Happy Canada Day, Star Trek style

 Happy Canada Day from the good people at Star Trek: Strange New Worlds.

 July 1 is our National Holiday up here in the Great White North and how awesome was it for me to tune into the latest episode of SNW and find it set in Toronto, Ontario, Canada in the not-to-distant future?

And that the episode featured Christina Chong as La'an Noonien-Sing, one of my favourite actors and characters in the long history of Star Trek?

What a fantastic surprise.

Now, that's not to say it was a perfect episode. The Romulan spy found them just a little to easily and they travelled to Vermont and back just a little too quickly for my taste. I don't know why a Romulan, who has been trapped in Earth's gravity for 30 years, would be so much stronger than La'an, who has always been very powerful for a human.

I am still not sure how we reconcile the argument SNW makes that the name Noonien-Singh is infamous in the 22nd Century when, in TOS, Kirk and Spock have no idea who Khan Noonien-Singh is and make it clear that "most records from that period have been lost".

But... it was great to see the homage to Toronto's street hot dog vendors, to the futuristic-looking colourful Canadian banknotes and to the overall Canadian custom of kindness and serenity.

And it was also nice to get a chance to explore La'an as a character a little bit more. She's one of the more intriguing characters introduced in recent ST series and I enjoyed the chance to get to know her a little bit better.

SNW continues to impress. I look forward to more.

And, as I watched "Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow" filter to a quiet end, I wonder why the last second focus on the 21st century watch La'an brought back with her and, further, if we are going to find out that a little Kirk baby is on the way...

Yes, it's true, Star Trek: Picard got even worse in Season 3

OMG, is Star Trek: Picard season three ever awful!

Plot holes, internal time issues, canon consistency problems, character defilement. What more could you (not) want?

I despised the deification of Jean Luc Picard in the first two seasons so I guess at least it's nice to see him brought down a peg.

Plot hole:

In the third episode, Worf and Raffi identify from a picture a criminal they wish to apprehend and question. They find him, chase him through the yet-another crowded Blade-Runner-esque dark and dreary night club district, then torture him for information. The big reveal? That he's a changeling from the Great Link (of DS9 fame).

But, if he's a changeling, why did he keep the same appearance long enough for Worf and Raffi to track him down? Why did he not "change" in the middle of the chase so as to be able to escape his pursuers easily?

Arghhh!

Internal Time Issues:

With Titan trapped by the enemy vessel for mere hours, how is that Raffi and Worf can move from planet to planet, track down shapeshifting terrorists and carry out extensive torture during those same few hours?

Arghhh!

Canon Consistency Problems:  

So, after that maudlin the-Picard-line-is-at-an-end story line in Star Trek: Generations, it seems absolutely ridiculous that episode three of STP suggests that Picard did not want children (a son) or that Crusher actually believes that at this stage of their life?

We spent two hours listening to Jean Luc bleat about how upset he was that his brother and nephew died in a fire and, as a result, put an end of the Picard family name in that awful crossover movie -- the least the writers of STP could do is respect what we sat through and the canon.

Oh, and let's not talk about how much of the scene between Crusher and Picard ("Why didn't you tell me?" "Were we going to be together?") is "borrowed" from Kirk and Carol Marcus in Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan. Though, to be fair, the writers of STP didn't borrow so much that they matched the dramatic effectiveness of the original scene. They managed to make a short, somewhat tense scene from Wrath into long, boring scene in STP.

Character Defilement:

Troi's only appearance in episode three is a ridiculous cameo that comes straight out of a 1950s era family sitcom. Formerly a strong, independent character, she's now reduced to a sitcom mom?

And, on a related note, how did we end up with a Star Trek series where the two leads are both old, cis-gender straight white men? And the only other captain we see in Star Fleet is also an old white dude?

Arghhh! Arghhhh! Argh!!!

At least Riker and Picard are now sensitive, new age cis-gender straight white men who are in touch with their feelings and sensitive to their roles as fathers. And that they choose the bridge, in the middle of a life-and-death crisis, to talk them through.

Arghhh!!!!!