Recap / Star Trek: Picard S3E09 "Vox"

"My friends, we've come home."

Where we left off last week, Jack Crusher was contemplating the red door that has lived in his mind his entire life. Deanna Troi, psychologist and half-Betazoid empath, had joined him in his mind to open that door. In the end, Jack can't do it, and Deanna opens it instead. What she finds results in her fleeing the room entirely, leaving Jack to yell in frustration that she's leaving just for cheap drama. Only, she's not: she runs straight to Sickbay and tells Picard and Crusher that what she saw was a Borg cube. Apparently, Picard's body has been a host for Borg Organic Technology that was mistaken for Irumodic Syndrome and has been passed on to Jack. And, given Jack's proven ability to telepathically control others, she can only conclude that Jack is some sort of danger.

Picard confronts Jack and suggests he retire politely to a Vulcan research academy — Jack identifies it as a psychiatric institution where he can be de-brainwashed (he may be cynical, but under the circumstances he probably isn't wrong). When Jack finds armed redshirts waiting for him outside his room, he uses his Borg red-eyed telepathy to take control of them. He commandeers another shuttle and warps away to find the Borg. Aboard a cube, he confronts the Borg Queen (voice of Alice Krige) and learns his true nature: where his father was a speaker — a locutor, if you will — he is a vox, the voice itself. Jack, unable to resist her, is assimilated.

Worf, La Forge and Data present what they've learned from a genetic scan: the genetic therapy the Borg conduct on all their assimilated was more extensive in Picard's case. It's the reason he could still hear the voices of the Borg after being de-assimilated: he was modified to be a receiver, and through him Jack became a transmitter. Even worse, Frontier Day is starting at literally any moment, and whatever is about to happen, it's about to happen now. Picard orders the Titan back to Sector 001. Indeed, the show cuts to Spacedock, where the Odyssey-class U.S.S. Enterprise, NCC-1701-F, emerges to lead the festivities with Admiral Elizabeth Shelby (Elizabeth Dennehy) in the captain's chair. Shelby shows off the latest bit of technology, "Fleet Formation," which allows Starfleet ships to operate as a Hive Mind. (Picard and Riker, watching the transmission from the bridge, marvel that Shelby, the anti-Borg expert, would sign off on such a thing.)

As the Titan arrives, Geordi and Data continue their research, discovering something even worse: Picard's Borgified DNA and parietal lobe has been incorporated into the ship's transporters, which are copy-pasting the data willy-nilly onto everything that passes through the pattern buffer. This is what the Changelings infiltrated the fleet for: to help the Borg pre-assimilate everyone who has ever beamed on or off a ship. The only edge Starfleet has, Beverly notes, is that it's restricted to the Competence Zone: it can only affect people who are still growing, which for human beings is about 25 — as that's when the frontal cortex finally concludes development. Still, while Starfleet may be Mildly Military, it is still military enough to be weighted heavily in favor of younger people. Up on the bridge, Sidney La Forge, Alandra La Forge, Lt. Mura, Ens. Esmar and the other bridge crew become assimilated; Shelby's transmission reveals the same thing is happening to every ship that is here — which is of course All of Them. The fleet is rapidly assimilated, with Admiral Shelby being gunned down by her own ensigns; the only ship where the crew regain control, U.S.S. Excelsior NCC-42037, is blown up by the rest of the fleet. Shaw leads the Titan senior staff down to a maintenance shuttle. As the assimilated Redshirts attack, the TNG crew evacuate and Shaw, Seven and Raffi Hold the Line. Shaw is killed in the firefight, passing the conn to "Commander Seven of Nine" with his last breath.

Geordi takes the maintenance shuttle back to the Athan Prime Fleet Museum, where he's been working on a project in the garage: the Galaxy-class U.S.S. Enterprise, NCC-1701-D. Because of the Prime Directive, the saucer section was retrieved from Veridian III after it crashed there (as seen in Star Trek: Generations); the engineering hull, meanwhile, was once part of the U.S.S. Syracuse. She's nearly forty years old and heavily refurbished, but since her systems aren't networked with the rest of the fleet, she's also the only functioning ship that can't be hijacked by the Borg. And so, for the first time since 2371 (or in real life, 1994), the Enterprise-D command staff return to the bridge, just as we remembered it, even including the old computer voice (Majel Barrett). Having finally succeeded at Putting the Band Back Together, Picard orders his crew out into space to save the Federation one last time.

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Tropes:

• Abandon Ship: With the Borg having taken over the Titan through the Fleet Formation system and their assimilated crewmates gunning for them, the remaining senior staff have no choice but to abandon ship. Only Seven and Raffi remain behind, and Shaw is killed trying to hold off the crew.
• Actually Pretty Funny: Geordi and the others can't help cracking up when Picard wryly admits that what he's missed most about the 1701-D was the carpet.
• Aesop Amnesia: If Starfleet thinks that fleetwide connectivity is a good idea, they clearly didn't learn from Control taking over Section 31 in 2257, the Living Construct debacle involving the U.S.S. Protostar two decades prior, or even what happened with the Stargazer and her accompanying ships with Jurati's Collective in the immediate preceding season of Picard (mere months prior in-universe). Given the Changeling infiltration, any dissent on the matter was likely pushed aside.
• Alien Non-Interference Clause: Cited by Geordi as to why Starfleet had to retrieve the Enterprise-D saucer section from Veridian III. As per the Prime Directive, they couldn't leave it behind to contaminate the nearby pre-warp civilization's development.
• All Your Base Are Belong to Us: The Borg, through the Fleet Command system, hijack every single ship in Starfleet that's in active service.
• And Then John Was a Zombie: The Borg's all-encompassing signal causes the latent transporter-planted Borg DNA to trigger in both younger LaForges, Mura, Esmar and much of the rest of the Titan-A's crew and Starfleet as a whole, assimilating them and turning them against their shipmates. When queried for Alandra's location, the computer informs Geordi that her lifesigns are no longer compatible with human designation. Time will tell if this is reversible.
• The Antichrist: Jack Crusher is revealed to be this for the Borg, thanks to genetic alterations inherited from Picard that were added when he became Locutus of Borg, believing him to be the lynchpin to their perfection and the annihilation of the enemies that bar their path. The Borg Queen even remarks one of the possible names that she thought to call Jack before assimilating him was "Puer Dei"^note "Child of God" before settling on "Vox", as Jack becomes the representation of the singular voice that the Collective all share.
• Arc Welding: TNG's Federation-Borg conflict and DS9's Dominion War storylines are formally merged with the reveal that the rogue Founders have been working with the Borg Queen. There's also an implied welding with the events of VOY'S own Borg arc given the apparent status of the Collective and the Queen (though this won't be definitively confirmed until next episode).
• Arch-Enemy: In one fell swoop, the Borg Collective instantly reverses over twenty years of Villain Decay and reclaims its position as the most lethal, dangerous, and terrifying enemy in United Federation of Planets history.
• Art Evolution:
  • The Enterprise-D itself. While the 1701-D had already been rendered in high-definition CGI for the pilot episode, the design has been tweaked for the final two episodes — and more importantly, to account for its present state after being recovered and refurbished following the events of Star Trek: Generations. While the secondary hull's CGI model is unchanged (Geordi replaced it using the decommissioned stardrive section from the U.S.S. Syracuse), the primary hull (the original saucer section) by contrast is visibly older, more worn, and still bears the signs of her fiery plunge into Veridian III's atmosphere and crash into the surface from thirty years earlier. Geordi also mentions that there are some cosmetic changes that haven't been properly retrofitted yet, giving a further In-Universe explanation for some differences (the lighting of the nacelles in particular is crisper).
  • Behind-the-scenes example with the re-built Enterprise-D bridge. Michael Okuda has discussed how the classic LCARS panels aren't quite faithful reproductions; the crew took advantage of updates in production/digital technology to make subtle changes and upgrades that weren't possible during TNG's original run. Terry Matalas also admits they had to tweak the lighting of the bridge, trying to balance and honor the original late 1980s-era lighting aesthetic with the advances in cinematography in the thirty years since, not to mention making it fit within the pre-established cinematic style of Picard.
• As You Know:
  • Data explaining the mechanics of transporter architecture to Beverly and Geordi. This is largely for the audience's benefit and to help set up the twist; Geordi, an engineer, would already know this, though Beverly wouldn't.
  • Geordi explains to the others that the saucer of the Enterprise-D was recovered from Veridian III to prevent it from influencing the development of any species in that system. The former crew of the Enterprise-D would presumably know this bit of Starfleet protocol, and it seems unlikely that they wouldn’t have been informed of the saucer’s recovery.
• Ascended Meme:
  • A common subject of heated debate among Star Trek nerds since Star Trek: First Contact was released is whether the Galaxy-class or Sovereign-class is the more powerful warship, and which ship would win if they faced off against each other in battle. Characteristically, Worf complains that the Enterprise-E had superior armament.
  • Picard's quip about missing the carpet is an unintentional example, according to production designer David Blass. That scene was shot over a year before "Vox" premiered — and well before the fandom's missing carpet debate regarding the Titan-A started up. It was obviously never intended to be a punchline or commentary on the fandom, and Blass grouses about how they had to keep it buried for a year to avoid spoiling things.
• Assimilation Plot: The Changeling conspiracy's long game is revealed ultimately to be this: to assist the Borg in assimilating Starfleet and the Federation by covertly implanting them with Borg DNA.
• Avengers Assemble: The Enterprise-D/E command crew completes their reassembly with the final "member" of their old team: the 1701-D herself.
• Awful Truth: Jack is, for lack of a better description, second-generation Borg. When Picard was assimilated into Locutus, subtle genetic alterations were made that turned him into an organic receiver, which is why he could hear the Collective despite lacking Borg implants. Jack, on the other hand, is a transmitter, able to control those with the receiver, which is why the Borg want him.
• Back for the Dead:
  • Admiral Shelby returns as the commanding officer of the Enterprise-F. Sadly, the last view of her is her getting shot twice in the chest by her assimilated crew.
  • The Excelsior-II-class Excelsior, last seen in Season Two, is destroyed after it is briefly reclaimed from the Borg. This means that her NCC-2000 forerunner actually outlived her successor, since she's resting safely in the Fleet Museum at Athan Prime.
• Back for the Finale:
  • The Enterprise-D returns thirty years after its last appearance in Generations (discounting flashbacks and alternate versions). Geordi has spent the last twenty years in-universe rebuilding it from the damaged saucer and parts scavenged from other decommissioned Galaxy-class vessels.
  • The Enterprise-D computer — the voice of all the 24th-century-era technology — also "returns" for the first time (and not counting its Kelvin Timeline appearance) since Star Trek: Nemesis in 2002 via archival audio of the late, great Majel Barrett.
• Back from the Dead: The Enterprise-D, which was severely damaged and reduced to only its saucer section as a result of the events of Star Trek: Generations, is back in full thanks to Geordi and serves as the last hope for the Federation surviving the Borg.
• Badass Crew: In the climax, Picard gives his old command crew a chance to back out (from what will almost certainly be a suicide mission). Riker and the others aren't hearing it; as Riker reminds Picard:
  Riker: We're the crew of the USS Enterprise.
• Bait-and-Switch Comment: Being back on the 1701-D's bridge, a visibly emotional Picard says that being here and surrounded by his old command crew — the people he loves and cares about more than anyone else in the galaxy — has now made him truly realize what he's missed most: the carpet. Everybody cracks up.
• Be Careful What You Wish For: Downplayed, but subtle black comedy example. Throughout TNG and its films, Geordi wanted to help Data in his quest to become more human, including mastering humor. When post-merger Data breaks out the cheeky gallows humor on the Titan shuttle? From the stunned look on his face, it's not hard to imagine that Geordi's thinking, "God, I liked him better before he died."
• Black Eyes of Evil: The assimilation process causes the eyes of its victims to briefly turn pitch black.
• Bolivian Army Ending: Starfleet has been totally assimilated and is converging on Spacedock, while the TNG crew is forced to flee on a shuttle to the Enterprise D. Raffi and Seven are also left behind on the now-seized Titan and hopelessly outnumbered by the new drones.
• Break Out the Museum Piece: Geordi breaks out the refurbished Enterprise-D from the Fleet Museum, as they need an older vessel that predates the new Fleet Formation system and thus can't be hijacked by the Borg. Worf can't help but complain about its sub-standard armament in comparison to newer vessels.
• Brick Joke: A very subtle, almost-stealth one for the Enterprise-D. Back in "The Next Generation", Riker was incensed to learn that Ten Forward was having trouble selling models of the 1701-D because nobody wanted "the fat one". Now, nine episodes later, all of Starfleet's been compromised, and what's literally the last ship still standing and the Federation's sole hope? The Fat One herself. They're definitely going to be wanting her now!
  • The punchline gets even funnier with a little Fridge Brilliance. Naval tradition has long referred to ships with female pronouns and this tradition's carried over into Star Trek. So, the Enterprise-D, the Fat One, is thus for all intents the Fat Lady. And how does that saying go? "It ain't over till the Fat Lady sings." Well, ladies and gentlemen: the Fat Lady is back, and she's about to sing.
• Call-Back:
  • Geordi is once again at the helm of the 1701-D, just as he was during Season One of TNG.
  • The crew sets foot on the bridge for the first time from the aft port-side turbolift, the same way that Picard first set foot on the bridge in "Encounter at Farpoint" — and while it's not an exact replication, the slow pan from right-to-left of the restored bridge does evoke the very first shot we and Picard ever saw of the bridge. Finally, the staging and push-in on the final shot of the seated Picard, Riker, and Troi also replicates the same final shot of them from the pilot episode of TNG.
  • Picard remembers being still able to hear the Collective after his assimilation was undone.
  • In Voyager's "Dark Frontier", the Borg Queen tells Seven that their previous assimilation attempts on humanity had failed because they were direct assaults. As such, they will change tactics and will instead employ an insidious method of assimilating humanity. Decades later, just such a plan has now been implemented, albeit with changes, possibly because the Queen anticipated that Seven would warn Janeway and Starfleet of her altered tactics.
    • Similarly, back in the "The Star Gazer", Seven and Jurati discussed how the Collective might have adapted after being left crippled and hobbled during "Endgame". Seven agreed with Jurati that the Borg would change tactics to do whatever was necessary to achieve victory and in the absence of strength, they'd employ deception. This is exactly what the Queen has done — and despite correctly calling it a full season ago, Seven still missed all the clues and signs until it was too late.
  • The Excelsior being moved out of formation to be destroyed by the assimilated fleet is reminiscent of the Romulan fleet culling its errant Bird-of-Prey in the Strange New Worlds episode "A Quality of Mercy".
  • This is not the first time an Enterprise has been "borrowed" from Spacedock (let alone this Spacedock) and operated by a skeleton crew consisting of its command crew. The difference is that at least Geordi actually has legal access and oversight over the 1701-D as the Fleet Museum's curator. Like Kirk, Picard also orders "stations, please" as they prepare to leave Spacedock.
    • The staging and camera direction on the Enterprise-D as it clears Hangar 12 and enters space mirrors the Titan-A's departure from Earth Spacedock back in "The Next Generation". The angle of the "D" just before it jumps to Warp likewise evokes Picard's old portrait from that same episode.
  • As The Art of Star Trek points out, the angle of the Enterprise-F as it leaves Spacedock and the backdrop of the fireworks display mirrors the shot of Voyager's flyby over the Golden Gate Bridge at the beginning of "Endgame".
• Canon Immigrant:
  • Elements of Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens' 1996 novel The Return are formally canonized — specifically that as per the Prime Directive, Starfleet had to salvage the Enterprise-D saucer section from Veridian III to prevent cultural contamination of the system's pre-warp civilization.
  • Elements of Peter David's Star Trek: New Frontier series — specifically Shelby's first name Elizabeth and her continued upward career in Starfleet — are also formally canonized.
  • Elements of David Mack's Star Trek: Destiny Trilogy are formally canonized with the Borg's Evil Plan — specifically the Borg surviving the events of "Endgame", regrouping and completely revamping their tactics, and launching a final apocalyptic campaign against the Federation to deal with it and Starfleet once and for all. However, both continuities take different routes to get there. The literary Borg's revenge came shortly after Nemesis and they abandoned assimilation in favor of annihilation, intending to burn the entire Alpha Quadrant to cinders. By contrast, the canonical Queen here is still intent on assimilating the Alpha Quadrant and instead chose to play the Long Game across twenty years: slowly, quietly compromising the Federation with subterfuge and guile before assimilating all of Starfleet in one fell swoop. Once it succeeds, then "eliminate all unassimilated" is officially a go.
  • Elements of Una McCormack's Star Trek: Picard - The Last Best Hope are formally canonized — specifically Worf inheriting the Captaincy of the Enterprise-E from Picard following his promotion to the Admiralty to lead the Romulan Evacuation. However, this is also technically only implied with subtext in the episode itself; the actual confirmation of canonization itself comes from Terry Matalas.
  • After an Early-Bird Cameo earlier in the season, the Odyssey-class and the Enterprise-F originally from Star Trek Online are formally canonized.
• Chekhov's Gun:
  • Geordi being the curator of the Fleet Museum comes in handy when the crew need a non-networked starship.
  • Picard's ability to sense the Borg collective despite being free of all Borg cybernetics is given an explanation that the Borg intended for Locutus to be a lynchpin of Borg evolution, so his assimilation went beyond nanoprobes and rewrote his DNA in a way that Starfleet medicine could not detect back then. Traits of this was mistaken as Irumodic Syndrome, which killed his physical body, but this was unknowingly passed down to Jack. Jack became the lynchpin to resurrect the Borg in a new fashion.
  • Geordi mentioned several episodes prior that modern Starfleet ships all talk to each other in an Everything Is Online fashion. This is revealed on Frontier Day as part of a new centralized Fleet Formation program that can coordinate combat scenarios far more efficiently than before. This proves to be a BAD idea, as the Borg are easily able to take advantage of this system to wrest control of the entire fleet with ease.
  • Ro Laren's fear that the transporters had been tampered with was absolutely correct, Jack's vision of vines engulfing people who transport is also explained.
• Continuity Nod:
  • Archer and the Enterprise NX-01 are cited in Shelby's Frontier Day speech.
  • If you look closely, you can see the Enterprise-D saucer section still has dirt stains on its underside and topside from the Veridian III crash-landing during Generations.
• Cool Chair: Upon seeing the restored 1701-D bridge, Data is delighted to be reunited with his old Ops chair.
• Critical Staffing Shortage:
  • Downplayed, but this ironically is what saves the TNG characters when Titan falls to the Borg. Between Ro Laren transferring most of the crew onto Intrepid and the losses Vadic inflicted when the Changelings stormed her, Titan is now operating with a skeleton crew. So, while all junior officers still succumb to the Borg genetic malware and seize control of the ship, they also don't have the numbers to instantly overwhelm the vessel and the senior officers compared to their fellow drones aboard the other Starfleet vessels. So, Picard and company are able to fight their way to the shuttlebay and escape without being overwhelmed by superior numbers and firepower (albeit barely and not without losing Shaw and being forced to leave Seven and Raffi behind).
  • The Enterprise-D is designed for a crew of a thousand. She currently has a crew of seven. Geordi mentions that automated drones are helping with loading the torpedoes. It's justified as there's no time to get a crew. Besides, the Galaxy-class ships have been established in-universe as being heavily automated, with the Enterprise herself having been controlled solely by Data on multiple occasions (albeit never in a combat capacity). Equipped with a (still) powerful main computer core located in the saucer section and a secondary core in the stardrive section, she can be operated with as few as three people (or even one person) from the bridge in the event of an emergency.
• Darkest Hour: For the Federation as a whole, as their most nefarious foe that is the Borg manages to pull off a masterstroke on their long con that cripples the entirety of Starfleet via mass assimilation that none of them knew they were being exposed to until it was far, far too late to do anything about it, leaving Picard and his crew without much allies left as their last few are either assimilated, killed, or forced to be left behind. Thankfully, though, there is one last hope to make a comeback with some help from the old girl that started it all ...
• David Versus Goliath: Essentially the setup of the finale, as almost the entire Starfleet is assimilated by the Borg in a single fell swoop, except Picard and his crew, commandeering the Enterprise-D — a ship thirty years out of service — as they prepare to face the entire Collective on their own one last time.
• Death by Irony:
  • During "The Best of Both Worlds", Shelby was one of Starfleet's leading Borg experts and survived the first Borg incursion in 2366-2367. Now, over thirty years later, the Collective ends up killing her and using Borg-esque tactics and technology that Shelby herself unwittingly championed — and Terry Matalas has confirmed they very much had this trope in mind when planning Shelby's death. While she did not die on the Enterprise-D, Shelby does still end up on dying on another Enterprise.
  • Shelby also was ambitious and eagerly climbing the command track even during the original Borg crisis. Had she not attained the rank of admiral, she would almost certainly have not have been commanding the Enterprise-F during Frontier Day when all hell broke loose — though given the assembly of the entire fleet, there's still a substantial chance she'd have died when the assimilation began.
  • Shaw survived the Borg's first incursion at Wolf 359, being the last crewman ordered onto a lifeboat, but winds up dying at the hands of his own crew when they're assimilated by the Borg, while ensuring that others can board a shuttle and escape.
• Despair Event Horizon: What happens to Jack after learning his true nature and confronting the Borg Queen, as he's unable to reconcile the conflict within himself and kill the Borg Queen before she can fulfill her plan, thus giving in to the Borg Queen's wishes and allowing himself to be assimilated.
• Didn't See That Coming: Picard and company are floored by the back-to-back revelations that Jack is part-Borg and that the Changelings have been working with none other than the Borg Collective.
• Dramatic Irony:
  • Back in "The Next Generation", Picard wanted to bequeath his old Ready Room portrait of the Enterprise-D to Geordi. Picard felt that as the Fleet Museum curator, Geordi would love the portrait — and had no idea that Geordi has actually had the 1701-D parked in the Museum's garage for the last twenty years.
  • Shaw has severe Survivor's Guilt because he was one of ten people who were ordered into an escape pod by a lieutenant, who didn't even save herself and thus died along with the U.S.S. Constance crew during the Battle of Wolf 359. Now, he dies heroically, ensuring that Picard and the TNG crew escape the U.S.S. Titan, forming a sort of bookend to his Character Arc.
    Terry Matalas: It's [Shaw's] worst nightmare, but one he faces heroically, and he gets to be the one who sends them on the escape pod. They are the lucky ones this time. You know, the story was always about the brave lieutenant who sent them off. He gets to be the one who does that, and I think he'd probably have it no other way. And in his last moments, he gets to show Seven of Nine the respect that he always knew she was due. That was always his story.
  • Back in the "The Star Gazer", Seven and Jurati discussed how the Collective might've adapted after being left crippled and hobbled during "Endgame". Seven's prediction — that the Borg would change tactics to do whatever was necessary to achieve victory and in the absence of strength, they'd employ deception — was right on the money. Seven called it a full season ago, yet even she gets blindsided by the revelation and missed all the clues and signs until it was too late.
  • Back in "The Bounty", Geordi didn't want to get involved with Picard and his "scheme"; he was hellbent on protecting his family. However, his daugthers would have been endangered and ultimately assimilated regardless because, thanks to the Transporter sabotage, they'd been infected with the Borg's genetic malware. By being forced to go with Team Picard and reunite with his old friends, Geordi ironically has ensured he's in a prime position to help fix the problem and save Alandra and Sidney — something he wouldn't have been able to do had he remained at Athan Prime.
• "Eureka!" Moment:
  • When the Titan receives a transmission through channel 99-Delta, an engineering line separate from the main comm channels, Shaw realizes that the Titan's repair shuttle won't be networked with the rest of the ship and can be used to escape.
  • Shaw's "Eureka!" Moment subsequently triggers one for Geordi, who realizes the Enterprise-D is similarly un-networked and thus the perfect ship to use in taking on the Borg.
• Everything Is Online: "Fleet Formation" links all of Starfleet together — and allows the Borg to assimilate the fleet at once.
• Evil Evolves: Like the rogue Changelings, the Borg have also changed and adapted to their circumstances in the interim since VOY's "Endgame". The Borg are now altering their drones’ biology rather than just surgically grafting implants as before. The Queen has also been playing the Long Game, covertly compromising an entire civilization over time rather than the old Borg "You will be assimilated" routine that was part and parcel of their tactics during TNG, First Contact and VOY.
• Evil Is Not Well-Lit: Played with. The modern Starfleet ships have had the darker lighting all season, and this did not change after they became assimilated. When the crew escapes the Titan-A and boards the Enterprise-D, the latter ship has the brighter soft lighting that was typical of many mid-to-late 24th century Starfleet ships.
• Explain, Explain... Oh, Crap!: Data and Geordi have discovered that the Changelings have converted Picard's Borg-altered DNA into transporter code. Beverly, having previously wondered how Jack could control random ensigns, orders the computer to scan for the code in the Titan. It identifies the code as part of transporter system architecture, a set of instructions that identifies common biology between species ... and now considers Picard's DNA as part of that. To their horror, they realize this is what the Changelings have been doing: all of Starfleet has been compromised by Borg biology, and it's simply waiting to be activated.
• Failed a Spot Check: Retroactive example with the Changeling that was posing as Titan transporter operator Eli Foster back in the first half of the season. Everybody was so focused on the infiltration itself that nobody considered why the Changeling chose to replace that specific officer, or why they were aboard the Titan well before there would be any need to sabotage the ship. Justified, though, as the Titan was fighting for its survival against Vadic, then had to go on the run, so they were focused on solving the immediate mystery of the Daystrom Station heist. Even if they had thought to check his work, without the context provided by the recovered files from the Shrike, they probably wouldn't have understood the purpose of the alterations to the transporter architecture.
• Fate Worse than Death: Changeling Tuvok's gloating promise to Seven back in "Dominion" — that by the time their cabal was done with the Federation, death would "come as a relief" — wasn't hyperbole or an exaggeration. Death is most definitely preferable to you, your entire crew and your friends, and even your own loved ones being simultaneously assimilated en masse.
• Field Promotion: Humorously inverted. Since the 1701-D's computer recognizes him as captain rather than his post-Nemesis Rank Up, Picard dryly and humbly accepts his "field demotion".
• Five-Second Foreshadowing: When Deanna deduces that the vines are meant to represent connections, Jack's response is "Yes, many." From that, viewers can likely guess what Deanna sees behind that door a minute before she tells Beverly and Picard.
  • Similarly, when Deanna opens the Red Door, you can hear some of the familiar Borg ambience and sound effects about before it cuts to Deanna and her POV.
• Final Boss: With the deaths of Vadic and the Shrike crew last episode, the Borg emerge as the true final villain, taking over Starfleet. This also culminates in the Borg being the final antagonist of the Next Generation era of Star Trek as a whole.
• Fish out of Temporal Water: Another subtle example with Data at the Fleet Museum. When Geordi remarks they can't use the Enterprise-E, everybody except Data gives knowing works to a chagrined Worf. Mere hours have passed since the Fusion Dance last episode and with all focus on Frontier Day, Data has had no time to catch up on the major events of the last 20 years. In this instance, Data's out of the loop on what exactly happened to the Enterprise-E and what role Worf played in this incident.
• Flaunting Your Fleets: Starfleet's flotilla orbiting Earth and Spacedock as part of the Frontier Day celebrations. It's the Federation equivalent of Fleet Week and a way to show off their new Fleet Formation system, which allows the ships to operate as a single unit. It also puts Starfleet's military might in one location to be affected by the Borg activation signal, no doubt intentionally arranged by the Changelings for precisely that reason.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: When the Excelsior is destroyed, a display shows a section of the hijacked fleet. Among the four vessels directly firing upon the Excelsior is the Hikaru Sulu, the man who was captain of the original.
• From Bad to Worse: At the beginning of the episode, Team Picard now has Data back and their full team re-assembled for the first time since the Shinzon crisis. But they're also now down to hours before Frontier Day. They still don't know what the Changeling endgame is (and it'll take time to sift through and analyze the files Raffi extracted from the Shrike's systems before it blew up). And then Deanna takes a look inside Jack's head...and realizes they've got bigger problems than a nebulous Changeling endgame or Jack's new abilities: The Borg are back and they're behind both mysteries...
• Gallows Humor: Data merging with Lore's personality and memories has given him a very dark, cynical edge to his humor, so dark in fact it leaves Geordi in Stunned Silence after the fact.
  Data: "There?" What makes you think "there" hasn't already been destroyed?
  Geordi: Data, could you try to be a little more positive?
  Data: (Beat) I hope we die quickly!
• Given Name Reveal: Shelby's first name is revealed to be Elizabeth; in "The Best of Both Worlds" she was only referred to as Lieutenant Commander Shelby.
• Gracefully Demoted: Joked about when the reawakened Enterprise-D computer recognizes itself as being under the command of Captain Jean-Luc Picard. Instead of trying to set the record straight, Admiral Picard accepts the "field demotion".
• Gratuitous Latin: Aside from "Vox", other names that the Borg Queen considered for Jack are "Regenerati" ("Rebirth") and "Puer Dei" ("Child of God"). Jack isn't keen on any of these.
  Borg Queen: I have thought of so many names for you. Regenerati. Puer Dei.
  Jack: A fondness for Latin, I see. But I am neither your rebirth, nor a child of God.
  Borg Queen: That is why you are Võx. Not Locutus, the one who speaks. You are the voice itself.
• He's Back!:
  • Thirty years after crash-landing on Veridian III, the Enterprise-D flies again.
  • Downplayed, but Picard in a sense. Being back on the 1701-D bridge for the first time in decades — let alone with the people he loves and cares about more than anyone else in the galaxy — seems to reignite some of his old TNG-era spark. The strength of his presence and tone as he sits down in the center chair and gives the word is more Captain Picard than Admiral. Even the beloved "Picard Maneuver" returns when he sits and straightens his jacket.
• Hell Is That Noise: The Borg signal that activates the sleeper drones through their altered DNA. Alandra even all but cites the trope by name in-universe before she too is taken over.
• Hijacked by Ganon: The Borg Collective managed to do this to both the renegade Changelings and the Federation, proving to be both the biggest fish and true final adversary of The Next Generation era of the franchise, with the Borg Queen herself at the head.
• History Repeats Itself: Just like his father thirty-five years earlier, Jack's attempts to remain Defiant to the End in the face of the Borg fails and he too is assimilated into the Collective.
  Terry Matalas: [Jack becoming Vox] started with the question: what's the very worst thing for Picard to face here now that he has his son? And the answer was to watch his son go through what he did as Locutus. And the rest fell into place. What if he passed on the very worst part of himself? How terrible that would be?
• Hope Spot:
  • The Titan-A arrives back at Earth and, despite the Fleet Formation override, are able to hail Shelby and warn her of the conspiracy. As soon as Picard mentions the Borg, it does seem like Shelby's listening and taking him seriously, and with good reason given what they all went through during "The Best of Both Worlds" in TNG. Unfortunately, this is the exact moment that the Borg, now in possession of Jack, make their move and everything starts going to hell.
    • When the Borg Activation Signal goes out, the audience is expecting Picard, Riker, Seven, and Shaw to become Drones (since, having used the Transporter, they too have the Borg genetic malware). Instead, they're unaffected (apart from Seven's implants reacting severely to the signal). For a moment, it seems the Borg's plan didn't work ... until we cut back to the Science Lab, where Data and Beverley are realizing that the Borg genetic malware will only affect anyone infected who's under the age of 25. The audience instantly knows what's coming next.
  • The Excelsior's unassimilated crew retakes its bridge, seemingly giving Picard's team a safe place to escape to ... and then the Borg fleet seizes control of the Excelsior remotely and destroys it.
• Indy Ploy: So, Team Picard grabs the Enterprise-D — the one active Starflet ship left not linked into the Fleet Formation protocols and thus can't be hacked — from the Fleet Museum. Okay, makes sense; so far, so good. Then, it's back to Earth to save the Federation from the Borg. Okay ...*how*? What, is the "D" going to fight the entire Assimilated Starfleet with the power of awesome weaponized nostalgia? It's justified, though, as every moment Team Picard wastes, countless people are dying back in Sector 001. It's easier to just grab the "D" from the Museum, smash their foot down on the [figurative] gas pedal, and then come up with some kind of a Hail Mary play on the way back.
• Irony:
  • Picard lampshades the irony that Admiral Shelby, who pioneered anti-Borg technology, would be promoting Fleet Formation, an inherently Borg-like technology (that is actually based on Borg tech).
  • The Excelsior-II, the successor to the original Excelsior, was destroyed by the Hikaru Sulu.
  • Geordi was unwittingly responsible for Enterprise-D's loss during Generations, as it was his compromised VISOR that allowed the Duras sisters to bypass its shields and inflict fatal damage. So, it's ironic and fitting that having been the catalyst for the 1701-D's destruction, it's Geordi who has labored to refurbish and restore her.
• Kansas City Shuffle: The Borg Queen using the renegade Changelings as her saboteurs served this purpose. Vadic kept all attention focused upon her all season long, with Picard, the Enterprise-D/E veterans, and their allies (and by extension the audience) all thinking they were dealing with rogue Founders out to avenge the Dominion's defeat decades earlier. By the time everybody realizes the Changelings were never the real threat and it was the Borg all along, it's too late to stop the Queen.
• Killed Mid-Sentence: Two when the Borg assimilation takes effect.
  • First is Admiral Shelby, seen on the viewscreen gunned down by her own officers.
    Shelby: They're turning on us. What the hell is going on? We are under attack from within. Repeat, we are under attack. Something is happening to my crew. Ensign, what are you — (gets phasered)
  • The second is Captain Benbasset of the Excelsior, heard on comms trying to retake his ship.
    Benbasset: Can anybody read me? This is Captain Benbassat of the Excelsior, broadcasting on frequency 99 Delta. To all who can hear, we have managed to retake control of our bridge... Hold on. Helm, what's happening? They're controlling us remotely. Taking us out of formation. No, no! We're being directed in front of the fleet. Now we've been targeted. Tell my family — (gets destroyed)
• Killed Off for Real: Shelby and Shaw, the latter via Heroic Sacrifice.
• Kryptonite Factor: Downplayed; Seven is immune to the DNA rewriting like the rest of the adult crew, but has enough Borg tech in her to still receive the signal. When the Collective sends out its signal, Seven is visibly pained by its intensity, even if it doesn't actually co-opt her. She shakes it off to fight back with the rest of the heroes.
• The Last Dance: Non-combat variation with the Enterprise-F during Frontier Day. With the current Federation flagship set to be decommissioned following the holiday celebrations, the Enterprise's role as the "Master of Ceremonies" and representation of the Enterprise lineage on the 250th anniversary of the NX-01 is intended to an honorable final sendoff for the latest Starship Enterprise.
• Laser-Guided Karma: While it's not explicitly pointed out, this is basically the rogue Founders' revenge in a symbolic nutshell. The Federation tried to infect and wipe out the Great Link with a morphogenic virus during the Dominion War? Vadic's faction is returning the favor, collaborating with the Borg to infect Starfleet with their own brand of viral plague (in this case, the Borg genetic malware). For added karmic symbolism, the subsequently assimilated Starfleet junior officers are now linked as one thanks to the Borg Hive Mind. In effect, they've punished Starfleet's next generation by turning them into a twisted reflection of the Great Link.
• Last of Its Kind: Geordi cites the Enterprise-D as the last operational ship in the fleet not plugged into the Fleet Network and thus compromised by the Borg.
• Leitmotif:
  • The TNG theme, which quietly sounds off when the 1701-D is first unveiled, starts building with the reveal of the restored bridge, and then finally surges into a triumphant fanfare as the USS Enterprise 1701-D clears Hangar 12 and flies among the stars (and with her command crew) for the first time in thirty years — and to save the Federation again one last time.
  • Dennis McCarthy's Generations theme briefly plays when Picard and company first arrive on the refurbished Enterprise-D, musically symbolizing where we last left the bridge and the ship thirty years ago.
• MacGyvering: Geordi had to reconstruct the Enterprise-D using the stardrive section of the Syracuse and salvaged Galaxy-class ship parts. Although Geordi warns there's some subpar parts, the ship looks sturdy.
• Mental Fusion: Troi uses her empathic abilities to do a Betazoid equivalent of a mind-meld in order to help Jack discover what's behind the Red Door. She does not take what she sees well, and with good reason.
• Messianic Archetype: The episode subtly reveals this with Jean-Luc and Jack. Picard, who was once Locutus or "he who speaks", was almost god-like among the Borg and has still been addressed reverently by ex-drones, like those aboard The Artifact back in the first season. Meanwhile, Jack, his son, is consequently an amalgam of human and Borg biological influences and named Vox by the Borg Queen, which translates to "voice" but also makes him analogous to "the Word made flesh", or in other words, Jesus. Lampshaded in that the Queen had also considered calling him "Puer Dei", or "Child of God". That said, for the rest of the galaxy, he would more fulfill the role of The Antichrist by helping usher in a new era for the Borg, regardless of whether they wanted to or not.
• Mildly Military: At the end of the episode, retired Captain Riker orders Commodore LaForge to make sure the shields are at full power. This is probably because, ranks aside, Admiral Picard has essentially reappointed Riker as his XO. Besides, Geordi is still first and foremost an engineer.
• More Dakka: Worf grumbles that he would have preferred the Enterprise-E, which has better tactical systems and superior weapons, though after Troi gives him grief, he does admit his nostalgia for the 1701-D.
• Motive Misidentification: Turns out Ro Laren had very good reason to distrust Starfleet transporters back in "Imposters" after all. At that point, Ro was worried about conveniently dying in a transporter "accident", not becoming part-Borg (though she wouldn't have been affected). That's not to say getting scrambled was out of the question, of course.
  • Similarly, Ro, Picard, and the others belived the Changelings were targeting Frontier Day because, as Starfleet's 250th anniversary, it was the perfect time and place to make a statement (for good or ill). While there arguably is some truth there, the real reason turns out to be because the 250th Frontier Day is the perfect mechanism for gathering as much of Starfleet in one location as possible and assimilating them all en masse.
• Never My Fault: Played for humor, where Worf insists that whatever happened to the Enterprise-E was not his fault.
• New Era Speech: When Starfleet gets assimilated.
  "A message to those who resist: Your armada has been added to our own. Your weak and willful will soon be eliminated. Your strongest have already been assimilated. We are Borg. Starfleet now is Borg."
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Implied. It's not explicitly stated, but given the physical state of the Borg Queen and her now-venomous hatred of the UFP — to say nothing of the lengths she went to go after the Alpha Quadrant this time around — the subtext here is that this is payback for Janeway and Voyager, for all intents, firebombing the Collective on their way out of the Delta Quadrant two decades earlier. The next episode will explicitly confirm it.
• No Biochemical Barriers: The transporter can copy and paste human-ish genetic material onto every single species without any issues of compatibility or rejection, all with a section of code small enough to fit on a single screen.
• Noodle Incident: The fate of the Enterprise-E since Nemesis. Obviously, something happened to it, or else Starfleet wouldn't have rolled out the Enterprise-F. But it's left unclear if the "E" was destroyed or damaged and forced to be decommissioned. Either way, Worf was in command (as Terry Matalas has confirmed Worf did inherit the Captaincy from Picard following his promotion to the Admiralty). Whatever happened and whatever Worf did or didn't do, the Klingon's still protesting his innocence to Geordi and that it wasn't his fault. It's possible the incident in question may actually be a reference to the Battle of the U.S.S. Protostar, which the 1701-E participated in and took significant damage. Alternately, it could be the incident at Krilar Prime noted in tie-in social media material. Only time will tell, if it's not a Shrug of God.
  Terry Matalas: [Worf did become Captain of the Enterprise after Picard]. But I wanted to leave its exact fate open for someone to tell that story. It's more fun that way. Better left to the audience's imagination. What do you mean it wasn't his fault? Was it an accident? A mission gone wrong?! The possibilities are endless!
• Nothing Is Scarier: We only see the Borg Queen from behind, and don't see any of her biological components, presumably hiding the damage from the alternate Admiral Janeway's neurolytic pathogen.
• Not Quite Dead: Despite alternate Admiral Janeway directly infecting the Borg Queen with a neurolytic pathogen and the entire Unimatrix complex exploding, the Borg Queen seems to have made it out alive, though what little we see of her suggests she's hardly in the best of shape.
• Number Two: As the Enterprise-D prepares to set out, and after Riker gives his old captain heartwarming words of encouragement, Picard affectionately calls him by his "Number One" nickname again.
• Oh, Crap!: Deanna opening the Red Door ... and seeing a Borg cube on the other side.
• Once Done, Never Forgotten: Whatever it was that Worf did to the Enterprise-E, Geordi and his old shipmates are still giving him grief over it.
  Worf: That was not my fault.
• Only Fatal to Adults: Inverted. The Borg infection spread through the transporter only affects those who haven't fully matured, which in humans is at about the age of twenty-five years. This means that while most of the younger crew are assimilated, the generally older command staff and upper echelons of leadership are not. That said, the older and/or senior officers are outnumbered by their younger subordinates by a significant margin, and get taken down by sheer weight of numbers of their assimilated crew.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business:
  • Deanna disengages from the mental link with Jack after seeing what's behind the Red Door. You would expect her to fall back on her counseling experience; instead, Deanna is disoriented and panicking. She all but runs out of Jack's quarters in terror rather than reveal to him what she saw on the other side of the Red Door, and immediately seeks out Picard and Beverly to inform them that it was the Borg.
  • Picard doesn't immediately answer Jack's demands that he reveal what Deanna saw behind the Red Door. He's instead nervous and tries to dissemble and stall, attempting to provide a context to the truth he intends to reveal.
• Organic Technology: The Borg made subtle changes to Picard's DNA that allow him to receive the Collective's signal without needing a physical implant. When passed onto Jack, it made him a living transmitter that can influence anyone with that receiver DNA.
• Override Command: The Fleet Formation system is able to hijack Starfleet vessels and remotely pilot them without the input of their crews. Accordingly, the Titan-A is taken over almost immediately after warping in. Not long afterwards, when the unassimilated crew of the Excelsior (the current successor, not the original which is in the Fleet Museum) manage to regain control of the bridge, the Borg remotely take it out of formation and all the nearby ships blast it into dust.
• Papa Wolf: When Geordi realizes that his daughters are being assimilated, he tries to rush out to them. Data has to physically restrain him, pointing out that Geordi couldn't save them even if he could get to them.
• Poor Communication Kills: The Titan does not try to send any advance warnings to Starfleet or Shelby until they arrive (too late) at Earth. However, it's justified. With Starfleet compromised by the rogue Founders, any advance signal could be intercepted and blocked; as Picard himself states, Titan only gets one chance to warn everyone. More, they know the Borg and Changelings are involved, but they still don't know the exact plan (and indeed they don't figure it out until just as they drop out of warp). Any advance warning lacks credible evidence (and indeed could force the Borg/Changelings to pull the trigger prematurely).
• Properly Paranoid: Back in "The Bounty", Geordi was highly opposed to gathering the fleet in one place for Frontier Day, and he also expressed misgivings about networking said fleet together so they'd be in constant communication. His concerns are now justified, with the entire fleet (sans the outdated Enterprise-D) under Borg control.
• Putting the Band Back Together: The TNG reunion is complete, as Geordi "recruits" the final "member" of their old team: the 1701-D herself.
• Rank Up: Shelby has gone from a commander, when we last saw her thirty years ago after "The Best of Both Worlds", as well as a captain as depicted in Lower Decks, to a fleet admiral in the "present day" of the series.
• "Ray of Hope" Ending: The Federation may be facing its Darkest Hour, with all of Starfleet hijacked and assimilated by the Borg and about to attack Earth...but Picard and his officers are back aboard the Enterprise-D and are charging to the rescue.
• Red Herring: Almost literally, as the red aesthetic and vines around Jack Crusher all season when his powers flared up implied a connection similar to the Pah-Wraiths or other extremely abstract entities throughout the Star Trek franchise, instead of the highly technological (and sickly green) aesthetic common to the Borg. It's revealed offhand that the imagery is taken from fond childhood memories of a place called the Crimson Arboretum, due to the interconnected root system being similar to the Collective Hive Mind.
• Red Shirt: On a ship scale; Captain Benbassat and his officers on the U.S.S. Excelsior (NCC-42037)^note the original Excelsior NCC-2000 is still in the Fleet Museum, as seen earlier in the season manage to retake their bridge and send out a signal, but the compromised fleet interconnection system just takes them out of formation and makes them an easy target for the rest of the assembled ships.
• Redshirt Army: Numerous junior crew members get simultaneously and remotely assimilated by the Borg, and violently turn on anyone who isn't assimilated, killing countless older and/or senior officers.
• The Reveal:
  • The entity behind the Red Door is the original Borg Queen, trying to tempt Jack into joining the Collective.
  • Jack's powers are a result of Borg Organic Technology passed down through Picard, who was modified by the Collective when he was assimilated into Locutus. Picard's mutation makes him a living receiver, able to hear the Collective even absent any Borg technology in his body. Jack's mutation makes him a living transmitter, able to connect to and control those with that receiver protein, hence his powers. The Changelings stole Picard's corpse so that they could integrate his genetic mutation into the base transporter code, rewriting the DNA of anyone who uses transporters. When Jack delivers himself to the Borg Queen in the midst of a Despair Event Horizon over the news, she uses him to assimilate all of Starfleet.
  • The restored Enterprise-D is the secret project that Geordi has been working on in Hangar 12 of the Fleet Museum.
• Revenge: The Borg Queen joined forces with the renegade Founders out of a mutual desire for revenge against the Federation and all the trouble it and Starfleet have caused the Collective and Dominion respectively.
  Borg Queen: What I see in you [Jack], what Vadic saw, an end. The vindication of both our species. To take everything back from those who live like shattered glass.
• Revenge Before Reason: While it's not explicitly acknowledged, this is basically the rogue Changelings working with the Borg in a nutshell. Helping the Borg bring down the Federation in revenge for the Dominion War and Project Proteus ironically is not good for the rest of the Dominion or the Great Link. Assimilating the Federation — the only major power which, despite heavy losses, has at least held the Borg at bay — only aids the Collective's expansion and augments their power, technology, and supply of drones. This is, of course, very important and bad, because sooner or later, the Collective is coming for the Gamma Quadrant. By helping the Borg, Vadic and her faction have been endangering the Great Link this entire time — but of course, they hate Starfleet and the Federation so much that they're willing to pay any price if it means burning their foes to the ground.
• Rule of Symbolism:
  • Deanna deduces that the vines represent connections — and that this is what Jack and whatever is behind the Red Door are seeking. She's more right than she knows...
  • In-universe example with the Enterprise-F leading the Frontier Day ceremonies as the current Federation flagship and symbolizing the Enterprise lineage and legacy that the NX-01 set in motion 250 years earlier.
  • When the Enterprise-D leaves Hangar 12, you can see the NX-01 moored at its museum exhibit just above it. Today, Frontier Day, is the celebration of everything it, Jonathan Archer, and his crew achieved on their voyages in the decade leading up to the UFP's founding — a celebration and legacy has now been despoiled and horrifically perverted by the Borg. So, it's as if the NX-01, ancient and unable to fight or sail any longer, is there seeing off its distant descendant, cheering it on, and reminding it (and the audience) what's at stake. The NX-01 was Starfleet's inaugural Enterprise — the first generation — and the "D" will be the last generation and the end of the line if Picard and company can't stop the Borg.
• Scars Are Forever: The refurbished Enterprise-D saucer section. While Geordi has done superb work in restoring it over twenty years, the saucer still sports some wear and tear from the crash-landing on Veridian III, from scuffed hull plating to dirt stains on its underside and topside.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Deanna gets a look at whatever's on the other side of the Red Door, and upon disengaging from the link, she immediately all but runs out of Jack's cabin in barely-controlled panic.
• Series Continuity Error: The Enterprise-D bridge had been upgraded with additional status screens and consoles on both the port and starboard walls sometime between the time of "All Good Things..." and Star Trek: Generations, but they're absent in Geordi's refit of the bridge. This can be easily explained as Geordi removing them when he did the repairs, given how badly trashed the place was.
• Shown Their Work: Picard production designer David Blass and his team have lovingly recreated Herman Zimmerman and Andrew Probert's iconic Enterprise-D bridge design a full thirty years after the original set was (intentionally) destroyed during the filming of Generations.
• Shout-Out:
  • Possibly unintentional, but Picard and crew need to find a older ship, one that does not have newer standard-issue software and thus is not linked to other ships that have been compromised by alien technology, similar to how the battlestar Galactica and its resolutely non-networked technology survived the Cylon attack on the Twelve Colonies to fight back in the reimagined BSG series. It's likely intentional, given TNG-era writer Ronald D. Moore's role in the reimagining and 2023 being the reboot's 20th anniversery.
  • Jack Crusher travels to the nightmarish heart of darkness, encountering a Dark Lord on Life Support — one also launching their final Take Over the World plan. Said Evil Overlord covets his abilities and is, for all intents, Jack's Grandparent — a revelation that has shaken the next generation to his core. Now, where have we seen this before in modern Sci-Fi franchises?
• Significant Name Shift: Shaw finally calls Seven by her preferred name as he places her in command as his last act.
• Signature Style: Subverted with the Borg — which is part of why nobody sees them coming this time around. While assimilation, let alone assimilation of the Federation, is still very much on the agenda, the Borg have abandoned their traditional overt and brutal "resistance is futile" tactics and adapted. They're now actually content to play the Long Game and engage in subterfuge and guile to compromise their opponent. And because Picard, Seven, and the whole of Starfleet are so used to dealing with the old Borg, they get completely blitzed when the "new and improved" Collective finally makes its move.
• Sitcom Arch-Nemesis: Downplayed since Riker and Shelby don't actually interact before her death. But going off of Riker's snark during Shelby's Frontier Day speech, some of that old friction and rivalry between them from "The Best of Both Worlds" is still there even 35 years later.
• Sour Supporter: While Worf appreciates the nostalgia of the Enterprise-D, he complains that it's tactically inferior to the Enterprise-E.
• Suddenly Shouting: Jack understandably starts shouting at Deanna when she flees his quarters without divulging what she saw in their mental link when she opened the Red Door.
• Suicide Mission: When they board the "D", Picard admits he' reluctant to have his old command crew face the Borg again. Picard doesn't outright say it, but the subtext is clear: this is almost certainly going to be a suicide run and he's giving them a chance to get out while they still can. Riker and the others don't care.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome:
  • Geordi needing twenty years to refurbish the Enterprise-D. Starfleet obviously would recognize the historical value of preserving the Enterprise-D in the Museum and would sign off on the project. But the saucer section did get dropped out of orbit at Veridian III, and hauling it back up the gravity well (let alone towing it all the way back to Federation space) would've caused God-knows-how-much additional stress to the already-compromised hull. Geordi almost certainly had to pull a Theseus' Ship Paradox and physically rebuild the entire superstructure from the ground up. While having some technical facilities, the Fleet Museum also isn't a full shipyard — and what resources they do have would've had competing priorities due to the other preserved ships requiring upkeep. Likewise, as curator with his own many responsibilities (to say nothing of being a family man), Geordi could only devote so much time to, for all intents, hanging out in the downstairs garage and restoring his classic car on the weekends. The Galaxy-class was also designed for an operational lifetime of a century (indeed, some Galaxy-class ships are seen in the assimilated armada), so acquiring decommissioned components, let alone an intact stardrive section, would've taken additional time. The one thing Geordi would have going for him in scavenging parts is the Dominion War.
    • There are also additional national security concerns to have justified salvaging the "D". Even though it had been in service for the better part of the decade as of Generations, the Galaxy-class was still the pride of the service and a testbed for Starfleet's then-most cutting-edge technologies. The loss of the Federation flagship (let alone the unexpected ressurection and final death of James T. Kirk) would obviously dominate galactic headlines and put Veridian III on the map — which means any scavengers or hostile intelligence agencies (i.e. the Tal Shiar or the Obsidian Order) would realize they had an unprecedented opportunity to acquire advanced Starfleet tech and any valuable data contained within its databanks. Given these parties wouldn't care about the Prime Directive, their presence in the system could contaminate or even endanger the pre-warp civilization on Veridian IV. Removing the Enterprise was thus important and justified for Federation national security and Prime Directive reasons.
    • Picking the D as their ship was also the best possible choice at the Museum. Like on "The Bounty", none of the other ships were operational, and even if they were, most of them barring maybe Defiant and Voyager were far smaller, less advanced ships that stood no chance against The Borg, let alone the entire Federation fleet. Not only that, but this is the only ship they're familiar with how to operate; the NX-01, the Enterprise-A, the Excelsior and the New Jersey are a century older, Worf is the only one familiar with how to run the Defiant and far too pressed for time to teach his crew how she runs, and the only Voyager crew member they know is stuck on the Titan-A trying to buy them time. And they can't use the Enterprise-E, which does have the better weapons and maneuvering capabilities, because of Worf. The D is their best and only choice.
  • The evolution of the Borg's stratagem. As shown numerous times throughout the franchise, the Borg, while a frighteningly powerful adversary and capable of being considered the true Archenemy of the Federation, have been also repeatedly beaten back despite their overwhelming power in a fight, with Starfleet eventually becoming enough of a threat over them to severely cripple their Collective in the years since due to their closemindedness as a faction prior to this point. Their persistence and need to achieve perfection however would eventually see overcoming the Federation as a challenge enough to finally adapt their own philosophy to counter their opponent, which they achieve with frightening efficiency by playing the long game and gradually undermining Starfleet through subterfuge and guile instead of a brutal, direct assault as they had before. In short, by assuming that the Borg are above change and were thus wholly predictable, the Federation signs its own doom.
  • The Borg have shown time and time again that they are so strong and adaptive a menace, and there are so many drones (in the trillions, as once stated by a Voyager crewmember), that they metaphorically get up every time they are knocked down. Even Alternate-Janeway's neurolytic pathogen wasn't enough to take down the entire Borg Collective.
• Swiss-Cheese Security: Jack just gets to practically waltz down to the Titan-A's shuttlebay, take a vessel, and escape the ship without much of any effort to stop him. While he can Mind Control crew members into escorting him and the ship is in the midst of a Critical Staffing Shortage, there's all manner of automated security systems that should have locked him out and prevented him from opening the shuttlebay doors, and anyone on the bridge could have at least tried to throw a Tractor Beam on his shuttle before he went to warp.
• Tainted Veins: The assimilated officers all have darkened veins on their faces from the Borg DNA (and possibly nanoprobes, however they were manufactured) taking them over.
• Theme Music Power-Up: The Epic Launch Sequence of the resurrected Enterprise-D is accompanied by the most bombastic and triumphant rendition of the TNG theme ever heard.
• There Is No Kill Like Overkill:
  • How Admiral Shelby bites it amidst the confusion of the Borg takeover, being peppered with multiple phaser shots before the transmission between the Enterprise-F and the Titan-A cuts off.
  • The Excelsior, whose bridge was retaken by her command crew, gets blasted to bits by the assembled fleet.
• Theseus' Ship Paradox:
  • Played with. The Enterprise-D has had its stardrive section replaced with that of the Syracuse, meaning a substantial portion of the ship has come from another ship. In the Galaxy-class ships, the saucer and stardrive sections could be separated — in fact, that's the last thing that happened to the E-D before the saucer crashlanded in Generations. Most, or all, of the new stardrive section came from the Syracuse.
  • Meta example with the rebuilt Enterprise-D bridge set. According to production designer David Blass, the entire bridge was rebuilt from scratch. But the dedication plaque? That was the original prop from TNG, so that is the only piece of the original bridge remaining in the current set.
• This Cannot Be!: Picard and Beverley's mutual reaction to Deanna telling them what she saw when she opened the Red Door: Jack is part-Borg. This is a completely justified reaction, as Picard and Beverley both point out that what Deanna's saying makes absolutely no sense. Jack's never encountered the Collective, he has no implants or nano probes in his bloodstream. Beverley eventually accepts it as she and Deanna discuss it, but Picard initially remains fiercely resistant.
• This Is Gonna Suck: Picard's reaction upon entering Jack's quarters and having to face Jack demanding answers about what Deanna saw.
• Title Drop: The Borg Queen calls Jack Crusher "Vox", which means "voice". While Jean-Luc Picard may have been the spokesperson of the Borg as Locutus, Jack is now the voice of the Collective.
• Trojan Horse: The method in which the Borg manage to defeat the Federation and mass-assimilate it is essentially an elaborate form of this by utilizing various means the Federation has taken for granted over the centuries against them with a few lines of code, some genetics appropriated from the Borg (unknowingly courtesy of Picard), and a network infrastructure that was gradually built from theirs. It is so insanely devious that by the time the crew of the Titan-A realize what is happening, they can only helplessly watch the pieces fall into place as the Borg effortlessly win (for now) without having to do much of anything themselves.
• Uncertain Doom:
  • Elnor. While Terry Matalas has confirmed that the Romulan cadet wasn't aboard the U.S.S. Excelsior, where he'd been posted at the end of the second season, that doesn't do much to improves his chances of survival wherever he is (either via battle or assimilation).
  • On a wider scale, there's also the survival (or not) of any of the other TNG, DS9 and/or Voyager characters at the hands of any assimilated officers with whom they might be serving. That said, if the original DS9 is still in service as depicted in Lower Decks, it almost certainly has different computer and hardware architecture from Starfleet and would be safe from anything like the Fleet Formation system or the transporter modifications, which explicitly targeted Federation technology. Other civilizations like the Klingon Empire, the Romulan Free State, the Cardassians, the Ferengi and others are probably immune — for now.
  • There's also the question of whether Jurati's Collective has been affected.
• The Unreveal: Geordi explains that while he refurbished the saucer of the Enterprise-D, the stardrive section came from the Syracuse. Okay, so then what happened to the saucer of the Syracuse?
• Villain Decay: Averted with a vengeance as compared to the Borg's increasing blunders between Star Trek: Voyager and the earlier seasons of this series, the Borg have put their most deadly, devious plan to assimilate the Federation into motion and, unfortunately for Picard and his crew, they are unable to stop them from succeeding (for the moment) and can now only hope to undo their victory.
• Villain Team-Up: The renegade Changelings are confirmed to be working with the Borg Collective, with both parties sharing a mutual goal of bringing down the Federation. However, as it's been implied earlier in the season, this isn't an alliance of equals and the Borg are the dominant partner.
• Voice of the Legion: "WE ARE THE BORG."
• We Have Reserves: As to be expected of the Borg, the assimilated crews attack heedless of their own safety, as they outnumber the unassimilated by a wide margin. Notably, when Picard, Riker, Seven, and Shaw are being fired upon in the turbolift, one officer is shot through the shoulder by his fellow Borg, only to stumble to his feet and continue attacking.
• Wham Episode: The Borg are revealed to be the true power behind Vadic's Changeling conspiracy and Jack's abilities. In one fell swoop, the Collective manages to assimilate the entirety of Starfleet simultaneously — and the Federation's last hope is now Picard, his command crew, and a resurrected and refurbished Enterprise-D.
• Wham Line:
  Shaw: The fleet ...
  Picard: It's ... been assimilated.
• Wham Shot:
  • Deanna opens the Red Door, and what lies behind it is a Borg cube.
  • A double whammy in the space of a few seconds: first, when Shaw orders Lieutenant Mura to initiate Red Alert, Mura does not move or respond. Second, as Shaw's confusion deepens at Mura's motionless refusal to obey orders, and dread mounts, the camera slowly pans to reveal Mura's assimilation in progress — and without any implants, unlike past drones.
  • Geordi opens up Hangar 12 at the Fleet Museum to reveal a long-term project he had been working on: restoring the U.S.S. Enterprise-D. The camera even focuses especially on the "01-D" registry on the upper hull as the hangar's lights come on to instantly reveal just what's parked within.
    • This is also only the first part of the shot; it had been established in Season Two that the Fleet Museum had the salvaged Enterprise saucer section, so that's what the audience is expecting to see. But then the camera keeps pulling back and panning down ... revealing that it's not just the primary hull. Geordi acquired a decommissioned Galaxy-class stardrive section (stated to be from the U.S.S. Syracuse), revealing that the Enterprise-D has been made whole for the first time since Generations.
• When Things Spin, Science Happens: The Borg assimilation beacon looks something akin to a Human Gyroscope Ride from a science museum, with multiple rings spinning and rotating at its center.
• Where It All Began: To fight the Borg one last time, Picard and his command crew finally return to where their story — and the entire 24th century era of the franchise — began over thirty years earlier: the bridge of the U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701-D. Terry Matalas has confirmed this was exactly the intent of reuniting the Enterprise-D and her cmomand crew.
• Whole-Plot Reference: To Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country. Like Kirk, Spock, and the Enterprise-A at Khitomer, Picard and the Titan-A crew are racing to stop a conspiracy aimed at crippling the Federation — and the countdown to zero hour has finally ended. They're also still officially considered renegades and don't have all the details they need to win the day, such as how Jack factors into the endgame. Like Kirk, Picard is now facing his greatest enemy (the Borg, rather than the Klingons) one more time.
• You Are in Command Now: With his dying breath, Shaw tells Seven that she's now in command of the Titan-A. Ironically, she and the other senior officers are trying to Abandon Ship at that moment. She and Raffi choose to stay behind and continue fighting.
• You Are Too Late: Beverly, Data, and Geordi figure out what the Changelings were doing and how Jack ties into it, giving them the information they need to, at the very least, keep the Titan-A safe from the Borg. Sadly, in their haste to warn Starfleet, the Titan-A is already vulnerable, and the signal goes out before they can warn anyone.
• You Have to Believe Me!: Picard's desperate pleas to Shelby as the Titan-A arrives at Spacedock and they try to warn her about the Changeling/Borg plan. To her credit, as soon as Picard mentions the Borg, it does seem like Shelby is listening and taking him seriously — and with good reason, given what they all went through together over thirty years earlier during the first Borg incursion in 2366-2367. Unfortunately, this is the exact moment the Borg make their move and things go from bad to far worse.
• You Shall Not Pass!: Shaw fights his assimilated crew to give Picard and his officers time to escape, and is mortally wounded in the battle.
• You Wouldn't Shoot Me: The Borg Queen boasts that if Jack could shoot her, he would have. He lowers his phaser and allows himself to be assimilated.
• Zombie Apocalypse: The Borg's long game is to essentially initiate one by simultaneously assimilating all of Starfleet and turning all infected personnel into instant drones. It works.

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