The Delta Flyers - Distant Origin

Episode Date: July 26, 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 Distant Origin. Garrett and Robbie recap and discuss the episode, and share their insight as series regulars.Distant Origin:Scientists of the Voth race discover the human remains of a Voyager crewman and locate a genetic pattern similar to their own.Season 3 of Star Trek: Discovery is now on Blu-ray™, DVD and Limited Edition Steelbook! The must-have collection features all thirteen episodes and also includes over two hours of special features - including deleted scenes, behind-the-scenes featurettes, cast interviews and a gag reel. Own Star Trek Discovery: Season Three on Blu-ray & DVD now. From CBS and Paramount Home Entertainment. You can win a copy by being an active member of The Delta Flyers. Sign up today at www.patreon.com/thedeltaflyers We will announce the winners in August. 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.And a special thanks to our Ambassadors, the guests who keep coming back, giving their time and energy into making this podcast better and better with their thoughts, input, and inside knowledge: Lisa Klink, Martha Hackett, Robert Picardo, Ethan Phillips, Robert Beltran, and Tim Russ.Additionally we could not make this podcast available without our Co- Executive Producers: Stephanie Baker, Philipp Havrilla, Kelton Rochelle, Liz Scott, Sab Ewell, Sarah A Gubbins, Jason M Okun, Luz R., Marie Burgoyne, Chris Knapp, Michelle Zamanian, Utopia Science Fiction Magazine, Matthew Gravens, Elaine Ferguson, Brian Barrow, Captain Jeremiah Brown, Rich Gross, Mary Jac Greer, John Espinosa, James Zugg, Mike Gu, Anna Post, Shannyn Bourke, Vikki Williams, Mary Beth Lowe, William McEvoy, Sarah Thompson, Holly Smith, Dominic Burgess, Amber Eason, Lucas Shuck, Mary Burch, PJ Tomas, Nicholaus Russell, Darryl Cheng, Alex Mednis, Elizabeth Stanton, Kayla Knilans, Tim Beach, Ariana, Marcus Vanderzonbrouwer, Shambhavi Kadam, and Christopher ArzebergerAnd 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, Mary O'Neal, Aithne Loeblich, Heidi Mclellan, 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, Mark G Hamilton, Rob Johnson, Kevin Selman, Michael Bucklin, Lisa Klink, Justin Weir, Simon Inman, Joseph Michael Kuhlmann, Mike Chow, Kevin Hooker, Michelle Maroney, Rickard Fahlander, Meg Johnson, Victor Ling, Scott J. Mark, and John MannThank 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, everyone, welcome to the Delta Flyers. I'm your host, Garrett Wong, and my co-host, Robbie Duncan McNeil. How are you, Robbie? I'm good. I'm great, actually. Really good. Nice. We've got some exciting news here.

Season three of Star Trek Discovery is now on Blu-ray, DVD, and limited edition Steelbook. The must-have collection features all 13 episodes and also includes over two hours of special features, including deleted scenes, behind-the-scenes featureettes, cast interviews, and a gag reel. Own Star Trek Discovery, Season 3 on Blu-ray and DVD now from CBS and Paramount Home Entertainment. Why don't we have a gag reel? Here's our official gag reel. There's a fake one, not a fake one, but underground one out there. Yeah, we didn't really have a gag real. This is exciting, though,

discovery on Blu-ray and what was the other one? It says Blu-ray DVD and Limited Edition Steelbook. What is Steelbook? I'd like to know what that is, too. I don't even know what Steelbook is, but Paramount and these DVDs and this steel book sounds super hot. I'm into it. I need Steelbook.

If you are cool, if you are a true Star Trek fan, and you are, if you're authentic Starfleet, you need Steelbook. Trust me. I don't even know what it is, but it's awesome because it's got steel in the title. All right.

Okay, so let me wrap this up. If you'd like a chance to win a copy of the season three of Star Trek Discovery on Blu-ray DVD and limited edition, Steelbook. And this is, and by the way, this is winning a copy. Did you guys hear winning? I think it did.

So if you win, it's free. You just get to win it. Well, let me explain to them how they can win it. You don't have to pay for it. You just win it. You just win it. Okay. So all you need to do is be an active Patreon member of ours. And you can sign up at patreon.com forward slash the Delta Flyers. And we will announce the five winners in August. Get in the game. Get in the contest.

Exciting new prizes. Many more to come. I want to show you with the blue screen. Look at the screen. Look what happens to my the tail of the dragon becomes the, Yeah. Oh, yeah. Look at that. It goes back and forth between the space behind me, so it looks like, you know. I like that shirt. What is that? Which one is that? It's a DragonCon shirt, yeah. It's just, it's just DragonCon 16, 2016 shirt.

Every time you work for DragonCon, which I do, I volunteer. I get all volunteers. Every staff member gets a Dragon Con t-shirt. Yeah, that's such a fun convention. Yeah, it is. And this artwork is just awesome. You can see the, you know, it's that sort of like that retro, like, that. 50s cartoon kind of thing, you know. I love so much. You can see the Spock guy right here. He's right there. Oh, yeah. It's very cool. Yeah, it's a cool shirt. All right. So are you doing okay? Everything all right? I'm doing good. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Heading back to work soon. So gearing up for that. Oh, my goodness. Are you going back early? Is that a little bit earlier than you thought?

Not really. This is the normal time. Okay. Yeah, I'm heading back. Yeah, this is the time. Okay, dokey. You're going to have to quarantine in a hotel as well, aren't you? I know. You can't. And stuck up there away from my nice new home that I am so much enjoying. Yeah. But it's all right.

We'll be back. You'll be back sooner than later. Yeah. It'll be good. Okay. So this week's episode is distant origin. Well, let's not waste any time. Let's just go and watch this episode.

I'm excited. Patreon, patrons, please stay tuned. tune for your bonus segment. What do we remember? Hey guys, we are back from watching Distant Origin. Yes, we are. Did you know this was ranked like in 2016 as the third best Voyager episode? Really? Yeah. So I enjoy, I got to say, I got to say, I enjoyed it a lot. I really did. I liked it a lot. but my one criticism is there wasn't a lot of Voyager characters involved like it was very heavy

with the guest stars it really felt like I mean even Robert Beltran who had the biggest story I guess I would say in the episode yeah yeah he didn't have that much like he didn't basically do anything to almost halfway through and then he had some great scenes and great speeches I thought he did a great job but but you know in terms of just screen time he He wasn't on that much until at least halfway through the episode. But it's a good episode. I just wish, I wish that they could have involved our cast even more somehow. So 1 to 10.

1 to 10. What are you doing? I would give this an 8. Okay. I think that, and if the cast had been involved even more, I would give it a 9. I don't think I'd give it a 10. I would. If our cast had had a little more opportunities, I just, yeah, I give it an 8.

What about you? I'm going to give it a 9. Oh, maybe a 9.8. Wow. And I'll tell you why. It didn't bother me, it did not bother me that it really focused on the guest cast, mainly because the guest cast was cast so well with actors that were so talented. I agree.

That they knocked it out of the park. You know, typically if you have an episode which is focusing on guest actors, and guest actors are usually very kind of nervous and they're not used to green screen and they don't know how to push buttons correctly. So there's a little bit of anxiety there, right? Where it translates into not as good acting, I think. And these guys just knocked it out of the park. It really was, it was impressive. The actor that played Gagan, Professor Gagan, he is, or he was the artistic director, the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, right? And then I looked up the guy that played Veer. He also has connections with the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. So I almost wonder,

I wonder if they met. Did he say like, yeah, or maybe, you know, when he was auditioning, maybe he said, hey, I have my colleague who would be great for this other role and told Ron Serma, our casting person. And Jenny Larry Johnson, maybe he said, hey, guys, take a look at, take a look at my buddy. You know, Christopher, he's great. And they were like, okay. And then the gal that played Minister O'Dala, wonderful. She was great, yeah. Yes.

And I love that that was a female. I love that cast a female. Oh, yeah. Which is interesting because, you know, at one point they talk about, oh, all the men are, when they're on the bridge observing, they say something like, oh, all the men are deferring to that female. Yeah. Yes, this must be a matriarchy.

But I was like, well, wait a minute, you guys have a female who's in charge, and you're not a matriarchy necessarily. Well, they weren't, I mean, the way I interpreted that was that when they said that, that was no big deal, because that was what they were dealing with, a matriarchal hierarchy over there. And then when they said, oh, must be a matriarchy. And Veer's like, yep, must be. And they were very, like, no big deal. you know and of course in 1995 when we premiered that was a huge deal for us to have a female leading everything and the other guest star who plays the voth commander military guy that takes over voyager the ship is played by marshal teague he plays halleck and you know what's so crazy

this is a while ago but on twitter marshal teague followed me and i thought why is he following me? Because I've never met him before. Well, the thing is, I've been a fan of Marshall Teague because I know him most from Roadhouse, the Patrick Swayze movie, which is where Anthony DeLongas, my teacher from college, and also who you worked with on Masters of the Universe, you know.

So he's in there. And now from watching this, when I saw his name in the credits, I'm like, that's why he followed me. So I really, I'm going to message him. I'm going to direct message him after this and just say like, you know what, I have a funny story for you. I just want to tell you what's going on. But I'm just really beside myself now.

I'm happy. I know that that's why he followed me now, right? You worked with them. Yeah, I worked, like, sort of. And he did a great job too in that same with Janeway. Everyone just rocked it all the way across every single guest star, which is rare, I think. I always feel like there's one guest star that's sort of like finding their way and sort of like, oh, I'm nervous. Oh my gosh. You know, this was a really strong guest cast. Oh, my goodness, they were so good. Let's start off with our synopsis, poetry synopsis. Let's do that. Let's hear your haiku, sir. For a synopsis in poetic style. Yes, please. Here we go. Let's go. My haiku goes a little something like this. Aliens from Earth. They are dinosaur people can't change.

stubborn minds. Okay. There you go. I like it. I like it. I think it captures the spirit of the episode. Yeah, sure does. Here we go with the limerick.

Here's my limerick for distant origin. Scientists unearth what's left of Hogan. Distant origin theory set in motion. Chocote is taken. Minister is shaken. Eyes open becomes Gagin's new slogan. Oh. slam dunk buddy that was good thank you that was a good one thank you now i'm getting nervous i got

to take over the you get yes you've got four more episodes nailing them you've been in yeah i will say this probably yeah i feel that when we revert back to the original way we've been doing the poetry which is you doing the limerick me doing the haiku it's just going to speed up our production time you know that it just it just for me i usually wait it adds at least an hour an hour just the limerick one more hour just to get come up with the limerick no no they're good they're good thank you thank you okay so this is written by brandon braga and joe monoskey which i did not know i did not realize that and you know there's some really good humorous one-liners throughout this thing uh chikote behind the voth force field with gagan on his ship he's like i won't bite you know your comment to tuvok tuvok i hope that's

your stomach when you hear the little chirping sound right so there's some great little one-liner kind of uh lines there's some nice fun moments which i always love david livingston directed this episode great job i got to say it was a really good job great job you know some of the things that we've talked about david livingston is known for on star trek was using these wide lenses and doing very unconventional kinds of shots. Yeah. I thought he did a great job. We'll talk about it as we go.

I'm going to change my rating, 9.9. I'm going to give it 9.9. Wow. I'm going to go even higher. Wow. Just because I keep thinking about every aspect of this episode. The guest casting, the guest actors acting talent, amazing. The director, you know, he didn't do anything that pulled me out, you know,

or annoyed me or anything like that. He really made everything flow very well. different his choices of of camera angles and the storyline everything for me worked well all right so we we open on this this planet exterior and there's a shot of a volcano in this planet and i just got to say from that first moment i was like oh this is it feels like a movie i love when our show especially with like planet surfaces i just love seeing scope and that cinematic kind of quality of big wide shots. I thought it was really well done.

So right from the beginning, I'm like, oh, this is going to be fun. Yeah, nice establishing shot for sure. And also a good establishment of that we now, we don't hear them speaking in English because there's no universal translator happening. So you hear the little clicks in the very opening scene, right? And it's essentially Gagan, you know, clicking or communicating with Veer that he's found something, right? So that's what I'm assuming he's saying in Voth language, Voth clicking.

But I just love that, that it wasn't your standard, you know, they're speaking English right now. They started with the clicks. So that establishing shot with a volcano in the beginning and establishing shot showing that they are clearly aliens and speaking in a completely alien language that nobody understands. Well, we go in the caves. We don't know exactly who we're seeing because it's dark and we see the back of someone and we see a lizard hand sort of go down. pull up this tattered we see it's a tattered starfleet uniform or parts of it yeah um and we see a little pip on it yeah is that provisional pip that all our marquee uh crew members got when when we did the pilot episode right so immediately you know that they're pulling up some starfleet remnant and i do have to

say though when that lizard hand came in and pulled up the uniform for a moment i went back and freeze-framed it. I was like, they sewed the blue kind of purple undershirt to the gold uniform. And I was like, wait a minute, those are two separate items. There's an undershirt. Yeah. And then there's the gold uniform. We don't sew them together. We, that's not part of our story. So I was like, what? I was like, you're cheating. You know what you're trying to do. You're trying to make sure we know that's a Starfleet uniform, but you're cheating because you're sort of together. Was Hogan a marquee? Huh.

He must have had that provisional. Yeah. And it also could have been the crew. No, it was Hogan, right? Yeah, because Hogan wore gold. He had gold on, right? And where Dennis Maddlo and our stunt coordinator with the wig on when he was eaten, he would, no, he had actually teal. He had that same color as the doctor.

Yeah. I think it's Hogan. I think it is too. Yeah. So the dinosaur-headed aliens pick up some bones. they say this is a genetic match and one of them says this is the most important discovery in Voth history so we know this is a huge big big deal we go inside this research ship where they're kind of examining the bones putting together and we see another the alien hand comes in

I got to say in this moment I thought it was it looked like Alf it looked like the sitcom Alf I don't know why it was like oh maybe they're related to Alf somehow because it's kind of got the three fingers or something you know it was yeah I don't know I had an elf connection okay I did

enjoy seeing this Voth ship I like the look of it like not every ship that we see on Voyager am I yeah most most of the ships are okay and some look not so cool this one looked really cool I'm like oh I like this ship a lot you know I did too. The lights overhead and just all of the...

The interior. Yes. Yes. Yes. And sometimes there will be ships that I like that when we see the interior, I can't stand the interior. I'm like, what is going on with that? And the interior of this Voth ship and also the interior of the Voth city ship, the massive ship, I liked all of it. I really, really was very impressed. I did too. I did too. Agreed. So they're analyzing these bones, where they're computers, the research stuff, they realize that with the bones, that they had opposable thumbs, the skeleton, that, that, that, that they had lots of articulating joints. Yeah. They say something about they're lacking a delitis lobe, which I guess is a part, more brain than humans have, but these dinosaur aliens have a delitis lobe. So I thought that was interesting. They talk about the sense of smell was elementary. That lobe is what makes them

smell so well, the voth, that lobe. Is that what it is? Yes. The delitis. Yeah, because he says there's, since the smell was very rudimentary. Yeah. Yeah. Immediately I started going, oh, I was remembering this episode and the premise of it all of, you know, these, this dinosaur aliens are are kind of discovering their heritage and making this scientific and DNA connection. So we start to realize what, what they're doing. And there's a real poetic moment, I think, where. Gagin says, you know, he's talking about, he's wondering, he says, I wonder if there were

oceans or sand. Were there nine moons? Yeah, did you, he's holding, he's holding, was he holding the skull when he said that? Yeah, yeah. So it was a sort of an alas, a lot, alas, poor York. It was very Shakespeare-esque, yeah, which is, asking the, the skull questions and, but it was, it was wonderful. It really had a humanity and a poetry there that I thought was really interesting. And quite apropos for the ex-artistic director of the Oregon Shakespearean festival for him to hold the skull and wax poetic like that. Yes. Yeah, but they realize they've got to explore this sector. I think they say something like this person only died a year ago or something like that. Right. So we've got to go find them. They could be getting too far away and we won't be able to figure this out. So we got to find

the ship. We're going to need a fleet of ships, they say. A sector-wide expedition. So a fleet of ships to locate where this, the remains of this individual and his, where's the crew? Because they clearly feel like this is, this is the, the answer to finally support all of his claims of the distant theory, distant origin theory that he has espoused for many, many, many years. It's clear that his entire life's work has been about this, right? I mean, he's always felt that they were from a different part of the galaxy, right? Which is heresy. in their world, basically, to think like this. He's got to go, he feels like this is going to convince the Ministry of Elders,

that they'll give us a fleet, and we'll go, you know, finally have the answers on this. Yes. So we go into the Hall of Elders, and there he is making his case. Yeah. Like I said, I thought Minister Ocala, played by a woman, was great. I love that. That was Conchetta Tomei, who's a very well-known and a, accomplished actress.

And she was a regular, I guess, on China Beach, which Bob Bacardo was on. So I guess Bob probably knew her. And this is where you started to see David Livingston's directing style in this scene in the Hall of the Hall of Elders. Yeah. Because he's got these crazy dutched angles and close wide angle lenses and just he shot really cool angles. It worked great for me.

I loved it. Yeah. And, you know, he's, so Gagan, Professor Gagan is. trying to tell minister odal i think it's odala you said okala i think it's odala right o d yeah he's trying to show her listen we share 47 genetic markers with this bipedal endel therm is what they referred to hogan's remains uh referred to him as a bipedal endel therm and right then the person who's standing next to the minister very you know quickly just says we're related to a mammalian species, and you see immediately what they think of mammals.

Not very highly. I mean, it's a lower form of life, just like, oh, yes, that's just horrible. How could that be? By the way, I love the chair that Conchata to me was sitting. Oh, my gosh, yes. So cool. I don't know how they, if they found that at some type of, you know, really, you think they they built that?

Oh, my gosh. It's very cool. Looking at that, that almost reminded me of, something from aliens, you know, that that sort of look that the aliens movie franchise does for the aliens. Yeah, and it's just, oh my goodness, it was beautiful. I thought it was amazing. Yeah, well, so O'Donnell says, you know, this is probably just a hoax, this whole thing, some of these traitors that you've been talking to, giving you information and all your research, you know, they probably just were scamming you, and, you know, we could not possibly be related to disgusting mammals.

Right. And, you know, he says our beliefs need to be re-evaluated. You can sense per skepticism, very strong skepticism. And I also like the visual effect where they showed the representation of what they thought the human look like and it was green in color and he had the three fingers instead of five, right? Did you look closely at that drawing at that piece of artwork? I looked at it. The one thing that bothered me is the Starfleet uniform was all correct. And I'm like, how would they know the pattern and the style? I wish that they had in that drawing, I wish they had done this extrapolation of what these bones looked like. Right. I wish they had made the uniform wrong. Yeah, a little.

How did they figure out exactly the look of the uniform? They should have made it a little more wrong. Okay, I didn't notice that, but did you look at the face, though? not really what was it it's Tarek it is where to you it's it's Ayala I'm looking at it going

oh my god that's a green that's a green faced Tarek face that they put on there and then later when they clean it up when he searches and he's at the you know the trade station where that trade alien says no no this is what they really look like then

the new representation looks even more like Tariq it's like oh my they used him as the base. I think they use him as the base. Yeah, they used Ayala's face for that, for sure, which is hilarious. Well, we also meet his daughter. Yes. After O'Dala leaves and the elders step away. She's not convinced. She's not convinced at all. Yeah, she said, she's like, dad, you know, even his daughter is doubting him, which I found him sad. Yeah. It just shows you how hard it is for all of these people to buy into what he's saying. It's fundamental change.

Or it shows how difficult change is for people, right? That's what it is. When the majority believe one thing, I mean, sure, as a daughter, I'm sure all her friends are making fun of her. Look at your dad, he's a kook, you know, he believes in crazy things and no. So it's sad, yeah, she's not on his team on that. veer comes back in he's talked to the science committee they thought they'd get their support and he says nope we're going to have to go this alone and gagan says that he's found a microscopic identification code

in the uniform and he found this this name which sounds like it could be the name of a vessel yeah we go out on voyager so they've made a connection to voyager do they say what part of the uniform they find this on? I don't think they just... He doesn't say. He just says, I found a microscopic identification code. Right. Which I don't know where in our uniform

there's a microscopic identification code that says property of the USS Voyager. It's a name tag. You know those name tags that we always... I'm just kidding. That'd be hilarious. We had a name tag. Star Trek Voyager and then your name underneath. So... Yeah. Yeah. So that... And of course

he is told by Veer that he's going to be charged with heresy against doctrine. And that's when they make a run for it, right? Gagan says, no, you go, I'm going to do this alone. And Veer says, no, I've been with you this whole time. I'm going to stick with you. We come back and we have kind of a montage and we hear this narration. Yeah. It's a voiceover. Yeah. Yeah. Where Gagan is describing all the things they did for for weeks. They look around. They talk to traders. And a trader near the Nekrit expanse. The Nekid expanse, right? The Nekid expanse tells them that the ship they're looking for. He tells them about Voyager. Yes, there was it. There

is a ship Voyager, and it was near here. And another person they talked to, someone else they talked to as they're searching around, has some warp plasma. Who did we give a canister of warp plasma to? I don't remember this. I remember, I don't remember which episode, if it was Rise or something where we were trying to get something where we could, that would help the warp plasma. I don't. Oh, you're talking about when Neelix is dealing with those aliens on the trade station which yeah right that's

I think that's the episode yeah we definitely were trying to get some something you know some warplasma or some element we needed for war plasma and make it more efficient so maybe in that episodes maybe traded or showed them what we had but yeah they get a canvas of this

warp plasma and they say okay now we we got to look for this warp signature that's going to help us track them down. Yeah. And I just thought the montage was done really well. Mm-hmm. I thought it was interesting that we were listening to a voiceover of a guest star.

Yeah, which is rare. Totally rare. And kind of cool. That's why another reason why I like this episode so much. It's different. It's out of the box. And they sort of ground it because when we come back into their ship and they start the scene, you realize he's finishing sending his daughter an encrypted message.

Yes. This whole voiceover has been. Is him talking to his daughter. which I thought very clever love it the way you got that in there love it um and then there's there's one shot where we see this light on a table and there's a bunch of bugs flying around yeah

and they're talking about uh you know the warp plasma and yeah and all of a sudden Gagin's tongue shoots out of his mouth like six feet across the room yeah grab some bugs yeah and and they sort of laugh and Kagan says to the other guy he says uh what traditions are meant to be broken and i was like what i don't get the joke like was it oh no because he uh he said to professor gagan said to veer he was talking about yeah

he just sent a message to his daughter and then veer says is that wise to do and he's oh it's completely encrypted and then veer says did you send my regards as well he's like of course i did you know and then he looks at him and he says i've seen the tint on your scales when she's around And then Veer steps back, he's like, no, no, no, no. He goes, first you want to join me in my, you know, in my, uh, as my assistant. And now you want to be part of my family. And then he says, no, I wouldn't, I wouldn't presume anything like that. Like he's completely backpedaling, right?

And he says, well, you know, traditionally members of my family are always married to members of the Tao family. And then, um, and that, um, and then, like, looking down like, oh, oh, I see. And that, yeah, and then he goes, traditions have nothing to do with a bug. No. Oh, I thought it was. the bug confused me because I was like it's this about the bug but it was about the daughter

he's about the daughter exactly but I didn't make the connection of traditionally he's just saying because Veer's not part of the Tao family that traditions are meant to be broken meaning I would accept you as my son-in-law no problem that helps because I got confused though yeah it is a little confusing definitely so he eats a bug and then they get an alert that their scanners have found Voyager's warp signature and that there are 148 life forms on board.

So this is perfect for their research to go there. Is that true? 148? I thought it was 170. I thought it was 170 something or maybe, yeah. But then again, we've lost people. People have died. I know.

But I would guess that if somebody really went deep into the matrix here, they could find lots of inconsistencies because 148 seems small at this point. Okay. Anyway, they fly off after the Voyage's Warp signature, and they stay cloaked. They have cloaking technologies. Yeah, for their ship, for themselves, for everything. So, yes. And they're going to stay out of phase so that we can't detect them.

That's right. He engages spatial displacement to stay hidden, is what he says. And now they're in the corridor, and John Tampoya walks past, and they smell him, and they were like, oh, whoo. They're highly developed sense of smell, the human smell is too much for them. And what blew me away was when they go to access the computers, the ship's computer, Gagin basically downloads the entire ship's database, which is, God knows how much information is in there, right? Like gigacquads or whatever.

In less than a second, he's downloaded everything. I've got it all. They've got these portable cloaking devices, personal cloaking devices, which later on Tuvok and Paris are looking at and they, and Tuvok even says, I've never seen anything. This is more advanced than anything I've ever seen. So clearly they're technologically very advanced.

Yeah. And that's part of the allure of this episode because if you think about these guys are basically descendants of dinosaurs, which you would think as being primitive creatures. And yet they are so much more advanced than humans at this point, right? I mean, with all of this amazing technology,

trans warp technology, their cloaking technology, their ability to dampen, put a dampening field so that nobody's weapons or nothing will work. You know, I mean, these guys are, they're amazing. They're truly the most advanced aliens that we've come across so far. Absolutely. You know, right? Yep. So they download the computer and then Torres and Paris step out of a door. Yeah. And they're having an argument or a fun argument about, uh, some problem in engineering and Paris says, I think it's the relays. And she's like, what do you know, you're an idiot? And there's some fun banter as they walk by. Gagan says, oh, a male and female interacting. Right. You know, let's observe this. Yeah. And we get into engineering and they are finishing

running their scan or their, you know, their test of this. And Paris was right. It was a relay. So Paris says, you got to pay up. Alana, you got to pay up. there too tonight we're going to do the Klingon martial arts program and as he walks away he says B-Y-O-B and she's like what and he goes bring your own bat-liff yeah which is funny but it's funny or her reaction after you're gone she goes yeah bat-lath like that she her reaction is great just like classic and you know we were joking about at least you were joking in the intro about how you know oh it's all going to be about Paris well you do have a fair amount after Chacote. You're pretty, you're pretty close to his screen time. Yeah, you did. I try.

You did. You did. You did. I like that, uh, as they're observing, these scientists say, oh, that's, see, that feigned antagonism. That's yeah. And I was like, oh, that's interesting that, you know, these strangers are noticing that, you know, she's being obstinate, but it's just pretend that she actually is into him. Yeah. And, and how in their culture, that they don't have to, beat around the bush like us humans like they're very clear about because their skin changes colors. Yeah, scales change colors. And so you know when you're into somebody and you're not, which, hey, that would solve a lot of issues. If you're in a single scene where you're out at a bar and you just, you look at somebody, they look at you and if you both change colors, you know it's good.

You don't have to, no small talk needed, you know, just get right down to business. The bridge scene, go ahead. We go to the bridge and I got to say the very first shot, got this high angle looking straight down over, you know, the captain's chair. Yes, yes. I thought, again, David Livingston did some shots on the bridge. We've been there for three years. Yeah, never seen that shot. Yeah, he pulled out all the stops.

He really did. Good Lord. Love that high angle. And then we revealed that our Voth guys are on the bridge using their personal cloaking devices, so we can't see them. And who detects them? who, none other than moi. Yes. Kim detect spatial fluctuations on the bridge.

They are highly localized with modulating phase variants, and it's some kind of cloaking technology. That's how Kim does science. That's how he does it. He does it. Tuvok immediately puts a containment field around the bridge, so these guys can't leave now. They're sort of stuck there. Right.

Janele gets up with her phaser, and she's looking around. We're trying to figure out where these intruders are on the bridge. We know that they're there, and we know that they're invisible. lots of cool angles again, very unusual angles on the bridge. Gagan finds some type of way to circumvent, yeah, the containment field and ends up transporting themselves to the mess hall, where Nelix... I've compensated, I can't get us back on our ship, but I can get us out of here. Yes, so he gets to the mess hall.

Yeah. And Nelix is just, you know, I just felt like he was spoiling it. You know, when people give a spoiler for an episode. here he is like aliens what aliens i'll see it's like dude keep it down you know i'm like why are you doing that like i thought that moment was funny though because he's looking around it's funny and then the camera pulls back to reveal them standing right there i thought was a very david levison again good shot great great way to to help that reveal and that joke um so they can't be seen but the team arrives right and kim has found out the frequency which is uh 1.85 gigahertz to disperse the cloaking device that they're using.

Chicoathe fires after he adjusts his phasers and he fires and disrupts the cloak. The veer freaks out and shoots, where does that dart come out of? His hand? I couldn't, like he pointed his hand at Chocote. I think he had a very small, tiny little, you know... Little matchbook size thing.

Yeah, something small in his hand, I think he did. Okay, all right. It shoots this dart into Chagote who drops to the floor. Yeah, like a sack of potatoes. Yeah, and then I think Tuvok shoots to Veer, and Veer drops down, and Gagin runs over, grabs Chakotay and beams him out, they disappear. That's right. And so Veer is left behind. He's stunned and captured, and we cut to sick bay. I've got to say the doctor's running some scans, and we come around and we see Kess there helping him.

She says she's going to, you know, run some tests. Yeah. Well, so the doctor's running a DNA scan, Janeway enters, she's got questions, and all of a sudden, and Veer starts clicking, click, and he sort of locks up like this. And the doctor's like, it looks like he's going into some kind of hibernation. Yeah, I thought he killed himself. I was like, wow, that's amazing. He just, you know, chewed on a cyanide tooth or something. And that was the end of it. He's a defense mechanism of reptiles, I guess. Body temperature dropped and he went into hibernation. Yeah, protective hibernation. That takes us to back to the research ship. We see Chacote

is now on some kind of table and he starts to get up and Gagan says you can't step out of there I put this containment field around this table. He asked Chacote, are there more of me on your planet on earth? Is there anyone like that? And Chacote is like, before we get into all that, like, can you just calm down? Just let me out of here. You have a first contact in a nice friendly way. Well, yeah. And I think when he's when Chiquete says, look, I'm a scientist too because Gagan says that he's a molecular paleontologist that's that's the first time we hear what his title is or what he does right and then Chocote sort of builds on that and says well I'm a scientist too and I think that's what makes Gagin relax a little bit to the point where he releases

the force field right he says okay okay and they have a very cordial and like yeah very and then once the force feels down Chikotta is like okay now let's talk about Earth right yeah love that scene That's a great scene. We go to Sick Bay and the doctor says there are 47 genetic markers that are identical to humans. And Janeway seems amazed as a scientist herself. Yeah. I'm amazed and thrilled about this. Yeah.

Excited to meet her ancient cousin. She played that perfectly. Yeah, I thought it was great. She says, come on, Doc. Let's go to the holodeck. We're going to take a stroll through primordial history. And we find them in the holodeck now talking to the computer. and they ask about, you know, compare the two human and this alien veer's DNA, compare them and

find something that matches both of those genetic profiles. Yeah. And something pops up that looks kind of like a Komodo dragon, you know, that's sort of on all force. Genus Aereops is what they call it. And the computer says this is the last common ancestor to both mammal and reptile. I assume Brandon and Joe did their homework and this brew science would be my guess. So I think that's super interesting. Yeah.

And then they ask the computer to extrapolate from there and they find this other dinosaur from Earth called a hadrosaur. Yes. Yes. Yes. Which that is a hadrosaur, definitely with that kind of thing on its head that comes off the back right there. Yeah. Recognizable dinosaur definitely. And then she asked the computer to extrapolate once again saying what would happen to this hadrosaur if it continued to evolve over the last 65 million years.

And boom, we have what looks pretty much like pretty close to. Yeah, the Voss. Yeah. But then Janeway's like, wait a minute. Why? Then if this is the case, how come we haven't seen this in any museum on earth? How do we not know about these people? right and that's where which is a cool bit of writing because then it then jumps to gagan's research

ship and they are discussing the exact same thing jacote and and and and gagan are discussing why isn't there any evidence and then jacote you know he says well maybe they evolved on an isolated continent right that's a possibility and they're like yeah he said there were a lot of natural disasters that could have killed or buried most of his people yeah you know there could be remain still on earth that we have never found right because of those natural disasters volcanoes or asteroids chakotay sort of makes sense of this and helps him understand this evolutionary process from his point of view yeah and gagin talks about how he feels about mammals you know he says to chokote because he's really starting to warm up to chakotay and he said you know we always

thought of mammals as lesser life forms but uh he says i think i let my own prejudice prejudice get in the way. So they have a nice bonding moment there, which I thought was really well played, both of them. There was really good chemistry between those two with Gagin and Chukotay and I thought really warm and good science connection. Yeah. And Chukotay says, you know, okay, let's go back to Voyager and we can look into this more. And Gagin says, no, I can't, I, I'm up against, you don't understand what I'm up against here. And I need you to help me convince these people that this distant origin theory is possible. I can't, we can't go back to Voyager,

I can't take you back there. So we sort of go out on Chucote, still basically a prisoner. Yes. And we jump over to Paris and Tuvac testing this personal cloaking device on an Apple. At the rarely used science station. Yes, yes.

Yeah, that was a fun little scene. It was to have scenes with Tuvok and Paris. Do you remember filming with the Apple? Robbie? I don't remember this. No, I don't. There were some scenes I do remember. Did you get along with the Apple? You don't even remember that if you, you know, if the Apple had any, you know, no, diva like attitude or anything when you were working with the Apple. Okay, just checking. I know. I don't remember. I thought it was a cool scene, you know, because as we discussed before, two bucks, when the apple gets cloaked there, two bucks says this is the most advanced cloaking technology that he's ever seen. Yeah. So that's kind of cool. And as he's saying, these guys are super advanced, we see that a giant ship has appeared.

And when I say giant, I mean giant. The size of a planet. Yes. So big. Yeah, Kim's like, I'm reading a massive spatial displacement dead ahead. And this thing just shows up. Giant thing. Not much you can do.

And Harry says, we're being probed. There's an energy beam cutting through our shields. Yeah. And we realize it's a transporter beam cutting through the shields. And Voyager, the entire ship is beamed inside this huge mother ship. It was awesome. It was super cool. It was.

Appearing inside that thing. And then all the systems shut down. All the systems are shutting down. By the way, I love, I thought Marvin did a great job with the lighting. It was a whole different look than we've ever seen before, the darkness and the low power mode. Yeah. There's just a cool look at the ship. Yeah, Jamway tells everyone, arm yourselves.

So prepare for a battle. Yeah, we see Tuvok and Paris heading down a hallway. They get to this Jeffrey's tube and they hear some clicking. And Paris says, Tuvok, I hope that's your stomach. And it's not. Yes, they pick up a dampening field occurring. and the tricorder's not working. And then Tuvok is shot with one of these darts.

I call it, Robbie. I call a dino dart is what I call it. Dino dart in the neck. He reaches back, pulls it out. And I step out. There's some more dinosaurs coming towards us. I try to shoot my phaser. Phasers not working.

Nothing's working. I'd like, just to interrupt you, I'd like the fact that Tuvok still had some consciousness. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, I did too. With Chikote, him going down like a side. of potatoes, and then Tuvok being Vulcan and clearly of stronger constitution and strength, he had just a little bit more time to stay conscious before he got knocked out. So that made

sense to me too. Yeah, it made sense to me too. Yeah, Tuvok's going down. He goes, get in that Jeffries tube, get out of here. Peres wants to stay, but he's like, get out of here. That's an order. Go. That's an order. So off goes Paris into a Jeffries tube to crawl around, and we cut to Harry and Janeway. Yeah, Kim can't get a single relay back online. And so Janeway says, well, we should go over here. And then all of a sudden, we hear sometimes, type of beaming effect sound and clicking, yes. The Voth Commander Halleck shows up with one side, one assistant, I guess, one other person. They beam onto the bridge and he says, you know, your ship is under our control and that is it.

And your voices don't work either. She's got a, she's got a phaser rifle. Yes, nothing's working. Nothing's working. And Marshall Teague's voice was just great because that's not his, like he did some affectation to his voice as well. Nice. Yeah, so I just liked his work for sure on this show as well. Now we're back on Gagin's ship, and Gagin has received an automated message from the Ministry of Elders. They've captured the Voyager.

They refer to it as the Voyager here. Yes. And that if he doesn't return to the city ship to face his accusers, they will destroy his evidence, which is the ship, Voyager, and kill everyone on board. So that kind of prompts him to head back to the city ship. And Chikote offers to go with him, too. He offers, he says, let me go with you. and this will convince them so Chiquotay's on the same page

is gay right right they're going to convince them they think that this should do it then we have a great scene in Janeway's ready room with those dim lights and you can see the outside the windows of Janeway's ready room you see the massive interior

of the Voth city ship and that wonderful scene of interrogation between Halleck and Janeway happens which I thought was great, perfect. Yeah, yeah. Tone was perfect.

Everything was great with that. Great scene. We go into engineering and Paris has made it inside. He actually appears behind one of the Voth guards and with a quick hit that I feel like he picked up those moves when he had to fight the fruit bowl. I feel like he learned a lot and the fruit bowl incident has really stuck with him. He's got some new moves. And so, yeah, he takes out the Voth Guard. I love doing those kind of stumpy things.

I really enjoy it. Yeah, that was fun. You had a phaser rifle. I don't think you've normally, have you wielded a phaser rifle until this point? Not very often. I think in the pilot, maybe once or twice more, but not. Oh, okay.

All right. Yeah, so he manually overrides the weapons. Pauls Janeway. It says, I've got a full spread of torpedoes. I got everything back online. Jay, Lee, a little cocky. She's like, my guy's about to blow open a hole in the side of your ship. And Marshall Teague's reaction, even with all that prosthetic makeup, was perfect.

He was like, go ahead. Let me see what you can do, tough guy, you know, tough lady. Let's see what you got. Yeah. So she's like fire. Yeah, her hits the buttons and nothing. Nothing. Big fail.

Yeah. Your launch sequence was detected by some Voth tech guy, you know, and it was like, like probably one key stroke is what's what stopped. that from going. That's how advanced these guys are, right? Yeah, um, Halik then, oh, this was a kind of a, kind of a bit of a chilling line when Halik requests an interrogation surgeon to assist with the uncooperative captain of Voyager, right? I thought, oh my gosh, she's about to get tortured. I was like, hmm, uh, thank God that didn't happen though, right? Because guess what? Gagan shows back up. Gagin's there and he's ready to, uh, answer for his, his, uh, crime against. Yeah,

basically in this game of thrones courtroom yes with yes I wrote that amazing throne I wrote that on my yeah amazing and she accuses him of treason and attacking the fundamental principles of their society and she's like disavow your claims and maybe he'll get some leniency and she says our scientists have studied all your data and they say it's just a random convergence. Chacote argues that. Yeah, Chocote speaks up. He says, Voyager's database shows that the DNA connections and that they have with multiple

species on Earth, that he can, you know, look at our data. Yeah. And she doesn't want to, she doesn't want to do it. Well, she says the data is not in question. She says your interpretation of the data is. I don't, which, you know, this whole courtroom scene was, I kept thinking, man, Chikote would be a great lawyer. He really would be. Look how good he is. He's just going right through there. And you can see that, that, you know, after he said, after she says that your interpretation

of the data is, that's when she brings Veer in to discount his boss, Gagin, right? And you can tell he's scared to death. He says the analysis is flawed. Mm-hmm. And, yeah, he says, we saw an evolutionary connection when in fact there was none. But even after that, Gagin still stands firm. He still stands firm. He will not retract his claims. And that's when the minister kind of loses it a little bit. I mean, this is the first time when she yells, you know, we are not immigrants.

Like this is a big deal, right? Huge 20 million years of Voth history are basically questionable now and with this distant origin theory. Yeah, when she's losing her patients too, which starts to lose it, She also has a line where she says, your true scales are finally showing. Oh, yes, yes. I love that. Nice spin on that phrase. Nice sorin way of putting it, right?

We love it. Yeah. She says, yeah, you're mistaken. We are not immigrants. And Chakotay says, it's you who are mistaken. Yeah. You accuse Gagin of having his objectivity clouded by wishful thinking, but aren't you guilty of the same thing. Yeah.

And she says, my, I am not on trial. And that's when he says, your beliefs are on trial. And this is not the first time. Do you remember the breakthrough? Because I've had a chance to study the Voth culture and the history, right? Which is so many amazing accomplishments and breakthroughs, including the TransWarp barrier. You've broken through that. That's an incredible achievement that the ancient doctrine predicted.

There would be terrible disasters if anyone attempted to break Transwarp. but then that held the Voth race back for millennia until someone took a chance and challenged this prediction and then they succeeded and the doctrine was changed accordingly. So he's making these amazing arguments which should really make the minister go yeah you're right and he even says you know what change is difficult new ideas are often greeted with skepticism even fear sometimes ideas are accepted and progress is made eyes are opened and at this point I did think that the minister was going to flip her something was going to happen right I was like It's a strong argument.

Yeah, he did it, he did it, Chikotei 1. And then the minister is like, you know what? You know what this opens my eyes to? What this distant theory, distant origin theory opens my eyes to. When I look at it, I'm appalled at what I see. A group of pathetic refugees, a race with no birthright, no legacy. She's just, you know, she can't handle the truth. She can't handle it.

Nope. So she sentences Gagan to a detention colony for the rest of his life. it'll lose everything yeah but before the detention let me just say she does before the assigning to to the detention colony chikote does argue he's like okay you see pathetic refugees i see courageous bold voth ancestors who struggled and if you deny the distant origin in theory then you deny the struggle and achievements of your ancestors and you deny you deny your origins in earth and you deny your true heritage. And that's when Odala basically says, do you retract your claim? And she doesn't fold or give in to Chakotay's argument. And of course, that's when he's convicted of a heresy

against doctrine and going to be placed on a detention colony. And his life as a scientist has ended completely. And then she looks at Chakotay and says, you and your captain and your crew will also be sent to the detention colony for life. Voyager will be destroyed. Yeah. And that's, yeah, and so Gagin, even though he's okay with him losing his entire life, because he's going to stand by his beliefs, he can't allow Chikote, his new friend, his new scientist friend to suffer the same fate. And that's what makes him back off. Right. And he tragically retracts his claims. So sad. His distant origin theory. So sad. Very sad. That's I wrote down sad. He says he was mistaken. And he was mistaken. And, he was mistaken. And,

And so O'Dala says, you'll be assigned to metallurgy. You'll be a not paleontology. I got emotional during this scene. I really did. I didn't expect myself to, but I did. I mean, I didn't, when I initially watched it 25 years ago, but I got a good emotion to it. Definitely. And I thought it was a big threat at the end.

She says to Chucote, it will be in your best interest if I never saw you again. If I never saw you again. Yeah. Yeah, because, yeah, we want to stay away from these guys. Right. And I love how, I love how Conchetta played that role because, you know, if these are truly super advanced aliens, they're going to get, they will have already progressed to the point where it's not all about

aggression and warfare. And you know what I'm saying? And so she's very, the way she just worded that, she goes, it would be in your best interest if I never saw you again. And it's so, and there is so much more impact than if she played the cliche, like, evil scrunched up face and evil voice, you know, and she didn't do that. And what I really loved is after at the end of that whole courtroom scene, she hits a button on her Game of Thrones chair. And you hear this kind of a gong kind of sound, which to me harkened back to maybe some ancient Voth ritual sound,

you know, which I thought, wow, the thought that went behind all these little small little details of this episode were amazing. It really was. Just 9.9. 9.9 for me, man. Yeah. All right. Last scene. in the shuttle back in Gagin's shuttle and he feels foolish. He's lost everything. I love the shooting of this last scene. It started big and wide so you see this beautiful

ship that we both love. Pushes into this tight two shot and then we see that Chikote Hans, Gagin this small, a gift a small globe of planet Earth. It was a very beautiful gift. Very ornate.

Yeah, look great. Yeah. And they both say to each other, eyes open. Yeah. And we end. And we end. Yeah. Someday. Someday. What is your lesson? My lesson is, I wrote down, beliefs are stubborn and change is scary. So it's kind of a mixed bag, but, you know, the idea of being stuck in old ways and not willing to change and that change is scary that letting go of what you believed to be true and

being open to something new being true is very hard for that's a that's a human experience that I could relate to so yeah what about you uh similar to your lines I got a lot of different lessons I mean definitely about change being difficult to handle um but also just just the whole concept of eyes open. Just knowing that there are some systems in place in the world that we live in right now that are so entrenched and so guarded by the people in power that they will not want to relinquish that power, right? And so that we as everyday citizens that don't have this kind of immense power need to just keep our eyes open and realize that there is another reality going on and realize that there is a system where the cards are all stacked against us.

know, and that there's not that much, there's not much we can do. Like, look at what Gagan did. Gagan tried as hardest, even with with living evidence, Chocote standing next to him. Right. He could not present. No, no, no. They didn't want to back at it. They didn't want to back down whatsoever. So really for me, the lesson is, is know what's happening, right? Understand how the world works and accept that that is how the world works and be able to work and operate within that. And that's, you know, that's a big lesson, definitely. So, good episode. Yeah.

Distant origin. That was great. Well, good. All right. That is our recap for this week. Mm-hmm. I really did enjoy it. So what's your final?

What did you give this? A seven? No, you have an eight, right? I'm going to stick with an eight. That's your highest. I think that's got to be your highest that you've given anything. Is it? So far.

Yeah, I don't. I don't think you've given anything higher than an eight. I may give us an eight and a half, you know. Oh, you're 0.5.8.5. You're so kind now. Look at that. It's a good episode. It really is.

It really is. All right, guys, thanks for joining Robbie and I this week. Join us next week, and Robbie and I will be recapping and discussing the Voyager season three episode Displaced. And for all of our Patreon patrons, please stay tuned for your bonus material. See you next week, guys. See you next week, guys. Bye.

Thank you.