Picard: Mercy

The latest episode of Star Trek: Picard did seem to pick up the pace a bit, advancing the season-long story more than the past few installments. Yet it also felt as though, with only two more episodes left to go, things should have moved even more.

Picard and Guinan are in the custody of FBI Agent Wells, who is determined to get to the truth and believes they are extraterrestrials. While the two are separated, Q stops by for a revealing chat with Guinan. Rios hosts Teresa and her son on his ship as he works to purge its computer of Borg intrusion. Raffi and Seven stay on Queen/Jurati's trail, opening up to each other about past traumas in the process. And Kore confronts Adam Soong about the truth of her existence, sending him into an emotional spiral that drives him into the arms of a dangerous ally.

As you can see from that summary, there really is a lot happening in this episode. Most of it is well dramatized too. Picard flips the script on Agent Wells' interrogation, and in doing so reinforces the season's theme about how you can't trust your perceptions of the past. John de Lancie gets just a couple of scenes -- but in one he teases exactly why Renée Picard is important (her triumph is somehow Adam Soong's downfall), and in the other he gives perhaps his most intense performance ever on Star Trek, peeling back the layers of playfulness and scorn to present a Q grappling with his own issues.

A flashback between Raffi and Elnor is a great scene for both characters, and exposes exactly why his death earlier in the season hit her so hard. The confrontation between Adam Soong and Kore features subtle, non-verbal acting by both Brent Spiner and Isa Briones, as Soong reveals that his legacy does mean more to him than his daughter, and Kore reveals how deeply that hurts her.

And yet...

The storyline about Wells seems to culminate in the message that his being there is "fate" -- an odd thesis to introduce this late in the season that makes me a little nervous about how the overall story will end. (Also: if obsession hadn't driven Wells to capture Picard in the first place, he wouldn't need to have been there to let him go, right?)

Even as Q revealed a lot about why he's doing this (he's dying), there sure seems "more than two episodes' worth" of explanation about why he's doing this (trying to sabotage Earth's history in this particular way).

As effective as it was to learn why Elnor's death so affected Raffi -- and as fitting for her character as it was to hide that pain until now -- it really feels too late for the audience to be learning about it here. We could have been on her side more fully, for far longer, this season. We only needed to see the memory sooner, before she finally admits it to another character here.

And great though it was to see Kore make a stand (and to see exactly how being taunted about losing his legacy drives Soong to partner with Queen/Jurati), how far is she really going to get in the world without a phone, or money, or even shoes?

So basically: most of the plot lines in play this week had both great moments, and "wait, what?" moments. (Except perhaps for Rios and Teresa. Their blossoming romance is cute, but there doesn't seem to be much of a future there, am I right? Get it?) And speaking of romance, where was Tallinn and what was she doing this week?

Put another way, while it seems as though this season of Star Trek: Picard has started to accelerate toward the finish, it's still set in a relatively low gear. Here's hoping things "upshift" next week. I give "Mercy" a B-.