#et in arcadia ego pt. 2

[spockvarietyhour]

that lighting difference is a killer.

[majoris]

Star Trek: Picard | s01e10 | Et in Arcadia Ego pt.2

[stellarred]

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.

[categoricalglitches]

Romulan/Vulcan origins: “(…) long before our ancestors arrived on Vulcan”

Or:  the pointless overanalysis of a single, fourteen-word line no one has been waiting for.

At story time around the campfire in episode 10, Narek says the Romulan myth of Ganmadan is believed among the Zhat Vash to be a mythologized retelling of historical events (the last coming of the “über-synths”/‘Reapers’) and is said to “date back from long before our ancestors first arrived on Vulcan.” I’ve seen some interpretations of this line that I don’t think are borne out by its phrasing, which I will now analyze in gratuitous detail to argue the intended meaning/implication is that the Romulans believe Vulcan was not the ancestral home of the Vulcan species, and that is relatively common knowledge even in the Federation.

Production error I’ve read a few people thinking this was a simple production error, and Narek was supposed to have said “before our ancestors first left Vulcan” or something to that effect. I think that seems unlikely given the obvious meaning of this line; if it was in error, surely someone would have noticed somewhere in the process. The phrasings involved are too different to be that easily mixed up: “arrived on” would have to be entirely switched out for a different verb, and the ‘first’ seems out of place to me in the alternative version.

Maybe I’m underestimating the odds of something like this slipping through but I don’t remember any other errors on this scale happening in this season (there was the 16 years without an assimilation/14 years ago Ramdha wasn’t assimilated yet Borg cube discrepancy, but that could easily be chalked up to the days being Romulan days or something, and it’s much less significant). That’s not to say I think this season, and especially the two-part finale, didn’t have its fair share of missteps. It did, and IMO in the end it left a lot to be desired overall. I just don’t think this was a mistake.

Romulans think they’re the ‘original’ This can’t be the case, because Narek specifically says “our ancestors” and if he believed it was the Vulcans who split off from the Romulans, no Vulcans would have been his ancestors in the timeframe for the settlement of Vulcan after the split. His understanding of the settlement of Vulcan must therefore have involved the Vulcan species collectively, including the ancestors of those who would later leave Vulcan for Romulus, in order for him to accurately describe them as “our ancestors”.

Vulcans aren’t from Vulcan (according to the Romulans) It’s been suggested before that Vulcans may not be native to Vulcan. In the TOS episode “Return to Tomorrow” the Enterprise crew encounter a species who claim to have been the precursor species to humans and Vulcans several hundred thousand years ago (note timescale). Spock acknowledges that “would tend (…) to explain certain elements of Vulcan prehistory,” suggesting that there are known discrepancies, contradictions and/or gaps in, well, the knowledge and understanding of Vulcan prehistory (presumably in terms of anthropology, biology and so on) of a sort that could be explained by a non-native origin.

This line by Narek indicates that this is also the accepted belief among Romulans. If Narek knew or suspected this to be an understanding of history limited to the Zhat Vash, mentioning it would do nothing for his claim and you’d expect Elnor to have been surprised at hearing it. If it was accepted among Romulans but not common knowledge in the Federation, you’d expect the same for Rios and Raffi. Narek says it casually, as if it’s established history to him, and confidently, as if he’s expecting to be sharing known information with the others.

This indicates that this is common knowledge to all involved and the accepted view among Romulans—and it’s no surprise to the other three that Narek thinks that the Vulcans did not originate on Vulcan. He’s not introducing any new information here. That his ancestors at some point long ago first arrived on Vulcan from somewhere else isn’t at issue.

Narek says: some say it dates back from long before our ancestors first arrived on Vulcan, in response to Rios’ comment that it’s “an ancient myth”. He’s confirming that Ganmadan is said to be so unimaginably ancient that it predates the first thing the Romulans ‘know’ about their origins. This is the new information he tied to a previously-known, if not factually-established, event in the very distant past, the arrival of the pre-Vulcan Vulcan species to their new homeworld.

The time-depth implied by ‘long before’ (and ‘first’) furthermore seems to disqualify any alternative interpretations: by all accounts, the Vulcan/Romulan split is a relatively recent occurrence, dating back about 2000 years. We know the last time these ‘Reapers’ came around was several hundred thousand years ago. Establishing that the myth is ‘just’ a few thousand years old would not give it the necessary continuity gravitas. His point is that this myth is ancient, reportedly even much older (“from long before”) than the Vulcan species’ understanding of itself as (from) Vulcan.

What about the Vulcans? Now, obviously, there’s not much else here to go on. It’s a single, fourteen-word line somewhat supported by conjecture in an episode from another series. There are no hints as to what reasons the Romulans have for this belief and we have no idea of where they would have gotten to Vulcan from, either. It’s perfectly reasonable for Vulcan and Romulan perspectives on this matter to differ, and for Vulcans to consider Vulcan their planet of origin even though the Romulans apparently do not. Perhaps it’s a fringe view among Vulcans today. It could have been an accepted view or legend at the time of the Vulcan/Romulan split that then fell (back) out of favor on Vulcan and was strengthened among the Romulans for whatever reason. Maybe there’s nothing to it after all and it was just a bit of mythologizing on the part of the departing Romulans that caught on too well and Vulcans actually totally are from Vulcan. But apparently there’s at least enough room for argument that, when confronted with a similar claim, Spock concedes it would explain “certain elements” in their history.

Of course, unless both things are true, and the Vulcan species emerged from Vulcan then left it in whole or in part for a significant amount of time only to eventually return (and to be fair, there are some ways I could see that working out), it doesn’t really make sense for this to be a mystery in-universe—surely genetic testing would easily determine whether Vulcans are ‘from’ Vulcan or not. It obviously hasn’t, or this wouldn’t be a debate, and I don’t have an answer for why that might be.  

 (I posted a version of this post on r/DaystromInstitute last week but I don’t want the streams of my accounts to cross, so.)

[annikasevenshots]

For those of you curious - the occurrence of the Voyager theme in Picard S1 are in these two tracks:

Featured in 1x05: Stardust City Rag. Theme emerges at the 1:28 mark.

Featured in 1x09: Et in Arcadia Ego, Pt 1. Theme emerges at the 2:31 mark.

Happy crying, y'all. It's very emotional. Don't say I didn't warn ya.

[thyla]

It says a great deal about the mind of Commander Data that... looking at the human race, with all its violence and corruption and willful ignorance, he could still see kindness, immense curiosity, and greatness of spirit.

STAR TREK: PICARD S1E10 | Et in Arcadia Ego, Pt. 2

[mappinglasirena]

First Look at Season 2′s Sirena

In case you missed it, on this fine Captain Picard Day, we got the first real trailer for season 2 of Star Trek: Picard. You can find it all over the web by now, I’m sure, but here is a link if you haven’t seen it already.

In this trailer, we get a glorious 2 second look at La Sirena, and of course I’m going to spend way too much time exploring every detail of that shot.

Fair warning if you don’t want to know anything about the trailers and want to go into season 2 completely unspoiled: This is your moment to hit J to skip!

From the trailer, it’s pretty obvious that our motley crew find themselves in some kind of alternate timeline/dark future/mirrorverse-adjacent twisted reality, probably because of Q shenanigans. The characters all get a bit of a visual redesign, and so does our little Speed Freighter.

Here is the one shot we get in all its glory:

And below the cut, I’m going to pick apart aaaalll of the little (and not so little) changes I’ve noticed.

Observation 1:

Let’s start somewhere random because I can (and because structurally, it seems to be the biggest change so far): There is now a gridded frame separating the bridge and the main deck.

It runs inside the front-most support beams. If you look at the deck plans, it’s in the place where a bulkhead was originally planned but then taken out (marked in green below).

In season 1, the forcefield Soji puts up when she hijacks the ship is set in the exact same place.

Observation 2:

Next, because it’s sort of glaringly obvious: The logo on the headrest of the chairs has changed. We get the clearest view of the captain’s chair, where, instead of the double swirl of the Sirena logo, we now have a red delta reminiscent of Starfleet insignia (only symmetrical, which is just weird).

It’s likely the same insignia as Rios’s new badge:

Observation 3:

Next, because it is making me incredibly sad: My beloved red paint is gone 😭

The railing around the drop to the lower deck, the two support beams at the back of the upper deck, and the circle around the engine lights have all lost their beautiful, slightly worn red highlights and are now grey (or possibly white, it’s hard to tell with the lighting).

(Also, because I feel it needs to be said: That is one unhappy Rios right there...)

This repaint does not bode well for the outside of the ship. In this symmetrical, grey dystopia, a van Halen paint job doesn’t seem likely to stay in place. Who knows, maybe we’ll go back to the silver Araña Cosmica designs? Although since the delta and the lights and displays are still red, some red highlighting on the hull might be preserved.

Anyway. I already miss the beautiful red accents. If I needed any more hints that this is a dystopian alternate reality, this is it...

Observation 4:

While we’re talking about red things: the lights along the support beams and the centre of the ceiling!

For the majority of season 1, the lights at the side of the deck had a blue highlight at the top and bottom, while the ceiling lights were white.

Eagle-eyed Picard viewers may have noticed that at the very end of episode 10, “Et in Arcadia Ego Pt. 2″, we already saw a switch from blue highlights at the side to a warm red.

In the redesign, the lights at the side stayed red and the ceiling lights now have the same colour.

It’s difficult to say how much of this is down to colour grading, but from the images themselves, the new red lights have a much colder hue then the highlights in season 1.

Side note: I was wondering briefly whether the new colours might be because of a red alert. However, as we see in season 1, for a red alert all of the lights turn red, including the ones along the support beams (white in the trailer) and the vertical strips next to the holodeck (also white in the trailer), so this is probably just the new colour scheme in whatever alternate reality Rios finds himself.

Observation 5:

And a final red thing: In the gridded wall at the back of the bridge, there are two shapes that seem to be little control panels.

It’s too grainy to make out any details, so they might also be plaques or the labels of some container or other, if the gridded arch doesn’t reach all the way to the floor. But if they are control panels, it’s very clear that Sirena’s user interface has undergone a redesign as well.

Here is the panel from the trailer:

Essentially a dark red background with bright red control elements.

And this is an example of what the UI (specifically the tactical console on the right side of the bridge) looks like in season 1:

As you can see, season 1′s UI consists of grey and orange designs on a black background, with some white/beige highlights. If the red shapes are indeed control panels, the difference is quite striking.

(And yes, the image of the tactical console is part of the Deep Dive on Sirena’s UI that I have been procrastinating since... February. What is time? I am so sorry 🙈)

Observation 6:

And finally, one last observation to round out this little exploration: whatever Rios is transporting in this new timeline, it’s being kept in cargo containers the likes of which we’ve never seen before.

One day, I will make a collection of (very grainy) screencaps of all of Sirena’s various cargo containers, but for now, here are a few examples:

The containers in season 1 are all branded with the mermaid/wave double swirl of Sirena’s logo. (Here are just a few, trust me, it’s everywhere!)

Likewise, the mysterious new containers have circles on them that might be the same insignia that’s emblazoned on the headrests of the bridge chairs.

It’s very grainy and difficult to tell, so I’m not entirely sure. It’s definitely a possibility, but the longer I look at it, the less certain I am. The circles on the containers might not be broken by the points of the red delta like the circle on the headrest, it’s impossible to say for sure, so at the moment I don’t think it’s the same logo. But there is that possibility.

Either way, the containers look very intriguing and vaguely ominous, so very fitting for whatever horror our poor Rios has found himself in.

And thus concludes this mad little observational spree. What a way to spend an entire evening on literally two seconds of footage 😄

I’m sure there’s a bunch of stuff I’ve missed, if you find any more details, I’d be thrilled to hear about them!

I’m very curious to find out where the showrunners are going with season 2, the hints so far have been... interesting. I guess we’ll have to wait and see if we’ll end up with a completely new version of La Sirena to explore.

[breetzreactz]

Star Trek: Picard 1x10 - Et in Arcadia Ego pt 2

elnor is so fucking precious

can’t remember Narek’s sister’s name

thinking about this synthetic federation thing. seems kinda silly in a lot of ways. like... why would they leave this message anyway? they said they are watching...

now that I think of it, seems weird that Saga could die so easily

I appreciate that they actually decided to fill out the Romulan religion

thinking about how it makes no sense that they crashed the borg cube

how are organics able to beat up synthetics. data was always much stronger

I get that the tal shiar/zhat vash is all powerful or whatever, but 200 ships seems like too much for a organization without a government

seven the revenger is a good look. Seven of Nine: Space Revenger is the new name for the spinoff series

picard maneuver lol

“planetary sterilization pattern number 5″ WHAT. WHY DO YOU NEED MORE THAN ONE OF THESE!

I hope picard actually dies, but it would seem weird to let Agnes die too

jesus did the federation send the whole fucking fleet

are they all the same model lol. that’s so fucking lazy

riker being the captain is bad. shoulda been someone else. hell, any other TNG character would have worked

“you’re in no shape to talk to people” what. even dying people can talk

robot snakes, cool. I wonder if they’ll come up again

oh right I forgot they set up riker as being reserve. that’s fine I guess

picard golem time

I wonder if their gonna resolve the data’s memories thing

just let picard die already

if they establish the existence of an afterlife, I’ll be mad. although I guess it wouldn’t be the first time they didn’t something like that in star trek

data saying the year like that doesn’t sit with me. he never did that before afaik

so data is alive, but only in a simulation?

here it comes, picard golem time

okay, so they’re gonna kill data. that’s good

called it, golem time

cool, so the golem means nothing at all. the brain thing was just a bullshit emotional hook with no stakes

wait raffi and seven gonna fuck?

wait they never explained why the synthetics attacked in the first place? did the zhat vash hack them?

okay so new ship and crew... but I assume rios still needs to make money or something? it’s unclear what his motivations are in general. living in the federation you’d assume you don’t need a job

[halfwayinlight]

My mind is absolutely exploding with how INCREDIBLE the ending is Et to In Arcadia Ego Pt 2

Omg I'm not even crying. Just sitting here awed because the aesthetics and utter beauty and depth!!! And how are they ever going to top this with two more seasons?

I can't. The utter freaking ARTISTRY of this

[spockvarietyhour]

Here he comes to save the day (again).

[spockvarietyhour]

The Federation Fleet.

[spockvarietyhour]

Star Trek: Picard “Et in Arcadia Ego Pt. 2″

[spockvarietyhour]

Look at my face.

[spockvarietyhour]

[spockvarietyhour]

Star Trek: Picard “Et In Arcadia Ego Part 2″ 

how to please your old man. 

Bonus:

[spockvarietyhour]

Merde.