STAR TREK: Picard Episode 4 Breakdown + Ending Explained

We’re back with another Picard Breakdown!

Our mission is to boldly go where no one has before and give out thoughts on the new entry as well as what could be happening in the future.

Throughout this, we’ll be discussing the ins and outs of the fourth episode’s plot, it’s easter eggs and what we thought of it as a whole.

We will be ENGAGING with heavy spoilers here so if you haven’t had a chance to catch the show yet and don’t want to know what happens then I highly suggest that you turn off now.

With that out the way let’s get into our breakdown of Picard Episode 4.

Picard Episode 3 Recap

Ok so just a quick recap of the series so far. After the Death Of Data’s Daughter Dahj, Picard made it his mission to track down her twin sister Soji.

Picard wanted to set out into the stars to locate her and after being denied by Starfleet he finally got a crew together to travel into the vastness of space in order to locate her.

Episode 4 Recap

Episode Four centers primarily around the titular character, his new crew and a Romulan orphan named Elnor that Picard helped to rescue during the Supernova that has shaped many events in the show.

The episode opens with Admiral Picard traveling to see Elnor as a young boy and it fills in a lot of the blanks from his past. Picard settled the Romulan refugees on Vashti.

There is a mention of 10,000 refugees and this actually ties in heavily with the prequel comic book Star Trek: Picard: Countdown in which the character and his ship the Verity were asked to evacuate 10,000 Romulans.

It’s during this mission that he and Raffi were taken hostage by the Romulan Government who revealed that there were actually 5 million inhabitants on the planet that needed saving but that the Romulans only wished to save their own people.

They defeated the Romulans and evacuated the 10,000 and over a quarter of a million more but as we know Star Fleet was not there to save the rest of the planet and thus many of the survivors remained on Vashti.

Vashti

Vashti itself is named after the first Queen Of Persia in the book of Esther and during that the Queen was banished from the Kingdom after refusing to show her beauty during a banquet.

This is mirrored slightly in the episode in which Elnor who we witness as both a child and adult carries a lot of disdain for Picard because he believes he was absent.

Picard shows up in his fancy suits whilst the Romulans are forced to live on an underdeveloped planet and it’s clear that the promises he makes about the federation are ultimately shown to be untruthful.

The Synth attack breaks his promise and thus Elnor grows up hating the character.

After the credits we jump to the present, fourteen years after the intro and see Picard returning to Vashti to try and recruit Elnor on his mission.

The Tragic Sense Of Life

We see Rios reading the tragic sense of life which we discussed last week was a book on how death gives life purpose and this is mirrored in Picard’s mission and his now finite time left alive.

Rios gives a much better description in the episode but yeah there’s a lot of parallels here.

His diagnosis has put a ticking clock on his life and he seems to be trying to live out the best of both worlds with the holodeck placing the character back on the Chateau once more.

We learn that Vashti is in the middle of a power vacuum run by gangsters and crime lords. It’s basically Mos Eisley but in Star Trek. Vashti is also part of the Romulan Rebirth movement. There’s also lip service of the Way Of Absolute Candor which is basically when you have a drink and go on a twitter rant but in real life.

It’s the opposite of what the Romulans tend to do as they are normally the strong and silent type but this allows them to speak their mind unfiltered.

Raffi tries to talk Picard out of it and we see how the death of Dahj has made the character feel like he perhaps has a chance to redeem himself not only in Soji but also in Elnor.

The Way Of Absolute Candor

Once he arrives on the planet we realize that though Picard necessarily isn’t in the good books at Star Fleet, that many still view him as the embodiment of it. He stands there, a charming man who is all front but really just full of empty promises.

The fact that he resigned from Star Fleet shows them that he never really had any intention of truly helping them and was only in it for the glory. Whilst we know this isn’t really the case and it was more due to being at his wits end, this stepping down has made you realize that perhaps the character isn’t the selfless pillar of good that we once believed him to be.

Back on the Borg cube, Soji is investigating the past of Rhomda who as we know was part of the last ship to be assimilated by the station. She mentions the Destroyer which she accused Soji of being and I actually have a theory that Soji may be the next Borg Queen. I keep meaning to mention this every video but forget so I’m making a point of doing it this time.

Soji can speak to the drones without knowing how, as we know she is the melding between synthetic and organic and though I have seen some people say that this could make her one of the borg if you’re gonna go all out then as a show you might as well have the Queen appear rather than just another lowly drone.

The Destroyer

She is called the destroyer which the Queen would have a reputation of being and there is a lot of weight to this theory sprinkled throughout the episode including the revelation that she was sent to the cube and not that she was requested to go there.

There are questions about her identity and who she really is and I think it makes a lot of sense.

On a date with Narek, she asks if he is Tal Shi’ar which he says he isn’t but then this is followed up by him saying that even if he was he wouldn’t tell her. As we know he is duplicitous and thus the second answer is more likely the truth. Whether it’s his clothes, mission or his sister being tied heavily in with a shadowy organization, it does seem like he is indeed one of them.

I actually do think he is falling for her and who knows he may be instrumental in her believing Picard. We know his sister is likely going to become the big bad so it does leave wiggle room for him to switch sides.

We see him and his sister discussing the fact that they are using Soji to find a nest of Synthetics which is where she potentially came from. I think this may be located at FreeCloud where Bruce Maddox is as we know due to the ban on Synthetics he travelled into the universe to continue working on his perfect machine.

We discover that Narek is becoming her boyfriend because if she is pushed too hard she will Activate like Dahj did and potentially enable her combat systems.

Romulans Only

We jump with Picard back to Vashti that is a shadow of the planet he landed on almost fifteen years prior. Everyone looks at him like he just told them he’s gonna be building a monorail in the area and there are clear designations of Romulans only which mirrors the separation of race that used to exist across the world.

He is given less time than he’d hope for when Raffi sends word that an incoming Bird Of Prey carries Carn Katar on it. A Bird Of Prey is a Klingon ship but this looks slightly different from the typical design. It is an older model rather than a newer one and it provides our first big space battle in the series.

Elnor doesn’t seem that up for going with Picard and he becomes, even more, angered that Jean Luc seemingly cared more for his dead friend than he did the living child he made a promise to.

He rejects his request worse than those people who watch every video and don’t subscribe and Picard starts trouble in the town center in order to get him to come to his aid.

Countdown Comic

He rips the Romulans only sign off and enters the bar. Picard comes face to face with a Senator from the aforementioned comic book run we mentioned and see that he has devolved from a high ranking official to a man that lives in poverty. He reiterates how angered everyone is over Picard. Romulan’s as we’ve seen are a proud race and the ex-senator believes that the Romulans could have actually saved themselves had they been left to their own devices instead of being filled with false hope.

Now I do think that this once more adds weight to the theory that the Romulans actually carried out the Synthetic attack on Mars whilst they were in the midst of a supernova in order to make Star Fleet look bad and for Synths to be hated.

As we know from Admiral Clancy, there were fourteen systems threatening to leave Starfleet that did not end up going because of the Synthetic Uprising and this made androids banned throughout the galaxy.

We do know that The Romulans hate synthetics and perhaps they hacked them in order to make the rest of the galaxy join them in banning the robots.

Picard Episode 4 Ending

I don’t wanna get all Bush knocked down the towers but there is definitely a lot more going on here. The fact that their planet was on the brink of destruction during this would give them the perfect alibi and personally I believe that’s what happened.

Anyway, we see first hand that Elnor is a brilliant fighter and he binds himself to Picard in order to protect him. I got a lot of Legolas vibes here and Picard makes a public apology like he’s just been canceled.

The show ends with an epic space battle with an ally joining the fight. With his ship failing, they beam them aboard and its revealed to be 7 Of 9.

It’s an awesome way to end the episode and it’s great to see her back in a Star Trek show.

As for her feelings for Picard, Jeri Ryan recently discussed how she views him in an interview which I’ll play right now:

So we know a lot from that and though they haven’t met before I do think it’s going to add an interesting dynamic to the show. As mentioned she works for a group of freedom fighters and Picard may even end up reaching out to her allies.

In the next episode, we see them traveling to a more offbeat planet dressed as pirates and I think this is where they could end up trying to meet this group.

I did enjoy the episode and so far the series has been great for me. Thank you, everyone, who’s stuck with the channel and I hope you’re enjoying the recaps too.