Vulcan mind melds have traditionally been depicted as an intimate telepathic linking of minds — but they can erase memories, too.
Season 2, Episode 8: ‘Mercy’
Martin Wells, an F.B.I. agent from 2024, is one of the consequential humans in the history of the galaxy, we find out in this episode of “Picard.” It turns out that he is the one who made first contact with an extraterrestrial being, not Zefram Cochrane (James Cromwell), as we are led to believe in “Star Trek: First Contact.”
And the Vulcans Martin met? They tried to erase his mind. My initial reaction to this revelation was: “Wait a minute. Vulcans can use mind melds to do that?”
Actually, it turns out they can! Spock did so with Kirk in the original series episode “Requiem for Methuselah.” Mind melds have traditionally been depicted as an intimate telepathic linking of minds — but they can erase memories, too, like those widgets in “Men In Black.” What if Vulcans were the biggest criminals in the Alpha Quadrant but no one knew about it because they keep erasing everyone’s minds? But we digress.
More specifically, how long were Vulcans chilling on Earth?
Guinan is the one who correctly deduces that there is more to Martin than being an overzealous F.B.I. agent — that there was something personal to the exchange. Picard notes that the F.B.I. might disrupt the launch of the Europa mission, and this will cause the future timeline to break. (These concerns remain amusing: In the previous episode, Guinan nearly blew up her bar to summon Q. Hardly a subtle gesture to hide an alien presence! Rios beamed 2024 humans to the ship where they’re learning all about the future! And he makes out with one of them! The timeline is shattered, admiral!)
Our favorite bartender’s work isn’t done. She finally meets Q, whom, in this timeline, she has never met. And this is where the story becomes even more muddled. Guinan tells Q that when the summoning stopped, she felt “emptiness and fear.” That’s quite perceptive, and in line with Guinan’s character. (Unlike when she first meets Picard and can’t sense anything.) Q is dying and wants to give his life meaning. He seems to fear death.
And Q gives Guinan a couple of key pieces of information.
“The trap is immaterial,” Q says. “It’s the escape that counts,” Q says.
We seem to have gotten away from the story line of the first half of the season, which was that something happens in 2024 that causes a future in which the Federation becomes the bloodthirsty Confederation. It is implied early in the season that Q is the one who caused this in order to teach Picard something about humanity.
But how does this link with the Borg Queen’s plan? She wants to assimilate Earth and then the whole galaxy, beginning in 2024, which is essentially the same plot as “First Contact.” It continues to baffle me that Picard doesn’t bring up his previous experience with the same exact thing. The Queen essentially wants to partner with Jurati to accomplish this, which is what she wanted to do previously with Data.
This feels like relevant information to bring up to the rest of the crew. It happened! It was a huge deal! It would be like Paul McCartney writing a memoir about his life and not mentioning the Beatles.
Either way, lets say Picard stops the Borg Queen from doing her thing, and no one is assimilated — although, as we see at the end of the episode, the assimilations have already begun. How does this connect to a future in which humans become the angry, spiteful versions that Q presents?
What remains unclear to me is why the Queen needs Jurati to accomplish her goals, or Adam Soong for that matter. (The Queen is able to mimic voices, overtake computer systems and assimilate at will. She shouldn’t need Soong’s help with anything. Unless her previous fascination with Data comes into play here.) The goal now is to sabotage Renee Picard’s Europa mission, which seems to align with Q’s mission. And now Soong also wants to sabotage the mission so that the world will turn to him for his genius — or at least that’s what the Queen sells him on.
(Why does the Queen needs Soong’s assistance to take over La Sirena when she has shown herself perfectly capable of possessing the ship without anyone’s help?)
If you’re losing track of what is happening here — who needs what and why — you aren’t alone.
There’s a moment when Soong tells his quasi-daughter, “You exist because I willed it,” which lines up neatly with this season’s emphasis on patriarchal views. But more broadly, it speaks to why Soong might be tempted by what the Borg Queen offers: a path to conquest.
Even so, Jurati — possessed by the Queen — has become a terrifying figure who nearly chokes Raffi to death, right after Raffi and Seven have a dispute over whether Raffi is too manipulative — incidentally, while they are trying to stop the Borg Queen from accomplishing her mission to manipulate everything.
Manipulation is at the core of this season. Jean-Luc wants to manipulate Renee into taking a spaceflight she isn’t ready for. He also manipulates Martin into freeing him and Guinan. (Martin has made finding extraterrestrial beings his life’s work. He finally finds them and almost immediately frees them. It was a bit incongruous.) Q manipulates entire timelines and so forth and so on. Soong manipulates his daughter into believing that she is human.
Guinan ends the episode being more optimistic about humans than ever — that they “do the work and want to evolve,” despite not being given any real reason to. No one is to be trusted in this “Picard” universe. And perhaps that’s the key for how the future goes awry.
Source: Television - nytimes.com
