Star Trek: Picard.

The reason is fuck you. I want my Rhode Island.

That was one of the unintended timeline changes that came out of the Butterfly mission.

Those 185,000 timelines from "Parallels" correct for all of this.

Wikipedia says the first season of PIC starts in 2399, and that line about the Borg not having been seen for a decade means at least ten years since the end of PIC season 2, which took place long enough after season 1 for Picard, Raffi, and Rios to all be back in Starfleet, Rios to be promoted to captain, Elnor to get into the academy and get his first posting on the Excelsior, the Synth ban to get revoked and Soji to start acting as an ambassador...

Season 3 has to take place after 2409, regardless of what anyone else says.

Aw... remember back when Shaw was explaining to Seven how to catch a changeling in the act, and he tells her she's a great officer who'll make a great captain one day... and then Seven cuts him off, assuming what he's saying is an example of how a changeling might out themselves by saying something the real person would never say... but in fact he was sincerely baring his soul to her, like Ro and Picard did to prove to each other they weren't changelings.

Probably helped that he was loopy on painkillers.

Of the entire bridge set, the dedication plaque was the only piece that was originally used on TNG.

The Good:

- The Enterprise-D swinging around to pick up Picard et al from the Borg cube. Easily the coolest shot ever in TNG, and a beautiful angle on the Ent-D. Just wow. The younger version of me would have creamed his shorts watching that sequence.

- The Enterprise-G. Captain Seven. And Captain Shaw's officer review of Seven. (Still pissed they killed Shaw.)

- The final scene of the Ent-D crew playing poker. It's been done before, but at least they ended on a high note.

The Ugly:

Everything else. Most of this season and the previous two seasons were a complete fucking wreck and an entirely unnecessary addition to the Trek universe. The only good that may come out of this show is hopefully a new series with Captain Seven and crew. And hopefully they kill Jack Crusher in the pilot episode.

Has anyone explained why the Borg became an ally of the Federation and petitioned for provisional membership at the end of season two... but in season three they decide they want to destroy the Federation?

What happened to the Borg-Jurati Queen? And the transwarp conduit threat?

https://www.reddit.com/r/television/comments/12u907s/im_terry_matalas_showrunner_and_executive/

Matalas did a Reddit AMA, that's the link.

For @Uncle Albert

Hell… I’m still stuck on the Synths in Season 1 spazzing out on Mars outpost. Like WTF?
So I guess Patrick Stewart was playing Picard like a doddering, feeble old man the whole time? Because the second he got on the bridge of the E-D, he seemed like an older version of JLP that I know. I think that choice was a mistake. I still think the 1st 4-5 episodes of S1 was this series’ best.

Bottom line, All Good Things was better.

It was a classic TNG episode ending. Everything resets and there are no consequences and we don't talk about it ever again.

I think there are multiple Queens and maybe this was the last one left. Jurati Qeen takes over for the alternate universe Queen. So the Borg we see is the Borg we know from TNG-VOY and FC. Apparently they were destroyed with the exception the Queen and apparently this one cube. Jurati is a separate Borg faction, I guess. The transwarp conduit threat is anyone's guess.

That leads to this tweet from Matalas, which explains the Borg situation:

https://twitter.com/TerryMatalas/status/1646886712814223362?s=20

Apparently there's some throwaway line from Captain Shaw that explains it. I probably missed it.

I missed that line too. Did anyone catch that line?

Shaw said "the real Borg are still out there" at one point, which explains basically nothing.

Sounds like Terry’s pulling shit out of his ass.

Yeah, it's absurd that the cool fun Jurati queen couldn't just overwhelm that sad dying Krige queen in a battle of wills, or even just warn everyone well in advance that she was coming.

Star Trek: Picard's Final Scene Came From 45 Minutes of Footage

This is interesting.
Write an episode of Star Trek: Picard with the plot revolving around the Borg and the changlings working together to destroy the Federation. Picard has a son named Jack that he was previously unaware of, but Jack is central to the plot and the Borg Queen needs him in order to carry out her plans.
Title: The Son and the Queen

Fade in:

The USS Picard receives a distress signal from a remote planet. Captain Picard and his crew beam down to investigate.

As they explore the planet, they discover a group of Borg and changelings working together to destroy the Federation.

Picard: "This is a grave threat. We must stop them at all costs."

Suddenly, a figure appears behind them. It is the Borg Queen.

Borg Queen: "Captain Picard. I have been searching for you. I need your help."

Picard: "What could you possibly need from me?"

Borg Queen: "Your son, Jack. He is the key to our plan."

Picard is stunned. He had no idea he had a son.

Picard: "What do you want with my son?"

Borg Queen: "He has a unique genetic code that will allow us to assimilate all life forms in the galaxy. We need him to carry out our plan."

Picard: "I will not let you use my son for your twisted agenda."

Borg Queen: "Then you leave me no choice. We will have to take him by force."

The crew of the USS Picard engages in a fierce battle against the Borg and changelings. Meanwhile, Picard and a small team infiltrate the Borg Queen's ship to rescue Jack.

Picard: "Jack, we need to get you out of here."

Jack: "What's going on, Dad? Who are these people?"

Picard: "Long story. We need to leave now."

As they make their escape, they are pursued by the Borg and changelings.

Picard: "We need a plan. How do we stop them?"

Jack: "Wait, I have an idea. I can use my unique genetic code to create a virus that will destroy their assimilation technology."

Picard: "Brilliant! Let's get to work."

With Jack's help, the crew creates the virus and successfully infects the Borg and changeling ships, destroying their assimilation technology and putting an end to their plan.

Picard: "We did it. Thanks to your help, Jack."

Jack: "Dad, I know this is a lot to take in, but I'm glad we got to work together."

Picard: "Me too, son. Me too."

Fade out.

Since Q apparently isn't linear, do you think he hatched his Season 2 plot because of an original bad future where Picard either wasn't around or wasn't emotionally capable of helping Jack disconnect from the collective and humanity fell as a result?

Season 2 was... wacky at times, but I can live with it if Q was doing an Avengers Endgame style gambit where this was the only timeline where things would work out for humanity in the end.

I'm generally a fan of Matalas. Twelve Monkeys remains awesome.

But the one huge thing I can't rationalize about this season is fucking up the changelings only for them to basically just be spies and muscle. It's just bad from any angle. There are other shapeshifters established in trek already and you could have easily have just had them in their, have the heroes go "we're not sure how to deal with these because they aren't the changelings we just had a war with" - and then at the end you find out they were some assimilated race (like the one in TUC or whatever) that they co-opted for this purpose.

Other than that, if they had said "We're making one season of Picard to honor the TNG crew and only made THIS one without the other two, it would have been a fine if imperfect way to tie a bow on this group. In the same way that I force myself to ignore the TCW and the Xindi in Enterprise, I shall need to mostly (I'm a sucker for Q) memory hole the first two seasons.

This week on STAR TREK WARS: RETURN OF THE NEXT GENERATION!

REVELATIONS!

Borg Vader: "Jean-Luc, I am your SON!"

THRILLS!!

LeVar Calrissian: "It's damn near impossible to get to the core of the Death Cube!"
Brent Solo: "I can do it! I have... Faith of the Schwartz!"
LeVar: "Faith of the Schwartz? Damn... It's been a long road getting from there to here... Hit it!"

ACTION!!!

Raffi Arden: "Seven I love you, but we've only 24 hours to save the Earth!"

EMOTION!!!!

Picard looks out of the viewscreen as a deepfaked Paul Walker blows a raspberry at him from the cloaking Titan

You gasped at A NEW PICARD! You held your hands to your cheeks in horror at THE BORG STRIKES BACK! Now witness... RETURN OF THE NEXT GENERATION!

Only at IMAX! And Paramount+! And possibly Amazon Prime! Have we checked Netflix?!

That was a sugar rush, made the eyes pop and my internal organs feel like I was 13 again, loading up on ill-advised sweets. Enjoyable, exciting, but ultimately empty and exhausting.

It reminds a lot of recent Dr Who - some very good ideas that needed chucking at a wall, being picked up by an adult, and polished and completed, rather than a fan making noises like someone with ADHD and no ritalin at hand.

Anyone watch Lego Masters Australia? Remember Jordy? I imagine that was Matalas every day.

So, I'm glad we got to say a proper goodbye to the TNG crew, I'm glad Picard got made, but I'm a little sad at the missed opportunities. I feel we've all been on a trip out to the beach, but the car kept breaking down, it was pissing it down when we got there and seagulls stole all our fish and chips and ice creams, but we had fun anyway.

Nah. This wasn't the Dominion, millions of Changelings in the Great Link supported by uncountable Jem Haddar and thousands of worlds conquered by the Dominion.

This was a dozen or so Changelings that had been tortured by what no doubt was a Section 31 operative looking for a way to weaponize them against other species. And honestly, they were still pretty fearsome.

I concur that I expected more politics about the Changelings and those left with Odo, but it made sense as they were separate from them. And Worf was working with Starfleet Intelligence and Ro because he was warned of this faction by 'an honorable man' no doubt Odo himself.

What I thought was that the Transwarp Conduit represented the Dominion finding a way to the Alpha Quadrant without using the Bajor Wormhole. But nope, turns out it had nothing to do with it, so my guess is they are saving that plotline for a later series. Perhaps Legacy that the showrunner is clearly trying to force Paramount to back. Hope he gets his wish.

Personally I enjoyed the hell out of it. Picard Season 1 and 2 were both meh. Season 3 knocked it out of the park. And that does seem to be the consensus among the fans and the reviewers. Between what comes of this, the like legacy spin off, and SNW, seems like Trek is in good hands. Because it has remembered something - Trek is a bright sense of the future and is at its core escapism hoping for better days. Considering all the shit in the world right now, I'm happy for something that I both love and has managed to remember how to be FUN.

I feel like I was promised more connection to DS9, but I guess the changelings were it.