Hey, Joe. Hi.
Hey, Tom.
Hello there.
So we are gathered here together to watch Star Trek for the Voyage
Home.
It's the 2nd time that we've done a movie and our previous time of
Star Trek Generation.
So we're definitely heading up.
We've recently done threshold.
God help us and God's destroy.
So we are doing something really, really sort of uncomplicatedly
great.
Is that how you find this one, Tom?
When I watched it most recently, I was just a tiny bit
disappointed, and that was only because I think I was in the mood
to watch Star Trek.
And for all the wonderful things that this film is, and it is
terrific.
It isn't very Star Trek.
It's sort of Star Trek inflected, but it's otherwise kind of very
very good. 80s time travel fish out of water comedy.
And that's a perfectly fine thing for a film to be.
DS9 is my favourite iteration of Star Trek, and that isn't very
Star Trek either.
So I've sort of come to the conclusion that my favourite Star Trek
is when it's not Star Trek at all.
So this is built for me this.
I'm also still slightly recovering from the fact that we all
sounded like we were introducing Blue Peter at the beginning of
this episode.
Less anybody but to astound Shepherd.
I think that's slightly about either of you guys are Marx Brothers
fans, but I think that about the Marx Brothers, because what's
generally regarded as their best film, Duck Soup, is also in many
ways their least typical.
But I think it is kind of appropriate for a comedy group as
perverse as the Marx Brothers.
That their best film should be their least typical.
I feel the same way about Dogs who, you know, the most atypical
Doctor Who is heaven sent.
And yet it's just been voted the number one Doctor Who episode
extraordinary.
Well, I mean, this, this is kind of odd, isn't it?
Because the Enterprise isn't in it until the very end.
And it's the 3rd in a trilogy.
And so there's a real scale to this story, which I think does give
them permission to kind of go off format for once in a way that
really works well because we're still getting the fallout from the
previous 2 films in this one and particularly with the character
of Spock, who, you know, obviously is the breakout character of
the entire show.
And so I think that is really great.
But the other thing that I think is great is how incredibly woke
it is.
Why?
We've just lost half the audience for you saying that word.
You really like that.
No, they're not listening.
So what's great about it is when I was a kid in high school.
So this film comes out when I'm 17, right?
And when I was a kid in high school, there was a joke that, you
know, leftists and so on cared about land rights for gay whales
right?
And the kind of some text of that is that the concerns of gay
people, indigenous people, and Wales were something that it was
ridiculous to fixate on.
Anyone who cared about those 3 things was ridiculous.
Do you know what I mean?
was being silly.
And so here is a film that absolutely deals with an incredible
pressing issue and puts it front and centre in a way that's
utterly bafflingly weird, um, and really properly makes us care
about it.
And I think that's awesome.
I think that's so good.
You know, our whole future depends on whether these whales get
saved and so does Star Trek and I think that's just tremendous.
There's a wonderful bit in the centre-C interview series where
they're talking about the voyage home.
And David Gerald, the writer of Trouble with Tribles, has got his
head in his hands when talking about the voyage home and he's like
I mean, it's a bit out there.
He goes, save the whales.
Come on.
But originally, this wasn't supposed to be about humpback whales
at all.
Another thing I've gleaned from this documentary says, I'll never
stop plugging it because if you want trivia about Star Trek, go
and watch the centre seat on Amazon Prime.
Originally, it was supposed to be about these tiny little fish
which the producer was delighted about because it was very cheap
and Leonard Nimoy basically said, no, we're not doing that.
That's very boring.
We don't want we don't want the world to be saved by these tiny
little fish.
We're going to have, you know, something big and epic.
We going to have whales.
So that's that's one change that was made.
The 2nd change was the big name guest star, mooted for this movie
was Eddie Murphy. who was supposed to play a nutty professor style
character.
I think it was going to be Gillian Hicks, wasn't he?
I mean, imagine the romance between him and Shadow.
The chemistry would have been extraordinary, wouldn't it?
I think the president of Paramount, so this is either the best
idea anyone's ever had or the worst.
They had chats, didn't they?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
He said the script or a version of it.
He decided to do the golden child instead.
Interesting choice.
But, you know, what's his name?
Richard Pryor had done Superman 3, only like a year or 2
previously.
So it's not quite as crazy as it sounds. but this is already the
Star Trek film that isn't really Star Trek.
One could only imagine what it would have come out like with Eddie
Murphy in the key guest role.
Do you know what I think like the key indicating factor that this
isn't a Star Trek film is?
The score.
I don't think there's another score for a Star Trek movie quite
like this.
And have you ever read the reviewers, sort of prestige trek
reviewers, Mark Altman and Edward Gross.
You know, they were saying lovely things about this in their big
Bible of Star Trek reviews.
But the one thing they absolutely loathed because it wasn't, you
know, this serene orchestral score that you normally get in a Star
Trek movie was, was the music.
I love the music in this film.
I think it gives it a real identity.
I'm not a big fan.
I don't love it.
Yeah, I think the identity it has is Meg Ryan walking to a
shopping mall.
Oh, well, no wonder I love it.
That is not kind of movie.
It's very period, isn't it?
Very, very period.
Shouldn't it be though?
Yeah, oh, yeah, no, I think it should, particularly for this
film.
And it's really the 1st time that Star Trek engages with the world
of its audience.
And I don't think assignment earth counts because that Star Trek
being in another TV show from the 1960s.
It's not Star Trek engaging with the actual world. it's so strange
isn't it?
And we've done it a couple of times since then.
It seems less odd.
It's obviously such a brilliant idea that we do it again in
Voyager, and then we do it again in Picard, and I think it works
really well both times, and the Picard one is super woke in a
fantastic way, I think.
But that's so strange, isn't it?
And just, and just showing us the space people, you know, it's
it's almost like I'm getting vibes from the Brady Bunch movie and
I know you're both English and you don't know what I'm talking
about.
But the Brady Bunch movie is, you know, a film where characters
from a cheesy early 70s sitcom are living in the world of the up
to the minute 90s and just the sort of strange, you know, the
strange interactions between their TV world and ours.
And that's very much this, isn't it?
These odd characters from a 1960s TV show, turn up on our streets
20 years later, or nearly 20 years later, and have to try and fit
in, and it's really fun.
It's just so enjoyable.
It's such a brilliant idea.
Yeah, that fish out of water idea is genius and it works like
gangbusters here.
The other thing, I think the films started to realise that the TV
show never did really, because it was always about 3 is just what
a brilliant ensemble they've got.
And this is the 1st film, I think, that really gives them all
maybe not Sulu, maybe Sulu's the one that's shortchanged in this
but a big slice of the pie.
They all get a set piece in this movie and it just really leans
into the chemistry between all of the actors and it's wonderful to
watch.
This is one of the things that struck me watching Star Trek from
the beginning, which is that we're kind of used to the idea now
that there's this core group of 7 actors and they are the stars of
Star Trek and they're the ones who had to keep coming back for
every movie.
You watch the 1st season of Star Trek. you wouldn't, well, 1st of
all, you wouldn't pick out one of the 7 because he hadn't been
cast yet.
But also there's no particular reason if you watch a couple of
episodes at random to not pick Nurse Chappell or Yeoman Rand, or
even poor Eddie Paskey, I think, is actually in more episodes than
George Decay, but didn't get anything like the royalties and movie
roles and convention appearances.
And so yeah, when they steal the Enterprise in Star Trek 3, that's
really the 1st moment when you see this core group of characters
come together as a gang, and then that's what we kind of roll with
into this film, but it's not part of the series.
I almost feel a bit sad at the end of this where they, well, we
get the enterprise back, you know, because that Klingon cruiser
looks amazing, doesn't it?
It's so much more atmospheric in those hits.
But what is also fun is that they're not on a mission and there's
no command structure.
I mean, there's a kind of command structure, but they're kind of
friends.
And so that makes that very different, I think, from, you know
what happens even even in the next film or the film after.
So I think this is special.
It's just a sort of confluence of some really weird unusual ideas
that just land perfectly.
Okay, we should watch it.
I think we should.
All right.
So I'll count us in.
Five, four, three, two, one, and we're off.
I did notice the music at the beginning of the film.
It does start with like a Star Trek riff, doesn't it?
So it lows you into a full sense of security and then it just goes
into all all out rom-com music.
Marvellous.
So this comes out in late 86, and it's dedicated to the crew of
the Challenger, which exploded soon after takeoff in January 86
and I remember that really well.
That's the last year of school for me.
And so I remember all the coverage of that.
And I think, you know, like, I think that that's actually
perfect.
I do love how we see the Enterprise.
But I actually saw the space shuttle Enterprise, uh, like on the
on the launchpad at um, Kennedy Space Centre or Cape Canaveral, or
whichever one it was called at the time.
Did you notice how the Star Trek for the Boy H.
Holmes appeared to come out of a humpback whale then on the
screen?
I thought it was, I thought it was the beaming down effect.
Yeah, the transporter effect.
I couldn't come up with one transport, honestly. on this Star
Trek.
How many Star Trek podcast have you done at this stage?
Oh, many.
It's just so nice after the last couple we've watched.
It's so nice to watch something that's fun, isn't it?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, they've been grim.
No, I'm going to stop being mean about generations, you know
because this is rather dull this opening, isn't it?
Just the starscape and the names.
At least had the champagne bottle flying through space in slow
motion.
I've got a really good storytelling fix for generations.
If there's a lull, I mean, I can do it now if you want.
I'll see how fast I can do it.
There's a weird bit at the beginning of generations when Picard is
looking through his photo album and getting all misty eyed about
the death of his nephew burning to death, which is kind of awful.
And then it's, it's, they didn't do anything with it.
And then 3 quarters way through the movie.
He's in the nexus and can leave the nexus and go to any point in
time and space.
He just goes, I know exactly where I want to go, which is kind of
the stupidest time and place you could go.
But there's an opportunity there to pay off the photo album
scene.
He could have the moral dilemma.
Do I save my nephew from this awful fire or do I go and save this
planet?
and they never even consider it.
Tom automatically does.
That is far more interesting than the generations that we got.
Thank you very much.
Well, think of the film as he doesn't even consider going back to
the enterprise and just, you know, arresting Sarah on the moment
he comes on board.
Like it just seems, it's very silly, not very well.
Having to make a choice about his nephew or the planet would
actually be kind of rooted in character and like I said, would
make sense of why that scene was there, but it seems like they
never even considered it.
I think they were so lost trying to figure out what Picard's
vision of the Nexus should look like, that they just began not to
have the complete map of the story in their heads anymore.
At what point during this movie, do you think that William Shatner
looks over at Leonard Nemoy, you know, the man who everybody loves
who's bringing together this fabulous movie that comes in on time
on budget and is thinking, oh, I want a bit of that?
I'm going to do that.
I'm pretty sure he's thinking it all the way.
But I think in many ways, this is Shatner's best performance.
I don't disagree.
So he's so relaxed.
He's so charming in this.
He never looks ridiculous except when he's deliberately being
funny.
I think he's terrific.
So this is Manchester Sinclair as the captain of the Saratoga.
You have a fact, don't you?
Yes, this is the 1st on-screen appearance of a female starship.
Do you know, Maya, who is no, in no way, a Star Trek fan, was
watching the beginning of this movie with me.
And he went, oh, screw Captain Janeway.
That is the 1st female captain.
She's awesome.
She comes back in an episode of Star Trek, the Next Generation, to
play Geordie's Mother, in Interface.
Yeah, so it bucks the trend, that episode, because normally
they're finding new family members in series 7.
But this time we lose a family member and it's her.
There is one moment in her very brief performance in this movie
where I was like, the shit's hitting the fan and she's just sort
of going, hello, come in, please.
Come in, please.
I'm like, come on now, bring the drama.
Very understated.
We seem to be watching the film here in the Federation Council
Chamber.
The Federation Cinema.
It's movie night.
Where's the trip?
Surely he should be putting on Bride of Frankenstein or
something.
But this is odd, isn't it?
Because there's all of this previously on Star Trek Admin.
And actually, you could have started this with everybody got home
okay?
everybody's fine.
They're in the Federation.
They're back home, but there's this desire or this assumption that
we have to start where the previous one left off.
Yeah, there's a deliberate choice to tie the 3 together, isn't
it?
I have one leading to the to another.
And as you said, Nathan, I mean, I like that choice.
Yeah, it means that they're cut loose of all the rest of the
Federation bureaucracy when they have to go and solve the problem
which I think is a plus.
It means within within the original Star Trek movies, you just
have a big story, don't you, between 2 and four.
You know, that's, and, you know, 6 is obviously their big send
off.
But I think that is their story in this 6 episode, a 6 movie run.
Yeah.
Look at how camp he is.
He's got his hand on his thigh there.
Look.
Every great Star Trek movie has got to have a camp Klingon, doesn't
it?
See, I think we want this stuff.
Like, I think we want to see the Federation Council, and I think
we want to see the Klingons, and I think we want to see Mark
Leonard back and all of that as Star Trek fans.
And given, as you said, Tom, that this isn't really a Star Trek
film in lots of ways.
Here's where all the Star Trekness of it lives.
And I'm happy for that.
You know, like I think the great thing, when we watched Enterprise
Series 4 and thought that it had a sort of movie scale.
The great thing is that the status quo changes in these 3 films
like across across the 3 films, the status quo of, you know, the
situation that our characters are in and their relationships with
one another change, and something happens to the world that they
live in in a way that we never saw in the original series because
we couldn't afford it, I guess.
And you notice that every time we meet the president of Earth. a
different person.
We never, we never find out.
There's, there's one, isn't there, in DS9 series four.
That's like Bruza, yeah.
Oh, look, look at Vulcan.
Gorgeous.
It's so funny because these...
Is this what it looked like in 86.
This hasn't been spiffed up for Blu-ray.
No, this is...
I mean, that does look like painting.
It's gorgeous.
But all of these scenes, outside the Klingons, they're in a car
park, they're being filled in a car park. with a bit of sand on
the floor.
And I'm trying to like, look, because you can see behind the ship
there, but he's got so much dry ice pumping into the scene and
things like that.
It's very clever.
It's really cleverly now.
This is kind of the peak of this kind of filmmaking, isn't it?
There are some bad shots in some 80s movies, but you know
miniature work and forced perspective tricks and map paintings and
so on.
This has kind of been pretty much solved by this stage.
Yeah, I think it looks really good.
Like I think it looks, you know, it's exciting.
Uh, and it feels a little bit more substantial.
Like I love spectacle and I love computer generated imagery, but I
love this as well.
And it is what I went to see when I went to the pictures when I
was a teenager, you know.
Well, there is one special effect sequence in this movie that is
just backling, isn't it?
The bit where they go back in time.
We're not there yet. is going on?
Yeah, it's very good.
It's like Hubrick's taking over for a bit, isn't it?
It's very strange.
So this is all hard.
It's sort of low rent, Kubrick.
This is all half Bennett stuff, isn't it?
So they carved the script up and Nicholas Meyer wrote all the
stuff on Earth and Half Bennett does all the Star Trek admin
stuff.
I didn't know that until I'd watched the interview.
And actually, I was watching this side, seeing if there was any
perceptible difference in the writing and there was.
It got a lot funnier. when the, you know, the suddenly the lines
really were zippy.
We're in sort of po-face Star Trek territory here.
The 2nd we were on earth.
The zingers start hitting.
And Half Bennett wrote all of Star Trek 3. he's the only credited
writer on Star Trek 3.
And given this is a guy who'd been dragged in from TV in order to
try and make Star Trek movies cheaper than Star Trek the Motion
Picture, who'd never seen that episode before.
It's kind of amazing and he's able just to sit down and go, okay
Klingons, the Genesis planet.
But especially Joe, as you think about this as a trilogy, you can
sort of now see that the job of Star Trek 3 is to get the
characters from where they are at the end of Star Trek 2, to where
they need to be at the beginning of Star Trek 4.
And it does do that very efficiently, albeit without an enormous
amount of flair.
The only bad thing that this film does is get them to the point
where Star Trek 5 starts.
But, you know, we can't blame someone.
Presumably there's a sort of Star Trek equivalent of the Star Wars
machete order where you just don't watch Star Trek 5.
Oh, I was really, really hoping that we would roll Star Trek
five.
I found a, oh, I found a fabulous bookshop in town, Tom, which I
found the William Shatner's personal account of directing Star
Trek 5.
It's this big thick volume.
I read up a little extract in a previous episode.
I'm going to read the whole thing when we do five.
I'm sure...
It's called something like, why am I surrounded by fools?
No, I think it's called guys.
I've edited the movie.
It's ready to go And then the fuck up is all of them in horror
watching that edit of the movie.
Oh my god, it's a love letter by Shatner 2 Shatner.
It's just tremendous.
I let him know, isn't it?
It's like the moment in Star Trek 6 where, you know, I think I, you
know, I actually kissed your word, must have been a lifelong
ambition.
You know, like it's...
Oh, man, don't you?
So here we are for Jane Wyman.
She's great.
But don't you just love, she is pretty right.
Like, he can do no wrong.
Oh, yeah.
This is this is really good for him too.
And they've done something a little bit unusual, which means that
he gets to play it a little bit like data, doesn't he?
Because he's sort of new.
Um, he, you know, he's, oh my god, I just remember that he had sex
with Savage in Star Trek 3.
He's had sex with Savik. got that past him, and now he's learning
all of the things from the computer, but he still doesn't know
like what metaphors are and stuff like that.
He gets to, you know, play it, play it a little bit differently
from how he's been playing it.
It's great.
I think it's really good.
Presumably, well, this is being made.
Somewhere in another part of Los Angeles, Gene Roddenbury is
sitting down devising the character of data right about now.
In that tiny little office, yeah, in Paramount, where they're like
yeah, look over the, look over the scripts, gene.
We'll take all your notes on board.
I'd say.
You say you got over the, oh, I'd like to give away the twist
there.
You got over having sex with Savik.
Originally, the big twist was going to be that she was pregnant
and she was going to stay on the ship and that was going to be a
whole thing.
And then they just unceremoniously cut her out the movie.
Yeah, because she gets an opening credit.
Like, doesn't she, like, that actor who is not one of the sex in
the city people?
It's Robin Curtis.
Um, uh, she, she gets one line or like one scene, doesn't she?
And then takes a very 80s perm off the bounty, never to be seen.
I wonder why she didn't come back for Star Trek 6.
On the on the on the Saratoga there.
I felt as if I was watching Hunt for Red October for a second.
I think that that probe looks amazing. sound effect.
It's great as well.
Oh, yeah, but just there's something like whale skin or there's
something moist about it.
Like it seems moist and sort of organic.
And then that probe thing, which you can't quite work out exactly
what the deal is, like, is it, like, shapes on the surface of an
empty gelatinous sphere or something?
Like, you're not sure what you're looking at, and you don't even
know how it's connected to the main thing.
Like there's a real proper oddness about it.
And something that does evoke like sea life, I think.
Like it's, it's consistent with what it's trying to do.
And of course, it's now in the opening credits of Star Trek Lower
Decks, in that very, very crowded scene.
With the Romulan Warbirds and the Silicon Avatar and the Borg and
the pros.
A sort of weird throbbing sound effect has clearly lodged itself
in my brain because for the last couple of weeks, knowing that
we're going to be doing this, I've just randomly been walking
around my house going, blah, blah, blah, blah.
I'm making that bizarre and my other ass, looking at me like, what
are you doing?
You know.
It's weird, isn't it?
Yeah, I like how weird it is.
And we do obviously have that very long sequence where, you know
Ahura's play and hurrah for using Ahura because we've just watched
a ton of TOS where she's had nothing to do at all.
Um, and they... repeatedly the computer.
Yeah, yeah, yeah Yeah, it's great.
It's strange credulity a bit that there are like a 1000 people on
earth desperately trying to figure out what their signal is or
what it means.
But we have to wait for Ahura.
We have to wait for one of our guys actually to be able to be the
ones to figure it out.
I sort of don't mind that because our guys have to be the best and
they have to be at the centre, but it is a bit weird.
When they do figure it out.
I'm really pleased they sort of hang a lantern on how absurd the
premise of this film is you have that wonderful scene with bones
going, we're going to go back in time and save a bunch of whales
in a hope that they're going to come here and save the earth.
And he goes, well, that's crazy.
You know, I'm like, thank God somebody's in it, you know.
It does help.
It really does.
All right, let's say goodbye to Robin, who we're never going to
see.
Why do we mention David?
Like David's no part of this movie.
That is an irrelevant line.
It's just Half Bennett saying that, remember that earlier film I
wrote?
It was really good, wasn't it?
You like, watch that one. get the DVD Oh, sorry, VHS.
It was DVD.
Why was it?
But I think all of that's worth doing.
I think we want to see that.
I think that this is a series of films that is creating its own
fandom with our own knowledge and stuff and we would have been
disappointed if we hadn't if we hadn't known for sure that Kirk
knew how David died and she was there.
We're Star Trek fans.
We live for that sort of stuff.
But like sort of, I don't know how much of the percentage of the
audience is hardcore Star Trek has.
I don't think those people care too much.
No, no, no, but I don't think they were put off by this.
Like, this is the sort of Star Trek shit that they were expecting
to see when they turned up to the cinema.
Do you know what I mean?
When they wandered into the multiplex.
They were kind of more or less signing up for that.
They got to the end and they were like, much more...
That's actually good.
And it'd have been 2 years since Star Trek 3. you know, unless
you'd bothered to buy the novelisation or the, as you say, the VHS
you would need a bit of a refresher.
It's just that this has so little to do with what's going to
happen next.
Am I misremembering Star Trek free?
I don't remember that being a particularly great movie.
It had some good sweat pieces.
I know, it's terrible.
It's not Star Trek five. the best of the odd ones I think.
Did you see that aspect shot there of the Klingon ship going up
and the planet escape?
Now, let's go.
Let's return to your comment about whether they've tarted this up
for the for this version.
I don't think they have.
No.
It's beautiful.
It does look great though.
It does look good, doesn't it?
Really?
Oh, I love that space station.
Use again in 1001 or whatever the episode's called in.
Oh, they used over and over.
Oh, yes. all the time.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. they never stop.
And why not?
You know?
Yeah.
Just the scale of this stuff too, you know, like, because original
Star Trek had just been the ship and maybe another ship, if we
were lucky, but having this giant space stock, and it just gives a
sense of a world for these adventures to take place in, which is
you know, like, strange new worlds does that and does it quite
well with its Starbase one, you know, um, and, you know, Admiral
April and stuff like that.
But here we get it for the 1st time here and I love it.
I'm absolutely here for it.
There's a wonderful story again.
The centre seat where the fellow from ILM that's doing the special
effects.
They brought in, you know, the top dog of ILM to try and turn what
is effectively a boiler to look like that alien probe.
And he's like, what am I going to do with this?
It looks like a boiling unit.
So basically he just he painted it black.
He sprayed it so it sort of glistened a little bit.
He shot it in interesting ways.
I don't think it even he's that impressed still, though, with how
it looks.
Whereas I've always thought...
I think it looks cool.
It just looks just unknowable, doesn't it?
It doesn't look like anything you've seen before.
But also in that stuff, like, you know, you had the stock footage
of the clouds that were sort of forming and stuff like that.
But you did have the shot of it kind of hoovering up the ocean and
there's clearly some liquid.
Do you know what I mean?
They can't, they're not computer generating it.
There's some liquid being dispersed and they're, they've got like
waterfalling and they're kind of matting it all together.
There's a few different elements that they're putting together.
And I think they're reasonably successful.
They certainly sell what's happening.
Even he says, though, during the sequence when I go back in time
you go, oh, I hate that sequence.
Because I'm trying to be sort of visually poetic.
He goes, none of it means anything, you know?
I've got a feeling that's that's where Bennett's script ran out
and Myerscript took over.
So no one had actually written the time travel sequence.
That scene.
It sort of fell between the cracks.
I love this scene.
Isn't this same brain?
So you've got this scene here where the 2 of them, again, we're
going over stuff that happened in Star Trek 3 and even as early as
Star Trek 2 at the very end of Star Trek 2.
But just, like, it characterises the 2 of them so well going in.
And just how incredibly frustrating Spock is, you know, like, it's
the big question of what happens after death. what happens after
Daphne just says, well, I could tell you, but I can't because
you've got no frame of reference, so you can't understand it.
It's so cool. you telling me I've got to die to have this
conversation with you?
It's great.
Even that exchange, which I don't think makes any sense, where he
says, excuse me.
Excuse me, doctor, I'm having a number of, I'm experiencing a
number of distress calls.
And he just says I don't doubt it.
I don't quite know what that means, but it is, yes, you are an
annoying person to be around and I feel like sending out a
distress call right now.
I don't think any of the films really manages to do anything
interesting with McCoy.
Possibly, apart from Star Trek 5.
That's the only one which really has anything to say about who he
is.
What does he do in Star Trek five?
Well, I mean, because everyone, all 3 of them have the, that thing
where they, they have to reveal their secret pain.
And he has that thing, yeah, that euthanasia thing.
I think it is.
But yeah, that's a sort of self-contained set piece of the middle
of the film.
But none of these 6 films really or anything to do with who McCoy
is.
He's simply somebody who hangs around and lets Kirk or Spock
bounce off him.
And it's weird because he's so vivid in the original series.
It's nice to know that before he was cooking up Jumbalaya, on
earth, Captain Cisco's father was...
Admiral Winstaff, Leo.
But this alien here on the ride of the shot with the ears, he
turns up, I think, possibly as a Bolian, in conspiracy, in series
one of Star Trek, the Next Generation.
We just saw Nurse Chapel, who is here for some reason.
I don't know why.
And I think I think Yoman Rand is there as well.
I think that that's they just get the tiniest of cameos here.
Eddie Pask must just be fuming.
I mean, fuming.
That's it.
Why am I not in the background?
going to ask you a favour, Tom, because we have a scale on
untitled Star Trek project, the Beaumont scale.
We had a couple of aliens turn up in the Star Trek Voyager episode
revulsion that had sort of coat hangers. going around their heads
and they look absolutely ridic- the most ridiculous looking
start.
When that alien comes back in a minute, I'd like you to rate him
on the Beaumont scale, please.
That's our guess for this. from one to 10?
One to 10 of how ridiculous it looks.
Obviously, 10 being super ridiculous and one being, you know, I
cut which episode it is now.
There are some Voyager Ravens.
I think it is who have on their heads what looks like one of those
games where you have to tilt it and try to make the ball go in the
hole.
That's the bone.
Going back to McCoy's box for a second.
There's a real difference in their chemistry as well in the movies
than there was in a TV show, which was a bit nasty, we've said
occasionally, haven't we?
It was a bit, whereas I think that's where you see the
relationships that actors have formed over time, actually on the
screen.
Yeah.
So it's the same sort of um, sort of culture clash.
But it's just a lot gentle. more enjoyable to watch, I think.
It's weird in Star Trek 6 that they have Cook be the one who's
racist against Klingons when we've had 20 odd years of McCoy being
racist against Vulcans.
But I mean, he has the character motivation for it, doesn't he?
He does, yeah, they killed my boy.
I mean, I've always liked these 3 because they represent just
different impulses.
Do you know what I mean?
You've got Kirk is the ruling impulse who has to decide between
emotion and reason.
And that's what makes them work together so well.
By having they almost function like a person.
Decide between Spock and McCoy, almost like, you know, the Lulu
Tunes or Disney, Devil and Angel characters, it's externalising
the decision making process, which is so clever.
And I don't think history really relates to whether any of that
was conscious or whether it was just the way these characters
emerge because McCoy is a late edition, isn't he?
They try out a few other doctors, which are sort of variations on
the same theme. before they eventually get to Forrest Kelly.
What I gather from the sort of behind the scenes that we've done
we've unearthed doing this is a lot of that 1st season.
It just is accidental.
But once it fell into place and they saw it worked, then they
really lent it into it after that.
In Star Trek, the Next Generation, I think they try the same thing
with Picard and Worf.
You know, and Worf's job is to be more aggressive and, you know
what he says is we should do this and he's always wrong.
Like he's just always wrong.
We're always baffled when he's right, aren't we?
That's usually in DS9.
No, it doesn't happen that often.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Well, he doesn't have that role in DS9 anyway.
I love this in a minute where they go, um, Yes, well, we're going
to have to go into time warp.
Like that's something you can just do.
But actually that was set up in Assignment Earth that we did
recently that you can just pop back in time, you know, should you
need to.
I think that's just covered in an opening montage, isn't it?
Just a voiceover.
We've gone back in time, but that's the beginning.
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
No, that's their mission.
They had to go back there on a mission to spin off this news.
We can only assume they've been through all the drama that they go
through in a minute in Assignment Earth.
We just never saw any of that.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So when they travel back in time in Picard series 2, there is a
kind of weird montage of the faces of the characters on board the
ship.
So I think they go back in La Serena, don't they?
And we just see all of the characters, but what we don't see is
this bafflingly weird thing that's about to happen on screen.
Like, it's so strange. bizarre morphing heads that come up out of
the clouds.
It's going on.
I think it was just, you know, with CGI, everything was just
experimental, and this was just, here's something we could do.
Can you use it?
Yeah.
Well, I mean, the Genesis effect, which they use for and over
again, because it costs so much money, is spectacular, I think.
And the full effect, where you actually, because it's quite pixily
and then you sort of zoom in and you see the, you know, the planet
terraforming itself and stuff.
I think it's a reasonably impressive effect.
And I absolutely remember when computers look like these ones.
You know, in the bulkheads.
We ever get under the skin of why the probe is so pissy that you
can't say hello to the whales.
Like, why is it destroying?
everything in the galaxy just because it can't say hello to the
whales again?
No.
Okay, which I think is I think it's probably correct.
There's a bit of ambiguity there.
Yeah, there's there's enough admin in this in this film as it is
without uh, yet more uh, and sometimes you don't want your your
monsters to be able to speak.
I think one of the things that Nemoy certainly came into this film
wanting to do was tell a story with to use the old Hollywood
parlance, no heavy.
No villain, no bad guy.
And so if you, if you now personify the probe, even if it turns
out it was all a misunderstanding, if the probe is personified
you're kind of going back to that, uh, Khan Cruge, uh, evil
villain character, which is what they were trying to avoid, this
is, this is circumstance uh, that they're battling against.
Is this the only Star Trek movie that doesn't have a villain
then?
Could very well be.
Yeah, I think it is.
Yeah.
But remember that the the probe is doing the thing that the the
film needs to make its point about ecology.
So it turns out that we're dependent on the other intelligent life
forms on this planet in a way that we suspect that we aren't, and
so it's there to kind of make that point, we need the humpback
whales.
And I assumed, and is it in the in the script that it's coming
back to check on them?
Like it just comes back periodically to check on the whales?
Is that...
I can't remember.
And presumably you can't just play whale song at it because it has
to be able to have a conversation.
They do have that line.
They cover that line, yeah.
Yeah.
Because I think that's what everyone's thinking, aren't they
watching this?
Play them some whale song.
Oh, this is the same.
That's crazy.
I love it.
Yeah, it does help.
It really does help.
And time travel is, but I think that's why that bonkers scene with
the floating heads is so important because otherwise time travel
seems trivial.
It seems like we're just driving a Klingon TARDIS.
We can go wherever we want.
And it has to seem like a big deal, like a hard thing to do.
And there's some lines later on as well about, oh, in order to get
us back where we need to be, I'm going to have to make some
guesswork.
Just to try and make this seem hard because actually the story
rests on this being very, very easy.
But we can't admit that.
So we have to then decorate that with all sorts of other little
flourishes about how terribly difficult it is.
Otherwise they'd be doing this all the time. think they sell it.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, I think they properly sell it.
And that's exactly it.
They don't want to make every film be about this.
And so they have to make it something that's difficult and risky
and costly, so they can't do it all the time.
Yeah, I think the weird things about 1st contact, which is that
not only is time travel seen as much easier in that film, but also
my God, that film does not hang about.
I think we're at what, 29 minutes now?
uh very nearly.
When I watched 1st contact, I took a note of this.
It's 14 minutes before the Enterprise enters Time Warp in that
film.
And that is some efficient storytelling.
Maybe that's why people were so surprised in this movie that
actually, half an hour is a long time to do, as you say, admin
before we get to the main event.
I mean, this is, you know, this is the way storytelling happens
happens in the 80s, you know, it's it's a long time later and
there's been 150 more episodes of Star Trek that we've all
experienced.
We don't need to be sold the time travel thing because it happens
in Star Trek the Next Generation.
And so just having them follow the Borg.
That sells it.
You know, they're not doing it themselves.
They're following a Borg thing.
It wasn't the case in Assignment Earth, though, was it?
That was only the what?
40th episode of Star Trek?
Yeah.
They just had boy hair, I think.
We had a spinoff to launch and we were going to do whatever it
took.
You know, this film is the perfect example how the memory cheats
because I have this vivid memory of that window shattering in a
minute in Starfleet headquarters and it being this incredible
visual.
And then when I was watching it, I was like, oh, it's a bit of
fibre class.
It's just sort of fallen out.
I think the reason it's memorable is that it links, you know, it's
happening again at the end of this thing when they go back
remember?
Like it's the thing that makes it clear that they've come back
into exactly the same time.
Probably the difference between movie and TV because that's not
the thing we sort of see in Star Trek on television.
Is it?
like, you know, Amidst all windows.
Like Windows.
Like, you never see through windows on television.
I miss all this continuity porn.
This does not look an awful lot like the Klingon ship from Star
Trek 3.
Oh, really?
I had meant to go back and watch the 2 films, but I just didn't
have time.
It's very cramped.
And although Kirk's chair in the centre, there is raised a little
bit.
In three, Christopher Lloyd sitting on a kind of throne with
everyone else like, 2 feet below him.
I think he insisted on that, though, you know.
I imagine so.
You'd think Shadow would as well, wouldn't you?
Wasn't Christopher Lee higher than me?
That's great though.
Oh, I love that bit.
It's exploded in Ahura's face.
I mean, that's that there alone is more than she normally gets in
the original series episode.
Oh, the consoles are already exploding where they're rocks.
I didn't see any rocks, Joe. It's a movie.
They don't need the rocks.
They don't need the drama of rocks.
Here we go now.
This is great, isn't it?
Yeah, yeah.
ILM pulling out all the stops.
Do you remember what we did this in DS9?
We're back in time.
Oh, sorry.
They detonated that sun and destroyed the shipyard.
How shitty that look compared to.
But it does count.
Here we go.
This is full on Nicholas Rhodes, Stanley Kubrick nightmare.
I think they actually painted the entire page set, white for that
one shot of...
Yes, staring off the screen left.
I like to think they're actual fast.
It's absolutely not clear who those people are. not at all clear.
Just about just about clock Nemoy there.
But that could be anybody.
Oh, there's a whale.
Is that the fella?
Descending to the earth and the clouds all around.
Very strange.
Yeah, man.
Is he naked?
Because it's Quantum Leap, isn't it?
It looks just like the title.
What is happening?
The water.
And then, look, watch this.
We cut to this shot of reeds in water, and then we never come back
here again.
Do we go on?
No, that's...
This is weird imagery.
It's very old.
So now the lines are gonna stop zinging.
Okay.
The 2nd somebody says, where are we?
I think, or when are we?
Yes, that's the beginning of the Nick Myers script and he gets to
do his pollution gag.
Suddenly we're saying, you know, everybody remember where we
parked?
How do we know he didn't invent the field?
such a great line.
But where is where is Alameda?
You know, suddenly we're getting these gray lights.
Who was that, Nicholas Meyer?
He wrote the middle bit.
Did he write?
He's the guy who wrote 2 and 6 and directed 2 and 6 as well.
He didn't direct this one.
It's something that links all those things.
It's all the best parts of the movies, isn't it?
Yeah, they're good.
You guys must know the story about too big written.
Yeah, well, it's all in there, isn't it?
the sense to see again.
The behind the scenes of these movies is fascinating.
I mean, 5's the most fascinating because it's such a fucking
disaster.
This one's almost a little boring because everything goes quite
smoothly overall.
For the benefit of listeners, I'll do that story as fast as I
can.
They had about 10 different drafts of a script for Star Trek 2.
And Nicholas Meyer came in to try and get Half Bennett out of
trouble.
And look to the bits they had and said, tell me all the bits you
like and I'll stitch them together into a coherent screenplay.
And Harv Bennett said, well, we start shooting in 12 days.
And Nicholas Myers said, well, I think I can do it with the
arrogance of youth.
And half Bennett said, Nick, we couldn't even do your deal in 12
days.
Yeah.
And that's why he doesn't get. why he doesn't get screenplay
credit.
Oh, wow.
No, they couldn't ride the contract as quickly as he had to ride a
screenplay.
So much. studio involvement in that film, isn't it?
It is astonishing, it turned out as well as it did.
Is it because it's a course correction, is it?
Because they're worried about what they did last time and so
everything's being redesigned and we're taking a different
approach.
I was thinking about this.
The way that Star Trek 4 sits so oddly, you see this sometimes
with long-running franchises that the 1st like 3 or so are often
the experimental ones, like what does this look like as a
franchise?
You know, the 1st 3 Mission Impossibles are all very different.
It takes ages for fast and furious to figure out how it works.
And you can see them in these 4 movies trying out different
approaches.
Really, Star Trek, 5 and 6, I think, are the only 2 which are Star
Trek films.
Star Trek Magic Picture is kind of, but it's so different from the
series. 5 and 6 are the ones which are, this is the Star Trek
formula.
It's just that 5 is executed poorly, and 6 is execution much
better.
Yeah, yeah.
But I'm glad that we have this, you know, because this big story
does seem properly epic, and it's obviously being done at a time
as, you know, Star Wars has its big trilogy completed at this and
just a few years earlier.
And so Star Trek wants to do something sort of fairly similar.
And I think they, you know, even though the middle, you know
episode is not that great, I think it all hangs together
wonderfully.
This is the movie that feels most like TOS to me.
And I know we said it's atypical.
But TOS was fun.
It did ridiculous things like going down to Alice in Wonderland
planet and things like that.
And it just lent into it and had fun.
And this is the most fun of all of them.
Yeah.
Ah, Sulu was born in San Francisco.
And that's it.
That's his only line for the rest of the film.
What does he do?
Where does he go?
We get all, we get our 1st extraneous characters a minute, the 2
bin men that see the ship land invisibly.
It's like, did you see anything?
No, and neither did you.
So shut up.
I love that bit.
But even someone telling someone to shut up in a Star Trek field.
Like, just the way, like, just instantly that dialogue marks it
out as something quite different and those characters are people
that we would never, ever have seen before.
I think it's so...
Morgan, shut up, and I'm not going to say it because doing it with
my finger doesn't count, but the bit where the, yeah, the fella on
the bus puts up its middle finger.
That's so not Star Trek, isn't it?
But the lyrics, the lyrics in his thing say screw you or something
at the same time.
You know, it's as sweary as we're going to get in a PG film.
Double dumbass on you.
Yeah, that's so great.
I'm from Crawley, you know, and every time you get on a bus and
crawling, there's a bloody arsehole playing music really loud or
having a loud phone.
You need a spock on every bus in Crawley.
So knock them out.
I love this.
That's so great.
So he's wearing his very, very period headband at this point as
well.
Well, we said that in assignment.
We're going to hang out to wear a array of spectacular hats, didn't
they?
Because they, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Everyone gets a phaser and a communicator, which presumably they
brought with them from the Enterprise.
Yeah, I guess so.
I'd pick one up on the way out, wouldn't you?
do that.
Just before setting the self-destruct.
I'm trying to think of other times where aliens have gone back in
time and they've had to cover up their various sort of latex
appendages.
There's Kira in past tense.
Remember, they put that massive bandage over her nose and then
every everywhere she lands, she goes, I had a bad accident.
That's all she said.
Well, is it that Kirk says about Spock in sitting in the chair
forever, my friend here is Chinese?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
It was a rice picking accident or something.
It's kind of racist, really.
In the 60s, you surprise.
Like it was a thing.
But this is so great.
I love the bin that flattens itself, like I said. it's so good And
I actually kind of secretly like that the cloaking device
literally makes a thing invisible.
But it's the closing counters moment where the door opens and the
line comes out.
So good.
And it's just our God.
Now, after that sort of half an hour of getting here.
Suddenly it's just all go, isn't it?
We're on the street and the plot just moves.
God, this looks good.
It's also kind of ripped off Terminator, isn't it?
You know, it's identical to that scene of the T 1000 arriving.
Now we're all watching, see?
We've got we've got in a good way now. problem, isn't it?
Just nice cinematography as well.
You know, even when there are no effects jobs, it's just lit with
a bit of care.
These night sheets are always difficult. remember where we park.
I just remember the tracking shot of them coming out there.
Yeah, but where does that even come from?
We're in full on comedy 80s music now, aren't we?
It's like, da, da, da, da, da, da.
And that shot bang, like suddenly this is not like, I don't know
what they've been doing for the last half a dozen hours while the
sun's coming up, but suddenly we're in this like aggressively
contemporary world.
We've never seen this on Star Trek before.
And it's so bizarre.
There was some talk apparently about whether they should change
clothes.
And Nemoy was in San Francisco scouting and just went, nah, no
one's going to look twice.
We'll be fine.
Just be in a minute where he says, come on, just blend in, will
you?
It's like a bunch of Star Trek fans out on the street, isn't it?
Looking up here awkwardly.
Exactly.
And I think this is the beginning of there is no money in the
future.
I think this is the 1st time this is made explicit because even in
the previous film, McCoy is trying to raise money to barter a ship
charter a ship, rather, and certainly in the original series
people, you know, buy triples with credits and Kirk says things
like, you're going to earn your salaries today.
But this is the beginning of there is no money in the future, which
then just becomes axiomatic in TNG.
In Next Generation, and then in DS9, obviously you've got the
Ferengi.
So there's a lot. kind of duck pedal on that, yeah.
Yeah, so then it becomes, yeah.
Strips and slips and, and, and, and, and...
Yes.
Oh, I love how they cover this with a line, don't they?
So it'll be his gift again, wouldn't it?
And presumably every time the glasses go through this cycle.
They get more and more...
They never caused.
Yeah, yeah.
No, they're never caused.
Like he buys them again and then he does them again and it's a
thing.
But it was that thing that was so important in the 2nd film, wasn't
it, about showing that Kirk was old, that he was getting old.
That's the other thing about Star Trek 5.
You know, you have these, this trilogy of films, which are, in
their various ways, all about, this one least of all, but the
other, the other 2 very much about how old Kirk is and how how
Nakate is.
And then as soon as William Shatner gets control of the means of
production, he's like, he's incredibly very well.
Look he's climbing up a mountain and there's nothing this man
can't do.
But there is like a whole episode in that.
It's one line.
It's one, it's a gag effectively.
I mean, that's what they do in times arrow, isn't it?
data's head.
It's like, oh, we've got to leave it there to find it again in the
future.
I think that what's really interesting is all that stuff about not
changing the past has not yet come into being here either, and
they just don't give a shit and they do all sorts of really fun
things, and they paper over it with a line from Scotty.
So there is, you know, a little thing, but I just, oh, what is
exchange?
God, you can chap your phone down.
Exact change playing is on a bus.
It is so annoying.
I love all of this.
A lot?
No, we're not, no, it's just glimpses of, no, we're all out in San
Francisco.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
But we don't know what this argument's all about.
So great.
I'm thinking about transparent aluminum is odd as well.
Why does it have to be transparent?
Who cares?
You want to see them?
Julian's gonna want to know how they're getting on.
But is that what the is that what the windows are made of in the
future?
One of these, yes.
Yeah, but also they couldn't really afford any of them in the
enterprise, basically.
Aluminum to use the American pronunciation is not tough.
It's flexible.
You use it to make airplanes outer because it's light.
Surely it should be transparent.
I overthinking this, aren't I?
My stomach turned a little bit here, aluminum in an English accent
then, if I'm honest.
I apologise.
The pair of them.
Well, where is Alameda?
And this was Nemoy as director just throwing extras at them and
saying, make something up and I'll just keep shooting until we get
something good.
That cop, I believe, is the unit security guy making sure that...
Okay.
And he just said, said to him, just like stare blankly and get a
couple of shots.
There we go.
His 1st appearance, but not last, the punk on the bus.
Yes.
Yeah.
He has learned some manners, though, by the time, you know, 2024
hits or whenever that series is set.
I think that's adorable that they did that.
And, um, you know, it's cheesy as hell and but they're allowed to
have it.
We've waited a long time, I think.
And this kind of wish fulfilment stuff is always good and this
kind of film, isn't it?
You'll wish we could be spot.
We all wish we could do this.
Oh, have you not tried this then?
It doesn't go down.
You get accused of all sorts.
Well, look, he does that. absolute comedy reaction to being, you
know, Vulcan neck pinched and everything's applauding.
It's so great.
So good.
I love this too, the gym conversation too.
There's time, isn't it?
There's time for very sweet character moments in this.
Yeah, yeah.
But this is this ongoing thing.
Like, like Spock does have an arc here.
We talked through it, but there's that lovely moment at the
beginning when the computer asks him, how do you feel?
How do you feel?
It knows that he's half human and it is, yes, it's Spock being
reassembled.
And yeah, if the next film hadn't been Star Trek 5, we might have
seen a bit more detail that, like, is this the same Spock that we
got to know the original series or is this some new version that's
been...
I mean, I think we resolve it, don't we, with the question where
he just asks them to send the message to his mother that he feels
fine.
And I love that as the resolution as well, that it's just so
simple, that it's, you know, just so straightforward.
It's also, that's the other thing I say to my behalf all the
time.
How do you feel?
And, again, not being a soundtrack fan, it has to be a clue.
Oh, here she is.
Gillian.
This is an actress that has to hold her own against Shatner.
I think she does extremely.
In fact, she just quoted a saying on the sentency that several
times in this movie.
She had to say, look, Leonard, would you just get Shatner out of
my light place?
It's in my show.
I think you do have to be.
I mean, she does a caveat, but I absolutely love Bill.
But I'm now about to insult him a lot, you know what I mean?
Bless her.
So is she's the mum in 7th heaven.
And the dad is Decker from Star Trek, the motion picture.
And so she's sort of TV famous, which means that, you know, like
she does look very familiar, I think.
Well, she looks like every.
I think she's tremendous.
Every 80s rob-com heroin, doesn't she?
Yeah.
She's Big Ryan.
She's...
Look at this kid with the camera and the blonde on my face. old
woman getting flashbacks.
She only gets one line now, woman, and she makes it count.
It's something about eccentric.
I actually think...
I think Bill does some superb comedy here.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. when he's reacting.
So I actually think that this is nearly impossible to watch, and
this is one of the things which makes it very period, is that this
scene takes place, and we get in shot all of this footage of these
whales being like sawn up and dismembered.
I think it's like, I just can't imagine you would do it.
It's really horrible to watch.
And so she says at the time that humpback whales, there's only
like 10,000 of them, and they're extremely endangered, um, they're
not endangered anymore, um, and there's like 150,000 of them
apparently now.
And this is part of the, do you know what I mean?
Like, I don't know what role this silly film played in it.
But it certainly is the public consciousness reflected by making
this the focus of the film that eventually says we can't keep
doing this.
You absolutely need to see it, though.
Like as viscerals, as horrific as that.
Just to make the point of this terrible thing that's happening.
Well, and what awaits George and Gracie at the end of the film.
It's interesting though that you see it on a small TV screen.
They sort of don't go in, do they?
It's pretty great.
Imagine watching that on a full-time cinema screen if you actually
had it full screen.
It would be horrible.
Oh, these are puppets, aren't they?
For the most part, yeah, I thought they were.
Yeah, there's about 20 seconds of actual well footage.
And this is all pieced together as well.
There's some stuff on location at the at some real Marine
Institute.
There's some stuff, yeah, shot on the back lot or the car park at
Paramount Studios.
There's some effects work, stitching it together.
Yeah, they have these big puppets in the pool.
I landed on the fact that, whoa, isn't it, a remarkable
coincidence that we've got, we've got 2 whales, a male one, a
female.
In captivity, right in front of us.
Yeah.
Not only that one of them's pregnant.
But they did go there.
Do you know what I mean?
They did there for they did go there for that purpose.
You still have the Adam and Eve problem of how does the 2nd
generation come apart?
come about if Grace is, yeah, let's try not to think about it.
Wells are tarts, it's fine.
But again, I think that the having the whales in captivity is
slightly ooky as well, and I guess because it's for their safety
but I just don't think we would be hugely happy about a Cetacean
Institute that had a big ass tank with 2 humpback whales in it.
I live in Sydney and we do get humpback whales coming into Sydney
Harbour, which would never have happened in the 1980s because the
harbour was much filthier back then and there weren't so many
humpback whales, but we do see them from time to time.
There's 2 nuns there.
No reason, it's okay.
I know.
Do you remember when there were nuns?
What happened to nuns?
They used to be the whole thing.
You just imagine all these extras walking through the Paramount
costume racks and they're just like picking stuff off at random.
Like, you could be a nun.
Can I be the nun?
Can I be a nun?
Sister Rack, what's Drake?
Let's have one of those in there.
I love this.
So that's great.
Pop it, though, isn't it?
It's fantastic.
And I think they did get complaints from some marine biologists
saying, you know, you can't be doing this with whales and they
have to come back and say, do you know, we know we didn't.
That's made of fibreglass?
They said, didn't they?
How did you get that close to film them?
Because it just it just wasn't...
And this is a no pun intended.
This really is the fish out of water.
Yes, indeed.
This is our heroes from a completely different time and place
doing something which no contemporary person would ever dream of
doing.
And it was a real thing.
You know, this was a huge year for Paramount.
Paramount had 5 of the top 10 box office films in the US this
year.
And either one or two, I can't remember, was Crocodile Dundee.
So now this is this is the time for these these stories.
So I have to say, because this is untitled Star Trek project, that
Nemoy's bomb...
I was just going to say the same thing.
Fabulous underwear.
He's looking pretty cold, I have to say.
How old is he here?
Who cares?
He looks amazing.
Wet hair, a bandana, I would.
Yeah, it's a whole thing.
And look, he's trying the hell thing.
I love that.
But it's weird because these guys are from 300 years in the
future.
And in every other way, they speak exactly like we do.
And there's the one thing they can't cope with because they've
been on network television for 3 years. swearing.
Yeah, because they're TV characters from the 1960s and now we're
in a film in 1986 where everyone swears all the time.
Let's dispense with that.
Colourful swearing on discovery.
Oh, I didn't.
We've had this conversation.
Because they don't want them to seem like space people.
I don't want them to seem like characters from the 1960s.
It's still got to feel like Star Trek.
That moment in like the, you know, where book leaves the ship in
discovery and the one that we did sort of midway through series 4
and Michael just says shit to herself under a breath and then we
go to a mid-season break.
I think that's a massive thing.
The 1st one I heard was that old Admiral to Picard in series one
where she goes, oh, yeah, telling you.
Fucking nerve or something like that.
Actually, I just felt like a missed opportunity because I thought
if anyone was ever going to say fuck, it's admirable.
Yeah, for sure.
Joe, how do you feel about Donna saying kick its ass in Doctor
Who?
Is that... mile.
That's what PG 13.
Yeah, yeah.
And Pearl had Pearl had used the word arse in Doctor Who, with
Capaldi, talking about how he runs.
She can say whatever she likes.
I suppose this man is the closest we get to a villain, isn't it?
when he later on...
I like this.
I like this scene a lot.
Because, you know, it's telling us what's at stake.
It's a very rare scene in Star Trek where it's not one of our
regulars involved in it in any way.
And he has a point of view.
And yeah, yeah, yeah.
And it pays off when she punches him in the face.
Do you know what I mean?
Like where it's so good.
Like that's really properly good, I think. and it's great
characterisation for her.
And again, he's, he's a kind of, he's a diet Coke version of this
stock character from these 80s comedies.
You know, he's the he's the guy in Ghostbusters who gets them to
turn off the machines, or he's Ellis in Die Hard, thinking that he
can coke broker a deal, which will get them all out of this
position, you know, it's a it's a trope, but it's a very effective
one.
And if that's the closest we get to a villainist, they really are
doing something different.
Yeah.
I have a problem with how Chekhov looks at this age, and it's
because he doesn't have a single gray hair, and I know he was
young, but he just looks like an old man who dyes his hair
really.
He looks like an actor that is... picked up a script and is so
excited that he's been given something to do.
And it's seizing every opportunity.
That whole sequence on the nuclear submarine in a bit.
I love that sequence.
It's just so it's really good.
It's just so nice for him to be doing something. and Ahura.
What's so odd is that, you know, this film was such a huge
success.
But they never try to repeat the trick of using the ensemble.
I think Gates McFadden has something like 11 lines in Nemesis.
I mean, there is a reason for that.
Do you know the next film that they do it in really properly is
Star Trek Beyond.
I think that Star Trek Beyond is massively underrated because it
does a great job of using all of the cast and giving them all
something to do.
My favourite of the JJ films by a long way.
Doesn't the undiscovered country get them all something to do?
I seems to remember all having a bit of fun in that.
It's sort of cutting between McCoy and Kirk escaping the prison
and Spot playing at being Miss Marple on board the Enterprise.
It's that my momwayahura's naked up the sand tune doing the
singing.
Oh, that's fine.
No, that's fine.
I love that beer.
The fan dance.
That's so great.
She's still got it.
And this, the, the, the line where he's done too much, LDS.
Like, he knows enough about...
Oh, no, come on.
To know that if you are...
So funny.
It's so great.
And she doesn't correct them or anything. and it's such a
perfectly shit mistake to make, you know, like it's just
tremendous.
It's also such a weird mistake, it does sort of help us to
understand why she would eventually believe that they're telling
the truth.
Because what other possible explanation could there be for
somebody not knowing what LSD is, but yet seemingly knowing what
LSD is?
I don't think she actually believes they are who they say they are
until she's beamed on that ship.
I think it's when the when the whales have gone and she's got
nothing else and it's these windows.
And she does say, look, you keep calling him Admiral.
Like something is going on here.
You know, you don't know about LDS, you know, like she, something
but that's because she's kind of desperate.
She has a photographic memory for this scene and this scene only.
Make her the...
Benny Bush or Star Trek then.
Yeah, memory Arkin.
Adromedry never forgets.
Oh, just a dipshit as well.
I love the word dipshit too.
Bring back dipshit.
I say it from time to time.
Where it goes, Brace is pregnant.
The brakes are straight on.
That's so good, isn't it?
I think Nemo as a director.
He knows how to pace things in a scene.
And from scene to scene as well.
It's incredibly good.
And he doesn't hog the limelight either.
Like he allows himself to be funny, but he's in the background of
this scene, which is basically between, you know, Jim and
Gillian.
He probably whispered in the scratch, just give Shatner lots to
do.
All right.
I'll keep him out of my hair. easier for all of us.
The trouble is is when Shatner was directed.
He's whispering, give me lots to do as well, you know?
And this is them just playing.
You know, this is them just, just, uh, on location, there's no
time pressure because Nemoy's planned out the schedule and they
can just play with this.
The no yes thing.
Do you like Italian?
No, yes, no.
They do it a few times, don't they?
No.
Yes.
Oh here we go.
Her reaction is so good.
She's absolutely Again, coming this with a line in the mirror
where he just goes, how do you know he didn't invent the thing?
Yeah, yeah.
But I love this bluffing their way in as well.
It's just... all of this with the mouse.
Hello, computer.
It's so funny.
But like I said, this is like, why is this McCoy?
There's no reason for this to be McCoy. could be anybody.
I do like the pairing though.
I like Chekhov and Ahura.
I like Scotty and McCoy because their parents we don't really
normally see.
What's Sulu doing?
Is he tidying up?
It's the one scene where he checks out the window wipers on the
helicopter and that's about all he gets.
That's right.
He gets to fly the helicopter later.
That's pretty good 1000000s of years. 1000000s of wine. such an
old ham, isn't it?
loving all of this.
He has.
He's so funny.
That accent is so unbelievably bad, isn't it?
It's just tremendous.
He never could have decides to learn to do it properly.
They never get a dialogue coach.
It's just the character.
He was master of dialect. are you talking about?
No accident he couldn't do.
A version of.
He did all of the voices.
It's basically everyone in the animated series.
Hello.
Bam.
He's Arax. is everyone.
He does incredible things with a keyboard in a minute.
I mean, he only talks about 5 letters and all those schematics
come up on the screen.
What an intellect.
Oh, wait, it is, but is Sulu picking this guy up?
I could imagine sorry.
Yeah, look at that smile.
That's flirty.
I can see that happening.
Have you guys seen this show about his musical about Japanese
Americans being interned during the Second World War?
I saw it in London recently.
And he was in it basically kind of playing his own grandad.
And, uh, it's it's a, it's such a terrific story.
I wish it had been a better show.
There's good stuff in it.
But it wasn't, it wasn't great, but it was sold out because George
Dakai was in it.
Well, I mean, he, you know, like that experience has led him to be
an advocate for, you know, refugees and immigrants and things.
And, you know, has, has, like during the Trump era, he was warning
about what was happening to, you know, illegal Mexican immigrants
or whatever, you know, like and, and he's always foregrounded
that.
He always talks about that.
So, you know, being gay and having had that experience has given
him all sorts of insight, I think.
I think he's a great guy.
Yeah, and good for him parlaying his the extraordinary fame he got
from spending 3 years on a TV show when he wasn't filming the
Green Berets, uh, was, uh, yeah, to to use it to share that story
which I think a lot of people, a lot of the young people, would
have no idea that in the land of the free, People who looked a bit
like the enemy were being rounded up and stuck in internment camps
in the 1940s.
I mean it's just appalling.
My 1st computer.
My 1st computer was a Macintosh, like this one.
That's not what they, what they, you look like, but that was the
mouse.
Yeah.
So the Mac comes out in 84 and I get one this year in 86 or 87.
Um, and the mouse, like Windows computer, they didn't have Windows
computers, but IBM computers didn't have a mouse.
So most people had never used one.
So having Scotty talk into one, it's a very, very up to the minute
joke.
My 1st computer was a ZX 81. which you had to plug into the TV
which meant I could only use it when no one else in the house
wanted to watch anything.
And next year I got a spectrum and I got a portable TV for my
bedroom.
Oh, wonderful.
The spectrum.
Awesome.
I've only had computers for about 20 years and I'm 43, so I came
to Thai.
I took on mobile about 10 years after everybody as well.
Sequence, yeah, whether not now, Madeline.
What?
Why was they even in?
Showing this future technology.
And I think he kind of suspects this is forbidden knowledge that
he's not supposed to have.
And here's that line you were talking about.
How do we know he didn't invent a thing?
Yeah, we've got this sort of series of problems.
You know, they need the tank for the whales.
They need money to get about.
But the way they just get over those problems with a series of
gags.
That's part of the fun of this. great, isn't it?
It's really fun.
Going back to TK for a second.
It's what they're very rare example of offscreen tension between 2
actors as well, because obviously you've got decay and Shatner and
famously didn't get on.
Um, I've got the only other one I can really think of is Mulgar
and Jerry Ryan in Voyager, where we're aware of the fact that
there was tension on the set.
I can sometimes see it, you know, when TK is acting against
Shatner.
No, it's getting all the clothes on.
Why doesn't why doesn't why doesn't Nimoy join them for dinner?
Because he'll be behind the camera.
He'll be busy.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's a bit weird.
And the transporter effects are weird in this film as well.
There's a swing on transport.
No, but I mean, there's a shot there of Nemoy being transported
while walking.
And then at the end, when Gillian leaps onto Kirk and they get
transported together, it's a bit weird.
So relaxing.
Yeah, normally you have your own... so charming in this area.
Although I'm perfectly convinced that Shatner still thinks he's
like 20 years old, the way he's playing this thing.
But like we said before on this, the charisma that he brings to
that role.
Like you can rat him and you can say he behaved terribly on set
and all of these things.
But all of that's nothing to what he actually brings to the
original series of what he brings to these movies.
Oh, absolutely.
He's incredibly watchable.
When I did my Trekaday project, I'd really, I'd seen like 3 or 4
episodes of the original series that I could remember.
I grew up watching the movies.
And so I started by watching The Cage.
And I was restruck by the fact that as leading men go, Jeffrey
Hunters, a bit dull.
You said that recently?
He's terrible.
He's possibly a better actor.
I don't know. hard to judge on the basis of this one episode, but
as soon as we get to the actual transmitted episodes, and it's
Chatner, you can see the improvement.
And I think the difference is that they've tried to kind of bring
some drama to the character of Pike by having him be a bit
beleaguered and a bit. characterise him doesn't help, does it, in
that 1st episode?
No, but the what's important is that Kirk likes being captain of
the Enterprise, and then possibly even more importantly, William
Shatner loves being Captain Kirk.
That's everything.
That suddenly kind of shines a sun on proceedings.
The end of episode's not the Doomsday machine where, you know
Winnow of Shadow.
When he tries to get me out of here now, just as he's about to die
horrible.
And we were like, this is as good as Star Trek's ever been, you
know, then.
Yeah.
Yeah, he's magnificent.
This, by the way, is a set.
This was all built in the studio, this restaurant.
I think it's just because they could control it more.
This kind of thing, you know, you come in, you have to close a
restaurant, take it over.
You've got to replace all of the diners and all of the staff with
extras anyway.
So this is a longish scene.
May as well just build it.
Wow. saying it's so nice.
It's just there's no space dialogue in this at all.
They're talking about real things.
It's sort of believable dialogue.
It's so not star, isn't it?
I know we keep saying that.
And it's shot a bit boringly. of medium close-up, reverse shot.
But what that means is that they capture the performances.
And I don't know if they've shot this with 2 cameras, but it feels
very fluid. very natural.
You know that dinner scene in when Harry Met Sally, you know, when
she has the orgasm at the table?
Of course, yes.
I think our shot exactly like this.
It's not blur your eyes.
You could actually be watching that instead.
I told you never to...
She thinks he's communicator.
That's so great, isn't it?
Like, why is he saying that?
That's so strange.
So that doesn't look like a Star Trek communicator, though.
It doesn't do the slippy opening.
Is it a Klingon communicator?
Maybe it's a phaser doesn't either though, does he?
I thought the phase looked weird in this.
The one that Chekhov has.
So maybe they are.
Is this the any Star Trek film in which a phaser is never fired?
This is the most quoted lines, isn't it, from this movie?
Don't tell me you're from outer space.
No, I'm from Iowa.
I just work it out, I suppose, yeah.
She's so good.
I can only imagine this was like a battle behind the scenes
between the 2 actors.
It's going to be the most show. really funny, isn't it?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, because they're both being as charming as hell
aren't they?
It's 1st date charming, I think, despite the fact that he's
admitting to being from out of space and she thinks he's crazy.
That sort of coy look.
She just gave him there a 2nd ago.
That's exactly how I behave on a date. you know, you get whatever
you want.
So why does he say what in your calendar would be called the 23rd
century too?
Because they're all stardates.
Yeah, that's right.
In fact, the posters had, didn't they have Stardate 1986, like on
some of the promotional posters.
One of the things I'd forgotten about Enterprise is the fact that
what does he call it?
Captain's Starlog, Spacelog, something stupid like that, but he
says no, 25th of October.
I was like, what are you doing?
Yeah, mate, come on.
Do you remember Zap Brannigan in Futurama, giving the, you know
Stardate, May the 17th.4.
You know, like.
They should do it.
I was watching her body language there because obviously I can't
hear this.
She wasn't wasting a moment in that scene.
No, but this is one of those stupid things where they sit down to
have a meal, but we don't have time for the meal because we do the
next thing.
And we just take the pizzas with us, which is a little bit crap, I
think.
Okay, so here we are on board the Enterprise.
So this is the point where Alfie got up and started barking at the
screen.
But the dog goes away quite quickly.
They do decide to sleep. away from this subplot now though, don't
they?
And give it all to check off.
Yeah, but I mean, Chekhov becomes, you know, Princess Paige at
this point.
He's just a damsel in distress who needs, you know, rescuing.
But he gets that wonderful scene where he's interrogated.
Oh yeah, that is pretty great.
But then he just wanders off, doesn't he?
Like, I don't know what.
Well, no, then you get the...
Then you get the wonderful thing... and I have to rescue him.
Again, it's just a series of comic misadventures.
This is all a bit weird as well and they have to get these photons
in order to juice up the ship again.
It's just something to do, yeah.
Yeah, it's all a bit bollocks, isn't it?
So we had the thing.
We had the thing where the Klingon thing needed re-crystallizing
but I think they just wanted him to appear on the street going, do
you know where I can find some nuclear wrestles?
You know, like, they absolutely, like, that's clearly the whole
reason behind that plot and then everything else comes along
afterwards.
It's very funny.
It's pretty great.
I love how she doesn't trust him yet.
It's so good, isn't it?
Yeah, it's what we said before, Nathan.
It's a believable relationship between a man and a woman in Star
Trek. that's rare Yeah, and I, but I also like how it ends up, but
it's kind of like the moment that she's in the 23rd century. like
off you go grandad.
I'll be given this whole position.
Who are you again?
That's right.
Probably the 2nd best male-female relationship in a Star Trek film
is Data and the Borg queen.
I mean, that's all we're dealing with here.
I don't know what.
It's about me, but that is hot as hell, isn't it?
It is kind of hard, isn't it?
I quite like that woman in insurrection, I have to say, which is
not...
I don't remember anything about insurrection at all.
I just remember that that woman was sort of beautiful and her and
Picard were quite good together, I think.
But yes, it's a bit of a nothing film.
It's like a sort of mid-season 2 parter from series.
It's the Gambit.
The Gambit of the movies, isn't it?
Yeah, Gambit.
That's it.
Exactly.
Like Gambit, it's all told in the wrong order, which is peculiar.
Ridiculous.
Yeah.
Do you think they know when they're making the movie, sort of like
oh, this isn't one of the great ones, you know, whilst they're
making it?
Well, there's a lovely quote from Ron Moore and Brunnan Brugger on
the commentary for generations.
Oh, it's a great comedy, isn't it?
Yeah.
They say we had like 5 months to write the script for generations
and then we took 2 weeks out to write the finale of the TV show
and then went back on the movie.
And at a certain point as the movie was being made, They kind of
looked at each other and went, a TV episode, it's better.
Yeah, the one that cost...
Mind you, the TV episode is not that great, though, because it is
the big swirly thing in space, you know, summing up.
You know, like it's got...
Oh, his generation stuff.
They just got a streak of gray in his hand.
It's sitting in an armchair.
I will not hear a word said again.
He's pretty exciting.
That is an episode of TNG.
But, you know, I think, I mean, we were given the chance to miss
these people.
I, you know, like you, Tom came to these people through the movies
but, you know, that those ridiculous slow pans over the enterprise
in Star Trek, the motionless picture, that they make so much fun
of in lower decks.
Like they're earned because they were away for a long time and we
missed...
I was live texting you when I was watching the motion picture for
the 1st time going, they're still going around the ship.
Oh, man.
It had been my secret plan to have you watch that film for the 1st
time during a recording.
Although if you can't hear it, what the best thing about that film
is the sound design.
The sound design is genuinely amazing.
I felt visually.
Just because it was so weird.
We love it when Star Trek goes.
Yeah, but I don't have a fix for this, but I know the problem, the
story problem with motion picture, it's that the whole 1st half of
the film is about Decker's relationship with Kirk, and that's
never resolved.
As soon as the AEA probe becomes the thing everyone's focussing on
Decker's just one of the guys.
And so all that, all that buildup in the 1st half, they'd never do
anything with it.
I'm glad you told me that then, because it's quite telling that I
never actually got to the end of the movie.
Wow.
Thank you for that.
Can you I think it's worth seeing.
I think it's Star Trek phase 2 interfering with the movie.
But it's why, you know, because they're, it's why what Maya did on
Star Trek 2 is so extraordinary because both motion picture and
Star Trek 2 are bits and pieces of mongrel scripts that have been
jammed together to make a movie, but Maya was able to think about
the whole movie and think about how things set up here are going
to pay off there and make it actually about something.
Whereas motion picture is just a cut and shut.
It's just shove these bits together and hope that the grandeur
carries us through.
And sometimes it does.
Yeah, I think it kind of does.
Two fixes for Star Trek movies you've done so far during the
voice.
One fix and one.
Here's your problem right here.
What cowboy did there?
44 minutes left of the movie.
You could do the rest in that time..
Oh no, Paul Chekov.
I mean, as I said, this is it's not a Star Trek film, but he does
know what it is.
And that is that is so crucial.
Yeah, this is a lovely scene.
Well, the line that we often say, when we're talking about Star
Trek.
Is that what he's looking at?
It's about something.
Because the worst Star Trek is the ones where it's not about
anything.
Yeah.
And that's the biggest problem with five, 5 believes that it's
about something and actually isn't about anything at all.
It's nonsense, isn't it?
Like, it's really...
Absolute bollocks.
Unbelievable.
This dialogue here.
My name?
No, my name.
I do not know your name.
This is old just right.
This is like...
Star Trek meets Abbott and Costello. on the top.
The top of what?
So, but it is, and it is kind of wonderful that, you know, he's a
Russian on the bridge of the enterprise of when he sort of comes
on.
He has that Russian pride thing, doesn't he?
in sort of series 2 when he 1st sort of comes on. and but he has
no idea about what made it such a strange thing for him to be on
the bridge of the enterprise in a TV show in the 1960s.
You know, he just doesn't know about the Cold War at all.
It's weird looking phaser as well.
I'm sorry guys.
I'm going to disagree with you again.
The music in this scene is great.
But very period.
Like it's not Star Trek music. devastated.
I can't hear it right now. somebody does attempt to fire a phaser
there, but it doesn't work.
The look on Chekhov's face as well when you realise, oh, good shit
I'm just holding a toy, basically.
It just throws me out.
And people are chasing him with guns, but we don't have that, as
far as I can remember, that action 80s cliche of bullet spray
everywhere and sparks going off and it's, it is, you know, it's
it's keeping its, it's rom-com feel even through the action
sequences.
This is utterly indulgent because we don't need him to fall down.
We don't need the sequence in the hospital.
None of that needs to happen for the block to work.
Well, it's jeopardy.
It's just making a journey.
It's also It's also bringing Gillian back. because she now has to
help them get him back out, get Chekhov back out of the hospital
and that unites them because without that, they would take off and
leave her.
Yeah, they're nearly going to do that anyway.
She's got the basketball under her thing and she's going, oh, oh.
And she becomes part of she becomes part of the gang then.
Those set pieces.
Yeah, I don't really consider very relevant.
That's my favourite part of the movie.
Yeah.
Well, that's it.
They're enjoyable.
This is a sort of caper, you know, it's really fun.
Like, do you guys know anybody that's watched for and not enjoyed
it?
I don't.
And that's a huge hunt.
Yeah.
Someone will someone will add us somewhere.
Oh, I don't like it.
Sorry to hear you all having so much fun.
Oh yeah, this.
I love this.
This scene is so good. and some of them swine.
Yeah, I love it.
And look at that.
Like, They've, you know, I don't know what's happened.
They let the water out.
They had a thing.
I mean, that's a pretty good location, I think.
They do shoot some of it at a whale.
I think part of that shot was a map painting. or a miniature or
something.
Now she's like, 0 my god.
All hope is lost.
What the hell do I?
Yes, woo hoo.
Oh, yeah, those crazy fuckers I met last night.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
There's only one person who can help me now.
It's so good, isn't it?
It's so well sold.
It's so good.
And you know why she feels that because we've had the opportunity
to hear her point of view about it just so thoroughly.
Like at the dinner and that previous conversation with that guy.
I do feel that's a character that could very easily, if it had
been miscast, could have been really annoying as well. she isn't.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, why is she so likeable?
I don't know what it is.
She really is though.
Oh, solo looks hot in that helicopter.
He's actually quite funny.
I loved her anyway, but the fact that she stood up to Shatner on
the set, it just makes me love her even more.
I love this.
Look at this.
That's so awesome.
This is wonderful.
She's there in the field, just waving around like a nutter, isn't
she?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
As it, as it sort of descends into the invisible spaceship, it's
so good.
But that sells what they had to do, you know, like the, it's very
clear what needs to be done, how that's not such a good shot, is
it?
Oh, much.
You know, like the, what they're trying to do is very clear and it
really tells all of that very well and just having the, you know
transparent aluminum turn up at the thing.
So the end of this movie is, the big sort of jeopardy at the end
of this is that the whalers are going to kill the whales and we
won't be able to take them back.
And so yeah, that fabulous secrets.
Klingon ship emerges over the water.
But I'm trying to think, so low key, isn't it?
technically.
What are the other big step pieces at the end of Star Trek?
I can't even remember with three.
With two, it was the nebula, wasn't it?
The big sequence of nebula.
And that sort of reprised endlessly. of the same at the end of
Nemesis.
It's not dissimilar at the end of insurrection.
It's sort of their go-to.
Let's go to a place where sensors don't work and play at
submarines.
Like, I know the states are high, but it just feels like a small
climax.
But I quite like that again.
Mm.
And we're not going to ruin all the fun with drama.
Again, here she screams and talks while being transported, which
is not what we used to say.
Hello, Alice. welcome to one.
But she doesn't know that you have to stand there.
Yeah, that's a long line, isn't it?
You big tail.
So you there you go, she's into that.
Is any of this real?
Well, she very quickly accepts all of it.
Now, I mean, there's a glorious story.
In a 2nd when they're going back in, going forward in time again
and the set, shaking, there's explosions going off, and the
actress just decides, no, no, no, I'm not in my best light.
And she's going, Leonard, stop, stop.
And Leonard Newman's quote is going, he pulls off aside after and
say, no, there are a 100 things going on in this scene.
You are not the focus here.
We cannot stop for you.
So maybe her arrogance eclipsed Shatner's.
Who knows?
She gets to see him in his full glory.
This is my favourite favourite bit of the whole movie in the
hospital.
I took a pill and I grew a new kidney.
That is really great because that's, you know, the dialysis.
Yeah, the city on the edge of forever, isn't it?
The stone knives and stuff.
Is that what that's from?
Did I dream that?
Yeah, no, yeah.
Nemoy has a line about that.
Yeah, I'm trying to make a computer system out of...
Oh, no, I was thinking, what's the one where, where um, Bones is
worried about medicine from the past.
You know, like scalpels and stuff, like cutting people over. those
sutures.
Yeah, what is that?
Yeah.
Yeah, I can't remember.
But it's been done before.
You know, he's horror at the primitive medicine that we have on
Earth.
Oh, yeah, isn't it?
Oh, yeah, yeah.
Really cold in his head isn't the answer.
It's great.
What does he say?
It sort of makes use of McCoy.
I mean, at least they remember he's a doctor.
But it's not about it's not about McCoy, the man.
It's about the position and the problem.
Well, I mean, we've said this before, you know, a lot of times
that one of the things about Star Trek as a show and about, you
know, many Star Trek shows is that they are often their job and
it's a procedure where the characters are being brought together
with a, you know, particular skill set to solve a problem.
And it's only occasionally that their personalities are key to
that.
And here we've got, you know, like there's more fun because
there's time for them to have personalities and stuff.
But they're still, you know, they've got a very clear job to do
here.
It's so Star Trek, isn't it, to have a pill that just grows
organs?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
In 10 minutes.
It's like the medicine we had in whom God's destroy, isn't it?
You know, it cures criminal psychosis or something like that.
Well, the thing you see again and again, TND is particularly bad
at this, but, you know, people have these terrible diseases where
their body chemistry is completely destroyed.
Bits of them have fallen off or they've been aged to death. and
you take 2 of these, call me in the morning, and all of that is
just reversed, like an elastic band snapping back into place.
I mean, we make a joke out of it.
Let's not forget.
You just did threshold.
Oh, God, not the Crusher.
D evolved us with her usual skill. with his usual skill. skill.
That is the actual line.
I'm not even.
But Genesis is joking about how stupid that is.
That's Brandon...
Oh my god, that guy has a saw.
Big drill.
Do you know, one of the things that this does too is that it's not
scared to be ridiculous.
And do you remember the moment where Harold Robbins gets
mentioned?
Yes, you know, like it's...
The greats.
Yeah, the Giants, like they're, like Harold Robbins, the sort of
crappy pulp airport novel writing guy. you know, is a great of
sort of American literature in the future.
And so making their future ridiculous and making jokes at their
expense is something that the show wouldn't have done before this
and I love it, you know, and it's a part of Star Trek's DNA now, of
course.
I love this fellow as well, the surgeon.
This film is full of one shot, one scene characters that are so
much fun.
None more fun than the old woman in a minute, though.
There you go.
We find a fan.
There we go.
Albeit not at the person. at anyone.
Yeah, just put this thing on his phone.
I did get a little bit of medical, medical babble there to try and
explain what was going on.
So he's got a brain bleed or something and they're reconstructing
the blood vessel.
Again, McCoy's got all his more things that McCoy remember to
bring him to the Enterprise just before they blew it up.
Oh, he has a shout in case.
You never know.
His little black bag.
That could grow a leg. put on this forehead.
Oh, the line in a minute when they come out.
Yeah, yeah, there's got to be fine.
Hey, you came in with a she.
That's so right, isn't it?
And then we get the ultimate comedy music in this sequence when
they're going down the corridor.
What about Chekhov saying, oh, look at his hairy arms.
Is that really even Chehov?
What's wrong with hairy arms?
No, nothing.
They were slightly shocking.
That's all.
They're usually under his uniform.
You do lose something, not hearing the music, you know.
Yeah, yeah.
And this is this is proper kind of comedy cape. literally
going...
Well, I'm getting, I'm getting Lily Tomlin running through the
hospital in, um, in 9 to 5.
You've got a way to quit cameo.
She's like, I think our own adventure.
Oh there she is.
The doctor gave me the fail.
I grew a new kid.
She knows this.
She knows that. don't know.
You know, I don't think I laugh.
They took her in for dialysis.
I think he can probably feel it.
I think 530 was able.
I would laugh.
New boy's doing all these extra touches now.
Those girls came through and the nurse was thrown into the arms of
a man who went, ooh, okay.
Again, great cup.
The gun into the lift. into the beam in.
It's a great, yeah.
You know they've only got the staircase here.
He's having to keep doing the same tracking shot going up.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
No, I mean, literally, you know, having an invisible ship is very
cheap.
She's saying she wants to help the whales, but she's like, oh my
god, this is a taxi rise of the future.
So they, hang on, they bring the ramp down.
Everybody walks on and then they beam on.
And then and then beams on.
Admiral privileges.
Excuse me.
Exactly of entrance.
I'll be expecting you to walk.
So if my bear is not available to carry me physically on board
then I guess you'll have to beat me up.
Oh, there we go.
All right.
So she's on board.
Do we have other people who come to the future?
We get those people in the neutral zone, don't we, who come from
the 80s and end up living in the city?
Guys who get defrosted at the end of TNG series one?
Yeah, that's the one.
Yeah, yeah.
On the Botany Bay.
But I...
Matt Frua?
Yeah, the TNG episode...
Well, he's from the past, isn't he?
Yeah, yeah.
But we think he's from the future, but he's from...
He'll get that great line, doesn't he?
the 24th century.
Yeah.
Look at the joggers, again. couldn't be more 80s, could it?
Like there's joggers.
So good.
So we're not going to go through that entire 5 minute sequence of
going forward.
Oh, no, no, we've got to say the whales first, haven't we?
Sorry.
No, we've got to save the whales first.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah. subtle camera move here from Nemoy.
Just crating down just to kind of remind us where we're in we're
in the air.
Look, it'll touch the...
Of course.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
But you can see, you can see all of them in shot there, apart from
Scotty, who's man in the engines.
Downstairs.
Looking at the waves.
Oh, they guess the best line, then the admiral.
They'll be whales here.
You're right, that accent is shocking.
It's really bad, isn't it?
Yes, it is not that Indian.
I'm not a tourist.
You haven't seen the final episode of the latest series of Strange
New Worlds, have you, Joe?
Why?
Okay.
Well, because we do meet Montgomery Scott, and he is Scottish.
Like the actor is actually Scottish.
I was just keeping one or two, you know, because I love it so
much.
I've always got another one to watch.
You know, when the next time we roll late discovery series four
you know I'm picking it, and then you'll just have to watch it all
because it's really good.
It's the ominous threat in series 4 or Discovery akin to the probe
in this, but they can't communicate with it.
Yeah, kind of.
It's, sort of.
I think they do a really they do a proper science fiction thing at
the end of Discovery Series 4, which is unusual for Star Trek, I
think.
It's more sort of mysterious, isn't it?
It's more of a puzzle to be solved, whereas the what the solution
is in this film is established very early on.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. how to do it, this is all about, you know, how
do we how do we do it?
what do we do?
Bizarre series.
It is almost a heist, isn't it?
Yeah.
Like, yeah.
But we love a heist.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, I know.
I love a good heist.
So we're back with Half Bennett's slightly more functional
dialogue now.
There's some momentum inherited from the earlier stuff.
Oh, actually, no, are we?
we haven't time travelled yet.
But this doesn't, this isn't quite as much fun.
Where does where he...
Oh, it's when there's a there's a quote, isn't there?
A Lawrence quote.
I think.
Is that where the other switchover happens?
Yeah.
Because, uh, This is this is just all plot now though, isn't it?
This doesn't quite have the same little character beat and jokes
and details.
And it's, I think it's slow by our standards now.
Because we know the consequences if they don't save them, there is
some drama here.
This, I think, is real well footage.
Both the the underwater stuff and the um, uh, and the stuff for
the the whaling ship, at least at least some of it.
Yeah, at least some of this is real footage.
But I think it is, you can't, you can't tell the difference.
It's nearly as good as the London Underground sets in the web of
fear.
That's it.
Look, that looks great, doesn't it?
It's properly worth it, I think.
That does sell.
It sells it better than they've managed to do with the puppets
really.
We've only seen so little of the whales and then seeing them
here.
Like because it's important.
I might have said it was a bit underwhelming until the bit where
the cruiser appears.
And that is just amazing.
Yeah, I, it's very funny just how not in the same shot they are at
all.
Do you know what I mean?
Like, we're supposed to understand that there's the ship appearing
directly above them and we get that incredible hero shot, which
works so well.
And then we just get to see a lot of business happen where they're
never in the same shot at the same time in a very obvious way.
I was a child when I 1st watched this.
I was utterly convinced this was happening for real.
They are magnificent.
I don't think I saw this at the cinema.
I think the 1st one that I saw in the cinema was six.
I was trying to remember.
Oh, no.
I saw the motionless picture, actually. originally.
Yeah, me too.
I think it must have been a real release.
I think I would have taken it to see it when I was seven.
But my mum did take me to see the motionless picture where Nomad
has gone before.
It really wasn't motionless.
I love my...
That was well called.
Yeah, see, that's great.
We've even got we've even got shadow cast by the by the clear.
Unfortunately, when we cut to the actual man on the boat, There's
no shadow at all.
Yeah, they're looking over their shoulder.
Somewhere else.
Here we are.
Okay, this countdown's selling it for me.
I'm tense.
But now we are laughing at each other rather than script now, I've
noticed.
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
That is so hilarious, isn't it?
Like we just beam all of the whales and all of the water at once
and like whatever, whatever it takes, you know, and I'm sort of
glad that they're, look at that. doesn't that look great?
So excited.
Right, we've got, let's go.
Go on.
Yeah, the ship's going to be a lot heavier.
I guess that doesn't matter.
I forget how they time travel back there because we can't do the
whole sequence again.
What happens?
No, we don't do the sequence, do we?
Yeah, it's like an abbreviated version.
Yeah, but without those weird things.
Fuck has got us back to the right time with his usual skill.
There you go.
Someone should have said that.
No, but we've also done the thing, like, again, this is something
that we do again, and I think we do it in Strange New Worlds as
well, where getting Spock to make a guess.
And I love that line, which is like he'd be more confident in one
of Spock's guesses than anyone else's certainties.
It's really good, isn't it?
Yes, here it is, and it's McCoy delivering it.
It's wonderful.
Yeah, that's a great character moment, isn't it?
It's really good.
I actually think doing this with Spock's character was actually
really good.
Like, you know, toning him down, making him not in charge of the
whole thing, and it gives Nemoy space to direct the film.
But it's just this movie, isn't it?
We don't go there again in 5 and six, do we?
It's just bulk.
Well, I think that I think that we do sell an ending to that
character arc with the I feel fine thing.
Do we think the Spock of Star Trek 2 would have taken the risk of
trying to broker that piece in Star Trek 6?
It's interesting.
Oh, okay, that's interesting.
Maybe.
Maybe not.
It was a kind of more ruthlessly pragmatic quality.
I think he had before this little adventure.
I think he's a bit... don't you think he also true?
ages into it a little bit.
And that's the direction that they end up taking the character
isn't it?
You know, ambassador Spock is where we end.
And that seems to work.
Like that doesn't seem like a wrench or anything.
I love those scenes in Star Trek 6 with him talking about the
piece and things with Kirk.
I think they're magnificent.
I would have left him in six, though.
I wouldn't have had him unification.
Let alone the JJ films.
Yeah.
Yeah, I don't know what he's doing in the JJ films.
So I think that's for like weird cannon heads.
I always think that they're very strange people.
Yeah, I do think...
I'm not sure I'd even put it in the original series characters in
generations either because that's the best part of the movie.
Yes.
Well, except it's less passing on the battle, but just reminding
us of what we're losing.
It's meant to be Spock and McCoy.
And so you have Chekhov, who keeps doing medical procedures on
people.
You and you just become nurses.
And I've just become a doctor, apparently, because I've inherited
the forest lines.
I love the fact that we get those 3 characters in Star Trek, the
Next Generation.
I think it sells that it's one big thing.
And like DeForest Kelly's cameo at the beginning in Encounter at
Far Point is wonderful.
But then relics is just tremendous.
I remember I remember watching Generations with Mark and he was
enjoying that 1st section and then we cut to the ship and the next
generation crew and he's like, oh, God, here we go.
You know.
I think the film was over for him from that point on.
I still want to know why it's not funny to push gates in the
water.
I think it's hilarious.
Maybe we should do it in every episode. was laughing.
Prevent her from acting. sorry.
I love her so much.
Shut up.
Right, now we're back in bed.
It was just a little war boy.
Did you say that was it?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
That's great.
You're not playing Chekov's still in his medical smock.
Yeah, we will see he's anticipating his future career as a
doctor.
Just a few films down the track.
This feels right somehow.
No, there's that alien.
Good grief.
Look at him.
Oh, well, here we are, back in...
So Beaumar scale.
I think he's I think he's probably no more than a 6.5 or a
second.
It's not humiliating enough.
Staric Aliens all looks stupid.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
He doesn't have extra nostrils or anything.
We had one recently told...
Well, there was so much latex.
I had a big arse for a head and crimped hair.
It was unbelievable.
Oh my god, that was bad.
That's one of the weird things about insurrection.
This whole planet of alien people who suck up this life force from
the whatever, and they just look like guys.
They just look like people.
It's very strange.
There's not a scrap of Michael Westmore latex on them.
It's a nice choice.
I still think the latex looks stupid.
Every so often I have to pinch myself while watching Deep Space
Line going, what the hell is going on?
What am I watching?
Shakespearean dialogue of people emoting away furiously and these
enormous rubber head.
They're literally saying this into seat.
They spend so much money on latex in the pilot.
They had no money left for the rest of their feet.
Sorry, Almond, you've got to wear the same face again.
That's great too.
This feels a bit like false jeopardy because the story's over, but
there's one little kind of adventure scene left.
It reminds me a bit.
There's a very similarly shot scene in the red dwarf episode, which
is the word, the dimension jump.
And there's a funny story because at this stage, Craig Charles and
Chris Barry still didn't really like each other.
And so they're in a swimming pool somewhere.
There are big fans and people are squirting hoses at them and
Chris Barry's moaning and complaining.
And Craig Charles says, loud enough for the rest of the crew to
hear.
Shut up, man.
We're supposed to be space heroes.
Which did not go down at all well at all.
Whereas these guys sell, they're having the best time ever in a
minute.
Even Leonard.
I love that.
Yeah, it's really fun when they're up, like, because it's just a
little bit of green thing.
Do you know what I mean?
Like it's, it's, um, it's supposed to sell the entire ship.
Fortunately most of it's underwater, so we don't have to construct
it.
And it just, it, I buy it and I love the joy at the end, like just
how happy they are.
Jumping in the water.
As a side, though, Tom.
Shatner's solid fat, isn't he?
I would love to see behind the scenes of series one tour of Red
Dwarf being filmed, you know, because it sounds like some
interesting things were going down.
There's quite a lot of it knocking around.
Oh, is there?
Well, there's like outtakes and it's, yeah, not the sort of Doctor
Who thing if you've got hours and hours of the live footage, but
there's bits and pieces for sure.
Don't have to watch that, you know.
I bought it.
What am I going to do?
Not watch this.
You crazy?
Yeah, you're right.
This is...
This is a bit boring, this bit.
The whales are here.
We know they're going to get into the water.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
It's great.
The fact they've got that physical prop in the water there
though.
I think you can sort of tell, you know, the the cloud backdrop.
It looks a bit like the Truman show, you know, when he bumps into
the clouds at the end.
Yes.
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, it's a very tight shot for a reason because that tank's only
about 15 feet wide.
And so you know the Shelly Wind is index and it's the number of
seconds that elapse after everyone in the audience has had to stop
holding their breath before and Shatner.
Like, that's about 2 minutes.
Shelley Windy's index there.
He can hold his breath for a hell of a long time.
Nathan, that's William Shatner.
Of course you can.
Of course he can.
Oh, here we go, that puppets there as well.
Ah, yes, we brought the puppet.
It looks great, doesn't it?
You're right about the sky, though.
Holy shit.
Yeah, there's there's me moist.
That is the puppet, isn't it?
Apparently, that's very controversial, but Spox, you know, having
a laugh in this scene.
Oh, you know, he's half human.
He feels fine, right?
No, this is the point where it's like, it is fact, fact, we've
made the movie.
It's a success.
You can't stop smiling.
Nimoy talks about this as well.
Like, how do you how do you visually sell this incomprehensible
alien probe is successfully communicating with these enormous
marine mammals and he was watching this footage at an iMac cinema
and saw this moment where 1st one whale and then the other assumes
this vertical position and he went, that would do it.
That would do the trick. the visual shorthand that we need to say
there is now a dialogue that's been established.
And it's beautiful footage. paces it really well as well.
With the calls going back and forth.
It's quite slow.
Yeah.
Well, the sound design is incredibly good, isn't it?
And has been all the way through.
And then we see it react.
Yeah.
Yeah, and it alters its orientation in a similar way.
Yeah, it's just really, really, very simple, but properly thought
through.
Given that was a water heater, that probe.
It is astonishing.
But it does look like a whale sounding there, doesn't it?
Like, and the just the, like the finish that they've put on it.
I like the way that the pro noises sort of get very friendly as if
he's going, oh, thank God.
You know, I've been I've been saying for ages.
Where are you?
And it's the same plot as the motion picture, you know, a
mysterious thing is going to blurt the earth unless it gets a
signal that it's looking for.
I not only got to the end of this.
I watched it 200 times.
Exactly.
It's all execution and this is just executed.
It's not only executed to a high level of quality.
So like I said, it's they know what film they're making and
everybody's on the same page.
And I think anybody was on the same page in five, you know.
It was only one page shatter was on it.
Put the camera on me.
Five is such a mess. so bizarre.
It'd be an interesting one to talk about.
Yeah, I reckon.
It's got the 1st of David Warner's appearance is in Star Trek.
And the least.
Yeah, yeah.
He's smoking, I think, too. a bit shocking.
And the probe is off.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
It'll be back.
So presumably now there are whales.
There are whales in the 24th century.
One assumes, yeah.
As this sort of probe prophylactic, just to make sure that this
never happens again.
Has that ever been picked up on something like lower decks, that
seems like something they would do.
No.
Do you remember cetacean ops where there's dolphins or whatever in
the, like there's a whole system of pipes with water in them full
of dolphins for some reason. like it's a very I don't know why
they're...
This will be going on for a long.
Just keep going, guys.
Yay!
Puppets.
We'll just roll that footage backwards.
Yeah, exactly right.
Just to sell that everything's going back to electricity beer on
that station must be enormous, wasn't it?
Ah, nice, so many lies.
Somebody go get an extension cord.
Oh, look, all their tellies are coming back on.
Excellent, see?
Turn the lights on in the studio, so we're in daytime now. right?
Please don't, yeah, don't do it, don't do a wide shot now, the
lights are on, because we, we really will see that backdrop.
That's great. though.
Oh, that's why we're doing a close-up because they had the painted
the painted clouds.
They're like high-fiving the water.
Yeah, he's got no idea what he's doing at this point.
I love how much fun Gillian's having, though.
I love that cheese stays in the future at the end of the film.
It's so great.
I really wish that we'd seen her again.
Presumably there are 145 novels about the space adventures of Dr
Gillian.
But we don't we never get that actor back, do we?
Did you see Nemo's face there where it was thrown in the water?
This was not rehearsed.
Okay.
Who's directing this thing anyway?
What the hell is that?
That sort of dog creature.
Oh, no, that's occasion.
That's like Dr. Tana.
It's the same race as Dr. T Arnold.
Oh, you know that.
All people, the rest.
The rest from the animated series.
It's the only live action appearance of vacation in Star Trek. the
back row there in the middle, those sort of birds.
What have they?
Yeah, I don't know.
I believe this is the only shot in any Star Trek movie of all 7 of
the main cast.
What, together?
In one single shot.
I believe this is the only occasion, yeah.
Even in that shot, I pointed out earlier where you had that hero
shot of the bridge, Scotty isn't there.
Yeah, I think that's right.
I'm sure one of your armies of listeners will write in and let me
know if that's incorrect and there's actually one in every film
but I think it is the only one.
And this is more this is more admin.
This is more plot admin.
But it does what you sort of suggested before, it sets us up with
a new status quo because the show, even the 1st film, he's the
admiral, isn't he?
And he kind of wants the ship and there's that conflict between
him and Decker about, you know, like because he wants to be in
control, being admiral is not the right job for him.
And it takes us 4 films to get him back.
You know, he gets busted back to captain and put in charge of the
enterprise.
And, you know, it's clearly a punishment that's chosen because
they're super happy not to all be dead, you know, because of what
he did.
I know you were saying something very smart then.
I was just obsessed by Gillian's space costume that she's in now.
Did you see it?
Oh, is she already dressed in a space costume?
Awesome.
The necessity of keeping discipline in the chain of commander.
They know who they're talking to.
You'll be reduced to captain.
We're literally going back to the status quo of the original
series.
That's it.
He's now the oldest captain in the fleet by 15 years.
Do you see the big Dolly people?
They're coming back.
There was a shot of them.
They got sort of white heads and like, oh... long distance apart.
I'd just seen Gillian's fabulous space outfit.
And then these people.
Actually, you know, trying to do a bit of Star Wars-y kind of
aliens here at this point.
Although it's nice to see Andorians and stuff and Tellerides in
the back.
Look at the front in the middle.
I can't even describe that.
That's the dolly person.
I don't know what that is Oh my god. that's like something out of
Miyazaki.
They're going, Nemo, just don't stay on them too long, all right?
Just quickly.
Oh, and I think the guy with the shaved head is a Delton, I
think.
Honestly, Tom, the knowledge he has a good Star Trek Aliens and
spaceships is... extraordinary.
Well, don't you remember, don't you remember, um, Agnes getting
drunk and and being hit on by Adelton at the beginning of, um, of
series 2 of Picard?
And they're very hot.
Clearly.
Why they say it all then?
There we go.
This is how chipping him off now.
Yeah, that's it.
Thanks for the ride, mate.
I've got a great job.
I'll see you later.
See you.
That was a great date. 10 minute date earlier in the film where we
had to take the food away.
I know a platonic kiss on the cheek she gives in when she's really
just like, yeah, yeah, yeah, see you later.
Oh, no, I may write.
The uses grinder, but basically he travels the world and he's got
a bloke in every port.
So, yeah, when he's there, he kind of gets in touch and says, right
I'm back in town.
I think this is what Captain Kirk does of all the ladies around
the galaxy.
So he's got her number.
I don't think Julian's having any of that, though.
Who are you again?
Oh, here we go.
That had to happen, didn't it?
if we had Sarek at the beginning.
I mean, we've had his mother as well.
So we do get both.
It is Mark Lennon again, isn't it, when he comes back in TNG?
Yeah.
It's extraordinary.
He played this part over such a long span of time on TV and movies
in on TV again.
I love that episode of TNG with Sarag.
You know, there was a huge fight behind the scenes about whether
they could say Spock's name because Roddenbury was very much, we
don't talk about the original series.
It didn't happen.
And they're like, well, we've got Mark Leonard, and eventually the
deal was that Patrick Stewart could say the name Spock once.
Geez.
Yeah.
And then they, is he dead when unification parts one and 2 happen
or he's in one, isn't he?
And then doesn't he die between one and two?
I can't remember.
I think they dedicate 2 to him, I think.
Like in memory of, I think.
Rottenberry made one or two.
Baffling choices, didn't he?
You really did.
They didn't want to do Vulcans again, did they?
No, when we get to Vulcans in Enterprise, maybe it would have been
a cool thing.
The Fox Enterprise is such shit.
Dr. Salah.
Do you remember Dr. Salon?
Oh, yes.
She's just in that one episode.
Yeah.
The schizoid man.
Yeah, she's wonderful.
But they're still mentioning her over the tanoi in like...
I was talking more... of his creative choice.
We won't have conflict on this show.
Okay.
No wonder it's so boring.
But I still think that that's right.
I think conflict between the characters when we see it on Voyager
is always shit.
You know, like it's just terrible.
Even worse on Enterprise, where there, I, you know, I watched all
these episodes in which these fantastically capable people are all
incredibly reasonable and brilliant that I want to be just like
all of them.
And then on Enterprise, it's 3 arguably 4 years of watching scrubs
bickering with each other.
It's just not as engaging.
But I think it works brilliant brilliantly on DS 9.
Yeah, well, DS9 because they're not all Starfleets.
They're a hotchpotch of people from all sorts of different
situations and here we go.
This is that interminable sequence in motion picture, but done in
a 5th time and twice as effective.
Sorry, that's not enough.
It's 100.
Yeah, that is a long sequence in the motion picture.
It's one of our favourite moments in lower decks when they do that
in crisis point. and you just get the same thing.
There's literally no jokes at all.
It is just the camera going around while the lower decks music
plays loudly.
The soundtrack.
No one says anything.
I don't think they kept that set.
I think they built a new bridge for five.
And it's a lovely set.
Oh, and here's a series of steels to remind us of all the fun we
had along the way.
Well, for minus, this is a TV show.
Baylock at the end. wouldn't that be great?
for no reason.
Yes, please.
Yeah, near Ryan Slave, girl.
Why?
Yeah, yeah, yeah I'm not sure Savage deserves to steal, though.
She was only in here for a scene.
She got opening credits.
She was just hacked out of the film, wasn't she?
Like, that was the thing.
We just didn't want her.
There's Kirk Thatcher as punk on bus.
Well, I think that film is very popular for a reason in that.
Yeah, yeah.
Like it's not making great shakes, but it is just very
entertaining to watch.
And it's very insane to watch again and again.
It just does some surprising things.
Like it makes some very surprising choices that end up working
amazingly well, I think.
And I think it sort of, I think it judges how the audience feels
about Star Trek after the 1st 3 films and after, you know, nearly
2 decades of distance from from the actual show.
It makes a decision that they don't like Star Trek.
I don't like Star Trek just for one movie.
But I mean, this, do you know what I mean?
Like this keeps Star Trek going, and it's something that Star Trek
goes back to, and, and like I said, that idea of making the future
slightly ridiculous as well is absolutely part of what the show
continues to do.
You think this has been bettered?
going back in time and having fun.
So overall, it's my 3rd favourite of the movies after Roth of Khan
and 1st contact.
And it's very close between this and 1st contact, but I think, 1st
contact, just get to a couple extra points for being a Star Trek
film. which, like I said, for all its virtues, this isn't.
But it's a very good.
There's a story that Nemoy tells that Ned Tanner, whoever it was
at Paramount, took him to lunch when they had the script and said
you know, this is this is magic.
This is everything we wanted.
We would make this even if it wasn't a Star Trek film, which in
some ways it's like the highest compliment that any screenwriter
could be paid handed this assignment.
Where does this rank rank for you, Nathan?
Among the Star Trek films, this is probably my favourite, but I
like 6 a great deal and I do like 1st contact.
I haven't gone back and watched Khan as often as I should, and
like, I know that that ending scene would still land all these
decades later, and, you know, all the times I've seen it
excerpted.
So that would probably go up.
I mean, one thing is that I don't think that, like, I don't think
that this, say, and Picard series 2 are comparable because they're
so different in their purpose and when they're being told and
things.
I do think that they can be bolder with the politics in Picard
series too, and they can very definitely, you know, almost make a
sort of party political call.
And, you know, there's those episodes where ice are the villain.
You know, like it's, it's, it's really properly political in a way
that new Star Trek is.
And what struck me this time maybe for the 1st time is how
political the whole Wales thing really is, in a way that seems
ridiculous, that putting this sort of ludicrous thing at the heart
of the film.
But it is still very telling, I think, that that's what they
decided to centre it on.
And I think they did explore some other avenues as well.
I think for a while they were thinking about, uh, they have to get
a violin maker from the uh, from the 20th century in order to, I
don't know.
There has to be something that we don't have anymore, like a
Stradivarius, I guess, is what they were thinking of, something
like that.
But yeah, there's something about just the sheer physicality. of
it having to be these colossal marine mammals and just the
difficulty of that just makes it feel like it has an epic scope, a
size to it.
Imagine if it had been the fish.
They could have just gone in with a net and gone, well, let's go.
A movie would have been half an hour.
But I guess ideally a McGuffin needs to be either something which
is very small and easily lost or absolutely colossal and
incredibly difficult to transport.
But you can't have it medium-sized.
You can't have it be a dog.
Who cares?
But having it, having it a thing that emphasises how much our
survival depends on what we do with the environment and that, again
is the thing that comes up in Picard series too, but having it
done here, that human beings will die because there are no
humpback whales because we hunted them to extinction.
That's what's said, isn't it?
That's one of the things that Gillian picks up on, is that Spock
talks about how we hunted these things to extinction.
And so having that be the plot.
That's actually, it's not just a Stradivarius.
It is representing something that is actually true in actually
happening in a really vivid way.
And so I think that's pretty great.
The Carl series 2 stretches out over 10 hours.
And it does strain at the edges of quite a bit.
This is 2 hours and it's dealing it's dealing with the message for
about 20 minutes of those 2 hours and it's just having a lot of
fun otherwise.
I think I think Khan is the best Star Trek movie.
I think this is my favourite because I think this is the most
relaxed Star Trek we get.
I think precursed when Trek.
Star Trek doesn't relax anywhere near enough as it should.
And everyone is just super chill in this movie.
And I don't know who said it.
Everyone knows what they're doing in this movie.
They know what they're going for.
And they they get there, they do it.
It's just incredible fun.
It's a really good time.
All right, it's the end of the episode and it is time for us to
find out what we're going to be watching next.
I've sent Tom over to Untitled Star Trek project. slash
randomiser.
And Tom, tell us what series we're choosing from.
Well, the task I set myself was to start watching Star Trek, the
original series, and keep going at the rate of one episode a day
and that got me to the end of Enterprise in just under 2 years.
Wow.
So looking at your website.
Down the left-hand side, I've got all of the episodes and films
that I've watched and blogged about and down the right-hand side.
I've got all the stuff I haven't.
So I'm going to give you the right hand side.
I'm going to give you Star Trek Discovery short treks all the way
down to Strange New Worlds.
Really?
Here we go.
I've never felt safer in another man's hand.
Press it up.
Bless you.
Your random Star Trek Picard episode is no win situation. season
three, episode four.
Oh, season three.
Oh, that's not the one with the scene in the bar, is it?
Is it that one?
I think it is.
So Star Trek, Picard series 3, which is obviously, and I didn't
realise this at the time because I'm a massive idiot, leading up
to the moment where all of them are on the bridge of the
Enterprise D, saving the galaxy again.
But before that, it basically does a long Mutara nebula sequence
doesn't it?
Like for episode after episode, it's astounding how long it goes
on.
Well, that's the episode I think it is.
That's the best episode of that season.
It's the one where everything stops.
So they're in that tense situation and it's just a series of
brilliant character scenes with what's her name?
Captain Shaw.
Yeah.
I think we probably just do it.
We don't often do our 1st one, but we haven't done series 3 of
Picard at all.
And I think that might be a fun one to do.
And I do, I have a very, very soft spot for Amanda Plummer, who is
a 2nd generation Star Trek excellent, which is a pretty impressive
theme.
And she is magnificent in this, really properly good, I think. do
you reckon?
I knew they were safe hands.
Let's do it.
Fantastic, yeah.
You've been listening to Entitled Star Trek Project with Joe Ford
Nathan Bottomley, and special guest star Tom Selinski.
We're online at untitled Star Trek Project.com, where you can find
subscription links and links to our social media accounts.
Our podcast artwork is by Kayla Ciceran, and the theme was
composed by Cameron Lamb.
This episode was recorded on the 5th of December 2023 and released
on the 8th of December.
We'll see you next time for Star Trek Picard, No Win scenario.
Without stroking your ego too much, Tom. 12 midday is the most
miserable part of my day because I work 7 till 4 and I work in
retail.
So by the time I've got to 12 o'clock, I'm really miserable.
I sort of just over the halfway point through my shift.
So that one paragraph that you said at 12 o'clock.
Yeah, it gives me something to think about for the next 4 hours
whether that's...
Oh, man, what a solid bloke.
Sometimes it's got to be, well, you know, like when Tom's watched
watching an episode of Enterprise, it's got to be, well, I might
be at work, but Tom had to watch that episode of Enterprise.
So like I'm not...
It's not the person worst off in the whole world.
Except when that, that, um, 2 nights in Sick Bay, which is, of
course.
Is it a night in sick pain?
A nice night, okay?
Which is, of course, great. one of my favourite King, honestly.
So good.
That puppet dog.
I love it.
In a way, you know, it's great that we got this film because it's
such a fun film to talk about.
And in a way, it's not great because, well, it's so great that
what you do, say it's great for 2 hours, you know, like, there's
not really too much to criticise here unless there is, and you
guys are going to surprise me.
I'm not critical, and in fact, there's something I'm going to say
about it that I think is probably, um, Oh, you know, like that is
that might be surprising.
I don't know.
Only criticism is I've seen it too many times.
Now.
Basically, no it, frame by frames, and it's just no surprise.
But no, you know, you know, when you watch something over and over
and you still get stuff from it.
Like, I think, I've just watched this about 200 times this film.
So I know it lying for lying.
The quotes may be interminable for both of you.
Brilliant.
All right.
I think I'm overlit, just a sec.
That doesn't matter, does it, really?
It depends how pretty you want to look on this recording.
Yeah, that's true.
We just, I just got a picture from one of my flights or entirety
co-hosts of, um, a bunch of flights through entirety people at, uh
Australia's Wonderland, a very crappy theme park in 1994 um, with
TV's Gary Russell.
And like, so I've known all of those people for 30 years and I had
so much hair and, you know, it was dark.
It was amazing.
My instant response was, who are those people?
Yeah, they knew like you'd seen.
You've podcasted with nearly all of them.
You're more handsome now.
Honestly.
Yeah.
Okay, we better jump into this before this gets...
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
We better do that.
All right.
So how about, um, How about I go, hey, Joe, you go hi, Joe, and
then Joe. You go, hey, Tom.
Okay.
Sure.
Yeah.
And then I might, then I'll launch in and kind of contextualise it
I guess.
Okay.
Okay. and the beginning and end bid can be edited so you can start
and stop and stuff and you can fuck up.
Do you know what I mean?
Like it's only the actual bit in the middle where we're watching
the thing where I'm limited to how far I can shift us around.
As um, Toast the cat is making her displeasure known.
Can you hear that?
Shall I try and...
Okay, honestly.
Gorilla podcast.
Yes, no, call it.
Anything can happen.
Yeah.
Oh yeah, let's say hello.
Oh, hello.
Oh, look at that.
Ooh, you can get your own right in there, yeah.
Tom, please wandering the house.
I don't know what they're gonna do for 2.5 hours.
Alvin's my husband's on here.
It's just me.
I've left all the doors open.
I've stopped all of his clocks, which he just collects to annoy me
and now I'm imagining that the other room looks like the opening
scene of Back to the Future.
Or the or the TV movie, the Tartars, the Tartars in the telly
maybe.
How many lights to go?
Uh one.
Okay.
Yeah, yeah.
He has turned lights off from Bangkok.
He lived in Japan for a year.
He's got this thing about lights.
He used to text me and say, you left the light on in the laundry
and eventually I just texted me back and said, uh, for every text
of that nature I received from now on, I'll turn on an additional
light and it stopped.
But now he can actually turn them off remotely using the home
app.
So it's not a battle of wills in that house. is a battle of power
isn't it?
Yeah, yeah.
Power play.
All right.