Hey, Joe. Hi.
So, we're back, and we are back in the 1960s.
It's the 13th of October, 1966.
It's season one, episode 6 of the original series, and it's Muds Women.
Oh, Flower Power.
The colours are day glow and the sex is flowing.
We're in the 60s, baby.
That's right.
So this is incredibly early, and Memory Alpha gives it as episode three.
And it was going to be, like it was one of the candidates for the 2nd pilot, but they go for where no one has gone before instead.
But it's really, really early.
And so there are some things about it that I think are kind of charming, but it's so weird.
Just the charming. sexual politics.
You're mad.
No, I'll get there.
I will get there.
They'll be intimate that I did quite like, but holy crap.
You can tell, can't you?
You can tell because of who is in the wrong colours and Spock doesn't look like Spock.
There's something weird going on with his eyebrows and I ears and hair.
And his performance and his performance.
Yeah.
He looks very amused by all of this, doesn't he?
Which I quite like, actually.
I quite enjoy that.
And of course, it's one of 2 episodes.
I think the other one is where no one has gone before, where the ship is pounded by lithium crystals instead of dilithium crystals.
And a guy as much.
Well, yeah, it's two, I think.
So...
Look, we need to edit this, all right. make it 2 crystals, all right?
Yeah, yeah.
Well, I think it's so it's not a real thing so that it can be a fake, you know, a made-up thing.
But it is, of course, from a world that really no longer exists and...
Yes, yes, and that he's strangely alien.
And of the 2 of us, I am the one whose lifespan actually overlaps very slightly with the run of TOS and I was born just before the last incredibly sexist episode.
Unbelievable time. to me, Nathan.
I mean, look at you.
I refuse to believe you was around when I was so young.
Oh, my God.
But of course, the final episode of Star Trek is turnabout intruder, which is also just kind of lamentably sexist.
This is really, really weird and bad in all sorts of ways.
So creepy.
I was watching the opening scenes just going, I mean, I feel as if I'm really shouldn't be here being voyeuristically watching these men getting extremely turned on just because there are women on the transport.
One of my favourite things, and I think it's in one of the captain's logs is Shatner delivering the line.
These women have a mysterious magnetic effect on the male members.
Oh, no.
Well, I'm here to report they had no effects on my member. whatsoever.
Does he say that?
He literally says it.
It's great.
I have not reached Star Trek at this point.
I think they have to die.
Because the term member, like, is so old.
Like, um, like the Latin phrase, uh, I've seen used in a, like an ancient Greek dictionary.
Like it's called the male member in the in the 1611 translation of the Bible, I think, in Deuteronomy 23, the phrase is used.
It's sad that I should know that, but I do.
I love that you know that.
My God, I've all the facts from the Bible that you know, you know.
But it's so weird.
I mean, it is so weird and it is hard to tell exactly what's being said.
It's you, wouldn't it?
I said, why is this episode trying to tell me?
And then you came back with some very amusing possibilities.
I thought, oh, I was not trying to say that.
I think I have nailed what it is.
I'm trying to say it, I think it is exactly that.
But it is very light on incident, and we've quoted Scott McNulty before that every episode of the original series is about kind of 10 minutes too long. 25 here, maybe.
I mean, this could be an animated series, episode comfortably.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, it could be.
And of course, this is Harry Maud, whom we haven't kind of mentioned so far, and I think he's great, and I can see why they give him a return appearance in the original series in an episode called IMud.
Uh, they get him back, and they do get him back for the animated series.
The same actor, Roger C.
Carmel, and I can't remember what that episode is called.
I hear, Nathan, that all those subsequent TOS episodes.
They managed to somehow get even more sexist as they go along.
This is sort of like the least sexist and it's incredibly sexist indeed.
No one can hold a candle to the discovery mud though, who is just amazingly good.
Yeah, so that's Rain Wilson.
And but you can see that what they're trying to do in discovery, and it's very early on in discovery, it's discovery series one.
They get him back.
He gets a couple of episodes because he's initially encountered like in prison, imprisoned by Lorell, you know, Vokes, Klingon girlfriend.
And so we meet him, and then, of course, he comes on board Discovery and is in magic to make the sanest man go mad.
And he leaves, remember, with that woman who he's engaged to.
Oh, it's so funny.
The tables have turned.
It's a very, very camp, weirdly 60s kind of Star Trek ending.
And it is Discovery, just doing what we now know Kurtzman Trek will go on to do over and over again, which is to take those sort of weird and marginal and unloved parts of Star Trek and reclaim them.
Like make sure that we know their canon and and show them some love. you remember?
You remember the discovery crew, I've never been in a TOS episode before, and that last scene, they just all look so baffled as to what's going on when that harridan comes along and drags him away, and they're all sort of going, what are we in now?
What's happening?
Normally we're a lot more serious than this.
It's very, very fat.
There is a difference, though, right?
Mud in discovery doesn't come along like an Austin Powers villain with a load of evil women with machine gun jubblings like he does in this.
Yeah, boy, yeah, boy.
Yeah.
But I mean, I do think he's kind of charming.
And I do think that there is something interesting about introducing that character to your futuristic space show, where he is dressed kind of like a pantomime pirate and he's got the earring and the, you know, the waxed moustache and all of that sort of thing, like he's got this really kind of fun comedy.
Yeah, pantomime look to him.
And I like that, you know, like, I think that is...
I say something outrageous.
What's that?
I mean, literally outrageous.
I think I'd prefer the outrageous O'Connor, you know.
Like, I mean, he's all of that, but really hot as well.
Yeah, and I think the outrageous O'Connor is trying to do the same thing. that Mud is doing, which is why he gets the episode title.
So outrageous O'Connor is in TNG season two.
And then, of course, he appears in an episode of Lower Decks and in an episode...
Is he still seducing women, left, right centre, because he's so hot.
We don't really get to see him all that closely.
He is just mentioned.
I think it's in an embarrassment of duplers that he gets mentioned.
And I think he's DJing at a party or something like that.
And he does appear in prodigy as well.
He so hot, Nathan.
He makes Terry Hutcher.
Get a sweat on in the ARH O'Connor.
But you're right.
The idea of this sort of like camp silly pirate, it's a really fun idea.
It's certainly a very TOS idea to have big eccentric characters come along.
I just don't need the women.
And this is called Muds Women.
And unfortunately, when it comes with a load of women, which brings with it a ton of misogyny, I'm like, well, I don't know if the trade-off's worth it then for this crazy character.
And and so it is trying to say something about this.
And so, you know, they're the cargo, they're identified as his cargo, as if he's trafficking them.
And it's made clear that they are coming along willingly because they want men and they come from places where there are no available men and so he's going to get them rich husbands.
And so, like, they're not being trafficked so much.
Imagine that.
A world where there's no men.
Oh, Nathan. sounds terrible.
But, you know, when TNG goes back to this well for age one.
Oh, God.
No, not Angel one, what's the one with Famka Jansen in it?
Oh, the perfect May?
The perfect maid, which I think is worse, you know, in a way than this, because, well, it does do the same thing where she's being trafficked and she's going to be handed over to a man whom she doesn't love as a wife, like as a consort, but she's really in love with Picard.
And we hint.
There's hints of this with Eve.
Do you know what I mean?
That she's in love with Kirk. but she settles instead for what's his face?
fellow in the car.
I remember his name.
Yeah, the fella in the car.
I don't know the dishes, love.
Go on.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
But she gets a more satisfactory ending.
I do actually think the ending where Eve ends up with a guy in the cave is actually kind of a happy ending and it is a little bit more sensible and realistic and down to earth than the sort of huge comedy nonsense that we've had for the rest of it.
And when I say comedy nonsense, this isn't particularly funny.
Oh, there are no jokes in this.
No.
Everyone's acting as if there are jokes in this.
Everyone saw looking a bit wryly amused by the whole thing, but there are no witty lions.
No, which is a which is a shame.
Because they can do comedy, right?
We've seen great comedies in TOS.
But this is so early.
Do you know what I mean?
It's so early.
They're still finding their feet.
They don't know what they're doing.
And can I also say that this is Gene Roddenbury's story.
Oh, fuck.
Well, we all doomed then. aren't we?
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
He was responsible for Angel one as well, remember?
Yeah.
So he doesn't write the script, but he gives very detailed notes and he gets a story credit for it.
And so it's the usual horny Roddenbury staff, which we get acquainted with again in season one of TNG.
Well, I got the same ick from this as I do with Sleazebag, Julian Bashir in season one of DS9, where he's trying to fuck everybody around him, but also romance Dax at the same time.
The same sort of ick I get from Neelix having sex with a two-year-old.
You know what I mean?
somewhere weaved into Star Trek.
There's this level of sort of absurdest, icky sexuality.
Yeah, where I wish I just hadn't gone there at all.
Like, they can be sexy, Star Trek.
I mean, Kursman Trek can be incredibly sexy, boy, or boy.
You have me been fanning ourselves down at some points.
Boy, these were rocky lessons to learn, weren't they, along the way?
And, I mean, we'll get there.
I mean, that bit on the transporter pad, I was just like, oh, I'm in trouble here. where I endured 2 minutes of close-ups on Deforest Kelly drooling and these women, and you know what?
I love.
I love powerful women in Star Trek, yeah?
Kira, Dax, some of those fabulous women in Kurtzman Trek, half of the cast, strange New Worlds.
I love powerful women.
These women display nothing at all.
They're just pretty.
They don't do anything else.
They're not clever.
Do you know what I mean?
They're not funny.
They're not strategious.
They're not scientists.
They do nothing but stand there and be pretty.
I don't know what the appeal is.
I have to say, though, that I do actually like where Eve ends up, and I think there are some, there are some good moments with her.
She's significantly older than the other cast, like they're in, you know, 20 and so on and she's 35.
She's not that old, but she is a bit older than them.
And I think she gives a reasonably good performance.
But, but it is in the context of a lot of like absurd camp nonsense and as well as some sort of fairly good sensible scenes at the end.
We do get her hysterical in this sort of sequined dress, you know, going through that stupid planet set, which we see now for the 1st time, I think.
Well, the whole, the moral bit where he goes in and goes, oh, no, you weren't given the medicine.
You were given flavoured gummies, you know.
The real beauty liars within.
I was like, oh, fuck off.
Fuck off.
Yeah.
Jesus, God, I don't think that's the proper moral bit, but I do think that there's...
Get in the kitchen.
Go do me ironing.
That's the moral.
But I think that I was perhaps trying to put that in the worst way possible.
And I do think there is a way of squinting and actually kind of thinking that there is an attempt to say something good here, given the kind of era that this turns up in.
And I don't want to forgive this because, you know, there are women who knew this was awful.
There was feminism around at the time.
This was not the only attitude to women that was available.
It's the one that they chose and it was a bad choice.
What year are we now?
What year is this?
66.
So we've had Barbara Wright and Doctor Who already.
Who could, you know, fall into the traps of the perils of Pauline, but could also be fiercely smart, you know, and drive stories and be our moral force and all this stuff.
I've refused to make excuses for Star Trek, you know.
No, no, no.
I don't think you need to.
And it is, you know, Star Trek is less progressive than we like to claim it is and less progressive at times.
Don't you think with you?
I think people that love this stuff go, well, it was the 60s.
They're like, oh, shit.
Let's call it now.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
It's unfortunate, I think.
And I'm glad that sort of this is the thing that Star Trek is largely over.
Don't get me started on those misty filters.
Oh, yeah, well, that's that is the era, though.
I mean, that's the most sexist thing of all.
No, we can't have them in sharp HD.
No, good grief. for her to make her pretty.
God's sake. think we should go in.
I mean, it's been a few weeks, so I'm so delighted to talk Star Trek again.
Let's do it.
Let's do it. count us in.
Five, four, three, two, one, and we're off.
Little tiny enterprise.
There they go.
Stargate, 13, 2, 8.9 for the...
I have no idea what that means.
And so again, you know, this is, because this is like episode 3 or it's really early, we do get that sort of, just the fun space business that I don't mind.
Oh, my God.
This was probably the funnest part of the episode where they're doing.
Well, it's not like a dog fight, but they are pursuing him, aren't they?
And he's sort of his spaceships all over the place.
Yeah, I mean, I don't know what it originally looked like and we're obviously looking at the HD version, but it is fun and they're sort of chasing things.
This guy, poor old Farrell is pretty unfortunate looking, isn't he?
Well, and I'm so pleased they put in Shell in the red, because that's saggy costume she's in in this.
I mean, how could you make Nichelle not look pretty?
Come on.
Oh, maybe they put her in this because the girls are coming, you know, come on, we want to focus on the girls this week.
There had been a long conversation with her, I think, between Mud and her that was Cunt, or not ever filmed, but that never made it to the final episode, and I think that the script writer had kind of liked it.
You remember how there was all the complaints about Spock in the 1st time he appeared to say he was too demonic looking?
It does look demonic.
Look at him, all of his... else and everything.
I pointed him out like the devil.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
They tone that down a little bit, don't they?
But I actually do like, and I do think that his level of amusement, he seems younger and he seems less serious and less sombre.
It's more Nemo than Spock, isn't it?
Yeah, and it's kind of nice.
And I do like, like, I like his reaction to what dickheads all of the other men are being is actually quite fun to watch.
I think He summarises the episode beautifully at the end, you know, but we'll get there.
Yeah, yeah, that's right.
You know, I don't think we have enough of big red lights coming out of consoles like that.
That's awesome.
I hope there's one on the Bridge of the Enterprise in Strangely World.
There must be.
Oh, here's the bit I always skip usually.
I just don't like the TOS theme.
All that stuff.
No, it's great.
George, do you always watch the theme tunes?
Yeah, oh, yeah, absolutely.
I've never skipped the opening credits.
I love the opening credits every time.
DS9 balls me a bit after a while, you know?
Yeah, that is a bit boring.
But like I've got something to sing along to with Enterprise.
I think my favourite.
The Kurtzman ones, you know, the music is beautiful, always, you know, you know, Russell Watson, CD the other day, right?
And I was like, please God.
Because he sung that enterprise theme, didn't he?
Russell Watson.
I thought, please God let this be a track on it.
I listened to the whole fucking thing and he didn't turn up once.
He wasn't on it.
Mike wasn't even aware that this was the guy from NTL.
I'm surprised you've stuck around to listen to this.
I was like, well, you know, I like to take an interest for something.
Okay.
Have they added the rocks?
Were they there originally, these sort of asteroids?
Well, the dialogue has asteroids and stuff.
So I'm guessing, yes.
Okay, my words, the lights are going down.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
See, all of this is exciting stuff and it's all kind of happening for the 1st time and now we're getting our lithium crystals, apparently, going to hell.
Oh, there's a big red light on that communications panel too.
I mean, until they come in, the ladies, mud swim in.
I mean, this is just a normal Star Trek episode.
It's when they turn up.
That's where things take a dive.
Unless you're, you know, an incredibly misogynistic straight man and then you're probably just going, war, this is where it's picked up.
Well, we get we do get Harry doing a terrible Irish accent.
Yeah, um, column, I, but look at him appearing.
I love that shirt.
And the giant belt as well.
It's pretty great.
He looks like he's come straight out of a comic strip, doesn't he?
Oh, like a poverty western.
Yeah.
But don't you think Panto?
Like he's got the big pirate thing.
He's got the big belt, you know, the earring.
But there's no amusement on McCoy's face that, oh, you wait till these women beam in, all right?
Yeah.
But I think he's charming.
Like, I really quite like him and uh, I actually...
He's got sort of sparkling always.
Yeah, yeah.
And it is that that Star Trek thing where you have someone who's a little bit chill, uh, surrounded by these sort of um, stiff military people.
Why does he have a look at McCoy on his neck?
He's a really hairy man.
Well, yeah, clearly, but I've never known a man have hair on their neck like that.
Oh yeah.
Have you?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Oh, yeah.
Tell me about it sometimes.
Yeah, I think you have to kind of decide.
If you're sort of particularly hairy.
I think you have to make a decision about the line of your beard in the line, if you're the kind of neck hair, and he makes a choice that fortunately I don't have to make.
No, normally, if I go.
But, um, he, uh, nevertheless, uh, makes a, uh, a bold decision.
Well, his car, you know, the ladies about...
Yeah, beamed across in time.
Who knows?
But the ship's just been blown up, so we better hope so.
Otherwise there's no episode.
Well, again, this is the 1st time this has happened.
How many times has it happened that the ship's blown up and it's kind of like, have we got them off?
Did we get them off and then we get them off and there you are.
It's the 1st one of these.
Look, the woman behind's touching herself up.
The woman to the side there's got her hands on her rips like she's on a catwalk.
I mean, no one beams in like that, do they?
Actually McCoy looks really funny.
Oh, here's the fuzzy, here's the fuzzy ankles.
Oh, no.
And this goes on forever.
It reminds me of the sequence in Rocky Horror, where it's like, Dr. Scott, Janet Brad, where you just get cut into all the faces, because you just, they just react to these women for a long time.
But and like everyone in the bridge is still having a sensible Star Trek episode because they're not aware of what's happened in the transporter room.
I mean, what's going on with Scotty there?
He looks like he's had bloody morphine pumped into him.
I, my favourite thing.
He comes up with a really funny line.
So, uh, um, What, it might be, it might be a bit later.
But...
But someone asks McCoy a question.
Oh, that fella sounded a might upset, didn't he?
And his reply is yes, yes, they are.
I mean, swimming, beautiful.
He looks like a serial killer right now, McCoy.
It's so lety.
That's D. Like, that's not McCoy.
We're not telling you what actors are in there.
Just go in the room and act normal, right?
I mean, has he never seen a what?
I've heard.
McCoy was a womaniser.
Didn't you hear Dax in trials and tribulation?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
But remember, these women are taking the Venus drug, which makes men fall for them.
So they're basically taking a space love potion, right?
All the time.
Right, but I mean, the blonde one there, yeah.
I mean, look at the way they're walking.
Wiggling.
Look at their bums.
Yeah, yeah, awesome.
And she just hasn't taken her hand off her hip.
She belongs on a catwalk.
Women do not walk around like this.
No, but when they have, it's the 1960s and they have the Venus drug.
Look at the way that she's fondling with that, fondling the control, Magda in the back there, has her hand on everyone has her hand on that.
Well, she's grabbing it like she wants to grab Spock's cock because she's looking right.
I am, you know, look how I can grab hold of this.
So doesn't doesn't Mud say to Spock, you're a volcanian, aren't you?
A volcanian.
Have they not decided on volcania then?
They haven't decided on Falconers, the damning him yet.
And I don't think that's the only time he gets called a volcanian either early on.
I will say actually, there was a number of very pretty red shirts in this episode, I noticed.
They're all sort of Latino.
They're slack jawed at them?
Yes, yeah.
There are actually some pretty men.
I did notice that too.
I have respect for them, all right?
I just had a sniffy.
I didn't give them weird looks.
No, you were drooling like Deforest Kelly.
It's like absolutely a witch.
Kirk's great.
I think, you know, this is Shatner, just being so great.
And he's not overplaying it.
He's trying to rate himself in.
Hello, lady.
It's like...
He went, no, captain, this is me Cargore.
Thank God he drops that accent.
We're doing a cartoon.
What is happening here?
Well, yes, I think we are.
And this is them exploring what Star Trek is going to be.
It's always a bit... not after this.
But they do go here.
And this is a thing.
Yeah, look, look at Spock smiling.
Oh my god, he just went...
I don't know.
Yeah, it was great.
But that was the line.
You just missed because the VOO, like the voiceover was him giving the captain's log where he talked about the male members of his crew.
Oh please.
Her lace.
Why has Kirk got sort of African art on his shelf?
Do you know what I really like is that his desk has a wooden veneer on it?
And so, like, it is very 60s and properly stylish, I think.
Like that's very modernist and very stylish.
I mean, you got to love Shatner trying to navigate this episode as if he's playing a drama.
Yeah, he's surrounded by it.
Oh, well, he's amused by the madness.
Look at that red shirt there.
Actually, I am being like D, aren't I?
Look at the Shatner reaction. at the end of the scene.
Now, what the hell are these coloured cards that they put inside the console?
Are they giant isolinear chips?
Oh, is that what they are?
Well done.
Well, maybe, I don't know.
Yeah, yeah, that's what I'm calling it.
God, this guy looks rough.
God, look, he's like, I feel like something grabbing hold of me.
Excuse me.
I mean, maybe they could have gone it all out and made this like a farce and um, like full of double entendres.
Yeah, yeah, again, I think they're kind of trying to work out where they can pitch it because there's a reasonably serious B plot.
It's not really a B plot.
But, you know, the thing about the lithium crystals and the damage that the ship has suffered rescuing Maud.
Um, uh, you know, that's all sort of played fairly straight and it gives us a reason to go and meet the, the, Yeah, look at those.
Never mind the ladies.
Look at this enormous Christmas bauble earring.
He's wearing it.
I love it.
I really like it.
I like a confident man, you know. who just doesn't care how ridiculous he looks.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
And again, you know, that space pirate thing is the thing that Star Trek goes back to.
Like we loved it in the serene squall with Angel and with that the big Orion pirate who used to cook for everyone.
I mean he's not going to be sweeping that hair back for too much longer, is he?
No.
Well, that's it.
All his hairs on his back.
Well, he's got that fabulous circusmaster's moustache.
You know, that goes around.
It's really good, isn't it?
It's a fun, like it's just a fun look.
It's not sort of super space serious.
I mean, I guess, you know, the primary colours of the uniforms and stuff.
This isn't sort of super serious military thing.
But it is staking out the ground that Star Trek can occupy, it can do the doomsday machine, and it can do this, you know.
The trouble here is, it wants to do the sort of wacky with the ladies, but it also wants to tell something of a tragedy that they get old and need to take this medicine to be pretty, and it wants to do the sort of on the planet adventure when we go down there as well.
And all of it just rubs shoulders a bit awkwardly.
I think the, that making them look ugly without the medication is a mistake.
Like, I think that it, because, um, and I think it's just there because the visual is striking, you know, like it's a striking. that conclusion they draw that they can just be pressure.
They end up not having it.
And because the whole lesson that we learn is it was just giving them confidence.
Do you know what I mean?
If they looked mousier, if they just look normal rather than, you know, like supermodels pouting supermodels or whatever, if they just look normal without it.
And so you might not notice it. covered in latex.
Actually, I thought the ageing makeup was pretty good in it, actually, especially compared to TNG series one.
Oh yeah, Jesus.
But, but it was a mistake.
Like, it doesn't really work in the story.
Well, not when that's the payoff.
You know, no.
You didn't need the gummies at all.
No, that's right.
Just think you're pretty.
I mean, yeah, yeah.
They could have learned from mud.
I mean, look at the fucking state of him, but he thinks he's the sexiest man in the room.
He is the sexiest man in the room, though.
You know what I mean?
Confidence is sexy.
You know?
And Spock is great.
Because Spot knows he's the most competent man in the room, you know, behaves that way.
Yeah.
Yeah, Shatner's pretty sexy at this point too, isn't he?
But, um, yeah, like muds, just sort of gray.
Smuggling.
Sentence, suspended.
Well, there we go.
We know he's a rotter now.
He's got a police fire on himself.
Hang on, what else does it say?
Purchase of stolen goods, counterfeit money?
my god.
Yep.
Yeah.
He bought a spaceship with counterfeit money.
All of that stuff's in the dialogue as well.
And then he was recommended for psychological treatment because it's the future and we don't imprison people, I guess.
Um, you know.
Yeah, I want a little description of him at the end there as well.
I like the fact he saw scratching his head go, well, this is a bit awkward, but yes, I did do all those things.
I will be dropping the accent now.
What?
My tiny little ship in this immense galaxy, he says.
You are a rotter, Harry Marden.
I know you'll be back to dog our footsteps throughout the seasons.
With that smile.
That just enthusiastic smile. he's great.
He's sort of, I know he's a godlike being.
But I suppose it's Q the same sort of thing as well?
Very charismatic, naughty sort of man that comes in and causes mischief.
Yeah, I think so.
Who's our equivalent over on DS9 then?
We don't really have one, do we?
No, but DS9, the crew are a bit less stiff generally.
Do you know what I mean?
They're a little bit more relaxed.
It's cork.
Eastern mischief is one over there. in that score.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
We had Cesca for a little while on Voyager, but for whatever recently got rid of her.
Yes, madness.
I recruit wives for settlers.
I mean, but that's got to have been a thing.
Do you know what I mean?
That's got to have been a real thing because you think about men who work on lighthouses or oil rigs or we have this terrible show in Australia.
I don't know if you have anything similar called The Farmer Wants a Wife.
And it's just like, farmers and they bring wives out to them and it's like a love island or whatever.
Do you know what I mean?
But it's like these bogan farmers who live...
Sometimes they're tired of hot.
Yeah, they get a farmer.
Yeah, I know.
Is it a hot farmer?
I mean, telly generally is, right?
Sometimes, but yeah, I've seen an episode this season and no one struck me as particularly hard.
I mean, that's not pretend that in areas of the world right now that women are shipped out against their will to be wives for men.
And and like these these women are not doing it against their will, which doesn't mean that it's fair or it's okay.
Do you know what I mean?
But they want husbands and they want wealthy husbands and do you know what I mean?
We can critique the society that makes that the case.
But he's not trafficking them as such.
Like, he's overstating that they're his cargo.
But the show does come down on the side of him being in the wrong.
Yeah?
So all of this stuff is bad.
Christ, they're just shooting through like whole...
Atmospheric conditions every time we get a close-up on the ladies.
It's very strange. all the way through Star Trek.
But it does happen in 60s TV, a beard.
Really?
Well, other 60s shows. the purpose of it.
To make them look soft, yeah, softer, yeah.
I don't know.
I mean, in Kurtzman, they're also pretty.
You want them in sharpest HD possible.
Exactly.
And, and you know, this one who plays Eve, Karen Steele, um, like she's beautiful, but she doesn't, she looks, she reads to me as older than 35.
And I don't know whether it's when I watch 60s TV and I see these adults.
I always think, oh well, they're just older than me.
Whereas, you know, I imagined that I'm actually older than everyone in this room. you know, but like when I watch that TV from this time, I just think everyone's older than me, but I do think she reads is older than 35.
Yeah, don't.
Well, especially when they put the makeup on it.
But yes, yes, definitely.
I mean, if anyone needed a misty filter, there was a working great close-up in HD there of Shatner covered in makeup and sweating his head off.
I was like, please, get the mist going on him.
We don't want to look at that.
No, he's kind of hard.
Just to put the put the mist over poor old Farrell, I think.
He does like a bit of slap shat, doesn't he?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. he does Spock again. sort of grinning across the table about all of this.
Yeah.
Yeah, but I actually like it.
I think like the rye that sort of rye spock thing is actually quite fun.
You just know, don't you, that there's a novel out there, a John Peel one, probably, where the reason that Spock stopped finding everything amusing.
Now I don't know, there's some great cloud that they went through that gave him personality issues or something like that, you know, explaining it all away.
We remember the big smile that he does in those old scientists that Boimler is so shocked by.
Oh, no, he plays it really.
What's the actor's name?
Ethan.
He plays.
I mean, he manages to tow that line between being sort of cold and logical and really sexy and rily amused.
And ridiculous at times too.
I mean, I even got him singing and I was still seeing Spock, you know?
They, I mean, they, Strangely Worlds get to make Spock a bit ridiculous in a way that the TOS doesn't often do, I think.
Sometimes, but brain, you know.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
They just made everyone really...
Embarrassingly ridiculous.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, now, we don't know how orbit works, because my understanding is that it would take, like, why the orbit decays so rapidly when the sky above our head is covered in, you know, surrounded by is full of things that are orbiting around the earth for years on end, you know, but anyway, whatever.
I mean, look at the love, she looks like a serial killer now coming to kill McCoy.
Did you see her?
sparkle in her eyes.
I'm gonna eat you up.
McCoy is, um, yeah, yeah, get out.
Conners, are you finished looking at her arse on the way out the door?
I mean please.
Has no one had a wank on this ship for a while?
I mean, what's wrong?
Well, that's it.
Like that horny thing, like that's a rod and bree thing, you know, um, and the fact that everyone on the ship is single and that they're all kind of giant hornbags.
And, like, admittedly, there's a, there's a, um, a, a love potion involved here, which is, is causing it.
I mean, I do like I like the idea that when they sort of come into port around a planet, that they've been to before, and the men will go to lock up the daughters quick.
The Enterprise crew are coming, all right?
Yeah, they're all really horny.
No, you're right.
But then even that, the sort of magic spell. that women have over.
I mean, Jesus, that story's been told for 1000s of years, isn't it?
Mud does say that when men take the Venus peel there, it makes them hotter as well.
Or mustier, as you say, it's all.
He says muscular, actually, yeah. makes them look more muscular.
My God.
We would have enjoyed it then, wouldn't we?
Yeah.
Give it to some of those red shirts. just the wrong podcast to be talking about this episode. being very mean to our straight friends.
I'm wondering if, like, our scant straight friends that we have.
They would be watching this going, you know, what a wonderful piece of drama this is.
I don't think so.
But then as well, if it is a magic, you know, a sort of seductive magic spell, a glamour, yeah.
Well, then it's not really telling us anything about the characters, is it?
No, no, but it is like it...
What is being offered to these men are hot women.
And, you know, these rich men and they've, you know, the guy Childress, I think his name is, the Ben from the cave or whatever, like he, he, um, he wants a hot woman and he thinks he deserves a hot woman because he's a very rich man.
But what he discovers instead is that it's better to have a woman who will be his companion, who will live with him.
And I know it's all expressed in terms of doing the cooking and cleaning the house and stuff, which is. pay you by doing a few chores, you know.
Thank you very much.
But, but there is something, you know, because what happens, the way the episode ends is with the 2 of them sitting down and they have to have a talk about what their relationship's going to be.
And I think that that's a good grown up, kind of grown up ending.
And the Eve as a character becomes more human and likeable when she, you know, just she's cooking him dinner and she, she, he wakes up and they have a talk and he's horrible to her and and she kind of snipes back at him and stuff.
But it is just a little bit more, like he's not having a relationship with a sex fantasy.
He's having a relationship with a woman who has opinions and ideas and stuff like that.
And so, like, I think it is trying to go somewhere good.
It's all the trappings, though, and it's yeah, where the emphasis is.
And when you read between the lines of all the, but as well, there is a moment where he grabs hold of her and then when they come in, he goes, well, I didn't hurt her.
And I was like, no, no, you look like you was about to hurt her.
Oh, no, I think he says I didn't touch her and I think it's about sex.
I think he's saying I didn't have sex with her.
Oh, I've read it a sort because it's in a very fraught moment.
I thought he was talking about pilots.
Oh, yeah.
But I think I think that that's what that's about.
What my favourite moment there we just missed, which is Shatner calling her Miss McCurean.
Do you know what I mean?
As he's trying to kind of fight off the effect of the drug or whatever, and he's very formal and sort of serious and respectful as well.
Like calling her Miss McCurean, I think, is great.
That bit there, right?
That bit where the camera followed behind the blonde one in the purple, whatever her name is.
I think she's Magda.
I think the camera because it's sort of handheld going behind her.
It's supposed to be sort of sinister.
She's almost like a bit of a predator walking around the enterprise, right?
And then the man sort of looks nervous at the door and moves aside.
It reminds me of the scenes in that dismal episode of Enterprise where Jolene is on Pompha. and she's going around the ship trying to fuck everybody.
And I don't like it when they turn women into sexual predators because I feel that's a very masculine take on women.
I'm like, don't remember them, you know?
Like, but remember that's the 1st broadcast episode of Star Trek, the man trap, which is exactly that, the salt vampire that, you know, the monster that wants to have sex with men, but will turn them into desiccated husks.
You know, that's the same thing and that's the central, you know, conceit of that episode.
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, I agree.
But it's not confined to this.
If we get to Enterprise, we should know better.
They're still doing it.
You see her then?
Eve going, oh, you know, I don't like you and I don't like myself much either.
I was like, oh, please.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, but, I mean, what she doesn't like is, uh, you know, like, a competent, you know, somewhat subjugated, but like a competent, you know, like a woman who is being treated like a person, which is where we end up.
I was pleased, you know, that we ended up on a planet in a minute.
I mean, even though it is just standard sort of jabber like, Um, I think it's, is it the 1st Jabalite planet?
where no one has gone before, has a planet, doesn't it?
We do end up on a planet, but it's not this set.
I think this might be the 1st time this planet, didn't it?
I know it was unaired, but without, you know, yeah, yeah.
Was that called?
The cage.
Yeah.
And and when no one has gone before, we end up on a planet, remember, at the very end of that, what I think is the last time that we have, don't we now?
Like, it's the Jabalite from now on.
I think that's the set.
The Jabelite said that, you know, what was the last one we did?
The Savage curtain.
Yeah, mad.
Wait, get up there. jumped down with a big boulder.
Do you think I'm serious free, Freiberg?
how do we shoot this thing?
Wait one sec.
For the 1st time, we get McCoy saying, I don't know what these people are. are they some kind of alien illusion, and all I could think of was Mariner burning through all of those different theories about her. could possibly have a girlfriend.
And here it is in episode 3 or 4 or 6 or wherever we are really, really early on where McCoy has its a stupid science fiction explanation for what's going on.
I mean, we'll give them a pass there that he doesn't go through the whole lot like she does because they're not knowing at this point.
They're still creating the show, but...
Exactly.
It's hor effort, McCoy, all right?
It was a good guess.
Okay, here we go now, an orbit of this very brown looking planet. very alluring, does it?
No, and it's not.
I mean, that's the point, isn't it?
You know, like it's dusty and horrible and distant and that's what the women will be signing up for.
Are they men paying a lot for this?
These beautiful ladies, yeah, the farmers down there.
A lot of lithium crystals.
Oh, look, I couldn't help but notice, you know, that, oh, gosh.
I mean, that is horrible makeup on her face, isn't it?
Yeah, yeah, see, that just makes no sense because that's where we end up.
You know, we end up there, you know.
But it is arresting.
Like, I think it, that's why that's right, isn't it?
I think I've said before, my very, very 1st memory of Star Trek was being told by someone's older brother or something like that or the, uh, uh, yeah, like an older brother or someone, not my older brother, I don't have one, but someone's older brother that it would give me nightmares that it would be scary.
And remember that Star Trek.
He's frequently very scary and it's that sort of visual that makes it scary for a kid, but I think it doesn't work in the context of the where we end up and what the story's trying to say.
Do you remember that fabulously terrible episode where Marina touched rocks with Alcar and became the sort of evil dominatrix, yeah?
And the people. when she sort of came to the transporter room and she was older.
I mean, she looked like she'd grown a 2nd head.
She had so much latex or whatever.
How are they unlearned lessons because that's quite subtle in comparison.
Well, I think I think probably, I think probably it's just Ruth, who has the worst ageing makeup and everyone else's is a bit more subtle.
Um, but what the story needs to do is make them mousy.
And in fact, the dialogue later when Ben sees her without, you know, and she's not taking the Venus peel, which she already doesn't like.
She's reluctant to.
Like Ruth and Magda both want to take it.
I mean, we're literally watching them take drugs here.
I mean, they're taking drugs and then sort of stroking themselves, going, oh.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, but she's doing it reluctantly because she doesn't want to be this.
She does, she's better than this.
I think.
She doesn't just want to be a trophy wife.
She doesn't, she's not just here to look beautiful.
She just needs more tool than that.
She's beautiful anyway.
Yeah, but so for the script to work, they have to be mousy and unremarkable looking when the drug wears off rather than, you know, hideous and covered in latex.
I like the fact that the medicine globes like that.
Did you see it?
It does make mud seem a bit of a creep, though, in this scene, doesn't it?
Whereas he was just fun before.
Yeah, that's right.
And in discovery, to be fair, um, uh, which is set before this, isn't it?
Uh, he does kill Captain Locker and stuff a bunch of times.
Like he does kill him.
Man, I'm a Beatle.
Mud was sexy as hell, man.
The way he strutted in and just started murdering everybody.
I couldn't have loved him more.
Rain Wilson, of course, from the office, the American office.
Incredible.
I mean, charisma personified.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
He's really good casting.
Do you know what I mean?
Exactly the right person to play mud. tried to capture the lightning in a bottle again with the fella at the start of Starfleet Academy, and it was good, but it wasn't quite as good as mud in Discovery.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Well, Paul Gemati, who gets quite, you know, like a number of, he's in a couple of episodes across that season, and I think he is very good, and he is a pretty solid actor.
And he's a get in the way that Holly Hunter is a get.
And in fact, the 2 of them against one another are pretty good because they're both, you know, really kind of solid ankles. none of them can hold a candle to the outrageous O'Connor.
He beams on the enterprise and he doesn't want to take over.
He don't want to kill anyone.
It just beams on and immediately just thinks, I'm going to fuck every woman on this ship.
I mean, look at me.
I'm gorgeous.
Harry Harch is here.
He's getting off of the woman in the transporter bag within 30 seconds.
So this guy, um, Ben, um, is in a season one episode of TNG. which one He is in the episode 11001 with the Binars and Minuet.
He's not a biner, is he?
No, no, no. too tall for that.
He's a Starfleet officer.
Okay.
Yeah.
He said, all the classics, Ashen, that is a pretty great episode.
I love.
That's actually a one.
Yeah, yeah, me too.
Yeah.
I love how they're sort of dressed like frontiers, farmers.
He's got sort of like a leather waistcoat on and jeans, doesn't he?
Yeah, and again, do you know what I mean?
There's something a bit pantoed.
Like it's not a particularly space outfit?
You know, it is like they're dirt farmers from somewhere horrible in the centre of the United States.
I don't know if you'll notice it.
Every now and again.
Oh, I love that shot on the surface with the little domes on it.
I'm seeing scratches on the film.
On my version, which is on Paramount Plus, which is the HD version.
Yeah, okay.
Oh, yeah, no, occasionally.
I think I know what you mean.
Just a little fleck of dust or something that hasn't been eliminated in the...
Look at the atmosphere. conditions here.
Yes, well, we will see Eve kind of, you know, stumbling hysterically through those atmospheric conditions.
Nothing, Nathan, pleases me more than 60s design.
I mean, look at that dome.
With the antennae on the top spinning around, and it's a live prop.
And then we can't straight from the dome to Magda's breasts.
Yes.
Stock cave set number one, I believe.
The 1st one.
Yeah.
I think it might be the 1st.
I can finally say it to you.
Oh, look, I like how they've got little windows hollowed out in the rock.
Look.
Yeah.
I think that's a pretty great set, you know.
Yeah, well, what lived there, though, would you?
No, well, Eve's a good cook.
Yeah, like, I don't know.
She wants a smart, intelligent man, not some farmer in a hole in the wall.
Come on.
No, I think she wants someone who will trade her well and will, you know, look after her, and he is kind of horrible to her initially, and that doesn't bode very well, but that does seem to be where the episode wants us to end up.
We're not gonna provide an alternative perspective here.
I realise I'm in 2026.
Um, but like, why can't Eve just want like some agency of her own and to go out and have a life of her own?
without a man?
No, that is unthinkable, isn't it?
In the 60s.
Yeah.
But, you know, it's unthinkable for the men to not have women either. and that's the other thing.
Like the men here by themselves.
There's a moment that I just think is absolutely adorable where, um, where Ben says to her, oh, yeah, you think you're going to win me over because you're, you know, making me female food and it's, you know, I can cook for myself.
I don't need you.
And then he tastes the food.
He goes, oh, that's so much nice.
That's bit like your home situation, isn't it?
Yeah, that's right.
Well, my husband's away and I'm just living.
Oh, fucking pig, you say.
Do you know, Ashley, what you said there about is unthinkable for men to not have women, women as well.
My nan divorced my grandad in the late 60s and the stigma she faced when that happened where she was a woman who was married and now single, look bringing up children.
I mean, I was learning about that in the mid to late 80s and I just couldn't believe it.
Yeah.
Oh, look, and his men being absolute dickheads and the girls love that, and she's kind of like, you guys are just awful.
I hate all of you.
I've got to say that one thing.
Why don't you just run a raffle and the loser gets me?
Yeah, yeah.
But that's it because she's not a supermodel and she's not like laughing while the men are beating the shit out of each other because they're horrible men from the 1960s.
Yes, I thought was so funny.
I was watching her, the elements attacking her and then Kurt...
It's so great. and her wig is going crazy. like a vision of hell, though, right?
Where Kirk's screaming like at him.
Eve.
But she's wearing a sequined dress. you know what I mean?
Like, it's so cab.
It's just correct.
Oh, Nathan.
A pink sequin drink.
Pink secret dress, exactly.
She's in fact, though.
Oh, no, those are all flip-flops, aren't they?
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Oh, come on now.
Don't give her heels on that.
Shut now, watch out, your wigs on the move.
This is more like it.
This is what I want to see.
Lessons of sexism.
More just on the surface of a planet being attacked by the by the elements. by the elements, but he's gone out to find her too, hasn't he?
Yeah, I mean, would you like to wind up stuck with that, man?
even if he was intelligent and sort of emotionally available.
Well, I think he's probably got the secondariest back of the guest cast.
Is that a plus?
Yeah, yeah.
Hairy back, really?
Yeah, it ain't hairy than modesty, let's be honest.
No, I've got some nanites that can deal with that, Mart, all right. shape all over.
Oh, dear, my dear.
The storm is ionising now, my word.
Yes, it's terrible.
Because we can't get a probe through. can't get appropriate.
That's why I say okay.
Yeah, yeah.
Is he saying, hang on, he goes, if any, I've got those crystals.
Oh, we could we could be able to save them.
Right.
I thought it meant we could just get out of here.
No, no, no.
I mean, and that's the thing, and he kind of loses his shit a little bit because he, remember, Ben said, I'll get around to the crystals.
You just wait.
Nathan, I can't help but notice that poor Nachelle's costume is outrageously short.
Did you see then?
Yeah.
It's also just ill fitting, I think.
Yeah, it's they did the right thing and red just looks stunning on that.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, absolutely.
And, you know, occasionally they give her something to do in the plot as well, not often, but occasionally.
Not in any say episode.
They haven't learned to do that yet, either.
Yeah.
That's it.
Oh, look, he's got her in his arms since the honeymoon night.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, but he has gone out to rescue her and Kirk has been unable to do that.
It's this bit of a minute when they start having a row, then suddenly Kirk's just there.
Hello.
But the row.
I mean, the thing about the row is that that's kind of like a sitcom 60s marriage.
Do you know what I mean?
Like that's how married couples spoke to one another sometimes in the, like the honeymooners or whatever in the 1960s in American television.
Uh, and that's the potential for it, the Rygel Fivers.
We could go back there.
But there's a, there's a kind of, there's, that's a more adult conception of what a relationship between a man and a woman is.
Do you know what I mean?
Like, and so we, that's where we land. you know.
Why is George Decay sweating so much?
Is it because the situation is dire right now?
It's those studio lights.
I bet everyone's a bit swing.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
You hear stories of the sprinklers coming on because it gets so hot, don't you?
Oh, here we go.
She's made a lovely bit of, actually, it looks a bit like plaster scene, doesn't it?
But look, I think she's she's suddenly hot now too, because she's not wearing the dress.
She's wearing one of his old shirts.
Do you know what I mean?
And that's kind of attractive, you know, like she's wearing a big shirt that belongs to him.
She's got her sleeves rolled up.
She's cleaned the place up and he's initially sort of grumpy about that.
You know, I know where everything is or whatever.
And she's beautiful too.
And it is that thing about just, um, confidence and stuff and agency again.
You know, look, she makes fun of him. those beautiful green eyes as well, like are brought out by the green, um, the green shirt.
I've not laid a hand on you, all right?
Remember that.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
But that's not like I haven't had sex with you.
You know, we're not married. you know, like, and I've been respectful, you know, actually, you're right.
This is a better scene than I remembered, you know?
Yeah, yeah.
But that old female cooking again, and then she has this little wry smile, but look at his reaction when he tries the female cooking, which I just think is really fun.
Why isn't he beguiled by her like all the enterprise crew was?
Well, because she's running out of thing.
And then he, oh, magic juice.
And then they're arguing about how shitty is it doing the washing up?
Oh my god, you could go to the well farming some water and then we'll talk.
Oh please.
I mean, there's just no, like if there's wind, it would scour it dry, and then he goes, yeah, no, I'm too stupid to have thought of that, whoops.
You know, and so they are fighting and stuff, but it's a fine, and he does it.
Look at him hanging up the pans on the washing line.
I mean, this is just like resolutions, isn't it?
Which I weren't.
Yeah, so I can't hate this.
I think that that was it's still sexist.
Of course the conclusion is sexist.
She ends up being his housewife and that's the only thing that she can hope for.
But you're all right.
I mean, suddenly we've come away from the Enterprise crew, and it feels a lot less sexist than it was.
Yeah.
And I think she's beautiful as well.
Like when she's not, when they're not doing the sort of glamour makeup and stuff, she's still beautiful.
Walking around pouting with her ass on her.
Yeah, she looks so much prettier, yeah.
Yeah.
Well, the truth is, Nathan.
I mean, it's a bit an obvious thing to say, but very pretty people can become ugly very quickly.
And less attractive people, can become very pretty very quickly.
The more time you spend with them.
And I think we've all met both people.
Yeah.
Yeah, so...
So this is the last time where, see, now he's getting violent and ugly because as we said before, he thinks he deserves a supermodel because he's a rich man and he can't give that up to accept what he has in front of him, which is a beautiful, competent woman.
We don't deserve he could make a life.
No, no, but I think he learns.
I think he learns and she learns as well that she can be attractive without the drive, which is what she does. how dating works these days.
You know, you sort of go along the date and you go, well, I don't really want you.
I'm looking for someone better looking.
And then by the end of the day, you go, oh, you'll do.
You know, like, it's a very 60s way of um, entire single woman.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
No, exactly, exactly.
And just this thing where she takes the gelatin or whatever and she's suddenly they put makeup on her again and stuff.
Again, it's just too much.
It doesn't work.
Actually, to be honest with you, Nathan, I think it's worse now.
I think you go, you know, go to the toilet on a date now and they're on their grinder or something looking for the next alternative.
Oh, you're away.
I feel that that's what date is like now.
I wouldn't have the faintest.
Well, I know people who are single, you know, it's a quagmire, I'll tell you.
Yeah.
Subspace radio marriage.
That's how we do marriage by subspace radio.
I like the fact that they've got space cars as well.
It's normal cards, but they're cut into circles.
They will actually turn up on the show elsewhere, I think, according to Memory Alpha, we will see them on board the Enterprise.
Do we see them later on 90s Kurtzman Trek?
I hope so.
That'd be pretty good.
That sort of chess that spot plays keeps turning up, doesn't it?
Well, I mean, I actually thought it was sort of charming when they were talking about cards.
Like she was playing some kind of solitaire and he came in and gave her some advice and she said, yeah, I'm not playing that kind of solitaire.
Oh, like whatever.
Do you know what those are?
Those are round trees, gummies.
They're delicious.
You know, what may you want these sweeties?
Yeah.
I mean, this bit now, I mean, the moral is just so laboured. isn't it?
I was like, yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
I'm 3 years old.
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
And it is possible for TV and media to be, but this is Star Trek, remember, even in the in the 90s, it has to absolutely hammer the message home.
Well, I mean, isn't this the period still, where someone would look out the screen and go, now, I know you've just watched that episode. and this is what it's all about, you know?
I mean, at least they're doing it, yeah.
I know, but we have watched like I've watched TV and movies from the 60s and stuff that do let you kind of do a bit of work in order to work out what they're about.
That might be about 80% of 90s track, if I'm honest.
Well, yeah, exactly.
There's a few times where they don't have the tag scene at the end and you go, my God.
They let the climax of the episode happen and we didn't have a dialogue scene.
Tell us what it was all about.
Like, it's rare, though.
Yeah, it is rare.
Yeah.
Yes.
Well, I suppose I'll be happy here doing your dishes.
Lovely.
Yeah, yeah, but that's it.
She thinks that she's taken the drug and so she's suddenly appears like she has makeup on.
I don't quite know how that works.
You know, what do you call this?
Roundtree.
Sweeties, coloured gelatin.
I realise that's what they are.
It makes it sound far less attractive.
Yeah, horses hooves.
Yeah.
They're delicious though.
They're really nice.
Oh, look at how he's looking at her now, the ball farmer.
He's so happy.
Look, oh.
Yeah.
I've got a real woman.
Did you bring a suitcase?
Because I've got no lady's clothes and you can't wear that forever.
Oh, I bet it really suits her though.
Oh, yeah, that's right.
She's wearing the dress. wash it.
Well, she was wearing that green shirt of his before.
It looked great.
Actually, look at it.
It's plastic. just wipe it down.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
How did we get here?
Right, we've got the crystals.
He's got the woman.
She's learnt to love herself.
Let's go.
Yeah, but that evil stay, the day at least, we have a lot to talk about.
We want to talk and they both do want to talk.
I like it.
Yeah.
I'm not sure I would have forgotten the fact that he'd said to me, I can pay for prettier girls than you, though.
I know you should let people learn things and develop things, but yeah, I think that would be an ugly scene.
Back of my head because I think, oh, the next woman that comes along who's prettier than me, I'll be out.
But he's learned a lesson and maybe maybe at the end of the day, she says, actually, I'm going to go somewhere else.
You were very nice.
Thank you, but I'm off.
You said on this planet. it would be punishment enough.
Well, you know you're leaving her then to this hell planet.
And what I did like was apart from that one scene where he was given them all the drugs, I think he stays on the right line of not being sexist in this episode.
He's just fun.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I can see why they brought him back.
I like it.
And look at Spock here. like where Spock makes fun of him.
Oh, and then he says the most annoying emotional episode.
I was like, what do you mean episode?
Oh, this episode of television.
But look, we're just finishing.
I know.
Is it the ears?
I can't tell what's different.
He's got a normal bigger. isn't it?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. he just looks younger.
Oh, he looks less...
He comes Scotty for no reason whatsoever.
To be in the last short look.
Why did he walk in the door?
God, that is a tiny dress that Nichelle's wearing, isn't it?
It's really short Well, Harvey Harts, well done.
You've set back women's rights by about 50 years, but you've taught us a lesson at the end.
Well, yeah, I don't know if he comes back to direct.
I think he goes over budget or something here, but how?
Yes.
We were on the ship for most of the episode.
Oh, I suppose it was the 1st time they built the planet.
Well, I'll have to say it was far more as usual, enjoyable watching that alongside you.
I can't imagine that's one I'll go back to in any great hurry, though.
No, I mean, it might happen.
Uh, it might happen if I um, roll it on the randomiser or something at some point in the future because uh, that's a thing that I sometimes do.
Uh, and uh, so maybe I will go back.
But like I said, I, it is bad and it is terribly sexist and it's very weird, but I think it's a functional hour of TV in spite of that, and that it's not as bad as it looks like it's going to be, I think.
There are sort of stables that you have at the end of the episode.
Just before the one of the really sexy green Orion lady.
There's still of Kirk, Spock, and Uhura.
Oh, clearly a torpedo's hit the ship or something.
They're all diving across the set, but Nachelle is diving straight towards the camera with a look of absolute horror on her face.
Did you see it?
It was very funny.
They've just taken the shot, the perfect time.
It looks like fucking chaos.
I don't know what's happening there.
Awesome.
No, now I am hang on a second.
The next episode started.
What are little girls made of?
And there's a beautiful blonde woman on the bridge there.
It looks like Majel.
Nah, sexist again.
Is that Nurse Chapel?
Yes.
So what are little girls made of is where the character of Roger Corby comes from.
So when we were last aboard the Enterprise for Strangely World, that's Nurse Chapel's sexy Irish boyfriend, the archeologist.
Yes.
Yeah.
So that's the episode that introduces him.
Oh, does she sort of flounder about the place getting emotional in this episode?
Yeah, she's actually a bit of wet fish in it.
She's it's a bit pathetic. can't imagine it. mature, can you?
But, you know, Laxada Troy.
I know, I know, I know, I know.
And it's not a good episode, I think. but it's obviously one that they've decided to go back to, you know, to give Nurse Chappell a backstory and to give Spock a rival, I think, in Strange U World.
You know, if you squint, she looks very like number one, you know, from the 1st episode.
That's also incredibly sexist.
Like we've said, it takes 2 beautiful and talented women to replace her in strange new worlds, doesn't it?
Oh, do you remember what the exec said?
Do you remember?
I couldn't believe it.
They said, fine, you can keep the alien who looks like Satan, but you can get rid of that woman in a position of authority.
And then Gene, who was so sad that he couldn't give Migel a brilliant role in this, married her instead.
He said, I can't do without you. marry me.
Sex is old cad, isn't he?
And that's where the plot 4 months women came to.
All right, it's the end of the episode, and it's time for us to work out where we're going next time.
We've had a rough couple of episodes and it's time for us, I think, to watch something a bit more fun, but just to add that edge of suspense, Frisson of danger to the rolling process, I have selected Star Trek Voyager.
That's the series that we're going to.
The last episode we watched was Twisted.
You love living on the edge, don't you?
I do.
It should be fun.
And I've got all of the seasons select.
I think it's probably about 50, 60, 40, 50, 50, 55, 45.
Let's be care, kind.
In fact, my friend James, friend of the podcast, James, has been watching Voyager, and has been like texting me and things, and I've gone through and looked at some of the episodes that we've done, and we have done a fair number of just kind of middling run of the meal episodes that are okay. you know what I mean?
that aren't bad.
There's plenty of bangers that we haven't done yet.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So it reminded me that there is sort of fun to be had even in a kind of fairly unremarkable Voyager episode.
Can't you just put in season two, so we keep rolling till we get the Thor?
please No, no, we're gonna do all of it.
Oh, shame.
All right.
Okay.
Here goes.
Oh, this is actually a good one.
Your random Star Trek Voyager episode is season one episode seven, Eye of the Needle.
Oh, it's really good.
It's really good.
But it's quite serious.
I mean, it's very serious.
You know, should we not go for something a bit more schlocky?
Okay, all right.
It shouldn't be too hard to find something that's a bit B-mov-ish.
Yeah, this is one that I actually quite like and I don't think you like.
And it's one that actually becomes very important in Starfleet Academy, would you believe?
Oh, boy.
I'm just off to listen to my Klingon opera, all right?
No, right, Klingon rock bands.
Yes, that's exactly what it is.
It's season three, episode 22, real life.
It does have one of my favourite lines of Star Trek of all time when Belana Torres goes, excuse me, But you're not discovering what family life is like with these lollipops.
She goes.
Yeah, I actually, I quite liked it the last time I watched it.
I mean, it is utterly manipulative and artificial in its sentimentality, but it is Robert Picardo.
We could...
And the twist is, yeah?
Well, the twist is that there's long running effects.
Yeah, the twist is that he's still mourning Bella in the 31st century.
He's still that loss that he experiences in this episode, has made him reluctant to ever really commit to anyone.
Um, because, you know, she's real to him.
She's a hologram, he's a hologram and her death, which is manipulative, I think.
You know, the thing I objected to last time I watched it was like, the Brady Bunch version of them was so like one note and then the dark version of them, that was so obvious.
And I was like, oh, there's just a better version of this episode they could have done.
It would have been so much for fun.
I think it's the, it is that Kurtzman Trek thing of finding, like I said before, finding an unloved corner of the franchise and elevating it in some way, like making it more interesting.
But yeah, you're right.
So we get a cheesy TV version of family life. that Bellana objects to, and we replace it with another cheesy TV version, which we're calling real life. you know, like, so yes, there are ways in which it doesn't work.
I think we might try again.
Oh, okay.
I thought you were going to make the choice there to do it.
All right, let's keep going.
Season six, episode two, I don't know what this is, survival instinct.
Oh, I really like survival instincts.
So it's the one Ronald D. Moore scripted Voyager episode.
It has the wonderful thing that they never do often enough on Voyager, and that is they go somewhere and just hang there, this fabulous space station where there's all these competitions and things, and they just get to go and have a lot of fun, but at the same time, there's 3 people there that were part of 7 of 9's Borg, unit, who have all come away from the Borg.
Um, it's a really, and it flashes back to when they crashed on a planet and they were suddenly all individuals and she portrays them and makes them Borg again.
It's a really good episode.
It's not like a standout, but it's like a top tier mid forger episode, I'd say.
Well, let's do that.
That'd be fun.
I mean, you even have fun with Harry and Tom.
They're off having these competitions and end up being up loads of people.
It was really funny.
Excellent.
No, no. that sounds great.
Perfect.
Let's do that. like this, Nathan, one last thing. because they're in orbit of this fabulous station.
They've got practical light coming in the windows into the sets.
Brilliant.
Love it.
Awesome.
You've been listening to untitled Star Trek Project with Joe Ford and Nathan Bottomley, where online at untitled Star Trek Project.com, where you can find subscription links and links to our social media accounts.
Our podcast artwork is by Kayla Ciceron, and the fee was composed by Cameron Lamb.
This episode was recorded on the 21st of July 2026 and released on the 24th of July.
We'll see you next time for Star Trek Voyager, Survival Instinct.
Yeah, we should cut it there.
We have not lost the touch for an outline, have we?
Oh, fucking hell.
The camera just zoomed in on her, right?
And to the side.
And she went, oh, it's not very good.
I did watch it before we did through the lens of time because I just wanted to see where he came from.
And it's got the guy who plays the who plays, what's the name of the big guy in the Adams family?
Lurch.
So it's got the guy who plays lurch on the original Adams family as a big killer robot.
And of course, the guy who played Lurch from the Adams family movies, I think, is Mr. Holm, isn't he?
Yes, yeah.
Yeah, in TNG.
Oh, Nathan, finder, something good.
Come on.
I mean, we did laugh a lot.
We were just taken up.
It's mostly.
And there was things to say, but let's watch something good.