Posted by Tony Findora in Picard Canon- Warning! Spoilers

Posted by Steven Sigle in Picard Canon- Warning! Spoilers

Posted by Daniel Lerner in Picard Canon- Warning! Spoilers
Posted by… suppressed (3) by the Post Ghost! 👻
So… for those of you who are watching, you probably have already come to the conclusion that there are going to be some issues going forward with new canon that affects the club. This thread is a place for us to bring up the things we’re noticing. At the end of Season 1 we can evaluate all of this and as a club we may have to decide if we make changes (like our club year) in order to not always be potentially contradicting things.

Plot Points:

Mars: Obviously, the attack and destruction of Mars and Utopia Plantia in 2385 is a HUGE deal. It changes a lot of things, though how it effects STF and individual characters varies greatly. Currently I foresee it being written in casually, but if you have a character that hails from there, well that gets complicated, obviously.

What else? Please go ahead and add to my list.

~Linds

One thing I think this also brings up, that there is a ban on all new synth life around 2385. We don’t have too many people playing as synth, and there is no knowledge if any existing synth life got kicked out of Starfleet or not, but it would mean anyone who had a character that was “built” pre-2385 would have been illegal in the Federation. This might be more minor, but it can affect some players.

~Steven Sigle

Openings of both episodes certainly had me sit up and take notice and brought up different emotions from deep in my heart for different reasons

I loved those door things they were using in part of episode 2. It reminded me a bit of Stargates or even Slider technology. I guess they were kind of a next generation transporter or something? It would be interesting to find out about their range.

I also appreciated the appearance of Romulan Lounge Lizards - I hope they are all referred to as Leisure Suit Larry. (PS, not a reference to Larry Garfield).

• Russell

Mars will certainly affect a number of characters. I’ve had one long-term character whose whole family lives on Mars, and that’s going to be a difficult retcon I still need to think about before I can play the character.

I’m not sure I agree the synth issue is that huge, at least after two episodes. Data was always meant to be a unique character, with no one in the Federation outside of Dr. Soong able to replicate Data and Lore’s construction. Between that and the fact that we discouraged artificial characters due to the god-modding concern (I’m not including the whole hologram thing, which is clearly not captured in the “synth ban” in Picard), I can’t imagine anyone’s characters really be affecting. I think the synth thing is more of a GM/sim thing, which may create some interesting creative thoughts after this season is over.

The synth issue may not be huge, but I can name at least three players who have had them in the past. They are often only used in supervised environments but they have existed. It isn’t something outright unheard of in the club. Does it need to be a huge focus? Not really, but it does lend merit to the uncommon occurrence no longer even being considered at all due to the banning in the Federation.

After Mars, in my mind the next canon issue to be addressed is the presence of Romulans on Earth (and supposedly elsewhere in the Federation). The Romulan refugees with Picard seem to be able to have some degree of authority that no one blinks an eye at. For example, Picard’s agent (so-to-speak) with the media is a Romulan. Again, I don’t see a character issue (unless someone was playing a character with a huge hatred of Romulans), but it does change a few other things. (As PDir, I’m dreading some of the potential requests I may end up getting on new membership applications.)

Following Mars and the Romulan refugees, the rescue fleet may have some lesser impact, given the immense size of that fleet and its destruction. But I think we need some more episodes about that first.

Those are my very early thoughts on potential canon issues.

Daniel

~Steven

I’m not sure if this was something already discussed or not, but there is the whole destruction of Romulus bit. I know Fleet 3 (the pioneer fleet) is situated near Romulan territory. That could certainly effect things there I think.

I’m enjoying hearing what everyone else shares too, so that’s all I have to contribute at the moment.

-Tony the Tiger

Romulus being destroyed should have already been baked in to people’s expecations for years now, since it’s been effectively canonical since 2009. What is not yet known and not yet obvious from what little we’ve seen of Picard is exactly how much of the Romulan Star Empire and the Romulan people still exist and in what form.

Clearly it seems as if many Romulan people have ended up in Federation space (though I find Picard’s personal acceptance of former Tal Shiar operatives to be a bit ludicrous; the Tal Shiar is basically analogous to the KGB, and possible KGB operatives are exactly who were excluded by refugee resettlement programs of pretty much any western country exactly because they were likely to cause trouble).

Unrelated details worth noting: Starfleet uniforms have changed at least twice since the last visible bit of canon in the mid 2370’s when the Dominion War had ended / Voyager came back from the Delta Quadrant. The flashback scenes to the mid 2380’s feature a return to division colors on the shoulders a la Voyager with added snazzy chevrons all over the place (http://blog.trekcore.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/103-picard-musiker-flashback.jpg), possibly indicating an aspirational desire to return to being a morally virtuous exploration service after a time of brutal warfare.

The present-day scenes in 2399 feature a more simplified look (https://blog.trekcore.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/comm-oh.jpg); all function, no flair, aside from the mini-delta stitching all over the colored area that combines with the new combadge design as if to say “Yes, JJ Abrams was here, and he totally ruined this universe too, just in case you were confused about that.” That, and moving the rank pips from the neckline to the chest adds a more militaristic feel without turning everything colorless. (Though Admiral Clancy seems pretty close to colorless; I don’t honestly understand what is going on there with that neck scarf thing).

Also side note about the 2399 combadge: it is very reminiscent of the combadge design that was used on TNG to indicate to the viewer that we were seeing something that isn’t actually our universe; e.g. in alternate and/or future timelines that our protagonists did not belong in or deliberately over-wrote because they were terrible. I think this is a very subtle way to emphasize that the Starfleet we’re looking at right now is not quite right, whether or not the explanation is something that off the wall or merely a reflection of the darker, dystopian tone that seems to appeal to the current stable of writers.

Joe