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Star Trek: Picard - "Remembrance" Fifth Anniversary Reissue
72 Plays10 days ago
It's been five years since the first season of Star Trek: Picard concluded, and here in the month of March, Bryan & Kristen will be revisiting the episodes they didn't get to when they first kicked off coverage of the series. Back in 2022, Trek Marry Kill began by grading all the live action pilots, including Picard. We were joined by Hector Navarro from YouTube's Heroes Reforged, so rather than make you search through your feed for it in order to sync up with our new episodes this month that will complete season one -- here it is refreshed!
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Transcript
Star Trek Picard's Final Voyage
00:00:00
Speaker
This week on Trek, Mary, kill since Romulans data next.
00:00:10
Speaker
Have you ever been a stranger to yourself?
00:00:16
Speaker
Many, many times. Nearly two decades ago. Amanda Dayton sacrificed his life for me.
00:00:31
Speaker
These past few years, I really tried to belong here. But it never truly felt like home.
00:00:44
Speaker
Do you know who I am? Everything inside of me says that I'm safe with you. Admiral, I have encountered a woman. She came to me for help. If she is who I think she is, she's in serious danger.
00:01:05
Speaker
Sometimes I worry that you have forgotten who you are.
00:01:11
Speaker
We do not. You can't do it alone. You need help. You need protection. You need a crew. Be the captain they remember.
00:01:25
Speaker
Engage.
00:01:31
Speaker
track mary kill
00:01:38
Speaker
Hi, I'm Brian. I'm Kristen. And I'm Hector. Welcome to Trek, Marry, Kill, a podcast where we basically go out on a date with an episode of Star Trek. And after it's over, we decide if we go out with it again, marry it or kill it on the spot.
00:01:53
Speaker
This week, our voyage through Star Trek's live action pilot episodes concludes, finally, with Paramount Plus' Star Trek Picard starring Sir Patrick Stewart.
00:02:05
Speaker
And joining us to discuss this is Hector Navarro.
Hector Navarro's Star Trek Journey
00:02:08
Speaker
Hector, hello. Hi. He's the co-host of YouTube's Heroes Reforged, their reaction show, their reaction channel.
00:02:16
Speaker
ah They watch Star Wars and the Marvel shows. They're watching Willow right now. And starting next year, I'm told you're going to start watching some Star Trek. So go and subscribe. Google describes you as a TV personality. But ah Hector, I know you to be a funny, charming, extremely geeky guy. So much more than that.
00:02:34
Speaker
So thank you so much for being here. I am so happy to be here, Brian. Thank you for inviting me. Brian and I go way back. We met in an improv class. Improv. Which is so, so exciting, but I'm so happy to be here.
00:02:47
Speaker
I love the show. It's lovely to meet you, Kristen, as well. So thank you guys for having me Likewise. Yeah. Yes. and And I think that that improv class was crazy. Shut Stop.
00:02:58
Speaker
It was funny because Hector was, he was, we were all learning, but it's just funny to watch who took, who caught into it so well and so quickly that I was just like, oh, wow, this is amazing.
00:03:10
Speaker
and And that was basically when I was like, this is my off ramp to go do other things. So very exciting stuff. Yeah. Brian took an improv class and was like, I'm a writer. Goodbye. See ya. I think like that actually happens pretty often with people who,
00:03:25
Speaker
are like, oh, am I an actor? And then they're like, I actually just like writing the the stuff that we do. No, I'm teasing. I'm teasing in all seriousness. Brian was always very, very funny. I was genuinely always excited whenever I got to do scenes with him. He's one of those people who, if anybody has ever taken an improv class, you know, it's, you don't mean to segment or form a click or anything like that. But like, you know, when you kind of sync up with a person's sense of humor, you know what i mean? And so maybe Brian and I sense of humor was in the fact that we were kind of geeky or whatever, but um it was always great playing with him and he was super, super funny. So yeah. And it helps ah all everyone in our class was super hot too.
00:04:03
Speaker
So just all of us, really hot. Awesome. Wait, Brian, were you with me when we were somewhere and like, I can't remember who was with us, maybe ah my friend Ryan. And I was like, I think we're the best looking people in here. And I and everyone else was just like horrible looking.
00:04:19
Speaker
Maybe that was just me and Ryan. and That was somebody else. Maybe i do. I thought you were going to bring up the story when you and I went to dinner once. ah hang on yeah Hang on. Hang on. that By the way, Kristen, that sounded like it was a ah ah mean setup for a joke. Was that purposeful?
00:04:34
Speaker
Because you were at first were like, Brian, were you with me? And then you went, no, you know what? You weren't there. It was specifically me and other people that were good looking. And we were talking about how we were good looking, but you were not there. That was hilarious.
00:04:45
Speaker
yeah That was great. And Brian walked right into it. He just went right past It turns you weren't there. Never mind. Do we all want to... Somebody else? Should we all take that again? now I'm just kidding. Yeah. Yeah, so i we Brian and I went to dinner once in West Hollywood, and I said, just so you know, most men I ever go out to dinner with get hit on by men.
00:05:09
Speaker
And I went to the restroom and came back and like the was it the the waiter gave you his phone number? was was a it was a ah sadder ruse than that. He said someone left this number for you at the front as they were leaving and asked me to give it to you.
00:05:27
Speaker
but Nice. Wow. well Brian's a hunk. He's a hunk. That makes sense. um I should also mention, I think it was like we were one of like maybe three other people in the whole restaurant. So was slim pickings.
00:05:39
Speaker
yeah And so it was it was the same thing. We were the hottest people. You've had this story twice is what I'm hearing. k kristaten So Hector, how did you come to Star Trek? Like when did you start watching it? um I there's a there. Everybody's got a different thing for me. It's not the popular answer because I know you guys grew up on Next Generation.
00:06:03
Speaker
And I came into Star Trek because I loved the TV show Lost. and And before that, I remember going to the theater in 2006 with my dad. I often go to the movies once a week or whenever I can with my dad still to go see a movie. And we went to go see Mission Impossible 3.
00:06:25
Speaker
And I thought it was going to be bad because I didn't like Mission Impossible 2. I wasn't a big Mission Impossible guy, but I was like, let me I'll go with my dad. This is a dad movie. Let's go see it. And I remember we left, and I was like really impressed with that movie, way more than I thought it was going to be. I loved Philip Seymour Hoffman in the movie.
00:06:42
Speaker
I thought that the action was slick and really well done. I really enjoyed it. Then I'm like, oh, who was the director of this? It's this guy named J.J. Abrams. He's a TV guy. He came from TV World.
00:06:53
Speaker
It was after 2006 that started to that i started to learn about JJ Abrams and what, who he was and knew and found out that he did the pilot for lost.
00:07:04
Speaker
So then I checked it out and I think, I kind of got into it around 2007, eight, nine, somewhere in there. I was working at a Blockbuster video at the time. This was in college.
00:07:16
Speaker
Oh, RIP. I was in college, RIP, Blockbuster video. And they used to have the TV shows for rent one disc at a time, depending on what the, you know, for those shows that had like the season box sets, you know?
00:07:28
Speaker
Yeah. And when when you work at Blockbuster, one of the perks on top of being horribly underpaid and whatever is like, oh, you can rent five things a week. So my coworker for free for absolutely for free. No, I paid. And you know, what a, what a deal.
00:07:44
Speaker
like a discount But knowing that I really liked mission impossible, which came out a few years prior and I'm working here and I knew that he had done the show lost.
00:07:54
Speaker
My other coworker was a massive lost fan and was watching it current And he goes, you got to rent the first season and just watch it. So I did. And I'm I'm I'm here to tell you I'm still impressed with the pilot episode of that series. I think it's one of the strongest pilots of a show I've seen.
00:08:12
Speaker
And I'm not a huge TV viewer, but I i still I watch the pilot. I watch like the. like the commentary track on it with like Linda Loff and Carlton Cuse and them talking about what JJ Abrams was doing and, and knew that JJ didn't have anything to do with that show beyond the pilot, but I still really enjoyed the show overall.
00:08:32
Speaker
And learned that like he left the show to go do Mission Impossible. And I was kind of like ipress like, I was like, that is crazy to have this incredible opportunity from like ABC television to to develop this show.
00:08:46
Speaker
And then Tom Cruise comes and recruits you because he's like, I like Alias. Come and direct the next Mission Impossible And now to this day, I mean, I'm a big fan of the Mission Impossible movies, I guess. Oh, me too. I am the biggest fan. Yeah. I think three still might be my favorite, honestly, just because of Philip Seymour Hoffman. But I love the Brad Bird one.
00:09:05
Speaker
I think the Christopher McCrory ones, the new ones are so, so good. I saw Fallout three times in the theater. It's awesome. It's so good. freaking good and again i was a huge fan of of all of lost and i really liked um i liked lindelof you know was hanging in there as a big lindelof fan and then um i didn't see what the what was the what what was his follow-up after leftovers leftovers i didn't see that but people really enjoyed it but then i loved hbo watchman the past couple years that blew my mind i thought it was great so anyway as i'm learning about all of this
00:09:41
Speaker
but Cut back to 2009. I'm into Lost. I like J.J. Abrams' first film, Mission Impossible 3. I learned he's directing Star Trek, and they're going to sort of reboot it.
00:09:52
Speaker
And I had always known about Star Trek, but never found my way in. And so in preparation for his Star Trek, which was coming out in 2009, I went and instead of doing the TV shows, I just watched all the movies in order.
00:10:06
Speaker
And then I fell in love with it in Star Trek II, Wrath of Khan. and learned about what that character was, Ricardo Montalban's con. He's my favorite villain to this day.
00:10:17
Speaker
I fell in love with Spock and Kirk and McCoy and everybody and really enjoyed the movies. Even when I got to Next Gen without the Next Generation
Patrick Stewart's Impact on Fans
00:10:26
Speaker
show behind me, I still latched on to like, I really love Data.
00:10:30
Speaker
I thought First Contact was great. So then after the J.J. Abrams Star Trek, which... then became like my new favorite thing. And I really love that iteration of Star Trek, which is going to tie into us talking about Picard. But then I went and started watching all of the shows and I watched, I've seen all of the original series, next gen, deep space nine.
00:10:53
Speaker
I'm like two seasons away from being done with Voyager and I've only started with enterprise. But then in 2017, i watched discovery and have watched every new star Trek thing since 2017. So all of the live action shows, animated shows, shorts, everything they've been doing. So my sort of general thoughts on it are that I am a, I'm definitely the Kirk and Spock guy. That's my era.
00:11:19
Speaker
Um, I don't have the sort of love for next gen and deep space nine and Voyager that people of our age who like grew up watching those do. Um, but some of my favorite Star Trek episodes and moments obviously are from those series and everything. And like I said, my top characters are like data.
00:11:38
Speaker
Um, I love Worf, um, Janeway and pretty much the original series crew. Um, so that's kind of my background to it. And I feel as though what it does is it gives me, because I kind of all came to it when it was trying to be new again 2009,
00:11:56
Speaker
I think I have an appreciation for the new as well as the classic stuff. I can understand the context, you know, for when these shows were coming out. And I learned like you guys were discussing with like, you know, encounter at Farpoint, all of the behind the scenes drama and all that really interesting stuff that happened for like, you know, for each of those shows to get made.
00:12:16
Speaker
And I appreciate all of that kind of thing. So, Yeah. And then Star Trek ended up becoming one of my I call it like a geek pillar. Like I've loved Marvel since I was five years old. And so and DC Comics as well. But um Star Trek and Star Wars kind of came later. But then those four have become my my geek pillars.
00:12:36
Speaker
Fantastic. You're also like the like the perfect person for Paramount. Like they would love to meet you figure out how to clone your experience. Yeah. As much as possible.
00:12:49
Speaker
There are dozens of us, Brian. There are dozens. Love the Kelvin timeline. There are dozens. No, but but like they Paramount got you. The gateway was mission. Mission impossible. I mean, that's true. Then they they got you.
00:13:02
Speaker
They hooked you. I guess that's technically true true, which also has a weird connective history to. the Star Trek franchise, right? It's all, they've all kind of been under the same thing. And Leonard Nimoy was in Mission Impossible after Star Trek. Desi Liu produced both. Yep.
00:13:15
Speaker
um ah Damon Lindelof though, big, huge Star Trek fan. I think original series Next Generation was his thing. and And his hand fingerprints over the 09 movie are pretty clear as well. so lin So you got a lot of connection there. If you haven't seen the Alias pilot, you should definitely watch the pilot.
00:13:35
Speaker
I always tell people it's it's the best pilot of this century, even though I think it was 99. But it it was the best done, best produced, best written pilot for a very long time.
00:13:48
Speaker
So one of the reasons, the the reason I asked you on was also, i like talking to you. That's part of it. The other part was we like to have connections. It's not going to happen with every episode, but sort of how close have you come to touching the creator, being involved in Star Trek? And you got to sit down right across from Patrick Stewart and interview him as part of the press tour for the release of this show for Star Trek Picard.
00:14:10
Speaker
and um yeah And you just it went through it where it was like, yeah, I didn't really have the connection. So I'm sure you were aware of the significance of it. But yeah, it wasn't like you were nine years old growing up with him as sort of a role model. But let me say this too. Let me say this. Tell us.
00:14:27
Speaker
X-Men. Let me say this. if my thing was marvel If my thing was Marvel, I can't think of, I guess the other honest example would be Sir Ian McKellen, where he's in two major you know geek property roles that are like iconic.
00:14:45
Speaker
And this was Patrick Stewart. And it's so funny because when he got cast to play Charles x Xavier in the first X-Men movie, It was it felt like it was total fan casting because he was Jean-Luc Picard and he had so much grace and he was this middle aged or elderly bald actor.
00:15:03
Speaker
And it's fan casting, but it worked beautifully. And I think he he he brought so much to that role that. I think people now think of that character as Patrick Stewart and it's difficult to divorce it because in the comic books, Charles Xavier is not even supposed to be British.
00:15:19
Speaker
But then, you know, yeah, he lives in New York. Exactly. He was just born and raised in like Westchester, New York. Like he's just like, he lives on Long Island or whatever. he just has like a mid Atlantic accent or whatever you call it. But now it's like, well, I kind of, it's like how also the character blade played by Wesley Snipes blade in the comic books is supposed to be English, like you're supposed to be from England.
00:15:42
Speaker
But you go, yeah, but how can that not be an American guy? Blade is so... do you know what I mean? like You you yeah get a performance and it just locks on. so But even without me growing up with Star Trek The Next Generation, I 1000% knew about the significance of that character.
00:16:00
Speaker
Even after I started watching Star Trek for years and I found myself more gravitating towards original series, I could still watch an episode of Next Gen and go,
00:16:11
Speaker
Yeah, but Patrick Stewart is phenomenal. And I understand too that, like, I don't think that this is what Kirk did for audiences. I think Kirk was like a wish fulfillment cut type character. I think Picard was a father who raised a generation that was watching television.
00:16:27
Speaker
And I think that has a profound effect on how people view Patrick Stewart to this day. I think he kind of takes on those responsibilities. And whereas I don't feel like William Shatner
00:16:39
Speaker
like took on the same, like saw the role in the same way. Yeah. He doesn't he doesn't want to be your dad. Right. And it's like, no, and that's not what Kirk was. In fact, Kirk was a bad father. Like he technically abandoned his child as we learn later in the movies, but yeah that's going to be later. But, you know, but Picard was still, and I think it's so interesting. You guys were talking about this because in the first episode, he gets so mad at children And for the for first few seasons, like Jean-Luc Picard hates children.
00:17:07
Speaker
And I found that to be so off-putting. But then that is part of his like arc in that series is that he warms up to like Wesley Crusher and, you know. And so i I really do think that that fatherly aspect to it made an entire generation of Star Trek fans grow up and go Jean-Luc Picard. I want him to be my father.
00:17:27
Speaker
i want to be Kirk, but I want, you know, I want to be on Picard's ship. And so anyway, when I got to to sit across from him and just ask him a few questions, and I think he was sitting next to, I'm trying to remember, I think it was maybe Michelle Heard.
00:17:41
Speaker
um I watched the clip just now. It was, that was it was Isa Briones. Is that how say her name? Oh, that's who they paired her with? Lovely. She was also so, so nice. And, and that was, that was really great. Yeah. I think Michelle Heard, maybe she was with, oh my gosh, I'm blanking. Yeah. Jerry Ryan, seven, seven of nine.
00:18:00
Speaker
Um, but I remember I didn't mean to say Sir Patrick, but I like called him Sir Patrick and he just answered a question. Like I asked him a question, but you know, instead of just saying like, Patrick, what's, I was like, Sir Patrick, this question. And he was like, he just took it, you know, without missing a beat. And, but in my head, I was like, damn it. I meant not to say that, but to, to, to kind of ah summarize that experience, it's like, when you meet this man, you can, you can feel the, the, um,
00:18:31
Speaker
Whatever that thing is, he had he he like exuded niceness and everybody it just felt like everybody was kind of gravitating around him. You know what I mean? like you like There's other actors that are his yeah his age that don't give that off, but he has this, it's it's like, I don't know, maybe because I'm an ignorant American, but he almost has this sort of otherworldly like you know like sophistication, right? And i and and i felt that you know I felt that and I got to sort of like...
00:19:00
Speaker
I don't think you guys know this, but I was at Star Trek Las Vegas when they announced he was going to come back. Which no like I have to tell you guys this story because this was insane. So I i got invited to go to Star Trek.
00:19:17
Speaker
No, actually, i don't think I got invited. I think I just bought tickets on my own. And my my girlfriend had never been to Las Vegas. And I was like, we have to go. It's awful and great at the same time. I love that city. It is the worst, but it's also glamorous.
00:19:31
Speaker
That's like the perfect way to describe it Yes. It's disgusting and glamorous all at once. So sometimes Star Trek is there. right Great for three days. Yes. So I think, Chris, did you say great for three days or great for three ways? Because both I think would work. okay Yeah. Okay. I said three days, but um yeah, three or more ways.
00:19:52
Speaker
So my girlfriend agreed and she's a Trekkie at this point. Like I was also, we're watching the new, like I said, everything from 2017, we're watching discovery and all the new stuff. And, um, nobody knew that, that, uh, Patrick Stewart was returning. So we go to Las Vegas for the weekend and during star Trek, Las Vegas, they have different panels on like their main stage.
00:20:13
Speaker
The one panel that I wanted to go see. And my girlfriend was like yeah, I'll come with you. Was a, like composer panel that had Michael Giacchino. And I can't even remember who else was on the panel, but they were talking about all of the music of Star Trek.
00:20:29
Speaker
And I love Michael Giacchino's work for the new Star Trek. And he's like really nice too. He's like absolutely salt of the earth type person. Yeah. And he loves he like he grew up on this stuff. So I was so excited to go see Giacchino on this panel with a other. compos i think they had like the composer from Deep Space Nine and some other folks. And I went, oh, that's going to be great.
00:20:49
Speaker
Right before that panel was like an hour of William Shatner on stage, just like doing his thing, you know? So we get there like 15 minutes before that panel is ending.
00:21:00
Speaker
And as that panel's ending, people are starting to file out even more. So me and my girlfriend like move closer in the rows. And I'm sitting there and I'm going, great, we're just going to watch this composer panel.
00:21:12
Speaker
And all of a sudden they're like, they like ladies and gentlemen, ah Alex Kurtzman. And he just comes out and everyone's freaking out because he's like the head of Star Trek creative. And he starts saying, we we weren't planning on doing this.
00:21:23
Speaker
Um, but we wanted to, to bring them out. Uh, everybody here's Sir Patrick Stewart. He comes out, the crowd goes insane. I can already see online. It's like trending that Patrick Stewart is just at Star Trek Las Vegas, but I'm there and I'm on my phone and I'm like, what is happening? And he comes out and he's, and he's getting emotional from like the crowd response.
00:21:45
Speaker
And he starts saying, you know, you know, I never thought I'd, I'd come back, but But talking to these folks, I'm extremely excited to tell you Jean-Luc Picard is back. And the energy in there was indescribable, indescribable.
00:22:00
Speaker
and And later, my girlfriend was like, I bet you Shatner was so pissed that that happened right after his interview, which just made it even better. It's so funny. and You have being lost it.
00:22:14
Speaker
I'm freaking out and I'm taking photos and posting them on Twitter. And it's kind of blowing up blowing up because I'm like, i don't know how many other people that are in this auditorium right now are like, trying to document it for, you know, the internet. No one, no one, cause it was such a surprise. There's no reporters in there. There's no press release.
00:22:32
Speaker
So I'm kind of trying to do that. And I'm not really a reporter, but I'm doing a Twitter thread of like, I post a photo of him. And then I say, he just said this, I post a photo and it's like, he's coming back for a series and it's called Star Trek Picard.
00:22:45
Speaker
And it's not going to be next generation, but it's going to have this new tone. And he was saying like, yeah I can't remember the specifics, but I remember Patrick Stewart was like, with everything that's happening in the world right now, and it's obviously he was hinting at the fact that like Donald Trump was just elected. You know what i mean? It was this, it was, and and everything that was happening in England with Brexit.
00:23:06
Speaker
yeah That was also Patrick Stewart's perspective. that he was like talking to these creatives. I trust them where they want to take this story and how meaningful it could be. And something to the effect of like, now is the time that people need this character to come back, you know?
00:23:21
Speaker
And, and it was like emotional and guys, I didn't even
Themes and Real-World Parallels in Picard
00:23:25
Speaker
grow up with next generation. You know what I mean? Like, and like you're still like feeling it. I a ah hundred percent feeling it. My girlfriend is feeling it. She hasn't, she didn't grow up watching star Trek, the next generation either.
00:23:36
Speaker
but just to be there in that moment live. And I'm like still tweeting about it. And then he goes off stage and then they bring up the composer panel. I don't remember a single thing from that panel. I was just like on Twitter freaking out, you know, and it was, but I, but we sat through it and, and afterwards my girlfriend and I were like, we were so lucky to happen to be in the room during the most momentous moment, you know, for that whole show, but certainly for Star Trek news in like years, um, all because I wanted to go see the composer. So,
00:24:06
Speaker
So I had like a lot of feelings about this before this show, Star Trek Picard even came out. It's amazing. That sounds awesome. Yeah, that's very cool. Okay, so this episode was called Remembrance.
00:24:21
Speaker
It premiered on Paramount Plus on January 23rd. Anyway, let's kill it. This one was a bad one. I kill it. That's what I would say. I'm kidding. Sorry. Hold on. We'll all get our turn. Yes. After all that, kill it.
00:24:34
Speaker
Well, I'll get back to our killing soon or enough. That was a nice birthday present for me. January 23rd, 2020. Telepay buy Akiva Goldsman and A&D James Duff. I sucked in my breath because here we go. Story by Akiva Goldsman and Michael Chabon and Kirsten Beyer and Alex Kurtzman and James Duff.
00:24:55
Speaker
directed by Hanalee Culpepper, who did a f***ing fantastic job, I gotta say, right out of the gate. um even Even a couple years later, I'm like, wow, this is no easy task, and I think she knocked out of the park. Quick quick synopsis.
00:25:10
Speaker
Sir Patrick Stewart returns a Jean-Luc Picard in a serialized drama about his retirement years after resigning in protest of Starfleet's decision to halt relief efforts in For Romulans displaced by their home solar system's sun-going supernova, an event that served to be the catalyst of the Chris Pine 09, Star Trek 09 movie, Picard finds himself alone, sad, waiting for death on his family chateau in France until one day he receives a visitor who's in distress, a woman who needs his help, who he discovers is data's daughter.
00:25:42
Speaker
And somehow the fate of the galaxy is in finding this girl who dies and then has a twin. And then he has to go on a quest looking for this twin. There we go. I kind of ran out of steam there because I was trying to put this together in a way that was punchy. And i'm like, there's a lot of, and then, and then, and then. So I don't know anyway, but as you said, this is a ah Hector in the announcement that this was conceived as a different tone for star Trek serialized.
00:26:11
Speaker
There was a CBS investor call that they Viacom. I mean, told the investors that it's star Trek's first adult series, which is a weird phrasing, but they basically meant like, you know, this is their dicks.
00:26:23
Speaker
Yeah. this ah This is their Game of Thrones, essentially, or like they're gritty. They're kind of like heightened drama that took on more adult tones. And like you said, we've got ah modern parallels here. We've got a refugee crisis.
00:26:38
Speaker
We've got sort of basically an evil bureaucracy and you know rising fascism as sort of the thing. And wouldn't you know it, a star like Patrick Stewart saying, this character I played is sort of a religious figure, a leader that everyone believes So, of course, an actor saying, wouldn't it be great if I save the world?
00:26:58
Speaker
from It's the current world from itself. Yes, I will come back and do the show. And then my final kind of general cap on the series. This is definitely the first Star Trek show to be produced by a knight of the British court.
00:27:12
Speaker
a Pulitzer prize winner and an Academy award winning screenwriter. I guarantee you no other star Trek show can say that. So also we forgot to mention this. Yeah. We forgot to mention this for a and encounter at far point TV guide voted Patrick Stewart as the best dramatic television actor of the nineteen eighty s Wow.
00:27:34
Speaker
Whoa. This was in 1993. So which is both ah it's damning with faint praise a little bit because there was a lot of television on in the 80s. Sure. Worth pointing out so much of it it was sort of disposable that his performance as Captain Picard really did make an impact on the culture.
00:27:52
Speaker
on pop culture on american culture yeah star trek was for a very small amount of time the next generation like the most watched tv show it was wild that's crazy well do you think william shatner's upset that he wasn't recognized for tj hooker during the 80s as a fine dramatic actor Oh yeah, no, that scene but Patrick Stewart once again a Tidal Wave erasing William Shatner. There was one point win at the Emmys that William Shatner was nominated for an Emmy in the same category as Alan Alda and William Shatner won and Alan Alda was like really unhappy about it. About how he lost to Will.
00:28:31
Speaker
he's I think he said something like hi lost to fucking Bill Shatner or something. Wow. yeah like and all Alan Alda feels like he's such a nice old man. I can't even imagine. He is.
00:28:41
Speaker
yeah he is. but like He's a nice old man, but at the time, yes. Yeah, I guess so. I can't believe I lost a fucking Bill Shatner. perfect Are you serious? Bill Shatner? I was on MASH.
00:28:56
Speaker
How could this happen? it was for i think it was for his role in the West Wing, too. So like a serious role. ah Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. I don't remember this at all. So Al and all the loss for the West Wing versus Shatner in either Boston Legal or would have it had been season eight of The Practice.
00:29:12
Speaker
Oh, my God. i don i think it was like it might have been best guest star. I'm going to have to look this up. Oh, no, I think you're right. it would Because it would have to have been for the practice then, would imagine.
00:29:22
Speaker
Wow. yeah it would Yeah.
00:29:26
Speaker
Okay, wow. I think there's even a shot, there might even be a shot of Alan Alda ripping up his speech or something. I could be misremembering that, though. Wow. Man, not as a bit. That sounds like a bit, but if it's not a bit, but like great.
00:29:42
Speaker
and To continue it after the ceremony. Yeah. Do you remember when you watched it? I mean, it was only a couple of years ago. I don't know. Did all of us watch it when it came out? I did not. I did not have Paramount Plus at the time. So no, I did not watch it.
00:29:55
Speaker
But not for lack of interest. yeah Or yeah, or whatever. That's so interesting too, that, that, um, that, that, you know, like the question of like, did next generation fans, cause you know, this whole conversation has been happening with streaming lately.
00:30:10
Speaker
And especially in the case of Disney with Disney plus there's, I I've seen a lot of conversations about like, they may be pulling back on all of the various shows that they're doing because Disney plus has certain fans already locked in. So it's like,
00:30:25
Speaker
there's no Marvel fan who hasn't already gotten Disney plus there's not another Marvel show that they're like, okay, I've been waiting for two years, but this is the one that's going to get me to sign up. Right. But I'm curious if Star Trek Picard did bring in a lot of next generation fans to sign up for their service, at least in North America, which is what I think, or the U S is, which which is, um, Paramount plus, I think everywhere else it's like, it maybe it was on Amazon. i'm I'm not sure, but like if, if Star Trek fans were not interested in discovery, like,
00:30:55
Speaker
Did another one of the shows being much more different than discovery, get them to check out the star Trek stuff? I don't know. I'd be curious to see that. Yeah. We'll never know. mean, yeah, the thing is these, these star Trek shows are insanely expensive compared to what it was. And, you know, and I, I think they're competitive in the marketplace, 15 million an episode thereabouts, which is competitive with, you know, game of Thrones and that stuff.
00:31:21
Speaker
But, um In the case of Picard, I think it exists mainly because of generous California tax credits. Like that's been the thing that's kept it going. So hard to say. um but I mean, just real quick. Yeah, I watched it too. i But I was as as excited as that crowd was, Hector.
00:31:38
Speaker
You just recounting that experience was getting me excited again. i drove i drove down when the trailer came out at Comic-Con when the trailer was finally done. And I drove down to San Diego just to go to the pop up, not to go to Comic Con.
00:31:53
Speaker
Like, wow. You can have got a ticket anyway. Yeah, no. But I mean, like, that's how much I was just like, I it wasn't like I want to meet anybody. I just wanted to, like, have more of the experience of the show and like see what props they put out and all that stuff.
00:32:08
Speaker
It was exciting. Captain Picard. it was exactly what you said. He was a role model to me, like after my dad died, like literally the only real like male role model I had for a time, which is a little sad.
Production Insights and Adult Themes
00:32:20
Speaker
I'm not going to deny it, but like no for a time. and I remember my mom as a gift wrote him a letter and he wrote back with a headshot. why It was very nice all that stuff.
00:32:29
Speaker
Yeah, it was it was great. So ah Picard, you know big deal to me, obviously. yes which is Which is why it's been very hard over the years to kind of admit might not It feels almost like a betrayal being like, I kind of like Cisco more.
00:32:44
Speaker
That's fine. Or like I can become a little more ride or die with Kirk sometimes. But yeah, it's like obviously... Listen, I'm um um'm a huge... i'm I'm the person who, if the conversation... And it used to be Kirk or Picard, who's the better character, who's the better captain, right?
00:32:58
Speaker
I will usually go... James T. Kirk. And I think I have enough to kind of back it up. Like, I don't just say, ah, like him more. I think I can pull some stuff to back it up. But there are things that that character Jean-Luc Picard does that no other character in Star Trek can do.
00:33:16
Speaker
You know? So if you want to say you like Sisko overall, go for it. But there's still stuff that like, that only Patrick Stewart as Picard can do. And that's another part of the reason I like, I really like this first episode, but I overall still like the Picard show. It's tough not to talk about the whole show with this podcast because we're just looking at the first episode kind of thing. It's hard not to think about like...
00:33:41
Speaker
Absolutely. One and and where it ends in season two and and the fact that season three is going to be the the reunion of all of the next generation characters. But I i mean, for for the the premise of Star Trek Picard bringing Patrick Stewart back, having a different tone, they kept you kept saying it was like their first adult series. I just think that means for old people. And I think that's good.
00:34:01
Speaker
I don't think that's a bad thing. You know, I think it's, think I agree with that. That's a good assessment. I love that. i I didn't see, I had no issue with what the, what the conception is. I think, right. Patrick Stewart being over playing the character and doing the week to week stuff, the plan of the week being captain makes total sense to me.
00:34:18
Speaker
In the show, he has a line, he quotes Shakespeare. He says, no legacy is so rich as honesty. This comes after he's had this terrible TV interview, which I'll get into. um But, you know, Picard as a character, you know, that that is really what he had.
00:34:33
Speaker
He stands for is is ah honesty and seeking the truth and trying to just, you know, operate under that. And that was consistent throughout the show. And I like that they...
00:34:44
Speaker
carry that over to some degree, at least in the first episode for this character. agree. I think that's, I think that's enough of a setup. Let's, let's get into these grades here. Cause we've got several of them. Are you ready, Hector?
00:34:56
Speaker
Yes. Okay. So we're going to start with great scenes. What great scenes did you see in this first episode? I mean, I love the opening, but I'm going to pick ah the, the scene with the reporter, which I thought was honestly really great.
00:35:09
Speaker
It was a great setup to, to know, like, Picard is like, she understands what we're not to talk about, right? And you as an audience member, you're like, well, she's obviously going to bring that up. like That's going to come into play in this conversation. And and and in the back and forth, i thought it was really great.
00:35:24
Speaker
I think that it kind of became the thesis of the um of the series where where That when when when Picard goes, the Federation understood there were millions of lives at stake and she goes Romulan lives and he goes, no lives.
00:35:39
Speaker
I'm like, that's my guy. That's my dude. That is Jean Luke. The fact that he got so mad when he was like, it was downright criminal that Starfleet ignored these people in their time of need.
00:35:50
Speaker
um I just thought that that whole exchange was because when you're first watching this episode, you're like, why did he leave Starfleet? What the hell happened? And that's a really compelling mystery that they're not going to tell you right up front. But with this ah conversation, I thought that was a really worthwhile, strong, great scene.
00:36:06
Speaker
Kristen, what do you got? um Well, you know what? mine Mine happens even before that. I really like the cold open. Like you have Picard and Data playing poker in 10 forward. Like you got me.
00:36:18
Speaker
You got me. Like I know it's like a dream or a flashback like or whatever. Like, you know, when I first see it, but I'm still like, I like this. This is my familiar stuff. I like it.
00:36:30
Speaker
And it like sets up, you know, what's to come um and that something horrible had happened. But we don't know exactly what yet. So I'm sorry to sound it this way, but I had I thought these are all great scenes because they told you what the show is.
00:36:50
Speaker
like So for me personally, I didn't necessarily enjoy them and can you know critique them or whatever. And a lot of them were just kind of written as necessity. It's funny that you mentioned the interview scene because, you know, later on, Alex Kurtzman would go on to adapt a version of Sounds of the Lambs with Clarice.
00:37:06
Speaker
And it basically opened. It opens basically with that scene, which is a very, you know, it's just kind of a very of its time. Like, let's have an interview or a counseling session where you basically recount all the events to set us up.
00:37:20
Speaker
But it but like literally that scene tells us what's happened since we last saw Picard, but also establishes the tone and values of the Star Trek universe as it exists in this show that we're watching.
00:37:31
Speaker
You know, it's basically humans being very cold, like you said, theyre the the racist angle, essentially. but then also just the idea that it's saying, you know, 900 million lives. I think they're lowering that count of a star goes Nova. But anyway,
00:37:45
Speaker
You know, you've got, you know, 900 million refugees and then 92,124 people on Mars died. And of course, she's making that moral equivalency of saying our lives that we have are more valuable.
00:38:00
Speaker
And then I have the scene outside Starfleet archive where Dodge finds Picard and Picard just straight up tells her Susan the android. Yeah. though Even though he's. i have some news for you.
00:38:11
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. But it's, it's so funny because it's like his reasoning is i had a dream. And the dream caused me to go and look at a painting in my storage locker or at this museum.
00:38:25
Speaker
But then it made me realize. But I'm just saying like the way it kind of just kind of brusque. What am I saying? Brusquely kind of brutishly. It brute forces its way into the story. But just to kind of advance like this is a lot to drop on her. And he's doing in a way where it's like, I know it's a lot to drop on you, but I'm going to say a couple of kind words around that. And I just need you to go with it.
00:38:47
Speaker
That was kind of it yeah i I love the idea that um I think we I think we just got another taste of it with the Indiana Jones trailer that just came out. But Harrison Ford did the same thing in 2015 when he came back as Han Solo, where it's like you take the character who by this point, who's been through so many adventures and magical, you know, moments that they go. Yeah, it's true, kid. All of it. It's all real. The Jedi that you know that I'm like at this point, I like that Jean-Luc Picard is so like.
00:39:18
Speaker
you know, two, two steps ahead that he's like, okay, I've been through this multiple times. If this dream came to me, it has to be significant. I'm like a magical level. Like it's very important. So when this woman shows up, he goes, I think your date is child, like just cuts right to act three does not do that.
00:39:35
Speaker
You know, I grew up in Seattle. Like that's, that's nice. yeah but no He literally said, yeah, he goes, I'm glad you have that memory. yeah most Patronizing thing. like it is.
00:39:47
Speaker
uh however complete bullshit sorry i am actually a big fan i do wish some shows especially shows that have been on a longer time or like in movies i i like exactly what you're saying where the characters are like the audience you're like i've been through this before i'm just gonna shortcut i know what's going on here i do like that notion of it um but again i think it's just more of the show is telling you what kind of a show it is it's like so she She's not actually important, like who she is, but what she represents is very important. And then I do have one last great scene that I have to say, because I can't find the tweet. I think it's been deleted, but I remembered it until the it actually premiered. But when they screened it in the UK,
00:40:27
Speaker
Ian McKellen was at the premiere and and and someone tweeted, i can't. ah The best part of the Picard screening tonight was there was a moment that happened that caused Ian McKellen to gasp in a dark theater.
00:40:40
Speaker
My goodness. that So I remember that. And so when when the episode happened, i assumed it was when Dodge explodes.
00:40:54
Speaker
Well, first she but a classic. You have the biggest summer blockbuster writers, ah Kurtzman and Akiva Goldsman writing. So they have to transformers this up. It's like it's not enough that she dies. She has to melt and be exploded.
00:41:08
Speaker
So we got to do two things to her. But when she blows up, it's very shocking. It's a very shocking moment. It's not what you think how the episode is going to go. So I remember confirmation. i tweeted back i tweeted back at the guy. I said, was it this scene? He goes, yes, it was.
00:41:22
Speaker
Yes. Wow. oh No, it's awesome. you Getting a great reaction to being McKellen automatically makes it a great scene. So that is that, you know, and I was going to bring this up, too, because when I did I got to do the press junket for the show, I hadn't seen the show, but I interviewed again. She's sitting next to Patrick Stewart.
00:41:41
Speaker
Issa Briones talking about her character, Dodge. So I ah when the when they killed her in the first episode, I truly was like, what did they kill her off in episode one?
00:41:52
Speaker
And this whole press thing was just like, a like, like, you know, pulling the rug out from under us, like thinking she's going to be like a, you know, she can appear in flashbacks now. Like, you know, a lot of shows will do that is is it is is a a character will still be a part of the story even after they're dead kind of a thing.
00:42:07
Speaker
Right. But yeah. No, i was I was honestly shocked that they killed her in that episode. And then at the end, when they revealed that she had a sister, i was like, oh, like I had no clue. So it was very fun for me.
00:42:20
Speaker
Again, not a writer. I'm not a huge TV person. So I'm very easily impressed. But yes. All right. Should we get on to best Trek tropes? Yes. Every time we see San Francisco in a Star Trek property, you know, I'm just glad it still exists in the future.
00:42:37
Speaker
um it hasn't gone off into the ocean. um So that's nice. um I also thought it was interesting that like when we have this scene of Dodge in her apartment, like her boyfriend complains about how crappy her replicator is.
00:42:52
Speaker
And like, and then it didn't even like dawn on me, like, of course a college student would not have like the nice, the super nice food replicator that could do anything. She has one that does vanilla shakes only.
00:43:04
Speaker
And also, I thought it, and I also, we've already touched on this, but like the resettlement of the Romulans being a huge political issue and a lot of previous Star Trek shows didn't really get into the politics of Starfleet. It would get into the politics of like whatever,
00:43:21
Speaker
planet they're at right or whatever conflicts they're involved in but not necessarily the politics back home and i thought i put down his best track trope just because it i mean we haven't seen it before but i like that they're putting that in there because before we're just sort of made to believe that everything is great in starfleet yes they make mistakes occasionally but every on the whole it's a great institution and that's not necessarily the case in this one It's almost, I almost feel like when fans of Star Wars get older, the older they get, the more they're like, wait a minute, the whole Jedi thing is bad.
00:43:59
Speaker
They're not good. The organization is not just like some Jedi are like, you know, little darker are going to go Sith or whatever, but like the whole thing. You know, taking kids from their families very young and training like all of that is bad.
00:44:12
Speaker
And I think that Star Trek fans, I hope as they get older, too, it becomes more about like, wait a minute, what is Starfleet? What is it doing? What is it doing to other
Political Themes and Starfleet's Role
00:44:22
Speaker
worlds? What is it you know, what are things like back home? And it is supposed to be a utopia.
00:44:27
Speaker
But I like, in my opinion, I really appreciate it when the there's something off at Starfleet is done well. Sometimes it's not done well. Sometimes it's this weird alien worm that's infiltrated a Starfleet person and they have to like blow it up and it's weird.
00:44:42
Speaker
But other times I think i I remember when the show came out, people were complaining online, oh, that's not Starfleet. They're just doing it to try and be, you know, to show progressive politics and blah, blah, blah, blah. blah And I go, the point in my mind, the point of this whole franchise is not to be a perfect utopian thing. It's a obviously supposed to represent our world.
00:45:05
Speaker
And it's supposed to show you that you need to continue to work at the, the types of things that Starfleet has achieved. Like the same thing happened this year with the show and, or that star Wars show that people, uh,
00:45:18
Speaker
We're watching and they're like, oh, this is about how difficult it is to fight fascism. You have to do it all the time. So I like it when Star Trek shows can show you the nuance of Starfleet in some of its ideals might not necessarily exist.
00:45:34
Speaker
work with its utopian, you know, um with with what's with what it thinks it's doing. And sometimes they make mistakes and sometimes there's an individual that's corrupt or sometimes there's a whole side of Starfleet that you go, wow, how does Section 31 even exist? Like that's really, that should not be there, but it is. and And I really, really appreciate that stuff. I don't write it off as like, you know, oh, that's not Gene's vision or whatever. I'm like, no, that's...
00:46:01
Speaker
bunk. you know it should It should be about how people can work together to overcome that kind of stuff. and and um so i I also really appreciate that too. I think generally my view is i'm i can dig or grok some deconstruction, but you know how you deconstruct is as important as what or why you're deconstructing it. and I think sometimes this one hits the... If we're doing operation, i don't think they extract the value without hitting the sides quite a lot, but that's... But buried within that, one of the best struck tropes I like is we do learn why Picard is no longer with Starfleet. He resigned in protest and spoiler alert, we'll find out later in one of the later episodes that he does it as sort of a gambit.
00:46:46
Speaker
And and and I liked it because that fits with Picard's character, like literally in the first episode he surrenders. yeah So he thought he's thought he basically thought I'm a famous celebrity.
00:46:57
Speaker
If I resign, that will get Starfleet's attention. And he tendered his resignation as a protest for them pulling out. and they're like, great, we're going to keep not helping the Romulans. I think it um the Marquis de Lafayette tried a similar thing during the French Revolution of like, hey, guys, I think you guys are taking this too far. And they're like off with his head.
00:47:15
Speaker
heading He's like, OK, I'm out. I'm out. You guys are too crazy. Yeah, so i but i so I like the idea of a Starfleet officer standing by their principles. In a weekly series, what happens? They get bailed out or it's like such a powerful motion that it it influences other people to change their minds.
00:47:31
Speaker
And here that doesn't happen. I'm actually totally fine with that as an inciting incident. I think that it's within his character. It works well. it's a good Trek trope. And I like it's not an inversion of it. It's just a different consequence than we're used to seeing. And I appreciated that.
00:47:45
Speaker
No one's going to throw out the poker game? Oh, that's pretty good. Yeah. i I don't know if it's a Trek trope, but I loved when he said, T, Earl Grey, decaf. I thought it was a great little moment. And that's the line that is yeah that's a line that Patrick Stewart wrote that he was like, I thought that the fans would enjoy that little moment, you know, but it's not hot. It's decaf.
00:48:07
Speaker
I think that was great. yeah And that's why he gets a producer credit, y'all. Okay. That's right. Good ideas. That's exactly right. all right. Worst Trek tropes.
00:48:18
Speaker
Hector, what do you have? i Could not think of one. um ah One of you guys go first. Give me some examples and then I'll try to i'll try to jump in. But give me whatever you guys can. Yeah, I have one The personal cloaking devices on the roof fight.
00:48:34
Speaker
Which I feel a little a little ham-fisted just because they're like, well, nothing showed up on security. So we don't we can't believe that the romneyan Romulans were there and trying to do this and that. And it's like, okay.
00:48:49
Speaker
The entire like the entire roguelins and cloaking devices are a trope for sure. Yes. The entire rooftop thing is completely absurd. And it's only once we find out down the line, some other things going on in the in Starfleet that it only barely makes sense what's going on in the roof.
00:49:08
Speaker
Just the idea that you could have this big, huge fight yeah in the middle of Starfleet, you know, in San Francisco. archive in broad daylight when we just saw on the ground floor it was packed with people like people coming to and fro and not nobody heard any commotion and like oh well it was a cloaking device but still like are the the explosions cloaked so we'll find out later why yeah but that's a good one i i didn't you know i didn't quite clock it i just thought that was weird speculation on their part
00:49:39
Speaker
where they're like, yeah, they must have had a personal cloaking device. I'm like, I guess it makes sense to have it. Fine. But mine was the, at the time, and in I think even more, it's grown in size. The technobabble to explain fractal neuronic cloning, that you could take a cell from data's positronic brain and clone it, and it would basically make two datas.
00:50:02
Speaker
Or you can manipulate it, and it would grow. And it was, and to me, I'm like... A single, first of all, I was like a single, ah single cell that doesn't. Okay. That alone is like, this seems like very shaky technology if it's so difficult to recreate data. Right. But it's very easy to clone him. That seems very odd.
00:50:24
Speaker
ah But anyway, as a techno babble term, I can kind of barely see the idea of making sense. But it's just one of those things that are tossed out and you're just supposed to go with it that it was it's so abrupt. so It stood out like an episode of Voyager where where it's like, how are we going to get through this? Oh, we'll use an interferometric pulse.
00:50:42
Speaker
It's like, OK, what's that going to do? i thought I thought of one. I thought of a worst Trek trope. The end reveal to to learn that Dahj's sister is working or or meeting a Romulan character and they pan out and they're on a Borg cube.
00:51:01
Speaker
I just thought that the reveal was just way too long. I'm like, I don't know how you could shorten that. i don't know if think it could be closer to the edge of a Borg cube. But pretty soon as the camera started panning out, i was like, oh, yeah, they're on a Borg cube.
00:51:13
Speaker
And then it kept panning and pan like zooming out, zooming out, zooming out through their little like, we have ships on this part of the cube. And we, you know, I'm like, okay, I just think that that part took too long. Hector, but it's a callback to Star Trek First Contact. Don't you remember? sure Look, I understand that one of the tropes in Star Trek is to take way too long looking at the ships or the- How dare you, sir. Starbuck. dare you. Or whatever they are. yeah How dare you. It's wonderful. just complained about Star Trek Discovery the first two episodes not actually showing us the ship. So yeah. Yeah.
00:51:46
Speaker
It's indulgent. It's a little indulgent. That's all it is. That's why we're aboard her. That's what we're doing. Risk is our business. That's right. And long gazes at beautiful ships is part of that business.
00:51:59
Speaker
Goodness. Okay. I got to put this in here. I don't know where else to put it because we were talking about Dodge and the twins. Can we talk about the awful necklace that gets changed a lot a lot of attention in this episode?
00:52:14
Speaker
So yeah it's went it's referenced three times. That's an unusual necklace. Where did you get that rev that necklace? And then she takes it off to show it to Picard. And it's like crappily made too. i All due respect to the prop person on that. Not a good job.
00:52:30
Speaker
It's not... I'm sorry. I'm sure you had other stuff to do. And they probably just threw this necklace in it for like a reshoot. And you're like, what is this? And so you just had to do it. But like, it's like bent metal, like the wire, it's like a bent wire.
00:52:44
Speaker
And then these two really basically. It's like floral wires and things like you just get at the craft store and you can bend with a pair of pliers. Exactly. And it's not unusual. It's two silver rings ah tied, put together.
00:52:58
Speaker
There's nothing unusual about it whatsoever. Yeah, I'm trying to remember. Did did Jean-Luc mention that? Because then he went back to the archives and it was like a symbol that was present somewhere or something? No, they just wanted to establish ah just wanted to establish the idea of twinning and cloning. And that she has a twin. And that's all it was there for.
00:53:19
Speaker
um and And it's not even like used again or referenced. Oh, speaking of the painting, are we are we sure that they had no idea that no one making the show remembered Loll?
00:53:31
Speaker
data's daughter data's actual goddamn daughter um i thought that there was a reference to lol in the episode didn't put them the reference is data always said he wished she had a daughter right that's the reference not data had a daughter who died right that that would be different like from a king of the hill i always wanted a son named hank
00:53:57
Speaker
ah Most of it's time quality. um Hector, you can go first unless you want one of us to. Please go first, Hector. I got so much. You got so much? I think that it's a very 2000s. When did this come out? Two years ago? 2020. I think it's a very 2020s show. It's very shiny and slick.
00:54:16
Speaker
it's um Just like with with Discovery as well, you can absolutely see the influence of the um like the new Star Trek films. Yeah, the 09, the Kelvin timeline stuff, which I like a lot of that stuff. I don't mind it. I think that, um you know, the lens flares when used appropriately are good, but this is definitely a show that does not try to look like the...
00:54:41
Speaker
the 80s or 90s aesthetic of the next generation. you know Even though it's supposed to be i don't know how many years after, however many years later it's supposed to be. But yeah, that's my thing.
00:54:52
Speaker
Okay. Kristen? um I thought that the rooftop fight was very Marvel-esque. um Down to the fighting and everything, it looks just like something you would see in a Marvel movie.
00:55:05
Speaker
She literally does the Black Widow move where she looks to the guy's neck. She all of the Black Widow moves. yeah i mean I wonder if they use the same stunt person. um And I also put that Starfleet being in an untrusted institution now. I mean, that definitely is of it of today.
00:55:23
Speaker
um and of course, the opening credits, the opening title sequences are definitely a... recent TV, the very artistic, you know, yeah, whatever that stuff is supposed to be. Yeah, this will be meaningful later in the season, that kind of thing.
00:55:41
Speaker
Yeah, the the fight scene on the roof, just another thing in there. I thought it it looked another sign that this is what the show is about. It looked great, but made no sense because she's an android. She could just put her fist through all these guys.
00:55:54
Speaker
So like the only time her being an Android really stood through is like she could like dodge the phaser blast, which was great. And then when she does that 30 foot Michael Jordan leap onto the steps, love that.
00:56:05
Speaker
But it's like all these other times, like she doesn't need to grapple with them. One punch, they're dead. know, it's like that kind of thing with data. But OK, I got my list here. I'll start small de-aging technology.
00:56:17
Speaker
um pretty Pretty new for the time and being used to de-age Brent Spiner as data. At the time, it it looked good. and now seeing it two years later, i'm like, okay, all right. um it's It's tough because his face is just a different shape. His head is different shape than it was. And so, yeah. They didn't get the uniform fit right because it's, you know, someone had to remake those uniforms. So it's not like they just brought those costumes out, which would have helped. The hair piece was not accurate. You know, it was tricky.
00:56:46
Speaker
It looked okay. in In certain shots, it looked better than others. It wasn't terrible. um I think a lot of the dialogue, very, very modern, you know i think I heard a dude in there. think she so calls her boyfriend dude.
00:56:57
Speaker
um ah Picard getting up from the interview saying, we're done here. Which is like a very, like this interview is over, a very housewives kind of storm out. um Yeah.
00:57:08
Speaker
basic story stuff just to get the plot. Like, why does she rush out of the chateau after Picard's like, you should stay here tonight. And then she just rushes away and she says, i I just didn't want to put him in danger, but we needed a reason for her to leave that they could find each other at the archive.
00:57:23
Speaker
You know, just like basically coincidental plotting just to, because this is written as a summer blockbuster, even though they're supposed to be writing a nuanced serialized drama.
00:57:34
Speaker
doesn't it's It's a weird mesh of styles. But anyway, here's the other part. This episode and this show could not have existed. It owes all of its credit to 2017's Logan by James Mangold. Oh, definitely. Yeah.
00:57:48
Speaker
Yeah. so That's the of its time. It's like of its inspiration is more like it. You know, Patrick Stewart even said that Logan was such a successful thing and what they did with it and what they did with this character, that if they could port that over to Star Trek, that would be what excited him.
00:58:03
Speaker
That was one of the things he said. and For a half a second, for a half a second, I forgot that Patrick Stewart was in Logan. I was just like, oh, yeah, he saw his buddy Hugh Jackman just killing it. Oh, wait. No, he was in it and he had a great, had nice role in that. Wonderful. Wonderful in that. Yeah.
00:58:18
Speaker
is So the epic conclusion of the Hugh Jackman Wolverine story, but I mean... What is the mean what is the synth band? It's a mutant band. And and he's got to protect a special girl with killer fighting skills.
00:58:31
Speaker
and And but then what happens is it relies on familiarity with an old friend data and all that stuff. I guess in that in the case of Logan, though, it's like his offspring. So there's little more direct.
00:58:45
Speaker
um But ah yeah, but then I think what happens through reproductive crime. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that's true. So I would say that the only problem is they ran into is like, well, Picard is not Wolverine.
00:58:57
Speaker
So how can we make this more of an action spectacle? And it's Picard. So we need to have the Borg. you know, I mean, like so there is an inspiration and like a starting point. This is what Patrick wants to do. This is what he what kind of interests him. We think we have part of the story here.
00:59:11
Speaker
But then they were kind of like, well, how do we make this more interesting? Because it's not that interesting. Even though I think you could have found a version where if it was just that, be interesting. But we do get the Borg in here. We get the Romulans.
00:59:22
Speaker
We'll find out what that's all about.
Narrative Critiques and Inspirations
00:59:24
Speaker
and And this is the final of its time quality. 9-11 is your story starter. So the the the Logan was the inspiration, but the story starter is 9-11 happens, which causes another 9-11 to happen, which sets up an even bigger 9-11.
00:59:41
Speaker
Like that's the premise of the show. The first 9-11 is the is the Romulan star exploding, which causes another 9-11, the synths rebelling on Mars and killing and destroying Mars and all the people there, which sets up a third one, which I guess I won't spoil, but it's tied into the synths and all that stuff.
00:59:59
Speaker
Um, and so that's very Mars and the mark didn't the Mars one happened first. And then that's what made them recall. And then the Romulan star exploded killing. So it's a little little, it's a little hazy on the timeline of when, when one explodes versus the other.
01:00:15
Speaker
I'm not entirely sure to be honest with you. In my head, it was happening, after the star exploded because they said 900 million and I'm like, okay, well, if the Romulan start, we saw no nine, um,
01:00:26
Speaker
that the the planet was destroyed. So that'd be billions of people who died. So you couldn't, you couldn't actively say that they were getting that everyone, you know, people who had gotten off the planet or were stranded because the star exploded, that would cause a lot of ripple effects. So I don't know.
01:00:40
Speaker
I could be wrong that one happened them, the other, what the order is, but, Three 9-11s. And that has been a pattern for all these Star Trek stories going back to 09. Star Trek 09 starts with a 9-11.
01:00:52
Speaker
You know, it's like, and then Star Trek Into Darkness is a 9-11. And then in Star Trek Beyond, they're trying to prevent a nine eleven and And so and then even in Discovery, it's like every season of 9-11.
01:01:05
Speaker
So it's just ah it's like ah it's a tired. I think it's a tired story story trope right now. But even Enterprise is doing that. Right. Talked about this in our episode, Kristen. Like that was what season three was about was the hunt for bin Laden after a 9-11 attack happens on Earth.
01:01:20
Speaker
So. That's had repercussions. Okay. would you consider Would you consider the ah the whales movie, them trying to prevent the 9-11? Because a huge probe showed up talking to whales, and then they had to go back in time to get the whales to come back forward to prevent the 9-11?
01:01:37
Speaker
Well, just from 2022 standpoint, you know thinking about the writers at the time writing it, they certainly weren't thinking about it from that time. They weren't they couldn't but they were conceiving of essentially a massive that was a planetary destruction, an environmental disaster, the end of the human race that our our environment, the world as we know it. That's truly true. That's certainly true.
01:01:56
Speaker
That was this Leonard Nimoy. Yeah. Yeah. But I think with the 9-11 type stories, they do. They are kind of like easy setups because I think for the people making these shows and and but my recollection nine eleven is 9-11 was a huge fiasco, terrible tragedy that also then quickly established the the shakiness of our government and our leaders and the effectiveness of all that. And are we really safe?
01:02:24
Speaker
Or what is the what are the actual priorities of the people that we've elected to take care of us? Blah, blah, blah. So it set up this thing train ah chain of events that I think that makes it easy then to transfer those concepts into other story ideas.
01:02:39
Speaker
and worlds, which I think is what we got here. So that's that. I feel I'm burdened now. Good. I'm glad. Okay. The line must be drawn here.
01:02:50
Speaker
Great lines. um Yeah. OK, so Dodge says to Captain Picard or sorry, Admiral Picard in this one, retired. um Have you ever been a stranger to yourself? And he says many, many times.
01:03:05
Speaker
um I have because it made me laugh every single time I've listened to it. I even go back and rewind it is when Dodge has run out of Chateau Picard and she calls her mom. She goes, hi, honey. And then she goes, mom, someone tried to kill me.
01:03:19
Speaker
it's just It's just the way she says it. And it's so out of out of the place. It's like it's just very funny to me. But he quotes Shakespeare, which I already mentioned. And then I had your line as well, Kristen, what you mentioned. OK, hey, look at that. Yeah.
01:03:33
Speaker
look at that I really like... I got three Picard ones. He's got the best lines in the episode, for ah um in my opinion. The first one is, i don't want the game to end, which was lovely.
01:03:46
Speaker
um The second one I have he is... when he is Wrapping up that conversation with the reporter, he says, I was not prepared to stand by and be a spectator. And you, my dear, you have no idea what Dunkirk is, right? You're a stranger to history.
01:04:04
Speaker
You're a stranger to war. You just wave your hand and it all goes away. Well, it's not so easy for those who died and it was not so easy for those who were left behind. We're done here. which I thought was great.
01:04:15
Speaker
Can I interject? That scene, that moment of that scene was really great. And I was really annoyed watching it this time around that they chose to cut away from that and have that playing sort of in the background because that really was a great moment of that scene where, you know, Picard, we've already cited a couple of moments where he really hits the no lives.
01:04:35
Speaker
Like, but that was also just as good as any part of that. It was bummer they cut away. And this is a very Logan inspired line. But when Picard says, I haven't been living, I've been waiting to die.
01:04:48
Speaker
I think that's a really compelling, if you love this character and you know the sort of adventure his life has been, and then you catch up in this show and you're like, oh, it's been X number of years since he's resigned from Starfleet. What has he been doing? You know, he's ah he's on the Chateau, just like we saw at the series finale of of The Next Generation, that this is a potential future for him, that he was just going to have this quiet, retired life.
01:05:13
Speaker
I love that that that he had sort of Romulan- you know, what would I call them? Housekeepers or, or, or helpers or aides or whatever they are like friends of his who are like, who remembered what he did, what he tried to do to help Romulus.
01:05:27
Speaker
But I love that, that, that, confession of Jean-Luc's where he's like, I haven't been living. I've been waiting to die. It made me excited. It makes me excited for the rest of Picard, right? You're like, yes, finally.
01:05:39
Speaker
What are we going to do? Let's go. I'm in your corner, dude. Let's go. Let's round everybody up. Whoever you need, let's go get this thing done. Very exciting. All right The Anton Caridian Award for best performance. Hector, who who are you putting here?
01:05:53
Speaker
um Anyone but Patrick Stewart. I'm kidding. He's the best. He's still even the age that he is. He's he is beautiful to watch. He's really beautiful. he's so human and so great for this character. I want to highlight Alison Pill as Agnes Jurati.
01:06:09
Speaker
I think she is funny. I think she's got a really difficult role to play. And I think that she is so believable in that. in in that scientist role. I think that she's really, really great. I also have another one that I can hold off on, but I'm going to highlight Alison Pill as Agnes Jurati.
01:06:26
Speaker
Oh, Kristen? Oh, yeah. No, just going to give it to Patrick Stewart. See, I want to highlight Maren Dungy as the ffn FNN news reporter. Yeah. Yeah, that's a tough role.
01:06:37
Speaker
Yeah. Francie from Malius. yeah Nice. But also just really, really good in that in ah in a really, yeah, exactly. A very tough role. And she's basically speaking exposition and she has to give a little attitude.
01:06:51
Speaker
You know, it's it's a very modern character, but it's written that way. You know, it's a very contemporaneous to 2020 and all that. But I don't know, she was giving as good as she got and she fit in. And just want to highlight it. stood out as like very consistent. She had a role. She nailed it.
01:07:06
Speaker
Who else did you want to highlight, Hector? I really like, especially rewatching this episode, knowing where what what this actor does and what this character where this character goes for the rest of the two seasons.
01:07:18
Speaker
Orla Brady as Laris, the Romulan woman who was helping Picard. I think she's lovely. I think that she is is really, really believable in her and her in in the way that she is to Jean-Luc. it's you know the The other male Romulan character.
01:07:39
Speaker
Instantly you know, like, oh... this is a absolutely plausible, believable relationship here. Like, apps you know exactly who she is in his life. like immediately And I, and I think i was that actor.
01:07:50
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. I love that too. Why not? Why the hell not? I think that that actor did such a great job that the actor almost, um, carried on beyond whatever they had in mind for that character. You know what i mean? Without giving away too much of what Picard, what it does, I just think that like, you can even see from episode one, you go, oh, she's really, really good. Keep her around Patrick Stewart. They have a really good chemistry when they're in scenes together. So.
01:08:17
Speaker
Totally agree. And they they this show was very much in the state of flux in its development. The first two episodes got expanded out to three. They were figuring out the story a lot of the time. So when they got lucky with her, I think for season one, she kind of doesn't she's not in as much as you would think based on this episode. And that's part of the reason why is they were still trying to figure it out.
Romulan Scene and Patrick Stewart's Performance
01:08:39
Speaker
The Shatner, b Brian, what do you have? Whoever did the voiceover for the assassins when they raid Soji's apartment? Where are the rest of you? She's activated. She's activated. part of that is they've got the voice filter on these helmeted guys, um which, by the way, they're only helmeted because they're Romulans and the producers don't want to reveal that, which is silly.
01:09:04
Speaker
And then the fact that they beam in and kill her boyfriend and then fight her. so just beaming her out. It just doesn't. You know what I mean? It's just silly. But anyway, that what adds to the silliestness the most is, is that she's activated. She's activated.
01:09:19
Speaker
What did you think was going to happen when you knocked her out? Yeah. Punched her. ah Let's put this bag over her head. That'll let'll solve the whole thing. Yeah, exactly. Okay. any Does anyone else have a Shatner that they want to throw in there? I know this is a touchy thing. This is not criticizing actors for their acting ability. This is just who went for it.
01:09:38
Speaker
Who went for it? I would give it to Patrick Stewart. I think he goes for it in the scene where he... you know, gets fired up and yells at the, uh, reporter when he goes, because it was no longer Starfleet. I'm like, that's going for it, baby.
01:09:53
Speaker
Do it. ah I like that. No, that's true. He, he definitely has good moments and, and extreme moments in that one. That's true. So, um, I put the index character at Starfleet.
01:10:07
Speaker
Oh, good one. That's right. Yeah.
Starfleet Policies and Animated Series Timeline
01:10:10
Speaker
Yeah. buttic is possible All right. Also a hologram, but yeah which is which is nice to see. It feels like they forget sometimes in the newer shows that there can just be holographic characters.
01:10:23
Speaker
What part of this are they teaching at Starfleet Academy? um This was maybe a little tricky because there's a lot of bands and genociding races. you know It seems to be the policy of Starfleet now, but I had whatever shit they're they're developing at the Daystrom Institute because Bruce Maddox don't think the show remembers, was a Starfleet officer who worked in cybernetics.
01:10:48
Speaker
But then he left to join the Daystrom Institute and then pulled Agnes Girardi out of Starfleet to join in there. And I can buy that he left Starfleet at some point and worked at Daystrom. But, you know, I'm sure that the information exchange kind of flows both ways.
01:11:03
Speaker
So whatever they were developing there at the Advanced Robotics Research Lab. That's why I think I put nothing because they don't seem to want to have any part of this shit whatsoever. Like it's very Trumpy and no learning. star Yeah, I think. Yeah, there I also had um I don't I know what they're not teaching at Starfleet Academy, which is the history of Dunkirk, because I think john was right.
01:11:28
Speaker
They don't they don't they just gloss over that. Yeah. how would the predecessor show or captain resolve the conflict? Now, folks, is a little tricky. Ooh. Because the predecessor show is Star Trek Discovery.
01:11:40
Speaker
Yes. The predecessor captain in the chronology of where we're at in the Star Trek universe is technically Captain Janeway. Technically, you're wrong, Brian. Who am I missing? Technically. Well, i'm glad you know I'm glad you asked that, Brian, because I have a beef to pick with you two.
01:11:56
Speaker
And that beef is that you have declared that you guys are not covering the animated shows. So you messed up. Because chronologically speaking, my friend, Picard season one, as we know, ah clearly ah takes place in the year 2399.
01:12:13
Speaker
So chronologically, before that, you've got a couple of options. You've got 2387 in the prime timeline when, of course, Spock Prime. went back to the Kelvin timeline. If you want to count Chris Bynes Kirk as the predecessor captain because of that time shenanigan, you can do that. But to go back even further. Yep. Yep. if If you want to go back even further than that, um Star Trek got to mention this after Voyager, ah which takes place. Let's see. The last season here of Voyager is 2377 2378.
01:12:43
Speaker
twenty three seventy seven to twenty three seventy eight So a few years after that, in 2380, is the first season of Star Trek Lower Decks. And each season has been a year after that. So 2380, 2381, 2382.
01:12:58
Speaker
From 2383 to 84 is the first season of Star Trek Prodigy, which also has a completely different captain than Lower Decks. than low you know There's so many captains to choose from. I'm still an Admiral Janeway in that.
01:13:12
Speaker
There is i just has a hologram. Now, if you had been watching the animated shows, you would have been like, oh, the new Trek shows definitely remember the holograms because there is an entire character in Star Trek Prodigy that is a hologram.
01:13:25
Speaker
ah character again, just echoing what what Voyager did. But my beef is, is ah you guys are what I love about the show, but also a kind of is driving me nuts about your guys's plan is what I love is that you're you're bouncing around and you're doing the pilot episodes, right? One episode each in each different era in each different show Star Trek as someone who has tried to figure out the best way to introduce Star Trek to people, the best viewing order, the best, you know what i mean?
Serialized Nature and Viewing Challenges
01:13:55
Speaker
Like I have thought about this a lot and I've pondered, I wonder if just like bouncing around to each show would be a good plan for new viewers, for people who never got into it so they could kind of see what they vibe with.
01:14:08
Speaker
um And I think it especially works with the episodic nature of classic Trek and Next Gen and the shows in the 90s and even Enterprise, I think. The thing is, is that the new stuff from 2017 to now is so serialized that I'm like...
01:14:23
Speaker
almost pulling my hair out. I'm like, I wonder how it's going to be for you guys when you do the first episode of discovery and then do a bunch of other stuff and then get back to the early part of discovery. You know what i mean? Like, and I also just want to say, i totally get that you guys were like, we have so much stuff to do. We're going to focus on the live action series, but I think that not covering especially lower decks and prodigy,
01:14:47
Speaker
as new Star Trek shows with their own complete seasons or whatever to cover those pilots, which I think are very strong is kind of dismissive. it's ah It was a bit of a bummer. It's, you know, animation is not the most important thing in Star Trek's history, but Star Trek had an animated iteration even before Star Wars had one movie in theaters. You know, animation is a is an important part of Star Trek history. And now more than ever, I think that Prodigy is doing some stuff that Brian, you said, and I'm calling you out, brother. You were like Prodigy is very much kind of an an echo of Voyager and Lower Decks is doing this comedic thing where like you kind of have to know next gen to watch Lower Decks.
01:15:28
Speaker
You're not wrong. But I think Lower Decks is also its own accessible thing. I think you could watch. Am I saying all of this? And you guys have already seen the animated shows. that what's funny? Is that why you're lying? I am dying because have nothing to do with like what shows we watch and what order we're doing. am just along for ride. Kristen, you're cool. Listen, Kristen, you and I are cool.
01:15:48
Speaker
We're tight. We're going to hang out. It's totally awesome. But now I have beef even more beef with Brian. Brian, what the heck, bro? well I cannot believe he out Star Trek nerded you. I can't believe it. definitely thought about if people were to go and watch Star Trek, where would they start?
01:16:07
Speaker
That was certainly baked into the concept of this to some degree. But I'll just throw out right away. If anyone's interested in watching the original series, in 1991, for the 25th anniversary, a syndicated strip...
01:16:20
Speaker
ah hosted by Shatner and Nimoy, did the Viewer's Choice Top 10 Star Trek episodes. And that was my gateway into Star Trek. Wonderful. Star Trek fans from the 60s and 70s were basically calling in and they picked the 10 best episodes that they thought at the time. That doesn't mean that those are the only good 10 episodes, but they were the 10 best.
01:16:41
Speaker
And I think that list holds up pretty well. So you can find on memory alpha, just type in viewers choice marathon 91. um In terms of the serialized episodes, when we are done with the strip, we're going to hit we're going to do a couple of random ones to set up Picard season three. We've got like a, we're going to,
01:16:58
Speaker
We're going deal with Moriarty because Moriarty is somehow a character in Star Trek but season three. Yes. But he's got two Next Generation episodes. Lore is in there. So we're going to do some more episodes. And then we're going to go on a run of just finishing off Strange New World season one. That's right. And we're going to do Star Trek Picard season three.
01:17:15
Speaker
those are so we're going to try to do some blocks for the serialized ones and keep it consistent. Like you said, with Discovery, it starts to get tricky. So that's definitely something i'm mindful of. And then to fold it back into the animated shows, it's what I said before.
01:17:29
Speaker
there They're born on the backs of these other things. So why not just first cover those other things? And maybe somewhere down the line, we'll cover them. But at least... Yeah, maybe let's tackle the 800 hours live action. The 800 that we already have, and then we'll go into Well, I think Lower Decks is...
01:17:50
Speaker
more enriching if you have seen most of the shows which isn't to say that's not funny on its own and sure i mean i did my job i went i watched the deep space nine episode and i and i enjoyed that they recreated it and also um is it tawny newsome yes she's she's from the bay so i you know i she's from vacaville she's like right by my hometown so like i'm in the bag i'm like i'm on board um with Mariner. And if she ever wants to come on the show, we'll do a details nine. It'll be great. But, ah but, you know, just in terms of like, like I said, 808 live action episodes, let's let's tackle. You're not wrong.
01:18:25
Speaker
But listen, it's, it's, it's, you're totally right. And I liked what you, you said, because you're true. It's that it, it enriches the experience of those animated shows in particular more.
01:18:36
Speaker
But I think the same could be said, obviously with Picard. i mean, you guys are going back and doing, you know, older classic episodes Moriarty so that the car season three will kind of land better. And if there's somebody listening and they're like, I haven't really done Trek, but I'm going to follow along with this fun podcast.
01:18:51
Speaker
It's a great way to get somebody current and up to speed on Picard season three. But I say, hey, Prodigy is currently airing its first season and maybe before season two or whatever, you guys could go and tackle that. It's his own little serialized thing. And the sort of same thing with Lower Decks. I think they're, I'm assuming season four is coming out next year because they've wrapped their third one this year and each season's 10 episodes.
01:19:13
Speaker
And again, just to go to bat for those stories, they absolutely, are are for Star Trek fans who know the stuff and it's why not go back and watch all that stuff first to then better appreciate the animated thing.
01:19:25
Speaker
But, um you know, I just saw these all these pilots get in love, you know, all the different eras of Star Trek get in
Animation's Role and Future Star Trek Plans
01:19:31
Speaker
love. And I was like, and also, to be fair, i do consider Star Trek the animated series of the 70s. I'm like, just attach that to the original series. that To me, that's not like a new show.
01:19:41
Speaker
It's like a continuation. You know what i mean? I see that like. Roddenberry said as much yes too. Yeah. i I see that as like their year four on their five year mission. It can just be part of the thing, you know, and, Same with the movies. I'm glad you guys didn't try to introduce the movies as part of your like pilot you know ah marathon that you're doing. Yeah, no, we don't have time for that.
01:19:59
Speaker
Don't have time for that. But do not discount Lower Decks. It is a blast and a half, but it does have its own unique things that I think they can do that other Star Trek hasn't done. And I've seen people talk about Prodigy, which is the show for children, I might add. It's the it's the one geared towards the kids on Nickelodeon.
01:20:18
Speaker
But moments in Star Trek Prodigy Fans have talked about him as like being the most Star Trek-y thing since like an episode of Voyager or Deep Space Nine or Next Generation, you know? So they're doing beautiful, beautiful things.
01:20:32
Speaker
Don't count them out. They're great stuff. And that ah that's all. I imagined you standing on the transporter pad making this speech and I'm behind the transporter console and Scotty's pulling your arm saying, listen, they've got to go The ion storms closing our portal to the other dimension. Yeah. Now I'm going to say to you what Spock said, Captain Kirk, I shall consider it.
01:21:00
Speaker
There's so much. And I'm sure Kristen is like, dude, shut up. We don't have the time. Well, this is why i appreciate this is why i preach you yes this why I appreciate you so much because you are always game for everything and you have such an open mind and you're just like, I want i want to see it. I want to experience it. I want to try it. I want to do it.
01:21:19
Speaker
That's why it's great. You're the perfect guest for this episode. i do Here's my infinite diversity, Hector. yeah That's why we're asking how would a different show in the Star Trek universe do this?
01:21:30
Speaker
I'm the person who I'm like, get into Star Trek. Sure, I'll watch every episode of everything ever. That's the the insanity that I am. You're over here, Brian, like, reasonably, just watch the best 10 episodes. um Okay, so we're going back chronologically. Also, as someone who's seen them all, I am saying, watch the best 10 episodes. I know.
01:21:46
Speaker
Start there, and then work your way out. Chronologically, I think that Captain Dow from Star Trek Prodigy would probably find a way to help...
01:21:57
Speaker
Dodge in a way that um without knowing exactly what was wrong with her, obviously because he's a kid, he's 17 years old, he doesn't know what the heck he's doing, but Hologram Janeway would have some really good um in ah um like advice, but I also think that Gwynn who is another 17-year-old on the show Prodigy. as She's the communications officer officer. She's also trying to escape her father on the show, who is voiced by the dude from um ah Fringe.
Speculation and Future Series Ideas
01:22:28
Speaker
But that relationship would make Captain Dow really consider helping Dodge in a different way. If going back to the Lower Decks Mariner, she's not the captain. It would be cap Captain Freeman.
01:22:39
Speaker
she would probably be maybe as effective as Picard. She would just do it a little bit slower, I think, but she's also... And there'd a lot more yelling. Very much yelling. The Lower Decks crew would mess it up, but also somehow help.
01:22:50
Speaker
I don't know. It'd be really funny. I think Janeway would be an admiral, right? She'd probably be assigned with figuring out what Picard's doing or the security threat. And so she would basically be on the hunt for Dodge.
01:23:01
Speaker
And then she would very quickly discover... and because she's Janeway, she'd like get to Dodge very quickly and like figure out something else is going on, like Starfleet's kind of being weird about this. And then she would just switch sides and she'd she'd help.
01:23:15
Speaker
I'm so fascinated by this era of Star Trek that I hope that they keep doing stuff beyond Picard season three that's still set in this timeline, you know, so they could bring back actors from the other shows if they wanted.
01:23:27
Speaker
I think that'd be great. I'm so fascinated. Everything you just said, I'm like, I'd watch the hell out of that. That sounds great. Yeah. I mean, there's been rumblings about a Janeway style Picard show. And I don't know. At the end of Voyager and in retrospect, I'm like, oh, I like also really like Kate Mulgrew personally. So like, i don't know her. I just like her an actor. Personally, we're really good. My very good friend, Kate Mulgrew. We're going to get a beer with her at the happy hour tomorrow.
01:23:50
Speaker
yeah Yeah. I'll mention it to her. We'll see what she's doing. Kristen, do you have a concept here? So I'm just going to do what I think Michael Burnham from Star Trek Discovery would be would do.
01:24:01
Speaker
And that is maybe just do a hostile takeover of Starfleet and steal all the tech that she thought she needed in like the most um unreserved possible way.
01:24:13
Speaker
Yeah, that's that makes some more sense. All right. So then that that brings us to Trek, Marry or Kill, the pilot episode of Star Trek Picard. Patrick Stewart's triumphant return to the Captain Picard character. I'm going to kick this to Hector first.
01:24:30
Speaker
I would Trek the hell out of this episode. I would Trek it. I don't think I'd marry it. I certainly wouldn't kill it. um It may be my favorite episode of season one, but I also really liked the finale. And I know that was kind of divisive, but I really liked where this season ended.
01:24:47
Speaker
And I like other moments in season two, but yeah, I think this is pretty good. I would track it. I'm so um'm I'm very much intrigued by what this episode sets up. I think it's a really strong first episode for a season.
01:25:03
Speaker
I would also track it. I liked it. and I want to see more.
01:25:08
Speaker
I'm giving this a a faint track, but a track as well. And I base it on the fact that I think I've seen this episode four or five times. So even after I watched it the first time, after all that excitement, I definitely rewatched it very soon after. And I've watched it in the interim since. So.
01:25:23
Speaker
um Yeah, so Trek, we definitely recommend everyone checking, especially if you have any inkling about sticking around for Star Trek Picard season three. I'm sure it's set up so that you don't need to have watched the other seasons, but i kind of think, not for completionist's sake, but...
01:25:40
Speaker
It's worth going on the journey with Patrick Stewart and and Captain Picard to see, or Admiral Picard, to see how this all winds up, I think. Hector, is there anything you want to plug?
Heroes Reforged Channel and Star Trek Introductions
01:25:50
Speaker
but Heroes Reforged, YouTube.
01:25:53
Speaker
If you're looking for reactions everything come out, are you watching the Megan trailer and reacting to that? Oh my God. No, we skipped that one. I can't remember the last trailer we watched. I think it was... um Transformers or Indiana Jones or something or Super Mario. But um Megan, i don't know how to feel about that one. I'm going to wait for that to come out, I guess, before I see before I go to the theater to see it, see what people say.
01:26:15
Speaker
All right. And so check that out. Subscribe to the channel, especially if you're in the in the good geek stuff, mainstream stuff that you can watch, you have reaction. And Hector is going to he's ah he's exactly the energy there as he is here. i mean, we got we got pure Hector is great. Yeah. yes Yeah.
01:26:33
Speaker
So yeah that that was if you end up editing all that out of the episode. No hard feelings. Oh, yeah. We're going cut these down to a lean fifty five. Yeah. a lot Yeah, that's fine. But um I am honestly very excited because with my love of Trek, my my two buddies who we like watch shows, the three of us, they've never really seen Star Trek.
01:26:51
Speaker
Like you said at the beginning of this. And next year we're going to dive into it. And I'm the fool that has come up with the plan, the game plan here. They have no idea what we're going to And I'm going to try and do it chronologically.
01:27:03
Speaker
But if I give you guys a hundred guesses, I don't think you'll guess where we're actually going to literally start watching Star Trek. Are you um including the films?
01:27:16
Speaker
Absolutely. yay Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. All right. Yeah. Subscribe to the YouTube channel. You'll find that out. Follow us on social media, Trek, Mary, Kill, where it's Trek, Mary, K-Pod. And online, we have a website, trekmerrykillpod.com.
01:27:28
Speaker
And thanks for listening. We'll be back again with an all new episode. And until then, TMK out. Bye.