway, that brings us to the fifth milestone on my journey. Buckleberry Ferry.

So I’m going to leave it here for this time. It’s been a fun journey so far and there is plenty more to come.

Next time I do a Lord of the Rings Read, Walk and Watch, we’ll meet Tom Bombadil. 

Until then, happy walking.

Feel free to add me as a friend on the Walk To Mordor app, if you’re using it.

And I’ll see you somewhere in Middle Earth.

Next time I do a Lord of the Rings Read, Walk and Watch, we’ll meet Tom Bombadil. 

Feel free to add me as a friend on the Walk To Mordor app, if you’re using it.

Next time on Nerd Heaven, in two weeks time, I’ll be talking about Star Trek Generations, that epic meeting between captains Jean-Luc Picard and James T. Kirk. I’ve got plenty to say about the movie, so I hope you’ll join me.

Until then, 

Live Long and Prosper.

Make it so.

My history with Star Trek began in the year 1986 when I received a "Star Trek Annual" as a Christmas present. That launched me into a lifelong love of the franchise. In today's podcast, I tell the story of my history with Star Trek.

I'd love to hear your Star Trek history stories as well. Drop me a comment wherever you listen to this podcast.

https://www.buymeacoffee.com/AdamDavidCollings

Star Trek Picard's season finale "Et in Arcadia Ego Part 2" has arrived. We finally get to see some turn of the century Starfleet ships, plus a welcome familiar face. So what did I think of the climax? I talk about what worked for me, and what didn't. It's been a wild ride over the last ten weeks. I've enjoyed the journey, and I hope you'll continue to join me on Nerd Heaven now that Star Trek Picard is finished. There's plenty more to come!

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Transcript

Welcome to Nerd Heaven

I’m Adam David Collings, the author of Jewel of The Stars

And I am a nerd.

This is episode 20 of the podcast. Today, we’re talking the 10th episode and season finale of Star Trek Picard Et in Arcadia ego Part 2.

And yes, apparently, it’s et, not et. It’s apparently latin. Last week I interpreted it as a mixture of french and english. Which should probably be a little embarrassing.

So we’ve made it all the way through season 1. Be sure to stick around to the end of this podcast, because I’ll be talking about what the future holds for Nerd Heaven now that Picard season 1 is finished.

I’m recording this episode on the 28th of March 2020. And right now, basically the entire world are being told to stay in their homes unless absolutely necessary, due to the spread of covid 19. It’s a crazy time. But at least we have new Star Trek to talk about.

The description for this episode on memory alpha reads

Picard and his team are pitted against the Romulans and the synthetics of Coppelius in a final confrontation.

The teleplay was by Michael Chabon.

The story was by Michael Chabon and Akiva Goldsman

It was directed by Akiva Goldsman

And it first aired on the 26th of March 2020.

Make it so.

I love that opening shot of the Borg cube crashed on the shore of the ocean.

And we see that Narak has arrived. Makes sense this would be the place he’d go.

Elnor and Seven are just sitting around in the dark talking about xbs. Why did they stay behind again? One of the downsides of this show seems to be under-utilising certain characters, such as these two. I think this scene epitomises that problem.

However, it’s a great scene.

Elnor posits that because the xbs have no home, and are hated by everyone, that they might be better off dead.

Seven reminds him that she’s also an xb. Does that mean she should just kill herself?

The reason he gives that she should not, is that he would miss her. Nice little friendship growing between these two.

So in Elnor’s philosophy, being loved by another is a reason to live. And it is. It’s one of the strongest driving forces that keeps us going through hard times. It’s also one of the most soul-destroying things that rob people of their hope, when they feel that nobody loves them.

And then surprise surprise. Rizzo is on the cube. This has me really confused. We saw her being attacked by xbs. At the last second she beamed aboard one of the Romulan ships and left the cube, heading for Coppelius. And then last week, we saw her commanding one of the warbirds, a day away from the planet. Unless that was Oh. We know she’s commanding the fleet now. But it seemed very clear to me, back in Broken Pieces, that she had beamed off the cube. So if we’re supposed to accept that she’s been hiding on the cube all this time, they’ve not done a good job of explaining it.

Now she’s on the cube, but the fleet hasn’t arrived yet. I was waiting for her to fade out, as a hologram. Very strange.

We’ll see the robot butterfly flapping about a lot in this episode. It could be symbolic. I’ll talk more about it later.

For now, Picard is envious of the freedom the butterfly has, since he is currently imprisoned.

Soji comes in to see him.

It seems she wasn’t being a double agent last week, when she agreed with her evil twin Sutra.

And she has the nerve to say to Picard “Try to see this from our point of view.”

We’re going to kill you, everyone you ever loved, and literally all organic life in the galaxy. But try to see it from our point of view.”

She says of his plan to rescue them in his ship,  “You choose if we live. You choose if we die. You choose. We have no choice.”

But that’s exactly what she’s doing right now. She’s choosing whether people live or die, and she’s chosen for them to die.

The synths have legitimate grievances again organics, but she has become just like her enemy.

But she has become worse.

Worse than the Federation.

Not worse than the Zhat Vash, who want to exterminate all synthetic life. The synths and the Zhat Vash have become mirrors of each other. And both because of the same motivation. Fear. Again, we’ll come back to this.

Picard says “To say you have no choice is a failure of imagination.” Which I think is a great line. And one that we can all apply to our own lives.

And as he points out, not only have the synths become the Zhat Vash, they have become the very monsters the Zhat Vash fear.

And so another party separates, leaving one of their number behind on the Borg cube. This time, Rizo remains to bring the weapons online. Not sure what she hopes to accomplish with the weapons of a grounded borg cube, but anyway.

And Elnor notices Narak and follows him.

Rios and Raffi are fixing the ship using the magic repair device. It feels like a technology that would be more at home in Doctor Who than Star Trek, but it’s interesting. I do like the friendship these two have.

Altan Soong is an interesting one. He really is okay with all organic life being annihilated for the sake of his synths. As long as he gets to transfer into a synth body, of course.

He really believes Agnus is willing to help him do that, and then die herself. And he’s okay with that as well.

The guy is a bit unhinged.

Of course, Agnus has no intention of helping him, or of dying.

Narak makes a good point to Rios. He’s trying to save the universe. And he is. While Narak and his sister are really not fantastic villains, this is one aspect of them that I like. They believe they’re the good guys. They’re not just evil for evil’s sake. I do like a villain who is the hero of their own story.

Right now, Narak and Rios have a common enemy, and a partially common goal. They need to stop the synths from calling in the supersynths. Of course, Narak wants to do that by eliminating all the synths. So working with him is very risky.

But maybe, just maybe, the partially genuine feelings he developed for Soji have softened him just a bit. Maybe he’s hoping to find a way to save the universe without slaughtering the synths. Maybe that’s why he insisted that Rizo stay behind at the cube, because she’s more trigger-happy than he is.

I really like Elnor’s innocence. He just says what’s on his mind like a kid. He looks across the campfire at Narak and says “I don’t like you.” And yet, somehow, Evan Evagora sells it without it sounding silly or on the nose.

So Narak tells the story of  ganmadan. It’s like the Romulan end times. What’s interesting is that he says “some say it dates back from long before our ancestors first arrived on vulcan.”

Now, either this is a mistake in dialog, meant to say “before our ancestors arrived on Romulus from Vulcan”,  or they are implying that Vulcans are not native to their homeworld, that they travelled their from somewhere else.

Which is a major game-changing idea to casually just drop into conversation like this. What are we supposed to make of this? 

Anyway, Ganmadan is a story that is eerily reminiscent of what is going on, even more eerily reminiscent of what will soon happen later in the episode. Narak doesn’t believe it’s a prophecy, he believes it’s history. A history that will repeat itself.

Okay. So we know the super-nasty-synths from a higher plan have come and annihilated organic life before. But they were called by two sisters? It seems strangely coincidental that all those eons ago, it was synths made in sibling pairs, just like Maddox’s synths, that called the big bads.

So I’m left wondering. Is there more to it? There’s no time-travel involved in this show. Will there be there in the future? Or is it supposed to truly be a real prophecy? Something none of the characters around this fireplace actually believe in?

I know it would probably be easier to pull off their plan in daylight, and the campfire scene allows the episode to give us some exposition in a dramatic way, but given the stakes, they seem to have very little sense of urgency. If I were them, I’d be trying to destroy that beacon as soon as possible.

They do that cutting back and force thing again here, and it works well for me here, because it’s kinda reminiscent of a heist movie.

They hide the detonator in a soccer ball, which the synths let him carry into the village. Odd that he’d happen to bring a soccer ball, but whatever. I’ll give them that one.

So agnus breaks Picard out of jail. I love Agnus’s face when she says she thought she’d be a terrible secret agent, but she’s starting to think she may have a gift.

Picard and Agnus are talking about how to stop the synths. Technologically, they’re more advanced, but they’re also like children. Their only teachers have been a couple of hermits. And we already know that one of them, Soong, is a pretty unstable guy. They’ve lived their lives under the threat of extermination.

Picard can’t single handedly take down the Romulan Fleet, or destroy the beacon, but he can teach the synths some better lessons. This is what he’s good at. This is the speech-making Picard we’ve known all these years. Who debated passionately with Q. Who pleaded with Soran to call of his genocide of the people in the  Viridian system.

Picard is a man who influences and convinces. That’s how he’s going to save the day.

“Yes, they have life, but nobody is teaching them what life is for. To be alive is a responsibility as well as a right.” He’s going to teach them this lesson by example.

This is a pretty decent Picard speech, and will likely be remembered alongside many from TNG.

“Fear is an incompetent teacher,” he says. Feat has been an important theme throughout this show. Probably the most important. Everybody in this show is allowing their actions to be dictated by fear. The Zhat Vash, Starfleet, the synths. They’ve all succumbed to it. That’s the other thing about fear. None of us are immune to it. You know what would have made this theme even more powerful, is that if Picard himself had struggled with fear a little through this season, but overcame it in time to teach the galaxy this lesson.

Picard has had an arc, and he has struggled with things, but fear hasn’t been one of them. Which makes him come off, just a little pompous. But then, I guess that’s also been a bit of an aspect of Picard’s character all these years. He’s the high idea, the one who teaches us all the error of our ways. This show has probably given us the most flawed Picard we’ve ever had. So, I’ll not be too harsh here.

Actually, I’ve gotta say on second viewing, I’m really connecting with this more than the first time.

The thing is, at 94 years of age, Picard is no longer an action hero. He’s using what he’s got. His mind. His mind, and his conscience are as keen as the day we first met him coming down the lift in the engine room of the newly commissioned Enterprise D.

And then we finally get our one and only “Make it so” in the season. And it’s spoken, not by Picard, but by Agnes.

In a way that feels very much fan-service easter-egg.

I talked about this last week. “Make it so” is not something that should be fan service. Make it so is not an easter egg. Make it so is a very natural and regular part of Picard’s vocabulary. I don’t think the writers of this show understand that.

It makes little sense for Agnus to say it. First of all, how does she even know it’s a phrase of his. He’s never said it in front of her, at least not on screen.

It’s like they’re thinking, “we can’t put in too many easter eggs, and we’ve got to mix them up, so we’ll have Agnus say it.” Totally missing the point there. As I said last week, there have been plenty of opportunities for Picard to say it very naturally. But instead, they give us this.

I know it’s a small thing, but we Star Trek fans like to nitpick the small things. And this was a bit frustrating to me.

Anyway, moving on.

So Soong learns the truth. Saga was killed not by Narak, but by Sutra, who let Narak go.

So he decides to become one of the good guys. He confronts Sutra and de-activates her.

But remember, minutes ago, this was the man who was quite okay with all organic life being obliterated. This is a little too much for me. It’s not that the realisation that he’s been played makes him join the good guys, it’s the fact that he went so far the other way first. I’m afraid it’s not quite working for me.

Soong realises at this moment that he’s been a bad teacher. His line as she falls is kinda telling, though. “Turns out, you’re no better than we are.” It seems that Soong believed the synths were better than humanity. Superior, not just physically, but morally. Perhaps that’s why he was willing to let all organic life die. This line helps, but his turn is still too jarring, from super-super-evil-moustache-twirler to reasonable man.

And I’m afraid I have to point out that Elnor and Narak punching and kicking synths is ridiculous. All they’d get for their trouble would be broken fingers and ankles. These are androids. Metal and plastic. Super strong. And super fast. Honestly, there’s no way our heroes should succeed here. But of course, they don’t.

For a second there, I thought Soji was going to turn good and help them. But no, she throws the detonator into the sky.

She’s really still okay with comitting genocide.

I’m ok with the other synths being committed to this plan. As picard says they’re children who’ve not been taught well. But until recently, Soji thought she was human. And she’s begun to develop relationships with humans.

Anyway

Rizo is trying to use the Borg weapons to destroy La Sierena. But Seven shows up to stop her.

I always thought Elnor would be the one to kill Rizo, but I’m okay with Seven doing it. In fact, that may be even more satisfying. Especially when she says “this is for hugh.”

Rizo’s prejudice against rescued former borg is inconsistent. She doesn’t treat her aunt Ramdha with hate, or call her a half-meat. But it’s probably a mistake to look for logic or consistency in hate.

Have I mentioned before that I quite like the designs of the new Romulan warbirds?

Oh orders her people to sterilise the entire planet.

I feel like the episode should be over at this point. They should have been able to destroy the settlement before the orchids even made it into orbit.

Anyway, those orchids buy us a little time.

I have quite mixed feelings about this next part of the episode.

So Agnus and Picard come up with a plan, inspired by the old Picard Maneuver he used on the Stargazer against a Ferengi vessel all those decades ago.

Picard’s plan here is to show Soji a better way. Her specifically. She’s the one he can reach. She’s the one he’s been building a relationship with all this time.

He’s not just trying to stop the synths from unleashing hell. He’s also trying to stop the Romulans from killing the synths. In effect, he’s on both sides of the conflict, or on neither.

He wants Soji to know that despite what she’s doing, he still wants to save her people, to find an option that works for all.

Again, Oh orders all ships to target the nest. Then a good 30 seconds before Picard’s fake ships even appear. The nest should now be destroyed. But no, the Romulan ships are just sitting there, their guns glowing. Doing nothing.

And Oh is so distracted by the site of La Sirenna. One ship. “What is that?” she asks, like she’s seen something amazing.

This is not a new problem. TNG often had the crew of the Enterprise sitting around like stunned mullets when they should have been acting. This time around, it’s the villains.

Then Agnus pulls off the trick. Lots of fake La Sierannas. It distracts the Romulans for a moment or two, but it doesn’t actually achieve anything.

Except, I guess, it buys them a little more time for Starfleet to get there.

But before that can happen, the brecon activates. It opens a whole in space. A portal.

Again Oh, is so slow. Does it really take that long to re-target their distruports? “On my command. Now I’ll start into space dramatically for a few seconds beforeI give the command. Oh. too late. Starfleet are here now.”

However, the arrival of Starfleet was a great moment.

We’ve been wanting to see some turn-of-the-century Starfleet ships, and finally we get some.

This is the moment we’ve been waiting for.

We spot some modern upgrades to the nebula class, an excitingly, a couple of sovereign classes! Could one of these be the Enterprise? Has the Enterprise E been retired or destroyed at this point? We don’t actually know. But either way, it’s wonderful to see the sovereign class. I love that ship. And you know, this is the first time we’ve actually seen the sovereign class in a TV show. Back when they were doing the TNG movies, we never saw a sovereign on screen in either DS9 or Voyager. I thought that was a shame, personally.

At a closer look, those other ships are not so reminiscent of the nebula class. They’re kind of a squishy hybrid between the intrepid class and the galaxy class, but skinned with the aesthetic of the sovereign class.  

Most of the fleet seems to be made up of this new ship class, and sovereigns, although I think I might have spotted something slightly deficient-esque. But maybe not.

Anyway, then, a not-so-big-but-still-welcome-suprise. 

This is acting Captain Will Riker in command of the USS Zheng He.

I was hoping Riker would put the uniform back on to lead the fleet coming to Picard’s aide. He’s not on board his old ship, the Titan. This, apparently, is Starfleet’s most powerful ship.

The ship is named after chinese explorer Zheng He. Apparently, he was also a mariner, diplomat, fleet admiral, and court eunuch! That’s quite a diverse career.

He lived from 1371 to 1433.

We don’t know much about this ship. We don’t even really see the exterior. Memory alpha describes it as a Zheng-he type starship. So it’s a new class, a prototype. We have no registry number.

We do see the interior of the bridge, and I quite like what little we see of it. Loving that super wide viewscreen.

Apparently, the bridge is a redress of the USS Discovery bridge. All I recognised was the chair, so it must be a pretty significant redress. Anyway, that aesthetic looks a lot more appropriate here at the turn of the 25th century than it ever did in the twenty third.

As much as I love this moment, I’m kinda annoyed that they don’t even show us the exterior of this ship. We Star Trek nerds live for this kind of thing.

And all the while everyone is talking, that beacon is still working, and the portal is open. There’s a real timing problem with this confrontation.

While all of this is happening, Picard is having some kind of stroke or something. Obviously related to his brain defect. It seems his syndrome, irumodic or otherwise, is taking his life a heck of a lot quicker than we were expecting.

But Picard still has to convince Soji.

He begs Soji to prove to the Romulans that she’s not the destroyer, that they don’t need to fear her.

And while all of this is going on, those fleets are still just sitting there. No shot has been fired yet. Even though Oh ordered her ships to target the Federation fleet and attack. For some reason, these romulan weapons take an absolute eternity to re-target, which is preposterous to me.

Picard makes a good point. We’re not trying to destroy you. We’re not joining the Romulans, targeting you. We’re defending you. Because we believe in you.

Then we get a cool but brief look at the super-synths. They’re really creepy. The stuff of nightmares. Crawley tentacled things squirming in red-tinged space.

Soji finally listens to Picard’s words and turns off the beacon. As well she should. Picard, I believe, has successfully made his point.

But it’s at this moment when everybody seems to give up too easily.

The super-synths are just gone. Now we have to speculate at this point, that the beacon is more than just a message, saying come help us. It literally opens a portal into our universe. A portal that can’t be opened from the other side? It would seem to me that these super-synths wouldn’t just give up and go home just because the beacon stopped transmitting. I mean, the beacon could have been destroyed by the organics.

The romulans give up too easily. These extremist Zhat Vash who have devoted their lives to wiping out synths leave the scene immediately. And then the entire Federation fleet leaves the system. Escorting the Romulans out of Federation space, apparently, but not one ship remains behind to guard the planet, or to make sure no super-synths return with a portal of their own.

I love that we got to see the Federation fleet, and I love that we got to see Riker in uniform again, the new uniform. Looks good on him. But I wanted more. Starfleet didn’t even fire a shot.

I get that this show is more sci-fi drama than sci-fi action. But this felt quite anti-climactic to me. I was expecting an epic space battle here. It could have been one to rival the battle in Deep Space Nine’s Sacrifice of Angels. The two fleets should have battled while Picard was convincing Soji.

Anyway. That was the plot climax for the series. But not the character climax. That’s about to come now.

The little exchange between Picard and Riker actually felt reminiscent of the scene between Kirk and Sulu at the end of Star Trek 6. They may not be stationed on the same ship together, but these characters will always have each other’s backs.

And now that it’s all over, Picard’s brain tears itself apart.

Hastened by the dru Agnus administered.

I’ll admit, this surprised me.

I thought Picard’s slow descent into dementia and eventual death would be an arc that would take us through all seasons of this show.

It’s an emotional moment, but at the same time, it’s kind of hollow. We know this is not the end.

We know they’re already working on season 2. The show is called Star Trek Picard. They’re not gonna do it without him. So we know they’re gonna pull some kind of magic reset button like they did back in the days of TNG.

As Picard dies, he tells Rafi she was right. She asks what about, but he never gets any more words out.

What do you think he was talking about?

I’m guessing he means when she got angry at him for giving up after Starfleet refused to help the Romulans.

It’s the one big disagreement they had.

So now we get a couple of character scenes between different people.

When Rios says “You heard?” they make it clear that Picard has died. But there’s more they don’t tell you yet.

Seven is angry at herself for killing somebody just because it’s what they deserve. Just because it feels wrong for them to still be alive.

I love this moment.

I agree with Seven. It felt wrong for Rizo to still be alive, given how evil she was. If we were talking about a real person, I’d feel differently, but because she was fictional, I really really wanted her to die.

But I love that the show addresses the harsh reality of this. Seven took a life. That’s not a good thing. It’s not something to be celebrated. In so many shows, the good guy kills the bad guy, and feels nothing. This show is acknowledging that Seven did what had to be done, but that doesn’t means she should be okay with it. Taking a life exerts a toll on the killer. I assure you I don’t say that from experience. I’ve never killed anyone, and I desperately hope I never have to.

As for Rios, he’s angry for once again letting a great captain, another father figure, into his heart, only to lose them again.

These are the moments that Star Trek Picard excels at. The quiet character moments.

And then the butterfly swoops past the camera again.

At this moment, my wife said “That butterfly has to be symbolic of something.”

Poor Elnor. The way he puts his fists up to his eyes didn’t feel like a good acting choice. Looked more like a little kid crying of a broken toy, than a young man crying over the death of the only father he ever knew. But apart from the tiny moment, this scene still made me hurt inside. As Elnor sobs and Raffi holds him. Yeah, that got to me, so well done to both actors.

And then we cut to Picard.

I think that maybe, the butterfly was symbolic of Data. Although the butterfly has what Data lacks. Freedome. But i’m getting ahead of myself.

Picard wakes up in a room with Data. Data calls it a massively complex quantum simulation.

Turns out, Picard’s consciousness has been uploaded into a computer. That computer also contains the consciousness of Data, originally backed-up to B4, and used to clone all the other synths. So..this is efficevely, the real data. Not a dream.

This is wonderful because it gives Picard the chance to actually have a real talk with the real data.

Also, I love that Data shows up in my favourite uniform - the TNG movie uniform he last wore before he died.

Makes sense. That’s what he was wearing when he backed up his engrams into B4.

I love how Picard says “I was furious” because Data sacrificed himself to save Picard. And Data says to straight “I apologise, Captain. But I am not certain I could have done otherwise.” 

Data doesn’t quite look right in this scene, but honestly, that doesn’t bother me in the slightest. Brent Spiner is 71 years old. He was 38 when he first played Data. He’s allowed to look different, even under all that makeup. And this is a beautiful scene.

This really is a great conversation. They talk about their lack of regret for the sacrifices they made for others. This all helps Picard finally come to terms with Data’s death.

It’s beautiful.

Which makes it all the more heartbreaking when Data makes a request of Picard.

Data asks Picard to terminate his consciousness.

What did I say about this show being full of suicide? Here’s another example.

I struggled with this. Data says he doesn’t want to die, he wants to live, however briefly, knowing his life is finite. Mortality gives meaning to human life, captain.

Data says peace, love and friendship are precious, because we know they cannot endure.

I agree with Data that these things are precious, although I’m not sure I agree with his reason. They are precious, but not necessarily because they cannot endure. I’m not even sure I fully agree that they cannot endure.

Anyway, Data has always wanted to be more human, and there is nothing more human than mortality. As Picard said to Soran in generations. It’s our mortality that defines us. It’s part of the truth of our existence.

Picard agrees.

And so, heart-breakingly, we have to watch Data die a second time.

And it’s worse than the first time.

But I’ll get to that.

The thing I like about this show is that, in some way, it redeemed Star Trek Nemesis. Don’t get me wrong, I still think that’s a bad movie, but this gives much greater meaning and depth to it, in much the same way that Avengers Endgame gave more depth to Thor Ragnarok and Guardians of The Galaxy.

So they downloaded Picard’s consciousness into the golem. It looks exactly like Picard’s real body.

We still don’t understand if this golem is made of metal or flesh. But given he has normal skin tone, not yellow skin and eyes, I’d suggest it’s probably a flesh body like what Soji has.

Picard seems remarkably okay with this. Personally, I’d find the realisation that I’d died and was now in an artificial body a difficult transition to get used to. I’d be feeling a whole host of emotions.

But this body is not augmented. No super strength or speed. 

The brain abnormality is gone.

I love when he says, almost panicked, “you haven’t made me immortal.”

“No, we were paying attention. You’ll die roughly around the time you would have died otherwise.”

And then Picard says “I wouldn't have minded an extra 10 years. Maybe 20.”

We still don’t know what the average lifespan of a human in the 24th century is, but it’s clearly longer than current day.

So picard de-activates data. As he listens to Blue Skies he sips a drink and closes his eyes with satisfaction. He lies down, like he’s going to have a nice nap.

This is a hard scene for me to watch.

Last time, we just saw the ship blow up. This time, we have to watch data’s face rapidly age, into a ray dried husk. And then he whisps away like he’s been Thanossed out of existence.

That’s hard.

It hurts that they brought him back like this, just to have him die again.

So now that we’ve all crying, let’s take a look at thematically what this is saying.

Data’s desire to end here, seems to connect with the common quesion that people often ask, “would eternal life became a form of torture? Would living forever eventually become so painful that you would want to end?”

This is a thematic question that Star Trek Voyager once addressed, in the episode Death Wish. The best Q episode they ever did on Voyager, and some would argue, the only good one.

This is an interesting philosophical question.

And I understand where people are coming from, when they ask it. And to be honest, I have contemplated the question myself, certainly since I first watched this scene last night.

I personally do believe in an afterlife.

But I don’t believe it will end up becoming torturous. I believe it will be a fulfilling existence, and that it will be eternally fulfilling. That’s the biblical perspective.

But Data is not living in the version of eternity that I believe in.

Data’s situation is not entirely unpleasant. We metaphorically see it as a room he is in. A comfortable room. In reality, he’s an isolated personality inside a computer simulation. He probably has plenty of literature to access, and we know Data was creative, so he can probably create his own entertainment. But he is alone.  Nobody to interact with. And as much as someone like me might jokingly say “that sounds like introvert heaven” to really truly be alone, with nobody else, for the rest of eternity. That would be hard. That would be painful. Even for an extreme introvert like me. So I can see how he wouldn’t want to remain like that forever.

It’s all very thought-provoking.

So I get why they did this Data. It’s sad that Data, the one who should have endured long after all his shipmates is truly gone. But it’s good to know a part of him will live on in the children Maddix and Soong have created from him. Data will not be the last soong-type android. He is the father of a new race.

But what about Picard?

As I said, I thought the arc of his brain abnormality would continue through the rest of the show. The writers said they planned to make this a 3-season show.

I feel they jumped the gun a bit here.

Picard’s illness played out too quickly. They killed him, only to put him in a synth body, the problem all solved now.

Why did they kill him off only to bring him back like that? It all feels kinda pointless to me.

It’s like, they’ve just eliminated the most interesting part of his character, for no real reason at all.

That reset-button mentality was, in my opinion, one of the weaker aspects of TNG and Voyager. And not something that I am thrilled about them reviving.

And then we get that final scene on the La Sirena.

The ban on synths has been lifted. In one sense, this again feels a little too easy. But I can accept that once Starfleet understood that it had all been a conspiracy, that Oh had infiltrated Starfleet and set the whole thing up, to make the synths look bad, they would see their mistake and undo it.

The whole problem is fixed. It seems Elnor and Seven and Soji will all remain on board, as part of Picard’s new crew.

Picard now plans to wander the universe, Doctor Who style. Looking for whatever adventure may find him.

It feels like everything has wrapped up a bit too nearly.

I thought this was gonna be a 3 season story, but it seems this story is completed, and season two will be a completely new standalone story. That’s not different to Discovery, really, but, I dunno, this ending just felt a bit too much like a TNG ending.

There’s a lot of great nostalgic  stuff from TNG I’ve wanted to revisit, but TNG also had a lot of weaknesses, and this feels like they’re reviving the weaknesses along with the strengths.

I hope I haven’t come across too critical this time around. When I first watched it last night, this finale fell a little flat for me. Upon second viewing, I’ve appreciated the thematic and character stuff a lot more, but the climax still felt a little … well …. Anticlimactic.

Star Trek Picard hasn’t been a perfect show, but I would say on balance it has been a good show. I’ve enjoyed it, and I’m sure I’ll get it on Bluray when the time comes. Certainly this show has been better than both seasons of Discovery so far. So yes, my opinion is overall positive.

I really liked how all the story elements came together, and how the mysteries were paid off.

This has been the first STar Trek show ever, to not focus on Starfleet. I feel that at the end, Picard has a rag-tag group of friends, not a crew as such. It’s almost taken us to a bit of a Farscape-eqsue kinda place. Which is interesting.

A part of me wants more Starfleet, though. I want to see what will become of Starfleet as we move into the 25th century. I wanna know what their new ships can do. I want to see more people in that new uniform.

I think ultimately, I am hoping that this won’t be the only show set in this time. We’ve opened up a whole new era of the Star Trek universe. And I want to keep exploring it. I’d actually love something that connects a bit more with Deep Space Nine.

Anyway, I think I’ll leave any further overall thoughts on the series as a whole for another time, after I’ve let it marinate a bit.

But I’m very glad that CBS have given us this show. I’ve had a fantastic time on the ups and downs of this journey.

So now that Picard is done and dusted. What am I doing with the Nerd Heaven Podcast.

Well, it certainly isn’t over. I feel we’re just beginning.

I’ll keep talking about sci-fi and fantasy. And Star Trek will always be a big part of that. I’m going to move from a weekly schedule to a fortnightly schedule, now that I’m not talking in real time about a current show on the air.

I’ll be back next week, where I’m gonna talk about my own history with the Star Trek franchise.

But there’ll be no podcast the week after. And then back the week after that.

I’ve got plenty planned for the future.

I plan to talk about the two remaining TNG movies, Generations and Insurrection. In fact, I’ve already recorded my thoughts on Generations. I have some Stargate content I want to do, and a Lord of the Rings, Read, Watch and Walk series. And I want to work my way through the DC movies. I’ll probably tackle the Marvel movies at some point as well.

Will I return to the weekly format? Maybe. Perhaps when Discovery season 3 comes out. We’ll see.

But going fortnightly now will give me a bit of a breather, and let me get a small backlog built up, so I don’t feel I have to spend all of my Saturday every week putting this show together as quick as I can.

Plus, I’ll have time to give some attention to some of my other creative endeavours.

Anyway, be assured. The party is just getting started.

I’ll see you next on Nerd heaven.

Live Long and Prosper.

Make it so.

It's the second-last episode of Star Trek Picard season 1. And all the threads have now come together. A show like this lives and dies on the payoffs to its mysteries and mythology. And I feel that Star Trek Picard is doing pretty well in that regard. What do you think? This episode manages to be quite thematic and thought-provoking while still leading up to the grant finale. Let's dig deep into this show.

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Transcript

Welcome to Nerd Heaven

I’m Adam David Collings

The author of Jewel of the stars

And I am a nerd

This is episode 19 of the podcast

Today, we’re talking about the 9th episode of Star Trek Picard.

Et in Arcadia Ego Part 1.

Et? Et? I want to say et because in French, e t is pronounced et. It means and.

But the rest of the title is in english. So I don’t know what’s going on with this title.

Anyway, it’s the first Star Trek episode title that’s had Part 1 in it for a very very long time. Voyager was probably the last show to do it. Actually, I think Enterprise used the same title with parts 1 and 2 for the two-parter In A Mirror Darkly.

Anyway, This is the second last episode of season 1. Can you believe it?

The description on memory alpha reads

Following an unconventional and dangerous transit, Picard and the crew finally arrive at Soji's home world, Coppelius. However, with Romulan warbirds on their tail, their arrival brings only greater danger as the crew discovers more than expected about the planet's inhabitants.

The teleplay for this episode was by Michael Chabon & Ayelet Waldman.

The story was by Michael Chabon & Ayelet Waldman & Akiva Goldsman

The episode was directed by Akiva Golsman

And it first aired on the 19th of March 2020.

Make it so.

In story structure, the second plot point takes place at the 75 percent mark of the book or film. It comes just after the darkest moment, when all hope seems lost. IT signifies the protagonist setting off for the final showdown, heading toward the climax, and it signals the beginning of act 3.

The end of last week’s episode felt very much like the second plot point, and it’s showing up in roughly the right place.

So this is act 3.

After a harrowing trip through a borg transwarp conduit, the La Sierrena arrives at Soji’s homeworld. A planet called Coppelius.

Agnes is still wandering the ship and asks “Am I still under arrest?”

I’m still kinda shocked that they’ve brought her here to the synth homeworld. I know she says she’s turned over a new leaf, but honestly, this is a risk I wouldn't be taking. She killed the man she loved in order to prevent the creation of new synths. Now she says she won’t harm the synths themselves. I wouldn’t be taking any chances with her.

If I were in Picard’s shoes, I’d have continued to DS12 to drop her off. Or, if the urgency of the situation didn’t allow it, which is how Picard ultimately felt, I’d be keeping Angus under close guard. Just in case.

Anyway, Narak shows up and they have a nice little space battle.

They manage to get in a lucky shot, which gives them a nice moment to discuss the morality of rescuing your enemies, but it turns out to be a bit of a ruse. They really don’t stand a chance against Narak’s advanced fighter.

But, surprise, a honking big borg cube comes out of the corridor. I cheered out loud when this happened. Seven!.

But the cube doesn’t even have a chance to be awesome.

The orchids are really cool. A bunch of giant space-faring flowers come up and swallow the ships. This was really cool.

This is Star Trek. This is the kind of wondrous thing you find at a strange new world.

So the flowers drag the ships down to the surface in a visual and audio extravaganza that rivals any big screen movie I’ve seen.

I was a little skeptical about the flowers bringing down the cube, but there were several attached to it, and it’s not operating at peak efficiency. They mention later that the flowers are not used to bringing down something so big.

It was a bit of a shame though, because seeing something as terrifying as a borg cube coming to the rescue is a new idea that I was looking forward to. But we’ll see later. That cube ‘aint going anywhere ever again.

Picard chooses this moment to exhibit symptoms of his dementia. Just briefly. We get a nice little scene with Agnes, doing her medical thing. It was nice to see and hear the old TNG tricorder.

Agnes knows about his condition. The acting between these two is amazing in this scene. The way Allison Pill makes her mouth quiver with emotion. I have no idea how actors do that kind of thing, but I’m somewhat in awe of it.

So Picard tells the whole truth to his crew. Raffi’s face when she hears Picard’s prognosis is terminal is subtle but heartbreaking.

They seem to be going out of their way to avoid using the words irumodic syndrome. I don’t know why, but to be honest, it’s kind of annoying me. They’re clearly drawing from All Good Things, so for goodness, just say it and get it over with.

And on that, we have yet to hear Picard say “Make it so” even once on this show.

That’s Picard’s most iconic catchphrase.

And, putting that into the script would not be an easter egg. It would not be fan service. It would be remaining consistent with his character.

When Picard seeks options and recommendations from his crew, which has happened a number of times in this show, the words he always chooses to communicate his agreement, and instruct them to proceed is “Make it so.” The whole thing is very glaring by its absence. It’s like they’re deliberately trying to avoid using it for some reason.

I’ll be disappointed if he doesn’t say it next week. But, I don’t want them to just shove it in there either. There have been missed opportunities to use it naturally in the past.

Anyway, moving on.

Soji is pretty sure her fellow synths don’t hate biological lifeforms.

But I love Rios’s line. They crashed my ship without even asking. That feels a little biased to me.

The surface of the planet looks really cool. Rock formations. Alien plants. It’s a nice mix of the familiar but beautiful, which is live action, and the unusual, which is CG.

So they’re off to rescue Hugh and Elnor first. Of course, what they find is Seven and Elnor.

The reunion between Elnor and Picard is very nice.

And there’s a nice final send-off for Hugh and Picard and Seven talk about the loss together.

So they’ve established the xbs are okay. There’s nothing Picard can do for them. But Raffi and Rios are able to use the Borg sensors to determine the Romulan fleet is 2 days away, and it’s massive.

It’s time to take Soji home to her settlement.

Honestly I’m not sure why Seven and Elnor are staying behind. I mean, Seven came all this way specifically to help Picard.

Picard says the xbs need protection more than him. Which frankly seems an absurd statement to me.

But they’re gonna try to get defensive systems online. I suspect the borg cube may end up being a refuge from the Romulans next week.

It’s feeling like they really haven’t used Elnor’s character to his full potential. He’s barely spent any time with Picard and the La Sirena crew. We spent an entire episode recruiting him. I don’t think that’s paid off as well as it should have.

Anyway, off to the settlement.

Which looks pretty cool. A very nice place to live.

The synths that live here have tinted skin and yellow eyes like Data. They don’t look as human as Soji.

And their skimpy outfits make this look a little like an episode of TOS.

They also speak more like Data. As if they have a less advanced emotional program than Soji. Again, more like Data.

The crew are welcomed into the facility. But Soji has to give the bad news. The Romulans are coming and the synths don’t have anywhere near enough orchids.

And then the big surprise.

Brent Spiner appears. As himself. Fully human with no de-aging.

Turns out he’s playing Dr. Altan Inigo Soon, the son of Dr. Noonian Soong.

It seems every male Soong, of any generation, looks just like Brent Spiner.

But it was a cool way to bring him back onto the show.

It seems reasonable to me that Soong had a biological son. We know he had a wife.

And it makes sense the son would be this old. I mean, Soon was over a hundred when we saw him die in TNG.

Altan’s mother can’t have been Juliana Soong, because she didn’t marry Noonian until he was living and working on omicron theta.

So I’d say Altan was the product of a previous relationship. Probably long out of the picard by the time Data and Lore were being created.

So then a more android-looking version of Soji reveals herself, first to Picard, and then to everyone else.

This is Sutra, Jana’s sister.

It seems that there are a number of different models, and many copies of each model, but always in sibling pairs. If you’re thinking this all sounds very familiar, you’ve probably seen Battlestar Galactica. The more I think about it, the more paralleles I see.

And let’s just acknowledge that now, we have Agnes walking around mixing with these synths. Risky business if you ask me. And yes, we’ll learn some information soon that may alleviate some of the anxiety, but they don’t know that information yet.

If I were the synths, I’d be pretty angry that Picard had brought this person into their midst.

And this is where Sutra makes quite a jump, mentally, to a theory she has very little evidence to support. But it makes sense, and it’s really interesting.

She theories that the admonition was never intended for organic minds. We’ve seen how it drives many insane. It’s not the nature of the content as such, it’s more of an incompatibility. Which I like, because it seems a lot more believable. I mean, we’re gonna see the full contents of the admonition shortly. Dunno about you, but it didn’t make me want to commit suicide.

So this is fascinating stuff.

The theory is that Agnes was driven somewhat insane by the admonition, and that’s why she killed Maddox. But now the madness is leaving her, and she’s getting back to being her old selse.

This doesn’t exactly justify her crime, but insanity is a legal defense used. Agnes wasn’t in her own right mind when she did what she did. Which means she’s not entirely to blame. Which means, she is less of a risk now. Ok. I’m with that. Not sure how Sutra made that leap, but the conclusion is logical and makes sense of a lot of stuff in the show.

Sutra theories that the admonition was intended for synthetic minds.

And this is where it gets a bit weird. Sutra is fascinated with Vulcan culture. And she has taught herself how to mind meld.

And that’s absurd.

Mind melding is not just a skill you can learn. 

The mind meld is a biological thing.

The vulcan brain has telepathic abilities. This is linked in some way to their sense of touch.

Now, can I conceive that an artificial brain could be constructed to simulate the same telepathic functions of the organic Vulcan brain? I suppose so.

But Bruce and Altan would have had to have constructed her specifically that way from the beginning. She can’t just decide she likes vulcan culture and teach herself. I’m afraid I don’t buy that. Not one tiny bit.

But I’m just going to have to accept it, as silly as I think it is.

It does solve a story problem. They can’t afford a big detour to take Sutra to the grief world. And she needs to be able to see the admonition somehow.

But Rios is against this. As he says, “Agnes is just starting to get over this.” He’s worried, and legitimately so, that this mind meld, forcing Agnes to relive the admonition again,  could re-trigger her madness.

Not only would that be bad for Agnes, but it could make her a danger to the synths, once again.

He’s right to warn caution here.

But Agnes feels the synths have a right to know, and this information could be the key to solving the whole mystery. So the mind meld goes ahead.

Again, some great acting from Alison Pill. She’s terrified to live through this again.

So now we finally get the whole truth behind all of this.

And it’s a bit of a twist.

Organic life is fragile and impermanent. As it advances, organics seek perfection, and that perfection drives them to create synthetic life. But they always end up fearing that synthetic life and feeling threatened by it. Which leads to conflict. Inevitably, this will lead to conflict.

The big mysterious force out there does not come to wipe out races to prevent them from creating synthetic life, as the Zhat Vash believed. No, they are an alliance of synthetic life. They wipe out races to protect the synthetics.

The admonition wasn’t a warning to organics. It was a promise of help to synthetics.

That’s really interesting. At this point, I feel like everything has come together. It all makes good sense.

A show like this lives and dies on the payoffs of its mysteries and mythology.

And I feel that Star Trek Picard is doing a good job with it’s payoffs.

So well done to the team.

A couple of little thoughts about the admonition message itself.

First. Why all the starfleet imagery. We see Data’s face. Starfleet logos. Even an image of the Mars attack.

Obviously, the ancient race couldn’t have known about these things when they created the message. 

But perhaps it's because they tailor the message. I mean, they’re still out there. Monitoring. Adding new relevant imagery to the message. Except what we’re seeing here came from the grief world 14 years ago. The mars attack hadn’t happened yet. So are we saying these synths can see the future. Personally, I think this is just a bit of sloppiness on the part of the show, choosing visual symbolism to aid the story-telling at the expense of in-universe believability.

I really don’t think there's any time travel or seeing into the future going on.

Second thing. The way they show a human aging from a child to an old man was very impressive visual effects. And the shot of the fox dying and rotting away to nothing was impressive but kinda of gross and disturbing. Do they timelapse film a real dead animal? I dunno. But it kind of made me uncomfortable.

It’s cool that Altan made android butterflies because he missed them.

We have a nice conversation between Agnus and Altan. Altan makes it clear that he is not dismissing her crime. The loss of Bruce Maddox is a tragedy. Not just because human life is precious, and the death of any human being is a tragedy, but because his was a great mind, that could have done so much more. And she extinguished that.

Perhaps her insanity defense means she’s not guilty of murder as such, but she still owes a debt. They both know it.

Altan offers her a chance to repay her debt. He shows Agnus what he’s been working on.

It’s not entirely clear.

We see a synthetic body.

Is it an android, or is it biological like Soji? Not sure.

Agnes calls it a golem.

The world golem comes from Jewish folklore. It is an anthropomorphic creature made out of clay, animated and brought to life by magic.

She then starts talking about mind transfer.

It seems Altan has created an empty shell of a body, into which he plans to transfer a living mind.

Apparently, Altan was the body guy, and Maddox dealt with what Altan calls substrates.

Now I’m wondering, whose mind is gonna end up in that thing by the end of this show?

I think Altan is planning it for himself. Perhaps because of his age. Maybe he too is dying. He says he recently regained an interest in mind transfer, along with a sense of urgency.

His father, Doctor Noonian Soong, also worked on mind transfer and successfully transferred his wife’s mind into an android body at the time of her death. This android, Data’s mother, continued to live, believing that she was a human, rather than an android with all the memories and feelings of that deceased human.

Data discovered the truth about this, and chose not to tell his mother what she really was.

I wonder if she’s still out there.

Sutra has a worrying plan. I understand where she’s coming from. All they have to defend themselves from the Romulan fleet is a few space flowers, an old man and his friends. They won’t last more than a few minutes. And I can’t argue with that.

She wants to contact the alliance of synthetic life. Get them to come in and “bring hell” as Agnus put it last week. Wipe out the Romulans.

Except, I don’t think they’ll stop there. They’ll wipe out all organic life in the alpha quadrant.

Soji has an alternate plan. Repair the La Sirena and flee this world before the Romulans get here. Apparently there’s room in that little ship for the whole colony of synths.

Sutra believes they will never be safe as long as the Zhat Vash is out there.

Again, she’s probably right about that.

But it doesn’t justify what she’s planning to do.

She’s operating from cold logic. She lacks Soji’s humanity.

And then Narak shows up.

They found him and brought him in.

It was cool that we got to see spot 2. An artificial cat. Again, I’m asking, is it a robotic cat, or did they manufacture it biologically, like Soji?

This leads to a nice moment between Rios and Agnus. It shows that there really is still a spark of something between these two. It’s actually kind of sweet.

We also get a nice scene between Raffi and Picard.

She has finally, fully forgiven him for all that went on 14 years ago. We get a sense of just how close these two are. She means every bit to him as much as Riker, or Deanna, or Geordi does.

There’s a really awkward moment between them as Raffi says she loves her.

Picard shows a lot of growth as he manages to let himself say it back to her. Picard has never been one to express emotions to his crew. Heck, it took him seven years just to join his crewmates in their weekly poker game. I find Picard’s character arc very satisfying. I feel we’re seeing the fulfilment of an arc that began all the way back in Encounter at Farpoint. And that’s awesome.

Also, I don’t read any hint of a romantic aspect to what these two are sharing. They love each other as close friends. That’s a thing.

Rios and Raffi are off to repair their ship with a magic repair device. I believe this is the last we see of them this episode.

Jean-Luc is unable to get a message through to Starfleet.

That’s annoying. But it’s not like Clancy can’t figure out where he’s gone. She’s already got a squadron on its way to DS12 to help him.

Let’s just hope Picard was smart enough to give her the coordinates of the planet before he set off without the squadron.

I love how Narak is judging the synths on their treatment of him as a prisoner, and when Saga asks him how Romulans treat their prisoners, he says “Let’s change the subject.”

There are two races you don’t want to be a prisoner of in the Star Trek universe. Cardassians, and Romulans.

I also like that Soji is having none of Narak’s talk. He’s not gonna smooth talk her back into trusting him again. That would be a huge disservice to her character.

As soon as the camera zooms in on her bird broach, we know it’s gonna be the weapon that kills her.

Not only is Soji not trusting Narak. She’s very seriously considering killing him. She seeks Picard’s council. And we have an interesting conversation about the morality of killing, and the logic of sacrifice. He’s not an idiot. He is concerned about what she might be considering. Picard isn’t interested in having an academic philosophical debate. He wants to know what they’re really talking about.

Sutra has a plan. And it makes sense. She knows her idea of calling the synth alliance is gonna be a hard sell. So she needs a way to convince her brothers and sisters.

So she lets Narak go, makes it look like he escaped and killed Saga.

Just another reason for the siblings to believe that organics cannot be trusted.

When villains talk about sacrifice in stories, they’re always talking about someone else. But the true meaning of sacrifice is paying that cost yourself. Self-sacrifice. The one who suffers the loss is the one making the sacrifice.

Both Soji and Sutra are considering “sacrificing” the life of another for what they consider to be the greater good.

For Soji, she’s thinking of killing Narak.

For Sutra, she lets her sister Saga die. Who actually carried out the murder? Her or Narak? It doesn’t really matter. Ultimately, Saga’s metaphorical blood is in Sutra's hands.

The difference between Sutra and Soji is that Sutra carried out her plan. Soji is still wrestling with the ethics of hers. And then it’s too late.

Everyone would have been better off if Soji had killed Narak (well, everyone except Narak) but does that justify it morally? Personally, I’d say no. But you can see Soji’s regret that she didn’t act sooner.

Sop Sutra makes a speech to her people.

The organics came here and now we have lost another sister.

Notice how she puts all organics in one big basket. Narak and Picard are the same. They’re both organics. Organics are not to be trusted. This is the very definition of prejudice.  It’s interesting to see the show demonstrating this prejudice from both sides, the Zhat Vash and the synths.

I feel like all the themes that this show has explored are all converging at this moment.

It’s really quite well done.

And Altan Soong is siding with his synthetic children. He even helped Sutra create the beacon to contact the synth alliance. I wonder, does he believe he will be spared? Because it’s pretty obvious Sutra thinks that all organic life must be exterminated.

Altan is right about one thing, though. Picard can’t guarantee that the Federation will listen to him. If anything, what sutra is planning to do will make the Federation fear synths even more.

In a way, Picard is probably viewing these synths as his second chance to succeed, after he failed to help the Romulans.

But soji says “we can’t be your means of redemption. We’re too busy trying to survive.

So Picard is placed under house arrest.

They agree to let Agnes go free with the promise that she will protect them as a mother protects her children. She would die for them.

And now I get it. I’m certain that Altan wants to transfer into his synthetic body, so as to survive the coming apocalypse. They won’t kill him if he’s a synth too. Agnes will help him do that. But what about her? She’ll die too, unless she’s in a synth body.

Meanwhile, Rios, Raffi, Enor and Seven are free, able to still help. But then so is Narak.

And the Romulan fleet is 24 hours from the planet.

Things are getting exciting. I’m very interested to see how it will play out next week, in the season finale.

All in all, another great episode. I’m continuing to love this show. 

I haven’t hit any more milestones in my walk to Mordor since last episode. I’ve been a bit distracted, but I’ve still managed to go for my morning walk some days.

The world is kind of crazy right now, isn’t it? The company I work for has decreed that everyone works from home until further notice. Which of course is business as usual for me as I work from home by choice anyway.

I know a lot of schools in other countries have closed. Here in australia, our schools are largely staying open, but we’ve got school holidays coming up in a few weeks. The scariest thing locally is that we’ll soon be heading into our winter, and Tasmania has pretty cold winters, so people are going to be more vulnerable to disease.

Anyway, stay hopeful. As Picard would say, don’t give in to fear. Don’t panic buy toilet paper or food. Just get what you need and then there’ll be enough for everybody.

I’ll catch you next week for the season finale of Star Trek Picard.

Live long and prosper.

Make it so.

Everything is coming together in this week's episode of Star Trek Picard "Broken Pieces". We delve deeply into Rios's character, seeing the broken pieces of his life symbolised in his holograms. We also get a much greater understanding of the mythology of the show. And it's exciting me. We're getting the big-scale science fiction coming into view, and we finally add a little more depth to the villains of the show. Let's dive in and geek out over this episode together.

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Transcript

Welcome to Nerd Heaven

I’m Adam David Collings, the author of Jewel of the stars

And I am a nerd.

This is episode 18 of the podcast.

Today, we’re talking about the 8th episode of Star Trek Picard. Broken Pieces.

The description on Memory alpha reads

When devastating truths behind the Mars attack are revealed, Picard realizes just how far many will go to preserve secrets stretching back generations, all while the La Sirena crew grapples with secrets and revelations of their own. Narissa directs her guards to capture Elnor, setting off an unexpected chain of events on the Borg cube.

The episode was written by Michael Chabon

It was directed by Maja Vrvilo

And it first aired on the 12th of March 2020.

Make it so.

This episode is really starting to fill in the new mythology of the show now. That’s seen straight away with this week’s flashback, in which we learn about the origins of the Zhat Vash.

The episode begins with some beautiful scenes of a nebula. Just like the first episode. But we don’t see the Enterprise D. Instead, we zoom past 8 suns onto a planet.

The on screen label calls this Aia, the great world. It seems a group of Romulans, all female, sent out to study this strange phenomenon. A system of 8 stars, which seemed scientifically unfeasible. There they found, on a planet, the remnants of an ancient civilisation, and a storehouse of memories that explained how their civilisation died.

Yes. This is the kind of cool mythology I’ve been wanting from Star Trek.

We don’t even know the name of this ancient race, but they were clearly very advanced. I wonder if they knew the Iconians. They also operated in what is now Romulan space in the distant past.

The Romulans call this warning message “the admonition.” The first time they heard it, they formed the Zhat Vash. This was hundreds of years ago, so pre-Kirk.

And interestingly, Commodore Oh appears to be their leader. So, we’re left wondering again, is she biologically a Romulan or a Vulcan? We’ll come back to this later.

We don’t get to see the full extent of the message, but as Oh says, it drives many of them mad. In fact, after seeing it, most of them immediately commit suicide, some of them in quite unpleasent ways.

This is super dark. I actually found it pretty disturbing. It seems we’re getting a lot of suicide in this show. Now, I’m really fortunate that I’ve never been touched by suicide in my life, or my family, but even I am fiding this quite disturbing.

We’ll talk more about what this message means later, when Picard and crew figure it all out, but for now, let’s just say that the show has fleshed out more about the Zhat Vash, and why they hate synthetic lifeforms. Which is good.Our villains are finally getting some depth to them.

And, we learn that Rizzo really is a cold-hearted monster. While the others tear out their hair and do other horrific things to themselves, she stands there, clearly struggling with the images a little, but holding it all together. If she were a Vulcan, I’d call this emotional control. But I think that Rizzo just doesn’t have a heart. She’s an evil…..we’ll...let’s just say I don’t like her.

There are two kinds of Villains in fiction. There are some that you love to hate. These are the ones that you want to see more of. You get excited when they appear in an episode. Weyoun, Bester, Morden, Scorpius. And then there are others that you just kinda hope they die soon because you just don’t want to see them. Rizzo is firmly in the second camp for me. I find myself wanting her to die for all she’s done. Man, I promise I’m not so vindictive against real people. Just fictional ones.

We get confirmation now that it was the Zhat Vash who organised the synth attack on Mars. So they sabotaged the rescue efforts to help their own people. I’m kind of in a place where I can buy that now. They’re worried about what they consider to be a significantly greater threat than the supernova. And having read the novel, The Last Best Hope, it seems that due to their arrogance and price, half the Romulan leadership didn’t want Starfleet’s help to begin with.

We recognise another of these first Vhat Vash. Ramdha, the Romulan who was assimilated and then went crazy, calling Soji the destroyer. She doesn’t handle the admonition as well as Rizzo, but she does survive. This is making sense of a lot of what we’ve seen. It seems to have been the admonition itself that drove the borg cube to shut down after they assimilated Ramdha. Really interesting stuff.

Oh and Ramdha is Rizzo’s aunt. She raised Rizzo and Narak. Rizzo says that when Ramdha lost her mind, she did it with panache. I feel like panache is not the kind of word you’d expect to hear from a Romulan. 

I know they’re reallying speaking Romulan, and we’re just hearing a translation into english. But panache is a french word, included in our language for historical reasons. I dunno, it just didn’t feel right somehow to me.

There’s a nice bit of subtle foreshadowing when Rizzo says “I’d have made a much better borg than you. Resistance is futile.”

And let me just say, while I keep going on about hating Rizzo, I found Peyton List’s acting in this episode pretty darn good. I think she’s a lot better when she’s not so busy trying to seduce her brother or being Miss-Super-Evil-Face.

Once again, the romulans are choosing to fight Elnor hand to hand instead of shooting him with a disruptor. If they’d shot while he was stunned by that grenade, he’d be dead. This whole tradition of Zhat Vash fighting Qowat Milat by hand seems a plot convenience that exists purely so they can have a kick-butt sword wielding elf on the show. Don’t get me wrong, I love Elnor. He’s awesome. But a fighter who uses a sword just doesn’t work in a sci-fi setting like Star Trek.

Anyway, Seven saves him at the last minute and asks “Where is Hugh?”

Then there’s a very nice touching moment as Elnor breaks down and Seven has to, rather uncomfortably, console him. She does a good job seeing as though it’s pretty clear this is outside her comfort zone.

So apparently Seven knew Hugh off-screen, we just never got to see them together. My guess is that Seven gave Hugh the Fenris Ranger contact card. Elnor was actually in Hugh’s office when he found it. So that kinda makes sense now.

I’m still not thrilled about Hugh’s death. It feels like they’ve totally wasted the potential of his character. They made such a fuss about bringing him back, but barely did anything with him. And his death wasn’t satisfying. He didn’t die saving the day. He kinda failed. Yes, there’s a realism to that, because we don’t always die in some big grand moment. That’s kind of why I have somewhat defended Tasha Yar’s death. I dunno. I’m torn between my appreciation for gritty realism, and my desire for Hugh to have been treated with more respect.

It’s very clear that something weird is going on with Rios the minute he sees Soji. 

There’s a lot going on in this scene. Picard wants to go to Deep Space 12 to get reinforcements from Starfleet. Makes sense. They can’t fight off a whole fleet of Romulan ships by themselves. This understandable makes Soji nervous. She thought they would be heading straight for her homeworld. And then Raffi is suddenly very suspicious of Soji, given the revelations about Agnes.

First of all, I like that the crew have figured out that Agnus killed Bruce Maddox. They’re not gonna drag that out and have our characters unnaturally stupid. Good.

I can understand Raffi is distrustful because Picard knows nothing about Soji. He’s putting all his faith in that single Neuron. But, this was the mission. Rescuing Soji is the whole reason they came out here.

Picard is kinda kidding himself a bit, trying desperately to make up excuses for Agnes, because he doesn’t want her to be a Romulan spy, and a murderer. But he does accept reason, even though he doesn’t want to.

There was a nice little scene between Picard and Clancy. And I feel it redeems her as a character a little. She is starting to regain her respect for Picard, now that he’s proven to be right. She even calls him Admiral Picard. I love it when Picard says, “I’m sorry but if you say this is not a job for Starfleet then you are a waste of space.”

Anyway, she agrees. She’s sending a squadron to meet Picard at DS12. He’s to wait there for them to arrive.

I like how Raffi is getting all giddy with excitement about the whole conspiracy theory, even while knowing she shouldn’t because the whole thing is horrible. She does like her conspiracy theories.

It makes no sense that it takes Raffi so long to realise that the Rios she’s talking to is a hologram. I mean, his Irish accent is hard to miss. She must be really preoccupied.

The fact that the ENH recognises Soji and calls her Jana is very interesting information. It confirms that Rios has seen a soji-type android before. Which explains his reaction to her.

I’m not really a fan of the glowing eyes while thinking thing the holograms do in this episode. First of all, there’s no reason for them to do that. The Doctor never did that on Voyager. Second of all, why take so long to access such a simple piece of data. Computers today could gather that same information, from the internet, in a fraction of the time the hologram’s eyes glow. And this is 24th century computer technology. The whole thing is like programming an artificial progress bar when none is needed. You can maybe explain that they’re downloading this information from memory alpha, in which case, that’s pretty high bandwidth for subspace. But this is information I’d expect them to have locally.

But I like that the ENH actually proves useful, when Raffi realises she does have an astrogation question.

The Romulans were depicting an octanary system all over the borg cube. A system of 8 stars.

Enoch says that septenary systems are extremely rare. The only known account of an octanary is an apocryphal ancient Romulan star chart. Now Raffi begins to realise the conclave of 8 refers to the place where the bad guys met, not 8 people. Now they’re getting somewhere.

I like that they at least acknowledge here that the gravitational mechanics would be incredibly complex. Which, of course, is true. Having read the book, The Three Body Problem, I have an inkling of just how complex a trinary system would be. For a planet to actually exist in an octanary system seems pretty unrealistic. But again, we’ll come back to that.

I love Elnor’s childlike innocence. That combined with his kick-butt skills as a warrior make him quite an interesting character.

Seven’s plan, originally Hugh’s plan, is to regenerate the cube. Re-activate the borg drones. I love the shot of the drone rebuilding the ship. At first, I thought they were nano probes. But then when you realise the scale, they’re a lot bigger. Let’s call them macro probes. It seems a logical aspect of borg technology.

She’s playing a bit of a dangerous game. There are huge moral questions about what she’s doing, essentially re-assimilating the XBs, putting them into a localised micro-collective. Controlling their thoughts like a pseudo Borg queen. It’s chilling when she says “I might not want to release them.”

There’s a very nice character scene between Picard and Soji and the dinner table.

It doesn’t really push the plot forward at all, but it deepens both of their characters, and I really like it.

The choice of a scottish accent for the engineering hologram is quite on the nose, as a tribute to Scotty. Especially since Lorca already did that in Discovery. But it doesn’t really bother me. He’s quite different to Scotty. I actually quite like him.

The idea that this octanary system was artificially created is very interesting. My sense-of-wonder metre is going off. It’s showing you the power of this ancient race, whoever they were. Showing off isn’t a bad guess at their motivation, but clearly raffi has the better theory. Such an extreme act would call attention to a message you really want people to hear.

I’m enjoying Raffi’s little detective work in this episode. I think maybe she’s jumping to the truth more easily than she realistically should, but it’s still enjoyable.

There’s some good quiet scenes with Rios in his quarters in this episode. Nice to see his old Starlfleet uniform. Looks like Rios’s old ship, the ibn Majid might have been a sovereign class, like the Enterprise E, which is pretty awesome.

I don’t think it’s stated outright, but I get the impression Rios was first officer of the ship.

His captain’s name was Alonzo Vandermeer. Not a name we’ve heard before, I believe.

The scene with all the Rios holograms together is absurdly fun. I’m quite enjoying the engineer’s overuse of scottish slang. But that tactical hologram. How useless is he? The bloke just wants to sleep and laze around.

It seems the holograms don’t just have Rios’s appearance, and aspects of his personality, but his memories as well. But Rios has removed something from their memories. And it’s all about his time on the ibn Majid.

We learn that captain Vandermeer killed himself. Yet another suicide in this show.

So then we get Picard’s reunion with Agnes. There’s no more self-deception. Picards tells her straight. You will turn yourself over to the authorities for the murder of Bruce Maddox.

Agnes said Oh put her hands on her face and poured in poison. Why doesn’t she know that’s called a mind meld? Put her hands on my face seems a very awkward phrasing when she should just say “she mind melded with me.” Weird.

So Agnes gushes all over Soji’s human-like attributes. Just like Bashir and Kestra.

But Agnes says now that she’s met Soji, she’d never kill her. I’m finding that hard to buy. The admonition Oh showed her was so traumatic it caused her to kill her lover and mentor. But now, having met Soji, she’s a changed woman? I’m afraid I don’t trust Agnes at all at this point. Soji says she’d never give agnes the opportunity to kill her, but she’s giving her an opportunity right now.Why on Earth did Picard leave those two in a room together. That’s crazy. Agnes should be in the brig until they reach DS12. she certainly shouldn’t be roaming the ship and joining them at their makeshift conference table. “I’m done murdering people now, so that’s a good thing.” 

“Oh, well in that case Agnes, it’s all good. Take a seat, Mate.” I mean, come on.

Raffi refers to Rios’s record player as a walkman. Reminds me of an early Christopher Ecclestone Doctor Who Episode, where they refer to a jukebox as an ipod. Somehow it was funnier in Doctor Who.

Rizzo is going around murdering all the xbs. So Seven does what she doesn’t want to do. She takes control of the queen’s systems and re-assimilates the drones.

I got a thrill when the drones woke up, and we hear the voice of the collective say “We are borg.”

But was kinda disappointed when Rizzo immediately had all of them, every single one, ejected into space.

So here’s a rundown of what we know.

There was once some kind of sisterhood of Romulans. Not the Qowat Milat. Some other group. They found this planet in the octanary system, with a warning left behind by a long dead race. The impression I get is that once a species reaches a certain threshold of developing synthetic life, a threshold Starfleet is on the verge of, some outside force comes in and destroys that civilisation, rather than just the synthetics themselves taking over. This outside force theory seems much more compelling and creepy to me. So I kinda hope they are leaning that way.

Those who survived the horror of this admonition formed the Zhat Vash, dedicated to preventing the return of this outside force, by preventing all synthetic life from being created. In their minds, they’re saving the universe, which to be fair, they might just be.

One of them was Oh, a half Vulcan half Romulan. I’m not sure how such a person would come about. Romulans and Vulcans are completely disunited. Until recently, they weren’t even allowed in each other’s space. So how do two of them end up mating and producing a child? I know there’s a non-canon theory that Saviik was also half Romulan / Half Vulcan. I guess Nimbus III, the planet of intergalactic peace, may have been one place where vulcans and Romulans could have mixed. Oh’s mixed heritage explains a lot of things. Her lack of inner eyelids, but her ability to perform a mind meld.

Anyway, when Data is created, the Zhat Vash are concerned. So Oh infiltrates Starfleet and works her way up to chief of starfleet security. All with the hopes of preventing the Federation from developing true synthetic life.

She engineers the attack on mars, to turn the Federation against synths, and ban their research.

It works.

Bruce Maddox flees to a distant world and continues his research.

Then the ibn Majid encounters a ship from that world, containing two of Maddox’s creations. One of them looks identical to Soji and Dahj.

Starfleet treats this like any other first contact situation, but Oh gives orders to captain Vandermeer to kill the synth ambassadors. If he disobeys, the ibn Majid and its crew will all be killed. He’s got to know at this point that Oh is not above board. Does he consider going to someone else in Starfleet, I wonder? I guess he decides the only way to protect his crew is to carry out the order. So he does.

Rios goes at him hard for this. Telling him this was the wrong thing to do. Overcome with guilt, Vandermeer kills himself. And now Rios has to live with the guilt that his judgement pushed his captain over the edge. Rios is a broken person, symbolised by the 5 holograms, each a broken piece of him. He covers up the whole thing, so as to protect the ibn Majid. But he goes through post-traumatic stress from the whole experience and is booted out of starfleet.

Maddox sends two of his creations, Dahj and Soji, out into the universe, to find out the truth behind the synth ban. One to earth, the other to the Borg Cube. We can see how the borg cube is connected. They assimilated Ramdha, and the knowledge of the admonition caused the borg to all shut down. But how does Maddox know this connection? How does he know to send Soji there?

But it backfires. Her presence on the cube allows Narak and Rizzo to find the location of Maddox’s world, and now they’re sending a fleet to destroy it.

It’s all coming together, and I’m really liking it. The value of a mystery is all based on the payoff. So far, the mysteries on this show are paying off much better than the Red angle did on Discovery season 2. That, in my opinion, was the biggest weakness of that season. I loved the setup, and I loved the character stuff with Pike. Pike was awesome. But the payoff fell flatter than I’d hoped.

This episode only makes my excitement about Star Trek Picard grow. I feel like we’re in the middle of something very important. Something big. 

Now that she realises that she has put her people in danger, Soji isn’t willing to wait for Clancy’s squadron.  There’s no time to lose. They have to get home to protect the world from the Zhat Vash.

So she takes over the ship.

But I love Rios’s lullaby that gives him back control of the ship. Smart.

At this point, Picard is willing to let Soji take them straight to her home. “She’s done it Maddox’s way, she done it my way. Let’s let her try her way.”

I’m kinda torn on this. The Zhat Vash ships are on their way. We’ll see more of them leave the sub shortly. If we don’t get there before they do, it’s all over.

On the other hand, what can one little ship do against that Romulan fleet? Clancy told Picard to wait at DS12 for the squadron. How’s she gonna feel about him now that he’s disobeying that order. Just as they were starting to be able to work together again.

But they can at least get there in time to warn the synths of the coming danger. Maybe the synths have some defenses.

It’s understandable, and mildly amusing, that Picard doesn’t know how to operate the new holographic controls on this ship.

So they head off for a Borg transwarp conduit, which should get them there quicker.

While the un-reclaimed drones have all been flushed into space, there are still xbs on board, which Seven appears to be controlling. They swam Rizo. And yes! Finally, She dies! Woohoo.

Ah. I’m a terrible terrible person.

I’d say it’s more likely they’re assimilating her, rather than tearing her apart, so maybe she’s not fully dead. But assimilation seems a fitting punishment for her crimes. For her hate.

I don’t have a problem with her trying to save the universe from this big evil threat, but it’s the way she goes about it. Instead of warning everybody of the threat, she works in secret, because that’s the romulan way, and she doesn’t care who she hurts or kills in the process. That’s what upsets me about her.

Actually, on rewatch, what I thought was her assimilation, I think, was her beaming out to safety.

Darn it!

So Seven achieved nothing. She regained control of the cube, but the Romulans are all gone anyway.

We learn that as an ensign, Picard served on a ship called the Reliant. Not the same Relient from the wrath of khan, of course. That one was destroyed. This was probably the Relient A, or maybe the Relient B.

There’s a nice little conversation between Picard and Rios. Picard pointed out that the Zhat Vash set the trap, with the attack on Mars, but Starfleet could have side-stepped it. Instead, they gave in to fear. I feel like this theme of fear is even timlier that the writers intended, given the whole covid-19 thing going on right now. There’s certainly a lot of feat in the world right now.

Risk points out that there is still a very real danger.

Picard believes fear is the great destroyer, not the synthetics, or some outside force from 200,000 years ago.

I think they both have interesting points.

Picard is right about fear, but I think he’s not giving enough credence to the threat this outside force could represent.

Of course, what we need is more information. The truth can sometimes dissipate fear. Of course, the truth can also confirm our fears.

It’s all very interesting stuff.

It’s all very Star Trek.

As the La Sierrena enters the borg conduit, we see that Narak has found them again. Logical. He knows where they’re heading.

He follows them in.

I really enjoyed this episode, and I’m hungry for more. Bring it on.

With my ongoing walk to Mordor, I’ve been captured by Baron Wright. My next milestone is Bree. I’ve been recording my thoughts about Fellowship of the Ring, both the book and movie. After we’re finished with Star Trek Picard, I’ll be sharing my very first Lord of The Rings Read, Watch and Walk episodes.

But until next week, I’m Adam David Collings.

Live long and prosper.

Make it so.

Wow. This was a fantastic episode. Bringing back Riker and Troi wasn't just a nostalgia stunt. These character were very well used to fantastic effect. This is a beautiful character episode that adds more depth to Riker and Troi's characters than was done by any of the TNG movies. This episode is packed with scene after scene that makes you feel a variety of emotions. Let's dig in and geek out over this wonderful piece of television.

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This is episode 17 of the podcast.

Today, we’re talking about Star Trek Picard episode 7 - Nepenthe.

 I’m away at Ulverstone in North-West Tasmania for a church family camp. So you might hear some rolling waves or even a fairy penguin or two in the background of this episode, because Star Trek waits for no one.

 And wow, what an episode we have to talk about!

 The description on Memory Alpha reads

Picard and Soji transport to the planet Nepenthe, home to some old and trusted friends. As the rest of La Sirena's crew attempt to join them, Picard helps Soji make sense of her recently unlocked memories. Meanwhile, Hugh and Elnor are left on the Borg cube and must face an angered Narissa.

 The episode was written by Samantha Humphrey and Michael Chabon

It was directed by Douglas Aarniokoski

And it first aired on 5 March 2020.

 And of course, it guest starred Jonathan Frakes and Marini Sirtis.

 Make it so.

 Man, I loved this episode. It exemplified what Star Trek Picard is, when it’s at it’s best.

It was a slow-paced deeply character-driven story.

 This week’s flashback takes place just 3 days ago, taking us back to Episode 3 of the show. We get to see a little of what went on between Commodore Oh and Agnus. She asks a few questions about what Agnus told Picard and then she says she’ll show Agnus what will happen if Synthetic lifeforms are allowed to exist. And she performs a mind meld with her.

So up until now, my assumption has been that Oh is a Romulan posing as a Vulcan.

But can Romulans perform mind melds? We know they are an offshoot of the Vulcan race, and we know that mind melds are a very ancient Vulcan practice, but to my knowledge we have never seen, in any canon or non-canon source, a Romulan perform a mind meld.

Raffi and Maddox both believe there are Starfleet officers complicit with the Zhat Vash behind this whole thing, so maybe Oh really is a Vulcan, just working with the Romulans. It seems pretty obvious to me that she knows Rizzo is a Romulan.

We don’t know exactly know what she showed Agnus. A few rapid flashes of images. I believe there was an exploding planet in there. We don’t have a full enough picture to see what exactly it was to change Agnus’s mind so completely, to drive her to betray Picard and murder Maddox. It had to be really compelling. So far, we haven’t seen any compelling motivation from the bad guys in this show, other than, “they hate synthetic life”, which is pretty weak.

Did Oh convince her, or mind control her? We don’t know enough. In fact, this flashback doesn’t really tell us anything new, other than a mind meld was performed.

Anyway, Oh gets Raffi to swallow a tracking device, which will come back later in the episode.

Back in present day, The La Sierenna is caught in a borg tractor beam at the artefact.

And poor Hugh is being interrogated by Rizzo. I am so ready for her to die!

Rizzo says she can’t kill Hugh because as a Federation citizen, it would be a treaty violation. She doesn’t strike me as the kind of person who cares about treaty violations. Her real motivation here is to get Hugh to talk. She can’t get the information out of him that she needs if he’s dead. So instead, she starts killing ex borg. Knowing how much Hugh cares for them.

When Hugh refuses to talk, she let’s the La Sierra go, but sends Narak out to follow them.

Elnor stays behind to help Hugh. This is where he is needed. MY biggest question is, where was Elnor while Hugh was being interrogated. Why didn’t he just jump in and behead Rizzo right then and there.

What I like here is that the people in this show are not stupid. Rios thinks that Raffi hacked the tractor beam, because that’s what she was trying to do, but within seconds, they realise that’s not the case. They know this is suspicious and they have their guard up from that moment on.

That brings us to the planet Nepenthe, which is very earth-like. Looks like a bit of a paradise planet. Picard and Soji emerge from the Sakarian gateway thing and are immediately confronted by a warrior armed with a bow and arrow.

Quick aside. Am I the only one terrified that the borg now have the technology to beam a drone onto a planet from lightyears away? One drone is all it would take to cause an apocalypse. And they’re using it solely as a means of escape for the queen. That seems … illogical.

Anyway. I love how Picard points out that his heart is solid durateneum. I think this is the first time it’s been made clear to new audiences that Picard has an artificial heart. Of course, it turns out the warrior is a child, and that Picard knows her, and her parents. By this point, I’m sure we’ve all guessed that her parents are Riker and Troi.

I love that they named their daughter Kestra, after Deanna’s older sister, who tragically died when she was just Deanna was just a newborn. That story is told in one of the few really good Lwaxana episodes that TNG did “Dark Page”. DS9 did several good Lwaxana episodes, and one bad one. Anyway, I Think that’s a wonderful tribute to her sister.

We’ll learn later in the episode about Will and Deanna’s other child, who also has a significant name.

Through a nice conversation between Soji and Kestra, we find that Soji trusts nobody, including Picard. After what she’s just been through with Narak, and the shock of finding out her entire life is a life, I really don’t blame her.

The way Picard breaks the news to Soji that she’s an android was really sloppy. He should have handled that with a lot more delicacy. He should have put off Kestra’s question, and taken the time during the walk to break the news to Soji as gently as he could.

Personally, I think that discovering you’re not a “real person” but are actually artificial, would be a massive shock, and quite a difficult thing to accept.

But this is all another case of Picard being a good man, but not perfect. Sometimes he stumbles, even just on the little things. And I love that about this show.

He kinda stumbles again when he tells her that Dahj WAS real. That implies that Dahj is dead.

She assumes this whole thing is just another mind game. Again, I don’t blame her.

And we get our first glimpse of Troi. I love the look of joy on her face when she sees Picard.

She knows immediately he’s in trouble. And then she just clouds over as she senses the depth of what Picard has been through, and is still going through. Because, of course, she’s an empath.

Marina Sirtis is absolutely fantastic in this episode. It’s a good reminder of what a great actor she is. Something Star Trek didn’t always give her the opportunity to show.

When Picard introduces Soji and Dr. Soji Asher, she says “just Soji.” She’s just learned that her doctorate, and her surname are both lies. Nice touch.

Then we get to see Riker for the first time.

He may not have his wife’s empathic abilities but he can either see in Picard’s face, or just knows he wouldn’t show up for a social call.

And so Riker says “Shields Up!” That’s such an iconic Riker line. Loved it. And I just love that Riker has shields on his house. He’s prepared for all eventualities.  I thought he said “we’ve had some problems with the Xindi, would have been a nice nod to Enterprise, but no, it’s the Kzinti. Have you heard of them? Top points if you recognise the name. I didn’t. But they’re a race of aggressive felines that were previously seen in Star Trek The Animated series. So that’s a pretty deep cut.

Deanna recognises the emotion on Soji’s face and acknowledges that she’s been through genuine trauma. But she can’t sense those emotions. This makes me wonder if she could sense Data’s emotions once he installed the emotion chip. The movies never answered that question. Either way, Troi respects the truth of Soji’s emotions, artificial or not.

Picard tells his friends that he is in over his head. I think this is the first time he’s slowed down long enough to truly realise that. He’s lost his crew, and his plan was not as fully formed as he’d thought. He was so focussed on finding and rescuing Soji, he hadn’t given any thought to what he’d do once he found her.

He needs a place to regroup and formulate a new plan. And where better than he with his most trusted friends.

Will Riker, his right hand, and Deanna Troi, his conscience.

I’m loving the relationship the Rikers have with their daughter. It seems like a very happy family. And that’s probably, partly because of, rather than just in spite of, the tragedy we’ll learn about later.

From what we see of it, Nepenthe is a beautiful world, but I would have liked it if it were just a little more alien. Apparently they have venomous animals called bunnicorns, but they look exactly like rabbits. The name bunnicorn is a bit on the nose. Actually, a lot on the nose. I know they don’t have infinite budget, but I’d have liked it if they’d used a CGI creature, just to add a little alien-ness to the planet. At least in TOS they put horns on the dog.

Kestra is fascinated that Soji is Data’s daughter. She asks her if she plays the violin or likes Sherlock Holmes, two things we know about Data. That’s a very kid way to approach it.

Kestra is more fascinated with the little human details about Soji, than the superhuman things. The fact that she has mucus fascinates her.

This reminds me of the time Julian Bashir met Data. He wasn’t impressed that Data had super strength and speed. He was fascinated that Data breathed and had a circulatory system.

Soji doesn’t understand in what sense Data could be her father. She was created long after Data died. Picard really needs to take some time to explain this whole neuronic clone thing to her.

I like the relationship that is developing between Kestra and Soji in this episode. There are so many great character scenes. It’s just one after another after another.

I like the subtle little moment as Deanna sighs before opening the door to Thad’s room.

We learn that the Rikers had a son. Had being the operative word. Last week would have been his 18th birthday. So that’s a very sad development. I love the photo of Picard in uniform holding baby Thad.  Picard has such a smile on his face. By this point in his life, he’d mostly gotten over his fear of children, but this was just any child. This was the child of his dearest friends. Of course he’s gonna have a huge smile plastered all over his face.

I love the acknowledgement from Picard that as Kestra’s aching for her brother slowly fades, it brings a whole different ache to Deanna and Will. I love the writing in this episode.

Their son’s name was Thaddeus Riker. Thad was likely named after Colonel Thaddius Riker, an ancestor of Will’s. He fought in the American Civil War during the 1860s and was named Old Iron Boots by his fellow soldiers. Will knows this story well, and was shocked once to learn that Colonel Riker was rescued by a Q posing as a human. It’s doubtful he remembers this detail, however, as he was transported to the USS Voyager in the Delta Quadrant to give evidence in a trial against the Q, before being returned to the alpha quadrant with his memories erased.

Rios has figured out that somebody is tailing them. Again, the crew are not stupid.

Another thing Rios and Raffi are noticing is that Agnes is not herself.

Agnes makes a comment about wanting to be the fun crewmember who suggests hiding in a comet that turns out to be a giant gormagander. This seems like a bit of a Star Wars reference, referring, obviously, to Empire Strikes Back, where the Millennium Falcon hides in a cave in an asteroid, that turns out to be a giant space worm.

But it’s also a reference to something that was introduced into Star Trek lore by Star Trek Discovery. The gormagander is a space wale. A sentient animal that flies through space. They were on the endangered species list in the 23rd century, so the fact that Agnes is making this comment suggest that maybe they are a little more plentiful in the 24th. Which is cool.

Agnus is really out of character at this point. She suggests abandoning the mission, abandoning Picard and abandoning Soji. She was so excited to meet a real living synth, and now she wants no part of it. She’s getting really bad at hiding her true feelings.

I love the little shorthand between Rios and Raffi. With just a look, she says “Leave it to me, I’ll work on her.” And with a look of his own, Rios says, “Go for it, she’s all yours.”

That demonstrates the shared history of two old friends better than Raffi’s use of JL as a nickname for Picard. Not that I particularly mind the JL thing.

Next we get yet another wonderful scene. This time between Picard and Riker. Picard is still trying to protect the Rikers from all this and he thinks the best way to do that is to tell them nothing about his situation. Riker’s comeback is both stinging and heartbreaking.

“I was just thinking about how great it would be if ignorance of danger was all it took to keep it away from the people we love.”

It’s a very personal statement for Riker, as we see him choke up while he says it.

The soil on Nepenthe has regenerative powers. Things grow really well here. It’s why they came here. It seems Captain Riker gave up his Starfleet career to move here to Napenthe for the sake of his son’s health. He and Deanna thought that maybe it would help.

Soji is exhibiting more and more android traits. Now that she’s activated, she’s found she can read a 300 page book in a few seconds. And she gives a little head tilt. I recognised that as very Data long before Riker called it out. I’m sure you did too.

Riker shows Picard how foolish he’s been trying to keep everything to himself, but essentially recounting the entire story of the show so far. He’s not an idiot any more than Rios and Raffi. And he reminds Picard that he’s not the captain of a starship anymore. He’s dealing with a teenager. Something Picard has no experience with. But Riker does.

We get some interesting insight into Thad. He grew up on Starships, mostly, on the USS Titan presumably. He never felt like he had a homeworld. His mother was from Betazed. His father was from Earth. Thad didn’t feel like either of those planets was his home. He was a child of space. But he was fascinated by the idea of a homeworld and invented his own. Ardani. He came up with various different cultures and even whole languages. It’s very creative. I can so identify with that as a writer. Already, this boy that we’ve never seen on screen has so much more depth than half the characters on Discovery. Interesting that. I hope it doesn’t sound like I’m bagging out Discovery. I like Discovery, but I must admit, I’m loving Picard more.

Eventually, when they came to Nepenthe, for Thad’s health, it became his homeworld, and he loved it.

He had Manadaxic neurosclerosis, a silicon-based virus. The heart-breaking thing is that it was curable, using positronic technology, which of course was banned after the synth attack on mars. The machine that could have saved Thad’s life was made illegal. I wonder if Riker and Troi tried to get their hands on it through illegal means to save their son.

This ties into an interesting discussion which starts with a comparison of grown verses replicated food, and culminates in the question of whether real is always better than synthetic.

You know what I love about this scene. It’s allowing Troi to be a counsellor again. Her character was used pretty badly in most of the TNG movies. She got to be a counsellor for one brief but fantastic scene in Generations, and then that was it. Voyager gave her the chance to do a little more, but it’s been a long time since we’ve really seen Troi being so awesome in her field. It’s fantastic.

But Soji still doesn’t trust anyone. All these friendly faces, these people being caring, just when she needs that more than ever, it could just be another mind game like the one Narak played on her in the meditation chamber. Again, I don’t blame her. And yet I know these people. I know she can trust them.

Picard responds to this with bluntness.

As Riker said, Picard’s not so great with teenagers. He may not be up to the challenge.

But then Troi calls him out and says he had it coming when Soji shoves him.

“To you, the idea that this could be some kind of subterfuge or simulation is preposterous, but to her, it would be more of the same.”

And then she makes a great suggestion.

Pretend our dinner table is the ready room of the enterprise, or more accurately, the conference lounge.

I really love Troi and Riker in this episode, but especially Troi.

So Hugh is determined to take the cube from the Zhat Vash. He wants to protect the Xbs. As we established last week, they are victims. Hugh is one of the few people who care about them.

Sadly, the stupid-face Rizzo appears at that moment. And here we run into that problem. No matter how good you are with a sword, you’re useless against a phaser. At least a lightsaber can deflect blaster bolts. But Elnor just carries a metal sword.

Fortunately for him, the Zhat Vash have a duelling tradition of hand-to-hand combat against the Qowat Milat. If that weren’t the case, Elnor would be dead now.

But in some ways, this is subterfuge on Rizzo’s part, and there is a cost. Tragically, that cost is Hugh.

What sucks the most is that Elnor fails to kill Rizzo because she beams out at the last second. Oh man. I’ll be cheering when Elnor finally chops off her head.

I can’t believe Hugh died. That’s so sad. This show has quite a high body count. At least died a hero, trying to save the Xbs from the Zhat Vash. I hope Elnor can fulfil his legacy by saving them in Hugh’s name.

You know what upsets me the most about Hugh’s death here. We’ll never get to see him meet Seven. I was sure those two would share scenes together in this show. And we’ll never get to see him reunite with Geordi, his first friend. I feel like both Descent and now Picard have robbed us of that reunion. Which is sad.

Raffi is trying to draw out what’s bothering Agnes. She thinks it’s just the pain of losing Maddox. But then Agnes absolutely breaks down. She can’t hold in all the stuff that she’s hiding.

But before they can really dig deeper into this, Rios announces that Narak is back, still following them, which doesn’t seem possible.

Remember that tracking device Oh had Agnes swallow?

I like how Riker just casually calls Troi Imzadi like a pet name now. Back in TNG, they would use this term sparingly, only on special occasions. But they, they’re been married for 20 years. They’re extremely comfortable with one another. Imzadi seems a natural pet name to use at this point in their relationship.

WE get a classic Star Trek conference scene, but it has pizza! I’ve missed these scenes. So having one again, with Riker and Troi, but also their daughter and Dahj. That was so cool.

And did I mention pizza?

I also like how Kestra makes a worthwhile contribution to the discussion, but not in a way that feels unrealistic for a child of her age. I really like Kestra.

Rios is playing an interesting game with Agnes. I don’t for one minute think he truly believes that Raffi is being tracked, on purpose or otherwise. Given the strange way Agnes is acting, I think he suspects she has something to do with it, and he’s trying to draw her out by expressing his fake suspicions of Raffi. Remember, he already knows that Raffi was doing down on Freecloud, and why she returned to the La Sirena.

And it kinda works. She admits, “it’s not her.”

And then we get a very dark scene. Agnes replicates a neutron-toxin. It appears this is a suicide attempt. Is this just because she feels guilty, or does she think killing herself will stop Narak tracking them? Maybe this is part of her mission from Oh.

I think she is probably trying to prevent Narak from tracking them, from the way she kind of psychs herself into it, saying “you can do this,” which was horrifying, by the way.

I wanted to reach into the screen and stop her.

But I couldn’t

She injects herself.

And then she collapses.

And then she starts foaming at the mouth.

This was horrific.

And my theory is proven true, because once she starts to die, Narak suddenly loses the signal.

The EMH gets reactivated and manages to save her life, but she’s stuck in a coma.

I wonder what Rios’s idea was, the one Raffi wasn’t gonna like. We never actually get to find out.

That’s an odd bit of storytelling. I wonder if that will come back later. If not, why include that line at all?

Meanwhile Elnor finds a tag and presses it. It activates a Ferris Ranger SOS. I guess he’s calling Seven of Nine to come help him. Cool!. But what on earth was it doing hanging here in a Borg cube? That’s kind of weird.

Now that they’re not being tracked, the La Sirena can finally meet Picard on Nepenthe.

I kinda laughed when Picard said his new crew carry way more baggage than the TNG crew ever did. Because, of course, Rodenberry wouldn’t allow them to have baggage.

Riker makes it clear he’s still on active reserve with Starfleet, but it would take a very good reason to get him back in uniform again.

We have another nice scene between Picard and Riker as they sit by the pond. We do see an interesting rock formation in the background, that lends a little alien-ness to this planet.

But then we get an awesome scene between Soji and Kestra. It seems Soji has lost one sister, only to gain another.

And I LOVE how Kestra talks about what got her through her hard times was her parents. As a parent myself that affects me deeply. I think the hope of every parent is that their child might be able to say those words to someone.

She urges Soji to let Picard be that support to her, a father figure. Those two have a bit of work ahead of them to really let each other in.

In noticed in the credits that Jay Chattaway was credited as having written Lullaby #2 in this episode. Not sure what that piece of music was. Jay Chattaway was a regular composer on Star Trek back in the 90s. Especially on Voyager. Maybe it was just a little music queue that they referenced in the score of this episode. I’m really not sure.

This was a phenomenal episode.  It gave me such a Star Trek: The Next Generation feel, and yet, it was very much not TNG. TNG only ever tried to do a character episode like this one. Family. This show takes the best of what we remember nostalgically, but does something very new and fresh with it.

I’ve really enjoyed Star Trek Picard up until now, but if I didn’t already, Nepenthe has definitely made me love it.

Well done to everyone involved in bringing this beautiful chapter of the story to our screens.

Next week’s episode is called Broken pieces. I wonder what it will bring. A quest to find Soji’s homeworld, no doubt.

It’ll be very exciting.

As for my walk to Mordor, I got a whole lot of steps in yesterday. Packing for our trip and then walking along the beach with my daughter.  I just encountered Old Man Willow, and my next milestone is Tom Bombadil’s house. That’ll be a trippy experience.

Stay tuned for the next episode of the Nerd Heaven Podcast. Please consider giving the show a review wherever you listen to podcasts, or if you are watching on youTube, click that like button.

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Have a fantastic week.

Live long and prosper.

Make it so.