The Delta Flyers - Think Tank

Episode Date: July 4, 2022

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 Think Tank. Garrett and Robbie recap and discuss the episode, and share their insight as series regulars.Think Tank:A "think tank" offers to help the Voyager crew solve its dilemma with the Hazari in exchange for Seven of Nine.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 FullerAdditionally we could not make this podcast available without our Co-Executive Producers: Stephanie Baker, Philipp Havrilla, Kelton Rochelle, Liz Scott, Eve England, Sab Ewell, Sarah A Gubbins, Jason M Okun, Luz R., Marie Burgoyne, Daniel de Rooy, Chris Knapp, Utopia Science Fiction Magazine, Courtney Lucas, Matthew Gravens, Elaine Ferguson, Brian Barrow, Captain Jeremiah Brown, Heidi Mclellan, Rich Gross, Mary Jac Greer, John Espinosa, James Zugg, Deike Hoffmann, Mike Gu, Anna Post, Shannyn Bourke, Vikki Williams, Kelly Brown, Lee Lisle, Mary Beth Lowe, William McEvoy, Sarah Thompson, Samantha Hunter, Holly Smith, KMB, Dominic Burgess, Ashley Stokey, Lori Tharpe, Mary Burch, Nicholaus Russell, Dominique Weidle, Lisa Robinson, Normandy Madden, Joseph Michael Kuhlmann, Darryl Cheng, Alex Mednis, AJ Freeburg, Elizabeth Stanton, Kayla Knilans, Barbara S., Tim Beach, Ariana, Meg Johnson, Victor Ling, Marcus Vanderzonbrouwer, Shambhavi Kadam, James H. Morrow, Christopher Arzeberger, Megan Chowning, Tae Phoenix, Nicole Anne Toma, Donna Runyon, Nicholas Albano, Daniel O’Brien, Bronwen Duffield, Brandon May, Andrew Duncan, David Buck, Jeremy Mcgraw, Jason Bonnett, Ian Ramsey, Jack Fine, & Susan V. GrunerAnd our Producers:Jim Guckin, James Amey, Eleanor Lamb, Richard Banaski, Ann Harding, Ann Marie Segal, Charity Ponton, Chloe E, Kathleen Baxter, Craig Sweaton, Nathanial Moon, Carole Patterson, Warren Stine, Mike Schaible, AJ Provance, Captain Nancy Stout, Claire Deans, Matthew Cutler, Maxine Soloway, Joshua L Phillips, Barbara Beck, Aithne Loeblich, Dat Cao, Scott Lakes, Stephen Riegner, Debra Defelice, Tara Polen, Jenna Appleton, Jason Potvin, Cindy Ring, Andrei Dunca, Jason Wang, Gabriel Dominic Girgis, Amber Nighbor, Amy Tudor, Jamason Isenburg, Mark G Hamilton, Liza Albright, Rob Johnson, Kevin Selman, Maria Rosell, Michael Bucklin, Lisa Klink, Jennifer Jelf, Justin Weir, Mike Chow, John Mann, Holly R. Schmitt, Rachel Shapiro, Eric Kau, Megan Moore, Melissa A. Nathan, Captain Jak Greymoon, David Wei Liu, David J Manske, Roxane Ray, Amy Rambacher, Jessica B, E.G. Galano, Cindy Holland, Craig M. Nakashian, Julie McCain, Will Forg, Max Wilson, Charlie Faulkner, Estelle Keller, Carmen Puente-Garza, Russell Nemhauser, Chris Casiano, Lawrence Green, & Jordan Marie BenkoThank 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 [e-mail].”Our Sponsors:* Check out Mint Mobile: https://mintmobile.com/TDFSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/the-delta-flyers/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Hey, everyone, welcome to the Delta Flyers with Tom and Harry as we journey through episodes of Star Trek Voyager. Your two hosts along this journey are my fellow Trek actor and guest star on four episodes of the 1992 TV series Homefront, Mr. Robert Duncan McNeil and myself, your favorite, Forever Ensign, Gary. Wong. Remember, you can get the full version of this podcast by signing up to become a patron at patreon.com forward slash the Delta Flyers. Do you remember your character's name in those four episodes? No. I'm going to give you a hint. The first letter, the first name starts with the B and your last name starts with the C, B and C. I don't know. Brian? I just have no idea. You're Bill Caswell, yeah. Bill Caswell, yeah, that's right.

That's right. How was that? Shooting that. Well, it's so funny because I had gone in to test for that pilot. And I came very close, and I know the creators of the show had wanted me to do the show, and the network wanted to go with somebody else. Anyway, so they created that character because I had tested. And I'm surprised it was only four episodes.

I feel like I did more. I felt like I did six or eight episodes. Okay. But it might have just been four. But it was great. It was a great role. I played sort of kind of like Nick Lacarno in the next generation guest star. He seemed like a really good guy when he first came on.

And he turned out to be a con man and a swindler and was kind of, he basically came back from World War II. And came into this little town and found this girl whose fiance or boyfriend or whatever had died in World War II. He had been killed. And I came back and said, oh, he was my buddy. And he told me all about you. And then I sort of romanced her and got her, you know, took advantage of her grief and all of that. And ultimately kind of wanted to use. her connections to further my own interests. And so he was sort of a bad guy. But yeah, it was

kind of cool. Well, it's interesting. That must have been the theme for 1992, because that is when you filmed Nick La Carno the same year. So was it really? Yeah. So Homefront kind of a grifter, kind of, you know, good at first and then not so good later. Same role in the same year. That was the same year? Oh, that's funny. Isn't that nuts? It's kind of weird. Then it must have been because as I recall i was doing six degrees of separation on broadway yes and i had gone in to test for that pilot and didn't get the pilot but then i ended up doing the show and then that year and then um yeah next gen must have been that same year because then i did another pilot called going to extremes that year correct right after next gen so wow that was a nice that was a good year then it's a good year

It's a good year. 91, 92, yeah. But, you know, that's rare as well. Like, you could, for you to be up for a series regular and then they go with somebody else, but then give you this consolation prize of, by the way, we're bringing you back as a guest star recurring for this many episodes. It was very nice of them. Very nice of them.

Somebody was really going to bat for you in that. They really, they really did. Their names were Lynn Latham. and Bernie Letchewick, I think, was his name. Okay. And Lynn and Bernie that were the showrunners of Homefront. And a couple years later, after, but right before Voyager, maybe the year before Voyager, they called me for another show that I tested for, did not get.

Wow. And then they brought me in as a recurring. So they did that twice for me. Wow. Yeah, Lynn and Bernie were very good to me. Well, Robbie, if you decide to go back into acting, I think you should contact Lynn and Bernie and say, hey, it's me again. No kidding.

You're very, they were very, very good to me. Good. I did a show called Second Chances for them, ironic title. And when I tested for it for CBS, when I went to the network test, that's where JLo was testing. And I remember her sitting in the hallway. Oh, wow. She was like shaking like a leaf and panicking. Oh, my goodness.

for this show called Second Chances and she had just been she had never gotten any kind of big acting role before this and I remember going it's all right because I had gone through a couple years of like testing and getting pilots and not going and I was feeling very much more relaxed

and I knew Lynn and Bernie so I said to you know and there's only like three or four of us in the hallway right waiting to go in and and I said oh they're so nice and you know don't relax and i and i ended up like reading you know running the lines with her or something out there oh wow she ended up getting the series uh second chances and then as soon as she started

shooting that she got this other job yeah a movie called selina which is the thing that really that's what made her yeah so second chances was this weird little soapy CBS show that didn't last we only made eight or nine episodes i think but uh well this is my take takeaway from your story is that for all of you aspiring actors out there, just realize even someone like J-Lo shaking like a leaf outside for her audition. And, you know, the nerves are, they're going to be there. They are going to be there. You cannot suppress them because that makes you shake even more. You have to acknowledge them. And the best way to acknowledge them is to really control your breathing. That's the one thing that people forget. They start getting so shallow in their breath and they almost

to the point of hyperventilating. They're like, You know, that's just too much. It's just in really slow five seconds, out really slow five seconds. If you can do that, you can control those nerves. It's funny, remember we talked to Brian Markinson, who had been a guest star on Voyager. Yes, good old Brian. Brian is a good friend of mine. And he's an acting teacher as well as an incredible actor up in Vancouver.

And his class is called Breathe Into Acting or something like that. I love it. It's all about breathing. Oh, wow. He's like, learn the lines so you don't have to think about it and then forget them. And just focus on breathing. On your breath. Yeah.

Yeah, it's all about exactly what you're talking about. I love that. I love that. I almost feel like I want to drop in and audit his class. Yeah. Brian Markinson. Wouldn't it be funny if we both showed up in his class and like, hey, Brian, here we are. Let's do it.

Next time we're in Vancouver. Let's go. Let's do this together. All right. So are you ready for this week's episode? episode. Yes. Oh, did you notice? I'm wearing the new shirt now. You see? Oh, I like it. There's our Delta Flyers logo, the name of our show on the front, and the back has every episode. Yeah. I have too many wires I'm connected to, so I'm not going to spend. But it's cool. It's a cool shirt. Yeah, you could see it on our, you can see it on our website, the deltaflyers.org org, and just hit shop and you can go to the store and take a look at all our,

little offerings that we have. Okay. So this week's episode is Think Tank. Think Tank. So let's go watch this and we'll be right back. See you soon, everyone. We're back from watching Think Tank. Yes. And I have to say, there was an aquarium. There was an aquarium. Like in the first shot. I did remember that kind of vaguely in the intro, but I didn't bring it. I didn't bring it off, you know, but then when I saw it, I'm like, oh, my God, there's a dang aquarium in here. Robbie's like, I was right. That was my guess.

Let's start with our poetry synopsis. Yes. Here we go. Here's my haiku for Think Tank. Think Tank offers help. Request 7 as payment. Trojan Borg saves us. Nice. I like that.

Initially, I said Trojan horse. And I thought, no, I'll throw Trojan Borg in there. Still one syllable. Yeah, there you go. That's good. That's my creativity. All right. Here we go.

Here we go for some more poetry coming at you. Let's go. Our limer goes a little something like this. Oh, before I start this. Yeah. What? I just want to make sure you remember. So Tom Paris gives Janeway and the whole crew this puzzle that he finds.

Do you remember the name of the puzzle that she's struggling with? Everyone's struggling with. They gave it a name? Yeah. Janeway brings it up. She talks about he had a yo-yo and then this game. The name of it is sheer lunacy. Shear lunacy.

Okay. That's the name of the game that she's playing. Okay. So here we go. With our poetry, Limerick Synopsis, Voyager has been taken. over by sheer lunacy. The tank once seven added to their community. Seven declines.

Curos wines. The Hazari shoot the tank with impunity. Nice. Anytime you can use impunity with lunacy. Right. That's impressive. I know. Okay.

I know. I know. But I just want to get sheer lunacy in there. All right. Let's give me your breakdown of the, guest stars are guest stars okay jason alexander uh you know everybody knows him from seinfeld pretty woman pretty woman he's a very successful big star certainly when he did this episode he was huge at that time yes um but the most important thing is the very first job that any of these

actors had and jason alexander's first film and tv job is was a 1981 horror film what about a summer camp teenagers at a summer camp called the burning what horror film um what yeah he was in a horror movie a lot of people make their first you know have their first shot they cut their teeth on horror yeah okay okay that's um the other thing i want to say about jason alexander is what i remember him from very first thing when i was still in high school he was in the original cast of a stevens on high musical called merrily we roll along It was a huge flop on Broadway. The concept of this musical was that you see three friends or a group of friends, three friends, and you see their story backwards in time.

So you start from the end, everything's going backwards. So you start when their friendships have kind of fallen apart and there's a lot of baggage and a lot of, and then it goes backwards in time until when they very first kind of met and started out on their job. journey, idealistic and young. Okay. It doesn't jump back and forth. It just starts from the end and goes backwards chronologically, correct? Okay. Until they're young.

Yes. And Steven Sondheim and Harold Prince, the director cast teenagers in this musical as the concept of having young people telling a story from the dark ending and then working their way backwards until they're really teenagers in the show. when Jason Alexander was a teenager. He was like 18 or 19 years old. He was a baby. And he did this musical.

And I just have to say, if anyone is interested in seeing what I remember is Jason Alexander's first job. And what I think is a brilliant musical that just didn't succeed in its first outing, but it has a lot of fans. Merely, we roll on. You have an image of him? You have an image of him from that? I don't have one.

I don't. but he was a baby he had hair then i'm guessing too yes he did oh yeah um there is a documentary about this musical called best worst thing that ever happened oh wow best worst thing that ever happened and it's a documentary with real footage of jason alexander when he was a teenager getting this job doing the show wow you have to if you're a fan of musical theater or or jason alexander watch this documentary i'm sure you can find line. It's awesome. Okay. We also have Christopher Darga playing Yasek or Yasek. I don't remember how to pronounce it. Oh, is that the first guy? Is that the first alien? Okay. I think so.

Yeah. Okay. Christopher Darga and his first job was in 1987. He and I share a TV show that we both did guest stars on L.A. Law. He did L.A.A.A. 1987. So about 10 years before that he'd been doing this for a while. Yeah. In contrast to Christopher Darga, we have Christopher Shea, Chris Shea, who played Sawin, Saywin, Salin. He was the other, the other Hazari, I guess. Um, the other Hazari? There was two of them that spoke, right? Or was it the same guy both on the music? I think it's the same guy because Darga, one of these guys has to be that first. blue alien that comes in the very beginning, the first scene when that alien comes in. Oh, that's got to be yes. Remember that guy? Yes. I think that's Yassick. And then what's the name of the other guy?

Salwin. Salwin. Okay. And again, they never say their names. I don't know. They never say their names. And that's Christopher Shea. Christopher Shea, his very first job was Deep Space Nine in 1997. So we got him on our show was one of the first shows he ever did. So that's kind of cool. Okay. That is cool. I will say that looking at these guest star names, it's Jason first, then it shows Christopher Darga, then it shows Christopher Shay. I did experience a little moment of PTSD for myself. And I'll explain why. Yes. Because in high school, my worst bully was a Christopher, was a Chris.

No. Yes. And I've also experienced some bullying from a Jason. So my entire life when I was a younger man, I always said that, And of course, this is a generalization. Not all Chris's and Jason's are bullies. But in my experience, up in my 20s, every single person I had an issue with was named either Chris or Jason.

It kept happening over and over again. So when I told us, do you want to stop now? Do you want to stop and we don't have to do this? I think I'm going to go, I'm going to go take a nap. And it's just odd that everyone's named Jason in this episode. So it's just something just the random weird, weird. connection you made. Yeah, just a random connection.

Okay, before we get into the plot, I have one last bit of trivia. Please. That I learned. So we do jumping ahead, spoiler alert. There are some battles where Voyager has to fire weapons. And we have a full spread of photons, I think, off the bridge. Janeway calls for torpedoes. She talks about.

And I just want to say what I found out is that in this episode, at this point in our series, we have, by the fans count, there have been 53 photon torpedoes fired at this point. But Chacote, Chocote says in the first season, Voyager only has 38 irreplaceable photon torpedoes. Well, they're irreplaceable, but you can still replicate them, though, right? I think when he says we have an irreplaceable complement of 38 photon torpedoes. That means that's all we've got to get home.

And they said 38, we've fired 53 at this point. I think it's just a little bit of trivia that the writers were not keeping count of how many photon torpedoes they fired just like the crew, the number of crew, seems to go, it's around 150, maybe 163, maybe 148, somewhere. Okay. So what you're telling me is that the last 15 photon torpedoes that were fired were ghost torpedoes. They were not even real. They were not even in our compliment. I don't know why somebody didn't tell Janeway. We ran out of those photons. We're at negative eight right now. Yeah. So I'm not sure if you need to fire another ghost torpedo captain Janeway. Okay. All right. Well, thank you for that little tidbit. My goodness. You're welcome. We did not guess story until a way, but story is by. Berman and Braga, teleplay by Michael Taylor, who's been doing quite a few teleplays lately, to be honest. Yeah, he was busy around this time. Very, very busy. I think Michael and

Brian Fuller were the kind of the more newbies sort of at this point still. Yeah. So they were assigned. They were the workhorses. Yeah. That makes sense. And Michael continued on to Enterprise and Brian did not. Brian went elsewhere. Directed by Terrence O'Hara. Who is this Irishman? I don't know him. I do not, did not remember him. I had to look him up. And I will say that he's got a very extensive resume, but most of it is in the kind of procedural cop shows, things like that. Like a CSI and those kind of things. NCIS. He's done like 50 episodes of NCIS. All right. He's the king of procedurals, essentially. Yes. Procedurally kind of stuff. But I did not remember him at all. Did you even look up an image of him and that didn't jog your memory? Nothing.

Nothing. Because we know Terry Wendell, another, I'm guessing Terry is the abbreviated form of Terrence, I'm guessing. So we know that. But then O'Hara, oh my goodness. I feel horrible. I feel really horrible that we do not remember this director at all. Well, we did a lot of episodes. If someone only does one episode.

So this is a one and done. I think so. Probably is what it is. Yeah. Okay. Well, Terrence. O'Hara, if you happen to be listening or any relatives of Terrence O'Hara, we are sorry that we don't recognize or remember working with you. So, our apologies.

He may not remember working with us either. He was like, what the heck is the Delta Fliars? What is the Delta Fliars? I got to tell you one time. Who are these goofy guys? I'm not going to name the shows or the actor. But I came on to produce a show at one point. And one of the of the series regulars came up to me and said, oh, so good to see you again. And I did not remember. And I was like, oh, yeah, good. Series regular.

One of the lead, like, top series. You have no recognition. I was like, great to see you too. And I could not remember. And then, you know, some time goes by. And I was talking about another show I was doing with that actor. Yeah. And she said, yeah, I remember.

I did that show with you. And I was like, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I did not. I still didn't remember. Oh, no. I did not remember that she had guest starred on a show. Yeah. That then I ended up producing a show that she was the star of or one of the stars of.

Oh, my goodness. So directors don't always remember us either. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Point well taken. Point well taken. It's probably the same.

All right. But I also have zero memory. Of anything. Anyway. So let's get into this plot. So this is finally. Finally, let's get into this. We see a blue alien walking into some bridge or whatever it is,

some alien room we've never seen before. And he's calling out for Mr. Coros. Mr. Coros, where are you? And finally, you know, we see a tank. We do see some type of aquarium looking thing, a big jellyfish looking something in there, yes. But later we do learn that this is not some type of species of life that they are trying to investigate.

This is actually one of the think tank aliens. In fact, one of their most brilliant and probably the most gifted, we find out later. But Coros is basically there, and we find out that his population or his species has been saved by the think tank because they have found a way to find the precise harmonic for a planetary containment field. And they were able to do this in days. And this is something that the scientists on this blue aliens planet has been attempting to figure out for decades. So what has been an ongoing problem for decades has now been solved. But then this alien says we've got a new problem.

The Bernicium mines were destroyed during the last series of quakes. So all the ore, which is owed to the think tank is payment. That's who we were going to pay you with. Yeah, is buried under 60 gigatons of ore. So then in, you know, sort of as a, as a, not a consolation prize, but an alternate payment, he says, look at this rubidium geode. It's so rare. And Kouros goes, yeah, it's rare, but it's really not what our deal is. And also, I know you're lying.

We know that the ore was transported to a shielded facility right before the collapse. And so if you would like us to deactivate the containment field, which we would. would be doom for all of you, go ahead and just give us this rabidium, geode, and that's what's going to happen. So you better pay up. And so, of course, this alien bends the knee and leaves and says, okay, I'll pay it. But I got to say just a couple of things during the scene that jumped out of me. One is the weird alien that talks, that looks like insect face or whatever. He had a super cool jacket that had these like compartments on it. Yes. It looked like box. It looked like he was wearing a metal jacket. He was kind of like the tin man with these boxes like compartments. And I was

like, I want a compartment jacket like that. Like what a smart jacket. Bob Blackman knocked it out of the park. You know, it's a great jacket, but it reminds me of those aliens that wore those clear raincoats with the LED, you know, things in there. It's not. I didn't like that But that's what I'm trying to say. I feel like, although you're praising, Bob, I thought this one was cool. I didn't, I didn't. You didn't like the compartment jacket? No, everybody should have a compartment jacket.

What if a doctor, what if the holographic doctor had a compartment jacket? He could just like keep his tools in there. He just, you're just saying that because you had to do seven years of episodes in a uniform that had no pockets. No pockets. And that's why you're in, you're so envious of any alien with a 50,000 pockets. probably. I mean, I will say, I'd like, I think the make, I think Michael Westmore knocked it out of the park, all the alien makeup on here, because typically, let's face it, it's usually a little thing here on the nose, the bridge of the nose, or a little thing

on the temple or an extra nostril flare, not full. I mean, look at the first alien that comes in, full prosthetic makeup. The dude with the crazy pocket jacket, full prosthetic makeup. The The Hazari, full prostit, all completely different. So really, Michael Westmore and his crew. So they, I think they pulled out all the stops on this, the entire makeup department. So I'm guessing, I'm wondering if Scott did these, sculpted any of these. I'm sure he was probably going on. We did, we did do for our Patreon patrons, we did a deep dive with Scott Wheeler, the Neelix designer and the board queen designer and lots of great alien makeup designs.

Yeah. Scott Wheeler talked about all this and how he would sort of create aliens and have them ready in case a story came up. And this was probably an episode where they used that stuff. Do you recall Scott said that there were two sculptors? So one, he was one. Yeah. And two, I'm guessing was Mark Shostrom. Yeah. I think that's who it was. I think he did the other ones. I remember him working on some stuff. So clearly, so one of these or more than one of these aliens were sculpted by Scott and or Mark. So a good job overall. You know, when in the intro I talked about remembering Jason having a monk type of robe. Oh, yeah. His hair being like Einstein. It's worse than Einstein. It's like it was really like what is going on with that hair. It is just,

Oh my goodness. I almost feel like I would have liked to have seen him completely bald. Just the little prosthetics on there and no hair at all. Because it almost cheapened it for me, you know, in a way. As an audience member, I felt like, you're pulling me out with that horrible, those horrible split ends. What's going on with that dry frizzy hair? It's like, ooh, it's bad. And it looked very different scene to scene.

Yes, there was no consistency, none. Yeah, the hair, the hair was not great for Jason Alexander. We do go to the ready room from here. Jane was working on a puzzle. Yep. She is working on the puzzle that Tom gave her. And it is called sheer lunacy. And she also mentions seven walks in.

She's very, she's determined to beat this puzzle. She's really trying. I love the whole runner with her in that puzzle. Every time it came up, she was like rolling her eyes. She talked about how Paris had brought in the yo-yo for all the crew to try. That's right. Just before this.

Yes, you are the reason why all these ship-wide crazes are happening. Exactly. It's Paris. So that's pretty cool. So Seven had actually came in to tell Janeway that long-range scans have picked up, and then that's when she gets interrupted because Jane was so into that puzzle, have picked up a planetoid with high consequences. concentrations of dilithium crystals, which is what we need.

We need that warp core. So we need it badly. So we go on the bridge, they walk out, and guess who else is working on a dag-gum puzzle? But Harry Kim, Harry Kim, did you make any notes on this? Did you say anything regarding like, why does Harry have a game while he's at work? But he's at duty shift. It's kind of like, what?

Like, this is something that they would do on the Orville. They would have a game on the bridge and be playing it, I'm sure, right? There's a little bit more laxed regulations there, but I just felt that that was highly unusual that Harry's playing the game. It just shows the power of Tom Harris's games that he can start these crazes that everybody is obsessed with. Okay. All right. I'll go with that. Okay. Substantial. Substantial dilithium deposits about 60 kilometers down. Harry detects some kind of resonance wave that's emanating from the core.

This freaks Janeway out. she orders Tom to back off. We do, and the entire planet just explodes, and there's now Metrion gas all over the place, which has now collapsed our warp field, knocked our impulse engines offline. Tuvok then reports a heavily armed vessel has just dropped out of warp off of the port bow,

and Seven recognizes them, species 4228. The Hazari, technologically advanced, extremely violent, hired to capture and deliver alien vessels, Paris lets us know, bounty hunters. Bounty hunters, that's right. Yep. The Hazari captain asked Janeway to surrender when he comes on the view screen, and she basically says, oh, well, I'm going to charge up these phaser banks.

And he says, good luck, you're going to ignite the entire gas cloud. And Janeway goes, fine, I'll do it. And then you're going to get blown up too. And he says, okay, he calls her bluff. He moves closer, engages a tractor being Voyager's now stuck, being pulled in. And Jamie says, fire. We fire, ignite the gas cloud, which throws us beyond the cloud, and Tom Harris takes us to warp. And for some reason, Hazari don't follow. He's not really that damage. So Janeway's a little

curious why. We jump to astrometrics and Tuvac, Harry, and Chakotay are in there. And now Chakotay realizes why they didn't come after us because they have backup. They have reinforcements. 23 ships in our own sector and more coming. So yeah, that's a big issue. Um, Chikote says, you know what, there's got to be a way out of this. There's something that they have not anticipated. So he orders that the info is downloaded and given to the captain for her to basically ponder. And that's what brings us to the next scene in the mess hall. Next scene in the mess hall.

We see, uh, Neelix is bringing some coffee over. We pan over as he walks through the dark mess hall. And there's Janeway. He reveals Janeway sitting by herself with her, her computer. and he makes a joke about, well, maybe we should get the doctor to just give you a hyperspray. Of caffeine. Of caffeine. And I thought that was funny.

A little coffee joke in there. Yeah. And then he leaves her with a coffee. She puzzles over. She walks, she stands up and goes over to the window. And this was something that the director did that I like. It was sort of a trick shot where she stands up. She walks over towards the window to ponder.

and then we hear someone off camera and she turns and there's, there's, there's, Corros, there's Jason Alexander sitting where she just stood up from. Correct. And it's a cool, you know, it's a very simple shot, but it was really effective to sort of surprise her. The other thing that came to mind is, as Janeway stared out the window trying to puzzle over that's solving this problem, there's got to be a way out problem, is that we didn't often have our character standing by windows just staring out into space.

and we almost never put the camera outside and looked in because Rick Berman didn't, for two reasons. He didn't like those shots very much. He felt like, why is the camera out floating in space? And also because our sets weren't finished on the outside. Like, I don't know if you remember, but if you stood outside of our sets, you just saw wood and nails and, you know,

it was not finished on the house. It's all two by fours, yeah. Yeah. So I thought of that as she walked over to ponder the puzzle. of how to get out of this, that we never go out there. But he did a great job. Basically, he has this conversation about the philosophical opportunities

that problems create for us. He talks about, you know, problems like this can spark new ways of seeing things and new solutions. And he's just very philosophical about her situation. He is. And also what's important with this scene is we realize that Janeway at first tries to call security

and he's like, well, I've disabled. I've disabled your comms, and by the way, I'm not even here. I'm an isomorphic projection. So we learn now that this is superior technology to what Voyager or anyone else has at this point. I like when he drinks her coffee, too. Yeah, I know. He takes a drink of her coffee and he's like, oh, you like this? You actually like this?

And she says, it's an acquired taste. Yeah, but again, how advanced is that? As a projection, he's able to pick up her coffee and drink it and taste. fit, even though he's not there, which is insane. He's offered to help with this Hazari problem. And he's, you know, as a little helpful tip, I guess, he says, look, I just downloaded every possible Hazari trap for you right now into your, into your little laptop there. And you can just take that as a good will offer. Yeah, exactly. Here's a little taste of how I could help you. Yeah, all for a price. And he does, he does say for a price. And why don't you come over? We'll talk

about the price you come over to my ship you can only bring one you can only bring one crewman and no scanning devices scanning of devices yeah and it's interesting like when he said this it never occurred to me like what if she what if she didn't take seven over there what if she took tovok his head of security sure how did they must have gone through all the mathematical simulations and like because they wanted seven yeah so they realized that that that was the way that janeway was going to go for some yeah um we're on the bridge And we are now at the coordinates for the meetup with the think tank vessel. And Tuvok, the vessel does appear out of subspace.

It shows up. And Tuvok says, this hull is made of a neutronium-based alloy. Super advanced. Starfleet has theorized about this, but they definitely have not manifested this. And then the Borg have definitely not manifested this either. Seven says the Borg have tried and they haven't been able to build it. Nope. Yeah. So now we finally go to the Think Tank Bridge and Janeway. We do. Well, on the, on the bridge, on our bridge, as Seven and Janeway head to the transporter room to beam over. I noticed that Seven headed back towards the turbo lift and stepped right in front of the captain. And I was like, usually the captain would go first or I was like, whoa, that was an interesting. I wonder if that occurred because I feel like if you were. I had gone, you know, if the captain said, you know, Mr. Cam, this way or something, you would

have followed her instead of led the way. Correct. It was just a little detail. Small detail. You know, the formality of the military protocols that I don't know that we always stayed on top of. Yeah. All right. Good call. Anyway, yes, we do go over to the ship and Janeway and seven, they beam aboard, and they're in this room we saw earlier. And they see an alien named Phenom. Yeah, well, the first thing she sees is the tank, right? So, Janeway sees the tank, and she says, They must be studying it.

And then that's when Jason Alexander replies, actually she is studying you, our residence expert on temporal physics, perhaps the most gifted member of our group. Janeway says, one of my most gifted crewman, seven of nine, and that's the biggest compliment she's ever paid seven. I'm going to say right now, she never says that.

Never. That's true. It's always what's seven doing? and now, you know, and talking back to me, this and that. And boom, one of my most gifted crewmen, seven of nine. And now Kuros introduces phenom and also tells us that the round sphere is what allows the members of the think tank to communicate telepathically. And then we hear this whale-like sound. And now we go over to this another huge aquarium. And it's Bevox, a bioplasmic life form another member of the think tank he prefers variable gravity environment and his

specialty is exosciology and quantum mechanics and bevox which really to me looks like a massive manatee or something what's the lockness monster is what it looks like oh yeah yeah like that right and bevox is the one who founded this group 100 years ago which means uh number one by the way by the way as soon as he said 100 years ago i'm like you know you know you Years are a measurement of time in our solar system based on the orbit of the sun. Correct. So for him to say, like, although he's got to be translated anyway, so I guess whatever. Whatever language he said in his language was translated into our years.

Is the equivalent of 100 years. But sometimes those little things bump me. I'm like, wait, how does he know years? Correct. And we write it off with the universal translator every time. But this guy, or Bevox, this individual, this being founded the group 100 years ago after wandering the galaxy on his own for a few millennia. So over 3,000 years, this individual has been wandering the galaxy, and we don't even know

his true language. How did he wander if he floats in this environment that looks like a tank? Like, he looks like he's in a giant fish tank. You know what he should have said. He founded the group 100 years ago after float. through the galaxy on his own for a few millennia. So, yeah, so Michael Taylor could have changed that to that line, and that would have made a little bit more sense.

And then the final member of this group is the AI, the artificial intelligence. And then, you know, Kuro starts listing all these wonderful accomplishments that the think tank has done. Yeah, the AI, by the way, the little robot. Yeah, what do that remind you of? Because to me, when I looked at, you know, the AI, It looked, do you ever watch Mystery Science Theater 3,000?

Oh, yeah, yeah. There's like one robot that looks kind of like this AI in a way a little bit. But, okay, let's just talk about these accomplishments. I mean, he lists all these crazy things that the think tank has helped different species with. But the most amazing, the most amazing is the fake. They cured the Vidian phage. We're like, what? Oh, my God.

He's like, you don't, you won't even recognize them anymore. Of course, we don't, because they're all cured. This is amazing. I had no clue that this. was what happened because of the think tank. Then they said when they helped the citizens of Rivo's five resist the board, they only asked for the recipe of their famous Zoft Nut Soup as payment. And I thought, wow, look at these philanthropists.

Look how great they are. Sometimes they just want a recipe. They don't even ask for money. Yeah. They don't seem like really harmless. Really harmless. Harmless think tank. Do-gooders, you know, someone that you want to be friends with.

And so Janeway says, hey, well, is there any job that you won't take? and let me just tell you a little bit about the prime directive. So I just want to know, what are your parameters? Where do you draw the line? And, you know, Coro says, well, we don't participate in genocide and we don't create weapons of mass destruction. And Janeway's kind of nodding in approval, like, cool. And then Coros asked Seven if it's okay

if the AI could interface with Seven. Seven looks at Janeway. She nods, Seven agrees. And he does interface with her. And seven tells us that the AI is requesting information about integrating organic components into its technology. Again, she looks over at Janeway for approval. Janeway nods, and she then allows him to take some knowledge from her. She gives him a few pointers, and the AI thanks her.

And Kuros says that they can solve this Hazari paradox without firing a single weapon. And then she gives him a pad with Voyager schematics and also an overview of our database. for him to sort of pick and choose to see what he would like as like a little menu. It's basically like she's the waitress giving a menu and she even says, I recommend the replicators. They're very popular at this time of year. I recommend they're in season. They're quite fresh.

I really do feel that you'll be satisfied with this entree. I got to say, I loved Kate's performance in this whole episode. She did a great job. She had a sense of adventure and fun and sarcasm. Oh, yeah, she was The running bit with a puzzle frustrating her was great. I thought she was awesome in this episode.

Rare form. She was in rare form. So now we're back on the bridge, unless you have any other comments about. No, no, we go back to the bridge after the server has offered up the day's specials of replicators. And Chacote says,

we got some bad news. Every possible escape route is a trap. They're all traps. They're all traps. There's more Hazari vessels joining to search for them. And so there's no way out. And Janeway says, don't worry.

We're going to let the think tank, you know, solve this problem, put our plans on hold for a minute. Let's just wait. So we kind of think that these guys are going to help us out. And we go to the ready room next and Tuvok says, Kuros is back. In isomorphic form. In isomorphic form, he is back. And he's got his list, basically.

He's made a list of things he wants. And he says to Janeway, on the list, there's quantum slipstream drive. And again, Kate's very funny. She's like, good luck with that. We couldn't make that thing work. Right. That technology. Yeah.

And he asked for Neelix's recipe for Shadra Cobb. He asked for an Olmec, an ancient figurine, old neck figurine. And Janeway's like, well, I think Chukotay might be persuaded to part with that. And then she looks at the list and he goes, you can't be serious. And she stands up and you realize and, you know, she's in shock. Yeah.

And she says no. First she says, it can't be serious. Then she goes, no. Yeah, she says no. Then we figure out it's seven of nine that he wants, yeah. Yes, he wants seven of nine. And I started making notes of push-ins at this point.

I did notice a pattern of camera shots that were pushing in, that you know there seemed to be uh you mean pushing into the two shot or to a single what are you to singles into singles that yeah that and i and i made some more notes as these next few scenes came up i was like god enough of the push-ins like camera just keeps like pushing in it was very very procedural yes procedural i would say it felt like a cop show or medical show for our show it's just it's that's not a uh an ingredient that we use all the time we use it some sometimes. But I started noticing a pattern of like, oh, we're pushing in at the end of the scene.

We're pushing in again. So, you know, Janeway says no, but Kuros comes back with, why don't you ask seven what she thinks? And Janeway's like, oh, okay. And now? Now some time passes. We come back. Seven has thought about it. And Seven says she'll do it. And Janeway said, she's like, what? Yeah, she's like, I'm ready. And seven's basically like, you know what? If I go over there, that will solve the ship's problem. And Genway's like, this isn't a puzzle. Great.

I love the puzzle theme here. But it isn't a puzzle with a solution. Yeah. But the way that she's so nonchalantly agreed, it's almost like I felt like January was sending her to summer camp. You know, it's like, yeah, I'll be gone. I'll be, I'm fine. It's like, oh, no problem, which was a little unnerving to watch that.

Yeah. And Janeway says, you know, slow down with this. I mean, if you decide you really do want to go, then I'll respect your decision. It's not my right to tell you what to do. And this is another scene. In the middle of the scene, we have these push-ins, by the way. Like, every time there was a deep thought from someone, it was like the camera was pushing in. Janeway says, seven, why don't you talk to Kuros and see, you know, what, go see what the opportunity is and really take some time to think about this. And then give me your answer. So we go to cargo. Bay to the Borg Regeneration Al Cove in Cargo Bay. And Coros is explaining to Seven what they're hoping is that. Yeah, seven begins with why me? That's the top of the scene. She's like, why me? Why am I special, right?

So. Yes. And he talks about all the Borg implants and the entire knowledge of the Borg held in a single mind. And they just think that she is, the think tank believes that she is the perfect candidate to be one of them. Yeah, because then with seven, they have access to basically the entire Borg database. So this is huge for them. They think this is, this is a major win for the think tank.

Then seven starts just bringing up, you know, ethical issues. She starts talking about how, well, what about the people that don't agree to your terms? You just leave them hanging, you know, and you just, you force people to pay you what they need to pay you in order for you to solve their problem. I mean, you've been act, the group kind of has been acting selfishly. And Kuro says, well, they have a singular mission to perfect their knowledge. And then he says perfection sometimes necessitates selfishness. Yeah. Seven declines the offer basis.

She does. She says, I can do all of that. What you're describing, I can do all of that. And by the way, he says, we haven't taken a new member to our group. in years and I think he says 17 years he says 17 but it wasn't as effective I would have been cooler if he says we haven't taken a new member for 82 years that would have been a little more you know but 17 sounds a little too recent in a way for me he says think about it yeah she's called to the bridge yes Tuvac calls calls her to the bridge we go on to the bridge and we're

Roos joins. He asked to join. He asked to join. The Seven and Coros walk onto the bridge. Blue Alert. I love Blue Alert. We hear the Hazaria approaching. I do. I love Blue Alert. It looks cool. The Hazari are approaching. And Seven says she declined. And Coros says, well, she's declined our first offer. So you're like, oh boy, here we go. He's not, he's determined. But Coros does offer up. the strategy that they use. Yeah, to fight off those two Hazari ships, right? He says that whenever there's an attack ship up front, they always have a support ship behind. So if you take them out, there's going to be another ship right behind. And so, Jamme, we say, okay, let's, hold on, probably.

Right. Well, actually, what it is is the strategy that the Hazari use, the attacking ship, their shields are bolstered by the ship behind them. Oh, that's what it is. So then when we fired on them, it was. really no effect. It didn't do much to them. But if we take out that support ship.

Yes. If you fire on the support ship, their shields are not boasted. They're going to, they're going to take damage. That's what it was. It was the shield. Mm-hmm.

He gives them the tip. He gives them the tip. And so Janeway says, fire photon torpedoes. Now I go back to my first trivia comment. We ran out of photon torpedoes. We only had 38. Yes.

This is more torpedoes that we don't even have, but we fire them anyway, I guess. We do. And then we go to warp. Yeah. And now, Kuros, he has, you know, he tells us that he is analyzed, where the think tank have analyzed hundreds of scenarios and that Voyager will not survive. And he says, you need to order seven of nine to join us, Captain Janeway. And then Janeway says, I've had enough of this.

She goes, we have an old expression, Kuros. Don't call us. We'll call you. Which is more of a Hollywood expression, I think. And she says to remodulate the shields to a phase variant frequency, which starts to fritz out Kuros's isomorphic projection, and then he's gone. And now we come over to the think tank ship. Well, we end that scene on the bridge.

And the last thing January says is, well, looks like we have two threats now. Yes. The Hazari and our saviors. Yes. And now we jump to the think tank ship, and they calculate that even though Seven has refused their initial offer, there's still a 96% chance that Seven will become part of their group. And this is a scene, I got to say. So we tilt up off this dome, this telepathic dome and push into Jason Alexander. And then it just sort of cuts around and we hear the voices all talking

to each other telepathically. Right. But I felt like this was a real sci-fi moment that just didn't feel like it was photographed in a sci-fi way. Like I really sort of felt like, you know, we tilt off the dome, we push into him and then there's just shots around the room. I wish there had been some cooler sort of something with a little more style to it that that covered this telepathic meeting of the minds here. It just felt a little, it felt a little flat to me. You have a suggestion? Did you have? I don't know. I don't know if it would have been like low angles or Dutch dangles or, you know, just more variety in the, in the coverage of this scene.

It felt like this is something they just shot really quickly. And I feel like this was a big, important scene to know the bad guys have done all these calculations just to feel the stakes here. And it didn't feel as dynamic as I wished it could have. Okay. All right. So their final decision is just to wait and let the problem solve itself. And that brings us out of this scene.

And now we have a super cool exterior shot of space of a Hazari vessel speeding in and coming across this debris field, which clearly is Voyager. You see, you know, you see different parts of Voyager just scattered all over the place. And now we cut to the interior of the Hazari vessel. And the Hazari captain is, he's not happy. He's like, wait a minute. I told you to like disarm them, not to destroy them. They're not supposed to be destroyed. Yeah, we were just going to disable them.

That's it. And he's not happy at all. And my question here is there is no explanation of how they cause that debris field to be like that. There's nothing. It's like in the span of minutes or a very short amount of time, we're able to replicate debris pieces of Voyager and throw them out there. And we have to, we had to, we had to replicate enough that we could hide behind the debris field. Yes. So where is all this coming from?

It just, to me, it's a cool shot. It's a cool idea, but it's just, there's no basis in any scientific fact of how they do this. So it pulls you out a little bit. Yeah, they skate over this very quickly, but it's a, it feels like a big cheat. But we do go to the bridge and Janeway says, she orders the spatial charges that they hid in the debris field to be detonated. And it damages the Hazari vessel.

And this is a smaller Hazari vessel. It's not one of their big fighter ships. It's like a shuttle almost. They detonate the spatial charges and Voyager comes out from its hiding place in this debris that they could not have made. And comes out and Janeway says transport the shuttle, their ship, their vessel into the shuttle bay. Well, lock up, well, actually she lets you say, okay. So Janeway, yes, correct. She locks, she says lock on a tractor beam, pull them in the shuttle bay and then beam the Hazari crew to Voyager.

So to the transporter room. I the next scene is super cool because not because it's in the transporter room but because finally finally someone beams in not standing up perfectly I was so happy that he was bent down so I got to say man O'Hara for doing all his procedural type of shots he did do one cool shot which is having someone kneeling down you know it just finally you're you're beamed in in in the because you can tell he's neat he's kneeling down because he's probably working on some type of panel on his ship or trying to change something.

So I do like that scene because of that. Yeah, that was cool. And I got to say, again, when you get the close up of the Hazari on the transporter pad and you take a look at that makeup. Oh, makeup is good. God, it's so good. It's so good.

Really, really good. We go to the cargo bay inside the vessel. And Chukotay and Jane, we are looking over trying to get information or data from the ship. And I noticed outside the window, there's some extras that just sort of stop and point and then walk on. I was like, what? I mean, I know that she said pull it in a shuttle bay.

Yeah. And we're probably in the shuttle bay, but like, what are those extras doing out the window behind Chakote? They're just like pointing and stopping and looking and then walking. Yeah, it's a funny moment. It's a little strange. Yeah. Yeah. Well, so Tuvac enters.

Tuvok comes in and they're like, how did you get anything? Yeah. And any success with your mind melds? He mind melded with those guys. And he said, no, no, they don't, they're too, they're too, they're too good. Very resistant. Yeah, you can't get extremely, extremely resistant. But I'm like, it's a mind melt.

Like, you can't, don't mess with a Vulcan and a mind melt. Yeah, but clearly they're so advanced, they're able to block it, right? So these are more questions that we don't have answers for. More questions. And then Janeway says to Tuvok, she says, says, hold off on the torture until, until something. And Tuvok just nods. And I was like, she was joking. Yeah. We don't, we don't, we don't, like, Tuvok doesn't laugh. Yes. He should have went. Is that an option torture? I don't think so. Well, you know, when she said hold off

of the torture, he should have went, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, with a really dry Vulcan delivery of H-A-H-A-H-A. And it does not happen. Chocote finds a series. of encoded transmissions. Janeway asked Chakotay to check their sensor logs to see if they've had any visitors. And he says, well, you know, I do have some bio readings, but man, they're really scrambled. So Tuvok says, hey, the doctor, he may be able to figure this out, these bio readings, which then leads us to sickbay. And by the way, before we go to sick bay, she's, Janeway says, yes, have the doctor try to,

you know, decode these bio readings. And she's really close. close to Chacote. I just want to say it. She's like leaning on him. Okay. And then when Tuvok takes off, she and Chukotay shares sort of a smirky look. And then she flips her hair.

Oh, does she? And walks out. And he sort of smiles. He's got like a smirky smile after he watched her take a few steps away. Wow. It's just like there's a lot of energy between Beltran and Cape Mulgrew that I don't know if they were trying to play. like it wasn't scripted

all of that sort of tone and energy but there's little stuff that I'm just like come on writers like it's gold write more of them anyway oh my goodness okay so now we're in sick bay now we're in sick bay

the doctor has created a forensic reconstruction from the bio readings using hollow emitter and voila it's a malon he is the person behind it's yes yes we see this hologro hologram of a malon come up and before just before he does that he says he says to everybody brace

yourselves yes and then the malon comes up yeah jayn way says something doesn't feel right and she notices isomorphic signatures are embedded in the bio readings this is not a mail on it's only a projection and that's when tuvok says brace yourself right exactly two vok restores these are original signatures and then says to the doctor brace yourself Brace yourself. Check yourself before you wreck yourself. And it's Kuros. It's Kuros. The whole thing was a setup. He's a con man. Coros and his split ends. That's what it was. That hairdo. That crazy hairdo. So briefing room, Janeway says, I believe we've both been manipulated by the same person.

All we have to do now is out think, the think tank. I just love those. I mean, she's, she, really relishes all these little lines of these little quips that michael taylor has given her which is wonderful i mean it it has a lot of personality uh in this episode for janeway and a lot of awesome lines very very diehard like lines you know what i'm saying yeah one liners that that just they're zingers and they work really well with janeway um any other well she's yeah she's telling the hizari like we've both been tricked here and if we can outthink them if we can work together um maybe maybe we can bust these guys because the Hazari says, yeah, I know this think tank group. They've made a ton of enemies.

So he knows he can get some money for them. Yeah. Like if they can, you know, capture them or, yeah, they have a lot of enemies. So they're motivated, you know, by that. Right. So anyway. They'll probably get a bigger bounty for the think tank than with Voyager, right? Exactly.

We moved to mess hall. Yeah. We moved to mess hall for like. a team meeting, which I thought was really weird. It is weird, but I wrote, Janeway assembles her own think tank, is what I wrote down. Yes. And she basically says, we've got a puzzle,

and we're not leaving this room until we solve it. How do we find them in subspace? And if we do find them, their hull is impervious to our weapons. So how do we capture them? Harry suggests a multis spatial probe. Torres says that would take weeks of scanning. The Hazari are like, we don't have that time. Tuvok says, well, we could use subspacial charges to,

force them out into the open, and Chacote says, yeah, that's great, but we still have to find them to target them. So Janeway says, you know what, direct assault probably is not going to succeed, and we need to use pure tactics and psychology, just like the think tank use on everybody else. How do we manipulate them? And now we have this crazy passage of time where it's just kind of weird montage. It's a really weird montage. And when the camera pans across it, you see, You see Paris talking to Nelix? I'm chewing gum. I knew that.

I was, oh, I sat there. I was, I sat there and I thought, okay, is he eating something like a snack? And then I look, he's not holding anything. No. He said, no way. Robbie's actually chewing gum in this scene. I can't believe I chewed gum. They didn't catch that.

I'm so shocked. I know. I'm so embarrassed. That's a horrible thing. I didn't want to say it. I wanted you to say it first. And so when you'd said that you, were chewing gum. I'm like, oh, I was right. I was right. I didn't want to make the assumption that

I was right, but I felt that you had some gun. It's a classic actor problem. It's like, you know, I've, I've told actors so many times when I'm directing or whatever, like, oh, speak your gum out, because it's just you forget, people forget. But in this montage, like, we got, I got busted. They just reminded me when I was filming into the West in 2004, whatever it was, the miniseries on TNT, in the Old West, set in the 1800s, right? And so there's a scene where my character, the Chinese railroad worker, set some charges with a couple of other workers, and we're trying to run out of these caves before the explosion takes us out, too. My cell phone, I had my cell phone on me in my wardrobe. This is so crazy. You see the outline of the cell phone? Well, no, what happened

is it popped out of my, it came, while we were running, it came out of my pocket. And it flew up in the air and the actor behind me caught it in midair and put it in his pocket and kept running it was funny they didn't use that take but it's still he was like dude why do you have your phone on your wardrobe right now i mean this is like you can't that's 1865 you're not going to have a cell phone and so yeah so it reminded me of just things that actors that we do that we forget about and and you clearly had a good piece of gum in your mouth i had gum or the other classic thing is like, you know, we have sides, which are with the scenes. They, they shrink down the script pages into something that you can hold it small. You can fold it and stick it in your pocket. Yeah,

like a pack of cards size. I can't tell you how many times I've seen actors have their sides. They fold them up, stick them in their pocket. And then sticking out of the pocket. It's sticking out of the pocket. You can see it. It's in the scene. Oh, God. If you ever see a little bit of white paper sticking out of somebody. That's the, that's their lines. Yeah. pages that is hilarious so we have it we have our yeah we have our montage and I just want to comment our think tank sucks we're like we're coming up with no ideas we got nothing we've got a crappy we've got a crappy think tank it's just all it is um but then you know what changes the energy is chainway hands seven the puzzle the sheer lunacy game that paris has brought is introduced to the crew

and she goes solve it and so she does and then we find you know everyone's shocked she's like you can do you can solve this prove it prove it do yeah she does it very quickly right not not not a lot of moves and then he's like how did you do that and she goes I scanned it she did yeah Paris goes well no she didn't say I cheated Paris goes that's cheating immediately so you're you're not happy with that and Janeway says well you know what if you can't solve a puzzle cheat and she goes if you can't out think a think tank don't try Neelix is like well what just give up and Janeway's like, no, no, no, no. If Seven can link with their communications array,

she can disrupt it. And then they would be vulnerable. So that is the plan that we come up with. And finally, the think, and it really wasn't a think tank. It was Janeway who figured that out. The think tank was just useless. Our think tank sucked. Our think tank was bad. It's a horrible. Do you have any more notes on that scene? No, seven's going to go in, pretending to join their think tank. Yeah. And then she's going to link with the computer and basically, disrupt their Trojan Borg, Trojan Borg. Exactly. So we go out to a cool space shot of the think tank ship, the vessel. It was a cool shot. The camera going up the side of that think tank

and the light. I don't know if it was a model or if it was CG. It looked like a real physical model to me. It was very cool. It was super cool. The think tank vessel interior, we'd now see that, we'd now hear that the Hazari vessel is hailing them through subspace. They answer and Hazari say, look, you guys have deceived us. You lied. You wanted us to deliver Voyager. Well, fine. We can do that. But now, because you lied to us, we are requesting triple, triple payment. Yeah. Or we'll just let him go. We'll just let him go. Kuros finally, you know, he bends. He says, I agree. We'll go ahead and send you, you know, triple the bounty. And now we have a exterior space shot of Hazari ships attacking Voyager, right?

It was cool, by the way. It was very top gun. Like those Hazari ships were doing some top gun moves. Yes. That was pretty cool. Very very top gun. We cut into the bridge. They're spark flying.

And Kuros is saying to Voyager, you know, sorry, the Hazari are greedy. They're just, they're really greedy. And he's just in her ear right now. So just chatting away. More Hazari are approaching. Yeah. And then Chikote says he does. detects an unauthorized shuttle launch from the shuttle bay.

Yes. And it's seven. They figure that out. And they go, who's who's in there? It's seven. And Kuro says, well, seven is trying to save your ship. And Kuro says, safe journey home. And then he disappears.

He's gone. So he thinks he's forced seven into sacrificing herself to save the ship. Yeah. We cut to his ship. He's very smug. And he says to seven, we knew that. you would make this decision. We calculated this.

We ran all the calculations, and we knew that he was very smug, very cocky. And then the Hazari call and say, all right, you got what you wanted, pay up now. And he cuts the call with the Zari. And he's like, this was suspicious. Why are they in such a hurry to get paid? If they decloaked, then they would be vulnerable.

And he's so he's kind of small. smelling a trap. Yeah. So then he detects that something's going on. There may be a trap. And he's talking to seven and he then, you know, he's asking her what's going on. And he says, well, you know, we don't even have to ask you. All we have to do is we have to link you to our communication system and our AI will probe your mind and reveal Janeway's plan. And so he's so smug about this. And that's what happens. She is linked into the communication system. At that point, the doctor, Notifies Janeway that Seven's neural transceiver has been activated. Janeway then orders Tuvok to transmit a carrier wave, which ends up shutting down their communication

system. And you see her-Trojan horse works. Yeah, you see her neural implant sort of fritzing and sparking, which we've never seen before. I don't recall that ever happening. No. It's a nice little visual effect there for that. It's cool.

Yeah. And we see Janeway orders the Hazari to fire spatial charges, which then, then brings the think tank vessel out of subspace. And Seven is at that point beamed back on board. Kuros appears in his isomorphic projection on the bridge, and he is trying to persuade Seven to return. He starts to fritz a little bit. Yeah, by the way, when he's on his ship,

he can't communicate with his buddies. No, he can't. They don't have that telepathic. No. The communicative system is down. Yeah, he can't. He can't. So he says words like, you know,

Turn this off, put shields up, and the guy's like, they don't know. Rick, quick, brick, very funny. I like, I like it. So he starts pritzing. Chainway says, it looks like your ship's having difficulties. And then he says, Coros goes, it's a minor problem. Chainway tells him, I'm sure you'll find a solution.

Just give it some thought. And that smirk she gives him at the end, the best. It's just like, oh, she played with all these lines and she loved, I'm sure she loved every moment of this. This is a really good episode for her. So he fritzes out and then we see an exterior shot of all these Hazari ships that are swarming away. Oh, they're firing at will.

There's like, and more showing up onto the scene. Voyager goes to warp and we're out of there. And that ends the scene. And it ends not only the scene, it ends the whole show at that point. Yeah, we go out on that big attack as we just take off. And that's the end. Cool. That is the end.

What is your theme? What is your lesson? My theme I wrote down here is simply acquiring knowledge doesn't necessarily make you smart. That's the lesson for me. Like just possessing knowledge doesn't mean that you can put it to good use. And I think there was a lot of arrogance and a lot of ego, a lot of cockiness. Yeah. With this think tank gang, they had, you know, they had done a lot of, solved a lot of puzzles,

but that they got outsmarted here. Even though Janeway didn't have all the knowledge, she was able to come up with something more clever. So what about you? I just kind of said beware of a wolf and sheep's clothing because we really look at the think tank as a helpful group that they're good guys. And then it turns out, well, they had ulterior motives the entire time.

That's right. My rating of this episode, Think Tank, I'm going to give it a splat out seven. I'm going to give it a split out seven. Interesting. Okay. I give my rating for this episode would be a, there's a lot of things I liked about it, but ultimately it was a little, it felt a little slow to me in a little flat in places. I would say 6.5 is my rating.

I'm going to revise mine. I'm going to join you. 6.5, 6.5? I'm going to join you at 6.5. Our captain and admiral average rating, let's see how close we got. Okay. For Think tank, 6.8. Woo!

Look at that. See, if you had stayed where you were at 7 and I went 6.5, we'd be right there. Right in the middle. Our average is 6.8. Oh, my goodness. I should have stayed with my first choice. Oh, well. Oh, well.

everyone for tuning in to this week's episode of the Delta Flyers. Join us next week when Robbie and I will be reviewing, recapping, and discussing the episode Juggernaut. Love that name. I love that name, Juggernaut. Yeah. Ooh, yes. It'll be fun. This was fun. It was fun to watch Jason Alexander and Kate Mulgrew tearing it up. Everybody did a good job. It was fun watching Jason. I just wish he didn't have that hair. That's my main complaint right there. Yes, the hair. Agreed. I think if he had not that hair, if that hair did not exist, that wig, this would have been in the seven higher rated. Yes, I would have rated higher. That hair really took it down for me. So that was the issue. All right. Thanks, everyone. See you next week. See you next week. Patreon. Patrons. Please stay tuned for your bonus material.