CONTAINS SPOILERS
In my review of last week's episode I mistakenly assumed that the destruction of Utopia Planetia and the whole of the Mars colony directly lead to the deaths of thousands of Romulans. The flashback scene at the start of this week's issue - and then further revelations - make it clear that the annihilation of the Mars colony by the synthetics led to the destruction of many of Starfleet's ships and this prevented Starfleet from rescuing more Romulans. It's a minor point, but I suspect it will have major repercussions.
This week's episode was another fascinating instalment, building on all the threads that were started last time: Picard starts his investigation into Dahj's death with the assistance of his Romulan friends, while we learn more about Dahj's twin, and her relationship with the Romulan.
Picard goes on a classic Dixon Hill investigation into Dahj's death, and the death of her boyfriend, by visiting her flat and investigating the crime scene. Laris, Picard's Romulan friend has a useful array of gadgets to help the investigation along, and it becomes apparent that the Romulan secret-secret-police have been involved. I mentioned last week that there was bad blood between the Romulans and the androids, but revelations this week show that these pre-date the Mars attack and the aborted rescue plan for Romulus. The Romulan secret-secret police, called the Zhat Vash (even more secret than the Tal Shiar) have a loathing for artificial intelligence of any kind, and are tracking down any synthetics they can identify, and terminating them.
It becomes clear that Dahj knew and communicated with her twin sister, and Picard learns that her twin is off world. This all makes sense and is explained well. So, Picard needs to go out into space, and for that, he needs to return to Starfleet, and for that he needs medical clearance. This is not a formality; the series again taps into Picard's alternative future from The Next Generation's finale All Good Things by giving Picard a disease in his parietal lobe. This part of his brain was identified in All Good Things when Dr Crusher explained there were warning signs he could develop irumodic syndrome - a form of 24th century dementia. Here, the news is delivered by Dr Benayoun - I'm sure I've seen him before. This is a clever move, since it continues to tie the series to its history without bringing someone like Dr Crusher into the story - she would add too much emotional backstory that would need to be addressed.
The music around the Borg cube last week was excellent and there is no subtlety in the Star Trek theme blasting out as Picard arrives at Starfleet Headquarters. This contrasts sharply with his undignified arrival at Starfleet (the receptionist doesn't recognise him), and is merely a precursor to the shoddy treatment he gets from the Admiral he meets. She drops the f-bomb (a Star Trek first) and calls him out for his "hubris". That went well, then; so much for the fanfare. This scene makes two things perfectly clear: this is not the Star Fleet we used to know, and it has certainly not changed for the better.
As Admiral Picard offered to accept a temporary demotion to Captain, I was reminded of Kirk's similar demotion to a role he excelled in (at the end of Star Trek IV) and of Kirk's warning to Picard in Generations - don't let them take you off the bridge of a ship; don't let them promote you out of it. This made the verbal slap in the face even more dramatic.
Still, Picard is Picard and he has his ideas. To quote Kirk again: "The word is no. I am therefore going anyway."
Meanwhile, Dahj's twin sister Soji is living and working on the Romulan-claimed Borg cube. The setting one Borg cube alone says, "Danger!" (even if it's 5843 days since the facility's last assimilation, a very funny way of telling us that the Romulans have been on the cube for 16 years - before the Mars attack) but as an unidentified synthetic working among Romulans, we know Soji's life is a ticking time bomb - as soon as she is discovered, she will be killed.
Except, in a major development, we discover that the Soji's friend, new arrival Narek, is actually an undercover agent who does know her identity - even though she doesn't. The Zhat Vash have agents within the ranks of Star Fleet - and a Romulan commodore at that - and they are using Star Fleet's intelligence to track down the synthetics. There are more questions than answers, but this is fascinating, and as I mentioned earlier, this is really not the Star Fleet we used to know. Not at all.
There are some gory scenes as we get a glimpse of what the Romulans are doing on the Borg cube. They aren't rescuing "xBs" - presumably people who were Borg but can be saved - but stripping Borg drones for spare parts and saleable items. This is as gruesome as it sounds, and is carried out in a way that could best be described as disassembly-line surgery. I'm already backing the Borg to reawaken and start assimilating the Romulans.
Picard goes to meet an old 'friend' - her identity isn't clear - to arrange a ship and a crew, and while her first response is to draw a phase and tell him to leave, there's plenty of unmentioned history between the two. So, Picard is still stuck on Earth - no sign of him returning to his usual environment of outer space. At least not yet.
This was another great episode - the revelations about the Romulans in Star Fleet has set the tone for the series. There isn't any phase fire in this episode, apart from the flashback scene at the start, but there are still plenty of fireworks.
In my review of last week's episode I mistakenly assumed that the destruction of Utopia Planetia and the whole of the Mars colony directly lead to the deaths of thousands of Romulans. The flashback scene at the start of this week's issue - and then further revelations - make it clear that the annihilation of the Mars colony by the synthetics led to the destruction of many of Starfleet's ships and this prevented Starfleet from rescuing more Romulans. It's a minor point, but I suspect it will have major repercussions.
This week's episode was another fascinating instalment, building on all the threads that were started last time: Picard starts his investigation into Dahj's death with the assistance of his Romulan friends, while we learn more about Dahj's twin, and her relationship with the Romulan.
Picard goes on a classic Dixon Hill investigation into Dahj's death, and the death of her boyfriend, by visiting her flat and investigating the crime scene. Laris, Picard's Romulan friend has a useful array of gadgets to help the investigation along, and it becomes apparent that the Romulan secret-secret-police have been involved. I mentioned last week that there was bad blood between the Romulans and the androids, but revelations this week show that these pre-date the Mars attack and the aborted rescue plan for Romulus. The Romulan secret-secret police, called the Zhat Vash (even more secret than the Tal Shiar) have a loathing for artificial intelligence of any kind, and are tracking down any synthetics they can identify, and terminating them.
It becomes clear that Dahj knew and communicated with her twin sister, and Picard learns that her twin is off world. This all makes sense and is explained well. So, Picard needs to go out into space, and for that, he needs to return to Starfleet, and for that he needs medical clearance. This is not a formality; the series again taps into Picard's alternative future from The Next Generation's finale All Good Things by giving Picard a disease in his parietal lobe. This part of his brain was identified in All Good Things when Dr Crusher explained there were warning signs he could develop irumodic syndrome - a form of 24th century dementia. Here, the news is delivered by Dr Benayoun - I'm sure I've seen him before. This is a clever move, since it continues to tie the series to its history without bringing someone like Dr Crusher into the story - she would add too much emotional backstory that would need to be addressed.
The music around the Borg cube last week was excellent and there is no subtlety in the Star Trek theme blasting out as Picard arrives at Starfleet Headquarters. This contrasts sharply with his undignified arrival at Starfleet (the receptionist doesn't recognise him), and is merely a precursor to the shoddy treatment he gets from the Admiral he meets. She drops the f-bomb (a Star Trek first) and calls him out for his "hubris". That went well, then; so much for the fanfare. This scene makes two things perfectly clear: this is not the Star Fleet we used to know, and it has certainly not changed for the better.
As Admiral Picard offered to accept a temporary demotion to Captain, I was reminded of Kirk's similar demotion to a role he excelled in (at the end of Star Trek IV) and of Kirk's warning to Picard in Generations - don't let them take you off the bridge of a ship; don't let them promote you out of it. This made the verbal slap in the face even more dramatic.
Still, Picard is Picard and he has his ideas. To quote Kirk again: "The word is no. I am therefore going anyway."
Meanwhile, Dahj's twin sister Soji is living and working on the Romulan-claimed Borg cube. The setting one Borg cube alone says, "Danger!" (even if it's 5843 days since the facility's last assimilation, a very funny way of telling us that the Romulans have been on the cube for 16 years - before the Mars attack) but as an unidentified synthetic working among Romulans, we know Soji's life is a ticking time bomb - as soon as she is discovered, she will be killed.
There are some gory scenes as we get a glimpse of what the Romulans are doing on the Borg cube. They aren't rescuing "xBs" - presumably people who were Borg but can be saved - but stripping Borg drones for spare parts and saleable items. This is as gruesome as it sounds, and is carried out in a way that could best be described as disassembly-line surgery. I'm already backing the Borg to reawaken and start assimilating the Romulans.
Picard goes to meet an old 'friend' - her identity isn't clear - to arrange a ship and a crew, and while her first response is to draw a phase and tell him to leave, there's plenty of unmentioned history between the two. So, Picard is still stuck on Earth - no sign of him returning to his usual environment of outer space. At least not yet.
This was another great episode - the revelations about the Romulans in Star Fleet has set the tone for the series. There isn't any phase fire in this episode, apart from the flashback scene at the start, but there are still plenty of fireworks.
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