Hey, Joe. Hi.
So, we're doing Voyager again.
So soon after our last Voyager, but this best, aren't we?
Honestly.
But this is a very special episode.
Yeah, this was billed as a very special episode.
And in fact, UPN insisted that this went out, as 2 episodes, as a
movie, as like a, you know, like, as like a rating event.
And it worked.
I don't think the ratings were spectacular, but they definitely
saw a spike upwards, so there was some interest around this.
Yeah, so this is one 90 minute episode.
We're obviously not going to do it that way today because we are
stuck with Netflix and Paramount+ and they've been divided into 2
episodes kind of for syndication or whatever.
But it is a one big event.
And it's something that Voyager starts to do at this point.
We've done it once already this season with the hotel with some
Kurtwood Smith, isn't it?
Which is probably the best event episode they did.
Oh, do you think?
Oh, God, yeah.
I mean, and that was supposed to have been a season-long arc.
That was pitched as a season-long arc and Paramount just went no
way.
And so they had to truncate it into 2 episodes and it's 2
fantastic episodes, which takes that premise of Voyager alone in
space against like an implacable photo that are going to take them
down and the ship's torn to pieces to our point where she has to
blow the bloody ship up to reset the whole thing.
Oh, that's amazingly good.
Amazingly good.
Yeah.
And I mean, it becomes something that Voyager, sort of does from
here on in.
Yeah, they did what else did they do?
Dark Frontier.
Yeah, I remember that being heavily trailed.
And that sort of retreads the stuff from the raven.
Their sort of workforce.
Oh, workforces.
That's really, you know what?
Worth Force is desperately underrated.
I'd love to see it again.
I thought it was good at the time.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
It's just very competently written, active and made, and not a lot
of Voyager is that good in that last season.
Yeah.
And it has something to say, doesn't it?
Like, it struck me as a kind of, you know, the lotus eaters, uh, in
the odyssey, some of Odysseus' men go and taste the lotus, they go
among the lotus eaters, and they taste the lotus, and it makes
them forget their destination, and so they're happy.
They're enjoying themselves, but they're not travelling home
anymore with Odysseus and Odysseus gets really cross and drags
them home and they have to resume their journey.
And so it's that, but it's also a sort of critique of capitalism
you know, like kind of obviously.
Plus also, you know, a chance for the regulars to play different
roles for the 90s of time, you know.
Which is what we get here.
We get to this point where it's like, well, these characters are
so boring.
Let's just make them other people every other way.
But what they do here is really something special, I think.
I didn't really rate this super highly before, but my memory of it
was pretty dim.
I definitely watched it at the time.
But I thought this was really properly solid and interesting.
And that it wasn't just spectacle, but it was, it was kind of
spectacle on a 90 straight budget.
It's mostly spectacle this, isn't it?
I know you're going to hit me with some themes and, you know, and
I know you're much kinder about the resolution than I am.
And I do want to go into that when we get there.
Because I think there's a good reason why I react badly to that
resolution.
But this, I think this is expensive.
I think you can see the money in this.
Like they're trying more ambitious special effects.
We're out on location, which, you know, we don't do as often.
Paramount backlot anyway.
Okay, but it's dressed up.
We've got new sets, loads of new costumes, like they've thrown a
lot.
What's interesting is, if you read the behind the scenes of this
They've done a fair few blockbusters in series 4 already, and
apparently the entire production crew was exhausted at this
point.
And then they were like, well, now we're going to make this
massive movie blockbuster, you know?
But I think they do a bloody good job.
I've done a complete sort of 180 with this because I went back and
read my review of my block and boy, it was like grumpy.
I think I could, like a 5 out of 10 saying, no, all style, no
substance and all this stuff. is substance.
It certainly is, yes.
Now, I think this stands up as just a very entertaining 2 episodes
of Voyager.
And there's nothing wrong with that, you know?
No.
Because I'll tell you what. of them are really shit.
That's right.
If it's not making you furious, then it's a success.
Oh, God, do you remember that episode, Fury?
When Kes came back?
Oh, God.
I don't have any sense. all that.
Oh, yeah, please.
Please, please.
This was series 4.
We've already talked about Kate Mulgrew and Jerry Ryan and their
particularly friendly relationship at this point.
By all accounts, Jerry Ryan was very sick at this point in the
season.
And she's quoted as saying she had like every other day, she had a
new, you know, illness hitting her cold bronchitis, like she was
exhausted.
She was sleeping like 3 hours a day, working 16 hour days, man, she
is fantastically good in this.
Somebody that's exhausted and sick, you know, there's just no sign
of it at all.
When we did the Raven, we said that Jerry Ryan hadn't kind of
settled on her final performance. but it's here and it's only a
few episodes later.
It's a handful of episodes later, less than half a season, I
think.
And we're in a position where Kate Mulgrew is playing a character
in the holodeck that has a very contentious relationship with the
7 of 9 character on the holiday.
So I don't think there's any fucking pretence at all in their
scenes.
I'm not happy you're here and my character's not happy you're here
and I'm going to be bloody toxic.
I may have to kill you.
Yeah She may have to kill her.
Yeah.
I think we should start watching.
All right, I'll count us in then.
Five, four, three, two, one, and we're off.
Here we go.
So, I'm...
I think this is a bitch.
So this is Janeway and very clearly Janeway in a Klingon, like in
full Klingon latex with a bat left, fighting these Klingons, who
will come back in part 2 when the money starts to run out.
And they're really boring.
And like this, I think this is a bit shit, actually, because it's
a sort of shock.
Um, it's a shock teaser.
Like, there's nothing...
It's clear, isn't it?
It's very clear, immediately, though.
But you know what?
I think every time they put one of the regulars as a Klingon
character and they did it in DS9, didn't it?
was Cisco O'Brien and oh God, who was it?
An Odo, sorry, in series 5, um, a Cisco was amazing as a Klingon
because, you know, he basically just grunts his way through a lot
of those scenes anyway.
But January, Kate Mulgrew is madly over the top in this scene
isn't she?
I'm wrong once prey.
You know, like, really going for it.
But I'll tell you what I do like is the fact that they cut to the
chase and haven't shown us the boring takeover of the ship.
Yeah, yeah.
I mean, we have to assume it, and it is actually addressed in
dialogue.
There's like 2 lines of dialogue saying, I think 7 says that she
remembers being in a firefight and then nothing else or whatever.
And so, but all of that stuff is super boring.
It's just established.
But I think the reason is that we have 2 resistance is taking
place at the same time.
And one is fictional on the holodeck and then the other one's
fictional on our televisions and we will see, you know, for
instance, 7 is involved in the holodeck resistance and Harry's
involved in the other fictional one.
Um, And I guess that's why I think this tease is a bit cheap and a
bit shit because it's not really about anything that the episode's
about and it is just there to present a shock, I guess.
So we're just kind of scratching our head saying, what's going
on?
Another reason it's quite cheap is because they're using standard
trek cave set number 52.
You know?
Yeah, yeah. like the one tree, you know?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
There's a bit of a root hanging down.
I think that those scenes are embarrassingly shit and they're the
worst thing. get worse in the 2nd episode.
I'm telling you now Oh, yeah, yeah. when Paul even suffers the
ignominy of not only wearing his Neelix makeup, but they slap on a
load of Klingon makeup.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
He has a different teeth.
He says in an interview, he goes, it was like being in a bloody
oven.
Oh, yeah, just...
Okay, can we talk about the herosion, please?
Because I'm not too sure about these people, you know.
So they came in a few episodes ago.
So we had Hunter's Hunter.
Hunters, then prey, and then we stop and do, I think it's called
retrospect, and then we come into the killing game.
So they've been introduced a few weeks ago.
I think they have a really good distinctive look.
Uh, you know, they're rubbery Star Trek aliens.
It's always going to be something like that.
But I think that they have a distinctive look.
And I also like their demeanour.
They're very reserved.
They're not like Cleons.
They're not shouty or anything like that.
And this guy in particular is very thoughtful.
Doesn't that annoy you?
They bring in these aliens for like 3 or 4 episodes and then
actually, no, what's more annoying is that they then come back in
series 7.
Once the ships kind of moved on about 30,000 light years and oh
hang on like that.
I need to be quiet a second.
I like how the hair clip is a bit borgy.
So she turns around.
Like that that glittery hair clip reminds you of a sort of Borg
implant.
And so, this is 7 singing in the bar.
And, like, she won't knock your socks off, but I think she's
pretty good.
And of course, she's...
Well, when they when she sings you are my sunshine in Series 5
someone's watch over me.
Yeah, that's true.
Her voice is very, very good.
But she's kind of in there with Robert Micardo and yeah, yeah
beautiful together.
However, I'm not sure she's ever looked sexier than she does in
these things.
Oh, he's beautiful.
And this, like, it's so great.
It's so great having 7 do that.
Now, have a look at this scene, right?
We're in the bar.
There's wine, there's singing, and the Nazis are there.
Um, and eventually we're going to have our lead guy here.
Our lead, our hero Herogan, who has a name, but I've misplaced
it.
And I'll talk more about that a little bit later.
She's really good, isn't she?
Oh, seven.
No, no.
Now I've Katrine on the screen.
Oh, she's marvellous in this room.
And I love what she's wearing, that white suit.
No, no, she's sort of power lesbian from World War II.
She really is.
Yeah, yeah.
There's no hint at all.
So she fancies anyone but 7 of 9 left because, yeah, yeah.
The energy crackles, but there's a lot of that out there, you know
on the internet, you know, these pictures of Janeway and 7 of
nine.
Oh, yeah, of course.
Honestly, of course around.
But I, I was reading an interview with one of the writers and
they're basically saying that this is, um, Kate Mile Group, being
Humphrey Bogart in, in a World War II assessing.
And it kind of is, isn't it?
Oh, she's...
Like, she might have had a lot of complaints about Jerry Ryan
coming in, but I think the knock on effect is that Janeway is even
more impressive.
Yeah, yeah.
When, you know, and and I do think it's because of their scenes
together.
And in this, they just sizzle together.
Yeah.
She and gosh, Jerry's good.
She's singing again.
So great.
But it's like 11 doesn't best the other.
They complicated.
No, no.
That's what that's what the actresses should have been seeing. you
know, is how good they are together.
Ah, bless them.
And they're both back in Star Trek right now as we speak.
It's so good.
I think there was a, there was a similar tension initially when
Michael Dawn came into DS9.
Yeah.
A bit.
I think that cast all kind of rallied around him and said, well
let's make the best of it, and let's all do fantastic work, you
know?
Whereas poor Jerry Ryan just wasn't allowed to have a toilet
break.
Yeah.
So, so he's our hero, uh, Hirogen, and he's dressed as a Nazi.
And so there's already this sort of blending of the 2 fictions, the
Star Trek aliens fiction and the World War II resistance one.
And it...
And there's something about the way that our main herogen, the
commandant, enjoys this environment that I think is super
important.
So they're hunters, we've seen them.
They live on their own, do they?
They just live on these ships.
They live on a adorned. with like the victims, the skulls.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Skulls hanging on the fucking walls and stuff.
But I think, you know, it is very Klingon, most aliens are sort of
Klingon knockoffs, particularly in Voyager, aren't they?
Like the Kazon.
But there's a kind of reserve to these guys.
They're very kind of low key.
And this guy, our main guy, has a great voice, I think.
Yeah, he really does.
And you know what?
I think he, you're right.
He is quite a thoughtful character.
What's interesting about like the development of the story is, you
remember Joe Manosky?
I mentioned him a lot.
You know, Joe Manosky of Masks, in for me.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Any any oddball episode, Joe Manosky's there.
Well, they were trying to entice him back into Star Trek, right?
And he was determined.
Well, he's like, well, I want to do a Well Wazoo story.
I want our characters all dressed up and we're going to do Nazis
and blah, blah, blah.
And they were just like, well, we're going to have to do this, all
right?
Like, we don't know how and where this can fit in.
Then season 4 came along.
Then the herosion came in and they were like, okay, we could do
this now.
We've got like a set of villains who fight.
Let's, yeah.
And initially, it was all going to be set down on a planet.
The World War 2 planet.
Well, I mean, that's what the original series would have done
right?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
They just happen to, you know, have these documents and this is
how they, you know, they based their whole life on it or something
like that.
But no.
And then Kenneth Biller, who I think took over as like showrunner
in series 7.
He says, he said, no, why don't we send it on Voyager, why don't
we use the holodecks?
And then the killing game started to emerge.
Yeah.
Well, I mean, look at this guy.
He's drinking the wine that Janeway has provided that Katrina has
provided.
He's been enjoying 7 singing.
And that's going to lead somewhere, I think.
It really is.
And but like what they said was initially this was going to be
like, you know, Cowboys versus Indians or rather, resistance
versus Nazis.
And there was no ambition beyond that.
That's what this episode is going to be.
And then the writers realised, no, let's make one of these
characters more thoughtful.
Let's make give one of these characters a bit of depth and let's
see if we can end this as you're going to tell me later. in a more
interesting way than just a big bloody battle.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I think I think it's really, really good.
Like oh, here we go.
All the daggers are out.
Here we go.
Yeah, these things.
Look at Mulgrew's face.
I'm gonna tear your face off in a minute.
I know there's a little smile there.
That's... but yes, it is them arguing.
They put you in that silver catsuit.
Now they've put you in this gorgeous period dress. lipstick and
you're singing, you know, you could have been more womanly if you
tried.
Look at her hair as well.
It's fantastic.
And what have they done?
They've done the other way, is make Mulgrew very masculine, haven't
they?
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
And she pulls it off.
She looks terrific.
But this is the dynamic as well between the lead Hirogen and the
angry young Hirogen.
You know, there's there's exactly the same dynamic.
The lead herogen is thoughtful and calculating and careful, and
the young one, you know, just wants to sort of stab these people
and he's the one who grabbed Jerry's arm before and insisted that
she continues singing.
And that's exactly the same dynamic. like the most nuanced
characterisation you're going to see in Star Trek, is it?
Oh, no, no, no.
Basically, we have 3 guest Hirogen, and that's all we have.
And we think that this is expensive, but basically we've just got
the 3 guest actors.
And one of them, the guy who we've already seen in the, in the um
Sick Bay, the Dr. Hirogen, is uh, Mark Metcalfe, who played the
master in series one of Buffy.
Oh, is it really?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Once you, once you know that, you, you'll...
Our trivia be this time, Nathan.
No, well, I saw his name in the opening credits.
I saw Mark Matt Carf, and I thought, I know that name, and of
course, it's from Buffy.
You know what, right?
Chvolt looks incredible in that suit.
Okay.
Oh my god.
But what's annoying is, right?
This is one time where he's playing another character.
So he had a chance to emote like mad and they still have him
playing, you know.
I think Neil says at one point, oh, that's very logical of you.
You know, it's like, oh, God.
Yeah, yeah.
It's still the same old Chewvok.
He looks good.
Well, no, no, he does look good, but he always does.
Oh, here we go.
Nearly cycling through the Paramount backlot.
Yeah, yeah.
It's marvellous.
Smiling at everyone who goes first.
Is this for people where they secure on that bike?
Well, they pull out their pistols and we'll shoot him because I
really love that bit.
Oh, do you know, look how they've dressed this up.
This looks good.
Yeah, yeah.
Oh, there's some California Hills in the background.
But you know, there's French signs.
They've put shutters on the windows to make it look like France
but they've only done it on 3 windows.
Look.
They can't even be wrong.
Just the ones that are in shot. you know?
Now, here is angry, young, uh, angry young Nazi Hirogen and he's
Nazi friend.
Oh, as well as the 3 guest Hirogens.
There is a guest Nazi.
Oh, yeah.
And he's quite a well-known theatre actor I was reading.
Like he was quite a draw.
He is Enterprises go to Nazis.
So he plays a Nazi, like in stormfront or another one.
He plays 2 different...
He's just Nazi guy.
And he is also a rubber faced alien of some sort, but I can't
remember which sort.
So he's been in Star Trek a bit this guy.
And I think we want to know, see, we'll pull in...
I think his name is Paul J.
Boemer or something like that.
Yeah, that sounds right.
Oh, okay, so we've got Roxanne Dawson's pregnancy.
So for once, she's not behind a console.
Oh, of course she's really pregnant.
This is the one time and she says in an interview.
Memory Alpha, how delightful it was to actually just, you know, let
it all spill out for one episode, you know?
It's forgotten.
Wow.
Oh, did you think that was just a nice touch?
Yeah, yeah, because it works because you have those. do you know
what I mean?
You had the French women who kind of collaborated with the Nazis
you know, and who were horribly mistreated by, well, you know, they
fucked Nazis, you know, kind of, but they were kind of punished
and ostracised by people.
Kate Mulgrew.
It looks like I've stepped into an episode of Kate Love's a
mystery, doesn't it?
This is a very, I guess it's very period, that dress, but it's
really not doing any famous.
I just, I do think like there is like class is a word you could
pin on this episode.
It is very classy.
And it's just so nice to be in these sets away from those boring
voyages.
Corridors.
Yeah, yeah.
Although it is definitely like, I feel as if they've watched a few
episodes of Secret Army and a lower low before they've written
this, you know, every cliche is in there.
Yeah.
Well, I mean, because this isn't them doing World War II.
This is them in a holodeck simulation of World War II.
And I said recently when I was criticising an episode of Doctor
Who that was doing World War 2 that appallingly that they
romanticised it in the most appalling way.
But of course they can do that here, can't they?
Yeah, yeah, because it's fiction.
It's openly fiction.
And so one of the interesting things about this is that the
holodeck in in Voyager is a shared experience on the whole, isn't
it?
That they generally have these programs that, Well, I mean, not
the Lord fucking whatever Rebecca, that horrible one. series one.
Yeah, it's so bad.
Do you remember, do you remember those fucking annoying kids?
Oh, I hear you're our new governor.
That kid, the little the little the little blonde boy is in it in
something like other Star Trek, isn't he?
No, he is uglier than any alien we ever saw, though.
He's probably hot by now.
It's been a few years.
Um, yeah.
Oh my goodness.
She's really pregnant.
That's delightful.
Well, that's what they did with Kate McFadden, wasn't it?
They made Jason McFadden have that blue jacket.
Yeah, so sure.
Yeah, her bum was covered.
Yeah, no, but they give her that jacket with the with the tools in
the in the top pocket.
You know what I'm gonna say, don't you?
Uh, they had a stupid space way of dealing with non-visitors.
Pregnancy.
She's been an interview.
Then our visitor says in an interview, how grateful she was, but
they actually, and they might not have done anything spectacular
with it, but she could be bloody pregnant on the show.
There's one episode.
I don't know if you remember There's one episode where she beats
the shit out of somebody.
Pregnant.
It looks amazing.
Awesome.
Oh, look at all this location work.
It's sunny and light and beautiful.
Oh, I'm getting very definite past tense vibes from the little
staircase that Roxanne just walked up.
Yeah, that's because that's because they're featured in past
yeah.
But they all say in interviews how refreshing it was to have so
much location.
They loved going outside, actually, you know, playing about a
bit.
Yeah, well, it's it's kind of fun play acting.
I mean, you think that, you know, Star Trek is fun play acting and
we really, really like Star Trek.
But for them, that was just a day at the office, you know, he's
our standard go-to German guy.
It was just a day at the office and so they get to play dress-ups
you know, like, yeah.
I've been doing 16 hour days in the same roles, in those four.
Yeah, yeah.
I mean, I can't always have been fun.
No, no.
Here, they're running around with guns and period dresses.
Marvellous. you know.
So this is interesting as well.
Because one of the one of the things about this is the way that
the 2 fictions kind of bleed into one another, the Star Trek one
and this World War 2 simulation end up.
So, so he's a Nazi.
Like our hero Hirogan is dressed as a Nazi and he's speaking to a
simulated Nazi on the holodeck and he is trying to kind of get to
the bottom of Nazi ideology.
And this Nazi has 2 important speeches in this story, one in each
part.
So it's here, he explains the Nazi ideology, which, um, the
herogen rejects, he just says, you know, you don't deserve these
prizes, you're not superior.
Oh, if you don't respect your enemy. your prey.
Yeah.
Yeah, he rejects Nazi ideology.
But the young, the young kind of angry Hirogen gets a speech from
the Nazi and that encourages him to overthrow our hero.
And it's in absolute Nazi term.
So the, the, the Nazis and the hirogen are kind of bleeding into
one another, you know, they're, and you can see it in the look, but
it isn't just the hirogens are Nazis.
Like it's more interesting than that.
But having like the 2 speeches and one, uh, rejecting a one
agreeing.
You're very clearly seeing with those 2 characters, how they
differ.
And that basically this is not going to end with them agreeing on
a path of action, you know.
No.
Well, I mean, it's in part two.
It's basically this guy who is now, you know, kind of smiling into
Roxanne's eyes, which wouldn't you?
which is so great.
I don't know where I was going with that.
Yeah, I mean, this guy actually is the one who encourages him to a
Bell at the very end of the episode.
So we already know he's a loose cannon and staff.
This is very nice because bringing in Jerry Ryan meant that
Roxanne Dawson suddenly got a lot less attention than she
otherwise did.
And she was pregnant.
So they were trying to keep her to the periphery of a lot of
episodes as well.
So this was a chance for her to actually be centre stage a little
bit more.
Oh, hang on.
Is this the bit where they start shooting at the Ulix?
It isn't it?
Yes, there we go.
Yeah, so already we're having the tension between these 2
hirogen.
One of them just wants to resume the hunt and the other one
doesn't.
And like, yeah, they're just...
You have to want to shoot Inspector of the Gun about Star Trek
doing, you know, the familiar and the unusual.
So having these A.J.
Ryan.
In her little beret and her cardigan and that dress.
Look at look at the camera work here.
It is a little more imaginative than you usually get in that
track.
There's a low angle there.
In a minute, there's a big zoom in on them in the door.
Yeah, yeah.
And I'm not suggesting this is like filmic or cinematic or
anything like that.
No, it's not, but it's this is they've expected.
I've said to you about David Lyverson before.
He's one of the few directors of 90s trek. that just genuinely
wanted to make it pacy and a bit more, you know, I don't know if
he always succeeded, but.
Well, I mean, I think this kind of works.
And and also, interestingly, what is interesting is both of them
participate in shooting Neelix and seven.
And now, I think, is this where we start to get our Voyager
characters who are still on the ship and not in the simulation?
This is us seeing them.
It's just hurricane, isn't it?
Well, I mean, there's nothing to remember.
No, no, no, no. just saying that we're several minutes in.
Like we, we're quite a way into the episode before we're back on
the, on the ship.
Unless I just sort of...
Well, that's why we've been enjoying the previous scene.
Well, maybe that's it.
No, I want to very briefly talk about Harry Kim, though, because
Brandon Bragger and Joe Manosky had 0 interest in the character
right?
And deliberately left him on Voyager, um, away from all the fun
and Garrett Wang was very verbal about saying, hang on.
These guys are all having fun dressing up and da da.
And they, you know, they were very open about the fact that they
thought he was a boring character and they just didn't want to
have him involved.
But what happened was, and this is kind of interesting, is...
The episodes underrun and they couldn't have any more time on the
expensive sets that they had built.
So they had to have scenes on Voyager.
So they had to give Harry Kim more to do.
They were stuck in this position of taking this character.
They didn't want to ride for and give him interesting things to
do.
So obviously he gets brutalised a bit, doesn't he?
And he kind of shows his teeth a bit.
And what happened at the end was they thought Garrett Wang did
such a bang up job of the material that they gave him.
They wrote timeless in series 5 for him and said, this is a
character that's got legs.
Let's give him more to do. and my god, he looks gorgeous Yeah, yeah
he really does. at him.
So, our hero Hurogen just said, we have to send Jerry Ryan.
We have to send 7 back to Holodeck one because he likes her
voice.
So he actually enjoys her singing.
That's not just a funny line.
And he likes the wine.
Holy crap.
Look at Gary.
I know, but I do think that, you know, maybe there is, you know
like brainwashing her and shoving her in a simulation.
Like, you know, Oh, no, he's about.
I'm trying to say his methods, yeah, yeah.
No, no, he's they're terrible people.
Well, I did, I thought that was interesting, and uh, Harry Kim was
almost written out, wasn't he, in series 4, and at last minute, he
won, I know, top 30 sexiest man or something like that.
Yeah, no, it was like people's 100 Yeah, most attractive people or
something.
Understandably.
I mean, look at him.
Oh, no, he's really pretty.
And when he has floppy hair.
Yeah, and he's a bit angry.
I love this guy.
The guy who's just in the background tapping on the pad, and he
doesn't get any line.
No, he's like, he's just, he's just doing facial expressions.
And then he wanders off and his one line of dialogue appears to be
ADR.
So they didn't have to pay him to say anything.
Look, here he goes. something about the fact that, I, I, I, this
is something more about me than I should probably admit on a
podcast.
The thing about the fact that Harry Kim has been brutalised and
he's got a bloody face.
That's very hot about him.
I don't know what he is.
No.
And he's dirty and sweaty.
It's a whole thing But like, and then when they give him timeless
in Series 5, he really does it. well.
Yeah, he's really good.
So I'm inclined to think it's not the actor.
It's the lack of opportunities Well, yeah, I mean, that's what
Beltran will complain about, but I think that the lack of
opportunities that Beltran gets because he's largely because he's
boring.
Well, he just phones it in.
He doesn't really give a shit. so they don't write for him, I
think.
Are you suggesting his turn as the American commander in this?
phone.
It's super boring.
It's absolutely phone in.
He's just not bothering at all And, and...
I love it when they do this, you know, when they do like, this is
Harry Kim and the doctor trying to retake the ship and they did
it.
Do you remember when they did it with Suda and the doctor in
basics?
I love it when it's just a couple of characters trying to take on
like, you know.
Our whole race had taken over the ship.
Oh, what's the next TV show they're going to watch?
The Hirogen?
He's choosing our next holodeck simulation program?
Oh, isn't he saying though?
Is he saying they're actually going to go and take on the Borg?
You know, they're going to do a Borg episode. on the holiday?
If it's read by this production team, they probably will.
Yeah, they're going to run the scorpion simulation, just do a
season finale.
I seem to recall Luaxana Troy had eyes a bit like the herogen with
the big black contact.
Yeah, yeah. quite appealing, actually, isn't it?
So here's the central conflict here.
So the young Hirogen is kind of conservative.
He just wants to continue his life, the way that he does and just
thinks that we should be hunting and why are we here playing these
games instead of hunting our prey.
And he's, you know, and the older guy identifies that position as
being young.
The older guy is more thoughtful.
He wants to learn things and what he's learning from is the, you
know, kind of library of TV programs that the Voyager crew have.
He's learning that there are different ways of living.
But he still wants to find it.
He still wants to use the technology to fight.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, and that is a thing.
Like he wants to use the technology to create hunting simulation
so they can get hunting out of their system.
At the end, she gives them the gift of the holodeck technology.
And the next time we cap 4 seasons in the future, when they decide
to do a follow-up to this, the holograms have revolted.
Because they've had enough of being killed.
They're sick of being stabbed and stuff.
But, but the reason that he wants to put the hunt on the holodeck
is so that they can spend the rest of their time together just
doing the sort of things that he's watching on the, on the, on
these TV programs, listening to people seeing, drinking wine.
Don't you think?
That's what he wants.
Yeah, you know, he wants, yeah.
So he wants to, who's like obsessed with the glories of the past
and yeah, he wants to continue.
And the hunt, like a traditional way of life.
And this guy says, no, there's more to life than that.
It's the Star Trek ideal, isn't it?
It's we could be better than this.
That's right.
And it is that thing that we saw Inspector of the Gun where, you
know, Kirk hasn't abandoned.
Like he still wants, he still has an urge to violent, but he
doesn't indulge it.
You know, he's chosen not to indulge it to be better than that.
And that's what this herogen wants to do.
He wants to move the prey, the hunting, rather, into a fictional
environment so that he can get on with enjoying life in the real
world.
He calls it civilisation, and that's a thing that will come up in
the 2nd Nazi speech we were talking about earlier.
I just find it really weird that he just wants like his entire
race to just spend their entire, you know, all of their time in a
simulation.
No, no, he wants them to do the hunt in the simulation.
Oh, and then spend the rest of their time being cultured
together.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
I think that's absolutely it.
Listening to Jerry Ryan Singh drinking the wine that Katrine gives
you.
Uh, you know, doing a bit of hard time.
I don't want to watch the Hiroshan show anymore.
Well, that sounds really boring.
I'm sorry.
The thing about the Hirogen as well is I feel quite sorry for them
because they're introduced in hunters where there's a far more
interesting A-plot where voyagers getting letters from home.
Then you've got then you've got prey, which is a really fantastic
action episode, but it's got Species 8472.
So who cares about the Hirogen?
And then there's this, and this is kind of where they duck out, you
know.
Yeah, yeah.
They didn't really get a shot.
The Kazon had far more screen time.
Oh, yeah.
But, you know, like they're doing better than the swarm or the
Beaumar at this point.
More than one episode.
That's not fucking stupid, like the bone.
Imagine if the Hirogen had been designed like the Beaumont.
The greatest hunters on their waico hanger faces.
I think I think it's a solid look.
Can I ask you a corrosion look?
Do you think Jerry Wright has the fullest lips of any person who's
ever been on TV?
No, nope, that would be LaVar Burton.
You know, there was a kiss scene between those two.
It would be the sexiest thing ever, wouldn't it?
Yeah, yeah.
Um, He's so pretty.
So this is the master from...
Buffy.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I did not know that.
Oh, this is your scene in a minute where she goes back into the
simulation.
She starts singing. and then she says, I'm...
It's my favourite line ever.
Don't don't spoil it.
But yeah.
Oh, look, I just love that outfit.
Like 7's outfit, like when she's shooting people with her little
cardi, and then obviously this dress is spectacular.
I've got a kind of question about holodeck simulations, right?
And how every time we go into the holiday batter being, but bang
this, I'm at Bashir.
It's always so much more stylish and interesting and visually
sumptuous than our regular stuff than the shows.
So my question is this.
Why the hell do we spend so much time on those boring spaceships?
Yeah, yeah, rather than this sort of stuff.
Yeah, that's what, no, we're in the future.
Here's the line.
So her neural interface has been deactivated. and she turns around
doesn't quite know where she is and says, I must discontinue this
activity.
She can't even come up with the word singing.
It's so good and it is played for laughs.
Like, I think everyone's aware that that's a funny line.
And he's a bit of an argument, another, oh, yes, gosh. when they
look at each other. they don't know whatever. they don't know if
to fight each other or snog each other, you know, but it's gosh, it
sizzles.
Now, look, you know, I'm not going to disagree with what you're
saying about the Hirogen characters and the kind of thoughtful
things they're trying to do with them, however.
I think that is on the periphery of having our regulars in
different roles.
Oh, I agree.
The stylishness of the setting and all that other.
That's basically what this is.
Yeah, it's just an excuse to get them into the holodeck doing this
thing.
But I think they've given it a layer, though, haven't they?
They've given it an additional layer and that's...
Well they've given the hirogen something to do, some reason to be
here.
Oh, right, I just fell asleep immediately.
He's Robert Beltran on the screen.
And Tom Paris.
Oh, that's the Americans.
You know how they, you were saying that Manosky didn't really like
Harry Kim as a character.
And there's nothing there.
You know, like what's Harry Kim's character.
He plays the clarinet.
Like, personal character.
He likes the Delaney sisters, and...
He waits his pants when 7 of 9 comes onto him.
That's about it Yeah, that's it.
He's really got nothing He's absolutely undercharacterized.
And so there's nothing there that isn't Garrett Wang's
performance.
That means you can surprise with him, doesn't it?
It means if you do give him something exciting to do.
Then you go, wow, there's potential.
He's great in this.
Whereas, like, I don't think either of these 2 are very
interesting at all.
And I wasn't missing them.
Like, were you there going, I wonder where Robbie is.
Not once.
Hang on.
You are Janeway...
Chewvok, the doctor.
Show me the best characters involved.
I didn't.
Yeah, yeah.
I think everyone called Robert on the regular cast is in this
scene and they're both terrible.
I think they think that Robert Duncan McNeil's Tom Paris is far
more interesting than he actually is.
And that, oh, yeah, across the 7 seasons.
They give him a lot of time, you know?
Yeah.
Yeah I don't think he's very good at all.
You know, like, I think Garrett Wang is is more fun to, I mean
that could just be me because he's pretty.
But, um, certainly, minus the doctor, you've got all the best
characters in Voyager in this scene.
Torres, Janeway, 7 than Tuvok.
Yeah, yeah, you're right.
They got really good.
Look at them all dressed up in black as well, you know.
Undercover.
And as usual, they've just stuck Tim Ross in the background...
Looking at that, pissed off.
That's right.
He may as well be behind the fucking tactical console.
Is that the episode where I said, oh, they're firing on us.
He said nothing.
He is just standing there looking at them.
Then he walks off, we're done.
Oh, this thing here where she realises that the bomb isn't set out
properly and she accuses 7 of 9 of trying to sabotage the plan.
Yeah, yeah.
There's just something tangibly there.
I, you know, it's sad because I think they lose it in series 6 and
7 as they start, yeah, they start playing nice for each other and
it's it's far less interesting.
I'm going to call that character progression.
I'm going to say it's the fact that Jerry Ryan is now having sex
with...
Yeah.
Ah, bless her. so fantastic.
What I do like, though, and I think I didn't realise when I 1st
watched this, was it is definitely a game of 2 halvesists, and the
1st half is a lot of talk.
And the 2nd half is basically, oh, action, isn't it?
There's so much action in that 2nd episode.
I think I think there are some really shitty boring bits in the
2nd episode.
And I don't care that this is all talk because I think it's
interesting.
Like, I think it's probably interesting.
It looks good.
You've got to be honest.
There's got to be some shit bits because if you and I can't spend
an hour and a half saying that for you, it is amazing how great it
is.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
It's got to be at least one scene where you say, well, this is
completely terrible, you know?
And look at Harry standing up to these and the actors they've got
playing Hirogen.
So we've got a guard Hirogen who doesn't say anything and is just
paid to wear the latex or whatever, but he's standing up to them
and he's absolutely, you know, dwarfed by them and he's back
talking and and all of that.
It's so good.
And and he's like a proper nerd.
It sort of cute.
Look, I mean, it irritates me. 9 times out of 10, they just give
him obvious dull.
Do you remember that episode?
Do you remember equinox where, um, Belana Torres's X squeeze turns
up on the equinox and he's like, oh, you know, I used to call her
BLT, bacon lettuce tomato, and then Harry Kim's in the background
going, Oh, well, we'll call Tom Paris, Turkey platter.
And I'm like, oh, God.
And that's the sort of dialogue about Harry Kim normally.
Fuck, Voyager banter is so shit, isn't it?
It's really terrible.
How can we make these people sound like terrible sitcom
characters?
Yeah, no, but they don't.
That's the problem.
Whereas on, like on Deep Shace 9.
They're good, solid, well-defined sitcom characters.
You know, and because they have a way that they always behave, you
can do fun things with them and take them out of their comfort
zone.
These people on Voyager have no discernable personal
characteristics as far as I can tell.
And it's a shame.
We're spending a better money.
We've got a nice shoe here, Nathan.
Yeah, I know.
I love it.
It's so good.
And we're standing on top of the building with a handheld camera
like kind of pointing down earlier on, I think.
So do you think this entire episode is basically an excuse to
build up for the money shop, which is behind you right now?
Yeah, yeah.
So, so, in a way, I mean, giving Harry those extra scenes in this
means that.
And I think I said this earlier, we've got 2 parallel resistances
happening against the hirogen in each case.
So in this simulation, they're Nazis and we're trying to blow them
up, in, um, in the other the simulation that's running on our
television.
Harry is trying to, you know, incite our regular crew to sort of
get their memories back and join his resistance against the
Hirogen.
And so, obviously, the cliffhanger to this episode is a giant tear
in reality that goes into another.
Yeah, and then what happens in the 2nd episode of that?
That's the two, basically, combined, don't they?
The American genres go on the ship and help with that part of the
and then they and then they get their memories back and head into
the simulation.
Yeah, yeah.
It's really great.
And I think that's really fun because do you remember shipping a
bottle?
Oh, I love that episode. yeah.
So Moriarty is kind of trapped in a sort of device, I think it
looks like the device that Janeway gives the Hirogen, actually.
It really does.
It may be the same prop.
And, oh, my God, I just realised something.
That was sitting on Picard's desk, you know.
When the Enterprise was destroyed.
Oh, poor Moriality, honestly.
Hor Moriarty.
Anyway, go on.
But, uh, you know, I think, uh, Picard suspects that all kind of
theorises, what if we were a comp- or in a complex simulation that
was being played out on a device on a table in someone's living
room?
Which is, of course, what they are.
Do you know right?
Do you know what the very last scene of DS9?
They mooted this and at the last minute they said, no, we're not
going to do it.
The very last scene was going to be Benny Russell.
And the whole of DS9 was...
Was he's riding?
Yeah.
Oh, man, that would have been pretty good.
Yeah.
Yeah, that would have...
Do you reckon in this scene?
Mulgrew was like, oh, it's the safety on.
Oh, no, a real gun.
Needix is a Klingon.
Uh...
The layers of latex he's wearing.
Yeah, it's really not great.
It's really great.
And I've got to be honest.
It doesn't quite pull it off.
Oh no, I think he's terrible.
And I think these scenes are incredibly cheap and kind of not
great to watch, I think.
I don't think Voyager ever really does the Klingons very well.
No.
And it doesn't have to, I guess.
It's almost like the hierogenism, like the original villains
aren't enough.
They've always got to bring back the old favourites, you know?
Yeah, yeah.
But I think the hirogen are much better than the Klingon tier.
Look at those.
I do love this side guys.
I do love this running around the streets with a machine gun at
night.
Yeah, it's really good. is you telling me 90s tracks never very
dynamic.
Have a look.
No, this is, yeah, this is properly fun and it is deliberately
spectacled.
So, you know, they've given the herogen something to do.
They've set up this situation where you've got a fictional world
inside a fictional world and the 2 fictions kind of bleed in
together.
All of that.
But that's not the primary focus here.
The primary focus here is to give us 90 minutes of action and
something that looks different and is fun and dynamic where the
stakes are really high.
Like the fact that, you know, you've got the resistance, you've
got Nazi occupied France, but Voyager has been occupied in a
pretty thoroughgoing way in a way that hasn't, has it happened
before?
I mean, I know that the K's on stole voyager at the end of
basics.
But is the ship being taken over quite as comprehensively as
this?
I think one of Cesco's holodeck program as well as did it in
series 3.
Apart from that, no, I don't think so.
Yeah, so the stakes are super high.
This is an important episode. don't see the takeover means the
fact that they cut to the chase means they just want this to be
what it is, you know.
Yeah, yeah, but it's...
Yeah, they're both Nazi occupied.
You know, the Hirogan occupied Voyager.
Excuse me, can we talk about this special effect, please?
Because now, whilst it is very clear that Janeway and 7 are, in
fact, against the CSO backdrop.
I mean, I love any any scene that features 2 actresses. diving
over the camera.
It is.
Isn't that funny?
They just absolutely can't afford that, so they just get them to
dive in front of a green screen. surprise you to know that that is
in fact their model and they didn't blow up a building.
Do you know, I love this.
All the decks bleeding in through the holiday program.
I really, it's just such a weird visual, isn't it?
And that's what I like about it.
And look, the holodeck walls kind of flashing in and out and
stuff.
I, when I was watching this in preparation, I wasn't super sold on
it because it's only sort of vaguely integrated into the
environment and stuff, but now I kind of think it's the iconic
visual of the show.
And it is prettier.
Yeah.
But also, well, I don't know.
There is a visual in episode two. where I think it's Jane...
No, no.
The herogen looks out through the tear and you can, and it
literally goes, oh, that looks so good.
It does.
There's lots of explosions coming up and I'm just like, wow.
Yeah.
I do like as well.
They didn't end it on that shot of the tear, that they have all
the characters going across the line.
Because you're like, shit, where is this going?
These characters are all brainwashed and they're heading into
Voyager right now.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. with rifles.
Actually, this does this does rather highlight one of my issues
with the killing game.
And that is, wouldn't it be so embarrassing if this is how, like
you know, the Voyager crew was finally defeated that they were
killed within the holodeck within this fiction?
Like, what are the stakes in this really?
Well, I mean, the ship's been taken over.
They've got to get the ship back.
I think that's a reasonable.
I don't think we're ever convinced that this is where Voyager's
going to end, like this.
No, no, but we never are.
You know, like that's a way we know that they're all going to be
okay every week, you know, like it doesn't mean that there isn't
steaks or it's not exciting.
Would you stop talking about this being fiction, please, all
right?
Where everything will be all right in the end.
But no, I got to say, I do have to say, uh, and Trek part ones
generally are more solid than Trek part 2s, but I think this is
fairly solid across the board.
That is that is a strong part one.
Yeah, I agree.
I think it's great.
All right, what do you think?
Should we go on with part 2 Well, after the end of part one?
How can we not?
Yeah, yeah, it was pretty exciting.
Okay.
I'll count us in then.
All right.
Five, four, three, two, one, and we're off.
It's last time on Voyager.
So we get this terrible scene.
Again.
So I mentioned to somebody that we were doing this episode this
week and they're not a Star Trek fan, right?
And they were like, oh, well, tell me, what's what's it about?
And I said, oh, well, you know, it's, um, there's these aliens.
They've taken over the ship and his eyes rolled.
And I said, and then they're all, they're all on the holodeck in a
World War 2 simulation and the eyes rolled and he was like, well
that's just every episode of Star Trek, isn't it?
And my question is this.
Should we be aspiring to more than this?
Well, I mean, I think that we have seen that Star Trek can do more
than this, but this is very Star Trek in the sense that you have
well, you know, the hirogen are trying to be more or, you know, the
leaderogen wants to be more than he is.
He wants, he's learned something from these holiday programs, these
entertainment, that Voyager has a huge database of.
He's learned something from it, that there's more to life than the
way that they currently live and he wants to be better.
And I think that is Star Treky.
I think there is something there.
I do also think we've established that, you know, Tuvok's running
around with a machine gun.
And that's kind of, that's also, what it is all about.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
No, absolutely.
And that's what you want, isn't it?
Isn't that Star Trek?
What, what?
A lot of action.
Yeah, action spectacle, guns, explosions, and some kind of
philosophy theme as well.
In this same spot in DS9 series 4, you get home front and Paradise
Lost, which is a massive treaties on paranoia and frightening
people enough. to go on to like a war footing and things like
that.
And it's saying it's saying like big substantial things.
Yeah, and worthwhile things about America.
You know, that's the sort of thing that discovery does in season
one and that enterprise kind of does badly.
It's sort of... season three.
Well, just go and behave like bullish assholes and then we might
we might save the planet, you know.
But, you know, like there is something, this doesn't have a
massive political thing.
You know, it's Star Treky.
It gestures towards what Star Trek's about.
But what I like now in this 2 parter is that they've installed
holodecks, holodecks, holo emitters in the in the corridors, and
so the boundary of the fiction has broken down completely, and now
we have American soldiers with guns running around, like running
around. cynical, but that is just a technobapable excuse to have
Americans soldiers running around in Voyager.
Absolutely.
No, but but what the Verogen has done.
Like, my point is this, is there's not a lot of brain here. you
know, it is no.
It is basically just a bit of fluff.
Yeah, but that's okay.
I think that's all right.
And and I love the fact that the Hirogen loves the holodeck so
much that he has turned Voyager into a giant holodeck and the
explosion that they set off because the safeties are off. actually
completely destroys the boundary between the 2 fictions and that's
great.
It was already porous, wasn't it?
Because our characters were going in and out and the hirogen, were
they Nazis or weren't they Nazis and all of that.
There was a pretty porous boundary, but now it's completely broken
down and that's great.
I think that's so good.
Okay, I'm going to be descending again.
I don't think there's a Nathan Bossomley in that writer's room
going, oh my god, the boundaries between 2 fictions are being...
I think there's someone...
No, I think there's Brandon Bragger going, wouldn't it be cool if
there was a great big hole in the holodeck simulation and they're
soldiers climbing.
They know what they're doing.
I think they know what they're doing.
Yeah, yeah.
And my objection is this.
I mean, look, he's watching it on television.
The Aroach was watching.
What was happening on a television for God's sake.
And we're watching him watching that on television.
Like, it's absolutely.
It's absolutely deliberate.
But my point is, is like the, the reason I'm bringing it up is, is
I don't think there's anything wrong with a bit of fluff either
but that's the voyager problem.
It's just so much of this, it's fluff.
Yeah.
Yeah, but I think this is sort of competent and interesting in a
way that Voyager doesn't always matter.
That is true.
We've seen a few like that.
Yeah, yeah.
Whereas this is, you know, it's fun and there's actual sort of
action.
Do you know who directs this episode?
It's a different director for each part, even though it's one big
thing.
This is directed by Victor LeBaule.
And you and I have recently seen an episode directed by Vita
LaBole, and that was in the...
I think I want to call him Victor Lerble.
Okay, well, maybe that's it.
But it was in it was in the Pale Moonlight, which was a very
stylised piece and very contained.
And this is the complete opposite of that, isn't it?
You know?
Yeah, yeah, it's running around at action and stuff.
Look, I mean, Star Trek, the original series aspired to do action
and usually the way it achieved it was by having fist fights
because they're kind of cheap to stage, I guess.
There he is.
William Shatner, I guess, thought it really Butch and Tatty, you
know?
Yeah, yeah, he was awesome last week when he was kicking that guy
in the chest.
I mean, I've already set up.
There's nothing wrong with the motive of just having a lot of fun
and delivering that fun to the audience.
I think my big issue is, is there is another Star Trek show that
is on the air at the same time.
That's just doing more thoughtful things.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
And so here.
Wait, I can't remember who's had there.
Have this guy, like Beltran hasn't had his neural interface turned
off?
No, and he still thinks he still thinks, yeah, that's right.
No, no, he's boring when it gets switched off as well.
I can't tell the president of performance.
He still thinks he's an American troop guy, right?
But the others don't. isn't that right?
Yeah That's right.
Yes.
Yeah, yeah.
Oh, no, I think Tom Harris still thinks he is an American troop as
well.
Oh, yeah. why is that?
I don't quite understand what the in-story reason for that is.
Because there isn't any difference in the performance?
don't know.
Well, maybe, isn't what happened?
We deactivated a few people's chips and then the hierogen found
out and put a stop to it and so that that's where we are.
There's no story reasoning because there's no reason later on in
this episode as to why they have to be.
Like, at one point, there's a big explosion and suddenly
everybody's themselves again.
Yeah, yeah, we break the.
Oh, they they explode the something in the in Sick Bay, don't
they?
The thing that controls the neural interface. right.
And a really fake looking CGI explosion.
Well, we had a pretty great fake looking CGI explosion in part
one.
That was nice. was pretty good.
Oh, all of this.
I'm sorry, Tom Paris and B'lana.
And oh, you're carrying my baby and oh, God almighty.
No, well, she's carrying the German baby.
I mean, it's super upsetting.
I thought it was his.
No, no, he was there years ago.
So she's, yeah, yeah.
But it's like these 2 are, you know, this is the season where
these 2 are starting to get romantically linked.
So within the program as well, they're romantically linked and how
much more interesting would it have been had it been just 2
characters that weren't?
Or they hated one another or something.
I don't know.
I don't, well, but he could have come in, you would like, you
jerry bag, you know.
I think we want I think that we want that romance arc to appear.
You know, it's kind of like even when I'm in a simulation, I don't
know who I am, I'm attracted to you.
I think that's okay.
It's just a bit obvious.
I'm being a bit critical now, aren't I?
Do you know why?
Because I think in this episode, we, like, somewhere in the middle
of this episode, my goodwill ran out a little bit.
Yeah, it sags horribly.
My goodwill runs out in the Klingon scenes in holiday. too.
I think they're not necessary.
I don't know why they weren't cut.
I think they're terrible.
Well, maybe it's for time.
If they had to give Harry Kimmel the extra time.
Maybe they were just like, well, we need to pat this out a bit.
Yeah, yeah.
I mean, you get the spectacle of the Klingons invading the French
village at the end, which, you know, that's quite amusing.
You do get that wonderful bit where Neelix keeps slapping the
doctor and the doctor just goes, please don't do that.
Yeah, well, I think that they think those scenes between Neelix
and the doctor are funnier than they are.
I think they're less successful than, well, you know, you've got
Ethan Phillips and Robert Picardo, you would think that would work
but I think maybe the dialogue is a bit too shit.
I guarantee one of those actors can deliver lions extremely well.
I think even Phillips, like I said, I think he's very good at what
he's called on to do.
How do you know I wasn't talking about Ethan Phillips?
You know, I'm saying very hot about Kate Mull group going around
with a gun, you know.
Remember that episode where she's going around looking for that
CGI virus and she goes, oh, Ripley, and she's going around in the
tank top.
Oh, shit, yeah.
What's that episode called?
Macrocosm.
It's really, really awful. terrible.
I know about Star Trek.
No, you don't.
Every time we roll that round, you're like, well, what's that?
I don't know what that is.
One episode she went, why the hell do I have a Star Trek podcast?
episode one.
So here...
She is Janeway now, isn't she?
She's not Katrine because at that point in the last episode where
she was going to shoot seven.
That's when she got when it starts.
And I do think this is a good Janeway episode.
Like she gets to do a lot of improvisation.
She gets a lot of action.
I love the bits where she's running around the ship being
hunting.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, and she gets shot and, you know, like, doesn't she?
like in the leg.
She's really good.
And she outstinks him by being like...
No, don't don't hurt me, please.
Just the game to come a bit closer unless she blows the shit out
of here, isn't it?
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, it's really good.
She is great.
I actually, all right. going to say something nice about Robert
Beltran.
Oh, so you ready?
Sit down.
I think his hair looks great in this.
Oh my god.
I was going to talk about his hair earlier, but actually, I think
you know, when he had a bit of gray in it.
There is one and two.
He looked super hot back then.
Yeah.
Yeah, no, he's a handsome man.
Like there's Don't make a rip a character, though, does it?
No.
Look, you wouldn't cast, if you had a Native American character
now, you couldn't cast someone who wasn't Native American like
they have here.
And there's a problem then with all of his kind of Native American
shtick, I think.
Well, the fact the fact that they have the nerve to bring in what
they thought was a Native American specialist who turned out to be
make, you know, he got it all off the back of a serial packet or
something.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I mean, yeah.
I think that's that's bad.
And that was kind of an important aspect of his character, but I
think he checks out.
Think about Tim Russ, who is underserved all the time.
He's shoved up the back of that fucking bridge and he gets nothing
to do.
And he still delivers like he's still trying. in a way that
Beltran doesn't seem to be, I think.
You remember when I watched series one of Voyager a little while
back?
You know, I wanted a bit of escapism and I stuck that on.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I was really struck at how much they gave Tim Russell to do in the
series one.
How strong his relationship with Mulru was.
And in episodes like Prime Factors where he managed to be like
really surprising and I was watching that going, well, what
happened?
He's really good.
Like, what happens?
Now, have a look at this doctor, have a look at sort of Dr. Mengele
the Herogen, and you can see that it's the master from Buffy.
I can see him rising up out of a pool of blood.
He's pretty good.
Oh no, here we go.
Back into stock cave set number 64.
So this is so fucking cheap as well.
They've got 2 Klingons.
That's all they have.
It's the same cave, you know, where they went in a strange new
world that Enterprise episode.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
It's terrible.
Not only are they stuck poor even Felix under all of that latex.
They put him in front of a bloody fire.
Yeah, yeah.
Poor son.
But like there's a huge battle happening, like what, just kind of
offscreen, just offscreen.
There are a lot of Kleons that are that you're going to fight with
them.
You find the money runs out.
Yeah, that's right.
Well, no, because there's more than two, isn't there, when they
attack the French?
Oh, yeah, yeah.
When they attack the village, they've got heaps of Klingons come
in. but here we can't afford them. think they cover it with a
line.
He says, go and get your comrades.
We're off So bad.
They're boring.
Oh, no.
Oh, see, now look.
Instantly Harry Kim's less interesting because they paired him out
with Tom Paris again.
Yeah, yeah.
But although, do you remember that?
I heard right.
Where they went, called the chute, where they're stuck in that
prison, which is turns out to be like a space station or
whatever.
Tom Paris gets stabbed and they're they're almost going to kiss
the pair of them.
It gets really like homoerotic between them.
Yeah. sort of hurt comfort, isn't it?
Would have been quite interesting, you know, to see that develop.
Yeah, it's not going to happen, is it?
And look how heterosexual it is.
It's kind of like if Betty Grabel came around that corner.
What part of her would you be staring at?
He's like, fuck off.
And that's a sort of horrible Tom Paris thing, you know.
The way this show deals with sex.
We talked about it before. dreadful.
It's so bad.
And compared to how Star Trek is with it now. horribly, it's even
horribly sexist or it's incredibly chaste.
It's not what it should be, which is very sexy and, you know
open.
Yeah.
Or kind of sophomoric or sort of high school. you know, it's like
the Delaney sisters, you know, like maybe I get to fuck both of
them or something and it's just sort of yuck.
I mean, they could have done, you know, they could have lent into
Janeway and Chakotay again, and, you know, their characters are
fucking, you know, that would have been quite exciting.
Yeah, yeah.
Imagine a pair of them down the Jeffreys tube right now, you know
rolling about.
Yeah.
Oh, God.
I don't know, though.
You know, just like in enterprise where they try to make it more
sexy, you know, they're they're naked and rubbing gel into each
other's naked bodies and things and it's all, it's really
terrible.
What was the one that I was watching?
I was watching one where she takes her top off and um, a trip is
massaging her.
Oh, that's serious free.
No, there's a whole thread of them having, you know, massages
throughout Series 3.
You know, to because they're so stressful and the Delphic in
fact.
Yeah.
I think, yeah, maybe it was anomaly or something, I can't
remember.
So the other thing here too, which is just super embarrassing, is
that there are Klingon subtitles that we can watch and they bear
absolutely no relationship to anything that comes out of Neelix's
mouth.
So Ethan Phillips has been unable or unwilling to learn the shitty
clean.
I want to say I'm willing.
I'm sorry, it's still better than those shitty scenes in the 1st
discovery episode.
So good.
So terrifying.
Terrifying.
Terrifyingly dull.
That 1st speech where he gives the thing to camera and then ends
up speaking in English at the end, I think, is really good.
That's an effort to make the Klingons properly scary and alien
which they need to be for discovery to work.
Oh, totally.
Series one.
Well, here.
No, then.
No, no, no.
But here, right, you've got all this Klingon dialogue.
The Klingons are so domesticated by this point, that, you know
they're just kind of, they're no threat.
And discovery makes them a threat in series.
I think, you know, as properly.
It's just like, oh, let's bring in the Klingons.
Everyone loves the Klingons, you know.
No, but I mean, they're trying to examine what America is like.
No, not in discovery here.
Oh, here.
It's just sheep, isn't it?
For fuck's sake.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
We've got the fucking costumes like around.
I have the nerve in series 7.
But they run into this Klingon ship that got lost in the Delta
Quadrant. and they've been looking for the great saviour and
they're convinced it's Balana Torres's baby for some reason.
I mean, it's just, yeah, I don't know if anyone was actually
scripted it in at that point.
You know, the doctor is a little underserved in this, isn't he?
Yeah, yeah, it's a bit of a shame.
He does a good job in, you know, like just sort of popping into
existence and out of existence with and talking to Harry.
I thought that was really great in episode one.
But here he's just stuck on the...
Is there a fit later on where we...
He steps out from under like and it's raining and he just steps
back in again.
He's like, no.
Like, Ricardo can do anything with a look or a lie, can't he?
You know, like he makes everything quiet music.
He is good.
But he's he's really not given much to do here.
This is sort of bad.
I like that.
How did they manage to make Neelix look even more ugly?
Yeah, it's the Klingon teeth.
Those Klingon teeth.
You know, he's got the little pointy teeth normally and now he's
got big ugly Klingon teeth.
And so he looks super weird.
How is it that managed to make wolves look pretty then?
Because I think wolfed and the ugly, you know?
No, no, he's handsome man.
I think that this is also the money running out where they're all
just shooting guns out of window. and describing what they're
seeing.
Yeah, watch that doson's pregnant.
Don't give her a gun and tell her to shoot it. no that's cool.
But like that's cheap as hell.
They've obviously run out of time on the Paramount lot.
And so now we just have to have messenger speeches telling us what
the action is, which is a bit of a shame.
We will go outside again in a minute.
Here we are.
Look, we're outside.
Yep, yep.
And we've got people running around.
I like the fact that the camera was shooting through that archway
so we had a bit of depth to it as well.
I'm reaching here, all right?
No, no, no, no.
I mean, if this was Discovery right now, there'd be a drone around
this Paramount lot. filming it all from above, you know.
Oh, no, the environment would be much weirder than the Paramount
lot.
That's the thing.
This is a little bit, you know, it's it's interesting for Voyager
but but Discovery is much weirder looking.
I really like, you saw in that scene, the young Hirogen and our
Nazi friend have teamed up and that's going to be important for
how this ends up working, I think.
There's what's his face?
There's the master again.
Yeah.
A master.
He becomes Janeway with a gum.
He's the maestro in Seinfeld as well.
Elaine.
That's me whingeing and complaining about, um, you know, oh, this
is all a bit shallow, this and there's no substance like this.
And then I go, oh, there's Janeway with a gum.
You know?
Yeah, that's what you want to say.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
In black, Janeway, all in black, with a gun.
It's so great.
So good.
Yeah, and do you know what?
I said, when we did the Raven, I said to you, season 4 and 5 of
Voyager has a confidence to it that the rest of the series kind of
lacks.
I just feel like they kind of knew they were onto something this
season.
Even if episode every episode ain't great.
Yeah, there's a pizzazz to it.
Yeah, I mean, I think this is this is...
I kind of like how big Hirogan, big hero Hirogan is kind of
horrible.
He's not a good guy despite the fact that we're kind of rooting
for him, you know, Janeway's been shot in the leg.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, that's definitely like, you know, that's that's that's
fictional violence there because if that was me, I'd be riving
around on that floor.
Like, and I wouldn't get up again.
I certainly wouldn't be.
Oh, there we go.
There's that explosion.
Yeah.
Whoa.
Yeah, it's fake as shit, isn't it?
It really is unbelievable.
Awesome.
Doctor Who was doing explosions 15 years later, they didn't know
any better.
No, no.
And, and, you know, like they're not going to set off an explosion
in their standing sets, you know, in the in the corridor set that
they have to use next week.
That's not gonna happen.
I feel like back in the day, though, you know, like in both terms
of Star Trek and Doctor Who, they would have just done a real
explosion, you know?
No, they just wouldn't have been able to do it.
I think they just couldn't because they would damage the standing
sets.
It would be a problem.
Well, Doctor Who blew up things all the time, though, didn't it?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. travel.
And they say, oh, hang on.
Have we gone past the sequence yet where they make a direct
comparison between the, was it the Borg and the Nazis or is it
the...
No, no, no.
And and we've already got them being the Nazis, that's the point.
We don't need the Borg to be mentioned and the Nazis because the
Herogen are literally wearing Nazi uniforms.
Um, and like we are about to get that scene, I think, where um, uh
where the Nazi convinces the young Hirogen to rebel against the
old one.
And he'd been on board sort of reluctantly in episode one, but now
he's in opposition, and I think that's super interesting.
No, this is it.
The Borg of their day.
That is a horror of their day. fascists.
Well, thank you for that little history, like, I think he's also
got the little book of Nazis on his shelf as well, next to trucks
and cartoons.
He's our he's our main Nazi.
He does seem to be the expert on everything, doesn't he?
Tom Paris.
Yeah, yeah.
Well, you know, I, it shits me a little bit that you have to be an
expert on this, you know, that, I don't know.
I don't know.
They're trying to make them be from the future and make our
present kind of alien.
And I guess some of them are not from Earth or whatever.
Is this character this Nazi character?
Is he interesting?
Because I'm not sure if he's all that interesting, you know. acted
but...
Well, I think it gets interesting.
I think he has an important role.
And like I said, he's got the 2 speeches.
One in episode one with the old Herogen and one in the 2nd episode
with the young Herogen.
And those speeches are important, I think.
He also gets the thing about art, which I think has something.
Yeah, you know, like the Nazis plunder for art and he's interested
in art.
And, you know, the old Herogen is interested in art.
He's here.
You know, this is like the holodeck programs are things that are
created by humans in a creative way.
They're kind of art, they're like TV, aren't they?
That's what we kind of think.
This is the World War 2 resistance TV show holodeck program.
I mean, the Hirogen art just seems to be, you know, decorative
skulls all over the world.
Well, I did like the fact that they put it all over Janeway's...
Yeah, I did too.
And she looks at it kind of.
I don't think she says anything, but she does kind of look and
he's not super happy about it.
It would be great at the end of the episode where she went, oh, I
should be intimidating people more.
Let's keep him.
I am.
I keep them.
Oh God, here we go.
Back to the Klingons.
Yeah, we're a bit no, this is a bit desperate now, isn't it?
Yeah, this is a bit desperate.
Like, they're trying something.
I'll reattach any severed limbs, just don't misplace them as
pretty good.
Did you hear that?
Tally ho.
Tally funny.
It's so funny.
And he does a little thing, like he waves the dagger around.
Picardo, man. so good.
Yeah.
He really, really is.
Yeah, now here's Janeway looking around at the skulls and the and
the weapons.
I see you've done some redecorating blesser.
Jerry's got a nasty score on his face there, isn't he?
That herogen.
Yeah, yeah.
I think it's to help us distinguish them.
I mean, they've got different shaped heads and different colouring
and I think he's greyer, like white hair.
It's different. as well.
But it's like an instant, distinctive feature, isn't it?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I, oh, and he's wearing a Klingon, he's wearing a Klingon outfit
instead of a hirogen outfit because, again, the fiction and the
reality is, you know, bleeding into each other.
Well, the fiction and the other fiction, I keep saying.
Um, I really like this too, because he's explaining what's
happening, you know, he, he's telling her and she buys it.
I think, you know, she's on his side because what he wants.
Yeah, I'm trying to create a future for my people.
Um, This is the discovery route, isn't there?
But this is, you know what I mean?
It's aspiring to be better. building friendships.
Yeah, making a gesture.
It's all of those things that we should aspire to do instead of
fighting.
Well, look at J.
Ray.
She looks very comfortable sitting in that chair.
I know what she's got a sore leg.
You don't intimidate me.
Yeah, she's been shot in that leg.
I mean come on.
Yeah.
You're being bloody agony.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Well, Sanequo did stabbed in the leg in discovery recently and was
kind of, you know, trying to get around and get control of the
ship.
Or was that something that was that?
I can't remember.
Do you remember where the was?
All right, when Kira was stabbed in the gut.
And then we come back to her and she's literally lying against the
console with blood everywhere.
And it's like, yeah, that's what we would be like.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
Although she does have the lie.
No worries.
It looks worse than it is.
Bloody fiction.
All right, all right.
It is fiction.
But this, isn't it great?
The, he has literally used that.
That's what he wants.
It's the TV.
The TV shows that Voyager has in its data database in the holodeck
database have fascinated him and that's what he wants.
And it's not what he wants is to do the the hunting thing.
Instead of doing the hunting thing in reality and the games on the
holodeck, the culture and history and stuff.
He wants to swap them around.
He wants to do the hunting thing in the holodeck, and in reality
he wants to, you know, work together, drink wine, watch telly.
You know, like, like, listen to 7 singing.
And that's pretty cool, I think.
I think that's pretty great.
That's a great point that he is like one voice.
And yeah, like, I think realistically, if this was, you know, this
was happening in reality, he'd probably be murdered and they just
go about, well, hunting and killing again.
That is, that's what's happening.
That is what happens.
See, look, we're enjoying wine.
I just love that.
Like it's a Nazi herogen drinking some wine.
He doesn't like it.
But I think I do think that the other one likes it.
Now here's the speech, right?
This guy is annoying.
He's like, um, the Hirogen has the shits with him.
And, um, but he's the one who gives...
Once there's this ceasefire.
He's the one who gives the idea that it should break, you know.
And it's partly because, remember, in part one.
Now he's he's accusing the commandant of rejecting the idea of
Nazi racial superiority.
And that's the speech in part one where he tells him you're not
really superior to anything, you don't deserve any of these
trophies, you know, you're terrible.
So he's rejecting Nazism.
Does he die?
can't remember.
Is he killed?
What the...
Oh, is he killed by Paris?
Oh, I can't remember.
They probably dare to slap Bologna.
At 7's getting less of a cut of the pie in this episode as well
isn't she?
She is, isn't she?
Although Jerry Ryan does say, despite being very, very sick, she
found this was her favourite story of season four.
Oh, I'm not surprised.
It's just really fun to do.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
It's done nothing at all.
Poor Tuvok.
No.
Bless her.
I still love that she pulls the ball guard as a threat.
They're going to get you.
How could you truncate this thing?
Because clearly, like, like, we set up quite a bit of this 2nd
episode is treading water now.
We're basically waiting to get to the pertinent scenes that lead
us to the conclusion.
Yeah.
Like, should this be an hour rather than that?
I think, well, we can't do that.
It needs, but they do it now.
Now, they would write.
Yeah, they absolutely routinely do.
They make it longer if they don't feel like there's enough time
and they'll probably make it shorter if they felt like, you know
yeah, I think there's a discovery episode that's less than 40
minutes long.
But they're quite often an hour.
But they're not going out in a time slot on broadcast TV anymore.
So they can be as long as they want.
A flagship show.
There were like lots of rules in place, apart for which, you
know?
Yeah, because it's UPN's flagship show that's what it launches
with, isn't it?
Isn't that mad that then that stifles the creativity?
Yeah, yeah.
Like, you know, I've got many complaints, as you know, about
discovery, but the fact that they give the finger up to, you know
the network saying, well, you've got to do this and you've got to
do that and they're saying, no, we're going to tell the story that
we want to tell, you know.
Yeah, yeah.
This speech is so great.
Here's the Nazi giving the speech.
And he now convinces this guy to break the ceasefire.
And it's the same rhetoric that the older one rejected last
episode in episode one.
And I think it's really actually, like, I think there's a little
bit of kind of whitewashing here because the Nazis are in a way
Christian.
I mean, they're also kind of pagan in all sorts of ways as well.
But the fact that he says the Jews are civilised. that
civilisation in that sense is sort of decadent.
I think it's sort of, I think it sounds weird to have that line in
an episode of Star Trek.
It seems a bit too much, but I do kind of like it in a way.
I think it's very strange that, um, void, void, the very act of it
being in the Delta Quadrant could have introduced Nazism to the
Delta Quadrant.
You know, it's like, right.
Well, here's this appalling idea.
Let's run with that.
Yeah, well, no, no, we have Nazis back now.
They're back in fashion apparently.
There's a lot of it about, apparently.
Oh, Tuvok in this jacket.
Yeah, I know, and should be fair.
Chicago does look great in that uniform as well.
Yeah, he really does.
He's poured into that uniform.
No, he's a handsome man.
It's even funny. like when that when that car drove into shot.
I thought, oh, there are cars.
You can have cars on TV.
I'd kind of forgotten that because, you know, it is Voyager is so
much standing around talking.
Do you remember in Star Trek Nemesis when they had that buggy on
the...
So bad.
Treadful.
Okay, so the Nazis are shooting at us again.
Back to the Klingons again.
Yeah.
Are they really fucked this up in such a great way as well?
Like they, you'll see.
Oh, see, like fucking Messenger speeches.
You know, oh, the crew is taking heavy casualties off screen
somewhere that you're not going to see.
It's weird, you know, because I felt like the 1st episode gathered
a bit of momentum and a bit of pace as it went along.
Climax, whereas this just keeps stuttering.
Yeah, I think so.
It's like they've frontloaded.
Well, how does it play?
I wonder, as one big hour and a half?
you know, special that's heavily trailed?
Is it just that it gets a bit boring towards the end?
Like there's a big climax in the middle.
They kind of faff about for a while and then there's a climax at
the end.
I mean, essentially, we've watched it all that.
Just 5 minutes rest in between, you know.
And we're still having these complaints.
Yeah, I think you're right.
I mean, this is just, this is cheap as hell where Neelix has to
persuade 2 people before we can have a whole heap of Klingons
boring into the thing.
But I mean, I like these 2 together are really good.
And I like the bit in the minute where he says, you are my prey
rum.
Yeah.
And then there's some fabric.
They always managed to shoot these scenes going through the
corridors and starships.
Well, actually, no, you said the opposite in the raven, didn't
you?
Oh, lots of boring kind of corridor scenes.
I mean, this is clearly a more competent director then, because
the camera is like kind of zooming around after Janeway.
Yeah, I mean, this is a shock, I think, isn't it?
Doesn't this doesn't.
I think the fact that we're like 10 minutes away from the end or
whatever...
Maybe if these were the most standing characters, if this was an
alien race, we've been around for a long time.
I don't give a shit about the herosion.
That's not what I mean. that's not what I mean What I mean is that
the way this should end is with the alpha herogen or whatever, our
hero herogen, getting his way.
Right.
And yeah.
And the fact that that doesn't work.
Like, it looks like it's working out.
There's a ceasefire.
Everyone's got their memory back.
She's working with the hierogen to ensure that they have access to
the technology in the way that he wants.
She's cooperating with him to give him what he wants.
And that's kind of how a Star Trek should end. isn't it?
You know, and then they go off.
I do want to talk about that.
Yeah.
We still have.
We still have 10 minutes to go.
And so we kill him off.
We have some more gunfight, which is okay, sort of.
Oh, yeah, you know, yeah, I mean, yeah, I'm watching this about
the music and the dialogue.
Actually, can we talk about the music for a 2nd please?
Because I think...
Well, this is David Bell, okay?
doing a bit, is he?
He did a music in the Pel movie line.
I loved it there too.
And he's one of the few.
No, maybe the only.
Composers that's actually trying to give a bit of pace to what's
going on. you know?
And yes, a note is not as sophisticated as current day music and
probably shouldn't be.
You know, we should learn some things in 20 years.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Oh, hang on.
I love these things of Jane, we're being hunted.
It's like she suddenly remembered she's been shot like she's
suddenly hobbling.
Yeah, yeah.
But that thing where they're all behind the sandbags and stuff a
little bit earlier, and she's going to 7 is modifying the grenade
so it emits a photonic burst, which will destroy holograms
nearby.
And then they fuck it up because they don't get to throw it.
And instead it just makes all their holographic ammunition
disappear or whatever.
That's why I found it.
God, every time you talk about technobabble, you know, I get a
little bit.
I get a little bit hard. you.
Poor Harry Kim, you've not been able to have any fun at all.
No, I think like he just gets new kind of facial blood in every
scene. which is slightly different.
That's Robert Beltran, like whinging that there's no sort of
nuance to the history in this and all that.
At least he got to dress up, you know?
But it's not history.
It's a holodeck program.
They're not going.
This is a TV show about the resistance, which is what you alluded
to before.
They're in a TV show. and they're TV show characters in a
different TV show.
That's exactly what that is.
Yeah, that's right.
She gets shot, falls over, and we...
And it blows up all our ammunition.
So good.
They're doing some subversions now, aren't they?
So we're keeping this thing going for 10 more minutes.
Well, but I think what ends up happening is more interesting than
where it looked like it was going and we'll talk about that.
Look, Voyage has been blast to buggery, isn't it?
And all the bulkheads are down and everything.
Yeah, I know next week it'll be like a fun palace again, but...
Do you think, so what do you think the thing is, the crew just, you
know, does a lot of polishing or something?
That shot of the man has no legs. missing. really terrible.
Yeah, I don't know what it's for either.
He's just a hologram.
He gives a shit. one more quirky image in, you know?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
That's okay.
A man with no legs.
I mean, that's the sort of thing.
You get in a war drama, isn't it?
You know?
Is his legs blown off?
Yeah. yeah, yeah, yeah.
We're going to have everyone lined up against the wall about to be
shot seen.
Oh dear, so embarrassing.
This is marvellous somewhere.
Janeway, Janeway plays the victim.
I do like this thing.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
I think that's really properly good.
Gosh, that corridor is dirty.
Oh, well, that has gone...
I can't see any rocks.
So this designs have gone better.
No, no, there are rocks.
There are rocks on the floor.
There are as well.
They pack them in in those ships.
A lot of panels and stuff.
Oh, yeah, no, there's totally rocks.
Yep.
What's this chainway?
come on I can be of use to you.
I can help you prepare the ship.
I'll just be like, oh, you terrible fucking ham.
Boom, boom, boom.
No, she should have done with that guy.
She should have seen him. shoot him with a gun.
No, she should have smacks him round the egg with that gun.
That's it.
Standard assassination pose.
And here come the Klingons.
Oh, prepare to fire.
Yeah, like that, just shoot them and then go and look at the
Klingons, for God's sake.
Finally, we can afford execution's gone, 8 of them at least.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
And so this is only budget for two.
That shot there as we look.
I love that.
Reality into fiction and see it all going into hell. one fiction
into another fiction.
It is...
I love it right now, too.
You don't stop saying this is fiction.
There it is.
There we go.
He wipes his head.
Yeah, yeah, right.
That's right, it's raining.
And Picardo doesn't want to get the top of his head wet.
Ah there we go.
Whoa.
Evil Nazi gets wanged by a Klingon.
That's pretty good.
I'm happy about that.
Do you know what, Nathan?
I'm going to say something to you now and I don't think you're
really going to like it.
What's that?
I think I prefer the Voyager cruise to the TNG one, you know.
I think the best of the Voyager crew are more fun.
Yeah, oh, I think so too.
When we were young, Hiro, Javenday.
There was just nothing to hang anything on because they were all
just a bit dull.
Whereas they're all been quite fun in this, aren't they?
I think, well, Well, yeah, except for the 2 Roberts.
Well, they're boring it. terrible.
We didn't mention young Hirogen just falling through that crash
stories and stories and then getting killed.
It was so good.
That was a great shot.
It was fake as hell like, but whatever.
It's like the big giant special effects shot.
Now, here we gloss over a whole heap of stuff.
We did some fighting for a while and then decided not to do it.
You know what?
We've cleaned up the ship.
Look at Janeway's haircut, right?
She looks just like Genevieve Bujol from the original pilot.
That airs exactly the same here.
My favourite hair is the long hair.
Now, here's the, we've wiped this device.
We've wiped Moriarty.
He's, uh, we've reformatted the drive.
Moriarty's gone.
Did you see how we're giving it to that one?
with the camera swooping down.
So they were all in shit.
Look at the camera looking up at them.
But so what this is, is her giving them the opportunity to change
but leaving it up to them and leaving it up in the air, what
happens?
So this is a more interesting ending because it's ambiguous.
We don't know whether they go away and fix their society or not.
And it looks like they're not going to.
And I love the fact that she says, oh, just hang it on the wall.
I think we're supposed to think that they are and they do.
That's the thing is they do.
They do.
But here it's just we're giving you the opportunity.
And I like it too, because she does it because she made a promise
to the Alpha Herogen.
And she kind of, she's sympathetic with his ideas.
She likes that idea that the herogen can build a civilisation.
But why aren't they just killing them all?
Like, why, why?
What do they have over them now?
Uh, yeah, there's some dialogue.
I mean, like they don't quite get there.
There's some connective tissue that's papered over.
Do you know what I mean?
Like with the captain's log at the end.
It's just like, ah, we stopped fighting.
There's a ceasefire for some reason, but we don't know why.
But I have like a big problem with this, right?
Because they introduce like the Hirogen as the new Big Bad of the
Delta Quadrant, right?
Yeah.
And then they end it with this very lame ending where she gives
them a bit of technology and off they trot.
And they introduce, I don't know, Species 8472 as the new Big Bad
of the of the Delta Quadrant, sorry.
And then they do that episode on Fly 10,000 light years away from
them.
That's all an episode.
That's the recording episode where it's the fake Starfleet
headquarters.
And then they all shake hands at the end and go, oh, well, we'll
just be friends.
I just don't buy it, and I know this is Star Trek, and I get the
idea, and I think this is why I don't buy into a lot of Kurtzman
Trek, because Kurtzman Trek is always going for the, you know
we're better than this, and, and, you know, we're not going to
blow up the Clennon whole world.
We're going to be better people than this.
Yeah.
I think the problem is not Kursman Treg or Voyager.
I think the problem is me because I think I may appear to be this
wonderful optimist.
Actually, I think deep down I'm a terrible bloody cynic.
Okay, so the DS9 approach to Star Trek of you have to get your
hands dirty and a lot of people are going to get killed and at the
ending, you know, we're all very fucking miserable at the end of
every episode.
Well, that's just life, you know?
And I think that's, and I think like, in the back of my head, I'm
just like, that's reality, you know?
And I know, I know the whole idea of Star Trek is to portray
something better.
I just think something in my brain fights that.
And so every time they do it, I just go, yeah, I don't buy it.
I'm sorry.
I understand the aspiration.
I just don't buy it. you know?
See, for me, that's what's important about Star Trek, and it was
only partially there in Star Trek, the original series.
And then Next Generation kind of makes it more explicit because
it's kind of based a bit on our memories of the original series.
And then Kurtzmantrek comes along and I think despite what people
who aren't particularly good critics say, it is.
It is really, really firmly grounded in those ideals, that there
is a real proper concern for the Federation.
The discovery episodes that we've covered.
You've gone in, you've broken it down.
I don't think anyone listening to, what was that, the finale we
watched called?
Uh, that hope is you part two.
I mean, anyone could deny that the Star Trek ideal is not laced
throughout that episode.
But I remember you saying, like, you know, wouldn't it be awful if
it was one of the major powers that had created the burn?
And I'm like, no, that'd be fucking amazing.
And also probably more realistic, instead of some child crying out
to his mother, they go... mother, you know.
And so, yeah, I don't really think the problem is this ending.
I think the problem is my reaction to it.
But I think that the ending is ambiguous.
Like, I don't think it's at all clear that they will take that
route.
And we hope they will because it's Star Trek, but it's like I'm
now giving you the choice, but we're not friends.
I can't influence you or enforce it.
And, you know, Janeway does have that crack. you know, maybe it
can just be a trophy and you can hang it up on the wall in the net
with the skulls and shit.
Um, you know.
And so I do like that.
But I like that there is something aspirational in the episode
that the hirogen have come on board and they've learned from the
TV shows.
I keep saying it from the TV shows that Voyager watches, that
there is the possibility of a better life than the kind of
miserable, solitary existence with skulls hanging over your head.
Excuse me, I've just established that I am that person, right?
All right, it's time for us to choose our next Star Trek episode
and it's your turn, isn't it, Joe?
It is, it is.
And it's basically a follow-up to what I've just said at the end
of that episode.
I am selecting only Kurtzman Trek this time because I'm hoping to
find the one episode that's deeply cynical.
I doubt I will, but you know, I live in hope.
Okay, no, actually, I think someone likes season one episodes.
Yeah, I think so too.
I think, yeah.
And you know, like given there are, what, 4 seasons of discovery
now, there's a fair chance we'll get discovery when I press this.
Yeah, yeah.
Okay, you ready?
I'm ready.
Okay.
I won't actually know what any of these are.
Your Star Trek Discovery episode is season two, episode three
point of light.
Oh, so this is like really early.
Uh, this is early season two.
And I can't really remember where we are, but we're clearly still
setting things up for the big season 2 plot.
And, you know, there's a big sort of when is Spock going to turn
up, isn't there?
There's Pike is on board the ship by now.
So I think it might be interesting.
I, for me, series 2 of Discovery is the least successful one.
And I do think that it gets a little bit overwrought.
And it also kind of serves a little bit as an apology tour for
series one. said that before.
Yeah.
I love the series one.
I've already pressed the bum again.
I'm so sorry.
And do you know what?
I don't know what this is, but I'm choosing it on the title
alone.
Because it's got a fucking nerve.
I'll tell you.
What is it?
It's your random Star Trek prodigy episode is...
Season one, episode eight, time amok.
What, no.
They constantly riff on the...
They constantly riff on other episode titles.
They've got a 1st contact as well.
So, Lower Deck starts with an episode called Second Contact and N
Series 2 with an episode called First, First Contact.
And then Prodigy has an episode called First Con hyphen Tact.
And like they're just being terribly silly.
Not to mention.
We only touched prodigy once.
We both... let's do it.
Yeah, absolutely.
Let's do it Like I'm wondering if it needs any context or if
there's one that can just be watched on its own, but let's just do
this one on its own. let's give it a go.
Absolutely.
Okay, so season one, episode eight.
Time amok.
You've been listening to Untitled Star Trek Project with Joe Ford
and Nathan Bottomley.
You can find us online at Untitled Star Trek project.com, where
you can find links to our Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube channel.
Our podcast artwork is by Kayla Ciceran, and the theme was
composed by Cameron Lamb.
This episode was recorded on the 19th of March 2022 and released
on the 25th of March.
We'll see you next time for Star Trek Prodigy Time Amark.