I think it is appropriate that when I sat down to write and watch Picard today, I cocked my leg over my chair and shouted “Riker!” We’re finally moving forward, we’ve got some proper Picard-ing going on, there is some decent direction, and it is a decent episode of Star Trek all-round (in comparison). Written by Chabon himself, edited again by Zayas, and directed by the number 1 director, Jonathan Frakes. “Absolute Candor” finally gets all the pieces into place for adventure.

Another episode, another series of flashbacks where Patrick looks like a boiled testicle because Paramount didn’t pay for the Michael Douglas de-aging tech, and another series of tropes. I’ll admit Romulan warrior nuns bound by honor looking after a young man who effectively becomes one of them but can’t because he’s male, is interesting. Unlike Spock’s logic, this Absolute Candor that the Qowat Milat subscribes to is about being as honest as possible, not out of ignorance but simply a desire to convey the emotion without filter. It is a fantastic idea, I’m surprised it wasn’t done much more before now.

In essence, the A plot is about Jean-Luc trying to hire a Qowat Milat for his mission, something that is easy and complicated at the same time. The B plot, on the other hand, is more about Evil Spock and Soji getting it on, pushing each other away, and “Oh, I do love it when my sister smells the robot sex on me.” You could say there is a C plot too, focused on showing Alison Pill’s Jurati to be naive. However, it feels more like a story to reinforce something we already know and more importantly, break up the episode.

“Absolute Candor” does its best to give us back the Jean-Luc Picard we once knew, and quite frankly there is a moment that perfectly captures that. Though as I’ve already said in my “ageist” comment about Patrick looking his age, it is somewhat difficult to pull yourself away from what you can see. I love Patrick to death, he has practically raised a couple of generations already, but you can see the frailness in comparison to the Captain we once knew. He seems smaller and less agile, and acting-wise, something is being put in but you can see/feel what isn’t.

What isn’t being put in really is some effort to kick us forward with the Soji plot. We’re effectively in a holding pattern, and breaking free is not happening soon. The entire plot right now is that Jean-Luc needs to find and rescue Soji, wherever she is and from whatever danger she might be in. We’ve had two episodes already of getting the ship and getting into space, this one being about getting us the warrior nun for hire to fight whatever the big bad is, then we need the information, and from there we can save the princess— I mean synth.

Everything that’s happening with Soji right now is about Narek slowly unraveling the mystery box of a woman to reveal more about herself. Let me ask you something: Why do I care? It is shown that Narek and Rizzo (not the one from M*A*S*H*) know more about her than she knows about herself, so the question becomes what is their goal then? Find out where she came from and kill all of the synths so there are no more, forever and always, with lots of love, or in their case, hate. This returns us to the holding pattern. They are teasing the information out for plot convenience.

Jean-Luc’s story is one where I feel like we’re leaping forward the steps we haven’t taken in the last two episodes. The convent of Qowat Milat and all the Romulans at the Romulan Relocation Hub on Vashti are there because of his actions to save their people in the shadow of the Supernova. His return is something that isn’t easy. To many Romulans he’s the face of Starfleet, the same Starfleet that abandoned them the second the synths went rogue on Mars. He is the one who has to bear the anger built up in those 14-15 years he’s been gone.

Not only that, but the young man he read Dumas to and played Musketeer with has anger for the old man who he felt abandoned him with the Qowat Milat. They might be sisters, but they aren’t sisters of his and Elnor knows that. They trained him, fed him, and gave him everything he needed, but he’s not one of them. Again, it is about the only interesting and “original” thing in there all around, but that alone isn’t why I think I have so much praise for “Absolute Candor.”

In the third act, when Jean-Luc has exhausted his options and tried to reconcile with the nuns for a chance to hire one to join his crusade, he has almost given up hope and goes into the Romulan bar to sit. Only sitting down after grabbing the “Romulan Only” sign and throwing it in the dust, at which point, ignored by calls for service, embittered old Romulans confront him, cajoling him to fight. After saying his peace to the old man in the scene prior, Elnor steps in for the old man offering protection, and in this case, killing a bloke outside the bar.

This is where we get the full Captain Jean-Luc Picard, not admiral or formal admiral, but proper Jean-Luc. You can see as Elnor has that tan qualanq in hand after decapitating the guy threatening Picard, the anger being held back to verbally eviscerate Elnor in that moment. Only to let it out when they are alone. It is only a few moments, but it takes this meek old man we’ve seen for nearly three hours and turns him into this hulking beast of authority and command we’ve known him to be for decades.

The references, the hints at previous characters, and hell, even Johnathan Del Arco’s Hugh, none of it inspires the nostalgia it aims to hit. This demand for competency and peace feels like a warm comfortable place. The frail old man doesn’t feel like the Jean-Luc we knew, the man we saw in the interview and here with Elnor is the part of Star Trek that made many of us fall in love with the series.

To teleport from the praise ship, I will say there are other things I could do without. Alexx has been spoiled for choice with great space battles in The Orville: That dogfight thing at the end felt ok, but if I must draw comparisons between other similar shows and their offerings, Picard lacks that spark. Frakes does a good job throughout the episode and even here mostly, but it is one bit of direction I’m left wishing there was something special about it.

He made the scene with Soji and Narek where they are sliding around the Borg Cube in their socks fun, but at the same time, I still don’t love the writing on the Borg Cube much. It at least looked interesting this time, I’ll give him credit for that, it’s Chabon’s part that falls flat for me there. Isa Briones and Harry Treadaway are doing a great job playing off of each other, I just don’t have the connection to their characters I think Chabon thinks I should as a viewer.

“Absolute Candor” is a much better episode than “The End is the Beginning” and “Maps and Legends” because we’re going places. Sadly, it does mean we’re going to Freecloud, and we have to suffer costume design as done through copious amounts of drugs. Oh, and we have Seven of Nine because, quite frankly, we need someone you know and can punch someone without turning to dust. There I go again with my ageist comments but tell me you don’t think about it looking at Patrick in the way he’s presented here.

Ultimately, “Absolute Candor” offers not only a look at the great Jean-Luc Picard in his later years, but also a look at his actions in the years we’ve been away, and most importantly, holds him accountable for those actions. I could do with the lack of Jurati being awkward and annoying so we can reveal the Qowat Milat only bind themselves to a lost cause. It is fairly evident that we’re looking for a needle in a haystack, or an Android woman in space. A fine, Star Trek-filled episode of Picard that should have come sooner if it weren’t for glacial pacing before now.

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Star Trek: Picard "Absolute Candor"

8

Score

8.0/10

Pros

• Jean-Luc finally feels like the great Picard.
• Direction by Frakes.
• We're going places, finally.

Cons

• If only the Soji and Narek story were going somewhere.