‘Star Trek: Picard’ Recap – ‘No Win Scenario’

Written by John Edward Betancourt

Caution: This article contains spoilers for Episode 304 of ‘Star Trek: Picard’. To revisit the previous episode, click here.
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One particular topic that the Star Trek Universe rarely addresses, is our mortality, and it makes sense as to why. After all, death isn’t permanent in the future, since Captain Spock returned from the grave after sacrificing himself for his crew and shipmates and of course, Lieutenant Commander Data found a second life in a simulation and even Admiral Jean-Luc Picard found new life in his synthetic golem body. Not to mention, our heroes in every corner of the franchise tend to cheat death often and of course… people live to a ripe old age in this universe, to the point where peaceful death is nothing more than a norm. One where a fulfilling life can be reflected upon, so, with all of those elements in play… why bother to discuss that which we in the 21st Century face often?
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Of course, few of us have taken any issue with Trek not taking the time to ponder upon such matters, especially since it tackles other incredible problems and concerns in our world, on a regular basis. But as the franchise continues to evolve and we the audience continue to look to our favorite shows for guidance on topics that keep us up at night, the time has finally arrived for Trek to really dive deep into our mortality and what it means to face it, via the next episode of Star Trek: Picard. For ‘No Win Scenario’ opened up in a grim fashion, with the U.S.S. Titan in dire straits. For the damage from the brief battle against the Shrike left her dead in the water, so to speak, and drifting toward the gravimetric center of this strange nebula. 

In fact, the situation was so dire, that Captain Riker opted to funnel what little power was left in the ship to Life Support. So that the crew could quietly reconcile the forthcoming end. Also so… Will could do the same. Because it truly seemed as though there was no hope to this situation. That the Kobayashi Maru test was finally coming to life. Which prompted Will to try and find the right words to his beloved wife and daughter in the hopes of making sense of the rocky past few years they had endured and their lives in general and it is also where, on Will’s advice, Admiral Picard took the time to finally get to know his son in the holodeck. Just so both men could try and reconcile a lost twenty years and find some kind of connection before fading away.

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Which led to some interesting moments for certain. The kind that saw two deeply wounded men, try, and open up and fail often in doing so, because of their baggage, but try none the less. And this sequence even spoke to the trauma that facing the end can bring us, as evidenced by Captain Shaw’s grand and painful admission as to why he despised Picard, courtesy of a harrowing story from the frontlines of the Battle of Wolf 359. But what made these moments so incredibly unique and poignant… was how raw and bleak they were. For most stories that feature this kind of reflection, feature some kind of immediate positive spin. Where the character or characters find some kind of lesson or moment of inspiration that the audience can share in. But here… this was just… stone-cold reflection and an understanding that the end is inescapable and that oddly… was quite reflective of the past few years in our lives and how we all had similar musings with the unknown surrounding us. 
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Making this a powerful sequence, one that eventually used the bleakness of such reflections to once again mirror what so many of us took away from the pandemic and what we should take away from our mortality in the first place. In that… we only have so many years in this life, so it is best we do the most with them and the moment, since we never know when our time might come. Which prompted Beverly to dig deep into the nature of the nebula to see if it could somehow help them, and that brought forth a stunning discovery. In that, the odd power surges that kept coming from it, were signs of something greater, of a potential galactic birth of sorts. Which helped her to postulate that perhaps… that energy could be harnessed to recharge the Titan’s ailing power systems and get the ship out of harm’s way.

A plan that Riker was skeptical of, but everyone quickly reminded him… no one gets out of life alive, so why not go for broke and try make this moment, memorable and powerful. Which Riker agreed to and that led… to some incredible sequences for certain. One that finally saw Captain Shaw and Commander Seven team up to not only prep the Titan for a hell of an energy surge, but to also use Shaw’s knowledge of the Dominion War to sniff out the Changeling that caused so much trouble last week, and the work needed to save the ship… turned out to be the perfect bait to isolate it and deal with it. Which Seven did courtesy of Shaw’s teachings regarding the flaws of the Changeling, and that wondrous sequence of unity, led to more in this tale.

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For back on the bridge, the Admiral took the conn. Simply because no one knew how to handle dangerous flights quite like Picard and seeing his father in action, inspired Jack to help out and bond with his father at last. Since they both discovered they enjoyed the rush of defying the odds and Jack finally understood why his father made Starfleet a priority, and dear old dad… learned about how his son did reach out at one point, in an awkward meeting that Jean-Luc bungled to please a crowd of young ensigns eager to speak to a legend. Not to mention, this is a sequence that allowed for Captain Riker to finally give Vadic the lesson that has been long overdue. For she went back into the nebula to find Jack on her own superior’s orders and well… Riker got her good.
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Because he quite poetically, used the tractor beam to throw an asteroid at the Shrike. Badly damaging the ship and deeply bruising Vadic’s ego before this episode ended on a beautiful note. Wherein beauty surrounded the crew of the Titan when new life was created around them, which was the final exclamation point for Riker on bringing him back from his concerns and worries about death, and that prompted him to reach out Deanna and apologize and promise to live the moment to the fullest again, and most important of all… the ship is out of harm’s way. But of course, this is a season of mysteries, and this episode only deepened them further. Since we came to learn that someone is calling the shots for the Dominion Remnant and that’s a huge deal, and that something is quite amiss when it comes to Jack.

But while we wait to learn more about those little quirks, we can in fact… celebrate one brilliant story. One that finally and boldly went deep into a topic the franchise has been afraid of for some time, to offer the audience perspective on what we all faced collectively but a couple of years ago. Not to mention, it was filled with wondrous and satisfying moments involving the old gang since they embraced the bold heroism that once regularly flowed through their veins, and of course, this tense tale kept us on the edge of our seats and well, that makes it another homerun from season three of this series. And now that we are away from the nebula and on the move… that likely means the reunion will only continue and more answers and confrontation will head our way, as we inch toward the final mission of this intrepid and incredible crew. Until next time.

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