Star Trek: Picard season one, episode 8 recap: Broken Pieces

Soji has discovered the location of her home planet and is on La Sirena. Secrets are out in the eighth episode of Star Trek: Picard.

Hugh is dead, killed by Narissa, leaving Elnor stranded on the Borg Reclamation Site. As he fights off Narissa’s goons, it looks like Elnor might be facing defeat. Good thing the cavalry arrives to save him. The cavalry, of course, is Seven of Nine, and she has a plan to complete Hugh’s mission on Star Trek: Picard.

Reclaiming the Borg

Seven knew Hugh, but we don’t know how well or for how long. She doesn’t get to mourn his passing either because Seven and Elnor rush into the Queencell. Seven activates the power to assess the situation. There are xBs in stasis and numerous Borg drones who have not been reclaimed.

With Narissa and the Romulans closing in on them, Seven makes a drastic decision to reclaim the Borg site. She’s going to make a mini-hive that will repair the cube and jettison the Romulans. To do this, Seven must become the cube’s Borg Queen.

A better writing team would have taken the time to let Seven wrestle with the decision to join a collective – nay, lead one – when she cherished her liberation. We could have also had a moment where she struggled with the idea of messing up a mini collective, having once caused a trio of Borg drones to be connected with each other and practically driving them mad. But we get none of that.

Instead, Seven apparently craves to be part of a collective once again (Voyager was her collective!) and is afraid she won’t let go of the Borg.

As Seven becomes Queen, she activates the assimilated Borg, but Narissa jettisons all of them. Seven suffers each death, before waking up the xBs in stasis. They attack and pin Narissa down, but she somehow transports herself out of there along with all the other Romulans.

Having successfully purged the cube of Romulans, Seven disengages herself from the collective. Much to Elnor’s relief. He was sure she was going to assimilate him.

I love the dynamic between Elnor and Seven. He’s latched on to her like a teacher’s pet, probably because his life as a Qowat Milat meant he was surrounded by warrior women. Elnor is also unabashedly in sync with his emotions. He hugs Seven with grateful relief when she saves him, and she is quick to assuage his fears. I approach this relationship with caution.

Seven probably won’t survive this season, and even if she does, there’s a chance the writers are trying to push a mother-son relationship on to her again. I could be wrong, and Elnor will turn into Seven’s friend and protégé, but I’m not holding my breath.