We’re three episodes into the first season of Star Trek: Picard and we’re only just now leaving Earth. That’s nearly a third of the way through the season, and it hasn’t quite managed to get off the ground. After an exciting pilot gave way to a slow, talk-heavy second episode, the series returned this week with more of the same. We get scene after scene of characters sitting around talking about things that sound very important, but don’t mean anything to us yet. These last two episodes have been so busy setting up the rest of the season, they forgot to put in anything to look at while they do.
Except, that is, for Patrick Stewart’s acting, which remains some of the best on TV. He’s still a joy to watch, and I’ll happily listen to him talk about anything, whether I understand it or not. That’s a good thing in this episode, which isn’t all that interested in having us understand much of anything. There are lots of long conversations filled with jargon and references that lead nowhere except to the next scene. Picard and Raffi, who we met at the very end of last week’s episode, have a lot of back and forth that doesn’t reveal much that we don’t already know. The only relevant information is that she knows a pilot she can put Picard in contact with.
Michelle Hurd as Raffi; Patrick Stewart as Picard of the the CBS All Access series STAR TREK: PICARD. Photo Cr: Trae Patton/CBS
I was glad that the episode gave us more backstory about their relationship. They worked together on the Romulan evacuation. When Starfleet pulled out after the Mars attack, she helped Picard come up with a plan to continue the evacuation. Unfortunately, all her reason fell on frightened, uncaring ears. Picard threatened to resign and they called his bluff. After that, Raffi was fired. Picard went to his French winery, and Raffi ended up in the desert cycling through various stages of complication. It’s safe to say she harbors some bitterness about how things went down. This backstory is the smartest part of the episode. It shows us exactly what’s changed since Star Trek: The Next Generation. It gets us invested in there relationship. At the end of the episode when she shows up on the ship, we’re just as happy as Picard is to see her.
Really, the final moment of the episode is the reason we’re all here. It’s what the show has been building to for about three hours now. And once we get there, it’s everything we wanted it to be. Picard standing aboard his ship, telling his pilot to “Engage!” I live for that moment. As soon as it happened, I thought man, I’m such a sucker. Star Trek: Picard just showed me two of the most boring episodes of Star Trek I’ve ever seen. And I sat through all of… well, most of Enterprise. But all it takes is a few seconds of Captain Jean Luc Picard pointing at the screen and saying the thing, and I’m squealing like the fanboy I’ve always been. It really shouldn’t work as well as it does.
Alison Pill as Jurati; Santiago Cabrera as Rios; Patrick Stewart as Picard; Michelle Hurd of the the CBS All Access series STAR TREK: PICARD. Photo Cr: Trae Patton/CBS
To be fair, not all of the episode before that moment was bad. Aside from the Raffi backstory, we meet the pilot of the ship, Cris Rios. He’s a pilot who takes on all kinds of jobs, no questions asked. His doctor hologram even points out that Picard is the most morally good person he’s worked for in a long time. That strikes a nerve with Rios. Before he was a mercenary, as Picard deduces, he was in Starfleet. That’s why his ship is organized the way it is and so well-taken-care-of. And like Picard, there’s a reason he’s no longer in Starfleet. His story is much sadder, though. We don’t get the full picture, but he mentions that the last time he worked with a Starfleet captain anything like Picard, the captain’s brains ended up on the bulkhead. Clearly the mission went real bad, and Rios still suffers from the trauma. Not that he lets anyone but his hologram doctor see that. Rios is a cool, complex character, and I can’t wait to see how he and Picard interact. He might turn out to be the energy and the driving force (sorry) that the show needs.
Then there’s Dr. Jurati, who shows up at Picard’s house after a surprise visit from Commander Oh. At the time, she told Oh everything about Picard’s visits, but realized that was probably a mistake. She fled to Picard’s chateau to join up with him. Just in time too, because she arrived just as Romulan assassins were attacking the place. She blasts the final one away, ending a fight scene that really wasn’t working that well. I’m sorry, Stewart was never an action hero, and he’s even less of one now. Fight scenes like this really only remind us of that fact. Remember how The Wrath of Khan built the movie around a big ship battle because Ricardo Montalban couldn’t move around much anymore? Maybe Picard should take a page out of their book.
Jonathan Del Arco as Hugh; Isa Briones as Soji of the the CBS All Access series STAR TREK: PICARD. Photo Cr: Trae Patton/CBS
While all this was going on, we got scenes featuring Soji on the Borg cube. I was waiting the entire episode for them to tell me something, anything, about why she was working there and what the Romulans wanted with her. That never came. Instead we got long jargon-filled scenes in which things were said that might be important at some point in the future, but for now sound meaningless. She’s trying to help rehabilitate the formerly assimilated Romulans, and she interviews one of them who used to be an anthropologist. She gets as far as them using mythology to reclaim their connection to their former selves, but that’s all we get. The show tries to make a big ominous deal out of the old Romulan woman calling her The Destroyer at the same time as Picard’s captive assassin does. We know it’s going to be important in the future, but for now it’s just another proper noun to keep track of. Not the best way to build mystery, guys.
Star Trek: Picard went another week focusing entirely on set-up while giving us very little to grab onto right now. It was slow and full of drawn-out exposition, but at least the ending was good. Not only is Picard finally in space, but he’s surrounded by interesting people. I’m actually excited to see what happens now that they’re all trapped on a ship together. And Soji’s stuff managed to pack some interesting information too. She realizes she knows a lot more than she reasonably should, for one. I wonder if that means she’ll figure out what she is soon. Also, we see her call her mother. This is the second time Soji and Dahj’s mother has appeared, and both times, she’s acted super suspicious. In the pilot, she was a little too eager to send Dahj back to Picard. Here, she insists Dahj is fine and just got a new puppy. Who is she really, and why is she lying? Now that the show is finally in a new place with interesting things going on, I just hope it doesn’t waste any more time next week.
Star Trek: Picard streams Thursdays on CBS All Access
Previously on Star Trek: Picard:
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