The opening arc draws to a close as we finally engage.
What They Say:
Completely unaware of her special nature, Soji continues her work and captures the attention of the Borg cube research project’s executive director; Picard seeks others willing to join his search for Bruce Maddox.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
In a sense, you could say the first three episode serve as the main pilot for the series to get things underway. A lot of the basics are set up and we get that “cold open” action aspect, namely the death of Dahj, but it’s not until we’re finally underway in space does it feel like the story is moving forward. Which has been fine since it’s been a couple of decades in-series since we last connected with these characters and things have gone on that needed to be explored. We needed to understand where Picard was at this point and why he ended up there, the events going on within the Borg Cube, and the machinations within Starfleet itself that speaks to bigger things unfolding. This episode is a bit busier as well in that it really introduces Raffi in full but also brings on board Rios while giving us more time with Jurati as well, so it feels a good bit busier.
The backstory side for this episode is focused on Raffi who we see was basically Picard’s right hand when dealing with the evacuation fourteen years prior. That delves a bit into the meeting that he had that went sour and resulted in his resignation. Which in turn made her life hell, though she doesn’t go into detail as to the how and why his exit did so. But that put her into recluse mode and a lot of anger toward him that’s built over the years. Not enough to deny him entirely what he wants, or to completely ignore the information he’s got about the Tal Shiar that’s oh so tantalizing, but enough to keep him at a distance. And, in a way, to use him for her own ends as well. She’s a solid data person and finding what Maddox is serve both her and Picard and will introduce us to a potentially interesting new place called Freecloud in an episode or two. I like what we get of Raffi because she’s not all deferential toward him or anything.
Picard does get set up with his ship which is captained by a man named Cristobal Rios (Santiago Cabrera). We get to see a couple of flavors of Rios because it’s a one-man ship for the most part and he’s set up the EMH and ENH to look like far better and more cultured versions of himself. I’d forgotten about the hologram stuff from the Voyager era show but was amused at how it played here and will admit that it’s something that I thought would likely get nixed alongside synthetics for the potential trouble they could be. That said, he and Picard are going to be a lot of fun to watch together as Rios wears his true self out where anyone with a real eye can see it and Picard knows he’s Starfleet through and through, but has his issues for reasons that are left to be explored later. The tease isn’t bad even if it adds another “Starfleet Bad” nugget to roll over and deal with. His ship has a really nice open minimalism as well that’s definitely quite appealing compared to most ships we get.
In general, the show works toward get Picard to get moving by the end, tossing out that long sought after “Engage” from him and it does it pretty well. We get the addition of Jurati to the crew as she shows up at the vineyard just at the end of an attack on it by the Tal Shiar, which let our resident Romulans really showcase themselves. I continue to absolutely love Orly Brady as Laris and want to see a lot more of her. The dynamic with Picard and her husband is fantastic. Jurati’s useful here in making clear she’s coming along but she’s also able to provide the connection to Starfleet as she had Commander Oh visiting her to find out what Picard wanted. Seeing all the ties that bind coming together more and more, it definitely behooves Picard and company to get off-world as quickly as possible. And there’s a surprisingly good ease and comfort with this group as they click far faster than I expected.
The Borg Cube storyline is the one moving the slowest as we try to get a handle on what it is that Soji is really after – and how much of her true self she knows and what others know. With this episode, her story is a bit more focused as the xB (ex-Borg) that is in charge of operations and those that have been reclaimed has granted her request to interview one of the Romulans that was taken during its battle, Ramdha. Soji’s excited for this as it’s what she’s after in being able to find if there’s some kind of shared mythology that the Borg themselves have in order to cope with their experience. From an expansion on what we know it’s certainly interesting and I want to know more. But I’ll admit I did a double-take with Hugh because it is the same actor who played the character from the late-season episodes of The Next Generation where the young Borg was cut off from the collective. That’s a really nice piece to draw in from that series that will definitely factor in when others likely catch up and meet him.
In Summary:
I’m still feeling very frustrated by the number of reviews that talk about how slow this series is because that’s such a weirdly skewed view of it. The story is progressing well and with great care, introducing new things each episode to expand on the past and present so that we understand the scale of it all as more and more of it is pulled back into view. The budget for the series means this looks great, we get a lot of really strong locations, set designs, and solid range of characters now populating it. And it brings us a greater view of so many interesting parts of the Federation that in live-action form we’ve never been able to explore before. I’ve got three generations of viewers watching it in my household and we’re all enraptured by it week after week.
Grade: B+
Streamed By: CBS All Access
