The Delta Flyers - Darkling

Episode Date: June 21, 2021

The Delta Flyers is a weekly Star Trek: Voyager rewatch and recap podcast hosted by Garrett Wang and Robert Duncan McNeill. Each week Garrett and Robert will rewatch an episode of Voyager starting at the very beginning. This week’s episode is Darkling. Garrett and Robbie recap and discuss the episode, and share their insight as series regulars.Darkling:The Doctor adopts some impressive character traits from historical figures into his Starfleet database, but inadvertently adopts several abnormal traits as well.We want to thank everyone who makes this podcast possible, starting with our Executive producers Megan Elise and Rebecca McNeill, and our Post Producer Jessey Miller.Additionally we could not make this podcast available without our Co- Executive Producers: Stephanie Baker, Philipp Havrilla, Kelton Rochelle, Liz Scott, Sarah A Gubbins, Jason M Okun, Luz R., Marie Burgoyne, Chris Knapp, Michelle Zamanian, Utopia Science Fiction Magazine, Matthew Gravens, Brian Barrow, Rich Gross, Mary Jac Greer, James Zugg, Mike Gu, Anna Post, Shannyn Bourke, Vikki Williams, William McEvoy, Sarah Thompson, Holly Smith, Dominic Burgess, Amber Eason, Lucas Shuck, PJ Tomas, Nicholaus Russell, Darryl Cheng, Alex Mednis, Elizabeth Stanton, Kayla Knilans, Ariana, Marcus Vanderzonbrouwer, and Shambhavi KadamAnd our Producers:Chris Tribuzio, Jim Guckin, Steph Dawe Holland, James Amey, Katherine Hedrick, Eleanor Lamb, Richard Banaski, Eve England, Ann Harding, Laura Swanson, Ann Marie Segal, Charity Ponton, Chloe E, Kathleen Baxter, Craig Sweaton, Nathanial Moon, Warren Stine, Mike Schaible, Kelley Smelser, AJ Provance, Captain Nancy Stout, Claire Deans, Matthew Cutler, Crystal Komenda, Maxine Soloway, Joshua L Phillips, Barbara Beck, Elaine Ferguson, Mary O'Neal, Aithne Loeblich, Captain Jeremiah Brown, Heidi Mclellan, John Espinosa, Dat Cao, Cody Crockett, Stephen Riegner, Debra Defelice, James Cottrell, Cindy Ring, Andrei Dunca, Daniel Owen, Jason Wang, Gabriel Dominic Girgis, Amber Nighbor, Liz Lowe, Ming Xie, Mark G Hamilton, Rob Johnson, Kevin Selman, Heather Choe, Michael Bucklin, Lisa Klink, Justin Weir, Joseph Michael Kuhlmann, Mike Chow, Kevin Hooker, Peter Lucas, Michelle Maroney, Rickard Fahlander, Meg Johnson, Victor Ling, and Scott J. MarkThank you for your support!Our Sponsors:* Check out Mint Mobile: https://mintmobile.com/TDFSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/the-delta-flyers/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Hey, guys, welcome to the Delta Flyers. I'm your host, Gera Wong, and of course, my co-hosts, it will always be Robert Duncan McNeil. Hey, guys. Hey, you can wear blue a lot, man. You don't wear blue a lot. We already talked. Orange is huge. I like that color.

That looks smooth on you. Thank you, buddy. Um, this was, I put this on a little while ago, because I was going to go mountain biking. Yeah, that's where I thought you were. And I stepped. I was going to go. Yeah. And, uh, I got up this morning early with a dog, went outside. It was freezing. Oh, no. So I was like, oh, well, I'll wait a little while until the sun, you know, kind of warms things up. Yeah. And I went back out to go mountain biking, got all ready to go. And it's colder. Yeah. It's gotten colder. I was like, no. No way. I'm not worth it. I'll go in the basement and do a treadmill or something. Nope. Nope. Well, it's cold here in Los Angeles. I'm visiting my parents right now. It is cold here. Really? Yeah. So I go, I go back to Vegas tomorrow. So we'll see what happens if it's, if there's a cold front there, that'd be wonderful. I think it's warming up here soon. I mean, look, I'm so grateful for the weather

where we are in Utah. It's usually sunny. It's very mild. Nights are cool. There's not much rain. I think they get like maybe an inch of rain a month tops, you know, one, one range hour a month. Like, we don't get a lot of rain. So I'm very lucky, kind of like California weather. Yeah. And I will say, I think we may have spoken about this before, but I'm going to say it again, man, Utah snow, there's just something different. And it's so crazy because you- It's dry and fluffy and powdery. Yes, but Utah is right next to Colorado. And Colorado snow and Utah snow, there is a definite market difference between the two. Oh yeah. So much lighter, so much fluffier than Colorado, New Mexico snow, any other states that border Utah, they don't have the same snow. And I've skied,

I have skied on all of those states. I've been to Taos, New Mexico, I've been to several resorts in Colorado, Utah, I've been to Snowbird, I've been to Deer Valley. It's amazing snow up here. It's unbelievable. Yeah, it really is. Alta. Alta is the only only ski resort I know of, maybe they've changed, but they'd never allowed snowboarders. Yeah, I think Deer Valley doesn't allow snowboarders. God, I love that. Unless they've changed recently. Yeah, yeah. I'm sorry all of you snowboard enthusiasts, but I, I, sometimes when you're skiing, you just don't want to see any snowboarders. You just want to be on your skis and just deal with skiers only. So, um, no, Utah's got amazing. People should come visit. It's a beautiful

state. There's lots of national parks and great skiing and winter sports. And it's just a, it's a beautiful state. It really is. Are you west of Salt Lake, north or south? I am southeast. I am southeast of Salt Lake. One direction I don't pick. Okay. Southeast. Just slightly southeast. It's just under an hour from, you know, 45 minutes to an hour to get to Salt Lake, 45 minutes to the edge of Salt Lake. And then, you know, an hour to the airport. So yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. not bad. It's not bad at all, but it feels very, yeah, we love it here. We're really, really very happy. And this area that we're in is, I think, one of the fastest growing areas in the United States in terms of new people moving in. It's really booming right now. In your zone

right now? Yeah. Yeah. Wow. Even though most post offices and people don't have your That's why it's, that's why they don't have my address in the postal service because there's so many new houses, they can't keep up with all the new properties that are here. It's like they keep adding. Right. And it's fairly remote. I mean, it's not. I'm in a kind of a remote place, but I love it up here. It is, it is quite remote, but it's, but it doesn't feel remote, you know, get to anything I need and, but it's super quiet. Well, from your pictures, that you've shown me, it doesn't look like there's anything around you. Like I look at that and go, where are your neighbors?

Like if you grow up in LA or New York City, you automatically assume you're going to look at your window and you're going to be able to see into the window of your neighbor, basically, right? And then your photos just look so remote like you are on Mars. You're on another planet. It reminds me of, it reminds me of when Renee, Obergen-Wa was alive. He, and I love that man. He was such a wonderful human being.

Just, it's very sad. Very sad. Very sad. I actually, I remember when I saw the, someone had posted that he had passed, and that's when I first saw it on social media, I actually started crying. I was at a restaurant, and I just lost it.

Okay, so go ahead. My point was Renee had bought a home, up in northern California near a place called, I think it's near Jerry Taylor's property. Oh. Sea Ranch or something, whatever that area is called. Okay.

And I remember seeing photos of Renee's house and it was just on this bluff and it had an open view. And I remember thinking, good for him. Like, he was actually an inspiration to me. Really? Look into living in this kind of place because when I would talk to Renee

about how much he loved, his home up there and they would get away and just find so much rest and peace and quiet. Yeah, Renee was part of the inspiration to come to a place that's more remote, but not totally remote and peaceful and beautiful. And because I travel so much, I mean, you know, you travel too for doing convention work and life and all the things you do, I realize, you know, in the world these days with Zoom and the way that our business, you know, that entertainment has changed, you don't need to live in L.A. anymore. You don't need to be there. That is true. That is very true. I was talking to Roxanne's husband, Eric, after we had done our interview, I texted

Eric. I texted Roxanne's husband because we used to ride motorcycles together. And I was like, Hey, Eric, I hear you went through. You drove right past me in Utah, you know, good luck on the move. And then we ended up jumping on the phone for a while. And Eric, who is a casting director, a very successful, big casting director. For many, many years. For many years, has a company that's still very active and one of the biggest casting companies in Los Angeles. Eric says he has not been in a room with actors in a year and a half.

And his business has changed now. He goes, I don't need to be in Los Angeles to be a casting director. I can do it from Nebraska, you know, or wherever, you know. You could be anywhere. Yeah. Yeah. That is amazing. You should have started your text with him by saying, hey, I'm kissing your wife.

I'm watching me kissing your wife on the episode. We're reviewing is what you should have started with. Yeah, I should have. But yes, but thank you to Renee for inspiring you, right? So there you go. We still think of you and we miss you and we love you, Renee, wherever you're at right now. Absolutely. Yeah.

Yeah. So yeah, living around the world is possible now. And you don't have to be in Los Angeles, which is amazing, which is great, right? And I would imagine that's true for a lot of businesses. You know, I know it's true for television, the television world, because they're filming everywhere now. Los Angeles is not the center of the television production world for sure. So you can be anywhere. And I bet that's true for a lot of businesses. Yeah. Whatever, you know, if you're in finance or banking or computer software development or

whatever, my, you know, my father passed away last year as well. It was a rough year for losing people last year. My father died a little over a year ago. And he was remarried. His wife is named Patty. She's in the computer. My father's wife is a software development person. She has been living at the beach in North Carolina working for, you know, a company based out of Atlanta, but working remotely for a couple of years now. Yeah. Like her business is all remote as well.

Yeah. And they've been talking about how because of the pandemic and so many people forced to work from home that now people are used to working from home. And that a lot of companies are like, well, do we really even need them in the office any longer right now? It just seems a bit of lip service just to say, hey, come to the office. Why? Because we want you to be there like you were before the pandemic? Why? It doesn't really, you don't need me.

You're used to having my productivity. As long as I get done, what I need to get done today, it doesn't really matter where I'm at, right, any longer. Because I guess the fear from employers is, if you're at home, you're going to goof off. You're not going to do it. I think it's the opposite. I think for, you know, now that people are working remotely, they're working 24 hours a day. I find myself, you know, working on the weekends, working at night, jumping on Zoom's, jumping on phone calls, 24-7, which is, you know, I've heard of people who now in this new remote world have said at 5 o'clock, I am auto-responding to all my emails that I am done with work for the day and I will respond tomorrow. Yeah.

They've got to actually create limits because right. the remote work, you end up working more, you know. That's crazy. So what these employers have feared, the exact opposite is happening. I think so. You're getting more productivity from your employees if they're at home. Yeah. And you don't have to pay for the brick and mortar office for them to be, you know.

Oh, yeah. That's right. Saving money there too. Big time, big time. All right. So this week's episode is Darkling, Darkling, okay? For all of our listeners, Robbie and I. are going to go watch the episode. We'll be right back for all of our Patreon patrons. Please

stay tuned for your bonus segment. What do we remember? Hey, everyone, we are back from watching Darkling. Yes, we are. My goodness. Right off the bat, Robbie, one to 10. What are you going to give this one? What are you thinking? I'm going to give this. I mean, I'm conflicted here. Okay. Because in theory, I like the premise. Yeah. And I really thought Bob Picardo did a wonderful job in the episode it reminds me in some ways of like threshold you know yeah i felt like you know as a as a an acting um challenge threshold was great for me but as an episode i know a lot of people don't like it and and this is kind of like that for me it's like okay i appreciated his performance i appreciated the the concept in

theory but i thought the way it all laid out in the end i was like and there's a bunch of holes in it for me okay i did think i'll say uh teleplayed by joe monoski um i thought there were some wonderful scenes and moments in the episode really wonderful stuff that joe found right you know uh separate moments i thought alex singer our director Alex singer did a wonderful job i think this may be his best work as a director. It was beautifully shot. It was staged well. There was a lot of great moments directorially in it.

But I did, you know, after I watched it, I did a little Googling, and I found a comment that said that this episode is the first of what's known to some fans as the Trilogy of Terror, three consecutive episodes that are not considered very good. what are they like what are they so it would be darkling first of the three the next is right yeah and then next his favorite son oh which i know is big one for you so some fans are kind of with me on this one at least i i just kind of walked away from it going hmm it just it kind of was a little bit of a dud for me. Okay. I'm going to give it a, I'm going to give it a five, maybe even a four and a half out of ten, four and a half or a five. Yeah. Okay. Something like that.

What about you? Well, I, you know, my, I always take longer to go through these episodes. Yeah. Then you do. So I, in essence, rewind, rewind, and I, in, in the recap or the rewatch, I end up really rewatching the episodes five or six times. It's what I do. And my first rewatch was not, I didn't like it. I was like, oh, no, what is going on for doctor fans? You know, this is like the worst doctor episode ever I felt in the beginning. Yeah. As I kind of watched again, I really like the writing.

And the story is by Braga and Monoski. The teleplay is by Monoski. So I like Joe's teleplay. There was some really, really great. And when we go through the recap, I'll point out the points, the areas that I thought, or the dialogue that I thought was so amazing. Because I did think some of the. Yeah, I agree with you. I think there's some wonderful lines and moments that are really profound and deep thoughts and big ideas from both the doctor and from Kess.

I thought, you know, Kess had a lot of really profound dialogue and ideas. Most definitely. You know. Mm-hmm, definitely. Some lessons to be learned from this episode for sure. Yeah. Okay, so let's start off with our poetry synopsis. Why don't you give us your haiku? Yes. I'm going to give you the limerick. All right, here we go. The haiku for Darkling. Kess thinks she's in love. The doc enriched his program. Things got pretty weird. yeah that's it you sound like uh the french stewart character from third rock from the sun and harry when you went pretty weird and this is kind of how he talks though okay um here we go here's my limerick and by the way i've narrowed it down whenever whatever time that we've allotted for us to meet back up for the recording yes you if you add on 30

minutes then we're good that's pretty much what it is it's always going to be three and a half hours and not three hours that I'm going to need. Okay. Because the half hour is going to be only for... Only limerick. Limerick. That's it. Yes.

Okay. Here we go. My limerick for dark. Zahir romances young Kess and makes her swoon. New subroutines turn the dock into a goon. He knocks out Zahir. Hypo sprays engineer. Fixed by Torres, his program can now resume.

Ooh. Nice. Nice. I think you capture the plot much better than my things got pretty weird. I have more time. I have more syllables. Yes, you do. You have a lot more real estate in the limit. Yes. But the danger is when you select the first rhyming word, right? So basically in limerick, the first two lines rhyme. The third and fourth will rhyme. First, second, and fifth will rhyme, correct? And then the third and fourth are rhyming. When you select that first, rhyming last word. It locks you in. And if you can't find, you know, you might come up with this really cool first verse, but then the second verse, you're like, oh, crap. And if you do find a good second verse, sometimes you can't find a third word that rhymes with the first two to, to wrap the

whole thing up. It's difficult. Yes. Limericks are hard. I know. All right. You're going to be done soon. We're almost done season three. We're getting there. Good. All right. So our guest stars were David Lee Smith played Zahir. I thought he was wonderful. I totally get why Kess had an attraction and a and a fascination with him. I thought he was great. Stephen Davies is Nakon. You know, sort of the bad guy, the guy in the bar. Another guest star I want to point out, very important guest star who played the ensign in the turbo lift in the one scene where Paris showed up. She had three lines, I think, was Sue Henley. Sue Henley. That's the stand-in

for Janeway. That was Cape Mulgrew's stand-in. For the entire seven years. Sue was there for the whole time. The whole time. Sue was awesome. And had a wonderful little cameo, a role as the ensign in the hallway that almost gets taken by evil doctor. Yes. Do you remember the buzz

around when she was about to have her line? Yeah, because this literally, This was like front page views on the Voyager Gazette. I mean, it was like, oh my God, Sue's got a line, Sue's got some lines, Sue's going to speak. And everyone was, especially Sue, Sue was jazzed. And the funny thing is, Robbie, I thought Sue's line came in season six, not season three. No, three. It was three. I didn't know.

I didn't know. Did you also notice Sue Henley is also in another scene in the very beginning at the lodge. she crosses camera as an alien. That's her in the very beginning there. That's right. No lines, but she's an alien. So she's one of our regular background actors, as well as Cape Mugrews' stand in for the entire city.

Well, it's funny. You're right. I remember that now, noticing that there was Sue walking by. Was she an alien? Yeah, she was an alien. She had stuff on. And the funny thing was she wasn't from the McCauley aliens. She wasn't like Zahir's race.

She was a different alien. She was another race. It was weird that they would put. put her in the same episode as where she has the line yeah alien background and a starfleet crew member very strange continuity choice for sure for sure and that's probably why they made her this alien that was that it was even more um had more facial stuff than yeah zahir's people right so yeah that's probably their way of hiding her well we open okay so the episode opens in this lodge in this bar and we realize that we're at some outpost of the macaul travelers i think right yeah yeah

and these are these adventure types they're like frontier you know individualists they're out there on all these amazing adventures and um you know they're they're they're this loose group of explorers yeah and they know this territory so that's why we're there to find out what what's in front of us Yeah, Janeway's captain's log She says there are loosely governed Race of Explorers that has extensive knowledge of the territory ahead of us. So we need

this information and that's where we see we open up inside the lodge and Janeway is completely you know, focused on mesmerized. Yeah, mesmerized is even a better word. He's talking about this this moon or this asteroid that they found

that in his story, he says it turned out that this thing it was a living creature the entire asteroid the whole thing was alive and Janeway's never heard of such a thing and she's wrapped up and then Kess comes by

with Zahir this handsome man she's been working with him to get some medical supplies and restock Voyager for some things they may need and Zahir hears this and he's like I've been there and I've been there I've never, you know, we didn't detect any of that. So you already are getting a sense that these are like tall tale tellers, you know,

that these people, you know, a lot of these people like Nikon, uh, tell big stories about adventures that may or may not have happened. So we know that we're not sure if we trust him, but, but, uh, Zahir, you know, Kess is a very taken with Zahir right out of the gate. Yeah. And he feels like he's, uh, you know, uh, we feel like he's, uh, you know, uh, we feel like he's, He's a very trustworthy guy, and it's Zahir. There was a really tense interaction between Nakan and Zahir.

Like when he, you know, he kind of bends over to him and says, like, do you challenge my right to travel and go freely? And so this is now we're kind of- It's almost like cowboy talk. It is, but we now know a little bit about this McCall traveler people, this race, that, you know, there's certain things that they hold very dear. And obviously, freedom to go anywhere is part of that, you know. And that's, and there's something in their, in their culture or their race where, where if you challenge that person, then you have to duel them or fight. There's, like, something's going to go on.

I mean, we're not clued into what's going to happen, but you're right. You're getting a little tidbit of that, right? And that's important for Kess's story, because just to kind of take a big bird's eye view of it, Kess is really considering this whole episode about leaving Voyager. That's right. The big decision she's got to make. She, she, you know, is deeply attracted to this, this guy. We realize that in an early scene with the doctor coming up,

that we realize that Kess and Nelix are officially done. Yeah. They talk about that. And yeah, that's a big, this freedom to go where you want, to freedom to travel and do, you know, pursue anything you want to pursue is really important to these people. And that's very attractive to Kess at this point. Hey, I have a name for it.

It's the McCall mantra. Nice. Nice. Oh, my Lord. Okay, so now we're in the resort program, right? Yes, we go to the holodeck, and there's Neelix and the doctor, and they're talking, and Gandhi is there, Lord Byron is there. That's a good Gandhi.

That was a great. Yeah. Yeah. And Gandhi is talking, and they're talking philosophy, and the doctor's taking notes. And Gandhi's saying, you've got to temper your urges, and Byron is going, no, you've got to pursue passion. And docs is taking down all. these notes, and he talks about, Kess arrives, and he talks about his personality improvement project. So we realize the doctors on the holodeck studying all of these very, very famous

people, Gandhi and Lord Byron, and he says Da Vinci, and Tapao is there. Tapao is an Asian Vulcan, An Asian Vulcan who becomes very important in Enterprise, the series, by the way. Tapau becomes a very important character down the road. So, yes, one of the most famous Vulcans ever. Different actor, though, that played on Enterprise?

Yeah, probably. I think there may have been a Tapau actress in NextGen. There may have been one in the original series. I think this character has been popped up in a number of things. Yeah. And you forgot. Socrates, Socrates is sitting there next to across from Topal playing Kelto looks like, right?

So, oh, and he also mentions Madam Curie, but we don't see her. Madam Curie is somewhere floating around. So, yeah, so Doctor is just trying to integrate these character elements that he finds admirable amongst these historical figures. And he thinks that if their traits are integrated into his program, he will have a better bedside manner. He's just going to be a newer, improved doctor. And in theory, it makes sense, actually. It does. In theory, all these super smart people, he's pulling from the greatest minds of all time.

It sounds like the kind of thing, you know, I would do is like, oh, I'll read these great books, and that'll make me a better person. So it's, you know, it's logical what he's trying to do. That's logical. And Kess shares that she's met this guy's here. And she's clearly infatuated with him. And the doctor notices that. And he basically thinks she's rebounding off of this.

Well, not only does he notice it, he already knows it. He knows that he's. she spent all this time with this guy and he warns her the McCall or bad news, you know, and you're just affected by your breakup with Neelix and you just need a cold bath. In the words of Gandhi. He suggests a cold bath. Yeah. Yes.

He pulls a little Gandhi. Yes. We go to Sick Bay after this and we see the doctor moving around the biobed and he's taking a look at Bala because she's not feeling well. But I have to say, in the very opening shot, as he's walking by that wall, I remember Marvin Rush fought with this issue for the whole run of the series. As you pan across those vertical yellow line, gold lines. Yes, right by the clamshell. It sort of, it can, moray is the term, but it sort of distorts. Okay.

And it was weird because as Bob is walking around, the doctor's walking around, there's all this weird halo around him of that moray, that distorts. distortion. But part of me was like, well, he's a hologram. That would be cool. Like, wouldn't that be cool if they had, even though it was a mistake. And I know Marvin fought with this all the time. Part of me was like, oh, that would have been a cool thing to introduce as part of his, as part of his holographic reality that he always sort of had a little bit of distortion around him because of the projectors and things like that. That could have been a cool thing. That is a cool thing. And so that's why they always say, if you're going to be interviewed on camera, never wear stripes because it will end up distorting the image the camera just doesn't they can't

pick it up properly um so i have a question for you if mark what was marvin arguing for what was he trying to tell production that needed to be done what was he just he originally i remember this conversation originally he was like these vertical lines they just it's impossible i can't fight them he would try tricks like changing the shutter angle of the camera changing frame rates they would change the the frame rate of they try to they try different light bulbs in there and all kinds of things because you've got these fluorescent lights and the way that lights work is they sort of bounce out hundreds of pulses of light per second you know there's a rate to the to the way that the lights are flashing basically we don't notice it with our with our eye but but the camera

picks that up and it gets in out of sync with the lights and the lines and it's just yeah it creates this problem. So Marvin would always try to limit the camera movement and things around that because it just, well, you can see it in your background. There's the, there it is right behind you, all those vertical lines. Yeah. In your background right now. Yeah. And they're kind of distorted. Yeah. A little bit. They're not perfectly straight. So he would try to say like let's try not to shoot in that direction and just avoid that or try to limit the camera movement and things like that. But in that opening shot, the doctor's doing a whole circle around the bed and it pans him over. So you've got this to move. You have to track. You have to track the doctor. Okay. I got you. Wow. I didn't know that that discussion was going on. Now that's an issue. Yeah. Now that's an issue. Yeah. And he's acting very strange. It's almost like he's taken on the Lord Byron passion. Well, kind of. I wrote creepy doctor. So I don't know that's strange. I wrote creepy too. Okay. I wrote creepy too. because he he ends up touching her belly

Oh my God right in her belly and going Does that feel good? It's completely sexual. I love her line when she says Unless you want me to knock you into the middle of the next millennium, you better back off. And he goes and he says,

I'm going to review these additions to my program. I felt it very funny. I love the tweaks of dialogue from regular 21st century cliche lines. Like you would say to somebody, I'm going to knock you into the middle of next week. That's what we'll say, right? But then for Star Trek, Manoski tweaks it to say, I'll knock you into the middle of the next millennium, which is awesome.

I love that line. Yes. Yeah. Basically, Bilana says, you know, she's like, what? You've been messing with your pro. You can't do that. You've got to be careful. Yeah.

And she's telling him all this. And there's a great little two shot there. She's saying, you know, you got to be careful. You don't know what's going to react. Can I read what she says? Let me read what she says. behavioral subroutines have a way of interacting with each other that isn't always predictable. You've got to be careful or someone might hurt you.

And then the camera pats down and the camera tilts down. And you see his hand caressing her leg. He's like, oh yeah, okay. Creeper. Yes, he's creepy. Oh, my God. Creepy doc. So we see the beginnings of a problem there.

Yes, we do. And we go into the woods back on the planet. And Kess and Zahir is, they're walking through this beautiful forest and great, beautiful planet. And she's talking about, you know, he's talking about these adventures he goes on. And she's like, that sounds amazing. But do you ever think about like a bigger purpose, what you'll leave behind? And he kind of says, no, I've never thought about that before.

But now with you, I see the fellowship that you have with your crewmates. and I see that has value. Start to see these two sort of learning from each other and connecting, which that was great. There's also a shot behind them where we see three moons and kind of the point of view, the vista that they're looking at. And it's a beautiful shot. That's a vis effects wise.

It's stunning. It's perfect. Beautiful shot. One of the lines that I forgot to talk about that he had was right when he meets Janeway for the first time, back in the initial lodge scene that we see him. She says, she's, basically he's introduced to Janeway by Kess. And Janeway says, pleased, like, pleased to meet you. And he responds with returned.

I love that line. He says, returned. Like, usually someone says, yeah, great meeting you as well. But he says, returned. So just the style of Zahir's speech. Yeah. And the entire conversation between Kess and Zahir, walking through this mountainous trail, this bonding moment between these two characters,

just the dialogue was John Mnowski really found a philosophical approach to this whole episode dialogue-wise there was deep thinking and deep ideas they got profound ideas about the meaning of life all throughout this episode which I thought were really good My people are parapetetic by nature

we live for the excitement of facing the challenge of space alone I mean very simple line but the use of parapetetic and just how it's constructed I just enjoyed his writing for sure Yeah, well, it's a great scene. Ends with them kissing. Yes. And very romantic.

Why is he there? He's showing, he's taking her to show her this sort of like a inscription. Yes, on a rock. Which I loved on the rock because it had these like glowing sparkles. Sparkly. It wasn't just carved in. It was almost like this. This was a Star Trek sci-fi inscription, a futuristic inscription.

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And as he does it, he sort of, his hand glides across the inscription. this beautiful inscription and lands near her and then she says thank you for this and then the kiss and then the hands touch and then the kiss and it's very beautiful and we think it's all good except that as the camera pulls back we see there's a creepy figure a hooded character hooded character watching them oh yeah uh kess beams into the transporter room and she is all a glow yes her middle name is glow. Yes. Glow. Does she have a last name? She doesn't have a last name, does she? I don't think so. Just guess. Okay. Well, she is, let's just call a glowing Kess. Clearly, they have consummated in some way the moment after the kiss because she comes in and you think that, hey, wait, wait, wait, do you think

she had Nookie? I think they did something that was really. Really? Yeah. No, I read it as she just had a really great makeout session. I didn't, I don't point of actual intimacy. I don't know. But if you think that they knew each other biblically or that is your your i think she was glowing in a way you glow after after you've gone completely into the romantic activity okay okay um even the extra i can't remember who it was it was one of our regular extras there yes even the extra kind of looks and goes oh yeah i see what happened she got a good moment there she got showcased there you know yeah a lot of our background a regular background had great moments in this um um we could caught out in the hall and Tuvok's walking down and he sees Kess approaching. He says,

computer, what time is it? It's three in the morning. Oh, 300. Kess comes up and he's like, hey, Kess, what's up? It's 3 a.m. You got to report due. And I got to say, I felt like, wait a minute, are you? That is, that, are you? Yes. Really? Tuvok. Tuvok, this is, he is definitely, well, if you think about it, he has counseled Kess in, trying to focus her her powers her mental powers you know he's trying so he's basically served as a father figure for her in a way he has just like the doctor i mean i look at the doctor and tuvac as either father slash uncle figures like you know definitely male figures in her life um that are guiding her right so uh yeah he is definitely acting like a dad right there yeah um but she um she knows

she's got this report to at 8 a.m. We go to sick bay and the doctor is also awake at 3 a.m. And he's working in the dark. Yes. And he says he reminds her in addition to the report. He's like, you know, you forgot your summary analysis report that was due from last week. And she's like, oh, yes. And then he starts to say, you know, I've noticed you're increasingly unpredictable. You've got these swings of your moods. And she responds, you know what? Everybody is treating me like I'm still a child. I'm nearly three years old now. If I'm attracted to someone, it's my business. And I had to stop. I was like, oh my gosh. That's amazing. Only in Star Trek. This became an episode of Beverly Hills 902 and O where they're talking to the parent.

The parent is talking to the guest. Right? Yeah. Yeah. I love that though. She's nearly three years old. Yeah. Anyway, we go to the ready room. Kess is looking even rougher here than than before, which I don't know if that was intentional or just, you know, but she's pulled an all-nighter. Yeah. And she talks to Janeway, and she's like, I want to go on this adventure with Zahir. I may, you know, I may leave Voyager. I may decide this is an opportunity. I can't pass up.

She says, I've already lived a third of my life. She's, she, you know, they live till nine or 10 years old. She's almost three. Yep. So Janeway says, I'll help you, you know, weigh your choices. weigh this decision, you know, your decision, but this decision is your. And it does feel like we're moving towards Kess leaving Voyager in this episode. It does. Let's not ignore the little tidbit of character development for Janeway. We do find out that Janeway was a procrastinator

back in her academy days, putting off an important task until the very last minute, then rushing through it, she acknowledges that she was the master of that. So that's a nice little tidbit that we don't know about, you know, which makes me feel better as a person because I've always procrastinated my whole life. So, and they say procrastinators are perfectionist, basically, right? So, yeah, so it does look like she's about to make her move away. Yeah, and she's going to go on a bit of a test run by going with Zahir to explore this Salarin Rift and then meet back up with Voyager. And Janeway says, well, you know, just take your time with this decision before you make the final decision. But that final decision must be yours and yours alone, Kess, is what Janeway says. We jump to the lodge

and Zahir tells Tuvok that he needs to avoid or Voyager needs to avoid the Tarkin and the Tarkin or a race that are so powerful that they will basically hijack your ship and abandon your your crew on some remote location. Similar, yeah, they're similar to what the Kazon did to us. us earlier where they kind of marooned us on that really primitive planet, right? Yeah. At the end of basics, beginning of basics part one and basics part two. And so this is what the Tarkiner is the Tarkener, the Tarkiner, he says, near this plasma belt that you've got to go around.

Yes. Tuvok is like, well, that's going to take us months off our direct course to the Alpha Quadrant. So he's very torn. Yeah. You know, but obviously, again, it's, it's saying that Zahir is a, is a pretty heroic guy. He's, he's really giving them help and he's an honorable, good, good guy. So he also says that he's in love with Kess and he wants her to come with him and he's going to keep her safe. Normally, it's every man for himself.

But when, when, you know, they take that kind of commitment or responsibility in a relationship, that he will keep her safe. I wrote down in my notes that this essentially was Zahir's plea or Zahir's pitching Tuvok as if Tuvok was the father. Like he wants Kess's hand in marriage in a way, right? Because traveling for the McCall travelers is basically it's their life. So he's asking for Kess to share his life with her. So I wrote down, he's asking dad slash Tuvok for Kess's hand in marriage here.

Yeah. The next thing we see is Zahir out in the woods and he's alone. He's by himself and he hears someone. Yes, he calls out. And then suddenly he's sort of surprised and quickly pushed over the edge of this cliff. Yes. And he falls in slow motion, which I noticed, you know, You know, again, we don't normally do slow motion on Voyager.

You don't see it. We didn't use it a lot. And I thought Alex Singer, in directing this episode, did a beautiful job of doing things like that, like really, you know, making these moments very cinematic and cool. So I thought that was cool as the hear goes down in slow motion. And shocking that he's being attacked by who we don't know. and of course the next scene we're in the lodge and go in the bar

we see the hooded guy we see the hooded guy that was tracking him before and steps the hooded guy steps in the bar down comes the hood and it's evil doctor evil doctor yes

evil doctor and he he ends up grabbing the lodge keeper Nikon Nikon yeah grabs Nakon and sort of forces him over by the fire and grabs his hand and shoves his hand into the fire and basically says you're going to you're going to help me you're going to get me

out of here i need i need uh you know safe travel out of here yeah and he says it's kind of weird he says he needs a ship and passage off this world isn't the ship the passage off this world i think he means like you need to set me up safely not just get out of here but yeah i need to yeah get out of here under the cover of night whatever and he says you need to arrange this and kind of threatens him Basically, I'm going to burn you or kill you if you don't do this. Yeah, good. So we come back and we're in sick bay and Kess comes in and, you know, turns on the doctor's program.

He appears and she says, so here got hurt. He was, he fell off of a cliff. He's injured. He needs medical help. Medical attention. We need your help doctor. And the doctor's like, great. Sure, of course.

I will come help. But this seems to be nice doc now. So, you know, a little confusing. Wait, what's going on. And just to clarify. So here is not, he's no longer at the bottom of the ravine. He's at some emergency facility, some type of, you know, medical facility with a on the planet, yeah, on the planet with a McCall physician who is in charge and is waiting

for the doctor to come down to help assist is what's going. Yeah. Right. And the doctor's like, I can regenerate things. I'm good. It's good. We have the technology. I'll fix this right up.

Yeah. So we go into the transporter room next. Mm-hmm. And Balana is there. No, actually, Blana is not there. They're about to head onto the, into the transporter pad and Blana rushes in. Blana rushes in and says like, hey, hey, wait, whoa, wait a minute. There's a problem with your program, doctor.

I need to run a complete analysis of all the doctors, of all of your subroutines while they are running. So you got to come with me. And the doctor is, you know, he's like, okay, that's fine. Kess, you go ahead. You can handle it. You know, I'll be there soon. So then they end up in sick bay and Torres is basically debriefing the doctor on the fact that these dark threads that are running through.

these historical figures personalities are going to affect his program uh in a negative way and um so she has found a way to sort of uh and put a program in that will search for all these uh other personalities and extract them from his program purge all of these dark algorithms all of that stuff yeah and the only way that's going to this program can start running is if the doctor turns off his program and so as he tries to turn it off he starts fritzing and Again, great job by Alex Singer. We don't see the doctor fritzing in. We just see the reaction on Torres's face.

Yeah. Tora's looking very scared of shocks. Yeah, yeah. And we cut away to the hallway where Tuvac and Janeway are talking and walking down the hall. And he says, you know, they've analyzed the side of the attack and they can't find any DNA evidence, which is very strange. Nothing. thing. There seems to be, it's as if no one was there. Correct. Correct. And they come around a corner and the sick bay door opens and there's Balana lying on the floor by herself. Right.

And they rush in. The doctor appears and he blames it on the food, you know, the indigestion she was having before that he was. Well, he called it delayed anaphylactic shock, which is hilarious because people that have anaphylactic or allergies towards foods, it's immediate. It doesn't, as far as I know, like, they eat it and they've got to go to the hospital or get an EpiPen, but this is delayed anaphylactic shock. So she ate it and a whole day later, you know, so his, his, his, um, explanation is a little faulty, I think. So a little faulty, but it works. Yeah, it works. Yeah, it works. They believe him. They totally believe him. I also, okay, so then they leave and we find, uh, the doc Fritz again. Yeah. And he sort of fritzes into Evil Dock, back to Evil Doc. I just got to say,

I loved the makeup department and what they did. They put in some contact lenses that just changed his, his view, you know, his face. Yeah. They put in some teeth or something, I thought was very cool. The lenses were interesting because his pupil is still the same color. It's just the very outer ring is that light color. That's what I noticed, right? And don't forget the whole reason why Janeway and Tuvark were walking over to Sick Bay in the first place was he had a tricorder which contained all the raw data from the forensic investigation on the attack on Zahir. So that was why they were there. So he hands that over to the doctor saying, well, this is for your further analysis and we're out of here. And that's when he starts fritzing into evil doctor. Evil doctor. Yeah, with that cool

look. And the facial twitch that he does, you know, it's like, oh, evil man. He wakes Balana up. yep and he he gathers a bunch of hypersprays first of all like four or five of them yeah and you're like what the heck is he doing doing and um and he wakes her up and basically says he gave her ketylene to simulate anaphylactic shock yeah so that's why that's that's what happened when she had that look and we cut away he must have given her kettleine or at that moment so that she passed out and now he's given her these other hyposprays that have paralyzed her so she can't move. Can't move.

Yeah. And he's very rough with her. It throws her down. It gets very physical and basically. And he's taken her comm badge. Remember, he's taking her com badge off too. Yep. And he basically says, I need your cooperation.

Right. And he wants her cooperation because he wants her to delete good doctor and he just wants to be bad, evil doc. And she's like, I can't do that. I can't delete one without the other. Like they go together. And she said, you know, you're destabilizing. Like with both of these, with your program messed up like this,

the way they're reacting, you're destabilizing. Which makes them angry. He's not happy about that. So that's when he hypo sprays her so that now she's her whole upper body as well as her lower body. She's just laying there. She can't move her face or head. She can only speak. She can't even talk.

No, she can't talk either. She shuts her up. Remember that? He's like, now he goes quiet or else I'll cut your tongue out. I mean, he's so bad right now. Yes. Yes. Yes.

Yes. And that's when he heads down the hall. And that's where he starts following Sue Henley, the ensign. Yes. Yes. And you feel like, oh, boy, he's going after this ensign. And they get into the turbo lift together. And she says, deck 10.

is deck 14 And then Paris joins First time we've seen Tom Paris in the episode Yeah To the pops into the turbo lift Yeah nice casual scene with you Very happy go lucky Tom Paris And he says like hey doc, what's up

And you notice You could see the doctor sort of turned away Yeah like hiding his face Yeah And Tom's not really looking at him much either He keeps sort of you know It's that elevator etiquette Where nobody looks at each other

Everybody's just sort of looking around and talking words, but not really looking each other. And then Tom's like, well, great talk. Doesn't notice that it's evil doc. Yeah. And Sue Henley and Paris both step off. Well, you saved and since Sue. It was you that saved her from being. Like, what do you think he was about to do to her?

I think he was going to take her hostage. I think he was going to do. Or grab her or fondle her or something because he kept staring down at her. posterior. That's what I noticed. He was checking out her bum the entire time on the hallway and inside the turbo lift and it looked like he was trying to restrain himself like, no, I can't do this. And then he kept looking down. And the other thing is this entire time I'm thinking, I'm watching the doctor, all I can think about is Tuvok from the episode where he basically does the mind meld with Souter. The episode Mel. Remember that? He turns evil and he's in that. He's in

he's in and he gets where he's at he's he's evil in sick bay is that force field around him where he tells jane way you know you make me sick you disgust me and it's the same same thing it's the mirror universe evil version of tuvok in meld and now you see the evil bad version of the doctor in uh in this episode so that's what i was thinking about the entire time i was watching the doctor well he doesn't he doesn't get sue henley so no he saved thanks to tom paris yeah and the doctor goes to his gets off and heads into the holodeck. We're not sure what his next move is, but... Oh, no, we do know what his next move is.

Remember that? Because he, after he tries to get the information from Torres. Yeah. She says, I'm not going to help you, right? In a really restrained kind of almost cling-on-sounding voice that she had, she goes, I'm not going to help you. And he's like, fine, I will find out the answers from my progenitors. So he decides that he's going to go to the historical figures.

Yes. And Gandhi and Tapani and everybody. That's right. Yeah, he's going into the holiday. That's right. Now we go down to the planet and Tuvok is interrogating Nikon. And Chakotay carries Zahir in, who's taken this fall. This was the moment I was like, really?

The guy almost died. He fell off a cliff. And now we're dragging him into the pub. Because Zahir is going to show them where the actual attack took place so they could have a real, you know, get the precise readings and investigate. right but you're right it's like wait a minute dude you just fell off a clip and here you are you're just walking in you've got a couple of nicks here and there right yeah but he's going to show him yeah he's gonna take them to the attack site yeah yeah and uh and so then we go to sick bay oh did you say that tuvac was

interrogating to con at first you say that okay starts with that interrogation doesn't get much and chikote shows up and they're like well we're gonna go to the attack site yes um and then we go to sick bay yeah and uh kess sees balana unconscious uh tries to activate the doctor kess you know calls for the doctor and and the computer says well that program's already running and she says where where is the doctor what's his location well he's currently running in holodeck one yeah and so kess goes running down to holodec one and when she runs inside we see gondi with his head spinning around like a crazy guy like it was like out of the exorcist or something. And she looks over and to Paul is like fritzing and, you know, not working.

And then, and then who was it on the floor? Socrates was like only his upper torso was left. Yeah. So it looks like the evil doctor has gone on a rampage. When he can't find the answers that he needs, he ends up just messing up the historical figure to the point of, yeah, let's face it, he's basically killing them in a way. You know what I'm saying?

He's disfiguring them. figuring them yes so uh the doc is there and um and he and and and kess he runs in you know kess runs into him and like he wants some excitement yeah so funny because it's like an extreme version of what kess was expressing before it's like yeah you know i want i it's all passion and right and excitement and rightishness and self-absorbed and just me me me and yeah anyway He grabs Kess. He kidnaps her. And kidnaps her here.

He says, let's go. He takes her to the transporter room. He walks in and we see my stand-in, John Tampoya, operating the transporter pat and basically just phasers him. Phasers him and he does his on stunt. Yeah, he does his own stunt. Yeah, he yanks him and throws him on the floor. He throws him on the floor.

It disappears behind the console. It was great. John did it very. He did. So he's going to escape. from Voyager and take Kes with him. This entire time, Kess is pleading with him, trying to, trying to use logic in a way to try to just convince him that what he's doing is wrong. And the doctor is always is coming back and just saying that, you know, no, this is this is what has to happen.

Well, it has to happen because he says that doctor is weak, that I've got to get rid of him. And Kess is going, he's still inside you. Like, you know, there is there is good inside of you. There's empathy and there's good, you know, light inside of you. And he's like, no, I don't want. That's later, though. That's later because we have to, yeah, but yeah, she does, she does expand on that later, but she starts to talk about that here, you know, that's the beginning of that conversation because we then jump to the bridge where Kim, we see Harry, he detects that

there is an unscheduled transport taking place and transport of room three. And also there's a scattering field that has masked at the location of where they've transported to. So we're not sure where they've gone to. Yep. That's when we jump to the planet surface. And Chkote and Tuvok are with Zahir at the place of the attack. Tuvok scans have shown that the doctor was the one.

Yeah, there's residual holographic signature is there, and they know that it was the doctor. Right. And they tell this to Janeway. Janeway's just like, what? The doctor, she doesn't know what's happening. Then we flashed to the lodge. This is where the doctor has transported with Kess.

They're back at the lodge because they're waiting for Nikon. And Nikon's ship or plans to get the doctor off this world. So the doctor is tinkering with his mobile emitter. He gets angry. He starts hitting it. And then Kess runs in. He's like, stop, stop. And the evil doctor takes pause and he's like, wait, you care about me or do you care about him?

You know, and then this whole conversation begins, this philosophical conversation. The doctor thinks that he deserves to exist. The evil doctor deserves to exist more than regular doctor because darkness is more fundamental than light. And Kess starts talking about empathy and kindness here, and that cooperation and understanding are truly the essential qualities to life as we know it, because everything that we have today, or at least everything that has benefited society, has come from cooperation. Yeah. Yeah. She says families wouldn't exist. Societies wouldn't exist without cooperation and understanding. Right. And that empathy and kindness are basic to every form of life. That's right.

And they have this wonderful, you know, Joe Mnowski did a great job of scripting the scene because there's some big, big ideas. And they're sort of debating light and dark here and the two sides of the doctor. When suddenly Nekon comes in and says, hey, Doc, sorry, Janeway is cordoned off the whole area. You're not going to get out of here. I did what I said. You know, I got your ship, but you're not going to get out of here. And pay me.

He says pay me. And pay me. Exactly. See, that's what got him punched. If Nekon didn't say, the con just came in and said, hey, I set it up, but it's not going to work. And then left, he would have been fine. But he said, pay me. And that's when the doc backhands him, knocks him back and says, I've got to kill you.

And that's when Nekon says, well, if there's going to be one person who dies today, it's not going to be me. And he runs really quickly out of the lodge. Yeah. And then we go to the woods and Tuvok and Chukotay are there with Zahir. And Doc and Kess are running through the woods. So we see a bit of a chase starting. a doctor and Kess are trying to hide because he doesn't feel like he can escape since the ship and any escape route is cordoned off yeah so they're being tracked yeah and they end up by the

by some cliffs some other cliffs here and and then Chocote and Tuvac have caught up to them they shoot a phaser and it and it collapses all these rocks come crashing down in front of them they can't go further on the path exactly it blocks their path and they're stuck on the side of the cliff with rocks on one side or Tuvac and Jacote on the other with phasers drawn and and he's degrading you know the doc is fritzing

here and and they say turn off the scattering field will beam you back will will you know get you fixed yeah and and he said that he was you know he was taking Kess for his for her own good

and and and and and and says you know doctor you've twisted and suppressed everything that's good inside of you and uh as they're having this talk and they're stuck there they both fall off i don't remember no he takes her he takes her because like she tries to she tries to talk reason to evil doctor and finally evil doctor says nope nope nope i'm not having it like that and i'm i'm taking you with me and literally in his mind taking

him as in like no one else jumps off the clip jumps right he jumps fall okay no they don't fall he grabs her and jumps off and much to the shock of everybody standing there. But thank God, Janeway beams, basically beams both of them aboard. Now, this is the confusing part. I agree. That was about to say. Why is the doctor totally normal and himself? He should still be the evil doctor when he's beamed aboard. But I'm guessing the subroutine had degraded so much to the point that it had dissipated on its own. But then it was very confusing. This is the biggest told in the episode to me two things happening here. So they're falling. Yes. And you see a beautiful shot of them. It's kind of going down with them. The camera's flying past the rocks as they're

both falling backwards with their arms, you know, spread wide. And then when they're beamed out of that fall, mid fall, they land both of them standing up with their arms by their side. And the transport. I'm like, wait a minute. They should not be in that position. They should be falling or hitting the ground or I don't know. First of all, first of all, that was my first problem. And then second, yeah, he was totally the nice guy. It was good doctor. And I was like, what happened to bad evil doc? Yeah. There was no explanation of that that. And I went back and rewound it a little bit and I didn't hear anybody address that. So that to me was a huge. Yeah. It just jumped. It's just like ignored. And also there, there clearly could not have been a scene that

that hit the cutting room floor either because what are you going to, are you going to have a scene while they're falling where he realizes, you know, the real, the good doctor takes over evil doctor and becomes that, you know, there's not, that's not going to happen. I mean, the only thing that I could imagine, and this is just me imagining, is that they had figured out how to reprogram his, you know, what Valana said was if we can turn you off and reboot you, I've got this thing that'll get rid of all the darkness, all the, all of that, the bad algorithms. Yeah. Maybe they had that ready to go. So once they transported him, it just instantly sort of rebooted him back to, I don't know. It's, it was confusing.

It's a mystery. It's a true mystery. We don't know. We don't know. Yeah, because we do go to sick bay right after this. And Bologna says she has deleted all those added subroutines and that he is fine. He's back to normal. But that sounds like she just did that now.

I know. That's what I mean. Not that she did it while he was falling, right? so strange yeah strange i agree uh she also says that she's fine too um that she's feeling better from the salad she ate or whatever was going on you know your future wife is very uh forgiving i mean like she just she kind of just like she shrugged that whole thing off like it was nothing and i think that you know her cling on side would be a little bit still pissed off with with uh evil doctor what he did to her but she's okay with that

Right. So she takes off. Kess comes in and the doctor now expresses that he is pleased that Kess has decided to remain on board, which shows that he cares, that he cares deeply for Kess. Yes. And Kess always says, also says that, you know, that she cares for him by saying that I would have missed you two if I left and she walks away. And then he quotes a condensed version of the Hippocratic Ode. Right before that, one of the last things he says that I really love in the dialogue, Basically, he says, if she's changing, then being around those who love and know her best is the best place. I think actually, yes, yes is line. But she's like, if I'm changing, being, she's decided being around those who love and know her best is important.

And I thought that was a really sweet way to sort of, you know, there wasn't a big long goodbye with, you know, Zahir and all that. but you realize that she's really thought this through and decided that Voyager's where she belongs for now. Yes, exactly. And then the doctor does this Hippocratic Oath, which I thought was really great. It was a great little touch. And I looked it up online.

It's a long oath. That's a very shortened, condensed version of the real... I have a vague memory that actually that was Bob's idea. and I could be wrong. But I think that the Hippocratic Oath tag at the end might have been Bob's idea, maybe. I should text him and ask. I'll quote me on that.

I'll text them. I'll ask him that. I would be curious to know if that's true because I feel like I really liked it. All righty. So what is your theme or lesson from this episode Darkling? This was a tricky one. This was a tricky one to me.

But I think basically for me, the theme of this episode is that nature will always evolve towards light, towards the good, towards love, basically. Okay. Yes, both these things, the light and the dark exists in our world. We all have those inside of us. They're all around us, but that nature is sort of working its way towards a place of empathy and connection and love and lightness.

That's the theme that I got from this. Yeah, that's the same lesson that I'm. I received very similar. And it's from that speech between Kess and the doctor when they're down on the lodge about empathy, kindness, cooperation, and understanding being essential to all human life or all life that we know, right? So that is also my lesson to be learned. Nice. Yeah. Well, even though it's an imperfect episode, I really had fun watching it. I thought Bob did a great job. He was so good. And the guest stars were really, really strong. And, yeah, it was, and a lot of big ideas, you know,

which is what Star Trek does so well, better than any other show I know. It really is able to delve into these kind of philosophical, human experience ideas in a cool way. So, yeah. Which makes it must watch television. That's right. All right, guys.

Thanks so much for tuning in for this week's episode, Darkling, Robbie and I will be reviewing the episode Rise next week so join us next week.

See you then.