Star Trek: Picard should have always been a sequel series to the Next Generation

Star Trek: Picard would have been better off as a sequel to The Next Generation.

It’d be fair to say that of all the shows in the Star Trek library, only two are abject failures. The first is Star Trek: The Animated Series. It only got two seasons, had terrible animation, and only produced one episode that is worth watching back. The other, sadly, is Star Trek: Picard.

Both shows have their fandoms, and both shows have their defenders. But it can’t be disputed that Picard is among the more maligned shows in the current Trek lineup. For good reason, one of the reasons is that the show thrived on early hype of returning characters.

We knew that Jeri Ryan’s Seven of Nine, who was a Voyager character, would be on the show, as would Brent Spiner’s Data, though we weren’t sure how yet. This got everyone hoping and thinking that it’d be an entire show of reunions. It wasn’t, at least not in season one. When season two rolled around, still, no Next Generation main characters but we did get Guinan and Q, which was nice.

But there’s no Jean-Luc Picard without the crew of the Enterprise, and for it to take three seasons to give the fans that, really hindered the show.

Picard should have always included The Next Generation crew

There may be fans out there who only care about the captain of a show. Though, I would argue that it isn’t that many people. So it’s fair to say that the fanbase wanted the Next Generation crew in the series from the jump. Would it have made the writing better? Probably not, but we wouldn’t have had to sit through two uneven seasons of Picard just to get to the part everyone wanted in the first place.

The show has taken its hits and the prestige that it once had heading into season one is long gone. The number of fans who would’ve tuned in had they brought all the Next Generation crew back in season one, has been reduced greatly. The number of people who show up for season three may be a nice number, but there’s no denying it would’ve been far more had they done it sooner.

Trying to do a Star Trek sequel series without everyone that made the original series a hit is just one of the many, many missteps this show has committed.