Star Trek: Picard - Season 3 Review

This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm finally crossing Star Trek: Picard off my list of things I need to get done. It's over, I've reviewed every episode and now I'm covering season 3 overall.

That makes this the third series I've covered in its entirety, after Babylon 5 and Star Trek: Discovery, though in this case it wasn't that much of a challenge considering it only has 30 episodes in total. That's less than half of Discovery's episode count, and that wasn't particularly long for a Star Trek series either.

Anyway, I'm reviewing season 3 in particular, though there will be SPOILERS here for the rest of the series.

Star Trek: Picard 3-10: The Last Generation (Quick Review)

Episode:

30

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Writer:

Terry Matalas

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Director:

Terry Matalas

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Air Date:

20-Apr-2023

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This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm reviewing The Last Generation, the dramatic conclusion of Star Trek: Picard's dramatic concluding season. This means I've completed another series! This, Star Trek: Discovery and Babylon 5 are the only three shows I've finished writing about in their entirety, so this is a rare event for me.

The episode was produced, written and directed by showrunner Terry Matalas, so it's more one person's vision than any other Trek episode since, I dunno, the first episode of Strange New Worlds (and that has a couple of other names besides Akiva Goldsman's on the 'story by' credit). The next closest episode after that I can think of is from way back in the 60s, as the Original Series' Elaan of Troyius was written and directed by John Meredyth Lucas. So that's pretty rare too.

There are going to be all kinds of SPOILERS below so I wouldn't go any further unless you've seen the episode yourself. Also Star Trek: Voyager. And Return of the Jedi.

Star Trek: Picard 3-09: Võx (Quick Review)

Episode:

29

|

Writer:

Sean Tretta & Kiley Rossetter

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Director:

Terry Matalas

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Air Date:

13-Apr-2023

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This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm writing about Picard's penultimate episode, Võx, which has a weird title. At least, that's what the experts say. Personally I have no idea if it's right or not, I didn't even know that it was Latin, but the internet seems pretty sure that tilde shouldn't be over the o. It may have been meant to be Vōx, but plain simple Vox would've worked just fine. It means 'voice' by the way.

One thing you don't often see on Star Trek is the showrunner directing an episode themselves, but Terry Matalas was at the helm for this one. He'd directed a few episodes of Twelve Monkeys previously, including the finale, so I'm sure he knew what he was doing. It would've been hilarious if he didn't though, and Picard ended as a complete train wreck on a basic production level. I guess I'll find out!

I'm going to start discussing SPOILERS now, so avert your eyes if you'd rather not know anything about this episode or what led up to it.

Star Trek: Picard 3-08: Surrender (Quick Review)

Episode:

28

|

Writer:

Matt Okumura

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Director:

Deborah Kampmeier

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Air Date:

06-Apr-2023

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This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm reviewing the season 3 Picard episode titled Surrender.

It was written by Matt Okumura, who wrote Hide and Seek for Picard's second and absolutely nothing else. Well, nothing in Star Trek anyway; he's had experience writing for Leverage: Redemption and Blood & Treasure, which are two series I'm not sure I've ever heard of.

If you don't want to see SPOILERS for series like Discovery, Strange New Worlds and Picard, you should stop reading here.

Star Trek: Picard 3-07: Dominion (Quick Review)

Episode:

27

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Writer:

Jane Maggs

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Director:

Deborah Kampmeier

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Air Date:

06-Apr-2023

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This week on Sci-Fi Adventures I'm watching Dominion, which is an interesting word in Star Trek. There are ominous implications there.

It's the season season in a row to feature a Jane Maggs story as episode 7, though that's not much of a coincidence as she wrote almost a third of season 2. Arguably the worst third, but I'm blaming the season arc for that more than anything. I haven't seen director Deborah Kampmeier's name on any Picard episodes, but she did direct The Galactic Barrier for Discovery, which is an episode I didn't like all that much either. Damn, not a lot of reasons for optimism so far, but I'll see how it goes.

This is where the SPOILERS start, so quit reading here if you don't want the episode ruined.

Star Trek: Picard 3-06: The Bounty (Quick Review)

Episode:

26

|

Writer:

Christopher Monfette

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Director:

Dan Liu

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Air Date:

30-Mar-2023

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This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm writing about the 26th episode of Star Trek: Picard, which also happens to be the number of episodes Star Trek shows used to have each season. If Picard was like a 90s show this would've been the season 1 finale! But it's not, it's halfway through the final season. In fact there are only four episodes left, so if my maths are correct Picard is going to end up falling a little short of Next Gen's 176 episode run.

The episode is titled The Bounty and now I suddenly I want a chocolate bar with a coconut filling. It's not an unattainable goal, but I'll get this done first.

There are going to be SPOILERS, so if you don't want everything ruined you should stop reading.

Star Trek: Picard 3-05: Imposters (Quick Review)

Episode:

25

|

Writer:

Cindy Appel & Chris Derrick

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Director:

Dan Liu

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Air Date:

16-Mar-2023

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This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm finally back to writing about Star Trek: Picard's third and final season! It's only 10 episodes so you'd think I'd be done with it by now, but I had to put it to one side for a couple of months to get some other things written. Discovery's last season was coming out, I had a The Last Jedi review in the works for May the 4th, then the first season of Ncuti Gatwa's run of Doctor Who started as well, so there were a lot of things demanding my time.

But that's all done with now, almost, and I'm ready to give Picard my partially undivided attention for its remaining six episodes.

Imposters was the final story to be credited to Cindy Appel and Chris Derrick, who'd been on the show since season 2. Derrick did one story, Appel did a few, and none of them have been highlights so far. Director Dan Liu was new to Picard, but he'd also done some Strange New Worlds so I'm sure he knew the difference between a phaser and a phase inducer.

Warning, SPOILERS beyond this point.

Star Trek: Picard 3-04: No Win Scenario (Quick Review)

Episode:

24

|

Writer:

Terry Matalas & Sean Tretta

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Director:

Jonathan Frakes

|

Air Date:

09-Mar-2023

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This week on Sci-Fi Adventures I'm writing about more Star Trek: Picard. It's season 3, episode 4: No Win Scenario.

In Star Trek, a no win scenario is a situation where there's no possible way to achieve any kind of good outcome. It's a mythical thing, like Rumpelstiltskin or the Greek god Apollo, except less likely to be encountered by a veteran crew with an ongoing series. Sure the heroes lose sometimes, but if they ever think a situation looks hopeless they're just not looking at it from the right perspective yet.

The episode was written by Terry Matalas and Sean Tretta, so the showrunner scripted this one personally. You'll see often a showrunner's name on the most crucial and impressive episodes in a season, the opening chapters, the epic finales, the format-breaking stories, the ones that reveal something about the characters... though on Deep Space Nine you'd also see it on all those Ferengi stories. Ira Behr did love them Ferengi.

I hope you're okay with SPOILERS because this is where they start.

Star Trek: Picard 3-03: Seventeen Seconds (Quick Review)

Episode:

23

|

Writer:

Jane Maggs & Cindy Appel

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Director:

Jonathan Frakes

|

Air Date:

02-Mar-2023

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This week on Sci-Fi Adventures I'm watching Seventeen Seconds, written by Jane Maggs & Cindy Appel.

Those two were the writers for the weak middle chapters of Star Trek: Picard's second season, but who knows how much of its weakness was due to their writing and how much was because of the story they'd been given to tell. I mean director Jonathan Frakes also worked on those episodes, and he's got a fairly solid track record! He's is the only Star Trek: The Next Generation director to still be directing Star Trek to this day, and the only live-action Trek spin-off he's missed out on directing for so far is Enterprise. I guess he was too busy directing Clockstoppers and Thunderbirds at the time.

There will be SPOILERS ahead.

Star Trek: Picard 3-02: Disengage (Quick Review)

Episode:

22

|

Writer:

Christopher Monfette & Sean Tretta

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Director:

Doug Aarniokoski

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Air Date:

23-Feb-2023

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Today on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm watching another episode of Picard, called Disengage. Hey, I see what they did there.

It was written by Christopher Monfette & Sean Tretta. I recognise Monfette from season 2, he worked on some of the better eps, but I don't think I've seen Tretta's name on anything before. Director Doug Aarniokoski has been there since the start, he's the one that did Nepenthe, The Star Gazer, Penance... lots of the good episodes. Aarniokoski was on Discovery as well, starting with the episode Lethe, so he's a proper Star Trek veteran. He hasn't done any of Strange New Worlds yet, but I suppose there's plenty of time for that now it's been renewed.

There will be SPOILERS below, so beware.

Star Trek: Picard 3-01: The Next Generation (Quick Review)

Episode:

21

|

Writer:

Terry Matalas

|

Director:

Doug Aarniokoski

|

Air Date:

16-Feb-2023

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This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm starting Star Trek: Picard season 3 with the episode The Next Generation.

There's nothing weird about Star Trek shows switching showrunners, but it's funny how every season of Picard is clearly a new creator's story. The first season was helmed by novelist Michael Chabon, the second was by Akiva Goldsman, and the third was by Terry Matalas. Okay, that's an oversimplification, as Goldsman also worked on season 1 and Matalas worked on season 2, and the episodes themselves were by a bunch of different writers, but this was definitely Matalas' turn to steer the ship.

I'm one of the people who enjoyed season 2 but I have to concede that it was a bit of a mess. In fact, a lot of Trek fans consider it to be a complete train wreck, an embarrassing disaster, perhaps the worst season of Star Trek ever made. The trouble is, it's hard to tell how much of that was due to Terry Matalas' presence and how much was due to his absence. There was some overlap with the production of the second and third seasons, and Matalas switched his attention to season 3 after just a few episodes. So it could be that season 2 collapsed without him or it could be that his decisions set the season on a course for catastrophe.

Anyway, at the time I'm writing this intro I already know how season 3 went, but my episode reviews were written back when they were coming out so they're all full of authentic ignorance. It just took me a year to publish them because, I dunno, it seemed more important to write about The Trouble with Tribbles and Doctor Who's 60th anniversary, and Picard got pushed to the back burner.

There will be SPOILERS in this review for the whole episode, and things like Star Trek: Discovery, but it won't give away anything that happens later as I didn't actually know what happens later.