It's a good thing CBS All Access sent critics the first three episodes of Star Trek: Picard for review, because it's not until the third episode that the spinoff of Star Trek: The Next Generation really gets off the ground. Slow-burn, serialized stories are to be expected from modern prestige TV, but Star Trek usually moves at a quicker pace and features episodic stories along with its larger narrative, even on fellow CBS All Access series Star Trek: Discovery. Picard takes a more methodical approach, and while it's a pleasure to spend time with Patrick Stewart as Jean-Luc Picard for the first time since 2002's Star Trek: Nemesis, the show's early episodes are bogged down in far too much exposition and techno-babble.

Set 20 years after the events of Nemesis, Picard is heavily informed by plot elements from both that movie and J.J. Abrams' 2009 Star Trek, which split off from the main Trek timeline thanks to a supernova that destroyed the homeworld of the Romulan race. Retired from Starfleet, Picard has been living in relative solitude at his family vineyard in France, still haunted by the death (in Nemesis) of his friend and former subordinate Lt. Commander Data (Brent Spiner, who makes cameo appearances in dream sequences in the first episode) and by the near-annihilation of the Romulan people, after the Federation refused to help them following the supernova.

RELATED: Star Trek: Picard - The Enterprise-D Returns in Extended Teaser

Picard slowly returns to action thanks to the appearance of a mysterious young woman named Dahj (Isa Briones), who has some sort of connection to Data, and comes to Chateau Picard seeking Picard's help. Picard gradually starts to piece together the story of who Dahj is and why she's being hunted by a rogue faction of the Romulan secret police, the Tal Shiar, with the help of several new characters who eventually form a sort of ad hoc new crew for Picard to lead. There's Dr. Agnes Jurati (Alison Pill), Earth's foremost expert on androids like Data; Raffi Musiker (Michelle Hurd), a disgraced former Starfleet colleague of Picard's; and Cristobal Rios (Santiago Cabrera), a Han Solo-style rogue starship pilot who's introduced shirtless, smoking a cigar and drinking a glass of whiskey.

While Picard gathers information on Earth, the show also follows the action at a "Romulan Reclamation Site" aboard an abandoned Borg cube. There, Romulan agent Narek (Harry Treadaway) pursues his own, possibly sinister, agenda among former Borg drones who are being rehabilitated to potentially return to normal lives. The "Ex-B's" are led by Hugh (Jonathan Del Arco), a former Borg drone who appeared in a couple of notable Next Generation episodes, and Picard overall is full of callbacks and references to past Trek shows and movies. At times it rivals Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker for its level of fan service, and while those references will delight most longtime fans, they sometimes feel like they are holding the storytelling back.

RELATED: Wil Wheaton to Host Star Trek: Picard After Show, The Ready Room

Then again, some of the show's most appealing moments come from Picard echoing his past actions. Hearing him order "tea, Earl Grey, decaf," quickly conveys how his life has slowed down as he's gotten older, and the best moment in these first episodes comes when Picard is finally standing on the bridge of a starship again and can say, "Engage!" In the first episode, he laments, "I haven't been living. I've been waiting to die," and Stewart imbues those lines with all the world-weary gravitas that they deserve.

Stewart has a tougher time with some of the sci-fi jargon that the writers saddle him with in other scenes, and in general the show can feel like it's undergoing an internal struggle between the traditional sci-fi from the current Star Trek producing team (including co-creator and overall Trek boss Alex Kurtzman) and the more lyrical, contemplative material from novelist and series showrunner Michael Chabon. It's impossible to know which writers wrote which parts, but the early episodes can't quite fit those disparate elements together, and the result is a story full of sci-fi mumbo jumbo but little forward momentum.

In addition to those familiar Trek elements, Picard at times strongly recalls former Trek writer Ronald D. Moore's Battlestar Galactica, especially in its treatment of androids, or "synths," who play a major role both in the back story and the current action on the show. With synths, Romulans and Borg all kind of dancing around the edges of the story, it's hard to tell where the main focus will end up. It's a bit like the producers have decided to play Picard's greatest hits, peppering in as many references to notable Picard connections and adventures as they possibly can.

Stewart holds it all together admirably, though, and the new cast is just beginning to jell as the third episode ends. Pill is especially good as the eager but nervous scientist with no field experience, and Orla Brady makes the most out of a ridiculous character as the Irish-accented Romulan who helps run Picard's estate (and kill assassins if necessary). Spiner is now way too old to play the supposedly ageless android Data, and makeup can't quite convincingly give him his former look, but he otherwise falls right back into the character's wide-eyed but ruthlessly pragmatic demeanor. Other old-school Trek stars, including Jonathan Frakes, Marina Sirtis and Jeri Ryan, are set to appear in future episodes, and part of the show's appeal is in looking forward to seeing those old friends again.

RELATED: Star Trek Reveals Why Picard Retired

To truly succeed, though, Picard needs to do more than just trade on nostalgia, and these three episodes aren't quite persuasive enough on that front. The plot elements will need to come together more effectively, the new characters will need to make stronger, more memorable impressions, and Picard himself will need to find a genuinely new sense of purpose. The show hasn't done all of that yet, but the long history of Star Trek (and Jean-Luc Picard) makes a strong case that Picard will eventually make it so.

Starring Patrick Stewart, Alison Pill, Michelle Hurd, Evan Evagora, Isa Briones, Santiago Cabrera, and Harry Treadaway, Star Trek: Picard premieres today on CBS All Access.

KEEP READING: Star Trek: Picard - CBS All Access Officially Confirms Season 2 Renewal