The Greatest Generation - Culinary Objector (VOY S1E14)

Episode Date: May 17, 2021

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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 friendsofdececoto for Labor.com. That's FriendsOfDecoto for Labor.com. Link in the episode description. Okay, now let's get on with the show. Here's to the finest crew in Starfleet. Engage! Watch your back shot. Hello. I'm Captain Captain? Captain? Bringeng what is the U.S.S. Forthead? Welcome to the greatest generation Voyager. It's a Star Trek podcast by a couple of guys who are a little bit embarrassed to have a Star Trek podcast.

I'm one of those guys. Ben Harrison, come and see you live from our Twitch stream. I'm Adam Prenica. Not live. Adam Prenica is dead. You do have kind of a goth aesthetic going right now with the long black hair and the black t-shirt and the black microphone and the black headphones. Yeah. You kind of got summer goth. I do. You do.

No, not. That is the look. Yeah. Emo Trent Reznor. I love it. It's how I'm looking. We're like T-minus two weeks from the big haircut, too. Emo Trent Rezner. I love it. That's how I'm looking. We're like T minus two weeks from the big haircut too. Yeah, we are.

I might not end up getting it though, also. We've got a lot of shit to do that week. And I don't know if I can keep the res for that. Given all that we have to do for the end of Max Von drive, my haircut, my first haircut in 15 months was going to happen on the very last day of Max Von drive. And now I think we might have too much to do. Yeah, that's true. As of this recording, the Max Von drive has not happened yet. But when this comes out, of course, it will have happened. It's right. So I think we should probably pause to say,

thank you so much to everyone who contributed. I'm sure some people did. I'm sure some people did. It's not wishful thinking to do this right now. We're gonna have a great drive. I think some people will contribute. I hope many. Yeah.

I'm gonna transition us though us though Adam because we're about to open some mail and you are the person that is going to be doing the opening this time. We we met up in a neutral parking lot location, equidistant from our two homes in LA. I set all of the packages down in the middle of the tarmac and backed away and then you Approach the packages and picked them up. We did it all socially distance and proper the right way Yeah, yeah, it felt good. We we chose an equidistant taco stand parking lot as we do a different one every time in case we're tailed Right. Yeah, we don't want to we we don't want the man to get onto this situation. Right.

Do you want to start opening some presents at him? Yeah, can I do that now, Ben? Please, I would love nothing less. Well, the very first thing I need to do is put some people on blast. I opened this last time on the show. This Federation, the first 150 years book and battery-operated cradle.

This was sent by Dan and Leana. And part of their message was, we don't want this in our home anymore. It frightens us. You deal with it. You deal with it. You deal with it. And so I was so innocent. I put the batteries in this thing and I played it on one of our last Twitch shows.

It was fun. George decay reads this book. George decay. But what I hadn't planned on was later on that evening, very late at night. George the K decided to continue reading to me at a time not of my choosing. And it was very loud. Sorry to haunt you so effectively.

Adam, get up. I have more things to tell you about telewrites. Please wake up. I have some information that you need immediately. What I did is I, in my sleepy stupor, I unscrewed the battery lid and I took out those batteries and I threw them far away so that I would not have a George to K wake up call ever again. So thanks Dan and Leana for giving me their curse. This is like the lowest stakes Japanese horror film

of all time. Yeah. Well, I mean, the thing I didn't tell you is that like as soon as George to K started reading to me, he was like, now you have wet hair. And sure enough, I did. Wow. And you were crawling out of a well and then through the television screen. I know.

I was very scary. All right, Ben, I've got three more things left. I called them things because not all of them are packages. Like this letter, I'm going things because not all of them are packages. Like this letter, I'm going to try not to show the address of Bernie and Essex Ontario Canada sent this to Jim Shimoda. I'm going to give this letter the business. He didn't bring a letter opener. No, I didn't. No, I didn't. All right. Whoa, this one's got cash money inside.

Whoa. It looks like a million Spock bucks. Oh wow. Isn't there like a there's a bill in Canada that people always draw Spock on? Isn't that true? I mean, I think it's this one. Yeah The famous million dollar bill of Canada. I also got a starship license. Hey, which feels very official. It's not my starship license. Oh, I love that it has the room font across the top there. I did not cheat on my driving test. I did not. I did parallel park. I did. Five nine. Oh, hi park. Five nine

170 for for Jim Kirk. Wow. All right. Do you think that he gets that revoked after the events of Star Trek 3? No, probably. No, because then when Star Trek IV happens, he saves the day, they're probably like, all is forgiven for Star Trek III. Oh yeah, we're in a very forgiving mood, very magnanimous. All right, let's see what Bernie has to say. To whoever opens the mail, Ben and Adam,

I paid a lot of Latinum for this spot coin note. I thought it would be better off with the Jim Shimoda Corporation. Yeah, absolutely. This 1 million Spock coin note is probably worth less now. Maybe you could pass it off to an unsuspecting for Engey. PS, you can also have my Starship license too. I am retired and no longer can go where no man has gone before. Don't get caught drunk Shimoda driving though.

Yeah, fair enough. Yetiatlar, JKA, Bernie. Last name redacted, Essex Ontario Canada. I love it. Thank you, Bernie. Makes a ton, Bernie. Bernie's retired now. Good for you. Yeah. Does, is spot coin a cryptocurrency? Is that what I am to understand here?

I thought cryptocurrencies weren't tangible like this. Yeah. But, um, yeah. I had a friend who had like a physical Bitcoin though, and he sold it for like a thousand bucks, and I'm sure regrets it. I'm sure a lot of people have a lot of regrets about Bitcoin. Yeah.

I also knew a guy that tried to start a Bitcoin arbitrage scheme and lost like $50,000. So was that the video project we worked on up in Vancouver where we went to Bitcoin Hive? We did go to a Bitcoin Hive that one time and we were to the Bitcoin hive. We did go to a Bitcoin hive that one time and we were traveling with the guy but I don't think he lost the money yet when we went to that Bitcoin hive. That would have been less of a good time if he had lost the money before. Yeah, it would have been like us there while he like raged around looking for his bitcoins. Yeah. Yeah, that's no good.

It all. Alright, I'm using my hobby, exacto knife to cut up, open this box. This box, sent from Lincoln Park, New Jersey. Alright. One name on it, Lancaster. Okay. Wow. Alright, we got a little card. All right one name on it landcaster Okay, well All right, we got a little card

I'm gonna start with that Hi boys Inclosed is a vintage hallmark keep-sake that was given to me by a friend. Wow since I already had one I thought y'all would be best to send it to. I'll let your wives be the deciders of who gets to keep it. L-L-A-P, the STTC unicorn. Leaving our wives to decide something like that is basically guaranteeing that your gift

gets thrown away, unfortunately. Yeah. All right. Any guesses? Oh man, it's a hallmark keepsake. Yeah, so I'm thinking it's gotta be a Christmas tree ornament, right, isn't that? Right.

I'm guessing, I'm guessing just based on the shape, I'm guessing, transporter room. Boy, that would be, that'd be a lot to put in this little box. There are manyatures. They don't put a full-size transporter in the box. I'm thinking it's gotta be a lot to put in this little box. Well, there are many inatures. They don't put a full-size trend. I'm thinking it's got to be a ship. What's in the box?

Oh, it's the Shuttlecraft Galileo. I remember this one. Hey, that's an OG. You hit the button and Mr. Spock tells you all about the miracle of Christmas. Oh, that's great. The light's dim, the spotlight falls on Mr. Spock. And you tell he the true meaning of it. It's great. Wow. You would think a Vulcan wouldn't give a shit about that. But here we are. Oh, I mean, he Spock's been fighting the war on Christmas

for years. Happy Holidays, Captain. Oh, here. Happy Holidays. All right. Last one, biggest one. Is it right here? Oh, man. This one's kind of a choker, you guys. This one is from Jeffrey, from Somerville. Somerville Mass. Hopefully, I'm not showing any of this address. We should mention every time we open GIFs on here, the Bill Tilly rule applies as a discouragement for anyone who wants to send us bad things. If somebody sends us something gross, we automatically forwarded it on

to Bill, one of the nicest guys in the entire world. So just know. Someone you would never want to send a bad thing to. One of the greats. If you think you're dunking on us, you're actually dunking on somebody that doesn't deserve it. All right. I got a box of parts here. And I think I should just read the letter. Before you get into the letter, Adam, I just want to call out Sean

Connery 94 in the chat who had some mushrooms earlier and is thankful for the chill hangs. Hey, Sean Connery 94 in the chat who had some mushrooms earlier and is thankful for the chill hangs. Hey Sean Connery 94, welcome. It's gonna be all right. You're my friend. Did you have those mushrooms shaken or stirred? Tell you what you shouldn't do on mushrooms. Try to fuck the prom queen. to fuck the prom queen. Let her goes like this. Ben and Adam, hey guys, one drunk night in Boston, we took a picture and I promised you guys a gift and closed is said gift.

0.75. COVID's later printed off the 3D printer. I have been holding hostage from my office for the last year and unassembled as a project for you. Wow. This is the story of that night and its outcome. Four score and 700 years ago, there was a before time. Some time before that, there was a slightly tipsy greatest gen con two Star Trek three Boston show. This is a tale of the end of that night for those who may have been otherwise occupied with wine. It's sort of in script form.

Yeah. I'm gonna set the scene. Jeff gets to the front of the good by line. Chats with Ben. Jeff, completely sober. So I want to send you guys a phaser rifle. Ben, completely sober. Huh?

Jeff, no really. Look at my phone. I 3D printed it at work. I can print you guys one Ben Adam Adam also sober Ben Ben No, look we are getting this massive passage of time New scene Jeff is now season two riker. It's April 2020. Jeff, huh, I got to take home one of the really expensive printers. I should print off that phaser rifle time passes again. New scene, season five riker, September 2020.

Jeff, wow, we have updated the firmware. I can print that phaser rifle in half the time. More time passes. Jeff, fuck it. I'm finally going to print it two days later. Jeff, that was easy. Better write a letter and ship it. Time passes again. Package arrives. Adam opens it, shoots the nip of a distilled 2020 maloort. The end. From your friend of DeSoto Jeff. Jeff apologizes for the typo-ridden personal letter,

but he paid for a couple of priority one messages about various wedding events. So Jeff is a supporter in a number of ways. And he's also sent assembly pictures of how to put this phaser rifle together. Because we have got a phaser rifle, Ben. Oh my God! I gave you the wrong packages. Look at all these phaser rifle pieces. Wow. I can't believe how many pieces there are. There's so many pieces I can't even hold them all! And look at this ripped piece!

After we're done recording the marion, I think we'll spend some of the Twitch stream with you just putting phaser rifle together because that's all I want to watch right now. Jeff also included two of the worst gifts we've ever received. Oh, so many bottles of mullort. Wow, I did not know that they had mullort on airplanes, but based on the format of those bottles, apparently they have the next time a lornax spirit. I'm almost positive. That's the only kind of alcohol you can get. You say, can I have a margarita and they pour maloort and sprite

into a little plastic cup for you? It's the only beverage they have of any kind on spirit. Okay. Okay. Five dollars. That'll be five dollars. Wow. Well, thanks everyone for those great gifts.

A real basket of surprises. I'd say. I love it. You know, sometimes we open up the gift pile and it's like all baseball cards. That's true. Could not have predicted this selection of gifts. That was really something.

I can't wait to see that phaser rifle in person, to be honest. Yeah. I think you should put it up in the back window of your vehicle in a rack. put it up in the back window of your vehicle in a rack. I don't have a phaser rifle, much less many, thus necessitating a rack. But Adam, do you wanna get into the episode we came to talk about today?

Sure do. What is it, Ben? Season one, episode 14, Dutral. Reverse course. Unless you've got something a little bigger in your torpedo tubes, I'm not turning around. What is it, Ben? Season one episode 14, Jotrell. Reaver course. Unless you've got something a little bigger in your torpedo toots, I'm not dreaming about that. Nielix is in a sundreams bar in the South of France.

Teaching two Valkyries how to lose a pool. Nielix should be back in the kitchen learning how to cook. And like Tom Parris should be making him work back there. Yeah. Why did they make Tom Parris learn like medical stuff from the doctor? He should have been just like tasked with supervising the kitchen and making Nielix know how to cook things that don't taste like ass. How valuable would that be? Everyone should be preoccupied with this. Every time anyone runs into Nelix in public,

they should be like, why aren't you trying to be a better cook right now? People are actually freaking out. I thought you were the morale officer. The morale could not be lower. And it's mostly about the food. We've gotten over the whole, never gonna see our family's thing.

No one's got time for poor right now. Ha, ha, ha ha ha. Very funny bit where TuVoc calls this shot and scratches. This is kind of just a reenactment of every time I've ever played pool. Hey, much in the same way people argue that a Han shot first. Mm hmm.

Here's a new t-shirt idea. Nielix scratched first. How are they playing pool without a table scratch rule here, man? Nielix is playing defense by like playing bumper pool and he never hits any of the balls. Well, I guess we don't know what the house rules in Sandrines are, but it would seem that table scratching is back on the menu boys, et cetera. I don't like it. I don't like it at all. But I totally get why it would be this way if you're shooting pool. Yeah. Yeah. It's got to be crazy making production-wise. Like soon as, as soon as Tuvac lined up his shop after saying what he was gonna do,

I was like, this is gonna be an effect, right? The continuity person, when this script lands on their desk and they open it and it's page one in pool hall. Right, right, right. Fuck, fuck, not again, come on. Hey, I'm thinking, uh, strike. Ha ha ha ha ha.

Did you guys consider maybe having their holiday can be a bowling alley ever? Right. That's fucking dude. Let's go bowling. You can tell this is gonna be a very special episode when Captain Janeway calls Neelix to the bridge Neelix a place that they're usually trying to repel him from yeah

It's not Neelix to the bridge and bring canapes It's just Neelix to the bridge. Right. Aren't you forgetting something, Nielix? Yeah. So, what they've got is a Haconian shuttle inbound and it is carrying a passenger that has specifically requested to speak to Nielix. So, Haconian shuttle is kind of like a Mazda Miata Starship.

Kind of looks like an economically priced sports car. The Hacconian name sounds so close to Hacconian that I really couldn't jar it loose. Yeah, well, and this guy's loaf is ready enough that you could mistake it for boils. You are so beautiful, my Baron. It's just a single letter that changes the meaning altogether. This guy on this ship has got an urgent message to relay.

He needs to talk to Nielix. It's like that thing that, remember in the day of landlines when you were a kid? I don't know if you were ever tasked with this, but I always picked up the phone. Like I think my parents relished not having to pick up the phone themselves. I always picked up the phone.

And then I was like the secretary for the house. Rob's your old landline. Hello? That's my phone. And how disappointing it was every time I pick up the phone and no one ever wanted to talk to me. No, it was never for you. Yeah.

This is that mail. There's never mail for you. Jane Wait, turns on the FaceTime. This guy doesn't want to talk to her. And the worst part is he wants to talk to Nelix. Well, and what Nelix has explained is the Haconians invaded the Tlaxian home world 15 years ago. They were at war. This is not exactly a

Species that he looks forward to having interactions with and this yeah, this dude doesn't just want to have an interaction with him He's looking looking for him. Yeah It's interesting how looking for him. Yeah. It's interesting how contextually things are so muddy here up front. Nielix tells us that as people were at war with this person's people, and I'm thinking,

oh man, the war's not over and Nielix is in danger. Like that's where my mind went. Yeah, it's interesting. When Nielix said we were at war with these people, I was like, oh, I can't wait to see what the people that were at war with these freaks looks was like, oh, I can't wait to see what the people that were at war with these freaks look like. And it's just a pretty like, it's a pretty standard, just lofie, completely forgettable

Star Trek alien, unfortunately. Like James Sloyan pressed his face into some potatoes, O'Gratton. And that's what we got here. Yeah, and Neelix is like, what's this about? And he's like, well, actually, there's a kind of a hippie issue. I can't tell you over an open FaceTime connection. So I'd really like to come and board and tell you in private.

And then drops the J-Bomb, Adam. He says who he is. He's Dr. Jatrel. He beams on board and he points to the upper right corner of the frame. When the episode title appears, it's a really fun breaking of the fourth wall. And you only get to do that if you James Sloyan.

Yeah. He's at the point of his career where he's only accepting parts where his character is the name of the episode. Yeah, right. This is his third Star Trek series for us. He's so great. TNG, DS9, and now Voyager, and he was in the episode of Baywatch that we reviewed for our Max Fundrive 2021 bonus episode. Do do do. C.A. the count in my mind included the Baywatch episode.

I miscounted all of his Star Trek appearances, but you're right. Yeah, well between Dr. Mora and Dr. Tertrell, he definitely seems to be playing a lot of doctors who kind of put their work before their morals. Yeah, and here on the greatest generation, we celebrate James Loyan's entire catalogue. Yeah. We just think very highly of his work. He's great. This episode does that super fun thing that you can only detect when you watch a lot of

Star Trek, which is when you've got 30 seconds to fill and don't have any options, you do that. Who are you? Forgive me, my name is moment that we get here before the theme. Like exactly nothing happens in the last minute of this cold open, except for that. It's so funny because in some ways a very writerly episode, like, Nielix goes on some fairly long rants in this episode that

use a lot of like beautiful, immaturity and stuff. And they're like, wow, I didn't know Nielix had such like floral language when he spoke. And it's the same episode that does this. How? I love it. Especially because like this is obviously a time-filling technique.

Yeah. Like you could give Ethan Phillips another four lines of dialogues spread out throughout this episode. And I have accomplished what they did here in the cold open. I know. And what they did there makes even less sense when you see the next scene where Nielix is explaining who Dr. Jatrel is to him. Yeah.

Because Dr. Jatrel is kind of like a apex criminal in the war that his people fought with the Haconians. Like he is on like a Gulducat level of, there are hundreds of thousands of dead bodies blood on his hands. And Nielik's basically considers him to be the person that caused it. There was this thing that happened on Nielik's home world, which was called Rhinex, that was called the Metrian cascade. It was a weapon

of mass destruction that the Haconians unleashed on Rhinex and like the effect was so devastating, it killed basically everybody on the planet and the effect was so devastating that Tallyx surrendered that talax surrendered unconditionally right after that. It's I think compared very directly in this episode to the nuclear bombs that the United States dropped on Japan. This scene sets the tone for the entire episode and that tone is Ethan Phillips is going to take over this one. Like get out of the way, let Ethan Phillips run the show, and beginning here,

and never letting up until the end of the episode, I'm like, we're gonna talk about this at the end, I'm sure, but like the order of episodes in the first season, I've hated Nielix up until now. I know. And it's made me think a certain way about Ethan Phillips, quite honestly, and to see him have this gear and this character have this gear made me lament the order that

things happened in. My feelings for this character had started to calcify a bit, and now I don't know what to think. Neelix is often the comic relief. He is a jolly character by anyone's measure. And in this scene, he explains that in a shocking war crime, his entire family was murdered in this war. And he carries incredible trauma with him. And if you knew that that was a component to the guy that's like spilling the soup in season one episode four, you would be like, oh, like he is not just a shlamazzle, like he has,

like there's dimensionality to this character. Nielix was the only survivor of a genocide, but he just can't stop burning the vegetables. This season on Star Trek Voyager will find out. If his souffle will ever make him feel whole again. That's what I'm saying, Van. Like, how intentional do you think this season was about that about like setting him up is the boob and then having the thing inside the boob Be the pathos This isn't a show in the mid 90s that's going like oh, yeah You're gonna rewatch season one and then you're really gonna understand like right the dimensionality of a new like sear You fucked up you fucked up by judging him right. Yeah, it's not it's not like it's not like the sixth sense where the second time you watch it, you're like,

whoa. Yeah. When he spilled the soup that time, you could really tell he was drawing on something deep. So when Nielix gave Toothach that gross soup, that was just about Nielix struggling with what happened to him. You really get to understand why he likes Leola Root so much because the bitterness is the only way he can feel anything. So Chitrel beams a board.

And what's great about Captain Janeway meeting him in the transporter room is that the very first thing she tells him is, Neilix isn't interested. He's washing his face hair. Uh, it's funny, like, Jitrel is like complimenting them on their super cool transporter technology and she's like, does not pick up that conversation thread at all.

She's just like, sorry, you're not gonna be able to talk to Nelix but me and Tuvac can show you to your quarters because apparently Dr. Jitlle is going to be staying with them for a few days. I really like Kate Mulgrugh's performance as Janeway in this episode, because she rides that line of having

to be a good diplomat while at the same time, understandably hating her guest for what this guest has done to someone she cares about. Yeah, the diplomat skills that she displays throughout this episode are really like cool and impressive. And something I wish there was more of in television, like so much of television is people like unloading their shit on each other.

Yeah. And so much of real life is like knowing you have some shit you wish you could unload on this person, but you can't because of circumstances and having to cope with that fact. And yeah, this scene is full of tension. It's basically a scene about them hearing his request one more time to speak to Nelix and leading him through his quarters, but it's full of tension because of that.

Right. Yeah. In the corridor, Jitrel tells Captain Janeway the warning he's there to deliver. Matremia is what he believes Nelix might have. And it's a very, as you say, like a very post nuclear bomb in Japan situation, or like even an agent-orange style story being told here. This idea that warmaking has had long-term consequences to their secondary downsides, in addition to all the primary downsides. Can you believe it? Right. Right. He doesn't really explain what his motivations are, but he's saying like there is a chance I can cure Matremia. For what purpose? I need to like collect data from as many talaxians as I can find that have it because it was only people that were

exposed to the radiation in the aftermath of this blast and I want to fix this and you may have a hard time believing this captain Janeway but many talaxians hate me and won't let me near them. We open in the galley on a close up of, uh, Nielix making some very nice looking corn salsa. He's really taking it out of these vegetables, I think. Yeah. He's explaining to Kess. She's basically saying like, why is this war being retconned into your character now?

And he's like, well, I didn't want to bring it up because it's a pretty heavy story. Nielik doesn't want to talk about what happened. He just wants to ask people if he's a good man. And Kess is like, I don't know if you don't tell me about what happened to you during wartime. I can't make that determination. I can't really get this blue members only jacket. Yeah, it really clashes with your yellow and purple and teal. A chef outfit that you have under it. Like what's what's going on with that? So the hip of violation that was suggested earlier is not given by J. Trell.

It's given by Captain Janeway who enters the galley area and just gives Nielix the news in front of Kess. It's a tragic moment because he's like, I don't care what the news is. There's no way it's worse than Jitrel is here. And, you know, he's got this kind of like moral indignation and wants to be on his high horse about great. Like, he should live with the fact that I'm gonna dive because of something he did. And Janeway kind of makes the case to him. Like if he can find a cure, wouldn't you do that on behalf of other teleaccions

that might be able to be saved because of his research? And she admits, she doesn't know where Detrello's coming from. It's not clear whether this is like something he's doing out of the goodness of his own heart or some kind of atonement or what. Peace of mind is a relative thing, Captain. There's some real dimensionality to this moment

because it's not just a conflict connecting two points on a line. I mean, of course, he doesn't want to help the guy who made the weapon that killed so many of his people. But also, what's the point of knowing if he's got this thing, if there's no cure to it? Yeah. Like, there's the patient psychology happening here too. It's not just post-war psychology. Kess is like, hey, listen, the doctors in this quadrant have a different set of knowledge from the doctor on board this ship

and he may be able to bring some insight to this that Jatrel didn't even have. Neelix is like, I am not going to a Vitya doctor. Yes, you can stop that suggestion right there. I'd rather be immersed in a pit of crilinian eels than be examined by him. There is a McLaughlin group if you want with the Captain and Milux and Jatrelle.

And there's another Kim Friedman directed episode. And I thought that this particular scene was really beautifully lit and composed. And the camera movement is so good. Like, there's this opening shot where the camera pushes in on Jatrel in the foreground, but he's kind of facing away from the camera. And Nielix is in the background getting softer and softer as the camera pushes in. And then we get a rack focus where Neelix interrupts to Trell.

And unfortunately, why are you doing this? To ask about what is motivating him to do this? Like, why does he care? If he is the butcher of Rhinex, why would he be spending his time tracking down individual victims of this disease to study them? The scene is really intense.

They both feel really aggrieved about what happened in the war. Jotrel clearly has a lot of, I think he refuses to characterize it as regret, but he is talking about the fact that he has to live with his conscience, live with the knowledge of what he did and There is a lot of like who who has the moral high ground sniping that the captain has to cut through to be like, hey listen We're here to talk about putting a weird blinky device on Nielix's chest not about who was right and wrong in the war. There's something that is so necessary for an aggrieved person to feel in their oppressor,

and that is regret, regret of any kind being expressed for their actions. And this scene is an example of that. Neelix is looking for any possibility of that from Jatrel. And Jatrel is incapable of it in this moment or incapable of it to a satisfying extent. And it drives Nelix crazy. Doesn't anyone notice this? I feel like I'm taking crazy pills! That he just can't understand, like it's so obvious. It's so obvious that Jatrelle did something worth apologizing for, worth feeling bad about, and that he

can't get there in the room with him just stokes Neelix's fire in a very understandable way. I did what had to be done. And I think James Loyen's performance also does a great job of making you feel like Jitrel does regret this, but has built a system of rationalizations inside his own mind to explain why it happened and why he can still not judge himself to be a monster. Right. And the episode is in a lot of ways about that facade of rationalizations being chipped away at until it finally breaks. The scene sequence here does a lot of good work because the scenes before this moment, you're like, wow, Nelix really has an axe to grind against

this guy and it's obviously an understandable axe. But after this scene, you get to understand, like, Nelix is, like, on the scale for Nelix, is his middle finger on one thing. And then on the other pad of the scale, it's like his ability to help his people. Right. And it's very hard to measure anything accurately with a middle finger on that scale. Yeah, yeah. It is one of those kind of jump cuts to a decision though, right? Like the scene kind of ends ambiguously.

Like as Nielix gonna wind up going with giving this guy data to help his people, or is he going to go with middle finger? Right. And we cut right down to Six Bay where Nielix is on the bio bed, getting ready to get scanned. Just get it over with.

I love it when this show responds to a question I ask in the moment with the exact scene I wanted to see. And my question was where the hell is the doc? Like the doc should be involved at this point, right? And then here's the Six Bay scene. And the doc explains like this is a very specialized piece of equipment that I don't have. They didn't issue me one when we left space stock. So he's going to have to be the one to scan you.

He's got a special red flashlight that he waves all over Helix's body. I've never seen a cylinder and box combination quite like this. This is clearly alien technology. You see, this has gold metal and kind of multi-color blinking lights. If this was silver metal and like red, yellow, and blue blinking lights, then we might have a Federation piece of technology here. But there's like green, there's orange, there's all different kind of colors on this thing. Nielix has always been a talker, but you get the sense that he's an especially nervous

talker, and this is a scene that is emblematic of that. But he's telling a story so thinly veiled at Dr. Detrell. Did I ever tell you about the notorious two-tailed talchucks of Rhinex? That I kind of feel like he should just like lose the veil and just start dunking on Dirtrell directly here. Like why even keep up the facade? Oh, wait, you thought Nielix's story was a metaphor, huh? Yeah. That's how you communicate his name

by, by citing example, by metaphor. Turns out Nielix is very passive aggressive in a way that I really enjoy. He's got a tamarion amount of passive aggression. Yeah, really does. The diagnosis comes in almost immediately Ben and he's positive for metremia. Incipient metremia,

something my urologist recently diagnosed me with as well. I get a drink more water. Cranberry juice maybe. Later we find Nelix and what I thought was his darkened quarters, but when we see a wider shot it looks like the grow-up of the ship. Is he at work or is he in his quarters here when Kess finds him? I couldn't tell, I don't know if we've seen this room before, but yeah, he's definitely growing a lot of plants if this is his quarters, which I like.

I like having a lot of plants around. It's nice. It is. It's not quite a Saru grow up happening, but. No. I mean, Saru, one of the greats in the game ever in terms of growing plants in his quarters. He really figured out that whole like lamp ventilation power supply system.

Uh huh. You got those strips of lawn paper that you see advertised on social media all the time. Yeah. And just glued it all over every surface in his room. For a long time, I've thought of Nielix like Quark, like not to be taken seriously, but he starts telling war stories to Cass. And in this scene, I kind of realized that he's the rickles of the show, like in a war movie parlance. I got you the scatuna Naila nylon you want it. He can be like that. There's one for all kinds of warriors.

He is kind of re-adjusting his worldview because he sees the end of his life coming very soon. And he talks about that with Kess, like the idea that he fell in love with her and then later found out that she was like three years old or something. Something very weird about the Kess character, like I know that I'm like projecting human maturity onto an alien being but like it seems fucking weird that she's three. No, I mean the show has done nothing to disabuse you of that weird feeling though, and I think that's the problem.

And what's going on here seems pretty pervy. The problem is that they didn't do enough to establish that she has achieved adulthood for her species. I mean, she's obviously a very mature character, much more mature emotionally than Nielix in many ways. But this is a pretty heavy conversation because he's saying like, I thought that we didn't have that much time together

and now I'm finding out that I'm gonna die and we have even less time together. You know, I thought after my lungs were removed a couple episodes ago that like that would have been a good opportunity to do the whole living will thing. Yeah, yeah. Unfortunately, the only attorney that we have aboard specializes in litigation. And it really just doesn't know that much about a state planning in general.

In Captain Janeway's Ready Room, uh, Jitrell enters and boy, oh boy, that transporter. So interesting to him this moment in time. And he might have some ideas about how to use it in his experiment. I kind of thought that this was throwing the episode into another direction that Jatrelle had used this fake disease as a pretext to get a board so that he could steal the state secrets of how the transporter works. And I was like, you guys aren't being careful with what information he can access about your incredibly consequential technology that nobody in this quadrant has access to.

Jitrel very early on was like I was responding to a general hail from someone named SESCA who had some very interesting tech items to offer and trade. I was just here to see if I could do some of that with sesca. Is there a sesca on board? That name ring any bells? It's interesting though, because like I think that the writers may have done that intentionally. Yeah. Because I am suddenly suspicious of him and then he starts describing how he wants to use it to cure the disease. Right. And I also in this moment was like, I'm pretty sure that this guy is going to be revealed to have this disease based on how thirsty he is.

And I do think that that slightly undercuts the extent to which we can think of him as having done this out of pure charity, you know. Was the moment you decided that, the moment when Jatrelle walks out of the meeting and collapses in pain and that says it's nothing? No, I was like writing it down and I heard him go like, and I like looked up at the screen and it was like, fuck. So he pitches the idea to Janeway. Let's transport or scoop some of these particles out of the atmosphere of the planet. I destroyed to run some experiments on them. And Janeway seems receptive to this.

And so they headed the talaxian system. It's really out of their way, according to Jakote, which kind of makes the case that the talaxians are kind of a diaspora, right? They're kind of spread across the quadrant. It doesn't seem to be a significant enough detour that they can't do it though. So they... I love that this is Chicoote's one fucking line in this episode.

Yeah, are they like here to go today? Are they backtracking though? Or is it just like a, are they like heading at a right angle to the direction that they want to be headed? I don't know. I mean, it seems like a cool thing. They could potentially save hundreds of thousands of lives.

The writer who proposed just a line and a dot on the bottom of the screen for every episode of Star Trek Voyager was shouted down and fired. It's a bad idea to see their progress. Yeah. Don't want to do that. Well, it's like in a, you know, you're watching like a Netflix movie or something and you pause it to go to the bathroom and you're like, there's another fucking hour of this. What? Yeah.

That's not a good time. No. We come back from break and Jatrelle is down in 6 Bay doing some more scans on Nelix and the EMH comes in and is like, hey, you guys need anything? And they're like, no, we're good. And he's like, cool, well, I'm going to go shoot some pool or whatever and shut himself down. And this is another thing that really catches Jatrel's attention.

He's like, wow, quite a ship you guys have here. Anyways. It's so fucked up that all you have to do is say the words, and that's what happens to the EMH. That's bad. I thought that the EMH kind of had all of the agency over that, but it seems like anybody can just like pranks, stick their head in the in the Six Bay door and yell it. You think data walked around jamming his fist into his hole? Hahaha.

Demonstrating how anyone could turn him off? That's why he only showed Dr. Beverly where the hole was. I know. That's what I'm saying. The EMH should walk into his office and then whisper to him. So, I got tickets that knock them, get them all, a bit of lodgemage here.

Here. 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 Share Your Embarrassment 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 Share Your Embarrassment 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 get 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 Nanjiani. 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 already open.

Just pull it out. Give Jordan Jesse Goatry. Being smart is hard. Be dumb instead. Whoa, Raph's hit. Hey, I'm about to count you in line. These clouds are really freaking me out. I hate having to stand in line and, boy, what a line.

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. So, gotta get on the art. It is about terrain, about a spout to destroy humanity. Hey, oh, sorry, sorry, sorry. Are you Noah? Yeah, I know we look like humans.

We're actually, we're podcasters. 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 two by two. What do you think? Ono Ross and Carrie, available on MaximumFun.org. I've got to get that nutwood knob. Are you selling a high stone? We got a pretty intense scene here where Nelix is like, hey, listen, if you knew this metrian cascade technology was as dangerous as it was, like, why did you give it to your government?

Why didn't you tell them not to use it the way they plan to use it when they were planning to drop it on a civilian population? Like what the fuck is wrong with you? And he does that scientist justification of like all knowledge is good. And once we come up with it, it's up to the rest of you to decide what to do with it.

And unfortunately for me, what they decided to do was drop it on your planet. I was amazed by this moment in terms of how it played with my expectations versus the reality of it. Yeah. To trail opens by making the case that he couldn't stop what was happening, like as a scientist, he was lower in rank than anyone else in his government. So it's not like he had the power anyway. But then he was in the chain of command, I guess. He pivoted so almost instantaneously into it's fun to do bad things. Along the way, ran over two mailboxes, hit two parked cars in a Costco parking lot,

and struck two moving cars near Walmart. Neelix's sarcasm energy as an opposing force to detress scientific nihilism that really makes for an interesting conflict in the moment. And he's also smug about it. Like he's like, you know, you're not the only one that lost things in the war. For example, when I dropped this horrible weapon

of mass destruction on a planet, my wife left me with the kids. He loses the consequence measuring contest with Nelix right here. Divorce, it's the same as death to me. I actually know what it's like to commit genocide and lose your wife at the same time. No one in the universe knows what that's like. Detail, one thing that I found very comforting after I lost my wife was making a foam rubber faxsimile of my wife. If you consider doing that,

instead of running around terrorizing people that you victimized 15 years ago. You're clearly a very accomplished scientist. I imagine it wouldn't take very much. Maybe? Go to the holodeck on the very ship that you are right now. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha the family of Chula for the last time. Think of it like that. At the end of this scene, Ben, I want to know if you noticed this, Dirtrell drops a tear out of the non-camera-facing eye. And this is James Sloyen being a fucking boss. Like so many actors would drop the tear out of the, because he's sort of in like, not quite profile. You can see both eyes a little bit, but when he drops the tear from

the other eye, yeah, from the far eye. We got the far right now. How's that what you do? Major fucking props to James Sloyen. Like anyone can do the eye closest to the camera. Like that's just playing too much to the camera. Total pro. He gets to an incredibly deep place in this scene. They both do. Like this is, like you said, an episode that really makes the case for the amazing range that either in Phillips has too. Yeah what a privilege to see him go up against somebody with as much game as James Slyan for moments like this.

To trail does that thing that many shitty people do. They they've lost a fight. And then on the way out of the room, they're like, oh yeah, I've got I've got Matremia also. You feel good about that? Yeah. Nelix, much like the ashes on the bodies of people burned by my weapon of mass destruction. I hope the ashes in your mouth taste so good. Nelix is like, you still haven't won this fight. Nielix very upset has a pool dream playing pool against a cheating Dr. Jatrel who just walks around the the table shooting shots. You know, without really taking his turn, He didn't even put his stack of quarters on the edge of the table to show he had next game.

I know this is a, what did you call it before, a metaphor? A metaphor. Yeah. But I didn't really see how this sequence of Jatrelle cheating at pool over and over again against Nelix really like fit in within the greater context of the episode. And then Jatrelle does a bunch of like fun and it's Nielix really like fit in within the greater context of the episode.

And then Chitrel does a bunch of fun billiards tricks, like he does the mace and a bunch of ball hopping and stuff. The episode really lingers into those tricks. Yeah, and then Nielix wakes up, it covered in a cold sweat in the middle of the night and pulls his laptop over to himself and tries to relax by just watching pool tricks clips on YouTube for a while. He gets radioed by the captain who explains that they are pulling up to Reynax, Neelix's former home world. And I like this a lot. I think these memories affecting his dreams and coming back to him and almost haunting him could have felt so hokey and paranormal in the wrong hands. And they really don't. It just feels like he is getting closer

and closer to the thing he fears the most. I'm going to take a little bit of the other side of that argument here because in an episode that is, that's very right early in an episode that is like such a strong Ethan Phillips performance case. In the context of the episode, I just didn't like Neelix walking onto the bridge delivering his monologue, doing the loop around the bridge and then leaving. And for everyone to just kind of witness him, yeah. I kind of just wanted a little bit like I know why he's there. We just pulled up to the planet. Wanna check it out?

You haven't been here in ages. It feels like a scene just meant to exemplify what we already know about Ethan Phillips up to this point, which is he can do it. Yeah, I mean, I wonder, I mean, I don't know, Ethan Phillips is an actor I've seen in a few things, but I don't know how much they maybe put these scenes into say like he'll get like a bunch of swings at it.

Maybe if he like needs three scenes to get all the way there, like he's got one at the beginning, one in the middle and one toward the end, or something like that. Yeah. Yeah. So Neelix takes off and then Paris turns to the captain and is like, yeah, that guy's a real fucking bummer lately. That's the morale officer captain.

Is there any wonder the food is even worse than it usually is? Dr. D'Atrelle walks into engineering where BLT has set up another beam energy into the engineering section right next to the warp core experiment. And he says, I wanted a bigger location. And you know, like I'm a little bit worried about the containment field here. And BLT is like, no, like this is going to go great. We got the exact right container size containment will not be a problem. This is badly misplaced confidence. Literally nothing bad has happened here in a situation exactly

like this in a container just like this one in three episodes. I love to trail, santaering up to engineering and complaining about container size. I love that in the background of that shot, you could see the number of days since a containment breach in a in a transporter problem. You know, back when we were experimenting with this super weapon, the one thing that we knew not to do was experiment anywhere near a warp core. Yet another reason I'm very impressed with this ship. Yeah. They fill this canister with gas from the atmosphere and Kess walks down to the mess hall, which is empty. And therein she finds New York's

kind of like bumming out by himself under the bar. And he's taken off his combat and this is a much less lethal combat takeoff than what happens when Worf takes off his combat. Yeah, I mean, Nielix has quit Starfleet. To go murder a Klingon somewhere else. He has a big admission here for a cast. All that shit he talked about being in the Tlaxian defense forces, the fact that he was on TALACs when Reynacks was destroyed because he was getting ready to go attack the Haconians, all bullshit.

He was in fact a draft dodger. The real reason I didn't report was because I was a coward. He felt that the war was being fought on fake justifications. He thought it was a use of violence to settle a problem that shouldn't be used, shouldn't be settled with violence. It's interesting because like the... Hey Ben. Yeah. You mind if I take a run at this one? Sure.

I'm doing a bad job. Nielix's war stories relies. The truth is he was a culinary objector man i didn't realize you brought your hype crew to uh... to do that one joke here on the show today really hit the ramp on that one got full full explosion off of the pommel. Okay. Uh, uh, uh, Cass has an interesting take here, right? So she absorbed all this. What I'm gonna say is in all the descriptions of this war up until now, we've really only

heard it from Nielix's side. Like we haven't even heard Detrelle describe why the war started. We do need to both sides of this war here. I'm not saying we do, but like, Nielix has been talking about it the way a Bejurent talks about the Cardassian occupation, which is we just got invaded. And they just were taking over our shit.

And when Nielix says he was like not into even fighting it, it makes it seem like there may have been more to it than just that. And whenever one side of a conflict drops a super weapon onto the other side, they obviously have a great reason for it. Well, yeah. And like I think that it's interesting that the episode is like not focused on getting into that at all.

Like, it's not about what the geopolitical situation was that started the war. It's about what Nielix is going through given his subjective experience of it. It would have been so awful if in the beginning Nielix tells Captain Janeway about to trell his people doing what they did to his people. Nielix doesn't know why. And everyone on the bridge crew kind of understands why someone would drop a bomb on the, on the Tlaxian home world. Like, I mean, have you met a Tlaxian, Nielix? Like, we've only met two and we kind of want to do it.

We're kind of done with the one Tlaxian we've got. Can you imagine a planet full of these fucking guys? I'm kind of thinking at this point, your trail should be celebrated for the favor he did. But like, think about how many like terrible sci-fi movies have started with like the war began when blah, blah, blah, invaded blah, blah, blah. That was the beginning of the end for my people.

Right, whatever. Yeah, like I thought that was nicely done. And a very interesting, like, Kess just has to take Neelix's word for it. And he's like, well, when you were taking my word for it before that I was a war hero after you took my word before that I had never been in a war. Now you're gonna have to take my word for it

that I feel bad about telling you that because it's not true. And this is like as great of a performance as Ethan Phillips gives here, Jennifer Leane as Kes has to go back and forth and back and forth on what may be the lie and what may be the truth. There's an equality to the idea that Nielix could have been killed for being a culinary objector, or he could have been killed in the war. Like, both outcomes were just as viable in that moment. And just as dangerous to him.

And she is saying like, you were following your truth at the time, and there is a bravery in that. You know what's interesting is like, Kest, we joke about Kess not knowing whether to believe Nielix or not in this moment or to believe about anything regarding his service or non-service in this war. Yeah. But one thing that no one is questioning is

Jatrel and his story. And Kess in this scene is so willing to get Jatrel off the hook. Her position is like, forgive him to free yourself of these dark feelings. And in this moment in the episode, I was like, fuck no. Don't forgive. But I think she's coming at it from a standpoint of Nielix feels like there's some culpability that he bears because he wasn't like, suiting up and sharpening his Rambo knife, getting ready to take the fight to the Haconians. Like, if he had been a combatant, then maybe something.

Yeah, but that's also imbued with a, you know, you'll never, like the fire you set for your enemy is only going to consume you. Like that, there's, like this conversation is very pregnant with that kind of philosophizing as well. Yeah. Kess is recently read The Art of War. Yeah. Yeah.

Objection noted, we'll do this without you. We'll do it. We'll do it. We'll add. So in six-page, a trail is working with this dank purple smoke that got out of the atmosphere. Mm-hmm. It's pretty righteous.

Yeah. He's blowing clouds. He's, uh, scanning. He is working with the EMH and kind of summarily shuts the EMH off, as we mentioned before. It's just that easy. It's just that easy. And he starts doing this experiment and what starts to happen in the cloud of smoke

is a biomass starts to appear inside the canister. It's like a tentacle coming off of a puddle of goo. It's kind of semi-auto, like, if auto is a little bit sick. This scene was difficult for me to get because when Nelik surprises Jatrel in the scene and he sees what's in the container, he reacts with horror, like this isn't Star Trek. Like whatever's in the container. He reacts with horror, like this isn't Star Trek.

Like whatever's in the container couldn't be something good or bad or indifferent or anything. He looks at it and he recognizes it as something monstrous. And that's where I disconnected with his performance. I was like, how do you know that? What do you recognize in that thing? The hidden saying like, are you doing a bizarre experiment in here?

Is like, Loki, the funniest line in the episode because it's like, uh, you mean the mad scientist that you guys brought on board? Yes, he is. The mad scientist, though we left in Six Bay with no one but the hollow to keep an eye on. Yeah. So he drops Nelix with a tranquilizer and up on the bridge, Janeway wants to check in with the progress going down in the six bay. And when she radio's down there, nobody answers. And so she has to activate Doc Hollow Day who reports that, uh,

Jatrel has left six Bay, Neelix is down and out. He says he seems to have been tranquilized without really any evidence to, to support that theory. Hey, also, uh, Jatrel, use a stronger tranquilizer. Haha. I wonder does the EMH have sensors? Are there sensors built into the room where he wouldn't need a tricorder necessarily? Because there's sensors built into the hollow matrix that he inhabits.

That's interesting. When he looks at Nelix, does he know he's been tranquilized because he can see inside his body? Sort of like rest mode for a game system. Like, is it constantly updating? Yeah. What's going on while it's sleeping? Right. I don't know. I want to know more about this. Yeah. In the context of the show, Doc Hollude seems fairly instantaneously informed about what's happened in his absence, and he relays that to the captain, and then everyone rallies to the transportor room where the computer is told them Jitrel is.

And he is not doing a great job getting the transportor working. He doesn't really know his way around it. He would be getting to lose credibility. And he explains to them, like, listen, I'm actually trying to bring back all of the victims of the Metrion Cascade. This is something I'm actually trying to bring back all of the victims of the metrian cascade. This is something I'm doing to to cleanse myself of the crime

that I committed, basically, but he's got his like scientific papers there and he shows them to the captain and he's explaining that like basically his theories that they can use the transporter to like find all of the genetic information from the people that were vaporized and like reconstitute them on the transporter pad. Just for those like, you know how when you sneeze, all the mist goes into the air and turns into an aerosol, and you know how when you sneeze into a tissue, all those mist particles are together, and you know if you pick up an old tissue out of a waste paper basket, like, like, all those particles will turn

hard. Well, I'm going to take that person mist, and I'm going to turn it into this hard tissue mass. We're going to see if we can make some people again. Are you ready? And Janeway is disgusted by this metaphor. This is a metaphor, Ben. Metaphor! And this is the worst one. Yeah, worst one so far in the episode. Yeah. He's trying to become an unkiller.

And they're like, this is kind of far-fetched, dude. We don't really believe you. Do you know how many trans-order accidents have happened in Star Trek? Do you have any idea how many people we would have to reconstitute if this were to work? You're just making more work for us to trail. It is, but they're like, well, you know, if it does work, it's kind of amazing. And we're here. Like, why don't we give it a try?

I was very curious about why Captain Janeway, as a scientist, first and foremost, was so willing to dismiss this idea out of hand initially. They really needed to convince her to give this a try in a way that surprised me. Well, to Vuck and Janeway both think it's crazy. I think that that's the thing. Like, the trail is trying to make the case

that like you're the victims of your own scientific dogma and this is like new research that will change the way you think about this stuff. How can you teach such dribble? These people are here to learn and you're closing their minds before they even have a chance. And that's like how they get over the hump.

But yeah, like Jatrello feels terrible because he's been trying to kind of undo the harm of this thing that he did for 15 years and like his government won't give him funding. Nobody believes him. He gets laughed out of the scientific conferences and they're like, well, okay, we're going to try this. And so Janeway and Tuvac actually wind up doing the operation on the transporter computer. Well, Trell just kind of is a spectator with Nielix and they watch as

a Tlaxian body starts to materialize on the transporter and it's like it's there for a second and then they're like upping the coherence buffer or whatever. They're upping it and they're like past you know 120% over tolerances and they have to cancel the experiment. Shut it down, Mr. Dubock. And just block its door, splatter, all over the transporter pad. It's likely borrowed the set from Alien Resurrection. It is monstrous, semi-humanoid figures, suspended in liquid that then just break on the

transporter pad and like hair so much hair. More hair than you'd ever imagine. Yeah, and it's because the transporter pad is like a couple of steps up. It's like coursing off of it and into the room. Yeah. And like splashing up on the wall on the other side. It knocks your trell over. He gets some in his mouth.

He's like, oh, this was not worth it. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, My life's work is so gross. It's so much grosser than it was on paper. I mean, you think you can prepare for this. No. The simulations were not this gross. And then as he's as he's spitting it out, he's like, Oh, Nelix. I got a hair in the back of my throat. I hate this. You actually don't have metremia also just while we're all like gathering ourselves and like ringing out or clothing The two fucking Janeway like start slapping Nielix on the back. They're like, hey out of boy. Yeah

Jitrel collapses not because of the wave of Gore that hits him. The metremia got him It's finally taken him to the ground and got him. It's finally taken him to the ground and in 6 Bay we get our button on the episode. Neelix visits his bedside and forgives him. What do you think of that? It's an interesting scene because I don't know if I totally believe that it's a sincere forgiveness for Nelix, but one that maybe he isn't ready to do, but he knows that this is the last opportunity he'll ever have to do it and doesn't want to regret not having done it. This sincerity of forgiveness is dependent on who it's for. is dependent on who it's for. If Nelix is forgiving Chattrel, for Chattrel's benefit, then I think you can deem it sincere. But if Nelix is in there because of what Kess said in an earlier scene about like freeing himself from the shackle that he's put himself in, then it's not.

I think you can read the way Neelix plays this last scene in a lot of different ways, and I think it's a really interesting scene, and I think that maybe the most interesting way to read it is that it is genuine sincerity when he forgives this guy, and he has gone on that journey. And like that's like one of the most beautiful things human beings do for each other is forgive each other our trespasses. And the very name is racist. But I think it's ambiguous and I think it's intentionally ambiguous. And I think that what you read into it is for you as a viewer to process.

I think it's so ambiguous that you could have done without the scene. I think you could have had to trail in the bio bed alone in Six Bay and you could have Nelix outside the door wondering whether or not he should go in and maybe he just keeps walking. I think that does the same thing. And it darkens the end in a way that I would prefer. Like, if you're going to be ambiguous, go ambiguous

dark. Yeah. I know that you like the episode. Adam. Of course, it's long day. What? This one to me, very careful, because I'm going to say this once. I have a hard time with the end of this episode. I did like the episode as a whole. If you were to just weigh it, like most of the episode good. Yeah. Adam's, Adam's fuck me, no fuck you lifestyle makes it very hard for him to process it when a character seems to be apologizing. I was thinking a lot about how you were describing that conflict that as you did. And I was like, yeah, an apology is not a resolution, but it's at least a starting point.

Right. And what's interesting about the the button between Neelix and Detrell isn't just the ambiguity of it, but it's like, Detrelle wasn't there to get forgiven. He never expressed the desire for it. Yeah, he in fact said that he wasn't going to ask for it. And... Does that not answer the question, though, of who the forgiveness is for?

It's for Nelix, then. Yeah. Well, it's like Dan Savage says, closure is not something anyone else can give you, it's something you give yourself. Yeah. And maybe that's what Nelix is doing something anyone else can give you. It's something you give yourself. Yeah. And maybe that's what Nelix is doing is he's given himself closure. I love this episode for Ethan Phillips.

This is like a big comparison, but this is like Robin Williams being Jacob the liar. Like this is, this is like Ethan Phillips being Nelix in this episode. Like, like I was totally struck by it in a way that that is great. Yeah. He took over an episode in the first season that I only wish had happened earlier. So that's how I feel about the episode. What about you? I think that you put it really well. I love the episode for Ethan Phillips. It makes the character someone I look forward to seeing so much more with because up until now,

I could really see like an argument to be made for, let's write this guy off the show. I'm really looking forward to subsequent episodes where Chico Tay renounces his Native American heritage as being a fabrication. Like Kess gets to him too. And he admits to Kess that like that he's been lying about at the whole time.

He's like, it's not really my religion, it's a religion that was made up by the, this is gonna be hard for you to understand, but there are producers on this show who didn't do a lot of vetting when they hired the consultant. If you just look over there, there's a camera there. I know you can't see it. There's actually a camera over there too.

Yeah. You know how like we've said these words to each other a few times and we might do it a few more times and then like go to the crafty table. That's because we're on a show. Yeah. They're just getting coverage of this conversation. I mean, that there was this moment for Nelix gives me hope for Ticote, but I've got a suspicion

that that is misplaced. Do you want to see if we find any misplaced P1s in the inbox? Those are always in the right spot. Priority one message from Starfleet coming in on Secured Channel. Need a supplement on? Priority one message from Starfleet coming in on Secured Channel. Need a supplement on it. supplement on it? supplement

supplement Yes, extra The interest alone could be enough to buy this ship! Adam, we have a few p1s here and the first one is of a promotional nature. Goes like this. Hey fellow friends of DeSoto, come join Jeremy, Andre, Kevin, and Steven, four friends in the four corners of North America.

As we talk gaming, music, life, and any nerdy subject that comes to mind with much cursing. Jeremy is the host in Florida that collects and streams games over the generations. Andrei in Nevada talks music and retro games. Steven in New York talks snacks and his love of the switch. And Kevin in Canada is a fellow collector. And he's Canadian. Give us a listen and chat with us on Twitter. As a call to action here is check out Zen's Path 4 button podcast on iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, Google Podcast and more.

That's the Zen's Path, Z-E-N-S-P-A-T-H, the number four, the word button, Zen's Path 4 button podcast. 4 buttons for corners of North America? Yes. Oh, I get it. I get it. I get it. I'm picking up what they're putting down.

Everyone's got their specialty. They're like the mighty Morphin Power Rangers. They're like the Voltron. I think that the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles might be a more apt comparison, because there's four of them. Yeah, but no one wants to be Don. Yeah. I would never want to call Kevin Don.

Yeah, that's a real Donk on Kevin. Yeah. And also, is there a splinter? If that's the case, we don't know. We'll have to let them kind of resolve that on the Zen's Path 4 button podcast. Yeah, check it out. Yeah, give it a listen.

Our next priority one message is from Dan and Starfleet Academy City. It's to Ben and Adam and the message goes like this. Started listening from the beginning on August 15th, 2019. Remember 2019? Wow. On November 16th, 2020, I finally caught up with the ES9 season 7 episode 14 tentacle man. I listen to the whole Trumpian horror unfold on your show in one year. Wow. I don't know how many lights there are anymore. Ring on the Janeway. Wow. So this was submitted November 16th, 2020. Here we are. Kind of

a lot has changed since that day. The request here is that I mispronounce every word. Well, Dan, couldn't quite do that, Justice. I wanted this message to be understandable. I wanted people to get what you were saying. You've really been through it. An entire year, greatest gen. Yeah, that's like

That's like spending a year hanging out next to the reactor in Chernobyl. I feel like Really do a lot of harm to your cellular cohesion. Yeah Dan's definitely got side effects From that experience, but thank you for listening, Dan. And thanks for getting a P1 Yeah, we have a final and thanks for getting a P1. Yeah. We have a final P1. And thanks for waiting around for it to be read. Yeah.

We have a final P1 here. It is from Jim and it's to Arden. It goes like this. It's so great to share this. The greatest generation was you every week. I can't believe we're on to Voyager now. Halloween when I am. Is there really coffee in that nebula?

Here's to hoping you finally recover that script you wrote for Voyager during your tween years. Check every floppy. Oh, and Happy Birthday to the both of us. Love Jim. Jim and Arden, birthday twins. We should mount a table read of Arden's tweenage. Voyager script. I wrote a script for TNG in my tween years.

Really? It involved a shuttlecraft being used as a car bomb. Wow, check every floppy atom. I want to read that shit. Check every floppy. Yeah. Well, floppies are not how we get priority when messages they come from our podcast network and you can send them to us by going to maximumfund.org.

Slash, jumbo tron. You know, I'm really easy to get along with most of the time. But I don't like bullets, I don't like friends, and I don't like you. You're the toughest dude. Hey Adam. Step in. Did you find yourself a drunk Shimoda?

Drunk Shimoda! I mean, who's the K.I.S agent this episode? It's Jitrel. Yeah. What's his dark secret? What's he trying to accomplish? Is he trying to steal transporter technology or not? He always keeps he guessing until the moment you don't need to guess anymore.

Yeah. You know his dark secret. And I don't know, is this the last slow in episode? We're going to get in Star Trek. It looks like it might be just James slion. We, we stan you 81 years young at the time of this recording. Amazing. Just outstanding work. Yeah.

And I'm glad we get to celebrate it here. So, James Sloyan, my drunks, Shimoda. Yeah, I'm going to join you on the Sloyan Square for the drunk Shimoda's on this episode. Nobody pulls more isle in your chips out of Nielix's life than Dr. Jotrell. They are just in a big pile on the floor by the end of this thing. Yeah. All right, Adam. It's time to decide what we are watching next and how.

I guess we don't decide what we're watching next. That's never an unknown. It's season one episode 15, Learning Curve. Tuvac encouraged the wrath of the make-waste crew members when he's put in charge of a boot camp designed to bring them up to Starfleet standards. It's like an episode of Mori, Jesus. Boot camps were such a thing in the 90s.

What the hell? If Sesca were still on the show, she'd be like, cash me outside. Ha ha ha ha ha. Well, that's exciting. Yeah. I'm heading to gach.bizslashgame where the game of buttholes, the will of the caretaker can be found. And our runabout is currently on square five.

We've got that caretaker square out ahead of us on square five. We've got that that caretaker square out ahead of us on square ten. We could hit that. And I'm gonna go ahead and roll this bone. What do you say? Oh no. This is the caretaker sends the run about to a random square on the board. Yeah. If you hit that. You're required to learn as you play roll roll in a way Shula did I win I rolled the three so we are on square eight Fun you you make it my problem maybe your question to the caretaker Indeed well, that's going to do it for us today. Next week's episode will be the regular style of episode that we've come to know and love on the greatest

generation. Thanks again to everyone that contributed during the Max Fund Drive. We just could not appreciate it more. We are recording this on the first day of the Max Von Drive, so we're We don't have any final numbers for you here, but it was I'm sure a great one Yeah, I mean as much of a mystery as the drive might be to us at the time of this recording. I think it is always really heartening and inspiring and gratitude-inducing to see how much of an effect this show has on people, how many people like the show enough to support it, and all of those things. It's like at the end of every show, we ask for support of the show and then leave it at that, and then the Max Fund Drive is just a time to like really push that front and center, but

It is a yearly reminder I think for everyone Not just the viewer, but for Ben and I as well that this show is I mean the show is dick and fart jokes and I was being dumb But it's more than that too and that is it's a really great thing to be reminded of that during the drive. So thanks to everyone for supporting our shows. Yeah, we hugely, hugely appreciate it. We also appreciate the hard work of the Card Daddy Bill Tilly who runs our social media accounts at Greatest Trek on Instagram and Twitter. Follow those for updates about the shows and our Twitch streams at twitch.tv slash

greatest track and Bill's hilarious baseball cards that he makes about every episode of the show. Very very fun follows if you are a social media user to follow at greatest track and if you want to like join a community there are so many great communities of friends with Disoto all over the internet. Reddit, Facebook, DrunkShemoto.com, Discord Group, etc. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, the Discord Group is, I think, a big, big reason we do the Twitch stream every week now.

True. A reliable source of fun and games for you and me. Yeah. It's good stuff. We got to thank the great Adam Ragusia, who makes the original music for the program. He also, of course, was inspired by Dark Materia, who made the Picard sign, which you are hearing under our voices right now. Adam Ragusia has gone on to be more than just a Star Trek podcast music

maker. He also has a great cooking channel on YouTube so check out Adam Ragusia on YouTube. We're grateful to have him as a good friend of DeSoto. And with that we will be back at you next week with another great episode of Star Trek Voyager and an episode of the greatest generation Voyager where Adam and I are being given the tough love that we need to shape up. You'll be caught up in you and you'll spend the time Make me go make me think it's hot, make it so You'll be caught up, caught up, caught up Maximumfun.org Comedy and culture

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