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Star Trek Discovery Discussion: Perpetual Infinity
211 Plays1 year ago
An exciting new episode of Star Trek Discovery, and an exciting discussion at the channel. Tune in and let us know if we missed anything about this episode!
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Transcript
Introduction and Episode Title Discussion
00:00:02
Speaker
And we're back on another exciting episode of Starfleet Boy, where we have a casual and informal conversation about Star Trek. And today we're focused on Star Trek Discovery's newest episode, Perpetual Infinity, Infinity, Infinity, Infinity, Infinity, Infinity, Infinity, Infinity, Infinity, Infinity, Infinity, Infinity. Why did you stop me?
00:00:27
Speaker
I was curious to see how if you would go into perpetual, what would be the word perpetual? Perpetual. Perpetualness, whatever the right word is. Perpetuosity. Perpetual. Perpetual infinity. Like, don't you hear that and just think like, yeah, there should be an episode of Star Trek called Perpetual Infinity.
Guest Introduction and Episode Summary Challenge
00:00:59
Speaker
I'm joined today by Steve Fothery and PJ. Hello, welcome back, gentlemen. Thank you. I think it's awesome that you're both dressed in black, like black hats and black shirts. Did you guys coordinate at all, or is it just a way to know? It's just a fat guy way to slenderize. That's exactly right. You know, I got that from Ricky Gervais. He's like, always wear black at slimming. And I'm overweight.
00:01:27
Speaker
Yeah, and then Johnny Cash had that song, Man in Black, for all the old school outlaw country fans out there. Oh, nice. Well, I'm overweight too, but I have camera angle. I have a top down camera angle. Yeah, I think I'm doing the worst thing ever. I'm doing the bottom up camera. So we all have our tricks. That's cool.
00:01:50
Speaker
Um, gentlemen, welcome. Uh, I, uh, I want to, I'm going to try to do the summary really quickly. Like you did last week, father, unless anyone wants to like really, really do the summary, I'll do it. Okay. You, I'll let, I'll let you do it in the speech. He wants wants to go ahead. All right. All right. So let's time you.
00:02:11
Speaker
What was your record? It was like four minutes, six minutes? I actually went a little longer than normal. I think mine might have been closer to eight minutes than six minutes, but I tried to keep them all down under six minutes. All right, so here we go. Okay, engage.
Red Angel Revelation and Time Travel Impact
00:02:26
Speaker
Last week, we found out that the time traveler in the time traveler suit, I have refused to call it the Red Angel, is Dr. Burnham, Dr. Gabriel Burnham, who is Michael Burnham's mother. And everyone was like, or some people were like, duh. And then this week we get to really know her. And apparently she when the Klingons attacked on Dr. Alpha. Yeah, Dr. Alpha.
00:02:55
Speaker
She came up with a plan that she would just go one hour back in time and warn herself I imagine or or the family or something and so that way they could escape before getting there but the suit or some kind of malfunction happened had other plans and it took her to 950 years into the future and she couldn't get back she could hop back in time but she couldn't
00:03:20
Speaker
she couldn't stay there. The suit just keeps pulling her back to this 1.950 years in the future. So she starts utilizing the suit to do a couple things. One is to save her daughter, but the other thing is she realizes in the future that all sentient life is destroyed by the control AI, which has kind of taken over and decided that that was the best thing to do. So in the Federation, at least in the Alpha and Beta quadrants,
Dr. Burnham's Future Vision and Plan
00:03:45
Speaker
There are many planets that are totally destroyed. Eradicated Earth looks like just a lifeless rock. So she ends up finding a planet that still hasn't been discovered by the control AI, which later we find.
00:04:03
Speaker
we find out is Tara Elysium. She makes her camp there and she does all kinds of shenanigans across time and space, including saving people from World War III who later become the Tara Elysians, who she says are thriving in the future. So very interesting stuff there.
00:04:19
Speaker
Anyways, she's jaded and she's crazy and she's kind of angry all the time and she doesn't want to see her daughter. She tells Captain Pike that she has to get back to manipulating the timeline to stop the control AI and that he has to destroy. The only chance that they have is to destroy the archive data from the sphere. And we also find out that she like put the sphere in Discovery's path in order to, you know,
00:04:46
Speaker
protect that data, but obviously control still gets a hold of it. So, uh, you know, she doesn't want to speak to her daughter for whatever reason. She doesn't want to meet her until she's actually destroyed control AI and, and, and so that she can be reunited with her properly, I guess. And, um, and captain Pike decides, you know what, we're going to try anyways, cause we need to do something and we have to stop all the, all this. Uh, so he sends burn them down. They reconcile, they kind of reunite.
Mother-Daughter Reunion and Sphere Data Conflict
00:05:14
Speaker
have a have a mother-daughter like you know spat and then love situation going on and Burnham comes up with Burnham and the team come up with this clever plan to put the control sorry the sphere data into the suit and then send it in way into the future where it would be in a continuous loop
00:05:35
Speaker
uh so that control couldn't reach it and then they would use dark matter energy to beam Dr. Burnham out of time back to the present and Bob's miracle uh everything will be okay but Leland who's been infected by the control AI uh through these nano uh probes or whatever nano nano
00:05:57
Speaker
technology is up to his own shenanigans and he plots to steal the sphere data and he's unsuccessful when he gets Ash Tyler to try and then he's also unsuccessful when he gets Emperor George to try so he decides to take matters into his own hands. He thinks or he severely wounds Ash Tyler, goes down to the planet, kicks George's ass in an awesome fight scene I have to say but
00:06:26
Speaker
But ultimately, though he doesn't get all the sphere data, he's able to retrieve quite a chunk of it. Even manages to escape when Burnham saves the rest of the crew by beaming out and destroying the base. And then Ash Tyler jettisons himself in an escape pod and the control AI, Leland, and the Section 31 ship just leave, and that's it. The episode's over.
00:06:57
Speaker
Good job. That was five minutes. Yes. And it was, it wasn't bad, right? Like I got all the, you know, that was perfect. I think you had every, every beat that was necessary for that plot. Just one thing real, real quick. The word I was trying to think of earlier was perpetuity.
Character Comparisons and Casting Insights
00:07:16
Speaker
perpetuity of course that's a great word so no one has to like comment and like tell me that's what it that's what it was audience comments anyway all right so I really liked this episode I thought it was pretty fun I liked kind of the temporal stuff I like that I
00:07:39
Speaker
I made a comment on Instagram that Dr. Burnham is not the doctor who I asked for, but is the doctor who I wanted all. Doctor isn't like Doctor Who. Yeah, as in like Doctor Who. I think she's like the Doctor Who of Star Trek. She's she's a time traveler. She's a time traveler. She's time traveled so much that she might be its time lady. I love I love the character of.
00:08:08
Speaker
Gabrielle Burdam or as I as I called her on my podcast mama Burdam mama Burdam. She is over and I thought the acting was so damn good between the actress playing her who was on the the wire, I believe, but her name is a Sonya son.
00:08:26
Speaker
if I'm saying it correctly. I believe so. Korean last name, I think. Like S-O-N or S-O-H-N. And the chemistry between her and Sonequa Martin-Green I thought was really fantastic. And some of the best acting discoveries ever had
00:08:45
Speaker
I have to agree with that. I also like that they look like they could be mother and daughter, like the casting in just on a visual appearance level was spot on. And a little cool thing that I found out, Burnham's father is actually... Sinequa Martin Green's husband. Husband, so that was like... Yeah, I didn't know that until like last night I read that somewhere. So I didn't include that information in my podcast, which is going live
00:09:15
Speaker
shortly today.
00:09:16
Speaker
You have a chance to do an addendum. I already have it. I already have it uploaded. Oh gosh, OK, that's fun. Yeah, so that was that was cool too. I really liked finally seeing the the actual events of of their supposed murder by the Klingons and like Pj shaking his head. Jump in Pj. Tell us why you don't like that, because I think I think I know where you're coming from. Yeah.
Plot Inconsistencies and Time Travel Debate
00:09:46
Speaker
Michael Burnham has described this event in detail to where you can actually imagine what was going on. And this doesn't jive with those established facts. That's because season two is a reboot. She acknowledges that though, in this episode when she's in the hospital bed at the very beginning and they're telling her, yeah, your mom is down on the planet. And she says like, no, she died. I heard her die.
00:10:17
Speaker
So what I think might happen is I don't think we've seen the last of mama. Burnham, I think. Oh, no. She's she's going to return and she's going to end up. Maybe she has to give what the Red Angels do to Michael. And she's like, I got to go back and die then. You just gave me the fucking goosebumps of my life. That is what's going to happen. I'm so sad. Yeah, that's why Michael Burnham remember it the way she does in season one. It's like.
00:10:44
Speaker
Because she won't have to, she won't have the suit till now. Like, see, it's like, so she, of course she remembers it that way because that's how it happened until she gets a suit. It's a paradox. Can I just say one thing? If I were, if I were in charge of completely rebooting and like taking over and starting from scratch, the entire Star Trek franchise, I would avoid at all costs, time travel.
00:11:14
Speaker
It is a literary plot device that is wonderful and even back to the future doesn't make any sense. But anytime you think about it and anytime it's used, it's just so confusing and they can never fully explain it. Michael Burnham's mom has gone back so many times to change the past. On top of that, she has the power to heal people who are dead or recently dead.
00:11:41
Speaker
She has the power to transport mass amounts of people way across the galaxy. She says she's living on- And through time? No, no, she doesn't care to transport them through time, that's right. Yeah, but she's living on Terry Elysium where she says in her present 950 years in the future, they're thriving. So apparently control overlooks
00:12:12
Speaker
The suit is magical. I'll give you that like the suit is totally magical. I'll give you that like but but it does. Stamets does state in this episode that it has some kind of like crazy energy capacity because of the way the time crystal works so it could it could be that like
00:12:30
Speaker
They'll further give us some more details about how the suit works. The only explanation for this advanced suit, which would basically eliminate Starfleet altogether, it's that advanced.
00:12:44
Speaker
I mean, I got an explanation for it. Okay, go ahead. All right, cool. Because the suit only worked when they needed like two incredibly rare things and they needed both of them. They needed the time crystal and they also needed a supernova to power it up and her suit is only at 70% power from the supernova.
00:13:05
Speaker
So, yeah, I agree. The suit just seems capable of everything and anything. However, it kind of makes sense that we don't see this replicated because you had these two super rare items that you had to have both of.
00:13:23
Speaker
It is true. I think that the Red Angels can appear in Avengers Endgame and solve the problem of Thanos. Yeah, her and Ant-Man. There is an Ant-Man vibe to it, isn't there? Well, there's all the memes going around now of Ant-Man attacking Thanos by going up his butt.
00:13:48
Speaker
Oh, geez. And Dr. Burnham can help in that, for sure. Oh, my gosh. I like the idea of the yo-yo time travel, where she can't permanently stay at any time. She is getting yanked back. I think that was a good limitation to put on it. But other than that, she seems capable of dinner or anything. Yeah, like how is she able to watch her daughter's life in invisible
00:14:17
Speaker
Like, you know, it's almost as if like when Scrooge goes back in time with the ghosts and like they can't perceive, you know, modern day Scrooge. So like, you can time travel, but they can't perceive you.
00:14:32
Speaker
It is a little weird because but I imagined that the most likely explanation for that is that she was able to find mission logs and video footage and things like that somehow to watch it because obviously we didn't I mean like they would detect like gravimetric distortions and like temporal you know wakes and stuff like that like it wouldn't be a she couldn't just do it invisibly so I imagine that's what she and and she seems a little nutty like a little crazy to me like someone
00:15:01
Speaker
Someone on in yeah, well someone I mean someone on Instagram posted something about like oh she talks about time as being alive and stuff like that I'm like well, she's been on this kind of like Robinson Caruso castaway a la castaway style Adventure where she's basically on alone all alone in the future right like it's not healthy
00:15:20
Speaker
yeah it's not healthy and not only that she she doesn't even look at she says she's changed the timeline so much and she doesn't seem to care or give a shit about that like that's in and of itself to me that seems like a really destructive and irresponsible thing to do because who knows like if she's actually the one responsible for the ai getting
00:15:42
Speaker
you know smarter because she started doing messing with the timeline in the first place so there's like all these like questions that arise but she doesn't seem to think of it that way she seems to genuinely think that she's the only one that can save you know uh the galaxy and i don't think so i think she's like gone a little crazy she's doing the michael bernham thing where she takes all the responsibility all the guilt upon her own shoulders and so michael is seeing a a reflection of that behavior
00:16:11
Speaker
That's very deep. That's deeper than we usually get on Starfleet. The tree doesn't grow far from the apple. Yeah, close enough. But the idea of her like going back in time and monitoring her kid, you know, like I do wish they would explain the details on that a little bit more. But we, we have been told that the only person who could really communicate with her was Spock. And I don't think we've had anyone else see the red angel in person other than
00:16:41
Speaker
Saru with his Kelpie and eyes and, you know, Michael saw kind of a almost they're almost not their vision of her in the first episode of the season. Brother, I guess that World War Three camera had had footage of her. But, you know, it might be something that the Red Angel is kind of like outside our normal perception. It might be it might be pretty easily easy for her to appear to witness an event, but not be viewable herself. I like how they explain the
00:17:11
Speaker
I like how they explain the terrolysium stuff. Yeah, so that that like what okay, she has the capability to do that. But whatever magical stuff might be explained might not be explained. But the fact that they went through the trouble to explain that here's the problem. She says that terrolysium was overlooked. No pre existing technology for one thing they did have some technology there. But to assume that
00:17:39
Speaker
control eventually overlooks every planet in the entire galaxy that doesn't have technology yet, means that this idea that control will wipe out all sentient life in that galaxy, like the whole galaxy, does not make any sense because you would have an abundance of life still left that would eventually evolve too.
Control AI Threat and Motivation Questions
00:18:06
Speaker
Well, we know we know that there are humans or other types of life forms around because of Calypso, right? Like, so, yeah, I guess control does controls real beef is what the Federation it seems because they don't even mention if the Klingons are destroyed or there's about there's literally about 10 times in the show so far where they've said all sentient life. They should be saying that's true. But they're assuming it's every single thing. And we're only learning now that
00:18:35
Speaker
No, a good portion of the galaxy, who's to say that most of the galaxy that has life on it is the kind that's not developed yet. So therefore like the minority of the galaxy could have been eliminated depending on how many actually like warp capable or advanced civilizations there are in the entire galaxy. They keep saying the galaxy, right? I agree with that. That is a little, yeah.
00:19:04
Speaker
And Michael Burnham's mother even says to Pike, you're a ghost to me. The trillions upon trillions of lives all around the galaxy. It's not consistent within itself. And the show, I think, has a problem with internal continuity. Yeah, that's a good one. It's true. It's hard to say if there being
00:19:32
Speaker
true to their word with that, when I think we still haven't seen everything. We haven't gotten all the answers they're going to give us on that on that galactic wide genocide. Like we still honestly don't even know why Control would want to kill all the organic life. Like it's never said that. Yeah, like I got to kill all the all the biologicals. That's never come up. That was completely explained in one line in this episode when Control basically
00:20:01
Speaker
I don't remember the exact wording, but this old trope, this tired, you know, afraid of technology, you know, technology is going to be evil. If we ever create an AI that's so advanced, it's going to eventually realize that human beings and organic life is the problem in the universe. So therefore we must eliminate. It's so old. Like Ultron.
00:20:27
Speaker
Terminator, you could have so many examples, like this season or where it's going is taking from so many different areas of other sci-fi and piecing it together and saying, no, this is Star Trek. I get that. Don't you think that fear, because that fear has been going on for a long time. Don't you think it's an interesting thing to explore though? We've been down that road so many
Discovery's Timeline and Theories
00:20:53
Speaker
times. If you're a science fiction fan,
00:20:55
Speaker
Yes, you've seen that time and time again. And when a new show does the same old, same old kind of thing, and now they're tying it in with this apparent Borg origin.
00:21:07
Speaker
Well, I don't know that I don't know that I've been thinking about the board thing. I've been thinking about the board thing. And like I didn't mention in the summary because like, yes, while there are similarities to the Borg and, you know, like the black veins and like the, you know, the, the way the green lights and stuff. Yeah. The Nanos, the nanites or whatever, et cetera.
00:21:29
Speaker
I don't uh, was it you father or someone who said that like but the but the board's mission is like to assimilate life like not necessarily to destroy it right so So like troll is now learning by assimilating leeland. Sorry to cut you off, but that's what's happening here it's in the assimilation of leeland for discovering that maybe it doesn't need to
00:21:55
Speaker
destroy all sentient life. Like this, this whole thing about destroying sentient life isn't going to happen in the TOS timeline. They established a lot of people think this is going to be a variation on a timeline like this. Like they've tricked us like this whole time. What we've seen is not the real timeline and that Spock will somehow forget that he had a sister, which is bullshit because you don't need to explain why Spock didn't mention his sister because there are a lot of siblings and a lot of shows and TV shows and movies.
00:22:24
Speaker
don't mention their siblings and you could write a narrative or a sequel where they explore that they have a sibling and it would mean shit that they didn't never mention them. So this argument that Spock needs to forget or we need to eliminate Michael Burnham I don't think is going to work out. I think this is the this is the timeline that is meant to be by the end of this season everything will be resolved and I think fans I guess may truly see that oh this is the real deal this is
00:22:54
Speaker
leading into true TOS. I agree. I just think that I've actually abandoned all attachments to prime timeline and all that kind of bullshit altogether because I don't really care anymore. It's too much of a headache to think about. It also impedes you from watching a show and enjoying it just as it is. So personally, even though I would love
00:23:19
Speaker
for Star Trek. I think, Fatherie, I might be on your page now. Personally, I would love for Star Trek Discovery to figure it all out. If they don't, as long as it's a great story, as long as it ends up being something... The show definitely needs to improve even more, but season two is such a huge improvement over season one. That's why I jokingly say that it's a reboot and that nothing really matters for season one.
00:23:47
Speaker
And someone else said that like most shows don't even get going till season three. I think that like, what's that? We're season four. Oh, geez. Talking about enterprise, right? So like, I mean, I just think that I think that it was probably unfair of me to have like all these expectations, but also I can understand why I have them. Like I have a lot invested in Star Trek.
00:24:12
Speaker
personally, like just from the perspective of like how many hours of my life I've given to it. So it's like I'm like super into the stories and I'm super into the continuity and things like that. But at the end of the day, like I'm starting to enjoy discovery a lot more despite itself.
00:24:28
Speaker
And I think that's okay. I think it's cool that it's trying hard to make sense of things. But what you pointed out, PJ, it absolutely still needs to improve. There's definitely places where it's still doing a bad job or maybe an unclear job. But so far, it's been surprising me in ways where it's like a qualm I might have... Last season, I had a qualm
00:24:52
Speaker
And it wouldn't get answered. It didn't get answered at all.
Critiques on Technobabble and Plot Oddities
00:24:55
Speaker
Right. Like this season, I'll have a qualm and like a couple of episodes later, they have like a reason, you know, like an explanation for it. And what were you going to say? No, well, kind of. I don't think they're going to. I don't know. It's it's it's one of these shows that bombard you with so much technobabble and information. And the writers are seriously really consciously coming, trying to come up for reasons for everything.
00:25:20
Speaker
And in that, we get in dated with so much. Every time you watch an episode, especially when it's filled with technobabble like this one and the previous one, you're still asking like, well, how is this possible? How is that possible? This doesn't make any sense. Okay. They might explain it. They might not. But then if you get two more good episodes after this that don't explain anything that you, any of the concerns that you had in this particular episode, you kind of forget about it.
00:25:49
Speaker
but it's one of these shows, especially when you rewatch season one, you realize they presented things that made no sense whatsoever and then just forgot about them. It's a D7 that wasn't a D7. Yeah. Well, it's a small thing, but the breath print. The breath print was one thing that was designed just to have Burnham go up to Tilly while she was snoring and sneak into the lab thing.
00:26:18
Speaker
When in a Starship, you should be monitored everywhere you go. Your coordinates should be cataloged.
00:26:24
Speaker
so that there is no chance of any sabotage and stuff. But isn't it fair to say that they eliminated the breath print after Burnham duped it? Yeah, that's a stupid idea. We should get rid of that. Well, it is a science ship that has a bunch of experimental technology. So a lot of the weird stuff we see on Discovery, I try to excuse it as that. Yeah.
00:26:50
Speaker
When they started doing these Star Trek spinoff shows and they have like really weird stuff there on things that aren't like a super high tech experimental science vessel, it's going to be harder to do that. And if I really think about it, I just feel like
00:27:07
Speaker
uh you know even with its flaws like discovery is still kind of doing a pretty good job because overall like i do feel like it's star trek and it has that feeling and it's like you know i mean like again like these there's a lot of like we can go right into the nitpick corner and every one of these episodes and find like probably like 20 to 30 things that like
00:27:29
Speaker
you know, to talk about. Although, by the way, was that the D7 in the trailer for the next episode? Oh, my God. Like the proper D7 is coming up next episode. So that's cool. They're going to Borath, right? Yeah, that's what they said. Yeah. That's where where Tyler's kid is. Right. Laurelle and Tyler's kid is on Borath. You know what? You know what they should do in that episode that they will 100 percent not do, even though it would be the smartest thing in the world.
Klingon Diversity and Dr. Burnham's Fate
00:27:58
Speaker
Father, you're going to a different Klingon planet, correct? Yeah. Why not show another variation on the makeup that is more traditional to say that the Klingons on this planet look a little bit more like the ones you're used to. They won't do that. They'll have these big headed goblins or whatever the fuck.
00:28:19
Speaker
That's what I would do, though, because Borath is like the monastery planet that you think Klingons from all over the empire would go on pilgrimages to go there. So I would have I would have like some disco goblin Klingons and I would have some
00:28:38
Speaker
TNG DS 9 Voyager enterprise looking Klingons and then I would have like some TOS Augment virus Klingons and just like maybe just like stick them in the back I would do the same thing with the endurions same things with the teller I it's just like just show like there Yeah, there's like a whole lot of species diversity That that would be really awesome. Actually like I think that that wouldn't be a bad thing. No one would be a
00:29:03
Speaker
Most people will just be pleased by that, right? That's something that I think that would be wonderful. I mean, it'd be like if someone came to Earth and they saw an Australian aborigine guy standing next to an Inuit
00:29:21
Speaker
from Canada. And then you have like, I don't like a Dutch guy from Holland, and then like, a guy from Ethiopia, and a guy from Venezuela. And they're just like all like standing like, like, yeah, there's a lot of like really different looking humans, but I guess they're all the same species. I would just I would just like play it like that. Yeah, the aliens. Yep.
00:29:47
Speaker
That's good. Um, what about the, where, where, where did Dr. Burnham go? Cause the suit got sucked back to nine hundred for the users in the future, but then she got sucked too. Like, what do you guys think? She's stuck on her, on her planet and her suit is broken, but like, Oh, I'm just, what does that bother you? I lost all interest. I think all interest. I'm not sure yet.
00:30:16
Speaker
in this Red Angel stuff. Oh, it's so good though. The mother-daughter relationship. I'm jumping right into this bork theory now because at least they're giving us something different now that might lead into possibly the Picard series. That's just a loose speculation.
00:30:35
Speaker
That's the opposite of where my head space is, because you would hate that. I'm really worried about the Borg stuff. And to me, I was fine with Control and the Red Angel being what the whole season was leading up to. We should talk about the Borg stuff in a second. Yeah. Well, let's talk about it now. I just want to say one last thing about Control, about something PJ is bringing up about.
00:31:04
Speaker
if it is the story we've seen so many times of the computer just being like, the only way to have peace is to get rid of all the organic life. And I would totally hate that if we don't get anything other than that. I still think there's room to give it more motivation, but if not, then yes, I agree with you. That is terrible. That's cliche. We've seen that a thousand times. However,
00:31:29
Speaker
I do kind of like the idea of control as the villain. I typically don't like the technophobic stories and sci-fi. They're like, oh, this new technology is evil. It's going to destroy us all. I kind of hate that. But AI is something that's kind of really scary today. And also the surveillance state of government agencies that are using technology to monitor everything we do, trying to figure out everything we think.
00:31:58
Speaker
I love the idea of making that, the villain in Star Trek. I think it's a very topical, like Star Trek should be. There's a lot of people that make a lot of these jokes about that using older Star Trek. Like for example, the doctor being able to interrupt your holodeck program in Voyager and just pop into your holodeck program. Someone's like, Star Trek is a surveillance state.
00:32:26
Speaker
Like, why is the doctor allowed to do this? You know, things like that. And it is interesting to think of it that way. I do agree with what you're saying. Like definitely Star Trek Discovery, I was wondering how it would fit into discussing relevant events. Not that like, you know, certainly like, you know, injustice, inequality, gender stuff, all that stuff is still relevant today and like definitely needs to be discussed. But there are so many more things that never existed before.
00:32:53
Speaker
that
AI in Storytelling and Borg Connection Speculation
00:32:54
Speaker
are also really important to talk about like AI and its implications and stuff like that because we are truly closer to it now than we've ever been before. Science fiction is turning into almost like reality in many different ways. If you all want to talk about the Borg, I have a good segue back into that. I say you started. Yeah, go for it. I'm going to say something that my podcast co-host, Dave, mentioned.
00:33:23
Speaker
that y'all can check this out in more detail on the latest Tech Strike podcast available today. But he said that we have these section 31 groups with like the American CIA or these intelligence organizations that often do more harm than good and kind of create our own worst enemies. Like if we topple a regime in another country and then
00:33:52
Speaker
there's a power vacuum and then someone else takes over and you get a brand new villain who is even worse than the people you were trying to defeat previously. And that would kind of translate to Section 31 through their short-sightedness creating the Borg, if that is what they're doing. You know what I think is gonna happen at the end, and spoilers if it's true, but who cares?
00:34:22
Speaker
there's going to be a battle with control. Either I think a part of control is going to be, or the last remnant that they can't defeat or something, or the only way to defeat them is to send them back through a wormhole. They go like thousands of years back into the Delta quadrant. And, you know, at the time when Picard in first contact went down and dealt with the Borg in that time, that led into the enterprise episode regeneration, I think it's called. And, uh,
00:34:53
Speaker
they're going to get a signal from the Borg in that time and then become the Borg or like evolve into that eventually. They've already been the board and then they get it like a boot, like this, this concept of a tech, uh, an AI, advanced AI coming back to speed up its
00:35:18
Speaker
itself itself in all this yeah well it made me a headache it's because it's the kind of computation that only a computer could really do without getting a headache right like yeah really if you think about it like that's the and they they even describe that in this season uh the the uh the um dr burnham says Spock's brain is the only one capable of like really understanding the kind of nuances of
00:35:45
Speaker
the timeline changes and all that stuff because of his- He's probably literally the only half Vulcan human, even though there are other half Vulcan humans. Right, with dyslexia. But he's probably, because they're so rare, he's likely the only one with dyslexia. And because he's a bi-species entity with dyslexia, it's plausible to think that maybe he has an understanding of
00:36:16
Speaker
something that would fry a normal human being or a normal Vulcan's mind. That blend, right, exactly. The ability to get around the paradoxes and get around the conundrums that we, as you can tell, we're all like, ah. But also, a computer could do that. A computer could actually compute these things and exist outside of time, depending on how it works. I mean, if you watch Doctor Who,
00:36:44
Speaker
you're a little if you've watched Doctor Who like really and gotten into it, you kind of like start getting close to thinking that way. Like I still get confused. But I feel like oh, you know, I trust a little more. But did PJ just go away? Are you there PJ? And are you there? Are you there fathery?
00:37:05
Speaker
I'm here. I think you might have muted himself or something. Something happened. What I wanted to say though, something that I found, I'd like to wait for PJ to come back. So I guess to finish the thought that I was having there was that I do think that like section 31 is like what you described or your co-host described, you know, with like going in and being short-sighted and things like that.
00:37:34
Speaker
You know, it's very likely that the Borg were also defeated by control in the future. I think control is just something else altogether. And like maybe that's why that could be an explanation as to why some of the technology resembles the Borg.
00:37:50
Speaker
So the control AI is like, well, what can I do? It searches its own data banks and it's like, what can I do that's going to like give me the ability to control this human? And so it just uses Borg technology. It has Borg technology because it's from the future. Does that make any sense? Could that be plausible? Yeah. And they could do this whole thing without ever mentioning the Borg. It would be kind of weird because there's so many parallels and
00:38:14
Speaker
That's kind of the direction I was thinking at first, but the more I hear people talk about the possible board connection, the one line that really I think might give it away is when control says to Leyland, struggling is pointless.
00:38:34
Speaker
Struggle. Yes. Yes. Struggle is pointless. It's basically it's it's basically the same thing as resistance is futile. And they're like, if I was a discovery writer and I was trying to like hint at the at the board, like this is something that like some of the fans might catch on to, I would write something like that. So if they're not doing bork stuff and some people still deny this and I understand they don't want to have this whole thing. Humanity is responsible for the board. Tired old shit.
00:39:04
Speaker
But if they're not doing that, then they are literally doing something much worse. They are ripping off Star Trek. You know what I mean? Like if seeing the nano probes go into Leland's body and seeing the veins that are reminiscent, they first did that in first contact, like started showing like the CG veins. And then they continued that thing with a Voyager and all this.
00:39:34
Speaker
Then what are they doing? Well, they could. They could. If this is some trickery, I'm going to get pissed. Wherever you were, while you were in limbo, we were talking about how like... I had to use the washroom, sorry. I think he was like when Leyland's face started messing up and he had to go back in his room to maybe it was to regenerate his nanites on his face. I think that's what PJ was doing.
00:39:58
Speaker
Gotcha. A PJ. That's funny. If we had walked in on him, he would have stabbed us in the gut with a shard. But we were saying like, what if in the future control destroys the Borg, adapts the best of its technology? And then since part of controls AI did make it into the pass-through area or that probe, now control has that knowledge of like, oh, well, how do I control a human? Let me use this Borg technology.
00:40:40
Speaker
and that probe from 500 years. Tyler and Mike. Tyler and Mike. You said Tyler and Ash. Tyler and Ash, which is true. They were both there. And so was Voke. Voke was there too. Voke was there. When Pike and Tyler encounter that thing, that probe, that altered probe from the future, I was thinking there might be a Borg connection then. I think, I think in this iteration, it's, it's all control. It has nothing to do with like Borg or nothing.
00:40:45
Speaker
do you mean?
00:41:10
Speaker
But now it's almost like they're going to build up to where control is destroyed. And the future that where nothing is wiped out is, is the compromises where they, the, the Borg is created because it's been sent back so many years. I got a question or something like that, but it's, it's not, it's, it's, they don't know about it. They're not really, they don't know that they're responsible for that. And maybe that gets, gets figured out later when people in Picard's time say,
00:41:40
Speaker
figure out the Borg origin. Maybe Michael Burnham jumps into a future where she can figure out what the Borg are and their connection to control. And that has something to do with the resolution to the series, wild speculation. But anyway, go ahead, sorry. What year is the doctor's mobile emitter in Star Trek Voyager from? Like what century, what time period? Does anyone? 27th century.
00:42:10
Speaker
I think. The 27th, I'm going to look that up. But the reason why I ask is the Voyager episode, I think it was called One, where we get that super board, like Seven of Nine's kid, basically. He was so advanced partially because the board technology from Seven was using the future technology in the mobile emitter
00:42:40
Speaker
to make itself even more advanced than a typical Borg. And we see it grow like those robotic tentacles that looked kind of like the probe squid.
00:42:56
Speaker
in that episode of Discovery. So maybe that is like the technology from that time period. So memory of us is the mobile emitters from the 29th century. That would be, it would actually be like 600 years ahead of Discovery and not the- And you bring up a great point about how that's squiddy kind of imagery. Yeah.
00:43:20
Speaker
seen before in First Contact and Voyager. And the matrix. Card is washing his face and the thing pops out. Oh yeah. The jump scare. People jumped. It was like the only jump scare in the movie. It was cool.
00:43:33
Speaker
Yeah, people were freaked out. That was a freaky movie at the time. Like that whole idea now is kind of played out like a dream within a dream type thing, but no one was expecting that. Just like that shot of like the needle coming into Picard's eye, which was kind of like what happened to
Section 31 Series Speculation and Preferences
00:43:50
Speaker
Leyland.
00:43:50
Speaker
I know it's crazy. Oh, oh, my God, it is the board. There's like no escape. There's no escape from it. Question. What about so Leland's out? Basically, he's dead, right? Like this. I mean, obviously we saw him sitting and there's no coming back from. No, he's alive. No, but there's no coming back from this. Right. I mean, it's possible you get like all of the like the Red Angel could like shoot him with a tacky on and like fry all of the control technology out of the system.
00:44:20
Speaker
But I mean, his face was literally like open like he's not human anymore. I don't think I don't know. He managed to get seemed out at the last moment. Do you remember? No, I know. Oh, sorry. What I meant is like he like what I meant is like even before that, like when control injected him with the nanobites. Oh, like Leland himself.
00:44:40
Speaker
himself is gone, right? Like there's no more Leelans. So that leaves us with that characters out of section 31. Cause I was wondering how he would play into the section 31 show. So it suggested in this episode that it's going to be something between Ash. Do you think like Shahzad and Michelle Yeoh are going to, are going to be the main characters in that show or like anything about it? I think they are. PJ, PJ, what do you, what do you think? Tell us why you think we're wrong.
00:45:08
Speaker
I have a theory, and it's been hinted at in this particular episode, that Michelle Yeoh will sacrifice herself for Michael Burnham. Now, even though Michelle Yeoh's character, Georgiou, says, you're confusing me with my prime counterpart. And she's like, no, I know. It's weird to say prime. What's that like in the story? And she's like, I know who you are. And she's hinting at Georgiou dying.
00:45:37
Speaker
So what I think is going to happen is Georgia is going to die by the end of the season or appear to die. And by the time the section 31 show rolls around, which I don't think that show is going to happen. You really think it's not going to, you think that's good. Like it was all hype. There are two shows now that they've announced that have not been officially greenless. And that's the Nickelodeon animated and the, uh, the section 31 show.
00:46:04
Speaker
but they both have like people working on them. Oh yeah. They're, they're, they're writing a script for it. The script has to be approved for a series order. I personally don't think that's going to happen. I think the most logical thing that CBS all access is going to do is say, screw all that. Let's do a pike enterprise series. I wouldn't mind that. That would be amazing. I think the section 31 show is going to be dropped in favor of, so if we actually do see enterprise bridge by the end,
00:46:32
Speaker
I think that's going to be something that was done last minute, not like months ago, like everybody thinks. Well, we do know that Anson Mount is back in Toronto record. He says he's doing ADR work, like rerecording lines or whatever, but there's no reason why they couldn't be filming more scenes. So who knows? There's no reason to think that some of the animated chore tracks might feature characters that we've seen in the shows. Oh, yeah. He could be doing voice work for that.
00:47:02
Speaker
That's true. That's a good point. But I don't know if I'm going to say that the second 31 shows not going to happen because
00:47:16
Speaker
I don't, I don't care for it. Do you? Seriously? It's not what I would do. No, it's not what I would do at all. But I mean, I don't, I think that I don't see a whole show, uh, section 31 driving a whole show. It's just not what people, I think even not like new people tune into Star Trek four. Like it's a great component.
00:47:35
Speaker
for like to put into a Star Trek show, but like as constantly running as following Section 31, it reminds me of like that spin off of Doctor Who, Torchwood, where I liked Torchwood. I liked Torchwood too, but it kind of got old after a while. It's like this, you know what I mean? Like, I don't know. The last season where they come to America.
00:47:58
Speaker
That's very good. But other than that, I love Torchwood. But I still think they're going to want to do the Section 31 show because Michelle Yeoh is so popular. A lot of people love her. I know some more old school Trek fans don't like the character. But a lot of the newer fans seem to really love her. The actress is very enthusiastic about doing the show. Alex Kurtzman said it was her idea.
00:48:29
Speaker
And CBS All Access, I think, really does want to have Star Trek on year round because that is probably the only time that a lot of people subscribe is when there's new Star Trek on. So I think they're going to have enough shows where there's, if not every week, at least every month, there's going to be some Star Trek content. They'll want people to be subscribed every month of the year. That being said,
00:49:00
Speaker
I would much rather have a Pike Spock number one enterprise TV show that seems weird to me because you would have Discovery and this other show like both about a ship in the same time period they'd be like very similar.
00:49:15
Speaker
However, I just love Anson Mount. Yeah, I love Anson Mount as Pike so much. I love Ethan Peck as Spock so much. I really, really, really, really want to see more. Rebecca Romain is number one. I hate that we only got one scene with her. I was really surprised with her. She's coming back. She has to be back at the end, right? Yeah, we've got to see the Enterprise again. PJ is saying no. PJ says no. What about?
00:49:45
Speaker
So how did you guys feel about Dr. Culber like being kind of back in the uniform and so to speak?
Character Development and Set Design Praise
00:49:52
Speaker
Does he like, does it feel right? Like, does it feel like he's now like, did the transition from like lost soul to like finding himself again, like feel good to you guys or what? It was really non, non eventful with him. He just explains to Michael, you know, Pike wants to, I mean, Dr. Burnham wants to speak to Pike, but not to you, Michael.
00:50:15
Speaker
And then he beams up for some strange reason to explain the exact same thing to Michael again. Yeah. Well, maybe he had other shit to do on this ship. That's why he beamed up. He's got more important things to deal with and beam up just to tell Michael again what he just told him. Maybe he beamed up because it was like the end of his shift and he was ready to go to bed. Can I say something about that set that they have down on the planet? That's one of the most beautiful sets I've ever seen in Trek. Every angle that is filmed in that set is
00:50:45
Speaker
Just that warehouse place, whatever it is. It felt like it was also the Hiawatha set. I feel like that was some of it was with the columns and stuff like that. It reminded me of the Hiawatha. The Hiawatha was a redress of the mess hall, I believe. No, no, no. The part where everything's falling and Burnham's running, it just felt like it was the same. That could have been an off-screen screen. I don't know.
00:51:13
Speaker
So there was a physical set that they used. I believe that they filmed in a factory. Like they use that trick in the J.J. Abrams movies where they would use the brewery for the engine room. It's true. I kind of like I like it. So I'm just going to I'm just going to turn off the camera.
00:51:33
Speaker
And OK, cool. All right. Well, we're all we're coming to the close to try to try to hang in there. But I just wanted to say that I like the line at the end where Spock says, respectfully, Dr. Burnham was incorrect. Now does matter what happened before no longer exists. What will happen next has not yet been written. We have only now that is our greatest advantage. What we do now here in this moment has the power to determine the future.
00:52:00
Speaker
Instinct and logic together. That is how we will defeat control in the battle to come We will find a way all of history can change with our next move and I think that describes Really? Well, what Star Trek discovery is just period like it's like don't worry too much about like what's gonna happen It's good. You know, it is all gonna talk like how you stop worrying about how it's gonna tie into TOS and all that stuff and like just forget about what happened before because obviously dr Burnham has been fucking with the timeline and
00:52:28
Speaker
so focus on what's going on right now in the moment and I'm okay with that. That's a Star Trek ending, just like that optimism of like, we can do this, we can make this happen with logic and instinct. The whole episode, I feel, was a giant showcase of Star Trek Discovery doing what it does best as a TV show.
Discovery's Themes and Genre Shift
00:52:53
Speaker
This is a Star Trek show that always
00:52:55
Speaker
leans into like the hard-hitting drama. I think we get that. It always tries to go for like the big emotion. I think we get that. It tries to do super cool, spectacular action. I think we get that. It was too much. What?
00:53:15
Speaker
I find it too much. Yeah, it does bite off more than it can chew sometimes. But I think this is an example of discovery actually achieving everything and setting itself out to you. PJ, your lighting is exactly like the planet in this episode. You look like you're in Star Trek Generations. Yes. Time is a predator.
00:53:42
Speaker
Some of that time talk in this episode reminded me a lot of Star Trek Generations. So far in Discovery, destiny is a real tangible thing that they've acknowledged. And now time is a living entity that it kind of has that time machine rule where that guy tries to save his wife over and over again, but she keeps dying.
00:54:10
Speaker
It's like time pulls you into a certain path or the universe into a certain path and like destiny is a real thing. And I believe that this iteration of Star Trek or in the last 10 years has gotten into kind of like a mystical kind of like fantasy mentality. And they've kind of like drifted away from hard science. And now they can just explain any contrivancy with techno battle
00:54:38
Speaker
And I'm not like mad at that. I just, I would hope that going forward, they would be a little more hardcore with their science and not have Spock say stupid shit. Like, uh, I like science. I'm sorry. Hell yeah. It's like, that wasn't weird. Patrick, right? Sweet bro. Um, uh, what did you guys think of like, uh, hints, giving a pike a hint of what's what his destiny is. So to speak, that was cool. Yeah.
00:55:09
Speaker
PJ is like, no, I hated it. Here's the problem with Burnham's mother. If she's going forward in the timeline in which control takes control of everything, then how is she seeing Pike's accident when that wouldn't have been the course of events that would transpire if control succeeded?
00:55:40
Speaker
The true timeline that leads into Kirk is the one where control is defeated. If this happens to be some alternate thing all along, I'm done. I'm out. Time travelers are the only one. So it actually works only because Dr. Burnham's perspective is the one.
00:56:02
Speaker
not necessarily the correct timeline, but what she's trying to do is preserve her timeline. Does that make any sense? Cause she's the time traveler. Never makes any sense, dude. Never, never, never. Hard thing to like understand, but it's true from the person, the only person who knows about what's happening period is the person.
Michael's Role and Signal Creation Speculation
00:56:21
Speaker
So that's kind of like why Leland is so afraid of Dr. Burnham is because
00:56:26
Speaker
she has a perspective of time that no one else has like even even control isn't time traveling except for by accident through that like you know the probe that came through the you know through the the distortion or whatever um oh one thing we didn't talk about that i do think we have to touch on is why doesn't she know about the signals and so then what the fuck is going on with the signals so i think what will happen is michael birdham will get
00:56:52
Speaker
a repaired red angel suit or a red angel suit from before it got destroyed or something. I think Dr. Burnham will somehow put herself back into the timeline and she'll go back to the night that the Klingons attacked and she will get killed and little kid Michael will hear it from behind the closet door.
00:57:13
Speaker
But the suit will be an adult Michael's hand. Even Leland. Because even Leland says he saw the body. You're absolutely right about that. So I think the suit will be an adult Burnham's hands and she'll go back. She'll be the one who sets up the red burst signals. She'll be the one who gives Spock the vision of the red bursts. And she'll do something else that leads to them defeating control. And that'll be where all that stuff is going.
00:57:43
Speaker
Oh, oh, and it will also explain why the brain scan looked like 100% match to her and not her mother. Fascinating. What about, how do you think it's all going to tie into the, uh, the Abathwa tribe, which gathered to share the story of a girl who dug her hands in the wood, Ash, and threw it into the sky to create the story. It has to be met because it's before recorded history. So I think, you know,
00:58:10
Speaker
I have not thought of that since like January when that episode aired.
00:58:16
Speaker
I've forgotten all about that. Michael Burnham, Michael Burnham goes back in time and she creates the Big Bang. Oh God, that will piss so many people off. And she like elevates and becomes God. And it'll be like, oh, like when Mirror Universe Stamets was like, God is real. She's very mad at you. Like Michael Burnham is God. And like all, it shows like all other Star Trek characters.
00:58:45
Speaker
Picard, Riker, Khan, Cisco, Golducott, the board queen, Janeway, everyone at Star Trek, and they all bow down to God, Michael Burnham. I only brought that up because you said that Burnham might be responsible for the signals, and in that same monologue she says, when I first heard the story of the girl who made the stars, I wasn't ready to understand. I still don't know if I am. So she's literally making stars in the galaxy, right? Like, so
00:59:12
Speaker
I'm going insane with my theories but um is that is that all we got does i don't have anything else i think we should wrap it up any final statements and then your ratings i'll go first with my rating sorry guys 10
Episode Ratings and Future Excitement
00:59:28
Speaker
I really like, I really like, I just love really loving this season a lot. Like I have to, you know, I am not, I'm not. Disacknowling the flaws. I'm just saying that I don't give a shit about the flaws. That's what it is. And I'm really enjoying it. So I want to throw off all the ratings on my show by giving it 10.
00:59:51
Speaker
I would I would give it a six point five. I knew you were going to say almost said that you didn't give it a six and a half because it's actually not a bad episode in parts, but it's just so discovery is the only show where you get these episodes that are very intriguing and fascinating and all this. And then there's like this dumb shit that they don't bother to explain. At the time, it needs to be explained.
01:00:20
Speaker
I understand we may get that, like a few episodes down or something like that, but like you, you know, you could have done an entire episode where Michael Burnham's just going through her mother's logs and we could have got like all the answers in the one shot, but it's, there's all this other stuff with Leland and all that, which is cool. I like that they're doing like this, this borgie kind of stuff. I'll go, I'm going to be pissed if they don't follow through on that.
01:00:49
Speaker
because then I think they would be ripping themselves off, but it's a weird episode. It's mixed with a lot of good. There's some great acting between a Sonia who plays like Dr. Burnham. What's her name? Gabriel. Two people in Burnham's life that were various important, Gabriel Lorca and Gabriel, her mother, Michael and Gabriel are names of arch angels. Like it's, it's a little pretentious. You know what I mean? It's a little,
01:01:18
Speaker
But nevertheless, but it, it, those acting like Sineko Martin green is like really improved. And you have like great, dramatic moments between characters. And another thing that spike a spike pike Spock and spike spike, even though he's kind of like an unsure captain, you can kind of attribute that to the, like, this is not his ship. And he's constantly saying like, give me solutions. I don't know what to do.
01:01:48
Speaker
Like, that's fine. But even though I have a problem with the way certain characters are written, I love all the actors. And I love the production value that goes into it. So a lot of good things about this episode and a lot of unanswered questions that are really frustrating. So that's all I have to say about that.
01:02:09
Speaker
Well, I actually really loved this episode. I think it's my second favorite of the season. The favorite being, of course, if memory serves, or we visit Talos for. That was Star Trek Discovery doing
01:02:27
Speaker
being the show that I wanted it to be, that has like a bunch of like ties into the lore and stuff like that. This episode, like I said earlier, to me it was Star Trek Discovery doing what it does best. I do agree there are some unanswered questions, but I'm looking at this as a, you know, like a chapter in a book and I'm on
01:02:47
Speaker
Chapter 11 of 14 right the questions mate. Yeah, we can't assume they won't be answered, right? I hope hopefully the next three chapters can Get me there and if not, it's just kind of a problem with the book overall not this specific chapter I'm gonna give it an 8 out of 10 Whoo So, what is that was that bring the average to I think we could settle on a 7.5 or 8 Hey Google
01:03:16
Speaker
What is the average of 10, 8, and 6.5? Sorry, I don't understand. She's not going to cooperate. Siri does it. Hey Siri, what is the average of 10, 8, and 6.5? The average of 10, 8, and 6.5 is about 8.1666. 8.1666? So we'll give it an 8.
01:03:46
Speaker
Obviously, my AI is better than your AI. No, they're gonna combine together and become control. That's true. All right, so in AID it is. Anything about next episode that you're excited about from the trailer? Like the Klingon D7. Absolutely. I'm looking forward to seeing it. I'm looking forward to owning the Eagle Moss model.
01:04:07
Speaker
I'm all about the D7. It'd be cool if we see some other classic Klingon designs, maybe like some old school Klingon uniforms, some old school Klingon disruptors, maybe even like a old school smooth head Klingon. I'm not gonna hold my breath for that last one, but I'm definitely looking forward to seeing the D7 in action.
01:04:30
Speaker
Awesome. And PJ, anything about next week's episode that you fancy? It seems to hint at a showdown between Discovery and many Section 31 ships. I'm really interested to see how that plays out.
01:04:45
Speaker
Excellent. Yeah, there was like all of the there was that line about all this ships being section 31 ships. That's right. All right, gentlemen. Thank you so much. I appreciate you coming on to talk track with me. And I think this episode was of Starfleet boy was an exciting one. We had a lively discussion. Really good stuff. Live long and prosper. And we'll see you next time. Bye. Peace.