What you perhaps don’t know, is that Terry worked as an Intern, working in post-production on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and he was also Brannon Braga's assistant on Star Trek: Voyager and Star Trek: Enterprise! He and Brannon Braga also worked together on a short-lived favorite TV show of mine: “Threshold” in 2005. In 2011 he also worked on “Terra Nova” as a staff writer, executive produced by Brannon Braga and René Echevarria. Something perhaps he shouldn’t be too proud of is that he made a cameo appearance as an Enterprise-D crewman in the final episode of Enterprise, "These Are The Voyages..." 😊

So, as you can see, quite some experience with science fiction and also quite some experience with Star Trek from before. What Terry Matalas did, is finally bring back Star Trek we know from before, and with that I of course mean before 2006. Yes, it has some flaws here and there, there are a few things that bother me but on the whole this season was the best Star Trek since Star Trek: Enterprise’s final season. And okay, he already got a head start by bringing in the principle cast of The Next Generation. When I learned of this, knowing also that Terry Malalas was going to be showrunner, I knew beforehand that this most likely could become awesome.

Season 3 was about Family, passing on to the next generation, the good and the bad, and legacy of course. We get to see Geordie’s two daughters Sydney and Alandra (Ashlei Sharpe Chestnut & Mica Burton), both in Starfleet and Jack Crusher (Ed Speleers), who turns out to be Picard’s son. We get to see Data fighting his brother Lore to survive, we get to see Seven struggle with the conformity of Starfleet and being loyal to Picard and Riker. It would perhaps have been nice to also see Worf’s son Alexander too. Worf was one of my favorite characters this season, does not say much but when he does it is short and sweet, he has the funny lines, a warrior still, even though he says he turned over a new leaf. Jean-Luc Picard is also stronger this season than in the first two seasons, he regained a little from his strength during his time as captain on the Enterprise. I also thought Beverly Crusher was now much more than just the ship’s Doctor from before, really interesting development. And I was also really happy to see Riker and Troi back, still as a couple, although having problems but working on it. I really loved it back in “Insurrection” that they became a couple again and eventually got married during the “Nemesis” movie. In many TV shows they would have been divorced now, but these two old geezers where still working on it during their adventures! 😊

I also liked the fact that the antagonist Vadic, played by Amanda Plummer, was the daughter of Christopher Plummer, from the movie “Star Trek: The Undiscovered Country” where he plays the Klingon General Chang. I thought with her acting, she did remind me of the character Chang a bit, which I thought was very cool. We see a cameo of Wesley Crusher (Wil Wheaton), Ro Laren (Michelle Forbes) has a short but very important part to play and we also see two short scenes of Tim Russ’ character Tuvok, although in one of them he is actually not himself! With the other scene I got a bit emotional when he talks to Seven, for some reason that hit a nerve with me. This happens on many occasions this season I might add, for instance also when Geordie shows the rest of the crew the Enterprise D, almost fully restored, done by Geordie for the last 20 years, just amazing! We even also get to see Moriarty (Daniel Davis) back, as an AI program. Other non Star Trek related appearance which I found interesting was Thomas Dekker who plays Titus Rikka. We of course know Dekker from “Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles” where he is John Connor.

What I like is that the foe was back from “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine”, the Dominion, working together with The Borg. It was fitting that the Borg was the ultimate adversary in the end, Alice Krieg reprised her role as the Borg Queen. What stumped me a bit was that, besides Worf, there was no “Deep Space Nine” character present. I was hoping that with every season, it never happened, which is a shame. Yes, you can argue that Worf is a “Deep Space Nine” character, which is true, but he is there because he was from “The Next Generation” crew first. At some point I did began to think if Terry Matalas would bring back every lead character from his former hit show “12 Monkey’s”. First we saw Captain Shaw (Todd Stashwick) of course, then Aaron Stanford as the Ferengi Sneed and I also spotted Kirk Acevedo as Krinn. Not sure if I missed any but I was thinking, when do we see Amanda Schull, Barbara Sukowa or Emily Hampshire? Perhaps they did come along but I simply didn’t recognize them!

There was also an inside joke, The name of this planet in the first episode, M’Talas, was a "tip-of-the-hat" to executive producer Brannon Braga's assistant and Star Trek: Enterprise writer, Terry Matalas. (Star Trek Encyclopedia, 4th ed., vol. 2, p. 26) Yes, the same Matalas went on to become showrunner on Star Trek: Picard.

What I didn’t like, only small things, but as a Star Trek fan, I am critical, but that’s only because I love Star Trek. What I thought was uncharacteristic was that Riker in episode 3 expels Picard from the bridge like a schoolboy, didn’t like that, Picard from The Next Generation would not have accepted this. Riker does apologize afterwards but I didn’t like it. Of course this also happened in the first two seasons, everybody having a big mouth against Picard, like Raffi (Michelle Hurd) for instance does on many occasions in the first two seasons, and he took it. I don’t like the current day swearing, we don’t hear that in the first five iterations, yes we do hear it in “Star Trek: The Voyage Home” obviously, but they were in our present time. Why do we still hear this hundreds years in the future, while we didn’t hear it during the TNG era. It was presumed that the story with Captain Seven would resume in the new tv show called Star Trek: Legacy. Today it is still unclear if this presumed TV show is going to be green lighted. Lastly, when you watch all the credits of the last Picard season 3 episode, I did not see this the first time watching, you see Q paying a visit to Jack Crusher on the Enterprise G in his cabin. The first thing I thought was: NO, no, not again Q, why? Why do we need this character again, been there, done that. Hasn’t he been around long enough?

Final Word:

I decided not to say much about the episodes itself, as I said, I am trying to write different kinds of blogs, less detail. Season 3 of Picard is one big nostalgia ride for people like me, who’ve watched the first 5 iterations. It literally is 10 times better than the first two seasons, it is almost perfect. I only hear positive things about the 3^rd season, yes there are always things you don’t like but on the whole, a near perfect season. For me it is clear that season 3 will from now on be part of the “The Next Generation and “Generation Movies” rewatch, not the first two seasons, only the 3^rd season. This seems a contradiction to what I wrote in my first season blog, that I have to watch the first and second season before I can watch the third, but after watching the third season again, it is so different from the first two seasons, it is a Next Generation story, I don’t think I am having a problem skipping the first two seasons in the future. Recommended? Hell Yes!