Greg Sanders

Picard: Season 1 Review

While each series has its flaws, I’m more positive than many on the present range of Star Trek television stories. I was similarly pleased with Picard. It is at times darker than one expects of Trek, but I think Abigail Nussbaum captures its promise:

One of the things I wrote about when I rewatched The Next Generation in 2011 was how, coming to the show as an adult, it was hard to escape the impression that Picard believed in the Federation more than it believed in itself.  Insurrection may have been an over the top exploration of that concept, but it carried forward ideas already established in the show itself, in which Picard frequently clashed with admirals or the Starfleet brass over whether to uphold the Federation’s core values, and the proteges he tried to mold into Starfleet officers took one look at what Starfleet was outside the limits of Picard’s control and ran for the hills.  An old Picard who has been forgotten and dismissed by society trying to make one last stand for the values he believes in strikes me as entirely appropriate to the character.

I don’t know what she thinks of how it turned out, but for me, it delivered. Many of the characters not cameoing from TNG were more on the outskirts, and often had different values than Picard himself. The show tends to have some sympathy for each side of disagreements, but I think the overarching plot and the dilemmas it contains centers on those values. Not “is the federation weak,” but “how far do we push sympathy for the other, and what risks does it force us to take?”

I’ve heard some complaints from friends about the pacing, and I respect that, but I do think the series earns its mini-series length. There are a lot of different pieces in play, and I think the experienced hand of Michael Chabon does shine through in a finale that really ties it together with a twist or two that answered some of my doubts.

My biggest critique is just that there’s some unnecessary stake raising that makes some parts of the ending feel more contrived. I’m sure that the limitations of the number of ships Star Trek typically depicted was driven in large part by limits on practical effects and budget. Even so, but more is often not better. Likewise, writing long odds brings tension, sure, but it also makes it harder to make any problem-solving compelling.

Some parts of this story could have been told at a smaller scale, and I’d still be hooked. I’ll confess, as a callow youth, I was bothered that in Star Trek Generations Kirk died for some obscure world; it felt like his sacrifice should have been for higher stakes. But while I stand by some of my critiques of that film, I was wrong there. But I was also fourteen, and this series is rated TV-Ma. We can have more stories for adults that aren’t about anti-heroes. I do think the season reached that mark some of the time, and I hope it will keep striving for it in season 2.

Photograph of San Francisco, 2017 before Federation Headquarters has been built, taken on a trip with a colleague and friend.

Review: Garden of Words, Makoto Shinkai

Together with my spouse, we’ve been watching through the collective opus of Makoto Shinkai, whose films Your Name and Weathering with You received theatrical releases in the United States. Shinkai has a hard-earned auteur standing, in part due to some common visual elements (weather,  trains, a certain sort of photo-realism settings) and thematic elements (distance, connections, and timing to name three). His work ethic is remarkable, as shown by Voices of a Distant Star, which is intimidating, although that’s also true of the whole anime industry.

Garden of Words is a novella of a film about a focused male high school student, with a particular vocational goal, and a tentative not yet middle-aged woman who share a habit of playing hooky on rainy days in Shinjuku Gyeon National Garden. It’s more literary in mood than in content, a character study that crosses age lines without forgetting the distinct responsibility of a student and an adult. In case you fear it sounds too serious, I should also reveal that the female lead starts out enjoying beer and chocolate under the gazebo, in spite of signs forbidding the former. It’s beautiful, and if the concept appeals, it’s a great place to start with Shinkai, as my spouse commented he’s really got his aesthetic at this point, and at forty-five minutes, it keeps a good pace while having the room to explore both lives.

One reason Shinkai sticks with his fans in part is because he has a remarkable blend of romanticism and pragmaticism. He’ll leave us wanting a connection to happen, sometimes desperately so, but also aware of why it couldn’t or even shouldn’t. There’s a melancholy to his work that’s recognizable, even if our barriers are perhaps not so high or our courage and commitment not so remarkable.

There are ways I’d love to see him branch out next, including having more room to explore adult lives. There’s more I’ll want to say about his works, but for now, I’ll just recommend this one and savor it for a time.

Image source: Film promotional poster via wikipedia.

[Update: Minor editorial fixes. Refined a bit after watching interviews in the extras]