Star Trek: Picard season one, episode 9 recap: Et in Arcadia Ego, Part 1

La Sirena has reached Soji’s home on Star Trek: Picard, but they don’t know that the Romulans are right behind them.

Soji took Picard’s crew through a Borg transwarp conduit, thereby traversing 25 lightyears to her home, Coppelius. But there’s no time to celebrate in the penultimate episode of Star Trek: Picard.

Narek emerges and begins firing at La Sirena. Rios effectively disables Narek’s ship, but Picard refuses to leave him to die, though Soji does. They should have listened to Soji because Narek was playing possum. Both these ships are going to have much bigger fish to fry as the Borg Artifact comes reeling through the conduit.

Attack of the Killer Orchids

Giant orchids immediately attack Narek’s ship, La Sirena, and the Borg Cube. They’re the planet’s defense system. It’s very random, to be honest, and doesn’t quite fit with the series so far. All three ships crash land on the planet, and surprisingly no one is hurt. If you don’t count Picard, that is.

As La Sirena’s power cuts out, Picard starts babbling. Jurati finds an old tricorder to assess him and discovers Picard’s brain abnormality. Time for Picard to come clean to his crew about it. He doesn’t want to be treated like a dying man.

Instead, Picard would rather complete his mission of taking Soji home. The crew agrees though Raffi is struggling with this revelation. She and ‘JL’ have a long and tumultuous history, but it isn’t without its fair share of affection.

The planet is a desert, and it’s a long trek to ‘synthville,’ as Raffi calls it. Picard requests Soji to allow the crew to check on the Borg Cube, in the hopes that Elnor and Hugh are ok. He’ll only be partly disappointed.

Elnor is overjoyed to see Picard, rushing into the older man’s arms with glee. Several of the xBs have also survived, along with Seven of Nine. She’s busy disposing of Romulans.

Seven explains to Picard that when she connected to the hive, she was able to track La Sirena’s route, which is how the cube landed up on Coppelius.

Picard is, of course, devastated at the news of Hugh’s death, but the dialogue is clunky and emotionless. There is a certain empathy that defined Picard in his Star Trek: The Next Generation days, which is missing on this show.

The cube’s long-range scanners are functional, but they bring bad news – over 200 Romulans warbirds are on their way to the planet. And they’ll be here in two days. Now is not the time to dilly-dally.

Picard leaves Elnor and Seven behind on the cube to protect the xBs and to ‘keep saving the galaxy,’ a more challenging task than expected since Jurati has told them about Picard’s impending death.

Picard and Elnor’s farewell is forced and, once again, emotionless. Is Sir Patrick Stewart not into this scene, or is it the writing? Having Seven stuck between the two of them is another odd choice.

Seven has no connection with Picard, and he’s brought nothing but grief since their paths crossed. If he were passing the baton of being Elnor’s mentor to her, it would make sense. Perhaps it’s implied.

Synthville

The crew finds the settlement of synths. They’re mostly twins, and the entire scene is an obvious homage to the early days of Star Trek. Beautiful actors dressed in rustic but slightly risqué outfits enjoy life in the bright sun, while the hapless space crew weaves through them awestruck.

Arcana greets Soji, a woman who has Data’s yellow eyes. Soji tells her about the incoming Romulan attack. The synths don’t have many defenses – there are only ten killer orchids left. Arcana recognizes Picard as ‘Data’s Captain’ when a man who looks like Data appears.

Dr. Altan Inigo Soong, son of Noonian, knows all about Picard. There’s some apparent residual resentment in Altan about his father creating Data despite Altan being alive. I never knew Noonian had a child. Does Altan know that his mother died and an android replaced her? That is one messed up childhood.

Altan excuses Soji for leading the Romulans to the synths. Soji didn’t know her true identity. Following the ban on synths, Bruce Maddox, who was working with Altan, became devious and stole Dahj and Soji despite their presence outside the city, attracting unwarranted attention.

Altan’s reminisces are interrupted by another clone of Soji. Instead, this yellow-eyed, gold-toned, android is the twin of Jana; the android killed aboard the Ibn Majid by Rios’ former captain. Sutra has an unnerving aura about her, and we’ll soon find out why.

Sutra believes Soji has brought more answers than she has brought trouble. Having trained herself with Vulcan knowledge, Sutra can mind-meld with Jurati and experience the Admonition for herself. Sutra believes the visions of the Admonition cannot be processed by organics – which explains why so many of them lose their minds. A synth can decipher it. After some hesitation, Jurati relents and allows Sutra to meld with her. No one knows what a bad idea this is.

Lest we forget, Jurati killed Maddox in cold blood. The show writers seem to be very forgiving of this act, brushing it off as a moment of madness. That belittles actual mental illness – Jurati isn’t a strong enough character to carry such a storyline, and the writers keep proving it with every attempt at redeeming her.

Altan lightly chastises Jurati for killing Maddox and then invites her to help him with mind transferring an organic brain to a synthetic one. One assumes Altan is aware of his mortality and wants to experiment on himself.