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tori_reviews2023-07-28 11:24 pm
jedi_of_urth) wrote in tori_reviews2023-07-28 11:24 pm
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Star Trek Picard – 3x06: The Bounty
Star Trek Picard – 3x06: The Bounty
I actually had one of my all too often stalls after watching this episode, largely because I couldn’t get my mind around what I wanted to say about it. I certainly didn’t dislike it, but I couldn’t even decide as I was watching it whether I liked it or not, and I got more muddled the longer I thought about it.
The fact that I want to like this episode definitely comes into play, the pacing is such a relief after the action focus of the early episodes, they even have a conference room discussion, and characters do spend a lot of time talking to each other. But it’s also quite flawed even though it’s doing so much of what I want it to do.
I’m trying to work out some distinction between written badly and badly written, but I can’t figure out which is which so it probably doesn’t work as a turn of phrase. Because the story and even the telling work, but the actual dialog that’s exchanged is often quite blunt and not entirely natural. Everybody is far too willing to spell out their thoughts and feelings, and let things be said aloud that I don’t think they would without a lot more cause.
Not to sound like I’m condemning the writing, but the word that I keep coming back to is amateur. A pretty competent amateur, but traces of being amateur. Look, I’m a person I likes having people’s thoughts and feelings made explicit, because I’m not great at subtext and nuance, and my own writing attempts are more than guilty of being too blunt and direct, but that doesn’t make me a hypocrite to say this often doesn’t seem like these characters would be talking this way, I’m not being paid. It’s a little like the modern flavor of language used (which this episode isn’t too bad with actually), it just doesn’t ring quite right.
I sort of think Geordie (and the other LaForges) get the worst of this. And I can see why that would happen, he’s just coming into the story, they have very little time to take him on the arc they need him to have, and subtlety takes time. I can even respect the idea that he needs an arc to sign up for this mission, it’s fair that someone in the group wouldn’t be all ready to jump in the saddle for this reunion tour. But it means they have to rush through the phases of his arc pretty quickly, since they only gave themselves an hour in which to have this action play out.
Which, again, is understandable; it’s logical that there would be a narrow window of time in which the heist part of the plan can be carried out. But it puts quite the time crunch on the other plot threads that hurts the believability that they would happen so quickly.
And again, I like things like the Seven scene reminiscing about her time on Voyager, but I don’t quite believe that she’s that willing to open up to Jack about it. I like the way Jack reacts to her opening up, and him passing on what he’s picked up from Picard in the past couple days with a little of his own flavor; but the problem remains that I don’t quite buy how they ended up in a situation where they’re having the conversation that lets him have that reaction.
I’m sort of torn on Geordie’s role here. I partly like it, as I can appreciate the way he explains it to Picard; it seems fairly reasonable at that point, and part of this season is about Picard getting a crash course in parenthood. But the resolution doesn’t really match the setup…or at least the writing should have been more polished. Because Sydney uses a lot more words than were strictly necessary to get the point across about standing with her crew, and that Geordie would be doing the same thing in her shoes; he’s practically doing the same thing now and he and the old crew haven’t served together in decades. The flip side of that is that I wish the engineering daughter had been the one working most closely with Geordie, show us more of the conflict between the daughter who’s so much like her dad and the one who’s going her own way (not in the sense that they don’t get along, because I’d want the conclusion to be something along the lines of both being needed to get the job done properly); because if we’re meant to think there has been long standing friction between Sydney and Geordie, it really shouldn’t be resolved in a single moment like it seems to be here.
(Also, as I write about Sydney choosing to stand with her crew, I recall that most of her crew is gone and they have no idea what happened once they were on a Changeling heavy ship.)
Now, I’m pretty sure that’s actually Deanna at the end, but if no one questions that I’ll be unhappy. They’re fighting Changelings, who didn’t know which of the heist team they might end up capturing, and sure Troi’s a pretty good bargaining chip for any of the old crew but she’s definitely the most effective against Riker. It should seem a little too convenient to be sure of right away (although Deanna might be the easiest to prove her actual identity since Changelings aren’t empaths). Also, did Vadik just grab Deanna or is their daughter there too (still hoping for Alexander and a full next next generation).
I’ve been pretty hard on the writing overall, but I will say that there was one bit of subtle setup and payoff. The writing worked in a natural reminder that the Picard who’s around was an android replica of the original now dead Picard; which helps make sense of the closing reveal.
I’m not sure how I feel about what they’re doing with Data. There are a lot of contrivances to swallow to get us to this point; I’m mostly willing to go with the contrivances in this case, I think, and what reluctance I do have is not the fault of this episode. Weirdly, for all this season has been about putting the band back together, the absence of Data has never had a chance to be felt (Geordie hadn’t been there either and Worf only just reunited with the crew). It’s also not helped by having several of the other character dynamics under explored (Geordie and Worf clearly, but also Crusher and everyone by and large), so he ends up not being the one missing piece from a puzzle that could never be whole without him. I will say that Geordie’s reaction is lovely; and, from what I understand, sounds like another dig at prior seasons of this show that seemed to miss the fact that Data’s best friend was always Geordie, not Picard.
My other concern about Data’s return is the fact that they don’t go full contrivance and just have him be Data. Because it’s clearly all going to sort itself out by the end of the season, maybe even next episode, in a matter of days at most in the show. And so I worry that we’re going to get another forced quick resolution instead of having an actual story arc around getting Data’s restoration.
I actually had one of my all too often stalls after watching this episode, largely because I couldn’t get my mind around what I wanted to say about it. I certainly didn’t dislike it, but I couldn’t even decide as I was watching it whether I liked it or not, and I got more muddled the longer I thought about it.
The fact that I want to like this episode definitely comes into play, the pacing is such a relief after the action focus of the early episodes, they even have a conference room discussion, and characters do spend a lot of time talking to each other. But it’s also quite flawed even though it’s doing so much of what I want it to do.
I’m trying to work out some distinction between written badly and badly written, but I can’t figure out which is which so it probably doesn’t work as a turn of phrase. Because the story and even the telling work, but the actual dialog that’s exchanged is often quite blunt and not entirely natural. Everybody is far too willing to spell out their thoughts and feelings, and let things be said aloud that I don’t think they would without a lot more cause.
Not to sound like I’m condemning the writing, but the word that I keep coming back to is amateur. A pretty competent amateur, but traces of being amateur. Look, I’m a person I likes having people’s thoughts and feelings made explicit, because I’m not great at subtext and nuance, and my own writing attempts are more than guilty of being too blunt and direct, but that doesn’t make me a hypocrite to say this often doesn’t seem like these characters would be talking this way, I’m not being paid. It’s a little like the modern flavor of language used (which this episode isn’t too bad with actually), it just doesn’t ring quite right.
I sort of think Geordie (and the other LaForges) get the worst of this. And I can see why that would happen, he’s just coming into the story, they have very little time to take him on the arc they need him to have, and subtlety takes time. I can even respect the idea that he needs an arc to sign up for this mission, it’s fair that someone in the group wouldn’t be all ready to jump in the saddle for this reunion tour. But it means they have to rush through the phases of his arc pretty quickly, since they only gave themselves an hour in which to have this action play out.
Which, again, is understandable; it’s logical that there would be a narrow window of time in which the heist part of the plan can be carried out. But it puts quite the time crunch on the other plot threads that hurts the believability that they would happen so quickly.
And again, I like things like the Seven scene reminiscing about her time on Voyager, but I don’t quite believe that she’s that willing to open up to Jack about it. I like the way Jack reacts to her opening up, and him passing on what he’s picked up from Picard in the past couple days with a little of his own flavor; but the problem remains that I don’t quite buy how they ended up in a situation where they’re having the conversation that lets him have that reaction.
I’m sort of torn on Geordie’s role here. I partly like it, as I can appreciate the way he explains it to Picard; it seems fairly reasonable at that point, and part of this season is about Picard getting a crash course in parenthood. But the resolution doesn’t really match the setup…or at least the writing should have been more polished. Because Sydney uses a lot more words than were strictly necessary to get the point across about standing with her crew, and that Geordie would be doing the same thing in her shoes; he’s practically doing the same thing now and he and the old crew haven’t served together in decades. The flip side of that is that I wish the engineering daughter had been the one working most closely with Geordie, show us more of the conflict between the daughter who’s so much like her dad and the one who’s going her own way (not in the sense that they don’t get along, because I’d want the conclusion to be something along the lines of both being needed to get the job done properly); because if we’re meant to think there has been long standing friction between Sydney and Geordie, it really shouldn’t be resolved in a single moment like it seems to be here.
(Also, as I write about Sydney choosing to stand with her crew, I recall that most of her crew is gone and they have no idea what happened once they were on a Changeling heavy ship.)
Now, I’m pretty sure that’s actually Deanna at the end, but if no one questions that I’ll be unhappy. They’re fighting Changelings, who didn’t know which of the heist team they might end up capturing, and sure Troi’s a pretty good bargaining chip for any of the old crew but she’s definitely the most effective against Riker. It should seem a little too convenient to be sure of right away (although Deanna might be the easiest to prove her actual identity since Changelings aren’t empaths). Also, did Vadik just grab Deanna or is their daughter there too (still hoping for Alexander and a full next next generation).
I’ve been pretty hard on the writing overall, but I will say that there was one bit of subtle setup and payoff. The writing worked in a natural reminder that the Picard who’s around was an android replica of the original now dead Picard; which helps make sense of the closing reveal.
I’m not sure how I feel about what they’re doing with Data. There are a lot of contrivances to swallow to get us to this point; I’m mostly willing to go with the contrivances in this case, I think, and what reluctance I do have is not the fault of this episode. Weirdly, for all this season has been about putting the band back together, the absence of Data has never had a chance to be felt (Geordie hadn’t been there either and Worf only just reunited with the crew). It’s also not helped by having several of the other character dynamics under explored (Geordie and Worf clearly, but also Crusher and everyone by and large), so he ends up not being the one missing piece from a puzzle that could never be whole without him. I will say that Geordie’s reaction is lovely; and, from what I understand, sounds like another dig at prior seasons of this show that seemed to miss the fact that Data’s best friend was always Geordie, not Picard.
My other concern about Data’s return is the fact that they don’t go full contrivance and just have him be Data. Because it’s clearly all going to sort itself out by the end of the season, maybe even next episode, in a matter of days at most in the show. And so I worry that we’re going to get another forced quick resolution instead of having an actual story arc around getting Data’s restoration.