The Delta Flyers - Tsunkatse

Episode Date: November 28, 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 Tsunkatse. Garrett and Robbie recap and discuss the episode, and share their insight as series regulars.Tsunkatse:When Seven of Nine is captured by alien warriors, she is forced to fight a Pendari gladiator as a contestant in a deadly game.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, Janet K Harlow, 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, Amy Tudor, Adm. Bill "Seoulman" Yu, KMB, Dominic Burgess, Ashley Stokey, Zachary Upton, 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, Shambhavi Kadam, Holly Schmitt, 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, Ali S, Danie Crofoot, Ian Ramsey, Susan V. Gruner, Feroza Mehta, & Michael DismukeAnd our Producers:James Amey, Patrick Carlin, Richard Banaski, Ann Harding, Ann Marie Segal, Chloe E, Nathanial Moon, Carole Patterson, Warren Stine, Jocelyn Pina, Mike Schaible, AJ Provance, Captain Nancy Stout, Claire Deans, Matthew Cutler, Maxine Soloway, Joshua L Phillips, Barbara Beck, Species 2571, 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, Jamason Isenburg, Mark G Hamilton, Rob Johnson, Maria Rosell, Heather Choe, Michael Bucklin, Lisa Klink, Jennifer Jelf, Justin Weir, Mike Chow, Rachel Shapiro, Eric Kau, Captain Jak Greymoon, David Wei Liu, David J Manske, Roxane Ray, Amy Rambacher, Jessica B, E.G. Galano, Cindy Holland, Craig M. Nakashian, Will Forg, Max Wilson, Charlie Faulkner, Estelle Keller, Russell Nemhauser, Lawrence Green, Jordan Marie Benko, Christian Koch, Lisa Gunn, Kath L, Wendy Weatherholtz, Lauren Rivers, & Shane PikeThank 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 Voyager actor who also played the role of Peter Wood in a 1985 episode of The Twilight Zone. Mr. Robert Duncan McNeil and myself, your favorite for Everenson, Gerard 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. How was that episode of The Twilight Zone? Wow, the Twilight Zone. We just talked about that recently because of the Disney Ranch location where we shot Memorial. That's right. And that was the first place that I, the first kind of location that I had filmed on in California.

It was crazy. I was going to school. I was at Juilliard. And it was in the summer, it was during the summer of that year, I had a commercial agent. And I'd gotten it through like a roommate's friend who knew these people that had a commercial agency. And I hadn't really gone out much on anything. Right.

But this commercial agent sent me out for an episode. It was one of the first episodes of the Twilight Zone. Okay. That's a little weird. Yeah. This is your commercial agent sent me. not your theatrical agent sending you out on that. But it was in New York back in the 80s,

and they kind of crossed over a little bit. Sometimes they mostly did kids. It was mostly a kid's agency, actually. It's funny, I was just thinking about this agency because I was cleaning out boxes, organizing in the house, and I found a box of these old headshots.

No, I found. So the name of the agency was Chronic and Kelly. Okay, Chronic and Kelly. Gane Chronic and Somebody Kelly or something like that. I like the name already. Chronic and Kelly. Yeah. And it was a kid's agency that did mostly commercials.

And I ended up there oddly by accident. They sent me off a Twilight Zone. I booked it. And they were so thrilled because it was a small little agency that they gave me, they gave me a jacket of the agency that had. And I still have that jacket. Oh, I love it. And I just found it recently.

And it's like this black satin jacket with like pink lettering on the back, Chronic and Kelly talent agency. Yeah. And I remember when they gave me that as like a reward for booking a big job. Yeah.

I used to wear that around town. I was, I felt like, oh, I'm a professional now. I have a professional agency jacket on. Look at me. It just felt like such a status symbol.

You know what I mean? You just don't get these jackets. If you're not a working actor. I love that it's still in your wardrobe though. That you still have. It feels like one of those things I just don't want to ever let go. And I'm going to tell you,

I was going to ask you that. Please do not let go of that. Keep that in your collection. That has to go to the Delta Flyers Museum that opens posthumously after we both pass away, right? So they'll have everything our end. The jacket will be there. Okay. Yes.

That's funny. Yeah. Twilight Zone was very exciting. I did it the summer after my freshman year at Juilliard. And then it came out in the fall. And it was very well received. I was really proud of that. And it's funny because I was in Juilliard studying all.

this classical theater and so when I was doing it, the role I played was this modern kid who gets a fever and he starts telepathically speaking with a girl in the 1600s in Salem, Massachusetts. Oh, wow. They have telepathy and then the people around her. They think that she's a witch. She goes on a witch trial and then I had to look in history books to come up with a way to get her out of this. Oh my gosh. I love this premise. I love the storyline. So it was great. kind of cool. Yeah. I was speaking very precisely with my Juilliard trained.

Training and voice work. Yes. And then they had cast Justine Bateman, who was on family ties. Of course. Yes. Who's like a valley girl. They cast Justine as the witch. And the director kept saying to me, you know, you sound like an old English settler.

And she sounds like a modern valley girl. And we need to switch it. Like she needs to sound more classical. And so stop talking Juilliard. Stop talking like you're from Juilliard. And it was very hard because I had spent an entire year getting drilled in my head, like, you know, precise consonants and, you know, whatever. Yeah.

Did you make the adjustment? I feel like I tried. But the last time I saw a piece of that when it was on reruns or something, I was like, oh, yeah, I can hear the Juilliard. It's still there. The heavy Juilliard, you know, affectation. that I was just being drilled into me. But anyway, it was fun.

Were you a fan of Twilight Zone before you booked that? I was. Yeah, I loved Twilight Zone. So booking that was pretty exciting for you. Yeah. And the reboot, the relaunch of that show in the 80s was kind of a big deal. It was a big deal. I remember that.

Yeah, Twilight Zone reboot was. And then it went on as a syndicated show after a couple years in CBS. And I think the brand has gotten watered down. But at the time, it felt like that is a, a big brand to be a part of, and it was a big deal. So this is a project that you booked while still being at Juilliard as a student. Yeah. Well, I guess my next question would be, in your Juilliard class, was it the same for the

other classmates? Were they also booking things left and right, or were you the only one? There were one of my classmates. His name's John Tenney. He's gone onto a great career. John left in our freshman year to do the first national tour of the real thing, the Broadway play, which was a big hit. So he had already left to do a job.

And then that summer, another classmate had done a production out at the Guthrie theater, so he was that maybe was going to go to Broadway. So he was kind of on a track. There were a few people that were working, but it was mostly theater stuff. Right. There weren't as many doing film or TV. You were the one hitting those roles. right yeah i started getting a couple of those the the german little indie film the twilight zone

episode i think i did a couple of commercials that summer yeah so i was working and then a few months later into my second year is when the all my children people called and offered me a two-year contract to to do a soap opera and that's when i left school in my in my second year so well what was the mindset of uh a julyard classically trained actor booking non theater roles, booking television, film. Was it sort of looked on as a negative thing, or was it like, oh, you hit the promised land. I think if it had been some big feature film with Kevin Klein, you know, starring opposite,

you know, Kevin Klein or Christopher Reeves or, you know, somebody famous, sure, that would have been treated differently. You know, I was getting an episode of the Twilight Zone. Yeah. I'm getting, you know, a daytime soap opera. So the things that I was getting were not looked at as like, were worthy of leaving school, you know, gotcha. And I disagreed. So I left. So you left. And that is exactly what happened. You did leave. Yeah, I did. All right. Okay. So this week's episode is Suncatsi. So I am excited to go

watch this. How do you say it? Suncateze. I say it Suncatee. Yes. Being of Chinese, being Chinese American and being able to speak Mandarin, there are a lot of T and S sounds. that come out at the same time. Yeah, Tsunkate is how I say it. I think I've always said. Tsunami, Tsunami Tungkate, like that. Yeah, I think I've always said, now I'm trying to get your pronunciation out of my head. I know mine is different.

I think I've always said Tune Kats, Sunkate, Sunkate. So you don't even pronounce the first T. I don't think so. Suncatsi. Suncate, yeah. Sunkate. It's spelled T-S-U-N-K-A-T-S-E. Now I'm so confused

Tune Satsi I don't know what I ever called it Chunche I have no earthly idea Now I'm confused Suncati Suncatsi Tune Katsi

Shaka Khan I don't know Shaka Khan Are you ready for this episode of Shaka Khan? Come on I am totally ready I really don't know what I've called it in the past

Now I'm confused I'm going to call it what you call it But you have not called it You have not pronounced it the way I've been pronouncing no no sonkati i think i said suncati suncati tunes i don't know i'm literally confusing myself you are confusing yourself and me now yeah so it's a double confusion right now thank you for that shocka con that's it shocka chaka chaka kong yes let's go watch this episode chaka con and we'll be right back with our recap and discussion of tzuncatee and patreon patrons please stay tuned for your

bonus material. We are back from watching Sun Katsi. Tunkazi or Sun Ketzi or I don't know how to pronounce it. All right. Kadi, I have, I really have been mispronouncing this.

You have been. Anyway, it's okay. It is what it is. It's a made-up word. It's all right. Okay, let's start off with our poetry synopsis of Sumkazi. And here.

Here's my haiku. Here we go. Thank you. Crew loves Tsunkate. Seven must fight for Tuvok. Lucky Hirojan. Good. Good, good, good.

All right. All right. Here we go with our limerick for Tsumkatsu. The crew is on shore leave, but Seven wants to do science stuff. Kidnapped and forced to fight. Tuvok's looking pretty rough. Tom Neelix Harriet Chakotay are watching. The Rock is there.

He's definitely rocking. It's not seven strength, but her humanity makes her tough. Oh, nice. Yeah, very good. Good. This is a hard one. This is a tough one for me. This episode was tough, you're saying, or that limerick was tough?

All of it. The whole experience for me. This one, you know, I'm probably showing my hand here a little, but this one was tough for me. Let's dive right into it. Okay. Let's dive in. Let's talk about, let's talk about, let's talk about writers.

Let's talk about guest stars. Let's talk about direct. By the way, how lucky was I? I guessed that on the money. I guess that on the money. I don't understand because you never say Mike Vahar. I know. And you said it and it was right.

And it was right on the money. I'm getting a detective to figure out how you've pulled that one off. That's a tough one. I just said, I said, all right, if you already went with, we already went with Craker. We had Craker in the episode before. You picked, who'd you pick? I forgot who you said. For this one?

Yeah. I said Livingston. You said Livingston. And I was like, I got to come up with someone other than. And I was going to say Anson, Williams. And I was like, no, no, no. I'm going to go with another name. And Mike Vahar bubbled up onto my tongue.

Unbelievable. And I got to say, I'm right on the money on that. I was so excited. Okay. Okay. Mike Vayhart directed. We've talked about him before. Bob Doherty wrote the script. And I love, I love Robert Doherty. I love his dialogue. He does such a good job with everything. This story was by Gannon Kenny, who I, must have been an outside pitch.

It must have been. Yeah. First time seeing that name. Our guest stars, Jeffrey Combs as pink. So good to see him. This was the first episode he did with us, right? Or maybe this is the only one. the episode that he did on Voyager wow well Jeffrey's phenomenal um his very first job 1981 a movie called honky tonk freeway oh my god harry gar thank you yep Jeffrey combs he's done a lot of theater before yeah Jeffrey's great so he's great and and you know uh I don't even know where to begin with his Star Trek connections because he's he did so many episodes of D-Space 9 30 or 40 episodes maybe. He did a dozen episodes or so of Enterprise. He's been on, I forget, he may be tied for the most characters ever played in the Star Trek. I don't think he's tied. I think he wins it.

I think he may even be the winner. I really think he's the winner. I mean, the number of characters, different characters. Unbelievable. Unbelievable. Really is. But that's a testament to how good of an actor he is. He's a wonderful actor and a wonderful human being. Who's next on our docket? Next is J.G. Hertzler. Love J.G. Another, you know, regular in the Star Trek franchise. He plays the Herojin Fighter, which I never would have guessed. I completely forgot that J.G. was in this.

And I forgot that Jeffrey Combs was in it. And plus, J.G. sort of does a little bit of an affectation to his voice. So there's certain times when you're like, is that J.G.? Yeah, it's different. It's different. J.G.'s first job in show business, in 1978, he appeared on. The Soap Opera General Hospital. What?

Yeah. Daytime was his beginnings. And our last guest star, obviously, is The Rock. The Rock. Yeah. Yes. Dwayne Johnson, The Rock. So The Rock, I always thought that this was his first acting role, that he had just done

wrestling. No, that's incorrect. Correct. It is incorrect. His first acting job was that 70s show. as on the sitcom playing a character named Rocky Johnson. What year was that? 1999.

Well, Rocky Johnson, I think that's his dad's name. Oh, yeah. So maybe he, what year? What year? A year before, 1999. 99. So one year before. So this was, was Voyager his second acting job then?

No. The Net. A TV show The Net. Okay. It was right before us. That 70 shows, The Net, and then Voyager? Yeah. Three times a charm.

The third one was it. And that's what sort of launched him. I'm going to say our show launched him into the stratosphere. Agreed. Agreed. Must have done it. Must have. But his very first credit as an actor was in the U.S.

Wrestling Association Championship Wrestling episode. Oh, my goodness. Episode in 1996, he played a character named Flex Kavana. First wrestler, you know. character that he played before he was the rock yeah he was flex kavana flex kavana in 1996 and just so everybody knows the wrestling entertainment is you know the wrestlers that you see like the rock that's not real fighting in fact i remember once it's not i took my niece so i called my niece i'm going to make this story really quick i called my niece one time and i and i said um

Oh, WWE is, oh, no, I didn't call her. She texted me. My niece texts me and she says, hey, Uncle Robbie, this is in Atlanta. Hey, Uncle Robbie. I just saw that WWE is coming to Atlanta. And I remember we had talked about that. And wouldn't that be fun to go? And I said to Rebecca, I never remember talking to Abby about WWE.

what is she talking about i never it's fake wrestling i'm why would i ever want to go and but i said you know if my niece says uncle robbie you want to go i'm going to say yes so i got us tickets we go to w w we go have a dinner nice you know uncle robby dinner we go out to see the w e we're watching and about halfway through she goes uncle robbie she said i don't know if this doesn't seem real that's not what I expected and I was like oh she thought it was real and then it occurred to me that one time my niece and I had talked about MMA oh we had talked about MMA and I was like oh yeah I really enjoyed and she says me too I love it I was like that's so surprising happy that you like m m yeah she mixed it up she mixed the two so we went to WWE world wrestling entertainment

which is fake I feel like you should have said spoiler before you said it's fake because there may be people out there who are still die-hard wrestling fans that believe it all they do well part of the fun of the fans is that they they go along with it all the drama because it's kind of a soap opera there it is it's a soap opera in the ring that's what it is yeah anyway that's the rock that's our guest stars and you know you know he did play football right he did play football not professional they just played college no professional uh cfl CFL here in Calgary this is where I'm recording today so yeah he was a Calgary stand Peter mm-hmm oh wow yeah I knew he played college ball but I didn't know it wow okay

that's very cool all right on here we go yes let's go into it let's dive into this wow look at this opening scene this is it's literally a WWE match I mean just all the lights and the and the music and it was really a we go right into it It opens with an arena, and there's lots of different aliens, species in the audience. There's even some human Starfleet officers in the audience. So it's very confusing. It's like, is this a game on the holodeck? I didn't know what this.

I couldn't remember this episode, really, except that The Rock was in it. So I was like, it made no sense. So Starfleet is watching with all these aliens, these two fighters come out. Right. And one fighter is kind of martial artsy. He's moving around. And the other, this very fancy entrance shot. And we introduce a Herojin fighter, which is J.G. Hertzler coming out.

They have lights on their chest and on their hands that I didn't understand. I was like, are those like boxing gloves? Like if they hit with a light. And then I saw there was some electrical shocks when they make contact. If you punch the disc, that little. disc on the center of their chest. That's what makes them have the electricity or something. The electric. Yeah, the electrical shock. By the way, when they had those on and we were watching them fight, I thought, oh my God, that is so cool. Because at the time, I was so into trance and still

am, you know, but I was going to kind of like raves and whatnot and using glow sticks. And so I thought, those are glow sticks that are already on your gloves, basically. So I really wanted a pair, but I couldn't get one. Couldn't get one. No. Yeah, they were pretty cool. Those are cool design those little lights they were like pads yeah they were they were kind of on the back of the hand a pad and then a circle on the chest right um great fight choreography i did remember that this set was reused from virtuoso that they expanded the theater set into a full circle and added some stuff and this is the uh the sun katsi set yeah um but the horogen ultimately wins and then we reveal at the end of this that it's not just extras in the

the audience. We've got Balana and Chakotay and they are pumped. So we go out on that moment of revealing Balana and Chakotay are watching this fight. And I just didn't understand. I was so confused. We come back. We come back. We got a space shot. Captain's log. She says the crew is enjoying shore leave on the Norkadian home world. Right. So must be a friendly place if we're having surely we must have met them figured out they're safe you know we're trading a little or whatever yeah she's going to visit pandari the planet right in the neighboring system and over that captain's log we cut to the hallway see janeway um walking down with a like a duffel bag which i've never seen anyone go on a away mission with a duffel bag but we had big duffel bags and we came back from our two week

away mission remember the prior yeah that's true we did have okay yeah yeah it just feels a little new like this whole thing and we're gonna get to seven later what she's carrying yeah but uh but anyway she's leaving with the duffel bag they got to walk and talk she's reminding chikote he's gonna be in charge yeah he says you know don't forget about the diagnostic on the shield generator and he's like on it and uh she says also keep an eye on neelix and he's got a project yeah he's trying to use board technology to enhance his stove um be careful and chukote is like well i will sign a security detail to that um maybe a little overkill for nilings but anyway she takes off balana joins chakote here and she's pumped up balana yeah and she wants to go back and watch more of the fighting and she wants

chokote to go back with her and she says you know i've i've checked uh harry's free this afternoon In this part of the conversation, I paused. I'm like, what's going on? Bologna's telling Chocote, she wants to go on a date. And she's saying, Harry's free this afternoon. Is that for a date with him? Or I was like, isn't she dating Paris? You almost said Harry.

I know, I don't know. You did. But I was like, what about Tom? Why isn't she saying, hey, Chacote? I want to go with Tom to the fight. What the heck? It's, Robbie, it's clearly a. Mackey thing. It's a Mackey thing.

Maybe it does. Yeah, that's all. Okay. Next for the mess hall, I think, right? Mm-hmm. And Balana asks, as she walks in with Chukotay to the mess hall and she says to Neelix, I hope that's not lunch and she's

pointing at this giant, it looks like a punch bowl of like yellow. Did you say jello? What would you say that thing looks like? It looked like jello or pudding. Yeah, put it. Yes. it was it was gross she's like i hope that's not lunch and then we reveal neelux he's he's sunburned but like only on one side of his and he says it's leola root ointment and he's gonna he you know he needs

it for his sunburn it's a talaxian thing and said he fell asleep and he got sunburn because he forgot his his dermaline hypospray and he fell asleep under two sons. So, oh, man, I can't imagine. But he also says something like, you know, it'll, it'll heal up and turn a nice, what did he say, a nice amber color or something? I didn't know Tlaxians like sunbathe. Right. But I also did not know that Leola Root could serve as an ointment. Who knew that? I know. It's sort of the fix-all for everything, isn't it? Put a little Leola root on it. Yeah. If you skin your knee, rub a little Leola root on it. You're good. Yeah.

But they discuss the Suncatsi tournament. Seven comes over and Seven basically says, you know what? It's crude and pointless, this kind of fighting. Yes. Tuvac's there. They invite Tuvac. And he says he's got plans to go on an away mission to a micronebula, he says. And I guess seven and Tuvok have planned, you know, on their shore leave, they're going to go hang out

at this micro nebula and do tests and science. This is the best. This is the nerdiest. Yeah, this is so nerdy. It's the two driest, nerdiest characters on Voyager deciding to hang out together to look at this micronebula, which at one point, I was thinking, why are these two together? These two are perfect for each other. Yes, they are.

Chikote says, okay, well, you can do whatever you want. to try to please try to enjoy yourselves he says and then as everybody leaves I love at the end of this scene everybody leaves and and Nelix is kind of in the foreground and he slowly turns you know when you have a sunburn and like everything hurts yeah and you just don't want to move yeah I thought Ethan Phil's played that last moment everybody leaves it it's like the slowest turn and he takes a breath and then he just exits the shot and it was really it was a funny bit I love the realism Johnny put in there. Good job.

The sunburn, yes, the sunburn sense memory of it all. We've all been there. Oh, my goodness. We go to cargo bay next. Yeah. Oh, you're in this scene. Yeah. Paris comes in with the navigational data that Seven had requested.

Right. And I thought it was funny because you never see scenes with Paris in seven. No, it was so bizarre. It was like, what are you doing in this scene with her? I know. It's so rare. So rare. If I'm in a scene with seven, it's with a bunch of other people.

But just the two of us chatting. Never, never. Which is so funny because I thought it was a fun scene. It is a great scene. I love it. They are an interesting odd couple to have together because he's so not, you know, Paris is so not logical or interested in anything that she's interested. So it would be fun to see them.

I know we don't. I know what's not going to happen. Correct. It would be fun to see them together more. But he comes in, she's packing these giant containers and he starts giving her crap about that. He's like, oh, you're like, Balano, you overpack. Yeah.

And he asks her about like some kind of little tool. And he goes, why can't you just replicate this thing? And she said, I prefer this one. The isomodulator. Yeah, the isomodulator. Yeah, and I love that. Because you can easily replicate that. So you don't have to pack the dang thing.

But she's like, I prefer this one. Like, that's her favorite. isomodulator that she's always been using. And she's also, she's putting them into these giant barrels, like plastic barrels, which just don't seem very practical for stacking or carrying around or anything. Yeah. I mean, the only thing good thing would be you roll the barrel.

You could roll it. Yeah, which she doesn't in the next scene. She does not do. She's carrying both of them. I love it. But Paris does say in the scene, he says, yeah, Balana has special things she likes that she always brings a stuffed animal away with her on missions. This is new info for us.

I was like, what? Where did this happen? Yeah, I thought, this is insane. I've never seen a stuffed animal in her room. I've never talked about it. It's a cool detail, but it seems a little late in the game. I agree. But can I just say, Toby the Targ, I really feel like that should be in our merch store. We should have a Toby the Targ stuffed animal. Yes. That's a good one. Yeah, Toby the Targ is sounds cute. And by the way, as soon as he said, as soon as Paris said, oh yeah, Belon always brings the stuffed animal, I pictured something like a Targ. You did. Yes, I totally, that, that would be what she has. Okay. Seven does ask Parris, she says, well, can Toby the Targ correct whole oblations? Your comparison is flawed. And she walks off. And I love Tom's or my double.

double take at the end. It was like, you know, because she says, can Toby the Tark correct hull oblations? Yeah. And Paris starts to go, uh, and then she goes, your comparison is flawed and just walk, you know, like mic drop and walks out. Yeah. Yeah, good reaction. Yeah, it was funny. It was a nice, nice like comedy. I'm proud of those little, yeah, little moment. Yeah, it was. I think it was a wonderful scene between the two of you. Really, it was fun. Really? We go into the hall next. Yeah. And doctors, uh, asking seven. if she would join him for a tour of all the cultural hotspots on the planet. And she says, no, she's busy with Tuvok.

Now, she's walking down the hall, carrying two of these giant plastic barrels. And I was like, why was this the choice? And then I thought, okay, well, I know that there's going to be fighting because the rocks in the episode. Maybe it's to foreshadow that she's strong. that it's just something that it that no normal person would do i think that's that's a good way to put it i like your rationalization good i mean i don't know if i'm reading into it or no no okay i'm gonna go with that because there's no other reason why she would carry that she'd have a duffel bag or something why would she carry she'd have them on a heart exactly but still she just she's carrying

them like they're nothing too right she's walking like and clearly they're filled with equipment so they're probably each like I don't know I'm going to guess 100 pounds each so yeah yeah so it's it's very impressive that's what it is foreshadowing super strength um did you notice the extra walking behind her the the mistiming on the extra by the way no what happened so it's in a two shot and you see someone walking towards them yeah from the down at the hall and almost gets to them literally is going to walk behind seven yeah and then it cuts over but just before he passes it cuts over to her close-up. Yeah.

And I expected him to walk by in that matched action. And he doesn't walk by. He's not there. And then like four seconds later, he walks by. Oh. I was like, oh, wow, guys. They didn't catch that. You should have not cut it that way because it just, those little things always distract me.

Yeah. And I think they bug people that, you know, are in the know, for sure. And even if you're not in the know, there's something about the cut that you go, something was off. Yes. You don't even if you can't pinpoint it. But it's a distraction from the reality of the scenes. Yeah.

Did you feel like the doctor was hitting on seven right here? It felt a little like, hey, let's go on a date, you know? It's going to be wonderful. And then Seven's like, no, I'm already, I already have a date with Tuvok, basically. We're going to go look at this micronebula. Why don't you join us? And the doctor's just, it's too funny. You think he'd be into this, but he's not.

He's like, nope, I'm going to. He does this quick, you know, vaudeville kind of exit out of there. He says, no thanks, and off he goes. And now we go to a shuttle flyby. And it is not the flyer. No, it's just a standard shuttle, correct. Standard shuttle, because I guess Janeway took the flyer, I think. Yeah, you gave her the keys and she says, okay, I'm going to take the flyer.

We go inside the shuttle and they're silent. I love this scene, though. It's just so funny because she's like, they're talking about the fact that, I mean, she feels bad because the doctor's been trying to encourage her. to engage in conversation during awkward silences. Tuvok responds with, did you find the silence awkward? Seven's like, no. And two bucks says, nor did I. So at this point, I realized, these two are perfect.

They should be together. I mean, this is ridiculous. Well, she's literally the first line. There's this long, long silence. And then she says, two hours, 37 minutes, 13 seconds. That's how long we've been without verbal communication. And I thought what she meant was they were out of calm range. Right.

right and then i realized no they haven't talked for two hours 37 minutes and rebecca said at this point she goes oh that sounds like you what because i hate awkward silences so rebecca's fine with rebecca's fine with like silence and we don't have to talk we just sit here and do our own things and i am not and rebecca's like you would count you would say oh it's been 32 minutes 43 seconds since the last time you said, ask me a question or something. Anyway, yeah,

she talks about how the doctor says she's got engaged in conversation. Yeah, yeah. And then there's an alarm. Yeah, vessel approaching on an intercept course. They try to hail it.

Nothing. Yeah, nothing. And then they try to, actually, they try to hail Voyager, and there's a dampening feel that this alien ship has basically placed upon their shuttle,

and they've lost engines, weapons shield, they have nothing. and all of a sudden something is beamed something's beamed into the back of the shuttle craft it's like a little red blinky thing it's a red blinky thing which is clearly duvok goes and scans it and i just he's like it's an explosive device of some some sort and at that point i'm like why are you still sitting next to it why don't you move away sir he doesn't mind awkward silences with bombs either he's just hanging out fine But it blows up. The thing blows up. And they couldn't beam it off either. So they were,

oh yeah, it blows up. And uh, kaboom. Bad bad. Boom. And white. And it's a white out.

Yes. It blows up into a white out. Right. And, uh, as we come out of the white out, uh, we see in a tight shot that seven is being scanned.

Yeah. And she wakes up. And it's Jeffrey Combs. Yeah. Jeffrey Combs as we will learn his name pink later. Pink. Right. P-E-N-K, pink, pink.

But it's Jeffrey Combs. I love the mustache on his makeup. What does it do? It starts and it curls under and it's just like a catfish. It reminds me, right? It's like the whisker on a catfish. Very. And I remember Michael Westmore and Scott Wheeler and all our makeup people talking about how they

had animals. They used animals as insects, amphibians and they had all those books and they used them as inspiration for the alien makeups. Yeah, this feels like a. catfish very much so. But he scans her. He realizes that she is part Borg and he says she'll be a very popular attraction. So we don't really understand yet what's going on. What that means, right? We come back and we're still in the barracks and she asks where Tuvok is and Pink says he was injured in the explosion. And she wants to see him. She demands, I want to see Tuvok. And so he

calls the guards or you know calls for Tuvok to be brought in yeah and he says you know I just want you to be happy and comfortable uh that's very important for my fighters and we see the horogen uh JG Hertzler yeah is also in the barracks so this is like a prison you start to realize gladiator prison and when he says yeah I want the comfort and happiness of my fighters is that's very important to me yeah and uh and And J.G. Hertzner kind of laughs and says, says something like, Pink's generosity is legendary, sarcastically. Right. And everybody, all the other prisoners laugh there.

But when they bring Tuvok in, seven says that, well, he needs medical attention. And Peng says, okay, yeah, I can, I could do that. And Seven's like, well, then do it. And Peng's sort of like, wow, you haven't even won a single match. But yet you're already making these requests just like a champion. So he's excited about seven. And basically she says, are you going to treat him or not? And he says, well, are you going to fight?

And this is the best line when Tuvok says, do not comply. My condition is not severe. And then you look at his face and you're like, really? Not severe? In whose book is that not severe? Dude, you look like cheesecloth. Your face is just chunks of flesh. It's gone.

I mean, how are you even alive right now is my reaction to that? Very funny. everybody oh my goodness so pink uh decides that uh if she's not going to fight that he'll put tuvok in a red match right we don't know what a red match is but it sounds like a death match yeah oh they say it at the end because they do say it later on jg says it right here jg says a red match it doesn't end until one of the competitors is killed and your friend would not survive uh so she basically takes takes one for the team she says i'm going to do it i'm going to make sure I fight for him for Tuvok. At that point, Pank, because of the Hirojan, decides that

it's not going to be a red match for seven. It'll be a blue match. So this is one that does not end in death. Yeah, he doesn't want to lose her too soon. Yeah, the ratings and all the, you know, yeah. And because of her Borg enhancements, that she's part Borg, that he can, he can milk this. That's right. Lots of people will be interested. So 7 complies. And we go out to space. We see Voyager in orbit of this planet. We go in the mess hall, and we see Harry and Tom and Chkote, Torres. And they're all kind of looking at pads and talking about like the stats of all the fighters and all the matches.

And everybody's really into this Tsumkatsi fighting, which is kind of weird to me that it's just weird that everybody is so blithe. into gladiator style fighting, I don't know, it just, it, it, it seemed very out of character. This episode, I'm going to pause for a minute and do an overall. This episode, to me, felt super forced. Like, I didn't feel like, you know, I feel like there's other characters that would have been more interesting to see fighting if we're going to do this story than seven. Okay.

I didn't like the fight. It felt like a sellout to the wrestling side of UPN at the time. I don't know. I kind of felt that you were not so jazzed about this episode when we were doing our intro and we were doing our bonus material for our patrons. And I'm going to have the other side of it. I'm going to say now that for me,

I grew up watching wrestling. So this was very exciting for me to have the rock here and have that element there. So it didn't bother me. And funny enough, same thing with Mesa. Megan also watched wrestling as a kid. And she lists this episode as one of her favorites. She really, really like, oh, yeah.

And I wouldn't disagree with that. I mean, I did like this episode. So your overall is you're not, you're not happy. No, this is definitely, I will, spoiler alert. This is not one of my favorites. And it felt forced. And I think the reason is because it forced characters to like in this scene in the mess hall. Yeah.

Torres and Paris and Chacote and Harry. everybody talking about fighters as if we cared and i don't think these characters had any previous you know um history of caring about this kind of thing so it's just strained it felt forced to me the other thing is i feel like star trek always at its best is about ideas and even though sure we have space battles and things having these protracted like fake fights to me was just didn't feel like Star Trek. Yeah. It felt like, I don't know.

Yeah, I think the only, it didn't feel like our show. The only thing that pulled me out was that it's very clear that there is a stunt double for Jerry Ryan. And you can't, and it's not. Horrible used. Yeah. And it's not hidden to the point where you can't.

I mean, there's a way to shoot things to make it look like it's the real person doing it, right? I mean, and you use minimal. They just use the double. Oh, and even dead on shots. Yes. Yes. And I was like, oh, that's a little. But I will say that the individual who played the stunt double, I can't remember her name now. I can't remember even.

I had some wonderful conversations with her, by the way. And I wish, and I'm so sorry if you're listening on that if I can't recall your name. But yeah, I would love to talk to her about this episode, you know, since she did the majority, or not majority, all the fighting pretty much, you know, everything. the only the beginning shot of her posing getting ready to fight was seven of nine was jerry but everything else was this this guy yeah so that pulled me out a lot you know because yes the double pulled me out a lot yeah this one was a tough episode for me anyway yeah back to the scene so we're in the mess hall we're comparing all the stats i did like harry says at one point he says oh well they're talking about the fighting being really tough and harry's like well try taking a parisi's mallet to the rib and then chukot you and chukotay you and chukotay

get into this like one-upsmanship about what sport is tougher. I know. It just seemed out of character to me, all of this stuff. Is this male toxicity? What are we doing right here? What's happening here? What is happening? And he's talking about how he boxed a few Porese's players, you know, and then and Harry's

talking about, oh, yeah, and it just goes back and forth. And then at the very end, you and I engage in this little fake little fight thing. So that was a little bit pushed right there. I can hear you. I went, it seemed out of character. Palana even gets involved. She's like, well, the tattooed terror has more men in sick bay than they incarned flu. Right.

And the tattooed terror? Like, where do we get these nicknames and like one-upsman? It's just bringing out like uncharacteristic behavior from all of us. Understood. Understood. And then you kind of joking what you say. You said, yeah, you wouldn't want to bruise your clarinet fingers. You know, again, just not usually what Paris would say.

say no and then that's when when kim goes oh you want to go a few rounds or are you all talking you're like anytime but so you join in on this male one-upsmanship yeah we start like play fighting each other and i say that you punched like a ferengi which i thought was kind of funny actually i had to say that just it's weird yeah it's it's that kind of like banter that feels yes kind of the the version of male toxicity or like testosterone or one-ups yeah like it's bringing out qualities in these characters that was just like these aren't our characters these aren't our relationships and i agree it just uh yeah so that's what the whole fighting as a like it felt forced to me it felt like we were serving the wrestling uh block of uPN shows

rather than the crossover episode right rather than real story and real character anyway that's my thoughts let's just end our recap i think we're done No, no, no. All right, continue. All right. So we go out in the hallway and Balana and Chukotay are walking out of the mess hall where all that banter was happening. Bala wants to go back down to watch more fights. And Chukotay's like, oh, sorry, you're not going to be able to go.

I rearranged the duty shift. So you've got the bridge. And she's like, what? And he says, yeah, I was the first officer. you know, I'm in charge of the schedule here and he thinks he needs to go because as an anthropologist,

he's got to study this cultural phenomenon. He's just making up. He is. He is. Yes. And it's, again, a very uncharacteristic for him to do that as well.

He would probably let, I feel like the real Chikote would have said, you know what I'm saying? Like, he's not going to tell Torres, you're going to take this shift. because I, the commander who's now in charge of the whole ship, needs to be down on that planet to watch this Tumkatsi match. Like, really?

No, I don't think so. It all felt very flimsy to me. Yeah. We go to sick bay next, and Neelix is being treated by the doctor because he's got having a reaction. He's allergic to the Leola root ointment. Yeah. He's a little allergic. And the doctor says, you know, talaxian homeopathy is no substitute for men.

medical science, stay out of the sun. And so, Neelik says he's going to go see Sunkatsi. Right. And the doctor really doesn't like that idea. He hates this barbaric sport. Right. Yeah. He thinks that watching people hurt each other is barbaric.

And he's really, which again, I'm on team doctor here. Like, it just doesn't seem like this particular version of barbaric sport is something. that any of us would be so obsessed with right so the neelix asked do you have any suggestions other things for me to see because he's trying to he feels like okay you're making a point for how barbaric this is and that's when that's when the that's when the doctor says well i i'm planning on visiting the norcadian museum of entomology this afternoon there's a fascinating exhibit of beetle larvae from the ecotorius subcontinent you're welcome to join me and that's when neelix is the oh yes alien bugs or fistic cups yes alien bugs are figured that's a time

tough one. I did love the hives on his face, though. Like, his sunburn went from just sunburn to boils on his face. Yeah. Yeah. But the doctor gives him a shot because that's going to treat this because the next cut is right to Neelix. He's in the arena. And he's cheering like crazy, which is I like that transition. But the boils are gone, right? Everything's gone. So whatever the doctor did, Neil should have gone there first. He should have. Again, from the last episode, I think it was the last one. Don't skip your checkups, people. Go see your doctor.

That is the lesson. That is the lesson. Yeah, but we're in the arena. There's Nelix and Tom and Harry and Chukotay. I was kind of right. So it kind of looks like, remember I was talking about I was sitting away from you? I was sitting away kind of way. You were on the end.

Yeah, because it went, it went Chiquet, Paris. Then there was a bit of a space. or Neelix was in the row ahead of you, maybe, is what it was. I think we were all in the same row. Really? Okay. It just felt like there, but I was at the very, very end. And then the third wheel, really.

You were the third wheel of all our fun in the days of sitting in that thing. Yeah. There's different fighters there. We have some fighting. And again, another thing I hated about this episode was, you know, we're watching these aliens fighting that we don't know, that we don't care about. It has nothing to do with our story. right just to have more gratuitous fighting yeah anyway the lady wins she knocks out the uh the other

competitor competitor then neelix asks uh he he doesn't understand the fighting so now chukotay's got to explain the rules yeah they wear these polaron disruptors is what choket says on their hands and feet that's the the pads that we were talking about yeah um they emit a charge into the other opponent on contact with the target sensors so that's the things on the chest yeah and um you're the the object of this fight is to fight and try to attack the sensor the target sensor the other players target sensor without letting yours be um hit i guess yeah so he's going through this long explanation and paris goes hey are you guys going to talk or are you going to watch which i love come on watch this game and that is the introduction of dwayne the rob johnson who comes

Does he have a name on this? He has to have a name too, right? He's the champion. So he comes out and all the fanfare, the crowd goes wild. And I did love what he did with the eyebrow. He does his standard signature move. And it was great to me to see him there. It really was.

And his opponent is none other than seven of nine. And of course, the Voyager crew immediately are like, what the heck is going on? And we try. We try our hardest to scream at her name. She's not listening, which is a little odd. We're figuring out why isn't she? Tom says it's too loud in here. Everybody's screaming so loudly that she can't hear us.

So Chacote calls the bridge. And there's Bologna in the captain's chair for the first time, I think. I've never seen her. You're right. Chocote says seven is in the pit, beam her out. We go back. They're still fighting. Seven is winning, by the way, at this point.

She does have superior strength to this champion. champion. He's down. She's got the upper hand. And she says, I have no desire to inflict further damage. And because she pauses there, he goes after her. Now he's taking her down. We go back to the bridge. Balana says she can't see any life signs in the pit. She's scanning it, but there's no life signs. Yeah. And she says, I'm looking right at her. Recalibrate the bioscams. She said, all I see is photonic readings. Holograms. Yeah. Here, we cut back to the arena. Harry says holograms. Paris says they're transmitting this fight from some other location. Again, it's Tom and Harry figuring it out in the end. That's my takeaway. We figured it out.

Anyway, we go, we realize that there is a real arena. So I started in my notes calling it the arena or the real arena where they were actually fighting, not the hologram arena, where the audience was. so in this real arena where they actually are fighting we see this fight continue there's no audience there though it's just pink and his guards up in a like a control booth kind of thing and they're transmitting this to the viewing arena and they're watching this fight and suddenly an alarm sounds pink realizes that something is disrupting their transmission he says um you know compensate and the guards change their frequency, I guess, so that we can't, they can't be tracked. And we go back to the viewing arena and the fights continuing and seven's winning again,

but she hesitates again for the knockout blow that she has a chance to take here. And he takes advantage of that, ends up punching her chest sensor and looks around the champion here. Everybody starts chanting Tumkatsi Tumkatsi But this time Chikote and all of us We are not joining in

Now we've lost our interest in the fighting That's right And we're all very Very worried But seven is just unconscious on the floor Yeah

We go to Janeway shuttle next Which is the Delta Flyer Tom Harrison Danway's borrowed shuttle. Yes, her borrowed shuttle. She's heading back and she's getting a full report from Chikote and Torres who are on the bridge. So they're talking via a view screen. Chiquote and Torres say that they're having a very difficult time trying to track this transmission

because it's being sent to every planet in the sector. And it could take days for them to figure out where seven and two buck are. Chikote does say that Nelix has gone down to meet with some Nork officials and try to use diplomacy. Janeway responds that she will be back soon, but it's going to take her 48 hours to get there. So she's far away on her. Yeah, she's far.

We go back to the barracks next. And the Herojin is regenerating her or healing her. He's got some tools. I guess he's snuck in there. And Seven says use these on Tuvok. He's very severely injured. and the Herojan said he already has. So I thought that was a very nice gesture for Herojin.

It was for Herojin, definitely. But seven questions that. She's like, why are you helping us? And he says, well, I just recognize fellow hunters when I see them. Seven says, I'm not a hunter. And the Hogan says, well, I saw your match today and your skills are impressive. And basically, you know, he gives her this pep talk. And he says that there's certain things that she needs.

do to get better and that he can help her with this to make sure that she wins in her next match or when she has a red match. And essentially, this is the setup for him to become Mr. Miyagi. Her trainer. Am I right? Her trainer, yes. And he does say in here, you're either a champion or you're dead. Yeah. That's it. That's it. You have two choices. Pink does arrive. and he's he's perfectly happy that she lost her last fight right because all the people that were cheering that that someone was getting the best of a Borg of the Borg basically so that's why he's so happy yeah and so he's going to take advantage of all this interest and excitement in her fighting and he's scheduled a red match for the day after next yeah so

that's about 48 hours when Janeway's coming back by the way So it's all going to happen simultaneously. Yeah. Day after next, he said that 3 billion people paid to see her to get hurt. Imagine how many will pay to watch her die. Yeah. And then he leaves. I was like 3 billion people.

This is pay per view. Paperview fight with 3 billion. And he's going to make a lot more than that. Oh, my goodness. That's a good, that's a good business. Yeah. Yes. after pink leaves,

the Horogen says he can train her to win. And she says she doesn't want to kill anyone. And he says, well, consider the alternative. Yeah. And so she agrees. She agrees. She realizes with Tuvok injured

in her situation, she has no choice. Yeah. So we have a little time cut. She's training now. She's doing some martial arts move. Jerry was. Yeah. That I thought was very, it was good choreography.

It looked like Kung Fu. It looked like Chinese Kung Fu basically what she was doing. It looked really good to me. It did. And the Herogen corrects her. He's like, nope, that's not quite right. And she says, no, you're mistaken. And then she quotes the book of Suncatsi.

So there's evidently a book on how to fight this fight. So it's, yeah, which I did not know. It has defenses and attacks and maneuvers. described and she's doing it exactly by the book right um she says tuvac borrowed this from another fighter yeah and uh they had horogen uh shows her very quickly that that she must be ready to not do things by the book you can't you can't learn how to be a champion by some book that it's instinctual she has to be instinctual and then she hits him while he's talking And he goes, oh, nice.

He was impressed by that. It was. And she says, yes, I observe that you favor your left side. Yeah. And he goes, interesting, very observant. I was wounded 19 years ago. Yeah. During my son's first hunt.

And then I became the prey. Yeah. So we get a little backstory here. What happened? Yeah. And as she's leaning into his story and listening and starting to feel sorry for him, she lets her defenses down. And he hits her.

Knocks her back. And he says, you can't do that or you'll die. Yeah. And they kind of realize that, like, you have to be instinctual and you got to play a little dirty in this game. And then they start back to training. And they start doing this move, the two of them. And I was like, that is the most awkward circle dance I've ever seen. It was like some weird mating ritual.

Oh, poor man. All right. Yes. We go out to space for a minute, Voyager's still in orbit, come back to the transporter room and Neelix beams in. Yeah, he's been down talking to the Norkadians. Doing some diplomacy. Chikotay says, how to go.

And Nelik says, well, the Norekian ambassador was really upset that possibly any other, you know, I think he calls them off-worlders or something. that foreigners basically are being forced to fight. He was just outraged by this. And Neelik says, but I don't know if it was actually genuine because so much of the planet's revenue, they make tons of money from this game. And so they're not going to do anything to jeopardize. No, they're going to look the other way.

I mean, you already gave us the numbers. Three billion viewers. I mean, that's incredible. that's a lot i did like that you know it's a moment of of learning for chukote because he says you know they're talking about how can people cheer for you know this kind of barbaric thing and chukotay says well we were cheering before seven and two vok were about yeah so he recognizes that he was kind of being caught up in this barbaric game definitely and once it's someone you know it's it's a whole different it's not fun anymore really right now you're like oh

wait a minute, not what we want to see. Yeah, we go to Astromatrix. Kim and Torres are there. They report on transmissions that are coming from the ship. Chikote wants the status report, so he's there too. Chiquotay's there. And they talk about the ship where the transmission are coming from, though. It's very large.

It's well-armed. It's armored. It's probably too much for Voyager. And Chikote says, well, the bigger they come. Yeah. And he says, let's send the coordinates to Captain Janeway because we're going to need a hand. Yeah. And that's why we couldn't find Seven in the first place.

We were scanning all these planets. And in reality, she was on a ship, a fighting ship, a gladiator ship. We go to the barracks again. Seven is practicing some moves. This was one scene where the double just jumped out to me so much. Yes. They're practicing their moves. The Herodin is testing her on all these things.

he says at one point what do you see she says pray he says what do you do she says kill it when they're done with their training she says thank you and he says thank me by winning yeah so now she joins tuvok two vok's a little better tuvok is up and and walking and now he's over by the door he's trying to disable the ship shields and or disable their dampening field from a panel that he's open but it's you know he can't no he can't act yeah he needs to access the control interface otherwise you can't disable it. And she tells Tuvok here that she's very worried about what she might do in this pit, in this fight, like kill her opponent.

She's just worried. She doesn't want to do that. And Tuvac says, well, as a drone, you took many lives, right? So he sort of argues that she's got to do what she's got to do. And Tuvok puts a button on the end of this scene. He says, do whatever it takes to survive. So he is basically saying to her, if you must kill him, you must kill and that's what he's giving her that license right now it's a tough pill to swallow it really is

yeah we go to the arena again the viewing arena and uh there's a cool overhead shot i love it's just at the arena of them looking straight down yeah uh the light's seen even fancier to me it's it's the main event yeah it's uh it's it's very fancy and we expect the rock to come out right seven seven comes out And then it's not the rock coming out. It's G.G. Hertzler. It's her teacher and mentor. She's going to have to fight him and kill him. See, this is the twist that most people did not see coming.

I'm going to say, this is the twist right here. She says, in the beginning, she says, you knew and you were deceiving me. You were studying me so you can kill me. So now it's a bit of paranoia. Like she doesn't know, were you training me so that you could see my weaknesses so you can kill me or were you training me to kill you? Either way, it's bad. Yeah.

And he said he wants his death, a death that his son would be proud of. Yeah. So we realized that's why he wanted, he wanted this to happen. Yeah, he wanted to train her so well that she would defeat him. Yeah. And he would go out in a blaze of glory. Yeah. And she says, well, I won't kill you.

And then he said, well, then I'm going to kill you. Yeah, exactly. They start to fight. And we're kind of going back and forth from this arena. with no audience to the arena with an audience and it's and the bridge the bridge throws in here too as well yeah yeah yeah when we're on the bridge we uh learn that we are approaching this vessel to fight the the the barge vessel or whatever fighting ship the fighting ship let's say still no janeway though um chokote asks if there's any sign of two vok or seven harry says our sensors can't

penetrate the hull we hail them pink appears on our view screen um chocote says uh you know we want our people do you have our people we need them and pink's like seven's occupied right now chukotay gets pissed he's like you have 30 seconds or we're going to open fire and pink sort of smiles and he says oh fighter i respect that yeah but you're no match for me and he clicks off hangs up oh oh i love Jeffrey in this one he's so yeah he's great um we go back to the arena. As predicted, seven is winning superior strength. Yeah. Um, but she does say she wants to find another way out. Right. She doesn't want to kill him. She does not want to kill him. And the Horogen, JG is saying there's no other way, no other way. And then he's giving her tips.

He's like, you're still dropping your elbow. Yeah. He's like, make a choice. Hunter or prey, what are you going to do? So they keep fighting, jumps back to the bridge. Pretty even blows at yeah i'd say so so so the fight you know she was kind of winning at first now it's kind of even blows we don't know which way it's going to go you go to space voyagers firing on the vessel yeah and i noticed this vessel this fight vessel has giant satellite dishes like what you would see at a tv station yeah clearly that's how they're broadcasting right yeah they're broadcasting so i guess you know the the design and engineering of satellite dishes are still used, doesn't change.

No, clearly not. Because it's funny, because I had, for a brief time, I had Starlink, which is the internet service. Yes. You know, I don't have it anymore. Right. But I tried out Starlink. With an old-fashioned satellite dish, too.

You had that too? No. No, what I'm saying is it doesn't use a satellite dish. Oh, it doesn't. It has a panel that moves. So, like, you know, in the future, there's not going to be these satellite. dishes with a they're not going to look like that like the design is going to change just like the

Starlink internet that I had briefly yeah is not a satellite dish right but on this ship it's a satellite it's a bunch of satellite dishes it is maybe maybe Pank has a co deal with direct TV or something like that yeah that's what it looked like some you know anyway voyagers firing on this vessel but we're we're not winning we're not winning but Kim cannot locate seven But he does have a lock on Tuvac. So Chikote says, be him to sickbay, keep targeting those generators. We do have Tuvok. And Chikote asked, Tuvok, do you know where 7 is or her status?

And Tuvok then informs us that she is being forced to fight to the death. And I believe that they are on the uppermost deck. And of course, guess what? That's the most protected part of that fighting ship. it's protected by multi-phasic force fields and we can't even penetrate them. So now, because of the fighting ship's superior firepower, our shields are down to 40%. 32%. It's getting lower and lower. We jump back to the fighting and there again, still back and forth, nothing is, it's kind of a stalemate, to be honest. They just, they just, you know,

someone gets a little bit of an upper hand, then the other person gets the upper hand, just back and forth. I felt like in this part of the fight, that the Herojan was kind of winning. Like seven was, she was tired. In fact, that shot when she's kind of down on her knees in the foreground, you see him behind her. And he knows she's getting tired. And so he says, he insults her in the way that he knows is going to work.

To get her to, yeah, to fire her up. Yeah. You're imperfect. Yes. And she's like, you don't say that to a board. Don't. No. Yes.

You're imperfect. And now she comes back hard. She got. stuff she's now her you know her human emotions are triggered yes super reverse flying kick bam yeah and the erogen's like spinning around like some of those moves were very sort of uh over the top theatrical martial arts movie it was i'm okay with it but it was good i'm okay with it but then he still taunts her after after he she kicks him he's like was that the best you can do so it's still him urging her to be more deadly so that he could die basically go back to the bridge the shields

are down now. Our shields are down. Our shields are down. Harry still can't get a lock on seven. Paris is like, let's get out of here. Yeah. We're dead. See, Paris is the voice of reason. Why are we listening to Paris right now? But no, we're still going to hang out. And Chocote says, yeah, Chacote says, no, we're going to stay. We need to knock out their signal generators for this broadcast. He's using his noggin. Yeah, because why would they continue the fight if they can't broadcast this to the thousands of planets that are receiving the signals so that's a smart move and billions of people exactly suddenly paris sees a vessel it's the delta flyer thank god janeway's uh janeway i love her line she says nothing like jumping right

back to work after a long vacation uh chocote tells janeway target their signal generators yes um that's those satellite dishes yes uh we should That's what he should have said. Target the satellite dishes, Captain. Exactly. We see the Delta Flyer out in space, take out one of the satellite dishes. It crashes and flies off into space. We go back to the viewing arena where the crowds are cheering, but then the hollow images fritz and disappear.

We go back to the real arena, and we learn that they've lost half their audience. Hank says rerout power to transmitters five and six. He's trying to overcome this. We go to the bridge. Kim says that basically they've reduced power to their force fields, and he has two life signs in there, seven and a Herojin, but he cannot get an individual lock.

Chikote says, Bim them both. Beem them both. And that's what we do. We do. He sends Paris in a security detail to the transporter room. And so we go back to the arena. It's near the end of this fight. The Herojan is down.

throwing some super fast punches here um and then the horogen is down he says never let your prey suffer kill it and her hands are up and she's ready she's about to deal the blow the death we think so we don't know i don't know i think she was going to do it i really do because it's about it's about survival at this point well doesn't she say it well let's talk about when we get there later but they're beamed out we go to the transporter room paris and and and the security team have their weapons drawn everybody has phaser rifles it's like they're they're ready to go yeah and paris says to seven they're in that same position her hands are up yeah paris says seven step away you say stand away which is the weirdest thing because i was like why didn't he say stand down

that's typically the the you know verbiage that we would use on a show like this and you go seven stand away like huh it's a little weird interesting yeah uh but she responds by saying this fight is over yeah and she stands up she offers her hand to the horogen to lift him up and off of that moment we go to sick bay chukote tells this uh herogen that they've contacted a herogen hunting party close by yeah rendezvous and hand him off there and seven says can i have a minute just to talk to this horogen guy and so the doctor and chukotay uh give them some space but as the doctor's leaving he goes you know i'll be close by if you need anything like a shot or medicine or phaser rifle phaser rifle and then they leave and seven apologizes she's like you know

the doctor's just very protective and and uh herogen says well he doesn't know how how good a fighter you are how well you defend yourself yeah and um he gives her his chest sensor as a trophy yes because that's what uh herogen do they keep a trophy from all their prey but i love this when seven says well what are you going to do now, you know, search for new prey. And he's done. He's, he's over with that life. He's like, no, this time, I'll be searching for my son. And it's a very moving moment. It's a nice moment. Yeah. We go to space, Voyager's at War. We cut in astrometrics and there's seven working and Tuvok enters. Yeah. And offers assistance. And she says, fine. And then he goes to a consult. And it's the silence again, the awkward silence. Yeah. And he finally says,

I feel compelled to speak and he says if she had not offered to take his place that he would be dead and he says I owe you a debt of gratitude. And she says well you can help with these recalibrations.

That's it? That's it. You just save your life. And all you ask is like push some buttons some recalibration. He asks how she is and she talks about her her eye socket or something you know the doctor says she's healing from all the fighting but she'll be fine

and he goes no i'm not talking about your physical condition right she says you know what i feel like the horogen was right i'm weak i lost control maybe i'm losing my humanity she says i feel guilt i feel shame i feel remorse yeah and tuvac's response is well then you haven't if you feel all those feelings then you have not lost your humanity you have reaffirmed it you have reaffirmed it Yeah. There you go. There it is. Okay. What's your lesson out of this episode? Fighting is bad. Yeah. Yeah. That's the overall lesson. Yes. Fighting is bad. And let's face it, it's unnecessary. We don't need that. I mean, you can watch, there are plenty of sports to watch that have no death involved. So let's let's go to those sports, please. Yes. I mean, my lesson here,

was the reality that the human experience isn't just about lovey-dovey happy things, it also has a dark side. All of that is human. Yeah. So, you know, there's, the, the dark side was attractive to Balana and Chacote and Tom and Harry until seven was there. They were all cheering on that dark side, that gladiator fighting. So, you know, accepting and recognizing that our humanity has a dark side. And just that awareness maybe can keep us from going to bad places, you know, doing bad things with it. Yeah. That's my lesson. What about you? Yeah, I mean, for me, I guess I was thinking about this. And I kept coming up with, sometimes life will put you in a situation where you have to make a decision that may not be in line with your morals or your

beliefs. And really, when you are placed in a situation like that, it's important to really acknowledge that that is not the norm for you to have to do these, to make these decisions and to realize that you have to be good to yourself afterwards because the PTSD or the mental side of it can really take you down if you let it. You know, so it's about healing yourself by accepting that you were placed in a situation that you had. no control over. You had to do that. And so that will happen to people in their life. I'm sure everyone will come across a crossroads where they have to make a decision. And both decisions are bad. They're just not decisions that are, are, you know, upstanding or good for humanity. And so really,

I guess the lesson is that you may be placed in a situation where you're going to have to make a decision that's not popular. And that's not in tune with. who you are. But just because you have made that decision, it doesn't change you. You're still who you are. You know, you're, you still have the same morals. You still have the same. And to realize that that, that you are that person and that that was a momentary lapse because you were forced. Your hand was forced. And so be gentle on yourself. You know, don't, don't beat yourself up over it, which is very easy to do. So that's it, really mental health. Nice. Okay. What was your rating on this episode. I'm going to give this a, well, it was in the eights, but then after talking to you

and listening to you, I've now pulled it down and I'm now, I'm now, but I'm going to go high sevens. I'm going to go seven point nine. Wow. Seven point nine. Okay. All right. Well, and what's your rating? Yeah. It's a five. Wow. Okay. And I'm going to say that the average rating is going to be in the sevens it'll be 7.2 something like that let's see i've got it right here the admiral captain average rating for sumcate is 6.7 oh it's lower so you said 7 9 i said 5 that's almost right in the middle of you and me there you go yeah okay yeah this was one of my least favorite episodes no i'm sorry to hear that man it happens it's okay there's a lot of good episodes and some people love episode so but uh for me i found it out of character for a lot of us i found the fighting

to be gratuitous and forced and yeah just didn't i thought i thought geoffrey i thought jg were great and dwayne was good too dwayne was great yeah he was he was like he didn't he didn't trip over any of his lines he had to use some star tricky lines in there too as he had some technical babbles so there's a lot of it okay there's a lot of good moments in this but as an episode I think not my favorite got it but between you Johnny Ethan Phillips and Robert Beltran you three had the time of your lives such a great memory of that was a 9.9 for you guys or a 10 right or that was a 10 yeah it was a six for me because I was the third wheel but other than that it was nice to know that you

had a good time fun times together up there in the stands yeah all right thank you everybody thanks for listening to our rewatch and memories of Tsumkase and join Robbie and I next week when we discuss

the Voyager episode Collective which I'm going to guess has something to do with seven of nine I'm going to guess all right Patreon patrons

please stay tuned for your bonus material all right thanks everybody see you next week bye I don't know.