The Delta Flyers - Shadowplay

Episode Date: August 20, 2024

The Delta Flyers is hosted by Garrett Wang, Robert Duncan McNeill, Terry Farrell & Armin Shimerman. In each podcast release, they will recap and discuss an episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. This week’s episode, Shadowplay, is hosted by Garrett Wang, Robert Duncan McNeill, & Terry FarrellShadowplay: On a planet in the Gamma Quadrant, Odo and Dax discover a society whose inhabitants are mysteriously disappearing into thin air.We want to thank everyone who makes this podcast possible, starting with our Production Managers Megan Elise & Rebecca McNeill.Additionally, we could not make this podcast available without our Executive Producers:Stephanie Baker, Jason M Okun, Marie Burgoyne, Kris Hansen, Chris Knapp, Janet K Harlow, Rich Gross, Mary Jac Greer, Mike Gu, Tara Polen, Carrie Roberts, Tom Paynter, AJC, Nicholaus Russell, Lisa Robinson, Alex Mednis, Holly Schmitt, James H. Morrow, Nicole Anne Toma, Roxane Ray, Andrew Duncan, David Buck, Randy Hawke, Ian Ramsey, Feroza Mehta, Jonathan Brooks, Matt Norris, Stephanie Lee, Izzy Jaffer, Jan Hanford, Sam Mikelic, Francesca Garibaldi, Thomas Irvin, & Jonathan CappsOur Co-Executive Producers:Liz Scott, Sab Ewell, Sarah A Gubbins, Luz R., Utopia Science Fiction Magazine, Courtney Lucas, Elaine Ferguson, Captain Jeremiah Brown, E & John, Deike Hoffmann, Anna Post, Shannyn Bourke, Lee Lisle, Sarah Thompson, Holly Smith, Amy Tudor, Mark G Hamilton, KMB, Dominic Burgess, Sandra Stengel, Normandy Madden, Joseph Michael Kuhlman, Darryl Cheng, Elizabeth Stanton, Tim Beach, Victor Ling, Shambhavi Kadam, Tae Phoenix, Donna Runyon, Nicholas Albano, Tim Neumark, Danie Crofoot, Steven Lugo, Rob Traverse, Penny Liu, David Smith, Stacy Davis, Kevin Harlow, & Hailey LugoAnd our Producers:Philipp Havrilla, James Amey, Patrick Carlin, Jake Barrett, Ann Harding, Trip Lives, Samantha Weddle, Paul Johnston, Carole Patterson, Warren Stine, Carol Murphy, Jocelyn Pina, Mike Fillmon, Chad Awkerman, Mike Schaible, AJ Provance, Claire Deans, Maxine Soloway, Barbara Beck, Heidi McLellan, Brianna Kloss, Dat Cao, Stephen Riegner, Debra Defelice, Alexander Ray, Vikki Williams, Cindy Ring, Alicia Kulp, Kelly Brown, Jason Wang, Gabriel Dominic Girgis, Maria Rosell, Heather Choe, Michael Bucklin, Lisa Klink, Dominique Weidle, Justin Weir, Jesse Bailey, Mike Chow, Kevin Hooker, Matt Edmonds, Miki T, Heather Selig, Rachel Shapiro, Stephanie Aves, Seth Carlson, Amy Rambacher, Jessica B, E.G. Galano, Annie Davey, Jeremy Gaskin, Charlie Faulkner, Estelle Keller, Greg Kenzo Wickstrom, Lisa Gunn, Lauren Rivers, Jennifer B, Gemma Laidler, Dean Chew, Linda Daireaux, Mars DeVore, Jennifer Vaughn, Walkerius Logos, PJ Pick, Preston M, Rebecca Leary, Ryan Mahieu, Andrew Cook-Feltz, Karen Galleski, Constance, Loretta Reyes, Timothy McMichens, Cassandra Girard, Andrea Wilson, Carol Ramsey, Willow Whitcomb, Jadzia Mehari, Mo, Leslie Ford, Travis Campos, & Douglas Lawrence-PlantThank 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, or distribute our creations unless we give you permission. If you have any questions, you can email us at [e-mail] 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

Greetings, everyone. Welcome to the Delta Flyers Journey Through the Wormhole with Quark, Dax, and their good friends, Tom and Harry. Join us as we make our way through episodes of Star Trek Deep Space Nine, my personal favorite. Your host along this journey are Terry Farrell, our resident, old man, Armin Shimmerman, our creative entrepreneur, Garrett Wong, our Forever Ensign, and my good friend, Robert Duncan McNeil. And, well, he's just all around great guy, right? Thank you. Thank you, Terry.

You're welcome. I don't think anyone has introed you like that, Robbie. All around great guy. That's an A-A-G-G-G. It's an A-A-A-G. You're such an A-G. And today, we have Terry. We do have Terry.

who's terry where's terry what terry hello and terry does the intro you got to change it up every now then i'm goofy yeah we like it we like it we now know her personal favorite is ds9 so that's clear that's only because i haven't watched voyager yet yes yes once you watch voyager it's going to be a tie it will i think it will because actually you guys are all my friends i really like every single one of you Now you'll look at it's totally different after this podcast. I'm actually excited to be in the same room as watching Terry, watch us. That would be cool if we could do that. Yeah, because we still have to have our group journey.

Yeah. To stay at your house, Robbie. Yes, you all have to come to my house in Utah. I think so. And then the four of us can do a podcast from there. Yes. Yeah. And then we can, you know, just have a big party.

and maybe we just throw in your favorite episode of Voyager to redo with Armin and I watching it. Oh, my gosh, that would be amazing. Just like a bonus thing. Think about this. Terry, you, you, Armin and myself, the three of us are like the three wise men traveling to Bethlehem, Utah. Oh, I love it. Robbie lives and the child in the manger, the whole thing. It's a very biblical reference.

And there we go. Walter. Walter's the child in the maze. The child is the baby in the manger, the very large baby in the manger. Yes. He's a baby. Oh, my golly. That would be great.

Well, we have a happy birthday. We've got to shout out to. Terry. Yes, Kelly B. Kelly B. Happy birthday. Her birthday is on August 22nd. Happy birthday, Kelly B.

Happy birthday, Kelly B. Happy birthday, Kelly B. We'll be right back after this message from our sponsor. All right, let's just jump right into our poetry synopsis, starting with Robbie Duncan McNeil and his Limerick of Shadow Play. Okay, here we go. Dax and Odo do some particle field stalking. They uncover the truth of a village that's shocking.

Jake's independence, he's asserting, Hork's plan is diverting and Kira and Bariol do some serious kiss talking I always want to say burial it's beryl yeah it's barrio not burial Barrio is a whole different meaning

it's a whole different thing yeah yeah then that's kind of sad and morbid yeah yeah yeah you got everything in there though I got the kiss talking which did I thought you were going to miss it I was like maybe he's not going to talk about it but you did in the very last stanza, the last line. Honestly, there was a little when they were kissing and I thought, oh my gosh, give

them a glass of water. It was a little mealy. It was a little mealy. I didn't really like the kissing. Kissing, yeah. I was very uncomfortable. I didn't think she enjoyed it. Can I just say, did you really? Because I felt like they were in middle school drama. Yeah, it was a little. They were doing a play in middle school. They were trying to, they didn't know how to kiss yet. You know, that's what it looked like to me. Anyway. Well, they kept talking. They kept talking through the whole years, both of them. Yeah. It didn't work. But I also think we've seen the not kiss other gentlemen. Not us. We haven't seen her kiss. Oh, you haven't seen it yet.

No. This is the first time we've seen her kiss anybody. Well, okay. This somehow did not look like she was having the best time ever. I probably shouldn't say that. But that's just my humble opinion. Interesting. And another thespian. You know, maybe Vedic Barrio ate some garlic bread before the kiss scene. Brush his teeth. Who knows? Maybe. Who knows?

Because it happens. It does happen. Here's my haiku for Shadow Play. Okay. Dax Odo team up. Villagers are holograms. Starfleet snot for Jake. You like how I said holograms the way that everyone in this episode is calling it.

Here's my question. Is it pronounced hologram during deep space nine and once Voyager starts. It changes the hologram? No, no. Okay. No, it's hologram. That's how you say. Thank you. No, it was really just the one guy, the protector guy. He was the one that kept saying, hologram. No, no, others did too. I'm telling you right now. More than one person said hologram. Okay. Well, they might have been copying him. Yes, they were copying him. So my question is, we got a dinkin. Why didn't the script supervisor say something? Why didn't somebody go, hey, that's, no one says holo. They may have. I mean, I've seen actors get correction.

and they just can't seem to. They can't even say it because they memorized it as hologram and they can't flip to holograms. He sounds like a cowboy. Yeah. He was. Yeah.

He had a little cowboy in him or something. Well, just the way you said it. Hologram. Yeah. Yeah. And mine's really short. Okay. Love comes in many forms,

extinguishes social norms. The connection we fight for is real. Odo finds love and for him, it's surreal. Wow. Wow. Nice. Because he found love with that little girl. Yes, he truly accepted him and loved him. And in that runabout, he was all love. Yeah. Well, that's a thing. Have we seen him love anybody before this? No. No. He's not softened like that at all. No, he is not softened like that. No. Well, let's just talk about the, since we don't have arm, let's talk about the definition of this episode title, shadow play. Shadow play, a noun, a display, a display in which the display in which the

shadows of flat jointed puppets are cast on a screen which is viewed by the audience from the other side such shows originated in east asia and were popular in london and paris in the 18th and 19th centuries they survive in traditional form in java and bali so they're still shadow plays in those two Asian countries wow wow i didn't even think interesting that it's puppets it's the shadows of puppets that's kind of that's really cool yeah in a way with You guys, yeah, you guys recognize this kind of stuff, right? Yeah, yeah. Shadow puppets.

Yeah, it's pretty cool. Oh, right on. Right. Doesn't it feel like something we knew about when we were kids, like from school? And then you just never paid it, never happened for us. Like, it wasn't part of our generation. I like puppet shows. Yeah.

I like puppet, like really creative puppet shows. Yeah, that's amazing. I agree. Well, that's an interesting definition because this, this guy, whatever's name was, I forget his name, the character, Rurrigan. Rur-R-R-R-R-R-R-G. That guy. That guy.

He basically created shadows of his life that he missed in a way. Yeah. Look at that. The actor was Kenneth Toby. That's right. Speaking of all these actors, let's talk about him right now. So Kenneth Toby as Rur-R-R-R-R-R-R-Ber, as Robbie says, Rurrigan.

Kenneth Marz as Koli-Thornton as a little girl, Taya, or Taya, excuse me. And Philip Anglom as sexy Vedic Barre. he's in the house the kiss talker the kiss talker we also have co-stars trula m marcus as female villager and martin cassidy as male villager they both had lines at the end at the very end yes yeah so there we go those are our guest stars mm-hmm very good it was so cool to work with kenneth mars i can't even remember now yeah he was he was just so nice and funny but he played Rurgan, Rur, Rur. No, that's the leader.

He, no, Kenneth Toby was the leader, and Kenneth Mars was the, like, the sheriff. The sheriff? Kenneth Mars was like the cowboy actor. I feel like I've seen him in westerns or something. You've seen him in a lot of stuff, and I can't think of what it is now, but it was one of those, at the time, I remembered. Yeah. So it felt like somebody from my childhood.

Yes, definitely. Speaking of Kenneth Toby, who played Rurigan. Well, she was good, wasn't he? Kenneth Toby is one of Stephen Bear's all-time, Irish Stephen Bear's all-time favorite actors. So, we're commented. He was excellent. I love Ken. Yeah, he was.

He's a sweet, sweet man. I've always liked his work and I've always wanted to use him. It was great to have him in a Star Trek in a science fiction thing. Dan Curry was also excited that Toby was cast in this episode. Curry commented it was wonderful for us because we're all science fiction fans. and he was in the great ones, like The Thing, and it came from beneath the sea. So evidently, Mr. Toby's a lot of sci-fi. Yeah, old-school sci-fi.

From like the 60s and 70s. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. Very cool. This episode is also unique in that. Usually we see in Star Trek episodes, we see the A storyline and a B storyline. This one has A, B, and C.

So that is the rarity of this episode. So, Robbie, the original, you'll find this interesting. The original episode. title was Persistence of Vision, which was later used in the second season of Voyager. That's one of our titles. Yeah. So they changed that. Great title. Yes.

Robert Hubert Wulf's original idea involved Dax and O'Brien, not Odo, trapped on the alien planet. So that would have been a different dynamic. Totally different story. Very different story. Because Odo is very central to the lesson of. I think so, too. Also, it was really good because it was the first time Odo and I, I mean, really, really Renee and I spent so much time together.

And I think that's where we, if I remember correctly, that was where, like, the ice was broken. Well, Michael Pillar commented, when you put Odo there, we realized that we could deal with the idea of an odd life form and he could stand up for the values and survival of this community strictly out of his personal value system. We knew the way to do that was to connect him with somebody on the planet. The relationship between Odo and the girl worked remarkably well. Yeah, I think if this was O'Brien, this wouldn't definitely be... It would have been a whole different story. No. A completely different story.

And it works well with Odo and Dax, I feel. I think it's a nice combination. Yeah, integral. Interical. Interical that Odo was there for that relationship with Taya. Yes. Yes. And she was just, gosh, what a sweet kid.

Wasn't she? He was really good. For that age, too. You know what I'm saying? She's still very young. Very mature for her age. Very mature. Did she go on to be an adult actor?

Did you look that up? I didn't look up her other other credits. You might want to hit that in right now, Robbie. Yeah. Look her up right now. Her name. Her name is N-O-L-E-Y-N-O-L-E-Y, N-O-L-E-R-N-T-O-N-T-O-N. Oh, I left out.

That's a very specific name, too. It's very unique. It is, isn't it? Gorgeous girl. Noli Thornton. Yeah. Here we go. See anything?

Yeah. She was in a bunch of things. the last thing she did was in 1998 so no she was only a child yeah so she was a child actor did um it's like the one it's it's like the cadassian girl that's a shame because she's so good yeah she's really good and you know what her very first credit was billy joel's music video of we didn't start the fire oh oh my god he's in a music video that's like a corny cox beginning yeah exactly she was in star trek next to generation. She was in Star Trek

Deep Space 9. So she did a couple Star Trek shows. Wow. Noli, you should have kept acting. You were really good. You really were. So if you're listening, good job. Yeah. And that doesn't go away. No. This episode is also the first reference to the Bajoran

sport of Springball in the entire series. Yeah, they don't talk about that. Do we see it again? I don't think we do. I don't know. Okay, I felt bad for her when she had to have that headband on. We'll get to that in a minute. We're going back to Let's Get Physical with a little bit of John. It started dating the episode for sure.

Right? It was like 80s. What? Interesting enough, there's an episode of Star Trek Enterprise called Oasis, which aired eight years later in which Renee Obarjeunois guest starred with his character, Ezraal, taking on a role similar to that of Rurigan. And even Obergenois noticed the similarities. of first two characters, yes.

Interesting. I had no idea of Renee guest started. Yeah. Well, clearly not on your episode, right? You directed four episodes at Enterprise? I think so, yeah, three or four. Okay. Yeah.

So there we go. All right. Well, you want to dive in? Yeah, go ahead, Robbie. Just dive. Yeah, so the first thing that happens is a amazing science officer's log by Terry Farrell, where she says, Commander Sisko assigned her to investigate unusual particle field.

detected on the other side of the wormhole and Odo has come along to the Gamma Quadrant hoping to find clues of his origin so we see there in the runabout Dax is filling Odo in on some romantic drama gossip on the ship

I loved this she's like oh it was very well done you were just like motor mouth with a oh my God and then this happened and that happened my head was spinning with all the names and details. I was like, I can't believe she was able to regurgitate that without. It was so smooth. It wasn't techno babble. And if I can do techno babble, I can definitely do that. That's easy. That's nothing for you. Oh, my gosh. Exactly. Well, she shares all this.

Odo just doesn't get the point of any of it. And then Dax decides to talk about this woman, Lysia Arlen Bajoran who works at the what is it called the jimja kiosk I think it was a bollian Robbie I think it was a bollian woman

yeah the bollian woman who runs a jimja kiosk but if you remember in that episode yes in that episode where Kiko prior episode where Kiko was dealing with with Kai whoever it was Kai Wynn

you remember that and she walks up there and O'Brien loves them Yes, they were not being served by the Jumja person. That was not a bollian. That was clearly a Bajoran employee of the Boreen. Or the Bajoran bought it. Bajoran, yeah.

That's why because you remember before. Maybe let's write that story. Yes, let us write that story. That's the Bollion. The Bollian who works for the Bajoran. Yeah, Bajoran working for Bollian. How did that come about? That's my missing scene.

Did the bolean buy it from the Bajoran maybe business, possibly? Does it matter? Well, Dax is very clear that this Bollian. and Lysia Arlen has a crush on Odo. Right. And Odo's like, you're crazy. Women just don't see me like that. So he just does not, he did not notice it and he doesn't believe it.

And I love that you ask, ask Odo, if he's ever had an intimate relationship. He gets so uncomfortable when you ask him that. Yeah, it was cute. Yeah. Very sweet. Yeah. that his only friend he could mention was uh kira yeah yeah that's interesting i i didn't it bummed me out when he says because women don't react to me in that manner i don't like that

line because he already had that experience with uh balana balana sorry balana wait what he already had that experience with diana troy's mom so yeah you know what i'm saying oh he had yeah yeah but it hasn't been built into a romance yet yeah it hasn't gone to a romantic level but but he's seen women react to him like that yeah so it didn't seem well bummed you that was just probably one of those things they didn't remember in the writer's I agree yeah I agree I'm turning into Jason Oaken right now I am you are you're nitpicking I really am sorry well Dax does find the Omicron particles. She finds these particles that they're looking for.

They turn out to be Omicron particles, which are very rare. So they decide to go closer to the planet. Yeah. They scan, but no life signs, which later on, now that I'm thinking about this, zero life signs, but there should have been one life sign. Yes. Now that we know. Yeah. Yes.

And say the particles again, Robbie. How do you pronounce that? Omicron. Amicron? Amicron. You're both saying, okay. It's hologram and hologram. I'm like all over again.

It's, you guys are saying Omicron, and I'm saying Omicron. I'm just copying what they said on the day. I'm pretty sure they said Omicron? Omicron? As opposed to Omicron? Yeah. Oh, my heck. It was over 30 years ago.

Yeah. And are they even real particles? I want to know. Or is that a Star Trek made up? I don't know. That's a good question. Say that again, Robbie? What was the question?

Are they real particles or Omicron particles? Real particles? Or is that a Star Trek made up thing? Well, no, you know what? You know what? Yeah, that's true. We have smart people that are about to comment. Yes.

That'll be fun. Omicron particles on the Google machine. Just comes up from Star Trek. It is a Star Trek thingy. There you go. Oh, cool. It's not real. Not real.

Now, Omicron. Omicron is also a variant of the COVID virus. So I wonder. Oh, maybe that's where you're getting Omicron instead of Omicron. Amma. Yeah. Yeah. It seems like a Star Trek.

Language expert, though, Garrett. I'm just trying to repeat what I heard. That's all. Well, I just want to know, did they take the Star Trek word Omicron and make it the variant of COVID? I don't know. I don't know where that comes from for COVID. We'd probably have to find that out. Yeah, maybe.

Or someone will comment. Our listeners are much smarter than us. They are. That's okay. Odo and Dax decided to beamed down to the planet, which is always a mistake. All right. No one ever says like, let's beam down. What?

Yeah. You don't even know what you're jumping into. Yeah. Just once. Someone have a little hesitation. Just a little bit of natural hesitation. Yeah. Because you may disrupt the, wherever you go, you may end up messing up the prime directive.

Well, look at the last time we did this. We took that pillar. Oh, yeah. a whole pillar you do that you make i did and it was a whole odo thing again and odo and odo right yes yes i went back to say to odo let's beam the entire village up let's just beam the entire area take it back to the station we'll study the entire station we'll study the entire village i'll put it in my science i'll put in my science lab and let's see if we don't bust out there you go it's always a drama They do beam down.

We do find them sneaking through these abandoned buildings, it feels like. Abandoned structures. Dax is scanning with a tricorder. But the particle field has too much interference, she says. So she finds the interference is coming from this big. It looked like a sculpture to me in the middle of this village. It looked like a beautiful sculpture, but I guess it's a machine. It looks like a beautiful sculpture of a computer because didn't it have lights on it?

It did have some blinkies. Yeah, so that made me feel like it was a computer, a generator. Yeah, definitely it is a generator, but I just, the first thing I thought was, oh, it's like the fountain in the middle of the, it looks like a, like the village fountain or something. It was very, very pretty. I wouldn't call them abandoned, though. Doesn't that give the connotation of like disuse and no one's at there at all? I would say just peopleless, peopleless, because there were lights on. Weren't there lights on and everything?

It seemed like it just. No, but abandoned still can be just without people. Okay. Because when we had COVID and you would go out to drive to do something, it felt abandoned. Like, where is everybody? Empty. All right. I just need to change my definition of abandoned then.

It just hasn't been for a long time, which would be growth and all of that stuff would destroy it. Right. It's not run down. They're not run down structures. They're just peopleless. It's like when someone disappears and they go to their house and it looks like someone abducted them because something's still on the stove or I know. I went there, didn't it? Yeah, you went to a whole of...

I'm sorry, I went to a dark place. That's a whole other podcast. I don't think that's the murder. We'll do true crime next. That's a true, true crime podcast. I think we would actually do quite well if we had a separate podcast that was us. We should spin off a Star Trek true crime podcast, where we just go back through the Delta Flyers.

Yeah. True crime podcast. Very funny. With the three of us. Yes. You know, let's go even further. Why don't we just write a true crime show, basically, Starfleet show, like Starfleet Law & Order. Yes.

Something like that. That would be awesome. Yeah. Or how about just sci-fi law and order? Because we're never going to get the rights to do Star Trek, the three of us. You never know. But we could do a different sci-fi. Yeah, but that's a kind of pitch that Kurtzman might go for.

If you go to Kurtzman say, hey, this is what I'm looking at, Star Trek Law & Order. Oh, I want to be a lawyer. Could I be a lawyer? I think I'd be the lawyer. You could be the lawyer. You want to be the DA? You could be the head DA. Oh, yes.

The prosecuting district attorney. You could do that. Okay. Thank you. Yeah, Robbie produces and directs, right? I'll write. Absolutely. I'm right.

He's got his writer credits now. So he can do that. As long as you direct and guest star from time to time. Yeah, you got a guest star from time to time. Okay. And then you'll be our star of our series, Terry. Is that good? Okay.

I can do that. Great. This is great. I'm glad we've worked all this out. We've worked it all out. Yeah, definitely. I was ready to retire, but now. But now. Now I've got. And maybe Michelle Hurd could be the defense attorney. We could be each other's nemesis. Yes. You and Michelle turd tit a tit. I love it. Yeah. We're both six feet tall. So that's awesome. Oh, yes. And then every time we have visitors on the set, they're going to come up to both you and go, wow. You guys are taller than I expected. That's they always do. action they always do that always do how tall are you oh my gosh yeah it's hilarious that's funny well we do we find the sculpture in the middle of the abandoned yeah village and odo is nervous he wants to leave uh before they get discovered yes dac says no i need a minute give me a minute and then this we see a weapon in the foreground yeah otto turns and there's like a weapon pointed at them right uh jack says she needs a minute she doesn't

doesn't notice it yet, and Odo says, oh, take all the time you knew, which I thought was a great button to the scene. Nice Robert Hewitt Wolf line there. I love it. Yeah, really good script. Oh, by the way, we did not talk about that either. We skipped that entirely. Directed by Robert Shearer, which is the only episode of D-Space 9 that he directed, is this one.

And then written by Robert Hewitt-Wolf. So we forgot to add those two names. Huge. I'm so. And we like him, right? Yeah, we love him. I always liked him, but I think I'm having a new appreciation. And this reminds me of some of the stuff you guys said about rewatching Voyager.

Yeah. For the writers, because I was so worried about my own. I was so laser focused on my job. Yeah. And being on the set that it didn't occur to me to really appreciate each writer and what they were doing, right? Yeah. And the different styles that they write in and the stories they come up with. And he is consistently excellent.

consistently excellent writing from him. And because of this podcast, now you see that new side of it and you love it. Yeah, I love that. Thank you. Thank you both. Terry and Robbie, shall we bring Robert Hewitt Wolf on this podcast? I would love that. I was thinking that watching this.

Yeah, it made me want to call him and go, oh my gosh, I just saw that. But now we have, yeah, yeah, definitely. I think he would do it. Oh, I'm sure he would. Yeah, I didn't remember the director by Nate. I tried to look his picture up and I couldn't. I couldn't find a picture of him. I'm sure.

And he passed away in 2018, I think. Well, this is a really old picture of him, though. Is this, does this ring a bell at all? No. No. No. She's like, no, it doesn't. No.

And I was probably so grateful to be bonding with Renee that I'm sure that was way more important to me. Yeah. Well, he passed away in 2018. Yeah. But he did direct Voyager as well, Robbie. Yes. So he directed TNG, a couple episodes of TNG, one episode of D-Space 9, and then Voyager, he directed as well.

So there we go. I don't remember. Do you recall? Do you remember Bob Shure? Vagely. I remember the name vaguely. Was it our first season? It may have been our first or second season that you directed.

Let's see. Let's see. Television. Yeah, there's so much going on. I will say. Ninety-seven, 95, State of Flux and 97 Rise. So first season and second or third season, it looks like, right? so you will say what i was going to say i i've been kind of biting my tongue a bit because

my honest feelings about this episode were it were not it was not well directed and it was not well written to be honest in my opinion oh i didn't really love the writing so it'll be interesting to go through it with you guys because i like the concept yeah but there were so many things that just seemed inconsistent to me i didn't like that they didn't think me because i'm the one who fixed it. Yeah. There was a lot of stuff missing. They kept thinking Odo and I'm like, hmm, science officer, I did the hard work. Yeah, it's interesting. I also felt like the A, B, and C story, it was too much story because none of them could go as deep as they needed. Even the Odo story, even the Daxon Odo story. Yeah. Oh, no, yeah, we didn't really have a story together.

It kind of skimmed the surface of that. Yeah. So having ABC detracted from ABC basically, basically. Too much. Yeah. It distracted from the A storyline. A lot, yeah. I think an A and B would have been fine. Yeah, I think to keep the Jake and Cisco would make sense. Yeah.

I'm not sure how the Kira and Quark, there was not much. I don't think that fed into the. No. That could have been dropped for another episode. I think so, too. And why not focus more on them for that? Yeah. Yeah.

Mm-hmm. It felt a little scattered to me. So I don't know. I'm a little on the fence about this. this one, although there's tons of great moments in it. Yeah. Yeah. And there's a ton of great ideas.

Yeah, we like that line. Well, I like how he wrote me in it. Yes, of course. We love Dax. We love and we love Dax and Odo. Okay, so now we're at Horks. It's very late. The place is completely empty.

It looks like Gork is waiting for somebody. I got a sense. It was like he was fidgeting and waiting and then he hears a doorbell and he runs over and it's Kira there. And Kira basically says she's, They've discovered that his cousin, Kono, was trying to come on board the station. But when they tried to question him, he ran. He took off on another ship.

And Kork pretends to be very, very innocent in this moment. He's like, I don't know what's going on. Seems obvious. He does know what's going on. Kira says Kono, the cousin, robbed a museum on Kardassia 5. And she thinks that Kork was going to help them sell the stole. and goods um at the end of the scene though uh he asks if she doesn't you know he says something like well it seems like me and she turns around she says like you you collaborated with

cardassians blah blah blah i despise you yeah i was like oh again because rob you and i know arm and shimmerman first before we knew quark it hurt us to hear that comment right that's part of the writing that bothered me. It's like, why are you tearing down a character who's a series regular like this? Not that every series of regular can't be flawed. They can't. But it shouldn't be this like hostility. Because it's never ending, Bobby.

It's never ending. We haven't seen the end of it yet. Well, and also I think one of the things I like the most about Deep Space Nine are those moments because they're real. People say things like that that are hurtful and mean. And you have to deal with it. And if we didn't have the darkness of that of Deep Space Nine, we would have been mimicking every other part of Star Trek

where you don't see the difference of Starfleet to a character like Quark. Right. And a character like Kira, she would have no arc. Neither one of them would have an arc to not start from someplace. Yeah. And she would have really major transformations. Yeah. Robbie, does that change you?

Does this sway you a little bit more now? It doesn't have to use. I wish she didn't use the word despise. I wish that had not been written. That's a really tough word. It's a hard word to come back from. So that it should have been just like. And words do matter.

Okay. So it should have said, don't. Go ahead. Six and stones will only, what is it? Six and stones may make by bones. Break your bones, but names will never hurt you. But they do. Yes, they do.

Words hurt. Yeah. So much for growing up with that. Yeah. So instead of despise, she could have said, I definitely do not like you or something just, you know. Yes, that would have been better. That would have been better. Yeah.

Okay. So was that one word, Robbie? Yes. That one word that the writers wrote made me not like the writing. So now you're Jason Okin right now. Now you have Jason Okened it a little bit. I think this episode is very nitpicky for us. And I think we just have to embrace it.

I'm embracing it. I'm embracing it. I'm going to embrace it too. I'm not going to do it. Okay. Let's keep going. We go to Cisco's quarters. Cisco's quarters.

Cisco wants Jake to get a job, says Nog has a job. It's about time you get one, Jake. So Jake sort of reluctantly agrees. He'll ask Nog to help him get a job of Corks. And Cisco says, well, wait, what about helping out Chief O'Brien? And Jake clearly is not thrilled about engineering. You can tell from this scene. But Cisco goes, oh, you can learn.

And it's going to look great on your application to Starfleet Academy. so Jake reluctantly decides to give it a try. Yeah, and he didn't look happy about that at all. No. No, Sorok played it well. I mean, he played definitely in his eyes, like, I don't want to do this, dad. You know, you see that in his face, his eyes. It was right when Cisco says Starfleet.

That's when it hit me. It's like, oh, yeah, he checked out. Like, Starfleet is definitely not where he's going. No way. But isn't it, this is another contradiction to me that wasn't just a recent episode? where Jake was going to Miles saying, can you help me with this? That was for class, though, right?

So. Yeah, but still, it, it was confusing to me because it did seem like he was enthusiastic about engineering. Yeah, that's true. Oh, look at that, Robbie. You nitpicked it, so you now you got us. Enthusiasmatic about working with Miles O'Brien. Maybe.

Because he's like a guy, you can tell they were getting along great. Yeah. Just as like friends. were getting along great. So maybe that's the only thing. It just seemed confusing to me based on his reaction or is dealing with Miles in that episode. And now all of a sudden, no, I don't want to do anything with engineering. Well, and having kids, we know what that's like.

And he says in here, you like two, oh, Brian, don't you? And he says, he's okay, but I don't know anything about engineering. And I can understand as a kid having that response. Like, because if I say, yeah, I really like him, then you're going to still stick me with the engineering. yeah so you can't get too excited about that person yeah and also when he was excited about that little thing that he was getting help with that was the episode where o'brien wasn't o'brien right robbie remember like that's what he was really the he was the duplicate guy right yeah that's right so that probably changes things a little bit too in a way duplicate guy yeah wasn't my head just

exploded but yes you're right it was it was the yeah because jake was not aware that he was duplicate, but everybody else was. Yeah. Everyone else knew. But even that, even given the fact that he didn't know, it did seem like he was very enthusiastic about engineering type of things. That's what you're referring to. Because he had that piece, that part. But you could be interested in how things work, but not want to know how to make them work. True. And not want to join Starfleet. And not want to join Starfleet. Exactly. Yeah. You could be an engineer for a company that's that that is not a Starfleet based or related to a company, clearly. Right. Or do that for a living. So we go to the protector's office next.

That's our good friend Collius, the cowboy alien who says, Ologram. Oh, lo, Graham. Good old Kenny Mars. Go to Colius's office. Dax and Odo are being held. He's still got the gun on him, I think. Yeah.

And he calls himself the protector on this planet, which is like the constable. I do, too. I like that too. That was cool. Sweet. And they're like, we haven't done anything. What do you? accusing us of. And he doesn't even say what he's accusing him of. Otis says, look, if we did something

wrong and we wanted to run, we could just disappear. And he does. He beams out, funny bit here when Dak says, hang on, he'll be right back. I love that. I did too. Beams back in. And it was the funny pause. That's what made it work. It was the silence. Thank you. It was great. The timing. Yeah. It was all about the timing. Collius seems like he's poor. guy. He's like, I can't figure this out. I've been trying to find these 22 missing people. And that's when Odo becomes interested. He's like, wait,

missing people? That's up my alley. Yes, right at my alley. He asked Colius if he has any suspects and Coelius says, well, whoever's behind this is a lot smarter than me. And Otis is doing his voice now still. I know.

A lot smarter than me. It's a hologram. I don't know I'm a hologram right now. but I need some help. But Odo offers to help. So that's how we kind of end that little moment. Yeah. Okay, so now we go outside of Rurigan's house.

Dax and Odo are coming along with Collius. They meet Rurigan. Odo says that he heard that Rurgan's daughter was the latest victim of this disappearance. And Rurgan says, yes, my granddaughter, Taya, saw her in her work. room last. Rurgan seems pretty confident that she's gone for good like the others. He doesn't have any hope. Whereas Collier seems to have some hope. He's trying to solve this. And I felt like Rurgan was a

suspect to me immediately because he was just like, there's nothing. I think that was a great red herring because you did feel like he's holding something back. He's not happy to share information. He was very withholding and had his cards close to the best. Very, very. Yeah. Odo asks, why do you think they're not going to come, you know, none of these people are coming back. And he says something like, well, I haven't been proven wrong yet, which, again, was making me very suspicious of him. Yeah. It's like, are you a serial killer? What are you? Yeah, it sounded like serious. And our crime. Yeah, like the first time in Star Trek history, we're going to have a serial killer on board. All right. So next thing that happens is Dax is trying to scan, but she says this interference is two. strong and that's where colias offers his scanner so now she's got the alien scanner that seems to work in this environment she's scanning for residual transporter charges and ask colias to show her anetra's room the daughter rorgan's daughter right and otto says he wants to talk to the granddaughter

so dachson otto take off in different directions to solve this mystery this true crime mystery Yes. Yes. We'll be right back after this message from our sponsor. Hey, Garrett, have you been traveling this summer? Oh my gosh, so much already. I don't always travel, but this summer's been insane. Trip after a trip.

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for first three months only. Speeds may slow above 35 gigabytes on unlimited plan. Taxes and fees extra. See MintMobile for details. We go to the village square. That's where we meet Taya for the first time. She seems very sad all by herself. Playing with it, playing with the top. Odo arrives. She's very scared of Odo, really terrified. She goes over to her granddad. She's like hugging him.

And Odo wants to ask a few questions. But Tea's convinced that her mom's coming back. You know, she's very adamant that mom's got to come back. Of course she's going to come back. And then Rurgan says, well, it's past your bedtime, time to go to bed. Odo wants to ask a few more questions, but Rurgan's like, nope, have to wait till tomorrow.

And off coast, which I thought was a great responsible parent thing. Yeah, she's a little girl. Little girl bedtime. Not about her mom. Yeah. Just met you, don't know you. And you have a face I've never seen before.

Yes, exactly. Or no face. You have no face. Yes. No face face. You have a blank face. What do you guys think of? the wardrobe. Sorry, the whole beads. I don't, I don't know. Could you imagine sound? Because the first

time Kenny Mars moved in it, I thought, oh, sound must have just been like, what are you guys thinking? Yeah, a thousand deaths. Adorn the beads around your neck, your, your wrist, your ankle, or your midsection, but not coming off of your head underneath your hat. You heard it too. What are doing? Oh, yeah, you heard it. Yeah, you heard it. Okay, anyway, sorry. But I am going to use that look from now on in my life. Really? I'm going to be wearing beads from my hair.

Okay. So you're going to direct an episode of Resident Alien with beads coming off of your hair with a hat. I'm just going to live my life with beads, cool beads coming. Very cool. From underneath my baseball hat. Yeah. It's going to, it's good luck. It'd be kind of like a bead dreadlock thing going on.

A beadlock. Not dreadlock, but a beadlock. Beedlox. A beadlocks. I think you could make it work. Have you been directed by Robbie McNeil? Who's he? He's the beadlock director.

He's got. Oh, that guy. He's the bead man. He's the bead man. It's very noisy when he directs. The beads are just flattering away. All right, we go to ops next. Jake and Cisco arrive in ops and Miles is there.

Cisco says, here's your new apprentice. And as Miles takes him off to work, Cisco has a moment with Jake he gives him a com badge and it was very sweet so sweet yeah see all that pride in his face and he calls him mr cisco too he calls jake mr cisco he stops him it's a cute scene yeah even jake thought it was i thought jake was excited to get one too as well even though he doesn't want to go to starfleet he was happy yeah yeah and i think the father figure being Odo and Taya and O'Brien and Jake and Cisco and Jake, there was a lot of fathering happening in this episode, which I, it really touched me a lot.

Good. I thought it was very sweet. Good point. Well, we go to the infirmary next. Kira wants Julian Bashir to spy on cork while Odo's away. And Bashir says, Garek has lectured him on all the surveillance techniques and he wants to try them out. I was like, when are you sitting around with Derek talking about detectiveing? When did we see that?

I know. I want to see that scene. And that he was so eager. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. But Sid played a doctor. I want to be a spy. Right.

But Sid played it perfectly because his first line when he says, let me get the straight major. You want me to spy on quack for you? I mean, the way he says that the setup is, how dare you? I will not do this. But then he's a. It was a great turn. Yeah, exactly. Good scene.

Yeah, at the end of the scene, Francisco does call Kira and says Vedic Bariol is coming on board the station. She's very excited about this. But always trying to cover how excited she is, which I think is very sweet. Yeah. We go out in the corridor. She's escorting Vedic Bariol on board. And we learn that he's here to give a talk at the shrine,

the bejorns shine but he says I really came because I wanted to see you Kira this came out of left field to me yeah no what about when she went to the plant when she went down

yes and she had that dream vision of them together right no there's something going on but but go ahead Robbie finish your thought why is it left field for you just it feels left field I know she had a vision of her she was kissing beryl in her vision but to me that was just a vision And it wasn't reality.

Right. It wasn't reality. Okay. And there was a little flirting, but this just felt like a huge jump, like, oh, wow. No, because also when she had had the vision, he wanted her to share it because I think he had had the same vision about her. That's what I got from that time that they were spending together. Yeah.

And these aren't just any old random visions, Robbie. These were orb-orb-induced visions. Like destiny. Destiny, like this is your path. It wasn't just like a dream. It was like, for them, this is what we would say, this is God's destiny for me. That's their experience of the orb. Like, can you imagine if you went to church, lit a candle, and it's like, God gave you a vision of when you.

The angels, the sky party. That's what's happening for them. Wow. Wow. Okay. But my issue, though, Terry and Robbie, is that. Tell me. Vedic Beryl in this very first scene is his usual.

And it's also, you know, it's not that I agree with it, but it's his usual. Stephen Wright, very dry delivery of his lines. He's just like, he's very hard to read. He's like, that's exactly what I wanted to avoid. He's so dry. But then all of a sudden, in that scene in the quarters, after the replicated food, it's like somebody turned the on switch. It just flipped, they flip the switch on Vedic beryl,

and he had a personality all of a sudden. He was engaging. He was warm. He was flirty. And he just, he had color. He no longer was this guy. Well, hey, Kira. We're in a private situation, right?

Oh, so now he can let go. Right, exactly. He's wandering being a monk trying to be the next Kai. Okay. So you can't walk around if you're the next pole. Yeah, you've got to be a pro. Flirting with me. True.

But when he was on the planet, on Bejor, in that little garden where no one's around, he was also still like this talking. No, he would. Well, when he came in after her orb thing, I thought that he was. That he turned on. He was trying to lead. Trying to turn on the charm. Okay.

I just didn't feel the chemistry between. I guess the bottom line is like he comes on and he's like, I really came to see you. And I'm like, you guys don't have chemistry to me. Like I don't see it. Well, I would say that I agree with that. I just know that that's the intention of the story. Story. Yeah.

That the two actors don't seem to have chemistry. They seem to kind of bump up against each other. I think that you're right. That's what I get from that, too, to be honest. It doesn't feel like a genuine. passion and she's acting it and he's acting it but it didn't it doesn't feel no no connected i didn't buy it but she is kind of nervous and awkward around his his compliments there she he asks if she's happy to see him and she awkwardly kind of says yes i'm very happy and turns away

nervously and leaves yeah and think about she was a terrorist so she's got this whole other like shell around her trying to protect her feelings. So she has a lot to lose by relaxing and just being herself. Yeah. I mean, that's my take on Kira at this point. Yeah. They do walk away. They walk past Quarks and then Quark appears and he's

watching them and you can see his wheels are turning. He's got some kind of thoughts here. And then we go back to the Village Square. Tea's over there with a couple of other kids playing with the top again. I didn't realize that again. Yeah. I think it was one of those kids' toys that they just spray-painted black.

It was like the kind of pushed down top things. Yeah. Yeah. We're used to them being red or silver. Yes, exactly. Yeah. But Odo approaches, the kids run off, but Teia stays. And Odo says he wants to ask her some questions.

And then she immediately asks about his face. What's wrong with your face? And he admits that he's a changeling, tells her that. She thinks that she would have a ton of friends if she was a changeling. And Odo kind of shares a bit of a story there when people invited in places and pretended to be his friend, but they really just wanted him to do tricks. They weren't his friends. So we get a little vulnerability from Odo right away, which I thought was.

Love that. Yeah, it was nice. Yeah, and she asks about his parents because they're talking about her parents. both gone. And she asked about his parents. She says that her dad died when she was four. And that the last time she saw her mom was when she was making pottery for Mr. Deppnan, the Baker. Which, that was an interesting little soap opera story on the side. I know, right? We never even hear from Deppinin the Baker in this episode. But it doesn't matter. It's sweet. So it gives us a little backstory on her for us to care about her. Yeah, that's true.

going on in her life. Yeah, she says something like, he really likes my mom or something, the baker. Odo does ask if her mom went on any trips before, which kind of brings us to Taya saying, they never leave the valley, that they have everything they need here. They never leave the village, which is kind of suspicious. Yeah, right away. Right away. It's a Star Trek suspicion.

Yes. To hear something like that. That kind of information is bad. Yeah. Why don't you leave the valley? Why don't go to score? It seems odd. M. Night Shyamalan did a movie about that, too. Can't leave the village. The village. The village. But Odo does finish the scene by saying, I'm going to do everything I can. I'm going to help you.

I'm going to try to find your mom. So that's sweet scene. Really nice scene with those two. Yeah. I love all their stuff together. We go to the Repliment next. There's a group of rods laid down on the table. Miles is showing Jake all these various isilinear rods and what they're named. There's a lot of information. Jake says, I'm never going to get all this. Like you see him imploding. Yes, you see.

Oh, my God. Robbie, when you said a group of rods laid out on the table, I just thought a group of Rod Roddenberry is like a clones laid out. No, just laid out. Just laid out of the table. Mini miniature rubrodrodroddenberries. That would be upsetting. That would be.

But Miles says, don't want to be. or you give a time, you're not going to be at the academy for a, you know, a while. Yeah. And off Jake's reaction, Miles can see something's up there. So he says, do you want to go to the academy? And Jake says, nope, not really. And Miles shares this story of his dad wanting him to be a master cello player, which I thought was interesting.

I didn't. Yeah. That's some backstory about Brian. We didn't know that before this episode. Yeah, very interesting. But Miles didn't want to be a master cello player. He wanted to join Starfleet. And at first, his dad didn't take it great, I guess.

But now he's very proud. And O'Brien tells Jake, you've got to live your own life. Yeah. And your dad's going to come around. So that's a nice scene. I think those two together is fun. I like, I like Collin. I agree.

Yeah. I agree. But in that scene is like I can see Colum really saying that kind of thing. I mean, that it seems like a very. Easy, genuine scene. Yeah. Very truthful. Absolutely.

We go to the Pramina next. Kira and Bariol are coming out of the shrine, talking about his speech, and we realize they totally disagree with each other about the points of the speech. You know, they're on a total opposite ends of the spectrum there. They're starting to kind of bicker about it a little bit. He spoke about the eighth prophecy, I think they said. Yeah. And he finally goes, you know, maybe we should talk about something else.

And he goes through a couple of things. They land on spring ball. Suddenly, Kira is interested in spring ball. She loves spring ball. She even had Miles O'Brien create a holodeck program for it. And he's like, well, let's go play right now. Let's do it. Oh, that made me like him, that like kind of.

Spontaneous. Sorry. So it wasn't the scene in the quarters. It was this scene here. when he's like, let's go play. Yeah, it seems like, my God, do you have a personality now? Thank you. Yes, yeah.

Yeah, it was good. It was nice energy. Mm-hmm. We go back to Odo and Dax on the planet. Odo is conducting interviews in the protector's office. Rurigan says he's the oldest one there. He helped found this colony, we learn. But Odo accuses him of not being very concerned.

He's like, you don't seem too upset about all this. Right. And that's when Rurgan gets. It's very agitated. He's like, I can't do anything to change it. He's very frustrated or agitated. Odo says, you seem like you're in pain. And that's when Rurgan says, you know what, I'm dying.

And it's very sad. And also, Odo asks Rurgan why nobody has ever left the valley before, because that was suspicious with Taya before, why nobody's ever gone anywhere. And Rurgan just seemed very, very confident. He's like, we've got everything we need here. And trust me, there's nobody out there. You're not going to find any of the missing people out there. Yeah, because Odo feels like the missing people are lost beyond the village and that there needs to be a search. A search party.

Let's go out there and find them. If they weren't holograms. So Taya takes Odo and Dax out onto a hillside. Do you remember where you filmed this, Terry? No, I do not. I couldn't figure it out. Honestly, I got, I really honestly don't remember doing this episode like really at all. Yeah. Wow. That's funny because it like you said.

I mean, I remember Kenny Mark, but I don't remember. No. Huh. I think some of them are just that way. You just your brain can't hold on to every single episode. But I really. I mean, it looked like we were out. Malibu.

See, that's what I was going to say, well, I wasn't going to say Bronson. I was Robbie, what Robbie said, either Malibu or Calabasas or something like that, out that away, you know, further out. Yeah. Yeah, I don't remember. Well, if it, honestly, having to go that far away to shoot would have made us all so exhausted from whatever couple of days we had to do that. Yeah.

Yeah. That the rest of it would be really hard to remember because our turnarounds would have been a nightmare. Yeah. Because generally, if I was in a show, I would definitely have 9-and-a-half-hour turnarounds because of my hair and makeup. Yeah. Force calls, though. You get paid more money for those listening when you have a shorter than 12-hour turnaround as a union actor.

If they don't give you 12 hours from the time you sign out until you sign back in the next day, you get penalties on that. So force you. And they can't force you more than 9.5 hours, which, thank goodness, because of driving time and then just trying to take, you know, taking the wig off and getting all, you know, even to take a shower and get all of that, the makeup. Oh, my word. And then eat.

It's a process. Yeah. Try to learn your lines for the next day. There's no way you're getting eight hours sleep. No, no. Uh-uh. Because an hour of it's driving back and forth to work. Yeah.

Well, you're out on some hillside, maybe Malibu, maybe Bronson Canyon. Maybe you're really on a planet in the Gamma Corrid. Who knows? It was a really fun trip. It was a real distant location. Yes. But Teia's taking them on this hike, and she's telling this changeling story, like some story. Evil, I don't even think we.

Exactly. Because doesn't she weigh in the beginning say that you can't be a changeling. Changelings aren't real. Yeah. She says that, right? And so I think that's kind of a great banter that they have, too. Yeah. to talk about.

So she's telling that fairy tale. Yeah, it's a fairy tale, exactly. Right. Because change things aren't real. Yeah. It's like a unicorn. It's not real. Yeah.

But go back to it because it's good. Yeah, it's a story of the great Minra talking to an evil changeling, which I love. Basically, the great Minerah tricks that evil changeling into turning into a loaf of bread and then Miner eats up the loaf of bread. and defeats the evil changeling gobbles it up yes but if i was a changeling the the first at the at the at the sense of the first bite of my loaf i'd turn back into human i wouldn't let i wouldn't let someone keep eating me so yeah but you're not a fairy tale and odo even says after after the in the story the changing gets eaten he goes well that that changeling wasn't very smart or that

He's not as smart as I am or something like that. No, he wasn't. Pretty early in the morning to fool this changeling is what Odo was trying to say, yes. She had a line also where she says, I've never been farther than that tree right there. And I looked at the tree in the foreground. It looked like the set deck department got some old branches, dead tree branches and put them in the foreground. It wasn't it. They probably did.

It was growing sideways. Right. It was not a real tree. But you know what? Doesn't this happen? They set a shot and it doesn't look like enough is going on. Then they stick. Put some branches in there.

Yeah. Yeah. That's what they did with this dead tree. Yeah. I don't blame her for not going past the time. We got to hurry up. Yeah. I don't blame Taya for not going past the dead tree either.

It looked like a scary tree. Like there'd be a wicked witch or something on the other side. Dax and Oto tell Taya, you stay here. Yeah. Just stay right where you are. We're going to go look a little further. And they start walking past some bushes. And suddenly as they walk past these bushes, the scanner that Dax was using, the one that the

Protector Tricor. The aliens. Yeah. It disappears. It's just like, whew. Very strange. In a pinky purple effect. Isn't it kind of a different color than not?

It was kind of cool. Yeah. I liked it. Yeah. Then we cut over to Taya. She's grabbing some berries to give to them. and she runs over and as she lifts, Odo says, stop, don't go any further.

And as she lifts her hand up and reaches through that across that threshold, the berries in her hand disappear and her arm. And then she draws it back and they come back. They come back in again. Appears again. Yeah. And I wrote down holograms question mark.

Exactly. Did you write hologram or did you write holograms? I wrote holo, holograms. That's what I thought. She's right. Hologram. We go back to the village where Dax is working on that sculpture thing in the middle, the big machine, she's working on it.

Colius and Odo arrive. And Colius says he's heard she has some answers. So she has him lay down his cloak on the bench, fiddles with a machine, cloak disappears. Then she brings it back. I love he says something like, that was my favorite cloak. He's not concerned about why. It's disappearing already.

There's no concern about the tech behind it. It's just his favorite cloak. That's what's important, Robbie. He's a hologram. Yes. A hologram. Not a big thinker. No.

No, he doesn't seem like the smartest bulb in the box. No. They explained to him that the cloak is just a hollow projection. Like everything and everyone else here, they're all holograms. And I was watching the scene going, oh, my God, how cruel of you guys. to basically say you're not written none of you are real none of your relationships are real to me that writing it was a little sudden yeah okay without any without any like side conversation of saying how are we going to tell them you like this is going to rock their world

you want to ease them into that you don't want to just throw them in the deep end of the pool which is what happens yeah yeah i thought that was a little harsh to just basically no you guys aren't real you're all fakes sorry i got paid to just do that just i'm going to pull that rug out from under you exactly exactly um he he can't believe it thinks it's ridiculous he wants proof um they do tell him about tea's arm disappearing on the edge and they say that they'll take him there so they're going to prove to him that none of these people their whole lives are a fraud it's all fake oh you're so mean sad terry how can you be so mean to them i'm just hanging in my head in shame right now she was mean to write it you didn't write it but i can fix it i can fix it so let's keep going

i'll tell you why jacks was mean to them is because she saw that the villagers were chewing gum that's why okay robbie that's the reason that's what happens that's what she will make you disappear she'll make you disappear if you chew gum i'm very strict yes uh we go to kira's quarters next they're finishing a meal, Beryl, and Kira, talking about their spring ball game. I wish we had seen some of the spring ball game. Oh, love how you wrote this. Cheezy rom-com moment as they kiss.

So true. It really was. It was, that's Terry's reading my notes. Did she still have her head band on, too? It was like, oh. She did. All of me. Yeah, I think she did.

She didn't take it off for the kiss? No. She had it on the whole time. So awkward. And she's wearing, like, a dress. I don't like him for her either. No, she's wearing her workout outfit. It's a workout outfit.

I don't know. She goes to take the dishes. He goes to take the dishes. It felt like a rom-com moment. Like, oops, we're both a foot apart. We bumped into each other. We bumped into each other. Now you have to kiss me.

It's just awkward. Because I'm 15. It's my first kiss. Yes, exactly. It's like they're too old for it to be that awkward, like in that same way. Right. It just, that felt untrithful. Even though he made the initial first slow move towards her,

she took she took the lead and was very aggressive and went right and just met him before he got to that midway point if you know she went she went bam i felt like they banged their teeth like the first time you try to kiss someone you've never kissed before and you went ah like that that's what it looked like to me i look forward to that moment happening to me someday again i want to do you do you do you look forward to having a kiss where you kiss talk through the whole kiss like they do yeah well i yeah Yeah, but it would be way sexier than that. No, just talk is one thing, but it just didn't work for me. It didn't work. They're two adults, and it felt like a coming of age. Yes. It felt awkward thing happening.

It felt awkward. And if that's what they were inting on playing. And not in a way that made you go, yeah, yeah, not in a way that made you, I don't know, it seemed like they should have had the awkward, get the awkward moment, moment. not such a it was too big of a chunk of awkwardness for me yeah okay and to me the kiss talking thing can work but that almost seems more like you've already been in the relationship kiss exactly it's not like the first kiss like you wouldn't be first kiss it should feel great and you should like you're not talking no you're not hormones going crazy yes yes yes yes but kiss

talking not chitty chat chat like what yeah it was like business like they were talking business or like schedules or something while they're kissing it was weird you know what okay so this is what it should have been they should have had that romantic emotional hormonal kiss which then led them spinning around falling into the bed and then they cut to the next scene they're both in bed and then they had the conversation about priler writ returning to bejor and all that stuff well or they have when they're done with the kiss post quo you know pulling away like okay ah i got to get my head on straight and then have just have a conversation then there you go yeah yeah yeah Let's slow things down for a second.

Let's talk, you know. Yeah. You'd have that too. Or we got to go or whatever it is. Right. Right. Right. Okay.

Basically, their kiss talking is about how. Basically, it should have been directed differently. Yes, I agree. It should have been directed. Yeah. Differently. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, there was even something before, like when Oda disappeared and then came back in front of the protector, the way it was directed is the protector looked around like he'd never seen anything disappear before. yeah and then when he came back a moment later the protector says something like well you know we haven't found any transporter scans well how do you know what that is that why were you never seen people appear yeah that's weird weird contradictions he acted like it was magic but then he talked about transporters after that he knew all about it yeah yeah some of these directorial misses in my opinion like make it pick it

one and then do that, but don't you can't do both things. Right. No. Don't kiss and talk at the same time. Kiss and then talk. Yeah, there you go. There you go. I agree. Anyway, he lets it slip. Borrell lets it slip. The guy who invited him over to the station is someone that owes Quark some money,

basically. Gira takes off to find Quark and Barile's left. He even calls, she calls her the little troll. It calls him the little troll, which was heartbreaking to hear that. Yeah. Mean, poor cork. We love quark. We do.

We do. Well, you know, Dax does. Yes. I think Beryl needs a cold shower at the end of the scene. He's just sort of left there. Literally, she was, her sexuality, she's like, I'm really, I'd rather go back to work. I'm going back to work. Exactly.

Because you kiss talked to me. And so now I'm going back to work. Yes. Should have grabbed the back of my head, not a little more passionate. He's not passionate either. Oh, look at that, Terry. Terry's like giving the keys out. Just grab the woman's back of the head to show the passion.

Well, not grab her hair like that, but like he should, there's just something about, there's that romantic. Yeah, it was missing. It was missing. I don't find him sexy. Agreed. I know he's supposed to play sexy, but I do not find that character sexy in the least. Agreed. Okay.

I'm on Team Terry. He's an attractive man, but I mean, you know, there's attractive people. don't find sexy yeah he's trying to he's trying to walk the line between this pious sort of monk religious spiritual guy and this guy who's got a crush on kira in it yeah he didn't quite find that balance to me no no and you know maybe that's how he was directed to even by the producers about what they wanted i mean i didn't yeah do what they expected either they were trying to make me more like spock and yeah less emotion and to me that didn't work i couldn't do that it right so maybe that's part of it too he's doing what they asked but it's not working it's not working

right so it could be someone else's fault basically yeah well yeah i think he could be i think he's a good actor yeah i did too yeah i'd like to see something else he's done that's for sure yeah i don't know any of his other work i'd like to see that me neither yeah well we go back to the planet we're in the village the whole village is rowdy now oh boy they've shown everybody in the village the edge of the Valley and they're freaking out. Yeah. Yeah, I can't blame them. I can't blame them either.

No. You've laid all this on them. You're just projections. You're not real. You're nobody. This is all fake. Poor, poor village. But Dax thinks she can fix the machine.

She just has to shut it down. And I wrote down the old turn it off, turn it back on technique. Classic. It's what I do with my computer. It's what I do with. But it might not work. Look, that's what tech support tells you. Have you turned off your computer and turn it back on now?

Yeah, that's the first thing. That's what Dax is going to do with this whole village. I love it. Turn the village off. Well, I need to shut it down to fix it. Yeah, you do. You do. That's true.

To make the repairs. Right. Yeah. But they agree. They agree to let you turn them off. And Taya, before they're turned off. Oh, this is the sweetest moment. Right?

She tells Odo that his face really isn't scary. and he's very touched clearly yeah love yeah well we think that this may they may not come back like you may turn them off and there's a chance that you can't bring him back he he really has one or over yeah his personality and that purity of being a child and and just completely accepting yes it's very sweet unconditional love yeah it's just so gorgeous yeah well dax turns on the village everybody disappears the buildings disappear yeah it's nice and quiet do we have to bring him back i know it is we're back in bronzen canyon or malibu wherever hell we are wherever the hell you were someplace um the camera moves a little bit and we do see rurigan still standing there so that was a

nice little reveal that he was a nice reveal he's not a hologram so okay he's the creator he's the They start talking to Rurrigan, and he explains that he once lived on a place called Yadera Prime, but then the Dominion took over, and he felt like he didn't belong there anymore. So more Dominion talk, definitely getting everyone ready for him. Getting everyone ready. So he said he recreated his home with this hologram machine, hologram machine. He said it's a used holo generator. Recrate all things I'd lost.

Okay. Maybe he comes from like a cowboy planet where everybody's kind of... Yadera Prime is clearly... You know, would you be surprised if he was from Texas? No. No. Right? Like a rancher came from a ranching family.

I think Yadera Prime is another way of saying Texas. Texas. Yes. Yes. Oh, my God. Yeah, so he says he recreated his home here, but now, you know, the machine's breaking down. it's over you know he's getting old he wants to go back home yeah and odo starts to kind of argue with him here he's otto says you know these people are real in their own way yeah dax joins in to this

argument she says you know what about tea tea was created by the personality of her mother and her father um you didn't create them they have a life of their own they were created in this in this world and then oto brings up like do you care about tea and this was a sad moment like sweet and sad and where you kind of see this yeah bittersweet this this old man rurgan is really starting to realize he does love these people as if they were real even though he knew they were holograms it was a real experience for him and it was really shaking him up and i really loved how truthful Kenneth played that scene yeah i think it's one of the the crowning moments of the episode is his reaction and taking this in yeah uh of really considering

And like I said in my poem, Love, what did I say about? I mean, that was one of the reasons I wrote, love comes in many forms, extinguishing social norms. So we're supposed to think that because they're a hologram, it's not real and we don't love them. But it doesn't matter. Yeah, the feeling inside is real. It is. Yeah. And Odo says, well, he admits, Rogen admits he loves Taya.

And Odo says she loves you too And you can't turn your back on them right now So a really bittersweet, emotional ending to the scene That's great And I don't know When older people get choked up Freaking kills me It kills me especially a man

It's like something about that You guys are so conditioned to try to hold everything in And I think there becomes like most of us As we age Some people finally drop all that. And so when you see that intimacy of how they really feel,

especially an older man, I think it's just really heartbreaking because you imagine all the times they couldn't express how they were feeling. So I think they played the scene right on the nose, right on the money. Agreed. You know what it reminded me of,

Robbie, whenever he says hologram, instead of like Texans or Texas, it reminds me of that paste pecanty salsa commercial. Oh, those cowboys sitting around the fireplace. Do you remember that? And then one of them grabs a salsa like, where's that salsa from? He's like, this is made in New York City, like that. So it's the holmogram, New York City.

Is that one? There you go. There you go. Okay. Nice. But they could have been. Hey, they could have been in New Mexico. Yes.

Yes. Salas. Could have been. Yeah. There you go. We go to Cisco's quarters next. Jake arrives back home. And Cisco asks how it went,

with Chief O'Brien, Jake says, good. It's hard, but it was good. Jake basically tells his dad in the scene that he doesn't want to join Starfleet. He wants to find himself. That Starfleet is too much of his dad's thing. And I want to find what's my thing. And surprising to Jake is that Benjamin Sisko does not react adversely to that at all. He's actually a very understanding father and very supportive. And he says, you know, you got to do you if you have to choose your own way. So I actually like the ending of this scene. I was like, I didn't know how this is going to go myself. I'm like, oh, be good, be good. And it was good.

Yeah, it was. And he did say, though, he said, didn't Cisco say something like, find what you love and do that the best you can. Right, right. He did. You do you. Yeah, find what you love and do the best can't, yeah. But it's so funny because the minute the pressure's off, right, and Cisco says, yeah, just make

your old man proud. Then Jake says, well, I better go study. I'm still trying to figure out those isolinear rod. So the minute you don't push the kid towards Starfleet, guess what? He starts doing Starfleet stuff and he's into it. So it's that reverse. Well, then you can embrace it, right? Yeah, yeah.

Because there's no limitation that that is how he has to live the rest of his life. It's just like, now it's just a fun thing to do for the summer or whatever it is. Yeah. So basically, Ben Sisko is a genius when it comes to interpersonal relationships. He knows what's happening. He is. That's why he's our commander. That's right.

We go to Quarks Cafe next. Very busy at Quarks. Yes. Very, very busy. Serving drinks, running around. He's very busy. And Kira arrives and tells Quirk that. they caught his cousin with all the museum artifacts, but she really wishes they could have caught them

both together. And then I think Quark says something like life is full of disappointments. Yes. Which is in Princess Bride when he says, get used to disappointment. Like that's a very same. Similar type of phrasing. Yeah. It's very funny. I got to this time. Yeah. But she does thank Quark for inviting Vedic burial. Yeah. She says he was very very very. very, she's trying to find the perfect word. She says, diverting. Yes. Accusing him of, I know what you did.

Yeah. And I like Quirx last line when he says, not diverting enough. Yeah. As she walks away. But it's weird because in this scene at the end of the scene, she walks away to Vedic Barrio, who's waiting on the other side of the upper level of the promenade there. And she kind of does this thing where she just puts his arm around him.

And they kind of like, wear a couple. It's just, it's the weirdest little, little tag to this scene. It just seemed like if this was the 80s and they were wearing jeans, they would have stuck each other's hands and each other's pockets, back pockets, and walked off into the sunset. It was, it was. It was very high school. That's exactly what it was. Thank you. Well, like the kiss. But, you know, I think that it, it, ah, I just don't see. That didn't ring true to me because both of those characters seemed to be so concerned what. appearances. Yes.

Thank you. That's the word I was looking for. So to see them suddenly just hold hands, it's like, oh, my gosh, that doesn't seem like Kira at all. At all. Uh-huh. No, like give away that, oh, now this is her boyfriend just because he kissed her? It just, no.

Again, high school. Very weird. Yeah. It just didn't ring true. Nope. Oh, my gosh. I like this episode so much better before we started talking about it. Robbie has a tendency of doing that.

He does. He does. We go back to the planet, the Village Square or Malibu or whatever. There's nothing there right now. Dax is about to bring the village back to life. But before she does, Rurgan says, you know, please do me a favor. Don't tell everybody that I'm different. I don't want them to treat me any differently.

And Odo says, of course, and the village comes back, and Taya runs around, finds her mom. Colius, thanks, Odo, says, Yeah. He does not thank me. Yeah, he just thanks Odo. That's right. Yeah. Yeah. And then Taya thanks Odo. So nobody's thanking Dax. No. Oh. Without me on the trip, though, they'd be S-O-L.

Yeah. Yeah. True. True. Maybe they're thanking you off camera, all the villagers. Oh, thank you. You're so busy getting thanked. No, but then we leave. Oh, then you leave. That's true. Yeah. Well, okay, so I've jumped ahead. but yeah but tea thanks odo tea comes over to odo says that she'll miss him and he says he'll miss her

too and she says i hope you find your parents someday someday too very sweet like she gets him they get each other they really adopt her yeah i can't believe she stopped acting that little bit i can't either she's so good it's insane good yeah and then uh odo starts to leave but he stops looks back looks back at Tea and then he spins around and shape shifts into a top like they were what they were playing with. So I thought that was great. It was so sweet. Yeah. You know when we're trying to discover or trying to figure out the location of that hillside, what I could not formulate into words is, and I had to look it up, Topanga Canyon is what I was going to say. Oh, yeah. It does feel like Topanga. Yeah. And I know what you mean about Malibu because I worked in

Malibu when I first moved to L.A. in a low budget film and we did all of it out there. And it did look a lot like that. Similar topography. Yeah. And you can get to Malibu via Topanga Canyon. So there you go. Exactly. The same kind of geography. It probably was. You're probably

right. Somewhere out there. Well, Dax beams them up. At the end of the episode, they disappear leaving the holograms and their village. Computer two to beam up and off they go. Yeah. Oh, the holograms are still alive.

There you go. Surrah, sirrah. We'll be right back after this message from our sponsor. What would your lesson theme or moral of this episode be Robbie? My theme or moral I wrote down is what's real is what you feel inside, not what others decide. Which is kind of what you were saying, Gary. Yeah.

And that was mine. Love takes whatever form. Mm-hmm. And you have to trust that. Mm-hmm. If it means something to you, it means something to you. It's real. Yeah.

Yeah. If it means something to you, if you feel it, it's real. Yeah. Garrett, what about you? What's your theme, moral? Oh, no. I think mine is more about Odo and, because this whole episode is really,

it's just a lot of that kid in Odo, that relationship. And that's what's very moving. about this episode, and when she said your face, it's not scary to me. So I want to say beauty is on the inside is my lesson. Yeah. Ooh, I like that. Yeah. That's good. And also, we have a Patreon poll for our winner of the theme slash lesson slash more of this episode. And that would be who, Terry? Submitted by Katie McCarty. The definition of what is real can be flexible. I like that. Yeah. I like that too. I like that. I mean, it almost became, Robbie didn't remind you of some of our episodes of the doctor trying to prove that

holograms can have rights. It was the beginnings of that, basically, in this episode. So a common theme. All right. Well, that is our episode, our recap and discussion of Shadow Play. And please join Terry and Robbie and myself for our next episode, which is Playing God. Join us then. And for all. All of our Patreon patrons, please stay tuned for your bonus material.