The Greatest Generation - Friend to the Brass Plaque (VOY S4E15)

Episode Date: September 5, 2022

When Voyager picks up snatches of a reply from the A Quad, Captain Janeway is willing to trespass to download the rest of the message. But when Seven and Tuvok get claimed as relics, Janeway joins the Hirogens in being helmet-painting pissed. Why does Echo Park Lake run thick in the summer? Would any amount of signage be sufficient for your typical package-delivery person? What’s The Greatest Gen promise w/r/t technobabble? It’s the episode with a gift from the estate of Judith B. Raskin! Support the production of The Greatest Generation.Friends of DeSoto for Democracy.Friends of DeSoto for Justice. 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 Twitch.Facebook group | Subreddit | Discord | WikiSign up for our mailing list!

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! Bringengwe the U.S.S. Forth and Dirk. Captain, Captain, Captain.

Bringengwe the U.S. Forth and Dirk. Do it, Captain. Welcome to the greatest generation. Star Trek Podcast by a couple of guys just a little bit embarrassed about having a Star Trek Podcast. I'm Adam Prenica. I'm Ben Harrison. Ben, I was so excited to get on the mics with you today.

I just talked about something that we've not talked about for a very long time. Childlike excitement is what I would describe your mood as right now. You just could not wait to get on the microphones. Our friend, JK Woodward, paid me a visit, gave me a piece of original artwork that included our faces. He visited you? Yeah, he just came to my house. And it delayed our recording by a couple of minutes and I could tell you were

Disappointed that you were gonna have to wait like five ten minutes to get on these mics put me off man What what's up with JK give me the scoop on him JK Woodward famed Star Trek comics artists put us onto his edition of the Cover for IDW's 400th issue of Star Trek comics, but I think they did multiple different variations on this cover and he got the commission for one of them. He put us in it, he hid our faces in there.

Awesome. And so he offered to give us the original painting of it and he dropped by the house to drop it off because he's coming up from San Diego Comic-Con and happened to be in the area. That means that both of us have JK originals. It's true. Hung in our offices. Yeah, I have a bunch. JK is such a great friend of the show over the years. Yeah, even though the first originals that he ever sent us, you let a construction worker use as like a drop cloth to do some gluing or something.

I'm really glad you were reminded me of that. Yeah. I still think I'm going to find that JK original somewhere. You do. I've got a lot of tubes and a lot of flats of unframed artwork and stuff. Oh. And I've not put up on the wall. I just feel like I miss filed it somewhere, and it's going to surprise me years down the road. Wow, that'd be cool. And I will be vindicated. I think you destroyed it. Yeah. Through negligence.

That's, be honest. That's what happened. I do you wish that upon me, as you yourself are getting home renovations done. I would never hope for any of your beloved items to get destroyed. me as you yourself are getting home renovations done. I would never hope for any of your beloved items to get destroyed. I didn't wish that on you. I'm saying that's what happened in the past. And I feel bad about it, not because I was wishing it on you, but because I'm

ruining the great mood you seem to be in before we started recording today. Yeah. As great co-hosts are want to do. Heh heh heh. Speaking of mood ruiners, Ben, I've got a story, and it has to do with a walk I took around Echo Park Lake. What? You know what time it is, Ben?

Oh my God, it's been years since we've had a raskin open. I have just had the most remarkable experience. For a few months, I actually felt the air, current beneath my wings, the exhilaration of soaring above the tree tops. Oh, everybody's here. Look at the bed. Oh, man, I almost didn't know where to find that job.

It's just in the folder with all the other drops. Yeah. Labeled asking. Yeah. Ben, I haven't been to Echo Park since you moved away from that neighborhood and I was over there over the weekend showing a good buddy from out of town. All the delights to be had.

Oh, yeah, neighborhood. There are many. They are Legion. And I had plans to go to a Dodger game that afternoon. And me and this friend were hanging around Echo Park, and my wife had planned to come pick us up at Echo Park Lake. So me and this friend headed off of Echo Park Avenue, took a left headed for the lake,

and I was shocked at what I found there been. What happened? Have you been there lately? Yeah, they so They fence the whole thing off. Yeah, it's this was a Dickhead city councilman Michio Ferrell Had like a bunch of like heavily armed police officers beat up protesters and Unhoused people living around the lake at one point during the pandemic.

And then like completely isolated the lake, like it was completely fenced off in a way that you couldn't even go in for a while. And now there are a couple of entrances, but it's like super highly policed and like they won't let anybody go in there that doesn't seem like they aren't a homeowner. Basically, it's really fucked up. I did not see any police, but I also rarely saw an entrance. I kept walking and walking and walking

and I was like, the lakes right there, they're the swan boats. Yeah. How do I get in? And I walked a half a mile around the lake before I found an entrance to it, find my god in there. So like hundreds of turts.

I think city council person needs to do something about the turts and that lake. The water was running thick with the turtles, with the mossy backs. Yeah, they love the summer. They're big fans of the warm weather. Those turts. You know one of my favorite things to do

when I walk around Echo Park Lake is read the raskins. The rascans of course being the little plaques on every park bench there with with really fun quotes. Judith Raskin, a lady that left a bunch of money to the lake and a bunch of delightful quotes and provocations on her brass plaques on all of the benches. I was really enjoying showing my out of town friend all the rascans until we came upon a park bench where a raskin looked like it had been removed. Oh, what?

It was like a crowbar or something. Damn, what the hell? And it was so upsetting, because the rascans are my favorite part of Echo Park Lake. Yeah, yeah. These quotes like, isn't it a beautiful summer day today? Hahaha.

Look up in the trees. Maybe you'll see a heron. This one of them. Hahaha. I know this is kind of a lot of goose shit. Hahaha. Jeremy that runs the swan boats owes me 20 bucks. Who's shit? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha Whoa, Adam Pranicka, not friends to the downtrodden, but friend to the brass plaque. Here are a selection of rascans that I took pictures of. Okay.

And then you and I will vote on our favorite, right? Let's do it. Is there a red-tailed hawk flying overhead? There might be two as they mate for life and fly together. Gift from the estate of Judith Beerskin. If it's not sunny today, it will be shortly. This is Echo Park in California. Lots of gloomy rainy days are not allowed. Gift from the estate of Judith Beaskin. I wouldn't say that if anything, she was just a really good copywriter. Yeah. This one that, see if you can detect where the misplaced

comma is in this one. Come, view the lake's beautiful lilies in the summer. And finally, Judy wants you to enjoy the lake and the park and everything about it. Gift from the estate of Judith B. Raskin. Here's what I don't understand. This last one, zero commas. Okay. The one before unnecessary comma. Yeah.

So here are choices. Redtailed hawk. Right. If it's not sunny today, it will be shortly. Come view the lakes lilies. And Judy wants you to enjoy the lake. It's so hard to choose. I kind of feel like the ones about birds are my favorite because I would say that like a good half of them have something to do with birds and that's just like My grandfather loves birds. I'm just drawn to an old that is a big bird enthusiast. Yeah And I'm not saying a big bird enthusiast. I'm saying like a an enthusiast of birds that enthuses bigly I like to think about whether or not Judy B actually wrote these or if the estate wrote them for her in kind of a Judy voice.

Right. And it makes me want to make sure I have that shit dialed in before I die. Like if someone's going to install a park bench with a purported quote to me, yeah, I want all my commas in the right place. Yeah. I mean, you'd be rolling in your grave if a dangling participle wound up on a bench with your name on it. I bet. I bet if one were to make a park bench after my death and were to attribute a quote to me,

the plaque would be something like this. It would be something really funny you said. And then in quotes underneath it and ellipsis and then that's it. That sounds accurate. What would yours be? Probably something really funny you said and then, ha ha ha ha in all capital letters. Period. And then attributing to me.

Yeah, that's fair. Well, I mean, if we both die at the same time, we really need to make sure someone has got that figured out for us. Yeah. Maybe our friend and agent can make sure that that's done properly. Yeah. What else has he done for us lately?

Yeah. Yeah. You know, our friend and agent who should shortly know his way around a plaque that we're producing for him. Yeah, we gotta we gotta get that done I was embarrassed that we didn't go done in time for our show in LA. Yeah, it'll be done in time for February That's for sure. Yeah, we got Got like long odds that he shows up for February, but you know, we'll see Hey, why is your why is the gig bag that you take on tour so heavy?

Well, there's a lot of Mahogany and brass in there. The person outside our venue is like, I'm gonna have to check every one of these gig bags for Mahogany and brass. Can't bring Mahogany and brass in here. That's what we sell. Mahogany and brass sounds like a nice jazz combo that we do as a side project, huh? Sure.

Yeah. We re-record old sky hits, but in like a smooth jazz format. Like sky turned into Basinova. Right. Ooh. I like it. Yeah. Hey, Adam, you want to pass the dutchie from the left hand side and get into the episode

we came to talk about today? Wow, I sure do That is a reference I understand. It's season four episode 15 Hunters Unless you've got something a little bigger in your torpedo dudes. I'm not turning around A really interesting visual start to an episode that had a lot of visual flourishes. I really did. I thought space where everyone can hear your radio traffic.

Yeah. Is how this starts? We're getting the kind of tuning the dial in between actual stations sound. And it's a... Or you can catch snatches of words starfleet receiving this message voyager but it's all it's all garbled and bungled up and uh...

and a random red hot chili pepper song yeah they're playing the red hot chili peppers game on starship voyager on the bridge andson kim is working on cleaning up the signal. And this is, I thought I was hearing Janeway's voice in this. I thought so too.

I was thinking that this was going to like re-use some of the energy from that episode where they like sent a broadcast and they thought they got something back, but it was just scrambled of the thing that they sent. Yeah, they just keep doing it. Yeah, but no, this is a real message, seemingly, from real Starfleet. Yeah. But they don't have the whole thing. They just, it cuts off.

It's like, I've got something super important to tell you. That's all we got. It's the most annoying cell phone call. Yeah. That's all we got. It's the most annoying cell phone call. And Janeway looks over at Kim and she's like, can you clean that up and Kim's like, I can't. The plan is if they can't retrieve this audio from this relay station, why don't they just go and get it from the station itself?

Yeah. Makes sense to me. It's coming through that set of relays that they sent the EMH through, and the one that all the rest of the signal is jammed up in is really close. There's coffee in what the rest of that message says. This has got all the feelings of like, you lost your frisbee in a neighbor's backyard and you're like hot in the fence.

Yeah. Go get it. I mean, it also kind of felt like it could be a trap, right? Like they pissed those guys off the last time they used it and sent worth lightning down the line at a guy. Yeah. It didn't seem impossible that they had just like laid a trap, but that's not what this is. What are you carrying that burden

throughout the episode of like, well, they did shoot lightning at that one, herrogeon guy. So you sort of understand the gripe. Our card daddy and social media director Bill Tilly was telling us about a bad time he had on the phone with customer support recently. Bill, Bill, Bill, Bill, Bill.

And I've been dealing with a little bit of that myself. I had a contractor put a coat of varnish on a new step in front of my house, and it was drying. And I put a sign in front of the step. There's another way to get to the front door. This step was drying. It needed 24 hours to dry. I put a sign right in front of the step. There's another way to get to the front door. This step was drawing, it needed 24 hours to dry. I put a sign right in front of it that said,

wet paint, please go around and use other step. Yeah. Delivery guy came like three hours later and just like marched right up it. Like maneuvered his hips around the sign and I'm like sending photos to the company that sent this delivery guy, like, what is your guy doing?

Like, I got to pay a contractor to come out here now and, like, grind off the fucking... Oh, no. ...ruined, you know, sealant and put a new thing on. What the fuck? Like, are you gonna help me pay for that? Or is this just like, my bad luck, you decided to deliver something at the time.

So, I was, like, a little bit on the Voyager side when they sent the war flight thing down. Damn, dude. Benjamin R. Harris, an enemy of the gig laborer. I don't know. Just trying to drop a package, man. They're not trying to read any signs. Yeah, it's gonna read these fists if he does it again.

Oh, geez, Ben. Ha, ha, ha, ha. Oh, geez, Ben. You're clearly gonna need four or five signs. If you're black, the entry. You see your front door. Here's the fucked up thing. Like the contractor was leaving and he was like, Hey, man, do you want me to put like some caution tape up around it?

And I was like, dude, I'm gonna take care of this. Oh, no. Like I was like looking at the clock. It was three o'clock was his time that he needed to get out of there. It was 257 and I was like, I'm not gonna make you put tape up around this when you need to get out of here. There needed to be a physical barrier, Ben. I think expecting people to read the sign is just too much.

There was a physical barrier. I put a huge thing in front of it. It was not just a sign. You said the person wigg thing in front of it. It was not just a sign. You said the person wiggled his hips around it. Yeah. Hipwiggle suggests that there was sufficient room to walk on your patio. Come on. I'll send you a picture. I'm going to, I'm going to, I'm going to, Jackie and Laurie, if you want to give me a picture of the set up, the same picture that I sent to the fucking company.

I can't wait to make this the show art for today's episode. Do you have a picture of the footprint in the varnish? I do. I'm gonna be looking at this guy's fucking footprint for the rest of my life. Did you get those pictures? No. You sent them to a different atom. Shit!

Fuck! God damn it! Fuck! Ah! Fuck! God damn it! Fuck! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH Marbles. It weird shoes too. So I'm going to describe what I'm looking at here. It's your front porch and there is a podium in front of the steps. Yeah. People will recognize this podium from our Destroy the Falcon 2 video in which we accidentally destroy the star destroyer and then Adam on purpose destroyed the Roman Coliseum Lego model. Oh man, Ben, Ben, you know I'm on your side in so many ways.

Don't betray me here. I don't think this is a sufficient barrier for your typical package delivery person. I don't know if I want to continue with this podcast. Oh man, that is so brutal. I'm sorry, dude. That sucks. When did this show just turn into two old varts complaining about shit? God knows there's plenty of those out there. We'll cut all this out. So also listening into this signal are some herogens. We've seen these dudes before.

They've got helmets, they've got face masks, and they are fucking pissed that somebody is using their relays. What is, how did you get my espresso machine? Makes sense to me. It really does. This is in federation property. You fucking stole it, man. You're not be siding with the bad guys.

What's wrong with you, Adam? Are they the bad guys? All they're doing is using their own gear and getting electrocuted by people who are trying to steal from them. Yeah. I don't believe that this is their own gear. I think they're just assholes

that laid claim to this gear. I don't think they're smart enough to build relays that use singularities as power sources. They just seem like assholes, but they're pissed. This main guy is like helmet painting pissed. He sticks his finger in the white paint, puts that on his helmet. That's how you know it's on.

Does the herojin chip run on kind of a children's museum, playground toy? Like a type of controls. I was trying to figure out how these controls work. Yeah, the little rods that go in and out. Yeah. I love this. I'm all for it.

Like innovation in controls. Like this is the most innovative control we've gotten since the half dome shaped controls on every foreigngie ship. Yeah, I really like this is the most innovative control we've gotten since the half dome-shaped controls on every foreigngyship. Yeah, I really like this a lot. It's good. You know when this heroine starts face painting, shit is on. And after the theme, we're back on Voyager, where everyone's guessing about what the end

of the message says. Yeah, I loved the just speculation among the bridge crew. The, hey, this is so great. Like, we're about to get a message from Starfleet for the first time since this whole show started. Really interesting compositions in this scene. Every shot seems to be through a railing somehow. Yeah. And therefore kind of closed in and closed.

And Harry Kim is there just like so excited about probably hearing from his parents because they for sure haven't forgotten about him. No mention of his girlfriend. I think that Harry Kim has really moved on emotionally for her. I mean, Harry Kim is definitely someone who would say that his best friends are his parents.

I think his energy around hoping to hear from them is a little strange. I mean, it becomes the B story of the episode. So I have a lot of time to talk about it. But yeah, I tend to agree. We get like a full-on montage of Harry Kim's parents redecorating his childhood bedroom, making it, making it into a sex room. Yeah. They make it look like the interior of the herojian ship,

just a bunch of metal and sex swings and webs with bones hanging in them. Strong spray makes for a better hunt. Yeah, it's the season finale of that Netflix reality show about designing your sex room. Yeah. Of course, it's locked in. Word.

I've been missing to meet you. I'm very careful because I'm going to see this once. The EMH finds 7 of 9 in the Astrometrics lab where she has been burning the implants at both ends. She's been toiling day and night To connect to these realies and get more information 58 hours she's been awake. Yeah, it's a lot and it's a good thing too because in those 58 hours She's pulled six more words from the message

That was sent to them. So a word every 10 hours is about what she's achieving. That's also my typing speed. That's how you were let go of your copyrighting. Yeah. Adam's accuracy is bar none the best we've ever seen. But his speed of execution is so slothingly that the company cannot possibly be profitable under these kinds of conditions. No one understood me, genius, Ben.

No one does these days either. That sounds like something the doc would say in this scene who is totally delusional, imagining a hero's welcome for himself when he finally gets home. I've accomplished things no eMH ever has. Yeah. You can just see the confetti that goes right through his holographic matrix. Yeah. Showering down upon him. I mean, he would be in Seventh's ball-kicking machine where he to have tangible balls.

Because that ball-kicking machine goes right through him. Yeah. She can't reign on his parade by suggesting that he might get wiped and upgraded. Yeah. That's what's going to happen, right? There's no way you keep a classic program like his going. I mean, there's one lawyer in the federation that could prevent something like that from happening.

Some bangers get dropped on the ship as they approach this relay and there's still like two light years away and I kind of scratch in their heads about this. Like what is causing these bangers turns out it's the relay itself. It's got an incredibly powerful, gravimetric field around it. And they're able to compensate for it, but it's not a pretty look. I love the kind of keep-out sign that they pass on their way to the station. That's the form of a damaged ship with skin inside. Like, they're like, oh yeah, we're picking up a damaged ship and there's one dead body on board and when they beam it aboard, it's just like, oh yeah, we're picking up a damaged ship and there's one dead body on board and when they beam it aboard, it's just like,

it's chicken skin on a biopad. Did they literally just go into the makeup department and get like one of the rubber masks that they would pull over somebody's head for like an alien bizarre background character? And really has that drugstore Halloween costume. Look too, for sure. This is an alien that has been subjected to

what the image describes as a complete osteotomy. He's had all his bones taken out. I argued against this description at the time because I was like, how do you possibly say that this was a procedure to remove the bones, the muscle, and the organs, and not just say this was a procedure that removed the skin? Oh, yeah. It's like who removed home?

I know it's semantics, but that was important to me. Yeah. Yeah. Let's write a letter to the writers of this episode. Is it Jerry Taylor? I'm pissed too. I have a question. I love this move.

They're like, well, if all it is is a pile of skin, beam it back into that ship and it will be on our way. Maybe his friends can come find him. Just make sure he's face down when you beam him back. That's the bad part about picking up alien skin is when you return it to the nest. The mama alien. We'll reject it.

Yeah. So sad. Yeah. But also like get it together, aliens. What the hell? Just because it smells a little different, you're gonna fucking abandon your child. I've abandoned my alien.

Shit. Shit. I've abandoned my alien boy. They pull up to this relay where all of the rest of their data packets are and it looks rusty, it looks old, looks pretty haunted. They scan it and it looks like it's a hundred thousand years old and like we mentioned, powered by a black hole, just like a Romulanship.

I love how everyone immediately starts negging the station. Whoa, huh, didn't expect it to be this old. And it's somehow still working and useful. No water. This place is adult. It's wild because it's basically a station wrapped around a black hole. Yeah. And every time they get a little bit closer, the ship starts rocking more and more. So they've got kind of a maximum proximity that they can get before the ship is going to get torn apart. And nobody is riding for terror apart then. No.

Now, nothing is coming easy in this project. They thought that just by arriving there, they'd be able to get more of the messages off. Yeah. But that's not happening. Yeah. And in the astrametrics lab, they continue working on this problem. And as Janeway reads the snippets from these messages, it soon dawns on her that these are not like official, starfleet communicates. These are personal messages. Yeah. It's a big trove of

personal messages. And it's not long before Janeway picks someone to get the happy duty of delivering the mail, or a duty that seems at first blush like it would be happy. But turns out to be actually a shitty job. I feel like justifies why she picks who she picks. Right, because they're given to Nielix to distribute I feel like justifies why she picks who she picks. Right, because they're given to Nielix to distribute and this is going to devastate the people who don't receive anything, right?

Like you can just tell right up front, someone's gonna get hurt. Yeah, they've essentially beamed a ball-kicking hologram from the alpha quadrant onto the ship and they're going to go around with that. So she passes off these letters and they also detect some other stuff in the transmission. There is something else that's like heavily encrypted in the message, but it's going to take a while to pull everything down. So they're not even getting started on opening up those particular text documents just yet. Janeway has an interesting question for Seven in the scene, which is like,

pretty big moment right now, huh? How do you feel about this? And Seven's like, honestly, this doesn't move my needle at all. I've never even been to Earth. And she kind of doubles down. She's like, so what if there were people waiting for you on Earth? That would be weird, right?

And this actually does, like that Janeway keeps drilling until she hits a nerve here. I thought was a really interesting moment. I did too. It seems like there is a thing that happens early in the episode where the people that have gotten messages are really weird around the people that haven't and vice versa.

Yeah. And you can tell that Janeway is expecting a letter in this moment, but you know, Sevin has no reason to expect one. She's watching people get fajitas. Yeah. But also nobody on earth knows that Anika Hansen is even alive. So nobody would have sent seven a letter,

but it does like put you in the mind of somebody who isn't gonna get one. Right. Yeah, not only is seven not getting fajitas, she's not even in the restaurant. Yeah. And she doesn't even know the restaurant exists. You can't hear the sizzle at all.

Now, sad. On the bridge, one of the first letters ends up going to Cote, and this is a good moment for Robert Beltrein, because he's one of a couple of actors in this episode that begins reading a letter with the hope of something great. Yeah. And when he realizes it's from an old Mayquise buddy. Mayquise?

And then he begins to read it. It totally changes his mood. Yeah. I mean, the Mayquise element of this is only really lightly dealt with in this episode, but it's something I wondered intensely about. Like, what are the people at Starfleet Command thinking about the presence of a bunch of make-wease on this ship?

They will have learned this by now. Are they making plans to welcome them back with open arms, making plans to prosecute the survivors? Wait. I read one of the ideas that they toyed with for this episode was one of the official Starfleet communicates being something like put all the make-wee's in the brig for the rest of the trip and for Janeway to have to disregard that order. Yeah.

And continue. Damn. I thought that would have been an interesting tension. Yeah. No kidding. I mean, I can also see that tension just kind of destabilizing the show in a way that would be really hard to repeatedly justify,

you know, if the make-waste now have every reason in the world not to go home. Yeah. It's true. So I think they probably made a wise choice not taking it that direction, but I did wanna hear more about this. Once Neelix has passed that letter to Chico Dei,

he's like getting ready to leave the bridge and Harry Kim is like, what about me? There's gotta be something in that pile of three iPads for me. Hmm? Neelix is like, not dude. These letters are coming out in dribs and drabs. Just gotta be patient.

You know, there is a letter here from your parents, but it's actually to Tom Paris. So that's weird. Yeah. There's another one here from the Delaney sisters' parents to Tom Paris. What is going on with all these parents? Actually, half of these letters are to Tom Paris

and they're all from people's parents. I heard there are at least 30 more letters that have been downloaded. Oh yeah? I don't know, you don't want to do it. Coffee, black, make it yourself. I'm trying to help you see this as an opportunity to grow. Make it yourself.

TuVac is the recipient of one of these letters. And when Nielix gives him that, he takes great umbrage with the idea that TuVac would want to finish his work duties first. Yeah. Before reading it, he's really letter edging. Letter edging so much that he's like,

I did read the first paragraph or two. Why don't I just catch you up on what's in the letter? Yeah. As far as what I over read while I was walking around prying into your personal business. Hey, Nelix, that's a federal crime. Yeah. Maybe the thing from Starfleet is put Nielix in the brig

for the rest of the trip. It was just a long game that Janeway is playing to get Nielix put in the brig for the rest of the trip. There is a lot to fit your time, Nielix. Finally, we found someone. It was written centuries ago. Ha, ha, ha, ha. Tuvac, it turns out, has become a grandfather

while he's been away. Yeah. Commander Gramps. How about that? Yeah. And once Neelix finishes reading the part that he already read, he leaves the rest of the message on the console and leaves.

And Tuvac does, in fact, give in to his temptation and read the rest of the message before he finishes his tactical report or whatever. The news for Janeway and her letter is sufficient to read in private. She takes it to the ready room and it's from Tom Mervins. For the clothes you love to live in and she goes through the seasons of her emotions here Like the others like it begins with the joy of hearing from someone you care about yeah, and then

Segways into some pretty bad news here. Yeah, and she reads it all in silence So we're left only to wonder in this moment, but it doesn't seem like she is really loving what she's reading. And also, imparting some bad news is Chico Te, who comes down to engineering and pulls BLT aside with an update on what has befallen the Mayquise. I thought I knew what he was going to say, but extermination of all the Mayquise was not one of my guesses here. Yeah.

I mean, I don't feel like DS9 ever quite put it in terms of that stark as far as I can remember, but I guess that's what happened, right? In all those space battles with the Dominion during the war, I mean, the losses on the Federation's side were huge. Yeah. So the breakaway faction of the Federation that the makewies were really didn't stand a chance. They didn't have Dell's soul class starships.

Now, now the Dominion had bigger ticks. Yeah. BLT is not sad about this. She is fucking pissed. I will make someone pay. I swear I will. I mean, even Tara and Roberto are dead Adam. I'd be pissed.

Yeah. Yeah. They were great make-wee's. Some of the best. Yeah. They were sesca-gid. Some of the few make-we They were sesca-gid. Some of the few make-weez that Chico Tay didn't knock up.

We need tried. And to my way of thinking, there's still plenty of time. Yeah. So she's really raging around the ship. Tom Parris catches up with Harry Kim in the lunchroom and Tom Parris, another interesting case with these letters, really not looking forward to even receiving one because he knows it's gonna be from his dad and he doesn't wanna hear from his dad.

He's more interested in how his impossible chicken's been made. And he's not wrong in that curiosity. Yeah. It tastes vaguely like chicken, but it has the consistency of corn husks. So is it like, it's processed food, which is also bad for you. So is it worse for me or better for me?

I just want to understand this. We just got some impossible chicken nugs in our house. Yeah. And they are delicious. I feel like the current generation of that is really good. Yeah, but a science experiment, you know. Yeah. Isn't everything though. I don't like guessing at what I put in my stomach. Nielix comes in with like a bucket of iPads at this point and is passing them out.

And again, Kim gets passed over here. He's fucking pissed at this point. Who's more upset in this scene? Kim repairs. Because by the end of it, Paris is like, look, bro. Don't got any hopes. Don't got any disappointments. Am I making any sense here?

Yeah. That's how I live my life. It seems like Tom Paris's approach to this may be just as unhealthy, but from a different direction. I think no hopes, no disappointments is a plaque that they should put above the mess hall. Like, Paris is talking about the letters, but what he's really talking about is the food. That's actually the sign that the health inspector made them put in the window of the mess hall.

I've never seen that many letters as a rating for a place. Bon Appetit. Seven goes to see Janeway in her ready room and doesn't really even seem to notice how depressed Janeway obviously is. I wish she just walked in without ringing the doorbell. Again, I wish that was her thing every time. She should cram her every scene. Yeah, she should be the Steve Irkel of Voyager.

Uh-huh. Instead, she's learning. She's getting better. Yeah. She's adapted. She is. She wants a shuttle to take into, get a little closer to the station

because she thinks a Subaru brand will be more adept at handling these gravimetric eddies than an intrepid class starship. And Jane was like, yeah, fine, whatever. I don't give a fuck. Just take two vach with you. Yeah, nothing matters anyway. Sure. And seven's like, cool. All right. Thanks. Bye. Yeah. Like it doesn't matter the way in which the parent loans you the car. It's that they do.

Yeah, exactly. But when you are like in a funk and like trying to really like play up what a funk you're in for the person that you're having a conversation with, it really does hurt when they like don't seem to pick up on that and like ask if there's a thing I can do or whatever. That's it. You're so right about that because if anyone else had been in seven's position in this moment, asking for the car keys, they would have been like, Hey, cap, everything all right.

Seven does does not give any fucks. Seven's like me at any of our expert Shimoda meetings, just wanting to get the meeting over. Oh, that does sound like you at one of our expert's remote meetings. Everyone's fine. Side chatting me about can we speed this along? It astrometrics Harry Kim finds BLT and he's again thirstily looking for a letter. She can't help him.

But because BLT is still in the bad mood of the knowledge of a bunch of dead makeweas, she just hammers Harry Kim again about his crush on seven. Harry, you might as well wear a big sign that says, I'm in love, everyone sees it. Yeah, it gets personal, gets ugly. It's a very interesting moment because you really know like what both characters

are going through and why they're being, like BLT being nasty to someone doesn't always come with a emotional underpinning like this. Yeah. And I really liked the tone of this scene because I totally empathized with both of them. I understand why BLT's in no mood and I understand why Kim is feeling adrift and anxious about this. Yeah.

Why don't you go take it out when you're clear and it, Kim? That's a dim asking. Yeah. I got a ticket that's not numbed up that little bit of lodgement here. I... That's a dim asking. 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.

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So on the shuttle Seven of nine and two Valk or you know, it's like an airplane landing in Austin, Texas Just huge amounts of turbulence. Oh shit. I haven't thought about that in a while. Yeah This is gonna be fun to play as an actor, right? Like you're really giving it the 9 out of 10 on the bounce. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like doing it in a chair has got to be a little bit more fun than being up on on your feet on the bridge and trying to like make it look like you're hanging on to the banisters and stuff. I really feel like David Livingston went all the way in his setups for this episode because he's shooting up from the floor in the middle of these two seats on the shuttle.

In a way, I don't think we've ever seen before. Yeah. He's all over the place with camera placements. It's really cool. Seven is trying to get out of two-box like a... She made me take you on this OA mission because she doesn't trust me yet, right? And he's like, no, like the rules are,

use the buddy system on an OA mission. And so while they're talking about this, they're like sending a pulse at the station to calm down the gravity waves or something, and then they get set upon by a hostile ship. And they get scanned in a way that knocks all the systems out and I was like, if it knocked all the systems out, can you call it a scan or is that an attack?

Good thing they didn't scan the shields because those are still up momentarily. Yeah, and like you said, there's this really amazing floor up shot of the cockpit of the shuttle while they're under attack with sparks arcing over the view screen. And it is a really exciting bit of space combat. Yeah, I like the strategy.

You get a fire, just stress-boil. And I'm marginally. Before you're tracked or dim to an enemy ship's cargo bay. Yeah, I love that it looks just like, like this shuttle take a poop. Yeah. It's great. They don't know what's happened back on Voyager.

They're just, they're concerned with the letter story line still. Yeah. They're like, Hey, the gravimetric field of the station seems to have calmed down. Great news. They, they did it. Yeah. Anybody heard from them? Nobody's asking. We get a moment of relationship greatness here when BLT calls Paris to the astromectrism. Ankilles or...

I'm gonna keep doing that every episode. Yeah. It's hard to say. When BLT calls Paris. We need to just call in a new term for it. X-X-X-Gromatrix slab. How about to just call in a new term for it, X redo shirt, a slab. Coming soon to podge.fist. I really like this scene because BLT knows that Paris has got some complicated feelings about who he might get a letter from. And this is before he even knows who the letter's coming from. And BLT's like, it's your dad.

And Paris is such an interesting person in this episode because he represents someone that has had a better life on Voyager since being marooned in the D-quad. Right. And he can't be the only one. It is such a bad look for him to have such a poopy diaper in this scene about not wanting to read a letter from his dad and he hasn't checked in with her once. But then the second she pushes back and sticks up for herself, he completely abandons his casting of himself as the victim and is just there for her in a way. Like, I think it's a bad Paris moment that he hasn't asked her once this whole episode, like how she's feeling if she's gotten any news. But the fact that the second he knows how she's feeling and that she does have news,

he is able to put his shit aside and comfort her over a much more major thing. I don't know, man. In Paris's defense, you just can't assume that at all times that your lady friend has been given news of thousands of make-ways dying. You can't, but on a day like today when everybody's getting news from home, like even just asking her,

what would it feel like for you to get some news from home is like a question worth asking. He's got dad problems, man. He's made it all about himself. He's not right. I think he redeems himself in this scene, but the scene starts as a bad look for him. You know what, Loki? I like about this scene is that they don't turn it into a make out at the end.

It's just two people in a couple's relationship, figuring out, like, sharing their pain with each other. Yeah. And by the end of it, they're there for each other. Yeah, and it's just anal. They don't kiss at all. No. Mark Johnson? I thought it was Tom Mervins, first of all. I don't agree with the name of this guy whatsoever. I will not be saying the name they use on this episode. Tom Mervins. For the clueless you love to live in.

And his letter to Janeway. I was, I don't think I understood that he was her fiance. I thought they were married. Yeah, I thought so too. Maybe they were like common law. He ended up marrying the puppies. It's just another rule of me, love my dog demand. Yeah. Yes. The news that Janeway got is that Tom Mervyn's has moved on in life. And wouldn't you know it?

Chico Tez, the first one on the scene, to pick up those shattered pieces. Hmm. Interesting. Yeah. He's just going to put those pieces into his bindle. You know what happens to the opposite sex partner of a heterosexual person who becomes their confidant. You know, that tends to be a slippery slope. Sure. A well lubricated slippery slope. Sounds great. The dog had puppies, Ben.

Yeah. And Tom Mervin's got remarried. He didn't even send pictures of the puppies. I would have made it seem a little bit better, right? He just sends vacation pics of him and his new wife. Look at this fox! She's like half my age, Chico Te. She's like half my age, Chico Te. She didn't even graduate from the Academy. What the fuck is he doing?

Oh, man. I mean, the take here, am I projecting onto Chico Te a feeling of hope out of him instead of just total being there for a friend. I'm seeing an angle that doesn't feel great. Yeah, I think he's trying to boi her spirits. Yeah, I'm just writing mental slash fiction in the scene, I guess, huh? I don't think that that's not in this episode, Adam. I just don't think it's this scene.

That's fair. Well, speaking of Boaz, the ship picks up the distress Boaz that two-vac and seven of nine dumped out of their Bradstile shuttle and aboard the herojian ship. It is decorated like a seafood restaurant in there. Like a cheap mid-market seafood restaurant, like next to a truck stop. Yeah, better than Denny's,

but do you really want to take the risk? The camera floats around until we see two-fuck all lassoed into some real SNM style belt wear, and 7 of 9 is laying nearby, and her face is on the grate. Yeah, that's not great. Her face is on the grate. Not great. This is is on the great.

Not great. This is hero shit for Jerry Ryan. That's what I'm saying. Yeah. She didn't have to do that. These guys really have their dungeon set up in a big way, and this herogen dude comes in and he's fucking huge. You were pathetic, Prey.

I really love that they cast actors that are like a foot and a half taller than the main cast characters that they're playing against. I love the reveal of this because up until now, they could be one foot tall for all we know. We're just seeing them on camera. But you see some of the camera angles tilted down to even allow Tufak to be in a three shot later. I thought it was great.

Oh, yeah. And these guys are very angry. allowed Tuvac to be in a three shot later. I thought was great. Yeah, and these guys are very angry. They, I think they're primarily angry that the capture of the shuttle was quite easy. Yeah. The hunt was not satisfying. No. And Tuvac is talking a ton of shit. Like, let us go back to our ship and the guys like,

no, no, no, no, no, no. You guys are my trophies. I gotta get all my artifacts out of you. like, let us go back to our ship and the guy's like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no be like, God, these prisoners are weak as hell. I can't even blast from how easy it was to capture them. And your tack being like, you do not want to mess with us in our ship. We are bad ass. And when we bring the lumber, you're going to feel it. I wouldn't have done that at all. It would have been like, oh. Dude, not even worth the hunt.

This is a snooze, dude. You think I'm weak? You should check out my weak-ass ship. Yeah. It's gonna be terrible for you. Embarrassed to have even started hunting it. We're gonna be the lamest game. Ha ha ha.

Objection noted, we'll do this without you, do it. Get to do it. Objection noted, we'll do this without you, do it. Get to do it. Get to do it. Do it. There's some debate among the two heroogen dudes about like,

you know, we want to take Voyager, but maybe we should wait for our friends. One of whom is like, no, I want all of the glory of taking it myself. I feel like we're kind of like starting to establish what the heroogen are about. They are hunters as the title of the episode implies, but there's some formality to that, I guess.

Right. They're having this debate when Voyager pulls up and Janeway gets on FaceTime with the captain of the arogyne vessel and is talking the same kind of shit that two Vach has been talking, which doesn't work. So then she's like, okay, like, what about a trade? Give us our people back. I like Idren's whole deal here. He's like, not only am I not giving you your people back, but you should really fuck off because once more ships arrive, you're really not gonna have a chance.

Don't be foolish. Leave now and save yourselves. These dudes are willing to attack unprovoked and this kind of turns into your classic, the progress bar is creeping across the computer screen while an adventure or an attack is taking place. And we're just hoping we can get all the data out before we have to run away. Yeah. This felt like a misstep to me because maybe I had just underestimated the importance of the messages they were trying to get. But I was shocked that we cut back to the ASLAB and BLT's like, I could really use like at least another half hour.

While herogen ships are bearing down on them, it just didn't seem worth it to me. Yeah. I mean, the message isn't going to matter if you're dead. I think it's that message from command that they need to decrypt that they're mostly worried about. And I wasn't really clear on whether they got all of it out by the end of this episode. I'm not sure I really need to read another letter. Check out day.

I can't take that today. Nothing really matters today. I don't even feel like blowing up the ship. And that is literally my favorite thing to do. I'm not even in the mood to whisper. So the attack that they figure out is they're going to destabilize the station itself and expose the vacuum of the black hole to everyone. And that is going to work, but it's going to cut off the thing. And so they really have to wait till the last minute, but then they do it. And we see all the herojanship falling toward the event horizon of the Burr curl. I like that a lot. That was a fun scene. It was really cool. And they like barely make it away, you know, and

Janeway marches down to the ass lab and sees the like Visual representation of all of the other relays in this network collapsing, which I really feel like the writer's room was like fuck we can't just have them like in contact with Starfleet for the series It's great. What you don't see are all the hero gen being electrically shocked at all of those stations. Yeah. Every single one of them gets war-flightening than the entire hero gen species vows of end data against the Starship Voyager.

I mean, even to me, that's pretty fructive. I mean, what I did to the Hushnak, at least to his painless, you just hurt lots of them wantonly all at once. I think they have a right to be made. You killed him? It was a mild shock, he will recover. What did you make of TuVac just the road slitting out on the hero's and ship? I love this. That guy got the road slit,

but then he got back up and kept fighting. And then he throws TuVac across the room. God, the height disparity is crazy. I looked up how tall these guys are. I mean, our main guy, tiny Ron we've seen before. May he're do. Right. He's seven feet. His other guy, you know the the subordinate, seven foot four.

Wow. Holy mackerel. That's the guy you threw to Vock. Fuck. That guy is huge. That's a full foot taller than me. Did you know that anyone over seven feet tall? Statistically has a 17% chance of playing in the NBA.

Wow. Because there are so few people in the world that tall, like that is a measurable statistic. Wow. I loved it. Yeah. I'm so bad at basketball. My whole childhood was about showing up at an event

where older people hadn't seen me in a while and gone, boy, you've gotten tall. I bet you play a lot of basketball on me being like, I don't am bad at it. That sucks. Whole fucking childhood, everywhere I went. Sports expectations really had a negative impact on me going up.

Sounds like they did the same for you. Yeah. So I became a rower. Like, I'm going to do the weirdest thing. The sports that I was great at in gym were like, I couldn't do anything with badminton. I beat my teachers in badminton. But that doesn't mean anything in general population.

Oh, Ripley. Hello. Why didn't Tuvaak try to neck pinch them? Do you think it was because they were too tall? They had that armor too. I feel like part of what you're going for with that pinch is like under the collarbone. That's true.

I mean, it's crazy that they call it a neck pinch. It's as much a shoulder pinch as anything. If I'm blocking this scene, it had to be so seductive to shoot from Tuvaq height in profile and just see bodies rising out of frame. I was really surprised that we never got anything like that. Everything is tilted down toward Tuvaq. Yeah, I wonder.

There was some restraint about the comedy of the physicality of the scene, you know? Yeah, you said it before visually, This whole episode is really top tier and very fun to watch. So with all of the heroogen defeated, they managed to punch a transporter beam through the herogens hull and rescue 7 and 2VAC before that ship also falls into the black her and they're getting out of there. Day saved, but the whole network is collapsed as we said. The last letter that BLT was able to get out of there is one that

she is taking down to deliver to Kim. It's the letter he's wanted the whole time. Dear Harry, it's your parents. The letter is one of the whole time. Dear Harry, it's your parents. We've turned your room into kind of a gym, all-purpose space. There is a bookcase that is a secret entrance to a sex dungeon that is kind of herogen-themed. Anyways, glad you're alive.

Never mind the heavy-det hooks driven into the ceiling post. Not my mom and dad. Paris does not get the letter from Daddy. All we got is the heading of the letter from Daddy. Yeah. It's too bad. And it's forward, forward, forward, forward. Admiral Cartwright was right. Paris is like, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, on the episode, Adam. Yeah. Janeway, suddenly in a good mood, and it really feels like she isn't a good mood because she's realizing she's back on the market as she sits down for coffee with Chico Te and like totally flirts with him about his amount of sugar choices and stuff. Did you? I could swear that Janeway laughs about the number of lumps Chico

Tei wants in his coffee because he asks for two. Yeah. And she still grabs him one. Man, crazy. Yeah. You'll take what I give you Chico Tei. If I give you only one of my lumps, you'll enjoy it. This is a great strategy if you have been invited to a party that's kind of spur of the moment and you don't know if you have the energy. A coffee pre-funk. Yeah. Is a great idea. The finest organic suspension ever divides.

I always love showing up at a party needing to poop urgently. Me and my wife have been doing a lot of espresso martinis. Popular drink. Yeah, that's good. That'll pump you right up for a party. Yeah, that'll get you going. The sophisticated Red Bull and vodka, I guess. Yeah.

That is the end of the episode Adam. I have a question for you. Did you like this episode? You know, probably these to get a long way, post-review time. Did you like this episode? You know, I think I'll like it more if the hero gen are a going concern. I want to keep hanging out with the hero gen. I like the idea of giant aliens. Yeah. I like the idea of the star fleets may be fucking this one up from the beginning. Yeah, they really ship of death this thing. Yeah, they really did. They destroyed a communications network with a high dollar value.

Yeah, and I mean, I mean, I high sentimental value too, is 100,000 years old. Yeah. Do you think that like hundreds of little black holes were released across the quadrant? Yeah. How much damage was this? You're being flying serpentine to get home now. Yeah, I mean, as I said before, like super interesting visually

and an interesting story, like the tension of needing something that doesn't belong to you and trying to make that work diplomatically. I thought was a fun spin on a science fiction story dealing with aliens. And I don't like seeing Janeway hurt, but Kate Mulgrugh's ability to play strong in the face of disappointment is a brand of her that we've gotten throughout this season. And she's so good at it that you just can't help but it feels like rooting for the captain is like front running as a fan like rooting for the cowboys or something. But she is flawed and interesting and strong and good. And it doesn't feel that way to root for her as a character. And just more and more episode after episode, I just find myself really on her side as a captain. And this episode especially, what about you? Yeah, I think it's interesting how much her emotional journey in this episode sort of feels like it's almost the C storyline.

If the existential stuff with the ship and the hero gen and the station are the A and Harry Kim story as the B, the captain receiving her letter and processing it feels like the C, but it also like is incredibly humanizing. And this way, it's very uncharacteristic of captains we've seen in Star Trek, up till now. How great is it that she doesn't want to be alone looking out a staring window? Like, she wants to be with someone through this moment. And she wants to go party with her crew. Like, yeah. It took eight seasons for Picard to party with his crew.

Yeah, he should have done that a long time ago. Yeah, I think this is a great episode, very nicely shot, very nicely directed. Yeah, I think that there's a lot of ways they could have taken this script, and it's hard to fault them for just making a choice and seeing it through. I do feel like they see through the script that they wrote. It rises to the challenge. There's just so many more questions I had and guessing we'll see many answers

to those explored in the coming episodes. So. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, overall, an episode I really liked. Yeah, good stuff. I really liked yeah good stuff See what kind of good stuff we have over in the priority one message inbox Ben fine Priority one message from star flees coming in on secure channel Need a supplement

Supplement Yes extra the interest alone could be enough to buy this ship We're gonna have to destroy the priority when message system After getting these partial p1s right then. Oh, yeah, yeah, man. I could take hours for us to decode these But so we may as well get started now. Don't touch your computer. You don't want to get shocked by the lightning bin Especially from this first priority one message, it's of a promotional nature. Whoa.

Ben, the called action is for a podcast rec that doesn't violate HR policy, but still takes you on a journey. It's called the History of American Food. You can find out more about this on Twitter and Insta at THO-A-F-O-D. Right. So T-The-H-History-O-O-F-A-American-F-Food. The message goes like this. I'm gonna read this like it's a teleprompter, okay?

Okay. Voyager is Star Trek, Hashtag, Foodcast, and you still have viewers. The history of American food pod should fit. Start at 17th, see ship rations and work through food categories to the present. Nielix hasn't caused space food poisoning, not causing space scurvy, rickets, and pelagra more important. Jokes are bad science, teacher humor, and we are work and child safe.

For example, the history of the pineapple, molasses beer, and the context of Britain, lemons, and the mafia. Soon I'll be at Revolutionary War and how to make soup from shoelether. So Greta Harden sent this in. This is a promo for their show, The History of American Food. It sounds like they've got a lot of ground to cover here.

Yeah, I think I've exchanged some tweets with THOA Food on Twitter. And all these some funny stuff in there. I'm dying to know how to make soup from shoe leather because I've seen hobos lower their boots into pots of boiling water in so many images and I didn't know if that was a real thing or not. You can't do that with sebo right there's no such thing as sebo soup. I guess it depends on what type of wood you're

working with. Wow well check out the history of American food podcast that sounds really cool. Yeah our next P1 here is from Scott and it's two, the Friends of the Soto and it goes like this. In the next two months, the United States will have midterm elections. These are important and we need to be active. The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men and women to do nothing. Vote early, vote local, and use your voice to encourage others. To quote Janeway, one voice can be stronger than a thousand voices. Yeah, true that. I love this. Thank you for that message, Scott, a great reminder to all of us

that we should be getting out there. It takes a lot more than just voting, I would say. It's writing letters to your politicians. It is looking up who is running for what and what bills are being proposed to voters in your area and really doing the homework on it. And if you've got time, you know, canvassing for people or making calls, knocking on doors, volunteering for campaigns that you support, all of that stuff really helps in addition to giving money.

So... Well, you're right about all that, Ben, but at least... Vote. At least vote. Don't make it too hard on people, alright? Yeah, but also... Unique times. Yeah.

Yeah. Wow. Thank you, Scott. That's a great message. Ben, our final priority when message is from Kern and it is to you. From me? That message goes like this. I can't remember for sure, but I suspect

you'll be a better father than this Klingon turned Starfleet patac that I think I might have heard about once. Maybe. Capp la! I mean, that's a low bar. Yeah, I do hope I can clear it. Is the bargain any lower than Worf? I mean, you know, Brian lost his daughter in a time butthole. Yeah.

And then she had to raise herself fearily from the age of five. But that wasn't because O'Brien did a bad job. It seemed like Wurf didn't even want to be around Alexander. That's true. At least O'Brien wanted to be around his child. Yeah. He was negligent that one time,

but overall he was better than O'Brien. Yeah, let's look at the whole picture. Yeah. He was negligent that one time, but overall he was better than more. Yeah, let's look at the whole picture. Yeah, well, thank you, Turn, thank you to everyone who got a P1, and if you'd like to get a P1, a Dimaximum fund on or slash Gembo Tron and set it up today. Hey, Ben. What's that, Adam? Did you find yourself a drunk Shimoda? Hey, Ben. What's that, Adam? Did you find yourself a drunk Shimoda? Random.

Drunk Shimoda! I think I'm gonna give it to seven for just not picking up on how depressed Janeway was in that one scene. Yeah. I feel like that is a pretty Shimoda move to just like walk into a room, get the thing you wanted out of the room

and leave without like checking in with any of the people in that room. I don't know, it's like a sad scene in many ways, but it's also kind of funny and in that way. True, yeah. If Seven is going to be a Shimoda, that's the way that she's going to be it. They're not being able to read the social cues.

Totally. Every time. Mine is going to be Chico Te for kind of a similar reason. Well. That coffee clatch he gets into with Janeway at the end. I think he's got to lock that shit down a little bit. He seems a little too interested on this particular day, you know, of all days.

Yeah, yeah. It's a little bit ski-free to strike while the emotions all are vulnerable in that way. But at the same time, like this is what everyone wants, the entire show is constructed around an interest in them being together. There's a whole bathtub storyline about this. Seriously.

I didn't even have a replicator to burn rations on for that bathtub. What kind of day is Chico Tehad? He learns that thousands of his comrades have died, but also he's got a chance with the lady at the workplace. So, not all bad news. Could be worse. Wow. Well, Adam, why don't you head over to gach.bizslashgame and get your game and get your dice in your hands when I tell you about season four episode 16, pray when Voyager beams aboard a wounded hero, a board. When Voyager beams, a wounded herogen a board, then inadvertently allow a board his prey of members of species 8472.

They used a board three times in that sentence. Boy, that's like one of my bad tweets. You ever read a tweet and you just realized he repeated the same word four times? Yeah, all the time. God, that sucks. It's extremely frustrating. But that's the world we live in, Adam. Do you want to tell us about where we are

on the board game and where we're going? Sure, do you, Ben? Our runabout is currently on square 32. We're just a couple squares ahead. We've got a Janeway square. Oh, yeah. which would write us upwards to the second row from the top where the next episode becomes a measure of a man episode. Oh, yeah.

That's not the only thing in range. Got a Nielix's galley square, four squares ahead. Wow. And here's some breaking news, Ben. A new square has been put on the board. It's there. Wow. That is square 43, the Bronze Zone.

I take it here in charge here. Team leader, bronze, fourth, more defense contingent. I gotta get a pump. That's it, get it. That is the square where the hosts must communicate using glory, dvoritellings during the fullness of the episode. We also got the canar with Demar Square back on the board because if Renner DeSoto gave us that bottle of official

Star Trek wines canar and that has been re-added to square 54. I just wanted to say this every time we even mention a change to this game, Philippe Sobriero, Craig Anderson and Andrew Wong-Hoyer are like on it. Yeah. Ready to change the game, ready to improve it, ready to make it more fun. So that's been a real great part of the game of Buttholes. A genuine treat. Felipe is also working on a couple

of items for PodShop.biz. Last I heard. Yeah, look forward to that as well. You're required to learn as you play. Roll. I'm working on rolling this die. Do that thing. Do that thing. I rolled a one, Ben. Did I win? Creeping along. We're on square 33. Regular old episode for us. You know how I do.

Fucking, eh. Yeah. I think a couple of ones in a row. So, yep. We're just inching along. Yeah. We're not in any particular hurry. I'm prolonging the pleasure.

Yeah. I'm doing. It's getting tantric in here. I'm making this game last a long time. Yeah. Well, the people that make this show last a long time are the people that go to MaximumFun.org slash join and set up a monthly membership. We greatly appreciate those folks.

We also appreciate anyone who leaves a nice review on Apple podcasts or whatever podcasting app you use or recommends the show to a friend or you know, download it onto your parent's iPad or whatever. Just helping us juice the numbers, you know, makes a big difference. I just enjoyed some drinks with some pals who told me that they weren't listeners of the show. And it didn't hurt my feelings because they said that they downloaded and subscribed to it. Hell yeah.

I was like, love that. Doesn't upset me whatsoever. Yeah. That's all you got to do. Yeah. You don't have to listen. No. No one has to listen.

No one should listen. Nope. It counts the same. That's great. We should thank Wendy Pretty, the producer and editor of this podcast. We should thank Nick Dittmore, who made the show art, the card daddy Bill Tilly, who runs our social media accounts at Greatest Trek, and Adam Agusia, who made our original theme music, riff and off, with the original card song by Dark Materia, that you're here

on right now. Thanks to all those folks for being so great. You just did all the credits. There are no more credits for me to read. DrunkSremoto.com, now yeah. GreatestGen.reddit.com, which places that you could go to meet

Friends of Desotto on the internet. They would like that. How could I not shout out the Miriam places on social media where you can meet a friend of the Soto? Everywhere! GreatestGen.wakia.com, if you're wondering where a joke came from, they've compiled a huge list of runners on this show and cataloged many of their origins. GreatestTrek.com?

Surely a website that we own and operate at this moment Hmm, maybe With that we will be back at you next week with another great episode Star Trek Voyager and an episode of the greatest generation Voyager that has a 17% chance of having some actors in the NBA that has a 17% chance of having some actors in the NBA. Nice callback! Thanks, I'm a professional comedy podcast. Make it show. Make it show.

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