Subspace Rhapsody

Hey, Joe. Hi. So we're back for a very special episode this week. This episode aired on the 3rd of August 2023, nearly 2 years ago now. It's Strange New World series 2, episode nine. Subspace Rhapsody. You're Nathan Holster Podcast, but on a able. They love Doctor Who, but can they shirk that label? Apologies! The ruinest Star Trek pod has sprung into being lots of laughter loving friendship. We can confirm The biting crazy will impress you. Stickcase at 16 It's just number one. Let's not split hairs. It's all made of jabal life. Apologies. The most confounding thing We appear to be mocking. The techno babble exquisition. Nathan is doing his bit, smart as hell cutting wit, Chrisman track attracts some sexy crew members, emotionally honest. At the console, Joe is slanderizing. His trivia is memory now for rising for DS 90. can't find a one flaw. All is okay. Dramatic persona, all is okay. Tom Paris, we often punch. The lanot could do better. It's just a hunch. Shatter's got a shirt off again. Is it hot in here? Ethan Pecks for lunch. Apologies. The funnest track pod is about to begin Untitled Star Trek. Untitled Star Trek, Untitled Star Trek. But what is that title? Given how much I love a musical, and that's on television, in movies, and on the stage, it's something of a miracle, it's taken me this long to watch the bloody thing. I mean, I went in with huge reservations. I'm not gonna lie. I was bracing myself before I press play. So it's funny, I'm a huge fan of musicals as well. And of course, there's always the Buffy musical as the kind of genre TV musical episode par excellence, I think, which this episode compares itself to twice at least. And when I 1st watched this, I wasn't massively impressed, I have to say, but it has really, really grown on me. I think it does have some flaws, but it's Star Trek Strange New Worlds, which I just adore. I love this crew. I love the look of the show. I love the actors, and it plays to the strengths of Star Trek Strange New Worlds, in that, when we've said this before, that the space stuff isn't serialised, but the character stuff is. And so in a way, this might be just about the only series of Star Trek that could conceivably have done a musical episode. Maybe Deep Space 9 could have, but it's not the sort of thing that 90s Trek would have thought of doing, I think. Well, DS9 was never bold enough to write original songs, was it? It always took, um, brilliantly took, you know, songs that everybody knows and then appropriately put them in at the right thematic moments in episodes. Here's to the losers, the best is yet to come. Yeah, fever, for God's sakes, you know. So they certainly did a lot of singing over there. But this is the 1st time Star Trek has an entire album that is completely original. And I'd probably say 75% of it is very successful, and 25% of it doesn't land for me at all. And I actually think there's a point in the episode where it's almost like they, I don't know how how the songs were conceived if they were done in any kind of an order, but as I was watching the episode, I was sort of about 50% in halfway through going, my God they're really going to land this whole episode, and then somewhere in the middle, things started to go awry a little bit musically for me. And then the big, big number that needed to really strike home and sew all this together. I think that's the dud of the episode. And that's a shame. That is a shame because I'll say this. My favourite song in the whole thing is status report at the start and I think it gets the whole episode off on just the perfect footing. I was reluctant and I was at the end of that song, I was like, yeah they're going to do this. They're going to absolutely get this right. great song, that 1st one. So I think the big problem is that the lyrics are generally speaking not very good, and that is a kind of a problem, and it sometimes means that the songs don't successfully do what they need to do in context. And obviously that's hugely difficult. And I, and I guess apart from that, you know, it's, it's such a big undertaking. It's so much extra work to do a musical and, you know, they were practising and rehearsing and recording and all of that sort of stuff. And I think that it's pretty incredible that they manage to pull off what they have pulled off. And I think the songs are really agreeable. It's a really, really fun hour of TV. But it doesn't always work, I think. I mean, kudos sort of buffy crew because they were putting out 26 episodes a year. That was one of their 26 episodes that year. And it is, you know, the prestige musical. And they failed to get it out on time. You know, like it didn't actually air in the original run when it was supposed to be broadcast. It was delayed. And that was a problem because it had all sorts of crucial kind of plot things happening. Buffy lends itself to musicals. I think a little bit more than Star Trek because Buffy is more melodramatic and is a thing that's about heightened emotions anyway. That's not Star Trek's normal thing. And in fact, part of the fun thing about status report is having all those people sing about inertial dampers and stuff like that. Oh, yeah, I do think they totally missed a trick because there is a lyricism to technobabble in Star Trek. And I was absolutely certain there was going to be a technobabble song where everybody was just singing Dreadful Technobabble that rhymed. I was like, well where was that? But I did think the way that 1st song sort of shoots around the ship and everybody's talking about being at their consoles and, you know, doing the scans and security checks and all of that. And I was like, yeah, that's a good medley, that is. That's a really well structured, well-paced medley with a great chorus to it, but also giving a chance for every single person in the crew to have their moment. And you're like, my God, they can all sing. Great. Let's go. Yeah. Like, I think that that's really great. I think too, apparently Christina Chong had been badgering them for a musical episode for ages, like she'd really wanted to do one. And I recently rewatched the Elysian Kingdom and her character sings in that, like does sort of, yeah, hilarious comedy opera stuff. And so I think she's really good. Come on now. Celia Rose Gooding is a singer as well. and I had meant to... She's incredible. The best singer in the cast by a country mile. Yeah, I mean, I set you off, Mike, you should have done every 2nd song. We would have been fine. And for me, despite, again, the limitation of the lyrics. I think keep us connected is the best song. Um, and it's it's good that, you know, that's the moment where it goes from. She learns a character thing about herself, and that's the solution to the space problem in the episode. And so that's the big pivotal moment. And I think she absolutely nails it. And both her and Christina do just incredible musical acting as well. Like they act their way through those songs in a really, really terrific way. There's other people like Anson who is just trying to get out of this alive. He is the Alison Hanukah, not this episode. Well, I don't sing. Well, you could just say, well, why are we singing then, all right? at the end of a song. Look, I think he does great and they don't rely on him too heavily but he certainly doesn't act and they make it a character thing too. that Captain Pike is super awkward about the musical stuff all the way through. The best thing of many great things about once more we're feeling is that Joss Whedon, obviously, knows he's leading up to that musical episode, and he wants to make plots culminate and character arcs hit in that episode. This just isn't working on that level. Now there are, it's the same thing. Everyone speaks their truth in song in South Space Rhapsody, but it's not quite as climactic as Buffy saying, I was in heaven and you drag me back to earth and things like that. It's Christine going, well, I'm off to go and do a course. See you later, you know, which isn't quite as operatic as the Buffy episode. But within the premise, I did think that we learn a lot about the characters, especially La Arme. I thought her song was especially moving, because it just opened out aside to her that I'm, I haven't seen the one where she's um on the mission with Koork, so I, I kind of figured out what was happening because Strangely Wells is extremely good at catching you up if you just dip in for a single episode without the, as you said, Bob, seems that you get in 90s strik. But that really landed for me. There was one character beat, which lands, but I didn't like at all. which I will talk about as we go through because I just thought, wow, you've come across as a total bitch there. And I normally like you a lot. I think there is something from 2 episodes earlier that explains that. And so we'll get there because I think I know what you're talking about. Well, that's my fault then for not watching that. But I was just like, oh, my God. He's just there, all right? Like, stop being so mean. But he also provokes it as well. Like, he goes in there to make her have a song so that they can do the thing and he actually kind of provokes it. But the reason that she does it is complicated. Boiler warning. That's one of the songs I don't think lands, as it should. I think that should be a great part. Oh, I think it's a really good song. I think it's good. All right. That's not the worst. The worst of stuff finale, but we'll get there. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. All right. Well, in that case, I think we should go in. I mean, kudos for attempting this and putting it off to the standard that you did. The fact that you're 75% there is a miracle, all right? I think it's great. And I think it's a really good episode. I'm glad that Star Trek trying to do it and, you know, like it's essentially this year's Elysian Kingdom, isn't it? Where we do a completely different genres where a different genre of storytelling takes over the ship and they have to deal with it. And I, you know, like it's got that awareness that Strange New Worlds has of being a TV show and being in the Star Trek tradition rather than being things that happened in 2351 or whatever. Clynically, we can call it the buffy knockoff of this season, you know? Now does seem to be a tradition. is soon to be a tradition, I think. All right. Okay. I will count us in then. Five, four, three, two, one, and we're off. Okay, so it's the id end. And oh, yes, I know, I do like this idea, you know. I miss it. It's not on the episodes anymore. Yeah, yeah. Oh, and I did love as well the the glee version of the theme tune. We must discuss that when we get there as well. What's that style of music called? You know, when they're all vocals. It's like a cappella. It's not entirely a cappella, there are instruments in it, but God Christine and Spock Snoggin. I know, I know. I know. I mean, what a hot couple. I mean, you could say anything bad about it, but it's even peck. I mean, I'll just forgive him anything. Yeah, he's great, isn't he? Have you seen that picture of him with his shirt off, Nathan? That's doing the rounds. shirt off. in the 1st episode. Why wouldn't I? That episode, which is called tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow which I think is episode 3 of the 2nd season is absolutely magnificent. It's so good. And that season opens incredibly well. Series 2 is been great. episode immediately before this. Um, so it was called uh, Under the Cloak of War, and it is reference to here. It has Benga and Christina doing flashbacks about their time during the Kleon war. Fraser, who did our 1st contact episode, said to me, now he goes, I do like subspace Rhapsody, but it came after one of the best dramas I've ever seen in years. I must watch that one. So this is wonderful. Ahura is unfortunately in the position of having to relay everybody's communications around the ship. Which is what we always joke, she was. But this is the solution, right? Because she does this, this is foreshadowing the solution to the space problem. And it's so well structured as just a TV episode, I think. It's so great. Although now, you know, I love to do this. This has been done before, you know. There is one unfortunate episode where all the communications go down on DS9 and poor old Nog is stuck because he's got the biggest ears of the whole crew. He's stuck with this thing in his ear relaying to everybody for the whole 45 minutes. They do it for the whole episode. Bless him. Oh, so now look, now Pike's having a relationship with this lady. I have no idea who she is. She is the woman that he is in bed within the 1st episode. Ah, okay. Well, anyway, she wants to go away on a fabulous holiday and he's not too keen at all, is he? He's like, no, thank you. That's very. Sounds very boring. And unfortunately, has to sing a song about it later in the episode. That's right. It's kind of interesting because, of course, he has a terrible tragic backstory as well, but we don't go there. He's just a comedy character in this episode because I think Laan's tragic backstory and to a lesser degree, um, uh, Nyota's uh story um, uh, enough, I think, to be going on. Don't you love as well? In the Buffy episode, how they just go. Well, he's a demon that makes people sing. It's a thing. In this, they go to the whole effort of, well, we're going to put a song through this subspace fisher. That's wonderful. And then, yeah, they give it all the stuff. All the set of babble, and then suddenly we would just accept that's the case. It's still a Star Trek episode. Christader is such a fabulously English actor because she just does that posh embarrassment thing so perfectly. And like when she goes in the wrong direction to leave the, like she, there's just a cute moment. She, she says, oh, you know, like we'd better go or whatever, and then she heads off in the wrong direction and has to correct herself and walk back through the shot. What she has as well is the Renee Oberjon Wah, uh, gift of whilst whilst being a total prig of a character. You really feel for her. Like, because you know exactly the unrequited love that they're going through those 2 characters. And yeah, you just, and also as well, I have to say, the fella that's playing Kirk is exactly how I like people to come in when they recast somebody like this, it's the essence of the character but space for the actor to do their own thing. Because if you just charming, if you just do an impression, it's going to be lousy. Whereas he's got to charm all of his own, that actor, and there's space for it, which I really like. It took me a while to warm to him. He is in as early as series one. And it looks like he's going to be a sort of semi-regular. And Sam Kirk, of course, who is played by Shatner in the opening of an episode. He's found dead, remember, with a false moustache. I'm Sam Koch's been obviously in it since episode two, I think. I mean, the song, the Gilbert and Sullivan song, the Chris, number one sings, connect with your crew. And I was like, no, don't tell him to relax too much. That's why he's walking around the bloody enterprise with his top off most of the time, you know? So I love this, and can I just say how superb Carol Kane is like just her... Where is she? Is she the new hammer? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. She's a lanthanite. She's from Earth, and they're very long-lived, so she was alive in the 21st century on Earth, and in fact, Laan and Kirk meet her in that episode, which is said in 2024 or something. She's, of course, in Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. And looking quite different, I think, different teeth. But she sounds so great. She sounds like my mad auntie Liz, you know, or would add a few. She sounds like she's drunk. And yet when she starts singing, her voice is absolutely beautiful. She's great. I think she's really terrific. She's one of the best things. And now we have Scotty aboard in series three. She's still there because the other thing is she's she's so long lived that she's lectured at the academy for 100s. I love I love Ahura doing the little shoulders thing to anything goes. She looks across at Smock and does the shoulders thing. It's adorable. at this point. Okay, they're going to be doing light S 9. They're going to be doing songs that we already know. But actually, this is just a little taster of that and then they kick it into their original ones. Can I confess something about the wall? Yeah. You can see the joint. No, I can't either. I can't see the join. You go, oh, you can sort of see it. I'm like where? Where is it? It just looks like it goes back and back. Wonderful. Oh, God, that's it. The wave of musicality is now going through the enterprise and everyone's looking, oh, and here the song starts status report. God, I love Mitchell. She's so good. The woman who plays Mitchell is so great. There's, I notice as well. There's always a very stylish look to Strange New Worlds, but there was like some wonderful sweeping camera work. It was a bit Baz Luhrman-esque, actually, to this episode, I think to sort of carry the songs, the actual, the look of the show and the pace of it as well. It was all conspiring. Where's that music coming from? Not from anywhere on the show. I appear to be singing. It's just terrific. And then Sick Bay and then Mbenga and Christine. Oh, no, they go again. Nothing unusual happening here, sir. Sorry. Oh, he's got a lovely voice, my banger, isn't he? He's beautiful. Just that lovely tenor voice. I think he's got a stunning voice. I think he's, again, just another one of these incredibly beautiful people that populate this ship. He's so good. Why are we singing? Oh my god. so great. And just the way the camera goes all around the ship in this song as well. This scene here where everyone's doing musical acting as well, like you've got, you've got, um, uh, Erica, you know, in her pilot's chair sort of looking around and stuff and singing her thing. Later on. Ortega, right? and the one next to her. Why don't I get a lion? She's giving her daggers. Look. But no, what's happening is they're doing Corey. Like they're both moving forward and operating their controls at the same time and looking across at each other and going, no, we're not going to do choreography. And then, and then, Pike leans like this. You know, no. not doing that in unison. And like Pike comes in and he does sort of proper musical number acting as well. Like, it's not just that they're singing them acting like they're in a musical. Yeah, like this, where he's leaning over. He doesn't have any lines, but he's looking over it. moving his arms around as if he's got to convey something, but he doesn't get to sing at this point. The reason that the moment I realised, um, or I thought they were going to pull off this whole episode, was that all system stable? And it just builds and builds and everyone gets a version of that line to the climax of this song. In fact, what I really like is that the opening line, the, you know, the apologies, the most confounding thing I appear to be singing. That's Spock, because of course that's a Spock thing. Who's going to say, everyone's founding, because now that's the chorus, you know, because they've had to pick up on spots. light. And so now they're doing it as a sort of fuse or whatever. unusual so peculiar. peculiar. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then the comedy line at the end. Well, why are we singing? It's so good. And then the feature... It's great. It's so good Al Kirk's getting in on it as well. So this opening credits is the 2nd time in 3 episodes that we've done bespoke opening credits for the episode because, of course those old scientists was 2 weeks ago. Oh, yeah, of course. And that was, um, that was the cartoon version of the opening credits, which included um, the, the koala, and it included that thing sucking on the, the Enterprise instead of... All I could see was sort of Chris Kulfer and Jonathan Groff and that bunch from Glee, sort of going, ba, ba, ba, ba, ba, ba, ba. That's how I sing. That's what I do when I'm watching it. You know, like, obviously, with Enterprise, I sing because it's got lyrics. I forgot you weren't part of this episode then. You've heard you and me singing the Enterprise theme before. Thank goodness. of us are part of this episode, frankly. And again, series 3 has just started. We've had 3 episodes. We will have had 4 by the time this comes out. And it's redone the opening credits with just more exciting incredible new visuals and stuff, so they're clearly doing that every year like they did with lower decks. Yeah, see, this is only the 2nd episode of this season I've seen so I haven't really had a chance to explore these credits too much but you could sort of pause at any moment here, couldn't you? and taste in the visual splendour. Yeah, that's it's selling it, isn't it? Well, sort of strange new conferences during 90s trek, wasn't it? Yeah that's right. Okay, here we go. Yeah, too. I have to put, I'll be singing a little bit, all right? hope that's not too much of a problem. So this is our, so in Buffy, they did the whole song about what is going on while we singing, didn't we? Yeah, Dancing Demon. Well, something isn't right. Yeah, the theory it's called. Unfortunately, here we just do exposition. I'm like, well, what the hell is going on? Yeah. I think I think certain concessions have to be made here for those very prop-faced Star Trek fans. Like if this whole thing had been songs. I'm not sure how you could have handled it. I think that they, there's probably about half of it is sung. Um, and and because they have said, I think that they're not doing a song here, um, because it's when people are emotional that they sing. And so this sort of technobabble thing. Here's our 1st reference to once more with feeling, where, um, I doubt we will be bunnies. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Getting Spock to say a line about bunnies is absolutely the top quality thing there. But that is explicitly, and it says in memory, Alfred, they put the bunnies reference into... Hello, can I say in that puppet episode then? Spoilers. At least we're not limping to a close, eh? So there's a number of different space techniques that they try. And part of the fun thing is, so this is technique, A, this is cute too. This 1st interaction between Spock and Kirk. So we do... Yeah. So on this, we do get to see Spock and Ahura meat for the 1st time. We get to, we don't get to see. We get to see Kirk and Ahura meet for the 1st time. We get to see Kirk and Spock meet. But they don't tend to kind of, they don't lean into it too much. That's the original series. That's right. You know, we've got 3 seasons of that. We're going to have more episodes of that than we are of this. Although when he said, you know, what a great exploration, Mr Spulk. I almost understood it, you know? It's pretty good. I love this too. She makes a joke at his expense. That's the classic Vulcan romance I've heard about. And then she reconsiders because he's hurt. And this is, you know, her stuff about helping people communicate and understand one another. We get to see her do that. We don't just pull it out of our butts, and we don't just do it in the opening thing. Having her alongside Spock while he goes through this breakup in the episode, I think is really a good choice. Do you know, every time I see her in this show, I think that was just a genius moved, take her underserved character from the original series, and to just turn her into a fully fleshed character with an amazing actress playing the role, does make me feel sad for Michelle, though. Every time, every time she gets wonderful things to do, that 2nd episode of the 1st series, you know, where she's singing. And I'm thinking, oh, man, this show would have killed that, you know, back in the day, she would have been amazing. It's a shame, but I'm pleased they're doing it. So oh, here we go. Gilbert and Sullivan, here we come. Oh, you don't like this one? don't like this song. Why? Because I think the lyrics are really bad. And to your crew. So the reason we have to... Yeah, it's very cute. It is very cute. But I do think the lyrics are kind of bad. And it, what this song has to do is Laan has to see, um, Una reveal her innermost thoughts and freak out and that's what she does. She freaks out. She goes to a room and she has a song where no one can hear her because she's terrified of revealing herself to anyone. I really appreciate them just going for a different musical genre though. Yeah, yeah, various points. And I just like the idea that she has this sort of dream of being on the stage, regaling everybody with hours of Gilbert and Sullivan. we know this about her? Yes, we do. Oh, okay. So in one of the short treks, it's the episode where she meets Spock on the Enterprise for the 1st time and they get stuck in a lift and they sing Gilbert and Sullivan songs together because Spock knows Gilbert and Sullivan as well. But I think it's kind of beautiful as well that he's learning here that the kirk that we know and love in the original, where we say we love how relaxed he is, you know, and how chill he is with people sometimes. And the number one who was in that original pilot of TOS and then got booted off for reasons. She teaches him how to be that. Look at them dancing around the corridors. I really like this song. I, I, I just, I just, from fear or dispute. Yeah, yeah. These sleep help things. Oh, sorry, I must stop. Yeah, but it's connect to your truth and all of that sort of thing. Like it's a little bit full of kind of middle management cliches for my taste, I think. And connect to your crew. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, if they could teach this in my shop. They absolutely would, you know. right. So Laan's freaked out because, of course, and she already starts singing what she thinks before she gets to her quarters, but she's going straight to her quarters completely freaked out. She's sort of trying to hold it back. No, not in public, please. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. This song is beautiful. I really like this song. Yeah, again, the lyrics are not great, but I do think that she is so good, and I, you know, she's magnificent, and I'm glad that she gets like a big proper number. She is so terrific and she's been really great. You know, I'm going forward after this as well. You know what the trouble is with the lyrics, don't you? is that they are Star Trek lyrics. They are kind of po-faced and literal. Whereas the reason the Buffy lyrics are so great. It's because they're buffy lyrics because they're witty, you know they're sort of sitcom lines and they're sharp. Yeah, but but remember, this is a version of Star Trek that generally doesn't talk in cliches where people are actually... It can't be a bit po face, though. It can't be very serious. It's much more chill. It's much more chill than other versions of Star Trek, I think, on the whole. Oh, maybe again, you need the concession. If you're going to do something this off kilter. Maybe. All right, well, we'll still make it Star Trek. Yeah. Oh, no, no, it's still a shot coming out the window, yeah. It's wonderful, isn't it? It's a wibbly, wobbly musical field all around them. That's the official term, by the way. Yeah. No it looks like it. I don't think we get anything better. Oh, is it just called the subspace Rhapsody? It's a subspace fold. So, so, so. Um Yeah, she is so good, isn't she? And she is acting. There's another scene too, which is the big central scene, which is where she actually finally does tell the truth about herself where she finally... It's, again, it's the sort of, it's a very sort of um, TV character speech, but she just sells it. She's so good. What worked for me in that scene so much was I was like, oh yeah no, Kirk's sort of a free roamer, he snogs and fucks everyone on that bloody show. But then, of course, in the back of my head, I'm like, of course Carol is there. And, of course, this is that moment where they're trying. Well, I think I think too. I don't think he is quite as big a kind of pants man as he has the reputation for in the actual show. I think he's a much more serious character than that. Um, And like this relationship in episode 3 is just terrific. It's so good. This song and Celia song later in the episode are the two, I think that hit emotionally best in the episode, you know. And here is because she's sort of angry because and because we know her very tragic backstory, I mean, this would be the Tasha Yar song. if it was TNG, right? And that she really wants to give herself over to this and yet she's not letting herself do it. And then via music, she's she's allowing herself to emote. There just so much happening. It's really complicated what's happening emotionally with this song. Really interesting. Yeah. And she sells it. She just sells it musically as well. Yeah, she's properly good. She looks like she's got to cry any minute. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, she does. Well, and she does she does that final line where it sort of tails off and she does get emotional. She doesn't quite land the last line because she's too overcome with emotion. I was really scared because, you know, in the state of his report she's just there going, you know, security detects no threat. Oh, please, don't have her do it now for a whole episode. No. I mean, I think they took a good look at like, okay, let's let's hear you all sing. Right, you've got great vocals. lets go. I think they were always just going to do Christina and Celia Rose. Like they were just always going to get the 2 big songs, I think because they're just so great. And Chris, yeah, just stand at the back. All right, you'll be fine. Hey, friend, step forward. You're pretty good. And this is so funny. Like, she goes straight to the captain and says, I revealed my emotions through song and it's a massive problem. And of course, it is a kind of problem because she's been instructed, as we saw, in the previously on, not to talk about what happened between her and Kirk in the past. That line there was pure, strangely, well. Are you telling me that singing our truth? It constitutes a security threat? Her emotions? Well, it could, it could be if I'm honest. You wait till your missus turns up on the screen later, okay? The boys, like the 2 Kirk, like the Kirk boys together, which is so fun. Now, is he the one that just dies offscreen at the start of an episode of TOS? Yeah, it's Shatner with a moustache on. Yeah, he's already dead, isn't he? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Oh, that's a bit miserable. It's lovely, likeable man. Yeah, he's very sweet. He's been in it since episode two. And that's the other thing is I kind of realised like you've got Mitchell, you've got Kirk, you've got Sam Kirk, and you've got Pelia all as regulars. Can't we, you know how they sort of destroyed Vulcan in those movies? Can't we just rewrite Kirk's brother's death then? And just because I really like that guy. I know, I know, I know. I'm not sure I would have liked Shatner and moustache playing him but the, you remember that Roger Corby, who Christine Chappell is awaiting for news from is in an original Trek episode as well. Okay. Yes, turns out. Oh, for her fiance. All right. So here's our private conversation. conversation. A private conversation. So we've all been at work. Have you not been at work when this has happened? have, you know, during a particularly bad time during a polygamous relationship. I'm like, no, please, can we do this at home? imagine having to sing it. You're right. The lyrics are a bit strained here. It's his awkwardness that's so funny. It's wonderful. And the best bit is, of course, where Christina, Christina Chong. I keep saying Christine Chapel and Christina Chong. When Laan gets up, everyone's called Chris on this show. When Lean gets up and turns the communicator off in order to stop the conversation in order to stop him from embarrassing himself and then he looks around and sees that he's on his knees with one hand on his heart and his other arm outstretched in the middle of a song. That's a dreadful rhyme, isn't it? It's a private conversation about our frustration. Oh, no, that's okay. And I quite like how when she comes in and says private conversation. Like, I actually think this song is not terrible. Speaking of somebody who wrote some lyrics this week, all right. It's very hard to find the right rhyme. That's all I'm saying. But look how awkward. Look how awkward this is. Oh, no, look at him. He's got his hand on his chest. And his other hand out. straight into her. The best thing about that whole song is everybody trying to look at their consoles, staring intensely at their work. Yeah, yeah. everyone's trying to look somewhere else. Bless him. I mean, is he the least alpha male captain we have ever had? He's just so chill, isn't he? Oh, maybe. Surreal. I think Saru's the most cerebral of all of them. Yeah, he's a little bit unsure of himself too, Saru. What I really like is just how quick we are for give me options and then people give options and he chooses one. Do you know what I mean? Like he doesn't come in and just say we're going to do this. He always solicits assistance. He, it's such a flat team structure on this crew. I really, really like that, you know, because very often the captains think of Archer. They make very bad calls, you know? And look at this crew. I mean why wouldn't you ask for their opinion? Well, that's great. And all of those scenes are so relaxed. You know, like we have had the scene already. haven't we, in the whatever the conference room is, that giant conference room? And now where are we? We're in Pike's quarters? No, are we in the conference room? I can't tell where we are, but again, we're all just sort of standing around. Did you see what Pike said then? I think we should blow it up. Yeah, before it gets out of control. I've just been really embarrassed on the bridge, all right? Oh, they're ready to all torpedoes ready. See, this is another space solution to the problem, and of course it doesn't work. The only thing that works is having a big finale and that's genius. Like, and the way that they manage to make the science stuff work. Make the technobabble work so that the solution is we have to have a big giant finale. I think what Ahura says is so right as well, though, because the singing your truth means it has the ability to bring people together, but also to tear people apart because we all feel stuff that we don't say, right? Now, if I was to sing you a song, Nathan, you know, it might be this one. It might get a bit awkward, you know? I think this song doesn't land either. So this is Una's 2nd song, which is called keeping secrets. I don't remember this one at all. So that's not a good sign. So it's very closely based on what happens in episode two. And episode two, which is called Ad Astra Per Aspera is incredibly good, like a really, really good hour of Star Trek. Um, um, uh, courtroom drama. And we find out about her backstory. And she's Illyrian. She's arrested for being Illyrian at the end of series one because of course Illyrians are genetically augmented. Uh, And so, uh, she she, um, she's been keeping the secret all her life. And so she's someone who's kept secrets. All of her life for self-protection and has now decided she's not going to do that anymore. I like what this song is trying to do. The 1st line is you've got lots of faults to wade through. You know, like it's clunky, isn't it? Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I agree. No broken trust, no drama. You just keep it to yourself. Yes. This could be night years trek now. They're being so literal. And it's really static as well. I mean, she is just standing there sitting to her. That's the other thing too. The Celia song in engineering. Watch the camera. Watch how it just swoops around that amazing room. Also her performance too. like her performance is so strong. And you see, the other thing too is like this shot of Christine and Joseph is about the secrets that occurred last episode. Um, the, you know, the, so this thing about keeping secrets from each other and not being able to communicate and stuff, like, it's relevant to what's happening with the others. We did see a shot of Chris and Marie or Chris thinking about his holiday. You know, all of that stuff about keeping people. I don't know. I don't why they're floating. Yeah, no. reminds me of the buffy episode at the end. Remember when Tara and Willow are on the dance floor and they finally admit how they feel for each other, but they have a pair of witches. So I kind of get that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, she turned the gravity off. She went over to get her pads so she could turn the gravity off. I had an important moment in the sale. It was a metaphor that, because, you know, she's finally unleashed her emotional load, that she was floating up into the air. Yeah, it's very strange. This is not peaceful. the best part of the episode, is it? No. It could have been, but I just don't think it properly sells. See, she's talking this stuff. Heroskilli, perfected so I could survive. This is what we learned about her in episode two. And she's gone from being very stitched up. Remember, in episode one, in series one. There's an episode. I can't remember what one where these 2 pair up and they do kind of enterprise bingo or whatever it is, you know, like they do the um, they try and sort of chill and relax and do something fun and interesting and they're both very rigid, very stitched up characters. Una's chilled a bit more and now she's encouraging, um, now she's encouraging Laan to do that. But in a long way... She goes, what is it? Yeah, it works before, but it doesn't serve me anymore. anymore. Yeah, yeah. And it's like, you know, there's no lines in that Buffy musical that are that on the nose, you know? Yeah, they're super couchy. So they're like jokes or, you know, witty lines. Yeah, that's what I mean. I think generally speaking, the lyrics are not all that good. Well, I think, I, yeah, I mean, I think maybe they wanted to land a couple of songs, so they put a ton of effort into a handful, and then the rest, maybe they should have done just a few less. Maybe that could have been a dialogue scene. Yeah, I think even the, I think even the very good songs, the 2 best songs are, have lyrics are a bit clunky, clunky, I think. I wasn't that person as a child, you know, that sort of really looked into or read the lyrics of a song. I was far more interesting songs musically than I was what they were trying to say. So I've never really studied lyrics. So I think maybe I can just let the sweep of the emotional, the best songs, you know, go past without sort of going, Oh, what does she just say? Ouch. I love these diagrams that they do that look really, really classic trek. You know, they look really original trag. Now, this we must discuss, because they're setting up a joke towards the end of the episode, and it's my least favourite part of the episode. I think it really doesn't land and that is our boy band, Klingons that turn up. Now, I would have given them rock or something amazing to sing, and instead, it's Klingon Backstreet Boys. Oh, God, it's just... Yeah, but that there. And I know we should have made concessions for these po-face fuckers that one Star Trek to be as serious as it used to be threshold. But that is too much for a large portion of this. I like that. Because I thought I was expecting Klingon on Crash. And so this is, of course, Bruce Horac, who played Hammer. and yeah. And my feeling is that, yeah, he does come back for an episode this year, he is in an episode called Charades in episode 5 playing Hammer in flashback and stuff. Um, he, um, I think I, I'm not sure about uh, Bruce Horak. I think he might be gay. He's at least an ally. I've certainly seen him wearing rainbow pins and stuff. And I think they've come on, oh, we can't leave Bruce out of a musical episode. We have a musical episode, we have to have brews. If the Klingon's fire on it, what's the danger? That this musical explode. It's got to encompass everybody and everyone will sing across the entire universe. No, no. Everyone who's affected by the subspace fold will die, because they, remember, they beam the particles into engineering to see whether they can fire on it, and they explode catastrophically, and then we cut immediately to a scene saying, no, we can't do Captain Pike's suggestion of blowing the thing up because it would blow everything up that's affected by it. I mean, those are stakes, Nathan, but I think they're quite boring stakes. I like the idea that that that field might go out across the universe and everyone's going to be singing their truth. Can you imagine what a political disaster that would be? But I also think, though, that their musical episode is an episode where we threaten to blow up the entire federation. Like, I think it's allowed us that the stakes are so high. Even worse. imagine, right? Yeah. It's also a temporal rift, and the stakes are that all of Star Trek from TOS to the modern day could be a musical. We're going to re- redefine the whole of Star Trek as a musical. That would really get the fans in a tizzy. Yeah, now this song here. So this song about Christine leaving and being happy to go and basically see you later, Spock. Like, I'm off. I really didn't like her in this scene. So what has happened, of course, 2 episodes ago, is that amazing scene in the lift between her and Boimler, where Boimler basically accidentally lets it slip that the relationship never works. that he's unaware that there's a successful relationship. He thinks that Spock is behaving uncharacteristically, and Christina realises, 0 my god, this relationship never goes anywhere. And so for the last, for the end of that episode and in the previous episode, they have been, um, you know, we saw it in the in the previously on. They've been unable to communicate. She's been wanting to let him go because she knows he's going to drop her. Well, that's kind of shit though. If someone came and said to me, you know, Joe, I'm really sorry but you and Nathan, you don't make it, right? And I was going, well, fuck the future. I don't care. Like let's go. No, but it's a space thing. you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it's the, you know, this is genre brain. We can't change time. She knows the relationship isn't going to work. And so that's why she's been doing this. She's been trying to put some distance between them. And then he comes and provokes this song. So that Ahura can use her magical tricorder to solve the problem. I figured this song was going for the vibe that we got in those wonderful party scenes in that discovery episode in series one. Do you remember when Tilly was pissed as houses and everyone's having the best time? I just don't think it was quite there. I mean, I was going, man, they should be doing some sort of Latin music for this, this number. would be great. I think the problem is that the choreography's not there. Yeah, no, absolutely right. lavish dance number, but instead they've just told all of the crew to just dance. you know, just like... This looks like me, dolls in a apartment. Yeah, that's a problem. That's right So lifting her in the air and having what is she doing? Jumping up and down there. It's like we're back in that party in the Dax marriage episode. Do you remember, we're Nob doing this crazy dancing. Yeah, actually, I think that that's, without the music, it looks worse somehow. Yeah, yeah. I think this needed better Corey, but for this song to work because that's the sort of number it is. And I think she's got a great deep voice and a really sexy voice and she sounds like someone who doesn't need a man. And I think that works really well. And then, of course, when he comes back and does his song, it has the same tune. So his song is a response to that and it's the same tune, but a different arrangement. What's important is it hits emotionally because I really care about Spock in this scene and what he's going through. And in fact, the she's so she's so convincing in her, you know, I'm ready, I'm ready to go, you know, and and so alive and vital and like, you know, I'm going to leave all this behind and find my way. Um, yeah, I just thought, oh, he's just there. I think I can see her feeling bad about Spock at that moment, like aware of what she's doing to Spock. And Spock makes it happen. He goes in there and says, you know, were you going to tell me like he tries to provoke an emotional reaction from her for the sake of the experiment and that it goes horribly wrong and backfires on him? I think it's quite a good scene. Those those moments in this episode. They're the ones that hit the most. the ones you can sort of relate to. Yeah, I've been that person where the person that I have feelings for is moving on and I have been that person where I desperately wanted to tell somebody how I was feeling and I just couldn't do it, like La on. And yeah, those are the moments that speak to me in this episode. I think this scene, this is the scene I mentioned before, where she says, look, I'm going to tell you now otherwise it comes out in the form of a 17th century siege shanty. I kind of wanted... Does he say at any point? Yeah, that wasn't me, though. Does he say that? It's funnier than that. It's even better that. The way that she talks here, which is a long speech and, you know a speech where a character is just revealing what they think, which has the potential, I think, to be really bad. She sounds like she's thinking of it as she's saying it. Do you know what I mean? And there's little disfluencies, there's little hesitances and stuff and the way she's looking, she's not looking at him all the time. She looks up, she looks away. She's thinking. It's just a really, really good, just a well-delivered speech, I think. And the most emotional speech in the thing, apart from maybe Celia Rose's song. And it's not a song. And that's the triumph of it is she's decided she's just going to do it herself. And it's great, I think. before it comes out as an embarrassing song. And given what happens to her in the next 2 episodes as well. We do see a lot, who does change and grow, I think, at the beginning of series three. She's great. I mean, I 1st saw her in a, where he says, was he anything like the other me and she goes, no. Yeah, that's really nice. I 1st saw her in a Doctor Who episode and I kind of wouldn't have expected that she was capable of all this with what I saw in that episode because she sort of underwritten. Yeah, in that. And I'm really pleased. They took a tunnel for this because she's well, she's my standout character in this show. of all of them. I mean, I always fall for the ones that can't quite MO in the way that they want to. I think Ahura is maybe the best, like my favourite character and perhaps the best actor on the show. I always love terrific. I always like the bitch. They're always the best for me, you know. Seven of No Iden Voyager when she's a right cow, you know? But really, with a heart of gold. Yeah, yeah. I think she's wonderful. I think she is really good I mean, early Kira and DS 9. You wouldn't want to be around her too much. Well, of course, next week is the finale, which is called hegemony uh, and it's the gone 2 parter. It's, um... Oh, I love to go. It's best of both worlds, part one. They start tearing through corpses again. It's amazing. Oh, wonderful. Yes, that was, oh, we watched that one together, didn't we? I was hiding behind a cushion. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Bloody... That man dragged down the corridor, the bloody trail behind. We've done that on this, I think. haven't we? No, we have. Have we? I think so. I can't remember Oh, actually, oh, no, we were both screaming when that blue man was, when they did the spaceball stroke aliens bit where the Gordon tears his way out of it. Oh, okay, here we go. Time for the big powerhouse number. Well, no, before that, we've got, we've got Spock's response to Christine. This was a little muted, this song as well. But again, I think it's, like, it's muted partly because it's Spock. and he, like, Ethan is, is more adventurous and lets go a little bit more with the singing than he does in the opening one which is more sort of funny and and technobabbly here. Like, this is more heartfelt, I think. I mean, he's so pretty. I had to put a lyric in our song about him being for lunch. He's very pretty. That was the only line that definitely had to go in. He's so pretty and so restrained. You just want to do terrible things to him, honestly. Do you know, speaking of pretty, I'm sad that we didn't get to see Bob April seeing in his glorious baritone about what he wanted to have her next. That would have been really something. Can I quickly ask you a question while this scene plays out? which Star Trek show do you imagine would have given us the worst musical of all? Of original songs. I think Star Trek the Next Generation, for sure. Oh, you know, Gates McFadden? my god. Um, Like, but I just think, like, how could you do a Star Trek musical with those characters? you know, like, I mean, just what would you do? What could you possibly say about them? Because it's so stiff that show is so stiff. I think DSO might, the characters are well defined enough that I think you probably could with that one, but Voyager? I mean, imagine Robert Duncan McNeil. Oh my god. Yeah, come on, look at the join. Where's the join? I can't see the join. There can be a whole song, you know, about Robert Duncan O'Neil's. Tom Paris's obsession from season 2 trucks. Trucks, cartoons. you know, Irish towns. What would you call it? What the hell is he obsessed with this week? Oh my god, that set is incredible. Just so incredible. Where is the wall? Can you please tell me? I can't tell. I can't tell. Did you see how shiny those floors are? I mean, they must say to them, leisurely, right, get the shiners in and then we'll do the scene. It's the, it's exactly what I said to you right, right at the beginning of Untitled Star Trek project about the problem with 90s strike is there's no reflective surfaces and reflective surfaces are expensive because the camera can be seen in them and you have to make sure that it isn't. And I think this looks expensive partly because the surfaces are all reflected. I think there's a few more than you are care to admit in not East track. Because there's plenty of reflective services in DS9. All of those bloody consoles in Cisco's room reflect all the lights and everything. That's all. But like all everything is matte or kind of, you know, um, the sort of music. I mean, this is 30 years later, we're much more sophisticated filming techniques. much better. That's right. 30 years better. Yeah, but look, Ethan's killing it here, I think. He's doing really well. Yeah, he can sing anything. I just want to look at him He, we do actually continue with the Christina and Spock, Christine. Goodness me. With the Christine and Spock plot into episode 3 next year, the most recent episode I've seen centres on it as well. Oh my god, a pattern, she says. I mean, do you know what? I love I love the conclusion this episode draws in that. She can connect everybody emotionally at the end of the episode. Oh boy, do they not land it? Yeah, I don't think I think the song is not very good. It's a shame. It should have been the most impressive musical number, shouldn't it? And it should have really made you feel. Yeah. I think part of the problem is that the song is about the enterprise are not about the crew, and that's the problem. It's a song about the show and not about the characters. And when you think about, is it but to connect, what was the, there was that episode of Discovery where they all get together in the Cargo Bay and watch, a film at the end, and it's entirely about how much the crew, uh, gosh, she's good. She is so good here. Like, again... It's actually a bit of a shame we're mute, isn't it? The ones in the episode. Oh, she, I mean, she sings, she's just got a beautiful voice, but she's acting her way through it. She feels the whole thing. What surprised me was sort of about the 1st 3rd of this song, I was like, oh, wow, this is all going to be quite understated, this song. And then somewhere halfway through the song, she just lets rip and then she doesn't come down. She gets higher and higher and higher until, you know, the glass in that room is threatening to shatter with the power of her voice. But and like this is so great. Like, it's this thing all of these terrible things have happened to me. I'm on my own. There's no one that I ever really connect to. And that was all through series one with Hammer that was what her relationship with Hammer was all about. You know, that she didn't feel like she belonged anywhere. She wasn't sure she wanted to be in Starfleet. She ended up here because of her, you know, the death of her family. Then Hammer dies and remember her reaction to that. Like, part of the reason that's so heartbreaking is because you've got Celia Rose Gooding, they're just absolutely selling how upset she is about. I mean, I'm sort of pleased that she is because I'm reading the lyrics now. I wasn't really listening to the lyrics when I was hearing the song. She just said when we 1st met, I was a cadet. I mean, yeah, yeah, yeah. But there's that thing where she says, I absorb all the pain and she just goes, hmm, and it's the same point where she says... The camera pulling out into that the whole scale of the room. And she's saying, why does my life have to be like this? Why am I, well, everywhere I go, I'm solo, you know, why am I at my best unaccompanied? All I do is solve everyone else's problems and make everyone else connect. And at the end of the day, I'm alone. And then, and then one floor with the song is I don't know how she goes from that to where she ends up. So she sees the patterns on the thing. She realises what's happening and then she goes, actually it's okay. I am okay by myself. I do great work. I'm doing a good thing. I've solved the problem. But the song doesn't quite land it, I think. I mean, I'm so sorry, love, but you go to end up having one line per episode in TOS. Just going to be sitting there. But did you know that short where the camera came out? It's like her voice is filling that entire way out space. So impressive. wonderful. And there should have been more of this sort of stuff too. Her voice was so powerful there. Those equations flying around her all exploded. Yeah, there should have been more of that too, I think. They'd look at her. She's just killing it. The camera's going around and around and around and around. Now once I don't mind. We're doing musical. Get that drone moving. Actually, I'm not sure it is a drone. No, no, it's just a camera. Look at her. Look at her. It's not brakes, is it? It's fake's doing this one. No, no, it's not Frakes doing this. No, it needed a musical director. Yes, yeah, I think, and it is someone, I think. Oh my god, she's good. She's so good. She must have taken a good look at the song and gone, oh, look at these lyrics. Right. Okay, I'm going to slip. Yeah, she's so good. Just so terrify. Yeah, I wonder, you know, because they're given such impressive opportunities, I do wonder if this is going to be a bit of a launching pad for a couple of this cast. Yeah, it's hard to tell because, you know, this is very important to us, but how important is this? This is good telling. Star Trek. It is a just good Star Trek. This is good telly. No, no, no, I know, but how much is it landing? You know, it's on Paramount Plus, like, I don't know. As far as I can tell, just with my small space on the internet like this is the Star Trek, that non-Star Trek fans are watching. Yeah. I hope anyway, I do know. I do too. I mean, I think this is the best one that they've come up with and possibly the best one just of all. Oh, offence, those other shows. I can't imagine people. You know, sort of dipping their toes in Discovery and Picard and running a mile, but I can certainly imagine people just sticking on the 1st episode of this and going, oh, that was fun. Yeah, I'm gonna watch that. It has that. Yeah, it's better than TNG. But it does have that. can just watch an episode. And if I don't watch it next week, that ain't a problem because I can keep up. Yeah, but everyone does. I mean, because it's on streaming, you know, like there's no reason you wouldn't miss an episode, uh, you can just watch, but you can dip in and watch one. I could just imagine, you know, I keep talking about those awfully cynical Star Trek fans, you know, the ones that remember it being you know, serious drama back in the 90s with the great flaming books and, you know, salamander people and things like that. And the Anticans and the Soleil. Looking at this going, 0 my god, that's it. The climax of this musical episode is they've all got a feel for each other, you know, in order to break the subspace field or whatever it is and going, what happens? I think that's brilliant though. I think that's absolutely brilliant where we have 3 possible space solutions. They all fail. the solution is we have to have a big musical finale. I think it's superb in execution. I think it's very flawed. It doesn't quite work. I was really, I was just down. I was like, my God. This is gonna be the medley. Like a good musical usually takes themes from all the songs. Like Les Miserables, and then throws them all together in an amazing crescendo, and they didn't do that here for some reason. No, this does start with her just, you know, like picking up on the music from keep us connected. Um, But I think part of the problem here is, like it's the purpose and the mission and all of that is what we're talking about, you know, like, I don't care about those things. care about the people. That's right. That's right. And so it should have been much more about... Well, it seems to suggest that that is more important to these people than their connections to each other. Yeah. Nathan, I love this podcast, all right, but I love you more. Okay. Well, I think that's it, isn't it? Because they all sing about, you know, you've got that bit where um, they sing about what they do, you know, you've got, um, you know, spot quite enthusiastically saying I do lots of scanning and that's great for the mission or whatever, and you kind of think yep, that's really not a friend. You ever seen us? Swish your opponent tail than that woman walking down the corridor there. I love this. There should have been more of this. I know that it's expensive and difficult... Yes, in the corridor. Yeah. You're right. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, that has a lot of choreography. you know, think of they got the mustard out outside the magic shop, you know? The mustard, that camera falls up to that whole street full of people. I think it's about 20 people, but it fills me. It's it's pretty great. Yeah. But yeah, there's not enough curry, I think, is part of the problem. When we gain control again, I confess, I'll miss the singing, I won't miss the singing. Now let's bring this thing down. Oh, Spark says I won't miss the singing while they sing, I miss the singing. It's actually quite a well-done thing because Spot gets a little gap in their melody so he can be heard saying won't miss this thing. That's the problem, though? Because I think certain Star Trek fans, the mission is the thing. But it's a song, it's all about feelings and our emotions and stuff, like, and it's all about unity. I don't know. God, we're... The Klingons are about to turn up and do their... I like the Klingons thing. Number. That's great. That's so much better, I think, than... I didn't want to watch the episode. I was like, oh no, thank you. Like, I want to see cling on, it's doing a boy band. Please. I'm like, it's very strangely well to chill out that much. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think that's I think that's much less boring than Klingon opera which we've seen before or, you know, hair metal band, which is the obvious thing to do. The Backstreet Boys. It is, you know, A1 or some cut price boy bat. It's a really bad, bad, bad singing. Don't be made to Bruce. Sorry, Bruce. Come back as Hammer. Oh, is forgiven. We can rewrite time, you know. Oh, this is nice. I like my bingo and Christine dancing away through Sick Bay. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's wonderful seeing that because they were having such a horrific timeline. just staring off camera looking very safe there in a terrifying... Yeah, they're in a bit of music media. It was like ABBA, but they call... This is wrong somehow. It was a bit like sort of Bohemian Rhapsody, wasn't it? That sort of thing, you know. Oh, boy, here we go. Why are you calling us when you got your dramas? One of these days will repay you, slay you. Oh boy. The gold thing that they're all wearing as well is what Klingons wear now. Yeah, apparently. I mean, they do often look like boy bands these days, so fair enough. Oh, look at Pike's reaction. Oh my god. He just goes, okay, let's hang up now. Have we had enough music? I just won't mention that. Oh boy, 0 boy. Oh, look, all the spaceships are dancing around each other. I know, it's wonderful. It's just terrific. So good. Is that called a quadrille? Baby. Oh, no, look, they're all holding each other's hands and... No, this is. We're all in this together. It's high school musical. Yeah, yeah. Mitchell's going through as well. Oh, bless you. Oh, sorry. This choreography is terrible. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then they jump and the whole thing explodes. That's so great. the end of an operesa now. So this is what I think is really great, is now we have to reestablish that we're back in Star Trek, and the way we do that is with the original, the TOS music, right? That's coming in right now. And what it tells you, what it reminds you, I think, is how much of Star Trek's atmosphere and character and stuff is established through music. Like it reminds you that, you know, that's music that says Star Trek is back at its story. Excuse me. And how do we convey that information through this? Is this you making another dick at night is Trek? All right. My favourite parent is terrible bullpaper music. Until the 50s songs started coming in. That's right. See, I like this scene too, between these two. And it does go somewhere. We do actually develop Lan's character. Yeah. And I just, I, I, I love the focussing Kurtzman Trek on uh, female female friendships and relationships, which just didn't get enough of that before. It's so refreshing. Well, we've said before, this is the 1st Star Trek to have more women in the opening titles than men. more female characters. Wonderful characters. Yeah, yeah. Look, look who's doing the cooking. Captain Pike. Yeah, yeah. Wow. So, this holiday is not going to happen because Marie is about to say, I'm glad that Julia Childs is still important in the 23rd century. Did you hear that? Marie. We missed out on a song about him singing about Booth Bourguignon. Thank God for that. No, no, no, that wasn't it? He's doing the beef book in your to make up for the fact that he said, whenever I feel like I disagree with you, I just shut up and make up lies and stuff. I quite like how low key this thing is. because it's just about you know, we disagree on where we want to go for holidays and Chris can't say that he doesn't like it. So he's just been trying to put it off. We're not going to have the trip because she just says there. I just got put on a priority one mission, and next week, that will be the mission that's interrupted by the Gorn. Do you know what vibes I'm getting from this relationship? It's Cisco and Cassidy, a strong woman who's saying, yeah, you know what, right? I'm not fitting in around you. You make time for me. Something is going to happen in the next couple of episodes that really knock the, um, like make the, this a much more urgent and important relationship and I really like it. Okay, I really need to watch the season, don't I? Yeah, but no, I mean, you know, in the finale and in the 1st 3 episodes of the following... As for the Klingons, the following season. It didn't end that line there. As for the Klingons, they've released their track and have gone down a different route from trying to take over the universe. No, they got Spock drunk and now he's come to work. Oh bless him. Oh, dear, 0 dear. Now, it's a shame, though, because obviously the original Star Trek theme is probably the most popular, certainly the way to celebrate. Star Trek film. the only one I don't really like. It's the one I'll skip every time. Yeah. So she, when she was singing before, she gives Pelio the idea to send the music through the subspace fold, and now she's singing again. Both times. She's singing, Keep us Connected. Including before the musical thing even happens. She's humming it. That was really fun. Let's talk about. But, you know, it was fun to talk about the stuff that didn't work as the stuff that did. Yeah, I think it's a great episode. I really enjoyed it. I'm so, I'm not at all sorry they didn't, not everything worked but who cares? I mean, I think I think it shows that in order to get this sort of spot on, you need more time than perhaps they had to put this on the screen. But as a piece of Star Trek with a fun premise, and those are the one sort of TNG that we love, right? these crazy premises. Yeah, yeah. As a character piece about Leon and Christine and stuff like that there's important stuff happening with all of those characters. As a stylish bit of work. I mean, it beams off the screen, the episode. So I think in all measurable ways you can gauge your success. It's a really good hour of television. Yeah. Just a little more effort with the lyrics next time, please. I think so. I mean, I just, I love this show. I love discovery when it came back because it was doing things that I had never seen Star Trek do and I got to see what Star Trek looked like in a whole new century with a whole new production team and a whole new sensibility. And I think Discovery is great in all sorts of ways, but this because it is developed in the context of us already having Star Trek on television and knowing what that's like, because it doesn't have the production problems that Discovery had, and because it just decided that it could afford to do just a Star Trek show, in a way that Discovery isn't, and Picard isn't in Deep Space 9, is it? It could just afford to do a Star Trek show and do it incredibly well. And it just has nailed it. And the, and the serialisation thing really makes a difference because I don't think you can do that sort of syndication thing that you did back in the 60s and the 90s where these things just happened to people and had no effect on them and were never mentioned again. And so you have characters who things happen to and who have relationships with one another that matter while having a single focussed episode about a space thing that's happening as well at the same time. I think it's perfect. You know, like, and I really am not exaggerating when I think it's probably the best series that the franchise has ever produced. Kind of agree. Um, I, it's not ambitious enough in its storytelling for it to be my favourite because I think I prefer, and I, sometimes I actually like a show that's more flawed than this as well. That's a weird thing to say. But it's, well, I mean, discovery is slightly less interesting to talk about when you're just going, well, this is great. This works. How wonderful. This acting's wonderful. What competent writing this is. I certainly think it's the most confident Star Trek we've ever had and I think it's probably the most likeable Star Trek we've ever had. So that's why I like coming back to this because I think it's effortless to watch and that's just a joy. Like Discovery, Picard. I think they're deeply flawed in many, many ways, but really interesting because of it. Obviously, DS9 will always be my 1st love because I think of that period, that's by a country mile the most ambitious Star Trek. had at that point. And I just love those characters. But I would say in terms of a cast of characters, this is as close as I've got. Oh, maybe lower decks, maybe the 2 of them. It's as close as I've got to sort of loving everybody in different ways the same way I did with the assign. I think the thing that DS9 has that these dome is just more time spent that you can spend with those characters and that's kind of a luxury, you know, and and it means that you can sort of binge that in a way you can't these. You know, you'll do the run of strange new wells eventually in what is it, 46 hours, which is... But it's not a massively long run, but fuck me, it is confident this show. You need to be confident to pull off something like this. You need nuts, you know? And they've got it. They've absolutely got it. Yeah. Bravo, strangely well. All right, it's the end of the episode, and it's time for us to find out where we're going next. This was another excellent choice from you, Joe, which can only be counteracted by a shockingly bad choice from me. And so it's been a while since we've done one of these, but we are about to go back aboard the NXO one for an episode of Star Trek. I had done a musical episode. We could have had a whole song called Archers a Cunt or something like that, couldn't we? Archer's a cow. I prefer asshole. Archers a cunt. Well, that was the theme of the excellent episode, A Night in Sick Bay. All right. I am going to press the button. So it's Star Trek Enterprise, season four, episode 13 United. What does Germa have to say? Jama gives it 3 stars? And it says, a T-OS, it's a bit better than Bam. channelled reasonably through modern trek sensibilities. It was very ambiguous. Uh, is it a 2 parter or something? Story by Manikoto, directed by David Liverston, our favourite. It's about the Romulans. It doesn't actually say, hang on, let me see what's around it. Babel one, the Anar. It might be a standalone. Archer attempts to form an alliance in order to neutralise a threat from a common enemy, but instead finds himself in the middle of a fight to the deaf with Shran. Oh my god, Jeffrey Coombs. Oh, that could be, that could be. Would you like four? season four. Yeah. Yeah. like, well, I'm tempted. I mean, you know, like I don't know. We've still got about 95% of the abysmal series one and 2 to do but I'm prepared to wait. Maybe we could try and do one of those when we're together later in the year, you know? The fact that we're together might sort of make it a more palatable experience. Well, okay, I think that sounds like a possibility. All right, what do you reckon? I think we just do it. United. I mean, it does continue enterprise is unerring ability to have extremely boring episode titles. Well, I'm assuming that it's United, as in United Federation of Planets, is my guess, that, you know, that it's it's kind of foreshadowing that, possibly. Well, I mean, it's for. Uh, it's towards the end of the show, uh, in a mirror darkly was around this time. So we know they can deliver good work at this point. Manikoto is creatively involved in this episode. Let's do it. Yeah, I reckon. We'll do it Oh, good. Now I can talk about this song. So, yeah, yeah. Did you notice that the general shape of the song and the lyrics? It's based on status report. Absolutely is, yes, because I decided I was going to write and sing. my own version of status report with the help of Sihar and Fraser Gregory who sent me in various lyrics that I was going to sort of pipe in. And you know, I won't be too cruel about the people that put subspace Rhapsody together because this is a lot fucking harder than it looks. Yeah, I know, you were fearing. This is exactly what was coming, weren't you? Well, I have to say that I found a karaoke version of Faith of the Heart, and I have several attempts of me, uh, recording myself singing it, attempting, because I was going to use it for the closing credits and stuff from an early enterprise thing. And it's really hard. Like it's really hard and you're kind of super exposed and stuff. It's different. I don't think I realised just how bad my singing was until I heard it back after I sang this song. You know, and obviously the lyrics are a bit awkward because they're written by me. So lyrically, it was a bit challenged already. And then I piped in Sian Fraser and the music and a more horrific dirge. I have never heard. Like, you know, if they'd written a song about Kez and Neelix is you know, jealous love affair or Tom and Balan, you know, love song. It couldn't possibly be any worse, which is why the song landed where it did with the help of an app that can make singing mildly palatable. Yeah, it's just awful. It will never be released. It certainly wouldn't chart. That's for sure. It was really great. I did think it was really good. Although, you know, some of it I was quite proud of. The trivia is memory alphorizing, I thought, was quite a nice line. I like the reference to stock KFC number one. That was my favourite. Unfortunately, being made of Jabalai. in stick instead of stock you notice? So he actually says stick case there. I thought, well, that's very me as well, that even when with help of an app, there's still a massive flaw in there somewhere. But, you know, it turned out all right, I think. In the end. Yeah, I thought it was great. Yeah, no, I thought it was... Thank you for this technology that can do what creative people clearly cannot. Well, some creative people can. But suddenly I learned to appreciate the skill and the effort that went into subspace Rhapsody, even though I have just been, you know, an hour ripping into the lyrics. Well, yeah, yeah. I mean, I think, you know, like I think it was pretty great. And I was kind of surprised by people at work, again, being really enthusiastic about it when I was a bit lukewarm initially and like because I've watched it maybe 5 times in the last 3 weeks or 6 times and I listened to the album a fair bit. You've been indoctrinated now. I think I've been indoctrinated. And just, I just think Celia Song is so magnificent. Celia. But like the incredible thing. What's the actress who plays that song as well? Yeah, amazing. Yeah, yeah. Like, but what happens is, right? After this, we go to hedgemony. So we get the Gorn attacking a planet and like it's a huge giant 2 parter. It's Strange New Worlds is best of both worlds. like almost literally. And it's incredibly good and just incredibly well made. The previous one had flashbacks to the Klingon war, which was really bleak and terrible, and like, you know, had heaps of field medicine in it, and it's possible that Mabenga murders someone in it. And then after that, um, like after part two, like part two, you know, like series 3, episode one, we have a comedy episode with Spock and and a wedding and and all of that sort of thing on Starbase one and then, you know, like the week after that, it's like zombies and ultraviolence and stuff. Like, it does proper gritty Star Trek, of the kind that people who like proper gritty Star Trek like, and it does it in a way where I like it as well, which is pretty awesome. It's just such a varied show, you know. Yeah, I think I think they know they're onto something. I don't think they know that they shouldn't do it forever before it gets stale, which is why they sort of say, you know, this is where we'll stop. Well, you see, I think part of the thing is it's the same thing that happened with Discovery. We had 2 years between hegemony and hedgemony part two. In fact, Celia Rose gross her hair in those 2 years, so she comes back from the cliffhanger with like a big, like a slightly bigger hair. Oh, a ball cap on. Oh, no. We're not a poor cat. But she's holding all of this hair down, which is all there in um in episode two, but it's held down under her little, you know tight, you know, the hairstyle that she has in series one and two. It's like it's she suddenly has a bigger head for the 2nd episode. Yeah, you are gonna lose them eventually. But it's well, that's what happens with discovery. Do you know what I mean? Like discovery runs for longer than any other Star Trek in production and by the end of it, they can't get everyone back. And so here, I think they've decided. I think that what happens is they got an order of 26 episodes and they said, all right, well, that's our, that's our year 34 and five. I think maybe. I know there's things in 5 that you like. Maybe Discovery should have gone out before. Like, you know, on an absolute high with everyone involved. Yeah. Discovery, in a way, was amenable to that a little bit because the cast changed over the time, like part not just when we went into the future, but, you know, people would come and go and stuff, and that was a thing that happened. Sure, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. And, you know, like Bryce leaves and Christopher comes in and and Nan goes and comes back later and stuff and you've got Tilly disappearing for a bit and stuff. And it did make it a little bit more like a little bit more like in the world of Star Trek rather than a Star Trek show where you just have these 7 people and the only people on the ship. I still feel as if you had enough time with all of those people. It's Picard that is the one that irritates me because I just don't think it was if I had enough time with that original set of regulars. That crew. But, but, so, but I don't think Strangely Worlds would manage that. Do you know what I mean? Like Pelia comes, maybe she goes, but I don't think you could lose any of the main characters. No. And it still, isn't it? Yeah. And that is a sign of their success that they've balanced it so perfectly that if you pull one thread. It might feel bad. I mean, we lost Hammer. You know, we lost Hema and that was a, but that was a kind of a shock, a thing they decided to do. Um, He was never going to be in the opening credits until they decided to kill him, I think, at the end of episode nine. DS9's problem was they kept fucking adding guest characters. semi regulars all the time, didn't they? How are we going to end this? Well, I mean, 10 episodes to give everyone their moment. But they are kind of doing that. Like, they've introduced Pelia. introduced in series three. Well, end of series three, they've introduced Scotty. They've introduced a pretty new nurse, like a young guy who's a nurse working alongside Chapel and Wabenga. Um, you know, uh, we've got the 2 Kirks. Like, I think we are going getting more sort of semi-regular characters. It feels and Mitchell, you know. The Academy show looks interesting. again, everyone's very attractive. No, that's female Gemma deal. We were just saying there's no gemma dolls in the future. There's that picture of that female Jem'adar woman now, isn't there? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I think she looks amazing. And apparently she's part Klingon or something and we're going to find out why she's female and stuff. But all of the kids just look ridiculous. That Klingon guy, the Klingon medical student is just as hot as fuck. But, you know, everyone's very attractive. Oh, and it turns out that Holly Hunter's character is part lanthanite, so the same race as Pelia. So she's lived for a long time. So the thing about Peligo is that she, like, everyone was in her classes at the academy, including Scotty, but other characters as well, had had her. It'd be nice to have a new show to jump into as well, wasn't it? Something completely new to talk about again. Yeah, so, um, Tilly's in it, and Teague Nataro's in it, like Jet Reno's in it a bit, and um, and uh, handsome Admiral Vance was in it as well. Robert Picardo. and Robert Picardo. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Bobby P. I wonder what, um, I wonder which, is he the living witness, um EMH? Have you seen that clip of Mulgrew talking about prodigy being cancelled? is so great. Oh my god, I'll send it to you. so great. Because she's she's at a convention and there's people there that made choices and she goes, well, you tell me. Why was this cancelled? She goes, this was vital. absolutely vital television for children. She goes, I'm more importantly, it was really good. She goes, so please tell me what possible explanation you can give as to why this was pulled from the schedules and why another another streaming stuff is had to pick it up. She goes, don't you want children to have good television? Oh my god, I was like, fucking hell. they can't answer her. And the whole thing too was that it was to direct people into Star Trek. It was a thing for kids pitched at kids that was not dumb, that was smart and fun and entertaining and visually... And it was a gayway thing. Sophisticated. and some of the stop being pointed adults. So those 2 pars, we did, were pretty great. Yeah. Yeah, it's a great... Yeah, I love K Ballgrew, man. She's more fun, actually, so often she is, as J. Wayne. Yeah, yeah. Oh, boy. I mean, just put on any convention appearance with her on it, you know. When she talks about how she treated Jerry Ryan. That's just she she just holds herself to account. And she goes, she goes, I was embarrassed. I thought I would be good enough to draw a female draw for everybody. She goes and they brought in this, you know, young, attractive talented, ridiculously talented woman, you know. And she goes, and I was jealous, and perhaps I didn't carry myself as well as I possibly could have. And then Joe Ryan gives her a big hug. Well, I got the last load or turn on the card, you know? They're still both doing it. They're still, they were still doing it. Yeah. Yeah. I hope that's not the only one. So we'll have 20 episodes of Star Trek next year. And the year after, I assume, you know, It does feel like it's winding down a bit, though, doesn't it? From where it was. I don't think that was sort of sustainable long term, was it? The amount they were doing. But it'd be nice to have Star Trek be just a regular going concern. And like that section 31, I would have watched the shit out of that had that gone to a show. Or most of its problems were shoe horning an entire season into like a movie and with minimal effort to make it work as a movie. Um, it would have been fun though. I mean, I hope I hope academy lands. Otherwise, it'll be the rarest of things. It'll be Doctor Who and Star Trek, not on the air. Usually, God, usually. one rises when another falls, you know? Yeah, but it'd be interesting to see.