The Visitor

Hey, Joe. Hi. So, we are watching a pretty important episode, I think, of Deep Space 9 and one that would have to be on, well, it seems to be on everyone's sort of top 5 DS9 episodes and in many, many people's top 5 Star Trek episodes of all time, I think. Oh, I'd say the latter. And may I say warning signs hit me immediately when we start saying this because this automatically, like in the pale moonlight and the siege of AR 558 means that you are going to absolutely despise the thing. Well, no, I actually like it and I think it is very, very good. I think there are elements of the production that I'm still keen to make fun of because it is. It's still 90s trek. It is still 90s trek. And so there are some decisions which I think are a little bit unfortunate and which do kind of work against what they're trying to do. But I also think that it is really well done. And by all accounts, they didn't quite realise as they were making it how special it was going to be, it's got some great performances and it is a really interesting script that does break a number of Star Trek rules, which is super refreshing. If you've alluded to that a couple of times now, but haven't actually given me any details. I'm quite interested to see what you mean when you say that. I think this is one of those episodes where, yeah, you can point at the, you know, dreadful old age prosthetics that appear in this episode. The occasional piece of ropey dialogue that appears in this episode, and the languid pace, which seems to afflict most of 90 Star Trek. Yeah. But there is a magic to this episode. It taps into something very, very real, which almost transcends all of those things. I found this extremely moving. Uh, before my mother died 3 years ago, and this is the 1st time it's the 2nd time, sorry, I've seen it since she passed, and it works on a whole different level, if you've lost a parent this episode. So yeah, I think like, you're right. The performances, the characterisation, but most importantly, the emotion that is in this. They judge it so finely that by the end, and it takes a lot for television to move me to tears, like I know, like you, you'll blub at anything. Hey, I'm hard as a rock when it comes to television. I was watching this this morning and I was in tears. It's really moving I've never watched it without having experienced the death of a parent, so I've never had a kind of naive watching of it. And it, it doesn't say anything very definite about grief. Like, you couldn't say that they've sat down and tried to say something about grief, but they explore it in all sorts of interesting ways. And because it's science fiction, they also get to explore it from the perspective of the parent who's gone as well, which I thought was really interesting and which worked really well. I found that the most moving thing. I've always, is Ben Sisco's reaction to Jake every time he appears. Like he's so happy celebrating his life throughout. And then he's really sad when, you know, he loses his wife and he's suddenly got this obsession with trying to bring him back. And then, boy, 0 boy, I'm not going to spoil it, but the, you know his reaction at the end of the episode, when he realises the lengths that Jake's going to go to so they can be together again. That is powerful stuff. It is really good. And you've got this incredible sort of central relationship, which perhaps no other Star Trek series has ever had. and that's the relationship between Jake and his father and I don't think anything comes close to it. Porthos and Archer. Perhaps not. Janeway and no, Janeway 7? No, not really. No, no, it's just... I mean, it's all manufactured relationships. This is that father-son bolt, which kind of comes down to the writing, that absolutely comes down to the chemistry between the 2 actors. Yeah And it like it's really properly good, isn't it? There's really no scope in any other Star Trek series for that kind of family relationship. Lower decks as Freeman and Mariner, but that's a comedy and they do... Oh, but that's a... many different ways. Oh, it's fuck it. But this is really, really something. And I think, like you were going to say what Avery Brooks himself says about this. Yes, I've got a quote here on memory alpha, which is, and typically Avery Brooks fashion, it's fairly vague, but anyway, he says, I'm glad that relationship is there. It is even in the most naive mind, a sin of a mission that we have not looked at this side of people raising their children in other television shows and having some cultural resonance other than that of white Americans. It's something that actually he's being quite succinctive. It's something we have to see more of them, the relationship of a brown man and his son, because historically, that's not how it began in this country for brown families who didn't have the freedom of their own will and volition, let alone the ability to hold their families together. Yeah. It's true. It's really good, isn't it? Because their relationship is like it's very close and it's very tactile, like the 2 of them, you know, there's a physical affection between them, which I think is lovely, which I'm always moved by. The more I am watching this show, the more I am noticing, more than any other Star Trek show, even the Kursman shows, is how tactile these actors are with each other. And in this episode, it just, it screamed at me. You've got Kira kissing Jake on the head, Dax stroking his head in his quarters. Like there's there's a physical intimacy amongst these people that just sells it more than the usual Star Trek dialogue. We're a family, you know, we all work together. It's it's really lovely. Ira Bear, I've got a quote for Mario Bear as well. Because it also ties into the Jake Sisco thing. And I think this is really interesting because it sort of belies the fact that you and I sort of criticised love in 90s trick as being something that is incredibly awkward and uncomfortable. But this is a different kind of love and they get it spot on and what he says is it's a love stronger than death. Usually that's romantic love. But for this show, this series, we chose the love between a father and son and it worked like gangbusters. Everybody could relate to it. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's true as well Yeah, I think it's really terrific. And the 2 of them are excellent. And then we get Tony Todd, who had played Worf's brother in Star Trek, The Next Generation, and we'll go on to play him again later I think. Is that right? In Deep Space Nine? He also plays like, um, I think he's in Sankalsi. No, no, he's a Hiroji. I think in an episode. He's in prey. Yeah. Oh, no, that's a phenomenon. That's that's the sort of the alien episode of Sergeant Voyager. And interestingly, Tony Todd lost his aunt. not long before filming this. And he revealed that during the filming of this episode that he was mourning, that she raised him like a child and she died only 3 months earlier. And he's quoted as saying this script got me out of my shell. It's like she was whispering to me, go back to work, doing this was close as close to heaven, as I can imagine. Wow. isn't that lovely? Yeah, well, I suppose, yeah, a script that sort of delves into grief whilst you're experiencing grief. Yeah. And, you know, like grief never goes away. And I think it, it's telling, isn't it, that that we see these events where Ben comes back and speaks to Jake, you know, decades apart that even decades later, he feels the loss of his father and as he goes on with his life, sometimes that loss kind of prevents him from living his life. And I think there's, this is sort of quite well judged as well, I think. And we'll talk about it as the episode goes on, but I think that that's very effectively set up in the scenes early on where we actually just see Jake and Ben together before the accident. think it's good. What's really interesting. Obviously, the chemistry between Avery and Sirok is just there. Yeah, they've been working together for 3 years. They had it in emissary for the sakes. It's just gotten stronger since then. What surprised me was the chemistry between Avery and Tony Todd which I absolutely believe, you know, and I think are some of the most moving scenes in this. But I think if you're going to do an episode of this sort of magnitude where you're dealing with themes this strong, you know he's a movie actor, isn't he? He's like, he's quite big news for Star Trek. You need to bring in somebody that strong. I've just got one more little bit of track before we go in, if you don't mind, because this episode is directed by David Livingston who directs over 100 episodes of 90s Trek. Like he is the, you know, in-house, 90s trek director, and he can direct anything from, he directed Scorpion part one. So he absolutely can direct the hell out of an episode. He also directed Fairhaven. So when this script is somewhat lacking. He can get a little bit bored, but he personally says this was his favourite script, and this was his favourite directing experience. And you can tell because there's a lot of effort that's gone into the things that you and I usually complain about, the design, the lighting, like the crafting of the shots, certainly the work with the actors. Yeah. But Livingston wasn't supposed to direct this episode, um, and that is all, and it's all the fault of Column Meaney, who, uh, was not available uh, to record Hippocratic oath, which is the right episode. So that had to be. Yeah, it had to. Yeah, so he would basically do Star Trek under the understanding that, well, I'm going off to do a movie every now and again. They pay me more money, all right? If you want me in this show, then we can do other work. And so they did. And so they brought, um, Hippocratic 0 forward, which is directed by Renee Aubuchan Noir. So this was originally supposed to be directed by Renee. And he was quite a new director at this point. He done a couple of episodes of series 3 and then he goes on to do lots for, and I think he gets better about, he directs to quickening, which is really that in this season as well. So maybe, maybe this would have been as good. In Renee's house. I don't know. I think you needed a veteran to do this, you know? You wonder, though, whether an actor, given that it is a piece that doesn't really rely on action or anything very much more than the performances, he might have brought something to it. He is very good. Like, he's one of those strongest members of the cast. I don't know if you remember the performances in the quickening. It's the episode where Sid goes down onto the planet and they've all got that horrible fly virus from the Dominion. and he manages to drag some phenomenal performances out of everybody in that class. So maybe, maybe. But I think this is Livingstone's strongest character episode as well. So, and I can see the love that he put into bringing this thing to life. Oh, we should probably watch it. I think we should, but I have one very, very important trivia thing to tell people at home. So, excuse me, will you stay in your lane? No, no. So this episode was actually nominated for an Emmy. It was nominated for a Hugo Award as well, but it lost that to an episode of to an episode of Babylon 5, which is a show that I've never heard of. But it was also nominated. It was nominated for best makeup or best sort of makeup in a series for the... Yeah, yeah, yeah. God. And it actually lost to Star Trek Voyager's threshold. which usually finds itself in the bottom 5 of people's Star Trek episodes. So Emmy award-winning Voyager episode threshold, but this one didn't manage to win an Emmy at all. I mean, is there a guy? I would say no. Tom Paris's face in threshold. I can see why. They probably gave him the award just on putting that fucking mask on. Do you remember it? Oh, no, it's awful. It's dreadful. Yeah. Yeah, terrible. Well, thank you for that piece. I thought it was important that people knew. And, you know, we've just said all these glorious things about this episode. The old age makeup is fucking appalling. They just, they just can't do it in the 90s. And it isn't an affliction of Star Trek. It's a fiction of all television in the 90s. Well, we'll talk about that when we go in because I do want to talk about that. I don't think they've got better now. No. No I don't think it's ever very good. Just hire old actors. That's what I think too. All right. I'll count it in. I'm ready Five, four, three, two, one, and we're off. Oh, it was a stormy lights on the bayou. So this, I think, is really particularly interesting, and because Star Trek in this era doesn't really do subtext, and it does spend a lot of time making sure that you as an audience member understand what's going on, we open up, so we're panning across all of this stuff, and we've just seen a photo of Jake and Ben, and we've, he's just picked up the baseball, but we haven't seen him. And then he's going to go across to a box and he's going to, um inject himself with from a syringe a space, you know, injection thing. ibospray. That's the word. A hypospray. Yeah. he's going to inject himself. Now, we read this, I think, as an he's an old man. We read this as an old man. That's medicine, right? And then we don't think about it again. It's never referred to again. And then at the end, we discover that he's poisoned himself. And not only, like we work that out, and then we get to reevaluate what's happened so far again in that light. And I think that's really good. It makes sense of lines that are in this 1st scene where he suddenly says you've come today of all days, so I'm going to tell you my story because he has just committed suicide. So, so this is Tony Todd playing old Jake and the makeup is not good. And I wonder. Like, I think I think probably they made the right decision because you get Tony Todd in here, but I wonder whether it might have been better to choose a real old man to play this version of Jake and then just to make Cyra Glofton up to look older in... Oh, possibly. I mean, it wouldn't look any better. that's right But I think... This is the central, I mean, she's the visitor, right? I know that I know that Ben's the visitor as well, but she's the visitor. She comes and she talks to him and that's how we get to hear the story. And she's played by Andrew Robinson's... Garak's daughter. And she's terrific in it. But I just think like do other shows of this era do ageing makeup? Or is it a Star Trek thing? Yeah, the X-Files did an episode and it was magnitude's worse there. So it's, but genre fiction does it. Does normal TV do it. I think so. yeah. I mean, I couldn't answer that. Yeah, it's hard to know. I've not really explained that. No, I would imagine it's a thing and it is just put in all this. Do you know what? I kind of agree with you, but I don't because I just wouldn't want to lose time. No, I agree. I agree. I think obviously there are other very strong actors that could have brought this to life, but he just brings us sort of warmth and loveliness. He brings something to this world. I think he's terrific that is unique. But what I think is that these scenes benefit enormously from not being very spacy. I mean, they're still in the Star Trek set. love this set. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I love this set, though. I think I think they do just enough. They've got that big fire in there. The nice mirror up top. You've got the rain lashing on the window. It's enough to just sort of set the set. There's some computer panels and stuff like that. But I think the fact that there's no science fiction in this, you know, he used the, you know, whatever it was, the dermal regenerator or something to cure her thing. And I think that she's injured and he heals her so that we already have some kind of tactile relationship between them because later on they do actually become quite affectionate to one another in a like, not in an inappropriate way or anything like that. But there's a touch and stuff in that as well. Like their relationship develops. It's so strange how this works, though, right? Because Night East Trek will spend like entire episodes trying to convince us of like a romantic chemistry between 2 actors in something like Voyages unforgettable or something like that. they never succeed. Within about 3 seconds of these 2 being together. I believe the chemistry between them. Like, what do they just work in some episodes or not? Is it just the actors? I think I think it is. But I do think that the scene is a bit spoiled by the ageing makeup because it does add... I mean, the whole thing is artificial, but it is a... Because by the end of the episode, the scene between Jake and Ben and he's in even more latex. I just don't care because it's so moving, the performances are so moving. I'm not seeing the production deficiencies are gone in my head. Yeah, yeah. Look, I mean, and you know, you and I watch a lot of vintage TV. We are very used to skipping over production deficiencies to find some enjoyment in the thing. Yeah, yeah, but I think I think if these hadn't been Star Trek, you would never have done this. I think. you know, you would have cast someone older. And you might have considered having 3 people play, Jay. It's absolutely doing the thing that you say as well, isn't it? It's setting its story in the last line is him saying my father died. That's what the episode is about. And it is genuinely about that as well. Yeah, yeah, it's really good. Although, can I ask, right? Because I always get confused in these episodes where, you know they go off on an alternate. timeline and then they go back and make it exactly how it is. And I know you're going to say it's all fiction, so it don't really matter. But anyway. Well, like, so did all this happen then? Did all the original timeline happen and then because of what he does at the end, we spring back and it will, because I pointed out to you this morning that in the alternate timeline, Jazia Dax is alive, long into the future. Well, what do you think happens to um, what do you think happens to Melanie in this new future that's been created? She might never be born. Oh, no, I hope she's still. So remember that when Anorax does this in the year of hell, that makes him a villain. He's trying to change the past because he's lost his wife and child, daughter, something. His family's died, and so he's changing history. It's effectively the same story. It is the same thing. Just told in a very different way. Well, because really it doesn't matter. None of that science fiction stuff really matters here at all. And they do a reasonable job of just being super vague about it. Like there is some technobabble, but basically we're not explaining it. When it is properly explained to us, it's explained in a very, very clear way. In a way, so simple that even, oh, I can understand it. I was anchoring you through time. It's such a simple line. I absolutely understand what they're saying. Also, it says something about what grief is like, you know, that so it's a proper, sensible, you know, it's a silly time nonsense thing, but it doesn't matter because it's telling the story and we don't dwell on the details of it. You just have the word grief there. And it's worth mentioning that in the beginning, middle, and end of DS9's run, so you got emissary at the beginning where Ben Sisco is mourning the loss of his wife, this episode in the middle, which absolutely deals with Jake losing his father, and then the end of the series, which is Jake losing, it, like you said to me, it's a bit of a dry run. But what you leave behind and that sort of achingly longing end whereas looking out the window and we sort of pull back from the station in what you leave behind. The grief does sort of bookend this show. With sort of everyone living in incredible lives in the sort of in the meantime around it and having great fun and political machinations and being witty and wonderful and loving, and but it just means that those moments of grief really hit, you know because this is a show that celebrates life. But weirdly, it is bookended by grief and death. In a way, too, it is the kind of thing we see Ben reach a stage in dealing with his grief over Jennifer's death at the beginning, and we don't see the consequences of his disappearance at the end, and this episode ends with a reset button. And so everything's okay. It's not a complete reset because Ben remembers it. Um, Yeah, that surprised me, you know, that I made that choice. I think someone had to remember it otherwise. What the point? You know, it had to affect one of our characters. It's a bit like the resetting children of time, isn't it? where they all know that those 8000 people on that planet. It has emotional. No, you can't you can't just have the reset button and no one remembers it. That's that's pointless. That's waste of our time. I think Avery holds him just a little bit tighter after this episode. The scene is so important to the episode as well. So Jake is writing a short story. He's on this mission with his father to see the wormhole invert, do some magic thing, and he's still obsessed with this writing. And Ben is there saying, look, just get up every so often and look out the window. And that's when Ben's not there to tell him to do that, he doesn't do it. That's what he loses when his father dies. And so we'll see this as it goes on because he, you know, the appearance of it, the appearances of his father do affect him in sort of various ways. They pivot is life, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. You know what I took from that scene was it's that, and I find this idea more chilling than death itself is that you don't know when you're going to lose something. And you behave in such a mundane way around people most of your life and you never know when that's going to be the last time that you see somebody. And it's just a casual conversation where he's barely acknowledging his father. And then he's going to lose his father and that scares me. Oh, here we go. a bit of wobbling, too, from some top quality wobbling in the chair from Terry. They make lots of experience on this bar now. I'll tell you what I really liked about this is how I don't really find any suspense in any of this stuff anymore. But it's the fact that you think the danger's over and he smiles and he hands in the thing and then the thing is. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yes. Oh, and that that effect actually really sells the linking them together thing too. So there's a space reason they linked together, but there's also a grief reason that they're linked together. Yes, yeah. I would like to make a point in this episode as well. I think this has one of the best scores of any 90s strike episode and in the slower moments. The music is written. It's so strong that, in fact, they use, um, pieces of music from this in what you leave behind when Cisco brings Casti into the wormhole and says goodbye to her. It's the same music from the visitor. It's Jay Chataway, and that is basically... He is very good. He's one of the best. That's just me doing my bit for 93. No, no, no. I'm always happy to give Jay Chataway credit. I think they get the music right when they do slower scenes. when they're trying to do action. They just don't know how to score it. Look at this. Look how many people were in that set, though. I'm like, well, you know. It's pretty amazing. Oh, I love this bit where Kira says, more than that, he was my friend. I, I really like... There's Miles there contractually for a second. Um, I really understand the Jake thing, like just that he can't say anything at the funeral because he just can't, he's lost his inexpressible and look at him there. Look. Nathan, uh, uh, my mom's funeral. She asked me to do a reading. Yeah, and I got up and I was almost vomiting tears reading this thing out. I was determined to do it and I was utterly unintelligible, but I did it, you know. I did, yeah. Yeah, I tried to refuse to do anything, but then was persuaded to do a reading, but I read it at. you know, 90 miles an hour and sat down as quickly as possible. Do you know what's really very moving as well? Is everybody else? Look, look at this. Like, so so Quark has just come into the bar and has told Nog that he can't go playing on the holo suite with Jake. And then he realises and comes back and tells him, no, no, you know, we're not as busy as they thought. off you go. before I change my mind. Do you know what they do with Corp? They basically, even when they have it being a nice guy. He's still good. I just got it before I chose my mind, all right? And of course he would do that. Of course he would do that, you know. Oh, and this moment here where Nog and Jake are talking. Jake goes off. Nog goes to go after him and he wants to say something to help him. And he doesn't have anything because what do you say to people, you know? I, when I, when I worked at a hospice for the terminally ill. And I was working with families. They always said, don't presume to know how those people are feeling and don't put words in their mouths. You let them talk. You know, you let them open up, but don't you say, I know how you feel and things like that. And that's that's this here. What can he say? you know? And I think that's really good as well. Like, um, You know, the other big uh, event where someone is bereaved on this show and it really happens and has consequences is when warf loses Jadzia. And we do have a whole episode about their grief and, you know about his grief about her and stuff like that. Um, But I think that this, like having this, having him, having him be someone who's grieving for quite a long part of the program and and seeing how the other characters all deal with that, I think is really, really good. And we're about to get some just lovely stuff with him and Terry and him and none of the other visitor. You know, like, I think those scenes are really something. There's a sequence in a minute in front of a window between Kira and Jake. And I think it's like it's so understated in its emotion. And it's more moving for it, you know, and it lit beautifully as well. They're sort of silhouetted by the starlight. There's some effort gone into that. I think so too. Ah, here we go. Back to back to Alvin J.K. So, I mean, he's just being the narrator at this and filling in the gaps. And it's not that rewarding a scene for Melanie, but she does get heaps to do. Oh, yes. And so this is a weird kind of future as well, isn't it? Where we've only, we're only up to the Klingon war. And so the Dominion War never ends up happening and we just have the tensions with the Klingons which sort of eventually resolve themselves in some way. I'll just say, because I wouldn't normally do this, but I'm going to do this now because it really irritated me right. When I was listening to the random trek episode of the visitor which featured a verity contributor, Elizabeth Miles in it. And she's going, oh, I don't want to watch this, you know, weird future, not our regulars. And she'd like shout all over this episode because it was set in an alternative timeline and I'm like, Liz, you missed the point darling. Like, like, like, it really irritated me. I'm like, yeah, of course you've got to run with it, haven't you? You know, in all of this episode to work. Yeah, I think if, you know, like this, there is a limit to what we can do, we've, we saw this with Siege of AR 558 because it's serialised TV because we know from the beginning that he's this beautiful scene. Yeah. She says so basically. If I tell you to go, you need to go. But she's not going to... And you know, it's worth remembering. It's series one. She was this angry, unlikeable one, actually, because she was very vulnerable. But she was this sort of angry person who didn't want this life. And somehow in 3 years. She's found this sort of family. And now she's really protective of these people. It is that thing where he has no one left. you know, like his mother has gone. Now his father has gone. He's just here on this station doing what, you know, and and I don't know, like those 2 people who step up and they don't try and replace his parents or anything, but they're just so kind and so supportive. It's really lovely to watch, I think. I think because of this scene. I find that scene at the end of what you leave behind where he's looking out the window. She comes up to him and puts her arm around him and he holds her hand and they look out the window together and you're like, okay he's going to be all right. Yeah, she'll be she'll be okay. Yeah. It's really nice. And, you know, and it does tap into the thing that I've always said about Star Trek, and that is, I don't give a shit about the Techno Battle, the space problems. It's the characters I love. I like Star Trek, but the character drama side of it, and it can do it extraordinarily well. Yeah, so here he is again. That's a little bit awkward. It's still going to be blocked like nice tracker, right? It's worth noting, you know, they're both Avro Brooks and Saron. Lofton have beautiful smiles and they weaponize them on this episode beautifully. So, Yeah. Yeah. So there's that thing too, like sometimes you dream about someone who's died, and like that's something that's super weird, you know or even that sort of, you know, you sort of think that maybe ghosts exist because you're so used to seeing a person that you see them when they're not there, like just in the corner of your eye. You see something and your brain goes, oh, it's that person because it's used to detecting that person all the time, but they're gone. And so I kind of like that here. Like the 1st one seems like a dream. The 2nd one is real and now the science fiction is sort of properly kicking in. How he tries to hold it together here and then he just crumbles. And he holds his face. Oh, how are you doing? It is so sweet. Oh my goodness. And then, yeah, he just falls to pieces and Avery kisses you really gently kisses him on the face. Oh, it's so lovely. Yeah, like, you know, I never had a relationship with my father. so to speak, um, who is still with us. Alas. But boy, oh boy. I'll be a different person if I'd had a relationship like this. Oh my goodness. It's so beautiful, isn't it? It's so beautiful. It is just that thing where he says, are you okay? isn't he? Sarah Lockhen is a young actor. Like you could be forgiven for not expecting this sort of emotion from him. No, it's really good. It's really good. There was one bit here, though. The bit where it goes, don't leave me. Yeah, it's soap. You know, it's still a bit better. But then I do like the way he drops his voice and just says very quietly, don't leave me. That's a bit nicer. So Miles is in this, but just very briefly. Do you know what's extraordinary about this episode? is that, yeah, we know we're not going to lose. No that's easy. So the fact that it moves to the extent that it does. Yeah. Yeah. It is strange though, isn't it? Like it puts its cards on the table. We know that in the context of a serialised TV show that everything's going to be back to normal next week. And we know because of the technobabble they've been saying so far there's going to be some reason to get in touch. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's what they do. That's what they do. Of course, but what we do instead, instead is that we tell it, like this is the primary narrative. Everything else is a flashback, isn't it? So this is said in the middle of the 25th century when, you know all of this stuff is happening and we're looking back at it. Like this is the focus that it gets the title, doesn't it? If she's the visitor, um, then this gets this gets a title. That would be obvious, but it's a 2 tire. I was talking about her and... I love this bit where he goes, oh, I'm dying. It comes to an advert, right? No, no, no, I like it when he goes, oh, I'm just doing it for attention, right? But I just sort of thought that Melanie might say, well, I was worried for that entire ad break and now you tell me that you're not dying after all. It's a bit of a shit way of getting a cliffhanger in at the end of act, whatever, act 3 or 2 or whatever. It's a little bit shit. Oh, see, I loved all of this where he was taking an interest as well. She's like, oh, no. I want to be a writer. I'm doing a lot of reading. I don't know. these are really, really lovely suits. Yeah, I think so too. Again, it is sort of still 90s straight dialogue and stuff. But there's something nice about having that dialogue just be about things that are normal, you know, I remember reading an interview with of all people. The woman who plays the mother in the new adventures of Superman Lois and Clark, yeah? Play Clark Kent's mother. She in an episode of DS9, actually. Yes, sanctuary. I can picture that as an evil con woman. Brilliant. Anyway, she says that she loved doing that show because there was never any conflict between those characters. She said it was very easy to riot conflict, like manufactured conflict between characters, but to write genuinely sort of sentimental scenes between, that takes a lot of skill and for, and then as an actor, to deliver it in a way that's not boring. Well, I'm bringing this up for a point. There isn't a moment of conflict between 2 characters in this entire story. Like, like, in the way that we would sort of manufacture complicates. It's just people kind of being nice to each other. Which is why they should be boring as hell. Well, that's why they have to pull the dying shit, you know, like and you could just about have made that work. But it requires some kind of ambiguity, like we, we're deliberately distracting our attention at the very beginning. We haven't mentioned it. We've all forgotten about it as we're watching this, I think. And so, you know, like you could have made him feel a bit of anxiety about that or a little bit of misgiving about it, but we can't do that at this point in the episode. Like my point is, is like you and I have pointed out many times especially in 90s trek, where there has been that sort of manufactured tension, you go, oh, I don't believe this for a second. Remember that scene between Cisco and Bashirin in the pale moonlight, you know, and you were like, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. There's just, there's none of that. It's just... lovely people being lovely. And that should be very dull. Oh, look at his... and it's not. Oh, and Tony. Look how pretty he is. Holy crap. He had those Klingon teeth before. Oh, he looks very fun aware, isn't it? Really, really handsome. I like how Aaron Eisenberg doesn't... Sidic Elfadil comes in and plays old. Aaron Eisenberg doesn't play old. He just lowers the register of his voice to suggest he's a bit older and I think that is a better problem. Well, so these guys, how old are we now? Do you know what I mean? Like, is it he's 20 years later or something? I don't know that they're saying. Yeah, I think they say 40, don't they? that sort of age. But you know, I think Aaron Eisenberg is a much savvier actor than I thought he was, actually. Yeah, yeah. I mean, he has the advantage of acting under this sort of crappy latex all the time. So now it's just slightly different latex with a few more sort of lines on his cheeks and stuff. You know what they get to do here as well, though? Not to contradict Lisbeth, but is they get to sort of play out what would happen in the future with this Klingon plot, had it continued? Obviously, they cut it dead in series 5. they go back with the Dominion and they play that out. Well, this is like a nice glimpse with lots of little details. I do like the idea of the dilapidated station in the future with Maud propping off the bar, you know? But we do go back to this because there's an episode coming up called The Muse in which Jake starts writing the book that Melanie read twice in one night. And so this is something that could happen. I mean, you could object to, um, um, and we probably did object to all good things for not being the real future, but just showing us a possible future. And, you know, if it was on TV. Well, I did object to that in endgame, didn't I? Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I was like, this is annoying because this kind of isn't what happened, but then you once again reminded me that it's all... yeah This is just as real as anything else. For 45 minutes, this is the future. I mean, like throughout throughout the whole episode as well, how Tony told it in the old, as the old, older Jake, who has committed suicide. He gets weaker and weaker and he sort of, he, the pauses in his dialogue, like he, he's clearly dying. Yeah. Yeah. And he looks so fresh facing. I know, just trying to drag him off to bed. Yeah, yeah. Why is he so, and again. Okay. So this is the same situation that we had with Cisco and him where he was obsessed with his writing and she's taking him away from it because he needs to look up every so often and live his life right? And so she's doing what Cisco did, which is be a counterpoint to his sort of tendency to get obsessed with things. But in fact, it's Cisco's arrival here, which is happening right now, that's going to ruin that. Isn't it? Because then he starts to get obsessed. He's working on his 2nd book. Well, it's kind of, it's kind of just been long enough that he started saying, okay, this isn't going to happen again, and then it happens again, and then that just turns him down this path of right, I'm going to get him back. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Because at this point, he's still writing. He's not studying, like, all the techno battle to try and find a way to find a solution, but this is the tipping point. This is the point where he basically pushes her away and becomes absolutely obsessed with getting his dad back. Yeah, and it was his dad who did that and it was Carina who did that, who prevented him from doing that. And now he lets his obsession take over. This whole sequence hit. So this is the same scene we just had a minute ago where he's trying to smile, then Tony Todd just falls apart and Cisco smiles at him and says, what, don't think just because I'm not around, I don't want grandchildren. That's so beautiful. It's so beautiful. And it's all in his delivery because that line could have been terrible. Tony Todd is doing so well as well. Like, like he's so, like, he looks really relaxed. He looks really happy and then he's got Ben kind of calling him back saying, you know, don't worry about Starfleet getting here. Just tell me what's been going on because he just wants him to live his life, doesn't he? Yeah, and it is that sort of weird thing where like, you, when you lose someone, part of what you lose is that they never know things. Do you know what I mean? Like my mother died before, like while I was still at university so she never knew that I got a job that I was successful at. She never knew that I got married. She didn't know that, you know, I bought a house, any of those things. She never found out about. And so having, having him given the opportunities, you know, he's dead practically, but he gets to sort of turn up and we just see his reaction to seeing how, how, um, how successful his life has been. And he's even, none of it from Cisco's part is about himself. No, is it? And in fact, all he wants to know is what's happening with Jay. What does he tell him to do? He tells him not to worry about, oh, look at that smile. holy crap. He's doing some method there with those tears, isn't he? think that's glycerine. But he tells him not to worry about Starfleet coming. He says, no, what you're doing now matters, you know, like Jake says, oh, you know, I shouldn't have been worrying about that. I should have been trying harder to bring you back. And he says, no, no, no, no, you have a wife, you have this life you're doing these things. This is what matters. It is absolutely mirroring what happened in emissary, isn't it? He's stuck in time. Just as the prophets say to Cisco in emissary, you belong here, i e. you're stuck at that moment where Jennifer died. You need to go on and live here. that's right. that's what he does. Unfortunately, that's not where Jake goes now. No, no. So this is the thing that tips him over the edge where he, he, Yeah so he stops riding. He was writing his 2nd novel after having his 2 books published. This is why he stopped riding before he was 40. So is what is what Melanie says. It's in sort of, you're right. The Melanie roll, right? It's a little thankless because basically she has to spend the entire episode reacting to the story that she's being told with a few sort of sweet moments where she talks about her own life. But actually, I think she gets in plot terms. She gets the most important moment where she says, you're going to cut the cord on it. I'm that bit, that bit... And I think what's good there too is that she doesn't try and talk him out of it. She doesn't object to his decision. She doesn't do any of that. And that's because, you know, Ben will get to do that when he turns up at the very end. But she just, she's listens. She's heard the story and she isn't going to judge his son. I can imagine as a father learning that your son has committed suicide and is about to die in front. I just can't even imagine that. I think that that scene is sort of super odd, but we'll get there. Okay, so now we're in the future. We're wearing the all good things uniform. Oh, there we go. With some dreadful, dreadful old age makeup. Find this how we can take the piss out. Oh my god. So that, like, and I think Julian, I think that CD's doing a really, really crummy job here. Like, he's doing a comedy... Awful. We played old in distant voices in the last week, and they did a much better job. Yeah, it was pretty good in that one. He sort of carries himself and he hunches over and he carries himself sort of old. Here, he's just doing a strange odd voice. Yeah, yeah. It's like an old man voice. It's dreadful. But I do like the way they snipe at each other like an old married couple when Dax is like, well, that's the only thing that's kept me awake enough to listen to you going on about your fucking grandkids, you born out fart. Yeah. But apparently, so the one thing that the Michael Taylor says was a bit irritating was O'Brien was supposed to be in all these scenes, but obviously Colin Meaney's not available, which is why we changed the, um, and there was supposed to be a bit of banter between O'Brien and the ship, which, it's usually pretty good. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But that's, that's, that's one area of 90s straight where you can rely on a bit about that is O'Brien, yeah. that's true. So this is so this is now 50 years later, right? So that means that he's 68 at this point. Yeah. And they and so they do the sort of wormhole effect, don't they, in a 2nd where he's beamed off into top space? Yeah. I think that's really striking that scene, though. Just that that's sort of why it's like. It just, because then it, there's no out, there's not sort of nothing else to focus on, just the 2 actors and what they're saying. Well, two, I think it would have been a mistake to make the place that Cisco was in real in any way. Um, you know, it's not just that he can't get back. You know, he's sort of dead in a way. you know, like we don't want to think about any of that. That's not what the story's about. The story's about Jake. And like, I've said to you before. You know, some people criticise Avery Brooks's acting. And I do think sometimes he can go over a cliff, but that's what I really like. I really like the fact that he's a bit of a dangerous actor and he can absolutely deliver amazing work and occasionally he can be a bit melodramatic and... But when he hits, I mean, it's some of the best acting you're going to see. And it seems like this where he's like saying, promise me you'll do that. Promise me, like, 0 my god. In that voice of his, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think I think he's more awkward when he has to play Star Trek and do tech the Babble and things like that, but you give him like a meaty emotional scene like this, like the scene in far beyond the stars where he has the breakdown at the end. You know, it's so moving. Yeah, this is really good. And so this is Jake's life has gone horribly wrong. Um, and is he is this the point where he's going to explain that to Ben? Like, yeah, he says I've lost, I shouldn't have let her go, but I had more important things to do. Yeah, yeah, which is precisely what Ben told him not to do, you know, like it's not getting me back is an important. I'm not important. You have a wife and child. you know you need to live your life. And so, like, the grief thing doesn't completely work because, of course, he's rewarded for this sort of weird behaviour and then his father comes back and everything's fine again, you know, but But he does have to live his entire life. yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, no, no, sure, sure, sure. But it's... we are talking about a long time. We might see it in 45 minutes, but he's seeing it across 70 years you know? Well, yeah, yeah. You still have time to make a better life. and I like that. I love that line because it's like, yeah, it's never too late. Yeah, but I, and it works too, because he needed Ben. Like, when he tells Ben at the very end, just before he dies, that the boy, you know, a boy who needs you more than I think you realise, um, he's learned that he needs his father because his father stops him from going off the rails, like stops him from obsessing about things. reminds him to look up every so often and see what's happening around him because that's life. you know. So there is something there. I, uh, there is an emission in series 7 of DS9 and that is they don't really focus too much on the Cisco and Jake relationship. And I feel like that needed to come to a more sort of satisfying conclusion than it does. It ends up being Cisco Cassidy, doesn't it, in that last season? Yeah, well, and the fact, which is Penny Johnson, Gerald. No, not complaining. No, no, no. I mean, the fact that he comes back and says goodbye to her, but not to Jane. Yeah, people complain about it, which I think is raceable. It is. But then, I don't know, it does make that last scene have a sting doesn't it, when he's looking out of the wormhole? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, so this, so they've been up all night telling this story. She came, you know, it's the next morning. We only got one more night, Nathan. No, that was it. That was his night. Yeah, God. But this is like, this is like, or what, this is a bit like the framing device in, in the Palm Moonlight, isn't it? Like, it never happens. Well, I was we're privy to it. Yeah. I was thinking it's like the, because we need to mention this episode. It's like the framing device in suspicions where... Well, you know, I was thinking earlier, we haven't seen a storm lashed studio landscape, since some... No, that's true. Oh, her reaction here, though. when she says you're going to cut the cord. And it's mostly done without dialogue. It just looks. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, look at her. She is really good, isn't she? I think she's great. Like they are churning out Star Trek at a rate of north. This does not have to be this. And that, I think the fact that he's he's dragging him forward. He's the one who won't let him go, which is what the episode is also about, isn't it? That he won't let him go and get on with his life. It's that kind of nice thing they can do every now and again of marrying the sci-fi concept and the emotion. You know. They don't always get away. I've mentioned this before on the show, but I think that there's a Star Trek discovery episode in early series 4 just after Books Planet is destroyed, and it's called anomaly, and it has book investigating the DMA in a way that absolutely mirrors what his relationship with Michael is like while he's undergoing all this grief and he's tethered to the ship. And, you know, he has to cut himself free so that he can experience this on his own, you know, like it's, and, and I think that sort of stuff is super clever. And I don't think that Star Trek actually in the 90s does it all that much. But here I think it's really well considered. And I guess the only niggly thing is that it works and we're all back to normal and then we hit the closing credits, but that's, you know, it's Star Trek. just has to do that. The nature of the beast. Exactly, yeah. It's worth mentioning, um, in a moment where I, you know, you say it's weird. I think there's sequence in a minute with Ben and Jake when he realises that he's killed himself is just stunning, stunningly fantastic, that Renee Echevaria did the final rewrite on this script. Michael Taylor wrote it, uh, and then Renee Chavaria, who I think is the strongest character writer on DS9. He did things like children at a time and things like that. He knows how to sort of get under the skin of these characters and boy, he did a good polish on this. So I think there's something really beautiful about this. So he... We now know, and if we were thinking about that injection, we kind of now know what that was because she's realised what's happening that he's taken this poison. So he goes to sleep. And then there's this scene where he wakes up and he just sees Ben's face and Ben has been watching him while he's been sleeping. And it's a weird situation. It's nothing that anyone will ever experience, you know. Um, and... Oh, do you not watch your ever after? No, no, no, no. What I mean is, he's watching his son who's now an old man, far older than he is. Um, and he's just watching him and I can't, like, we don't learn they don't make the mistake of telling us what Cisco is thinking. We're just left to imagine what that experience might be like. And it is that thing. The thing that I really like about this is that it gives the the dead parent, you know, we get to see from their kind of point of view what that must be like. I mean, it's not like anything. You're dead. But do you know what I mean? Like the missing out on, you know, the fact that he, he, even though he's dead, he gets to come back from time to time. He gets to visit and see how his son is getting on. A lot of people said to Avery Brooks in the sort of 1st couple of series was sort of cold and unlikeable and that he really came alive in series four. Man, the war that he gives. I think this is one of his strongest scenes, the one of his best acted scenes in the entire run, and he doesn't have to raise his voice or anything. Just sort of look longingly and then react to this devastating news that he's about to lose his son in this very bizarre way. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Well, he he... Yeah. I just think the lighting is the lighting's helping as well. Yellow, like, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yes, and the shadow on his face. I might drive this point home to, but like, you know, this is a lot of black actors, you know, just being warm and lovely and it is unusual on television at the time. Well, I mean, just having, you know, like having a black lead was a big deal, but that implies that you're going to have, you know if you're going to cast relatives and stuff like that. That means more roles for black actors. And I think it's fantastic, you know. And these 2 are really extraordinary. And Syric and Avery are pretty great as well. And I think, I think this, this is one of the best episodes in terms of sort of representation of that. The best ever is Rapture, where at the end of that episode, um Cisco gets the visions of the prophet's taken away from him and he goes back home and he's really pissed and Cassidy says to him, look you may have lost something, but you've gained something as well. And Jake and Cassidy and Cisco all come together. their hands will come together and it's just a beautiful moment. Oh my god, I can't watch this. This really, it's really... Yeah. I mean, this is... It's just how they play it, though. It's so tender. Yeah. Yeah, because I mean, this is the bit where it stops being like anything anyone's going to ever experience, I think. This is a bit where it is very science fiction-y. But I think we're so invested at this point. Yeah, it don't really matter. And it's funny, isn't it? Like, it is, like, in a way, oh, you cheer when he lets... You want him to let go. And the fact that at the end of the episode, he hasn't let go and that in fact, he's killed himself in order to bring his father back. Like in a way that's sort of a defeat, isn't it? It is kind of a defeat, and we know that it's going to turn out okay because here we are now we're back, you know, and everything's going to be fine, and we're going to go to the closing credit straight away. You said like that, yeah, you know, he's rewarded for his strange behaviour, but I think he's honest. I think I like, you know, to be obsessed like that to make the wrong call. I don't think that's... No, no, no. No, no, no. I absolutely think that that's what the episode is about more than anything else. And, you know, the last conversation that Jake has with Melanie is about looking up from time to time and seeing life. You know, that's what my father told me, and that's what he hasn't been doing. And he's only just started to get back to it by writing the new novel. But then he kills himself so that his father will come back. And that seems like a defeat. That's sort of like the ultimate act of his obsession because if he got that wrong. Yeah, well that's right. He just killed himself. Do you know what I mean? Like that so it doesn't that doesn't quite fully work. And so I wasn't surprised to learn when I read on the memory alpha page that they didn't quite realise they were making something quite as special as this. And, you know, perhaps a lot of the stuff where it's about grief and where it's about getting on with your life, you know, isn't as conscious as maybe it's meant to be or maybe they don't find a way out of it, you know, that, you know, any other way out of it apart from what they come up with. And I don't think it's a big flaw because I do think that it's examined grief in all sorts of ways. It's presented that relationship really beautifully. It's shown us what grief is like and what, you know, like the isolation of it and the way that people manage you and the way that people, you know, people are supportive of you and all sorts of things. And then, you know, the fact that you might perseverate on the person who's died or not got on with your life, you know, like after a really traumatic thing. Like all of that stuff is properly real, despite the fact that it's sort of propped up with all of this in ridiculous science fiction. I mean, I don't think it's not as raw as Buffy's, the body, which but then, of course, that's... I may not be able to watch it. That sort of set in our world with people that behave like ours. And so, you know, there's not that sort of Star Trek distance between the 2 things. But I do think it's tapping into the same kind of emotion. Yeah, I think I think that the difference is that this lasts for one episode and doesn't have any ongoing consequences, whereas obviously the rest of that year in which the body takes place, you know, like that has ramifications all the way through the rest of the show. So, I mean, this does a thing that couldn't really normally be contained in Star Trek and, you know, it will sort of happen again I guess, you know, at the beginning of series 7, but we'll get it out of the way as quickly as we can so that we can get on with the adventures and the Dominion War and stuff. I would say they kind of do that with Buffy as well, is they have a couple of episodes where they mourn Joyce and then they just go and we're telling the glory story. Series 5. Because they've got some... That's right. But I mean, series 6 is her life going off the rails completely partly because of the lack of any kind of adult figure, like her failing at adulthood is a big theme. Two things, I'd like to say, before we out this episode. One is, I think this is a tipping point for DS9 in that, I think season 4 was a new mission statement. TNG is off the air after two. They've had a sort of a reasonably successful but not entirely successful season three. And Voyager has just started alongside season 4, DS9, and they're like, no, we are fucking going like gangbusters. We are going to make this show brilliant. You've just had Way of the Warrior, which was like a big political all the cast, all the guest characters. You probably don't think it is, but big budget action set piece at the end of the story. No, no. And it's, they change the status quo, the political status quo like the whole background that Star Trek was set against. coming in and shaking things up, then you follow that up double whammy with the visitor. Just around the corner. You've got little green men and old man Bashir, who are the best comedy episodes they ever did, rejoined where they finally do a same-sex romance in Star Trek. Like, they are literally set in their store to make this the best of 90s trek in series 4. And I think this season is justifiably celebrated. And like a visitor is the visitor is one of the big reasons as to why. And the 2nd thing I want to say was that I've said to you before that I watched DS9 alongside my mum from beginning to end. It's one of 2 shows, what I watched from beginning to end with my mum. And because 69 had a lot of issues shows. You know, it lent into a lot of different themes, and my mother was one to talk long into the night and argue on a dime about things. And it kind of got me stimulated and thinking and sort of getting my critical faculties going, which I think has explained a lot of where I've ended up now. And I remember I was watching the visitor. And we talked about grief because she'd lost my grandfather not long before this. And so we talked about sort of losing family members and things like that. And then she shared her beliefs of the afterlife and what happens after you die. And we talked about that a lot, uh, for years to come because my mum was a spiritualist and and a medium and all of these things, I personally don't believe it. Oh boy, do we argue about these things? But she absolutely did. And she had like, um, some strong beliefs about what happens when you pass on, which meant that when she was dying of cancer, uh, I understood how she felt about passing and the rest of my family didn't. They just didn't get it at all and they wouldn't talk about it and they wouldn't talk about the fact that she was going to be gone. And she was celebrating the fact that not that the end of her life but just what was going to happen afterwards and what she believed in. And this was our starting point on that journey. So this episode is very important to me for a lot of different reasons. I think it's a beautiful episode of Star Trek. But for the conversations that I had remember because of it, what I learned and then how I was able to sort of use that later on. It means a great deal to me. All right, it's the end of the episode, and it's time for us to decide what we're going to watch next, and it's my turn to press the button. And I've decided that we are going to do some more 90s track. And in fact, we are going to choose an episode from the series that we've done the least often and that's Star Trek Enterprise. Oh, you always, you always choose at a price. I really want to do enterprise. And anything will be better than a night in sick, babe. Night in Sick Bay was so great. And so I desperately want to do more. It would be kind of nice to do something from later in the shows right? Series four. which we haven't touched. No, we haven't touched series 3 either. We haven't done a series 3 episode, either. Okay. Well, let's make that a condition. There's gotta be latter one. Let see. All right. Okay, our 1st random Star Trek Enterprise episode is proving ground series three, episode 13. Yeah, okay. So it's got Jeffrey Coombes in it. and still playing an evil megalomaniac computer in lower decks, and it's not really a Star Trek series if he's not in it. What do we think? I have no idea. Well, this is this is sort of halfway through series three. And it's a massive Zindiarc. And it's probably the point where they're saying, well, look, we need a new element now and Jeffrey Coombs is always popular. So it's bringing back a shran because, you know, people probably getting a bit tired of this super weapon now and those floating turtles and things. Um, I don't know, maybe press it again. Yeah. That seems a bit middle of the road, the middle of the road once sometimes. Let me try another one. Your round of Star Trek Enterprise episode is these other voyages. Season 4, episode 22. See, I am tempted, but I don't think we should knock out all the big ones. too. So we've done the Voyager finale and we've done the next generation finale. Yeah, maybe you're right. It's tempting though. I don't think I've ever seen it. I do know why everyone's so cross about it though. It's got Marina in it. That's true. Okay, season two, episode 16, future tents. Oh, that's the one with the spaceship that you thought was really boring. Oh yeah, God, that was boring. Season 2, episode 21, The Breach. No idea. Okay, say it again. All right. Season four, episode 21 Terra Prime. Oh, yeah, that's a two-parter. It's a 2 parter and it's, I think it's really, it's not like amazingly good, but it is strong and it does bring together the themes of series 4. Is it the very end of series four? No, it's a two-parter at the end of series four. Yeah. So it's just a 4 that's on a voyage. It's kind of the last 2 regular episodes, right? Before... Effectively. This is the this is the enterprise tonight. Because these are the voyages are set in TNG. So this is like the last proper enterprise episode. Everyone gets something to do. There's some really dreadful and some really impressive special effects CGR sequences. I think you'll find it quite interesting. whether you'll like it or not, I don't know, whether you're like what it's trying to say. I don't know. And I think that's a really interesting one to do. So that means that we need to watch 2 episodes then because our rule is if it's a 2 parter. We watch both parts. And so that means we'll be doing demons and then Terra Prime. And so this is about like xenophobes and stuff on earth, isn't it? It's like white supremacists. Throughout season four. We're getting hints and whispers that all the alien races are starting to disappear from Earth. And this shows you the extremist group that's taking care of that and they won earth for the earth. and everyone else gone. So it's basically it is leaning into the Star Trek premise and it's a big it's a big threat to the basic. But it's also about the forming of the Federation as well. It's a really interesting one. It's got a subplot with Malcolm Reed, where it turns out he's something to do with Section 31. Like everyone sort of gets something to do. There's a bit of action. Arch is really good in it. I think this is this is one. All right, that'd be great. I looking forward to that. Okay. You've been listening to entitled Star Trek Project with Joe Ford and Nathan Bottomleave. We're online at untitledstar trekroject.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 29th of December 2022 and released on the 6th of January, 2023. We'll see you next time for Star Trek Enterprise, Demons and Terra Prime. Wow. You're probably gonna hate it, you know. Just any of that. Yeah, that's it. I wonder if I do. That would be really interesting. I'm not entirely sure because I thought you were going to love series 3. Yeah. I can't judge you anymore. But, you know, like, it does do something different, but it does something different by being really awful, you know, like, and I lost my shit when it was just like, all right, we're going to get the Illyrians and we're just going to steal their warp core and leave them there. Just like, well, fuck off then. Don't do that. What's the point of you? This has got, in a big guest star, this has got... James Cromwell. Fabulous. It's got James Cromwell. It's got Harry, what's his face, the mayor from Buffy in a big role. and the guy playing the villain is great. He's really, really good. looks like Richard Nixon. great. Yeah, he's got some he's got some serious gravitas about him. Okay. Yeah, it's good. It's good. They do a terrorist act on... Is it? No, it's not utopia pleasure. I haven't got that there. on Jupiter? It is, yeah, and it's not a bad sequence as well. Obviously, Joey. Cool. Oh, that'll be good. I haven't seen, I don't think I've seen any of it. series 4 because it's always like 3 parters or whatever. And it sort of, it sort of does lean into that thing in series 4 that they were trying to do more sort of long form. storytelling they were trying to do, but sort of contained within 2 or 3 parties. And the, they were just, they were starting to build a world, not a world, that's sort of a universe, an enterprise universe. It was starting to cohere. And then they pulled the plug. But I mean, this was Walking Dead, wasn't it in series 4 anyway? Like it was, yeah. Yeah, pretty much so they had nothing to lose. Yeah. That's why they did. We're going to do an alternative universe one, set on the defy with a gone. See, I just assumed that we did 2 or 3 partters for the same reason that we did 6 partters in Doctor Who. It's just cheaper, you know, like you're not having to, um, I'm not sure because they spent a bit of money. I don't know. I'm not sure. But it does, it does. I always felt whenever I watched series 4, this feels like Bragger and Berman are gone. Manikoto is in and he wants to sort of bring this all together and actually make something half tangible about it. Not those, you know, throwaway bullshit, like a strange new world. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, and as much as you might have found it a night in Sick Bay, amiable, you know, like, what the hell was that doing? Like it's... What is that for an hour? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, you can do one of those.