Heather Jones

I've been a Star Trek fan since STTNG, and as much as I enjoyed the first season of Picard, and it did make me think and look at the message it was conveying a little deeper. It wasn't Trek as anyone who grew up watching any of the previous incarnations remember. The hope and the thread of anything good or redeemable didn't come until the last episode, and even then it was difficult to see unless you were looking for it. It's eighteen years later, and what we're shown is a future that appears without a sense of hope. Where people aren't working together anymore, and ultimately selfish. There is even a black market for Borg tech, and people are willing to remove it from living people to get it. Why this was even happening is never explained, only that it is. What little we are shown of the Federation and Starfleet is something the viewer recognizes as being too close to home. There are plenty of shows out there where we can get this kind of depressed, dystopian future. Star Trek is supposed to be the one show out of all of them that is supposed to be optimistic. Whatever happens, as long as we find a way to keep trying. Sticking together, embracing our differences, inclusion, and focusing on how we can use that to create a better future will benefit everyone. I can see where Picard tried to do this to some extent. The best way I can describe it is this: I am given a present that is wrapped in an old newspaper that has been left in the garbage for a week. It is covered in coffee grounds, eggshells, and whatever nasty image you fathom. It becomes a feat of will to get past the wrapping to see the flawless diamond that lay inside because I'm too distracted by the presentation. I think the staff of Picard forgot that the presentation of the product is just as important as what lay inside. They could have the most brilliant storyline in the existence of humankind, but if the viewer can't get past the packaging it will never be appreciated because their mind is too stuck on how it's being presented. Maybe this should be considered more before writing and filming season two. I can't watch this version of Star Trek with my eight-year-old as I can with STTNG, Voyager, or DS9. He would begin to develop suicidal and aggressive tendencies before turning nine. It would only reinforce a feeling of hopelessness and undo all the positive things my husband and I are trying to teach him as parents. I find it sad that the Star Trek I grew up watching with my parents is dead and cannot share its current version with my son as my parents did with me.