

Enthusiastically Ambiverted Hopepunk
📚 2/2021: The Dark Veil by James Swallow ⭐️⭐️⭐️ #startrek
A year after the attack on Mars and Picard’s retirement, Riker and the Titan (including Troi and Thad, their first child) face off with Romulans while assisting a mysterious alien ship. More good backstory building.
Got out of the habit of my weekly Star Trek: Picard mini-reviews, thanks to the coronavirus stress, but just watched the final episode of the season, and I’m satisfied. Quibbles here and there, sure, but overall, a very good first season, and I’m looking forward to more. 🖖
Star Trek: Picard S01E07: As has been the case, the Borg cube pieces were weaker, but everything on Nepenthe with Troi, Riker, and their adorable daughter Kestra was so strong that this is by far the strongest episode of the season.
A bit of silliness. Very minor spoiler for ST:PIC S01E06.
The Naming of Romulans is a difficult matter,
It isn’t just one of your holiday games;
You may think at first I’m as mad as a hatter
When I tell you, a Romulan must have THREE DIFFERENT NAMES.
First of all, there’s the name that the family use daily,
Such as Pardek, Colius, Donatra or Vrax,
Such as Vreenak or Tomalak, Thei or Rekar—
All of them sensible everyday names.
There are fancier names if you think they sound sweeter,
Some for the gentlemen, some for the dames:
Such as Parem, Tal’aura, Karina, Livara—
But all of them sensible everyday names.
But I tell you, a Romulan needs a name that’s particular,
A name that’s peculiar, and more dignified,
Else how can he keep up his ears perpendicular,
Or spread out his schemes, or cherish his pride?
Of names of this kind, I can give you a quorum,
Such as Alidar Jarok, Zhaban, or Telek R’Mor,
Such as Narissa Rizzo, or else Caithlin Dar-
Names that never belong to more than one Romulan.
But above and beyond there’s still one name left over,
And that is the name that you never will guess;
The name that no human research can discover–
But THE ROMULAN HIMSELF KNOWS, and will never confess.
When you notice a Romulan in profound meditation,
The reason, I tell you, is always the same:
His mind is engaged in a rapt contemplation
Of the thought, of the thought, of the thought of his name:
His ineffable effable
Effanineffable
Deep and inscrutable singular Name.
(No, they don’t rhyme. But I limited myself to those named Romulans listed at Memory Alpha, so that’s what you get.)
Star Trek: Picard S01E05: A somewhat uneven mix of Las Vegas heist caper and serious themes. Parts I greatly enjoyed (the outfits, Patrick Stewart going overboard), other parts (the opening scene in particular)…not as much. Not bad, but not as good as prior episodes.
Star Trek: Picard S01E04: Lots more exploration of Romulan culture, Picard continues to face the consequences of disappearing for so long, and we finally get some gorgeous shots of an original classic Bird of Prey! Oh, and the main baddies continue to be generically creepy.
Adding to my list of probably wrong predictions about where a current Star Trek show is going (most recently, for Discovery, those would include that the Kelpiens and the Ba’ul are different stages of the same species and that Control was the genesis of the Borg)….
Spoilers for episodes two and three of Picard follow, but probably not for anything beyond that, because I’m usually wrong about these things. :)