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Since, Star Trek is trending on Tumblr, let me take this opportunity to say that Rios deserved better. Hell, the entire original cast from Season 1, aka, La Sirena crew deserved better
#star trek#star trek picard#picard#cristobal rios#santiago cabrera#agnes jurati#alison pill#original post#not incorrect quotes#raffi#raffi musiker#michelle hurd#soji#isa briones#terry matalas#jean luc picard#patrick stewart#season 1 episode 9#et in arcadia ego part 1#et in arcadia ego#elnor#evan evagora
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So since its return in 2017, Star Trek has done episodes called "Lethe," "Si Vis Pacem Para Bellum," "An Obol for Charon," "Nepenthe," "Et in Arcadia Ego," "Veritas," "Memento Mori," "Vox," "Ad Astra per Aspera," and "Among the Lotus Eaters," and so I am forced to ask: who in the writer's room has a classics degree?
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the scene in brideshead revisited (1981) episode one "et in arcadia ego" where charles is purposely fagging it up to annoy his cousin you will always be famous
#would love to post screenshots as an example but i would have to make my own and i cba#which just led me down the rabbit hole of trying to find scs online and i had to stop bc some of them were making me feel feverish#micah.txt
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THE DATA CONNECTION
The scene in ST: Picard Season 1: Et in Arcadia Ego Pt 2, where Picard's soul meets Data, keeps turning over and over in my head.
I think of how Data revealed a hand of Q cards in the very beginning of the series, so clearly Q had something to do with that. What better person to help Q reach Jean-Luc Picard than his "professor of Humanities?"
Did Q use Data to help him connect with Picard in the end of Season 1? Was Data being used as a channel for Q?
There are meta-analyses posted by other Tumblrs, describing how Q is represented by a butterfly.
*******
"I am the gentle flutter of a butterfly."
"Humans with your griefs and pains... are like butterflies with your wings pinned."
*******
It was a butterfly, or rather, a moon moth that essentially led Picard's soul to Data, and then to Picard's synth body, created by Dr. Soong.
Data even remarked as he released a butterfly from his hand (As in: "Open your hand, Data. Follow me, the butterfly, Picard!"--Q), that "A butterfly that lives forever isn't a butterfly." That sounds a bit odd that "Data" said that. Who lives forever, and is leading Picard to the synth body, thus saving Picard from death?
It's possible that it was Data that Picard was speaking to. But, what if Q was also talking, too? Through Data?
Data said something about Picard dreaming of him. Picard then happily said that he dreamed of Data all the time.
But, how interesting it is that Q was part of Picard's dream with Data in it. How many times has Q been hinted at in Picard's dreams?
What I'm saying is that Picard isn't ready to have Q in his familiar form with, dark, luscious hair and all in Picard's dream.
Picard would still see Q as an enemy, and his stubborness, since he has so much repressed love for Q, would call it a nightmare, not a dream.
So, Q would have to be hinted at. In plain sight, and yet, hidden from being so obvious.
So, instead what if Q essentially "piggybacked" on Data to reach Picard in his dreams?
The other thing that I, as an audience member hoped, was when Data got Picard to say that he loved him, Q was also trying to hear Picard say those words to him, albeit indirectly to him.
If Q is manifesting himself as the butterfly, and has used Data (That sounds nasty to put it that way, I know.) as a means of reaching Picard, then wouldn't Q also want to feel in some way, Picard saying that he loves him?
Receiving Picard's love is Q's greatest desire. I wouldn't put it past him to find a roundabout way of getting Picard to say that he loves him.
The last thing I noticed is how when you start to see objects in the darkened room where Data is sitting across from Picard, there are Hindu figurines on the table, such as a Buddha figure, (Buddhism was also in India) an Indian-looking tower-like object, and a third object that looked potentially Indian. The camera focuses on these objects very quickly, but it also focuses on them twice, once in the opening of the scene and a second time around the moment when Picard gets up out of the chair to step into the light. What's so special about these objects that we see them twice? In Picard's sitting room. With a faceless mantle clock and the cosmos sparkling overhead? Who's the interior decorator here?
A meta-analysis done on Q's clothing at the end of Season 3 revealed that the eight-pointed star brooch on Q's costume was a navaratna with rubies, which just so happen to be Picard's birthstone. It's extremely interesting that there was the, for lack of a better word, the Indian connection with Q's red and black costume brooch in S3 and the objects of Indian design in the final episode of S1.
In Season 1, if Q is involved in Picard's "dream" with Q (Queen) cards (Season 2 trailer reveal!) and later with this mysterious butterfly that pretty much saves his Favorite's life ("I am the gentle flutter of a butterfly " Season 2), why not a third connection? (Q's interesting choice in jewelry in Season 3).
There are simply too many odd connectors for it all to be coincidence.
My curiosity lies in how Data ultimately fits in Q's role in this.
Q IS present in Season 1.
Did Data serve as a connection for Q to help create a connection between himself and Picard?
****Just a quck mention: When I listened very carefully during the second that Data lays down the Q cards in Episode 1, I swear I thought I heard a two-second "fluttering" sound.
I looked up on YouTube the sound of butterflies flitting around.
I listened to one video of a group of butterflies flitting their wings, and I heard the same sound.
You'd have to turn your volume way up when Data shows the five cards. But, I swear I thought I heard a 1-2 second sound of wings flapping.
#qcard#star trek q#q#john de lancie#patrick stewart#star trek#q and picard#data#star trek picard season two#star trek picard season one#brent spiner#jean luc picard
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I know the copy-paste fleet from PIC's Et in Arcadia Ego, Pt. II tends to get a lot of people riled up, but honestly, I feel like it makes a lot of sense from an in-universe perspective.
Like, one of the big issues Starfleet had in the TNG and DS9 eras was that basically any time a new threat rolled up at the border, their threat response was just whichever ships they could call up at short notice. This was one of the bigger reasons why the fleets in episodes like The Best of Both Worlds, Redemption, Pt. II, and the Descent two parter were a mish-mash of different classes: from Starfleet's perspective, it was quite literally just whoever they could drum up in the moment, not which ships were actually best for this job.
During the DS9 era, there was a shift from fleets being just whoever they could drum up to being actual formalised big fleets that consistently did maneuvers together. This is why it went from DS9 getting seven ships as reinforcements during the battle in The Way of the Warrior to there just being hundreds of ships that operated together a few seasons later. This is apparently a trend that continued after the Dominion War, too: in Nemesis, the fleet the Enterprise-E was supposed to link up with towards the end was referred to as Battle Group Omega.
I think having a couple hundred Inquiry-class ships operating as a single fleet would make sense in this context. A lot of the ships that were in service during the TNG/DS9 era would have been decommissioned or destroyed by this point, and Starfleet would have had to replace them with something. In seasons two and three of Picard, we've seen some of the other ships that have been introduced over the intervening decades; having a few rapid response units would also make sense.
This wouldn't necessarily square with Starfleet's exploratory and scientific missions, but I don't think it'd necessarily need to. Even in TNG, there were more military-focused officers like Captain Jellico and Admiral Nechayev who were very concerned with the Federation's security, and they didn't get in the way of the Enterprise-D's exploratory, scientific, or diplomatic missions.
The same would be true of the late 24th/early 25th century of PIC's first season: they could easily have both the heavily militaristic officers and the more pacifist officers working different missions for the most part. It's just that the part of the fleet we saw was the military part.
Plus, from a thematic point of view, this would tie into why Picard left Starfleet to begin with. In Remembrance, Picard straight up says he left because he felt that Starfleet wasn't Starfleet anymore. Having a noticeable chunk of the fleet set up to be the immediate military response to a new threat would make sense in that context. Picard's traditionally been the kind of guy who prefers peace and diplomacy (though he is a capable military guy when the chips are down), so Starfleet immediately being able, and potentially willing, to respond to everything with deadly force really would rub him the wrong way.
The other reason I don't mind there being a fleet of hundreds of Inquiry-class ships ready to go is because of the makeup of the Romulan, Klingon, and Cardassian fleets during DS9. While these powers did have some varieties in their fleets, for the most part they're just as guilty of flying copy-paste fleets as Riker was in Et in Arcadia Ego, Pt. II. While Starfleet was flying fleets with a large variety of ship classes, the Romulans were almost exclusively flying D'deridex-class warbirds, the Klingons mostly Vor'cha- and Negh'var-class battle cruisers with the occasional bird-of-prey and K'tinga-class, and the Cardassians exclusively Galor- and Keldon-class ships.
This doesn't necessarily mean that these are the only ships these powers had available, but they were very much the backbone of their battle fleets and were clearly considered to be the most capable of combat. Their other ships were probably made for much more specialised purposes.
This is probably a design philosophy Starfleet probably took as well. Instead of having most of their larger ships be jack-of-all-trade ships, they spent more time having specialised ships for specialised purposes. The end result of this is that they could have 200 Inquiry-class ships ready to go for this purpose rather than just have dozens of different classes that might not be the best for it, but would do in a pinch.
I feel like this is also something people would have warmed to a lot more over time, had the Picard writers not immediately try to back peddle in season two's opening episode, The Star Gazer. Had they just said, "Well, this is a new era, both of production and in-universe, and this is how Starfleet does battle fleets now," it might still be a contentious thing but people would eventually get used to it.
The other thing they probably should have done--and I still think they should do this at some point--is have a show set during this same period that focuses heavily on a five-year mission during this period. That'd allow room for an explanation that the copy-paste Inquiry fleets are mostly just for emergencies, and that other ship classes exist for different purposes. (I know eventually someone will say, "Yeah, but Lower Decks and Prodigy exist", but keep in mind they're set twenty-ish years prior to Picard.)
I think this would allow for starship classes to clearly be for much more set purposes rather than just be the jack-of-all-trade ships they've traditionally been. While there's been exceptions to this like the Oberth- and Nova-classes mostly being science vessels, the Defiant-class being a warship in all but name, and the Olympic-class being a medical ship, but these are mostly the exceptions.
Classes like the Constitution- and Excelsior-classes are nominally explorer classes, but have been shown to be used for military missions as well for example, and that tends to be the general rule for larger ships. For the most part, if they're a medium-to-large ship for the era, then they're used as a jack-of-all-trades ship rather than for a specialised purpose.
So really, the writers on Picard had the opportunity to really do something interesting with how starship classes get used and having a set canonical purpose for each new class, but then they chose to not do it because it didn't really gel with a lot of people. I feel like this is ultimately an unfortunate thing.
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authors self rec! When you get this, reply with your favorite five fics that you've written, then pass on to at least five other writers. Let’s spread the self-love❤
Thank you! I tried to narrow it down to one pick per fandom:
The Dream Journal of Lucy Westenra: An account of Lucy's ordeal from her perspective, and a bit of a response to all the critics arguing she asked for it. (Read the tagged warnings here!)
Flora's Adventures in Ghostland: A pastiche of Alice in Wonderland where Flora from The Turn of the Screw ventures into the underworld to get brother back. Featuring a gothic heroine rendition of the Gashleycrumb Tinies!
Et in Arcadia Ego: The missing folk horror episode of The Prisoner. The new Number Two has plans that are a bit more Midsommar than A Clockwork Orange, with clues to my personal interpretation of the show's finale.
Sir Wishbone and the Bad Day: What if Wishbone did a retelling of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight? I think this is one of my best in terms of actually getting the canon feel right.
The Mel Brooks Cameo in Twin Peaks: Exactly what it says. Inspired by Mel Brooks's account of working with David Lynch on The Elephant Man, and wishing they'd continued their partnership.
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I think, about romulan women, I read it on startrek.com.
Oh so you're SERIOUS serious
The one article I could find on StarTrek.com about Romulan women & their presentation is this one
but if it's the one you mean I think you're misremembering it a bit because it actually talks more about the association we usually make between shoulder pads and the authority that women in position of power specifically hold:
[T]he shoulder pads endow Troi’s character with unprecedented confidence and air of authority even under adverse circumstances. While Marina Sirtis still appears quite feminine as Major Rakal, there is no denying that when her character woke up in the bulky Romulan uniform, Troi owns her newfound authority and utilizes her position as a Tal Shiar agent to intimidate her foes and complete her mission. The shoulder pads function to empower Troi with a more masculine silhouette without eclipsing her femininity. Major Rakal sitting in the Commander’s chair of the Romulan warbird with her imposing shoulders starkly contrasts Councilor Troi’s usual seat to the side of Captain Picard wearing a form-fitting catsuit.
the article also goes on to say that there's quite a bit of continuity in costuming choices between TNG and Picard (uh, spoilers for Picard S1 I guess):
The infamous shoulder pads make a comeback in Star Trek: Picard to emphasize the formidable power of Picard’s new Romulan foes, namely Narissa and Oh. These two women characters are introduced early in the series as undercover Romulan operatives in Starfleet working for the shadowy Zhat Vash. After Narissa and Oh reveal their true identities, they don the iconic shoulder pads in later episodes. In “Broken Pieces,” viewers obtain insight into Narissa’s traumatic past explaining why she joined the secret sect of the Tal Shiar with her aunt Ramdha. In the scene where they experience the ‘Abomination,’ or vision on Aia they are wearing dark robes with triangular leather shoulder pieces attached to the outside of their tunics. This new external interpretation of the shoulder pad returns during the season finale, “Et in Arcadia Ego Part 2” when Commodore Oh exchanges her Federation Head of Security Uniform for a sleek black Romulan military ensemble.
There's also no mention at all of what you were saying about women losing their womanhood... The article just says this
The 24th century Romulans have less colorful gender-neutral uniforms which denote several aspects of Romulan society. The Romulan uniform’s gray bulky tunics and straight slacks indicate that Romulans are practical and militant. Unlike the Starfleet uniforms in TNG, they are loose fitting and do not emphasize the waist, hips or chest. A departure from TOS, Romulan women characters are not sexualized and at a glance look no different from the men. Even Romulan civilian clothing that is seen in the TNG two-part episode, “Unification,” have similar shoulder-padded tunics and uniformly cut hair on men and women. From a production standpoint on TNG, there is simply much more representation of Romulan women characters compared to other alien species.
I won't dispute that pretty much all the enemies of the Federation were written based on stereotypes about countries on the other side of the Iron Curtain but it strikes me as odd, at the very least, to make the claims you've made in the previous ask?
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I'm watching Star Trek: Picard 1x10 "Et in Arcadia Ego (2)"
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I just watched Star Trek: Picard 1x10 "Et in Arcadia Ego (2)"
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Every Afictionados Best Line Award (Robyn)
Star Trek: Picard Episode 110: Et in Arcadia Ego Part 2
by the Afictionados Podcast Network
#raffi musiker#cristobal rios#star trek#star trek picard#afictionados#best line award#episode#110#et in arcadia ego
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Soji + various parody headlines
Aka my humble contributions to the 30 days of Picard Positivity as organised by the amazing @procrastinatorproject
(x), (x)
#picardpositivity#star trek#star trek picard#picard#aramis in space#soji#soji asha#isa briones#original post#not incorrect quotes#stp#season 1 episode 10#et in arcadia ego part 2#season 1 episode 7#nepenthe#season 1 episode 9#et in arcadia ego part 1#et in arcadia ego#picard positivity#day 1
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So the thing about Star Trek: Picard is...
Say what you will about the first season, but it’s meaningful. In fact, Rios says explicitly what it’s about in the fourth episode: “the existential pain of living with the consciousness of death and how it defines us as human beings.” Pretty much all of the character arcs are about different reactions to this, and the supposed “grimdarkness” of the setting reinforces this point; the Federation has become reactionary and xenophobic because it was a utopia that experienced mass death right on its doorstep for the first time in living memory. The conflict with the Synths is ultimately rooted in the fact that we die; they don’t. The fact that the finale was called “Et in Arcadia ego” really just telegraphs this; “Even in Arcadia [utopia], I [Death] am.”
And the second season, for all its many flaws, carries this theme forward, proposing that love, togetherness, and companionship are the only meaningful candles in the dark. Q is dying; he awaits meaning, and he doesn’t find it. And so he opts instead to do one last favour for Jean-Luc so at least he can spare his favourite mortal from his own fate of dying alone. Jurati is able to connect with the Borg Queen because she recognises that her own motivation is something similar: the Queen can feel herself dying across infinite realities and she doesn’t want to be alone. Seven and Raffi find each other; Rios gives up his entire life for a shot at love. It’s an infernal mess, a budget-saving exercise in want of a plot, but I’m going to be honest: I kind of adore it. I think it’s beautiful for all its flaws.
Throughout the first two seasons, we have serious contemplations of transhumanism and identity in the face of death. Picard escapes death using technology, even as his friend, a living machine, embraces his end as a necessary part of being human. Soji loses her identity even as she gains knowledge of herself as an immortal android. Jurati too embraces transhumanism and, to some extent, loses her identity by so doing, but–in an interesting twist for Star Trek–this is not stigmatized; this is framed as what’s best for her. All of this is philosophically rich, high-octane fuel for thought, as speculative fiction should be.
The third season, meanwhile–for all that I have loved (some of) the nostalgia hits injected directly into my veins–bugs me because of how absolutely lightweight it feels. Death is gone. Not just as a theme, but gone from the narrative. Sure we kill off Ro, and T’Veen, and Vadic, and Shelby, and Shaw, but it feels like nothing. Death holds no dominion; Data is back; so’s the Enterprise-D; so’s Q (or maybe he’s come in from an earlier point in his timeline; it’s not clear). Kirk apparently is alive again, resurrected offscreen sometime after Generations and kept in a covert warehouse awaiting new adventures. Apparently Terry Matalas has already formulated plans for bringing Todd Stashwick back if when he gets his “Legacy” spinoff. I’m half-surprised that they didn’t reveal that Romulus magically popped back into existence in a background Okudagram somewhere. The Federation is as “grimdark” as it has ever been depicted, but unlike the first season (or Deep Space Nine, or even the first season of Discovery), this is never seriously interrogated or problematised. We go through the motions, cargo-cult-like, of moral debate in episode 7, but it’s not connected to anything. We hear that Vadic was the product of Section 31 war crimes; Picard looks shaken up by this, but then he and Beverly immediately decide to commit some war crimes of their own by executing her. This is never mentioned again. The whole exercise feels perfunctory, as I have said above: like ten-year-olds playing with action figures. It doesn’t feel like Picard, and frankly, for all of the surface detail it gets right, it feels even less like TNG.
So no; I’m not pleased that the first two seasons were ignored.
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#raffi musiker#i'm so behind on raffi gifs from the last episode#soji#jean luc picard#cristóbal rios#la sirena#star trek picard#star trek#star trek gifs#startrekladies#startrekedit#picardedit#picard spoilers#queutinium#1x09 et in arcadia ego
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Spoilers.
Okay I can’t hold it in anymore, I need to yell about Star Trek.
SO.
In light of the revelations we got from Picard ep8 and ep9, I have come to the conclusion that the plot is a giant fucking mess. Lemme explain. (Buckle up, it’s long and VERY spoilery). First, a recap: 300 000 years ago, synthetic lifeforms from another galaxy dragged eight suns together (or maybe created them) and put a sign on the planet in the middle, saying “hey synth pals, when the organics decide to destroy you, give us a call, we’ll destroy them.” The Romulans stumbled upon it, understood only the “synth, organics, destroy” part and decided to hunt and kill robots before they evolved. So far, the robotic higher beings have only succeeded in making the organics hate the synths, so good job. Using the Romulan rescue, Oh makes synths illegal through the attack on Mars, causing the death of most of her people (and incidentally, of the entire Vulcan race in another timeline. Thanks, Oh!). I’ll give her points for dedication, at least this isn’t a “save my people and screw the rest of the Federation” scenario. She’s actually willing to sacrifice her planet to save the whole galaxy. (Doesn’t make it moral, but still, pretty selfless, in a dark a twisted way.) Again, this is the robotic higher beings’ fault.
Moving on, The surviving synths try to make first contact with Starfleet, resulting in the death of Jana, Beautiful Flower and Vandermeer, which has overall very little consequence on the bigger plot. AGAIN, this is indirectly the robotic higher beings’ fault. (Maybe losing her sister is what makes Sutra such a bitch? Don’t think so though, we’ll get to that.) Maddox, learning nothing from the Ibn Majid, decides to learn the truth about the ban and sends two synthetic girls that look exactly like Jana to investigate (my god is he stupid), while not actually telling them what it is they’re supposed to find (oh, Bruce. Oh my god). It leads to the Romulans realizing that there’s an entire planet of synths. Outstanding work, dumbass.
Picard does his thing and decides to save the synths and advocate for their lives, Sutra realizes what the Admonition actually meant, and decides that killing all the organics sounds like a great idea. She doesn’t hesitate to let Narek kill one of her sisters to unite her people, showing that she’s exactly the same kind of psycho bitch as Oh. The problem is: SELF-FULFILLING PROPHECIES. The robotic higher beings are fucking IDIOTS!! They’re supposed to have seen many civilisations rise and fall, so they should know what to do and what not to do, and their rational still is “organics will kill us anyway, so let’s kill them,” leading to the organics being like “oh shit, the synths want to kill us, let’s stop making them,” leading to Sutra being like “welp they’ve already started hating us, our robot overlords were right, let’s kill organics.” OH. MY. GOD!!!
I get that the lesson is that fear is the great enemy, and in this case it’s really well demonstrated (gotta give credit where it’s due), but still! It’s so frustrating!!
My biggest problem with that convoluted plot is that we (the viewers) are supposed to see the synths as the organics’ equals. Their plight is supposed to be equal to the Federation’s. Except NO. I’m sorry, NO.
(More on in-universe morality and out-of-universe viewer experience under the cut, because I took pity on your dashboards.)
I get wanting to survive from the Romulan attack, okay. (There is la Sirena for that, just as a reminder.) But Sutra saying that the Federation banning them was essentially genocide? NO. They are made. They aren’t born naturally. A government telling its people to stop making procreating isn’t the same thing as a government killing every kid younger that ten! Parents refusing to conceive isn’t the same as murdering their children (I won’t open the can of worms that is the abortion debate, the point stands).
We as an audience are still supposed to see the Zhat Vash as the bad guys, because Oh, Narissa and Narek are villains, and because they have caused untold suffering. (By the way, linking Cris’ personal tragedy to the synth crisis is a massive plot contrivance to make us hate the Zhat Vash more, which I found frustrating watching ep8. Losing people in a horrible way happens even without grand global conspiracies, and Cris had already been established as going out of his way to help people even when there was nothing in it for him. We didn’t need the connection to empathise with his pain, and he didn’t need the added incentive. Seriously, how small is that galaxy? Are everybody’s demons linked to Picard’s heroic quest? How convenient.)
But are the Zhat Vash really the bad guys? (Even Cris questions that despite arguably being the Sirena crewmember who as per ep8 had lost the most because of them, along with Elnor.) I’m sorry, if Sutra does try to call the robotic overlords, I say burn Cappelius to the ground. Lemme continue to explain. There are what, 50 synths? 50 robots. And the show tries to make me (again, the viewer) accept that risking the survival of the entire Federation (trillions of people) to save them is actually a question worth asking? From an in-universe moral standpoint, perhaps.
From an outsider’s perspective (the audience), not even close. Robots having souls and being equal to humans isn’t even a discussion we’re having in real life. I don’t believe androids will ever be self-aware, and capable of emotion and love. Sure, in the Star Trek universe they apparently are. So what? Suspension of disbelief only goes so far. The show can’t expect me to accept that many IFs. I get the very one-the-nose “fear of the Other,” “make love not war,” “different races have equal rights to life” analogy. The message is very much worthy, the show’s depiction of it really pisses me off. The show isn’t asking me to decide whether or not it would be moral to kill the last survivors of a human (or even alien) tribe to save the world, it’s asking “but what if we were basically God and we fucked up, how would we fix it? What if the stuff we made eventually had feelings? Then it’d be bad to destroy it, right?”
Aside from the sheer hubris of that premise, I don’t know that the robots have feelings. I know it looks like they do, and that they believe that they do, but again, how am I to know? From a biological viewpoint, they’re certainly not alive:
“Life” (biological def taken from the web) Definition. noun, plural: lives. noun, plural: lives. (1) A distinctive characteristic of a living organism from dead organism or non-living thing, as specifically distinguished by the capacity to grow, metabolize, respond (to stimuli), adapt, and reproduce.
Do the synths grow? Nah. Do they metabolize? Yes. Respond to stimuli? Yes but debatable as it’s programmed. Adapt? Yes. Reproduce? NOPE. 2.5/5 on the living scale lol. That’s not that great. (From an in-universe moral perspective, this time. I know, TNG did an ep on that, sorry.)
Still the show tries reaaaally hard to sell their sentience, and the one time that really didn’t sit well with me was that “robotic finger touching the human finger” image. WOW, last place where I expected to find religious imagery, a show that questions what it means to be human and what creating beings in our image would entail *sarcasm*.
Except they twist the imagery. In the Bible, human lives are sacred because they are in the image of the perfect God, and He values us (=> so human worth come directly from God attributing worth to us because we’re meant to reflect His goodness). Humans being imperfect due to their fall, creating something in their own image is called an idol - it’s a false god, it’s not sentient, it’s even more imperfect, and it’s wrong. And if humans don’t value it and and it doesn’t reflect who they are anymore, well, it would make the idol even more worthless, right? (clearer explanation because my arguing skills suck => drawing on the Bible’s imagery, either humans are not gods and the images they created are worthless, or the series means for them to have God’s place, in which case refusing to attribute worth to their images makes those worthless. That invalidates the question that I previously said the show was asking.) So all in all, reminding us of the Christian take on the issue right in the middle of the Admonition claiming that synths are perfect is thus completely counterproductive, both in universe and from a viewer’s pov.
But but but, I hear you protest, what about Data? He had worth!
This may be controversial, but Data mattered to us because of the character he was, not because he was supposed to be human. He was adorable and losing him meant losing an interesting and enjoyable element in the show, which would make us sad. I love him like I love Cris’ holos, the Voyager Doctor, Wall-E and Eve, R2-D2, Jarvis and Chappie. They’re (very) likeable fictional creatures that can be used as metaphors for real life issues, nothing more. In any show/movie I’d be really sad if one of them had to be sacrificed to save the world, but I’d accept it (looking at you, Infinity War Captain America). If the question arose in real life, would I question the morality of it? No.
So, are the new synths the same? I already tackled the metaphor thing, it’s not handled that well and Detroit Become Human did it first. (Again, it’s hard to portray the otherness of other real life-cultures that we may unjustly fear by using things whose living status is so easily questionable!!) Is killing off the synths wrong from an out-of-universe perspective because the audience loves them? Let’s see... Are the new synths adorable/likeable? Heck no, give me Emil and Enoch over them any day. Would we lose something in the show if they died? Nah. We didn’t even know they existed until one episode ago. Picard would get angsty and Agnes would get upset, but it’s nothing a few fluffy fics wouldn’t fix. Do we know the synths as characters? We know that Sutra is crazy, violent and bloodthirsty, Jana was probably nice (?), Dahj had a cute boyfriend (outstanding characterization) and Soji... Welp... *sigh* I guess Soji is okay, even though she’s the least relatable and interesting character of the whole Sirena crew? We know that their creators and biggest advocates, Soong Jr and Maddox, are(/were) creepy old dudes with warped ethics, half a brain between the two of them, really toxic interactions with Agnes, and enough hubris to bring the entire greek demigod population to shame. They would race Icarus to the sun, seriously. We know that Captain Vendermeer killed himself over two robots, permanently damaging one of the nicest and most beloved characters of the series. Yeah, real incentive for me wanting to see the Federation risk destruction for the androids, guys.
But seriously, the last time a psycho AI tried to destroy the galaxy and make it in its image (*cough* Control) the protagonists spent a season trying to destroy the thing, and they were right! Future-control was self-aware and demonstrated anger and fear! Make up your mind, CBS!!
And by the way? THE SYNTHS HAVE A MEANS OF ESCAPE!! No, I’m sorry, if they don’t decide to go aboard la Sirena and choose to endanger the Federation instead, then for all plot issues I’m siding with the Zhat Vash. Go on, destroy the synths. As part of the audience, I don’t care, and the show attempts at making me care by trying to make it a moral issue feel clumsy and forced.
Also. Q exists in the Star Trek universe! He’s a deus ex-machina machine!! (Pun intended.) It’s hard to take big issues like that seriously when he could just swoop in and teleport the synths out of the galaxy/destroy the Romulan armada/put the robotic overlords in their place. JL, please, give Q a call. Yeah, yeah, it’d take away from the moral stakes because you can’t solve your irl problem with a snap of your fingers and you have to make actual decisions - but as I already said, I feel like the moral stakes are dumb and contrived. Give me the deus ex-machina, please.
This has been a Star Trek rant. I know that I tackled two separate issues here: the in-universe morality of the synths’ death (I will admit that from the crew’s perspective it’s not right, because they can’t know if the synths are alive or not for sure) and the out-of-universe viewer experience. I apologize if it came across as really confused and complicated.
I still like the show and love the actual characters (meaning, la Sirena’s colorful crew), and the show writers are not incompetent, or stupid, or wrong for writing their show how they want. They are really skilled and talented and they have created mostly compelling characters - I’m just unhappy with the direction taken by the story.
#star trek picard#star trek: picard#jean-luc picard#sutra#noonien soong#bruce maddox#cappelius#et in arcadia ego#picard episode 8#picard 1x09#spoilers#picard spoilers#rant#meta#synthetic life#my meta#st talk#not sw
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Star Trek: Picard: Et in Arcadia Nego
Watched the last two eps of Star Trek: Picard today and...
I felt like it was just a series of disappointing copouts (:T
Killing Picard only to transfer his “engrams” to a synthetic body? Copout
Preventing the SynthCiv Federation from arriving rather than ending the series with The Federation confronting them with organics protecting synths while Picard passionately argues to them that History isn’t Fate and organic&synth life can choose to coexist? Copout
Deus Ex Machina-ing in Soong’s bio-son to explain away the holes in the Maddox storyline? Copout.
Throwing in an “evil” Android murdering an “innocent” one to cast The Choice btw self-defense and oblivion into stark black&white terms rather than dealing with it honestly&sincerely? Copout
Having the Evil Romulan Boyfriend both betray his sister at the end&having his myth directly match what the beacon will do&having the humans&Elnor(who’s sect of nun-assassins are sworn-enemies of the Tal Shiar) just decide to go along with his plan immediately? Copout.
Having Data still be “alive” as a digital copy so he&Picard can say their goodbyes and he can die on his own terms? Copout
the list goes depressingly on and on (:T (:T There’s even minor stuff like the Romulans just Poofing a fleet of hundreds of warbirds out of Nowhere when they’re SUPPOSED to be too devastated by the supernova to even police their own borders, or the Fed(having equally pulled back from the Neutral Zone, which is FAIRLY close to Sol and Vulcan, iirc from TNG: Unification part 2) doing the same to oppose them&protect the planet.
I also have some entirely idiosyncratic, stylistic objections. To have a plot so focused on Data and Soong-style androids NOT include Geordi just doesnt make much sense to me. I mean sure: he’s technically a starship engineer, but he was basically Data’s medical officer for the entire time they knew each other, repeatedly did complex brain surgery on his positronic matrix, and as such easily had more hands-on experience with Soong’s systems than anyone alive. The idea that Maddox could have succeeded without his input is about as difficult to believe as Picard not asking for his help in saving Data’s legacy(or him not finding out Picard was up to something odd involving Androids and tracking him down to help on his own initiative). I mean: Picard loved Data, was even, in some respects, a mentor, but Geordi was his BEST FUCKING FRIEND. Like: they hung out EVERYDAY. They talked about EVERYTHING together. They practically lived in each others’ pockets. Not having Geordi in this series borders on unconscionable.
And where the hell was Q? I can see Q ignoring the whole thing up to the last two eps, but beyond that? Would he REALLY sit on the sidelines while the LITERAL MASS-EFFECT REAPERS get called(not even ONE time-stopped moment to mock Picard? No Metajokes abt pre-wwiii computer games getting it right??)? And he absoLUTEly WOULD NOT just sit on his hands while Picard dies. He just wouldnt do it. COULDNT. We know this for a fact because, of course; it’s happened before and Q took the opportunity to Scrooge him over it. There’s basically No Way Picard wakes up in that chair, looks up, and DOESNT see Q in Data’s old uniform&makeup staring back at him with mockery, and cynicism, and maracas.
Anyway! Everything else about the series was ok; the plot was where all the major problems were to me. The acting was fine(a little forced in places, but that’s what you get with an overly Convenient plot), the costuming and set-design was great, I thought the casting and writing were good. ST: Picard has plenty of great art and good ideas(like dealing with the realities of Picard’s age and regrets) but it lacked followthrough; again and again, it failed to commit to its own premises, and ultimately that hurt it as a story for me.
#Star Trek#ST: Picard#ST: Picard Spoilers#Et in Arcadia Ego(Episode)#zA Reviews#zA Opinions#Summaries
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It's Pride Month, so here's a list of canonically and semi-canonically queer characters in Star Trek. (In order of characters' first appearance; exact quotations/references under the read more)
Special shout-out to any and all joined Trill for being trans.
Canon
Data (The Next Generation): Aromantic and asexual ("In Theory", "Phantasms")
Jadzia Dax (Deep Space Nine): Pansexual ("Rejoined")
Mirror Kira Nerys (Deep Space Nine): Bi/pansexual ("Crossover")
Mirror Ezri Dax (Deep Space Nine): Bi/pansexual ("The Emperor's New Cloak")
Seven of Nine (Voyager and Picard): Bisexual ("Et in Arcadia Ego, Part 2")
Hikaru Sulu (Kelvinverse films): Gay (Star Trek: Beyond)
Michael Burnham (Discovery): A-spec ("Magic to Make the Sanest Man Go Mad")
Paul Stamets (Discovery): Gay ("The Red Angel")
Hugh Culber (Discovery): Gay ("The Red Angel")
Mirror Philippa Georgiou (Discovery): Bi/pansexual ("Will You Take My Hand?")
Jett Reno (Discovery): Gay ("Through the Valley of Shadows")
Raffaela "Raffi" Musiker (Picard): Bi/pansexual ("Et in Arcadia Ego, Part 2")
Beckett Mariner (Lower Decks): Bi/pansexual ("We'll Always Have Tom Paris")
Andarithio "Andy" Billups (Lower Decks): Asexual ("Where Pleasant Fountains Lie")
Adira Tal (Discovery): Trans, non-binary ("The Sanctuary")
Gray Tal (Discovery): Trans ("Anomaly")
Zero (Prodigy): Non-binary ("Lost and Found")
Christine Chapel (Strange New Worlds): Bi/pansexual ("Spock Amok")
Semi-canon:
Q (Various): Bi/pansexual (Article)
Beverly Crusher (The Next Generation): Bi/pansexual (Article)
Julian Bashir (Deep Space Nine): Bi/pansexual, a-spec (Video)
Elim Garak (Deep Space Nine): Omnisexual (Bi/pansexual) (Article)
Phlox (Enterprise): Bi/pansexual (Article)
Keyla Detmer (Discovery): Queer (Article)
Exact quotes and references:
Data: "With regard to romantic relationships, there is no real me." (and "In Theory" in general); "I have no sexual desire."
Q: "There’s no question in my mind that when I play [Q], I love Picard." - John de Lancie
Beverly Crusher: "Bev would have slept with male or female" - Gates McFadden
Julian Bashir: "I don't think Bashir had a very overt sexuality…he certainly had a stunted sense of sexuality…I don't think that he put the…platonic side [and] the physical side together. So he could fall in love across…the board...because he's falling in love with both sexes." - Alexander Siddig (edited for brevity and clarity)
Jadzia Dax: The entire episode of "Rejoined"; "Terry Farrell says Jadzia Dax was pansexual." (Article)
Elim Garak: "It’s about being omnisexual. That basically his sexuality is something that can happen with anyone." - Andrew Robinson
Mirror Kira Nerys: Shows interest in men and women
Mirror Ezri Dax: Kisses/in relationship with Mirror Kira
Seven of Nine: Hand holding with Raffi, their relationship throughout second season; "Oh, Seven is canonically bi, don't you worry." - Jeri Ryan (Twitter)
Phlox: "I was trying very hard to suggest he had a polyamorous relationship with the boys as well as the girls. I do tell people I was the first gay character on Star Trek, whether you were aware of it or not." - John Billingsley
Hikaru Sulu: Shown with husband
Michael Burnham: "You've never been in love." (This is probably the vaguest one, but the discussion is about romantic love, and if a fully grown adult like Burnham has explicitly never experienced romantic love before, I think it's safe to say they're somewhere on the aro/ace-spectrum)
Keyla Detmer: "[S]he maybe is starting to accept herself in her own queerness, whatever that means." - Emily Coutts
Paul Stamets: "[I]n my universe, and pretty much any universe I can possibly imagine, I'm gay."
Hugh Culber: "I'm gay, and so is [Culber]."
Mirror Philippa Georgiou: Shown with male and female sexual partners
Jett Reno: "My wife is Soyousian."
Raffaela "Raffi" Musiker: Hand holding with Seven, their relationship throughout second season
Beckett Mariner: "Oh, I'm always dating bad boys. Bad girls, bad gender-nonbinary babes, ruthless alien masterminds, bad Bynars..."
Andarithio "Andy" Billups: "[I]f you're planning on tricking me into intercourse, think again. The only lady I love is two decks tall, and pumped full of dilithium;" "You need to accept the fact that I'll be a virgin for the rest of my life."
Adira Tal: "Um, 'they,' not–not 'she.' I've never felt like a 'she' or–or a 'her,' so I would prefer 'they' or 'them' from now on."
Gray Tal: "Transitioning, it's like, I had bigger things to think about. But, if I get another chance to remake my body, then why not get rid of all the things that aren't totally me."
Zero: "Not a robot, nor a he, or she."
Christine Chapel: "He and I are on the same page. Casual, no attachments, this is just for fun, zero commitments." "[Y]ou said the same thing about that gal on Argelius II."
#Star Trek#Queer Star Trek#Trekking across the universe#Not bothering to tag characters since there's so many#Star Trek creation#Tell me if I missed a character#If you're here to argue that XYZ doesn't count - I kindly suggest you remove yourself to the nearest airlock#Tricorder log
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