Comedy
Dead Boy Detectives
Dead Boy Detectives targets teens in style and story. But it comes with very adult, problematic content.
It’s been a while since Admiral Jean-Luc Picard has gone where no one’s gone before—at least with any sort of regularity. For the last several years, in fact, he’s mostly been where his ancestors had gone repeatedly: the family’s French vineyard.
“I’m not a man who needs a legacy,” Picard muses—though the accolades and mementos that dot his home would prove its existence regardless.
Even though Picard’s pushing a century old now, the stars keep calling. And sometimes they can be pretty insistent.
In the first season, Picard was encouraged to leave his beloved vineyards by a mysterious young woman named Dahj. She showed up on his picturesque front porch, knowing little more than the fact that she was in danger and that Picard—the legendary Starfleet commander, the multi-time savior of the galaxy, the longtime aficionado of Earl Gray tea—was the only one who could protect her. Eventually, he did just that. And he ensured basic human rights for synthetic humanoids along the way. Indeed, the old captain gave his life for them. (Thankfully, before he completely shuffled off his mortal coil, Picard’s own consciousness was transferred to a synthetic body that looked just like him. Lucky, right?)
In the second season, Picard was again drafted into duty, this time by Starfleet itself. Again, he’s told that someone’s asking for his help. Again, he leaves his grapes for the great expanses of outer space. That time, Picard encountered a couple of old foes: the cybernetic civilization known as the Borg and the all-powerful trickster, Q. And it resulted in a trip to an alternate reality, the discovery of a galactic danger and even those pesky Borg receiving a provisional membership in the United Federation of Planets.
Well, as you might expect, the third season isn’t a slice of life about Picard relaxing in his vineyards. No, he’s been called back a third time, in a rather unexpected way. He receives a coded message on an out of commission communicator badge—one addressed from an estranged friend and (at one point) love interest, Beverly Crusher. The message only contains an encrypted set of coordinates and a warning: Trust no one—not even Starfleet.
That’s a tall order, since Starfleet isn’t in the business of just handing out ships and crews for personal affairs. And even decorated admirals aren’t immune from that stipulation. So if Picard wants to investigate, he’ll need to do what Jean-Luc Picard has done many times before: disobey a few Starfleet regulations.
It won’t be easy, naturally. For one thing, Picard is … well, really old. Even in his Enterprise days, he kept his dash-about-and-shoot-things duties down to a bare minimum. And now his dashing days are clearly behind him, as his bodily aches keep reminding him.
But dashing is still required, so that falls to an eclectic band of youngsters, along with some old familiar faces.: Christobal Rios, a one-time Starfleet pilot-turned-thief-turned-captain of the C.S.S. Stargazer; Agnes Jurati, a doctor with who’s studied synthetic life; Seven of Nine, the former Borg drone turned galactic do-gooder; and, particularly in Season 3, a few old friends from The Next Generation and Star Trek: Voyager will help where they can, too.
But Picard seems up to the challenge. Retirement was never his thing, anyway.
Forget the Federation of Planets: The Star Trek franchise practically envelops a galaxy of its own, encompassing 13 movies and, now, nine television series—all of which interlock narratively.
As one might expect, Star Trek: Picard isn’t necessarily built to welcome in Star Trek novices. It presumes that most of its viewers have more than just a passing knowledge of this shared universe. There are so many Easter eggs to see here that it’s hard to move without stepping on a shell.
That’s likely music to many a Trekker’s pointy ears. But the show still comes with a caution or two.
First, we must make note of Picard’s worldview. Star Trek was created by Gene Roddenberry, a man who believed that the future would be largely faith-free (believing, as he did, that religion was the cause of so many societal ills). And one of the central premises of the show—sentient synthetic life—can be a ticklish one to navigate for those who believe that the creation of life is the province of God alone.
The show can be quite violent at times, too—at least compared to other Star Trek shows. That’s thanks to the hard-thumping deadly battles, a decapitation and a gruesome scene where someone’s eyeball is plucked from its socket onscreen. If characters aren’t utterly disintegrated, expect to see a pool of blood or two.
And unfortunately, as the series has progressed, the problems have as well. The language in the first few episodes was bad, but not terrible. But lately, the scripts have burgeoned with blue language (including f-words and s-words)–a sad departure from Roddenberry’s original vision of a brighter, kinder and honestly more decorous future. Romance is flickering this season, too. And while we don’t know exactly how graphic that’ll get, we do know that galactic residents—including those in the show’s crew—pine for both same- and opposite-sex partners.
Picard, in short, has departed from its roots–the hope and optimism that drew viewers to the Star Trek franchise in the first place. And that’s far more troubling than tribbling.
To help Beverly, Picard looks to an old friend for assistance. Meanwhile, Raffi uncovers a disturbing plot.
People fire lasers at one another, and someone is shot in the shoulder and hip—wounds from which blood begins seeping. A woman shoots and kills her attackers, her blasts disintegrating them into nothingness. A building is destroyed when a portal opens up below it.
We see people drink alcohol and reference drinking. Raffi admits to being under the influence of narcotics—something for which she was dishonorably discharged. People smoke, and others do some sort of alien drug.
Raffi mentions breaking up with her girlfriend. A song’s lyrics include the line, “Forbidden fruit, I had to try it.”
The s-word is used six times. We also hear a couple instances of “b–ch,” “d–n” and “p-ss.” “H—” is used seven times. God’s name is abused twice, including when one of the times is followed by “d–n.”
A strange space-time anomaly is discovered, and the Stargazer—a ship under the command of cigar-chewing Christobal Rios—goes to investigate. There, the Stargazer picks up a strange missive from inside the anomaly: “Help us, Picard!” So Starfleet fetches Picard from his French vineyards and sends him to investigate. What he finds is unsettling for all—especially Picard himself.
Before Picard takes off, he and his (recently widowed) Romulan vineyard assistant, Laris, come close to sparking a deeper relationship before Picard emotionally pushes away. Later, while talking with an old friend, the two speculate why Picard has always rejected love.
He’s not the only one pondering romance: Commander Raffi Musiker expresses her own yearnings for another female, Seven of Nine. (“I guess she has me hoping for something more,” Musiker confides to Picard.) At a social event, a party goer flirts with Agnes, but Agnes suggest he look elsewhere. “I was recently cleared of murdering my previous boyfriend due to alien induced temporary insanity, so I’m not exactly dating material, you know?” We see some slightly revealing outfits as well.
Starfleet personnel engage in a battle with an alien visitor (the melee, and a replay of said melee with additional context, bookends the episode). We see people get blasted by energy bolts and fall down. A tentacle seems to thwack into someone. Starfleet folks fire their phasers repeatedly at their attacker(s). One officer bleeds from the head. People get thrown about the imperiled ship. Picard launches a self-destruct sequence that culminates in a blinding light. On another ship, Seven of Nine battles a couple of galactic thieves—beating them into submission. In flashback, we see Picard as a young boy fight with family members and throw rocks through conservatory windows.
Picard drinks wine with Laris after the conclusion of a successful harvest. He later visits a bar where the proprietor tells him he needs a strong drink. “So, top shelf or hooch?” she asks. When Picard suggests hooch would be welcome, the bartender says, “Saurian brandy it is!” (The two drink shots of the stuff, and Picard grimaces as the liquor goes down.) Agnes appears to over-imbibe at a social event, and she beams up to the Stargazer still apparently a bit impaired. Rios holds a cigar in his hand for most of the episode.
Characters offer a volley of mild profanities, including “a–,” “d–n” and “h—.” God’s name is misused twice, once with the word “d–n.”
A lot has transpired from the first episode to the last in this inaugural season. Picard and crew have discovered that there’s an unnamed planet housing a whole community of peaceful synthetic beings, all derived from Data’s manmade neurons. But Picard isn’t the only one in the know. Second synth sister Soji accidently revealed the planet’s whereabouts to a former lover who turned out to be a Romulan spy. So now an Armada of hundreds of Romulan warbirds are bearing down on the planet to destroy it and save all organic life from a predicted synthetic doomsday. But this vision of destruction is more complicated than it first appears, and it’s up to Picard and Starfleet to make peace … if possible.
This season finale includes some hand-to-hand brawls and some space-blasting in the mix. But the real galaxy crush (between heavily armed ships and nasty-looking gigantic doomsday synths peeking through a space portal) is all diffused before everybody dies. There are bittersweet goodbyes in the tale, however. And a very key character does die … until he doesn’t. (Hey, the advanced tech in the future is amazing.) Some nice thoughts about peace, friendship, love and the meaning that the finality of life gives to human existence are shared.
On the less family-friendly side, we hear some strikingly foul crudities and blasphemes, and we see inebriated drinking and betrayal; some stabbing and ; stabbed and yanked-out eyeballs; a few winks at both same-gender and opposite-gender canoodling; a scientific nod toward the seemingly empty trappings of religion; and several screaming, but bloodless, deaths.
In a media interview, retired Adm. Jean-Luc Picard recounts why he moved on from Starfleet: The organization would not support the evacuation of Romulan citizens to safe havens after Romulus was destroyed (in the wake of an apparent revolt by synthetic life forms). But that’s just a setup for the real crux of the story—the arrival of a mysterious young woman with abilities far beyond the scope of organic life. Picard suspects she may be something of a holy grail in the world of android and AI development: a synthetic life form made of flesh and blood that is indistinguishable from natural life—even by the synthetic person herself.
The mysterious woman, Dahj, is attacked by unknown assailants. They chuck a knife into her boyfriend’s chest (killing him) and slam her face into a table (leaving a bloody wound) before some sort of self-defense mechanism clicks in. She eventually kills all three of the would-be assassins. Dahj later says how appalled she was by “all the blood,” even though the violent scene itself is largely bloodless. Later, far more assailants attack. She beats several of them into submission, snapping at least one arm (we hear it break), throwing a few off stairways (they vanish before they hit the ground) and shooting some with their own weapons. One of her attackers spits green goo at her, causing nasty-looking burns on her skin.
A weapon blows up, presumably vaporizing several folks and throwing Picard backward. We hear about a tragedy that took the lives of more than 90,000 people; it’s suggested that a failed rescue operation might’ve cost the lives of hundreds of thousands more. A disassembled android is viewed in a scientific facility. In a dream sequence, a planet explodes and takes out a spaceship (along with a couple of people sitting inside).
Dahj and her boyfriend talk intimately in her apartment as they both drink wine. Picard loiters about his family’s winery, and he and others literally drink the fruits of his labor.
Kennedy Unthank studied journalism at the University of Missouri. He knew he wanted to write for a living when he won a contest for “best fantasy story” while in the 4th grade. What he didn’t know at the time, however, was that he was the only person to submit a story. Regardless, the seed was planted. Kennedy collects and plays board games in his free time, and he loves to talk about biblical apologetics. He thinks the ending of Lost “wasn’t that bad.”
After spending more than two decades touring, directing, writing and producing for Christian theater and radio (most recently for Adventures in Odyssey, which he still contributes to), Bob joined the Plugged In staff to help us focus more heavily on video games. He is also one of our primary movie reviewers.
Paul Asay has been part of the Plugged In staff since 2007, watching and reviewing roughly 15 quintillion movies and television shows. He’s written for a number of other publications, too, including Time, The Washington Post and Christianity Today. The author of several books, Paul loves to find spirituality in unexpected places, including popular entertainment, and he loves all things superhero. His vices include James Bond films, Mountain Dew and terrible B-grade movies. He’s married, has two children and a neurotic dog, runs marathons on occasion and hopes to someday own his own tuxedo. Feel free to follow him on Twitter @AsayPaul.
Dead Boy Detectives targets teens in style and story. But it comes with very adult, problematic content.
An elf mage contemplates on connection and regret as she watches her human friends grow old and pass away.
