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Picard’s surprise cameo sets up a ridiculous MCU crossover

March 26, 2022

picard season 2 episode 4 spoilers follow.

star trek likes to boldly go where no one has gone before, but prepare yourselves, because we’re about to take your mind to new levels of absurdity that perhaps no fan theory has ever gone before. Although that’s not to say it can’t be true…

The theory in question all starts with picard‘s latest season two episode, titled ‘Watcher’. With our beloved team scattered across 2024, Seven and Raffi are forced to use public transportation in this episode to try and find Rios. It’s a rough ride, not helped by the presence of an annoying punk who blasts his music proudly on the bus.

But this isn’t just any old punk. As anyone who loved Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home might recall, this is actually the exact same character who we last saw in the 1986 film. And yes, he’s still played by the same actor, Kirk Thatcher, almost four decades on.

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If you’re a really diehard fan, you might have also noticed that the punk is blasting out a new version of his song ‘I Hate You’, which is now called ‘I Still Hate You’ in what might be the best and geekiest callback star trek‘s ever pulled off.

Back in the ’80s, Spock used a Vulcan nerve pinch to shut the guy up, but here, Seven’s plea to “Stop that noise” does the trick instead. And while it’s true he might have mellowed in his old age, it’s also possible that this punk recognized how similar this request sounded to the words that Admiral Kirk used against him in the ’80s.

Even though this version of Thatcher’s character didn’t meet Kirk and Spock due to all of the wibbly-wobbly timeline business going on in picard‘s second season, these echoes may have still induced some “time sickness” – much like what young Guinan experiences upon hearing words uttered by her future self.

That might explain why the punk is so willing to accommodate Seven’s request, and bear with us, because that’s actually quite key to where we’re going to end up.

Executive producer and co-showrunner Terry Matalas essentially endorsed this idea during a recent chat with TrekMovie:

“Now technically, Star Trek IV wouldn’t have happened in this alternate timeline, but maybe SOME part of him remembers his encounter with Spock in the Prime Timeline. And it made me chuckle that he’d go up against Seven of Nine.”

patrick stewart, star trek picard season 2

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Weirdly enough, these aren’t the only two timelines where we’ve put Thatcher’s punk. Before he took over the role in this new episode of picardKirk also played the same character in Spider-Man: Homecomingof all places.

“How did this happen?” we hear you gasp. Well, Marvel’s head honcho Kevin Feige is a big star trek fan, so he asked Thatcher directly if he’d like to jump in quick for a cameo on the last few days of shooting.

“I arrived in Manhattan at around 1:30 in the morning and my call time was 4:30 am the same day,” Kirk tells StarTrek.com. “So I grabbed a couple hours sleep, took a taxi to the set and had brought my own wardrobe. They made me look a little grungier, and the whole thing was done by 11:30 that morning! So, it was really only about 48 hours from Wednesday afternoon when he asked if I was interested in Friday lunch time when we had finished shooting the scene!”

While it’s safe to assume that this cameo was just supposed to be a fun nod to star trekThatcher does hint that the two punks are one and the same during said interview:

“The reason this all happened is that Kevin is a big Star Trek IV fan and he has told me that he was a big fan of the punk scene. So, I guess it just tickled him to include that character, 30 years later! I’m hoping this turns into a long series of ‘Punk on the…’ cameos that can fund my early retirement.”

We know we’re reading too much into this. We’re fully aware that these two punk characters are not actually supposed to be the same person. Except: what if they are? What if the ‘I Hate You’ guy actually transcends time and space?

patrick stewart, evan evagora, star trek picard season 2

Amazon Prime Video

Hear us out. Thatcher’s punk is the only character who’s appeared in both star trek and Marvel properties – on screen, at least. There have actually been multiple crossovers between the X-Men and different Starfleet officers in comics and books alike. But nothing like this has ever happened on screen. Yet.

We know that the punk character exists across multiple timelines, and picard‘s version seems to be aware of this on an unconscious level at the very least. When you factor that in alongside how Spidey just broke the multiverse (in No Way Home), there’s more potential for the two screen franchises to cross over than ever before. In fact, they may already have given Thatcher’s role in both.

And no, we’re not stopping there. Because who else is joining the party when Marvel tackles all this multiverse madness in the new Doctor Strange film? Why, Patrick Stewart of course, who we presume will reprise the role of Professor Xavier in a MCU first.

But what if that’s not all? What if, in perhaps the most ridiculous crossover of all time, Charles Xavier ends up meeting Jean-Luc Picard in the Doctor Strange sequel? We don’t deserve Patrick Stewart x 2, yet here we are thinking about it anyway.

Aside from the logistical concerns, we can freely admit that a meeting like this would be extremely random, not to mention unlikely. Although, saying that, we wouldn’t be surprised if Multiverse of Madness has hidden away at least a few more secrets not yet revealed by the promos…

In this theory then, the key to Stewart Squared is the punk, whose existence across these various franchises could somehow bridge the gap when everything falls apart. And what’s the point of a punk if not to rebel? When Wanda breaks the rules, she “becomes the enemy,” but maybe there’s some space for Kirk’s punk to become the hero in all this and make our wildest fanboy dreams come true.

That might sound bold, even for star trekbut we would have said the same thing about a Ricky and Morty crossover with picardand look where we are now.

Star Trek: Picard season 2 airs Thursdays on Paramount+ in the US and Fridays on Amazon Prime Video in the UK.

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