Entertainment
The Missed Opportunity That Denied Us A Perfect Star Trek Season
By Chris Snellgrove
| Published
Despite a very rocky first two seasons, many Star Trek fans hail season 3 of Picard as what they spent decades waiting for. The season largely ditched the show’s new characters to focus on returning heroes from The Next Generation, and we got constant fan service in the form of delightfully unexpected cameos (Shelby, Ro, Tuvok, oh my!) and some unexpected villains (the shapeshifting Founders). The shapeshifters were just henchmen for the real Big Bad, and that brings us to the season’s one missed opportunity: the final villains should have been the aliens from the TNG episode “Conspiracy” rather than the Borg.
Certainly, I was one of many fans who groaned at the inevitable reveal that the Borg Queen was behind all of the murder and mayhem of the season. The Borg loomed large in the first season of Picard and were major antagonists of season 2 while also popping up in Prodigy and Lower Decks. These guys are basically Star Trek’s biggest storytelling crutch whenever they need a nostalgic villain, and it was disappointing that even Picard’s greatest season couldn’t escape their influence. It turns out resistance is futile when it comes to writers resisting the urge to do the same old thing rather than try something new.
These Should Have Been The Villains Of Star Trek: Picard Season 3
Honestly, the alien bugs from The Next Generation episode “Conspiracy” would have made much better final bad guys for Picard and his Enterprise crew to face during their final team-up. In case you need a refresher, these aliens were able to take over the minds of pretty much anyone, and the only sign that someone was infected was a weird “nubbin bug” (as the Greatest Generation podcast might say) sticking out of their necks.
Picard and Riker saved the day by killing the alien leader in the most explosive fashion, but this season 1 episode ended with ominous speculation by Data that the leader had activated a homing beacon that would attract more of these nefarious creatures. Ever since then, fans have waited for these aliens to show back up in Star Trek. They never did, possibly because they were originally conceived of as a way to introduce the Borg, but that connection was dropped by the time everyone’s favorite bionic baddies arrived in season 2’s “Q Who?”
Why The Conspiracy Aliens Are A Better Fit Than The Borg
Aside from the fact that the Borg are seriously played out, why do I think that the “Conspiracy” aliens should have taken their place? For one thing, these mysterious aliens have their own ability to assimilate Starfleet personnel. That means that much of Picard season 3’s plot could remain the same, with the Founders’ mysterious employers simply being another leader bug rather than the Borg Queen.
For another thing, Picard’s third season was pure fan service: the show addressed Picard and Dr. Crusher’s romantic connection, answered burning questions about whether Ro was still in Starfleet, brought back the Founders as major players, and so on. Amid all this delicious fan service, wouldn’t it have been great for the show to circle back to the “Conspiracy” aliens and tie a nice bow on Star Trek’s most infamous tease? As for this fan, I’d have much preferred to see that than watch the Borg Queen die yet again (but this time, it’s for real, y’all!).
A Better Reason For The Reunion
Finally, the return of the “Conspiracy” aliens would have provided a more logical reason for Picard and Riker to get the whole gang back together. For as good as Picard’s third season was, we still have to just sort of accept that a bunch of geriatric heroes are the only ones who can defeat the Trek’s most frequent menace in time for the early bird special. The return of aliens that only Picard’s crew had ever defeated would have made their return more logical, especially because the bugs’ presence doubled the risk that friendly faces may not be what they seemed.
At the end of the day, this is only a minor gripe, of course. Picard’s third season was generally magnificent, leaving fans clamoring for a Star Trek: Legacy show that seems destined to never happen. However, its reliance on the Borg as the Big Bad revealed just how much the writers were starting to run out of ideas. The “Conspiracy” aliens would have been a perfect replacement, but considering that Paramount has killed our hopes for Legacy and is currently working on a needless Trek prequel film, it seems fans must wait another few decades to see the return of the franchise’s scariest aliens.
Entertainment
AI stocks are cooling — this ChatGPT trading tool keeps delivering
TL;DR: A ChatGPT-powered investing platform that helps you find and manage stocks with clearer signals—lifetime access for a one-time $54.97.
Credit: Sterling Stock Picker
The AI trade has seemingly had its moment — big runs, big headlines, big expectations. The AI fun is not over by any means. But now that things are settling, the real question is what comes next?
Instead of chasing whatever’s trending, Sterling Stock Picker leans into a more grounded approach: using a ChatGPT-powered assistant (Finley) to help you understand what’s actually happening inside a stock. You can ask questions about companies, sectors, or your own portfolio and get explanations that are tied to real data — not just surface-level summaries.
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It also handles the heavy lifting most people avoid. The platform analyzes financials, growth metrics, and risk, then surfaces signals like whether a stock is worth buying, holding, or avoiding. There’s even a “North Star” system that simplifies that call into something actionable.
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If you’re building from scratch, there’s a done-for-you portfolio builder that aligns with your risk tolerance. If you already have positions, it can suggest adjustments based on your portfolio’s performance.
One thing that stands out is how it balances guidance with transparency. You’re not just handed picks — you can see the reasoning behind them, which matters if you’re trying to build a repeatable process.
Have a lifetime way to pressure-test your judgment — especially in a market that’s moving past hype and into something more selective.
Get lifetime access to the ChatGPT-driven Sterling Stock Picker while it’s on sale for a one-time $54.97 payment (reg. $486) through May 10.
StackSocial prices subject to change.
Entertainment
Get 2TB encrypted cloud storage and collaboration tools for just $112.49
TL;DR: Lifetime access to 2TB of secure Drime cloud storage is on sale for a one-time $112.49 (reg. $299.99) through May 10.
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Cloud storage is one of those things that quickly turns into a monthly bill you forget about. That’s what makes a lifetime option like Drime worth a closer look.
You can currently get 2TB of storage for a one-time $112.49 (reg. $299.99), which means no ongoing fees just to keep your files accessible.
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But this isn’t just a place to dump files and forget about them. Drime leans more toward being a full workspace. You can upload, sync, and access files across devices, but also edit documents, leave comments, and collaborate with others without switching tools. It’s useful if you’re juggling projects, clients, or even just shared folders with family.
Security is a big part of the pitch. Files stored in the encrypted Vault are protected by end-to-end encryption, and everything is hosted in Europe in compliance with GDPR standards. This means your data isn’t floating around unsecured, and you have more control over who sees what.
There are also a lot of small quality-of-life features that make a difference over time — like version history for restoring older files, advanced link sharing with passwords and expiration dates, and even built-in e-signature tools.
It’s a simple way to get more control over your files without adding another monthly expense.
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Get lifetime access to 2TB of Drime Cloud Storage for a one-time $112.49 (reg. $299.99) through May 10.
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Entertainment
The Bear still doesnt know how to write romance
Whenever The Bear introduces a new female character, I pray she doesn’t become a love interest for one of the male leads. Not because I hate romance, but because I specifically hate the way The Bear does romance.
The clearest offender is Carmy’s (Jeremy Allen White) relationship with Claire (Molly Gordon). A childhood friend who re-enters Carmy’s life, Claire is less a real human character than she is a walking self-help book for Carmy. She spends almost every moment she’s on screen talking about him: her memories of him, his mental health struggles, his relationship with his family. In theory, she has a life apart from Carmy — her defining character trait outside of being his girlfriend is vaguely “nurse” — but in watching The Bear, you wouldn’t know it.
Usually a great performer (see: Shiva Baby, Oh, Hi!, and more), Gordon is reduced to two modes here: luminous love interest hanging onto Carmy’s every word, or calming therapist. She’s not the only Bear character to meet this fate. As The Bear builds Ever staffer Jessica (Sarah Ramos) into a possible match for Richie (Ebon Moss-Bachrach), it replaces her level-headed expertise with empty platitudes designed to ground him. (Season 4 line “honesty is sanity” made me want to drive my head through a wall.) Elsewhere, Richie’s ex-wife, Tiffany (Gillian Jacobs), acts as a similar pillar of support.
Their heads constantly askew, their eyes lit up in adoration, their mouths always ready to offer up an eager laugh or some cornball advice, these characters morph into The Bear‘s single idea of a Woman In Love. Now, The Bear‘s standalone episode “Gary” offers a new addition to this pantheon: Sherri (Marin Ireland) from Gary, Indiana.
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Sherri is a woman whom Richie and Mikey (Jon Bernthal) meet at a bar while on a work trip to Gary. She immediately strikes up a rapport with Mikey, playing a private game of “Fact or Fiction” with him, listening to his complicated woes while nestled together in a bathroom stall, and stealing his beanie and wearing it like a middle schooler trying to get a rise out of a crush. It’s a level of blindly supportive compassion we haven’t seen since Claire Bear, and Ireland, typically a huge asset to any project, soon becomes trapped in The Bear‘s love interest archetype. (Someone please ban affectionate head tilts from the set of The Bear, effective immediately.)
While Sherri feels like she was meant to be a moment of bright connection in Mikey’s life, maybe even “the one that got away,” she really just comes across as an empty vessel for him to pour his trauma into. “What are you looking for, Michael?” she wonders. Later, when he asks permission to do a bump of cocaine, she simply responds, “I want you to be you.” It’s a series of faux-deep exchanges that even two great performers can’t sell. (It doesn’t help that Bernthal and Moss-Bachrach wrote the episode.)
That faux-deepness is what sinks The Bear‘s other romances, too. The show tries to force these deep, cosmic connections, but it forgets that these relationships should be a two-way street. Perhaps that’s why many viewers are drawn to shipping Carmy and Sydney (Ayo Edebiri). While the showrunners have affirmed that their relationship is platonic — and I personally agree with that choice — what sets this hypothetical pairing apart is that they each have such rich lives, both in their work together and their time apart. That’s because The Bear is invested in both of them as characters, rather than just using one as a device to unlock the other. You simply can’t say the same of The Bear‘s other romantic pairings, and the release of “Gary” further proves that romance is the recipe The Bear has yet to master.
“Gary” is now streaming on Hulu. The Bear Season 5 premieres this June on Hulu.
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