Narrative structure plays a substantial part in our discussion this week. The director/producers chose to call upon a well-trodden film trope of opening the episode during a crisis then jumping back some amount of time; a sort of preview of what’s to come.
This technique is generally frowned upon by film nerds and the like due to it being a structural crutch to artificially inject energy and peril where there is none. There are plenty of legitimate reasons to use this technique, but in this case, it doesn’t seem to offer anything more novel or functional than if the episode had been presented chronologically. There is the novelty of before every act displaying a timer of how long until we catch up to the peril.
But it’s obvious if these “previews” were to be entirely removed, the story wouldn’t suffer one bit.
Synopsis of Picard 206 “Two for One”
With the help of Tallinn, Picard and the crew infiltrate a gala on the eve of a joint space mission, to protect one of the astronauts they believe to be integral to the restoration of the timeline – Renee Picard.
The reader might notice the title of this episode is Two for One. These podcasters originally thought it was Two OF One, which would have been a much more relevant and evocative title considering the only ground covered plot-wise concerns the escapades of Jurati and the Borg Queen.
It was established fairly early in the Borg canon that Borg has designations as names, such as 7 of 9. So, considering Agnes and the Borg Queen now have their own little collective, the title Two of One would be the most appropriate.
Q is invoked several times in this episode but makes no appearance. His storyline (is Q a he?) is becoming increasingly confusing, bordering on nonsensical. In Episode 1, Q informs Picard the test on humanity never ended and that Q’s intervention at the StarGazer and alteration of the timeline is indeed a continuation of that test. But then it’s revealed that there is likely something wrong with Q.
In the latter episodes, Q is shown actively disrupting the timeline and conscripts Dr Adam Soong to help incapacitate Picard’s and his crew’s attempts to set the timeline right. If we’re to now believe that Q is to personally benefit from this alternate timeline and this test on humanity is a lie, then why make Picard and crew aware of the timeline alteration?
Hopefully, this is a foreshadowing of a mind-blowing plotline and not just irresponsible writing. Only time will tell.
What leaves these podcasters most curious is what type of legs will be afforded to the Queen since she’s asked for them.
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Picard airs on Paramount+ in the United States, and on CTV Sci-Fi Channel and Crave in Canada. Outside of North America, the series is available on Amazon Prime Video
