salaydouk

Okay so if Picard remembers the bullet holes in the wall or the stories of them in the wall... Then why didn't he also have stories about bodies in the chateau walls!?!?!? I think Guinan now remember both events/meetings.. But before the timeline was restored she would not have met him in the 1890s. So again.. in order to get a field promotion you have to first be in the service! You cannot promote a civilian to any rank period. So that was a load of horse manure. Second Picard being an Admiral does not necessarily give him any operational control and the authority to make decisions on who does and doesn't command a ship. So by that I mean, and using the US Navy as the analogy, there are officers that are Line Officers and there are Staff officers. Line Officers(this comes from Ships of the Line when navel vessels would line up and the shoot cannonballs at the opposing fleet that were also in a line shooting back) are the ones that command ships and have operational authority to deploy sailors into combat. Staff Officers fill logistical or specialty roles - ie Doctors, Lawyers, Nurses, Clergy, etc - and they have no command authority at all whatsoever even in emergency situations. In his role as Head of the Academy Picard would be a Staff officer and would have no operational control at all and no power to give a field promotion just like it would not have been his call to initiate or deactivate the auto destruct order. Now I know that Trek has shown Troi and Crusher having command responsibilities. So perhaps Starfleet is different but even they both _are_ commissioned officers and taken the extra training necessary to have those responsibilities. But Seven has about absolutely none of that! So again a load of horse manure.

That is a ret-con that I can live with. And no he was not living in 10 Forward, but I would agree that this quarters were a bit _too_ large. And the conference room off the bridge was also very very large, but I don't know if that was also his ready room as I thought I saw a desk in the back. Agreed.. I enjoyed it... I got some of the idealism vibes going... And just surprised that they did add to canon with referencing 2 US Civil Wars and used actual news footage. I wonder just how many people they are going to lose for that?

Remember they said in Episode 2.01 that the BQ was just stunning people not killing them.

What the bleep was that!??!?! I mean seriously what the bleep was that episode?!?!??!?! Because I mean... Auntie Renee?!??! Aside from running up to Picard after Soong ran him over with Renee standing over them, how did Rios and Renee ever meet? Guinan knowing Rios and Teresa?!?!? When exactly did that happen? Or did she just keep tabs on them? But if it was the latter then how or why would she have a picture of them? Teresa and Ricardo back at the Chateau? Huh? The last we saw them they were in Talinn's apartment... and when the crew went back to the apartment not only were they not there, but if you looked the bed was perfectly made like they had left. And honestly if I was Teresa after the day that I had just had and after effectively being "dumped" I would have left that apartment asap and definitely _not_ made the bed. Q dissolved down to all those years of harassing Picard to be based on "because he liked Picard"?!?! Seriously?!?! Whiskey Tango Foxtrot! And now that he is dying alone he wants to make sure that his BFF doesn't either? And how did he even get his powers back to get to France?!?! And to send them all back? After having the whole season distilled down to Picard figuring out it is okay to have a girlfriend, we don't even get the sappy sloppy kiss at the end??!?! Wesley Crusher dissing on his own name was he basically saying he wasn't human anymore?!?!? Wesley Crusher not even showing up? And if he was what he said he was, then why wouldn't he want to find Picard? Or was it he might not have existed unless the time line was restored? Because I believe he showed up just after the launch with Renee on board was confirmed to have occurred. And huge swaths of ST cannon has just been completely ret-conned. So now does Guinan remember both timelines and have memories of meeting Picard in 1890s and also in 2024? How does she reconcile that in her mind?!? And so Rios was happy in the past... But why not take the two of them back with him?!?! He knew the history and that WWII was coming in 30 years!?!?! Why would he want to stay in the past with them instead of take them to the future?!? And since they stayed in the past... well great for him but - did his resultant family survive the Eugenics Wars, WWIII, etc.... Honestly again I wanted the sappy payoff of his 8x great grandson walking into the bar to meet Picard since he would have known it was now "okay" to meet him without dorking the timeline. And say you know see that he was a Starfleet Captain and was you know told he was just given command of the Stargazer!!!!!! And why did it take the Borg to tell Starfleet and the Federation that there was a "Galactic Destruction Event" about to occur?!?! I mean with all the sensors/monitoring that is going on they didn't see that huge sucker?!?! And my biggest beef Seven getting a field promotion to Captain!?!?! That is the same bleep as Kirk going from Cadet to Captain. ARGH!!! And it is made even more unbelievable/worse here, which I did not think was possible because - to start in order to get a field promotion to any rank, you HAVE TO BE IN the service, you can only be promoted at most TWO ranks, and they are given usually for outstanding performance on the battlefield. None of which is true for Seven. So what the bleep and then on top of that she did not do _anything_ that Picard himself or even Raffi was capable of doing. Raffi already a Commander would have been more appropriate to field promote! Also where is the Stargazer XO?!?!? He would have become acting captain at the point and there was NO reason to promote anyone. Also I don't believe Picard had command authority to give a field promotion and make that person the captain of the ship. He was at most the mission leader and was _not_ in the operational chain of command of the ship. ARGH! And I will say it again.. I feel used and abuse by this show. I was asked to care about characters that they just p!$$ed away and then threw away!

Yeah I noticed that the show dropped off after episode three as well. I see your point about Rios and the lack of full explanation/exploration of this character this season and the blame does lie with the writers and showrunners. I think there was intent to go there but it just got lost in the shuffle of the behind the scenes chaos. She accused him of a lot of other things as well including impatience and he accused her of being emotionally distant. That exchange to me seemed like an opening salvo for things to come that never did - hence the feeling like it was just thrown out there. Now I might be giving too much credit here but being accused of "not knowing what he wants" is actually pretty intriguing. Because there is this _huge_ life change when you go from being in the military and then being a civilian - it is drastic. So for Rios to go from being IN to being OUT to being IN again it would make anyone question what they actually want. In S1 it was revealed he was in Starfleet and why he had to leave - that forcing back in to civilian life while still wanting to be in the military at the same time is something that would keep him unbalanced. But in S2 we find him back in which means a return the a very structured life that he had become unaccustomed to while he was a civilian, which would in turn cause him to lament to his close associates that the military is too confining. This push/pull of wanting/not wanting a military life is actually _very_ common among military service members. But again I take your point that there was no on-screen depiction of this or anything else that advanced Rios' character for the viewer. And yeah I had the same feeling Rios was the most interesting and for me also most infuriating character from S1 and they turned him into a lapdog/gofer. And yes Seven seems to have taken over the role he was to have had...

Regarding using communicator and having everyone connected... This was done really well in the first couple of episodes. When they were all plotting to get out with the Borg Queen and fixing the transporters and dropping the security fields. It worked so well that Rios and Agnes were even having a break-up post-mortem which I personally found hysterical. And this particular type of communication/character interplay via technology was first mined with X-Files _thirty_ years ago - Chris Carter was even on record stating that that show would have been impossible to do without cell phones - and was done very successfully to not only insure character interplay but also serviced the plot. Heck even modern TV shows like NCIS LA and FBI have team members in constant communication. So the fact that the characters here were not in a revolving set of communicator conversations reeks of laziness of not wanting to do the post-production work to make it happen. And you are right Santiago Cabrera was severely wasted this year. When I think about the fact for just how in-demand he was in the 2019 pilot season and that he picked _this_ show over several other offers because he was told he would have creative control over the characterization and the ensemble nature of the show, I get a litte POed. Also he was always really careful _not_ to "play to type" so he usually avoided playing Hispanic/Latino characters - I mean he choose to play Aramis for the BBC. So in deciding to play this role and leaning so heavily into his Chilean background, I have to think he had to be infuriated when he was forced into the Undocumented Immigrant/ICE detention storyline. Regarding whether or not if Rios knew where he wanted to be... I don't believe he was content with his life - I think he was struggling with PTSD and how he basically dropped out of Starfleet after what he went through with his captain. I think a better term was he was resigned to his life in Season1. Because as Picard said when he first met Rios - that while he was spewing bad things about Starfleet that he maintained La Sirena like a Starfleet ship. During Season2, he did seem more comfortable in his own skin being back in Starfleet, but the "petty bickering" between him and Agnes at the start, which I believe shows initial intent to bring the two back together despite what was said/occurred later, I think foreshadowed an attempt to say that Rios now wanted to have a relationship/family which he wouldn't want to have when he was his PTSD self when he potentially viewed himself a danger to others and preferred the life of a loner.

IMO, even if you throw out all the concerns about Seven being a fully assimilated Borg drone, and the trauma and the questions of loyalty that come with it - there would be issues for Starfleet around Seven's age and her behavior aboard Voyager after being de-assimilated from the Collective. Going with the latter first, on Voyager she repeatedly displayed a superiority complex to her crewmates and at times blatant disrespect for and disregard for Janeway's orders. How she treated her crewmates reflects poorly on her future ability to work in and develop the necessary rapport for a cohesive functional military unit. Her blatant disregard for and not following her Captain's orders, regardless of what Janeway might have said otherwise, are HUGE red flags and flat out unacceptable. So since past behavior informs future behavior, anyone looking at her application to join Starfleet would quite rightly balk. Now you factor in her age there would be serious concerns around whether or not Starfleet would be able to "break" her of these habits. But basically she screams BAD for any command to be able to maintain "good order and discipline." Also if you turn it on its head... Seven used to be an assimilated drone that followed commands/orders. She was then de-assimilated and became an independent individual with free will. So think about the irony of this newly independent person exerting her free will to join an organization that would would required her to voluntarily give up her newly acquired free will and to accept the command/orders of those above her in rank. Somehow, to me, that is a recipe for disaster! I also agree. I actually thought the first two episodes were teeing up something quite good and then it seemed the wheels fell off. To me it seemed like there were 4 different shows(Picard with Guinan/Jurati/Laris, Seven/Raffi, Rios/Doctor, and Jurati/BQ) spliced together to create one and not done well. The scenes when they were together being shot after they had all gone through some amount of quarantine. And I agree that season three is shaping up to be a TNG party/victory lap, so I am left to fume over why I was asked to care about these characters to start?!?!? I feel used.

Yeah I am in the camp that they retcon'ed "Where No On Has Gone Before" as well. But I can' totally see the otherside as well. Regarding my previous post and the La Sirena being in Confederation bodies and not their own, which of course does belong in the 2.02 episode thread. Since I think it is still relevant here due to the events of this episode. I have been ruminating on it and I am not sure that is the case. In that episode the BQ was adamant that the timeline had been corrupted - that she could not find the collective and she was expect them to be there. This would seem to imply that Q altered timeline in 2024 himself but insured that unaltered personalities of the La Sirena crew were placed into the corrupted timeline. So and perhaps I am splitting hairs with what was posted up stream, but I don't think the Confederation Timeline existed at all - that it was never existed/ran parallel to the Prime Timeline - at least up to the point that Q created it. So Seven doesn't have implants because she was never assimilated and Rios doesn't have a tattoo because the conditions for why he had it in Prime Timeline perhaps never existed. But now that Q has created the Confederation Timeline and with Borgati basically hinting that both Timelines need to now exist - via the 2 Renee comment and we have seen the Borg ship with a different type of Queen come through a Space/Time Rift - the only questions in my mind are if the La Sirena crew gets the Timeline back to normal and if they can go back, are they going to have to go back to the 25th Century Confederation Timeline before returning to the Prime Timeline, if they will still exist in both Timelines( which I doubt since Annika now has implants) and if not then that would create huge paradoxes in both Timelines, ie no Rios to be Captain or no Annika to be President, and how they will get back since Q is now powerless. Still ruminating...

Darn it.. I either missed that or forgot it... the latter being the most likely though so going to have re-watch that set of scenes again. Darn it again! Agreed, I don't want Rios left in the past either. But if the central lesson of the season is not to make decisions rooted in fear. Well bleep that is the story of the human race. Why would Q care about humanity, and in particular Picard/Rios/Seven, making decisions rooted in fear? Also Q stated that he wanted to extract a Penance from Picard not provide a Lesson and all that was predicated on him still having enough power to marionette everyone around - since he can't or for now can't, how can he achieve what he originally wanted? ( I am also still trying to figure out how he was able to make people think he was FBI without his powers so he could walk into an FBI building to answer Guinan's summons and how he even knew where she was without his power. But that thought belongs in that episodes comments.) I am left wondering if the Borg Ship coming through the space/time rift has collected something or collected a Q while in human form that has adversely affected the Continuum. That Q was sent to collect whatever it is and before he got there it was blown up by Picard's self destruct order. But the temporal mechanics on how _that_ would work really makes my head spin...

Good question... there is no in canon in-depth information on the brother relationship aside from Robert was like his father and Jean-Luc was not. It could just be Maurice just told Robert to look out for his brother because they both knew that Jean-Luc was close to his mother and that her death would have deeply affected him. While it is possible he could have told Robert the truth, I think it would have been more likely Maurice would have still keep the truth to himself/Jean-Luc and told Robert either she got out on her own or he let her out. He would have taken Robert's hate for enabling his mother's suicide and just added it to the hate that he already felt for himself - I mean the amount of worry, hate, and guilt he would have already for/towards himself and for/towards Yvette and their circumstances, would have been pretty extreme because they were basically in a co-dependent relationship. Or perhaps Robert being older could simply have had a better understanding of his mother's condition and known what could happen and when it did was just able to reconcile it to her medical condition with out a post-mortem with his father. Or perhaps like some, please note I am saying some _not_ all, men are prone to do, the three of them just took the path of "it happened and it can't be changed so what is the use in talking about it?" As for bullying.. I don't think there needs to be anything added for two brothers to bully each other completely and totally. Siblings, by and large, are responsible for creation of a persons "buttons" and they are the only ones that can press all of the "buttons" at the same time. Oh I would have _loved_ to see that movie... I mean Chekov was more deserving to be promoted to captain then Kirk since you know he was already a commission officer...

Also just how did Yvette get the rope secured to what appears to be the apex of the solarium's roof so she could hang herself? I didn't see a ladder...

I don't believe so. You are right he was in command and it didn't then and doesn't now make sense. He would have been relieved of duty pending medical/psych evaluations. Based on what we know with "Family" he was in treatment, and clearly Troi knew there were still issues unresolved when he went back to France that she would have to work through with him when he came back. And totally agree with you, that father-son relationship would have been completely rough - even with therapy! And without it would have been complete toast! Totally agree with you - this retconning doesn't make sense one iota.

I can see your point on Icheb being a different and Starfleet would manage him differently, but Seven being rejected makes sense. I can see Picard being allowed to remain in service, but it would not be possible for Starfleet to accept him in a high security/intelligence post even after passing his evaluations - he would not be allowed to be or continue to be a ships captain for sure. Are you sure about that? Because if that is the case then we are looking at a situation where, as you mentioned up thread, they would need to spit the timeline, go back to the 25th century in the Confederation timeline, and then return to their timeline via powerless Q for a body switch out? So first how are they going to get back to the 25th century Confederation Timeline without a ship - by the powerless Q? Assuming the do get back to the 25th century Confederation timeline, how would Confederation Annika explain waking up with Borg implants to her xenophobic constituents? Would Q simply snap them away? Don't get me wrong, I see your point and am ruminating on it...

Starfleet would not reject Picard due to his mother's medical history. They would reject him because he has unresolved trauma due to his mother's suicide and his role when he was a child of "facilitating" it by opening the door. The amount of guilt that he could inflict on himself if not addressed could/would be an issue. And I am sorry, but that level of trauma if left unresolved would make him unfit for service. Severe enough trauma would make anyone unfit for military service. It is the very reason why the majority of US military members officially diagnosed with PTSD are quickly medically discharged from service. (And let's not get into the ethics/morality of the military taking care/not taking care of its veterans as it is not within the scope of this board.) IMO we should all be thinking about it this way... Starfleet Academy, like the US Military Academies, is a school/university with an applications process and therefore a limited number of places for each academic class. Given the number of Federation worlds, competition for each place would be high - thinking a ratio say of 500 applicant for each place. At that l level of competition, your prior school evaluations, your medical evaluations, and your psych evaluations would need to be pristine in order to be accepted. So it simply makes _no_ sense that Starfleet Academy would give a place to someone who has any inkling of a psych issue. So for Picard to be accepted he would have had to show that he had worked through all of the issues surrounding his mother's suicide. His mother's suicide and the circumstances of how she was found and who found her would have been a matter of public record. I suppose that Picard's father could have lied to the authorities regarding how she got out of the room and who found her thereby allowing Picard to repress the memory of his actions. But when it comes to his applying to Starfleet, he would have been evaluated and the subject of his mother's suicide would have come up. The psychologist would have been _brutal_ because his/her loyalty would have been to Starfleet and not the applicant. Picard's father would have known that and if he had lied, he have attempted to dissuade Picard from applying to Starfleet for years. (This will probably become a/the retconned explanation for why his father was against technology/Starfleet.) The psych evaluation would have caused any unresolved trauma to come to the surface, perhaps not right away but it would have surfaced. And it would have resurfaced sooner then the 80 years this show is asking us to believe that it did.

So regarding Seven's rejection by Starfleet it actually _does_ make sense. What does not make sense is rejecting her and accepting Icheb and by extension allowing Picard to remain in-service after "Best of Both Worlds". All three of them are effectively POWs and therefore been traumatized as a result, to the point where Starfleet could never be sure if they could over come it. This season alone we are seeing Seven not really being able to handle it. Picard had issues during "I, Borg" when he literally approved sending Hugh back as a genocide weapon. That trauma could have other effects and result in bad command decisions. there is _no_ way for Starfleet to ever be 100% sure of the loyalty of POW/assimilated person. Is there still some remnant programming that could cause him/her to turn traitor to Starfleet?!?!? As a result all three of them should be disqualified from serving. Picard should have been discharged from Starfleet and barring that he at the very least would no longer be allowed to be a ship's captain and he definitely would not have been promoted to Admiral. While all that might sound silly from a Civilian perspective, it makes total sense from a Military one. On a complete side note, this episode confirmed for me why Rios was wearing a long sleeve shirts for most of this season. I couldn't be sure when we saw him with short sleeves scrubs right after his "beam in fall"... But here during his bullet wound treatment, did anyone else notice that Rios has lost his mermaid tattoo on his left arm? Most likely the Covid bubble striking again... its just they were successful to avoid the continuity issue all season but to implode on themselves so spectacularly is just so funny.

And since in the Kelvin Timeline Adm Marcus sent Kirk on a coverup/stooge mission, maybe there is all sorts of Bleep going on their Starfleet.

Technically Kirk got promoted from Cadet to Captain in the Kelvin Timeline, not in the Prime Timeline that this show is in. So it's possible that Starfleet in both Timelines are drastically different?!?!? But your point is correct Cadet to Captain would _never_ happen and was my biggest annoyance of Star Trek(2009). And yeah you are not wrong, it did appear that way to me as well. But, I don't think there is much screen time of what full impulse speed looks like, so...

Yes and no, I think... When they were showing what happened with his mother in reverse Picard stated, " I used to imagine seeing her older, offering me a cup of tea." Which seems to imply that they acknowledge the scene in "Where No One Has Gone Before" but tweaking from what we assumed was an actual memory of an event to a memory from his life where he was imagining his mother. So is it or isn't it a retcon? I think they split the finest hair possible, because IMO it is a tossup. It would have been a matter of public record how his mother died - Starfleet would have known before they admitted him to the Academy. It _would_ have be a topic that was discussed during his psych evaluation when he applied to the Academy - therefore _no_ way he could have been suppressing this for 70 years and _no_ way he would have been accepted to the Academy if the psych evaluation found him to have not resolved this issue. They would not have accepted a candidate functioning with trauma as there would be too much potential for issues in the field. You are right though Startfleet is not trauma-free, but Startfleet would not want "damaged goods" going into the Academy. (This has basis in real life, you can be disqualified from the US Military Academies for seemingly mundane things, ie in the Navy you cannot be allergic to bees?!?!?)

True... but again how would Agnes know about Google for the BQ to know about Google to look? Unless of course Agnes was able to attempt to seduce the guy she picked up at the bar while at the same time asking him questions about search engines? Now there is a scene I would love to have seen. 😂

Right there with you... and yeah i am finding really funny that I like Rios this time around. But I would also add that I like the Buddy Cop vibe from Seven and Raffi. Yes... I really don't know what having BQ in her head that would prevent her from dying from being poisoned. But honestly, I was just rolling with that topic because regardless of the BQ being in her head or not there is no way that Agnes should have been able to break free from the handcuffs a few episodes ago or be able to raise Raffi off the ground while strangling her to death. So what's a little bit of lithium? Because wasn't it Borg mechanical implants that changed the physical abilities of a drone and not the nanoprobes? Or has that not ever been confirmed in canon? Also how is this for a nitpick... How the heck did either the BQ or Agnes know where to find lithium or any of the other "components" necessary to fully "birth a Borg Queen"? I mean I know the that BQ has now Agnes knowledge/memories and Agnes knows "old school coding." But how the heck would Agnes know what was in a car battery? I mean I seriously doubt she was an expert on 21st century Earth. Also further nitpick, she was eating car batteries from good ole gas guzzling cars not hybrid/electric cars - so good luck getting lithium out of those suckers.

I wondered the same thing. They I started speculating on those Transwarp conduits/hubs that the Borg seem to have developed during Voyager. If memory serves the Borg developed that technology to the point where they were able to jump to any quadrant of the galaxy that they wanted. So perhaps they simply jumped to the Alpha quadrant randomly and the war with the Confederation began? Although it doesn't explain how the Confederation could have conquered the Borg completely since the Borg would still have their entrenched positions in the Delta Quadrant. There are simply not enough provide details to even speculate there.

You mean the machine that the Enterprise crew destroys yet when they warp away they keep returning to Gothos? It has been a long time since I saw Charlie X, but if I remember correctly the Thasians were unable to repair/restore something... if they were Q I think they would have. But could they be - sure. In the end it is all non-canon. I believe the speculation that Trelane was Q was done in a book and I don't think the Thasians have ever been see/heard from again so there is no way to know.

That doesn't seem to be too hard which is sad...

Actually I think its Kore... because the Isa Briones' role in Season 3 is not contingent on Kore surviving Season 2. Potentially not accurate - remember at the top of Episode1, the rift that brought the Borg ship into the Prime universe was said to be a Space/Time rift. So we don't know from which universe that Borg Ship is from and we don't know what time it is from. Also since we know in the Prime Universe the Borg are functionally hobbled/destroyed, so where did that massive Borg ship come from if not from another universe? Could a collective created by BQ/Agnes in 2024 grown that massive while attempting to get back to future? Possible. And if so _why_ would they even want to go back into the future when there was an entire planet, of easy pickings, in 2024 to assimilate and restart the collective from the past? Regarding how could Agnes be in two places at the same time, if the Borg queen we saw in Episode1 was Agnes, that would be dictated by "when" that Borg ship came through that time rift. The Borg ship simply came through the Space/Time rift too early. Also as shown in Voyage Home when Kirk and company came back via the slingshot technique, they actually returned the same moment in time as they left but days have actually had to pass at least for Kirk and his crew. We know this because at the top of the movie and at the end of the movie shows Admiral Cartwright saying, "Get him back. Get him back," as the Klingon BofP is showing going into and then coming back from the past. I have the same question about Q dying... is it just him or all of them? And when are they dying off? Since they were practically omnipotent and can jump willy nilly, when are they actually dying? (And what impact does that have to the ST:TOS episode Squire of Gothos - if non-canon declaration of Trelane being a Q turns out to be true.) Like Guinan said, the ritual should have summon a Q not just the Q we are normally used to dealing with... so if none could show up except the one the one that was already on the planet, it seems to point to the whole Continuum being in trouble. As for the potential Soong's in the future... Adam Soong could have more family - brothers, nephews, sisters, nieces, etc that would continue his work. And nope right there with you on Evan Evagora's name... My brain goes to the same place... On a final note, what I found most bother some about this episode is finding out the transporter has been corrupted by BQ/Agnes and is off line?!?! So how the heck did Seven/Raffi get on and off La Sirena, how did Rios and the Doc and her Kid get onto La Sirena? Did it not go down until after Rios took the ship into diagnostic mode? And finally why the heck did Rios not get the Doc and her kid off La Sirena because he has to know BQ/Agnes are coming for the ship?!?!?

Agreed.. I mean that is the case for every assimilated Borg drone. Also in the episode the Borg was first introduced, there was a scene that showed babies that were in the process of having the "mechanics" being "added to them. So there was this concept that Borg reproduced biologically, but that was never continued. But with the Borg Queen, I always thought of her as the summation of the collective and as such I never thought of her as an actual biological being. Her body was mostly artificial and from what we have seen just really a bio head/chest. But how much of that head/chest is actually a biological, ie is it just skin, we don't know either. Also given ST First Contact where Data was seen as the ideal lifeform. All that makes me think that for the Borg Collective, and therefore its queen, that artificial life is considered superiour to biological life. So that leads me the idea that the Borq Queen would have "issues" with biological functions. 😝