Now that the second season of Star Trek: Picard is over, it appears that all the twists and turns paid off and the puzzle pieces have been put into place. In some regards, the finale does a pretty good job of fixing some of the mistakes and missteps that were made throughout the middle episodes of Picard's second season.
That's not to say that the way everything that was tied up with a neat little bow was done expertly. There are still some problems with this Picard Season 2 finale mostly because it appears that the writers wanted to leave a good taste in everyone's mouths. There is love and loss and some rather interesting relationships along the way. It's certainly a better way of carrying out the story than what previous Star Trek: Picard episodes had to offer. On the other hand, it was quite clear that in wanting to make sure there are no loose ends, some of the ways the storylines were tied up felt sort of rushed. Perhaps if previous episodes hadn't spent so much time treading water and instead worked at moving the story along, this episode could have been a little better.
Right at the top of the show, the crew of the Stargazer is coming to grips with the fact that they're going to be left in 2024. Off the bat, it seems a bit strange that no one appears all that sad about the fact that they are living in a period of time they have little understanding about. They also have no home and no plans. The show treads a thin line with this as it's absolutely true that spending 20 minutes with Seven of Nine and Raffi complaining about the fact that they got stuck in the past would be annoying and would waste what was already a hurried episode of Picard. On the other hand, it feels as though the 30 seconds it took for the crew members to resign themselves to their fate was just a bit too unrealistic.
Elsewhere, Kory is busy sticking it to her "dad" by making sure that he can no longer create any more of the "diseased" children that he'd been making in order to try and solve ... something. Maybe he was simply trying to solve cloning itself. In the long run, it's not clear what exactly his work was about once it became clear that he wasn't trying to cure his kids of something, but was instead making imperfect people. Even if viewers ignore the fact that it's not clear where Kory was able to get her own laptop after storming out of the house, there has to be a question as to how she knew how to hack into her father's scientific database. While shows like Star Trek: Picard tend to treat this act as something that's quite easy, even something like knowing his IP address would almost certainly not be a detail she'd just have at hand. While it's also not all that important to spend a ton of time wondering about how that all went down, it does demonstrate a lack of attention to detail with the show in general.
While Kory's story was getting wrapped up, so was Dr. Soong's and while his villainy seemed cartoonish at some points of Season 2 of Picard, credit does need to be given to Spiner for making him at least a decent bad guy who was smart enough to provide a real roadblock to the crew every now and then. This particular episode featured him mostly realizing that he was beaten, but still trying to somehow hand onto victory in the fact of his defeat. Granted, the audience didn't get to see his reaction when he was defeated for the final time, though it's a safe bet that would have been weird and over the top anyway.
Speaking of wrapping up a story, after several episodes where Q was barely there, John de Lancie gave a performance that continues to show that no only is he great as the godlike being, but he seems to really enjoy playing him. It's also a testament to the show that the way it wrapped up this season and also wrapped up the story of Q was done so well that it really does explain why he's been "haunting" Picard since the very first episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. This installment of the Star Trek universe has always been best when Picard and Q were going toe-to-toe and fans of the franchise now have some serious closure when it comes to just why they were going toe-to-toe in the first place.
It should come as no surprise thanks to trailers for Star Trek: Picard Season 3 that the season finale for Season 2 is more than just wrapping up the season. It appears that this is, in a lot of ways, the sendoff of the Stargazer crew in general. If that happens to be the case, then for the most part, it appears the show did a fairly decent job of getting everyone situated. That's not to say there aren't a few times when things seem more than a little contrite. That's certainly the case when it comes to Kory. Some of that can be dismissed because of how this show has been from the very beginning.
From the very beginning of Star Trek: Picard, the show has been one that has been all about the fan service. Certainly, there have been times when it seemed to ignore plot and story in order to try and squeeze people into the show just so fans could ooh and ahh and point. That definitely happened one more time when it comes to the season finale of the show, but at least it also gave the fans the chance to see some characters that may not appear on screen as a member of the Star Trek franchise again. More than anything this episode was a decent goodbye to several characters, despite the fact that the main star is coming back for one more season.
Star Trek: Picard season 2 is now available on Paramount Plus.