Picard 1x05 - "Stardust City Rag" [ SPOILERS WITHIN ]

Evade · 22-02-2020 9:01pm

TheValeyard wrote: »

Worf captain of the Enterprise is interesting. Thought he was with chancellor Martok. Unless they are going down the STO route where Martok was assassinated.

Seems they are also going down the STO route with the Romulus Supernova event not been a natural occurrence. Who knows, we may yet see Iconians!

He must have done one hell of a good thing to get past his terminal rank.

TheValeyard · 22-02-2020 9:15pm

Evade wrote: »

He must have done one hell of a good thing to get past his terminal rank.

Yeah I thought Sisko said he'd never make Captain now because of what he did. But maybe after the Dominion war, they were so short of Captains even Harry Kim gets promoted.

Evade · 22-02-2020 9:20pm

TheValeyard wrote: »

Yeah I thought Sisko said he'd never make Captain now because of what he did. But maybe after the Dominion war, they were so short of Captains even Harry Kim gets promoted.

They'd probably have a surplus of captains after the post war wind down. I think I'd prefer if Worf was stuck at lieutenant commander, you don't often see lasting consequences in Star Trek.

Stark · 22-02-2020 9:42pm

Yeah in the book, Picard has to argue the case for him and the DS9 incident is brought up. He ends up being promoted for "optics": if a Klingon can head up the Federation's flagship, then maybe someday Romulan can also be friends.

Evade · 22-02-2020 9:48pm

That's more than a little token-y isn't it? If I was Worf I'd be kind of annoyed if that was the reason I was getting promoted.

TheValeyard · 22-02-2020 10:01pm

Evade wrote: »

That's more than a little token-y isn't it? If I was Worf I'd be kind of annoyed if that was the reason I was getting promoted.

Corporate Diversity Promotion!

coffee_cake · 22-02-2020 10:27pm

TheValeyard wrote: »

Lol. Romulan Supersecret police.
I've a feeling that the Romulans go crazy when assimilated because they have already been assimilated. The entire race are Borg sleeper drones.

I couldn't remember the name except there was a v and a d and a h

pah · 22-02-2020 11:00pm

Stark wrote: »

I'm reading the prequel novel at the moment. Really helps fill in the gaps as to the characters' motivations. Makes some stuff easier to appreciate. Like you really get why Admiral Clancy went off on Picard the way she did for example. Or why the Romulan refugees are living the way they are. And why Starfleet just gave up after the Mars attack.

Bollocks. Why should I have to read a book to understand characters situations and motivations that are occurring in this show?

IMO because the writers don't know how to do it during the screen time available to them.

SimonTemplar · 22-02-2020 11:16pm

SimonTemplar wrote: »

I can understand this opinion. I think they knew this too because some of the pre-release interviews mentioned that this is not the same Picard from the Enterprise and that he had changed.

I was thinking about what I wrote here. It wasn't too long ago that Stewart gave a stellar performance in Logan so I don't think age has tarnished his acting abilities. In fact, it may have been a very specific decision on his part to play Picard differently than he did in TNG and the movies given that he mentioned the difference in interviews.

FGR · 23-02-2020 12:10am

TheValeyard wrote: »

even Harry Kim gets promoted.

I agree with everything you said but let's not go overboard here! :pac:

tromtipp · 23-02-2020 12:23pm

Captain Picard is still in there - we saw a few glimpses of him, notably in that exchange with Seven - he'll be back soon. Recovery from (or survival of) PTSD seems to be one of the themes of this 10-parter, explored through a range of individuals and societies each with its own trauma. I'm okay with that.

Bobtheman · 23-02-2020 1:07pm

I Must read the Picard book but at the moment it's about 15 euro.
It's a shame that other novels where he is married to Beverly with a kid just get tossed aside??
I don't read many of them. Perhaps one every two years but still.
As for Picard now compared to TNG or the movies- he is considerably older and has been tossed aside by Starfleet. Thus I expect him to be mellower but he is still Jean luc at heart.
It's a shame that at least one other member of the TNG cast can't be a regular. TNG was an ensemble cast.

JayRoc · 24-02-2020 12:26am

Stark wrote: »

Well that opening scene should give the sensitive souls who complained about the decapitation scene last week something to talk about.

I'm definitely not one of those sensitive souls, but I found it hard to give the first few minutes after the "eye" scene my full attention, I found it quite jarring. Gratuitous even.

pah · 24-02-2020 1:25am

JayRoc wrote: »

I'm definitely not one of those sensitive souls, but I found it hard to give the first few minutes after the "eye" scene my full attention, I found it quite jarring. Gratuitous even.

Yes it's unnecessary and untrek-like but are we not blessed with this streaming format where we can get a fuçking R rated Star Trek. Fuçk you Tarantino

Blazer · 24-02-2020 2:36am

Enjoying it ...definitely better than the trash called Discovery but I wish it happened 10 years earlier.
Like someone said Stewart is 80 years old now. I feel like he's just dialing it in. Jeri Ryan on the other hand.
When I saw Seven come into it last week I was thinking another half assed cameo but she blew me away.
Maybe they should have done a 7 of 9 series rather than Picard and having him do a cameo instead.

AllForIt · 24-02-2020 3:24am

Rawr wrote: »

Bizzare standoff and Seven's revenge: Seven getting revenge made perfect sense. Seven killing the evil Freecloud lady made sense. But setting herself up to die in the casino (off screen, so not for certain) didn't make sense. She had plenty of a chance to kill her before their escape. Also, I was never a fan of that shot where she brandishing two phaser rifles as if the were smaller hand weapons. They were going for bad-ass action hero moment, but it just looked silly. Could they at least pretend that those props had some weight to them?

Why would they (phaser rifels) have weight to them. How can you say weapons of that futuristic nature necessarily have to be heavy. Do you know something about phaser technology we don't know : )

Kirby · 24-02-2020 6:06am

Evade wrote: »

Going to try this without googling.

Jeri Ryan was married to a republican Chicago assemblyman. While he was running for election (and was supposedly a sure thing) against Obama, who was a newcomer at the time, Ryan and the assemblyman were going through a divorce. Ssome insight into their personal lives, I want to say it was a fetish but I'm not sure, was revealed through the divorce proceedings and tarnished his reputation. Obama won kickstarting his his political career.

He took her to sex/swingers clubs and kept asking her to participate. She wasn't into it and is the primary reason why they divorced according to her.

You have to wonder why a career politician would risk something like that. Stuff like that never stays secret especially as you climb the ladder.

Stark · 24-02-2020 9:13am

AllForIt wrote: »

Why would they (phaser rifels) have weight to them. How can you say weapons of that futuristic nature necessarily have to be heavy. Do you know something about phaser technology we don't know : )

In the previous series, people were always shown using two hands to hold them. Though probably more an accurate aim thing.

In any case, implausible it may seem from the barrage of weapons fire aimed in her direction, I don't think we've seen the last of Seven. They would have shown in if they were actually killing her off.

muckwarrior · 24-02-2020 10:38am

AllForIt wrote: »

What stood out for me was the performance of Jeri Ryan. How ironic. I always thought she was a bit too stiff in Voyager, and you could put that down to Borg implants, but my golly she out acted everyone else on the series so far.

Her character was a bit stiff, but there were a handful scenes and episodes where she was allowed break from her normal character and proved that she was actually an excellent actress. A bit ironic that someone clearly hired for their looks turned out to be one of the best actors on the show.

seamus · 24-02-2020 10:38am

Sad Professor wrote: »

I'm on the verge of giving up on this show. The thing i can't get past is that Picard is almost totally unrecognisable as the Picard from TNG. Not only do the writers not seem to have any grasp of the character, but Stewart seems to have forgotten how to play him.

I can appreciate this, but I have mentioned before that like 15-18 years have passed in-universe.

If you were to encounter someone from that long ago, I'm sure they'd say you'd changed. They'd still see the essence of the person you were, but you'd be very different.

There was a relatively long discussion about this; could have been here; about how TNG finished with Picard lamenting his stiff-collared approach to the captain's chair and sitting down to play cards with his crew/friends. Stewart had remarked that in many ways Picard's transformation mirrored his own - when he started TNG he was a stuffy by-the-book actor who had no time for dossing. But by the end he had discovered a more open and playful side of himself.
Even between TNG and the films, we saw Picard progress into a more sentimental person.

The series itself is hinting at this with its flashbacks to be fair. Showing us why Picard is the man is he now and not the man at the end of TNG/Nemesis.

On the bad French acting thing, one has to remember that Picard (not Stewart) has form for ham acting on the Holodeck. I always hated the Dixon Hill episodes and Picard's bad acting, and while the French pirate part did make me cringe, it's not out of character.

Goodshape · 24-02-2020 12:07pm

I enjoyed Picard's hammy acting. Was played for a bit of a laugh on the telly but that was fine, it was amusing, and it seemed to suit the scene and setting perfectly well.

Also, as well as the Dixon Hill stuff, he's also got form for this sort of thing from playing Galen in Gambit. That performance always annoyed me as being too OTT.

Greyjoy · 24-02-2020 12:43pm

This was a big improvement on last week's episode. However the overuse of flashbacks is getting to be annoying at this stage.
I think the Icheb dissection scene would have worked better if they kept it for when 7 of 9 confronts the crime boss rather than the opening scene. It would have made that scene land with more 'weight'.

H3llR4iser · 24-02-2020 1:04pm

All in all, I've enjoyed episode 5 - the ill-thought "heist" added that bit of goofy humor ST had in the past and that's been sorely missing in Discovery. Turns out Legol...ehrm...Elnor can handle firearms.

JayRoc wrote: »

I'm definitely not one of those sensitive souls, but I found it hard to give the first few minutes after the "eye" scene my full attention, I found it quite jarring. Gratuitous even.

pah wrote: »

Yes it's unnecessary and untrek-like but are we not blessed with this streaming format where we can get a fuçking R rated Star Trek. Fuçk you Tarantino

I'm not sure I'm getting what you're talking about - the "eye extraction" scene? That's "mild" at worst by current standards - and Star Trek had its fair share of "gore" in the past, just it wasn't rendered as well for technological reasons. Yet, we had crew fused into bulkheads, surgery scenes, transporter incidents, assassinations, a Klingon ship filled to the brim with floating blood, ribcage chewing parasites and THAT famous kill scene.

Stark wrote: »

In the previous series, people were always shown using two hands to hold them. Though probably more an accurate aim thing.

In any case, implausible it may seem from the barrage of weapons fire aimed in her direction, I don't think we've seen the last of Seven. They would have shown in if they were actually killing her off.

Eh...putting the super-nerd hat on here, but she IS still physiologically Borg; She was shown tossing people around in Voyager...even assuming a phaser rifle weighs in the same region of a current ballistic rifle, she doesn't have the expected strength for a woman her size. As for her survival in the situation...she was also shown as still being capable to adapt to weapon fire like a drone...just saying.

sutty · 24-02-2020 1:34pm

H3llR4iser wrote: »

Eh...putting the super-nerd hat on here, but she IS still physiologically Borg; She was shown tossing people around in Voyager...even assuming a phaser rifle weighs in the same region of a current ballistic rifle, she doesn't have the expected strength for a woman her size. As for her survival in the situation...she was also shown as still being capable to adapt to weapon fire like a drone...just saying.

Have to agree but then it leads to some other questions from established character arcs. Two of which kind of annoyed my or at least made me notice straight away.

1) Its pointed out in Voyager that due to her borg physiology that she cant hold her dink at all. She got wasted off one glass of Champagne. Yet in this she downs a glass of Bourbon
2) In the episode that established her maternal instinct over Icheb, the she had a fail-safe to shutdown her cortical node if she experiences to much human emotion/Individuality. But its not even mentioned if she undergoes a procedure to get this fixed with the Dr. Would have been nice to reference this as to how she is now completely human.

I'm finding this show to be very lacking of hope and the feel of Star Trek. Its grand but just seems to be missing that feeling of the best of humanity that its meant to embody.

I also dont like how everyone seems to dump on Picard. I mean he has only shown a bit of the real Picard once and that was because Elnor decapitated someone in front of him. At no point does he just stop people who are dumping on him. He just seems to sit there and take it like a dithering old man. Kinda disappointed in that.

Also longtime since I have been on here. Good to see someone from the old days still around

ilovesmybrick · 24-02-2020 1:44pm

sutty wrote: »

But its not even mentioned if she undergoes a procedure to get this fixed with the Dr. Would have been nice to reference this as to how she is now completely human.

As far as I remember she has it removed somewhere in season 7 to follow her relationship with Chakotay. I can't remember the exact episode, somewhere later in the season. (the finale, Endgame!)

Evade · 24-02-2020 1:46pm

AllForIt wrote: »

1) Its pointed out in Voyager that due to her borg physiology that she cant hold her dink at all. She got wasted off one glass of Champagne. Yet in this she downs a glass of Bourbon

That was a bad reaction to synthohol it's possible she has a better tolerance for real alcohol.

seamus · 24-02-2020 1:56pm

I believe the canon is that synthehol for humans is a bit like cigarettes; there's a brief euphoria and general good feeling, but it doesn't last long and can be easily nullified by a hypospray if necessary.

It would make sense in Seven's case if her hybrid physiology could still handle alcohol like a human, but not synthehol.

There have been so many little nuggets of canon in this series, that I'd be surprised if the bourbon bit wasn't an intentional nod to Seven's problem with synthehol.

Stark · 24-02-2020 2:09pm

ilovesmybrick wrote: »

As far as I remember she has it removed somewhere in season 7 to follow her relationship with Chakotay. I can't remember the exact episode, somewhere later in the season. (the finale, Endgame!)

Or she picked a relationship with the dullest guy on the ship to avoid being over stimulated :pac:

ilovesmybrick · 24-02-2020 2:22pm

Stark wrote: »

Or she picked a relationship with the dullest guy on the ship to avoid being over stimulated :pac:

Maybe that's what happened to their relationship.

Starts weird relationship with Chakotay
Has her cortical implant adjusted so she can feel the full range of emotions in her new relationship
Realises Chakotay is dull as f**k
Leaves Chakotay because he's dull as f**k
Pursues a wild life of adventure on the frontiers

odyssey06 · 24-02-2020 2:25pm

Stark wrote: »

Or she picked a relationship with the dullest guy on the ship to avoid being over stimulated :pac:

And on Voyager there was some competition for that title

Picard 1x05 - "Stardust City Rag" [** SPOILERS WITHIN **]

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Picard 1x05 - "Stardust City Rag" [ SPOILERS WITHIN ]