Watch: Trailer For ‘Star Trek: Picard’ Tie-In ‘Short Treks’ – “Children Of Mars”

A trailer for final Short Treks of the second season has been released. This episode is supposed to tie-in with Star Trek: Picard. How this connects to Picard isn’t very clear since the trailer focuses on two school girls, who initially dislike each other, but seemingly become friends during a crisis.

Description

12 year-old classmates Kima and Lil find themselves at odds with each other on a day that will change their lives forever.

Video

Promotional photos

Screenshots

A school shuttle comes in for a landing.

Children hurry into school after being dropped off at the shuttle stop.

A sullen alien child (Kima) is clipped by a redheaded human child (Lil) who walks faster…

which knocks the backpack off Kima.

In retaliation Kima trips Lil in the library.

Lil sends a mean sketch of the teacher to Kima’s terminal…

just in time for the teacher to see it.

The two girls seemingly alone likely as a punishment.

A Vulcan teacher reacts to an emergency alert claxon.

The two girls comfort each other.

They grasp hands.


Star Trek: Short Treks are available in the USA on CBS All Access. Season 2 is available in Canada via CTV Sci-Fi Channel (formerly known as Space) and Crave. Availability for the second season in other regions has not be announced.

Keep up with all the Short Treks news and reviews at TrekMovie.

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I’m sure the library was a nice location to shoot in, but they probably should have populated the shelves with less recognizably modern titles and bindings. I know it’s a nitpick, but it’s a little weird when you consider this is 300 years from now and TNG was always very careful about the design of this distant future. This just reminded me that it was filmed on location rather than admiring this marvelous future.

Recall Jonathan Frakes’ always likes to tell the story that Gene Roddenberry, upon describing the ‘Trek future to newly-hired actor Frakes for ST:TNG, that “….In the 24th Century there will be no hunger, there will be no greed, and all children will know how to read.” It seems clear that the intent of this story’s production design of being a library full of actual books is to keep this all-too-important tradition of STAR TREK story-telling alive for the future. Heck, even Kirk, Picard and the other captains could quote passages in many books – which would not have been possible had not future generations of humans MADE CERTAIN that everyone could read a book. Library Computers may be fun to work with, but libraries themselves are worth life-times of living. If future versions of ‘Trek include this back-story of what humanity’s BEST future could be, they would do well to include this exact type of reference – both in thought, and on camera. That would be a proverbial tip of the hat, and a loving tribute, to Mr. Roddenberry’s creation we all know and love so well.

Books should never stop being made. Its just not the same reading a book on a tablet and frankly it does the eyes no good either. Theres just something magical about holding a physical book in your hands. Getting a book of some sort on Xmas morning outside my bedroom door as a kid, sitting on my bed flicking through it. You don’t get that with a digital book.

I just don’t understand the attachment that people have to physical books. Its the words that are important, not the paper. Personally, I prefer e-books by a lot. I don’t have to schlep out to a store or wait for a package to arrive when I decide to read a book, I can adjust the text size, I can bring my entire library with me wherever I go, and I don’t have to lug heavy books around. I’ve done a lot more reading since e-books became a thing than I ever did back in the dark days of paper.

“dark days of paper”

You probably could’ve solved that by buying a new light bulb.

The thing is though, I think not everything that makes our live easier is to our benefit in the long run. While ebooks might make our lives easier, they still don’t give me the same satisfaction as physically opening the book or having that distinctive paper smells of the books. I think a person gets more emotionally attached to paper books while e-books can be considered more as utilities.

Even when I read paper books, I generally don’t sniff them. And I never got satisfaction from opening a book anymore than I get satisfaction from turning on my Kindle. I get satisfaction from actually reading the book.

Truth

My friend, you should seriously smell your books. They all have a different smell. You can tell about when a book was published by the smell of the pages.

You can also generally tell when a book was published by looking at the publishing date.

We maintain the fidelity of those important words by printing them on paper and in vast quantities. Left to the digital realm, the written word is subject to manipulation, forgery, deletion, paraphrasing… the list goes on and on.

Paper decays over time.

As does anything. I fail to see the point.

Digital data is immortal.

lol no

Then how did Amazon kill everybody’s Kindle copy of 1984?

I’m with you. I stopped buying paper books years ago. Now I carry over 300 books in my pocket. Plus when I lazy I can get Alexa to read the books for me.

I’ve been a fan of books since early childhood. As I grow older and people around me are dying one by one, I no longer collect books, I collect entire libraries. Last time I was moving, I packed fifty large boxes full of books – some three tons or so, and that’s merely a fraction of what was published in last two hundred years in my language alone.

And therein lies the problem. All the magic aside, books are awfully, awfully inconvenient for travel. There’s what, half a megabyte of data in an average book, a megabyte at best – and it weighs a kilo or two.

One thing is for sure: when humans go to space, books will have to stay on Earth. At least until we have replicators that will allow us to manufacture a book on the spot instead of hauling it around.

When Crewman Daniels transported Captain Archer to the 31st Century in “Shockwave”, “the library is not filled with electronically-stored records as Daniel expects, but, rather, paper books.” memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Shockwave,_Part_II_(episode)

Makes one wonder when the switch will take place.

Books basically have the design design elements as the did 300 years ago mate.

As a Librarian, I can tell you this is not the case.

Nah, I get what Jimmy is saying.

I remember seeing Beverly Crusher get ready for bed and she grabs a book to read. I feel like they’d still be around and used. We saw it often in Trek. Even Uhura had translation books at her console in Trek 6.

That was more for the comedic quality I think. It seems like there would be SOMEONE on board who speaks Klingon they could have used. But no big deal.

We have already seen physical books a lot of times in Star Trek. (A prominent example would be the huge Shakespeare tome in Picard’s ready room.)

And Kirk had a small shelf of classics in his quarters.

I like the idea that special books would be in hard copy to enjoy in a different way than the screens of workday text.

I also like how in Discovery, Michael Burnham’s treasured copy of Alice in Wonderland looks to be print-to-order.

And remember that lawyer, Cogley, who defended Kirk in Court Martial? He rationalized reasons to keep tons of his reference books around. Something about the words on pages and not on computers or other.

Well said, but Trek has become sloppy since ST: Enterprise / Nemesis.

I’m convinced this will be set during the classic episode The Best of Both Worlds Part II when the Borg reach Mars.

I would be shocked if this writing team actually had Locutus murdering children, killing and assimilating civilians, etc only for their show to be about Picard taking care of the poor Borg/perfect AI with Starfleet as the bad guys. I mean yes, that’s the climate we are in (poor Kahn, they took away his family!) and yes that is drama, but I don’t seem them having the guts honestly.

The Borg didn’t actually interact the Earth populace as far as I remember, before the Enterprise destroyed the ship.

I’m sure a state of emergency would have been declared on Mars when the Borg cube entered the system.

I don’t think they stopped on their way to Earth, Mars was referenced only because the Borg broke through the Mars defense perimeter which they showed briefly.

The borg cube in Best of Both Worlds does pass close to Mars in the episode as we see Mars in the background for a second or two. The cube could have fired weapons at the orbital facilities and caused debris to blanket the planet.

Interesting theory. It might explain why Picard’s flashback/dream in the trailer is from Ten Forward on the Enterprise-D. Locutus was physically aboard the Enterprise, which was 23 minutes behind the Borg on its approach to Earth; but he was linked to the collective when the cube broke through the Mars defense perimeter. So, maybe his dream is a bit convoluted but he is reliving it from both perspectives?

Oh, interesting idea! I like it!

Someone else pointed out this could also be a flashback to the incident (or a portion of it) that forced Picard into retirement. We shall see…

This is more plausible

Not sure what to say here except that it really doesn’t look all that interesting. But will be checking it out when I subscribe again in a few weeks.

It’s a Romulan alert. That doesn’t mean much in Kurtzman Trek, since the Discovery has a Klingon alert sound, VOY doorbells, and Enterprise D hailing sounds, but maybe they finally cared about sound consistency again and it’s a Romulan school?

Is it just me or does that shuttle look too Disco inspired for the post TNG era?

Yeah, that was a criticism from a couple of the Picard trailers too… I heard it was so they can redress and reuse the interior sets and wanted the exteriors to match. Not sure about that since Picard is filmed in California and Discovery in Toronto. Just seems a little lazy to me, but I suppose designs can have a way of coming back into style as an in universe explanation. If that is the worst continuity gap I can live with it. Most of the trailers lead me to believe that they have tried to honor the TNG era aesthetic. It can’t be worse than Discovery’s totally different look from TOS.

If it is it makes perfect sense. The look of Discovery places it better in the Picard show time than the Pike era.

It makes no sense at all, the look and design for ships of that period is already well defined and show not be the same as ones 100’s of years older.
To defend that is just trolling ‘Trek fans

If you are talking about the TNG/Picard look they were reusing models from previous films in the show. Hence they had 90 year old ships out there.

My point is it makes sense to change up Picard because it is 20 years after Nemesis. Things change a little. But it makes no sense to RADICALLY change the Pike era. Most reasonable fans understand and accept there will be some changes for modern TV. But what Discovery did was above and beyond. It looked more Kelvin or Picard that it did 10 years before TOS.

It’s more than lazy it’s just completely stupid

It’s just a repainted disco shuttle. A few of them turn up in the Picard trailer as well. Very lazy
development for a Post TNG timeline

The fancy shuttles are saved for Starfleet. This is just a school shuttle. Old tech.

This will be our first time officially back to the 24th century since Nemesis! Exciting!

And it does look like Mars will be attacked and a very important story point in the show. People are suggesting its the Borg but it could also be the Romulans although I guess it would be surprising they got that far into Federation territory.

Technically, our most recent look at the 24th century was in the mind meld scene in Trek XI.

Yeah, but it was a flashback and really showed like a few seconds of a planet being destroyed. You did say technically, but that’s the difference. This is our first real story taking place IN the 24th century again.

That’s true. But, to paraphrase Spock, I’m a Star Trek fan. We embrace technicality.

Hmmm…two adversarial schoolgirls who eventually bond and become friends. Perhaps a metaphor for the Federation/Romulan refugee crisis?

With some 70 million people being displaced due to war and natural and man-made disasters, and with that number expected to rise tenfold by the end of the 21st century due to unmitigated effects of climate change, refugee stories are sadly pretty relevant.

Yes, would love to see more of this in allegorical fiction, more refugee/displacement stories, more environmental catastrophes. Australia will be uninhabitable by the 23rd century if we don’t change course.

I think it’s more literal than that. Those two girls actually become part of ‘Trek

This either has to be an event which happens during the events of “Picard” or a past event that is either central to whatever is haunting Picard and forced him to leave Starfleet behind, or something which happened during “Best of Both Worlds.”

But is it possible the Borg assimilated Mars (or going through the “Mars Defense Perimeter” meant bombarding the surface too) in “Best of Both Worlds”?

Part 2 implies the Borg were trying to get to Earth as fast as they could. But Locutus’s words were “Sector 001” not Earth specifically. And the Borg do beat the Enterprise to Sol by quite a bit of time before turning back once Data gets access to their network.

But wouldn’t attacking Mars in the 24th century cause even more casualties than the number of ships and lives lost at Wolf 359.

I see many people connecting Mars with Best of Both Worlds, but we see Mars approached by an armada of Alien ships in the Trailers which is probably the most likely connection to this story. This may have something to do with Romulans, perhaps refugees. I can imagine Picard rescuing the Romulans and relocating them to Mars only for the Federation to turn their back on them causing Picard to turn his back on Starfleet (as alluded to in the original teaser). I believe this season is meant to be a story about displacement that reflects current events. All speculation, but that’s the fun part. I just hope it’s something we haven’t predicted yet.

I concur. A few real-world things to consider, about Sir Patrick:
– didn’t expect to return to Trek
– was content with where he left it
– doesn’t need the money
– is in plenty of demand
– at the age where he’s bloody well going to do what he wants
– politically engaged
– is very big on human rights and all the ‘political’ issues going with them

As soon as the series was announced, I considered the above factors, and where the world has gone since we last saw Jean-Luc. I’m dead certain that whatever the story is, it will have plenty of parallels to our troubled times, where societies are questioning their values because of the crises arising (refugees or otherwise).

Another site, in one trailer analysis or another, spotted a ‘Romulans Only’ sign in one shot. That sure suggests a more ‘contemporary’ statement is to be made.

Who knew that the ‘09 film would offer something genuinely sophisticated to chew on? I sure didn’t…

This is exactly true, I’ve been trying to construct the story based around these clues and the producer’s intent to reflect current events. This is the best thing I could come up with and I’m fairly confident at the moment that this is the angle they are taking and I really like it. I could also see how this ties in with the Borg, another story about displacement with Hugh and the Borg gang from “Descent”. I can see why this would appeal to Patrick Stewart in particular. It sounds like a real Star Trek story with substance. The battle between what’s right and what’s convenient.

Honestly, this might be great. The writers won’t be able to help themselves making the Borg and Romulans the good guys and the TNG Federation evil. The stagnation that is TNG will then be on full display for all to see.

The federation has always been evil if you take a certain point of view.

All the way back to TOS. Almost every flag officer they encounter is deliberately portrayed as crazy, incompetent or evil.

A bald Vulcan. I feel so inclusive!!

Yeah, thought the same…my male-pattern baldness is Represented! Vindication.

The result of too many mind melds.

That Vulcan “Teacher” reminds me of “My Favorite Martian” Ray Walston.

That he doesn’t remind you of Boothby makes me suspicious (just gatekeeping)

Holograms can be augmented :)

Don’t be surprised if Picard himself doesn’t show up in this.

Ooooh, that would be nice!

And come to think of it, they have certainly threw in a few cameo surprises in the Short Treks. Georgiou showed up unexpectedly in The Brightest Star. Pike in Q&A. And Spock and Number One in Ask Not. So it’s not uncommon to keep these appearances a surprise.

It probably won’t happen but won’t be surprised if it does.

Well, it’s not a surprise anymore. It might have been later this month when I plan on seeing all those….

Sorry if you haven’t watched them yet, but its really not a big deal. You basically see them and they say a line. But its not a shocker like Georgiou since they take place on the ship.

It’s not THAT big a deal. I have avoided the articles where the shorts are reviewed, however. I figured that is where the bulk of such reveals would take place.

He said “doesn’t” not “does”

Have to give them credit, they are doing a great job building up so much mystery for this show and yet we still have no idea what the direct story is even about. We currently have the Countdown Picard comic which I bought both parts and really like so far dealing with Picard evacuating a Romulan colony (and lets just say he has some ‘issues’ over it) and now this short which will deal directly with Mars and some kind of attack.

They are doing a great job of planting these little seeds and keeping the fans excited! I’m just thrilled as a fan and will officially begin my Picard countdown watch with rewatches of some TNG (key Picard episodes and obviously the Borg/Hugh ones), VOY (mostly some key 7 of 9 episodes and Endgame since that will probably play some kind of role over of the current status of the Borg), First Contact and yes bloody Nemesis lol. But its the sacrifice I’m willing to make as a fan!

We have officially 3 weeks to go now!

I’ve done the same. I’ve re-watched TNG seasons 3-6 and key episodes from 2 and 7. And I’ve watched First Contact and Generations and will watch Nemesis closer to the premiere date.(oh in the summer I re-watched VOY complete)

Great to hear Dvorak!!!!

Yes I have been doing tons of rewatches in the last year already. I rewatched all of DS9 last year when the documentary came out (my fifth time total) and probably watched around 70-80 episodes of TNG, 50-60 VOY and half of the films with a few episodes of TOS and ENT sprinkled in (maybe around 20 each).

But now I want to make it Picard focused as possible. I will probably watch around 20 episodes between TNG and VOY and the other movies I mentioned. None that I have already watched in the last year. Nemesis will be the last thing I watch since it was the last thing we saw in the 24th century.

I love Star Trek!

I’ve started my TNG rewatch. First time seeing the bulk of the shows since they aired. Seems I go much slower than you guys. I rewatched Voyager recently and it took me nearly two years. I’m in the 2nd half of season 1 of TNG. I know it gets better but holy cow… That first season is so much worse than I remembered. I’m stunned the show survived to be honest.

The first time I watched TNG with our kids, we borrowed the remastered DVDs from the library. I had the same reaction.

I went through the episode summaries and realized that there weren’t more than a half a dozen in S1 that I’d share with kids in their early middle grades. S2 is a better, and there are some gems, but about half the episodes we gave a pass.

But they’re close to their teens now, and sufficiently desperate for new Trek that they’ve recently been watching S1 avidly in reruns on CTV Sci-fi channel now that it’s come up again.

All to say that CBSAA and now ViacomCBS are doing a lot to increase the value of their TNG and Voyager libraries by bringing back Picard in a new series. I bet the ratings for Trek reruns are up.

I bet you feel like a kid again tiger.

I’m quite disappointed by the outlook of this. In the utopia of Star Trek I would rather expect a school system like Rudolf Steiner schools. Not a repressive, fascist school system à la “Breakfast Club”.

odarek, I think you’ve hit on some of the unfortunate elements that have been implied or established in Trek lore across most of the series.

This doesn’t seem to be the kind of school that successfully promoting kindness, respect and non-retaliatory behaviour let alone IDIC values.

You are right that efforts or discussions towards a utopian society often start with child development and schooling, even if some of the proposed/attempted approaches are downright appalling (from Plato, through Thomas More, Voltaire and Skinner).

I’ve noticed that Trek writers have however often presented schools that are a reflection of the writers’ experience rather than an exploration of an ideal futuristic approach that would help children develop into the ideally behaved people that TNG tried to portray.

Clearly, there is some kind of hierarchical achievement-based social status in human federation society. There may not be economic pressure to succeed, but one wonders if the utopian moneyless society where everyone pursues self-fullfillment isn’t extraordinarily competitive. Moreover, at least in Starfleet, rank seems to offer privilege in terms of better accommodations and other material benefits.

So, I’ll be curious to see what this episode models in terms of schooling, but having Vulcan teachers doesn’t suggest that compassion and empathy will be at the top of the institution’s priorities for psycho-social development of its students.

That is part of the reason why some of the elements of society hinted at in TNG are complete horsesh!t. For one thing they are using some form of currency. Society wouldn’t work without it. And yes, rank has to have privileges of some sort or no one would strive for it. The end result is that when TNG mentions the more fantastical elements of their pretend future human society I take much of it with many grains of salt.

For the record, the society hinted at in TOS is far more reasonable than the one mentioned in TNG. In TOS Kirk actually said “Rank has it’s privileges.” And the kicker there was McCoy responding “How well we both know that” with a huge grin. And then there was Cyrano Jones and the crew dealing in “Credits”. Obviously some sort of currency. And then there is Kirk telling Scotty, “You earned your pay for the week.” Which one could say is just a saying but I suspect that all the crew was getting paid regardless.

This might be why Picard actually works. The TNG Federation ends up being a stagnant repressive society where even Borg drones are the good guys that the whole thing falls apart. The stage is then set for TOS ideals to make a come back – free markets, diversity, democracy.

Rank still has its privileges even in TNG. Look at Picard’s quarters on Enterprise versus an Ensign’s which we seen in Lower Decks which is much smaller, shares quarters with other ensigns and sleeps in bunk beds. I think that tells you that still not everyone is created equal, just more equal than now. ;)

I know some people have an issue with no money thing but its no more fantastical than most things on these shows to me. Again we can’t imagine a society without money because its all we know. But I don’t think its impossible. Yes maybe for humans because we are programmed that way but I can imagine societies functioning without money if that’s how their society was created with a shared goal from the start. Our society doesn’t have that, hence why there are borders and different types of governments, economic systems and regimes. In the world of Trek those differences have mostly disappeared. But yes I do agree it would probably still be some form of money around, but I didn’t create the show.

Where are the men? no more men in Star Trek?

🤦‍♂️🤦‍♀️

Another comment to which facepalms are the only logical response.

(But I think that I should be looking for some more diverse and representative facepalm images if I’m going to keep needing to respond this way.)

The actual logical response would be to ask Gus to support his claim and to analyse it with an open mind. If it is unfounded, make him confront the truth. If it isn’t, challenge your own premises. IDIC 🖖.

Looking over the Short Treks, one cannot deny that females have the majority of roles. Is this a good thing or bad thing? It depends on your perspective. I personally would ask why before making my mind up. I’d be satisfied if the producers said “well looking over the previous five Star Trek series, there is an undeniable male majority. Therefore, we’ve deliberately tried to address the balance in Discovery and the Short Treks and had more female representation. In Picard and future series we will have equal representation.” However, I don’t believe that will happen anytime soon.

I understand your point Collector, but my facepalm response is precisely appropriate because we’ve had ad nauseam discussions on this thread along these lines.

These kinds of comments are facepalm-worthy because this issue is almost always raised when the protagonist(s) are not straight white males, and the times when episodes and series are mainly straight white males are somehow not counted.

I note for example that in singling out Short Treks, you did not consider than in S1 3 out of 4 Shorts were had male protagonists. It’s interesting that no one commented on male over-representation in Short Treks last year.

Last thought, Gus may have made their over the top comment with ‘tongue-firmly-in-cheek’, but it’s enough of a trope in discussions here on TrekMovie that it warranted the ironic reply. (And we Canadians rarely let an opportunity for ironic humour go by.)

That’s easy. one way to”prove” women are over represented in Short Treks is to ignore any evidence to the contrary.

I prefer women.

Combine this with what we’ve read in “Countdown.” Theory: LaForge is overseeing construction of a rescue fleet at Utopia Planetia at Mars, which is attacked (perhaps by some rogue faction of Starfleet?) to prevent the evacuation of Romulus — thus giving us the incident that results in Picard leaving Starfleet.

Great. So the silliness about Romulus being destroyed from JJTrek2009 is going to be legit, now? Dammit.

This was confirmed some time ago FASAfan.

That event took place in the Prime Universe.

This has been confirmed forever now. And its canon, so it was always ‘legit’. The only question was would they deal with it head on or ignore it and I’m happy its the former.

JJ made Star Trek Great Again

It was always legit.

Well, I have to deal with the silliness of Kirk getting off the hook just because he brought back a couple of whales. I hate it but unfortunately it’s canon.

2020 is shaping up to be a big year for Star Trek. Picard is legitimately one of the most eagerly anticipated shows (not just sci-fi shows) of the year and we are now less than three weeks away from the premiere. I just read on CBS’ Star Trek site that Discovery S3 will start later this spring – that seems like a big surprise since it was initially thought to start in late 2020, although SMG did hint that it was coming a lot sooner than expected. Sounds like Lower Decks will follow and with any luck more Short Treks.

Seems like the emergency is what will connect to the Picard show

Still no Short Treks for Europe. This is very frustrating and feels like we are left alone. Thats not the way Star Trek should be. Why dont they say anything? Who is responsible? Is there any ETA? They just dont care!

We don’t live in utopia yet, here on 21st century Earth the acquisition of wealth is still the driving force of our, er CBS’s life

Netflix clearly isn’t on board with Short Treks…they parked season 1 belatedly in the trailers section of their site. CBS evidently can’t force Netflix to take their approach to Short Treks given that they weren’t covered in the initial legal agreements for distribution of Discovery outside North America.

Now that Short Treks are being marketed as their own series, perhaps Netflix can be bypassed altogether.

I’m curious to see if Amazon Prime will take them on outside of North America given that it will be the home of Picard.

Also, I’m not clear if Lower Decks will be going on Amazon Prime.

It sounds as though there are more announcements to come.

My guess is that this will show a Romulan attack on Mars. In the recent Countdown comic we saw the Romulans plotting and succeeding in taking control of the USS Verity. We also see snippets of Romulans attacking Mars in the trailers. What is they used the Verity to attack Mars and destroy Utopia Planitia (which brings into questions whether or not Geordi survived). Since it was Picard’s ship they use, it would certainly affect him emotionally and could be the reason he quits Starfleet.

Well after watching the short, it looks like things are going to change in a HUGE way. Since this isn’t a review of the short I won’t spoil anything but it is amazing that it proved basically everyone wrong over who was doing the attacking!

Spoiler!!?!

Did anyone catch on the screen when they show Picard’s photo, above it states “Synths Attack Mars”. There’s a word prior to that but as it zooms in it scrolls off screen.

Apparently it’s “Rogue Synths”

Oh and another tiny detail I loved about the short and that is they used the TNG font at the end for the title card! I normally don’t care about stuff like that but it was great to see again. :)

I noticed that too. Another cool thing from the credits:
Based on Star Trek: the Next Generation created by Gene Roddenberry