#star trek picard rant

[tuttle-did-it]

Remember they brought on Riker and Deanna in the last episode of Star Trek: Enterprise, and how offensive it was that Enterprise wasn't even allowed to finish their own show?

That's exactly what Star Trek: Next Generation has done to Star Trek: Picard. Except instead of displacing the Picard cast for the last four minutes, they displace the Picard cast for an entire season. For 1/3 of the entire show's run.

All of the Picard characters, except Picard himself, have been shunted to the side and are no more than wallpaper on the set- *IF* they are in the season at all. ONLY the Legacy TNG characters men matter. All of the Legacy TNG women do nothing but give the men someone to talk to or someone to rescue. They are furnishings that come with the ship. They are ghosts with no identity, no purpose.

Seven, who is one of the most dynamic Legacy Trek characters ever, and who was, for the first two seasons, integral to the story whilst simultaneously having her own thing going on, is diminished to taking abuse ad being dead-named from Shaw for most of the show, not being able to even be in the same room as her lover, and sitting in the shadows existing entirely so that Picard and his son can have someone to talk to.

Raffi, Ro Laren, Shelby- it's like they don't exist. Juratti and Laris are rarely acknowledged as even existing. You could digitally paint Seven out of most of her scenes, and almost nothing would change about the scene itself. You could digitally paint out most of these women and 90% of their scenes would barely change. And they fucking fridged Ro Laren.

How the cast of Star Trek: Enterprise felt about having TNG come in and take over their show at the 11th hour? That is how the Star Trek: Picard cast should feel, but worse because they were brought in at the 7th hour, not the 11th.

Matalas' hard-on for TNG men trauma-dumping and saving the day has done far more damage to Star Trek: Picard than that awful Enterprise ending ever could.

Jeri Ryan, Michelle Hurd, Orla Brady, Allison Pill, Evan Evagora, Isa Briones, Santiago Cabrera all deserve to be furious, right now. We all do.

Even Jonathan Frakes acknowledges having him on Enterprise 'wasn't a great idea.' And yet he doesn't seem to have a problem with coming on Picard in season 3 and essentially taking over the entire show, pushing aside every one of the original Picard cast members, including Jeri Ryan.

He and Marina Sirtis have done the same thing, twice- coming into a show that was NOT about TNG, and by their mere presence, it becomes about TNG.

[thresholdbb]

I have a gripe about the Star Trek mugs...

Picard's teacup is a delicate, fragile little thing held by a strip of plastic and a dream. That thin glass will break if you look at it sideways. And where do they put that ridiculous tiny cup? On the Enterprise, which is always being dragged into conflict

The DS9 raktajino mugs are hefty, wide-based things that are meant to not tip over. They're called no-spill mugs. They have a foam piece on the bottom so they don't slip. They're incredibly sturdy – meant for ships and traveling! Where do they put them? At the station, which is arguably the most stable place they could be cause DS9 rarely gets knocked about.

Far as I'm concerned, Janeway's the only one doing practical space mugs correctly. Come on, a metal travel mug that's as strong as her coffee is black? Takes a beating through 70,000 light years of bridge shakes fighting off the Borg and the Hirogen and still holds a hot drink? Now that's a space mug

[stoplookingup]

Also, it was pretty clear that, from the start, the idea was to introduce new characters who could be spun off, since obviously Patrick Stewart wouldn't stick around for more than 2 or 3 seasons. So when most of the original characters were dumped, the new characters of S3 inherited their spinoff spots. Not only did Picard turn into a TNG epilogue, but now the spinoff will be one, too, with the addition of the TNG progeny. It's just a terrible idea (though I'm grateful they're keeping Seven and Raffi, at least).

I get that they were giving TNG fans what they want, but they should have come up with something other than a bait-and-switch. After putting together a great cast for Picard, they were given two seasons of very uneven writing, and now, we'll never know what they might have become.

Something not a lot of people are talking about is how disrespectful and insulting Season 3 (and Season 2 as well, let's be honest) of Picard is to the viewers who actually liked Season 1. How this show was such a dishonest fucking bait-and-switch. The way S2 unceremoniously dumped the orginal cast, either killing them off ignominiously or straight up firing the actors.

"Well, duh. The show is titled Star Trek: Picard, not Star Trek: Sirena"

Perhaps an argument could be made, but if you were me and meticulously following any and all news of this brand new shiny show that Santiago Cabrera was going to star in back in 2019, you would have noticed that they consistently marketed it as a new, fresh chapter in Picard's life with Patrick Stewart insisting that it had to be something new and different and not a TNG 2.0. All the interviews and cons the cast appeared in repeatedly assured us that this was not a Star Trek: TNG, Electric Boogaloo, but a different show with a different tone and a different Picard and a different crew. That was the idea they marketed us. That was the story they sold us. That was what compelled me to tune in to this show.

And what did this show end up being after Season 1? A fucking Star Trek: TNG, Electric Boogaloo

Fuck the writers. Fuck the producers. Fuck everybody involved in this decision

[wewalkadifferentpath]

tng is like insubordination is unacceptable, terrible, will get you fired... unless you were right though 😘

[nonbinaryhatboxghost]

Thoughts on the State of Trek

I would be less upset about Discovery ending if they had known going into season 5 that it would be their last. But that was not the case. The additional filming to give it an actual finale is good and I have no doubt that it will be as good a finale as they can do under the circumstances.

But recently I’ve been more observant of Trek fans online and there is a thing happening where I’ve seen far more immediate praise of Strange New Worlds and the current/final season of Picard than any other new Trek show has gotten.

Strange New Worlds is a good show! It is also specifically emulating the original series and has a straight white male captain as the lead. (yes, Pike rocks, that is not the point here)

The current/final season of Picard (which I do think is good!) has radically altered the tone of the show into a revival/sendoff for The Next Generation, as well as emulating and referencing Star Trek media of the ‘80s and ‘90s. And again, straight white male lead.

Both shows, particularly this season of Picard, have been pretty immediately praised by certain types of Trek viewers. Specifically longtime straight white male fans.

I’ve also noticed less diversity behind the camera of Strange New Worlds and Picard compared to Discovery. At least if one watches all the behind-the-scenes stuff for those shows (which I’ve been doing a lot lately). There’s not zero diversity, but Picard especially has been putting more emphasis on bringing back legacy crew members who are majorly, you guessed it, straight white males.

Contrasting that with how Discovery was met with skepticism from the get-go and is openly dismissed by certain older fans (one I talked to at work said something like “I guess I don’t get it because I’m not a millennial.”) makes me a bit angry because a lot of these same longtime fans watched and stuck through the first two seasons of The Next Generation. Those two seasons are some of the roughest television I’ve ever seen, and the handful of good episodes hidden throughout do not make up for it. But fans at the time stuck through those seasons anyway.

Why didn’t Discovery get the same treatment from those vocal longtime folks?

Why did The Next Generation, which is a very different type of show compared to the original series, ultimately become a beloved show? I’d like to believe it’s because people accepted the show for what it was once it found its footing.

But when I see comments like “Picard season 3 is the best Trek in 25 years”, I get mad. You gave Picard, a show that has two seasons with a mixed reception at best, a continued benefit of the doubt because of nostalgia for an older show, and because this season is essentially a Next Generation reunion. But you dismissed Discovery because it wasn’t “your” Star Trek show.

Literally part of the purpose of Star Trek is infinite diversity in infinite combinations. Discovery not only gave us an incredible lead character played by a Black woman, it gave us representation across the entire cast of both people of color and queer folks. As a nonbinary person, Adira’s quiet coming out scene had a profound impact on me, and later served as a helpful reference point for coming out as NB to my dad, who watches and enjoys Discovery.

Discovery spends an entire season depicting a debate between multiple characters/factions about how to handle a situation that threatens all Federation members. It does so with empathy for all points of view, and ultimately resolves this threat not with an action sequence, but a conversation. That season of Discovery (season 4) is Star Trek as fuck, and some of the best Trek ever.

Hell, Star Trek Beyond is so good that it manages to take the flashy action J.J. Abrams approach to Star Trek (which I have mixed feelings about because Trek ’09 is fun and despite his storytelling problems, Abrams is by all accounts a genuinely nice person so I won’t be shit-talking him here) and make it more properly Trek by introducing a villain who believes conflict is necessary for human evolution, which is the antithesis to Roddenberry’s whole vision for Trek of being a future where we work to resolve and avoid conflict rather than seek it.

Strange New Worlds and Picard (seasons 1 and, so far, 3) are both good and also contain great Trek. But they are also fundamentally more appealing to the nostalgia of middle-aged straight white male fans. And they are the shows that are getting more visible attention and praise.

Lower Decks is awesome and has a fantastic Black female lead in Tawny Newsome. But it meant something to have Sonequa Martin-Green and Newsome be the leads of two Star Trek shows airing at the same time.

And it means something for the live-action show with a Black woman as the lead to be cancelled while the animated show with a Black woman as the lead but a straight white male as the head writer is allowed to continue.

I don’t want Star Trek to become like Star Wars and turn into an endless cycle of fan service. Star Trek has had a huge impact on our planet over the 55+ years of its existence. Don’t make the mistake of turning it into another franchise that exists as a way for whiny white dudes to center themselves over the global majority.

(PS, Paramount, how the hell have you dragged your heels over Michelle Yeoh’s spinoff for this long? She has an Oscar now, what the hell is your excuse?)

[annikasevenshots]

rewatching picard s3 (ep 2 rn) and i have thoughts

i actually sympathise with shaw a lot more this time around. just playing by the rules and getting through the day with the lives of 500 in your hands. like, he's not a hero and that is okay!!! god knows it takes so much energy to go all out and rebel and live with the consequences aand bro does not have that. and that is FINE. he's doing his best.

deadnaming aside ofc

not to diagnose him with Like Me but i'm thinking thoughts about shaw having me/cfs. just thoughts.

conversely i hate jack crusher even more this time round lmao. like wow he really is a cringe mary sue oc and we just allowed that.

i'm ambivalent about holo engineer shaw in legacy but can we boot jack crusher out the airlock at earliest convenience

like the picard's son plotline is so uncreative and cringey. there's nothing his character brings that cannot be filled by soji and elnor combined. elnor could have been working with beverly as Qowat Milat!! or even soji!

or beverly could have gone solo i literally dgaf

and if you're going to be uncreative and fuck around with the borg again, SOJI HAS LITERALLY BEEN WORKING WITH THEM IN S1. like if anyone is set up for a dormant borg virus it's her.

and lord knows you aren't going to pay either of them equal to what you pay a cis white man so there literally was no reason to boot the two of them to introduce jack

i just??? he is so useless???

sorry gang i am feeling feelings and the feeling is salt

[sasukecouchiewa]

I also watched around 7 episodes of tng and idk....like its interesting and all but im not so sure about the characters...like yes data is funny geordi too picard is commanding and smart riker is competent troi is beautiful bla blablablabla

I find these characters rather interesting but i dont feel any immediate connection to them as ive felt with tos or ds9  where i could feel just from looking at a character for a bit that it was gonna be interesting and promising.

obviously i dont doubt that it has many interesting and fun aspects and will develop into something better and better as seasons go by but it doesnt feel like something i really want to binge nor have to patience to watch. Now i Am watching it but because im interested in the universe per se, in the new worlds, and new interactions with other entities and spacey stuff. 

The thing that annoys me the most are the, well, annoying characters, such as the romantic interest that was made obvious from the first episode (or was it the second) because oooh the captain is losing controlllll hes giving in into his romantic and sexual impulseeeesss noo so funny!!! we now know theyre gonna be annoying af impling stuff and longing for each other for the next??? how many seasons. and her prodigy son! why must there be such a character literally no one gives a fuck and from what ive seen no one in the fandom likes him much either so literally what was the point lmao

another thing i didn't like by far is the constant slapping in our faces that the “humans” are the superior species in confront, for example, of the ferengi because now women have rights! and they have clothes! crazy shit man like i get it because in that period women did actually start getting rights so whatever it was historically important but damn like 5 episodes out of the first 7 were only about that .

also why are the jokes constructed so weirdly like theyd make one single unfunny ass joke and thered be a pause where everyone laughs except that one character and someone will be like OH! IT WAS A JOKE LMAOO hahhahahah like no….please stop its cringing me out please just make funny jokes. Like riker would look around…waiting for everyone to laugh… to giggle… or someone would make joke and linger for a moment like hey think about the fact that i made a joke. also what is that acting and what is that thing where everyone seems to have a frog in their mouth when theyre talking OMG ITS SO ANNOYING i just cant with this series im sorry i dont get it.

[v-e-l-v-e-t-g-o-l-d-m-i-n-e]

You know, the thing that pisses me off the most about the Enterprise finale is not Trip's terrible death, or that the crew doesn't even have a proper POV during their finale episode. Sure, these things makes me very angry, but the one thing that makes me see red, you know what it is?

It's the presumption that if the franchise were to be given a goodbye to a not known lenght of time, the ones who had to send it off had to be the TNG crew and none of the other series deserved this honor, as if the other ones - even the Enterprise crew, the one show doing the goodbye - were not worth it.

I'm having a similar feeling watching the third season of Star Trek: Picard, considering they wrote off the entire cast of the series, with the exception of Raffi and Seven. It does feel like once again the TNG crew is kicking out the cast of the original show to insert themselves in there at the end.

But it's not the same because it's a Picard series and Picard was the main TNG character!

Yes, I see this point, somewhat agree with it but. It's not the same. Because this is Picard twenty years after his captain years, and it's about who he is now. We saw him make new friends, a new family in the two previous seasons, and this is now all cast out, as if it was all worthless.

And you see, I'm not actually against the inclusion of the TNG crew in Picard's last season. I think it makes sense to include them; they are Picard's family, after all, and Nemesis left several loose ends. What I'm against is the exclusion of the original cast, when they should have been kept IN ADDITION to the TNG crew being brought back.

But it's too many characters to write about!

Deep Space Nine had NINE main characters (Sisko, Dax, Kira, Bashir, Odo, O'Brien, Quark, Jake, Worf), three main antagonists (Dukat, Winn, Female Founder) and a TON of supporting cast (Garak, Damar, Leeta, Rom, Nog, Morn, Keiko, Kasidy, Ziyal, Martok, Weyoun, Vic Fontaine...) and they managed to juggle it all just fine. More than fine.

But they have to work with much less episodes!

I see this point. It's true; only ten episodes it's not a lot of time when there used to be 26 episodes per season, but you know what? It's still a body of work with almost ten hours of duration. This is just a little less than the hours of the LOTR trilogy, and see the size of the universe and the storylines you're capable of creating with roughly the same timeframe.

If they focused on what matters and if they were to write it well, it is more than possible to juggle many characters and do a good work while you are at it.

Elnor should have been in this season; he could be a foil to Jack, since he sees Picard as a father figure. So should have been Soji, especially now that Data is back; I think he deserves to know he has a daughter. They never should have gotten ridden of Rios. Borg Queen Agnes is very plot relevant, but she's nowhere to be seen.

I'm glad that Raffi has been in this season and its a joy to see her with Worf, but it leaves such a bitter taste in my mouth that her romance with Seven seems dead to me. Trek has a terrible record with queer characters, and Seven and Raffi are the first lesbian couple in the whole franchise (and the only main ones apart of Jennifer and Mariner in Lower Decks), and even if they had highs and lows, at least season two bothered to give them time together and interactions. They barely were in the same room together during this season.

The constantly barbs to the early seasons like the way Troi and Riker talked about their home life, the way they ignore Borg Queen Agnes whole existence... this season seems do disdainful of its predecessors, and even if they were full of flaws, this seems so unfair to me. Especially when this season have such a a weak plot being held together only by the talent and the charisma of the TNG crew, it's really not a good look. The story is weak, it's repetitive, it doesn't make sense when you think about it for too long.

And you know what it's sad? Man, I LOVE the TNG crew. In fact I love TNG; apart from Deep Space Nine, it's my favorite Star Trek series. I prefer it even over TOS. It makes me sad to see them being brought together again so messily, and in detriment of everything the Star Trek: Picard series had previously established, especially when you can see the ways it could have been good.

[deliverance-guy]

Imagine being such a lazy and incompetent writer, that you not only forget to give one character closure but at least two.

Rant incoming:

You can do so much with Narek's character and I would have loved seeing him getting a redemption ark, exploring the cult of the Zhat Vash and interacting with other people than his sister. Dang, let him realise that he has been brainwashed since his childhood, allow him to overcome his prejudice and trauma with the help of Laris or even Elnor and make him a powerful ally through the plot, which could have been so strong and interesting to watch. But no. They literally forgot about him and Chabon’s clarification, or better his planned fate doesn't make sense. Why should he be brought into federation custody?

A) What he did was horrible, yet inside of romulan space and under romulan laws dedicated towards a then illegal life form who has most likely signed a contract agreeing to said laws and possible consequences of conflict with the police/ the Tal Shiar. As a result, they shouldn’t be able to arrest him for anything since he was also way too young to be involved into the destruction of Mars.

B) Moreover, he recognised his mistakes and showed a will to work on himself. Prison will only make him loose that short window of change of mind and harden his believes, since he spends the whole time with himself and we all know how thoughts can spiral into hate and frustration rather than understanding and reflection. His whole world collapsed around him and instead of taking the shot to work with him, they leave him alone with his thoughts and the urge to find someone to blame for his misery?

Even though I am heartbroken to what they did to the La Sirena crew, I felt like they had some sort of resolution inside the seasons and their arcs, not perfect or satisfying but still (we don’t talk about how the writers ripped everything apart in season 3, that is another essay worth of rant). I deeply mourn for what could have been and are beyond mad they threw out Soji and Elnor so fast. It just felt cheap. I can understand why they did it with Elnor, to give Raffi a motive to work through her guilt for manipulating him (which kind of got brushed off and came out of nowhere so idk why you couldn’t leave him in there and work through it alive and together).

For Soji, why give us Core when you don’t plan on doing something more with here than give the actor and Spinner something to do. How great would have been it, if Soji met her look alike and got to understand the origin of her “bloodline” and the reason behind her creation, something she desperately longed for. Let her find acceptance for herself and the confidence in her skin she deserves. Let her be more than some diplomate and a tool to portray the conflict between Agnes and Rios. The money I would give to see both of them coming up the agreement to work together and Soji’s decision to change her job from an anthropologist or doctor (I am not sure what her profession fell under) to an ambassador. SHOW US, please. To be honest, I can’t see Paramount doing a show with the watchers and Core, so why waste that time with a plot you could have given to a character already established in the season before, a whole audience was thrilled for?

And Laris... Cutting her off for nostalgia porn and claiming it was out of budget? How cheap is this please?! She deserved way better and not being tossed in the trash so carelessly by so called fans! If you don’t want her in the main storyline, fine. Just give her an ending. A sentence or brief interaction. She and Picard were literally a couple, so why deny her the interaction with Beverly and her stepson?

You can say what you want about star trek Picard but I think we all can agree on one statement: Picard has been such a massive mess in terms of carrying the plotline, characters and ideas throughout the seasons to a point were it almost felt like they have been completely different series from the beginning. Every season had such an unique idea and character developments, which got tossed aside and completely ignored in later episodes.

I know enough people have talked about this already but I needed to get it out of my system.

[savameh]

“Every ship in this fleet is now fully integrated, which means they talk to each other. So, you can drop transponder signals all you want, but the Titan is a beacon. It’s only a matter of time before it gets close enough to alert the other ships.”

EXCUSE ME????? DID YOU DUMBFUCKS NOT LEARN ANYTHING FROM THE GAMMA SERPENTIS INCIDENT????

[datasoong101]

I JUST FINISHED STAR TREK PICARD LIKE FIVE MINUTES AGO AND THAT WAS THE MOST BEAUTIFUL THING I'VE EVER WITNESSED!!

I was scared to start the series because I was extremely terrified that they would ruin the story of characters I've held so so dear to me for so long, but they didn't. Instead, they beautifully brought the Enterprise D crew's story to a close and set another Enterprise off on its adventure. I am sure the G will live up to its name. I was surprised by how they fixed things that have bothered a lot of people for a long time. I absolutely hated Nemesis as an end to the story. It ended with Data dying in a way that was seemingly needless, and even though it was a beautiful sacrifice, it wasn't even appreciated. It was clear that whoever made that movie didn't understand the crew's dynamics. They even deleted the scene that showed Geordi mourning for Data. The characters didn't seem themselves, and nobody got quite enough screen time. The whole thing ended with mourning, which doesn't seem fit for a crew with so much life.

Picard changed all that. I was okay with how they resolved Data's death at the end of season one. (I sobbed my eyes out but I mean, at least there was resolution.) The fact that he came back in season 3 was spoiled for me, but in a way that I wasn't at all sure what would happen. I was scared that it was going to feel like a cheap attempt to do a reunion trope or something. I was proved wrong. I was astonished by how it played out. I cried so many times while watching season three. From the crows in his dreams and Pop Goes the Weasel, to watching Lore try to take over and destroy his memories of Holme's pipe and Tasha Yar, I was shaken by how beautiful the execution was, how much care and love was put into Data's rebirth. And then getting to see him reunite with his friends again, especially Geordi, in a way that seemed true to everyone's personality, how they would actually be. They truly felt like a family.

And, after more than 35 years, the mechanical man got his wish.

[staringdownabarrel]

There's a couple of things that really annoy me about the Titan-A getting renamed to be the Enterprise-G.

One is that it would have been fine for it to remain the Titan. The fact it had a letter after its registry was an admission that everyone was onboard with this ship having a strong legacy. Saving the Federation only should have guaranteed that there was eventually going to be a Titan-B, not that they now had to go and rename this ship.

The other is that it would have been fine for the Enterprise-E to still be in service. The Enterprise-E was commissioned in 2372, so it would have been just under thirty years old at around the time of Picard's third season. This wouldn't have been too old to still be in service: Kirk's Enterprise had been in service for forty when it was destroyed. Plus, given how often the Enterprise-E was refitted (it seemed to be after each TNG movie), I think Starfleet would have been reluctant to give it an early decommissioning after investing so many resources into keeping it going.

Yes, they did include a line about Worf being in command of it when it was destroyed. However, I disagree with that narrative choice, too.

As much as Worf's entire vibe is that he's occasionally prone to making very Klingon-style choices that don't always sit well with Starfleet's higher ups, there's always a lot of mitigating circumstances involved. I think a lot of his arc involve him maturing to become someone who doesn't act as rashly and by the end of DS9, most of his big decisions tend to be very considered ones, not the rash ones he might have made as a younger man.

Because of that, I don't think he'd willingly get himself into a position where the ship became unusable or destroyed. I think having that line weakens his character and ignores a lot of his character development when they weren't willing to go into detail about what actually happened.

While there probably would have been fans complaining that they hadn't introduced a new Enterprise for the new show, I think that would have been mostly fine. Most people would get that it'd be weird for a ship that young to be out of service after only thirty years anyway.

Plus, I feel like it also cheapens having the Enterprise-F introduced as well. Yeah sure, it's an Odyssey-class and they'd been included in beta canon before that so might not feel as special to some people because it's not a new design specifically for the show, but they always could have made it some other class. Nobody had a gun pointed at the production team to force them to include this class.

I'm not entirely convinced they couldn't have repaired the Enterprise-F, either. Like, it's basically brand new at that point; surely they could have done something with it.

Ultimately, I just feel like having the Titan-A renamed to be the Enterprise-G just feels silly and pointless.

[grissomesque]

And on the subject of P/C let me just say, I was resigned from the jump but there's also, like... nothing? Between them? At all? They don't seem to be friends, they don't seem to hate each other, there's no angst, there's nothing for us to sink our teeth into at all. I would almost (almost) rather they tear the ship apart than leave it like this. We got the one conversation in the mysteriously emptied sickbay and that's it. And I didn't love it, but it made me feel something.

The marketing/publicity of this season defies comprehension. I'd say we've been had except that I didn't buy it anyway, but I know people did, and people hoped, and Matalas is out there tweeting about P/C like it's still gonna happen in the eleventh hour and he deserves to be trampled by a stampede of P/C shippers, frankly, because it's just mean. It's shitty and manipulative. It's fucking Bees. I'm mad and I didn't even believe him.

And yes I'm 1000 odd words into a goddamn fic about it, but I don't want to still need Trek fix-it fic in the year 2023, and certainly not considering the sheer budget they've got!

I have the impression we're supposed to be left at the end of this season with some sense of catharsis, but it's not going to feel earned. At all. It's going to feel like: why did they even bother to make this show.

[annikasevenshots]

Happy birthday to Raffi Musiker! 🌻✨💛

In Star Trek: Picard, we see the best and worst of Raffi - quite literally. This level of vulnerability, resilience, courage and kindness from this character has made so many of us feel seen. She's given me hope during tough times, showed me that I wasn't alone when it felt like it, and taught me so much about who I am.

Hopefully this isn't the last we've seen of this wonderfully beloved character!

[procrastinatorproject]

On the Changing Nature of the Borg

I was thinking about Season 2 of Star Trek: Picard yesterday, and I was once again struck by one of the things that disappointed me about the show: The complete retcon they gave the nature of the Borg.

I'm far from the first person to make this observation, and when I complained to friends about it last night, I was a little worried I might be doing the S2 writers a disservice. Maybe I was misremembering the details from the show and putting too much of my own interpretation on top of it. Or I might have latched on to somebody else's criticism and not checked to see if it was supported by the text.

But then I rewatched episode 2x09, "Hide and Seek" today, expecting to have to look very closely for the details that support my reading - only to find that I didn't over-interpret some throwaway line, this is a key piece of dialogue.

So, here it is: my thoughts and feelings about what happened to the Borg in season 2!

Spoilers for season 2 of Star Trek: Picard ahead, obviously. Also quite a bit of saltiness. (I have tagged this post accordingly, so please take this as your sign to blacklist that tag and/or stop reading if you're not in the mood for saltiness ;) )

Let us begin with a quick walk through the history of the Borg. [Edit: That was a lie, I am incapable of "quick." Prepare yourself for a verbose trek through the history of the Borg.]

In TNG, they were introduced as practically a force of nature. They didn't hold grudges, they weren't ambitious or greedy or megalomaniacal. They didn't spread across the Galaxy because they wanted to be conquerors or rulers. They simply spread. Like a virus, or an invasive plant.

They added new technologies and biology into their collective to improve themselves and their chances of survival. Assimilation was akin to evolution for them. (I know this is not how biological evolution works. I'm using it as shorthand. )

These Borg didn't care that people might not want to be assimilated because for one, their objections would be overwritten once they were Borg, and for another, they had no chance of escaping their fate, anyway.

This first, original form of the Borg, in my opinion, was the most truly alien they have ever been.

This characterization started to collapse a bit once First Contact decided to introduce the Borg Queen as a weird psycho-sexual horror component, making the Borg less of a force of nature and more of a nominally collective hive-mind that operated like a person would.

Voyager definitely added to this interpretation of the Borg, making them more beholden to the moods and wishes of the Queen. They were no longer simply a dispassionate alien organism, moving through the galaxy in a quest for self-improvement because that was their nature. Instead, their characterization became more human, pursuing specific goals, strategies and motivations.

On some level, I completely understand this choice. Making your main series villain a force of nature rather than a character with personal motivation is difficult to pull off, especially when that isn't the main story you're trying to tell. But it did end up taking the Borg one step farther away from their original alien-ness.

One thing Voyager added to the mythos, though, that I find deeply fascinating is that instead of having the Borg Queen lust for power and control, or having her act out of fear and self-preservation, they instead focused on the concept of Perfection. In "The Omega Directive", Seven of Nine explains that to the Borg, the pursuit of Perfection is almost spiritual.

According to this interpretation, the Borg don't simply search out and assimilate new species because of an "evolutionary" drive for self-improvement. Instead, they are on a quest to reach a state of absolute perfection. They add new technologies and biological diversity in the hopes of coming closer to this goal and one day finding this most ideal state of existence.

These Borg don't care about your objections to assimilation, because they are convinced that their vision of perfection is universal. Every species must obviously strive for perfection and they can offer that, so why would you ever want to resist? They have no concept of the fact that others might not define perfection in the way they do, might not strive for it at all, or that "perfection" at the cost of giving up all individuality and sovereignty might not be an acceptable trade-off for people.

(And no, Voyager is not internally consistent about this. Barely any long-running tv show is entirely internally consistent. But the point still stands.)

On some level, this drive also brings the Borg closer to humanity: less dispassionate virus and more colonizers who come to extract value from “lesser cultures” and impose a more enlightened way of life on them because They Know What's Best. Still, I think the relentless, uncompromizing pursuit of a nigh-spiritual ideal of Perfection and utter disinterest in personhood and self-determination of other people make the Borg into a formidable and, at the end of the day, alien villain.

Which brings us to season 2 of Star Trek: Picard.

The thing that rubbed me the wrong way about the way the Borg were characterized here is summed up in an exchange between Jurati and the Borg Queen:

Jurati: "Millions of species, planets, and still you always needed more." Borg Queen: "Perfection takes time, dear." Jurati: "This was never about perfection or evolution or any of that bullshit. It was never enough, because you're just like me. Lonely."

And that's it. In all of five sentences, we have retconned the entire history, motivation and fundamental nature of one of the main alien species of the Trek universe.

Everything we have been told about the Borg, everything they have said about their reasons and their character, none of it was true. They have been lying to all of us and to themselves this entire time. They aren't a force of nature or a people/collective organism in pursuit of a higher ideal. Instead, it was all a single woman's misguided quest to not feel alone anymore.

Now, I understand that for some people, this revelation adds a new layer of complexity to a villain that had grown somewhat stale. And I have seen others argue that they like the idea that the Borg collective is actually all about connection. If that's you, I'm not saying you're wrong or trying to ruin your enjoyment of these characters.

But personally, I find this development rather disappointing. This plot twist retroactively changes not only the philosophy, psychology, and raison d'être of a fascinating alien culture but also the narrative significance of the Borg in the Trek cosmos.

Before, they were in conflict with the Federation because they refused (or were unable) to look outwards and see that there was more than one "correct" mode of existence, and that the life of people different than them had worth. Now, the conflict arises because they refuse to look inward and acknowledge that what they are really looking for cannot be achieved through conquest.

Where before they assimilated civilizations in a quest for utmost perfection no matter the cost, now they are assimilating masses of people in the hopes of creating a chorus that will drown out the loneliness.

Don't get me wrong, that sort of twist can make for an intriguing villain arc, but firstly, it needs to be executed with a lot more care than season 2 made room for, and secondly, it works a lot better for individuals or groups of individuals than for a species that is ostensibly a telepathic hive-mind.

(Seriously, the in-universe implications -- for the Prime-timeline Borg, the Federation, the xBs -- are staggering and are glossed over completely on the show. Then again, this is the same season that doesn't bother to show (or tell) whether Agnes Jurati chooses to remain with the Borg Queen out of a genuine desire to create a new collective or as a desperate bargain to save her friends. You know. The culminating moment of her character arc in season 2. But that is another rant.)

At the end of the day, I don't feel like this newly-revealed secret motivation adds a fresh layer of complexity to a well-known villain. Instead, I think it takes away many of the aspects that made the Borg intriguing, both narratively and as an alien species, and turns them into something much more human and, frankly, much more banal.