Dominion

 DVD, Picard S3 (Dominion)

From the relative heights of the previous episode to the depths of this one, although even the depths are relative - we still have scenes with Geordi talking to Data (and Lore), or Picard and Dr. Crusher, but good scenes are thin on the ground as there's a massive shift towards the weaker characters of the piece, and for every bit of good news (Raffi's not in it), there's bad (it's also Worf-less). Unquestionably one of the weaker episodes as we go back to some of the bad decisions of the season, and 'Picard' in general, that remind you the state of Trek underneath the glossy euphoria of our 'TNG' cast back together is not a healthy one. For one thing, most of them aren't, here - no Worf, only a momentary Changeling mockery to represent Riker, and it's sad to realise Troi only has three episodes of anything substantial since she doesn't appear here and her previous glimpses were fleeting. It is still lovely to see Data and how effortlessly Brent Spiner can switch between the two personas of he and Lore, but even in that side of the story it's much simplified, with the nuance and potential of his mixed brain excised by the kind of primitive 20th Century medical equipment we're meant to believe Starfleet used to experiment on Changelings - we're told there are four personas in Data's hybrid body, which is ignoring any connection to Lal they suggested in the previous episode, while also explaining that B4 and Altan Soong are only memory files, so it takes away a lot of the fascination to simplify things down to just good and bad sides with Data and Lore.

It was a relief that the good stuff between Lore and Data each seeking dominance of the joint mind (or not, as we'd see), was not in this episode because I was really hoping it wouldn't be wasted in such a weak story and kept wondering throughout if there was still time to fit it in. Fortunately, this is one of the shortest episodes of the season at just under forty-six and a half minutes (makes you realise how much they were able to pack in during the old forty-five-minutes-and-less days), but I was surprised how many things in it were a big step backward after so many instances of this getting Trek back on track. But it seems the whiff of past 'Picard' can't be fully expunged even with the joint 'TNG' cast's presence. And it began so well, too, with a surprise cameo from Tim Russ as Tuvok, now apparently (and rightly!), a Captain as can be observed from the four pips on his collar. This is exactly the kind of thing I want to see: a chance for these great Berman-era characters to reappear, and not just from 'TNG,' but 'DS9' and 'Voyager,' too. We never got anyone from 'DS9,' and sadly, Tuvok is only a minor blip who isn't even Tuvok himself, so it's another of those cruel moments, viewers left wondering if a favourite character has been done away with offscreen for no reason other than to provide a shock dramatic twist. At least Tuvok's wellbeing is eventually confirmed later in the season, and the Changeling posing as the Vulcan lets slip he's still alive since he says he'll regret it after they'd finished with him, but it's once again telling that Trek's most Vulcan of Vulcans (the first main character to be a full member of that race, don't forget), is smiling evilly before long.

Russ' performance is still recognisably Tuvok with none of the emotion so many Vulcan performers exhibit. Maybe the ears stick out a bit too much, and he really does look old, but on the whole it was a pleasure to see him play the character again, even though it was a facsimile and a bit of a disappointment we couldn't add Tuvok to the growing cast and see him alongside such greats as Worf or Riker (actually we did see him and Riker together when he was whisked into the Delta Quadrant by Q for 'Death Wish'), but this isn't the first time he'd played an alternate version of the character on another series since he had the distinction of appearing as Mirror Tuvok in a cameo of the second 'DS9' Mirror Universe episode, 'Through The Looking Glass' (the best MU story of all), not to mention appearing in both 'TNG' and 'Generations' as other characters so he has a long connection even to these actors! So Tuvok does have past connections with Trek outside his parent series, however obliquely, and it's a good move to continue that - he was also my favourite 'Voyager' character! It's also not the first time he's reprised the role post-'Voyager' as he was involved in fan films for a while, I think even spearheading one, so it's good to see that wasn't 'held against him' as there did seem to be some animosity between Paramount or CBS at the time, and independent productions using Trek characters and names. From a story perspective it made sense Seven should be talking to him, trying to get in touch with past allies, and they even throw in yet another reference to Admiral Janeway whom it's claimed is involved in preparations for Frontier Day, though another disappointment we'd never get to see her.

Seven is quickly able to expose the Changeling for what he is, since knowledge is one thing they can't replicate if they don't have it. Even there it was a bit of a weird one where she lists his mistakes, saying a Vulcan would never go where there were anti-Kolinahr demonstrations, but I'm not sure any Vulcan would shy away from debating such things, and just who would be holding such demonstrations if not a subset of Vulcans themselves since why would anyone care? It's a discipline for removing all remaining emotion for complete logic, a personal thing, so people being opposed to such an idea didn't sound very realistic at all! She also says her neural pattern was stabilised on Voyager, rather than where she said it was, and by Tuvok himself, which I assume is a reference to a specific episode, possibly Season 5's 'Infinite Regress' where multiple past personalities from her Borg implants were taking over (one of Jeri Ryan's greatest performances). And lastly, the key fact that unmasks the traitor is that only the real Tuvok would know they played Kal-toh together, so he must know what's happened to him! Except that didn't make any sense because she'd just said they played it - the trick should've been when this Tuvok says she often beat him and she said it was a card game, when it's not a multiplayer game, it's one person trying to arrange metal sticks into a pattern: a puzzle, not a card game! So that was all a bit confusing (maybe they were thinking of Kadis-kot, a boardgame for two players?). Russ only gets Special Guest Star billing in the 'end' credits, as opposed to the main ones, so were they toying with the idea of the main credits coming early in the episodes and didn't want to ruin the surprise, or was it simply he only had a small role so couldn't be placed with the main stars?

According to Geordi, he's responsible for finding places to hide the Titan from pursuing Starfleet vessels, claiming, short of junkyards, he's running out of these, but it was a great 'DS9' reference to have them squatting in the Chin'toka Scrapyards, site of important battles in the Dominion War, and makes sense there would still be a big debris field there. What doesn't make sense to me is later on when they're trying to lure the Shrike in by playing dead after a battle with a Vulcan ship. Huh? Presumably they didn't really fight this vessel, so what was it doing floating in 'Open Space' as the onscreen title claims? That was bizarre, and it was disappointing we weren't afforded a good look at it since it's rare, if ever, that we've seen a specifically Vulcan ship in later centuries of the 24th or 25th kind. Even worse, one of Vadic's Changeling lackeys calls it a Vulcan warship - now this could be the context of their point of view, that any and all opposition races' ships were considered warships, but it seemed awfully specific and not in keeping with the Vulcan way. I know they retconned in 'DSC' that a 'Vulcan Hello' means to come in all guns blazing in response to their Klingon first contact, and ruthless logic makes some kind of sense there, but would they still have vessels built for war all this time later? Even the recording didn't sound very Vulcan to me, but perhaps I misunderstood and that was meant to be the Titan's, or even if it wasn't, they might have mocked it up to sell the story. But why would this Vulcan ship have remained unclaimed, left to float in space, it doesn't seem efficient or security-conscious?

They were able to tie in the two stories reasonably well in that experimenting to try and help Data regain control leads to Lore having access to the ship's systems at a critical moment (Spiner deliciously nasty as the errant android), which then leads to Vadic and her minions easily subduing the Bridge (where'd all those guys come from and what were they doing when their Captain was captured?), but everything about this plan was nonsensical! They managed to squeeze in another 'Star Trek II' Trekference with her lifesigns scanner beeping like the one in the film, but it couldn't distract from the silly premise. I understand they can't keep running and they want to lure in their pursuers to capture them in a reverse cat-and-mouse setup, but the plan was poorly executed: we'll have Jack and Sidney run down some corridors, then use the age-old tactic (admittedly, nice to see harking back to the old days with that), of dropping forcefields to trap the invaders. And of course the plan would've originally been to beam the pair out, but due to Lore they were prevented. But why fiddle about with Data at all at this crucial juncture even if he may know more about the enemy's plot, they know how dangerous Lore is and that he keeps getting control so it seemed the height of stupidity to be taking any risks with ship's systems like they did? Of course they couldn't have foreseen it, but it makes Geordi look a little shortsighted - I suppose we can say he was still suffering from the shock of having his best friend back, desperate to help him, and it was certainly a nice scene when he tells Data/Lore what Data's death did to him, which he didn't fully express in 'Nemesis,' but even so!

The trouble with Jack is that he's a bit of a fantasy character, like he's strayed out of a superhero film, what with his apparent telepathic abilities (has he always had that or are they just manifesting themselves now?), reading Sidney's thoughts, to full-on taking control of her to fight her Changeling assailant, not to mention the continued blackouts, or 'red-outs' when his eyes blaze fire and he becomes SuperJack - even then he appears to have trouble dealing with the one Changeling in the corridor this time (the first time one of them spoke English), though ultimately doesn't hesitate to reduce him to ashes by Phaser. What is it with lethal use of Phasers, do they not believe in incapacitation any more? Then there're the usual Phaser bullets pounding away that always get my goat, another of those reminders of the legacy of the series' other seasons. And 'DSC.' And the Kelvin films... It was pretty good when Jack reveals his marionette power, acting out the moves Sidney needs to do to win her battle, but even that's been done before in Trek, and in a much cooler, more technological way rather than through mysterious fantasy powers: Worf controlled Quark's Bat'leth fight to win the heart of a Klingon woman, much to his disapproval, but 'Looking For Par'Mach In All The Wrong Places' had far more character, drama and stakes than this episode. Jack's statement that he likes a good fight when it's fair or when he's the one cheating, just about sums up why he's so irritating, and far from the many heroic, principled Trek characters we've known and loved. Clearly he's designed to appeal to a younger crowd who don't value fair play and good morals, and while his heart's in the right place he just keeps coming off as a rogue, the kind modern Trek prefers (unless they're superheroes with unfailing success and unerring judgement, like Michael Burnham!). He also has a short memory: feeling guilty about Riker's abduction, he claims he was good to him from the first moment, forgetting the elbow to the face when they first met! When he asks Picard if he's felt what it's like to know people are dying for you I expected him to recount his experiences of 'The Best of Both Worlds,' but he didn't. At least he's showing conscience, even if it still comes across as a bit self-absorbed.

Captain Shaw doesn't have enough time to be irritating, his main crime being that his idea of Phaser fighting is to run down the centre of the corridor firing as he goes, rather than taking cover! No wonder he has a chip on his shoulder when he comes up against great Captains or former Captains! He also has the distinction of being injured and flung onto the deck of the Bridge again, so is it another trip to Sickbay to patch him up? The character that really brings the episode down is Vadic: she's back to the forefront with all her musical line delivery and tottering madness. In some ways she's not so bad as she was earlier in the season, since things are getting out of her control, being threatened by 'The Face' who gives her her instructions, and feeling the tick of time running out. We get the Big Reveal this time on her and her cronies' motivation and it's a terrible destruction of Trek's Utopian ideals, or I should say yet another one! Now they're saying, or she is, that Starfleet refused to give the Changelings the cure to the virus that was killing them, claiming they had to steal it, but that's patently untrue since Bashir went into Sloan's head to recover the formula and Odo transferred it to the Link! She then recounts how she and others of her kind, her 'family,' were kept as prisoners of war aboard Daystrom Station and experimented on! We see images of syringes, bunsen burners and other outdated instruments of medical torture, perpetrated by lab-coat scientists happily whistling while they work, with the squeak of trolleys on castor wheels... I mean where do they come up with this stuff, why would Starfleet be using such ancient devices, it's ridiculous!

We're meant to feel some sympathy for her, but it's just a load of incoherent horror-infused creepiness. It's possible Starfleet weren't actually experimenting, or that they were, but didn't realise what they were doing (except it seems fairly cleat it was a specific plan called Project Proteus, all very comic book), rather like Dr. Mora Pol when he was trying to ascertain what kind of being Odo was, and whether he was sentient. Except Starfleet wouldn't have had that excuse because they knew a lot about Changelings by that point (couldn't we have seen a shot of James Sloyan advising them, is he still alive? Actually, I'm glad they didn't do that and ruin another great character). This was the perfect time to pin it on evil Section 31 being responsible for such heinous acts, but it seems the makers of modern Trek always want to make out that Starfleet, at base, is just as bad as any other group, worse when you realise they spout all this positive philosophy and are actually committing acts of atrocity! And what was all that about Starfleet voting not to give the Changelings the cure? Starfleet is the space fleet of the Federation, not some autonomous decision-making force by itself. If they'd said the Federation Council had voted that would have made some sense, though I don't believe they'd have refused to do that, going against all that it stands for. That was the whole point, that was how the war ended, they promised the cure, so to go back on their word would show the Federation no better than the Changelings who started it in the first place! They could easily have explained a lot of this away by Vadic misunderstanding the intentions, but instead this episode as a whole does a major disservice to the season, and while I found it interesting the first time round, this time I see how awful its messages are.

Supposedly Starfleet were turning Vadic and these others into spies to be used against other races, presumably after the war. Starfleet doesn't sneak around, that was always a key message of Trek, and while 'DS9' got the cool cloaking device for the Defiant it was more of a useful tool for the time, they didn't then retrofit the Romulan technology to fit the entire fleet, even during the worst battles of the Dominion War where it would've been advantageous to do so. To suggest they would manipulate a race of people like this is absolutely disgusting and turns Trek on its head! It doesn't even make any sense since how can you control a former enemy so effectively as to force them to infiltrate other enemies, the Changelings wouldn't have gone along with it. And what good are spies that can be tracked! After all that, Beverly discovers a way to track them due to what was done to them meaning there was something detectable in their DNA, so once that got out they'd be pretty useless spies, wouldn't they! The whole concept is just so badly written, and then, as if to put the icing on top, we have Beverly and Picard standing in front of Vadic's forcefield debating whether they should execute her on the spot! It's flabbergasting, did the writers not know what they were doing? Did they ever even watch Trek before? Are they really that debased of mind that they want to dismantle the whole ethos? The writing is back to old 'Picard'/'DSC' levels with lines like Crusher's melodramatic assertion that the moment they allowed Vadic to board they invited death aboard. It would be laughable if it wasn't so tragic.

Originally I assumed Picard and Crusher could be overheard by Vadic and knew that so were pulling a ruse to make her believe they were going to kill her only for the reveal to be... But no, it was left in a distressing, unpalatable state. Crusher admits she's compromised because of the love of her son and the need to protect him above all other concerns, and even says she's thinking of breaking her Hippocratic Oath to do no harm. It's just awful, and Patrick Stewart has none of the power he used to have, so comes across as an old man looking worried and just sort of going along with what she says. It's really quite scary as I can imagine the Picard of old forbidding Beverly from crossing the line, reminding her of her duty and warning her of what it will do to herself. But no, they just summarily decide to kill Vadic in cold blood, no trial, no appeal, it's just simpler and easier to remove her from the equation; to kill. Then when Lore intervenes and powers down the forcefield they quickly try to shoot her as she escapes and that's the only moment in the entire season when I felt even a modicum of sympathy for Vadic, but really only because I didn't want to see two beloved characters compromised by evil. I get the impression they thought this short debate on the ethics of killing was going to evoke memories of what Trek used to be, back when it examined the hard choices and morals encountered on a regular basis, but it's really only lip service, and shocking, too. Beverly even talks about genocide earlier in the episode, as if uncovering the Changelings' weakness and using it against them would be going that far, but it's all very weak stuff.

What a drop in quality, it really was surprising, and I didn't feel quite as strongly when I first saw it, but it's worse in the context of the season as a whole and shows that Trek has gone down a path, turned a corner, however you want to put it, that it will take far more than the addition of old faces to put right. It's a bit depressing because there have been some good things this season, the writing has generally improved and the style is reminiscent of good Trek. Perhaps the only good thing about this episode are the stakes that they could lose Data again, this time forever. Presumably there are no other backup copies of him (there are always backups, they can just 'find' another one in future if they need to!), so all that constitutes Data rests in this current body. It was nice to have Data 'wake up' and still think he's on the Enterprise, and mentions the threat of the Scimitar, with no explanation for those that don't remember what happened in 'Nemesis' - it's back to being part of that exclusive Trek club for those who have bothered to watch and keep track of everything, which made Trek so appealing in the past. Shame we have to be reminded of more recent events, like Picard saying Data asked him to set him free (years ago, apparently, but I thought this was supposed to be only two years later, which I suppose would make his statement factually correct, two years being 'years,' but isn't a natural way to put it!), the horrible euthanasia moment of Season 1. And as for the Shrike (back to foghorn announcements of its coming - ugh!), why would it just hang there while its Captain was captive, did they not have a contingency plan in case it was a trap, as suspected? There's such a horror theme to the episode with the imagery and the 'music' which sounds like a kettle coming to the boil, and even the great, reassuring theme is replaced for the end credits! Maybe the filming production itself was infiltrated by Changelings or Changeling sympathisers to give us such a twisted, miserable entry in the season?

**

The Bounty

 DVD, Picard S3 (The Bounty)

Data? Daaa-taaa? DATAAAAA! That was my reaction to this episode when I originally saw it. With all the hoopla over what character Brent Spiner would be playing, his past form on the series being as many characters other than his most famous creation as he could, and knowing he was going to be Lore, I had assumed this was to be yet another negative slant on the old positive Trek spirit that has been seen so, so much in the modern versions where evil or unpleasant characters seemed to be their preference (for example, they brought back Punk on Bus rather than Gillian Taylor!), so when we meet this android hybrid... 'thing' that contains not just Data, but past characters such as Lal, B4 and Lore, I was surprised to be so impressed and excited about the possibilities inherent in that idea! Trek is at its best when it explores ideas so this seemed to be an amazing source to both delve into a new aspect of androids, and to bring back a beloved character in a cunning and intelligent way that appealed on every level. How apt the title, as this episode brings so much bounty to the series and why I consider it to be the first genuinely good one of the season (and possibly the series), hitting all the right notes and harking back without becoming a machine gun of Trekferences without the heart or intelligence to back it up. It's such a bounty of treasure it's difficult to know where to start, but the title's a good place to begin - immediately the word 'bounty' conjures up memories of the famous Klingon Bird-of-Prey from 'Star Trek IV' (and 'III,' though it hadn't been dubbed HMS Bounty in that film), and here's how Trekwise they were with that: we get to see the actual ship, and not just as some fun little nostalgia nugget, but it plays a role in the story!

They knew what they were doing when they used that title, we get a bounteous selection of classic Trek ships as part of the plot involves the Titan heading to the Fleet Museum, presided over by none other than Commodore Geordi La Forge, and featuring 'every legendary starship' in their final resting place according to Picard. I'm not sure that sentiment quite rings true as there must be more legendary ships in Starfleet's long history than we see in the dozen or so bays attached to the (mushroom-shaped!), Starbase, even more when you consider it represents various Federation (or non), worlds - you can just about make out Klingon and Romulan designs, and I also thought I caught a Ferengi Marauder, although DVD quality isn't the sharpest (as I'll mention again later), which does impact the detail on display in long shots, and obviously can't account for many vessels which may have been lost or destroyed. It could also be said this is a shameless attempt at tugging on the sentimentality nerve, giving beautiful moments to anyone that loves 'TOS' (or more specifically the film era), 'DS9' and 'Voyager' - in that respect Terry Matalas wasn't lying when he implied characters from those two series could appear, because although we never get anyone from 'DS9,' sadly (unless you count Worf, which would be a technicality), the ships in those old series were characters in their own right, from the amount of time we spent with them. It's not mere gratuitousness, either, as the whole setup leads to the ingenious idea to retrofit the Bounty's cloaking device for the Titan's use.

In that case I almost wish they could have simply borrowed the Defiant itself since it had a cloak (although obviously what we know as the Defiant was destroyed near the end of 'DS9' and replaced with a renamed USS Sao Paulo and I can't remember if the Romulans replaced the cloak or not - they were allies at that point), but that might have been going too far for story reasons, and while the Defiant's innards would have been considerably cheaper to reproduce than most main starships, since it was an add-on to its series rather than the main standing sets, it made sense to incorporate a plot point from the films since they've obviously been a big inspiration and influence on this particular season - there were so many things reminiscent of the films, from the way the Shrike rises into frame at the start (admittedly like so many enemy starships in the past, but I specifically thought of the end of 'Star Trek V' when another Bird-of-Prey rose in front of Kirk on the planet), or when Riker and Worf explore the dark and dingy Daystrom Station - Riker even moves exactly like he used to and I only wished he was holding up a Palm Beacon to light the way for it to be a perfect recreation of many scenes, but again, specifically when they go aboard the Array in 'Generations.' Another visual link to that film was the room where Data's stored, with a circular platform at the end of a walkway suspended over a room being similar to Stellar Cartography (a key scene for Data in the film series so I have to assume it was a deliberate callback even if this one was much bigger to incorporate all the characters).

'Insurrection' came to mind with the Transporter tags being fired, which is how Riker's captured, and the events of 'Star Trek IV' are specifically recalled, with Jack referring to 'the whole whale thing,' with Seven adding further detail about the aftermath of the incident by saying they had a hard time finding it as it disappeared, clearly meant to remind us of its cloak, although in reality its outline would be visible from the displaced water, since cloaks don't phase-shift a ship, just refract the light around it, but it was a lovely idea that some 'modern' character from 'Voyager' would have read up about the events of that film a previous century before, tying two very different eras together in a new way, and I love little moments like that. But it's evident that 'Star Trek II' remains one of the main influences for Terry Matalas, the guiding force of the season, and there are multiple suggestions and connections to that film, such as the Titan using some three-dimensional thinking and hiding behind a moon near Daystrom Station (I was glad it didn't prevent them being detected, however, as such superior sensors wouldn't be fooled by such a simple tactic in the 25th Century, as you'd hope!). Even Vadic's lackeys seem to be evoking Khan and his followers' first appearance on the planet's surface in their masks and turban-like scarfs, and in the dim light of the Shrike they could pass as part of the same group. This is all without the actual specific pieces of those films, of course: the Genesis Device (actually 'Genesis II Device' as it's titled, since the original was used up in 'Star Trek II'), Kirk's Enterprise-A, and to great wonder, his actual body!

Funny that it's not the only former Captain of the Enterprise whose remains are part of this episode, as we learn the major theft by Vadic and her cronies was Jean-Luc Picard's body. But to dwell on the links for a moment, it was lovely to see these ships and that they haven't been dismantled or discarded, have a place of honour... Yet, at the same time it is sad that that time has passed, Trek's greatest series' are represented as being long in the past, remembered fondly by those that served then, but as is inevitable with time, we have moved on, and as Shaw so dismissively calls them, they're now relics (in itself a probable Trekference to Scotty's visit to the Enterprise-D in 'TNG'). We know from 'Lower Decks' the USS Voyager became a museum piece a very few years after she returned to the Alpha Quadrant, which in itself seemed a little unrealistic since it was a brand new, cutting edge ship of the line and while modern sentiment might prefer to parcel off such things in amber to preserve a narrative that reflects well on a brand, I feel like Starfleet was actually much more practical when it came to such things and preferred to keep its ships going as long as possible (you only have to witness the number of Excelsior-class ships still in operation the century after they were introduced), and I, for one, would much prefer to think of these places as continuing to be living, useful tools for continuing Starfleet's mandate of exploration and peaceful diplomacy rather than so quickly reducing them to museum pieces or 'experiences' for the general galactic public.

This is all just personal preference, I know, and Season 3 of 'Picard' is set decades after the previous series' which featured these ships so it makes much more sense than in 'LD,' and complete sense for actual historic vessels from before living memory such as the Enterprise, and Constitution-class New Jersey - obviously they couldn't have the original Enterprise because that was refit, and then destroyed in 'III,' so they managed to get a different example which represented that most famous ship class of all. It also widens the universe a bit as we're left wondering what events this ship was part of, what deeds led it to be considered worthy of being placed along with the finest in the fleet's history. I only wish 'Enterprise' had been represented, as the NX-01 is the most key ship in Starfleet history and its first voyage is what Frontier Day, so important to the season's plot, is all about celebrating. I have the feeling it may have been there, and maybe gets exposure in a subsequent episode, so it's not too egregious an omission, but I do wish that series' connection to events had been played up a bit (a hologram of President Archer wouldn't have gone amiss, but they weren't made of money!). For obvious reasons the Enterprise-D isn't part of the visual tour, but I must mention the decision to include Kirk's body. Probably the most controversial, at the very least mind-blowing, inclusion of the season (and amidst so much that's saying something!).

I knew there would be something along these lines as I couldn't avoid the news headline about it, but I didn't know if they'd actually feature William Shatner at all (probably not - again: money), or even a CGI version of his face. I did wonder if they might reanimate him, and I wasn't sure how I felt about that, but as it turned out the flurry of excitement was over very little! It's just a display case in a corridor that has a vital signs computer display with his name on and the wistful classic signature theme playing over it. I'm not sure if the suggestion was meant to be that his body was in some kind of stasis, because you get the sound the Bio-beds always used to make over it, although it could simply be monitoring the conditions in which the dead body is kept in preservation rather than any actual life signs. That wouldn't make sense, because we saw him die and this was my concern: I love 'Generations' as my favourite Trek film, and a big part of its attraction is the poetic, fitting death of possibly my favourite Captain. He always knew he'd die alone, and he did, in the sense he wasn't with his comrades of old, but shared the moment with his successor and it's just a beautiful part of a sensitive, mournful, poignant study of life, death and the passage of time that came on the scene at the key moment of Trek's Golden Age, and while part of me has always wished Shatner came back somehow, you can't keep having one final appearance - I know Spock died and came back, you could almost say twice since he ended up in another universe and was as good as dead to his old friends, and Data has now died twice and now comes back for a third time, but equally I think I'm at the point where I wouldn't want characters to return from the dead.

My view has always been I love it when Trek brings back actors to play their character again, but once the original actor has died, that should be it, the work of that character is their legacy and shouldn't be tampered with, it should stand as a testament to them and not be recast or recreated because while death isn't always permanent in Trek, in the real world it is and it undercuts the uniqueness of each person if we do recast, the only real reason being to capitalise on past success, reinforce branding and all that other marketing jargon - show business always has emphasis on the second word, it's there to make money, but I always loved the way they treated Trek through the Golden Age of the 90s and beyond where they only brought back a character with the original actor and after that was no longer possible, though they might be mentioned, you knew you wouldn't see them again. There was a finiteness to the possibility which made you appreciate it more. That changed in 2009 with 'Star Trek XI,' and subsequently 'DSC' and 'Strange New Worlds,' all three of which I rank at the bottom of Trek's output, not just for having the audacity to suggest others could portray beloved characters, but also that they weren't treated with the necessary respect, and even with the greatest actors and the greatest respect, they were never going to equal what had been done before so it would be better to keep moving on to new characters. I'm getting off-topic a bit, but my point is that I now wouldn't want Kirk's death to be undone. Unless they could do something as ethereal and special as the recent 30th Anniversary tribute to 'Generations,' the Roddenberry Archives' '765874 - Unification' in which the amazing development of CGI has shown what is possible.

I'm not going to get into that short, it's not canon, sadly, but was a lovely idea to have something which could be interpreted a number of ways, one of the reasons it works so well beyond mere technical demonstration. I like the impression I had from 'Generations' that Kirk was laid to rest on an alien world that never knew him, taken out of time to make a difference one last time, the only man who'd ever know being a future successor who made the effort to bring his body to the top of a mountain and built a cairn upon it. It's a hauntingly respectful treatment of both Captains, right down to the finishing touch of placing Kirk's combadge on the rock. To me it made sense that Picard wouldn't have written a detailed log of all his experiences, but had kept Kirk's death a private matter out of respect for his original death in the 23rd Century, a secret he shares only with the audience, although I can imagine him tracking down Spock, if possible, to tell him of his greatest friend's last moments. Again, it's all about interpretation and leaving things open to an audience's imagination, something modern writers tend to fail at monumentally, spoon-feeding every development in a bland malaise of action, melodrama and the next mystery. They don't make Trek like that any more, it's much closer to that second (mis)treatment, hence why I wasn't entirely keen on the idea of Kirk being revived or his burial place disturbed. At the same time I can buy that it was still a secret and it would have found its way to Section 31 or Starfleet Intelligence who wouldn't have been so sensitive about investigating a time traveller. But ultimately we don't know what happened or what was planned by the writers since it looks increasingly likely there won't be more Trek in the 25th Century.

The Section 31/Starfleet Intelligence mashup is another point that bears thinking about. I think this is the first time Section 31 had been mentioned this season (perhaps even the series - if not, I hope so!), Starfleet Intelligence had obviously been part of it since Ro, Worf and Raffi all worked for them, but once again there's a bit of fudging going on here: Worf stating Daystrom Station contains many of Section 31's most nefarious projects, or 'table scraps' as he describes them. I'm not sure if this is meant to imply that everything Section 31 did was impounded and is now overseen by Starfleet Security (if so, putting it all on a station in space seems about the least secure storage possible since a starship can come along at any time, whereas a planet affords a little more protection, especially a vault deep underground!). Does this mean that 31 is no longer operating and was finally put to bed after Bashir's investigations in 'DS9'? More likely they just went deeper underground for a few decades, the trouble is inferior writers think it's easy to write about this entirely tricky proposition introduced by, and during, the best of 'DS9,' so anyone taking them on is on a hiding to nothing as we've seen so often from 'Into Darkness' to 'DSC,' and it's best to leave well alone, I fear. Worf even says they are a division of Starfleet Intelligence, but can that be right? They were supposed to be entirely autonomous, although top brass like Admiral Ross were aware of them. It's a very difficult and touchy subject to poke, especially nowadays as the free world becomes ever more vigilant, surveilling its populations, using controversial facial recognition, etc, and I'd have preferred they ignore 31, and any clandestine ops touched only on Starfleet Intelligence, the legitimate face of internal intel-gathering.

It was actually pleasing at first when 31 was mentioned because Riker seems not to know who they are, but then it turns out to be just a callout so it could be explained for the audience and Riker admits he knows of them, just didn't realise they kept their stuff at Daystrom. In the one instance it would have made sense for 31 to be mentioned, when they're discussing the events of the Dominion War (you almost have to pinch yourself: we've got Worf standing up in front of Picard, Riker, Crusher and Seven at a conference table having a meeting about the Dominion War and its aftermath, saying Ro Laren's death must not be in vain - can this really be happening? The only missing piece is them saying a little about what they did in the war, and also, it reminds me that Ro's shuttle crash should surely have taken out the Starfleet ship's Nacelle and left them without any power, but hey ho). They say a virus was developed in retaliation to the Changeling threat, but wasn't it 31 who were responsible for that? Again, I should remember my 'DS9' lore better than that, it is my favourite series, after all! Picard reminds us Starfleet gave the cure to the Great Link (thanks to the efforts of Dr. Bashir, I think, which would have been nice to mention), so although it was the kind of underhanded tactics Roddenberry would've been horrified by, it made sense in the context of 'DS9' and the war that such extremes were gone to (even though in reality the Founders were infected long before via Odo after his visit to Earth, so it was a long-term plan, though it was clear the Changelings were a threat well before their overt aggression). Sounded a very modern idea to expect the villains to attack on a notable date such as Frontier Day to make a statement, like the 11 September attacks on the Twin Towers, but maybe that's always been a tactic of terror in history?

These exposition scenes were a joy, however, as are the numerous reunions throughout. We'd had four of the seven main cast of 'TNG' (five if you count the Troi bit, though it wasn't much, nor in person), but not all together like we see here: we get to welcome another valued member of the crew (and Raffi...), with Worf coming aboard the Titan at last, to the sound of the great Klingon theme (no more La Sirena, thankfully - let's hope that ugly 'Star Wars' excuse for a starship doesn't end up in the Fleet Museum, though qualification is far from clear!), reuniting with his old friends, and it's a wonderful moment. Somehow all these characters just come across more themselves as they spend time with each other, most notably Picard who almost sounds like his old self again, which is a big improvement over the wheezy old dodderer he'd become. Oddly, Worf notes it'd been eleven years, five months and four days since they last met (he's been counting down?), and I wondered if this was significant in some way since Worf had been in eleven seasons of Trek (seven 'TNG,' four 'DS9'), and five films (counting his role as his own Grandfather in 'Star Trek VI'), and four actual 'TNG' films. Could it be? It's certainly possible with the amount of in-depth canon continuity shown in this episode! And I love it. It's not just that, though, as they've had infrequent communications and Picard has sent him a bottle of 'sour mead' as Worf describes the finest Picard wine, much to Picard's chagrin - oh, it's all so 'TNG' and the films, they slip right back into that easy banter, a balm after all the anger generated around or by Picard in many previous episodes of the series that bears his name, wiping Riker's unprofessional outburst from memory in scenes of joyous togetherness!

This is the kind of thing that makes me like this episode more than what had been shown so far (and probably what came after, too), even if not everything is explained. For example, Worf never states how long it's been since he last met Beverly, and that could be twenty years or more since she'd been out of contact with all of them. It's nice he grimly allowed her to hug him (I know the feeling!), and there's no animosity between anyone - even Geordi, who shows he's changed after having a family, is only mildly disapproving of his former boss (whom he now may outrank as a Commodore, though it wasn't mentioned), and while there's a light attempt at an arc there where he refuses to help because, like Riker, he's lost his nerve when it comes to his family, too concerned for his daughter who's chosen the starship path and considers Picard put in danger, then shamed by his pilot daughter into realising he's made a mistake and allowed age and concern to take him away from the younger man he was. That's the second reunion, and it's not quite as joyous - it made sense to me Geordi behaved the way he did, except for the fact that it's explained Starfleet is compromised. If he knows the Changelings are affecting the organisation then how could he believe they'd ever just leave him and his family alone? It makes more sense to get off the fence and do whatever he can to fight against this force for evil, not selfishly try to protect his family (as realistic and understandable as that is - except these are heroes, don't forget), but for the very sake of his family!

One thing I will give them is Geordi's highly sensible opposition to Starfleet's nonsensical idea to create a huge centralised target of themselves by gathering the entire fleet together to commemorate Frontier Day - it shows Geordi has a head on his shoulders and it was a concern which needed to be voiced. And it is so good to see him again - like all the rest he looks and sounds like his character, but has a cool new look. The eyes with their technological wizardry are still there, but now he's a bit smarter in his Commodore uniform, retaining the small beard from the film era. And though we already knew at least part of the 'All Good Things...' timeline had come to pass, we finally get to see his family together (though either he didn't have a son in this timeline, or he's just not mentioned, which you'd think he would since sons are a topic of conversation!). The one area they remained coy about was his wife's identity. I don't know whether this was an effort to allow some space for future productions to add to the canon as Trek so often did (something that can be a wise choice when good writing steers the franchise, and spectacularly bad if it doesn't, as we've seen in recent years, to Trek's detriment), or whether this is some kind of agenda-led choice to dissuade the coming together of black and white (I know, it sounds ridiculous, but so much which is ridiculous happens nowadays). The only reason I wonder about that is because in the past it was always understood Geordi's greatest connection was to Dr. Leah Brahms (played by Susan Gibney, a frontrunner for the role of Janeway, who returned to Trek to voice a fantasy version of Brahms in 'LD,' and I was so hoping we'd get a little cameo from her, even if only via Viewscreen!), and even in the alternate future of 'All Good Things...' his wife's name is Leah, so I think it's what most long-term viewers would respond to.

As it is, while Geordi mentions they'll have to tell Mum they won't be home for dinner, it's a line which creates a nice, homely image in itself, but leaves us intrigued as to whom he's married. It's a mystery that was left blank and will now probably never be revealed, but Alandra, his other daughter who works at the Museum with him, has much lighter skin tone than Sidney so it's perfectly possible they could be the mixed race offspring of Brahms, and it would have made a lot of people so happy if it'd been the case. As it is, it's another thing we're allowed to speculate on and interpret as we see fit, and there's something to be said for that. Speaking of Alandra, it's not that there's anything wrong with her, but after the fresh vivaciousness of Sidney whom we'd been allowed to gradually get to know a little over the first half of the season, she does come across as a little more reserved and plain. Which is a shame because she's Levar Burton's actual daughter. But maybe that's meant to be part of the character because her Father was a bit like that and Engineers seem to be largely portrayed as more interested in technology than human interaction, or feel more comfortable in that sphere - not universally, but generally speaking. She does have one important line when she reveals that starships are all interconnected now, so anything that happens to one of them will be known by the others. I'm not sure about this concept... You could say starships have always been connected, but this makes it sound like it's more than just long-range sensors and comms, they're actually interlinked directly, as in their systems...

Does not sound like a sensible idea at all! I can understand they might have more advanced comms, can be remotely controlled, or easier to locate if one's in trouble, but it sounds like what we'd get later in the season, that they can just be group-controlled (I think that's what happens), and this connectedness, a bit like the Internet of Things, the idea that everything from your washing machine to your lights could be linked up, just suggests the danger that if one part can go wrong, the whole lot can be brought down, not to mention computers have always been hacked, so leaving your tech open to an outside force controlling every aspect of life just seems a ridiculously high price to pay for added convenience, but that's a whole other issue I don't want to get into! Connecting a fleet together isn't exactly a new idea, and even in new Trek they've done it a few times, such as the automated fleet Kirk brings in as cavalry in the alternate future timeline of 'SNW' Season 1's finale (the only episode of that series I've liked so far!), as well as it being a key part of 'LD' Season 3's finale (at least it wasn't the finale this time), and even the identikit fleet Riker shows up with in the 'Picard' Season 1 finale could very well have been linked up considering they were all the same vessel (in which case you'd think he'd know about this development, of anyone on the crew). Perhaps it's a very new development otherwise the Titan would be similarly connected and Shaw would pipe up, and I wasn't even clear if they were referring to the whole fleet old and new, or just the Museum ships, but that wouldn't make much sense since why would you go to the trouble of interlinking museum displays?

It's a good time to mention Captain Shaw since he's largely quiet in this episode as the limelight has gradually shifted to the 'TNG' cast infesting his ship, and apart from the occasional glib aside he's really only the Titan's figurehead at the moment. Until he gets one moment to show another side of his personality, getting all tongue-tied on meeting Geordi whom he clearly idolises as the legendary Engineer that he is. There are a couple of problems with this for me, firstly you'd think some of Geordi's glory would have reflected upon Picard and Riker (though I increasingly think his showing off at the dinner table on their first meeting was the power play of an insecure man, reacting to having such dignitaries march aboard his ship out of the blue), so he'd have been a little kinder to them on behalf of Geordi (though of course I'm sure he never contemplated meeting the great man), and secondly, because we're so used to his sarcastic persona, when he's speaking genuinely it's hard to quite take him seriously, as if he's really being insincere, though obviously he isn't (I remember a guy at college who had a similar way of speaking, so when he said things he often wasn't taken seriously, so it just goes to show it's important to be sincere, whether you mean it or not!). It's more of a comedy moment than anything, the irregularity of this guy who'd been so dismissive and disrespectful is suddenly ingratiating and embarrassed at his excitement on meeting his hero, and it certainly fits with the general upbeat tone of all these reunion moments where the 'TNG' people have slotted immediately back into their old roles with the playfulness and comfort of old friends.

It at least serves to humanise Shaw somewhat, even if he remains rather unlikeable on the whole. Another character who's struggled with that problem is Jack Crusher, and yet another reason I warm to this episode where previous ones haven't quite made it is because he works a bit better. He has a nice talk or two with Pops (well they had to get their money's worth out of that bar, didn't they - they've hardly used it so far! At least the episode didn't open with 20th Century pop music again), resigned to having inherited the Irumodic Syndrome that ultimately killed Picard. I'm so glad they stopped being coy and called it what it was! In Season 1 they were vague about it, referring to a brain defect, or something along those lines when you just want them to come out and spout some Trek lore - maybe they were still in a bit of mistaken mindset that they didn't want too much Trekkiness to it or it might put some people off? That's the only reason I can imagine why it wasn't stated directly and only hinted at, but here it's all canon cannons blazing as it should be, and this is what Jack should have been concerned about when they finally had a proper chat without animosity in the last episode or whichever, instead of how long he was likely to keep his hair! I don't remember if it was referred to in Season 2, but probably not. Although it was a rather stupid development and they've been generally fairly good at ignoring it, it made sense to bring up Picard's positronic synth body and brain, partly to underline the seriousness of Jack's condition, but also for an easy hook to comprehend Data's new form later in the episode, so some nice, deft work going on here which I appreciate even if I don't like the synthetic idea, but we have to accept they did that, and move on.

Another scene that helps Jack, not to mention Seven (also in grave need of character restoration after the terrible direction of the first two seasons), is the shameless nostalgia plugs of having them on the Bridge surveying some of these classic starships. It helps Jack immensely with someone like me when he admits that, while not very pro-Starfleet in his time, he's always loved the starships, as so many of us do. He becomes more identifiable as a fellow admirer of the clean lines of the Enterprise-A, and has just enough knowledge to speak confidently on the subject, but not too much that he doesn't leave space for Seven to open up about what Voyager means to her. It's actually quite emotional when Seven tells him she was reborn there, calling it her home, and the crew her family, and I mean emotional in the old Trek style of not blubbing and making a scene of yourself, but quietly evoking a poignant connection that's as much about what goes unsaid as what is expressed, so they really are hitting everything with this episode. It would serve as a reminder for why Seven is so objectionable since she appeared in 'Picard,' because she's so different to that time, except that there's much more of the old Seven now. Still far from perfect and they don't always hit the right notes with her, but an improvement all the same. It would have been great to see her meet Worf, presumably for the first time - it's exciting just to have two of the greatest Trek characters in the same room together, the same way I felt when she was with Riker or Crusher, though not Picard as we'd already had that botched in Season 1.

Jack and she have a nice bonding moment, something he does several times in the episode, such as with Picard himself, but also with Sidney whom he seems to admire. They share a commonality in the difficulties with their Fathers, so he's come a long way from the hostile, cocky young bounder he started as, though still overly cocky - he gives Picard a rundown of what he considers his qualities are, in typical modern self-absorption, and modesty was not on the list: another contemporary view where people are encouraged to praise themselves and show themselves in the best light possible rather than letting others judge their qualities for themselves, or am I being oversensitive? Importantly, he doesn't detract from scenes with the 'TNG' cast, everyone's served quite nicely. It's not that it's full of exciting moments of visual splendour or pounding action, it's little character interactions that bring the past to life, but continuing it in the present, and that's what works so well. The reunions punctuate the episode and give it structure - I've already mentioned Worf and Geordi, but the best is yet to come. While the whole trip aboard Daystrom Station smacks of Section 31's space base in 'DSC' (and I really don't need anything that reminds me of any of that!), it is a repository of Trekferences of the kind 'LD' was built on, except there, in the flesh! So we get a killer attack Tribble that naturally throws itself at the cubicle when the Klingon passes, the aforementioned body of James T. Kirk, a crow of the type Data dreamt of (was it a crow, though, or a raven?), Genesis, and what at first came across as the damp squib of the episode: Moriarty!

If they'd kept this quiet it would have been an amazing reveal, Easter egg though he was, but it had to be included in the trailer and there was much excitement about the return of the two-time 'TNG' holographic villain played once more by Daniel Davis (it was rich his calling out the characters' ageing - he with his wispy white hair and craggy face, though it was fairly well hidden in the murk!), especially as the impression was given that he'd be a villain of the season. Granted he still was, slightly, but it was a very small cameo appearance compared to others who returned, and I must admit I was a little disappointed they didn't appear to tie in to his ongoing story or finish it in some satisfying way, so that on first viewing I think I missed the importance of it being a device Data (or whatever he is, I'll just call him Data for the sake of ease), used to confirm these were his former friends, with the violin notes reaching that point where Riker understands this is a test, then we see the flashback, or technically actual footage from the first ever episode of 'TNG' (how did they make it widescreen?), where he met Data and whistled on the Holodeck and it takes you back to that exciting time of the start of a new Trek series and the unknown potential and possibilities that existed then. I'm still disappointed it wasn't exactly the 'real' Moriarty, or at least Riker says he isn't the same self-aware Hologram they'd encountered on the Enterprise, he recognised them, but there was no mention of being stuck in a fake reality cube for decades so I assume this was just some kind of copy of the program Data had access to, and it is a nice moment when you realise what it's leading to.

They didn't have to do that, they could have had it be something simple like Riker doing the whistle at the door to the vault and it opens for him ("Open Sesame!"), so the knowing touch was appreciated, and it's better the way it is, it's just that whatever they do it's never enough, we want everything neat and satisfying, but this was just a little extra fun. The fact Moriarty shoots at them and looks like he could do real damage must have been the side of the station's program within Data (or even Lore's input), that was also something designed to generate a security response, as it came up on screen through the system's glitchy vision point of view (we even got a Riker publicity still from 'Nemesis' when the system uses facial recognition, which was nice), again suggesting it's not quite working right. Whether it makes sense for Starfleet to employ 'lethal protocols' in one of its facilities is another question, but I'm still a little vague whether this was a Starfleet Intelligence location for storing 31's miscreant experiments, or a base for 31, and in that case they would undoubtedly have no qualms at all about using such defences. Geordi calls it the Federation's most classified facility, so maybe nobody really knows what it is? I'm not counting Moriarty as one of the reunions because his nature is so unclear and I think he'd have more to say about how they left him if it was the exact same program (which means the 'real' version could still show up on something, like 'LD,' though unlikely, I suspect), but his role is as gatekeeper to the third and most ground-shattering reunion of them all: Data!

Or is it? A little bit of Lal here, a touch of Lore there, mix it in an android synthetic body and add a dash of Soong, and what do we have: Trek's greatest comeback since Spock in 'Star Trek III,' it's fair to say! I never dreamed they'd undo the travesty of 'Picard' Season 1 which concluded with the neural remains of Data (after he'd been exploded aboard the Scimitar in 'Nemesis'), asking for euthanasia because he was bored and dying would somehow complete his journey. I hated it, it was just so terrible, clearly a support for the idea that everyone should have the choice to die if they get to the point of suffering or in this case, boredom, which made it even worse. Rather than being a touching scene of Picard helping to make his great friend finally finish his journey to being human it just looks lazy, cruel and unnecessary, and by teasing us with the android body that was ready to go and not giving it to Data, it was a horror that this episode finally puts right. Was it even Data from the Scimitar (these villains do love their intimidating ship names, don't they!), or was it the remains of his 'brain' from the unstable B4, the last vestiges of him that Picard was comfortable winking out? Either way, that awful event is undone, but in such a way as to provide a fascinating direction for the character to go - Brent Spiner was always superb at performing variations on the character, as well as entirely new ones (see 'Brothers' for his triumvirate tour de force as Data, Lore and their creator, Dr. Noonien Soong, or 'Masks' for taking on various personas, or 'A Fistful of Datas' for a sight of Data in a dress, as well as appearing as every other denizen of a holographic Western town, to name three examples off the top of my head!).

What they gave Spiner here was a real gift and one that I don't think was fully realised, even in the following episode. I loved the idea Data was the most dominant part of the mind, but that he could also slip into other personalities at a moment's notice, like the perpetually childlike and confused B4 (whose head returns having been seen in the Season 1 opener, 'Remembrance'), or the corrupt Lore. I wonder which Soong it was meant to be - I would assume from the fact that Noonien died after Lore shoved him back on 'TNG,' and that we see a holo-recording of Season 1's surprise human Soong son, Altan, that it was meant to be the latter since he gave up his own body to save Picard. Did he die alone, did Starfleet help transfer his consciousness to this new Data? There's a lot we don't know, but it remains a rich source of story potential if we were going to get more Data in the future (although some of that potential is neutralised very quickly!). They did get one major thing wrong about Data once again: everyone always forgets Soong androids were designed to age! It comes up in Season 7's 'Inheritance,' I'm always mentioning it because Spiner himself used to argue he couldn't play Data forever because he's getting older and Data isn't, but that's just not true. Maybe they should have made more of a song and dance about it at the time and followed up on it in the films, but for whatever reason, they didn't (probably the old business reason of simplifying things in film adaptations of a TV series to keep the status quo).

Not that it matters - all I care about is that we get to see Spiner back as Data, and just like Worf, he's one of the best characters ever created by Trek so it was all such a joy, almost ending the episode on a high. But it's not over yet, there's much to find out about - we learn Starfleet continued Soong's work after he died (again, which Soong? Presumably Noonien), though would he have allowed that if he had a son? Wouldn't he have made it all possible for his son to take over - and wasn't the whole point of creating Data because he couldn't have human children? Anyway, now the ban on synths has been lifted the sky's the limit (which was a stupid, unreal plot point of the series before, but if they must mention it, fine, because Data's back!). They may have done Spiner a slight disservice to go from his first appearance as the android in 'Encounter At Farpoint' directly to what he looks like now, but I assume they were ensuring the audience was keeping up and understood this old guy with ordinary-looking human skin was now Data. I was just impressed they used so many little details to build up to his return with Riker talking about crows, Moriarty, the whistling, 'Pop Goes The Weasel,' if ever the term 'love letter to the fans' can be applied, it's here. Spiner even gets an 'And Special Guest Star' billing at the end of the main cast credits, topping the other returnees who were 'only' Special Guest Stars, but he deserves it, and the nuance of his performance is right there again. I know he'd played Data in a couple of episodes of Season 1, unlike some of the 'TNG' cast, but it was still different this time: Crusher says it's an almost human positronic body, and his and Picard's newfound kinship even slightly improves the bad writing of turning him into an android, although I doubt Picard can turn his eyes into a holo-projector! And his official designation is Daystrom Android M5-10 (M5 a reference to multitronics, perhaps?), rather than tongue-tripping Datalalloreb4soong it could have been.

When they refer to Data as being some kind of hybrid, a synthetic android interface, although his skin tone is human, I thought they might be referring to his brain and how he has these different minds within it. It really was a masterstroke, and almost as good was making Data not just another stored item of the station, but the manifest and security AI all rolled into one. I wasn't quite understanding the reason for the theft of the portal weapon (especially when Vadic could have gone for the attack Tribble, which seems more her style: personal, painful and deadly!), and how it was all a smokescreen to distract from the real objective, which was Picard's body, because I'd forgotten why they would want it, in the same way I couldn't remember why Jack can do extraordinary physical acts, taking out multiple assailants (he didn't see Riker's elbow coming at the end of the first episode, did he?). At least that mystery is solved and they mostly haven't dragged out the mysteries this season, other than Jack. I felt the way Starfleet Security was handled worked reasonably well - we know they patrol every hour, although I'm not clear if that means within the facility or by sending a starship from the nearby planet every hour - I thought at first one of them was a Ferengi which was an interesting choice, but it turned out it was once again the darkness and indistinctness of the DVD (and it was on a monitor), that led me astray as this guy is a new alien race, and in reality Vadic in disguise so she could kidnap Riker. I'm surprised her real Starfleet flankers weren't shown to be shocked by the violence in punching Riker as that isn't Starfleet behaviour, but they were taken out very quickly and we didn't get a sense of their feelings on the matter.

It wasn't all good, there are still elements of the aesthetic legacy of the previous seasons to linger like a bad smell, such as the warp effect where they just slam in with a boom sound effect, losing the grace and poise (why did they warp back to the station and then cloak when they got there rather than cloaking before, that seems ludicrous, and even more that they weren't spotted - I can only put it down to a belief they had to have a visual, but that's why you have the rippling effect so we know where the ship is!), and my eternal annoyance of the blat-blat Phaser 'shells' rather than the beauty of lancing beams slicing through space like a scalpel of light. Not to mention some of the out of place language, such as Geordi using the phrase 'geek out,' which just doesn't sound right and brings it back too much towards the actors rather than their characters. And maybe even Worf's so-called pacifism which is verbalised so specifically by him this time when he tells Riker he prefers pacifism to combat now when the former suggests they'll need old-fashioned Klingon offence, and yet he's still carrying a massive sword on his back! I understand, it's harking back to the humour in their differences and there's plenty of that natural back and forth between them, which is only right. Raffi's a sort of third wheel they didn't need, but exists to remind us of the series' past. One thing Worf said was a bit melodramatic: fearful be the god, the man or the beast that stands in the way of him bringing Riker back, but if a god was stopped by a mere mortal they wouldn't be God - but of course Klingon gods were phonies anyway as they were pretty weak to be killed by those they supposedly created, according to Klingon mythology!

We're given more depth to our knowledge of this particular group of Changelings - for instance, I hadn't been certain the masked lackeys that crew the Shrike were such, but when they're given a vehement tongue-lashing from Vadic, calling them 'ill-defined, unshapen' (which isn't a word - should've been misshapen), it seems quite definite, while Riker obviously believes they're Changelings at the end when he brazenly insults his captors by asking one of them 'how much goo did they pour into you?' Not exactly the height of cutting remarks, but it upsets the lackey enough to give him a slap, not a typical reaction from the usual examples of the race since they tended to hold themselves to be so superior to 'Solids' they wouldn't deign to bother. But these are also shown to be a breed apart (and sadly, like Vadic, less interesting for being mere puppets, a real step down for people related to those who held the entire Alpha Quadrant to ransom), with the implication from Vadic the others can't change their faces since she claims they suffer each day having to wear the faces of the Federation, which would at least give a motive for mask-wearing. But then it's more puzzling they speak in clicks and chirps (with subtitles, which I usually adore for alien languages), except in this case I'm left to wonder why, especially as Vadic's one of them and she can speak normally, and is also able to shapeshift.

There's also the rather major issue of 'no Changeling has ever harmed another,' a defining line from 'DS9' about the race, and why it was such a shock when Odo was forced to kill one of his own people. Yet here, one of the masked menaces shows some mild dissent by pointing out Frontier Day is only seventy-two hours away and they're no closer to their objective, for which another mask-man blasts him into the usual red sparks that pass for a Phaser disintegration these days. This shows the writers either didn't have a full grasp on the unique nuances of one of Trek's greatest villains, or they didn't understand that making them everyday thugs was a grave disservice, since, like the Borg (coincidentally...), it was their sheer alienness and radically obtuse mental processes that were so opposed to Federation reality which made them such fascinating adversaries for our heroes to engage. I certainly never felt with this season they managed to portray these aspects or make them sympathetic, even though we'll find out they're literally wearing the faces of their captors (a bit like the Vidiian who stole Durst's face in 'Voyager'). Why they can't, or don't, change their faces, wear masks, and why Vadic doesn't, I don't recall an answer ever being given, as they faded towards the end of the season. But while they (or Vadic, at least as the only real character to represent the whole), are such a mad, rogue offshoot of their race, they also seem to value the Great Link even so, since Vadic says something about there being silence, unity and peace again, which sounds very much like a desire to return to the Link.

Riker's kidnapping leads to one last reunion of the episode, but this one's not such a happy one: as much as Riker would be glad to see his wife under normal circumstances, finding her already a captive of the rogue Changelings would be quite debilitating (I wonder why they didn't have their daughter, Kestra, too, but perhaps she was old enough to have left home by now and it might have moved the focus away from Riker and his Imzadi, plus the ever-present issue of needing to save money for certain things, I'm sure). It was lovely to see Deanna again, it's just unfortunate for her that we'd already had Geordi, and especially Data, showing up for the first time, plus she was old hat since we'd seen her in Season 1, and she's barely in it, too. But it's still a good way to end what was otherwise a very happy (and mostly quite clean), episode with the final part of the team reunited with at least one other cast member, even if we had seen her a couple of times by screen communication. And it was amazing to see every 'TNG' main cast name (of those that stayed the course), everyone together again after so long and in the flesh (even Picard, sort of, with the holo-image of his real body!). And you get Daniel Davis. And all those ships. And even the delicious old cloaking sound. Trekky details like Transporter inhibitors, a return to the Engineering 'bit' we saw previously... (Was a character called Starbuck mentioned in dialogue as a 'Battlestar Galactica' tribute?). It truly was a bounty! And just to show they knew exactly what they were doing, they didn't even tread on the toes of past Treks, careful to make the title slightly different from the 'Enterprise' episode, 'Bounty,' unlike 'DSC' which broke yet another Trek rule by reusing a previous episode title ('Anomaly' from 'Enterprise'), so you can see they were really trying hard at every level, and at least here it paid off.

***

765874 - Unification

 download, 765874 - Unification (2024) film

Whatever it was I just watched, it had more power than anything Trek has done in the last fifteen years! But I don't now what I just watched - was this a proof of concept for a CGI Kirk and Spock? A top of the range expensive fan film? A vanity project for Shatner? I really have no idea, I just saw the news story on TrekMovie.com and thought it looked interesting. The only real disappointment is that it isn't a genuine Trek production! And maybe the fact it gets a little too fan-fiction in bringing back these various characters (including a surprise one-episode wonder from 'DSC' in Yor, the time travelling Starfleet officer who I always thought looked like an Yridian). It's also clear that this is 'fake' in the way that characters don't quite move one hundred percent realistically, and the shots from a distance have an unreality about them. It also suggests they can't yet have these CG recreations speak as no one says anything, not even a croaked, "Jim..." But as a proof of concept it was amazing to see James T. Kirk, and in three different stages of his life. Not only that, but to bring back Robin Curtis as Saavik was amazing, although I didn't understand who the hooded Vulcan with her was meant to be (her son?). I thought at first it was meant to be Spock and I was slightly put off by his emotional demeanour (typical of modern depictions of Vulcans, it has to be said!), and that he didn't actually look like Spock. But now I'm not so sure as Kirk ends the short with a visit to the bedside of the presumably dying Spock, again presumably in the Kelvin Timeline.

It was simply magnificent: touching, with a grandeur and majestic quality befitting of bringing back two legends one last time. I know 'Picard' Season 3 gave us the additional canon that Kirk's body had been retrieved from Veridian III, and there did seem some connection to that here when 'Yeoman Colt' (how is she alive and still young? So many questions...), is shown with modern Starfleet displays like that in 'Picard,' but the mechanics of it all and getting us to this point didn't seem to matter as it had that mystical, heavenly impression sometimes seen in 'TOS' films like 'Star Trek III' and 'Star Trek V.' I was very impressed, although at the same time, as much as I'd love this to have been part of a new Trek film, I also don't like the idea of artificial recreations (or really any recreations, recasting included), to continue their story - I feel they should be left to lie in peace, especially Kirk and Spock, who have both died in Trek. But I can't argue with the quality on display here, even Michael Giacchino's music, which I don't always appreciate, was suitably sensitive rather than over the top bombast, and this was a triumph! I'm not sure what the title refers to, I assumed it was a future Stardate, and obviously the Unification is that between two old friends separated by death, and about to be separated again. Beautiful.

*****