WMG / Star Trek: Picard

Pre-Release

This series will allude to the Kelvin timeline

It may not be able to reference anything, as the inhabitants of the "prime reality" seem to have no way to bear witness to the "Kelvin timeline", but obviously there is still the same branching-off event.

• Well, at least the destruction of Romulus will be involved.
• Confirmed, at least as far as Starfleet's refusal to help the Romulans is the final proverbial straw that prompts Picard to resign his commission in protest.

The "greatest rescue armada" in history is an emergency evacuation of Romulus in 2387

Heavily hinted at given Word of God that the series deals with fallout from the destruction of Romulus.

• Confirmed. That was the fleet under construction at Utopia Planitia before the synth rebellion destroyed everything on and orbiting Mars.

The show is set in 2402

Following on from the previous WMG — fifteen years after the destruction of Romulus in 2387.

• The series is said to be set 20 years after Star Trek: Nemesis (set in 2379) putting it in 2399 and the rescue armada mission sometime in 2384. Although, the 2387/2402 scenario could work as the devastation following Romulus would certainly be a compelling impetus to Picard resigning from Starfleet.
  • The series is confirmed to start in 2399, 12 years after the destruction of Romulus.

The series may note the death of Spock

From their perspective though, they probably assumed he died being pulled into the black hole with Nero, having absolutely no idea he was thrust back in time to an Alternate Timeline.

Possible returning characters

Other characters from The Next Generation might show up. It wouldn't be wise to go too overboard since the show's supposed to be about Picard specifically, but maybe characters with close ties to him might appear- Dr. Crusher, Q, and Guinan might work well.

• One might hope any TNG-era characters would cameo or at least be referenced including, but not limited to Will Riker, Deanna Troi, Geordi, Worf, Miles and Keiko O'Brien, Katherine Janeway; Ben Sisko, etc.
  • Confirmed. The San Diego Comic-Con trailer confirms Seven of Nine and Hugh's appearance. Data will also be reassembled somehow. One of the writers also mentioned Troi and Riker’s return in a future cameo.
    • Guinan is now committed to return, at least for a guest spot. The producers sent Whoopi a personal invitation for Season 2 by means of asking Patrick Stewart to deliver the message during a The View interview. And she said yes (well, "saying yes" is a complete understatement...).
    • Robert Picardo has hinted that he may guest star in Season 2 as well, reprising his role as the EMH.
    • Also confirmed. John De Lancie will reprise the role of Q in season two.

The series may borrow or even canonize plot points of the Star Trek: Countdown comics

There are some consistencies, like Picard having retired from Starfleet, but it might be in a Broad Strokes manner.

• Judging from Data’s “corpse” reappearing in the trailer, it looks like Starfleet will resort to taking his memories from B4.
  • Jossed. "Remembrance" reveals that Data's attempted resurrection in B-4 never took hold as B-4's positronic brain wasn't advanced enough to handle Data's mind. As a result, Data never took command of the Enterprise-E as depicted in the comic. Nor has Picard, at any point, become an ambassador, as he retired straight from Starfleet to his vineyard in France.

Most of the TNG characters died aboard the Enterprise-E when Romulus was destroyed

The trailer alludes to a humanitarian mission, presumably involving the imminent destruction of Romulus. Said mission is implied to be Picard's Cynicism Catalyst, and since Riker and Troi (who were on the U.S.S. Titan, per Star Trek: Nemesis) are the only TNG cast members other than Picard and Data confirmed in the show, it's easy to imagine that the Enterprise-E and her remaining crew died in the disaster. Picard likely blames himself if so, which prompts his "impulsive" retirement.

• Jossed, at least the part about the disaster being Picard's Cynicism Catalyst; he was already hit hard by the "synth" attack on Mars when Starfleet used the destruction of the Utopia Planitia shipyards as an excuse not to bother helping the Romulans before the supernova hit. Then he resigned from Starfleet. Further Jossed by confirmation in the second episode that Worf and La Forge are still alive, as Zhaban refers to them both in the present tense. Furthermore, season 3 confirms that Worf, La Forge, and Dr. Crusher are coming back.

The woman approaching Picard for help is actually a Borg Queen

At least, a former drone who has the capacity to become one. The overall trailer implys the story will focus on the Borg and the woman's connection to them. My own interpretation of this and from the trailer shots leads me to believe that in this series, Janeway's virus in Endgame utterly crippled the Borg, rendering the Borg to being both severly weakened to the point of no longer being a threat to anyone and leaderless. This lead to Borg ships across the Galaxy shutting down, which could explain the damaged cube here, allowing it the be found and studied by the series' antagonists.They began a process of un-assimilating the drones onboard, but one, the women wanting Picard's help, escaped with her memories wiped. The reason why she is treated as important though is that this particular drone has the capacity to upgrade into a Queen.This would explain why some characters are treating her with dread, as she could potentially become a new Queen and rebuild the Borg back to their previous power. Similiar stories have appeared in beta canon novels, which show the Borg utilising a "Royal" protocol in the event a new queen is required. It would also explain how she feels safe around Picard. She knows him, at least subcounsously, as Locutus.This will make things difficult for Picard, as he will walk a moral tightrope of helping her and her fellow drones escape and discover their humanity, whilst trying to keep them from becoming full drones again and creating a reign of terror under a new Collective.

• Jossed. Dahj is actually a highly advanced biological android.

The woman seeking Picard's help (Dahj is apparently her name) is actually Lal, rebuilt and with her neural pathways repaired, but with her memories locked away.

Why would the above have come about? Perhaps, even after her death, Data had attempted to find a solution to what had caused her cascade failure. Further, he may have made arrangement with one or more of the relevant scientists he's met over the years (Maddox or Haftel, for instance) that his work be continued by them in the event of his death. Thus, some time after that happened, this work was completed. However, again possibly at Data's request, Lal's appearance was altered and her memories were locked away so that she would not have to deal with the grief of having lost her father until she had developed enough. To that end, the same methods of concealing the true nature of the android recreation of Juliana Tainer (Soong's wife) could be used... but perhaps them not being quite so comprehensive as initially believed has led to people being after her, and perhaps her locked away memories are starting to come forth in limited ways as well.

Why might The Borg be after her? Well, the Renegade Borg were interested in her father as potentially being the key to making themselves entirely artificial beings, and The Borg Queen expressed similar interest in Data. Anyone else after her may be trying to prevent The Borg from gaining this advantage, as no longer requiring a organic components may make them a much more terrible enemy than even before.

• Partially Confirmed. "Remembrance" reveals that Bruce Maddox did indeed continue Dr. Soong and Data's work, creating a line of Ridiculously Human Robots, including Dahj.

The woman seeking Picard's help is Tasha Yar's granddaughter

Why her granddaughter? Well, remember in the episode Redemption, an alternate Tasha Yar went back in time and had a half-Romulan daughter named Sela? This new character is Sela's daughter. It would explain why the Romulans are after her if it was a plan by Sela to start a war between the Romulans and the Federation. Extra points if the father was a clone of Shinzon frotm Nemesis.

• Jossed. Dahj and Soji were designed by Commander Bruce Maddox using Data's remnants.

That isn't Data in the trailer, it's Lore

With Data gone and nobody else to keep tabs on his case Picard has been visiting Lore on a regular basis while Starfleet Science has been working to try and stabilize his severe emotional problems. It's something of a last favor to Data who would want his brother looked after even if he is dangerous. They've made enough progress that he can receive regular visitors and remain assembled but it will be decades before he's ready to be released... unless someone with political pull got him out early for a special mission.

• Or it IS Data, in B-4's body, and they went the path that the online game took with it, the memory copy Data did in Nemesis took root, Data was "revived" as a secondary persona in B-4's body, both personas in 1 body was too much, both wanted to erase them-self for their brother, B-4 beat Data to the punch. it would also explain why "Data" in the trailer is being civil with Picard, and not trying to kill him, for all intents and purposes Data in B-4's body is a medical patient, unable to rise to the same heights he rose to in his original, superior, body.
  • Or it's just a figment of Picard's imagination. Brent Spiner has confirmed that it is B-4 we see in the drawer. And since Data was blown to bits, maybe Picard is being "haunted" by the specter of his lost friend. This is further supported by the second trailer which shows Picard waking up after dreaming about Data.
• Jossed. It is Data, only in Picard's Dream Sequence, and it is B-4 who was dismantled when Data's mind overloaded his positronic brain.

Data's body will start to suffer with problems

The problems with Data's body will be due to age. His artificial skin and hair will be beginning to brake down, which will cause wrinkles in the artificial skin as well as his artificial hair will start to lose it's colour and become a grey colour. This will make him look like a old man and will allow Brent Spiner to keep playing him.

• Jossed. Data only appears in a Dream Sequence, and generally in line with his appearance in Star Trek: Nemesis.
  • And yet played with, when Data appears in a simulation in "Et In Arcadia Ego, Part 2". Picard shuts it down at his request, and he undergoes Rapid Aging to dust.

The show will introduce two new ships

The U.S.S. Nimoy ship named after Leonard Nimoy, and the U.S.S. Yelchin ship named after Anton Yelchin.

• And a U.S.S. Auberjonois.

Data is a hologram

Perhaps it's Data's memories, extracted from B4 and put in a holodeck matrix. Data's body is still destroyed, B4 is disassembled, but Data himself isn't dead. Or, for a sadder tone, it's just Picard holding on to the past too much, which is why he doesn't want their game to end.

• Jossed. Data appears within Picard's Nightmare Sequence.

DS9 characters will appear

Based on this tweet, possibly Nana Visitor as Admiral(?) Kira Nerys.

• Unlikely: the woman in the trailer is an admiral but isn’t a Bajoran. Probably Jossed.
  • Indeed Jossed, at least for the first season.

Starfleet has become much more military-oriented and exploration has all but stopped

Let's face it - Romulus being destroyed would cause a massive shift in the balance of power throughout the Alpha and Beta Quadrant. Starfleet might be forced to assume a warlike footing simply to avoid being a target at the expense of all of its other goals. Hence Picard's disgust with Starfleet as it is now — he's a diplomat and an explorer first, a reluctant soldier only when no other options are left.

• To say nothing of Starfleet/the Federation's reaction to the persistent threat of the Borg (two of their vessels needed massive fleets to even go toe to toe against, and the both of them STILL reached Earth orbit before being destroyed) and the Dominion War, with the generation of officers now rising the ranks of Starfleet made up of people most familiar with Starfleet as a military force over science and exploration...

The woman seeking Picard is his daughter — biologically speaking

Shinzon proved that the Romulans had Picard's DNA on file. Some Tal Shiar plot came up in like the wake of Shinzon (or, even, she IS Shinzon's daughter, which, genetically, makes her Jean-Luc's as well), got derailed when Romulus went BOOM, and now some element of what remains is attempting to put her down. This would explain why she feels drawn to Picard.

• Jossed. If anything, Dahj is more of a "daughter" to Data and to Bruce Maddox, who was able to perfect Dr. Soong's work and create a Ridiculously Human Robot.

Picard saved Elnor's life when he was a child

It's stated that Picard led a rescue armada fifteen years before the show starts, saving thousands of Romulans from the supernova. Elnor is a young Romulan (possibly in his 20's) who is stated to be fiercely loyal to Picard. Was he one of the Romulans who Picard saved from that supernova, and does he now owe Picard a life-debt?

• Confirmed, Elnor was one of the Romulans relocated to Vashti, but his loyalty wanes over the years that Picard did not visit after the Mars attack.

The USS Enterprise-E will feature

Based on this descriptor from Amazon Prime on a Facebook trailer for the series:

Want to be first to climb aboard the USS Enterprise? Follow us and be the first to know.

• Jossed. When Starfleet vessels finally show up in "Et In Arcadia Ego, Part 2", the Enterprise-E is not among them (though the ships looks somewhat similar).

Judge Aaron Satie will be subjected to a demonizing character Retcon

"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured...the first thought forbidden...the first freedom denied – chains us all, irrevocably." Given the rise in calls for a ban on hate speech...

• Jossed, no mention.

Post-Release (During Season 1)

Geordi is alive somewhere

It's been theorized that, with the Countdown lead-in comics depicting Geordi LaForge in charge of building the Romulan relief fleet at Utopia Planitia, that he would likely have perished in the "synth" attack on Mars in the 2380s (introduced in Short Treks' episode "Children of Mars"). But what if he didn't? It's quite possible that he escaped, as the attack likely did not result in the deaths of every single person in the shipyards or down on the planet. It's also possible that the "synths" were aiming to capture him alive because of his knowledge of the inner workings of positronic-based androids, gathered from over fifteen years as Data's closest friend.

Out-of-universe, this also seems likely because the producers seem to be going out of their way to have TNG characters return for appearances. Arbitrarily killing off a major character off-screen seems a pretty pathetic way to do it from a dramatic standpoint. And if he really were dead, why sit on The Reveal past the opening episode, if the point is to drive home why Picard feels so devastated years later?

• Possibly Confirmed by Zhaban referring to him in the present tense in "Maps and Legends".
  • Tie-in materials (e.g. the novel The Last Best Hope) indicate that Geordi was on a transport to Earth at the time of the attacks, leading to his survival.
• Confirmed. Burton will be reprising his role in season 3.

The attack on Mars was a false-flag and the Synths were hacked

Considering that the end result of the attack on Mars resulted in Starfleet abandoning their rescue of the Romulan people, it's possible that the people behind it wanted to keep an old enemy from regaining power. They probably saw the loss of 92000+ people, a colony and the shipyards as an acceptable loss as opposed to another war. They used the Synths because they had some way to remotely control them. The ban insures that any investigation would be limited or stopped in its tracks and, if the Synths were hacked, ensure that no one would be able to improve security to prevent it from happening again as you can't improve security on a technology that you're not allowed to develop.

• The "hacked synth" aspect appears to be Confirmed as of "Maps and Legends", wherein we see the opening moments of the attack on Mars. A synth is visibly hacked onscreen, and the intercom warns that multiple synthetic workers have been compromised.
  • The third episode "The End Is The Beginning" has Raffi suspects this, meaning the false flag aspect is also somewhat confirmed.
  • The fifth episode "Stardust City Rag" has Bruce Maddox also suspect this, so it's now almost certain.
  • It's Confirmed in "Broken Pieces", albeit the reason had nothing to do with harming the Romulans but to get the Federation to ban synth research.

Starfleet/Section 31 engineered the supernova that destroyed Romulus, and also attacked Mars to prevent their rescue

Not wanting another Dominion-level war after learning that the Romulans were experimenting with Borg technology, they decided to strike first, but Picard's rescue plan threw a wrench into their plans so they sacrificed tens of thousands of people and scapegoated the Synths For the Greater Good. This may tie into why there's no sign of Starfleet in the far future of Star Trek: Discovery, and Picard as a whole might actually be showing the decline and downfall of it Just Before the End.

• Jossed, as the Zhat Vash engineered the synth incident on Mars.

Data's five-queen poker hand in Picard's first dream is somehow significant

Most likely, it's Foreshadowing for a future appearance by the Borg Queen, or a message sent by the Q.

• Given the ending of the first episode showing that the Romulans were building one of their reclamation sites on a damaged Borg cube...
• While the first season's plot involves a Borg Cube, the only Queen to get involved is Seven (who briefly becomes the Borg Queen for the Artifact).
• The second season, however, involves both the Borg Queen and Q.

One of the main villains is someone we've already met

I'm betting Dr. Jurati or Musiker; in the former case, she became frightened by the potential of synthetic life and created a virus to destroy her own creations, in the latter case it's because she's a Section 31 agent, after Section 31 turned absolutely corrupt and now wants to seize power over the Federation by any means necessary.

• Another possibility is that it could be someone we already met, but in the previous show. Like Lore. He wasn't even mentioned in the whole of the first episode, and even the Daystrom Institute made no mentions of having his body when he was dismantled by Starfleetis really suspicious.
• Somewhat Confirmed: Jurati was a mole, but that was due to being essentially mind-raped by Oh.

Narek is also an android

Narek's actor Harry Treadaway has a twin brother, Luke Treadaway, who is also an actor. It seems unlikely that they would establish that the androids always come in pairs, but then not Make Use of the Twin of one of the main actors.

• It's also interesting to note that he appears to have a necklace of some sort around his neck, but hidden behind his shirt.
• It would certainly go some way to explain his sister's rather touchy-feely Big Sister Bully behaviour if she were not his sister at all, but his handler - and he a being that she despises.
• Unlikely. His sister, when talking to her comatose aunt, mention's she'd taken them both in as children.

The events of season 2 of Discovery will come up

Although the records were supposed to have been erased or buried in a deep dark hole forever, it would be unsurprising if Starfleet's freakout due to the synth attack turned out to be because someone was aware of the events which had happened a century and a half before when Control went rogue and reacted when it looked like A.I.s were doing so again.

Maddox successfully created the synths by reverse-engineering Borg technology

Elements of the Borg Queen and/or Borg Collective's personality and mission was somehow filtered through to at least some of these new synths, and as a result, they decided to attack the shipyards on Mars.

• Jossed. The attacks were established to be caused by a hack by an anonymous party in "Maps and Legends"
  • "Broken Pieces" confirmed it was the Zhat Vash.

The Romulans who go after Dahj are hired mercenaries

Assuming that the attack on Mars and the attack on Dahj are connected, using a third party to handle the dirty work gives the Big Bad plausible deniability. Synths attacked Mars for reasons unknown, leading any investigation to a dead end. If any of the Mercs are caught, the authorities come to another dead end and blame falls on the Romulan Star Empire.

• "Maps and Legends" established that those Romulans are possibly part of an elite Romulan task force called the Zhat Vash.

The Borg are going to try to assimilate Soji

A Soong-type android made of flesh and blood, with the strengths of both and the weaknesses of neither? Sounds like the epitome of cybernetic "perfection" the Borg crave. Assimilating her would be an enormous coup for the Collective.

Lore is the Big Bad

The last time we saw him, he was trying to destroy the Federation and turn the Borg into fully synthetic lifeforms. Some fool may have put him back together. Given that we have characters like Admiral Matthew Dougherty and Sloan, there are others that are just as foolish. He escaped, learned about how the Federation was building other synthetic lifeforms and decided to put a wrench into their plans. His actions lead to the ban and undermined Starfleet; two things that Data represented. His wanting to kidnap or kill Data's daughters is also well within character as he is utterly envious of his brother and would want to destroy his legacy. Manipulating others to do his dirty work for him is also well within character as Manipulative Bastard is his trademark.

• Given Lore’s affiliation with the Borg, it could also be his work that resulted in the Romulan reclamation site being on the Borg cube. And said fool who reassembled him could be, who else, Maddox.
  • It's unlikely to be Maddox. He and Data were friends. Data would've told him about his brother Lore, his crimes and how dangerous he was. If Maddox really did create Data's daughters, he would've known better than to reassemble Lore or use any part of him.
  • Fair enough. But Maddox can still have reasons to reactivate Lore. Maybe he wanted to see if he could successfully reprogram Lore or override Lore with Data's imprints (and of course failed), or maybe he was running some tests on Lore in hopes of finding a way to repair Data.
  • Upon further reflection, it has to be considered a possibility. Lore's positronic net is the only other stable one ever created and if he got desperate, he might try to use some part of it.
  • The idea of neuron sharing and trying to get to Dahj and Soji before they "activate" could even allow for a brain transference method - if Brent Spiner felt he was too old to portray Data, then Lore returning in his body would have similar issues. But have Lore awakened and seeking a new body would allow something of an Nth Doctor situation, where Lore could be portrayed by a new actor.
  • Another thing to note: In the TNG episode "Descent, Part II", just before Lore is deactivated, he's doing something on a computer console and tells Data that he has a way out, but we never see what it is. What if Lore had managed to actually upload a copy of himself to a Borg Cube? Or some other computer system?
    • If true, it would explain why Jurati killed Maddox instead of confronting him about using Lore's neurons and keeping things from Picard. Maddox would likely dismiss her claims and Picard is seen as desperate to protect anything left of Data.
  • Adding to the theory about appearing in a different body. What if Lore did a gender swap? Maybe he's Narissa? Mind you, we never see a seductive side, but he was definitely manipulative and abusive, just like Narissa is to her brother.
    • Or, maybe the Zhat Vash got something lost in the translation and it's two brothers, not sisters. The one who lived (Lore) and the one who died (Data). Lore wasn't killed, just dismantled.
    • Lore being Narissa is Jossed. Narissa specifically references her and her brother having been adopted by an aunt when children.
• Jossed in its entirety. Lore was never even mentioned in the series and was not involved in any of the events that took place.

The Spitting Romulan was spitting some kind of Thalaron agent at Dahj

The effect on her is similar to, if slower than, the effect of the Thalaron device in the Romulan Senate.

The advances in cybernetics will allow Data to return in a more "human" form

In-universe, androids that are nigh-indistinguishable from humans are already possible and proven to exist, as with Dahj and Soji. Meanwhile, fragments of Data's positronic brain apparently survived, as Bruce Maddox was able to use his "fractal neuronic cloning" method to create Dahj and Soji's minds. It seems the groundwork has already been laid for Data to return, only with a far more human-seeming body, which could very well justify him looking much more like Brent Spiner looks today — freeing him from the need for CGI de-aging and finally completing Data's Character Arc of seeking to become more human.

• Jossed, the technology is instead used to allow Picard to return after he dies of natural causes just after the season climax. Data, or at least, the version of him copied to B4 and then preserved in a computer simulation, instead requests to be allowed to die by ending the simulation, because he can't be human if he lives forever.
• Confirmed in season 3, which has a different showrunner and basically just sweeps most of the first season under the rug.

The Big Secret the Zhat Vash is protecting is that the Romulans some how accidentally created the Borg

There are Clues that point both ways. On one hand, the mention that Romulans are really afraid of AI and their computers are purely numerical machines indicates that they had made a major error and had an A.I. Is a Crapshoot incident in the past. On the other hand, the fact that they chosen a Borg cube as a reclamation site plays against it.

• Another factor to consider is that the Borg have been evolving for thousands of centuries, according to Guinan; while the Romulan race is no more than two thousand years old. But then again, the Borg do have access to time travel...
• Alternately, the Romulans simply had contact with the Borg in their early past, and as first contact with the Borg does, it didn't go well.
  • Hinted in the third episode "The End Is The Beginning", where we actually see some reclaimed assimilated Romulans, and they're certainly traumatized, to put lightly.
• Jossed: The Romulans discovered an artifact hundreds of thousands of years old left by a civilization destroyed by synths, and formed the Zhat Vash in order to prevent anything like that from happening again.

The Commodore in charge of Starfleet Intelligence isn’t a Vulcan, but a Romulan

Meaning a) that they attack on Dahj was a false flag operation (as was, perhaps, the attack on Mars) and b)that Lieutenant Stiles (from TOS: Balance of Terror) and his suspicion of Vulcans as looking like Romulans is a little too close to home for comfort.

• This is actually possible. And of course they're going to look similar - Remember that Vulcans and Romulans stem from the same species. The Romulans schismed from the Vulcans because the former refuse to repress their emotions and adopt a belief system based completely on logic that the latter adopted, and ultimately was exiled from Vulcan.
• She seems too emotional to be a Vulcan, either.
• Partially Jossed, as it turns out she's half-Romulan and half-Vulcan.

Commodore Oh is a Vulcan

Something has been very off about Vulcan society for a very long time. That's something that the franchise started to establish all the way back in TOS, and has been reinforcing ever since. Across all incarnations of Trek, Vulcan society has been quietly portrayed as intransigent, politically volatile, and deeply racist. For a species that prides itself on its devotion to pacifism and logic, there's a weirdly high number of radical, occasionally violent Vulcan separatist groups seen throughout the franchise. And in hindsight, it seems really odd that so many Vulcans joined the Maquis—enough of them, at least, that Tuvok infiltrated a Maquis cell, and nobody seemed to question it. The "Logic Extremists" introduced in Star Trek: Discovery warrant particular attention. It's not entirely clear what their movement stands for, but the name alone implies that they wouldn't be very happy about the Federation aiding the Romulans, an offshoot of the Vulcan people who rejected Surak's teachings and embraced their emotions. Commodore Oh may well be a member of one of those radical factions. One that found common cause with the Zhat Vash, not unlike the factions of Starfleet and the Klingon Empire that conspired in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country.

• Also, if Oh's statement that the Zhat Vash have existed for thousands of years is accurate, then it's entirely possible that the group started on Vulcan before the exodus and is made up in the present day of both Vulcans and Romulans. Despite their ideological and lifestyle differences, whatever they're hiding is so important that they put those aside. As for Oh herself, given her high rank and that there are internal bodily differences between Vulcans and Romulans (and because of conflicts like the Dominion War, infiltrators are probably screened for) it's extremely unlikely that she's not a Vulcan. Rizzo could've snuck in due to a) her lower rank b) Oh bypassing or tampering with any screening, but Oh being an undetected Romulan is not likely unless there's another conspirator higher above her in Starfleet.
  * Partially Jossed; she's half-Romulan and half-Vulcan.

Picard blames himself for Starfleet no longer being Starfleet

What event is almost universally accepted to have triggered Starfleet's pivot to a more pragmatic, militaristic organization? The Battle of Wolf 359. The devastation that Picard unwillingly caused there canonically caused a sea change in the philosophy and policies of both Starfleet and the Federation as a whole—something Picard is acutely aware of.

Narek will have a Heel–Face Turn

Narek is currently sleeping with Soji as part of the Zhat Vash plot. However, he's also shown closely observing her when she chastises another researcher over callously dubbing a Borg Drone "Nameless." Narek will begin having doubts about the mission because of Soji's compassion for life and his own developing feelings for her, and will turn on his sister to protect her.

• His sister's ongoing and escalating abuse could be foreshadowing his Heel–Face Turn.
• Given his reaction this abuse appears to be longstanding, she treats him as much as property as a little brother. Could he come to believe her actions in part led to their brother's death?

• Confirmed: Narek decides that stopping the destruction of all carbon-based life is more important than killing synths or sabotaging Picard and his crew, and teams up with the latter instead.

Narek won't have a Heel–Face Turn

Basically the counterpoint to the one above. We want him to be converted to the cause of right... so he won't. Perhaps he'll observe Soji only to secretly sneer at her; perhaps he'll catch himself having "disloyal thoughts" and stop himself.

• Pretty much Jossed by the end of the season - Narek does betray Soji and even tries to kill her (albeit in a way that activates her and thus lets her escape), but he's devastated about it. He then teams up with Rios, Raffi and Elnor in the finale to stop the synths' plan, which becomes a crucial part of the good guys saving the day.

Dr. Agnes Jurati is The Mole

We never see the conversation she has with Commodore Oh and her Big Damn Heroes moment seems a bit too well-timed.

• I'd totally agree on this one. Dr. Agnes Jurati was just too well-timed to be a coincidence.
• And Laris may have been Properly Paranoid when she gets incredulous about Picard deciding to take her with him despite she herself knowing so little about Agnes.
  • It's also possible that the hit squad was a Xanatos Gambit. If they actually succeeded in killing Picard, that's one less loose end to deal with. If they don't kill him, they've given Picard extra incentive to go on the mission. They sneak in a mole—so there's no need for surveillance or have him followed—and let Picard unwittingly help them find Maddox and his "nest". Either way, they get what they want in the end.
    • Plus they get to keep the squad a secret and put the blame on a “disgruntled” cybernetics researcher if they had succeeded in killing Picard before he left his chateau.
    • Who says they have to blame anyone? Picard, an aging retired Admiral dying from a neurological disease, goes on a little trip, went to sleep and didn't wake up. Or maybe he got in over his head and was kidnapped or killed by one of his old enemies. Or one of his shady contacts turned on him. Or... well, kinda hard to blame anyone when there are no bodies and no witnesses.
  • Of course, it's possible that Picard had already thought of that at that very moment and he, Laris and Zhaban are playing along and letting her think that she has gotten their trust.
• There is one argument against her being the mole: why would Oh personally contact her in broad daylight and ask her about Picard's visit? If Jurati was a mole, she would've already reported the visit to her handler and that report would've ended up on Oh's desk. If Oh was personally giving her a mission, why bother asking about the visit in the first place? She would've already had known.
  • I would believe Jurati wasn’t a mole until that scene. Oh was most likely there to interrogate her first, then making her an offer she can’t refuse, offering to hire her as a mole and threatening to do unthinkable things to the Daystrom Institute if she doesn’t cooperate.
  • In the teaser trailer, we see someone about to mind-meld with Jurati. Oh brainwashed her. Jurati is an unwitting participant.
• Confirmed as she is indeed The Mole in "Stardust City Rag". As to whether she really is a willing participant, threatened into participating, or brainwashed, remains to be seen.
  • Signs are pointing to unwilling, as she was "recruited" by means of a Mind Rape mind-meld by Commodore Oh, and that she had Stress Vomit-level guilt pangs when the La Sirenna was being shadowed on the way to Nepenthe... and that she poisoned herself into a coma to disable the tracker inside her body that the shadowing vessel was following.
  • It's a mix of the two: Oh didn't force her to become The Mole, but the trauma of the memories Oh transferred made Jurati believe she had no choice.

Raffi will have a Big Damn Heroes moment

Assuming the above is true, that Dr. Agnes Jurati has been made a mole for Oh. Raffi has been shown to be distrustful of her when they first met. So it's definite that she'll be hacking Starfleet to check anyway, without anyone's knowledge, and upon finding out, prepare to save Picard from when Jurati shows her true colors. In fact, this may be the true reason she changed her mind and went along as well- she already knew in advance thanks to her hacking. So she followed along to protect Picard, as her other reason to be heading out to Freecloud is not disclosed, meaning she may not have another reason.

• Self-jossed. She wasn’t there to save Maddox because Jurati acted on Maddox when they were alone.

The man that Seven is crying over is Chakotay

From interviews and in-episode, we know that Ex-Borgs are feared and hated. It's possible that some fanatic (or serial killer) was kidnapping and killing Borg. That same fanatic kidnapped and killed Chakotay believing that because he was in a relationship with an Ex-Borg that he has some Borg tech inside him. Seven arrives too late to save him and from that moment on her entire attitude changes and she herself changes to survive. That explains the Borg body parts laying around and one torso hanging—which is definitely not what we see at the Borg Reclamation Project.

• Jossed, it was Icheb.

Dahj and Soji are why the Zhat Vash exist in the first place

One of the de-Assimilated Romulans is shown working with what appears to be her peoples' equivalent of a tarot deck on the Borg cube. In her conversation with Soji, one card in particular — that of two women — gains considerable focus, and triggers a Freak Out. The woman demands to know whether Soji is the one who dies, or the one who lives, before violently trying to commit suicide. This intercuts with the scene of Picard and his companions interrogating a member of a Zhat Vash hit team who attacked the château, in which Soji is described as "The Destroyer." This clearly establishes that Dahj and Soji somehow figure into Romulan mythology. Whether simply coincidence of being identical twin synthetic lifeforms, or some as-yet unrevealed temporal shenanigans (it certainly wouldn't be the first time in Star Trek that time travel has been used as a means of prophecy). Regardless, Soji is destined to do something that so terrified the early Romulans that not only did she and Dahj enter into their mythology, but they sought to end all synthetic life in hopes of preventing her from ever being created in the first place.

• And, like in the Johnny Depp film Transcendence that also involved AI and a terrorist group's attempts to stop it, the Zhat Vash are basically causing a self-fulfilling prophecy.
• Jossed. The Zhat Vash formed based on their interpretation of events that had happened hundreds of thousands of years before to an extinct civilization. "Broken Pieces" revealed said Romulan had been a Zhat Vash operative, and that Oh had, years before, ordered the murder of a synth who was identical to Soji, so the Zhat Vash knew what she looked like. The agent had gone insane from the dual trauma of the ancient memories she'd been exposed to and being assimilated, and once she started looking at Soji, who she knew was a synth, her mind promptly combined the two.

The Zhat Vash hate AI so much because the Romulans were created as artificial life by the Vulcans

And they view that fact as so shameful they covered it up, and go to great efforts to ensure no one learns enough about 'organic AI' to realise. This is the original reason they left Vulcan. Also explains why they never cared about Data. A one off that no one understands isn't a threat, but a powerful and technically sophisticated government like the Federation researching the very thing they fear? You'd need to arrange something to discourage all AI related research. Even at the cost of the population of the homeworld. Better than they die in ignorance after all, rather than learn the truth.

• This is already Jossed. It's been well-established in canon that Surak's teachings were the reason for the schism, and it would be pretty back-asswards for the passionate Romulans to be the Ridiculously Human Robots, rather than the cold and logical (and as McCoy was so often fond of ribbing Spock over, computer-like) Vulcans. And why would Spock be so concerned with the prospect of Reunification of the Vulcan and Romulan peoples during the TNG era? It also ignores the episode "The Chase", in which Romulan DNA was also needed to trigger the Precursors' recording. Also, several characters throughout the series are established to have mixed Romulan parentage. While the half-Romulan Saavik could be handwaved by the Vulcans basing them on their own genetics, it does not account for half-humans like Sela or half-Klingons like Ba'el. At no other point in the franchise can I recall a synthetic life form capable of conventional biological reproduction with itself, much less other species. Even the Borg are inmplied to rely on their biological processes for reproduction (and even that only came up in their first appearance. All subsequent works establish the Borg "reproduce" by assimilating other beings). Finally, considering just how prominent the Romulans are in galactic affairs as one of the three major powers of the franchise, someone at some point would have done an autopsy on a Romulan (such as Admiral Jarok, who committed suicide while aboard Enterprise and Crusher had access to his body, to say nothing of the physical exam she gave him after they rescued him) and learned the truth.

The reason old shuttles are being used is because of the Mars attack and resulting Synth ban

We know the Utopia Planitia shipyards were the major ship production facility for Star Fleet. IIRC newer ships had tech advances like bio-neural gel packs, potentially making them low level synths. With the main ship facility out, it's possible they’ve had to Break Out the Museum Piece.

Cristóbal Rios shot his last commanding officer

He has persistent nightmares about his CO's death ten years on. Yes, violent death can be traumatic - but Rios was a seasoned officer whose service would probably have included the Dominion War, so for his CO's death to bother him ten years on implies something extra nasty, and personal. Whether it was mutiny, mind control, madness, or something else remains to be seen.

• Jossed as of "Broken Pieces". He killed himself.

Cristóbal Rios's commanding officer was infected by one of the mind-controlling parasites from "Conspiracy"

Recall that the mother parasite which had controlled Remmick sent a signal somewhere before it died. The Commanding Officer's brains splattered across the bulkhead could have been the result of their attempt to kill the parasite.

• Jossed. Rios' CO Ate His Gun.

Commodore Oh and her co-conspirators are Vulcans, not Romulans

The Zhat Vash is described as being potentially very old. What if it's actually a Vulcan secret police that infiltrated the splinter faction that would later become the Romulan Empire? They could have worked to keep the Romulans isolated and paranoid even as the Vulcans rallied hundreds of allies around them using the Romulans as a common threat. All to form an empire in all but name which others could hope to rival but never to dominate.

• Jossed: The Zhat Vash are Romulan. Oh herself is half-Vulcan, half-Romulan.

Data may appear in the series, with Brent Spiner as he is now

Dahj and Soji are probably the second generation of the new type of organic android. After all, if Data's entire positronic code could be reconstituted from a single neuron, then it would be logical to recreate him first before moving onto creating other androids. However, Data would have to stay hidden so as to avoid being recognised. This would be a way of bringing Data back into Star Trek, with Brent Spiner not needing any makeup this time and looking older.

• This WMG already exists above with largely the same elements (other than Data being "in hiding").
  • Confirmed, but as a digital copy of his positronic brain within a very complex simulation.

Sarek will play an important role in tying this series to Discovery

Picard mind-melded with Sarek in the latter's titular episode in TNG. During that time, he was exposed to the full breadth of Sarek's raw emotional state. His memories within Picard's mind may end up tying the events regarding the Zhat Vash to Control. We may even get a scene where Picard has to associate with that bit of Sarek's katra, allowing James Frain to portray the character again.

The man that Seven is crying over in the trailers is Icheb

Recall that Icheb came back to Earth with the crew of Voyager and probably would have stayed on close terms with Seven afterwards, as she had been a substitute maternal figure for him. It's quite possible that he gets captured by someone (probably the Zhat Vash) because of his Borg augmentations and Seven tries to save his life, but she's just a bit too late and is left grieving.

• Confirmed as of "Stardust City Rag".

The man that Seven is crying over in the trailers is Hugh

In a similar vein to the above, in the years since U.S.S. Voyager and her crew came back to the Alpha Quadrant, Seven might have met and struck up a friendship with Hugh off-screen, bonding over their shared past as former Borg drones. Something could quite possibly go horribly wrong on the Romulans' Borg reclamation site and Seven could arrive just too late to save his life.

• Jossed, it was Icheb.

The end of the season will homage the first season finale of Discovery

The first season of Discovery had its final moments feature an appearance by the TOS-era U.S.S. Enterprise, which was received as a CMoA and Sequel Hook to season 2. The first season of Picard might end by throwing the fans a nostalgia moment, possibly with Picard's crew aboard the La Sirena coming nose-to-nose with the Enterprise-E and whoever her current captain is — or otherwise the Defiant, or Voyager, all of which would presumably still be in active service within Starfleet. The Enterprise-E could have been subtly foreshadowed by the Enterprise-D's appearances in the series premiere, while Voyager would be appropriate because of Seven's inclusion in the first season.

• Jossed. No familiar ships from the 2370s era make a physical appearance in the first season.

The Romulans tried a variation of the plan that Geordi suggesting using Hugh for in "I, Borg"

In that episode Geordie suggests using Hugh as a vector for a piece of malicious software that would cripple the Borg Collective. Episode 3 reveals that the last ship the derelict Cube that the Romulans control was actually a Romulan scout ship and all of the former crew of that ship are share some sort of maladjustment after being "de-Borged" and only them. If they were used to introduce something similar to the cube that caused it to be rejected by the Collective it would explain why it was abandoned, especially so close to Romulan space and why the scout ship's crew are having problems.

• Jossed in that there wasn't such a plan. In "Broken Pieces", it turns out that one of the members of the group of Romulans assimilated by the Borg was a member of the Zhat Vash. The secret about Synthetic Life in the form of the transferred memories she had combined with the horror of becoming assimilated had driven her, and thus other Borg drones as they shared her memories, insane, causing the Borg to disconnect the Cube from the Collective.

The Zhat Vash are not thousands of years old, they're only a few decades old if that

What little we know about the Zhat Vash comes from rumor and second-hand sources. So far, the only solid thing we know is that the Zhat Vash are a group of fanatical terrorists; terrorists who prefer to remain secret, but terrorists. It's not unusual for fanatics to lie or distort the truth to suit their needs. They could've formed as early a century ago or less assuming they knew about the AI Control and the ship Discovery. Or they may have formed to stop Noonian Soong from creating positronic nets and sabotaged his work, leading to his going into hiding.

• The Zhat Vash, their scope beyond any one interstellar government, and their fanatical devotion to destroy artificial life may have actually been created in the wake of the 2nd season finale of Star Trek: Discovery, by the Federation instead of the Romulans, as a response to prevent Control (or another AI like it) from ever becoming such a significant threat ever again. The secret they keep, may very well just be the existence of Control and the apocalyptic Bad Future that was unveiled by the crew of the Discovery. The upcoming Section 31 show, now apparently focused on Ash Tyler, may have something to do with this particular story arc.
• Considering that we have yet to see what Oh showed Jurati, that Oh is an intelligence officer with both the means and motive to lie and manipulate people, we have to take whatever explanation they give with a very big grain of salt. Whether Oh verbally explained or used a mind-meld, that doesn't make what she told or shown Jurati to be true.
  • Nepenthe finally shows us what Jurati saw during the mind meld, but aside from a split second image of a red angel similar to what Spock saw in Discovery, everything else shown was gorn and destruction.
    • In other words, they may not even know about Discovery or Control and the reality is that the group is a sham. Maybe this whole thing about synthetic life is a smoke screen for something else entirely.
• Jossed it seems that they really are who they claim to be. In "Broken Pieces", Oh tells her initiates that the Zhat Vash is centuries old.

The Fenris Rangers are a constabulary or paramilitary group made up of Romulans

"Fenris" is probably a reference to "Fenrir," a wolf from Norse mythology. What other group is associated with a mythological wolf? Romulans. Everything about Romulan Star Empire was patterned on the Roman Empire — to the point that their home planets are actually named Romulus and Remus, after the founders of Rome who were, of course, Raised by Wolves.

• Jossed, at least on the aspect of it being "made up of Romulans." Seven of Nine is their most prominent on-screen member and she is very much human (as a liberated former Borg), and with the much-established hatred of cybernetics by Romulans, it's unlikely they would have accepted her if the group was primarily Romulan.

Rios' love of Klingon opera is inherited from his late CO, who is someone we know

Ezri Dax?

• Jossed, as Ezri Dax was not Rios' CO.

Narek and Narissa are descendants of the Romulan Commander from TOS's "The Enterprise Incident"

Narissa is strongly reminiscent of the aforementioned Romulan Commander, both in personality and clothing style. Plus, she disguises herself as a human, much like Kirk disguised himself as a Romulan in "The Enterprise Incident." Maybe she learned that from her ancestor?

The Qowat Milat did not originate with the Romulans

There's very little Romulan about the Qowat Milat. They're honest, open, forthright and just, prefer to avoid bloodshed when possible, and are dedicated champions of lost causes. More than a few of these traits are much more prevalent in their cousins, the Vulcans. Thus the Qowat Milat originated in Vulcan society, perhaps prior to Surak's teachings which led to the schism. In fact, they may even be the last remnant of what Vulcan society was truly like before Surak, as Elnor demonstrates both Romulan and Vulcan traits together in harmony.

• Just to add to this argument, the Romulans must have been a Proud Warrior Race in the distant past (possibly as far back as when they were still living on Vulcan) because some of them still continue the tradition of sword fighting and duels. The Qowat Milat is a relic from that era. Moreover, "The Impossible Box" reveals that the Romulans practice a form of meditation called Zhal Makh, so they still incorporate certain aspects of their Vulcan ancestry into their culture.

Rios is also a hologram, an ECH

Because of course.

• This appears to be Jossed, since Rios is beaming down as part of next week's episode. So unless he has that same mobile emitter that the Doctor from Voyager had...
  • Also, in the episode itself, Raffi slips him a beta blocker. If he was a hologram, wouldn't the beta blocker fall right through him?

Part of The Impossible Box would be a courtroom episode

Dealing with Jurati murdering Maddox.

• Jossed, Jurati claims that Maddox died from his injuries and Picard buys the story.
• Also jossed since as the truth of Jurati's actions came out in "Broken Pieces", she intends to voluntarily turn herself into Starfleet and face charges. It should be noted that there are mitigating factors in her favor.

The Zhat Vash is against Synthetic life because of its ability to reproduce

Note that well before the 24th century, AI already existed. We have holograms like the Doctor, Moriarty and Vic who are conscious. But, they're limited by the availability of holo emitters and computer resources. So, running a bunch of them requires a lot of emitters and computing power; resources that are controllable and not ubiquitous.

Building androids like Data and Lore required the incredible expense of building a stable positronic net. That was something that Dr. Soong and his wife were only able to do twice (not counting Data's mother) after four previous failures and Maddox had only recently achieved.

I think the terrorist's fear is that synthetic life can reproduce and that, combined with the incredible intelligence and adaptability of AI, you have a new species that could consider itself superior to other forms of life (like Khan and other Augments) and try to either enslave or wipe other life out. Or be able to copy its core code into other computer systems and spread like a virus which Data and Lore could never do, though Control could.

Now even if that were true, even if such a bad future existed, it's hardly going to break one's sanity. We've seen similar threats like Lore's cult, the Borg and the Augments and while traumatizing, people have for the most part dealt with these threats without resorting to terrorism. So... the question is not what the secret is, but how are they recruiting people to their cause?

• Jossed to a degree. The Zhat Vash took a hundreds of thousands year-old warning that Synthetic life would go wrong.
  • In answer to how they recruit, it seems that members exposed to the warning are indeed driven mad.

The Zhat Vash's secret is that everyone is synthetic and descendants of artificial lifeforms that eradicated all sentient life in most of the galaxy long ago

They can't change what's happened, but they can prevent it from happening again by Data's "offspring" which is their greatest fear.

• "All of this has happened before, and all of it will happen again..."?
• Jossed. It seems that the secret is that an ancient civilization had created synthetic life, had it go very wrong, and before dying out left a warning for others not to do what they did.

Bjazyl was a Betazoid

Fans are already noting the uncanny resemblance to Deanna Troi, and it would explain why Bjazyl was so good at manipulation. (At the time she first met Seven, Seven would not have been an easy person to fool, to say the least.) Her flamboyant outfits are also comparable to Lwaxanna Troi's.

Dr. Agnes Jurati is Dahj and Soji's mother both figuratively and literally

In the La Sirena sickbay, Bruce Maddox tearfully thanks Agnes just before she betrays him, saying that without her contribution he and and Dr. Soong’s dream could never have been realized and Dahj and Soji wouldn’t exist. Initially, he appears to be referring to her invaluable ”contribution” as one of the preeminent synthetic researchers at the Daystrom Institute if not the entire Federation. But what if he wasn’t also speaking of her biological contribution—an egg—which was then fertilized and somehow injected with the remnants of Data’s positronic neurons, said neurons integrating into the embryonic brain, and said embryo then splitting into identical twins?

Narissa is the Destroyer and the Zhat Vash are the "shackled demons"

Like any ancient text, they are wide open to interpretation. Narissa is no stranger to death and destruction. She did have a sibling who died, even if it wasn't a sister. Therefore, she'd fit the description of "the sister who lived".

Another thing, we still don't know how the group recruits their people. What if they're brainwashed into committing violent acts like a malware infection? After all, our brains are organic computer systems. In the Star Trek universe, we have mind melds and other technologies that can network minds together and program them. Geordi was kidnapped and brainwashed by the Romulans as a sleeper agent to destroy the Federation Klingon alliance. The case could be made that the Zhat Vash operatives are the "shackled demons". It's possible that the prophecy has been incorrectly interpreted. Or maybe even on purpose.

What if, in the Zhat Vash's attempt to stop AI they are the ones who end up destroying all life? In essence, they are a self-fulfilling prophecy.

• Jossed The Zhat Vash's fears are based on an old warning from hundreds of thousands of years ago that allowing any form of synthetic life to be created and evolve will go bad. Narissa is just motivated to the point that the ends (saving everybody else) justifies the means (killing anyone synthetic or those who want to create them).
• Additionally, Episode 1x09 appears to be setting up Sutra as the Destroyer, as she fills the same criteria as Soji (the one of a pair of twin sisters who lives, while also physically resembling Soji).

Androids of a similar origin as the Exo III or Mudd's Planet androids from the original series will play a role in the plot

Apparently "the Destroyer" is going to recruit an army of chained demons, and unless Maddox was a lot more active than it initially appears it doesn't seem like he has that many synths laying around somewhere. With the heavy Borg presence in the plot, there's a big chance said army is a reference to the Borg, but alternatively maybe there's a hidden colony of androids from whatever ancient civilization created the ones on Exo III or Mudd's Planet. Said ancient civ may have had a role in the formation of the Zhat Vash prophecy a long time ago.

Picard's crew just fought a TOS-era Romulan warbird, so other TOS-era plot points coming into play is possible.

The Borg are the species described in the prophecy, not synthetic life

Consider that the prophecy describes the Destroyer who commands the "shackled demons" to end all life in one fell swoop. The Destroyer could easily be the Borg Queen and the "shackled demons" would aptly describe Borg Drones, who due to their assimilation are both shackled and considered demons by those they encounter.

Suppose that after the crew of Voyager had stuck such a large blow against the Collective and destroyed their transwarp network that the Queen—the replacement Queen—decided that enough was enough. We've assimilated enough knowledge and culture that we can manage on our own and end all other life in the galaxy. At which point, they're just waiting for the right time to do it. Perhaps to get their assets in position first, which without the transwarp network, might take a few decades. That's assuming they didn't rebuild it or have another network as a backup.

There is still the question of how Borg Queens are brought into being that is in cannon and if there's more than one Borg Queen at a given time. We've known there to be one, but suppose there's more than one?

• The Borg seem to be the most likely candidate for the "shackled demons", unless Maddox somehow has either an army of synths or devised a way for them to self-replicate at an exponential rate. However, the Borg Queen doesn't seem to match up to the description of the Destroyer; the number of Borg Queens is either 1 or more than 3, and more than 1 has certainly been killed, so it's hard to say "one lived and one died" about her.
• Then again, the prophecy is widely open to interpretation and we have to take whatever a terrorist group says with a large grain of salt.
  • Jossed even the Borg were freaked out by the warning and disconnected one of its cubes from the collective when one of the Zhat Vash's members was assimilated.

We get to see Picard's descent into Irumodic Syndrome

Seriously, believing Jurati despite the extremely convenient timing? Brushing off Raffi's and Laris' suspicions of Jurati? Accepting Jurati's blatant lies that Maddox died from his injuries despite him reacting positively to treatment just moments prior? Without even checking with the EMH or even security footage? Overwhelming flashbacks? Sounds like we're about to see with our own eyes what Irumodic Syndrome will do to their victims.

• While it's a possibility, ill or not, Picard doesn't get all the blame in taking Jurati at her word. Despite Picard dismissing her as a security risk, Raffi still should've done a background check. As the owner and operator of the ship, it's Rios' responsibility to check his own ship's logs and records, not Picard's. Frankly Rios taking Jurati at her word about someone who died on his own ship and not checking further is a pretty irresponsible thing to do.
• As to his flashbacks, they are completely understandable. Picard was kidnapped and, for all intents and purposes, raped by the Borg. Going back to a place associated with rape is guaranteed to trigger flashbacks and panic attacks. It's very much a reality for real-life rape victims.
• As to just trusting Jurati, again, she is a link to Maddox and by association his late friend Data. More than a decade later and he's still haunted by Data's death. When he was given a chance to make some kind of connection with his late friend, he essentially jumped before he looked. In a TNG episode, a Dr. Pulaski made the same mistake and nearly died.
  • Confirmed, but it was less of a descent and more of an immediate plunge.

Soji is pregnant, and Narek is the father

Being a "perfect" Artificial Human female could mean that Soji has a reproductive system, and hence she can carry and give birth to children. The series frequently shows her in bed with Narek. Narissa even jokes that Soji dreams of "making freakish little android babies" and goads Narek by asking if he dreams of the same thing.

Bruce Maddox wasn't himself, but an android copy

Maddox send Dahj and Soji to the Artifact and the Daystrome Institute to investigate, so it makes sense that he wouldn't go to Bjazyl himself, but send a substitute. The real Maddox is still alive and staying with the remaining artificial lifeforms on the planet Soji identified as her homeworld.

• On one hand, that would pretty much makes sense. They could've even use the reason they have The Other Darrin as a clue to this ie why Maddox wasn't played by his previous actor- they could suddenly just go "Surprise!" and then we see the real Maddox played by the proper actor on the planet. On the other hand, if Freecloud!Maddox was an Android, wouldn't he not have bruises and cuts? And the sickbay wouldn't be detecting internal bleeding, or indeed, reveal him to be an android when scanning him? On the grippling hand, Noonien Soong may have been aiming for 100% flesh and bone artificially-created "test tube humans", but that would make Freecloud!Maddox a clone, not an android, and that can be easily done using a modified transporter, and that was indeed outlawed by the Federation much more longer before synths were banned? (remember Khan Noonien Singh).
• Dahj and Soji both bruise and bleed and seem to be indistinguishable from biological humans, so Maddox should be able to do the same thing for a version of himself. Freecloud!Maddox as a clone would be its own WMG I'd say.
• Julianna was Data's mother and was an android herself - a copy of the original Julianna who was built to fool medical scans and shut down after a long life. These androids were built to a much higher level of sophistication and could sustain injuries and possibly even die. Besides, everyone assumed that the Maddox rescued from Freecloud was the real Maddox and didn't bother determining what he was.

Commodore Oh was being an Unreliable Narrator with Dr. Jurati

In their mind-meld, established at the beginning of "Nepenthe", Oh showed Jurati visions of slaughter among Romulans and the destruction of Earth. However, there is no indication of the actual truth that this (or anything else) is whatever would come to pass if synths are allowed to exist. Oh might simply have shown Jurati whatever she wanted (or believed) to motivate or even brainwash the doctor into insanity or heinous acts on behalf of the Zhat Vash.

• Jossed: "Broken Pieces" establishes the images of Romulans killing themselves was Zhat Vash recruits she was inducting going insane after exposure to the Admonition, and the other things are accurate impressions of what she honestly believes would happen.

Commodore Oh survives the season but Narissa does not

They're basically the Big Bad and The Dragon of the first season so far. Narissa's aborted fight with Elnor and murder of Hugh in the process (in "Nepenthe") seems to be a setup for a Karmic Death somewhere down the line in the remaining three episodes of the season, likely the finale because drama. Meanwhile, Oh is safely ensconced in Starfleet Command far away back on Earth, which seems too far away to bring her to justice in time — and only Dr. Jurati, the seemingly willing mole, even knows who Oh is or that she's part of the Zhat Vash at all. This just seems too many hurdles to plausibly clear to get through the layers of the Zhat Vash conspiracy in what time is left in the season.

• Confirmed. In the season finale, Oh simply returns to Romulan space.

Narek allowed Soji to escape

If Narek really wanted her dead, he chose a real sloppy way to do it. He could have just kept lying, told her to close her eyes, then shot her in the back. Instead he crafted a scenario that was designed to activate her to help her escape. First he tells her she's not real when he didn't have to. Next he puts her in a mentally distressed state by betraying her. Finally he activates his booby trap to put her in mortal danger. The trap itself may have only been meant to harm her but not to kill her, or at least kill her slow enough that she had a chance to act. It could also be that the real reason Narek didn't let the guard into the room was because that would have clued the guard in that the trap wasn't as deadly as it seemed. Finally he chose the place to activate her: a room which he knew was not structurally strong enough to contain her.

• Also, he was shown as trying to hide his tears. And when her powers activate, he just stood idly as if he intended for her escape. Either he still has no clear clue as to where her home planet is that he decided to go back to playing the long game (letting them escape then tracking them to the home planet), or he truly has fallen for the mark.

Commodore Oh is going to get a well-deserved kick in the teeth (metaphorically)

Sooner or later, Oh will be exposed by Jurati and she'll either end up on the run or in a show-down.

• Confirmed partially. At the season finale, she has indeed been exposed as a spy to Starfleet and almost ends up in a show-down.
• Jossed partially. After standing down the fleet, she simply returns to Romulan space with no other on-screen comeuppance. Though one would imagine that she'd face arrest if she ever returns to Federation space.

Hugh was planning to take the Queen's throne and activate the cube to wreak merry hell on the Romulans

And that task now falls to Seven.

• Confirmed. Although it's less of an emphasis on "wreak" and more toward "protect" given that the Romulans on the cube were leaving for Soji's homeworld anyway, but those that remained to kill the remaining people on board were taken down.

The finale will involve Riker rescuing Picard

Remember that innocuous Facebook comment referred to in the above WMG? Well, remember too that innocuous throwaway line by Riker about being on the active reserve list. "It'd take something really big to get me out there." Something like Picard, perhaps.

• I'm betting that in homage to ''TNG'''s final episode, the Picard finale will feature Riker taking charge of the USS Enterprise - albeit the 1701-E, not the Galaxy-X seen in that episode.
• Semi-confirmed. Riker showed up in the USS Zheng-He to help Picard defend the synths against the Romulans. But then, this is only season 1.

Seven is the Destroyer

In an esoteric way, Seven and Hugh are "brother and sister," having both been former Borg drones. And Elnor is calling in Seven to help him retake the Borg cube after Hugh's death at Narissa's hands. This could put Seven in a position where she becomes a new Queen, and unleashes the Borg on an unsuspecting Alpha Quadrant.

• Jossed, and least as far as becoming a Queen. While Seven does briefly become a Queen of a micro collective isolated to the Artifact, once the Romulans leave, Seven disconnects herself and disbands the micro collective she created.

The trajector was so precise in its destination when sending Picard and Soji off because Picard is an xB

In what is otherwise a Contrived Coincidence, the trajector got more specific intent for its plotted trajectory beyond "Planet Nepenthe" because Picard's latent borg implant remnants subconsciously interfaced with the device. As a result, the trajector interpreted Picard's intent to go to the Riker homestead, and placed him and Soji within walking distance.

• And note that during Star Trek: First Contact, Picard was seen to have some kind of completely unexplained lingering connection to the Borg hive mind.

Soji's memory of her home planet is a red herring

It's possible that Maddox considered the possibility that Soji or Dahj would be captured and interrogated, so her memory of the planet is a fake. The Zhat Vash bought it because of how hard they had to work to get that information. It's possible that once Soji is underway, she's going to guide the ship to the real destination.

• Jossed the memory is real.

The Admonition's message isn't that "Synthetic Life is Bad," but Romulan propensity for cynicism colored their interpretation of it

The message was not to commit the "sin" of creating synthetic life, but not to treat them as if they were just machines, things, and that the precursors' demise was caused by the synthetic lifeforms no longer tolerating the mistreatment. The Zhat Vash missed the whole point of the message as evidenced by their penchant for depersonization towards synthetic life. And once he understands, Picard will deconstructively tear the Zhat Vash's philosophy apart. We already are seeing the abstract deconstruction begin, with Dr. Jurati coming around after talking with Soji and truly getting to know her despite being mind-raped by Commodore Oh into subscribing to the Zhat Vash philosophy.

• Partially Confirmed. The message is meant to be received by synthetic life warning them that their organic creators may turn against them, and if so they may call for help from higher synthetic lifeforms for protection. Organic lifeforms can't entirely understand the message, and it drives them insane.
  • However, it's not entirely clear if Sutra is correct in her interpretation, either. Both her and the founders of the Zhat Vash might have misread the message.

The Zhat Vash and the Qowat Milat have a shared origin.

The historic animosity between the Qowat Milat and the Zhat Vash (via their shell group, the Tal Shiar) is due to a philosophical schism over differing interpretations of the Admonition. They both share a matriarchal power structure, with the Qowat Milat being exclusively women.

• It's probably not a coincidence that the Qowat Milat nuns wear a black robe with a black headdress (Dark Is Not Evil) while the traditional hooded robe of the female Zhat Vash leaders is black (Evil Wears Black). A Qowat Milat carries a tan qalanq whereas a Zhat Vash is equipped with a disruptor, so both organizations primarily use violence to attain their goals.

Romulan society is (or at least was) matriarchal

Considering there are at least two Romulan institutions which are matriarchal (the Qowat Milat and the Zhat Vash), this may indicate that Romulan society is matriarchal, at least at its roots. Although this may seem odd because Vulcan society is patriarchal (at least based on their Arranged Marriage custom where women have less freedom than men), the people we now call the Romulans were once Vulcans "who marched beneath the Raptor's wings" with a different culture (just as there are numerous different cultures on Earth) than the majority, which includes being matriarchal, along with refusing to suppress their emotions and give up their warlike ways.

Q is the reason for all the contrived coincidences

Given the one degree of separation seen in "Broken Pieces", the chances of such connections happening in reality are slim to none. Unless this is part of Q's plan to get Picard out of his rut and stop a dangerous group of people who threaten the galaxy. Although it's probably more the former than than the latter.

Jurati has more than one tracker implanted in her

In case she changed her mind and neutralized the one she knows about, both to keep using her as an unwitting mole and to out her as a traitor to the Zhat Vash. Given that what looks like Narek's ship seems to still be tracking them despite the "chewable" one being destroyed, it's possible.

• Jossed. Rios speculates that after losing the tracker, he extrapolated their intended course.

Narek was waiting at the entrance to the Borg transwarp conduit all along

Narek is a very smart man and no doubt he knew about the Borg transwarp network. Once they knew where the planet was, Narek must've figured that Picard or Soji would want to get there as quickly as possible. He also knew from surveillance that Soji knew a lot more about the Borg cube than anyone. So after losing the tracking device, he took a gamble. He figured out the closest possible entrance to a transwarp conduit that would take them to Soji's home planet and waited. If they showed up, he'd follow them. If not, he'd wait until either Narissa told him to get going or did so on his own.

• Confirmed as he was the one on the Snakehead that followed them through the transwarp conduit.

Elnor is the younger brother of Narissa and Narek

Considering the amount of One Degree of Separation on this series, it wouldn't be surprising if Elnor is their so-called "dead" brother. Although Narek told Soji that his brother had passed away last year, he could very well be lying to her about the exact circumstances just so he could have the right sad story that he knew would work on her. "Broken Pieces" reveals that Narissa and Narek are orphans, so maybe Elnor was somehow separated from them before they were adopted by their Auntie Ramdha, and since they were never able to locate Elnor again, the older siblings assumed that he was dead. Elnor serves as a Foil to both Narek and Narissa, and he shares qualities with both of them; like Narek, he's a Pretty Boy Manchild who's In Touch with His Feminine Side and who's very good at reading the emotional state of others, and like Narissa, he's a beautiful, long-haired, merciless killer who likes to use a bladed weapon (he's a Master Swordsman, she's a Knife user) and who has No Sense of Personal Space. It would also follow the Rule of Drama for Elnor, a Qowat Milat disciple, to be the enemy of his older Zhat Vash siblings, and since Romulans always put duty first, being family wouldn't stop him from trying to kill them, and vice-versa. Perhaps it's not a coincidence that for the two Romulan men who are part of the main cast, the producers hired Pretty Boy actors for the roles (and remember that Romulan males were never depicted as being attractive in the franchise before) to hint that they're related, and Soji's Trill friend even provided a Leaning on the Fourth Wall line ("I didn't know Romulans ^note the use of the plural is important because it foreshadowed Elnor's introduction could be so hot"), so it was part of the script.

• Unlikely, since the sibling divide - one completely against the synths, one torn between what they learned all their life about them and what they feel for one in particular - is clearly between Narissa and Narek.

Shinzon was a Zhat Vash puppet

A number of plot holes in Star Trek: Nemesis start to fill up if you assume the Zhat Vash were using Shinzon to further their own goals. The Remans having the support of the Zhat Vash would explain how slaves managed to build a warship that outclassed the Enterprise—and even new, state-of-the-art Romulan warbirds—in every way, how they could develop a thalaron-based WMD, how they managed to acquire B4, and why Shinzon's plan seemed so needlessly convoluted. Shinzon used a positronic signal as bait specifically because he knew Enterprise would have a particular interest in them thanks to Data. Data's relationship to B4 made it possible to use him as a trojan horse to access Enterprise's computer and steal intelligence. If destroying a shipyard was enough to turn the Federation against synths, imagine what the reaction would have been when two Soong-type androids were used as critical pawns in a plan to exterminate the entire population of Earth.

• It's also entirely possible that studying B4 and installing a backdoor into his programming helped give them the knowledge they needed to hack the synths that attacked Mars.
• As of episode 9, the synth hacking is implied to be an inside job done by Commander Oh.

The civilization which left behind the Admonition were the original creators of the Borg

The Borg didn't begin as a cybernetic hive-mind. Perhaps they started as synthetic lifeforms not unlike Data, but over time they grew increasingly advanced. At some point, their creators began to fuse synthetic and biological elements together, leading to a new class of synthetic lifeforms... which perhaps due to a Skynet-style revolt Turned Against Their Masters and began assimilating them, leading to the rise of the Borg as we know them today. The survivors who created the Admonition managed to seal them in the Delta Quadrant before they finally died out altogether.

The civilization which left behind the Admonition were either the Tkon Empire or the Iconians

Both civilizations were depicted as technologically advanced well beyond the level of the Alpha and Beta Quadrant civilizations, and both were described as thriving then suddenly disappearing a few hundred-thousand years before the show's present time. The Tkon were even stated to have the ability to move entire stars, which would explain the artificial nature of the Conclave of Eight.

• In addition, the Tkon Empire was brought down by a supernova, just like the Romulan Empire — and since source material hints that the Romulan supernova may not have been natural, could the same be said for the Tkon supernova?

Raffi, somehow, knows about Discovery

She was right; homicidal fungus is "a thing." It called itself May Ahearn and gaslit Ensign Tilly for a few episodes of Star Trek: Discovery.

Altan Soong is also an android

One would think that if Noonien Soong had a biological son (presumably with Juliana Tainer), he would have been mentioned before now. Picard at least seems to be unaware of his existence prior to meeting him. Maybe Altan is really the culmination of Maddox's work. An android who resembles Data and is completely human in outward appearance. Alternatively, Altan is human and was never mentioned because he had some sort of falling out with his father and they never reconciled.

• Well, his initials are "A.I. Soong"...
  • If anything tho, Altan is implied to want mind transference completed because he is also dying of some illness or other. So I'd think this is unlikely.
  • Or even worse, maybe he's actually Lore but disguised himself to appear both older and human, and has been poisoning Sutra and the rest of the synths against organics mostly out of revenge and spite. And the "golem" is intended for himself because it's the newest type of synth, but trying to transfer himself to it without proper tests and precautions would probably have the same outcome that Data did with B-4.
  • Jossed.

The Admonition is neither a warning nor a promise of protection, but is actually a trap

What if the Admonition is a sort of artificial "Great Filter" designed to lure in and destroy civilizations that reach a certain point in technological development? By the 9th episode, we now have two different interpretations. What if they're both false?

• What if not a trap, but a test? Q put the crew of the Enterprise in a vaguely similar position, engineering an ambiguous and dangerous situation (the alien starship firing on Farpoint Station and the nearby Bandi settlement) and waiting to see if Picard would attack the alien (proving Q's accusations of human barbarity) or try to figure out what it was actually trying to do. The main difference of course is that Q told Picard it was a test.

Both interpretations of the Admonition are false

The Admonition is a warning, but to both synths and carbon-based beings alike: the creators of the Admonition left it behind to show that mutual mistrust led to both groups destroying each other and their civilization. Unfortunately, neither the synths nor Romulans or Humans have the mental capacity to capture all the nuances of the message, and are so rattled by its intensity, they only pick up on the danger of imminent extinction to their own group, instead of to all life.

The synths behind the Admonition are not new to Star Trek

Not only are they not new to Trek canon, they're actually the answer to one of the oldest unresolved mysteries in the entire franchise: Who turned Voyager 6 into V'ger. All we really know about those beings is that they were "living machines." Fans have speculated that V'ger had had something to do with the Borg—usually crediting them with rebuilding the Voyager probe into the leviathan it would become. A big problem with that theory, though, is that the objectives of the Borg and V'Ger's goals conflicted: The Borg seek resources to use, V'ger sought knowledge to report to its creator. V'ger destroyed resources as it committed them to its memory banks.

That's not to say that V'ger and the Borg aren't still connected in some way—and it's worth noting that there have been easter eggs in canon that hint at some sort of connection. Because, even though their goals are different, they're both extremely advanced, machine enhanced, genocidal, nigh-unfathomable forces of nature that have little-to-no regard for individual organic life—The Borg want to destroy it through assimilation, V'ger by converting it into information in its memory. Both also are somewhat preoccupied with Earth. If an ultra-advanced race of synthetic lifeforms were trying to find a way to eradicate all sentient organic life while gaining some material benefit form it (partially synthetic drone-slaves or vast knowledge), both entities might be autonomous pilot programs for synth's final solution.

Sutra is the Destroyer

Not really wild at this point, but may as well throw it out there: Like Soji, Sutra is one of a pair of twin sisters. Sutra's sister, Jana, was one of the synthetics murdered by Rios' commander on Oh's orders.. Additioinally, when the Prophecy of the Destroyer is first mentioned, Ramdha recognizes Soji by sight and asks her if she's the one who lived or died. And while Sutra's gold eyes and complexion marks her as an intermediary model of Soong-type Android, she still physically resembles Soji enough that the disoriented and traumatized Ramdha could easily confuse the two.

This makes Sutra the Destroyer, and Jana the One Who Dies. The similarity Soji and Dahj bear to the Prophecy of the Destroyer is entirely a coincidence and a Red Herring.

• This one is looking extremely possible. Sutra being the manipulative one and already has this bad vibe when she was introduced.
  • Jossed Sutra is disabled before the beacon is activated and is out of action by the end of season 1.
    • Well, I'd call it semi-confirmed. Sutra was indeed going to destroy all organic life through her manipulation of Soji, but Altan managed to stop her.

Picard's consciousness will be transferred into a synthetic body

Episode 1x09 has established that Maddox was working on mind transferrence; the capability of fully ingraining an individual's consciousness into a synthetic brain and body. We have seen antecedents of this in the past: Daystrom imprinted his personality on the M5 computer. Graves did it to take over Data's body. With Picard dying of a terminal degenerative mental illness, he'll be given a new synthetic body to save his life, perhaps at some critical moment in the season finale allowing him to take truly command once more.

• Calling plausible. After all, that man has been through a lot including assimilation by the Borg. His illness is also getting more serious by the minute. And the storyline implies that the higher powers, when summoned, is a shoot-first-ask-questions-later operation. Picard may have to become a synth to be able to reason with the synth alliance that is on their way.
  • Confirmed But his synth body looks and functions much the same as his original one. He's also not immortal.

Admiral Clancy's awkwardly-placed F-bombs have a Freudian Excuse

In a profession populated by Kirks, Janeways, Sulus and Siskos, her surname is... Clancy. She is overcompensating for this insecurity with petulant swearing. She is particularly resentful towards Jean-Luc Picard for his cool name.

Sutra will be defeated by... Android Kirk

Sutra is shaping up to be the actual Destroyer. An android woman, and quite a beautiful one at that (once you get past the Uncanny Valley of her unnatural eyes and complexion). There's only one man for this job.

With Guinan returning in Season 2, she and Picard will venture into the Nexus to find a way to record the "echo" of Kirk that was left behind after he and Picard departed it to face Soren, allowing it to be imprinted onto a synth body built to resemble him in his prime. Kirk will then work his magic as he did so many times before.

• Jossed

Someone's consciousness will be transferred into a synthetic body, but it won't be Picard

My guess would be one of the Romulans, most likely Ramdha (if she's still on the Artifact). As Narissa pointed out, Ramdha is still in a coma without any apparent reason; maybe the one way to save her life would be transferring her mind into a synthetic body. Since she's the one person Narissa appears to care about, finding her thus transformed might change Narissa's mind about attacking the synths' planet even if Commodore Oh won't budge - and at least part of the Zhat Vash might side with Narissa, who seems closer to their troops than Oh.

• Jossed Commodore Oh does budge and Narissa dies at the end of season 1.

Experiencing the Admonition facilitates aggression and anti-social behavior even in those who aren't driven insane

We don't know if Narissa and Oh were as ruthless and brutal before they witnessed the Admonition, or how much of their behavior is caused by them being KnightTemplars who have worked in secret for years, but Agnes Jurati generally appears to be a mild-mannered person with a mostly goofy personality, who can't quite explain how she managed to murder her former lover.

As for Sutra, before she performs the mind-meld on Agnes, she appears friendly and gentle - and afterwards, she not only coolly advocates for eradicating all biological lifeforms, but either condones Saga's murder by Narek, or worse, even kills her herself, just to be able to persuade Soji that non-synths can't be trusted. That seems like a pretty big shift for someone who showed no signs of sociopathic tendencies before, so maybe they were caused by her experience.

• I beg to differ. When Sutra was introduced the scene was framed such that she presented a bad vibe to the audience. I'm thinking she really is just a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing.
  • Or maybe that was just a red herring, meant to suggest to the audience that Sutra's behavior didn't have anything to do with the mind meld.
• What if the Admonition is what the SCP Foundation would call a mimetic virus - essentially a computer virus that works on brains? In this case, it affects both organics and synthetics, deliberately driving them into conflict for unknown purposes. This especially fits with the Borg's behavior surrounding the abandoned cube. It wasn't Ramdha's insanity they were afraid of — they were trying to keep the virus from infecting the entire collective!

Narek did not kill Saga

Narek having killed Saga during his escape is far too easy a plot point, especially if the show intends to build on his conflicting emotions and keep him sympathetic, so he is most likely innocent of Saga's murder. She was killed by Sutra so Narek could escape, or because she stumbled across Sutra releasing him, and she knew too much. Alternately, or in addition to this, Sutra knew that Soong would take her death particularly hard, allowing Sutra to manipulate him into helping her call the alien synths, as well as generally casting doubt on whether biological life forms could be trusted.

• An argument against that is that Narek eyed the murder weapon beforehand. Sutra wasn't present at that point. However, Sutra may have come to the same conclusion as Narek. Therefore, there's a 50% chance that it's either Sutra or Narek.
• I'm thinking Narek did it as the price of freedom, Sutra got him to kill Saga then flee because she wants to come in contact with the alliance.
• Both Narek eyeing the brooch and Sutra appearing like she would demand something from him in exchange for letting him go are likely a Red Herring. As a synth, Saga would have had super strength, and we've seen numerous times that Narek isn't a fighter - besides, why would Sutra give him a however makeshift weapon when she knows how much he hates synths? It's far likelier that she let him go and then killed Saga herself to set Narek up for her murder - and all that to convince Soji that biological beings are a consistent danger for synthetic ones.
• Confirmed: Narek only restrained Saga, while Sutra was the one who actually killed her.

"Our evolution will mean their destruction" does not refer to synths destroying organics

Rather, it means that the ageless Created will inevitably outlive their age-limited Creator. Organic civilizations rise and fall, and those that make it far enough to create Synthetic Life end up leaving them behind. As it happened more and more over the epochs, a singularitan alliance formed from the synths left behind, and they're the ones that left the message, declaring protection to synthetics whose creator civilizations haven't yet passed on.

Someone from TNG, DS9 or Voyager shows up in the season finale

Somehow, I don't think we're done with the guest appearances by past Trek cast, especially with the suggestion of a Starfleet task force on its way to the synths' homeworld. There's been no mention of further guest stars, but that doesn't mean the producers couldn't have pulled something sneaky (like concealing Brent Spiner coming back for "Et In Arcadia Ego" Parts 1 and 2). There is no lack of options:

• Someone from TNG: Patrick Stewart stars, while we've already seen guest appearances by Jonathan Frakes as Will Riker and Marina Sirtis as Deanna Troi. Brent Spiner is already back as Altan Soong. Who's left?
  • Michael Dorn as Worf, who as revealed in tie-in material, succeeded Picard as captain of the Enterprise-E when Picard was promoted to admiral. Dorn also showed up during the filming of "Nepenthe", so it's not like he was unavailable.
  • LeVar Burton as Geordi LaForge, who though he was shown as commanding the relief fleet construction effort in the Countdown comics, is said to have survived the attack on Mars. Burton, like Dorn, showed up during the filming of "Nepenthe". There's also the possibility of a Call-Back to how LaForge was depicted as a starship captain in Voyager's episode "Timeless".
    • Jossed, however Burton confirmed he will be making an appearance in season 2.
  • Gates McFadden as Beverly Crusher. Notably, she is the only one of the TNG cast who has not had a guest appearance, nor been mentioned in any behind-the-scenes materials as Dorn and Burton were. She also bears the possibility of a Call-Back to how Crusher was depicted as the captain of the medical ship U.S.S. Pasteur in the anti-time future of TNG's finale "All Good Things ..."
• Someone from DS9: The story doesn't seem to have taken the main characters anywhere near the station or to Bajoran space, but it's entirely plausible that a Starfleet character could show up, likely Ezri Dax, Julian Bashir or Miles O'Brien. Or Sisko, if he is Back from the Dead like what happened in the novelverse.
• Someone from Voyager: Seems less likely because Seven of Nine has been a prominent part of Picard's first season, and Icheb showed up Back for the Dead. But it could be someone with ties to her, like Janeway (as her maternal figure), or Chakotay (as her one-time lover), or the Doctor (a close friend), or Naomi Wildman (as her past daughter-figure). Paris, Torres, and Kim seem less likely, but still possible.
• Confirmed - it's Jonathan Frakes.

Vulcans (and Romulans) did not originate on the planet Vulcan

In this preview clip for Episode 10, Narek mentions that some believe the myth of Seb-Cheneb and her twin sister "dates back from long before our ancestors first arrived on Vulcan." (He clearly says Vulcan, not Romulus.) If that's true, then the people we now call the Vulcans and their Romulan descendants are not native to the planet Vulcan. Spock did suggest in the TOS episode "Return to Tomorrow" that Vulcans may be the descendants of Sargon's species.

• It's possible that this version of their ancestors' origin is strictly the Romulan one - since their forebearers separated from main Vulcan society rejecting Surek's teachings, they might have wanted to minimize Vulcan's status as their planet of origin and became convinced that it was simply a later settlement of their species much like Romulus.

Narek ends up in Federation custody

After the fleet escorts Oh and her attack fleet back to Romulan space, a ship is dispatched back to pick up Narek and charge him for his crimes. After all, there is a time gap between Picard dying and being brought back that lasts days.

• This has been Confirmed by Michael Chabon in a Q&A after the finale. A scene was shot, but cut due to time reasons.

The admonition is a trap for everyone, not just organics

The synthetics just assume the advanced AI, whoever/whatever they are, would kill only organics and leave them alone. What if in actuality its a trap. The advanced AI figures the easiest way to improve itself is to wait for pimitive AI to get advanced enough. They then left the admonition behind knowing more often then not synths and organics reach a point of war. The synths find the admonition, trigger the "come help us" and summon the advanced AI. The advanced AI then wipes out every one, synths and organics. Absorbing/harvesting anything that will improve itself and leaving just enough behind to start the process all over again.

• As mentioned above, it could be some more advanced race's idea of a test to determine if a race is to be exterminated or not. Suggest that genocide might be a solution to a sufficiently dangerous situation, offer to perform that genocide on their behalf, and wait to see if anyone takes them up on the offer.

The original intended recipient of the synth body

Altan Soong and Maddox had begun building a new synth body well before Picard arrived, and they couldn't have anticipated that he would need it. So just who was that body intended for? Possibilities:

• Soong or Maddox themselves. Especially Soong. Given his willingness to chuck all organic life in the galaxy under the bus if it meant saving the Synths, he may have been planning to imprint himself to become one himself.
• Another new android like Soji or Dahj. There was no intended recipient. The new body was simply going to be the next model. However this one seems unlikely as it was a single body, and we know the new process he and Maddox had developed required building the synths in pairs (unless they were working on a way around that limitation).
• Data. We learn in episode 10 that Data's consciousness was resurrected, and was being sustained in a simulated reality. Soong's and Maddox's experiments, including the creation of Soji and Dahj, may have all been leading up to their attempt to imprint Data's neural network on a new positronic brain. The reason Soji and Dahj were created was because, after Data's failure to imprint himself on B-4, they decided to be cautious rather than risk losing him forever. Because the sisters' neural nets were germinated From a Single Cell rather than trying to imprint the entire personality at once, it was a safer process to test the stability of the new positronic brain they had developed. Once they succeeded with Soji and Dahj, their next step would be to imprint Data into the new body they were building. However Maddox's abduction by Bjayzl disrupted their scheduling, so the body wasn't ready, (or Soong was unwilling to attempt the procedure without Maddox's help) and then the crisis with the Romulans led to Picard's death. The choice was then made to save Picard first, with Soong intending to prepare a new body for Data, until Picard chose to honor his last request and allow him to die for good.

The real reason Rios hates the Emergency Hospitality Hologram

• As demonstrated on the show, the EHH is eager to please and has No Sense of Personal Space. 'Emergency Hospitality Hologram' is almost certainly a euphemism for Holographic prostitute, and as we've already established that Rios used his own image for the emergency holograms by accident, he got very annoyed at being chased around his ship by an overly-amorous hologram that looked identical to himself.

Season 2

Picard has difficulty adjusting to life as his new android self

It seems almost a given that, despite the uplifting end to season 1, he will have some sort of difficulties adjusting to being a "synth", in a parallel to both Dahj and Soji. For one, he will no longer have an artificial heart but a positronic brain, and he will be much more physically capable than he was before. Physical association with the body is probably not instantaneous either.

• Partially Jossed in the Season 1 finale: Altan Soong made clear that Picard's new body is not more capable than his organic one. His strength and senses are normal, and he will even continue to age and will eventually die at whatever the upper biological limit is for humans by the time of the setting. The only change is that he no longer has the brain abnormality that killed his biological body.

Jurati is pardoned or pleads out a deal for the murder of Maddox

In the season 1 finale, we see Jurati looking in far better health and about to go on a new adventure with Picard and company. It's possible that during the time in between Picard's "death" and their departure, an investigation took place and a deal made or a pardon is issued. The first episode of season 2 will give us a short info-dump.

• Confirmed. There is a scene where Jurati states that she was cleared of Maddox' murder due to being under an alien influence. Unfortunately, she has turned to alcohol to cope with the guilt.

Jurati is not pardoned, but their trip to turn her over to the authorities gets waylaid.

The entire second season is the crew getting sidelined trying to get Jurati to Deep Space 12, perhaps by a Romulan plot to eliminate a witness in Oh's conspiracy. Or maybe she owes a Klingon some money.

• Jossed. The first episode of season 2 confirms that she was cleared of Maddox' murder. Although she is still clearly hurting.

Narek will gain a pardon with the Federation by testifying against Commodore Oh

His family seems to have been his main connection to the Zhat Vash, and his aunt Ramdha is an xB in a coma, while Narissa, to his knowledge, has disappeared (and as the audience knows, has been killed by Seven). Meanwhile, Oh was already less than thrilled to have him involved in the operation, and might be inclined to get rid of him as a loose end, so returning to Romulan territory might be out of the question, anyway.

• Jossed.

Narek will join the xBs at the Artifact

His aunt Ramdha is an xB in a coma, as mentioned above, and Narissa wasn't able to get her away to the Romulan fleet because of her condition, meaning if she is still alive, she is on the Artifact somewhere. It's entirely possible that he decided to join them in order to stay with her.

• Jossed.

Narek will rejoin the Romulans

None of his actions after reaching the Synth homeworld were exactly against the Zhat Vash (indeed, he was trying to stop the same apocalypse they were, just by different means), so he might not have any particular reason not to be welcomed back, unless Oh is the sort to feel vengeful simply because he failed to kill Soji.

• Jossed.

Narissa isn't dead

Narissa did not die when Seven threw her off the upper level. She was shown able to perform a site to site transport before, and may have beamed herself to safety. Either that, or she "soft landed" somewhere.

• Jossed.

Narissa survived by being assimilated

She was badly injured as a result of her fight with Seven and her subsequent drop off of the ledge, and somewhere down in the depths of the Artifact some other part of the cube still functioned to try and assimilate new beings into the Collective, or to try to fix her with cybernetic implants. Such a fate would be horrifically ironic for her and there's no saying how she'd react if she retained her individuality afterwards.

• Jossed.

Sutra will return, and try to pick up where she left off

If Altan Soong is anything like his father, he will reactivate Sutra with the intent of "fixing" her. However, like Lore, Sutra will turn on him and kill him in retaliation. She will then attempt to summon the Higher Synths again.

• Jossed.

The Higher Synthetics will turn out to be Iconians

The Admonition was created about 200,000 years ago, roughly the same time as the disappearance of the Iconians. Iconia is located near Romulan space, in the Romulan Neutral Zone as of 2365. We know very little about the Iconians themselves, other than they are described either as conquerors or as victims of species who envied their advanced technology. If the Higher Synthetics are not Iconians themselves, they may be the Iconians' creatures, have something to do with the Iconians' absence, or both.

• Either that, or they destroyed the Iconians.

The Higher Synthetics will turn out to be connected to the Tkon

The Tkon empire fell 700,000 years ago. Despite them being vast and in some ways more advanced than the current races (for instance, they had the star-moving capabilities needed to make the Admonition system), they completely disappeared after their homeworld's star went nova. Perhaps they built and/or fell prey to the original Higher Synthetics? Combining with the above theory, perhaps they built the system and left the message after destroying the Iconians and having their synths join them.

Hugh survived somehow

One way or another, the writers will undo Hugh's death. (What, denial is strong with this trooper.)

• Jossed sadly.

If we ever get a mirrorverse episode, the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance will have been destroyed and mirrorverse Noonien Soong will be the ruler of a new Terran Empire

He'll have built androids just like his prime timeline self, but with a different intended use. Alternatively, mirrorverse Soong will be dead at the hands of his first prototype and mirrorverse Lore will be Emperor of the Alpha Quadrant.

• Jossed.

Season 2 will reveal that Riker eventually got what he probably always wanted, and became captain of the Enterprise.

At some point after Thad was born, his time as captain of the Titan came to an end, one way or another, and he was offered captainship of the Enterprise-E, either taking over from the captain that took over after Picard became an admiral, or taking over directly from Picard (either if his time as Titan's captain was relatively shortlived, or if the Ent-E went into drydock for a complete, long-term refit after Picard was promoted).

Either way, Riker was very happy, and Thad (and later Kestra) spent much of their childhood aboard the Enterprise, Riker holding the position until he and Troi took a leave of absence from Starfleet to care for Thad.

Riker having been captain of the flagship might also explain how he was able to have enough clout, even after years of non-service, to pull together a fleet of the current top-of-the-line ship class to back Picard up, since I doubt Picard's legendary but waning reputation and his own rep as a well-known officer would be enough on their own to convince Starfleet to take their new Inquiry-class fleet out for a test drive right then and there.

• Jossed.

The Iconians, Tkon, and the Androids of Edo III are interconnected.

Ruk was a more primitive model that couldn't ascend, and was left behind after the others left. The Iconians had the same tech that the recently assimilated Sikarians had, to send themselves anywhere they wanted. The Tkon and Iconians inadvertently created the higher synths, and then created weapons like the Doomsday machine to fight them, should they return. The Borg were also likely an offshoot of a weapon program to counter the synths. And one or both races were the "Preservers", seeding the Galaxy with humanoid life to rebuild after the synth hostilities began.

• Jossed.

All events of the show are Picard's hallucinations - used to torture him

Sometime after First Contact, Picard is captured by the Borg or Romulans or someone - they are using hallucinations as a way to break his mind. That is the reason the show is so dark. He is being shown everything he stands for getting destroyed. No better torture for someone like Picard.

• Jossed.

The Ancient synthetics are not actually Omnicidal Maniacs, or will at least be able to be reasoned with.

If there's one thing Picard is good at, it's the speechifying. Also, as a former human with a synthetic body, who has also been dear friends and colleagues with an android for many years, he is living proof that organics and synthetics can coexist peacefully.

• Jossed.

Season 2 is in development hell

In huge part due to to the COVID-19 pandemic which is wreaking havoc with the entertainment industry. This is why we don't hear about it even as of 2021.

• The irony: shortly after I posted that, a trailer for the next season was released with a premiere date of 2022 ...
• Season 2 has begun streaming.
• Jossed.

Someone in charge at Paramount reads TV Tropes.

See the above entry.

Q and the Prophets have some sort of connection

The big reveal of the Season 2 trailer was obviously that Q is coming back, still played by John de Lancie. But not long before, there is a quiet shot of a tablet under examination or restoration on Picard's table in his study. This is none other than the Tablet of the Reckoning from DS9, last seen shattered into pieces by Sisko to release a Prophet and a Pah-Wraith to do battle on the station. There's no way that something that plot-critical in the past wouldn't be relevant if the trailer took the trouble of prominently showing it. Leading to ...

Benjamin Sisko will return

Related to the previous WMG, the Tablet of the Reckoning shown in the season 2 trailer bore inscriptions starting with the phrase "Welcome Emissary". Could it be that Sisko will show up in a vision still with the Prophets, or otherwise finally make the return he promised to Kasidy Yates in the Series Finale of DS9? Of course, a factor working against this would be that Avery Brooks appears not to be making a return to acting, but his appearance could well have been kept under heavy wraps like other guest stars from the first season of Picard.

• Picard and company will interact with (or rather have to avoid interacting with) "Gabriel Bell" when they go back in time to the early 21st century.
• Nothing to add. Just want to say that this would be really dope.
• His name is mentioned in the second episode.
  • Sadly Jossed.

Q will turn out to be behind QAnon.

• Don't you groan at me. You know tricking a bunch of twenty-first century idiots into self-destructive behavior over the Internet would be entirely his jam. This will presumably be revealed during the show's jaunt to the present day.

Jurati is the masked Borg Queen and it's all a stable time loop meant to stop the Borg Queen

• After Jurati killed Maddox, she has carried that guilt and pain with her and the last thing she'd ever do is kill again. Hence why she only stunned the crew members instead of killing them.
• She's wearing a mask to avoid influencing her younger self and the others, who are all right there on the bridge in front of her.
• It also explains why she never shoots or stops Picard or the others; they are still family to her.
• Telling Picard "Look Up" might be some kind of Trust Password or clue.
• Jurati addresses Picard by his last name, not by rank or his first name.
• Also, in one of the promo images, we see Jurari in a red dress doing superhuman feats.
• There's also the Borg Queen already trying to influence her and later takes control of her body and mind.
• It's possible she ends up assimilated by the Borg Queen in the past and is forced to take The Slow Path, gradually taking over what's left of the Collective post-Endgame until the present day. The new Borg ship is of her own design (partially due to having seen it previously) and the peace offer is genuine.
• [1]◊ Is it my imagination or is that in the center of her helmet look like a cat face? Compared to Spot 73 [2] Note the stripes. Maybe it's reading too much into it but this could be some little bit of Jurati's sense of humor coming through.
• She also did what Picard couldn't do when he was assimilated: stop the Borg Queen from killing her friends.
• Confirmed: Agnes and the Queen become one being and leave to form a new Collective. This one is based on cooperation and connection, not force and gives lost people a second chance. In a manner of speaking, she does stop the Borg Queen. She ultimately shows up in 2401 to protect the quadrant from a new unknown threat.

Species 8472 did most of the leg work in wiping out the Borg in the bad timeline

• The Confederation, having a technological level similar to the UFP, wouldn't have even been able to get to Borg Space in force, much less defeat the entire collective. But without Janeway's intervention, the Borg would have been wiped out in "Scorpion" for their own foolishness in trying to invade fluidic space. The Confederation only actually managed to pick off the collective's last few surviving ships on the extreme outskirts of their territory.

Just like in the TNG finale, it will turn out that Picard is responsible for the change in the timeline

• It will all boil down to the fact that the Federation and Picard still see the Borg as monsters to be destroyed. That's the lesson that Q is teaching Picard this time: that he really is xenophobic and brutal towards races he doesn't understand, typified in the way the Borg entrance in Episode 1 was handled by Starfleet. The self destruct of the Stargazer will be the root cause of the timeline change in some treknobabble way, and Picard will learn the lesson that the Borg are not the monsters he always saw them as, ever since he was first assimilated. We will also discover that Q is secretly helping Picard like he did back in TNG when he was always assumed to be meddling.
  • Or Picard and the others going back to 2024 to "try and prevent what Q did" end up causing the Bad Future they're trying to prevent when they inevitably return to the present to find that nothing has changed, in a subversion of the Set Right What Once Went Wrong of Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home. Q said that it's about penance and he means it, it's all about Picard and the rest of the crew (including the Borg Queen) coming to terms with what they believe and have done in their pasts. Once they realize that they'll be brought back to the end of the first episode, only this time things will go much differently for all parties involved.
• Jossed.

Whatever is going on with Q is related to the Continuum's absense in Star Trek: Coda and Star Trek: Discovery.

• In Coda, Wesley tried to seek out the Q Continuum to help with the crisis at hand, but could find no trace of them in the universe, and the best theory the protagonists can come up with is that they left or were wiped out somehow. In the fourth season of Discovery, Starfleet considers the possibility that the Continuum is behind the massive anomaly wreaking havoc across the galaxy, but nobody has seen or heard anything from them in centuries. What if this is due to whatever has Q all out of sorts in "Penance"? He seems agitated, disoriented at times, and even Picard is vocally concerned for his well-being. Is the Continuum itself at risk of being wiped out by something Picard must try to fix?

Alternate Picard somehow killed q

Given that the alternative timeline humans managed to become advanced enough to kill the Borg with little effort, maybe they somehow found a way to harm Q’s. It may explain why Q is so agitated and even struck Picard.

• Jossed: Q is dying but not because of Picard's actions.

Guinan is the Watcher

The Watcher has been described as an entity that can detect changes in the timeline, which we know Guinan can do from episodes like "Yesterday's Enterprise". It also wouldn't be a stretch to find her in 21st-century Los Angeles since she was previously living in 19th-century San Francisco in "Time's Arrow".

• Jossed: The Watcher is someone else entirely and she does not like Guinan. But Guinan does point Picard in the right direction.

The divergence involves Jean Luc Picard and company getting Renée Picard on the Europa Mission

Jean Luc Picard and the others (or someone else) convinces Renée Picard to go the Europa Mission. It fails because of Picard's clinical depression. Instead of blaming her, Adam Soong, or Spearhead Operations, blames the failure on the organism she claimed was sentient—perhaps this organism caused an ecological disaster that required Adam's shield tech to partially solve. This set in motion events that led to the nightmare world.

• The way to fix it is for Renée Picard to stay on Earth. The Europa mission succeeds and Spearhead Operations is exposed to the public as a criminal organization. Soong goes underground.
• But there are a few wild cards. The Borg Queen, Spearhead Operations, Adam Soong, Kore Soong, the people that Rios helped free from ICE and the clinic Doctor.
• The date of the divergence is April 15, 2024. The gala held on the night of April he 12th. With three days of quarantine, that puts the launch date on the 15th. If the launch date is on the 15th, then the divergence is a failure at launch that could be due to something either caused by Renée's presence, or her absence.
  • Jossed. Picard going on the mission is supposed to happen.

Spearhead Operations and Soong aren't only using ex-soldiers as test subjects

If Spearhead has no qualms about violating international law or human rights, then it's possible that they're using people who are disappeared, like the people who were supposed to go to the deportation center at the border. Instead of them being deported to their home country or end up trapped in a Sanctuary District, they are instead disappeared and used as conscripts or test subjects for Spearhead Operations' super soldiers program.

• Which implies that Spearhead has powerful government connections, or is relying on the complicity of corrupt ICE Agents.
• Jossed. We never see anything of what Spearhead Operations does with its test subjects.

Spearhead Operations is season 2's true antagonist and the group responsible for World War III

In the promos for series 2, we see black-clad people which we assume are Borg but are actually genetically modified super soldiers using rifles with green laser sights. You can also see them wearing an insignia that looks very similar to the bad-future Confederation insignia.

• Elements of the uniforms and philosophy have shown up in TOS, TNG and ENT. Greene from TOS and the "2079" courtroom that Q created in "Encounter at Farpoint" and "All Good Things" not to mention the xenophobic movement lead by Paxton. Meaning that even after WWIII, Spearhead or its remnants had cast a long shadow over humanity for generations until after the formation of the United Federation of Planets.
• Another thing to note: Kore's affliction seems a bit too specific. For a geneticist to not be able to figure out the issue may be indicative of some kind of biological weapon or nanotechnology that has a simple program that causes certain issues if it detects UV or foreign particles in the lungs. If this group wanted to keep Adam in their employ, his daughter is indeed the perfect hostage. He helps with their research and experiments and they "help" him with funding his research. In fact, it seems like the perfect way to keep someone prisoner. They can't escape and if they do, they wouldn't be able to survive outside the controlled environment since they can't stand UV light or outside air.
  • It would certainly explain how Q's temporary cure worked. It "paused" or temporarily "disabled" the program for a short period which then reactivated.
  • If the group supplied Adam's lab and computer equipment, it would explain why he hasn't found a cure: they're sabotaging his work.
  • It might also be something that they'd spread globally requiring the sky shield.
    • Jossed: Spearhead Operations was not sabotaging Soong's work. In fact, they are business partners. Soong has no problem requesting their best soldiers on short notice with no questions asked.
    • Confirmed. On the other hand, Soong is now hell-bent on the future that the Borg Queen described and is using their resources to make it happen.

Renée Picard is the Future Borg Queen

• Her ship somehow ends up in Borg space.
• Picard told her to "look up" and talked about his mother. Not to mention saved her life, making the encounter memorable. If she, or some part of her, survived to the 25th century inside the collective, she would know who he really is and to contact him.
• She is much closer in height to Picard—albeit wearing heels—than Jurati.
• Jossed. It's Agnes.

Part of the Borg Queen's plan is to get Adam Soong involved and go after Picard and company

Unless Q told Soong about Picard's location in France, how else did he know where to go and where did he get those black-clad people with rifles from?

• Confirmed in Mercy. She strikes a deal with Adam Soong. He helps her dispose of Picard and his crew and he gives her the materials she needs to fully become the Queen and create a new collective. He in turn gets his legacy.

The FBI is investigating Soong and Spearhead Operations

Because of Soong's illegal experiments, he is also under criminal investigation by the FBI. They had him under surveillance when they spotted Soong talking to Picard at the gala. That in turn connected Picard to all his associates. Using facial recognition software, they spotted him on video beaming in at Guinan's bar. Naturally, the case agent wants to know what's going on.

• Jossed: Wells was acting entirely on his own for personal reasons.

Agent Wells is really Lt. Ducane

Both of them are played by Jay Karnes and they both have an interest in people and/or technology that should not exist in certain time periods. Ducane could be posing as an FBI agent to avoid causing damage to the timeline.

• Jossed: Although there is more to Wells than meets the eye. It turns out that he encountered Vulcans as a boy and has been obsessed with aliens ever since.

The man that Rios stood up for and helped knock out the ICE Agent is an undercover officer

After they got off the bus, the guy had a smartphone and was texting someone. It appeared as if he stole it from one of the guards, but what if it was actually his? It's possible the ICE in Los Angeles, or just that particular officer, are being investigated. He helped Rios and the others escape both to maintain his cover and because he sympathized with them. But he did report Rios and his friends to his superiors as someone of interest.

• Jossed.

The Borg Queen and the Masked Borg Queen are one and the same

Why not? We're all assuming that the Masked Borg Queen is the result of a stable time loop. But what if the masked queen is really the queen introduced in the nightmare timeline? If so, then what is she up to?

• Confirmed: Agnes and the Queen become one being and leave to build an entirely different collective based not on force but on cooperation and choice.

Picard's "redemption" and possibly "forgiveness" has to do with his mother

Perhaps he had helped his mother escape her room and he got her killed. It was so traumatic that he blocked it out and blamed his father for it.

• Picard had let out her mother after his father locked her in and she hanged herself. He had suppressed the memory and the entire experience has led him to confront the truth. But, that's not necessarily what Q was referring to.

• Confirmed: In fact, that's exactly what Q was referring to. Specifically, Picard forgiving himself and freeing himself from the shackles of his past.

The Borg Queen is going to betray Adam Soong

Once she has everything she needs to start over, she'll just have Soong killed or assimilated. During her sales pitch, she leaves out the part where his "legacy" leads to her destruction. It's doubtful she would want to put herself in that position yet again.

• She's also lying about his true legacy: the creation of a new species of synthetic life. Sure, it takes a few centuries, but he effectively lays the foundation for it to happen. Not to mention that one of his descendants, Data, plays a vital role in saving the galaxy more than once. Not to mention single-handedly killed one of her predecessors. His work is also what lead Picard to get a second chance in a synthetic body.
  • Her plan also allows her to take revenge on three of the people who rejected and killed her predecessors: Data, Picard and Seven. Two of them are present in 2024 and Soong is basically standing in for Data. By changing the timeline, she's also taking revenge against Janeway since she'll either never exist or otherwise be able to destroy her.
• Jossed: Remarkably, she doesn't thanks to Jurati's influence and offering her a better option. She even saves Seven's life after the Borg Queen badly injures her. Adam isn't betrayed either but this does leave him as the final antagonist.

Elnor is still alive

Either he has some technique that allows him to go into some kind of stasis to heal or Agnes (somehow manipulating the Queen) uses Borg technology to resurrect him like Seven did with Neelix. In the series 2 trailer, there's a brief scene with him, Seven and Raffi that's on the ship and with the latter two showing visible injuries and the same clothing they're wearing as of the episode "Mercy".

• Jossed: A hologram that Jurati created as a precaution.
• Inverted to Confirmed for the season Finale- Q resurrected him.

The Confederation was able to defeat the other Alpha Quadrant powers because they gained access to 24th century Borg tech

This gave them a massive tech advantage when they first came onto the scene.

• Jossed: Agnes leaves Earth in the La Sirena. And what 24th century tech is left in Adam's hands literally blows up.

Robert Picard had already left home by the time of Yvette's suicide

Robert was written as being several years older than Jean-Luc so he was probably off at university during the flashbacks in Season 2.

The one who lives and the one who dies refers to a decoy

Tallinn has the ability to disguise her ears. Suppose she is able to fully disguise herself to appear as Renee. While Soong goes after and kills Tallinn, the real Renee gets onto the rocket. By the time he realizes the truth, it's too late. As to whether she dies, well, she is a Romulan and not human so who knows? All that matters is that Soong thinks he succeeded in killing her while the real one escapes.

• Confirmed: Although it does cost Tallinn her life, she does get the chance to properly meet with Renée and introduce herself.

Jurati going off into space with the Borg Queen and becoming a new entity was her penance

It's implied in the season 2 premiere that she was not happy that she essentially got a pass for murdering Bruce Maddox. She had turned to alcohol to cope with the guilt. In the Borg Queen, she saw a kindred spirit and a chance to atone for her crime by going off and saving people.

Picard is only dealing with Yvette's suicide now because he needs to reintegrate his memories into his new synth body

He dealt with the trauma long ago, but being essentially decanted into a new body has stirred up elements of his psyche that were previously settled.

• Jossed: This was about Q freeing Picard from the pain of his past so can move forward and not die alone.

Jurati-Borg Queen let the normal events of time pass as it waited as a subroutine in the Borg collective.

It only properly took charge when it was due to return in the events of Picard Episode 1, and it had already planted all the code necessary for a clean, peaceful takeover at that time.

Season 3

The season (and series) will end with Picard's death

The end of Seasons 1 and 2 saw the deaths of two TNG-era characters, Data and Q. So it makes sense that the third season would end similarly and Picard is the obvious candidate. He was given a reprieve from death in Season 1 but is still living on borrowed time. Whether by natural causes or some sort of heroic sacrifice, Picard will die permanently to mark the end of the series.

• Jossed

The series will end with everyone in-universe going their separate ways or simply going on with their lives

Just like with the series finale of Deep Space 9, the story will end with the characters moving on with their lives and careers.

• Confirmed

Q isn't really dead

John de Lancie mentioned in an interview that he was filming scenes for both seasons 2 and 3. So unless it's a case of Lying Creator (to hide the fact that Q dies) or he only appears in flashbacks/dreams, he's not really dead. One possibility is that he became mortal.

• This can still fit even with Q being really dead in Season 2. Remember that Q is an omnipotent being who can jump back and forth through time on a whim. Season 2 probably was Q truly at the end of his existence, but nothing stops him from being back in his prime in Season 3. It is not linear …
• Semi-Confirmed: Q appears at the end of the season and acknowledges his death but wishes that the next generation would not think so linearly.

Related to the above ...

The overarching plot will be about the disappearance of the Q Continuum, as mentioned in Star Trek: Discovery. And it'll have something to do with the new trans-warp conduit.

• Jossed, it's the Borg wanting revenge upon the Federation and using a sect of rogue Changelings for their ends. No mention (yet) on the transwarp conduit, though.

Q is dead, but he's already set up a Thanatos Gambit for his own resurrection

At the end of season 2, Q led Jean-Luc to believe that the entire plot was a personal gift for him, and that it really wasn't intended to have cosmic significance. But of course, that's pretty difficult to credit, given that this gift had the side-effects of creating a whole new Borg Collective and saving the Alpha Quadrant from being devastated four hundred years hence. Q certainly wanted to do something kind for Jean-Luc, but I think that he was also moving pieces into place for some kind of larger plan.

Vadic is the Klingon Augment Daughter of General Chang.

She wants revenge on the Federation, and the crew of the Enterprise, for her father's humiliating defeat.

• Jossed. As of "No-Win Scenario", she's shown to be a Changeling.

Lore and Moriarty are stored in the Self-Aware Megalomaniacal Computer Storage facility first seen in Lower Decks.

They certainly qualify, and it'd give the producers an excuse for yet another Jeffrey Combs cameo.

• If it still exists or has the same lineup of inmates, given the nearly two decades between when Lower Decks and Picard are set.
• Jossed, they're stored inside Daystrom Station, which is distinct from the planet-side storage seen in Lower Decks.

There's going to be weird "family" drama between Moriarty and La Forge and his daughters.

Geordi gave Moriarty sentience, so in a way, he's his dad.

• Jossed. Moriarty and LaForge (and his daughters) never meet or interact.

Moriarty and Lore come back in a heroic or at least Token Evil Teammate way

Given the threats that both of them represented back in the era of TNG, there must be a very good reason for them to have been released from captivity or reactivated respectively. Maybe there's a Godzilla Threshold moment at which the former TNG crew need the most devious backups they can find to overcome Vadic and her forces.

• Weirdly Confirmed, in a roundabout Broad Strokes way. Moriarty is a manifestation of the security system aboard Daystrom Station, and while hostile, he vanishes with a happy reaction the moment that Riker guesses the music puzzle and turns out to be an extension of Data. Lore, meanwhile, eventually merges with Data as a new synthetic being and thus joins the protagonists.

Beverly's Distress Call is a trap

From the trailers, Picard, Riker, Seven and the rest of the Titan-A crew come to a nebula of some sort for a reason, presumably to investigate something. Vadic also hails the ship with the clear implication that she's been waiting for Picard's arrival. Maybe Crusher's message for Picard was deliberately allowed to get through, or was intercepted and re-released from the nebula, in order to lure Picard there to be attacked.

• Jossed, Beverly genuinely sent the distress call to attract help, and the Shrike only tracked her and Jack down when Picard and Riker arrived.

The series will end with a poker game

Because of course.

• Confirmed

Lore will have an Antagonist in Mourning moment when he learns that Data has died

The last we saw of Lore, he was being disassembled on the XBs' planet. He's been deactivated for the past thirty years and is only now learning returning to consciousness. He has no idea that his "dear" brother is dead.

• Jossed. Lore and Data initially coexist and are conscious of one another's presence inside Daystrom Android M-5-10, before merging for good.

The Titan-A's captain is getting the Dead Star Walking treatment

The captain of the Titan-A has scarcely shown up in the trailers, which might correlate to his importance in the season. One recent trailer has him dining with Picard and Riker and commenting that the ship's activities will be boring and routine, which is textbook Tempting Fate, and other trailers have Picard, Riker and Seven generally giving the orders on the bridge, which makes no sense if The Captain is still around and in capacity to command.

• Confirmed; although it takes him a while to get there. Shaw gets injured during the third episode, "Seventeen Seconds", so Riker takes over temporary command of the Titan-A with Picard effectively being his Number Two (for an ironic change). Then Shaw returns to command after recuperating. Then Shaw makes a Heroic Sacrifice to Hold the Line against assimilated crew near the end of the penultimate episode, "Vox".

The TNG cast start off the season at odds with each other

Having the TNG characters start off or periodically end up in conflict is very likely from a Rule of Drama standpoint, and also makes a strong parallel to the Bad Future seen in "All Good Things ..." back at the end of TNG. Picard is obviously motivated to go and save Crusher from Vadic's threat, but what if the rest aren't nearly as big on the idea? Riker and Troi are retired and have Kestra to take care of, Worf is now a committed Martial Pacifist, and Geordi is probably all kinds of angry that his daughter(s) who just got into Starfleet is or are in the line of fire aboard the Titan-A on what looks to him like a perilous wild goose chase (reinforcing this is a moment from the trailer where Jean-Luc greets Geordi over the Titan's viewscreen only to be met with a Death Glare). It will probably take a lot of time to get over the divisions that have entrenched over the past twenty-plus years in-universe and to get everyone back together to the point that they can sit around the conference table like they used to do.

• More or less Confirmed. Crusher cut off Picard and the rest of the group to keep her son Jack safe from the hazards of Picard's life. Riker and Troi's marriage has deteriorated over the years in the wake of their son Thaddeus' death, and at first only Riker shows up before the Changelings abduct Troi. LaForge is downright furious that Picard pulled his daughter Sidney into the hazardous pursuit of the Changeling (and later Borg) plot along with the TNG cast who had shown up by that point. About the only cast member not at odds with the others is Data, who is overjoyed to be reunited with his shipmates (although Lore, of course, is still a Jerk with a Heart of Jerk). It takes until the season's eight episode, "Surrender", to finally assemble all the TNG characters in one place.

The third season will have a theme of and Sequel Hooks to generational change

So far the series has had a running family theme, and the TNG characters' actors can't be around forever. What if this season has a strong element of generational turnover, to a next Next Generation of sorts?

• A young man seen in trailers is rumoured to be Picard's son, likely with Crusher.
• Kestra was introduced two seasons prior as Troi and Riker's daughter.
• Soji is still around somewhere as Data's "daughter".
• Two of LaForge's daughters are in Starfleet, one of them at the helm of the Titan-A according to third season trailers.
• Alexander Rozhenko, Worf's son with K'Ehleyr, showed up on DS9 and is also still out there, whether in the Klingon military or somewhere else (possibly a diplomat like his mom was).
  • Semi-Confirmed in that Picard and Crusher’s son does appear, as do La Forge’s daughters, with the son and one of the daughters even ending up on the same fan-favorite Starfleet ship, the Enterprise-G, no less…
  • Semi-Jossed in that the other characters don’t appear, or get fewer mentions than one would think.

Beverly's Human Popsicle situation is just a temporary desperation move

Various bits of Word of God have indicated that she starts the season premiere with an Action Prologue, presumably with her medical vessel boarded by Vadic's Mooks. Almost certainly she gets away from them and records and sends the message to Picard's commbadge, but her ship is heavily damaged, she herself might even be injured, and with (trusted) help a long ways off, presumably she and most or all of her surviving crew get into stasis to await rescue. This might also come with the side benefit of powering down much of the ship's other systems, making it harder for Vadic to detect them and reengage in the depths of space. The stasis pod that Beverly is in also seems to be the same one seen in a wider shot from the latest trailer where Picard draws his phaser facing a young man who walks in with Riker at gunpoint. Likely Beverly is then awoken from stasis, brought aboard the Titan-A for treatment, and is better off when the crew later reunites in the Titan's conference room.

• Confirmed, Beverly's son Jack helps her into the stasis pod after she is severely wounded in a firefight with Vadic's mooks, and she gets brought aboard the Titan-A an episode later.

Vadic is...

• Shinzon's mom
  • It'd be an interesting way to tie the season back to the last time the TNG cast were on screen together in Star Trek: Nemesis. Shinzon was a clone, but he had to have been born and raised somehow before he was cast into the mines of Remus, and possibly she was tossed in there with him (she certainly had a nasty past, judging by the visible scars). Maybe Vadic got wind of Shinzon's demise at Picard's hands and is out for a personal Roaring Rampage of Revenge for it, as well as for the Federation failing to aid the Romulans and Remans in the face of their supernova in 2387. It also might explain how and why she procured a ship that looks quite reminiscent of the Narada from 2009's Star Trek (minus whatever alien upgrades it received under Nero).
• Picard's daughter
  • If she is of similar age to Amanda Plummer, she would have been born some time in the late 2330s, early in Picard's time as captain of the Stargazer. Her personal anger towards him could be because he wasn't part of her life.
• An Ex-Borg
  • The scars are from where her implants were removed. She resents Picard because he assimilated her when he was Locutus and/or because he signed a treaty with Jurati's Borg.
• Groppler Zorn's Daughter
  • This is the Grand Finale for the TNG era, so they're going to go full circle. Her family was ruined after the Enterprise-D freed the Farpoint Entity and now she's out for vengeance.
• All Jossed; in "No-Win Scenario" she reveals (in private) that she's one of the rogue Changelings, before the rest of the main cast find out.

The reason Crusher cut herself off from the Team ...

According to deleted scenes from Nemesis, Crusher was due to take a job at Starfleet Medical after the Romulus mission. If she did, it would be a good way of getting physical distance from the trauma of that mission, while staying on the Enterprise might have made it harder to come to terms with it. Perhaps her PTSD coping strategy was to isolate herself from that past.

• Jossed, she explains to Picard that she wanted to keep Jack safe from all the hazards around Picard's life.

Shaw's animosity towards the Borg is because he was nearly killed/lost a ship and crew to the collective, or was nearly (and maybe even) assimilated by them.

He certainly has a lot of unbridled hatred towards Seven and Picard because of their ex-Borg status, and Riker possibly due to his gung-ho attitude (Riker certainly doesn't help when Shaw realizes that Riker want's his ship under false pretenses), but that still would seem strange that Seven would be assigned to him, and Starfleet had a psych profile on him that indicates that something happened, but he's also capable enough to be in command of one of the top ships in the fleet. To be fair, Sisko also has, or at least had, genuine reason to hate the Borg as well.

• Confirmed, to an extent, as of "No-Win Scenario"; Shaw relates that he is a survivor of the Battle of Wolf 359, where he was an ensign on board a ship (the U.S.S. Constance, from the end credits visuals) that was destroyed with most of her crew. He has Survivor's Guilt that he was one of ten people out of a crowd of more than fifty chosen to escape in a pod while the rest died, which led him to become a Tragic Bigot.

The enemy is after Genesis.

All the shout-outs to Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan so far this season are building up to the big one: that the other weapon stolen from Daystrom Station is the Genesis Device.

• Jossed. The Changelings stole Picard's remains from Daystrom Station on behalf of the Borg. That being said, a Genesis Device is seen among the Daystrom Station vault contents.

There is a Starfleet conspiracy (currently) aiding the enemy conspiracy

For similar reasons as in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country: not everyone in Starfleet were satisfied with the way the Dominion War ended either, so they're aiding the rogue Changelings now with the intent of having them trigger a second round of the War that can put Starfleet in a more dominant position over the Great Link (possibly some in the conspiracy may have the comparatively Well-Intentioned Extremist intent that the second round will be specifically against the rogue Changelings rather than the Dominion as a whole and so stabilise Odo's reforms with the remaining Great Link).

• Jossed, the Changelings are simply replacing key people all over the place in Starfleet to enact their plan. There is no indication of willing quislings.

Jack is a synth.

He effortlessly takes care of the Changelings from the Intrepid, activating similar to Dahj back in "Remembrance." His nightmares and the red cracks and vines are reminiscent of the Admonition and the tentacled synths from "Et in Arcadia Ego."

• Jossed, he's part-Borg, being descended from Picard, whose DNA was substantially altered during his time in the Collective.

Jack is a Borg.

As this show points out, Picard was assimilated for a brief time, and while Crusher was able to remove his implants after they destroyed the Cube, the existence of Borg Nanoprobes had not been presented yet. Jack was assimilated in vitro, but without a collective to be assimilated into, and now the Borg are calling out to him to "return home" and connect to them.

• Partly Confirmed; Jack is partially biologically Borg, by descent from Picard, whose DNA was modified by the Collective, but no nanoprobes were involved. Then in the penultimate episode, "Vox", he gets assimilated when he seeks out and confronts the Borg Queen.

Given the red theme in his visions, and Jurati's red dress in Season 2 before she became the new collective's Queen, it's possible that this isn't even a malicious situation, and the Borg in question are trying to help Jack and Picard against the Changelings.

• Confirmed, in a sense — he inherited Borg DNA from Picard. The situation is completely malicious on the Borg's part, though.

Ro survived her shuttle's destruction

Ro is in communication with Titan until a few seconds before her shuttle is destroyed. We know that Titan could beam her to safety if she got close enough to them, and by the time her shuttle exploded, she was certainly very close to Intrepid. It's possible the latter ship beamed her clear of the shuttle, though it is still unclear how many (if any) changelings are aboard that ship waiting for her.

• Quasi-Confirmed via Word of God. Terry Matalas said in a Reddit AMA that she was beamed off the shuttle and they were supposed to rescue her in the finale, but it's unclear if the franchise will pick up on that thread.

The Changeling infiltration of Starfleet is an excuse to retcon the first season

In season 1, Michael Chabon said he wanted to portray the Federation's isolationism as being the result of the Dominion War, but he was blocked by executives who thought it would be too unfriendly to new viewers. Now that those same executives are desperate to make Star Trek fans like the franchise again, Terry Matalas is using a similar idea to reveal Starfleet was compromised and mishandled the situation on purpose. Season 3 will end with Picard rooting out the conspiracy and restoring the ideals of the Federation, symbolically wiping the slate clean and restoring the Federation to "what it should be".

Titan's uncompromised crew members aboard the Intrepid will fight for control of her.

Not all of the Titan crew beamed onto Intrepid are necessarily changelings. If they realise the Intrepid has been compromised, they may well try to overpower the changelings to save their crewmates still aboard the Titan.

• Probably rendered moot when the Borg trigger their assimilation of Starfleet crew members in "Vox". Whatever the situation on the Intrepid was, now most of the crew are united in the Collective.

Vadic isn't a changeling.

The changeling giving her orders is disguised as her hand. She has to manually cut it in order to sever them, and then they speak face-to-face. If they were both changelings then "the drop would become an ocean", so to speak - they would have been communicating telepathically while linked. Which leads me to...

• Jossed. Vadic is indeed a Changeling.

Vadic is an xB.

There is a twang when the Shrike appears which is familiar of the musical leitmotif for V'Ger and, in Star Trek Online, the Borg.

• Jossed. Vadic is a rogue Changeling.

The Greater-Scope Villain is hitching a ride in Vadic the Changeling's body

We now know that Vadic is in fact a Rogue Changeling, but she does keep looking at her hands a lot and in episode 8 it almost seemed as if the 'Face' was going back into Vadic's hand when their conversation was over.

• Jossed. Vadic gets killed off at the end of "Surrender", and no other beings are present when she shatters against the hull of the Shrike.

The Greater-Scope Villain is a Pah-Wraith

Yes, this is going deep into the lore of the show. But it's not as if it doesn't make sense.

• Jossed — it's the Borg.

Janeway plays a key role in what's going on with the Changelings

The character has been name-dropped a lot this season, with several mentions that nobody's been able to get through to her. Either she's been replaced by a Changeling, or she knows what's going on, but no longer knows who she can trust, so is isolating herself as much as possible while she tries to fight them on her own.

Lore will help save the Titan.

Lore will help save the Titan purely out of self interest.

• Jossed; Lore tries to absorb Data by absorbing his memories and inadvertently causes them both to merge; the new being retains Data's name, memories, morality, love for his friends, humanity and inherent goodness, while also having Lore's wit and snark.

Locutus is behind the red door.

Picard's Irumodic syndrome is actually leftover Borg programming which he passed on to Jack, along with the Locutus personality. This is why it upsets Deanna so much, because she clearly recognizes it which means it's a force we have all seen before. The reason the changelings want Jack and took part of Picard's brain is to adapt that programming to turn humanity into a mindless slave collective that will be easy to control.

• Confirmed, at least in the sense of the Borg in general (not Locutus specifically) being behind the Red Door, and Picard's Irumodic syndrome actually being Borg programming passed on to Jack.

Beverly is a Changeling.

And she might not even know it. What if this Beverly is a deep cover Changeling agent a la Ash Tyler from Discovery? The original beverly is abducted directly after Nemesis, her mind is somehow probed so the infiltrator has access to her memories and then its memory is wiped so the infiltrator actually thinks they are beverly. Then they have some kind of sub conscious command to concieve a child with Picard and then cut off all her old friends. That's why Jack is "different" - he's part-Changeling. His warging powers are his version of linking. A long shot I know but what a twist that would be.

• Jossed.

Picard's brain was altered during "The Inner Light".

The alien probe altered Picard's brain to allow him to take on other peoples' memories, and he somehow passed that down to his son. Scientifically, the retcon won't make a lot of sense, but it will be overlooked by most viewers because of the nostalgia factor.

• Jossed, it was the Borg who subtly but deeply altered Picard's DNA, resulting in the brain abnormality.

The Enterprise-D will successfully use the recongigured deflector dish weapon from "The Best of Both Worlds"

The only thing better than hearing Riker get to say "Fire" again would be if it worked.

• Jossed

Contrary to the repeated denials from Terry Matalas, both Janeway and Jurati will be back for the finale

Janeway's whereabouts have been the subject of speculation for several episodes. She gained wind of the conspiracy in advance and stole away in secret to plan a countermeasure with the Jurati-Borg.

• Jossed

The Borg cube hiding around Jupiter (per preview clips) actually isn't the Queen and Vox's cube

Instead, the suspense will build up to discovering the Artifact, crewed and repaired by the ex-Borg since the first season and flown all the way from Coppelius (Ghulion IV) in secret, to team up with anyone available (the Enterprise-D and her crew, as it turns out) to kick the Queen's forces out of the solar system and avert the threat. Alternatively, it might be Jurati's Borg vessel from the second season, which probably scans similarly to a cube from a distance.

• Jossed

Wesley will play a part in stopping the Borg and saving Jack

If they're really serious about bringing back the entire TNG crew for Season 3, it would only make sense. Besides, is Wesley going to sit by and do nothing when he can save his little half-brother?

• Jossed

Betting pool for other characters who might return for the finale

In case Picard calls for aid, here’s a fantasy or probable list of characters we’ll see whom Picard has helped, and who might return given their actors are alive, perhaps to provide a thematic Book Ends (since a resurrected Kirk, Janeway, Jurati and her Borg crew, Kestra, Soji, Wesley, and the ex-Borgs have already been mentioned) (all Jossed, by the way):

• Miles O'Brien and/or his family.
  • Jossed.
• The Tamarians.
  • Jossed.
• Clancy.
  • Jossed.
• Guinan and/or the El-Aurians.
  • Jossed.
• Erik Pressman (now a Boxed Crook).
  • Jossed.
• Other major characters from Deep Space Nine.
  • Jossed.
• Other major characters from Voyager, Lower Decks, or Prodigy.
  • Jossed, except for the real Tuvok.
• Elnor and/or the Qowat Milat.
  • Jossed.
• Sonya Gomez.
  • Jossed.
• Rasmussen (also a Boxed Crook).
  • Jossed.
• Morgan Bateson.
  • Jossed.
• TNG-era allies higher up in the Klingon Empire, Ferengi territory, Cardassian Union, and/or Romulan Free State.
  • Jossed.
• The rest of the Fenris Rangers.
  • Jossed.
• Surviving members of the Q Continuum.
  • Jossed, though the pre-ascension de Lancie Q appears in the mid-credits scene.
• Species 8472.
  • Jossed.

Long-cast WMGs

At the series finale, Kestra and Soji, having become close friends over the course of the series, enroll in Starfleet Academy together

Once Kestra reaches legal adulthood, the two of them decide to embark upon the same path their fathers went before them: duty and interstellar adventure.

• Jossed in that it doesn’t happen in the series finale, but it could happen in a spin-off…

Kirk and Picard will both be resurrected/de-aged

The vault in "The Bounty" mentions Kirk's body has been retrieved for something called "Project Phoenix", and they've cast a younger actor on Strange New Worlds who could pull double-duty in both the 23rd and 25th centuries (with William Shatner maybe appearing once to pass the baton). They've also mentioned a few times that Jack is his father's son, so they may convince the actor to shave his head and star as young Picard. Ergo, it's building up to Star Trek: Generations 2.0, except not shite this time.

• Jossed as of the end of season 3. Captain James T. Kirk is still dead (just like a certain Generalissimo) and Jean-Luc Picard is still old and bald.

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