The first season finale of Star Trek: Picard streamed in March and the show was originally set to go back into production for season two over the summer, but the pandemic got in the way of that. Now one of the returning stars has confirmed when Jean-Luc and the gang will be back on set.
Picard returns to production in February
In September, TrekMovie first reported production on Star Trek: Picard’s second season was being planned for January of 2021, and last month actor Evan Evagora confirmed the plan was “January, January, January,” but it appears the plan has had a little bit of a delay. On Thursday, actress Jeri Ryan responded to a fan on Twitter, revealing a new start date of February 1st.
Pushed to Feb. 1 now
— Jeri Ryan (@JeriLRyan) December 23, 2020
Unlike Star Trek: Discovery, which began production on season four in Canada in November, Star Trek: Picard is filmed in Southern California, which is dealing with a new surge in COVID cases. Even though film and television production is exempt from lockdowns, it’s no surprise that extra time is being taken to plan out proper safety protocols. Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is also expected to go into production in February in Ontario, Canada, but that has yet to be officially confirmed.
Ryan reprised her Star Trek: Voyager role of Seven of Nine in season one of Picard and is returning for season two, which is expected to include the return of other Star Trek stars, but as of now the only confirmed character being reintroduced is Guinan, played by Whoopi Goldberg. Other possibilities that have been hinted at include Gates McFadden as Dr. Crusher, LeVar Burton as Geordi LaForge, and John de Lancie as Q. Marina Sirtis (Troi) and Jonathan Frakes (Riker)—who both appeared in season one—have expressed interest in returning as well. And it has also been hinted at that Brent Spiner could return as Dr. Alton Inigo Soong, a new character introduced in season one.
Jeri Ryan as Seven of Nine in “Stardust City Rag”
Keep up with everything Star Trek: Picard at TrekMovie.com.
Liked the first season a fair bit. Part 1 of the finale was pretty rough, but it recovered decently well for Part 2. Looking forward to a continuation of my favourite era. :)
I can hardly wait to see more of this one.
Season 2 in late 2021 probably.
Please be safe. As much as I want to see Picard season 2, the actors are more important to me.
Please. They’ll be just fine. The question is why are THEY permitted to work while millions of Californians that work in restaurants, hair salons, bars, movie theaters, etc are prohibited from working? While I believe they should ALL be able to work, why does the film industry get a pass while so many millions don’t?
The film industry is far better able to keep a very tight reign on testing and keeping track of test results, also it’s not just any average Joe that can walk on set and spread the virus. Plus they dint have to do things in an exact order, if somebody gets sick they can skip those scenes until the actor is healthy again. What would you do to keep busy through the pandemic, if not for the arts? Artists, actors, musicians, authors, comedians, video game developers, game and talk shows, news casts, djs on the radio, talk radio hosts, they’re all due some major credit for continuing to work and risk exposure (their own and their families) to covid so that we can remain informed and entertained! If everything had just shut down right at the start, and everyone had just worn masks and stayed home in proper quarantine for 6 weeks, this would likely have been over with 7 months ago.
There are billions of people. And you can bet that there will always be a percentage of that number who will do what they are not advised by government or advice from scientists.
What is more likely is all that would have done would be delay the inevitable.
Oh really? Let’s see your math (considering that your baseless claim flies in the face-off over a century of hard won epidemiological science.
Don’t make this political, I want this without your vanity or drama
What a disgustingly egotistical statement.
Ooooh, you’re hard. What a silly response to a perfectly reasonable comment.
There is nothing “reasonable” about statements completely at odds with accepted science. You have no business being a sci-fi fan.
Also, the film industry props up many other industries which you may only indirectly see on screen—writing, catering, fashion, hair/makeup, set design, and other effects (it is sci fi, after all) are all industries effected. In looking at tv credits, easily a couple hundred people remain employed by a single episode. It makes good economic sense, especially if they can do so safely.
A film or television production is a closed system where you can control who is around at all times and make sure that everyone is tested for covid and exercises proper precautions (masks, social distancing, etc.). This is not true of most work places.
This is a VERY fair point. The film industry is hardly “essential”. It’s obvious by now that the best approach is to open up all the states that are not open and take steps to protect the vulnerable.
Something tells me that if the governors who ordered lockdowns had to lose their paychecks like the people they are hurting are there would be a lot less lockdowns.
If COVID didn’t specifically target people ages 65 and over, Congress and the White House wouldn’t be taking it even as seriously as they have.
Also, I replied to your MU opinion in the other comment board.
Considering your sense is completely at odds with all epidemiological science, you really should leave the sci-fi world and stick to fantasy.
The film industry powers California. Every other business besides those connected to essential services revolves around Hollywood and production.
That’s less true these days. It’s still an industry. But with Canada and Atlanta and other places opening up to the industry SoCal is becoming less and less relevant. Tech drives CA more than anything else. But many are leaving. HP and Oracle are just the latest who are leaving CA.
Tech can survive a pandemic and remote working. Entertainment production cannot, and the creative industry fuels 15% of California’s economy and nearly 3 million jobs. Classifying it as essential is in the California economy’s best interest, especially given competition out of state and overseas. Whether that’s wise given the risks is another matter.
So you are saying it’s essential only in that it still fuels 15% of CA’s economy? (and who knows how long that will last) I thought “essential” was more about the bare minimum society needs to still kinda function. Meaning, if your business makes rugs, you aren’t “essential” as we can get by without rugs for a while.
So if essential only means what fuels the economy, then pretty much every business is “essential”. Especially to the owner of that business and the people employed by it. So using that metric it makes little sense for the film industry to chug along while other people’s livelihoods are not allowed to.
Bring it up with Gavin Newsom, it’s his state, and rules are different from state to state for better or worse. They deem that 15% meets your definition, I assume because there are nearly 3 million of these workers who have no remote working alternatives, they need money the government is not rushing to give them, so they they are a drain on state resources. I don’t make policy, I’m just stating the most likely reasons.
Literally nothing you wrote is accurate.
Because without some form of ENTERTAINMENT
(for those of us SMART enuff to Quarantine)
During this PANDEMIC people would go MAD!
Seriously, scrap the section 31 show and do a Seven of Nine series instead. You can thank me later.
I would have liked that before they ruined her character in the first season. An intelligent Woman who hat to (re)learn the value of human life would be interesting to visit 20 Years down the line. Watching a Lesbian Space Ranger Psychopath isn’t really that interesting … It’s not as bad as how they fucked over the Rikers for some cheap drama but still. Picard probably came away the best and he gut outright killed …
With the exception of mentioning her new sexuality (chin up, Chakotay lol), you’ve hit the nail right on the head.
It’s sad that Jeri didn’t challenge the showrunners on totally destroying her Voyager character arc. If only the actors love the characters they portray even half as much as we do/almost as much as they do a paycheck, the show could have been much better. That’s aimed at Sir Patrick, Frakesy and to a lesser extent Sirtis.
Yeah, I don’t have a problem with her (also) liking women. It just made the phrase that extra bit more pulp-y 😅
😂
Yeah. Picard was the last thing I needed in 2020, and it’s the first ST I’m planning not to watch when the next season comes out. I don’t need anymore back stabs and knives to the heart.
It’s a travesty of a Star Trek show (as is Discovery). Whilst I watched the first episode with optimism, by the end, it was with horror. I shall not be watching the second season unless I read good things about it.
As above, no one care about your opinion. Thankfully.
You got half a dozen retreads of the exact same, tired, old, boring, unoriginal, formulaic, soft sci-fi pablum, and now you and your ilk begrudge the show finally growing up and directing itself toward adults.
There is a reason Patrick Stewart only signs one reluctantly after a number of very rigid conditions were met, most of which had to do with raising the calibre of the story telling, in exactly the ways you are decrying.
Better get use to it. Even the return to overplayed Planet of the Day scripts will not fully return to the simplistic, space soap opera nonsense you wold have us all be stuck with in perpetuity.
Boo hoo. See ya. The Star Trek universe does not mourn your loss.
Playing the devil’s advocate here… Maybe she does care and returned BECAUSE of what they did with the character?
Well yes and no. It’s entirely possible, that she returned because of the script. I don’t think its very likely since supporting actors rarely get more than a pitch before signing but it sure is possible.
But all that would show, is that she doesn’t really understand her character, since that developement makes no sense without some massive leaps in logic. And that’s not really a bad thing. It’s not what she’s paid for. She’s an actress, that has to perform what’s written to the best of her ability. And that she did. I can’t say, that I have any problems with her performance.
And it’s not, like that is a rare problem. Patrick Steward for example has no Idea, why Picard worked. But that wasn’t much of a problem since he didn’t write him. Same with Shatner and Kirk. But as soon as they gave creative controll to them, it fell apart pretty much instantly. Kirk punching God in the Face in Star Trek 5 and Picard becoming an Action Hero for no good Reason in Nemesis. Not to mention this show.
Point taken. And Stewart wanted more for Picard in the 2nd half of TNG. In all the features (well, less so Generations) he pretty much was the “action hero”. Not just Nemesis.
Yeah. The first example I wrote was First Contact, where originally Riker fought the Borg on the ship and Picard repaired the Phoenix. Which makes a lot more sense with theire respective characters from TNG.
But I believe, it was Nemesis, where it really showed, what happens if you let him inform the character. From Generations to Insurrection, you still see glimpses of the character (namely because of the writers). But with Nemesis all bets were off and it showed.
Well … and then came the Picard show (which funnily isn’t even really about him). People gave so much shit to Braga and Berman but at the very least, they managed to keep the IP consistant (maybe to the point, that it got to repetitve and risk-averse but looking back, I’ll take Enterprise Seasons 1 and 2 over any of the new shows)
Well, regardless of original intent, what we got was tank topped Picard swinging on plastic pipes and out-maneuvering the Borg Queen. Like any true action hero would. And then we got it again in Insurrection.
Personally I don’t think Seven was in the show as much as she perhaps could have been. I’d be intrigued to see them develop her character more as she is now.
In your point, it seems so many fans think characters should be the same as they were 20 and 30 years prior. Fact is real people do change, we are changed and constantly shaped by our experiences. And sadly its true to say that many of us undergo unpleasant life challenges that do weigh us down and make us a bit more ‘crazy’ or something like that lol.
So change is normal and necessary for the characters.
While what you’re saying is certainly true, it doesn’t necessarily apply here. Yes, characters change over long periods of time. But they usually don’t become completely different people. And while physical or psychological trauma can (in extremely rare cases) lead to that in people, you have to keep in mind, that you’re writing a TV show. So if you completely negate 7 Years of character growth and even ignore the characterisation that was there in the first place, there needs to be a reason for that. You can’t just handwave that away with “people change”. Then my question would be: why aren’t we telling that story? It obviously has way more impact on her life than what we’re seeing here. (Which is a problem with pretty much all legacy characters in Picard)
Why not have a natural development of the character occur offscreen and save the life changing stuff for the story you’re actually telling? There’s no reason for example you couldn’t easily replace Allison Pills character with sevens. It would make sense for her to be a cybernetics specialist. It’s not like her whole revenge story had any bearing on the story anyways. So why all that pointless trauma in her past? It’s actually kind of insulting that they probably wanted a female action role and had to take pretty much her intelligence away for that. And for what? Make romulan Legolas female. It’s not like his tragic backstory served any purpose in the plot (notice a pattern here?)
I think people miss the point about characters. Like people in the real world change so do characters in recurring roles in TV shows and movies.’ I think if you reexamine your life you’ll noticed you have changed over the years. An intelligent woman who had to relearn the value of human life and later a few awful events can send one 3 steps forward 6 steps back.
As I’ve said above: that is certainly possible but it’s no what I was criticising here.
Say what you will about Braga, but he had a wonderful grasp of what her character should be. He saw her as being ultimately tragic and best developed by not quite being able to achieve full humanity. Having her sacrifice herself in the finale was a good idea. As much as I adore Jeri Ryan and was thrilled to see her back, I had such a hard time recognizing her character (I could understand Ryan’s difficulty at finding her voice), and it was punishing to see her be yet another victim of a dark event post-Nemesis and get consumed by it.
And then he stuck her in a skin tight catsuit to get ratings
If I looked as good as Jeri Ryan did in that catsuit back in the day, I’d have worn one too… :)
And Seven never once attempts to seduce anyone bar her experiment with Harry and the odd fever dream. The catsuit is played off as an efficient garment designed to help her regenerate and function. That it was a b*tch for Ryan to wear and was solely designed to titillate and get ratings is nothing to do with the character on paper.
I wasn’t real impressed. Nice seeing the characters again. But killing off Picard, only to bring him back as an android was cheesy at best, and rather lazy from a creative standpoint. Hopefully season 2 will be more polished.
And it was completely unnecessary the story could’ve been served without that added
Yeah it was a repeat of the debacle of Into Darkness with them bringing back Kirk from death within several scenes.
It’s not drama. It is lazy, useless, a waste of our time, unnecessary and so much more I’d think.
If you want to kill a character off them just do it.
Maybe they do have an exciting reason for making Picard into an android but I have doubts on that.
I 100% agree with that, Scott, and am not sure I’ll be back for S2. The reviews here will inform about that.
Agreed, Scott. I wasn’t all that impressed. I did like the new characters much better than anyone on Discovery, however. Save for the elf. It was indeed a very bad decision to make him an android. Makes zero sense and goes against a value and principle Picard espoused for decades. And, as apc0408 claimed… Completely unnecessary.
Picard is the show you never knew you wanted which, upon watching, you realised is awful.
You are speaking only for yourself there, Mitchell. I wanted the Picard show very much and was for the most part very happy with it.
Awesome. Horses for courses, right?
Star Trek seems to withdrawn up it’s own hole though, revisiting and revising this and that. This implies a devastating lack of creativity and imagination.
Your kidding ,right? And how would you write and produce the show? I’m waiting. I don’t know who’s worse Star Trek fans or Star Wars fans. Always bitching and moaning about really nothing. Would you rather have no Star Trek or some Star Trek? Do u realize the writers of today were kids when TNG,DS9 Voyager. And even Enterprise aired. And I’m sure they thought the same way you do ,that they could do it better. I’m sure if CBS cancelled everything Star Trek because fans stopped watching or said they would or bitched about all the shows you would be the first to bitch about that!
I find your question doesn’t really fill the bill. For me, at least, I’d rather have no Star Trek than garbage Star Trek. But I would take mediocre Star Trek over no Star Trek. So far, Secret Hideout has yet to produce even mediocre Trek.
That does sum it up for me too. I’d rather have the rewatch-ability of just about all of the old Trek shows than the blandness and often times, downright rubbish-ness of Discovery and Picard… And I am saying this as a huge fan of Sir Patrick Stewart.
There’s an inherent problem with Alex Kurtzman being in charge of Star Trek on tv and selecting the writing staffs and showrunners, though.
Most of Star Trek 2009’s accolades were about the casting and direction, not the script, besides how it didn’t mess up established characterizations and had some fun dialogue. Into Darkness got even less praise for its writing as fans compared it unfavorably to TWOK – while Spock saved the ship by performing harrowing delicate repairs, Kelvin Kirk just kicks the damn thing until it works. That’s Kurtzman in a nutshell. Bringing that sensibility to the tv space was a mistake IMO. Kurtzman is not the right Trek writer to shepherd these shows for old fans and new ones. While they had the right idea with Bryan Fuller, CBS should have approached successful Berman Trek graduates like Ron Moore, Naren Shankar or Manny Coto and offered them the keys to the castle. Kurtzman is style over substance, plot over character, and he has admitted to being a Star Wars over Star Trek guy for most of his life. CBS offered him a cushy and powerful fiefdom, but he’s not suited to it and Discovery and Picard’s revolving door of showrunners inspires no confidence, at least to me.
Well said. Can you imagine what we could have got if Manny Coto had been tapped for this?
I think it would have been a solid success, and one that was reverent of legacy Trek while still bold and new. It may well have had the opposite problem Trek has now of not being progressive enough for some audiences, but Coto has good ideas, cut his teeth with Berman and Braga, and has had proper success as a showrunner post-Enterprise. Kurtzman just brings in overpaid hacks like Goldsman and writers who may be outside the box but are out of their depths like Gretchen J. Berg and Aaron Harberts. It’s just a shame to see the next generation of Trek writers apprentice under the tutelage of writers who don’t really get what made Trek work on TV, only the superficial things that worked off and on for the JJ movies. All the wonderful edicts, (particularly about character) Michael Piller instilled in his TNG writers are not being passed on in the family.
Unfortunately yes Mark Lynch. And it would not have been great with Coco.
Fuller was very junior when he worked on Voyager, and has a track record of not seeing things through. Why fans have ever thought he should be the keeper of the flame is beyond me.
Last thought, the casting on the Kurtzman series has been brilliant as has the strategy of a menu of series to appeal to different audiences (note how Disney is now copying this).
The actors are high level and only the DS9 ensemble had the same deep competence in acting craft that all of the new series have. Would they only have coherent and consistent writing of the characters and plots. Serialization has not been great for Trek. I’m not sure that it can ever be well done when the scripts aren’t written all in advance of production. DS9’s heavy serialization happened after many seasons and after the story arcs had been laid down bit by bit over a long horizon.
Agree in principle. However I would say that I like the idea of new blood in Trek rather than going back to Moore or those folks. I would probably take Coto as he only had the one season of Enterprise as the show runner and I liked what I saw there.
But my main issue with Kurtzman is not his overall plan. Which I think is a good one. (That Trek should have different genres) No, the problem is he is not very good at hiring his writers and producers. Also he has made the fatal mistake of using the same people to work on all the shows. How can they have their own unique voices if they share so many bts staff?
I’m all for new blood, but I think it should be introduced under the tutelage of some proven old hands. People from the Berman era who went on to succeed at other shows and demonstrate continued originality but would not be inflexible to great new ideas that were presented to them. Fuller was a good idea on paper but turned out to be serially unreliable.
I’m not down on Kurtzman like so many seem to be in general, but I agree 100% I would love if they brought back Manny Coto, Ron Moore and a few of other old guard. They just really understood Star Trek. Not that Kurtzman doesn’t understand it, but his version of it just feels a lot more hollow compared to all the old shows. There is a reason why so many of us can rewatch most of the old shows over and over again decades later, because they still resonate. It’s impressive how well most of them have aged. Yeah the sets and camera work may feel dated at times, but the stories still really shines even now.
Yes maybe not everyone loves every show like Enterprise, TNG, DS9, whatever but most people DO seem to like and appreciate most of them. I love them all frankly.
I’m enjoying Discovery a lot more this season, but even that said it’s still missing something that I always get watching an episode of TNG or even ENT.
But at least it’s improving IMO, but I know not everyone here shares that view and completely understandable.
I have to agree with that comment unfortunately… And add that just about every Easter egg we got in Picard was, rather than an Eggs Benedict, more like an undercooked, mouldy fried egg!
Dammit, I just hate not having anything positive to say about any of these new Trek shows. I have been a fan for as long as I can remember and even the worst Trek of all that has come before had some sort of redeeming quality, even if it was only being so bad it was good in a laughable way. You know I am looking at “Spock`s Brain”!
But there is nothing I have been able to get out of either Discovery or Picard that has made me feel glad that I have watched them.
If you do, then good for you.
Maybe I am not really a Star Trek fan after all/anymore?
Even though season one ended up being a massive disappointment in SO many ways, I am still looking forward to season two, just not as I was for season one. I really love being back in this era of Trek again, but they didn’t really do a great job of reminding us why so many people love it just like people who felt Discovery failed to capture the spirit of the 23rd century. Well that’s SNW job now for that era. As for Picard I’m hoping we do get more of the spirit of TNG back, but just better writing would make a lot of people happy.
I’m trying to keep my expectations low/open so I can appreciate the really great moments (of which there were many in S1), but find it more possible to let go of the bad.
I’m sincerely hopeful that getting all the scripts done before shooting (due to Covid) will lead to a better plotted and more coherent season overall.
I”m also thinking that with Akiva Goldsman having the creative lead as showrunner of Strange New Worlds he might be less inclined to try to push Picard in a trippy TOS direction.
As I’ve said earlier, the season finale really worked as long as you watch it dissociated from the rest of the season. How did that happen? At least part of it seems to be that some of the strong voices in the writers room had different ideas about what the show should be that were unresolved before shooting. Worse, after letting Hanelle Culpepper “set the tone” of direction for the series in the first three episodes, the direction after that was all over the place and Goldsman didn’t seem to feel bound by Culpepper’s precedents at all.
Mostly, I’m also reminding myself of how much both TNG and DS9 stepped up between seasons 1 and 2.
I don’t like the space of time between seasons. Move the filming to a non- Covid area.
I like Picard far more than Discovery because it deals with a Federation in ruins and with it the morality rock bottom after a costly Dominion War, things were never the same, great leaders and assets lost and then destruction and fall of the Romulan Empire which lead to a change and shifting of power in the Alpha Quadrant. The show Picard makes sense and shows us no matter how progressed, grown up and developed humanity is, all achievements are just fragile as glass. So, forget Discovery and watch Picard. I am looking forward to.