The Greatest Generation - Dark Matter Deer Blood (VOY S6E20)

Episode Date: October 2, 2023

When Captain Janeway takes an interest in the ship’s biggest losers, a dangerous away mission is her prescription for bringing them back into the fold. But when the Delta Flyer gets away from her and the mission turns into a disaster, letting the dark matter aliens remain a mystery is preferable to letting a jerk end up the hero. What will you never get from a hotel room? Who is the Leah Brahms of the Delta Flyer? How long does the Janeway have to wait for her soup? It’s the episode that would take a no-broken-glass time loop any day of the week!Support the production of The Greatest Generation.Friends of DeSoto for Democracy.Friends of DeSoto for Justice. Friends of DeSoto for Labor.Follow The Game of Buttholes: The Will of the Caretaker!Music by Adam Ragusea & Dark MateriaFollow The Greatest Generation on Twitter, and discuss the show using the hashtag #GreatestGen!The Greatest Generation is on YouTube.Facebook group | Subreddit | Discord | WikiSign up for our mailing list!Get a thing at podshop.biz!

William Shatner wrote, directed, and starred in the fifth Star Trek film in the winter of his 57th year. Over the next three decades, the film has been pilloried as one of the worst entries in the series. But when Shatner had fallen on hard times becoming primarily known as a television pitchman for a travel booking website, The recent share your embarrassment tour earned him a sudden, unexpected second run at celebrity. Well, everyone knows that Star Trek V is a catastrophic failure of a film that nearly ended the franchise.

What this tour presupposes is, maybe it isn't. Let me ask you something. Why would a reviewer make a point of saying someone is not a genius? Do you think I'm especially not a genius? You didn't even have to think about that. Did you? The share your embarrassment tour. Coming to just a few more cities this year.

Tickets still on sale at greatestjentour.com. Here's to the finest crew in Starfleet. Engage. Watch your back, shop. Hello. I'm Captain Captain Brindjeng, what are the U.S.S.S. Boy, Captain Captain Captain

Brindjeng, what are the U.S.S.S. Boy, Captain Captain Captain. Welcome to the greatest generation Star Trek podcast. By a couple of guys who are a little bit embarrassed to be doing a Star Trek podcast by a couple of guys who are a little bit embarrassed to be doing a Star Trek podcast on our YouTube channel. Right now, you're listening, you could be watching, I'm just saying, I'm Ben Harrison. I'm Adam Pryanaka. I like that, like, the way that we start every show is with that clap sink. And, you know, for video, I feel like we're gonna open the show like a magician, like a cheap magician

that you'd get in like a hotel lobby. Like, show begins like this. Right. That's the first thing anyone sees. Yeah, oh yeah, I like it. Welcome. Ha ha ha. Rejoice.

There's the big snifter glass full of singles. You know, the tip money. Get rid of those singles and put some fucking brandy in that snifter. That's what I say. Yeah. Yeah. Make those singles wet. Yeah.

You know that brand of wine glass, Reedle? Yeah, I do, because those are the glasses without the stems, right? They make ones with stems. They make stem wear and non-stem wear. It's a nice, nice brand of wine glass. This is not sponsored content. I ordered some of those for shoot ones because we were doing a cocktail that was presented in a brandy snifter and they make a brandy snifter.

And I was like, who sells brandy snifters? I wonder if Reedle does. And I went online and I looked at the picture and I was like, who sells brandy snifters? I wonder if Reedle does. And I went online and I looked at the picture and I was like, that's a nice looking one. And I ordered it for this shoot. It came, the Reedle brandy snifter is like the size of a basketball. It is so comically big.

What? Yeah. Because I think the deal with a brandy snifter is you're supposed to be able to turn it on its side to fill it up and that's like one serving of Brandy and I don't know why Rital decided that one serving of Brandy is like 18 ounces That's amazing. Yeah, very big glass. I don't know anything about Brandy All I know is that my my Polish grandmother the bopcha loves it And I noticed that she was drinking it

at this big Polish wedding we were at together. I got her a Snifter Brandy. Nice. I don't know the language. I don't know anything. But she seemed very, very grateful for the gesture. What's Polish for Snifter? I have no idea.

Snifed it. I don't know Polish for anything. I'm useless. Adam, we're doing a video code 47 today because so many people have sent us stuff through the mail. Yeah. So many people have sent us stuff through the mail and I have not been to the post office in like two and a half months

to the extent that I'm like getting shit from the postman when I show up to open the PO box. You said this last time. Are you in deep, deep trouble now? He was like, yeah, you haven't picked up in a while. And I was like, oh, I was out of the country. I don't know why I said that. It was just the first thing I thought of.

Wow. And he's like, yeah, well, a lot of people go out of the country and then they don't pay their fee and their box lapses and they get closed. And I was like, yeah, I don't think that's and their boxlapses and it gets closed and I was like, yeah I don't think that's gonna be a problem. Wow, hence the credit card information you've left for them. Yeah, hence the fact that I prepaid a year, like what are you talking about man? Leave me alone. I pay for the fucking box, so the stuff can show up there and I can pick it up at my leisure. I don't know.

Leave me the fuck alone, the postman. You know, postal workers have it hard enough, Ben. Why are you making it so much harder for them? I don't know what it is about this one post office. Like the one that we had at my previous apartment, there was one, you know, like these are both post offices that are walking distance from where I live at the time. My apartment in Echo Park, we had a pretty close by post office.

Everybody there, super nice, super friendly. It was popular post office. You would often get a line when you got there, but when you got to the front of the line, everybody just pleasant as could be. This post office, sleepy, almost never a never align but everybody that works there is a bit of a dick like not a not like an aggressive full blown asshole but they just say a little dick is shit every single time I go there. Well, maybe if you went back with a greater frequency, you'd see their attitudes change

a little bit. Maybe they'd be happy to see you next time. If you returned maybe two weeks from now. Can you stick to a two week schedule, you think? I don't, here's the thing. I don't need to. I brought so many packages home that we have enough for today's code 47 and the next one without any new things coming. Okay, we better get into these then. Yeah, I was not expecting such a load. I'm receiving a code 47 verify. It is code 47, sir, starkly emergency frequency. Captions eyes only. We got a great big load today. First one is one that was actually here in my office for the previous code 47. And as I opened all of the other packages,

the packaging fell on the floor and covered the box. And I realized later on, like what I had done, I left one in the field. Yeah. You're never supposed to do that to a Navy SEAL. That's a bad feeling. Yeah, no Navy SEAL would leave a fallen soldier behind covered in packing tape and paper.

This one is from Andrew D in Meadows Place, Texas. Sorry, Andrew, that it took us so long to get to this one. Andrew's getting concerned. Worry no more, Andrew. Is there a packing tissue in here? Oh, Andrew. Nice packing tissue in here. Oh boy. That's the kind of packing tissue that usually covers up some thong underwear. This is the packing tissue of Italy or Mexico. And you're only going to get that if you're watching the episode.

So glad you're leading so hard into the visual humor. Multiple pages of letter, so probably have to trim this down a little bit in the edit. Here we go. Dear Adam and Ben, I know you don't remember me, and why would you? We've never met. A few years ago, there was a priority one message from one brother to another in which the sender compared himself as the lore to his brother's data. Well, it me.

I wanted to say that my brother and I have gotten countless hours of laughter and enjoyment from your podcast. I know you get this a lot, but hearing you guys every week means a lot to us. And closed, you will find a very rare item that I'm sure you will appreciate as collectors of Star Trek items, a la Kivas Fajo. It is a printed and bound Star Trek items, ala Kivas Fajo. Luhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhluhl area. The only info I could find is the full of the blurry newspaper photographs of like feet sticking out of sheets. Oh no! They called themselves the USS Scorpion. Apparently, Wuppie G and Majel B made submissions. So it seems like this group had some reach back in the day. There are tons of recipes here and a nice drawing of warf on the cover.

I'm not sure if any of the recipes are good, perhaps this could become a square on the game of buttholes, a little of the sulabon where when you go to a Star Trek Enterprise, drop in, it's been a long time. A lot of direction on this weather. Yeah, I mean we're not going back to this one to re-edit. You could record the pod at the same time as you make a dish, just like dinner in a movie. At the end, you could review the dish, like in factory seconds. It isn't a great idea, but it is an idea nonetheless.

With that, I will say thank you again for everything you've given us, friends, and to Soto. We're lucky to have devoted content creators such as yourselves to entertain us. It's sincerely Andrew. P.S. please come back to Houston. I missed you when you played the Whiteout music hall and I will never be able to live with myself for it. Wow! Well, never playing the Whiteout music hall again, but we'd love to come back to Houston. We love Houston, but yeah, that venue kind of fucked us up. So this is the book.

Not bad. And it is indeed a nice drawing of warf. I miss tight-bun warf. Yeah. Yeah. That is like notebook illustration by the Arty Kid in school grade, warf, warf drawing. I really love that style of binding.

I loved messing around with that binding when I was in school. Like pulling the the tines out. Yeah. So they'd go on the other side of the binding and then I'd put them back in. I love that this exists. Oh man, full color on some of these pages. What's the recipe that WIPI-G donated? Can you find it? I'm gonna see if I can page through real quick and turn it up. Yeah. I've gotten to the index and I'm just scanning through it. I'm gonna go to a recipe called Next Best Thing

to Commander Riker, just because I can't help but figure out what that could possibly be. That's gotta be a size of recipe, right? Mix together one cup of flour, one stick of butter or margin, one half cup or more of chopped pecans and walnuts. What is it though? You're just reading the ingredients.

Oh, it's like a chocolate layer cake. Oh. So this is for Troy to eat. That's what's going on here. I see. If she can't be with him, she can be with the cake. Oh, here it is. I found it. I found whoopies. It's called Gaiden's Gupe. This is a versatile appetizer spread that works as a cocktail dip

or sandwich filling for a child's lunch. Okay. It's also a floor wax. It tastes terrific. And just look at that shine! Once seven ounce can of tuna packed in water, one eight ounce package of cream cheese, one half of a lemon, juice, one tablespoon, finely chopped dill weed,

and two tablespoons of sweet pickle relish. Combine all ingredients, spread on pumpernical, crackers, etc. and serve at any occasion. I get to tell you, Ben, I'm a tuna fish man. Yeah. I love eating the fish of tuna, and I've never mixed my tuna with cream cheese before. That is an interesting combination.

That's enough to go viral, I would say. I mean, that's how you make a mousse. You need something with the thickness Wow screen grab that if you're if you want to make guidance goopay Which has a helpful God next to it I've got to believe that whoopee did not name that dish right that comes straight from her Did not name that dish, right? Did that come straight from her?

Amazing. That's what it says. I mean, she's a professional comedian, so... Go pay. Very funny. Yeah, that rolls. Well, that's a great submission. Very excited to look through that.

Yeah, maybe that'll be a square on the game of buttholes down the road. Yeah. A make a recipe from the book and Share about it. Maybe we can do a crossover episode with Adam Rekusia and do some some Star Trek recipes on his show. I think that's fine Yeah, while we're here on YouTube. let's not try and do any YouTube synergy. That guy only eats tilapia fish. So if we could make... Right out of the pot that he cooked it in.

If we could make a whoopies gupe with the tilapia instead of the tuna, I think he'd be game. This next one here is from Mr. Steven C. in San Leandro, California, right next door to my hometown of Oakland. Love to hear from the San Leandrons. Alright, here we go. The comparatively short note, guys. Dear Ben and Adam, longtime supporter, first time code 47er. Thank you for all the fantastic pod and the excellent communities that they have inspired.

I meant to hand this to you in person at the SF Double Dumbass show, but I got sick and couldn't go, so here you go. Hope you enjoy it. PS, what's up all my exo-cooks? Please play the exo-cook drop I made, hopefully either Bill or the goose sensitive. I know 45 is a long amount of seconds for a drop, so if you want me to make a shorter version, let me go. All right, let's see what has been sent.

Nice to even have a weird little package here. Some wax paper. Oh, Quarks bar and restaurant deep space menu from the Las Vegas Hilton. This is amazing. OK. Okay. Wow. So this is back when there was a fully licensed star trek thing in Vegas,

which will never exist again. But this is the actual menu from Horks Restaurant. Isoleneer chips and dip. Mmm. Lita's soup, which I think you know how you order that. Lito, lito, lito, lito. Oh, yeah. I remember now. The salad of K-Las. Wow, a warrior salad.

That's what I- Just a Caesar salad with chicken breast. Yes, but the chicken was dead and now it is alive! Hahaha! Some of these are real stretches. Barbecue continuum pizza? Hmm. No, because the cue continue? We.

No, nothing wormhole related? Hmm? Wormhole wings. Not a wormhole dish. Hmm. The wrap of con. Oh, no. Hahaha. The wrap of con. Oh, no.

That's fun, now. You know what, that's all we had, and now we don't even have that. Yeah, yeah. Sucks. Whoa, you could do weddings there. 24th century weddings day. You should mail that to creation with a posted note that says, see?

You can't just name things in a fun way to make things more fun for people. Yeah yeah. Desert menu is called the final frontier which I like. Yeah you guys have room for the final frontier? Yeah we'll take a look at the menu. Of course. Couldn't hurt. Boy, that's a lot of fun. Thank you for sending that in, Steven. I will cherish this. Or Adam, we'll figure that out later. Don't you wish that place still existed?

I sure do. I sure do. You go to the Westgate anymore, and not a fun place to be without a Star Trek exhibit. Yeah, it's just sad. Without a Star Trek exhibit. Yeah, it's just sad. Without a Star Trek wing. Hmm. Next thing we've got here is a package from Corey H and Burnaby B.C.

We've met Corey before, Adam. Sure have, yeah. Couple of times, I think. If you're from Burnaby, are you known as a burner? Oh, yeah. You got to throw your phone away at the end of the day. Yeah. All the time.

All right. Got a note here. Dear Adam and Ben, I made you guys a custom expert inimoto war deck because I missed that segment on TGG and because this card game is how I started working in games writing, of the use of Star Trek and Star Wars CCGs. 30 years later, I'm starting work on my 6th AAA video game title.

If my buddy and I hadn't sat down to crack open two brand new Trek TNG CCGs starters, I'd probably be slinging hash somewhere, Jesus. Hmm. This is like the classic rapper brag, like if I wasn't rapping, I'd be selling, I'd be slinging hash. Anyway, the letter does not go short enterprise, so real quick, the cards all have some connection maybe most readily apparent to the Uxbridge family of shows. Also I keep saying it that way because there's a card in there called Friendly Fire, but that's not a fun thing

But a bummer thing. I apologize and please feel free to drop a Lego Sherman tank on it And the deck is not remotely game playable though. It should be well suited for some trick war Also included a first addition I think of the first contact novelization A first addition, I think, of the first contact novelization, as well as a copy of Patrick O'Brien's Master and Commander. This handwritten letter has already gone on too long. So let me close by saying I'm sorry we got rid of our printer because I have no idea if I have legible handwriting anymore. Guess we'll find out together.

Thanks again for years of great pod. As long as you guys are willing to keep being a little bit embarrassed, I'm on board. As long as the ship is flying. Cheers, Cory. So we have a magic-thegathering box here. Let me see if I can figure out how to open this box. Oh yeah, here we go. Now look at those.

Yeah, yeah. Right on top, the on top the man the myth Captain DeSoto cool. There's our guy. That's great. Got the USS Hood Edmund Naccia Kevin Uck's bridge friendly fire The line must be drawn here wall of ships. We got to play a game sometime We've we've threatened to do that for years and years and just I know. How do you do that? on a show How do you play a game on a show? It seems boring as hell We got a couple of copies of master commander. Hey, that's great. I want one of those

Yeah, one for you one for me. Cool. And one copy of first edition novelization. First contact. Oh, you got a bubble wrap that one. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, I mean, it's made out of Lego, so it would probably come apart in the shipping if you didn't bubble wrap it so cool Yeah, that looks great With an exclusive behind the scenes look at the making of the film for half of its pages No, yeah, it seems like

Yeah, there's like some pictures in here. All right Is that from Cochran shaking a hand with with Vulcan when Lily should have been the one doing it? Etc. Yeah. Cool. Yeah. I mean, I think you, Cory.

I hope the novelization is more about Lily than the movie ever was. Lily, of course, first contacts true hero. Truly. Another package here, this one's from Zenvia F in Brisbane, Australia, Adam. This one has come quite a long distance to get to us. Another handwritten letter, boy. The friends of the soda are really testing me today. Zenovia has beautiful handwriting. Oh that's good. Here we go. Zen here, writing to you from the other end of the alphabet and Australia. I know your mailbox slash basement gets flooded with lots of gushy sentiment, but I'm

another FOT benefiting from your niche balance of gutter humor and compassion. Hi, my own embarrassing activity is crafting very silly soap bars. I hope this one translates. There are four pips. But actually, as the bar wears down, you'll find that exclusive fifth light was inside all along. Elusive, not exclusive. They're unsurprisingly bergamot-centred for the Earl Grey element. How does the box smell been? Well, I have a bit of a cold, but the box does smell real nice.

It's got a something wood and honey vibe that to me says, Horgon holiday, so you can wash your mouths out properly. There's one for each of you, plus one for an FOD, friend of Disopo. Hmm, absolutely. Thanks for all theOD friend of Disopo? Absolutely. Thanks for all the good part and making my brain work better. Love from Daonanda, Zenovia, and Brisbane. So it looks like Zenovia has her own company called Slippy Boys.

Oh, I like that name. And also included a bin chicken appreciation society, sticker? Oh yeah. I have no idea what that is in reference to. Definitely pro bin chicken. That must be some kind of poisonous bird that they have down in Australia, right? Sure.

Everything's poisonous there. That cool, already tapes that people use. Oh, look? Sure. Everything's poisonous there. That cool, arty tapes that people use. Oh, look at that. Look at those great soaps. Really cool. And as a command uniform soap handcrafted for discerning weirdos. That belongs at a booth at a convention.

It really does. Sonobia, if you're at Star Trek Las Vegas, you would be raking it in. Yeah. Yeah, I don't think Soap came in the rooms at the Rio. I'm not making a comment about the attendees. I'm making a comment about the Rio. Yeah. Slippy Boys is on Etsy and it looks like on social media at slippy.boys Boys spelled B O I S. So I don't know if this particular bar will be for Sailor

if that's just for us, but thank you so much for sending that in and for sending it such a long way. It's an Ovia. I hate to note someone's great business idea, but I don't think slippy or slippery boys V O I S is search engine optimized for your specific business. My dice suggests like slippery boys not sex stuff it's actually soap like in parentheses. Yeah I did notice that. Let's get you there. We sent that in tasteful discreet packaging.

Yeah, yeah. I appreciated that about it. Keep doing that. All right, one last package here Adam. This is the big package of the day. It's from H. Ezekiel Sauer out of Oklahoma City. Mm-hmm. I feel like it's sent in stuff before.

Yeah. out of Oklahoma City. I feel like I've sent in stuff before. Yeah. We've got some bubble wrap big. Oh god. It's like a sleeve of wizard you got in your lab. We've got a Elkars themed letter here. Dear Ben and Adam, this is a follow-up from the packages sent around the beginning of 2023. I felt bad that I only had one of these and I wanted you both to have one, so I scoured around and was able to find another book and a bunch more pages as well. I hope between all these you can complete the set and will have extras to sell or keep

for backup in case you spill a beverage on them during a drunken so. Perhaps you could work these into a new Marin Open or include it in your Bible study bit. Anyway, I hope you guys enjoy it. Thanks again for being amazing podcasters. You are an adding tremendous amount of joy to my life every day. Your loyal viewer and forever FOD, H.C. Heal Sour. Mmm. So this is a...

This is a duplicate. This is a dupe of that ring binder book. Oh wow. We got last time and so additional pages for the book. You know, I didn't realize I was missing that until just now. That is amazing. Look at this haunted picture of Quarks makeup half on. Wow. It's amazing.

It's just like a hat with your flaps. Yeah. It's a fedora with safari flaps in the back. It doesn't even really look like arm and shimmyman or quark in that photo. It really doesn't even really look like Armand Shimmerman or Quark in that photo. It really doesn't. Now, it looks like a Halloween store costume like big eared alien costume. Picture of a bane. Oh yeah. That's pretty good. They're big. Oh here's a picture of a beloved Star Trek character Andy Dick. Oh yeah. I'm glad was in an episode for sure. One of the great.

No weird feelings about that. Oh man, this is great. So, so many pages. Well, thanks to all the FODs who thought to send us some gifts in the mail. Here's another page that we have no regrets about as Star Trek fans. Just glad that episode exists and no complicated feelings whatsoever. Yeah, just keep pulling out pages that we have strange feelings about, Ben. Okay, if you insist, I will keep doing that. Oh yeah. Yeah. Perfect.

keep doing that. Oh yeah. Yeah. Perfect. What do we do? Let's go back and review the next generation right now. It's somehow better when the images are big. You know, like we've seen these on little baseball card size images for years and years, but feels good to see him big like that. Oh my god, champion standing from some of these stills that they picked. Yeah, that's real built-ill-free, free-stream quality there. No kidding, wow. Well, thanks to everyone who sent stuff in. We should probably get to the episode. We've been recording for a long time and haven't reviewed any Star Trek yet, Adam. If you'd like to send to something in the mail that Ben will go pick up from a post office between four and six weeks from now,

get it, hold a bill, Tilly. He'll screen your package carefully and thoroughly, and make sure the right ones get to us. Do it. Thanks, everyone. Okay Adam, why don't we get to the episode we came to talk about today. It's Star Trek Voyager Season 6 Episode 20. Good Shepherd. We get a first episode of Star Trek, the next generation of the next generation of the next generation of the Unless you've got something a little bigger in your torpedo tubes, I'm not turning around.

We get a first episode of Star Trek, the next generation style camera fly through. Shot here. Yeah. Feels good. I like this shot a lot. Great zoom in and I've really nicely done a fact showing the exterior of the ship and then showing us right where Janeway's office is in relation to the bridge, the conning tower. I don't know what you call that. The windows are for grief or lovemaking, though, unstarfully chips. I'm not sure what exactly Janeway's doing with hers. Yeah, just looking out of it. That's her broth window. We get a little morning briefing from Chico Te, just kind of like some,

here's some business of the ship stuff. Hey, just reminding you I'm here. She's like, carry on. Away from me, preferably. If you need time off to chisel a bathtub or whatever, you're welcome to do that. Sounds great. I like that there's some delineation here in this scene, right?

Some stuff just isn't worth Voyager's time, but the Delta Flyer is just right for this kind of job. They're passing by something a little too boring for the big ship, so they'll send the little ship out to take a look. I like it. Yeah, there's some stuff that is not going to be a worth diverting. So Jakote walks onto the bridge and we get some nice

ship board business here as well. You know, he tells Tom to get a way team together for this Delta Flyer mission and then we start sort of following instead of Jakote I'm much more Interesting and fully developed character and I pad around the ship It's years of film and television training that has made this scene feel to me like outbreak It's going airborne like I love a passing the story baton between people type of sequence,

but like whenever you see it especially at the level of an iPad, I'm thinking like viral touching of a bunch of different crew people. It's can't get it out of my head. Yeah, this is not gonna be good for anyone that comes in contact with the iPad, it's a good thought. Yeah.

Got to wipe that thing down. It gets to astromatrix where seven wants to boost something, so that gets it sent down to engineering where the bedron lady that brings it to BLT gives her the information that they're gonna need some more power in one of the scanning systems and BLT dispatches someone down to deck 15, where it finds it's a final home in the hands of a guy named Mortimer who's going to have to

like physically turn the knob that turns up the power. This all seems like stuff it could should be something that you can access from engineering by just like pressing a button on a screen, but it's all done manually on Voyager. Or at least like you hit a button in engineering and then a light flash is on deck 15 and then Mortimer here and hits say corresponding button down there. Yeah, like it's one of those things like in like a World War II movie when you see somebody like yell into a horn and have audio ricocheting through a pipe down to the engineering section of the boat or whatever.

More like horn of plenty of orders. That thing won't shut up. Yeah. Dick 15 seems like a real shitty place to work. It's on the bottom of the birdie of the Voyager because the camera falls out of this porthole and we see the Voyager from the outside as we began the sequence. So nice little book end here visually.

Yeah, like the camera flew into the mouth and out through the anus of the Starship Voyager over the course of this opening section. Deck 15 is the anus in this comparison? Well, it's like the lower intestine and then that porthole is the sphincter. Right. Where Mortimer hangs out.

I mean, you're bad. After the theme, we're back with the Bejorin from the cold open. Her name is Tal Celis, and she's under the sheets of the flashlight, and she's got a roommate that she may or may not be keeping up. Also, she's under the sheets radioing Billy. Ben, this is a way we used to record podcasts sometimes. Like if we're away from the studio, you got to do a sheet show. Yeah, under the bed sheet. You got to keep the other person awake with your fucking sheet show. And the other bed, because you're famously a two queen beds hotel room person. Enjoy my own bed when I can have one to myself.

If there were two king beds, I would take that every time. Why isn't that a thing? I think you're losing very little space between the beds by going to kings. Two kings never happens. It's always two queens. It maxes out of two queens. I don't get it.

I keep waiting for a hotel that has two ply toilet paper also, but we're never going to get that either. Yeah. Billy is on the other line here and Billy has been woken up with this bullshit. Can I? Billy, don't you dare go back to sleep. Tal, Celis can't figure out this complicated formula that she's been tasked with. And Billy is like, well, we can't do this over the phone. It's too complicated. So we can meet or we can meet in some other way,

but Tal doesn't want to get out of bed, so that's it. Like, she's not going to get the solution to her problem. No. What do you make of Billy having all this glass on his nightstand? Like, Billy is a bottom bunk, but also has a nightstand with two glass glasses and a glass to counter. That seems dangerous for the top bunker. It really does.

I always hesitate to put a glass of water at my bedside just because I've never done this, but I'm terrified of groping for something on my nightstand in the middle of the night and knocking water over and having a bunch of broken glass on the floor. If I'm stuck in a time loop and I keep waking up Beverly Crusher by hearing voices and knocking over the glass on my nightstand, I don't have a glass on my nightstand because I don't want to know. I will happily do this time loop forever. Pretty good time. Yeah. Hit me with that no broken glass time. Everyday the week. Yeah. So we get a McLaughlin group.

Is your one about sevens big report on ship efficiency and several key departments are being drags down by dead weight in the form of these three engines that have been kind of highlighted over the course of our opening sequence. She absolutely shoots her assimilation nodules at everyone's nuts around the table like you're nuts get shot you're're nuts get shot. Tuvac you think you're safe If you'll range the phasers and the weapons locker so that the smaller rifles were in front They could be more easily removed in the event of an emergency Fasers big faces. Oh look into it those Vulcan nuts are getting shot Everyone's getting a little yeah, I mean mean, Duvac gets off pretty light

compared to everyone else, but. Seven's great at this. We learn about these three kind of like low effort and sins. We've got Mortimer who basically he has a galaxy brain. He's like one of those kids that does really bad in school because he's bored by the material. He's too smart for it. And so he wants to be left alone with a super low stakes job

so he can work on all his calculations. We've got Billy, the sort of, you know. Mr. Telfer is a hypokondriac. Probably as more sick days on his record than anyone else in Starfleet. Yeah, I didn't really get the sense that he and Celeste had like a romantic relationship. I think they're just friends, right? I think Billy would find anyone else's body gross and something to get sick from.

Yeah. So he can't risk a romantic relationship. But yeah, so he's always checking into six bay and always getting a doctor's note to get out of assignments. Then we've got Celeste who is just not cutting it in the brains department, not smart enough to really be in starfully like that. Yeah. Bunch of losers, according to seven.

And it's interesting that they're like people that would have washed out and it makes sense that they would have washed out if the ship was in the alpha quadrant. There were somewhere for them to wash out too. Yeah, I mean, they're holest plugged. They got nowhere else to go. How much did you want that soon? Like, that scene done it exactly that way. It really did make me think about those people that you know,

Tuvak was trying to whip into shape in season one and we're there at and like whether they're thriving now. I mean those folks were whipped successfully. These three have been nannied. Yeah, just watch him. I'll say it again, I think Seven is just the perfect person to tighten up the reins of any situation. She cuts through the bullshit and goes right at you. The trouble is with the scene like this, is that like she's trying to improve the efficiency,

but everyone around the table is of the opinion that efficiency can't be improved. Like, you get what you get with these folks, and like, in some cases, you might be able to do better by working without them at all. Right. There's like a case to be made for like, hey, just take them off the hook.

Like they don't have to contribute. That's fine. The idea that Chicoete floats, that they could just get fired to be passengers or something, kind of blew my mind. Like I wish there was a little more detail to that moment in that thought, because Chicoete tells Janeway,

you know, like they're not even wearing pips, you just get their uniforms back, give them to someone else. But then what happens to these people? Do they just get a free ride? Like it's a fucking cruise ship? Well, it's from each according to his ability, to each according to his need.

Like, that's the kind of vibe in the federation, right? Yeah. I guess it can't be the vibe on a starship though, two each according to his need. That's the kind of vibe in the federation, right? I guess it can't be the vibe on a starship, though, because the resources are too strained. And people keep getting killed week after week. They're eventually going to run out of folks. Yeah. Need some warm bodies, sitting on the bench for backup. Pretty interesting scene just between Janeway and Ticoate talking about that, you know, these

people fell through the cracks and Janeway is going to take responsibility for the fact that they haven't been properly motivated or they haven't been properly inspired. There's a moment where she stands up into frame and it's the captain and Chicoate, like, knows to knows in one of those, those like they're standing too close together for real life but it looks right on TV. Yeah. Camera close is so different. Yeah and like they're rim lit in this way that makes them stand out against the background such that it almost had a will and Tom Reiker nose to nose energy in this shot. Will and Tom Riker knows to know his energy in this shot. It's so difficult to make that case.

Like, I remember in my corporate video days, like getting two management figures to stand next to each other and deliver dialogue to camera, like, they were never comfortable being that close. Yeah. Cause no one's comfortable being that close. There are social conventions surrounding this and violating them at work Just feels so wrong. Yeah, it feels wrong, but it looks so right on camera So good. What have you got in mind captain?

Janeway, I don't know because she's bored or something sees these folks as a project Yeah, a project that is her responsibility. So she goes and invites a couple of them on this away mission. She goes and finds Celis and Billy, who happen to be in the same place at the same time. So she has an easy time telling them that they're going on the away mission, but then she has to go spolunking on deck 15 for Mortimer. There's another loser on deck 15 that she even has some conversation with and he seems to be doing fine down there. Crimin Mitchell, how have you been? Never better, man.

I like this other guy. Like I wish we knew that person more. It turns out you can get stations to deck 15 if you wail on guitar too loud for the rest of the ship, I guess. Yeah. It's weird how different Tom Morello looks when you just put a uniform on him. Like he's not covered in loaf. Yeah. He's not covered in makeup, but he's not even doing anything that like rocks that much, you know?

But he's not even doing anything that like rocks that much, you know? Yeah, he's he's not playing air guitar at all even and yet he just blends into the operations of deck 15 seamlessly just a stunning performance by Tom Morello here. I wonder what the story is behind this like Was he just a fan of the show and called this agent? Could we do that? Could we call our friend an agent and just say we're a fan of the show and we want to get on it?

Have a couple of speaking lines? The last time we called our friend an agent about anything we got rooted from Atlanta to Toronto. Fuck. Okay, don't do that. Don't do that. Yeah, I'm going to go a little while before the next phone call, I think. Yeah, fair enough.

Sometimes Star Trek's pretty good at shooting that Captain walking through a corridor with a bridge officer scene, and like when people pass going the other way, they'll get kind of the star power recognition of another crew person. And that's typically all you get, but it's really fun to see someone kind of blown away by holy shit, that's Captain Janeway, and she's all the way down here. Yeah.

I like that he's not like scared or anything about it. He's just kind of blown away at how unusual it would be. Like, like he knows it's beneath her to be there. She is on a totally different social strata than him. Like, obviously, like, her rank is way higher, but also, they just would never have any reason to speak to one another. So, like, you know, she knows his name

and like, they exchange some like, extremely light pleasantries, but there's some real tension in terms of status in that, in that little interaction that I thought was really well done. You hear about this all the time, like what happens to child actors when fame just kind of breaks their brains. Yeah. But like you see a little bit of that effect here where, where like, Janeway can't have a normal interaction with anyone because everyone treats a disser performance.

Right. Except for Mortimer. Like, Mortimer is uniquely unimpressed by the four Pips. She goes down there and like, just big dogs the shit out of him because he's really excited about this theorem that he's working on that'll disprove someone's multiple big bang argument and she knows enough theoretical astrophysics to be on top of exactly what he's trying to do and tell him it's never going to work. Chico che chate convincing me that multiple bangs were possible. He couldn't pull it off.

convincing me that multiple bangs were possible. He couldn't pull it off. It ended up being a theory. Few men can. I like how she's sort of a master of all conversational trades here too. Like Mortimer is so quick and such an expert in his field of study, you think that maybe he'll get Janeway off balance here

conversationally? No way! Janeway's got this gear too. Yeah, she has the gear. What do you know about my expertise? As much as I need to. He has to go meet up with her and the rest of these lower decks in the As lab where the mission briefing goes down.

You know, it's a, we're going to go through this area with a bunch of tantalizing anomalies and we're gonna scan them and you're gonna look for life forms and you're gonna, you know, do astrophysics on them and I don't remember what all the different jobs are. Yeah, it's a real rundown of the thing but like the main takeaway of the scene is like, after these three fuck off because O600 is coming around the corner pretty fast. Seven's like, you know you could die doing this.

Like you die by putting together the wrong team on Star Trek. It happens all the time. And you should know. So I was like, weren't you in that McLaughlin group earlier? Did you not see my whole thing about, like, how these are the worst people on the ship? So, Janeway tells seven the story of the scorpion and the shepherd. She's like, one day there was a shepherd who attempted to cross a fast-moving river with his flock.

And for some reason, there was a scorpion there. with his flock, and for some reason there was a scorpion there. And the shepherd convinced the scorpion that they should make a podcast together, even though there was much evidence that it would end poorly for everyone involved. Over and over, the scorpion promised. Things would be fine, but then the shepherd, the scorpion, and all the sheep drowned. It turned out the scorpion was not ready. Sevens like, I do not understand the story at all. And she doesn't have to.

We cut over to the mess hall where Nielix and BLT and Paris can't help but notice, Heron alone in the lunchroom. And this is such a visceral scene for anyone who had a hard time in middle school. Anyone who ever ate alone in the lunchroom. Yeah. I don't like that Paris is dared to have a conversation. That seems socially mean. It does. But what's meaner is Heron not giving a fuck at all

about smashing Paris's nuts to smithereens through the attempt. It's a shame. I mentioned a good steedius up at the helm. It's like the teen comedy where like the popular boy bets someone that he can like turn the nerdy girls life around and he goes up there and like kicks it during, and she's like, fuck off!

Get the fuck away from me! Am I a bet? Am I a fucking bet? I don't want a victim blame here, but I think you got to make the tell to flyer the subject of the conversation, right? Like, hey, you know, when you're in the delta flyer, you gotta be careful of those knobs.

Yeah, yeah. I design those knobs. So when you touch those knobs, you're in the Delta Flyer, you got to be careful of those knobs. Yeah. Yeah. I design those knobs. So when you touch those knobs, you're touching me. And my knobs. What's your down here? I'm very much the Leob Brahms of the Delta Flyer, and so go ahead and touch the knobs all you want.

I'm not going to feel weird about it at all. Am I making any sense here? Heron is not nice here. And it's in this scene that I recognized Heron and the actor who plays him for who he is. Did you recognize this guy? I did not. There was a movie that I watched over and over again as a kid.

And I can't explain why because once I recognized the actor from this movie, I looked it up, and I was like, this movie wasn't popular. No one watched this movie. It's called The Boy Who Could Fly. Do you remember seeing that as a kid? I've never heard of The Boy Who Could Fly. Maybe if you wish hard enough. And love long enough.

Anything is possible. Weird little movie about a boy who could fly. Uh-huh. Like, sold in the room. But I watched this movie over and over and over again. Wow. And J. Underwood is at star. He was much nicer in that movie, as I recall.

He wasn't the asshole that he was here. Wow. Hey, he was in that he was here. Wow. Hey, he was in it with Fred Savage. Yeah! Right? I got to get that platinum gift that roll, a little bit of large rich here. I got to get that platinum gift that would not be selling a heist.

God. How would you like to have dinner ready tonight in two minutes? Seriously, two minutes. I couldn't believe it either, but that's how they do it at Factor Meals. And you know how much of a skeptic I am, right? So I was like, sure, two minutes is great, but I could make a play to crap in two minutes. How good could it be? The answer?

Really good. I still can't believe it. Factor food sent me and my wife six meals to try. Every single one was a banger. And these aren't frozen TV dinners either. Everything is fresh, never frozen, and the meals were like nothing I've ever gotten in a meal delivery service. Premium ingredients like broccoli, leeks, truffle butter, and last time you got truffle butter in a box. And how useful is a 2 minute prep time? How about no prep time?

Think about lunch at the office. Factor meals have effortless wholesome meals like grain bowls and salad toppers that are ready to eat when you're on the go. No microwave required. This is a sponsor of the show that I'm really excited about. So head to factormeals.com slash scar50, and use the code Scarves50 to get 50% off. That's code Scarves50 at FactorMeeals.com slash Scarves50 to get 50% off. It's the final week of co-optober. I'm Richard Roby, producer, and I'm here with

KT Wigman, Operation Specialist, to cap off National Co-op Month. We're sharing how worker-owned co-ops can benefit their communities. Read about it in our newsletter, or on social media at MaxFun HQ. We're also trying to do our part. We're volunteering at our local food bank this week, and we encourage you to volunteer in your area too.

On Friday, we're announcing the donation that you helped raise in the post-MaxFun Drive sticker sale, going to five food banks across the US. And we want to make sure that you know this is your last chance to get our limited edition Launch Crew merch. Grab a pin, hat, shirt, or hoodie before they disappear at the end of the month. Details on merch, resources for volunteering, and all things co-optober can be found at maximumfund.org slash co-optober. That's CO, OP, T-O-B-E-R.

Thank you so much for your support and a great co-optober! People say not to judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree. Which is why here on Justice Zoo of us, we judge them by so much more. We rate animals out of ten in the categories of effectiveness, ingenuity, and aesthetics, taking into consideration each animal's true strengths, like a pigeon's ability to tell a mone from a Picasso or a polar bear's ability to play basketball. Guest experts like biologists, ecologists, and more join us to share their unique insight into the animal' world. Listen with friends and family of all ages on MaximumFun.org or wherever you get podcasts. That night, Towsales get to calm call from Billy.

Billy wants to call out sick again, but she will not let him off the hook here. She does not give a shit. O600 is moments away. And she just straight up hangs up on him. And I love the physicality of a combat hang up. Yeah. I like the big arm swing. I do too. I feel really bad for Towsales' roommate, not only because she's constantly like up late at night, but also because they live in a future where all phone calls are speaker phone. Yeah. Like you can't take a private phone call and start track.

You're really right about that. No one had an earpiece except for Ahura. Yeah, she was the last person in history that had AirPods. Damn. What a sad day that was when the AirPods went away. Yeah, yeah. The day the AirPods died.

They just worked. Yeah. In 6 Bay, the doc isn't going for it either. No. Not going to grant a 6 day from 6 Bay. And also, what's he doing with a medical tricorder? Billy shouldn't have one of those. Yeah.

Well, Billy does have. Which I locked onto right away, is slippers. You see him slipping around the ship? I like to slipers, I like to his sleep outfit. It's like the under uniform, you know? Yeah. Because it's not like when we've seen Janeway

like up in her apartment late at night with her action jacket off, it's still got the high, you know, mock turtle neck collar. And he doesn't have that on this sleep out fit. Even in a mid market hotel or low to mid market hotel even, they'll give you the hotel slippers in the plastic bag. That's what these look like. They're useless to me.

They're always way too small. They don't make a hotel slipper in size 13. You have enormous feet, don't you? I do. I got big honkers. My feet fit right into hotel room slippers. Oh, that must be nice. With room to spare. Good for you Adam. Good for you, man. Good for you. Good for you. They're useless though. They're too flimsy. Yeah. Well,

they're just for that one visit, you know, it's not like they're washing them and reusing them. God, I hope not. On the mission, we get the sense that Celeste is kind of the suck up copycat group person that Billy would rather hide in the back and that Mortimer is a real don't care. He isn't interested in being easy to talk to or easy to get along with. He's downright hostile in this scene. Yeah. Well, if there's anything I can do to help relieve your guilt, please let me know. I'll keep that in mind. The conversation turns to like where he grew up and Janeway kind of

innocently suggests that maybe that's why he has an interest in astrophysics or whatever. And he gets up on his high horse about like genetic determinism and like how where he grew up has nothing to do with what he's interested in. And we learned that he didn't want to be in Starfleet really. He wanted to be at the Institute of Cosmology and this was like a requirement for matriculating there. It was like do do a little time on a starship and his starship happened to be the one that got lost in space. Amazing. Terrible fucking luck. We crashed. Some people really got it off.

But also there's that class thing I was talking about earlier in this scene again, where like, Janeway's concern with him is not something that he treats as being sincere. He basically flouts this as this like, no bless oblige that he doesn't give a fuck about and is totally disinterested in. And he doesn't care about her status, he doesn't care about whether she feels good or bad

about what happened to him in his life. Like he just wants to be left alone and do his own thing. And he's really got a chip on his shoulder about that. Whether or not that's coming from a, like neurodivergent standpoint. I think he is justifiably angry about his circumstance and is unfortunately taking that out on Janeway. Yeah, and he shouldn't. Yeah, so everybody has gone into the back at this point to get soup. And nobody, like, like somebody took Janeway's soup order,

but never brought it back up to her, which was driving me nuts for this entire sequence. You and me both. Like, she gets a moment up front by herself, and you can see she's waiting for that soup. Like, you can't start a new task when they're soup-common. Soup-common. Yeah, but also, you definitely don't want a big bowl of hot noodles and broth when a banger gets dropped

on the ship, and that is what happens. And we cut to the exterior and like a tuna can, like a big piece of the ship hull has like peeled off of it. That doesn't look good. New. This is enough for the folks in the back to come up to figure out what happened. And January's like, which matter have you had my soup order? I wish one of them was covered in soup on the comeback, right? Billy should have been totally covered in soup, right?

The Bejure and Girl should have spilled her soup on someone else back there. Yeah, I think Billy is the funniest person to get soup all over him. I think so, the funniest person to get soup all over him. I think so. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, they quickly diagnosed the circumstance and sent out a distress call. Almost all of their antimatter is gone and they have no warp and they have like one-eighth

in pulse and the ship is in a real bad way. Pretty quickly Mortimer decides that what must have happened is that they got hit by a dark matter proto-commit thing that he wrote the paper on and Janeway happens to have read this paper. And it's just like a totally one in a zillion freak accident that it happened to them. But he is arguing for like like if we are in an area where there's lots of dark matter, proto-common activity, they're going to be attracted to our anti-matter. So we got to jettison the warp core and change was like, like fun we are.

I can't do that. Not on the basis of an unproven hypothesis. Have you seen how many pips I have? Let's do a pip comparison. Oh, oh I see. You don't have any of these, do you? That's right, I'm the boss. He might be right, but he doesn't have to be a dick about it. Yeah, and then he's like a dick about Celis' ability to do calculations on the fly, that they need to do to like, you know,

like he's being a dick to everyone for no reason. Like Celis didn't ever do anything to him. Like, I couldn't see being mad at the boss's boss's boss. But like, Celis is like totally an innocent bystander here. I love the real world idea of like, well, let's wheel around and get that piece of hull that got knocked off and scan it. And when they do, there's like, fur and deer blood all over it.

Like, what happened? What did they hit? Like, dark matter, deer blood all over this thing. It's gross. While they're in the back with this chunk of hull, Janeway's talking to Celeste and learns a little bit more about her and how hard she struggled at the academy and she really feels authentically like that thing Chico Te was talking about. Somebody that worked really hard to get into Starfleet and get put on a ship but just

isn't really being stationed on a Starship material. And it is not necessarily because of her capabilities, it seems much more about her having a case of terminally bad self-esteem. Like she sees herself as having gotten through the Academy because she's Bejorin and everybody just wanted Bejorins to be in Starfleet. So people were like looking the other way on her being unable to make the cut. That's a pretty fucked up zap for her to have on her head. I really liked Zoey McLelland's performance here.

Yeah, the scene is so sad. This so easily could have been like, ham and cheese-dap into a like, and I never learned how to read kind of thing. But like the way she describes her struggles is really heartbreaking. In my nightmares, I am chased by algorithms.

My brain just wasn't built to understand this. And there's never like that cliche component of like, you know, my parents really wanted the best for me. And they put me into schools that I had no business being in. And like they hope for the best. And I tried to impress them. Like all of her, her struggle is like within. Yeah.

It's not this outward kind of, I mean, some of it is that because the picture she paints of herself, you know, as a person on Voyager is pretty sad, but like, God, there's a lot of self-loathing there and she doesn't feel like she deserves to be there or as a part of the crew And that's got to be tough when there's nowhere else to go. She makes this argument so forcefully that it like Janeway is like trying to Talk her out of that headspace saying like yeah, I pulled tons of all Niders at the academy too. And by the end of the scene, I feel like Janeway is kind of like at a loss for words, like not knowing what to say to sell us to get her out of this funk.

If I go into the front and you stay here, I can hit the button on the airlock and just accidentally blow you. Is that what you want? You've almost persuaded me. In the back, Billy and Mortimer are working, and by working, I mean, Mortimer is working while Billy kind of scans himself for viruses or whatever. Yeah, yeah. Billy always reverts to the self-scan when he's bored and nearly gets Mortimer killed here. What's wrong with you, everything?

Mortimer is shocked at how little Billy is doing to help him and he's pissed at Billy for being so distracted. Yeah Billy is fucking nervous as hell about about his health for some reason. Yeah, he should be nervous about that panel Yeah, I think nervous about having a dead birdie on board the shift He's never been around that much dear blood before. Yeah, yeah, that's probably what it is. Anyways, they find some radiogenic particles in the rings of a gas giant nearby.

So they go over there to try and get those particles to restart the engine. This is when they start hearing the weird sound. Yeah, I mean, there's a sequence here where Janeway hails the comments. Yeah. And then shoots a torpedo to kind of attract the comments if they're there.

Right, because it's got like antimatter in the torpedo, so they're hoping that whatever is going for them will go for the torpedo instead. Yeah, but like in rapid succession, it's like bang, bang, bang, there's like these talking sounds that fill the cabin and everyone whips out their tricorders to see if they can figure anything out about them. And in this scene, Billy gets beamed away and then beamed back.

Yeah. And there's something in him. It's fucking gross. Oh, God! It's fucking gross. This whole sequence, I think, does a great job in, like, looking like it could belong in the body horror alien universe, while being distinct from it in a very crucial way. Like, the back of the neck location is, ugh, it's gnarly. And like that he's able to describe the place that he was abducted to while being unable to communicate, like really gives a sort of like communion vibe to the thing. Like that version of science fiction, that was all of out alien abduction.

Yeah. There's that kind of thread weave through this. Oh, yeah, they got to like put them on a, I love the makeshift bio bed in the back too. Like it's a little half bed. You don't see him, like he's got a curl up into a fetal position to fit in it. And then they force field him in. They don't want that thing popping out.

No, they can't scan it. Like it's made of dark matter. And they're talking about like the idea. Maybe it's like a life form that is dark matter based and that seems to defy what they know about dark matter. Sort of seems like you got schismed honestly. There's something like, oh my skin is crawling just even thinking about this. Like the parasites we know in real life are like tiny wormy guys, but this thing in his neck is like a fucking linguesa sausage. He's just enormous. It's like a nub-in-bug fucked in linguesa.

Is what would result. Yeah. It starts like operating Billy's body, And this is fun. They're getting like their disgraced call played back at them and it seems like it's like trying to tell them to do something. And then he's like, I'm in control of what I'm doing. He starts doing a bunch of like pelvic thrusts. I hear they can stop. That's inappropriate. I'm sorry, Captain.

Yeah. You've gotta stop it. He's got another one of the Riggly guys and Mortimer expressed some interest in it and he says it doesn't want you, Mortimer. It does want you. He turns into the Captain. And Billy just fucking bus in front of everyone. Oh, this is so gnarly.

Like, you saw the size of this thing in the scene previous. The back of his neck must just be completely blown out. I don't understand how he's not dead instantly from this. The thing is worse looking than an ebb and bug. And Mortimer phasers it against the captain's orders, killing a beautiful opportunity for first contact that she was really excited about. And they now realize that they are like being pursued by whatever alien force this is. And they have to take refuge in these radiogenic rings.

It's a good thing Billy has some sort of a psychic link to the worm's thoughts also. Yeah. of a psychic link to the worm's thoughts also. Yeah, and somehow like having that thing in him has unburdened him of his hypokondria. You know what, it's probably unburdened him from half of his blood supply. I think you need to put some packing into that neck hole before he bleeds out. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, and so like these like invisible pursuers are like pushing the rocks in the rings of this gas giant aside chasing the Delta flyer Neat scene and The captain is like I'm gonna like I'm gonna get you guys to safety everybody getting the in the escape pod and they're like fuck that We're not abandoning our captain Mortimer's like I think I'm gonna abandon my captain. I gotta go guys I love how given how quickly this decision needs to get made like how Mortimer's like, I think I'm gonna abandon my cat. I gotta go guys. I love how given how quickly this decision needs to get made, like how okay everyone is with that.

Like, under no obligation to stay. And he's like, cool, I'm not. Yeah, good luck. And he gets in the escape pod and it's announced that it's launched. And I was so mad that they didn't show it coming out because I'm dying to know where in the ship this fucking escape pod is.

It seems impossible. Also, we get the scene of him operating a computer inside, but you look at this thing in profile, he's got to be laying down, right? Yeah, it seems like one of those like, Kamikaze torpedoes that they had in World War II. Right. Right. And he's kind of using it as that, right?

Because he like turns it around and is heading right for the thing that is pursuing them. And Janeway's like, not on my watch, am I going to let an asshole buy the farm and get all the glory? He's really a Randy Quaid in Independence Day. The end of this episode. That's what I thought. This is the redemption arc and he wants this really bad. Yeah. He's like in the middle of self-sacrificing, but Janeway manages to beam the escape pod away and they're zooming out of there and having gotten enough radiogenic particles to restart the warp reaction, I thought the use of Celis making a slight miscalculation

in the countdown to the shockwave hitting them in this moment was really funny. Like, great comedy. It's like the most tense moment of the episode and they do it to just drive bright underline against like, yeah, Celeste has not gotten better at math. Like we've cured Billy of his hypokondria and Mortimer has like demonstrated some interest in a spritical and like being a member of the crew. There's no cure for her problem.

She still sucks at algorithms. She's still succs at algorithms. Like Captain Catherine Janeway's last words of her life are, boy, you really are bad at this. Boom. Everything gets real bright and then Janeway wakes up in six bay. Everyone made it. And I in heaven, it's Jacotez face, the first thing that she sees.

I thought that was sweet. Yeah. Yeah. They're all fine. They were found unconscious and there's no sign of the dark matter aliens either. Yeah.

Was it all a dream? The dark matter aliens read WordUp magazine and decide that they were like pretty cool after all Yeah, it's the rare Star Trek episode where like the nature of the alien force is Almost totally unknown like we don't know if they were bad or good if it was misunderstanding if it was

Something that was trying to eat them. Like there were moments where I thought the aliens were trying to communicate or maybe ask them for help or something. Yeah, yeah. Like that message, right? When Billy says, do not belong or whatever. Right. That felt like it could have been interpreted

in a bunch of different star trekky ways. And we never get any closure on that. It's just a situation where they had to get out of it as fast as they possibly could and they did. How fortunate are they that it was the Delta flyer on this mission and that voyager? Could have been bad. Yeah, it's been fucking rigly worms busting out a next left and right. The feeling during the final moments of this episode are Janeway believes this whole thing was worth it. There's coffee in that personal attention from their captain. Ben, do you think this episode was worth it to us?

You know, I really used to get along with most of the time, but I don't like bullets, I don't like bread, and I don't like you. I like this episode quite a bit. I feel like we've had a little run here where like a huge amount of the crew isn't really in the app. And that's kind of a strange choice that they seem to be making over and over again. But I thought the characters were all really interesting and I enjoyed watching this one.

It didn't burden itself with some of the things that a Star Trek episode typically does. Like it sort of zagged when I thought it was gonna zig on us like learning something about these aliens. Like I like that generally speaking in Star Trek, we learn about the aliens and we learn what, you know, what the right way to act is at the end of the day. But I like, I think that it's a smart writing choice to every so often, let a story be about just how confusing and scary it will be to be in space sometimes.

Yeah, this is an episode that's very confident in what the most important aspect of the story is. And that's the three folks in Janeway. It's not the alien. And for a season where I feel like you and I have asked over and over again, what is wrong with Janeway? Like season six, bad Janeway season. This is kind of a redemption of her, I think, in a big, big way. It was great to see how tenacious she gets in the face of a real opportunity that no one would blame her for for giving up on some folks. Like, everyone around her

is convinced that these people are a lost cause and she never gives up on them. And I think that's just a great character development for her. I thought it was a, I mean, it's ridiculous that she would risk her life for this. I think there are probably less life-threatening ways to do this. But good look for her in the end. And I liked it for that reason. Well, I like priority-on-message at him and I want to go look at some. Adam our first priority on message is of a promotional nature and it goes like this. How does Starfleet Captains trust that the incident and tactical will launch a probe into that sentient nebula as asked, and not a full spread of torpedoes?

What my head candidate presupposes is Starfleet has great user training content. FODs, if you sell an app or software, you can't just send your users to the Academy. Instead, Patrick Wright's good can deliver the training content your users need to be successful. 100% booth be free. Amazing. Yeah, so visit PatrickRightsGood.com

to learn more. FODs can message me at Patrickrickrightsgood.com slash contact to get a free consultation. You know, I hate to note patrick here, but I feel like, you know, with patrick specialty being writing, you should probably know a better way to put it is a patrickrights gooder,

than those other writers. Yeah, then the average. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's very interesting niche that Patrick Wright's good has found for themselves. A like like user training writing is a it's hard to be concise and broadly understood. So something that if you can specialize in it, it's a good idea. And I know that there's tons of app developers and other kinds of folks in our audience

that will need this service. So I hope this goes well for PatrickRightsGood.com. I mean, I know as a consumer, you must have been frustrated by this many times before. But like, you're not just buying the item, or the thing, or the app, or whatever, like, you're buying how to use it. And so often, those materials disappoint, you know? And you're made to, like, go find a YouTube video about how it actually works. Like, this is important stuff.

So if you're in the game of selling things to people, make sure you communicate how to use those things. Do it. Ben our second priority when message is from Gus. And it is to Ben and Adam, who I'm sorry to say seem to have entered a temporal causality loop. Message goes like this. Oh wait, this is a script. I guess we gotta read this back and forth like a script, huh? Okay, yeah, yeah, I see. All right, so, uh, script note, someone's quarters. Data does a fast

professional shuffle. Riker. Sometimes I wonder if he's stacking the deck. Data, I assure you, Commander. The cards are sufficiently randomized. Warf, I hope so. Data, eighth, eighth, queen. The dealer receives a four. Warf, no bet. Data, 10. Great scene from a great episode that we talked about this episode. Yeah, we did, didn't we?

How weird. How did you call that, Gus? Wow. Maybe we are in a temporal causality loop. Yeah. Wow. Well, our final priority one message here on the episode is from Defested AKA Jake

and it is to STLV 2023 Pranaka Banaka folks goes like this. Another wonderful year at Pranaka Banaka folks goes like this. Another wonderful year at Pranaka Bana, thanks to all that came out, and special thanks to Sam for helping continue hashtag icecrotch challenge. Y'all make the Rio bearable and bend. It puts the lotion on the skin. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha with us to the karaoke night that was hosted by the

open-pike night folks. Yeah, it was fun. Ben, if you brought a banana to the Phrana Cabana, would that be a Phrana Cabana? Phrana Cabana? Phrana Cabana. Yeah. There's a less fun way to say Prana Cabana. Yeah. Prana Cabana. Prana Cabana. Yeah, I think it would be that. It would also be very dumb.

I'm sorry I said it. Yeah, I'm going to banana split out of this bit. What the hell did you just eat a banana? If you'd like to get a message out there of a promotional or personal nature, the best way to do it is by going to MaximumFund.org slash JemboTron, setting up a priority one message today. Hey Ben, what's that Adam? Did you find yourself a drunk Shimoda?

Granabal drunk Shimoda? Gran Shimoda! Gran Shimoda! Yeah, I'm giving it to Celis for that last minute miscalculation. And the little self-deprecating remarks you made as they think that they're going to be overtaken by some huge explosion. Outstanding. I love that scene.

So it was great. I'm gonna give my drunk Shimoda to Tom Morello, just another in the long line of celebrity fans of Star Trek, who just want to be in Star Trek and it doesn't matter how or who or how much low few wear, even if it's no low for all. Like Tom Morello, a big, big rock star and a recognizable face. And he does so, so little in this episode. And he seems very happy to do that. So good job by him. Yeah, I mean, at least they didn't put him in a fish man costume. Yeah, yeah. Other rock stars settle for the Fish Man. Yeah. Well, Adam, that is the end of today's episode. Next week's episode, his season six episode, 21, live fast and prosper.

Impostors, jeopardized Voyager, good reputation in the Delta Quadrant. What? What good reputation you might have. That was going to be my question. Yeah. What? I thought they were with a ship of death to most people. Yeah.

They're feared. They're treated with great suspicion. Yeah. No one likes them. It's when. Do they have a good reputation? But that is the premise of the episode. And to find out how we will be doing that episode,

I'm heading to the Game of Buttholes, the will of the caretaker where our runabout is on square 89. Looks like we could hit a the traveler square, which moves the runabout forward five spaces. And I think we can also hit a Nielix's Galley, which is a bubble-wide drunk-assowed. Okay.

You're required to learn as you play. Roll. Go ahead and roll this thing, see what happens. Tsk, tsk, tskly. Jumping as over both of those, we are on square 94. Starting to get really close to the end of the board game. About that. We've got a Mornhammered in range. If someone rolls a six next time we play this. So close.

It could happen for the first time in a long time boy Yeah, that that just may put you into the ground We don't want that this is the fourth of five episodes of our to smash hit Star Trek podcast or recording this week and Yeah, who I don't know if I'm gonna survive the fifth this week and who I don't know if I'm gonna survive the fifth. Heavy flow week for us. Gotta thank all the FODs who support the effort. I go to Maximumfund.org slash join. Those monthly contributions really help keep us going.

And they keep Ben from calling out sick like Billy. Yeah, Ben's not billy-ing around through here. Ben shows up. I show up, even though my medical tricorder says I should not. Yeah. You shouldn't even have a medical tricorder. Just want to thank Ben for working sick today. I really hope you feel better soon, man.

Me too, buddy. Don't like to see you or hear you like this. Me neither. Alright, well let's get through the credits so that I can take five over here on the couch. Wendy's our great producer tasked with editing out all the sniffles and coughs from one of the channels today. Sorry, Wendy.

She's the best in the business. She really is. We gotta thank Dark Materia, who made the original Picard song that you're hearing under our voice right now. And Adam and Goose, our buddy, made the Janeway song in all of the original theme music for the program. Goose has great cooking channel over on YouTube. You got to be followed with the Goose!

Yeah, Betty's got a great chicken soup recipe Ben Make sure of a big pot of that big pot of tilapia and chicken soup That sounds really fucking brutal But I know that if the goose kicks it will be delicious. Yeah I'm not gonna go by your description on this You know we got Bill Tilly out in the social media streets. Hashtag greatest gen is where you can find people talking about the show. The discord is one of the best places to meet other FODES at StrunkShemota.com, but we've

also got places for them at Reddit, at Facebook, at Instagram, all the places, every social media place. And with that, we will be back at you next week with another great episode of Star Trek Voyager and episode of the greatest generation Voyager that could jeopardize our good reputation. I don't see how that's possible. Iron Clad. Maximum Fun. A worker-owned network of artist-owned shows supported directly by you.