If you count Galaxy Quest as a Trek film, then the even-odd number theory still holds up, lol.

To me the greatest weakness of ST Nemesis is that it fails to provide a credible reason for Shinzon to want to destroy Earth. i would have instead had him try to lead the Remans in the destruction of Romulus in an effort to gain the approval of his "Father" Picard whom he invites to witness the destruction of the Federation's greatest remaining enemy. Picard feels morally obligated to prevent the genocide of the Romulans on the grounds that even if they are the are the enemies of the Federation, they are still a people. The Romulans have an ancient civilization that for all its defects is intrinsically valuable. This would have given a credible motive to Shinzon who had been enslaved by the Romulans and greatly deepened the conflict between him and Picard.

One of the great touches to Wrath of Khan is that Kirk and Khan never met in person. They spoke over the viewscreen and the communicator a couple of times, but most of it was them trying to outthink each other. It's similar toe Balance of Terror in that regard, and that's one of my favorite TOS episodes. Also there was no real connection between Shinzon and Picard. They were strangers with the same DNA.

Despite all weaknesses, I have a very privileged place in my heart for ST Nemesis, because it was the last true ST movie. Star Trek definitely died in 2005 after the 4th season of Enterprise.

One thing that I have just realized is what would have really helped the film is reiterating the point from Generations that his family have all died, his brother, sister-in-law, and nephew all died in a fire and that film showed Picard's wish for family. That film ended with his crew being more his family but this movie could have used Shinzon as Picard's last chance at youth/having a son. They could have added this fact to connect Shinzon and Picard, Shinzon obviously wanted to get close to Picard for sabotage but also genuine curiosity of his "creator", but Picard didn't really have a reason other than, "Oh he's my clone raised by a brutal enemy empire I should care." there needed to be more. To bring back Picard's family tragedy would have helped.

Watching Nemesis, I was wondering if it was a result of the cast sitting around with notepads saying 'You know what? I always wanted to do . Picard was suddenly Jim Kirk-ish while off roading and such, the actions of so many folks in this movie just seemed out of place compared to what came prior. Picard making a joke at Riker's expense on the Bridge and other situations just seemed incongruous.

When I first watched this film I could not understand how they could just fix B4 without thinking of Data's other brother Lore. It seems that they simply forgot all about him and what he did.

His utter hatred felt a bit left field after being initially very curious and welcoming to picard.He total determination to kill the enterprise was also a bit "where the fuck did that come from?"The emotional depth they were trying for at shinzon's death felt unearned like they were trying force the audience to be sad for a character we really didn't know well enough.There are no shortcuts to empathy I'm afraid

Picard shot and killed a temporal copy of himself in a TNG episode to free the enterprise from a time loop. He didn't seem traumatised, and that was HIM, not a clone, a version of him from a day into his own future.

The biggest problem I had with every TNG movie after Generations was that - for some bizarre reason - Geordi was replaced by Picard as Data's dearest friend. This felt entirely wrong to me. I get that Picard is the main character and Geordi generally a supporting cast member but rewriting this important relationship seems a really bad narrative choice.

There are sooo many holes in the story. One example: when the ship is so easily invaded, why didn’t they activate the force-fields in the corridors? They did so many times in the series….and …also later in the same film!! Geordie deactivates the field to blow Data out into space 🤪

Dave, I owe you a debt of gratitude about your videos about the WEF/Great Reset. You were way out in front of the implementation of all the tyrannical bioweapon measures and your expert guests were absolutely right. Now my plea again to you to contact Nerdrotic for a long anticipated Friday Night Tights guest spot!

There were so many "why" when I watch this film in 2002 but the biggest one was, "why is a young academy picard bald".

With Star Trek V, the line "What does God need with a starship?" is worth the cost of admission alone. Fight me.

Nemesis is still 100x better than any modern Trek.

Nemesis....this is why you back up your Data!!!

Nemesis is very villainccentric and that is its' biggest problem. Tom Hardy and Patrick Stewart make the best of a pretty thin script . The actiion sequences do hold up I though on a technical level and the set design for the Romulan Senate is spectacular.

RLM had a great point about needing Hardy to be bald to be Picard for the hoi polloi non-Trekkie audience..even though we know Picard had his hair in the Academy.

I’ve said this in another video, but I’ll repeat it here: I regard Patrick Stewart as one of the finest actors who ever lived, but when it comes to story ideas, he can’t write his way out of a wet paper bag. They should have kept him busy, by having him play his own clone.

A good call back/mirror would have been when Picard stabbed Shinzon, Shinzon looked down at the wound and started laughing. And that would have let Picard see it from the other side.

I always liked this movie, but the "live on or destroy earth" part never made sense. It cheapened the Romulans somewhat as well. I have long said that the movie would have had a stronger ending if 1) we understood why there were no Romulan ships around Romulus, 2) we learn the Shinzon's plan was to use the Thaeleron weapon on Romulus if he didn't survive/was holding it over the Romulans who didn't follow him, 3) after the Enterprise escapes Romulus, they learn of Shinzon's plan and have to decide whether or not they'll turn back and save Romulus (because again there are no Romulan ships around to stop him) or themselves

I never really liked any of the TNG films that much - they all more or less attempted to turn Picard into an action hero, while pretending that Picard and Data had some transcendent relationship (that never existed in the series, unlike the relationship between Kirk and Spock). Even First Contact, which is fun to watch, has a lot of story problems and changed the Borg from a truly alien collective hive-mind to basically an army of goons controlled by an evil sexy dominatrix.

9:34 Star Trek: Nemesis was criticised as being an "inferior Wrath of Khan"... only to have JarJar Abrams show up and say: "Hold my Romulan Ale" with Into Darkness...

The problem is the story. I just didn't believe the story. It was far-fetched and didn't make sense. What they should have done was to lift a story arc from one of the episodes and expand on that. They had 7 years with some really compelling stories that could have been explored further. I think that's why the 'Wrath of Khan' was so compelling. They had a resolution to a TOS episode and by happenstance a mission more than a decade later (the movie) they found out what happened to Khan and his people. Finding out that Khan blamed Kirk for their circumstances. Bringing the familiar is a nod to the fans as well as inviting others to go back and watch the originals.

I think Nemesis had alot of good ingredients and intentions. Like you said, it was the execution of those elements that caused it to underperform.

I never understood the plot of Nemesis; I guess I found it too boring or kept loosing focus. This summary was quite good.. and extracted and condensed it so I could finally understand it. A fan edit with your suggestions would really make it better and probably more popular. But it is like just another Episode, not a Movie.

It's my understanding that Brent Spiner requested Data be killed. He believed he was getting too old to play an ageless android.

In First Contact, an extra can be heard saying that the Borg took over decks 26 and up. Also, remember how in ST5 when Kirk's Rocket Boots went past deck 78? So who knows how many decks these ships have. :)

Excellent review. I like your idea of Shinzon aging into Picard. That was one of the flaws I immediately noticed when I first watched the film in the theater back in 2002. The film was trying to sell us on the “shock” that this young clone of Picard looks just like young Picard-“oh my God!” The problem is it’s hard to have that kind of emotional impact with the audience when we have never seen an image of young Picard who looked like Shinzon. (Indeed, the one time we did meet Picard at that same approximate age, he had hair and he looked nothing like Shizon!) Therefore, the whole premise of the film is we, the audience, taking their word for it. “Oh my God, he looks like me at a young age!!!” Uh…okay, if you say so. There’s no emotional impact.

I actually like Generations. The special effects on Nemesis still look amazing today. The space battle at the end was epic.

Yeah, you touched on my biggest issue with this movie: I just don’t buy Tom Hardy as a young Picard. I saw this in the theatre and I never believed for a second they supposedly came from the same DNA. That photo of Hardy as Picard from the Academy honestly just looks silly.

I think Nemesis suffered from high expectations, and other than killing Data off, and if it had been a two-parter in season 7 it would have been viewed positively.

What went wrong? Really, not a whole lot. The android subplot was a bit contrived but, overall, this is still a pretty solid film with the best space battle we’d had to date. I think maybe had they given this to a director who had a familiarity and/or appreciation for the franchise, we would have been better off. I’ve always enjoyed Nemesis.

Nothing went "wrong", everything is perfectly in sinc and on track for destroying everything we love....

At 63, I grew up with TOS and kept up with everything since. I can’t be very critical…it’s all “family to me. Happy to see you delving into this stuff :-)

5:34 Unfortunately, this part really fell apart for me. Because you're right; we (the audience) are supposed to see a younger Captain Picard here. We're supposed to be right there with Picard as he wonders who this person is. What this person is. Is he a transporter duplicate? Someone surgically altered to look like young Picard? From a parallel universe? Is he a clone? But instead, since Tom Hardy doesn't look sufficiently like Patrick Stewart to imply "young Captain Picard", we the audience just see "random bald human". Picard's looking at him weird. Wonder what that's about. And now some oddly emphasized comments about how alike they are; are they supposed to be related? It's not until Crusher reveals that Shinzon is a clone that we even know what we were supposed to have been looking at. We're playing catch-up with the emotional tone of the scene. As you later say, we needed some kind of scene with Tom Hardy playing Cadet Picard, if only to know that he's what the film says "young Captain Picard" is supposed to look like. Now, if the film had come out after X-Men First Class and they'd used James McAvoy, it would have been more obvious (though a scene contrasting Picard's memories of his younger days juxtaposed with Shinzon's upbringing would probably have still helped).

I think that one of the most major issues with the TNG films generally was that they continued the 'safe' stories and Picard-Data centred plots, presumably at the behest of franchise showrunner/film series producer Rick Berman. That he was far less involved in creating and heading up DS9, which did take far more risks, which do stand the test of time do count against his leadership. I think he tended to 'go safe' on the stories after the death of Gene Roddenberry in 1991, quite noticeable in the lesser quality of seasons 6 and especially 7 in TNG, followed by the films. Whilst First Contact was good, it was (like all the other TNG films) very Picard and Data-centric and yet again involved the Borg, something IMHO the showrunners did to death in Voyager. In my view, much of the best of the TNG era (including DS9, Voyager and Enterprise) story-wise came from the (Pocket Book) novels, which sadly were never either adapted or jointly used to keep the franchise going and in good shape. Maybe it was down to contracts rather like the 25% different one for the JJ era films and subsequent TV shows. I much prefer the novels that took over from the end of Nemesis storyline. I think what the TNG films also showed was Star Trek was far better suited to the medium of episodic television (and novels [many of the best ones were multi-book arcs/crossovers]), and DS9 showed them the way by having over-arching story arcs that would develop ALL the characters, not just a few to the deriment of others (as was the case with TNG, VGR & ENT) as well as decent stand-alone episodes. I wonder if Paramount's legal spat with Michael J Strazinsky over similarities with Babylon 5 actually helped them, because they were allowed to follow a series-wide arc as B5 did, which helped both shows.

Insurrection is among my favorites. Most people didn't get its spiritual message, which was actually part and parcel with ST. For me, it's an underrated film.

You can find this video on KZfaq, but there is a version of Nemesis with all the deleted scenes added or in place of the cinema's version of the scene. It adds in the character building scene, more Beverly Crusher and the better ending.

They really did miss the chance to give Worf a little arc. While everyone else is moving on, He's stuck in a sense of not knowing where he belongs. The Ambassador gig didn't work out, DS9 no longer has any need of him, now he's back where he started and the family's breaking up. But then show him steadily taking more of a leadership role which culminates in him becoming First Officer at the end of the movie. Picard: How does it feel Mr. Worf? Worf: ... Comfortable chair.

Except for the illogical appearance of Wesley, who's suppose to be with the Traveller, nothing went wrong. It was a poignant in-your-face examination of ones past. Especially for Data, who did the most human thing possible: died saving his friends.

Nemesis was bizarrely forgetable. Literally, even a month later after watching it I could barely remember what happened. Also, 2002 was a strange time for big franchises. James Bond was also struggling, with the promising but quite terrible Die Another Day the same year. Many of the same problems, a mirror ironically.

I do like the idea of Picard facing his Younger self and shown what path he could've take.

I know some people shit on nemesis, but I enjoyed it & will stop & watch whenever I come across it

I did enjoy ST Nemesis although it wasn't exactly great, I wonder why they didn't have Sela (Denise Crosby) in this film, I think there was a missed opportunity with that character if she was, what with all that Romulan stuff in this film & it being the last TNG film.

I’ll never get over how stupid that buggy they used was. When firstly they have beaming technology and they also have shuttles. And that cannon at the backend of it was pretty useless being able to only shoot in one direction.

One thing that seems to never get noticed: The final scene between Picard and Shinzon is a direct rip/homage to the final embrace scene between King Arthur and his son Mordred in EXCALIBUR.

I forget the entire quote, but it's something about "the best writers steal from other writers."

The Scimitar is an incredible ship

You made me think of something new related to this film-- in a sense, these story arcs were very Trek-ish, but also highly restricted because of the film format. It would have been great over a multi-episode story rather than cram it into movie. The TNG films tried to be extensions of the show, which limited them a great deal. The TOS films, by contrast, were more like a brand new series with their own circumstances. And every TOS movie, save one, started with a premise completely removed from the episodic plot of "another adventure for the Enterprise" with all stock characters in position. That exception, perhaps not surprisingly, was ST5. ST1- Kirk is Admiral. New captain, New ship, no Spock. ST2 - Kirk is old. Spock is Captain, Checkov is gone, and Saavik, Carol, and David are introduced. ST3- Spock is dead, and the crew are being put out to pasture. McCoy is losing his mind. The ship is being decommissioned. ST4- No ship. Spock is back--sort of. McCoy seems to really like Spock in a way you never see in in original series. Kirk's son is dead. Saavik leaves. They're all criminals now. ST5 -Just an episode with all set pieces in place. The malfunctioning Enterprise is one new element, but alas, it is an illogical one. ST6- Sulu is gone. The crew is retiring. Spock is playing ambassador, Kirk's racism and bitterness are surfacing, and Scotty just bought a boat.

Dave, Damn, it's always a treat when I see a new video by you! Great work! Oh, here's my ranking of all Trek films that no one asked for or needs: 1. Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982) 2. Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country (1991) 3. Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986) 4. Star Trek III: The Search for Spock (1984) 5. Star Trek (1979) 6. Star Trek: First Contact (1996) 7. Star Trek: Generations (1994) 8. Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (1989) 9. Star Trek: Insurrection (1998) 10. Star Trek: Nemesis (2002) 11. Star Trek (2009) 12. Star Trek Beyond (2016) 13. Star Trek Into Darkness (2013)

This must be where Mike Myers got the idea for how Dr. Evil should look.

My problem with the TNG movies is that they have poor continuity with the tv series. There are mistakes in the movies that are frustrating to watch. If you don't believe me, re-watch the TNG tv series and then start watching the movies, you'll see a lot of movie mistakes that contradict the characters and the episodes. The movies are cavalier and kind of generic. They are well acted and the special effects are well put, but the stories for these films just aren't very good. Johnathan Frakes directed some great episodes in the TNG series but I don't understand why these films weren't well written with him in the director's chair. Stuart Baird didn't even watch the episodes or get help from the cast members, he just did whatever he thought would make a good sci-fi film and that was it. The older films with William Shatner and Leanard Nimoy was full of great special effects, you could see the electricity from the Reliant ship in Wrath of Khan when it lost one of its engines. The explosions felt real and the dialogue doesn't feel forced or out of character. Star Trek 2 , 3 and 4 are actually part of a trilogy which is real cool. They roll right after the other in one long movie. I think with Star Trek 5 you would have to look at the competition in the theater and Paramount cut William Shatner's budget down by a lot because of his direction. It's not the worst film in the world but I think it captures the idea "To Boldy Go Where No Man Has Gone Before." I think Star Trek 5 should've been an intro to Star Trek 6 and what I mean is to have one last mission where the main crew learn that there are parties in the Klingons and Star Fleet undermining the alliance with the help of the Romulans. It could be a subtle story and have BiBi Besch come back and have Kirk actually mourn for his son's death and bring back Merrit Buttrick for a couple flashbacks. One of the things that really frustrated me about Star Trek III was how it wrote BiBi out and killed off Merrit's character for the budget. Kirk just learns he has a son and get's back together with his ex-wife in Star Trek 2 and then in the beginning of Star Trek 3 they both just disappear because of "reasons???" . Then obviously Kristie Alley left because she wanted more money and the studio hired Robin Curtis and her character of Savik mated with Spoke in Star Trek III and then gets forgotten after Star Trek IV. In Star Trek II she was trying to get her own command and captain her own ship but then she descides to be Science officer for the Genisis project and then in Star Trek 4 she's left behind. She's never brought up again and you don't know if she gave up Star Fleet. Robin Curtis should've been in Star Trek 5 and 6. She's kind of a big deal. The older films have their problems but they capitalize and compliment the series. In TNG, the movies dis-regard the series and are lower quality with the story.

As imperfect as it is I love Nemesis. Maybe because Romulans are my favorite trek villians but I also like Insurrection, as it deals whitha theme that was very badly covered in TNG, but the film does cover it in a far better way.

Hollywood has a terrible record of hits and misses when attempting to understand franchise fandom. The “miss” stories are written in boardrooms instead of writer’s rooms. They ring their hands as they read over what they believe the fans loved about the series. Favorite episodes, etc. As a result, the stories we have come to love become overplayed memes and parodies of themselves. The whole Data clones thing… The whole Borg-Locutus thing, …Etc. So there’s that. The other area where they fail is with the villains. It’s one thing to have a villain that we “love to hate”. But it’s another thing entirely when we are completely sick of him by the second act. And such completely destroys the rewatchability of these films.

What confused me is that we see the Romulans complaining that Shinzon has not attacked the Federation yet, but when he does finally attack the Enterprise, the Romulans side with Picard.

I seemed to recall hearing that intended to do another TNG movie but the poor performance of Nemesis nixed that. That would explain why this movie didn't have Picard become Admiral. And, B4 (dumb name) seemed to be meant as a reboot of the Data character for the next movie.

Picard makes Nemesis look like a masterpiece!

One important fact you glossed over, Shinzon placed B4 on the planet the Enterprise crew found him on, so he cansteal the codes for Starfleet's cloaking detector net. His plan hinged heavily on the Enterprise crew randomly stumbling on B4, assembling him on the ship instead of sending him to the Daystrom Institute, leave him switched on during the very important negotiations with the the new Romulan praetor and on top of that completely unattended.

By the time that nemesis rolled around, the fans had trek burnout. That is one of the reasons why Star Trek was not included in Enterprise for the first season.

Honestly, compared to any of the modern Star Trek, Nemesis is excellent.

Early Access squad sound off!

Pretty much nailed it. I was always troubled by Shinzon's motivation for destroying Earth. There was a deleted scene that kinda explained it, but even that wasn't all that strong a motivator.

Nemesis was my favorite TNG movie, hands down. And I'm a die hard Trekker who has seen ever episode of every incarnation a million times. I've never understood the trashing of Nemesis. And Insurrection was also one of my faves! I think I like Star Trek for reasons most people don't. It could also explain why I've never been to a convention or dressed up in a goofy suit.

I’d still take this movie over any of the modern drivel they’re trying to pass off as Star Trek. And that includes Picard Season 3.

Nemesis had the best space combat there's ever been in trek. The visual effects, pacing and and intelligent choices made by the characters involved really brought it to life. Compare and contrast with the messes discovery presented us with.

We know about Picard's recklessness based on an episode of the series with Q. If Shinzon was able to age then there's no need for going after Picard. Kirk told Picard to never leave the bridge of the Enterprise in Generations.

My wife and I watched Nemesis a couple months ago. I remember when it released in theaters the same week as the Two Towers, so it didn't quite do well in it's opening week.

I actually love insurrection, for me growing up it was one I really loved data in, and felt it really flushed him out in to being more human, and tho I'll admit the joy stick scene with the Enterprise - E was really rediculous, I loved the film over all, Nemesis I almost completely agree with you on, I absolutely hated that they killed off Data. Data was the sole reason I watched TNG, to me TNG was too boring and slow and ehh except for the few fighting scenes... But Data gave me joy whenever he had a part in it, so for me Nemesis is a 4/10 film in my book.

Wow, you're right about the idea of having Stewart play his rapidly-aged cloned self at the moment of his death. That was so perfectly set up that I can't imagine why they wouldn't have, and it would have demystified Picard's stunned reaction.

That aging to Picard's age is a spicy idea. I like it!

Picard clone was miscast. He doesn't feel like a formidable enemy of picard, he shouldn't be bald at that age.

I remember getting my hands on the leaked script for Nemesis. I found it so utterly ridiculous that I dismissed it as a fake, though I did enjoy someones (can't remember their name anymore) annotated take on the script. And then, months later, the trailer dropped and it looked like the leaked script wasn't a fake after all. Movie came out, and it was the freaking script except that the Data knock-off had undergone a name change from B9 to B4. Such contrived trash.

This is still one of my favorites. It also helps to know that Data dying wasn't just tacked on per se. It was intentional because Brent Spiner was aging noticeably which didn't fit the character. I'll agree they could have set it up better, but jumping from ship to ship was a pretty cool idea.

I think it would have been intersting if Picard had been *offered* promotion but had responded with something to the Effect of, "James T. Kirk, himself, once told me never to accept promotion. I think I'll keep the Enterprise."

TMP: “We have no idea who Nick Meyer is….” TWOK: “This Nick Meyer guy is good!” TSFS: “We really don’t need Nick Meyer….We can do it….” TVH: “Eh… we better get Nick Meyer’s help….” TFF: “We don’t need Meyer… the last movie was huge!” TUC: “Eh, we really need Meyer!”

I remember nearly 20 years ago walking out of the Theater & it was kind of depressing with Data killed off,Riker & Troi leaving the Enterprise. I saw Nemesis a second time,& enjoyed the Action Sequences,a lot of the plot & the cameo with Janeway! Nemesis is so much better with the Discovery Show!

I admit I’m heavily boast towards the original cast (Kirk, Spock and McCoy). Star Trek I, II and III make up the serious and best of all the films, with IV being fun and VI finishing strong. I hated the Picard lineup, but was honestly taken back by First Contact, which has now become my second favorite only to Wrath oj Kahn. All other ST films, especially the “lens flare” ones I can’t stand.

Are we not going to mention the worst part of the whole movie? Wesley Crusher came back from literally being an entity that has transcended time and space, to...attending a wedding and rejoining the Academy so that he can serve as an ensign? What?

Very true Dave, but it's still miles better than the garbage we're getting today with CBS and Klutzman. At least back then, they took their jobs and storytelling seriously. Now, we get unlikeable characters making stupid illogical decisions, virtue signaling, forced profanity and political agendas, story contradictions and unexplained events from one episode to the next, and worst of all, most of the original TNG cast reprising their roles but acting as their idiotic selves in real life instead of the intelligent thought-provoking characters they used to portray and that the fans used to look up to. ~Scott

I'm so glad you brought this movie up. Now I can nitpick about 2 things without judgement! LOL! 1) I hate how the Enterprise "thrusts" itself into warp with vapor trails! Its not like using an afterburner on an F-16! 2) When the Enterprise collides into the Scimitar and then Shinzon reverses thrusters. Well, the E isn't reversing also so, technically, all that would happen is Shinzon dragging Picard. Somebody forgot elementary physics!

I never thought of nemesis as "better" than insurrection, it was just less...shitty than insurrection. And yet it was much much better than anything they pooped in recent times

I particularly enjoyed the line when Picard asked, "How many people had to die for YOUR freedom?" That turned my stomach, I was done.

I remember an episode where Q took Picard back to his days in SFA:Tapestry,,, and he definitely had hair. Also. Data had to destroy the weapon. Was Picard just going to die and do nothing, destroying himself and everyone else. Let me know if I have that ending all wrong.

To be honest, this could have worked well with a few modifications. First, I would get rid of the whole blood transfusion plot point. Shenzon is a failed cloning attempt but he still manages to rise through the ranks of Reman society through sheer ruthlessness. He gets Picard into the picture with a fake peace negotiation for three reasons: One, he sees the Sovereign Class the way we see carriers. There's only a handful of them and taking one out is a blow equivalent to crippling 1/11 of the starfleet navy. Two, the propaganda significance of defeating Picard, the name Enterprise, and the flagship, as well as the high level tactical information are huge military gains. Third, he wants to see why he was considered a failure by the Romulans. Who is this captain so peerless that even the man who conquered Romulus from a Reman slave pit couldn't equal him? Second, there's no B4 and Worf is given his own arc. Worf was the ambassador to the Klingon Empire and in the House of Martok, the ruling house. He is going use the Captain's Yacht to attempt to make it to the neutral zone where he can escape Romulan communications jamming and call for help from the empire. Of course, he's accompanied by a Romulan senator who survived the slaughter and he must work with them to broker a temporary peace in time to have the Negh'Var show up (with the two Romulan Warbirds) against the Scimitar. Also, he had Dax on DS9, there should be no pining for Troi BS. Third, make Data's sacrifice mean something. Have him struggle with the emotions of making the decision to sacrifice himself and deliberately leave his emotion chip on so he can carry the memories and feelings of his friends with him. Logic says "let the bomb go off and kill the Remans and the Enterprise crew to save trillions from war, he needs the emotion of the loss of even one of his friends to push him forward to stop the bomb. Just like Spock, it is the human in Data that saves the ship, not the android (as it was said before, if you want to be a ripoff, be a good one). Fourth, Shenzon isn't against the ropes when he triggers the bomb. Scimitar is crippled, but he will escape back to Remus to continue his war. He has back up plans. He is the one with a special plot armor teleporter gizmo. But, during a previous scene where Picard breaks down in a very defeated and uncharacteristic way, JLP stole the device and while Shenzon realizes it's missing, Picard uses it to abandon him on the Scimitar, saying something to reference how his "human weakness" is actually what made him better and that's why the Romulan clone would never have been able to succeed. Just me 2 cents on how I would have written it.

Ah, First Contact: the last good Trek film.

Dave I would recommend that you read the Nemesis novelization. There is just SOO MUCH that the studio cut out of the screenplay to favor the theaters being able to show more screenings of Lord of the Rings that it ultimately wrecks the pacing and storytelling in the film.

I really like Nemesis, it's a Guilty Pleasure for sure, but It started my personal fandom of Tom Hardy. So years later when Rockn'Rolla and Bronson came out I was there for Hardy. Hell, I even watched Marie Antoinette and Black Hawk Down, because he was in it.

I quite like it, the directors cut that is. Almost all of the cut scenes improve the film. I like the action scenes, some of the best since Khan. It ends on a good note and most of the crew is split up, I wonder if that other TNG featuring the DS9 and Voyager crews would have ever been made. At least some of them got to return in small roles afterwards, Star Trek online for example. The final scene of the directors cut is great too, we see the crew getting ready for the next voyager with the new first officer. It was bittersweet with something being left to the imagination.

I ENJOYED 'Nemesis'. Felt like it introduced some MUCH-NEEDED energy and sinisterness.

You nailed it perfectly. I'd like to see someone deepfake Patrick Stewart's face onto the dying Shinzon...to create that scene the way you described.

"They gave the car keys to the bimbo." -Marina Sirtis

Btw 1st comment yeee 😗🎉🥳

Data's death wasn't random/for shock value, Data was always going to die in this movie. Brent Spiner wanted out because he was getting too old to play the ageless Android. As far as it not being a fitting send off, the movie was never supposed to be a send off for the TNG crew, the fact that it did so poorly is the reason it ended up being the send-off film.

Stuart Baird is more of a film editor than a film director. I suspect only got the job of directing this film because of nepotism, and a reward for being a loyal film editor.

I could never suspend disbelief enough to accept that Shinzon was a Picard clone. The crash scene is ridiculous. So fake looking and shields were up so they just should have bounced.

Imagine Nemesis had been a Mirror Mirror episode instead. With Evil Picard against Good Picard.

I'd read Brent Spiner said he wouldn't do another "Trek" film unless Data died. This was the only reason I was thrilled about "Nemesis." I loved Troi saving the day. The schtick about her crashing the ship is tired. Anyone in her place during "Generations" would have had the same lack of control over the navigation. :(

Riker taking over the Bug Chair on Enterprise would have been great. The end felt so empty and hopeless because pretty everyone had transferred or died. Having Riker and Troi stay on ship would have felt hopeful for the future.

At least Picard didn’t apologise about everything to everybody.