Despite not feeling particularly positive about the previous two seasons of "Picard" I've dutifully reviewed every episode and, given that this is the final straight, it would feel churlish to stop now. To be fair, the first episodes have felt promising before, only to let me down, but this again was an OK start.
Under attack, Beverly Crusher (Gates McFadden) sends a coded message to Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) with her co-ordinates and a warning not to trust anyone in Starfleet. Picard enlists the help of his friend Will Riker (Jonathan Frakes) and the pair organise an inspection of the USS Titan, Riker's former command, now under the stewardship of Captain Shaw (Todd Stashwick). Aware of their past adventures, Shaw is unwilling to facilitate any of their subtle requests to get near Crushers location but his second in command, Seven of Nine (Jeri Ryan) is much more willing to accommodate her friends.
It immediately feels much more "Star Trek-y" than the previous two seasons, getting fairly quickly to a real starship, with a bridge, and corridors. The conceit of not trusting Starfleet felt a bit of an artificial impairment, but I guess we'll see what that means as the plot develops. As much as I like Todd Stashwick (which is quite a bit) I'm not sure he fits the straightlaced by-the-book Captain Shaw, again, I'm hoping that we'll end up seeing a more dynamic version of him as the plot opens up.
Alas, we haven't shaken off Raffi with this new story. We initially meet her looking like she's fallen on hard times, but it's not the case and she's operating as an intelligence agent, working with a mysterious handler and investigating the disappearance of portal technology. This would be used in an excellent looking (in terms of visual effect's I feel I should stress) terrorist attack later in the episode.
Again, fool me three times, shame on ... well, both of us, but this start to the third run was pretty good.
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