Re: Star Trek
Posted: Fri Apr 01, 2022 1:27 pm
Picard season 2 episode 5
This was better than last weeks episode. Still has a lot of contrived story elements though.
Spoiler
"Laris" transports Picard to her apartment. Picard once again calls her Laris, and she introduces herself as Tallinn, confused as to why Picard keeps calling her Laris. She explains that she's a supervisor, assigned to watch over and protect a single individual, without ever making herself known. Picard realizes she's like an individual Kirk's Enterprise encountered, Gary Seven (I don't recall him being able to mind control people like we saw in the previous episode). Apparently she just happens to look exactly like Laris, albeit human. I kinda get the impression there is more to it though, like maybe Laris is somehow a descendant of Tallinn or something. At any rate, the person Tallinn is watching over is Renee Picard, Jean Luc's ancestor (which I guess explains why Guinan thought she'd want to talk to him once she learned his name is Picard, but begs to question how/why Guinan knew Tallinn's mission, especially since they apparently didn't get along). Renee is meant to go on a mission to Europa in a few days, but her nerves are starting to get the better of her, and Q is trying to convince her not to go (posing as a psychiatrist). Picard says they'll need the help of his crew if they are to prevent the divergence in the timeline. Meanwhile, Seven and Raffi save Rios from the deportation bus (they discuss beaming him out, but decide that'd be bad with so many witnesses, not that it stopped them from blindly beaming into LA), using their tricorder to create an EMP to disable it (and apparently an EMP can also knock out the driver? They use it against him when they get on the bus to free everybody. Also have to question their logic for potentially changing the timeline here, since they let everybody off the bus that would have gotten deported in the original timeline. They don't even go into that.). Pretty anticlimactic end to this side story and was way too easy. Ultimately this did nothing related to the plot. They could have completely avoided all of it if Raffi hadn't been so recklessly hot headed when they arrived.
Back at the ship, the Borg Queen gets access to local cell phone signals after Jirati goes to get some sleep in the Chateau (the Queen's voice doesn't have access, so she starts faking the crew's voices. Despite Picard ordering the cloak online in a previous episode, for some reason, the computer says his voice doesn't have access in this episode. Only Rio's voice works). She calls the police, and a cop comes to investigate. I guess the cloak isn't maintaining a stable field or whatever, since it keeps shimmering, which the cop notices. Somehow he finds his way into the ship. Rather than straight up assimilating him, the Queen captures him and calls Jirati back to the ship. I guess she wants to assimilate Jirati, but says she'll settle for the cop if she refuses. Having taken a shotgun that was mounted on the wall of the Chateau (why was it loaded if it was mounted to the wall?!), Jirati kills the Queen to save the cop (but not before the Queen injects Jirati with nanoprobes). Jirati beams Seven, Rios and Raffi back to the ship, while Picard and Tallinn arrive through her own method of transportation, and catch the crew up on what they've learned.
Elsewhere, because of Q's inability to use his powers, he enlists the help of Adam Soong (Brent Spiner once again playing the role of the Soong men). Adam has a daughter (the actress who plays Soji filling this role) with a rare genetic disorder that prevents her from going outside (apparently he also had a son that has died, but don't really go into what happened to him), and despite his expertise in the field, he hasn't found a cure for her himself (he has also had is license revoked and funding taken away for running illegal experiments on former soldiers... pretty sure he should be in jail for that). Q gives him a cure, but the effects wear off after a while, forcing Adam to work with Q (to do... something to Renee) if he wants the permanent cure. (Not sure how Q has access to this cure without his abilities. Unless maybe he does still have his powers, but just can't affect Renee for some reason. Be nice if the series addressed it, or told us why Q thinks this is necessary if he's already manipulating Renee in other ways. Also, side note, Adam has drones that can create forcefields that protects his daughter from the sun. Pretty sure we are not 2 years away from that type of technology.)
With Renee Picard's launch only a couple days away, Picard and company decide if they can keep her in the program until the astronauts go into pre-launch quarantine, it'll be impossible for her to back out (if she's having anxiety attacks and stuff, it's not realistic that NASA would keep her on the mission). There is a "high security" gala (I get it's a high profile mission, but I doubt NASA would facial recognition and all this stuff) that night that they decide to crash... Jirati is sent to hack the security (apparently she's the only one with the skills necessary... Wasn't her expertise building/programming androids? How does she have the skills to hack what would be antiquated tech from her perspective? EDIT: Apparently I missed a throwaway line that Jirati took "antique coding". And wouldn't Seven have the necessary skills for this? These writers don't seem to know just how intelligent Seven is supposed to be.) it's revealed to us that the Borg Queen is inside Jirati's head.
Jean Luc doesn't seem to know much about Renee Picard. He says whatever records remain from before First Contact were chaotic. She apparently plays a big part in early exploration of the solar system and discovers a microorganism on Io at some point that she believes may be sentient, and convinces the mission commander to bring it back to Earth.
Back at the ship, the Borg Queen gets access to local cell phone signals after Jirati goes to get some sleep in the Chateau (the Queen's voice doesn't have access, so she starts faking the crew's voices. Despite Picard ordering the cloak online in a previous episode, for some reason, the computer says his voice doesn't have access in this episode. Only Rio's voice works). She calls the police, and a cop comes to investigate. I guess the cloak isn't maintaining a stable field or whatever, since it keeps shimmering, which the cop notices. Somehow he finds his way into the ship. Rather than straight up assimilating him, the Queen captures him and calls Jirati back to the ship. I guess she wants to assimilate Jirati, but says she'll settle for the cop if she refuses. Having taken a shotgun that was mounted on the wall of the Chateau (why was it loaded if it was mounted to the wall?!), Jirati kills the Queen to save the cop (but not before the Queen injects Jirati with nanoprobes). Jirati beams Seven, Rios and Raffi back to the ship, while Picard and Tallinn arrive through her own method of transportation, and catch the crew up on what they've learned.
Elsewhere, because of Q's inability to use his powers, he enlists the help of Adam Soong (Brent Spiner once again playing the role of the Soong men). Adam has a daughter (the actress who plays Soji filling this role) with a rare genetic disorder that prevents her from going outside (apparently he also had a son that has died, but don't really go into what happened to him), and despite his expertise in the field, he hasn't found a cure for her himself (he has also had is license revoked and funding taken away for running illegal experiments on former soldiers... pretty sure he should be in jail for that). Q gives him a cure, but the effects wear off after a while, forcing Adam to work with Q (to do... something to Renee) if he wants the permanent cure. (Not sure how Q has access to this cure without his abilities. Unless maybe he does still have his powers, but just can't affect Renee for some reason. Be nice if the series addressed it, or told us why Q thinks this is necessary if he's already manipulating Renee in other ways. Also, side note, Adam has drones that can create forcefields that protects his daughter from the sun. Pretty sure we are not 2 years away from that type of technology.)
With Renee Picard's launch only a couple days away, Picard and company decide if they can keep her in the program until the astronauts go into pre-launch quarantine, it'll be impossible for her to back out (if she's having anxiety attacks and stuff, it's not realistic that NASA would keep her on the mission). There is a "high security" gala (I get it's a high profile mission, but I doubt NASA would facial recognition and all this stuff) that night that they decide to crash... Jirati is sent to hack the security (apparently she's the only one with the skills necessary... Wasn't her expertise building/programming androids? How does she have the skills to hack what would be antiquated tech from her perspective? EDIT: Apparently I missed a throwaway line that Jirati took "antique coding". And wouldn't Seven have the necessary skills for this? These writers don't seem to know just how intelligent Seven is supposed to be.) it's revealed to us that the Borg Queen is inside Jirati's head.
Jean Luc doesn't seem to know much about Renee Picard. He says whatever records remain from before First Contact were chaotic. She apparently plays a big part in early exploration of the solar system and discovers a microorganism on Io at some point that she believes may be sentient, and convinces the mission commander to bring it back to Earth.