> In order to understand what a thing is, I believe you must first understand how it dies. Endings are the most important part of a story because they are the culmination of everything that came before.
> If there is one thing I want to get across in this essay, it’s that what we’re witnessing is the real Star Trek as it springs from its stated values.
Funny aside: one of Hegel's major themes is this, that the a thing's end reveals it's true essense, what it really was from the beginning. The history of a thing is thus it's reaching (and revealing) its essense.
I'm only half-Trekkie, on my father's side. But I still speak conversational Trekkie, and I'm in for however many posts you have in this series; you're articulating some things about Star Trek that I haven't heard before and I'm fascinated to hear the rest of.
"But something always struck me as profoundly wrong with the alternative, with gracefully bowing out and being placed in the cottage. Was that always going to be the end of the journey, a boring retirement? All that adventure, all those high stakes, all the fighting, all the philosophical musings, and that deep aspiration for something higher, does it really end in a lonely French cottage, being passed by and overlooked by history? After everything Picard has done, is this how it ends? Is this what Q saw when he leaned in to whisper into Picard’s ear? You’ve given your entire life in service, but the answer, the ultimate meaning behind it all, is for someone else a little younger?
Going off the Fandom page, Picard had a child with Beverly Crusher somewhere in the canon. One child. Apparently in an alternate reality he had more children, but for the canon timeline, he didn’t have any lasting relationships, and you can bet the Picard bloodline is probably going to die when Jack Crusher (Not Jack Picard for some reason?) finally bites the bullet."
Out of curiosity, how far does your instinctive revulsion at this sort of retirement go? If Picard had married Dr. Crusher and had seven children (having finally overcome his discomfort with children from throughout TNG), and our vision of his future in "All Good Things..." showed his grandsons and granddaughters transporting over to Chateau Picard in the evenings, playing around the vines or listening to the tale of Darmok and Jalad while the grown-ups enjoyed some wine from the cellar, would that feel right?
And if not, is there a satisfying ending for Picard within the basic premise and framework of the show? Obviously there are visions you and I would both love to see. For instance, Picard, an aristocrat and a man born to speak, converting to the faith and preaching with that tempered fire only old zealots have, quoting the Bible the way he once quoted Shakespeare and dying of overexertion in one final speech exhorting the Romulans to honesty and the Vulcans to love and the Klingons to crusade...that would be cool, but would just as obviously break the show's basic ideals in just about every way. Are there any endings that would both fit and not feel profoundly wrong?
I should note the farmer ending isn't egregious to me except in Star Trek's frame. The family ending is much better, but the only way the ending would be completely satisfying would be if Q answered Picard's question.
> In order to understand what a thing is, I believe you must first understand how it dies. Endings are the most important part of a story because they are the culmination of everything that came before.
> If there is one thing I want to get across in this essay, it’s that what we’re witnessing is the real Star Trek as it springs from its stated values.
Funny aside: one of Hegel's major themes is this, that the a thing's end reveals it's true essense, what it really was from the beginning. The history of a thing is thus it's reaching (and revealing) its essense.
I'm only half-Trekkie, on my father's side. But I still speak conversational Trekkie, and I'm in for however many posts you have in this series; you're articulating some things about Star Trek that I haven't heard before and I'm fascinated to hear the rest of.
"But something always struck me as profoundly wrong with the alternative, with gracefully bowing out and being placed in the cottage. Was that always going to be the end of the journey, a boring retirement? All that adventure, all those high stakes, all the fighting, all the philosophical musings, and that deep aspiration for something higher, does it really end in a lonely French cottage, being passed by and overlooked by history? After everything Picard has done, is this how it ends? Is this what Q saw when he leaned in to whisper into Picard’s ear? You’ve given your entire life in service, but the answer, the ultimate meaning behind it all, is for someone else a little younger?
Going off the Fandom page, Picard had a child with Beverly Crusher somewhere in the canon. One child. Apparently in an alternate reality he had more children, but for the canon timeline, he didn’t have any lasting relationships, and you can bet the Picard bloodline is probably going to die when Jack Crusher (Not Jack Picard for some reason?) finally bites the bullet."
Out of curiosity, how far does your instinctive revulsion at this sort of retirement go? If Picard had married Dr. Crusher and had seven children (having finally overcome his discomfort with children from throughout TNG), and our vision of his future in "All Good Things..." showed his grandsons and granddaughters transporting over to Chateau Picard in the evenings, playing around the vines or listening to the tale of Darmok and Jalad while the grown-ups enjoyed some wine from the cellar, would that feel right?
And if not, is there a satisfying ending for Picard within the basic premise and framework of the show? Obviously there are visions you and I would both love to see. For instance, Picard, an aristocrat and a man born to speak, converting to the faith and preaching with that tempered fire only old zealots have, quoting the Bible the way he once quoted Shakespeare and dying of overexertion in one final speech exhorting the Romulans to honesty and the Vulcans to love and the Klingons to crusade...that would be cool, but would just as obviously break the show's basic ideals in just about every way. Are there any endings that would both fit and not feel profoundly wrong?
I should note the farmer ending isn't egregious to me except in Star Trek's frame. The family ending is much better, but the only way the ending would be completely satisfying would be if Q answered Picard's question.