The Greatest Generation - A Special, Weird Kind of Losing (S4E19)

Episode Date: December 12, 2016

When Lieutenant Barclay gets struck by lightning by an alien probe, he starts solving problems all over the ship. But when he starts sticking things into the computer that don't belong there, it's up to the crew of the Entrepreneur to unplug him. What is a bursar? How do you build a plane in mid-air? Isn't it always best to be friends with your ex? It's the episode that won't get you invited back to game night.

Priority 1 message from Starfleet coming in on Secured Channel. Hey friends of Disodo. Before today's episode, we just wanted to take a moment to talk about the historic labor actions being taken by writers and actors in the American Film and Television industry. If you're a fan of the work done by the people who make Star Trek, we hope you'll join us in standing in solidarity with the folks who actually bring these adventures to life. Over the past several years, the AMPTP, the organization that represents the American Film and Television Production Studios, have reduced the profit from movies and TV going to workers. And in so doing,

they've attempted to weaken the labor unions that represent those workers. They wouldn't even engage the unions on many issues in their negotiations. And so a strike was the only course of action to take. Adam, Wendy and I have been having a lot of internal discussions about how best to stand with the unions and we are continuing those conversations in a dynamic situation. We're doing our best to understand where the picket lines are in these digital spaces,

and we would never intentionally cross one. With the information we have, we feel like we can do more good talking about and supporting the strike and continuing our show as planned. We'll keep you informed about what all this means for greatest trek specifically. Today we're making a contribution to the Entertainment Community Fund. This fund exists to help all the people whose livelihoods have been put on hold because the AMPTP refuses to negotiate

in good faith with the unions. It provides financial support for writers, actors, and all the thousands of laborers who make the shows that we talk about here and without whom we wouldn't have Star Trek to cast pot about. Those folks are all out of work because billionaires, company shareholders, and the executives of these companies don't want to compromise on the length of their yachts. We hope you'll join us in supporting entertainment workers in a challenging time, especially after they've already endured several years of challenges brought on by the pandemic

and season two of Star Trek Picard. We've set up a page where you can also contribute. It's at friendsofdecotoforlabor.com. That's friendsofdecotoforlabor.com. That's friendsofdisotoforlabor.com. Link in the episode description. Okay, now let's get on with the show. Here's to the greatest generation. Star Trek Podcast by two guys who are a little bit embarrassed to have a Star Trek Podcast. I'm your host Adam Pranika.

I am also your host Ben Harrison. Hey Ben. Hey Adam. I mentioned this briefly on the last episode, but in between recording that and this, I've kind of fallen in love with the idea. And let's get to a thousand reviews on iTunes before the end of the year. How many of those do I need to leave? You don't need to leave any, because that would be cheating.

But I was thinking we have like poster and t-shirts left over from our tour. Would that be a cool prize? I think what you're talking about is a prize pack bin. Yeah, that's a full-blown pack, isn't it? Sure is. Unfortunately, the range of our t-shirt cannon is very small, so we can't use that, but through the magic of shipping, we can ship a shirt and a poster just about anywhere. Let's do that. Why don't we make a review contest? Sort of like the first one, right? People can leave a new review and then email us that review to prove that they've done it.

Yeah, take a screenshot once it shows up on iTunes so that we know that it is actually there. And I think let's keep this to US. Sorry everybody else not trying to shit on you. I'm just saying like that's the store whose numbers we can actually see. So we appreciate reviews in other stores too. It's just I don't have any idea how many reviews we have there. So here's what I'm thinking are the terms, Adam. This is an all or nothing contest.

We get to a thousand, somebody's getting a t-shirt and a poster. If we do not, nobody's getting a t-shirt and a poster. That's strong but fair. And I say just write your best review. Whatever you think is good doesn't have to be anything in particular, but be persuasive and send us a screenshot. I don't want to review it for content this time because I think this is just about a brute force push to a thousand.

Oh, so this will be a random selection. This won't be a subjective take on whether something's funny or witty or whatever, right? Right. Okay. Does that seem good? Yeah, that sounds great. Let's do it. Cool.

Contest. It's on. These always work out great, right? Mm-hmm. And just one other thing I should say is, you've already put up a review and even if you entered our last contest, you're eligible. Take a picture of your review and send it to us. That's totally fine.

DrunkShamoda at gmail.com. But if we don't get to a thousand, nobody's entries will make any difference in the world. Well, you could say that anyway. Couldn't you? Yeah. Here's the thing, nothing you do will make a difference in the world. So I guess we can enter this contest just to pass the time. What is this an episode of Planet Money Economics Podcast? Oh no. Is that the direction they're going? I feel like maybe I don't know. I'm actually friends with somebody that works on that show.

I'm not talking shit, I'm just... Hey Ben, you know, occasionally we'll get fan mail on the internet. It's one of the things that I pinch myself about every time. They, of course, write in using the email address junksmotageemail.com. I want to read a message to you that we recently received. Yeah. Picking up the complaint line Ben. I'm receiving a code 47. Verify it is Code 47, sir. Start lead emergency frequency. Captions eyes only. Message from Sam. Subject line, politics complaint.

It goes like this. The real life US politics in the show have always bothered me. In an episode 88, I reached my limit. I ignored the Twitter traffic of the same because I figured that was more personal than strictly show. And that is the traffic of the same because I figured that was more personal than strictly show And that is the end of the of the email

Sam were you were you injured? Mid-comment You got me on you've got me on tinter hooks here buddy really like to know how this message ends It sounds like he has resigned as a viewer, so I imagine he's not hearing this what I've done is I've taken his Politics comment and I've put is I've taken his politics comment, and I've put it along with all of the other complaint emails we've received. And that's going into sort of an Excel spreadsheet engine.

And what we do before every episode is it outputs a way and a tone that we do the next show. So all of this stuff works. When people write into complain, it changes the show substantially. That's the only reason the show is any good, right? Because of all the complaints. Yeah, absolutely.

So I want to thank Sam for writing in. Sam, who is clearly no longer listening and may no longer be typing anything anymore because of how his email was cut off halfway through. But enjoy living in a world in which no one talks about US politics. That's a fantasy land. You want to start our show? Let's do it.

This is becoming a speech. We're the cat monster. Very entitled. I'm typing a ramble on about something everyone knows. We're talking about season four episode 19, the nth degree, Ben. This is it. You know, I almost graduated with an nth degree.

I ended up going with the nth degree minor. Oh yeah. Yeah, I couldn't quite get the foreign language credit in line enough to actually get the double major. So film major nth degree minor. So how it goes? My college roommate was really upset with me because I didn't didn't transmit a piece of mail that he received early enough for him to find out from the Berzer's office that he wasn't getting his nth minor.

What is a Berzer's office? I didn't get what I saw. At the Berzer's office. I didn't go to a fancy school. They don't have a bircer at your school? I have no idea what that is. I think that's like the person you pay. Oh really? Yeah, or like the person that like sets up your academic, makes sure you qualify academically or something.

I don't know. Look it up, jerk. Oh, I went to a fancy college with a burser. Everybody talks about the amazing burser at our college. One of the best bursers, people all over the country say, that is a good burser. You know, I just recently got off the phone with a burser of Taiwan. Very great conversation. He loves me. Believe me. It really no way affect our negotiations with the Berzer of North Korea

who has nuclear weapons and we need to be careful about. You know, we might need to edit that out, Adam, because we're not supposed to ever talk about politics. Oh, shit. Well, whatever. So, yeah, the episode opens and it's another classic cold open in the middle of a play. And Reg Barkley is playing... He's not Sarah No DeBurgerec. He's the other guy in that play. I thought he was playing Roxanne. He's not, is not Sarah No. DeBurgerec. He's the other guy in that play. I thought he was playing Roxanne.

He's Keith Martin movie. Yeah, he's got, got a big ol' schnauz on him. Oh, I hate to see the grindstone. Yeah. Well, that's the whole thing about Sarah No. DeBurgerec. It's like, not good looking, but he's like got a silver tongue, I think, and so he like helps a good looking guy talk to girls. 10 more and I'm leaving then that's the Roxanne movie then that is that's what that was based on I

Think that's basically where it comes from I wonder which came first Barkley's yeah, I'm possible to find out We just got 30 more emails been This is gonna go ahead and reply to these while you're talking. Okay. Yeah. Barkley's performance is not great. I have done better since. But the crew give him an extremely dishonest round of applause. And Data's review is fart-face. Like they pan him several times during Barclays performance. And he is like, oh god. Did someone just take a shit in here?

It's like he walked into a portapati at a music festival like after like three days. Yeah, Dada is way better at mimicking humans than Barclays. Yeah. It makes it kind of exposed us. What's so interesting about Berkeley's character, right? Is it like, data has like a physiological and physical reason for not being as fully human as he would like to be.

Berkeley, it's just a mystery. Do you think there's some narcissism of minor differences between data and Berkeley at play here? Oh, you mean like data doesn't like him because he sees himself in Barkley? Yeah, that is what I mean. Dang. That's a hot take. Huh, let's explore this as we go on.

Sure. So, I guess we should say like at the end of this play, um, Councillor Troy comes up to Barclay and it's a little like, it's a little hard to read what her motive is here because she definitely is like really buttering him up. She's laying the compliments on fast and loose and she's like, she's like, you know, in like a fancy dress and like really fancy makeup and jewelry for her going out to the theater look, I guess.

Which is so weird. Like they basically sought the equivalent of a fifth grade school drama recital. Yeah. Why did they get dressed up? Well, they like nobody else did. Like everybody else was just in their fucking uniform And she is like dolled up. She is dressed to the nines Maybe she's going somewhere later. She's in like an evening gown

When would they go they've redress 10 forward for this occasion? Yeah, there's a well, there's the downstairs venue space, right sure but 11 forward. Um... This is the part that Gainon shot her gun into. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha Boy, Reg, you sure did try hard out there. I couldn't imagine you doing this a couple months ago. I think you've really come a long way. None of that is complementary towards his performance at all, which I think is great.

Like, damning with faint praise is what she's doing here by completely ignoring the performance that she's just seen. Even though that was super embarrassing for you, you should feel great about having had the courage to do it. You know, gym classes aren't for everyone, and I noticed when they pull down your pants, doing the rope climb that you have a lot to be embarrassed about. But way to keep going to gym class, buddy.

Yeah. Yeah. The entrepreneur is in orbit of the Argus Array, which is like the Hubble Space Telescope on crank. It's like a huge piece of hardware and it's loaded up with nuclear reactors that I guess power it or something. It looks a lot like a settlers of Catan game in progress. Like there's a bunch of octagons linked I've never played settlers up to two. Yeah, I've played it once and it was really fun, but I never got invited back. And it was like, oh no.

I've always wondered about that because they're like, we do this all the time. We do this like every couple of weeks while I was there. And it's how we bond with our friends. Yeah, yeah. I think that they may have not liked me because I went for the purest, but I think that they're not going to be able to do weeks while I was there and it's how we bond with our friends. Yeah, yeah. I think that they may have not liked me because I went for the

PURIC victory option where nobody wins. Everyone loves that after playing a game for five hours. Yeah, I did the real chaotic, neutral gameplay approach. Because I think that I would feel really bad if I just lost. So I have to have a special weird kind of losing. You're a weird loser. Yeah. I've been called that for years.

Weird loser Ben Harrison tweets very unfair things about me and then he works them into his Star Trek podcast and I met my wits end. Sad. tweets very unfair things about me and then he works them into his Star Trek podcast and I met my wits end. Sad. Very unfair, weird. So yeah, the ship is there because the telescope is broken and I've got to figure out what caused fault and it is not long before they discovered

that there's a weird alien probe hanging around in the neighborhood. And it's fairly quickly determined for themselves that this weird alien probe is what they're going to be focusing their energies on trying to figure out what it's doing, why it messed up the array, what it's made of, all that stuff. So, Jordy goes and grabs Barkley. They load onto a Previa.

They ship out, and they go over to this probe and they're doing some scans on it and it does like a Q flash, you know. It flashes the whole ship and... What was that? And Jordy is like... Computers down, Ridge. And Barkley doesn't respond. He turns around and Barkley is passed out on the floor. Rich. Good strategy from a production standpoint, not to show him falling over.

I think that was a trap they fell into in the last episode. Yeah. If someone can't pull off a fall down, don't show the fall down. I mean, I guess it must be just like different from director to director, but like there's many episodes now where they've known not to show everybody bailing out on screen, and yet occasionally, they show people bailing out on screen. It's a director's prerogative, I guess. They managed to not do that this time, which was great.

Yeah, sort of a sort of a fun toss to commercial. Yeah. Barclays down. Jordy Radio is up to the enterprise. Barclays down. We thought we would rid of him, Adam, but it turns out he recovers pretty quickly. It was just like- There was enough energy in that flash to overload your optic nerves. It knocked you unconscious.

My advisor must have filtered it out. Exactly. Don't you worry. My advisor must have filtered it out. Exactly. Don't you worry, you're pretty little head about anything. This fucking circumstance though drives me crazy. Like, hey, someone has had a strange reaction to contact with something alien. Go on right back to work. We will not study you any further.

You seem to be OK. It's not like we have a rich history of contact with aliens leading to people being compromised mentally. Is Beverly a terrible doctor? I just want you to put that in the back pocket, I guess. I don't know, she cured the lady in the last episode from her body suit lobster claw illness, I mean, she's got things that she's got

things going for her instinct was to go clip show on her. If she was not already in six bay, I think she would have gotten out and predatored up the whole ship. Yeah, she might have gone to blue mode, green mode. Yeah, I'm just gonna, you know what, I'm gonna plant my flag in this opinion, and we'll see if I ever pick it up again, but I'm pro-pilasski.

I don't think she'd make these fuck-ups. I like them both, Adam. I really like both doctors. There's room enough in our hearts for both. Yeah. Or at least mine. Well you just got a great big heart. Yeah. I just have a shriveled gross heart. You don't deserve the way that you know ball so they're they're walking out of out of six Bay and Like before they get Barkley well There's this scene where the probe starts chasing the enterprise and it's like

It is such a weird sequence. It's the probe is chasing them. They keep like you know speeding the ship up You know like okay? Okay, we're gonna go to half impulse to get away from this. Okay, full impulse. Okay, warp two. It's still on us. Still right on our ass. And it's like coming closer.

And the way Patrick Stewart plays this is like, he is bored to tears about this fucking probe chasing them. Like, he can't think of anything worse. Like, as they go through standard procedure and like nothing works, he's like, all right, well anybody else have any ideas? Uh, uh. The probe itself looks very benign.

It looks like a fucking beer can. Mm-hmm. With some wires sticking out of it. It's no voyage home probe. Right. Which looks sinister and weird. For the first time that I can remember, data wheels around it in this chair and goes. The probes field intensity is continuing to build, sir.

We are in danger. And to me, that seemed to be the counterpoint to what you're describing, which was a very impassive bridge crew about a very real threat. Like, it's shot like a Borg cube chasing them down. Like, it's getting closer and closer in the view screen. It's made very clear in manner and action that this thing is a threat.

But until data actually tells Picard that we're in danger, I'm not sure if I bought any of it. Yeah, Picard comes very close to checking his watch in this scene. And Data's like, I can't this is fucked up! Yeah, I can't remember data ever saying that before. Real weird scene, and it doesn't really come back or anything. It's just like, what the fuck did we just see?

It's so close that there's sort of handcuffed about how they deal with it. They can't just shoot a bunch of torpedoes at it because torpedo explosions at that range are just gonna blow them up. It's sort of like too close for missiles, they gotta switch to guns. So warf shoots it with a phaser and nothing happens. So they're getting pretty desperate.

They get Barclay back well enough to go down to engineering and he like kind of like takes over in Shemota corner and gets the shields all souped up, like, in a way they've never been souped up before, and it's enough that they can shoot a full spread of torpedoes in the probe and blow it up and get out of the danger. So Barkley saves the day,

and Picard can't even break out of his lackadaisical mood to put any, you know, sincere enthusiasm into his praise of Mr. Barkley. It's a really weird performance, right? Thank you, Mr. Barkley. And its counterpoint is the scene in Shimoda Corner where we're in the aftermath of Barkley just big dogging the shit out of Jordy. Like he doesn't even ask to do what he's doing. He just does it. And it was strange for Jordy to just sort of give way. Like this is a person up until now that we don't know if we can completely trust. And Barkley

is like wheeling around to all the different areas of Shimoda corner. He's like taking out wires, connecting him to other wires. He's sort of hot wires, the warp drive into the shields in a way that's never been done before. It would have been so fun if he'd pulled some isolinere chips and reorganized them. Yeah, I know.

Maybe Shimoda was on to something. Yeah. So on the bridge we get this weird, impassive gratitude, but in Shimoda corner we get Jordi going, what the fuck, Reg? Like both in terms of where did that awesome solution come from? And also, like, I am the big dog around here. Yeah. I've never had my dog big in quite such a strange way. It's

a first in a series of scenes. It might not even be because I guess it happens a little bit when they're leaving Six Bay and Barclay like recommends some medical diagnostic strategy to the doctor and she's like, yeah, right asshole. But this whole first act of this episode, every time Barclay does something that kind of exceeds people's expectations of him, they have this knee jerk super negative reaction to it. Can you just let this guy fucking rise up a little bit? Why does him saving the entire ship get everybody kind of like either neutrally like great fine who cares or you know like the number line is great fine who

cares to fuck you. I can't believe you fucking did that when I'm supposed to be your boss and you didn't even ask me. And also, like, Lavar Burton has got to be watching this going like, you give, you give fucking Barclay story arcs at, at a dose of one per season, where he is growing and changing as a person. Yeah. And he's, and, and Jordy's laying back in the cut, like, unchanged. Yeah. Yeah. It's like unchanged. Yeah.

Yeah. It's so strange. Yeah, Barclay has gotten fairly three-dimensional at this point. Yeah. It's like, oh, wow, what an interesting character. I have to say though, somebody wrote in about Dwight Schultz, the actor that plays Barclay.

I don't remember if it was on Twitter or on our Drunk Shimmota at g Gmail.com inbox. But it turns out that guy after his sojourn as a very long running character on Star Trek went into business as a right-wing radio talk show host. Oh, no. And I had a real hard time enjoying him in the same way after learning that. So I guess I just want the like tens of thousands of people listening to this to also stop enjoying.

Sorry. Thanks. Thanks for sharing. Yeah. Wow. Well, now I can definitely put myself in the place of people he works with on the enterprise in being a little bit annoyed at what he's doing. Is the most right wing, he's incredibly right wing.

Nobody is more right wing than him. Believe me. So we get a number of inyets here of, of Barkley sort of being awesome in different ways. Like Barkley's solve-and-problems around the ship. Barkley is working with Einstein in a holiday program, you know, working out math problems. Barkley has turned into a great actor with Beverly. Like they know one of these scenes where he makes Beverly cry based on the strength of his performance.

Like some really interesting vignettes that show his growth in intelligence, not just intelligence intelligence, but like emotional intelligence, too. Yeah, and this is like, this is always fun stuff, right? Like they know that they need like a really strong actor to carry a performance like this where they show the character as portrayed by an actor acting badly and then later acting well. It's real capital A good acting in that second scene, but like

Gates McFadden's performance is like 10 times more impressive to me because it's a like she cries but it's a subtle cry. This is something that I wanted to talk with you about, which is the meta-acting of an episode that involves someone's character changing like this, like in which we see, we get a baseline of Barclay, and we know what Barclay is at this point. We also... Baseline Barclay. And we know what Barkley is at this point. We also... We see bad acting baseline Barkley. And then we see Marlon Brando Barkley on the other part of the spectrum. And I'm wondering, how do you cast that first of all?

How do you know that this actor can do that? And as an actor, right, knowing that you must in the same episode act with incredible emotional intelligence and grace. Like, does that mean that what you're doing for the rest of the episode is, is mindfully dropping everything back from that point? Like, how do you, mindfully dropping everything back from that point. Like how do you act like that? How do you act great and act not so great with this amount of strategy, you know?

Because the episode is very much written for shouts, you know, like they didn't, they definitely didn't write like a generic version and then go like, Hey, remember that guy? Cause it, it, it draws on what we already know about him as a character. Like they couldn't have re-auditioned him for this. So they knew that he had game. But it's like none of this shit is in his previous outing.

They had the story structure in place before they made it a a Barclay episode. Well interesting. That is the little bit of research I did on this episode, but he really carries this well and it totally falls apart if he can't do the great acting, you know? Yeah, if he's somehow unable to deliver that scene with Beverly, I think the whole thing falls apart. Like, it's so much easier to act smart, I feel like. Like, like, like, math smart when he's in the holodeck working with Einstein, like, you can vomit out mathematical equations and sound like you know what you're doing.

But to affect an emotion in someone else in a realistic way, like, that is Capital A acting shit and I don't know if you know you have that with Dwight Schultz until you actually do it So to me it seemed super risky, but the risk paid off. I thought he was great throughout He was I begrudgingly grant him great performance status. So they pretty quickly figure out that Barclay's mind is like revving up. The alien probe flash did more than just knock him out. It's like, it's like Jack has IQ into the thousands range, and it's rising still. He's getting smarter and smarter.

And... Barkley's brain is as Jack does Jordy's body. Yeah. And at one point, they're even talking about like, like Barkley being super smart as security threat in a way that they never talk about Barkley being super smart as security threat in a way that they never talk about data being, what data is as security threat.

Like, they like have a McLaughlin group to consider this unique situation. So like, do you think you could steal the ship? No. No one ever does that. Ha, ha, ha, ha. Yeah, could he lock us out of the computer? Hmm, be pretty hard.

I don't think we need to worry too much about that. I thought it would be really fun. If I could do an edit pass on the script, I would put in one scene where somebody comes into his quarters and he's picking out, like stuffing his face because his mind is like so much more powerful. He needs to consume like 50,000 calories a day to like fuel this like newly souped up organ in his body. The way that that one guy ordered eight banana splits.

Yeah. That's what Barclay does. Yeah, he needs to order the Ziggy Piggy. Ziggy Piggy. You know what else could have been great in this episode is, you know, in addition to data, who's the greatest mind on board? It's Geinen. Yeah.

What would Geinen take on Barkley be at this point? That would be fun. I'd like to know that. She is such a great counterpoint to so much that happens on the show. She is a great way of poking a needle into everybody's hubris bubble. For all of the intelligence that Barclay displays, he's insanely arrogant. He's arrogant before he's smart almost, which I guess maybe goes a little bit of the way toward explaining how why everybody's so fucking annoyed with him.

I think when you break a story like this, you have to cut it, you have to head it off at the pass. Because I feel like instinctually you want to root for Barclay because of what you know about him. You also are excited about his potential. Like wouldn't it be great if there were someone on board who could think as fast as he does? But they fucking clap that down right away by making him so annoying, right? Like that's the engineering they do with this character.

Like you can't possibly like him long enough to let him live. One of the other things that comes out of this McLaughlin group is Troy relates a past that Barkley made at her. And one of the funniest moments of the episode is as they're all kind of departing, you know, she's like, yeah, like, he actually kind of like laid the Mac down in a big way. And as they're departing the ready room, Rikers like, hey, Deanna, you didn't actually say whether laying the Mac down worked.

And she just like gives him a little grin. Real fun. Because now Rikers threatened on not only an intellectual level, but also, am I still the biggest Mac on this ship level? Which I thought was really fun. I like all the callbacks to Troy and Rikers' plutonic relationship. It only takes a moment to remember what they had. It makes me think there's a really substantial Facebook thread about

Who is the best relationship on the show? Who is your favorite? coupling Yeah of us of a certain type and If you haven't gotten into our Reddit and Facebook groups like if one of the one of the other of those social media websites appeals to you and one of the other of those social media websites appeals to you and you're interested in the community aspect of this show. Like they're so good. Yeah.

Like you can really post great stuff and it's like they're really like friendly groups of people. Like there's no jerks. Every time I've expected a conversation to devolve into just shit throwing. Like I'm constantly amazed at how good the people are. Are there about talking about the nuance of stuff like this. Totally. And so yeah, my point being is like, Riker and Shroy's Plutonic relationship at this moment

in their story is one of the great relationships. Yeah, absolutely. They're imzades and they respect the shit out of each other, I think. You don't have to be enemies with your ex-bin. Yeah. It's in fact a good sign if you're not. To a generation of nerds, I think that's a really big lesson. Yeah, if you grew up watching films and are under the impression that the way you woo a woman is raising a ghetto blaster over your head in the middle of the night outside of her house and every ex you're supposed to have is supposed to be a bitter enemy, you got

told wrong. So anyways. I am a cute, just a boy. There are four lights. The like thing that's driving the story here is the Argus Array. He's loaded up with nuclear reactors or fusion reactors or something.

And the probe damaged the computers on the array and it's going critical, and the race against time to try and stop it, that's not going well. And it looks like it's about to go, and they try and get the ship out of there. And like an old pickup in a horror film. Ha-ha-ha.

The enterprise does not turn on when they try to turn the key. There is no pair of keys falling from the visor to help them get out of there. No, yeah. I mean, you got to look, but you know they're not going to be there. Yeah. They're basically counting it down, like they've got 10 minutes left to fix the thing before it goes critical. Yeah. And then then only a few minutes and then only a few seconds before they decide to beat feet and get the hell out. The problem solving is happening in Shimoda Corner and what they need to do

is prop up the array as computer in such a way that it that it helps to save the array. But what's happening is Barclays coming up with these solutions faster than the computer can implement them. And like anyone who is working on a company issued laptop that's just a fucking pile of shit Dell or whatever, he's like, forget this fucking garbage, I need a better computer. So he runs down to the holiday and sets himself up

with something great. He's like, I want a panel over here with symbols, I want a panel over here with numbers, I want a big laser shooting, laser's into my brain. Like this way, I will be more souped up than any laptop could possibly be. And I can send instructions over to that computer

that are faster than our computer can send them. And I can save this thing. Yeah, keyboard and mouse are not cutting it for this problem. Yeah. And this is how he basically invents the tools that will cut it in real time. He's like building the plane in mid-air.

Yeah. And one of the consequences of this is that he becomes one with the computer. So he shuts down the array and gets everybody safe. And you know, they're up on the bridge and they're like, computer, what happened? And it's not Major Barrett as the computer. Yes, Commander. It's me.

It is fucking dopey voice. Really made me miss Major Barrett. Yeah. And it's fucking annoys the hell out of a cart. Like, you just don't know it as anyone. Broccoli, give me a break. Which is good. Like, it's a very effective scene because that computer voice is so established that the second it's different, it's a not-computery is so jarring.

It's interesting to me that the more computer-like and smart barkly gets, the less able he is to understand people's emotional responses are to his actions. You know? Yeah. Yeah. Like people immediately become freaked out by him, given his, his leap in intelligence. And he's just not rocking that. He's like, no, no, no, like I'm going to do some awesome things for you. You just wait and see, like you just gotta let me do it. And everyone is freaked because he's unpredictable and he's not listening to orders. This is like one of the big questions I have about this episode,

because here's the scene where dirty is like, like they do all these things where they like have to turn off the computer's audio sensor so they can talk shit about Berkeley. Yeah, while they're having a McLaughlin group and like they haven't seen 2001. they like have to turn off the computer's audio sensor so they can talk shit about Barclay. Yeah. While they're having them a Gloughlin group and like, like they haven't seen 2001. Yeah, it's, it's totally 2001. They send Jordi into the Jeffries tubes and Barclay is talking all this smack about how he understands the entire universe and it's just one equation and it's super simple.

And it's like, and Jordi is like, then why are you bothering me at work? Ha ha ha ha. And it makes me wonder, because that is a great question actually, like if your brain is that vast, that it can contain the universe easily inside of it, like why do you care what Jordi is doing in that,

like that impossibly small point in inside the universe that you understand as an equation? It's the why does God need a starship problem. Exactly. It's funny that they didn't really address that about Barclay's hyperintelligence. Like, he keeps saying he's hyperintelligent and we're, I guess, just supposed to trust him with that, but then like his actions kind of countermand that and nobody calls him on it.

Yeah, that's a great point because if he has truly achieved this level of intelligence where he just gets all of it. He understands every bit of it. It's super simple to him. Why is his expression of that a sort of hold my beer? Let's see how far we can take this ship sort of demonstration. Like instead, Jordy or anyone else on the ship never thinks to ask like, so what is the secret to the universe? Like what is the point of all of this? Yeah, you would think you would want to get to know the smartest person that's ever existed. No one's interested in that. They just want to stop him.

That is an opportunity lost in both storytelling but also in terms of like the cruise hardwired, explorational sense. Like they should have some sort of curiosity about him that goes greater than unplug the Barclay and plug him back in, which is what they're motivated by. Yeah. Well, it's not long before Barclay is opening up a butthole in space and trying to stick the enterprise into it. And they've been in buttholes before. They are motivated to stop him. So they send a desbuster club down to the holodeck

where he's told them that if they unplug him from the ship at this point, it will kill him because most of his mind is like networked across the computer cores or whatever. And the Despuster Club is quickly thwarted by a force field and the Enterprise slips into this butthole and they come out in a different-ass-looking part of the galaxy and this old man's giant head appears on the bridge.

And it's like, it's so much like the God character in Star Trek V. Yeah, it feels like a pretty big retread at this moment. I mean, it's like, it's not as like insane in some ways. It's like, it knows that this is a silly idea, the way they wrote this, like, because the character is funny and silly and written like that, and not just funny and silly because bad. The tone of this scene is really interesting, right?

This guy's giant head appears on the bridge. I feel like he's got some like, some like, pewter jewelry and like some, he's got like some like some like pewter jewelry and like some Some he's got like a weird like hologram in his forehead He does that thing where where every interaction with him is just described by him as that interaction like I'm Captain Jean-Luc Picard of the Federation Starship Enterprise Iraq a cool collective commands structure. Like you just sort of goes around the horn doing that. Who are you?

Interrogative. At this point in time, Barkley comes back to the bridge and he's like, hey, I'm better. Yeah. Turns out, my whole mission was to bring you guys here and meet the Cytherians. And everyone's just in a puddle with excitement about meeting them. And so Barclay's whole reason for becoming super smart was to engineer the ship in such

a way that it could get out there because the Scytherians way of exploring the universe is not going anywhere. It's like me not leaving the basement to go get coffee. You want things to come to you and that's what the Scytherians are all about. They bring things to them to study. They sort of did to the enterprise what Nunean soon did to data. They sort of hit the homing beacon, and it fucked up the array, and it fucked up the shuttle pod, but it managed to reprogram parkly.

And so it's a real weird like captain's log end to the episode because they're like, yeah, we hung out with these super advanced aliens for 10 days and we got to know him great and it's going to take us decades to unpack all of the knowledge that we gained. These seem like good friends to have, especially if you're going to fight Borgs, if they can just like automatically reprogram technology. Are we clear that they ever got back home, though, because we don't see their return trip, Barclay is no longer super smart.

Like, are they just stuck out there? I wasn't like that button, or a little bit more button than we got. It would have been nice. Instead, the button we get is a return to normal and 10 forward with Barkley. Barkley's hanging out at the bar. Troy is like, is it weird to be dumb again? Barkley is like not really. I mean, it's not like I blacked out or anything. Is it weird to be dumb again? Hahaha Probably is like not really, I mean it's not like I blacked out or anything I remember doing all this cool shit. I just don't remember how which is sort of a tragedy, right? Yeah, like it's sort of like

A guy getting black out drunk and then watching a video of yourself like jumping off of a roof like Oh man, I would never do that again Yeah, I don't believe I'm a golden god. Yeah. Yeah. And then and then Troy makes a pass at Barclay. Yeah, very strange. Troy's like, Hey, why don't we go on that walk in the Arboretum you mentioned. Yeah, Barclay is like, Are you serious?

Troy's like, Yeah, let's let's hit it. Maybe a roll around in the grass, you and me. Remember that time you kind of stole my identity and fucked me in the holodeck? I don't. Let's go for that walk. It's so fucking weird. What a weird end to this episode. Indeed, Adam.

Again, another bridge crewman who has done something that is a fireable or imprisonable offense. Goes free. No court marshal, no nothing. Did you like this episode, Ben? On balance, I did. I think that what it chooses to retread is weird and But like better and

You know, it's like if you if you do a remix of a song you want the remix to be like better than the original and I thought that the Steph with the laser brain was really fun and Well, there's definitely some missed opportunities and some weird plot omissions slash holes it's a fun episode and I love that the the thing that they're so scared of is exploration. It's like exploration by a means that they're not familiar with so so they're like terrified of it. And like, you know, they learn a big lesson. When you're not ready to go into a bud hole band, it's pretty scary. I mean, I don't blame them. It's a continuing pattern of just showing the amount of faith they have in the crew to not destroy the ship and kill everyone based on,

based on what they interact with. Yeah. Like, the ship gets taken over all the time and it's bizarre to see a human being do it. Like for as smart as Barkley is, he is just as susceptible to, I don't know, removing the air from the holodeck,

or something, and they never think to kill him until it's too late, and especially when the guy has not obeyed orders, up until then. So you're going on record as being pro summary execution. Pro executing barkly, yes. To save the rest of the crew. Not just because I want them executed. Let's be clear about that. Well, Adam, should we check if there's a priority one message or two in the, yeah, let's do that. Subspace inbox. We've come home from pod.

We've thrown our keys up on the counter. We hit the button on the answering machine. Mm-hmm. Priority one message from Starfleet coming in on secured channel. I need a supplement on that. supplement on that. supplement. supplement.

Yeah, it's extra. The interest alone could be enough to buy this ship. Stop alone. Stop alone. Stop alone. Yeah, it's extra. The interest alone could be enough to buy this ship. We have two priority one messages today, Ben. The first one is of a personal nature. This is a message four gram to young, and it's from his fellow code miners. Hey, Graham. Message goes like this.. Hey Graham. Message goes like this,

congratulations to Graham. I suppose this might be another pronunciation issue, right? Mm-hmm. Congratulations to Graham. On the birth of your child. You proximate birth because you weren't considered enough to be precise about timing. May your child roll all 18s, except for one.

For a faint of plausibility and their sleep non-collective. So two wishes there. Also, can we have your triumph and VR setup because you won't have time for them anymore. Yeah, when you have a baby, definitely do not have any triumph time. No. But I imagine when you have a baby, that VR setup is the only way you leave the house. Yeah, 15 minutes at a time.

You know, what you're going to want if you have a baby is a thing that completely obscures your eyes and ears from sensory information coming from the rest of the house. Because, you know, what good is that going to do? I wonder at what point we're going gonna start sticking VR setups onto babies. Oh, that dude. Yeah, teach them what it's like to beat up giant robots before they can walk. Graham, your fellow code miners have sent you a thoughtful, powerful message that demonstrates their friendship to you. I'm gonna talk to you directly Graham

Why don't you see what that VR setup does to a baby? Yeah, I think it's possible that it will not turn your baby into a barkly type Super intelligent danger to the world, but You never know. Yeah, you never know Thanks code miners. Yeah, thank you know. Thanks, Code Miners. Yeah, thank you. Our next priority one message comes from the best office made ever, and it is to Jeff. Jeff, thank you for introducing me to this hilarious podcast. It's one of the many ways you have helped me through some very difficult days. I know supporting these guys and hearing Kevin Xbridge say your name and wish you happy holidays.

I'll bring you tremendous joy. I hope it comes close to the pleasure I find sharing TNG and the greatest gen with you. They sure are talking a lot about pleasure. Pleasuring each other with our show is what they're talking about. What is Kevin Oxbridge know about that? I don't know. I don't know. Ben, if only we could interview him. Jeff, take it from me. I'm an all-powerful space creature known as a doubt.

it for me. I'm an all-powerful space creature known as a doubt. The only true joy in life is the love of a woman or a rubber and metal facsimile of a woman. A rubber and metal facsimile of an elderly woman, specifically. Give her a name that evokes grain motherliness and yet is somehow also futuristic at the same time like Rishan. I make real dolls of many ages and chagests. However, with the elderly models I use 30 to 40% more vinyl. For realistic wrinkles. Pleasant plumpness. The very gross veins always take a lot of detail work, but they really pay off in the end. I really hope that this is the sort of office that doesn't play our show out loud

Like I'm imagining it's a cube farm full of people wearing over the ear headphones Because good Lord if this is like a dentist office and this is playing in the lobby Not good times Jeff. Scytherian Godhead willing that's how it is Adam Well thanks office mates and Thanks Jeff for having such great friends If you are a friend I think it's just one friend that was thinking him. Yeah. Oh I guess it would be I wouldn't assume Jeff to have more than one friend a piece of viewer of show. If you have one friend and one friend only, you'd like to send a priority one message to,

you can wander on over to Maximumfund.org slash jubotron, let that friend know how you feel. Yeah, it's a hundred bucks for a personal message, 200 for a commercial message. It's big help for the continued operation of this here podcast. So thanks. Hey Ben! What's that Adam? Did you find yourself a drunk Shimoda? Who is not the smartest one?

Smotus one! Let the budget go but control Shemota! Who you make the warp drive hum? Warp drive hum? You give up the ship to a child Shemota! Drunk Shemota! Take it, pour the stuff, stack it up

Doesn't give a fuck everybody's drunk And touch your yards, kiddo robot My, uh, my, uh, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, There is the scene when, you know, as is typically true of WARF's security intercessions too late, but they send him and a dustbuster club down to the holodeck to second time in as many episodes that this has happened to get this rogue crewman under control. And Barkley is like doing that thing or he talks to them without opening his mouth through the ship. And Wolf just nominates one of his lackeys to go like take a headlong dive at Barkley and see if he can get him out of this chair. And it's just like, it's

obvious before Warfew have been makes the order that this guy is going to get bounced off of Forcefield. You wearing the cheap uniform. Watch him wander on up there. Go get a close shave on that Forcefield. Funny Warf moment. That's my Shremota. How about you? I couldn't decide between a couple of of conceptual Shremotas here like on the one hand. I don't know why there isn't some sort of of two-step computer verification that Prevent someone from full-on Integrating himself with the computer.

Right. What we need is a Ben Carson to separate Barclay from the computer using his gifted hands. Yeah. And there's no one around to do it. That just seems bizarre to me that you just put your thumb on the keypad and all of a sudden you're fucking the computer, basically, with your brain. The second one was a little darker, which was what are Troy's intentions when she asks Barclay out on the date? Because a couple episodes ago,

we were pretty hard on Jordy for having some fucked up intentions with Lea Brahms. Not being a campfire friend to someone, being sort of a creepster about other people's feelings. Troy feels a little manipulative here with Barclay in a way that I want to be even handed when I see, I want to call it out as I see it. I don't think Troy's being cool, wandering around the

Arboretum with someone that she knows is desperately in love with her. Yeah. So knock it off, Troy. Like, you were so quick to be a professional earlier on, turning down that Arboretum date. Maybe you should just let it lay. Maybe.

I don't know. Am I a dirtbag for saying that? I don't know, I mean... Is that hypocritical to call her out on that? I was definitely not feeling her asking him on that date, so... Yeah. I don't think you're wrong. Alright.

Darmak and Jalat and Denaga. A greatest gen live show is something you don't want to miss. Why? Well, it's a great opportunity to see me and Ben in person, but that's not all. FODs from all over gather at these shows to cosplay, to do pre and post show hangs, to make friends, and share their embarrassment. Hey, let's make a pretty great name for a tour. Let's do it!

The Sherry Reembarishment Tour is coming in August 2023, and we've got a bunch of dates in a lot of great places. Go to GreatestGenTour.com to get more info. That's GreatestGenTour.com for dates and ticketing information for the Sherry Reembarishment Tour. I'm Jordan Morris. And I'm Jesse Thorne. On Jordan Jesse Go, we make pure, delightful nonsense.

We were open awesome guests and bring them down to our level. We got stupid with Judy Greer. My friend Molly and I call it having the spaceweards. Pat Noswald. Could I get a Balrog burger and some air-gorn fries? Thank you. And Kumail Non-Giani. I've come back with cat toothbrushes,

which is impossible to use. Come get stupider with us at MaximumFun.org. Look, your podcast apps are open, just pull it out, give Jordan Jesse Goatry. Being smart is hard. Be dumb instead. Oh, rats, hey, hey, oh, I've got to count you in line. These clouds are really friggin' me out. I hate having to stand in line and boy, what do

I? These giraffes do not smell good. No, they do not and they've such short neck. But I'm here and we need to get on this. I gotta get on the art. Yeah. It is about terrain. I gotta spout to destroy humanity. Hey, oh, sorry, sorry, sorry. Are you Noah? Yeah, I know we look like humans. Oh, we're actually, we're podcasters. Yes, probably. We are podcasters, so it's different. Have you heard of Ono Ross and Carrie? We investigate spirituality, claims of the paranormal stuff like that. And you have a boat and say the world's gonna end So seem like something for us to check out. We would love to be on the boats. We came to by two. What do you think? Ono Ross and Carrie Available on maximumfund.org

Hey Ben, what episode are we watching next time? There are like a thousand people who think something's wrong with their car. Right now. We're watching Cupid Adam. Oh, goody. The mischievous cube turns Picard into Robinhood and sends him on a quest designed to force him to prove his love for an old flame. This is a tough episode because I love Cue and I hate holiday episodes and this is like matter and anti-matter to me.

Don't know how to feel about it. Yeah, it's also I think it's got Vash in it and it also has that part where Warf says he's not a merry man in it and those are usually great things but not this time. Would you have vetoed this episode? How do you had one? Mmm. I almost, like, I almost wouldn't want to miss this one just for the fucking horror show that it is. But, uh, it's a horror show. Yeah.

It's been a while, I feel like, since we've had a full-on horror show of an episode to review. So I'm excited to get into it, get in the mud. It's about time. Yeah. Let's get dirty. Well, no vetoes available. You know who is so very right, Ben? Who's that? The Legion of people who support the production of our show by going to Maximumfund.org slash Donate. That's true. The other people that are right are the people that go by the drunk

Chamoda and the West Hot American Summer t-shirts from the Max Fun store. What a great holiday gift those make. How'd you like to make a holiday bundle out of those two shirts? Oh, that'd be a great holiday bundle. You ball them up real tight, they'll fit into a stacking of any size. Remember to enter our contest by taking a picture of your published and available for public viewing iTunes review of our show and emailing it to DrunkShimote at gmail.com. We're trying to get to a thousand reviews by the end of the year so that we can walk around with our chests puffed out, I guess. That's the gift that you can give to us.

Yeah. The people we need to thank are Dark Materia for our theme music and Adam Ragusia for the priority one music that we play on almost every episode. Check out Adam Ragusia's podcast, ThePub, on current.org. And with that, I think we're going to call it a day, Adam. Check out Adam Regussi's podcast the pub on current.org and With that I think we're gonna call it a day Adam. Yeah, I think I'm ready for that Well, I'm done with my beer

With that we will be back at you next time with another great episode of Star Trek the next generation and a Merry episode of the Greats Generation. Maximumfund.org Comedy and culture, artist owned. Listener supported.