Icheb just got Phil Coulson'ed!

Yes, that is kind of gibberish, but don't worry, I'll explain. Did you watch Picard yet? Yes, the TV show. Oh, don't roll your eyes at me like that. You know what you were in for when you click on my blog. And if you haven't caught up with the show, I'm on episode five and am about to spoil the merde out of it.

I believe it's entitled Episode 5: The One Where Picard Wears a Beret.

"Fan service? Wait'll I show up..."

-Future guest stars, 

Riker and Riker's beard

Still with me? Super. I don't really have a lot to say (not that that's ever stopped me before) other than goddamn, this show really loves to service its fans. From the get go this episode was-what? Why...why are you laughing? It did include a lot of fan service, what did you think I-oh...I see. Get your mind out of the gutter. Now, where was I? Oh, right. So much fan service. Quark from DS9 and Mot the Barber from TNG get name dropped, Picard and Seven of Nine share a moment of ex-Borg bonding. 

Oh and in a total surprise, Icheb from Star Trek: Voyager shows up to be graphically vivisected for parts. Yikes. He was kind of that show's chirpy, overly eager Wesley Crusher type; a former Borg rescued and adopted by Seven of Nine. And tonight's episode brutally killed him off thirty seconds in just to give Seven someone to avenge. See? Phil Coulson'ed.

He was also brutally recast, possibly because original actor, Manu Intiraymi dismissed
 Discovery's Anthony Rapp's accusations against Kevin Spacey as "just life." So that's fun.

Pictured: Star Trek's dumbest moment.

And avenge him Seven does going so far as to straight up murder Icheb's murder, a black market Borg-parts dealer with whom she may have had a relationship. Speaking of straight-up murdering your ex, Allison Pill's Doctor Jurati murders Doctor Maddox whom everyone's been looking for since episode one. And look, I loved this episode. I'm just saying that's a lot of murder for Star Trek. It's not that trek doesn't get dark sometimes, but one time Picard and pals where turned into children and had to save the ship from bungling Ferengi.

Oh, and there's a B-plot about recovering drug addict Raffi's attempt to reconnect with her estranged son. Her plan goes off the rails when we find out her son wants nothing to do with her because she's a crazy Mars Attack truther. Which is even more tragic since we as the viewer know that there totally is a conspiracy at work. 

"Dilithium crystals can't melt tritanium beams. Think about it!"

-Raffi, seen here holding a vape
 pen that's not helping her case

Above: these jaunty hats really help
 lighten an otherwise murder-heavy story.

But it wasn't all Game of Thrones, we some comic relief from Sir Patrick Stewart's hilarious french accent and the Freecloud dress code which is maybe best described as Spirit Halloween Store pimp. Oh, and we also get some funny moments from Elnor, the Australian Romulan samurai raised by honest-to-a-fault warrior nuns, and his inability to grasp the concept of deceit. He's a little Drax the Destroyer, but whatever, it was a nice counter to the heaviness of the episode. 

Ok, other than people who cosplay
as Starfleet officers, who even cares?

Anyway, like I said before, I'm not sure I can be completely objective about this show having grown up watching TNG. The whole show could be Picard and his Romulan roomies drinking tea and running his vineyard and I'd still watch. I'm that into it. But tonight's episode felt like the point at which the slow burn of the first four installments is finally paying off. And speaking of paying off, while the surgeon is gutting Icheb, she asks him where his cortical node is. Which, just a one-off technobabble line and who even cares right?

I care, that's who. It's a call back to a twenty-year old episode of Star Trek: Voyager in which Icheb donates his cortical node to save Seven's life. It's an absurdly tiny detail and one only there for the most dogged of fans but they stuck it in and if you know what the hell they're talking about it gives Icheb's murder and Seven's reaction even more weight. Bravo writers, bravo. That's how you service your fans.

Pictured: The EMH from Voyager performing
a delicate MacGuffin transplant surgery.