Star Trek Picard Series
- Blake00
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There are 44 replies in this Thread. The last Post () by Cogwork Scholar.
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Ive been thinking a bit about the biggest issues I have with ST: Picard.
Putting the creative choices aside which make the show so different from TNG etc. there is one very specific issue I have.
We are meanwhile 7 Episodes in the show... and... when I write about the show I have to google the names of the characters. Either these people are not important enough for me to remember them or something is really wrong with their introduction and the way they interact.
After a 90mins movie I clearly can tell you about the people in it. After 5-6 hours ST: Picard I still have to google for names.
That is totally strange. I did not like Voyager at all... stopped watching it after the first season... but I do remember the crew and their names.
With ST Picard it is totally different. There was no true introduction of the characters.
In TNG every character was introduced. You knew who the person was... what job that person had... and already in the very first episode you were confronted with the character traits. DS9 started with an introduction where Sisco entered the station and met Dax, you knew that were old friends. Later Julian Bashir arrived and was introduced as the doctor. Odo was introduced. Sisco met Kira on the OPS. O'Brien gets transfered from the Enterprise. Quark was introduced as the greedy troublemaker... etc.
Right in the first episode you knew who you are dealing with.
ST Picard did not bother with an introduction, we know nearly nothing about the traits or motivations of the people. I mean... whats that romulan spy lady called, why is she such a bitch?
Whats up with the drug addicted ex starfleet officer? Whats her job actually?
Whats with the pilot guy... what is his motivation? He was hired to fly from A to B... but is that all that is to be said about this guy?
And what about the ship?
It is the very first Star Trek show where after 7 episodes I dont even know what kind of ship it is. Is it a Federation ship? A ship of any other faction? Why does it not look like a typical Star Trek ship... I can not even see the Warp drive. What's the name of that ship?
How comes the interior looks so much bigger than the exterior?
If you compare the inside cockpit size with the exterior window and try to imagine how that is supposed to fit together you very fast wonder where all the other fancy rooms on the ship fit into that tiny hull. Crew quarters, Cockpit, Picards holodeck, the sickbay, the "kitchen"... the large storage room.... does it even have an engine room at all? From outside you could even assume that there are 2 shuttle bays... but I actually have no idea how that would fit into that tiny ship.
And I think that sums it up actually.
I can not relate to the ship... or the crew. All of that is pretty much irrelevant in the show and thats probably why I dont care. That is why it does not feel like Star Trek anymore.
But when you look at other successul scifi shows/games you see a pattern.
Babylon 5 introduced every character, they started to become important after just 1-2 episodes. The station became special.
Mass Effect made pretty clear from the very first mission "this is your ship and that is your crew"
The Bartender in Freelancer points out who Trent is and introduces him to Juni and Junk introduces him to King. You have a clear idea who you are dealing with.
The Expanse introduces every character in its first few episodes in a proper way
Battlestar Galactica... same story.
Stargate... same.
Firefly... an awesome character introduction.
I could go on with many shows/games which just did it right by putting the focus on the crew and ship/station.
On ST: Picard crew and ship are "exchangeable". You wouldn't really care if people die or the ship explodes in the next episode.
Here the focus is on Picard who is going to die anyways and that android girl which in the end also is unimportant as you meanwhile seem to be able to create as many of these android as you want as long you have just one positronic neuron left (as described in the very first episode).
And in terms of story ST: Picard could in theory resolve in another ST: Discovery AI crap trying to destroy everything. At this point I would not be surprised if Control from Discovery Season 2 gets a revival in ST: Picard.
An AI trying to destroy everything.... yeah... we had that already... not too long ago actually.
Been there... done that.
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You're getting older and maybe don't remember names well enough anymore
And you seem to ignore the fact that when they want to introduce characters in a movie so everyone can remember them then this would probably exceed the restriction of an episode - and you have to plan for a long-term series - which probably lacks financial support (too risky in times where people dont spend too much money and/or time watching just one particular movie/series)
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do i know you?
I think after 7 episodes you should meanwhile be able to remember the names of the people and the ship... you should be able to care about the people that important for the show.
That simply is not the case. If you take away the unimportant crew... all whats left is a very thin story that wouldnt even be enough to fill one episode.
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I remember Picard, Troy, Number 1, Seven of Nine, Data is also mentioned here and there. There are Borgs, Romulans - havent seen Klingons yet.
Is there more to know?
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Dont ask me such complicated questions. As you have pointed out, I am old.
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E07 got me attracted a bit to the story, but yet on E08 they lost me again.
I normally can just off my brain and then watch and enjoy even shows like discovery or some low rated scify flics, but ST:Picard bores me to death.
It's like they are trying to tell an epic story while in fact the story is thinner than a papersheet.
You can't emotionally connect to any of the characters, except the ones you know from long before.That's why I can't remember their names, just like Operator wrote before.
Add: When 7of9 started to reactivate the borg on the cube, it got watchable for 5 seconds, then they switched back to boring conversation betwwen Picard and the other scum. It feels just like a coitus interuptus.
Well, I think there's one good thing with this series: There will be no season 2
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*sigh* Episode 8
Right on my first post on this thread I mentioned that I think the story will be told in the most complicated way possible.
I guess Episode 8 was this moment.
The drug addicted alcoholic ex starfleet officer cant talk to the pilot because he has his own mental crisis in his quarter, therefore she talks to the 5 different holograms of him have different personalities but were generated out of his memories in order to get information. A comedic scene that didn't feel funny... just forcefully embarrassing.
Well, that pilot apparently also met androids before and since that has a mild trauma. What a coincidence. Now everybody on the ship has a story to tell about androids and now they all put the pieces together (which actually are not many).
The traitor Dr. survived and now tell the others "sorry guys... but from now on i wont murder anyone... I promise" and all are friends again. A nice happy family again... consisting of a killer android, an old sick captain, a drug addicted alcoholic, a panicking murder Dr., a traumatized pilot and 5 holograms with split personalities. When they get united again with the killer borg queen and the low IQ romulan warrior... what could go wrong?
Oh and yeah... murder Dr. changes her mind on androids again because... the android drinks when thirsty... eats when hungry... cries when sad... etc. ... you know... the basic functions of a tamagotchi.
The vision from the previous episode was not one of the future... but from the past. 200.000 years ago.
Just because another species messed up why would the same automatically happen again?
The androids back then maybe had different coding, were faulty... dunno.
At this point I wonder what kind of species could have been there 200.000 years ago. That is older than the Iconians and those were the "first born" of the Progenitors which spread humanoid life in the galaxy. Either the timelines do not fit or they simply decided to give a fuck ST lore.
And then this old race "carried" 8 stars to form a new star system consisting of these 8 stars and put a planet in the middle of them? How should that even be possible? Just alone... how do you carry a star? How do you solve the 3 body problem with 8+1 objects? How does that planet even survive when it receives the energy of 8 suns... from literally all directions... non-stop. That is a guaranteed heat death.
All that effort just to warn others? There are better methods to warn the galaxy... especially methods where the warning sign is not only located in that very specific region of space. A delta/gamma quadrant race that is developing androids would never be able to read the warning.
Do you know what I consider more problematic that rebelling android? The fact that star fleet used the androids on mars as slave labor. In that way I would even understand why the Androids have an motivation to kill organic life.
Meanwhile on the Borg Cube 7 of 9 appears from nowhere.
From the previous episodes I got the impression that the borg cube is a high-security area... shielded... surrounded by drones and ships. But apparently everyone can come and go, unnoticed. Then 7 turns into a borg queen and controls thousands of drones... but fails to control the hangar doors.... so all drones get sucked into the vacuum. Not that this would even bother the borg. Star Trek First Contact showed pretty well that borg drones can operate in vacuum even without space suit. You know... details the show writers should have considered. Elrond is as useless as usual.
Oh and at the very end there is Narek in his cloaked ship who still follows the others. I mean... Ryker had a wooden house in the middle of nowhere with anti-cloak scanners... but... the ship of our heroes can not detect a romulan ship sitting right next to them. The show writers forgot what happened just one episode before.
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For some days i cant get the holographic consoles out of my head.
I know that they are a known thing since DS9... but in Episode 8 I noticed something that made me question the concept of it.
The ship control console seems to change the viewpoint based on the pilots body movement. Do you know how hard it is to hit a button when the entire console is moving around? Just a random thought. The coolness factor outweighs the practicability.
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episode 9... lol
this is so bad
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You mean that after star trek discovery stole the story from a relative unknown video game, star trek picard went all in and stole the story from mass effect (and that in the dumbest and most boring way possible)?
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remember when Picard was cool and competent?
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All of a sudden he became old
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just watched this clip and remembered why I liked DS9 and some other older Star Trek series: the crew
