Warning: SPOILERS for Star Trek: Picard Season 2, Episode 6 - "Two of One"
Brent Spiner’s new character in Star Trek: Picard season 2 fixes a big problem with Data from the previous season. Set in 2024, Picard season 2 finds Q (John de Lancie) enlisting the aid of one of Data’s ancestors, the eugenicist Adam Soong (Brent Spiner), to change the course of Picard’s family history. In season 2, episode 6 “Two of One”, Jean-Luc comes face to face with Soong at the Europa mission’s pre-quarantine party. Despite having played Picard and Data for decades, it’s a testament to Spiner and Stewart as actors that Adam Soong feels like a brand-new character.
The newest addition to the Soong family tree allows for Spiner to still be part of Star Trek: Picard without having to try and pass as an ageless android. Adam Soong's complicity in creating the Confederation is the work of a complex, troubled character, who believes himself to be a good man, but whose actions suggest differently. In “Two of One” it’s revealed that Kore, the daughter he’s desperate to save, is genetically engineered. Worse still, Soong attempts to run over Renée Picard, but instead hits Jean-Luc. While not as obviously villainous or ruthless like his descendants Arik and Lore, there is still darkness inside him, something which Spiner clearly relishes playing.
As much as Star Trek audiences may want to see Lore return in Picard, the harsh truth is that Spiner is simply too old to convincingly play an ageless android. Picard season 1 already proved this with the Data dream sequences, in which the character looked visibly older, despite the visual effects work. Within the narrative, this could be waved away as Picard's advancing years and hazy memories of his former crewmate, but it's for the best that the android was finally put to rest in the season 1 finale. With Brent Spiner joining Picard season 3's Star Trek: The Next Generation reunion it's more than likely that he'll be playing a Soong, rather than a synth, further solving the aging problem.
The more organic branches of the Soong family tree are a much better fit for Spiner in both Picard, and any future Star Trek shows that may be on the horizon. It's likely why the final episodes of Picard season 1 revealed Data and Lore's flesh and blood brother, Altan Inigo Soong, also played by Brent Spiner. His dialogue in the script for episode 9, "Et in Arcadia Ego, part 1" even refers to this when Picard recognizes the family resemblance. "Data if he had gotten old and gone soft. Must be disturbing. I know it is for me." Some viewers theorized that Altan may be Data's villainous brother Lore, with an organic upgrade. This was revealed not to be the case, and Altan eventually assists Picard's crew in defeating the Zhat Vash. Adam Soong isn't Lore either, but he's just as much of a threat now that he's a key figure in creating Picard's dark timeline. Where Altan Soong only took arms to protect his synthetic children, Adam's actions are driven as much by his ego and controversial scientific theories as he is by his love of Kore. Adam Soong's complex morals, emotional vulnerability, and quiet menace make him a fine antagonistic replacement for Lore.
Given that Star Trek: Enterprise finds Altan Soong's ancestor Arik still experimenting with eugenics in the 22nd century, it's clear that Adam Soong will never convince humanity of the merits of genetic engineering. Whether this means that his daughter will die like his previous experiments remains to be seen. Star Trek: Picard's 21st century Soong plotline is dark, compelling and painfully human. It also provides Brent Spiner with the rich material required to breathe new life into Data's legacy nearly four decades after his first appearance.
Star Trek: Picard Season 2 streams Thursdays on Paramount+.