Star Trek: Picard 2.09
Apr. 29th, 2022 06:17 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
selenakIn which Agnes Jurati demonstrates why she's the characer of the season.
Seriously. I did expect Jurati to fight back, but a la Picard in "Best of Both Worlds Part 2", when he gave Data the hint of how to shut the Borg down, something like this. Instead, the writers continued to build on the "mutual seduction" thing they did with Agnes and the Borg Queen all season, and after an episode where the Queen was dominant reveal that Agnes has used her time exploring some more Borg subconscious, had used her previous time of still being around to built in a failsafe, and now comes back to the surface the reverse way the Queen used to become dominant - by the feelings of sadness and horror the Queen inavertendly generates. And then she mind games right back, bringing up the "last of her species" angst, and makes an actual counter offer instead of an exorcism. Agnes, I am so proud of you. And it ties beautifully into the new Queen as a genuine amalgan/Hybrid creature idea, instead of a return of the previous one.
Elnor the Emergency Fighting Hologram: aside from providing Elnor's actor with the chance to do more than make cameos in Raffi's mind, this was a great Voyager callback (and hey, he even had the Voyager Doctor's mobile emitter!). To the degree that I'm now wondering whether Original Elnor won't actually stay dead, and we'll continue with Hologram Elnor. The big reason why I'm wondering is that Seven just got reborgified to save her life before the timeline was reset.
(This was the episode for Voyager callbacks in general, and the new information that Seven did try to remain in Starfleet after Voyager returned but couldn't.)
Meanwhile, chez Picard: we get the non-fairytale version of the flashbacks haunting Picard all season, and Dr. Adam Soong has gone all supervillain. There is now an explanation for the s1 episode where Picard sees his mother as an old lady offering tea that just about works with the here established fact she committed suicide for which he blames himself due to having let her out, but I do wonder whether Robert (mentioned only in one line in a previous episode where it's said he's at (boarding) school but otherwise completely unmentioned by either of his parents) is supposed to have known about any of this? Anyway, facing and accepting your past (trauma) is the theme of the season, mainly for Picard and Seven, though a case can be made that Raffi had to face the loss of her son and coping by adopting Elnor, then losing Elnor as well.
Newest guess as to why engineering this whole series of events was Q's idea of how to use his dying days: the creation of the Jurati Queen amalgan will actually result in a new kind of Borg, the one Agnes promised to the Queen. Since forcibly introducing Picard & Co. to the Borg in Q Who which resulted later in Locutus and thus the worst trauma of Picard's life (maternal suicide excepted), not to mention Jennifer Sisko and a lot of dead people in the Federation, I could see the creation of "good" Borg as a kind of redemption idea for him - then the end result would not be lots of death and trauma but a new species offering voluntary symbiosis and helping others.
(Sidenote: Q can not be blamed for Seven's orignal assimilation, though, since her parents left the Alpha Quadrant and came into contact with the Borg before the events of Q Who.)
Seriously. I did expect Jurati to fight back, but a la Picard in "Best of Both Worlds Part 2", when he gave Data the hint of how to shut the Borg down, something like this. Instead, the writers continued to build on the "mutual seduction" thing they did with Agnes and the Borg Queen all season, and after an episode where the Queen was dominant reveal that Agnes has used her time exploring some more Borg subconscious, had used her previous time of still being around to built in a failsafe, and now comes back to the surface the reverse way the Queen used to become dominant - by the feelings of sadness and horror the Queen inavertendly generates. And then she mind games right back, bringing up the "last of her species" angst, and makes an actual counter offer instead of an exorcism. Agnes, I am so proud of you. And it ties beautifully into the new Queen as a genuine amalgan/Hybrid creature idea, instead of a return of the previous one.
Elnor the Emergency Fighting Hologram: aside from providing Elnor's actor with the chance to do more than make cameos in Raffi's mind, this was a great Voyager callback (and hey, he even had the Voyager Doctor's mobile emitter!). To the degree that I'm now wondering whether Original Elnor won't actually stay dead, and we'll continue with Hologram Elnor. The big reason why I'm wondering is that Seven just got reborgified to save her life before the timeline was reset.
(This was the episode for Voyager callbacks in general, and the new information that Seven did try to remain in Starfleet after Voyager returned but couldn't.)
Meanwhile, chez Picard: we get the non-fairytale version of the flashbacks haunting Picard all season, and Dr. Adam Soong has gone all supervillain. There is now an explanation for the s1 episode where Picard sees his mother as an old lady offering tea that just about works with the here established fact she committed suicide for which he blames himself due to having let her out, but I do wonder whether Robert (mentioned only in one line in a previous episode where it's said he's at (boarding) school but otherwise completely unmentioned by either of his parents) is supposed to have known about any of this? Anyway, facing and accepting your past (trauma) is the theme of the season, mainly for Picard and Seven, though a case can be made that Raffi had to face the loss of her son and coping by adopting Elnor, then losing Elnor as well.
Newest guess as to why engineering this whole series of events was Q's idea of how to use his dying days: the creation of the Jurati Queen amalgan will actually result in a new kind of Borg, the one Agnes promised to the Queen. Since forcibly introducing Picard & Co. to the Borg in Q Who which resulted later in Locutus and thus the worst trauma of Picard's life (maternal suicide excepted), not to mention Jennifer Sisko and a lot of dead people in the Federation, I could see the creation of "good" Borg as a kind of redemption idea for him - then the end result would not be lots of death and trauma but a new species offering voluntary symbiosis and helping others.
(Sidenote: Q can not be blamed for Seven's orignal assimilation, though, since her parents left the Alpha Quadrant and came into contact with the Borg before the events of Q Who.)
no subject
Date: 2022-04-29 09:15 pm (UTC)Seven going back to being a borg is interesting as you say, implies their bodies won't be reset by time shennagians. I'd noticed she was getting bloody in the same pattern as the implants just before she was borgified.
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Date: 2022-05-01 05:51 am (UTC)Re: the mentioning of Janeway - I must admit, that made me wonder/hope we might get a Kate Mulgrew cameo next season....