The Delta Flyers - Natural Law

Episode Date: July 17, 2023

This episode was recorded in June 2023, before the SAG Strike.The Delta Flyers is a weekly Star Trek: Voyager rewatch & recap podcast hosted by Garrett Wang & Robert Duncan McNeill. Each week Garrett and Robert will rewatch an episode of Voyager starting at the very beginning. This week’s episode is Natural Law. Garrett and Robbie recap and discuss the episode, and share their insight as series regulars. Natural Law:Seven of Nine and Chakotay crash-land on an isolated planet where they are surrounded by a primitive tribe of hunter-gatherers.We want to thank everyone who makes this podcast possible, starting with our Executive producers Megan Elise & Rebecca McNeillAnd 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, Tim Russ, Roxann Dawson, Kate Mulgrew, Brannon Braga, Bryan Fuller, John Espinosa, & Ariana DelbarAdditionally we could not make this podcast available without our Co-Executive Producers: Stephanie Baker, Philipp Havrilla, Liz Scott, Eve England, Sab Ewell, Sarah A Gubbins, Jason M Okun, Luz R., Marie Burgoyne, Kris Hansen, Daniel de Rooy, Chris Knapp, Michelle Z, Janet K Harlow, Utopia Science Fiction Magazine, Courtney Lucas, Matthew Gravens, Brian Barrow, Captain Jeremiah Brown, Heidi Mclellan, Rich Gross, Mary Jac Greer, John Espinosa, E, Deike Hoffmann, Mike Gu, Anna Post, Shannyn Bourke, Vikki Williams, Jenna Appleton, Alicia Kulp, Lee Lisle, Mary Beth Lowe, Sarah Thompson, Samantha Hunter, Holly Smith, Amy Tudor, Jamason Isenburg, Adm. Bill "Seoulman" Yu, KMB, Dominic Burgess, Ashley Stokey, Zachary Upton, Lori Tharpe, Mary Burch, AJC, Nicholaus Russell, Dominique Weidle, Lisa Robinson, Normandy Madden, Joseph Michael Kuhlman, Darryl Cheng, Alex Mednis, AJ Freeburg, Elizabeth Stanton, Kayla Knilans, Tim Beach, Ariana, Meg Johnson, Victor Ling, Shambhavi Kadam, Holly Schmitt, James H. Morrow, Christopher Arzeberger, Nicole Anne Toma, Donna Runyon, Nicholas Albano, Daniel O’Brien, Bronwen Duffield, Mark Lacey, Andrew Duncan, Lauren Wolffe, David Buck, Danie Crofoot, Ian Ramsey, Feroza Mehta, Michael Dismuke, Jonathan Brooks, Gemma Laidler, Rob Traverse, Penny Liu, Matt Norris & Stephanie LeeAnd our Producers:James Amey, Patrick Carlin, Richard Banaski, Ann Harding, Ann Marie Segal, Chloe E, Nathanial Moon, Carole Patterson, Warren Stine, Jocelyn Pina, Mike Schaible, AJ Provance, Captain Nancy Stout, Claire Deans, Maxine Soloway, Barbara Beck, Species 2571, Mary O'Neal, Aithne Loeblich, Dat Cao, Scott Lakes, Stephen Riegner, Debra Defelice, Tara Polen, Jason Potvin, Cindy Ring, Kelly Brown, Jason Wang, Gabriel Dominic Girgis, Amber Nighbor, Mark G Hamilton, Rob Johnson, Maria Rosell, Heather Choe, Michael Bucklin, Lisa Klink, Jennifer Jelf, Justin Weir, Mike Chow, Kevin Hooker, Aaron Ogitis, Ryan Benoit, Megan Chowning, Rachel Shapiro, Eric Kau, Captain Jak Greymoon, David Wei Liu, Clark Ochikubo, David J Manske, Roxane Ray, Amy Rambacher, Jessica B, E.G. Galano, Cindy Holland, Will Forg, Ryan Tomei, Charlie Faulkner, Estelle Keller, Christopher Berry, Russell Nemhauser, Lawrence Green, Christian Koch, Lisa Gunn, Lauren Rivers, Shane Pike, Jennifer B, Dean Chew, Akash Patel, Jennifer Vaughn, Cameron Wilkins, Michael Butler, Ken McCleskey, Walkerius Logos, & Abby ChavezThank you for your support!“Our creations are protected by copyright, trademark and trade secret laws. Some examples of our creations are the text we use, artwork we create, audio, and video we produce and post. You may not use, reproduce, distribute our creations unless we give you permission. If you have any questions, you can email us at...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

Hi, everybody. It's Robbie and Garrett here. We just want to let you know that the SAG AFRA strike against the studios has happened. And we just wanted to assure everyone that this was recorded before the strike began. And we want to stress that we fully support SAG AFRA and the WGA in getting a fair contract. Agreed. Greetings, everyone. Welcome to the Delta Flyers with Tom and Harry. As we journey through episodes of Star Trek Voyager, your two hosts along this journey are my fellow Voyager actor, Garrett Wong, who in 2007 played Commander Garron in of gods and men. And myself, your favorite helmsman, Robert Duncan McNeil, a.k.a. McDunk, R.D.M. Robbie D. That pilot guy, whatever you want to call me. Remember, everybody, you can get the full version of this entire podcast and all the extra bonus, super cool stuff. If you sign up to become a patron at patreon.com forward slash the Delta Flyers. So of gods and men.

Yeah. Let's talk about that. Oh, my gosh. I thought that was 2000. that's so funny you read 2007 is that what you have on it? 2007 is maybe when they released it maybe you shot it and it took a couple maybe yeah because my memories was was this we had just wrapped Voyager and I got a call from Tim Russ and he said hey Bubba I'm going to be directing this Star Trek independent feature so wondering if you want to want to act in it and I said absolutely not I because I was you know I've done seven years a Voyager. I said, I don't want to do an independent Star Trek feature. And he goes,

but you're not playing Harry Kim. You're playing a character completely opposite. I said, oh, sign me up. So that's what got me. So the minute he said you're playing someone completely opposite, Commander Garen. Yeah, and they've made it Garen because they were trying to keep it close to my name. So it was Garrett, Garen. So that was written specifically. Yes, yes, yes. It was released in 2007. Yeah. And the synopsis goes a little something like this. Go. In the year 2306, 13 years have passed since Captain James T. Kirk was swept away by the Nexus after saving the crew of the Enterprise B. The remaining crew members of the original Enterprise have gone their separate ways. Captain Nyota O'Houra and Captain Pavel Chekhov,

along with Captain John Harriman of the Enterprise B, come together for a special dedication in honor of Kirk's Enterprise. Their reunion is cut short, though, when they were receive a distress call from a mysterious planet that presses the three friends to embark on a mission that will change their lives forever. There you go. That sounds pretty cool. How did this come about? Yeah, this was a project produced by Sky Conway, and the writers were, I can't remember right now,

I'm blanking right now, but the script itself is really good. It's a really good script. It incorporates a lot of different Star Trek actors from different shows. And, yes, and Harriman, did you read Captain Harriman in there? I think that's what you read it. Yeah. That was played by Alan Ruck. Alan Ruck, who played Cameron and Ferris Bueller's Day Off.

And also in Succession, since you've been watching Succession, he's the oldest. Yes, he's had like maybe the biggest job of his career. Oh, my gosh. What a resurgence for him, right, to be able to get that role. But he played, he plays my captain, essentially. Rock does. And yeah, so I play Garron, Commander Garan. I'm the F.O. I'm the first officer. And we're just sort of like the evil, the mirror universe kind of crew, right? So we're kind of the edgy crew, basically. So how did they get the license to do this?

You know, because it was not produced by Paramount. It was produced independently. Right. And they, and they title it as Star Trek of Gods and Men is what it is. But the thing is, they didn't sell it. anywhere. You see what I'm saying? So if you try to sell your project evidently, and this is before Paramount came down hard, CBS Paramount came down hard on all these fan independent projects, mainly because they were dealing with the producer and director and writer of Axanar, who was sort of, you know, banding about, you know, the Star Trek name without any, any recourse. And they, they really got their legal involved. And an army of lawyers basically said, if you're doing a fan project, you are not allowed to, you know, you're not allowed to use anything that says Star Trek in it at

all. But these guys were, this was before Ex-N-R happened. So this, again, Star Trek, I mean, Paramount and CBS were kind of clueless. They weren't sure what to do, really. They just thought, oh, yeah. And personally, my opinion is, if it's a fan film, it's a fan film, you know, right? I mean, it's just going to generate more interest in Star Trek. And then they will then watch other official Star Trek stuff and buy official Star Trek merch, whatever. So I feel like, Do you need a crackdown on people doing independent Star Trek projects? I don't know. I mean, I'd say no, personally.

Super fun project. We shot in upstate New York. Doug Knapp was our DP. Oh, that's right. Yeah, Doug came out there. But this is the crazy thing, man. We were filming on, there's a soundstage up there in upstate New York that basically resembles, it is the exact replica of the original series set.

It's a replica. I've heard about this place. Yes. Unbelievable. Hykondiroga. The iconoroga, yeah. So you can actually look it up, book a tour, and you can go over there. And James will let you in and take you on a tour of the set. And it's so well done.

It's unbelievable. But the issue is the building that it's housed in is an ex. It used to be like an automobile body shop. You know what I'm saying? It's like a great. Yeah. So not good insulation. It's a little rough.

Yeah, it's a little rough. So they don't have insulation for sound. They don't have, you know, good AC. Like, everything was just sort of the bare minimum. And when we were filming there, oh, my gosh, it was an August in upstate New York. Now, you know how humid New York City gets. Let's just talk about just anywhere in New York. It's bad.

It was so bad and so hot and so oppressive. And on that set without any AC whatsoever, I remember just seeing, I was watching Doug walk around. his entire shirt was wet okay just completely yeah the entire camera crew nobody had anything dry on because that's how much you were sweating um the funny oh and the craziest thing was the time that we were filming was in it was actually coinciding with the harley davidson festival oh how funny and there's these train tracks also next to this structure that we were filming in so if we weren't dealing with sound issues from trains coming past it was harley's coming past it was harley's coming passed. So it was like, we'd have a perfect take. And then all sudden, you know, that,

that, that, that, that, that, and we'd have to do it again. And I'm like, oh, my God. And I would look at Doug. I go, Doug, I don't, I don't know how much more of this I can take. I mean, I'm about to pass out from the heat. And every time we get a good thing going, our momentum is cut short by Harleys. And it was just, and he said, I'm sorry, Garrett. I mean, there's nothing we can do. I'm in the same boat as you. Look at me. And he, he does this. And I'm like, I know. No, you're basically walking sweat, perspiration. Everybody's disdifying. And then the producer thought it would be a good idea to open the setup to fans

on a couple, two of the days that we were there. So fans were there. So in between shots, I'd go sit down in my director's chair. A fan would come up and ask me questions. So I would be doing a convention panel basically the same time I'm working. Yeah. And I thought, oh, my God, why? It was really.

that was a real indie yeah indian grueling and it looks like in the photos i saw from of gods and men there were like classic star trek costumes well yeah probably very hot yeah they were hot and also the other issue that happened is the head of wardrobe quit two weeks beforehand and didn't have any of the costumes made so it was all last second scrambling to put things together um so tim so tim was directing we already said Nichols was there Walter Kinnig was there as well as another Alan Ruck

and another J.G. Hertzler I think was there. A lot of people, Chase Masterson. I'm sure this is a beloved film for the fans. It is. They like it. They like it. Yeah. It feels like a love letter something that they would love to see

whether Paramount wants to make it or not. Yes. But it was so oppressive on set. We would walk outside, which is still human. humid and muggy, but less humid and muggy just to cool off a little bit. And my funniest memory of the working on that project was there was a group of five Harleys that were coming around the bend. And J.G. Hurtzler was standing right there in the parking lot, right off the road with

a tiny little personal fan, those little tiny ones, little plastic ones that Jamie would give us or whoever makeup would give us. And he's standing there trying to cool off in full Klingon makeup. And it's like this little fan right there. And these Harleys, as they round the bend, they're like, they look over, and they're like, what? Because they see the image of a guy in full Klingon makeup with a tiny fan trying to cool off right there. Yeah. And that to me was absolutely hilarious.

That's very funny. I'm surprised we didn't cause any wrecks from people just driving off the road on their Harley seeing Klingon in upstate New York. Yeah. So that's, yeah, that's Star Trek of Gods and Men. There you go. I'll have to check it out. I've never seen it, but I'll have to check it out. One of these days, you should check it.

It seems very cool. Natural law is our episode this week. Yes, yes, yes. Natural law. We're getting really close. I can't believe we're near the end. It goes, natural law, homestead, renaissance man, end game. End of Voyager.

Wow. Wow. All right. Well, let's go watch it. I can't believe we're this close. Let's go watch this. And we will be right back with our recap and discussion for all our Patreon. members. Remember, stick around. We're going to have some bonus material for you coming right up.

Okay, we're back from watching Natural Law. Yes, we are. Okay. Let's jump right into our poetry synopsis. Please do. Let's hear your haiku. Here's my haiku for Natural Law. POM has traffic school. Beltron and Ryan paired up then to protected now i said traffic school because i know it's pilot school but it's but you know in l.a and in los angeles if you get a if you get a speeding ticket some type of infraction that'll give you points on your record you are then allowed to go to traffic school or you sit there for hours just going through all the i did traffic school twice during the run of voyager yes yes and i did it online I never went to a place.

You did the online one. Okay. The online. So it was a lot of questions, but yeah. Yeah. Well, when I, because you did, when did you come, when did you get out to L.A. again? What year did you get out there? 1990, 89, 90, really. But then I went back to New York for a few years. Yep. When I was in college, I was at UCLA in 85.

So 87, 88, 89. I went to traffic school every year. And then I, and this is the one where you had to go in person. But then they gave you comedy traffic school. Yes. You could go to the comedy club. Yes. I wanted to do that. Yeah, it was a comedian that would actually teach you the laws and make you laugh.

So I did that, too, to pass the time. But that's why I said, yeah, Tom is traffic school. Well, it's interesting you said traffic school, because listen to this limerick. Here we go. Voyager encounters a primitive planet tribe to an isolated life. They fully subscribe. Paris goes to traffic school till he finally breaks every flying rule. but I'm still not loving

the seven Chacote vibe Oh Bam bam Wow Traffic school We were in both of us We were in the same wavelength Yeah it was traffic school

Wow Well you know Your guess was that there was a Sort of a romantic flirty thing here But I didn't think any There was none in this one No not really There was a little

You know Beltrane Always plays seduction Even with you, with Harry, with Tom, he always plays a little like he's seducing everyone when he's talking. He's got, I feel like that's what that's what I get. So I did feel. So Neelix plays in love with Janeway when he's dealing with Janeway. And Chikotay with anyone else, he seduces us. He's seducing them.

And I did feel like the very last scene, I felt like there's a little, well, I'm really glad to be back here. Oh, the very last scene. There's a little, there's hints of it. But it's not as blatant as I thought it was going to be. Oh, no, no. There's a definite hint, but only at the final scene, though. Yeah. On the planet with the Ventu, there's nothing.

Absolutely nothing. Well, let's get, as we get into it, there's a couple of places where I did feel like he played the sort of seduction a little heavier. All right, let's just talk about writers and directors. We were correct on director, Terry Window. I can't believe we both nailed it. We knew that it was, he was in the mix. We knew he would come in one more time. Yeah, because he was.

You did a lot of episodes. I mean, did he lose a bet in a poker game with Rick Berman? And he just said, look, you're going to owe me 15 episodes of Voyager to direct. This is pretty much what's going to happen. I don't know. I don't know how. Very interesting. It's, yeah.

It's a puzzle. Uh-huh. Story by Ken Biller and James Kahn. Every time I see Khan, I think C-A-A-N is the actor, but no. Tell a play by James Kahn. I think I remember reading something that Ken had pitched this story, like in season four or something like that. Oh. When he was not the showrunner.

And so I feel like this story had been around. Ken had pitched it to Jerry Taylor or the room or somebody. And they decided not to do it early in Seven's run. But then he came back around because Ken was our showrunner this last season. Yeah. And maybe they didn't, they were missing one episode, a storyline for a single episode. and he said, hey, what about my season four pitch? And boom, here it is.

Okay. All right, actors. What about actors? Sure, let's go through them. Our guest stars, we have Paul Sandman or Sandman. He played the Ventu healer, the primary adult Ventu person that Chakote was dealing with. His very first credit was a 1991 episode of Civil Wars, is the television series. He has six total credits on IMDB, and three are Star Trek credits of his six.

total credits. Star Trek Clingon, a voiceover role, Star Trek Clingon Academy, yet another video game voiceover role, and of course, Star Trek Voyager. Next up, we have Autumn Reeser. I know. I'll get into this. Let me. Okay, go. Okay. Autumn Recer who played the Ventu girl. Now, Voyager was her very, very first credit, because at the time, I think she was 20. She was at UCLA. That's her alma mater. That's my alma mater. We have the same alma mater. And her very early auditioning in her career or in her credits, she has a Burger King commercial, which was my very first on-camera thing as well. So I have all these similarities with Autumn Rieser. She is 1980 in birth. So she's the year the monkey. She's the same sign as I am. I'm one cycle ahead of

her, 1968. And then she went on to portray Taylor Townsend on the OC from 2005 to 2007. So you directed her. I directed her. Yep. That's what I was about to say. When I saw Autumn's name come up, I was like, oh, my God, I've worked with her a bunch. I worked with her on the O.C. I worked with her on a show called The Arrangement. Yeah. That was a Bravo or E entertainment when they were doing scripted. I worked with Autumn a bunch.

Wow. And I can't believe that I never put this together that she was on our show. Didn't know it. Very interesting. that we both have some connection in a way like me i never i saw her in the makeup trailer and i saw the other vent two in the makeup trailer but i had no scenes with the ventu right neither did what did you know i didn't i didn't have none so i never spoke with her but now looking at all these credits and i was like oh my goodness this is oh she's done really well and she's a great actress yeah and i

can't believe you know the premise of this this primitive society they had no lines no one had any lines nobody it was all hand signs and you know how difficult that is oh yeah as an actor yeah no lines um so good job so good job all right uh next up we have robert curtis brown and i've also worked with a bunch i yeah you're all over the play i didn't know yeah i think i did know that robert did voyager because when i worked with them again over the years. I remember we had passed maybe on stage or something because he was always on the view screen. Yeah. But Robert Curtis Brown is a great theater actor. I did the Orville with Robert Curtis Brown. Oh, good. I've done a, I don't even remember, maybe desperate housewives. I've worked

with him a handful of times. Similar to Autumn Reeser. Yes. With them a handful of times there. So Robert, I keep when to say Robin Curtis, which we know is one of our Star Trek friends, but Robert Curtis Brown, who played the ambassador, very first credit, was a 1980 episode of American Playhouse. Yeah, he was a theater guy. It was some fancy, yeah, that's where he came from. He's a great actor. Yep.

Next up we have Neil C. ViPond. He's the flying instructor, Mr. Clegg. Oh, my gosh. My nemesis, my nemesis, yes. First of all, just to say, he did pass away in July 15th, 2022 at the ripe old age of 92. So we made it to the ninth decade, which is pretty amazing. Wow.

Very first credit, 1953 episode of a Canadian series called Encounter. Wow. 1953. Wow. Okay. That's crazy. Yeah. And we have co-stars.

Ivar Broger. Evar Broger. Yeah. Ivar or Evar. Evar Broder. It's Evar. Because, yes, I am friends with Evar. I met him when I directed the episode Unity

and cast him in his very first television job ever. He was another theater actor. And he did the episode Unity. He was one of the ex-Borg. He was like a big role. Oh, my God. He's back on our show as a different. Oh, this is his second time.

Yeah. Okay. Well, if we didn't talk about him, I'll just say. He played Boris, first of all, and you know him. And 1975, episode of Great Performing. was the very first credit for i i have a feeling great performances was uh a theater piece that was recorded and put on pbs oh all right i don't think he had ever done anything on film until he did unity oh you're kidding that's what he told me at least but maybe he meant he'd just

moved to l a may be l a thing that's a big gap that's 26 years from yeah 1975 great before he could have been in college and a you know production of some shakespeare play that they've filmed and you know and put on PBS so he says evar right evar is it bragger or broger broger broger broger evar broger yeah great is how he pronounces it yeah lovely wonderful gentleman great actor yeah i've stayed in touch with him over the years he's awesome lovely i like to hear that matt mackenzie who played the port authority officer 1987 episode of moonlighting mm-hmm the show that that big hit that bartender bruce booked when we talked about that we talked about it yes next up we have brook benko uh the transporter chief in the background there when harris meets

mr clegg for the first time she does have a single line 2 000 episode of boston public was brooks yeah there you go all right and that's it's got everybody yeah well before we get into this recap, I just want to say, and this is a surprise to you. I mentioned it just before we hit record. Yes. I have a video of behind the scenes filming this episode out in what I think is Griffith Park. Yeah. Location, a bunch of different scenes, some stuff, just a lot of stuff behind the scenes of this episode. I think I was filming for our rap party blooper reel that we were going to put together some behind the scenes interspersed with a blooper reel and put some of the crew on. So this was just me filming the crew at work for that. But we're going to show that in the

bonus material after this recap. Yeah. So all you Patreon patrons, stick around for your bonus material. If you're not a Patreon patron, this is the kind of stuff that we find and add in behind the scenes stuff that we find interviews. So anyway, I'm excited to look at this with you. You haven't seen it. Sounds amazing. Yeah. So for those of you who are have been kind of just tuning into our free podcast on the bonus just so you know with patreon i think you can see this video once you sign up for lieutenant level i think that's five a month something along those lines and you can actually see the bonus this this actual video so yeah um yeah i'm super excited and i'm shocked that you found this i can't wait to play it for you

right now at the end of this and hear what you say as you see all the faces and all the people there That's going to be fun. Yeah. Okay, now let's get into the story. Yeah. Yeah, well, you know, what are they doing? They're on their way to some conference. But for some reason, Chakotay kind of takes a, is it a detour just to like look at the beauty of the.

I think so. He's just looking out the window and kind of he's, he wants to fly down and see this beautiful lush planet. Right. They're not in the Delta Flyer. they are in a different like a class two shuttle or standard Starfleet shuttle it's one of our older shuttles yeah well thank god because you know what happens to that shuttle so yeah not the delta flyer right they it's seven inchicote in the in the shuttle and uh he's talking about how beautiful it is she's not interested and then he's got a line where he says but you don't see natural beauty

like this every day and when he said it i reround i was like was he doing a bob picardo imitation there i tell you seven there's always time for warp field dynamics you don't see natural beauty like this every day it was such a like i think robert beltrane was probably doing a little doctor flare to that delivery it was he definitely probably was that's so funny oh my goodness but they're they bump something happens there's a big bump we they look outside they see some kind of force field or dome right over the jungle there and the shuttle sort of bouncing off of it. It bounces and there's like a power surge that happens. They try to use shields, but the shields aren't working. They've loose impulse engines. The warp cores offline. This shield has caused some

kind of power failure in the shuttle that they're crashing. And so they decide to realign these weapons, the phasers, and maybe seven says she can open a hole in it and they can sort of crash land. They can't even beam out because their transporters won't go through this dome, this protective dome. So they fire the phasers just as they're heading through the hole. It looks like it closes up and chops off the back half part of the shuttle. Is that what you got? Yeah, look, it starts tumbling in the air and it looks like just a total, you know, a total loss of life and property. Like, I don't know how you'd serve.

They should have been toast, basically. But they had, they beam in to the planet and they're both standing up. Yeah, they had the wherewithal to beam in standing up after that little rump, top. They should have hit the ground, dump, you know, tumbling and rolling and they should have beamed in mid like, like, you know, in some crazy like, you know, like they're being. flipped around upside down it would have been quite funny it didn't match the exterior visual effects the the the crashing was so big and dramatic oh and then their beeman is just standing there yeah it's like hey nothing happened yeah and i noticed they had a didn't they have like a case with them or something

what no well they end up with a case where'd they get it do they find it along so they beamed in with the case one of them yeah did they think oh let's beam in with a case so we can so we can collect debris i I don't know. It was just, they wouldn't have had time to do that. No. That's not very practical and not very realistic. No. But that's how we, that's how we end. They're in the jungle. Yeah. And I think this was on the stage. I think we built a jungle set. I know they did some, some exterior location work, which I think was Griffith Park in this, which is very close to Paramount, 10 minute, 10 minute drive, up Gower.

How much do you think production paid to rent out parts of that park? To be honest, like, what did they pay the city for that? What do you think they would have charged? Back then, probably $10,000 a day. 10K? Okay. Yeah. Plus more money for parking lots that they buy out.

Yeah. And they probably had to pay some park guards. And so it was probably, you know, double that each day just for all the other fringe. The incidentals. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. And if they were out there two days, I'm guessing they were probably out in Griffith Park for a couple of days and on stage for a couple of days.

Because it was a ton of cave work, jungle work. It was all, you know, a mashup of real and stage work. Man, I bet you a lot of their budget is from renting out bits of that park, just the productions throughout the year. Yeah. Easily. All right. Come back on credits. Yeah, we go to credits.

We come back. We're still in the jungle. Seven looks at her tricorder or does she just look up? But she realizes the barrier is closed. The hole that they made is closed. We reveal that Chukote has his point. pants are torn and he's got this line it actually looked like a good wound like the makeup department did a nice job it looks you know he got hurt he's got a cut he's limping and seven scans

him and realizes that he's got a hairline fracture so he's got a broken bone i just want to make sure we it's not just a cut he's got a broken bone broken legs yes he needs fancy medical equipment to heal that bone or it's just going to take time. Broken bones take time to heal. There's no other option. It's either Starfleet technology to heal that broken bone or time. You know, four to six weeks at least. Anyway, okay, let's just say he's got a fract.

You know where I'm going with this. I do know where you're going. Now, seven basically detect shuttle debris all over the place. So Chakotay thinks that maybe we can kind of pull together there's some of these broken components and sent like a distress signal, something along those lines. So the conference is not going to happen. Yeah, he even thinks they can make the conference, he said. You know, if we hurry, he says we might even make the conference.

With his broken leg? Yeah, yeah. But he loves where they are, couldn't ask for a nicer place. And they start looking for debris. We cut out to this space station. Yeah. Which I guess is where the conference was going to be. Right. These are the Ladotians. The Ladogians. We see the Delta Flyer doing some super cool moves. I made a note, like, that's the kind of Tom Paris flying that I miss. I've been talking about that lately. Would you do more of later, too?

Yes, which is awesome. Thank God. I love that scene with Clegg. But yeah, he sort of dives under a ship and cuts in a tight space. And he's arriving to this port station and suddenly he gets. It's a hail, an officer, I guess, comes on the screen and says, guest vessel, 746-5-6, this is port control, shut down your engine, basically pulling him over. And Paris is like, what's up? And he goes, you committed violation 256, you're in trouble. And Paris tries to charm his way out of it. You know, the officer is not moved.

And he says there's going to be a penalty for this flying. And Paris wants to know what it is. And he says, the officer says, we'll tell your commanding officer. And all I could think of was like, don't argue with a cop, Tom. Like, why are you, you know, just say yes, sir, thank you, sorry. Take the ticket. Deal with this later. But he's like, he's trying to charm his way out, argue.

Yeah. And did you think of the, did you think of the scene from Q2, or the Chakuzin was actually Q and saying, you're going to have to, you'll have to pay, you'll have a fine. But I can't tell you what it is yet. It was almost like a similar sort of feeling. Similar thing. Yeah. By the way, when Tom first comes to a stop after that exterior shot where it's really cool.

Yeah. They cut inside and you see Tom powering down some levers and things. Yes. And I was like, we never do that. I love that it was a piloting story beat where I could use the levers and turn the engines down and, you know, settle back. It was, I just, I was happy with the way I was animating and using the parts. and things. Yeah, it looked good. Because there was no rules and no instruction on that. No, it was up to you. You pretty much figured out the sequence of the shutdown and it looked

very natural. So, good job. I was happy with that. So in the ready room, Paris opens the scene with piloting lessons. And I guess he's got to take piloting lessons, traffic school. And I just thought in this scene, Janeway's telling him he's got to take trafficking, traffic school or piloting school and she's like it'll give you time to brush up on all your skills

and well you you kind of saying like we're not even going to be here that long and she's like no there's a conference that seven and Jacote

were invited to so yeah you got plenty of time to go through this piloting school I felt like in this scene Cape Mulgrew was really enjoying

Tom or me Robbie you know being like completely outraged and powerless. Kate's eyebrows and smirks and smiles,

her facial mugging was hilarious. I love Kate Mulgrew's faces. She had tons of thoughts and feelings in the scene. It was very funny. Back to the jungle, I think, right? Yeah, back to the, but let me ask you, were you, were you upset that Kate was? Oh, no, I think it's,

that Janeway was feeling that way to play. Like, like, I love that that that. was her choice and it just made me more frustrated like I was totally I can't believe you're not telling them that I'm the best pilot in the alpha quadrant like I don't need traffic school oh it's fun all right made me laugh we're back in the jungle they find a little piece of debris it's completely just you know new so they can't do anything with it but then chakotay's tricorder picks up some other life signs and that this is when we are introduced to the ventu they're kind of like lower down in the valley when you first see them the shots from the distance and

they're very primitive i mean this is definitely a pre pre pre pre pre warp society no use of any technology so to speak right yeah and i couldn't tell where that pov when they looked down at the you know the village or whatever it felt like a a combination of vis effects and a high angle on stage because there were the caves, which we know were on set. Yeah. There was a lot of jungle around it, but it felt a little vis-of-fax. You know, those kind of shots are hard to get because you've got to get way up on the stage to get enough room

for them to fill in all that extra stuff around. So they brought a crane in for that. They probably brought a crane in. I remember, I don't know if this was the shot, but I remember Marvin talking about a shot like this. This could be the one, but where they had to take the camera up into what's called the perms. So the perms are probably 75 feet up in the air.

It's all those catwalks that are way up high where they rig the ropes that hold sets and walls and things up. They took that and there's stairs that look terrifying to me along the stage wall. And this could have been the shot where they went up into the perms and then pointed the camera over the edge of a catwalk looking down to get that angle. They might have done that. Oh, my goodness. On stage. This shot definitely felt like it was enhanced. and they would have had to do something like that.

Wow. Yeah, we see the village and then they decide that Chacote is very interested and he wants to get a closer look. And Seven's like, no, we're not on an anthropological mission. Yeah. And he says, okay, you're right. Let's search for debris. He starts to move and he collapses in pain.

Yeah. And I wrote down great head fling, Robert. He did this like dramatic, oh, and fell down. It was a little Shatner-ass. You know, it was fun. It was funny to me, actually. Seven says he's developing an infection. He should rest.

And so he's going to stay there and kind of keep out of sight, and she's going to go and keep foraging for more parts. Yeah, I think the thing that felt Shatner ask about it is he was so interested in, like, classic Robert, like, you know, this village, these people are so interesting. He was calm. And then suddenly it was like, oh. It was just such a big turn. I was like, whoa, that's a Shatner move.

That is, yeah. Well, you know, when you got a broken leg, you got a broken leg. You got to go, you got to go. You got to go up your performance. Yeah. Yeah, so he rests against the tree trunk and seven's going to go see if she can find anything. So we see seven collecting more spare parts. She finds another part.

And I thought, what is she going to do with all these spare parts? I guess they're just going to see what they get. and then MacGyver it together. That's right. Yeah. But she calls, she calls to Chikote. Yeah. And then it cuts to his com badge, like basically off camera of her line, right?

So it starts on her and then it jumps to him, but he's sleeping kind of. He's sort of like, he's unconscious. Against the tree. He's kind of dozed off. And this red hand comes in. Yeah. Yeah. It's one of the villagers and they touch him and he jumps up and then when he jumps up,

the guy reaches out, grabs the combat, throws it on the ground and then smashes it. Stomps on it. No, doesn't he hit it with a rock? No. Oh, yeah, no, no. He does it? Yeah, yeah, he rocks. Yeah, he hits it with a rock.

He takes the com badge, throws it on the ground. And then there's a tight shot of this rock hitting it. And then it breaks like it's glass. And I thought, isn't it made of tritanium or something? Some Starfleet and metal that, like, haven't we gotten beyond dropping our phone and things just break? Like, but see, clearly in this atmosphere, all of our comb badges turn into very brittle, brittle, brittle material. That's what I guess. I'm going to go with that.

Yes. It completely, you know, shatters into a million. Like I said, it was like glass. Yes. Oh, very funny. We cut back to seven. She can't reach him. So she puts the part in the case, the case that they luckily brought with them when they,

transported out of that dramatically tumbling thing, puts in a case and walks away. I'm getting a feeling you don't like this episode that much. All right, so there's a passage of time. It's nighttime. Yes. And she's trying to track Chacote. She follows his biosignal to this cave.

She sees he's lying on a blanket. All the natives around him. So she thinks he's, I don't know, something's happening to him. They're accosting him. So she's like, step away. step away and you know what i feel like i feel like i'm you in this comment because you often make this comment yeah when i saw this i was like this looks a lot like avatar aliens like like their costumes their hair their prosthetic i felt like it was the a little in the vein of like the avatar

uh you know people yeah and then i looked up i was like the navvi the navvi the navvi but when i looked up when was Avatar made it wasn't made for like another seven or eight years oh yeah right it's not out yet so obviously we didn't steal from avatar but i wonder james cameron stole from us clearly it feels like it no he was i think i think tom paris is james cameron's favorite character and he saw that you were doing this kind of cool flying thing so he really paid attention to this episode oh yes and then he saw the ventu he went ventu i like the vna navvi so He went with Navi Vintu, Naventu, Navi, that's what he did. I think he might have.

But they honestly, they do look a lot like the Navi. They do. Exactly right. Anyway. Because when I look at this, they do, because the Navi, to me, are very African tribesmen looking, right? Yeah. From the African continent. And same thing here with the red paint and the way that the girl's hair was, very much like certain tribes that you can see.

primitive tribes that at least back in the day I suppose on the African continent so that's what I saw. Yeah, maybe that's where they both got inspired from similar sources. Definitely. Anyway, she sees Chikote

lying on this grass bed or something. Yeah. And then she says, step away from him and shines a light to them. And I thought she doesn't have her weapon drawn. Like, how does she know that they're so primitive they don't

have weapons. She's going to, you know, stun them with her light. Yeah. She just shine the light. They sort of, they scurried quickly. But even in this case, you don't know. You would just for defense or protection, you would have your phaser out. Did she not have a phaser? I don't think she has a phaser. But she's got the utility case. That can be a shield and a weapon if you know how to wield it correctly. Yeah, maybe they don't have phasers. That actually just occurred to me. But I was just surprised she only holds the light up. Yeah, yeah.

But everything's okay. He's like, yeah, look, they bandaged my leg. They put some herbs on it or whatever. Some herbs. They've wrapped a banana leaf around it. So that's going to help the broken leg, the banana leaf. That's how skeptical I was. But we'll get there.

We'll get there. Okay, listen, the banana leaf has medicinal properties. I'm sure it does, but it can't heal a break. a broken bone. I don't care if it's a fracture. I don't care. I've had broken bones. There's nothing but time unless we have Starfleet technology. Banana Leafs are not going to do. Sorry. Anyway. The banana leaf is wrapped around his leg in a splint. And yeah, she turns off the light. They talk. Chikote explains that, you know, you couldn't reach me because your call on my combat, scared them and they broke it. And he says, this is really good shelter.

and they're helping me with this banana leaf on my legs. So let's just rest. I'm going to rest, and I suggest you do the same. And she's left sort of sitting nearby. Yeah. And there's flickering, by the way, there's flickering firelight from the fires everywhere. Right.

And I just want to say to the audience, when you watch these episodes, we didn't really have, we sometimes would have real fires. But if it was this situation where it's just on the walls, it would be light bulbs on what's called like a very, or a, you know, a thing that would flicker, a flicker, that would give it, it would give it juice and then it would block it. It would, that's the device. It would just flicker the light.

That's it, right? It was literally light bulbs that would just, you know, strobe and flicker around to replicate fire. But there was, it works. It works. Yeah, you can't tell the difference. We do see Autumn Reeser for the first time kind of trying to touch Seven's implant at that point and she at first i was like because i've worked with autumn but much more recently like the oc yes was maybe five six years after this but um on the arrangement that was just a few few years ago yeah and so when i saw autumn in this first shot i was like is that her because there's so much makeup and is that wig yeah i think it's her yeah you know so funny all right yeah let's move on we're back on Voyager. We're in the corridor. And we have Kim, Nelix, and Torres at this point in the

walking talk. And Kim starts off talking about how Chelle says, we shouldn't miss the flame garden. So we're talking about the Bolian on our show. So we have referenced to some of the other characters we haven't seen in a while. Neelix talks about how the Arboretum is beautiful as well. Torres says we can do both. And that's when Tom comes around the corner. And I'm going to say, yeah, you just appeared. I just disappeared. Yeah. And I'm like, oh, you're joining us. Oh, that's right you have to go to pilot school i feel like i i relished this moment as much as janeway we love piling on you and i felt bad to be perfectly honest when i watched this i said i'm a little too hard on robbie right no it was funny so you're okay with it okay yeah the thing i wasn't okay with

is i feel like we the blocking of walking down the hallway the three of you and the me joining you it was like four people in a walk-and-talk shot it just felt like like we were walking as if we knew there was a shot, a camera. I wish we had been a little more staggered and broken up. And maybe, you know, I could have come from behind you and caught up to us. It just felt like the simplest, shortest, walk with four people side by side so that, you know, they have their opportunity for lines and they didn't have to cover it.

It just, I don't know, I wish we had been a little more natural. It felt a little bit of this. What about this take? You come in, but you stumble. and fall and you're now flat on your back. And now the shot is the POV of you looking up and all of us are looking down at you. And like, oh, you're joining us.

That would have been kind of funny. That would have different. You know, no one would have known. Anything. Anything to break up. Fine. Yes. But yes, Tom's going to meet his pilot lesson instructor. They all go into the transporter room.

And then this man, Clegg, Mr. Clegg, the flying instructor is beamed aboard. And he is all. business this character is all business and by the way i love his character i thought he was awesome he was great and as soon as i saw him so many memories i forgot about this episode and this whole story for yeah tom's part of it um but as soon as i saw him i remembered oh yeah this guy i remember doing a bunch of scenes with him and i remembered so his character is all business and, you know, humorless and very sort of dry and bossy.

I remember the actor was kind of like that. And I remember feeling like, is he doing this with me, like, between the scene? Maybe he was method or maybe it was just, he was playing kind of himself. But I was like, even doing the scenes with him, I was a little bit like, he's all business. He's very, he's, he's, it was funny. Yeah. vividly remember doing those scenes with him and how between the shots, it was very much like the scenes themselves.

Did you try to make him laugh off camera? I think that was a good, yeah, I tried, he wouldn't laugh. Nothing. I tried to chat him up. He wouldn't chat. I was just like, wow, this is for real. I, he think he was a method actor. It just sounds like that.

He must have been. Yeah. That's so funny. Oh, my God. But he comes in and Neelix and Kim and Torres all sort of tease him about, oh, yes, he's very patient and never impulsive. And Harry says, oh, he'll enjoy all the time. You can give him take all the time you want.

So this is a very funny, cute scene. And Tom asked, like, how long is this going to take? And Clegg says, oh, usually about four hours, but there's no rush. Right. And I loved my awkward smile as we. exit the transporter room i really liked the storyline it was even though this episode the navi part of the episode to me was a little flat okay um good good themes in there but i enjoyed watching tom squirm and be out of fish out of water hey this is a great great story line i yeah oh yes

i loved watching all and you give good face in your reaction i know i give a lot of mugging And no, it was, and I know I'm biased here, but I usually I'm more critical of myself. But in this episode, I was like, oh, this was fun. This was funny. And I, I feel like, yeah. And you need that, you know, B storyline to sort of lighten it up a little bit. Exactly. I was so relieved every time we went back to the driving school.

I was like, thank God we're back at driving school. Anyway, we go back down to the planet. Chikote is trying to draw a map in the dirt. He talks about a river. the man doesn't understand him so he draws what a river is sort of yeah put some water in there and then the guy gets it and the guy makes a hit the hand signal a hand signal like something under like under the underwater or something yes yes and so chikote copies this hand gesture and then they talk about mountain he points to a mountain and it's this you start like this and go up that's

Yeah, there was some really interesting creative sign language, I guess. Yeah, nonverbal communication happening. Yeah, there was some really good stuff. I like it. But he does find out where he is, like he now knows because he draws that little map. Yeah, yeah. A trade happens where the main ventu guy sees his pips. Yeah, his pips, his mocky, you know, little badge, whatever it is.

And he wants it. So he trades him basically what looks like a nut for it. It's like, here, this nut for that thing. And maybe that's the medicine that heals his broken leg. Clearly. That must be it. Because a banal leaf ain't doing it. No.

Okay. That's solved that whole problem for me now. Okay. It's seven sees this exchange. And she walks over and she kind of makes fun of him a little bit. You know, it's like, I hope you, did you make a favorable exchange? It was a little edge to that, I thought. He was a little judgy.

But he's the one that was, you know, he's the one who, well, he knows. Yeah. He's a commander. He knows the Starfleet rules. He knows that giving any technology, I don't know if there's any technology in the PIPs. I doubt it. No. So maybe that's why he feels like it's almost like a rock.

I guess it's the safest thing that he could do. Yeah. But they do make the exchange. and she says that she's found some other components. And Chacote says, great, I've been mapping the area. Here's the river we passed. Here's where we are now. And they realize it's probably about six kilometers away.

And Chacote says, well, maybe one of them can take you there. And she goes, no, we need to limit our. So she's like distance, distance, distance. She's trying to prime direct of it is what she's trying to do. Yes, she is. As much as she can. And Chiquet is not. No.

She decides to go alone and not let them. see her building a Tetraeon-based signaling device that would break the prime directive. Yeah, so seven leaves. And we do see that Autumn Research character, the girl, is watching. And kind of, do we see her follow her at this point? No, we see her watch her leave. She's just watching. She's kind of hiding, hiding behind a tree or something. We cut over to seven in the woods. She trips over a tree route and drops her tricorder down a hole in the ground what what kind of hole is that it's like what no it's a i don't know it was a weird hole it was on stage i'm sure yeah it's just a dark before you yeah but before you jump into that

let's just finish out that end scene a very funny part where the ventu man has built a walking stick for chicote so he starts using that he's very happy and he hobbles over to a group of teenage ventu that are standing there and he says hello to them and he turn around and they've been drawing his tattoo on each other's ends

because they think it's cool yeah so and that was I laughed at that definitely he's already changing their culture the prime director just the littlest smallest action can have big ripple effect I love the hello sign by the way

because he does he does a hello and it's like a fist by the heart and yeah and that it opens up opens up like a fan or something yeah a finger fan it was cool i really like that yeah oh back to the jungle yeah she loses that tricorder and her hair is coming loose which i love that are you know she's loosening up a bit yeah she's sitting by the tree when suddenly she hears a noise she calls out identify yourself and autumn reaser the girl comes over with a blanket and puts the blanket over over her shoulders and then she grabs some some stones and squeezes some oils from some kind of nuts or fruit or something and she makes a fire okay because i thought she squeezed the oil out of a rock i was like man i thought it was like a nut it's yeah it has to be like a berry yeah

yeah but seven says oh an exothermic reaction so seven knows how that happened obviously the girl Just knows that if we put this on there and scrape the stones together, it will cause this fire. Yeah. And she pulls some type of, I don't know, it's, it looked like a tree bark or maybe it's a root, some type of root. Some kind of root. Yeah. Yeah. It's a cheese puff.

She gives her a cheese puff. That's why they're orange because they keep eating cheetos. The cheese from the cheese residue gets all over their face and their body. and they just started just once they got their face dirty they just said hey ha ha ha ha they laugh and they continue the color down their body and they're they're eating flaming hot cheetahs is what they're eating yeah flame and hot chitos definitely like if you've ever eaten flaming hot cheetos you turn you turn orange your fingers yeah pretty much so i think that's what it was i'm actually salivating for cheetos now because she she offers her the flame hot chito and seven at this point says no thank you i'm not hungry yeah

she's not no and now we go to the shuttle bay oh yeah delta flyer and the teacher's inside there um getting a a rundown of the delta flyer tom's very proud of it yeah but um but then the the teacher starts criticizing all the systems like you know inadequate system integration visibility is impaired by lateral sensor arrays insufficient console accessibility and then Paris tries to go along with him he's trying to kiss up yeah but the thing that he he lands on is the polarity thrusters he says they've been known to cause

accidental acceleration and then Paris kind of like you know he's like oh yeah exactly and why should I be held responsible for the design of the ship's flaws yeah the ship's flaws yeah the design and then Clegg's like well according to my records you were the designer so he he's done his homework there's no way yeah you can't get out you can't escape from this guy he's too good yeah i just imagine that this guy has been this pile of destructor for the last 46 years like he's heard it all yeah yeah he's he's a buy the book guy oh he doesn't go with any my dog ate my homework excuse no no um we're back in the jungle she's wearing the blanket that autumn research the girl gave her yeah i call it the

m&m blanket because it's this blanket with like m&Ms you know attached to it these little red and yellow and green you call it the eminem blanket my notes say the skittles blanket so i've got skittles and you got m&Ms yes or the candy blanket let's just say that for all of our listeners that may not have m&Ms or skittles in their country the candy blanket yeah it looks like little candies attached to the blanket it was adorable yeah the girl um offers her food again they wake up they look around at the you know the trees nature seven's kind of seven's starting to soften a bit. And the girl offers her food again this time, but she takes it, which you feel like Seven's

starting to loosen up. Her hair's falling down even more. And then Seven draws a map and says, hey, I'm trying to get here. Yeah. Can you show me? And the girl says, yes, she points. And they start walking. But they take a detour.

They take a detour. Yeah. And Seven's like, wait, I thought it was the other way. And then the girl takes her to this triple waterfall. Yeah. Beautiful vis effects there. and Seven starts to, you know, interrupt and say, look, we really have to go, and the girl sits down. And it's great because Seven does need to slow down.

She does need to appreciate things. Yes. And so she's starting just to sit with this girl and look at the beautiful waterfall and the birds and the trees. And it's like Avatar is what it's like. It's beautiful. Yeah. We're back in the clearing where Chukote is. He's stressed out.

really stressed out right now he's just like you know he doesn't he hasn't seen seven he's a little stressed out the guy doesn't know what he's talking about so he drops down and he draws in the dirt of what seven looks like and i at first i thought oh my gosh he did not just do that did he because i thought he drew two round circles to be you know boobs Yes. That's what I thought. Okay. And I was like, no, he didn't do that. But in reality, he drew a big circle as the face, two smaller circles with a line down the middle. That's the, that's the nose. Then he did the side dolphin looking implant over her eye. That's what it was. So I had to rewind it. But initially I thought, you did just, you didn't just draw breast. Did you? But no, he didn't. It was two eyes, nose and the implant. And that's clearly. Yeah. Yeah. He drew a very. primitive version of seven's face to show the technology he's looking for technology like what seven has right he grabs that one of the native girls one of the girls are over yeah and she has a piece of technology of debris tied to her eye to look like seven to look like seven yeah and chukot is like

where'd you get this and then they show him they bring him a bag filled with stuff they've collected yeah and he asks where yeah and we go back to seven who's found a piece of the like the nose cone of the of the shuttle yeah stuck on the ground a part of it and um don't try to touch it seven's like no don't touch it don't touch it and seven starts to work and then we go back to our ship uh we're in astrometrics janeway is talking tovok um twoac says you know chikote failed to report and we can't get a response from them they didn't show up at the conference right that's what harry says uh janeway basically says anything on sensors and kim goes yeah we've located a whole signature over the southern continent a whole signature over

the southern subcontinent but it's only a wing that's it yeah and what's crazy is that janeway's like wait wait wait wait that is really low for something to be in orbit and in two bucks like no it's not in orbit. It's sitting on an energy barrier. So that piece of the wing is right on top of the force field, which I thought was kind of funny. So anyway, the mystery continues. They're not sure what's going on. Our scans cannot go beneath the field. Tuvok says standard scans didn't reveal its presence, but we were only able to detect it using our Borg sensors. And I just thought, wait, we have Borg sensors? Why don't we always use Borg sensors? Like why? Why? Like when we have lines where we're like, sorry, nothing on sensors, Captain. Shouldn't we just go, try the Borg

sensors? Oh, yeah, got it. Like, why don't we do that? Or why don't we just start with the Borg or why don't we say nothing on the Borg sensors? We can try Starfleet, the Starfleet band. Because as Starfleet personnel, we were trained one way and one way, we know one way. I guess so, but like, we have Borg sensors? Yeah. I didn't know that. So, and they're better? Just use those. Anyway, Janeway says, you know... Hail the ambassador. Yeah. But Tuvok does say, you know, the barrier is deflecting all of our scans because

Janeway wants to see if the shuttle went through that barrier. You can't read it. And Tuvac's like, you know, the barriers deflecting our scans. And I was like, use the board scanners. You just said they're so much better. That's funny. Jamie does say to hail the Ladogian ambassador, so now we're the next scene, we're on the bridge with the ambassador on the view screen. And, you know, he kind of explains what basically happened and that he's sorry that he didn't warn them beforehand, not to go anywhere near that area.

But it's his thinking that our people are done. He doesn't think that they survived. Yeah. But we get a little bit backstory on what's going on here. the ventu were basically kind of primitive ancestors to them in a way and at least their people

their ancestors used to be at war I think with the ventu at some point so I don't know they talk about that they do a little bit and the aliens erect this hundreds of years ago this aliens erected this dome to protect them and they haven't been back so it's just a mystery they cannot find a way

through it they talked about protecting the ventu because their ancestors Yeah, the Lodosians fought them and polluted their habitat. That's what it was. And so therefore, that other intelligent species stepped in, covered them the ventu with a dome, and says, you're not going to mess with these peeps anymore. That's what happened.

I did like at the end, when the ambassador sort of leans in onto the desk and he's like, he's like, the generator is inside. There's no way to access. He's sort of leaning in. And I just thought, we never have our characters on the view screen. They always just sort of sit there. Stay in one place. Yeah.

They might move their head a little bit. I love that Robert Curtis Brown. Yeah, he did a little blocking. It was nice. I love that. Yeah. Made something out of nothing is what he did. Yeah, he did.

We're out in space. The captain says, although the Ladozians are skeptical, they're allowing us to try to locate our people. Meanwhile, we've begun to analyze the shuttle fragment. And then we go into engineering. We've got a giant piece of the shuttle. That's the wing. that part of the wing that was sitting on top, right?

It's in engineering. And I was like, why isn't this in a cargo bay? You know, that's usually or... Because Torres has to do the examination. So she'd be in a... Yeah, but couldn't she do all that in engineer. It just seems like you're going to put it right in the middle of the warp core room. Like this thing, it's people working on...

They got a lot of other things happening in this room. When you want to do this somewhere that's like sealed and I don't know, it just seemed like an odd place. this giant thing sitting in the middle, right next to the warp core. I know you like the B storyline, but you are so critical, right? It's making me laugh so much right now. Why is it an engineering? It should not even be there.

It should be the cargo bay, damn it. Torres does discover that the feedback from this dome, this barrier is what destroy the shuttle. And she says, if we're not careful, the same thing could happen to us. Right. Like if we try to penetrate it like Seven and Chakote did with phasers or something, it could destroy our entire ship. So this is a very dangerous rescue mission. It is. Tuvok does talk about how they found similar technology in Seven's Borg database.

So the Borg evidently did assimilate the species, or we think that they assimilated the species that erected the dome, the energy dome. Yeah, yeah. We go back to Seven and this debris field, Autumn Reeser is making some bracelets from magnetic pieces of rock. So we see these rocks that are kind of like magnets jumping together. Yeah. Which is going to be a problem later. But... Chacote shows up, right?

Chacote shows up. Seven has a ponytail, by the way. Yeah. Yeah. She doesn't have her. I like that. It was great. I loved it. I wish she had a ponytail more often on the ship.

But what did she tie it with? I guess it shows later. It's a little piece of, yeah, the girl gave her a little piece of thread or their fabric. She used that to tie it. You see it hanging off of her in the later scene. Okay, great. Orange, your favorite color. It's orange, your favorite color.

There you go. Your hat has orange on it too, right? Yes, it does. Yes, it does. Moab, Utah. Love it. Looks great. Okay.

So we're in the debris field. Chiquote shows up with the man. Um, seven asks for his tricorder, but you go, it's like, nice to see you too. I like that. Yeah. Um, she tells him that hers fell down that weird hole. And she's going to maybe try to transmit a signal by neutralizing, uh, the, the force field with a dampening field from the deflector of this crash shuttle. So she's got a plan.

She does, but it can't happen there. They have to, I think they have to be on higher ground. for this thing to work. So that's why they talk about moving it. And, you know, Chocote's like, look, that thing weighs a ton. So what are we going to do? And seven's like, oh, we can maybe enlist their help. And that's what they do.

That's what they do. Chacote is a little worried about enlisting their help. For the first time, he's like, I don't know if we should involve them. So he's flip-flop back to the prime directive team. But he does eventually say that once they do all this, they can disrupt this. Deactivate the barrier. Yeah, he's,

Chikode is worried they may deactivate it permanently, which would be a huge change. So Seven says, no, it should go back and reinitialize after we do this procedure and get out of here. Back to the flyer. Yes. Basically, this is a scene out in space where the flyer is going through a cones course. Like at the DMV, when you get your driving test

and you have to drive through the cones. Right. But it's going through very slowly, like molasses. Oh, yeah. Yes. Leg. Yeah, so Clegg does say to Paris after Tom flies through some of these cones, he says, so you can execute a turn at less than 300 KPAH.

Well done. That's really slow, 300 KPAH. That's real. For the flyer, yeah. For the flyer. That's like Tom's in pain. Oh, my gosh. But you're so impatient.

You want to take the test and get out of there. He's in a patient, but he's trying to be charming, trying to be, you know, really polite about it, but he's trying to get out of here. And he even says, my friends are missing. I want to help find them. And the driving instructor says, well, that's very nice, but I can't treat you any differently than the other people that take this course.

And then he ends it with, besides, you're getting very close to becoming an adequate pilot. Rude, rude, rude, rude. What a burn. Oh, I love it. It's hilarious. Oh, my goodness. Yeah, we go to this rocky rise where the Ventura helping drag this nose cone of their shuttle up to the very top. And then Seven says, you know, stand back.

This is where I was like, is this Griffith Park? And then I made that note. I was like, this is not on stage. This is definitely out. It looks like Griffith Park. Yeah. When I found that footage that we're going to. going to show in the bonus material. Oh, good. Yeah. There is some of that footage of this scene of them

dragging the thing up. So it was Griffith Park. You get to see that. You get to see behind the scenes. It was Griffith Park. Okay. And anyway, they drag it up and Seven says, you know, not so close. Back up to the bridge. Voyager is trying to phaser the barrier. Yeah. But they're getting this feedback. Phasers are overloading. Yeah, phasers are overloading, says Harry. And so Jamie says ceasefire. She asked for suggestions. And Tuvok says, well, we could reconfigure a photon torpedo to detonate at the appropriate frequency. I yelled, no more torpedoes.

This is another reason why you're teaching this episode. Yet another photon torpedo. Yeah. No. No. But that could get around this whole feedback problem. So in theory, it might work. Janeway says, do it.

We go back to the rise. the natives are trying to watch seven says they're too close they need to go back chikote moves them back um but the girl autumn reiser kind of sneaks around to she doesn't get zapped yet she doesn't get zapped yet not yet but she sneaks around away from the group so they don't notice she's away from the group sneaks around to get a little closer kim says uh back on the bridge kim says you know the energy barrier is coming down jaymway's like wait wait i thought you were still reconfiguring the torpedo to Tuvok. He says, I am. It's just being deactivated from the inside.

So Janeway asked Harry to scan for life signs. Kim says, I, Captain. And all the audience breathes a sigh of relief. We do not have to waste that photon torpedo because God knows. We don't even have that photon torpedo. We ran out a long time ago. That's right. We go back up to the rise. Seven's doing her thing.

We see this energy. It seems to be working when suddenly she goes to touch, Autumn Reeser goes to touch the the shuttle and her magnetic bracelet starts charging up and it's charging and seven says take it off but it's too late she gets zapped by this energy the magnets in the in these rocks she was playing with or mess it all up curiosity killed the autumn or almost killed the autumn yeah back on the bridge harry says he only reads one com badge at sevens i like my delivery of that line it was very it was very I put some layers in there where it was sort of like

Chacote's dead some kind of a thing you know what I'm going with that? Like that's kind of I add a little It should feel the jeopardy should feel real here

it's still not looking good but they do make contact Seven talks to Janeway Janeway wants to lock on to Chacote and seven says or lock on to them both but seven says just take Chacote

I need more time Yeah send a med kit send a med kit to me and uh seven says i can treat it i just need to make it and yeah so we go to a flyby and captain's log supplemental seven has remained on the surface to tend to the ventu girl while chukote being treated in sick bay now we're in sick bay when the doctor says wow well the the banana leaf healed the fracture and the infection i'm impressed i was like he's been down there for 48 hours. How does a banana leaf heal a broken bone? It's not science. Robbie, what's the time frame on earth to heal a broken leg or a bone typically? Isn't it like

eight weeks to 12 weeks, something like that? Four to six weeks before you get any kind of, and it could be eight or 12 weeks. And by the way, how does the doctor even know he had a broken bone? He just knows Chikote was injured. If it's healed, would he- You would know that it was healed. Oh. I don't know. Like, I don't know. I just felt like this banana leaf. That is, yeah. So everybody out there, grab a banana leaf and wrap it all around your body. You will be cured of everything. It seems like, well, if you get a banana leaf from what from these guys. But we don't know. We don't know what the herbs were that they also put on there. There's, there's some really good juju going on there. That's really good. Yeah. It's Avatar. I'm telling you.

it's miracle stuff yeah um chagote is very worried that they've traumatized them and uh and uh he wants to transport all the shuttle debris back so that you know they don't have any record of their existence with these people correct and we go back down with seven in the cave the girl wakes up um she touches seven's hand they have a nice moment and then they have some hands signals they sure do she said seven says it's time for me to leave she makes a hand signal and the girl replies where and it's the first time that seven used hand signal so i i love that being the thing that you know she just slowly was getting more and more relaxed and more more in touch in tune

and connected to these these people yeah um and the girl gives her a blanket uh or offers her a blanket as a gift yes that's a parting gift But we also hear Boris's voice, the actor who you... Evar Broger! Yes. And you hear him say, these botanical specimens indicate a high level of serum nitrates. And Seven walks out, I was like, what are you?

Who are you? Why are you here? And he's like, oh, oh, you must be from Voyager. She's like, who are you? He says he's Boris. He's the expedition leader. And they're there to conduct scans, evaluate the potential of this habitat in terms of resources and this and that.

They had anthropological research going on. And he said, you really did the vent to a favor. Yeah, yeah. By lowering that forest field. And seven's like, oh, what have I done? It's going to be like Avatar. All those giant machines are going to come in and ruin the forest. This is the beginnings of Avatar.

It really is. I know. Did you ever see the movie Firm Gully? Firm Gully was a cartoon, a feature of animated film back in the 90s i think fern gully it's about the rainforest in south america it's a wonderful environmental it's very much like this i love i'm just sidebar love it's anime what did you it's an animated yeah i think dreamworks produced it back when they were making a lot of animated stuff oh i want to watch it now yeah fern golly is a great animated film yeah about the environment

and about the rainforest we need more environment stuff like avatar long before avatar Yeah, that's awesome. Anyway, we go to the ready room and Chacote is wound up. He's like, we got to put that barrier back up. And Seven's kind of torn here. She's like, well, maybe, you know, exposure to technology and things will be good for them. And Chacote's like, how do you know what's best for them? And she realizes, I can't.

You're right. And Seven really kind of makes the case with Chacote. She's like, when I first met them, I thought they were very primitive and of little interest. But I came to realize that they're resourceful. and very self-reliant people and their isolation might limit their potential but it will also you know if if the isolation ends their whole way of life is going to be ruined right so she makes a case to the to the captain and we cut on the bridge and there's uh the ambassador again um thanking us for opening up the the barrier letting them now explore and she's like nope we're gonna have to get out of there

we're going to, you know, restore this thing. And you better get your people out of there because you don't want them to be trapped inside like ours were. Yeah. And he says, this is really important, you know. This is our living history. We need to research this. But she said, Janeway's like, nope.

Yeah. Well, he does make one final plea. He does say, in the spirit of cooperation, I hope you'll reconsider, which kind of sounds like something Janeway would say. It's a bit of a threat, too. it's a yeah yeah a little bit a little bit and then he says at the end okay i'll make the arrangements but it doesn't seem convincing no and uh a little time later we're on the bridge

and harry says we've transported all of that debris yeah onto back onto the ship there's nothing of ours left down there um seven's ready to go with a deflector array when bam there's a hit a Lidozian vessel is charging weapons on an intercept course. Our transporters are offline. They hail us and they say, we're not going to let you restore that barrier. Yeah, it's the ambassador again, right? Yeah.

And he says, you know, we only targeted your transporters, captain. We didn't want to hurt your people. Yeah. I hope you'll show the same restraint. I love her response when she says, I don't find weapons fire of any kind restraint I love that

calling him on his trying to get out of what he did not take responsibility for firing on them I know but he basically says look if you want to avoid any further conflict

I suggest you high tail it get out of here so it looks like they've got the upper hand Janeway thinks for a second she's like where's Tom get me Tom

yeah well she said take us out of orbit so it looks like we're leaving so to give us some time right yeah And she wants to talk to Tommy Boy, who's still in the midst of his lesson. Yes. And Tom gets a call, Janeway to Paris, respond. And the driving instructor is not happy.

He's like, please do not interrupt my student during his examination. Janeway says, no, this is important. I'm sending you some encrypted orders. And then Tom reads them real quick and does a 90-degree turn. some real cool flying starts here that was a nice maneuver when you just it was like a rotation roll and a and a oh it was some sweet sweet flying sweet flying yeah and uh driving instructor's not happy he's highly irregular he says um going much too fast but uh paris very politely says i wish i could you know, listen to you, sir, but I really do, but I got to take care of this. And now Paris is

under attack. The Ladotian ship is firing him. Yeah. And Janeway says on the bridge, give him some help. We cut back and forth, basically, between the flyer and the bridge. Yeah. And the bridge does kind of, you know, Tubac sort of gives you a little time. He gets that ship off of your, off of your tail. Paris beams in the whole Ladocyan expedition party into the back of the Delta Flyer. and Evar Broger is back there Cannot believe what is happening He tries to come up at He tries to bum rush you

But then there's a force peel that you've put up so Yes, yes And it was so fun to see Evar Broger in a scene again After we had we had worked together When I was directing Now we're just acting together It was great

Paris finds the deflector gets a lock on it But his transporters are offline So Janeway says you've got to get out of there then if your transporters are offline. Get out of here and Paris is like, no, I got an idea. Not yet.

I love that. Yay, ideas. You've been talking about this. You're like, why doesn't Paris come up with an idea? He's got all the wisdom of being such a great pilot. So now we have this moment. Yeah. Yeah.

And he basically does what Chakotay and Seven did in the opening scene, fire some phasers through, you know, from the deflect. into the barrier to open it up for a second. But because it's Tom this time, I'm going to interpret. He's able to get through that hole just before it closes. Okay. So no, well, this is how I think you saw it differently than I did.

So you're saying you fired and you got a hole and went in. No, I say that there is no shield up yet. You fire at the thing that stopped the shield from being up. It explodes. and then the shield starts to close and then he goes yes yes but that's all right yeah that that sounds right okay he gets out just in the nick of time last second because he's the best pilot in the alpha quadrant yes and right before you do that you are you have been failed by clegg by the way yes that's true which is fine i think i said something like something tells me that's not going to be not going to be

a problem yeah because you can't pilot in the lodosian space we're not staying here after this anyway so See ya. Yeah. Uh-huh. We go to Cargo Bay and Chucote and Seven have their last scene together. And, you know, we talked about it before. Like, there wasn't a lot of flirting with the two of them in this episode. But there were moments.

And this is definitely one where, you know, they're sort of decompressing together about this experience. It's a bonding moment. Definitely. It's definitely a bonding moment. But you felt there was a hint of flirtation when he says. I don't know about you, but I'm glad to be back on Voyager. And she's like, as am I. So that moment there.

I felt like that moment for sure. I also think that it's not just Beltran. I feel like Jerry Ryan must have known where they were headed. Maybe that maybe that was going to happen. Maybe. And she was behaving much softer with Chukote in this story. And particularly this scene. Okay.

Normally she's all business with, it doesn't matter if it's Janeway or, you know, whoever. She's all business, but she was very, you know, much more vulnerable and softer in this scene. So I felt like they were both teeing it up just a little bit, just a little bit. Well, I could see her being softer because she did use Chacote in the holiday, hollow Chacote as, you know, her social lesson. So I feel maybe that's influencing her. But as far as Chakotay being seductive in his lines, I honestly, my read was that he was still business, even at the very end.

And I didn't detect the hint as much as you did. Okay. Well, that's our episode. So what's your lesson? Did you get any type of lesson? Yes, I did. I got a lesson that the lesson I have is every action has a ripple effect. So be careful.

Oh. Every action that we take is going to have a ripple effect. So be intentional, be aware, be conscious of what you're doing. Because you could have ripple effects that you don't even anticipate. faith. Yeah. Okay. I'm going to say my lesson comes from Autumn Reeser's character and a little bit from Chacote, but sometimes you've got to stop and smell the roses. You've got to literally just stop rushing through life and go out and enjoy nature. Go on a hike. Go go to the ocean. Get in the ocean. I mean, nature is a very restorative and healing place for all human beings to frolic in. So I'm going to say, just slow down and slow down. Get in the ocean. except if you live near me in Utah where there is no ocean so well that's why I said hike so you can hike in Utah so hike in the Utah mountains and swim in the oceans if you're near an ocean there you go yeah deal okay okay ratings um I as I said did not love this

episode and not wait to hear this rating I did not I I didn't find And I think because the guest actors couldn't speak, really. Like all, and I think it was the right choice, but it needed something to keep it, you know, engaging and keep the emotional stakes really high and engaged. And I didn't feel like often it did. It felt very slow and pondery because it was no dialogue between them. Yeah. So I didn't love it, to be honest. I like the themes and the ideas. I just didn't think it wasn't really dynamically shot, in my opinion.

It wasn't. Okay. I felt like, you get my point. Yeah. Because I would have gone lower, but I do think that the traffic school story was funny. And the fact that Tom got to be Tom Paris and have an idea and show off some flying that I don't think we've ever seen in seven years. We've never seen much of that. I agree.

Whereas, you know, some of the new Star Trek's and things, you'll see some cool flying. Yeah. And we just didn't do it. Maybe it was too expensive. Maybe. It was probably just too expensive. So we didn't do it. So I feel really happy for that storyline.

So that raises your rating a little bit. It does raise it. It still does not raise it very high. I'm going to give this a six. Oh, that's actually more generous than I thought you would be. Okay. I would have given it a four. I think the, the traffic school story to me,

bumped it up quite a bit because it had a beginning, middle, and end. It involved all the characters. You guys got to tease me. I had a nice scene with Janeway. I got to, you know, Tom got to do, to be a part of the A story, which you didn't see coming. So I think that storyline really raised it a lot. Otherwise, it would have been probably a four.

I don't have as many issues with this as you do, clearly. Yeah. So, and because of the B, storyline with Tom Paris and because of my UCLA and Burger King commercial alumni Autumn Rieser, I'm going to give this one a 7.2. So I'll go, I'll go higher than you for sure. Okay. Well, let's see what the captain and admiral's average rating for natural law is 6.5. Now, 6.5. So right between you and me. Between us, yeah, 6 and 7.2, right in the middle. there you go um nice okay well there you go i just want to remind uh patron uh patrons uh

stick around for this behind the scenes a home video that i shot and i do want to say as i'm digging through as we're getting near the end i'm getting nostalgic i found a uh natural law script you can see it right there nice i found a natural law script nice it is we're going to put that on the store. It's even got some appointment that I had written on the back. There's an address. If you want to go there and see where I went in 2001, I have no idea. But that was my personal script. It's probably some business errand thing that you had to go do. So, yeah, all right. But yeah, there you go. Garrett, what is next week's episode? Homestead. Oh.

We may have a special guest for that. We may have the Nelix. We might have the Nelix. Yes. Okay. All right, everyone, thank you for tuning in to our recap and discussion of natural law. And join us next week when Robbie and I will be tackling the episode where we see the tearful exit of Nelix. Yes.

We do know that about it. Yeah. We do know that. That was a. Yeah. That episode, yeah, I don't remember all the details about it, but the episode where Ethan Phillips left us early was emotional. So, yeah. Big time.

Okay. So, Patreon, patrons, please stay tuned for your bonus material and super bonus material because we have Robbie's home movies from the behind the scenes of this episode, Natural Law, that we will get to see. I'm very excited to see this for the first time. All right. See you next week. Thanks, everybody. See you next week.