Star Trek

A general discussion forum, plus hauls and silly games.
User avatar
andersonh1
Moderator
Posts: 6323
Joined: Fri Jul 18, 2008 3:22 pm
Location: South Carolina

Re: Star Trek

Post by andersonh1 »

It looks like Data has put on a little weight :mrgreen: ... but we do just get that one scene, so I'd like to see more of the CGI mixed with Spiner's performance to really judge. But I agree, his appearance is a bit off compared to how he used to look.

And now that you mention it, I remember Data talking about his option to age. Wasn't there an episode with an older lady who came on board the Enterprise, and it turned out she was an android and didn't know it, and she was aging? "Inheritance", maybe?
User avatar
Sparky Prime
Supreme-Class
Posts: 5225
Joined: Wed Jul 23, 2008 3:12 am

Re: Star Trek

Post by Sparky Prime »

andersonh1 wrote:And now that you mention it, I remember Data talking about his option to age. Wasn't there an episode with an older lady who came on board the Enterprise, and it turned out she was an android and didn't know it, and she was aging? "Inheritance", maybe?
Yeah, that was "Inheritance". Juliana O'Donnell. Soong built an android version of her after she was injured escaping the Crystalline Entity, and wanted to give her the chance to live out her full life by making everyone believe she was the original.
User avatar
andersonh1
Moderator
Posts: 6323
Joined: Fri Jul 18, 2008 3:22 pm
Location: South Carolina

Re: Star Trek

Post by andersonh1 »

I had wondered if one of the Romulans in the trailer is Donatra, the Romulan commander who came to help Picard fight Shinzon at the end of "Nemesis". It would be interesting to at least see that character mentioned.

Speaking of Nemesis, I recently re-watched it since Picard will apparently pick up some plot threads from it. It's a mix of things that work and things that don't.
- The music is great, so no complaints there.
- I enjoy the fact that Riker and Troi finally get together and make it official. Took them long enough. The same is true of Riker finally accepting a promotion to captain. I always figured that he just wanted the Enterprise and kept hoping Picard would retire, but no luck.
- No explanation is given for why Worf is in uniform when he should be an ambassador for the Klingons. I get that he was probably there for the wedding, and stayed on the Enterprise for the trip to Betazed. But still... a line somewhere would have been nice.
- Picard and Data were clearly the two lead characters in all the TNG movies, but everyone else usually had something to do. Here Worf, Geordi and Dr. Crusher get a few scenes with very little impact on the plot. Riker and Troi get a bit more to do (though not all good... that mental rape of Troi is a terrible, very much in poor taste scene that the movie could do without). This is very much a story focused heavily on Picard and Data, who carry all the major action and storylines.
- It's nice to finally see the Romulans get some time as villains in one of the movies (prior to the 2009 reboot of course).
- similarly it's good to finally see the Remans and learn something about them.
- I appreciate the references to DS9 and Voyager with mention of the Dominion War and a cameo by Admiral Janeway.
- Tom Hardy gives a good performance, but he never once convinces me that he's a younger version of Picard. He doesn't look enough like Patrick Stewart, and he doesn't look like the younger Picard we saw several times during TNG.
- I like the battle at the end of the movie. It doesn't have the massive scale that the fleet battles in DS9 did, but it's a good hard hitting starship fight of the kind I enjoy seeing in these movies.
- Data's sacrifice is nicely played, though in re-watch the setup with the personal remote transport is glaringly obvious foreshadowing for how he will save Picard in the end, as is Picard's insistence that "I have to do this myself" when he beams over to the Scimitar to disable the Thelaron generator, when he clearly should have taken an armed security team with him. I hope this is addressed as part of the reason he's dwelling on Data's death in the movie, since it was in large part Picard's fault for going alone in the first place.
- There are a lot of deleted scenes on my 2-disc DVD version of the movie that add a lot of character moments, and they really should have been left in the movie.

Overall, I do enjoy Nemesis. I'm not sure the good outweighs the bad, though I think it probably does. There are some scenes I really enjoy, and some that I really don't. But I am glad to see that soon it won't be the finale to this era of Star Trek. Always assuming that what we get is a step up in quality.
User avatar
Shockwave
Supreme-Class
Posts: 6205
Joined: Sun Jul 19, 2009 4:10 pm
Location: Sacramento, CA

Re: Star Trek

Post by Shockwave »

I'll be glad to see Data return if he actually does become a full functioning Data and not just "B4". Also not sure about the CGI on him either. I do like the idea of giving us another wrap up besides Nemesis but with Kurtzman still being heavily involved I thoroughly expect him to fuck it up royally. As for Nemesis, there was a LOT about it I didn't like. Like most of it. Like, I enjoyed the wedding and that was it. I didn't think the Picard clone thing worked at all and why the hell would they do that anyway? They had to know that wouldn't work. And the scene where they fly the shuttle through the rest of the ship, and Data's death, and the aforementioned mental rape... yeah, I pretty much hated most of it.
User avatar
Sparky Prime
Supreme-Class
Posts: 5225
Joined: Wed Jul 23, 2008 3:12 am

Re: Star Trek

Post by Sparky Prime »

andersonh1 wrote:- No explanation is given for why Worf is in uniform when he should be an ambassador for the Klingons. I get that he was probably there for the wedding, and stayed on the Enterprise for the trip to Betazed. But still... a line somewhere would have been nice.
Yeah, this always kinda bothered me. "First Contact" had the Defiant battling the Borg Cube with Worf in command, "Insurrection" had Worf starting to explain why he was there but gets interrupted with all the commotion of the ceremony, and then "Nemesis"... Nothing. It makes sense he's be at the wedding ceremony, but they really needed a reason for him to be in uniform again. Same thing with Wesley Crusher. He's at the wedding on Earth back in a Starfleet uniform as well (and will be an engineer on the USS Titan according to a deleted scene), despite last we saw him, he'd left the Academy to go with the Traveler.
- Picard and Data were clearly the two lead characters in all the TNG movies, but everyone else usually had something to do. Here Worf, Geordi and Dr. Crusher get a few scenes with very little impact on the plot. Riker and Troi get a bit more to do (though not all good... that mental rape of Troi is a terrible, very much in poor taste scene that the movie could do without). This is very much a story focused heavily on Picard and Data, who carry all the major action and storylines.
Totally agree. I hated the mental rape scene, that shouldn't have been in the film. And the other characters certainly should have had more to do.
- It's nice to finally see the Romulans get some time as villains in one of the movies (prior to the 2009 reboot of course).
I really wish they'd kept the Romulans the main villains of the film, rather than making the 'real' villains the Reman's, lead by a clone of Picard... Fan's had been asking for the Romulans to be the villains of a film for forever, and I don't feel they ever really delivered on that. Even with the 2009 film, given they were miners that didn't represent the Empire.
- Tom Hardy gives a good performance, but he never once convinces me that he's a younger version of Picard. He doesn't look enough like Patrick Stewart, and he doesn't look like the younger Picard we saw several times during TNG.
Also, odd they decided to make him bald, when we saw Picard had hair in his youth.
- I like the battle at the end of the movie. It doesn't have the massive scale that the fleet battles in DS9 did, but it's a good hard hitting starship fight of the kind I enjoy seeing in these movies.
Yeah, this is one of the best space battles in Star Trek. One thing bothers me about that though... After the Enterprise rams the Scimitar, all it takes is the Scimitar reversing engines to separate the two ships again, when both ships would need to be in order to dislodge the Enterprise. Oh, and how the Viceroy falls down a massive pit (why is that there?) in the Enterprise when they're already supposed to be at the lower levels of the ship.
Overall, I do enjoy Nemesis. I'm not sure the good outweighs the bad, though I think it probably does. There are some scenes I really enjoy, and some that I really don't. But I am glad to see that soon it won't be the finale to this era of Star Trek. Always assuming that what we get is a step up in quality.
It's not the worst film of the franchise IMO, but it's certainly down near the bottom for me. 6 was a good send off for that crew, but this movie I don't feel did TNG crew justice. It is good to finally be getting follow up to that movie. I can only hope it will be better....
User avatar
andersonh1
Moderator
Posts: 6323
Joined: Fri Jul 18, 2008 3:22 pm
Location: South Carolina

Re: Star Trek

Post by andersonh1 »

https://trekmovie.com/2019/07/30/brent- ... ek-picard/
Data is back, but not every episode
Speaking to the Las Vegas Review Journal promoting his upcoming appearance (and concert) at Star Trek Las Vegas this week, Brent Spiner also talked a bit about his appearance in Star Trek: Picard:

Data makes appearances in the show, I can say that. And Data is a story point in this season as well. But I’m not in every episode. I’m not a major character on the show.

According to the article, Spiner has read all the scripts for the first season of the show, describing them as “excellent.” The actor also offered this assessment of Picard:

I think people will be really, really excited about it, because it’s a great story.

Based on what Spiner says to the LVRJ as well as his SDCC media appearances and on the SDCC panel, it seems he will have a recurring role in the series and not just a brief cameo. Jeri Ryan has also confirmed she will be appearing in more than one episode. As for Jonathan Frakes and Marina Sirtis, indications are they appear in just one episode, which was shot last week.
User avatar
andersonh1
Moderator
Posts: 6323
Joined: Fri Jul 18, 2008 3:22 pm
Location: South Carolina

Re: Star Trek

Post by andersonh1 »

https://trekmovie.com/2019/07/23/star-t ... r-details/
One of the big surprises in the Picard trailer from SDCC was the appearance of Brent Spiner’s Data, who was last seen sacrificing himself at the end of Star Trek Nemesis. Patrick Stewart talked to IGN about how that has impacted Picard and is woven into the show:

Jean-Luc carries a lot of guilt about how Data died, and he sacrificed himself for the captain. It was a sudden and urgent snap decision, but that has weighed heavily on Picard all the years since. And that becomes one of the central motivators of what Jean-Luc does in this new series.

Speaking to TVLine, Brent Spiner clarified his two appearances in the trailer, both in disassembled form and speaking at the end:

In that drawer [as seen in the trailer] I think is B-4…Data is indeed on the show…He isn’t in every episode. He makes some appearances. But he is in the show in other ways.
User avatar
andersonh1
Moderator
Posts: 6323
Joined: Fri Jul 18, 2008 3:22 pm
Location: South Carolina

Re: Star Trek

Post by andersonh1 »

I'm starting to wonder, after reading these latest interview excerpts, if they didn't download Data's memories from B4 and install them somewhere so that the Data we're seeing is a hologram rather than a physical entity. Other than inhabiting B4's body (which is the route the comics took), I'm not sure how else he could return to the series after being destroyed in Nemesis. I do like the idea that his sacrifice has haunted Picard ever since.
User avatar
Sparky Prime
Supreme-Class
Posts: 5225
Joined: Wed Jul 23, 2008 3:12 am

Re: Star Trek

Post by Sparky Prime »

It is interesting the implication seems to be that Data's memories didn't take over B4's body, as the Countdown comic said. And Spiner's comment that Data is in the show "in other ways". I've seen some suggest, based on the little bit of the collar we see him wearing in the trailer, that Data's appearance might be in the form of flashbacks. I kinda like the idea of downloading Data's memories from B4 and making him a hologram. I'd think Starfleet could reverse engineer the Doctor's mobile emitter to give him similar autonomy. Or maybe even just as a program Picard occasionally calls up to converse with his old friend. Another possibility, between having Lal, B4 and Lore's bodies in Starfleet's possession (not to mention, the Enterprise discovered Soong's labs on Omicron Theta and Terlina III that likely had plenty of materials to learn from), maybe Bruce Maddox finally figured out how to (re)create a Soong type android and built a new body for Data. Although, I kinda doubt the writers would go that route...

Not sure how I feel about Picard being haunted by Data's death, and that being a central motivator for Picard in this show. I mean, I can understand he'd feel guilty about Data sacrificing his life to save his life... But as a Starfleet Captain, surely Picard would be used to the idea of loosing people under his command, even some he considers close friends.
User avatar
Shockwave
Supreme-Class
Posts: 6205
Joined: Sun Jul 19, 2009 4:10 pm
Location: Sacramento, CA

Re: Star Trek

Post by Shockwave »

I can see Data's death sticking with Picard. He seemed pretty heavily affected by Jack Crusher's death, although that could also have been because his wife and child were aboard the Enterprise.
Post Reply