Star Trek: Picard Season 2 Episode 9
In the easter egg department, Star Trek: Picard would be hard-pressed to top the season 2 opener, “The Star Gazer,” which was absolutely packed with shout outs, call backs, and obscure references to the rest of the Trek canon. But, as season 2 heads towards its finale, the penultimate episode, “Hide and Seek,” still has a few deep cuts. From some subtle costume choices for Jurati and Elnor to a lot of talk about Voyager, and to a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it shot of a very special starship, this episode of Picard covered plenty of Star Trek history. You just had to be watching very closely.
La Sirena Grounded
The episode opens with La Sirena grounded, and with Rios desperate to figure out what to do next. Interestingly, this is the second time Star Trek: Picard has grounded the La Sirena right before the season finale. In Picard season 1, La Sirena was also grounded in episodes 9 and 10, “Et in Arcadia Ego Parts 1 and 2.”
Elnor’s Mobile Emitter
An Emergency Combat Hologram of Elnor is created on the fly by Jurati’s consciousness, but the question is, could he possibly leave the ship? Although we don’t see this combat hologram version of Elnor with the rest of the crew outside at the end of the episode, it seems possible that he could leave the La Sirena. Hologram Elnor is clearly wearing a mobile emitter, holographic technology first introduced in the Star Trek: Voyager episode, “Future’s End.” (Which, ironically, also featured a Starfleet crew traveling back in time to Los Angeles.) In that episode, the Doctor (Robert Picardo) was able to obtain mobile emitter technology from another time traveler, thus allowing him to move freely around the ship, and sometimes, leave it. Strangely, in the regular timeline, the technology of mobile emitters comes from the 29th century and only made its way into the 24th century because of the aforementioned time traveler crossover. So, who developed mobile emitter technology in the alternate Confederation timeline? Or, did Jurati use some Borg magic to create a new mobile emitter? We don’t know! And, technically, until hologram Elnor appears outside of the confines of that La Sirena (which has now been stolen) we won’t actually know if that was a mobile emitter.
NX-01 Enterprise Refit Is Now Canon!
This cut is so deep it actually creates new canon out of previously unused concept art. When young Jean-Luc (Dylan Von Halle) is sitting at the table, and his father Maurice (James Callis) is talking about him, briefly on the table we see a model of a retro starship. This model is of an unused, never before seen on-screen refit of the 22nd century NX-01 Enterprise from the prequel series Star Trek: Enterprise. In 2010 designer Doug Drexler revealed concept art for a proposed upgrade of the NX-01 Enterprise, which could have existed in a hypothetical fifth season of Enterprise. This version of Archer’s Enterprise would have given the ship a secondary hull and generally made it look a lot more like The Original Series version of the Enterprise Later, this version of the NX-01 Enterprise appeared in the “Ships of the Line” calendar, and, in 2017, was released as a physical model by Eaglemoss. In all likelihood, the model we see in this episode is from Eaglemoss. This all strongly suggests this all happened around 2378, right after Voyager returned to the Alpha Quadrant in the Voyager finale “Endgame.” This means that shortly before the events of Nemesis in 2379, Admiral Janeway was fighting with Starfleet. This also suggests that the Janeway of the Prodigy era (2383-2384) might still be pissed at Starfleet for not letting Seven join up.
Borg Fleet Destruction
Speaking of Admiral Janeway and Voyager, Jurati shows the Borg Queen the destruction of several Borg cube ships. This seems to reference the ending of “Endgame” in which a Janeway from an alternate future destroys a Borg transwarp hub and several Borg ships. The new Jurati Borg Queen also mentions that she plans to “set a course to the Delta Quadrant” because, as established by The Next Generation episode “Q, Who” and all of Voyager, that’s where the Borg live.
