So Picard is dead and Evil Spock disappears. That’s the entertaining, satisfying narrative that has been broken up into 10 episodes (9 stories). Let’s get the convoluted mess of credits out of the way, Akiva Goldsman directs both parts of “Et in Arcadia Ego,” though direct might be generous. Goldsman joins Chabon for the story in both episodes, but for the first part, Chabon enlists his wife Ayelet Waldman for both the teleplay and story. None of which makes sense as that means this disaster of a plot had to go through three pairs of eyes before an editor.

Part one is probably the most egregious thing to tackle, as the pacing launches us into the action at break-neck speed. Arriving at Soji’s planet as Evil Spock follows, a dogfight ensues only to be broken up by a flying Borg Cube and some space flowers. I’ve made a promise to my editor, I’m not doing brown ACID and it surely doesn’t seem that way right now. Waking up from old-man-itus, JL sets on in search of Teal’c and Samantha Carter. I can’t be the only one who got SG-1 vibes from that walking adventure, it honestly broke my neck at the pacing.

Part two rips that pacing back down to the ground with disinteresting twists left, right, up, center, and every which way. The plastic people plot to kill the organics; Raffi, Rios, and Elnor side with Evil Spock; Agnes sides with the synths to side with the organics in a twist of fate to show her nostrils flaring once more; and so on and so on. All for what? Other than lifting a ban that was introduced at the start of the season (and some other crap we’ll get to) this was an attempt to break up the closing part of phase 3 of Marvel into 10 episodes.

A dreadful space battle, emotional beats that don’t entirely work, and the reveal that Starfleet got a message from part one so we can see Will in his uniform again, oh great. Next, you’ll tell me the synths have Mass Effect Reapers on the way or something. In any other show or property, this could work as a story, but as Star Trek this was about as well thought out as a porn parody designed to anger fans at every line. Worse still, I’ve seen and heard arguments that this was good philosophy-based storytelling. I’d need to be on ACID to believe that.

I’ve said time and time again that I have little to no emotional connection to these characters, and at the end of the day, we’re looking at a story that is supposed to have this large emotional, heart-wrenching beat to highlight just how much toll this season has taken on Jean-Luc. As I’ve said before, why do I care that Picard is dead? Why do I care that Annika killed Evil Spock’s sister? Why do I care that Brent Spiner playing Dr. Altan Inigo Soong is going to die soon because the thing he created for himself is being used by someone else? Why-do-I-care?

The resolution is settled by… What again? Riker telling the Romulans to piss off. The reapers are called off because Soji is about as consistent and strong-willed as a toddler. Rizzo is killed by Annika punting her into the abyss of a Borg Cube, and Narek (Evil Spock) disappears. The last shot of Harry Treadaway is of him being forced to the ground by the synth guards, apparently an editing constraint. Of course that is only done after he throws a bomb directly at the one person who can catch it. Genius writing, up there with Chris Chibnall for stupid things being done because plot devices need to plot device.

To put it concisely: The plot is a mess, the season is paced like the humps on a camel’s back, and nothing interesting happened unless you are stuck in a rose-tinted Barbie world. At the end of the day, why did Jean-Luc Picard die and what was the purpose of holding that information of his condition until part 1 of the finale? We all knew he wasn’t dying here, it is his name in the title, with The Hollywood Reporter announcing ahead of season 1’s airing that season 2 was in the works. I have no emotional stakes in the 5-10 minutes he’s dead.

Better yet, the line is literally “Give you back the time you would have had if you hadn’t had the disease.” Emotionally I was never invested as a viewer about an old man I care about, so what was this piece of filler? At the end of the day, it was filler for a plot that was supposed to culminate in that big climactic beat. The thing is, it isn’t a climactic beat when you name the show after the character you’re killing off and returning as a synth 10 minutes after he’s gasped his last breath.

The question I keep returning to no matter what I see in Picard is, What was the point? Where do we go from here? Who was this for? Why kill off Data again but worse? In order, my best guesses are: I don’t know, psychopaths who don’t understand TV, and a fan that hates Nemesis. For all the ideas here, a captain that runs around with his EMHs, the former Starfleet officer wrapped up in conspiracy, Annika as a rogue pilot doing the work of Starfleet without the rules, warrior nuns, everything we’ve seen, and yet nothing happened.

The only things that changed are that Jean-Luc is now a synth because they wrote two scenes and were renewed only after wrapping up the season, Rizzo is dead, Hugh is dead, and Iched is dead. Oh, and your man Bruce Maddox is dead too but we’re going to ignore that Agnes is a murderer because she helped the organics in the end to protect the synths. The status quo has resumed and I have no idea how this leads into season 2 or even 3. They are three separate stories that feel about as connected as the directors for Discovery were to reality.

Emotionally how am I supposed to care when JL is huffing his last breath at 39 minutes (and change) but we see him at 43 (and change) in part 2? I’d have had more emotion if part 2 was about getting him back to life so he could stop Soji and the synths. Better yet, I’d have been more invested if a competent writer had an actual vision from the start. If you told me back in “Remembrance” (when I first watched it) that the season would wrap up with the plot of Mass Effect 3, but worse, I’d have laughed at you. Yet here we are.

The question I have now is, is Picard Picard or is he a construct of what Picard was? None of which will be explored, and also removes the weight of death. Surely if you can just create these synthetic bodies (the Golem) and transport the memories, it would remove all threat. Why have we just done that with the on-screen figurehead of Star Trek for 40 years? It is no longer just a titanium heart that Kestra can’t hit, he’s a T-1000 in the body of an 80-year-old man.

While I complain about the show going forward and technical details, can we stop with the “we’ve got lots of these ships trained on you.” Whether you like it or not as a pacifist/whatever you want to call yourself, Starfleet is a military outfit that uses military ranks, insignia, chain of command, and everything else. So why in that scene where Riker is telling Oh to (using my common parlance) “sling your hook, love,” is it that every ship Starfleet amassed was a heavy cruiser? The USS Zheng He is an Inquiry-class, and all the ships surrounding it look exactly the same.

Send out an Olympic-class, and get a couple of Californias in there, and the Phoenix is going into production around this time. Send out something a bit different in the background. It doesn’t matter that it looks a bit off, a military doesn’t care when it is quickly throwing ships at a problem. We’ll eventually see it in “Võx” or “The Last Generation,” you launch everything possible. If you think there is a battle about to take place, you send in medical ships because the sick bay might not be able to do enough.

As a plot on its own, “Et in Arcadia Ego” isn’t a bad idea, it is how it is executed and how quickly it wants to resolve all of these plot points at once. Or never at all in the case of Narek. If your character is so boring you can’t write their final moments, I think you’ve lost all credit as a writer in the first place. What Picard is to this point is a show specifically made for the fan service of one type of person. I’m not that person, and as a result, it falls flat.

I don’t think it falls flat because I don’t connect with it, I think there is something greater to how the show is written that contributes to that feeling as well. I mean, just look at how JL dies, it isn’t through self-sacrifice, it is through a disease that was going to kill him either way. At the end of the day, this was the only thing set up in character, and having a thing happen to a character than them deciding to do something is far less interesting to watch. That’s what is on the paper, something happening to Picard, not because of him or through his decisions.

If JL copped it 3 minutes earlier than he did we’d be talking about the Reapers coming through the time portal and wreaking havoc on humanity. Quite frankly, that could have set up for a better season 2 and we’d have gone on to have this crew fighting to get Picard back. It would have given me the time to mourn the character, and something would have happened. It would mean Picard affected the story of Lower Decks and eventually (spoiler) Discovery, but having that play out in the background of those shows wouldn’t see the ending of the franchise.

Picard and “Et in Arcadia Ego” aren’t bad, but they aren’t very interesting and that’s the problem. I like the cast we’ve got (minus Pill’s lower lip and flared nostrils), I think there is plenty to be done with those people, but what are their special skills and how did they use them to resolve the problem? Rios isn’t flying the ship to distract the Romulans, Raffi isn’t hacking/conspiring to halt the construction of the beacon calling the Reapers, Annika isn’t wearing a skin-tight suit (that’s satire!), and Elnor isn’t slitting people up. Picard talks and the problem is solved.

Admittedly it is the penultimate episode, nonetheless, it is the best comparison I’ve got: Go back and watch “Domino” from the third season of The Orville. Not only does that have more interesting space battles, but it uses the special skills of characters to solve the problem which is where Picard is failing. It is the same scary weapon idea but done correctly. I’m not trying to feed the “which is better, Star Trek or The Orville” argument. I like both for different reasons; the comparison is just a similar scary weapon idea, the end of a season, and characters I’ve grown to enjoy.

I don’t want to keep writing different ways I think the episode/season could have been done better, I think I’ve made it clear what had gone wrong. If Chabon hadn’t publicly stated the script was done weeks before shooting started on this finale, I wouldn’t have had the ammo to say “You didn’t know where you were going when you started, did you?” This season of Picard was a failure of serialized TV writing, one that I’m surprised it got as far as it did. All with predictable results.

Let this be a case study of production and writing failures. With decades of favor on its side, a cast of capable people, and a franchise of lore to play with, we got a subpar series of standard drama littered with jaded-lazy tropes. Essentially, the best parts of Picard are when it isn’t itself but the show it is trying to succeed, either through nostalgic reminders or some writing that aped what we once had. From beginning to end, JL has been in search of the plot which in these final episodes happens to him not because of him but to him.

It is nostalgia for the sake of it, peppered with big things happening that just aren’t interesting. Not that I am one to fall in love with the nostalgia dished out like extra servings lately in TV and film, despite a love for Lower Decks, that’s plot intertwined with nostalgia, not the other way around. If I wanted to relive the politics of “Measure of a Man” and what it means to be, I’d crack open a case and pop a disk in an Xbox. Evidently, why did this plot have to happen? What was its original purpose?

Ultimately, “Et in Arcadia Ego” much like Picard itself has sparks of interesting or entertaining moments, often which are too few and far between. Ladened with tropes so tired they go to bed at 5 PM after the Early Bird special, Picard feels like a show you’ve seen before and not a very good one. The cast and some ideas are fantastic, and someone in production had the sense to give us at least two good episodes, but no matter how much I praise the show something about it doesn’t click with me as a viewer, as a Star Trek fan, and as a TNG fan.

Phenixx Gaming is everywhere you are. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

Also, if you’d like to join the Phenixx Gaming team, check out our recruitment article for details on working with us.

Phenixx Gaming is proud to be a Humble Partner! Purchases made through our affiliate links support our writers and charity!

Star Trek: Picard "Et in Arcadia Ego"

4.5

Score

4.5/10

Pros

• A reminder of better shows.

Cons

• Where did Narek go?
• Where is the juicy emotional stakes in losing Jean-Luc?
• We get it, you hated Nemesis. We all did. Grow up and move on.
• That space battle wasn't much to write home about.