Our long national nightmare is over. Picard has been a difficult show to get through. The first season had an opener I really liked, but the show quickly descended into dumb territory, Patrick Stewart wasn't playing Picard anymore. This wasn't the wise thoughtful Captain I so loved on TNG...no this was action man Die Hard Picard of the movies...but now too goddamn old to do the action, so they surrounded him with younger unlikable characters to do the action. An dumb action man who can no longer do the action isn't interesting. And the show suffered a lot because of that. Plus all those new characters were truly unlikable in my book. I think Rios could be okay but he wasn't given a lot to work with. I think Alison Pill is a great actress suckered with a bad character. Raffi just sucks.
The characters I could sort of like was mostly down to past goodwill. Riker and Troi show up and I have goodwill to them. Seven was possibly the most interesting character on Voyager, so I have goodwill for her even if the character is portrayed very different now. And even if he didn't feel like Picard....I want to like Patrick Stewart. And then they made him a robot man or whatever. In an old man body that is withering away. It makes little sense. And the show never seemed to know what to do with it and tried to sweep it under the rug often. Or at least partially ignore that aspect of it.
The second season was awful. Just all these flawed annoying poorly written characters in a story with time travel gobbeldy gook and yet another foray in the Borg...it just didn't work for me at all. But I slogged through it...because I wanted to get to this season where I could see the old gang ride one last time. Did I have faith they'd be given justice? Not really...I dunno way I was interested because my faith in Kurtzman and Goldsman and co. just wasn't there. But with a free subscription to Paramount+, it seemed worth it.
And it sort of was okay. I think the third season is the best season of Picard, but that is pretty faint praise considering how low the bar was. Did I enjoy the universe ending season long arc? Not really. I was intrigued with the rogue changelings and fallout of the Dominion War angle...but then the fucking Borg show up AGAIN and I was quite bored with it. They've nearly blown up starfleet and the Federation in every single season of Modern Trek. The trope is so tired now. They can't do a season long story that explores the mysteries of the universe...that would be too boring. And Paramount+ has a low enough subscriber base as it is.
But do I enjoy getting to see all these old favorite characters again? Sure. Is Raffi still inthe mix gumming up the works? Absolutely. Did they try and tease a spin-off starring Seven of Nine and Raffi at the end? You bet they did. They just will not get rid of Raffi. They killed off or sent all the other characters to never return but she just won't die. Oh well. But the TNG crew and Seven are all likable and I enjoyed adventuring with them. Did the writers nail their characters? Not really...but the actors know them and just seeing them on a perfectly recreated Enterprise-D bridge was worthwhile.
My overall feelings on Picard is that it is a waste of time. The first two seasons are not good and got increasingly worse, and for the most part they can be ignored for this season. With the exception of Raffi they really did cut ties with the previous two years. The Jurati Borg? Ignored entirely and forgotten. Rios' ship being overtaken by the Borg centuries in the past? Ignored. I suppose the Data storyline from the first year was utilized as a key to bringing back Data here...but you really don't need to watch the first two seasons. And this third year only scrapes by as mildly entertaining. I enjoyed seeing the old gang back on the bridge like I said...but I can do that just as easily by popping on the TNG blu-rays. And the Stories are more fun there anyhow.
Anyways, I am glad this show is over.
NEXT TIME: Perhaps a venture into Pike's world?
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