The Greatest Generation - Sacrificial Pop-A-Shot Ball (ENT S3E10)

Episode Date: July 14, 2025

When Trip’s funeral kicks off the cold open, we go back in time to learn about the accident that caused Dr. Phlox to suggest an unorthodox procedure to save his life with some new brains. But after the symbiote they’ve created starts looking for solutions to keep living, hard dark Archer insists that he’s willing to kill him to complete the mission. What’s the shitty thing about having a business? Which type of child actor is a breath of fresh air? Could T’Pol have given Sym a better goodbye present? It’s the episode that explores an almost Tuvix dilemma.Support the production of The Greatest GenerationGet a thing at podshop.biz!Sign up for our mailing list!Follow The Game of Buttholes: The Will of the Riker - Quantum LeapThe Greatest Generation is produced by Wynde PriddySocial media is managed by Rob Adler and Bill TilleyMusic by Adam Ragusea & Dark MateriaFriends of DeSoto for: Labor | Democracy | JusticeDiscuss the show using the hashtag #GreatestGen and find us on social media:YouTube | Facebook | X | Instagram | TikTok | Mastodon | Bluesky | ThreadsAnd check out these online communities run by FODs: Reddit | USS Hood Discord | Facebook group | Wikia | FriendsOfDeSoto.social

I am so excited about STLV it is coming right up August 6th through 10th in Las Vegas at the Rio. Adam and I are gonna be there we're gonna have a booth the entire cast of Voyager will be there along with a hundred plus guest celebrities non-stop activities. There's also gonna be a ton of other stops for the Star Trek voyage around the country. They're going to be in Orlando, New Jersey, and Chicago with great Star Trek conventions there. And you can get 20% off tickets to those regional conventions using the code GREATEST at checkout. We'll see you at STLV, and I hope you'll see a lot of friends at DeSoto at those regional

conventions. CreationENT.com. Welcome to The Greatest Generation. It's a Star Trek podcast by a couple of guys who are just a little bit embarrassed about having a Star Trek podcast. I'm Ben Harrison. I'm Adam Pranica. Welcome to the show, Ben. Oh, thank you.

It's great to be here. I know I missed our record a couple of days ago. Appreciate your forbearance. I did that thing. I fucking taxicab couple of days ago. Appreciate your forbearance. I did that thing. I fucking taxi cabbed you, man. It's 15 minutes after our scheduled start time and I haven't seen you in the stream yard. So I blow in a phone call.

A phone call, I think that I began with, how you doing? And then I got a whole lot of news about another thing. And then I was like, I listened, I was interested. I heard you out, I maybe had some thoughts of my own. And then I was like, how do you feel about recording a show today? As the taxi cab tires are flippity flopping the day down the road.

Yeah, unsafe at any speed trying to schedule something with Benjamin R. Harrison, but especially on a day. You know, the shitty thing about having a business is that all the business you have to do. I know. That's what they don't tell you when you go to a hit Star Trek podcast academy. They don't. You know, they just send you on your way after you turn your tassel and they don't tell you about the next part. No, the next part, often a drag

and I was dealing with some bullshit business shit and yelling at people from banks on the phone about things. It's hard to imagine you doing that. I'm saying this both as someone who knows you, who is your friend, and also like, I'm taking the position of FODs now. Like, wow, Ben was upset with someone on the phone. You wanna know a thing?

I literally said to somebody on the phone on Monday, when we were supposed, probably like right when we were supposed to be recording, I said, I feel like I pulled into your gas station, pushed the button for 87 octane, and you've pumped a bunch of fucking diesel into my car. Now I'm supposed to stick this rubber tube into my tank and suck? You want me to suck it out now? You want me to felt your diesel out of my gas tank?

Did you then start to receive the customer service you deserved at that point? I mean, I think you could argue that I did get the customer service I deserved. I asked the wrong question. Yeah, I think very much that this is this person's fault that I'm talking to in this conversation, but they are trying to blame it on somebody else who I interacted with like months and months ago in February. Is that person no longer with the company? No, because insurance is just a nesting doll and like this was an insurance issue and so, you know, like the organization you go to might not even be the broker.

This isn't the same thing, but another parallel thing that happened, which I don't even know if you know about this, is like two weeks ago, we found out that for like compliance reasons, we had to have a workman's comp insurance policy on the company. And so I went to our payroll company and right there on the front of their website that said, we offer workman's comp insurance. I think the term now is work persons comp, Ben.

Yeah. Just wanna make sure you don't get letters. Anyways, I filled out the form, got the insurance policy, and then it was like a Tuesday and we didn't have any records. You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to take myself out to a movie. And I went and I saw the new Mission Impossible film, which I've been very excited about. And the entire time I was in there, I could feel my phone buzzing and my watch buzzing.

And I was like, fuck it, I'm at the movies. I'm not getting up and looking at my phone. Fuck that shit. Neither are you turning on, do not disturb either. You're just gonna keep getting buzzed. The second I get out of there, I discovered that because we have gotten Workman's Comp, our payroll company is shutting down payroll until they have a copy of the policy.

Oh! And they sold me the policy. That's fun. And by this time, it was like 5 p.m. It was like very close to end of business. So I had to be on the phone with like three or four different people making sure the right document got sent to the right place, you know, so everybody would get paid on time that week. And I was just like, well, I don't remember anything that happened in the movie now. Like, like the explosive stress bomb that awaited me the second the movie was over was so overwhelming

that like it has wiped that film from my memory. Like couldn't tell you one thing about it. And I'm like, probably never going to go see a movie in the theaters again. You try to use this for good, Ben. Like say, say you had a particularly traumatic medical procedure or maybe you got some bad news that that's bummed you out, here's what you do. You call up a bank.

You start talking about banking or insurance stuff. All of a sudden, I think what we're talking about is a new form of therapy, and I think it's going to help a lot of people. It doesn't even have to be your bank, like, you know, like Citibank. Like find out what the customer service line is, call them up, fucking rip into them. I think being a little less opaque might, might help FODs out there understand what's going on because a lot of FODs are small business owners who are dealing with a lot of the challenges we are.

We're attempting to get an SBA loan to consolidate a little bit of debt we've accumulated. It seems like it would be easy to do. We've been doing this since February. It's a Byzantine process, even with good help. Yeah. It's crazy. It feels like the end is in sight and then it's no longer in sight. And it's causing me to not be my best self on the phone with people in sales or whatever. I'm not really sure what their positions are. Ben, can I count on you to be your best self on the show today? Or at least like

what we would expect to be your best self under the circumstances? I can be my best self for a maximum of 16 days and then it's all gonna be over for me. What does that mean? Am I missing a clue there? What happens 16 days from now? I'm just saying, like, I might be a symbiote. Jesus. Are you also ready to dabble in a very special Star Trek language and terminology, Ben? I take it you're in charge here.

Team leader, Bro, fourth board defense contingent. I gotta get a pump. That's it, get it. I can't tell if my rages are turning into trembles or the other way around, honestly. I think you've mostly turned trembles into rages based on the story you've told.

It's hard to tell, but let's dive into it. We've got a special square today. We are going to attempt to use as many vory tellings as we can. It'll be great. It's one of our favorite squares on the Game of Buttholes. And let's get into the episode today, Ben. It's Enterprise Season 3 Episode 10.

Its title? Similitude. Got free speech and guitars. Cold open, fan RSVP Tripp Tucker. It's always sad when someone dies at the workplace, right? I don't want to get too much of a bummer on you, but that's happened to me. I've been at a workplace where someone has died. That's no fun. It's the happy privilege of all ship captains since the age of sail to be able to speak at the funeral of one of your friends and coworkers. To marry someone to a corpse.

That's what Archer gets to do here. How about this? Open torpedo tube casket is what Tripp's body gets. And pretty good thing, you don't want to die ugly if you can help it, right? Yeah. It's a good sign. Is he down facing? No, he's up turned. Soon to be fired into the hereafter once that Torp is loaded. Right?

Unclear what nemesis claimed him. Yeah. I don't know how many funerals you've gone to. I've gone to a couple. Do you think the good seat is next to Archer or is it down on the floor with the torpedo? Because you're looking at Archer give this speech and he's up on the balcony. I'm like, who the fuck are those guys on either side of him? We don't know these people. Like, where are his friends? They really looked like contest winners, you know? Absolutely did.

Yeah. Yeah, it was bizarre that it took several shots to see, like, the rest of the crew that we know. And, like, you see Reed, like, finishing up some letters and, like, stuffing them into the side of the torpedo. Like, I think he would have wanted this. I thought this was very interesting. They close up the torpedo. Like, I think he would have wanted this. I thought this was very interesting. They close up the torpedo

and then they just put it back in the rack to be fired at another ship eventually later. That's what's in these things. This was a really funny angle. Like you must pass through the rack to make it onto the like bowling ball return slide that this thing needs to load into to get locked and loaded. It's funny, you'll see a weapons officer load a torpedo and then kind of put his hand above the fan

to kind of dry off the sweat of his firing hand. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then the camera pans up and you see him glimpse the glare as he gets ready to shoot that thing. I miss bowling. You have a bowling alley in your neighborhood, don't you? Great bowling alley over here in Highland Park. There used to be another one that was even better because it was like totally untouched from the 70s and had like a totally haunted restaurant in it.

And, you know, everything was like a gross carpet that smelled. How heavy is your ball? I bet you got a big heavy ball, don't you? 16 pounder? 18 pounder? You know, I think I go medium on the on the on the ball weight. Yeah. I don't like them too light, but I don't like those those real heavy boys either. I feel like a heavy boy gives you a good smash. Like when I roll a light ball and I'm hitting the pocket where you want to, the ball doesn't do what it's supposed to do and like crushing all those pins, it's almost like the ball flies sideways and doesn't penetrate. Yeah, you want it to really take the fullness of the pins. Absolutely. I enjoy a bowling sesh. I'll get together with the boys and go bowling.

You got your own ball, Adam? I would love my own ball. I would love to be my own ball type of bowler, but I don't have one. Yeah, I feel like you're that type of guy. I feel like that's not out of reach for you. How much could a bowling ball cost? $20?

Here's the thing, like I'm so used to the balls that they have at bowling alleys that you can just get off at the rack. Like, I don't know if I need to go see a guy about how my fingers should go in or not. Like it seems like there's measurement and technique. Like I could buy a ball, but then I'd have to get it drilled. How do I do that?

I don't know. You know, it's a great feeling. Get a ball and you stick your fingers and they don't, don't really fit. It's like, yeah, a little too much girth for this one. You like that? Yeah. You know what? You seem like the sort of person that has definitely got fingers stuck in a ball before and then been injured on the bowling alley. Oh yeah. I swing it and I just like face point it on the lane. Two weeks earlier, Ben, it's another Vulcan Euro pressure session with Tripp and T'Pol. And this time, it's foot stuff in a 69 kind of way.

And to make it the least sexy thing possible, Tripp is talking about work during. Yeah. Not much of T'Pol's body is shrouded as it typically isn't and not much of his is either. You know, he made this sound a whole lot worse than it is. I love how there was a conversation we missed here where Tripp's like, oh, so we're just doing foot stuff today? Could I still take off my shirt? What are you, a novice?

There is a side out and a rotate to this scene where the next position is one where Tripp is extremely close to receiving some face sitting and what Tripp is glimpsing is truly gloried in the now. We haven't gotten to the more challenging postures. The small talk, the thing that they, I guess, are hoping will relax them amidst this rubdown sesh is some warp field theory stuff. Trip has an idea to make the ship shakeless when they're at high warp. We get out of this scene and now we're testing the warp thing. I had to rewind because I was like, I didn't realize that that warp field theory shit was

important. That was small talk field theory shit was important. I thought that that was small talk, but that was important. They're talking about a real thing here. It was big talk. Yeah. And I love that they went right from plan to execution. This is great. In the soon after, we are actually testing this thing out and it's something about compressing

the stream and they start going up to warp five. The ship is really shaken. Test seems to be going really bad until trip initializes the stream compression and then it's good. And then it's bad again. I like this sequence. Bumpy, bangers, and then smooth. You can really feel it.

Feels nice. Feels like a success. Nope. Nope. They turn their trembles to bangers and fire is breaking out everywhere. There's like big roaring flames on the bridge and in engineering as they talk about what's going wrong.

Is this visual code for past people? Like, I feel like in the 24th century, you were going to get sparks, and you're going to get little rocks flying out of panels. But to get actual fire and lots of it here, this is like a caveman Starfleet, right? Is that what the code is when you see these flames? Yeah, I guess so.

There's something up on top of the warp engine that Trip has to go mess with and you almost think he gets nullied when a huge explosion, including some of those aforementioned rocks, takes him out. You hate to see that moment in TV and movies where someone gets thrown from a high height, lands on their back, slams their head and they pick up their head for a moment and then block back down again. That's what Tripp does here. We come out of warp in a brown nebula and in a nocel to Paul is explaining to Archer that the nebula itself, like something got sucked into the intakes and that's what caused the ship

to fly apart the way it did. There's some like blown out material on the walls. In the same way that it felt jarring to go from footstuff to a warp speed test, I was also jarred by the image of, you know, Trip being down for the count. And then like, T'Pol supervises some welding in one of the next scenes. Like we're not with Trip at all.

And she's there giving Archer an update on the ship's condition and it's not good. And in exchange, she gets an update on Trip Tucker's condition, which is also not good. He is in a coma and has extensive neural damage. We got a little interstitial where we go outside of the nebula and it kind of looks like stuff is like blowing at the ship.

And in Six Bay, Flax is talking to Archer about this critter that he has on board and it's a larva that he can use to clone Trip so that they will have enough neural material to give Trip a neural transplant because so much brain damage happened when he got exploded on top of the warp engine. I think we note this every time we encounter it. When John Billingsley gets out of the jovial, jocular, normal Dr. Flax that we encounter most of the time

and tries on a different emotion, like fear for a co-worker and their medical condition, it is striking what he does in a scene like this. It seems very, very bad what's happened to Trip here. And it's because we're so unused to finding Dr. Flax this way. I don't make this proposal lightly, Captain, but I'm obligated to provide you with all available options. It's a pretty heavy deal because the clone is going to have a life. It's going to be aware of its surroundings and shit. But already, I feel like you've said more than Doctor Flax has in this scene.

There's an economy of description here that makes it so that Archer is, I think, rightfully weirded out by the idea and also doesn't have an answer to whether or not this is something that they should do. Can't tell if it's sharp yet. Yeah. So in the clarinet rental closet, T'Pol tells him, like, in addition to having no warp engines and a dead or nearly dead engineer, there's also this crud accumulating on the hull.

You fall into some crud or something? This stuff is sticky as hell and it takes firepower to remove it. It's also magnetic in a fun way and like a parlor trick way. That's neat. The longer they stay in this nebula, the more buildup will accumulate before they move on to the discussion of the Lycian clone. They do this multiple times now. We're talking about ship condition and then finally trips condition in a way that feels

sadly appropriate, you know? T'Pol's not psyched about this. She feels like it is weird and bad to make a clone of Tripp to do this. We'll be growing a sentient being for the sole purpose of harvesting tissue. I'm aware of the ethical implications. I think part of that is informed by T'Pol's awareness and understanding of the Lycian people and their many issues with their own practice. You know, like they've banned this, which suggests some issues they may have had with it over time. Like, why would we do something that they themselves have banned? And archers like, out there on Lyceria, it's Lycerian law, in here, it's me. I mean, why not send Tripp to the way after?

Well, to Archer's way of thinking, he's crucial to the mission, and the mission is too important to be worried about pesky little things like ethics. So with that, the procedure begins. You know how if you have a little pop-a-shot size basketball, but it's flat, and then you have a little hand pump with a needle? The way Dr. Flax holds this thing up in one hand and then fucking stabs it with the other,

made me think of that. Like he's got to get some of its gook out in order to make this clone. And unclear whether or not this thing survives. I think this is a sacrificial Papa Shotball. Seemed like they only had the one, right? Or is he injecting it with trip goo? Which direction is it going? I think, yeah, I think he was giving trip goo. Yeah. All right. That's what it is. Yeah. Ben, if you were hoping to see a disturbing

alien resurrection style chamber in Sixth Bay with a growing fetus inside. Oh buddy, you got it. You got one here. We see the fetus in the tank and we're going pretty quickly. We get a little baby in an incubator and Flox. It's decided that Flox is gonna keep the baby in Six Bay. Sounds like you found yourself a new roommate. He's like, I guess I'll give him a name

as long as we've got him. Pretty soon we're in a Flox's log. The baby has been named Sim. Boo. Hey, actually, I don't wanna do that, Ben. I feel like Doron has kids named Sim in his daycare, right? That sounds like a very now name to have. Sim Card Williams, are you here?

Yeah. Wi-Fi Anderson? Those of us who are gray don't understand it. But some of these kids, you know, if you can't fathom it, I don't blame you, but some of these kids have some pretty wild names. I love how the passage of time is given through these fun scene transitions. Something weird emerges here as we watch this kid grow. Sim has Tripp Tucker's memories.

Right. And as he grows, he's going to have more of these. Yeah, we get like maybe a five-year-old Sim and then maybe a ten-year-old Sim, and we learned there's only been like three days since Sim was born. Out of a total what, like 15 is like the total lifespan for these things. We're told 15 or 16 days. There is some talk over the head of equivalent of 10 year old Sim that they're going to eventually have to break it to Sim what's going on and what he's here for.

Almost before he finishes saying it, Archer volunteers for this. Archer wrestles his trembles to rages as he sets his jaw and says in the soon hereafter, I will tell him because I was the one that decided to make him. When we cut to Archer's quarters next and Sim is playing with Porthos, I was the one that decided to make him. When we cut to Archer's quarters next and Sim is playing with porthos, I was like, really good angle to take. What is more precious and sadly not long lived? What's a better example of that than a dog?

I thought for sure, you know, look upon the great porthos and understand that he's not going to be here forever. See, Sim? That's just like you. That is not the angle Archer takes here. They're talking about Porthos and then they're talking about Zephyrum Cochrane. I hoped so bad that Sim was going to go up to the Zephyrum Cochrane statue and be like, up to the Zephyrum Cochrane statue and be like, is that blood? Oh, and the statue, it looks like it was used in a stabbing. It seems to be perfectly clean.

I wonder if you run the Zephyrum Cochrane statue through a dishwasher or something and the blood comes right out. Yeah. Yeah. If you've got the sanitize function, you know, like can do some steam in there. That's what you want. monetize function, you know, like can do some steam in there. That's what you want. Instead, I think the metaphor is busted and crashed RC models that they fly around

launch bay because when Sim can't quite get the controls right, this thing crashes and a part bus out of it and Archer's like, you know, it's tough when you have a beloved RC model and you end up crashing it. You just remember the good times with the model, right? Yeah. Sim, I'm going to try and put this in a way that is not insulting, but because this is a Brone's Own episode, it's going to feel really insulting. You're motherless. I had the same Vori telling in my notes.

Sim has questions about the before. He is not motherless or fatherless though. This is the tension in the scene. Not really. He has like the memories that Trip would have at this age. So he like is wondering where his mom and dad are and he like misses them. But he's also forming memories of the experiences he's having here. What do you make of Archer like not really having the facility to answer a complex

question like this and instead defaulting to maybe the most horrific thing that he could do, which is like dramatically pull a curtain away from comatose Tripp Tucker and be like, there he sits, you, your whole reason for being. You're basically a novice version of that. Yeah. And that's a gray version of you. He's like, what's all over his arms? What are those little bumps? You're never going to let that go, are you? Sim is processing this through his own perspective and realizing that his memories aren't really his.

And it seems like he really gets that. I kind of wished this episode had almost been told with Sim as the main character a little bit more. There's a lot more about Archer and the decisions he's making. And like, I kind of thought it would be interesting if like we started with Sim as a kid and like didn't know about the accident that led to the decision being made. I agree with you. However, if this season is all about toughening up Archer and helping us understand,

appreciate, and root for him, I think this is why the decision is made the way it is. You must sit with Archer as he grapples with this thing. Pete It's interesting. I mean, they start to talk about like, okay, there's going to be this operation and you're basically our plantings and we're going to harvest some neural tissue to get Tripp back in working order. It's not going to hurt. You won't feel a thing. Doctors always say that. When Flock says it, it's the truth. And Sim has no further questions. Yeah, I mean, it's not gonna hurt is said at the beginning of a lot of things that end in death, notably.

He does not wonder what happens after, in the hereafter of that procedure, specifically. The ship is starting to look real cruddy. Get some water, wipe off that crud. And Sim is now in his late teens and is down in engineering. Warm body, they've put him to work helping to Paul fix the engines. Speaking of a lot of crud stuck to a thing, the inside of this dude's shorts absolutely encrusted anytime he's around to Paul. Yeah. any time he's around to Paul. Yeah, it's gotta be really hard for a kid of this age

to work around a supervisor in a cat suit. I mean, we've seen this on this show before. Kids of this age around to Paul, it's hard, literally. And this four dude, he's like showing up for his first day of work, like he's that first job age. Who could blame him? He makes a pass at a co-worker. He doesn't know any better. Yeah. What about dinner? You want to grab a bite?

It was okay back in my time as a youth. You could hug a co-worker back then. Okay, okay problematic. Yeah, I mean I think this is also just mean, to the extent that his body is building the neural pathways that an older Tripp Tucker would have, it's got to carve a deep groove of trying to trick to Paul into coming to movie night. Here's the thing, like, does he also get the whole taking it weird when he's let down by a romantic interest? Does he get that from older Chip Tucker?

Because he takes it real weird in a, if you don't want me at my entire brain in my head, then you don't deserve me at my massive pieces of brain taken out of my skull kind of vibe. Like how's this supposed to make her feel? You know you're really missing out on this, cause this is as much brain as I'm gonna have. Legally, it's just a fart joke. We get a great team at Uxbridge Shimoda and I'm so happy with the folks that we've hired to work with us. And I think we got really lucky.

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You will never take the greatest gin alive. Ben would rather die. In Archer's clarinet closet, T'Pol has great news. The engines are going to be fixed in two weeks. Hmm. That's not going to work with the crud that's accumulating on the ship because the accumulation of this stuff will mean that every system on board will shut down Well before these repairs are forecasted to be done. Yeah, it's not looking good. So they're gonna have to figure something out to get the ship out of the field and Reed is talking to And Reed is talking to Sim who is now finally being played by Connor Trenier. I love this moment. Sim has become the fullness of Connor Trenier and he's wearing fleet colors and coverings, but not the pips.

Not the pips. I really liked the casting that they did on the younger kids. The accents were either well-reproduced or dead-on. I thought that they plausibly looked like young Connor Trenier. I feel like this was a pretty tricky casting challenge, and I think they did better than they did with Nimoy growing up fast on the Genesis planet. Can I just say what a breath of fresh air it is to have a child actor on the show

not with an English accent? You know? Yeah, yeah. Let's just say those casting directors were toiling. Tripp has a question for Reed when Reed stops at his table. Does Reed fathom the idea of shooting the crud off of the ship and then using shuttle pods to tow Enterprise out of this hellhole? It's unorthodox, but Reed is going to look into it.

This is Simms' pitch. I really wanted him to demonstrate this with key lime pie or something, like with food. Yeah, yeah. Now I've got this whole key lime pie here and two bratwursts in buns represent the warp nacelles. Now we're gonna shoot a couple of shuttles out front. Now those are these two chocolate brownies and the grapplers, those are these red vines between them and the pie. The camera pans up to Reed and he's eating one of the bratwursts and he's like,

Oh, I'm sorry. Were you trying to show me something? Oh, have I messed up your little diagram? I need something to do with this shit. Come on. Fair enough. We cut over to T'Pol's quarters where Trip, I mean, not Trip, Tim. It's so easy to confuse them. See, this is, Sim. So easy to confuse them. See this is the thing. T'Pol gets asked what she thinks of his weird shuttle pod towing plan and she's all for it.

She's had time to look at this thing. She went to the mess hall and looked at his pie bratwurst plan. She saw what he did to that pie and she's already taken it to the captain and recommended it. Sim is also like, you know, while I'm here, you know, I do have some, some trembles. Maybe we could get down with a little foot rub action. Given Sim's feelings that he knows to be from Trip Actual, he wants to know if there's something between them. Is this real? Are these feelings real?

Yeah. Because it's almost as though he's making the past because he feels these feelings himself, but also he isn't sure if they're from him or from Trip or from some combination of both. I'm only going to be here for so long, so, like, I don't have the luxury of hemming and hawing about this. And I'm also not even sure if this is my secret to keep. So, I'm just going to come out with it is kind of the logic. It's like that end of vacation urgency when you're single. Like, I've met another tourist. Let's see what happens in the remaining time. Let's see what happens in the remaining time. So this is a pretty intense moment.

A lot of extra glisten onto Paul's eyes as this news is received. I was just going to say that. What an interesting performance out of Julian Blaylock here. It's a very intense moment. Hey, if you're just wrapping up a vacation out there and you've expressed some feelings to a person in this way. It's on! Only once. On riser.

Yeah, if their eyes are glistening like that, that's your go-ahead. We cut over to Archer's ready room where Sim tells him that he wants to be one of the Brownie pilots on this mission and Archer says, no! You want to make sure I'm around because you need part of my brain. Yeah. There's some argument about like, does Sim actually have the thousands of hours

of simulator time and logged hours that Tripp Tucker can claim or not? Simulator's practically my first name. But Archer has a second reason, which is can't afford to let the risks of this mission claim the brain that they are planning on harvesting. He's also made a key lime pie, bratwurst, brownies, and licorice diorama on his desk. And he's like, look, something goes wrong with you out there. And then he picks up one of the brownies and just squishes it in his hand. Do you crave this happening to you? I didn't think so. There's

no brownies in the hereafter, man. Yeah. So it's decided other people will be doing the piloting, I guess, read in Mayweather. They phaser the doors a couple of times and get the shuttles out. And I was so excited to see that the shuttles are also equipped with grapplers. How great is that? I was a little bit surprised it was so easy

to turn the phasers in the direction of the ship itself. Because there is military technology that goes back hundreds of years that sort of prevent that from happening, like bump stop style. You're kind of prevented from turning the howitzer back on the hull. I think it was in World War I that the French developed a plane where the rotor at the front of the plane was like the mechanics of that. It's timed in such a way that yeah so that they could shoot bullets in between the rotor blades. Could you imagine being the first pilot going up for a sortie like armed with that technology being like well fuck. We're gonna need you to test this.

being like, well, fuck. We're going to need you to test this. All right. This is impossible. We should have hired the Swiss to develop this mechanism. Why are they staying out of this war? Their wings are so big, why not put the gun on the outboard part of the wing? They start tuggingging and doesn't look like the engines on the shuttles are going to be strong

enough to budge the ship. And it's like, you know, like the ship is, is just standing dead still and the engines are overloading and overheating and kind it kind of feels like Sim is gonna get Reed and Mayweather killed behind this plan. Kind of feels like they might be headed to the hereafter with Sim's plan. Feels a lot like the scene earlier in the episode where, you know, we tried the warp drive smoothing technique

that ended poorly. We kind of rest a long time in this feeling that it's not going to work before it finally does. Finally, just as all of the things are redlining, the entrepreneur starts moving and the shuttles are able to get it up to a speed where they're going to emerge from the field in six hours and the crud overwhelming the ship systems issue that they've been worried about will not happen. So good job, Sim.

You're a good engineer after all. Good, good toil by you. Hmm. Yeah. Nicely put. I love how the enterprise looks like fruit leather as it makes its way through and out of this area. It is ugly. It's so bad looking.

It's really rough. I called it turd enterprise in my notes. Yeah, I like that. Archer goes and pays Flax a visit and gets some sad news. Flox did all his calculations about how this is going to work based on the Lyceans. And it works a little bit differently when you're making a clone of a human. And that means that Sim will not survive the transplant. So we've almost got a Tuvix situation on our hands here now. Like to save beloved previous crew member,

we're going to have to kill this crew member who we've all started to really connect with. I mean, this is probably part of why the Lycerians don't do this and have banned this technology. Doesn't anyone see that this is wrong? The Tuvix comp is appropriate. Like there is some energy that Sim has about, you know, wanting to live obviously, but it's that 15 day thing that is like the cloud over all of it. Like, yeah, you want to live and maybe there's technology that could make that possible. But I think when you add factors like that to this, you defang the moral question a little bit in a way that didn't sit right with me.

I thought it was really interesting because like in the next scene, like Sim is grappling with the premise of having only five or six days left to live and like knowing the thing about the brain harvesting won't work. And then we find out that there is this enzyme that could potentially stop the rapid aging process and SIM could potentially become TRIP, you know, like just kind of like slide right into that place. Like if they administer the enzyme right at the right moment.

And that sort of made me think like, oh shit was the funeral at the beginning for Trip actual and Sim is the one that goes on? Yeah. Or was that a funeral for Sim? Like it kind of makes that opening moment a lot more interesting because Now we don't have any sense of like which person is going to die. Hold on captain. Are you saying I'm some sort of golem? What kind of stupid shit is that?

That doesn't make any sense. So Archer is talking to Sim about this in Trip's room, which is like a bit touchy. Feels weird that Sim is in there to Archer because Sim is not Tripped to Archer. Then what am I? Just something you grew in a lab? And yet, Sim is Tripp to Sim. Yeah, and Sim is getting pretty lippy about his role in all of this to Archer. He wants to go forward with the life extension plan, even though it's an experiment, even

though it's untested, even though the odds are pretty far-fetched. My life is at stake! Any chance is worth taking, but at what cost? But there's stakes to that even, because even if they do try to synthesize this enzyme, it'll take a day. And in that day, Sim will cross the Rubicon where his neural tissue is of any value to them. Eventually, you age to a point where your brains are just useless to other people. Yeah, when you're gray. Like many plantings from now for you and me, but pretty soon for Sim.

I won't cease or desist, cause you really think it's fair use. It feels like Archer is ready to clash in this scene and fast-walk Sim into the surgical suite himself, if he can. It is basically like a, are you going to make me do this surgery at gunpoint moment? And Archer's like, I don't want to murder you, but if that's what it takes, I will murder you. I think everything in this episode depends on this moment. This is coming from someone who just watched Archer brain a crazy Vulcan on a haunted Vulcan ship, but this is the darkest Archer's ever been because he tells the guy to his face that he will kill him to save Trip Tucker. I'll take whatever steps necessary to save him.

Even if it means killing me. Even if it means killing you. What do you think the episode wants you to feel for Archer and how is that different from how you do feel about Archer when he says this? I think that this is another hard Archer episode. Another hard Dark Archer episode. He's really like after five shadowy all through this episode too.

Like he looks like he's not taking great care of himself in a way that felt a little bit more noticeable than normal. I wasn't sure what to make of that. Like don't also like make him into a chisel jaw action hero, like, like he's ready to kill. I felt manipulated by that also. It seems like Sim has kind of agreed to this and made peace with the operation in the next scene because he goes to talk to T'Pol and it seems like it's sort of been decided, right? I mean, before we're out of this scene, I just want to ask, like, what side are you

on? I think the episode wants you to choose a side in this moment, and that's why it's so specific. Yeah. I think that the, like, pragmatist in me is like, we don't know if that enzyme is going to do anything. And so, like, it's a bird in the hand issue. To our knowledge, they've only got the one deflated

Papa shot basketball. This is for when Tom Brady goes to Chuck E. Cheese. Yeah. Oh shit. I just hit the button. Ben Harrison sports reference. Woo! He did it.

We're good for one a season, maybe. Yeah. Hey, that was famous enough that even I've heard of it. I mean, it's like the morality's fucked up too, right? Like it's, it is like Tuvix in a lot of ways, but it's not in that it's the same consciousness really. Like, there's a few days of memories that will get lost here, but it's essentially trip for trip is the trade.

Yeah, there's very little light between the two, which I think helps soften the blow. It doesn't soften the blow to the back of his head that Archer threatens here at the end of this scene. That would be very hard. Yeah, I mean, Archer's gonna have to be pretty careful around Sim's head just for preserving the, you know, like, it's, you know. You're going to want to go body knock out on that.

The head is kind of the hostages he's holding essentially. Sure. Yeah. So this is a smoke screen when Sim kind of convinces to Paul that he's down with the operation and happy to go forward with it. Cause he goes over to do an engineering assignment and why is he looking at shuttle schematics on that screen? That doesn't seem like an engineering project that he should be working on.

I love how Tripp walks in and he sees her and he's like, I'm ready for a day of work. After all, the two things I care about most in this life are in this room." And he looks down at T'Pol's chest. You know, when the Vori discuss the sphere, they're talking about their planet. When I talk about spheres, I'm talking about something else. Talk about a basketball that's not deflated. You know who's feeling the conservation of gases?

Me after eating an entire key lime pie, two bratwurst, two brownies and two red vines. Up on the bridge, Reed tells Archer that launch bay controls have been locked out. Uh oh. that launch bay controls have been locked out. Uh-oh. And this leads to Archer going right down there and opens the door and Sim has already decided against jaking a shuttle. He thought about it long and hard and the fact that there are no toilets on the shuttles made him decide, I can't do this. I can't run away with their shuttle

and not save Tripp Tucker. That would be no good. His argument seemed a little like the difference between you get in a pool on the shallow end and then walk in when it's cold, versus just jumping in all the way and getting it over with. Sim seems to have a hard time with the like shuttle being the slow way to die

versus the faster way that would occur in Six Bay. I did like that he name checked Reed and like the only way it would be worse to die in a shuttle is if Reed was also there. Like a knowing smile from Archer in that moment. Like, yeah, I know, dude. Reid, right? What are you gonna do?

Tell you what, between me and you, I would never go to these lengths for that guy. Yeah, no. Like load him in a Torp, shoot him out there, done. No, that inflated basketball is too valuable to use on Reid. Oh, that inflated basketball is too valuable to use on Reid. Yeah. Sim decided this based on Tripp's sister,

not based on any personal feelings. I mean, also like, it doesn't seem like the enzyme is on offer. So it's not like he could like live very long. So this is like really the only way he has to advance the things he wants, which are the same things as the things that Tripp wants. Like Archer already pulled the trigger a long time ago at this point.

We're at a point in no return here. Cut to Simms' last moments, spending Tripp's quarters where he's petting porthos. That seems nice, right? You know what's about to go? Petting a pup? That'll do. To Paul, surprisingly, I was very

surprised by this, arrives to say goodbye. And it begins as a goodbye in a very to Paul kind of stoic Vulcan way, but it ends in a very human way with a great big kiss. She gives him a great smooch and pulls away and he says, he couldn't have asked for a better going away present. Then you see her head start to lower down out of frame and he's like, oh, it turns out I could have asked for a better going away present. She grabs his hips and turns them around like, whoa. All right.

Simi-like. I was struck by the fact that like, we've seen this kind of kiss in movies and TVs a bunch. It's the kiss that like the queen gives the brave knight before going out to war or whatever. And often it is like a smooch kiss, like a, I respect you, I admire you quite a bit. This is more for you than it is for me. And there you go. But this is a romantic kiss with some real firepower to it. And not even Trip has had one of those. Like the idea that she has given this to Sim and not Tripp.

Incredible. There's a little bit of a Leah Brahmsification thing where like, you know, Tripp is gonna come back and be like, wait, so we what? Wait, I mean, you did, but I didn't. So what does that mean? What does that make us? Why is the crew mentioning something called a, what is it?

A rusty trombone? Why is my nickname rusty trombone? I don't get that reference. Flax's daddy. How great was this moment? Real nice knowing you, Flax. Yeah, really good. Being a sick experiment is what Sim was meant to do.

Dad, you've been a great dad to me for all the 12 days, and now that you're about to murder me, I just thought I'd tell you that. I may be motherless, but never let it be said that I was fatherless. And then Flax nullifies Sim. RSVP Soom. And we're back at the funeral. And the reveal is that even Trip is here at the funeral. We pan up to Archer up there on the second floor and he chokes out

all the arms I've seen in my travels. It's had the most nipples. You're never going to let that go, are you? How could there not be anything about the nipples? You know there's a scene in this episode where Sim is like, hey, hey, Doc, I got questions about my changing body. And they're a little different than what I've seen in the human anatomy books that you've given me. They're a little different than what I've seen in the human anatomy books that you've given me. Not all my memories are coming online right in the same way that things happen to me, so I'm going to need a catch up on how this happened.

I mean, I mean it brightly, but it's strange. You like this episode, Ben? I did like this episode. I thought it was a fun gear for Connor Trenier. Like he is playing his character in a way that is subtly different from Tripp, but like the feelings are all really heightened and intense. And I thought he did a really nice job with it. The dark archer-ness of it is hard for me to feel great about, but I kind of feel like, I think you're right. They kind of have to center archer in this episode because it's about the unthinkable choices

that must be made by a commander in war time. You're always gonna have choices like this where some lives are sacrificed for other lives and you're maybe not shaving quite as often as normal. And so, interesting Archer episode from that standpoint. But I feel like they're intentionally making it a little bit morally muddy. I was struck by how absent Tripp and Archer's friendship was in this episode, up to and including that climax in that scene where Archer goes fully dark and goes, I will fucking

cut off your head and take it to Six-Bay to save Tripp Tucker who we need for this mission. So much is made of the mission, the mission, the mission, the mission, as being the most important thing, and I get it. I really think there's room for my friend also, because that softens the sharp corner of I'm going to kill you no matter what, because that's what you are to me.

You're an organ transplant to me. Yeah, well, and like the way that would affect Archer too, but because that's what you are to me. You're an organ transplant to me. Yeah. Well, and the way that would affect Archer too would be so intense. That would help me get to know him better. In a way, there's different shades to the darkness and we only get one shade in that scene and I kind of wanted the other shades too. Because if that doesn't work for you, that moment of like, we're killing you because we need you for the mission,

then at least you have other flavors of that to fall back on as a viewer. But I could see this being a real turnoff to people in a way that feels almost permanent for folks who haven't made up their mind about Archer. Totally. I think that to the extent this was intentional, which I don't know that it was, this episode does a lot less mind about Archer. Totally. I think that to the extent this was intentional, which I don't know that it was, this episode

does a lot less damage to Archer than Tuvix does to Janeway. And I think that's because of the expiration date that there is on this clone. To not intervene means this thing was going to end no matter what after 15 days. This is just a different sort of intervention. Sure. Do you want to see if anyone has intervened on our Priority One inbox? Lot of moral questions in these P1s, Ben, I'm sure.

Priority One message from Starfleet coming in on Secure Channel. Need a supplemental income. Supplemental income? Supplemental. Supplemental. Yeah, it's extra. By the interest alone, could be enough to buy this ship. Promotional P1 here, Adam.

Goes like this. Okay, I have to level with you. This is not really a promotional message. Also, I didn't think of anything funny to say. Just wanted to say that I started listening to TGG in 2017, and today with Enterprise Season 3 Episode 4, I have caught up on all back episode. The existence of Greatest Discovery slash Greatest Trek still feels like a surprising new development to me.

It's hard to get used to the idea, but the things you talk about in Marin Opens are not happening years in the past now. Time travel. That's from Nat from Chicago, and the call to action is just listen to Greatest Jen. Thank you, Nat. Ben, we got a priority one message here from Ben, and it's to Jordan. Here's what Ben has to say. My brother and my friend, thank you so much for telling me about this show.

It's been great having another thing that we can laugh about and talk about together over the years. Hey, Adam and Ben, can you do a conversation between Norm and Kern, trying to fix a food replicator together? I thought this said Morn, and I wanted to play Morn. Oh.

Oh. I think you would do a better norm than me. I think you should be norm and I should be currn. This season we're going to be installing a fabulous new invention in our project house. This is a food replicator. Now this one was broken at the factory and we're going to have to repair it as we install it But I have a member of our Generation Next program, Ken, here to help me do it. I do not remember enrolling in this program. Oh, it's quite simple Ken, you were on The Next Generation,

and so now that automatically makes you part of Generation Next. Do I have a brother? Are you my brother, Norm Abrams? You know, I think you would find that I've got quite a bit more honor than anybody else you would consider for that role. You know, I've not been disavowed or received any discommodation.

You know, Richard Trithooey still talks to me. I saw Richard Trithooey dance at a Klingon wedding. And it was awful. Well, let's get this thing installed so we can replicate some bird meat for you. Kapla! This last one is from Blast Hard Cheese. It's to Ben and Adam. It goes like this.

After listening to the end of season two of Enterprise and a story about pitching a show at the mall, I wanted to pitch a show to you guys in the style of Game of Thrones or Succession, but a drama about a bunch of warring Klingon houses would require a bread factory amount of loaf. What do you think? Is this working? Do we like this? Kern? I mean, it sounds like season one of Star Trek Discovery in a little bit, right? At least that's the way it started.

Yeah, and season two, right? Yeah, there was a lot of that stuff in there. It was a little like, you know, from the outside looking in. I think that that's always been an area that I feel trepidation when Star Trek goes there is like the Klingon politics of it all get really silly and weird for me in like Deep Space Nine and stuff when they like are actively, you know, trying to engineer

regime change on Kronos or whatever. But I thought Lower Decks did a great job like showing what Klingon society is like from a Klingon perspective. And I would love to see Star Trek do more with that. Like take the success that Lower Decks had with that and you know, not even necessarily in a comedy direction but like take some of those ideas and make a show out of it. That would be cool.

I agree. The thing that I'm hungry for is a tale told from a different perspective, not a different time. Yeah. You know? 24th century Star Trek told from a different ship's perspective or a different species perspective. Take Riker's visit to the park as a given, and like what happened after that? I do not care at this point for more prequel stories anymore. I think I'm good on that. Yeah, I think we've scratched the itch of prequels. Well if you've got a thot itch to scratch and you'd like us to get in there too.

Get in there too with a couple hands even. Maximumfun.org slash Jumbotron is where you go with your itchiest questions. And asking them will elicit some interesting answers and go a long way in supporting the production of our shows. Hey Adam. Zap in. Did you find yourself a drunk Shimoda?

Incredible. Drunk Shimoda. I think my Shimoda could surprise you. It's gonna be to Paul for kissing Sim. Wow. I think that is way, way out of what we would expect out of her. And I wonder if she did it

because she knew she would get away with it. Like if she's dabbling in feelings or whatever, wanted to know what it was like to kiss Tripp Tucker, kissing Sim seems like a pretty good way to experience what that could be. And no one will know that she did it except for her. So it seems like a victimless crime. Not that it's a crime, but you know what I mean. Yeah. What about you? I like that. I think I'll join you on the Tupol Square.

Yeah. Yeah, very un-Tupol move, and yet there's a logic to it, right? Like there is a closing window to even try this. And it's sort of the same closing window that I think prompts Sim to do his confession of love a little earlier in the episode. So if they're going to experiment with these feelings, they've got to do it now. Yeah, there's an urgency to it that feels real and earned. What if Sim had gotten down there to Six Bay and Phlox had put the clip show device on

him and said, I cannot perform this operation on someone in their refractory period Could have thrown the whole thing off. Is that one of the first? Flax impressions we've gotten out of you. That was really good Really good. Oh Thanks Wow, also really well directed episode by LeVar Burton I just wanted to say also should be be said, Manicado's first, I wanna say Manicodo, like the pork,

but I don't know how you pronounce his last name. One of the great television writers gets his first crack at a enterprise episode with this one, and I thought it was very well done. Yeah. And distinct as a written episode, I thought. It was distinct in a lot of ways. The music felt really special in this episode

and like extra considered and good. Whole way around was a really interesting example of an episode of Enterprise. I'm going to look for that Manny Cotto credit. I'm excited to see more. Evidently, he goes on to write 14 episodes beginning with this one. Wow.

Faith of the fart. Gotta talk a little bit about what's happening next week, do we not? Have to, Ben. I have to figure out how we're experiencing the episode. Of course, for that, we go to gah that biz slash game. And the game of buttholes, the will of the reicher, quantum leap.

Next episode is called Carpenter Street. Archer and T'Pol travel back in time to 2004 Detroit to stop a Zindi plot. Wow. Gotta have one of these per series, I guess. The fish out of water, Star Trek people are coming to our time. I wonder if they run into RoboCop.

Oh man, your move creep. The RoboCop Star Trek mashup that I think probably exists in comics, right? Yeah, that's gotta be in a comic. If it hasn't happened yet, I'm pitching it here and now. Star Trek meets Robocop. Yeah, IDW, get at us. Blast hard cheese will help us write it.

Robocop just immediately shoots Jordy in the nuts. Total bullshit, man. It's just bullshit. Leah Brahms, I will refer you to a sexual violence recovery center. Ha ha ha. As everyone knows, we're on square 96. Nice. That was the Brone Zone episode we just done.

And I'm gonna roll this bone we could land anywhere Adam. You're required to learn as you play. Roll. Yeah we've hit two special squares in a row. I mean we could just roll a hundred and go right back to Brone Zone and and really do it this time. That'd be a huge pump. All right, I'm gonna roll it. I rolled a six. Hoola! Did I win? Hardly. Landed us on square two. Hey.

Regular episode next week. How about that? A little bit of a break from the weirdness. Sounds pretty good. Yeah, sounds good to me too. Looking forward to that. We could not make this show without your support. MaximumFun.org slash join is where you go to become a monthly member.

Get some bonus hips. The whole reason we're able to make the show is the support we get at MaximumFun.org slash join. We sure appreciate all of y'all. You know why the show sounds so good? Hmm. Because it's produced by Windy Pretty. It truly is.

Many people don't realize this, but Windy Pretty is the producer of this program. Really classing the joined up and doing a great job. And we also appreciate Bill Tilley, our Zindi wartime consigniary. Slide into the DMs on our social media if you'd like to send something in to the show and Bill will screen your item for possible inclusion on an upcoming Code 47. Love you Bill. We also love our social media director Rob Adler. I mean he's so much more than a social media director.

He's like making musical elements for the show. Yeah, if you like the video content on social media that gets posted, he does all of that. He does all the effects work for those videos. You remember the horrifying mouth and voice switch video he did a little while back? That was Rob. That was Rob's idea. That was Rob. Awful.

I've never known what my face looked like with facial hair until that happened. Horrifying. We get a great newsletter once a month that Rob puts a ton of work into. I hope you'll get subscribed to that. gach.biz slash mail. Buy yourself some merch at podshop.biz. Thanks to Adam Ragusea who made our theme song, parody of Diane Warren's original Enterprise theme song, and Dark Materia for the Card song. You're playing under our voices right now.

With that, we will be back at you next week with another great episode of Star Trek Enterprise, an episode of the greatest generation of Enterprise that's imported from Detroit. Make it show. Captain John Lupicata, the U.S. 10th Santa Claus. Captain John Lupicata, the U.S. 10th Santa Claus. Make it show. Make it show. John Lupicata, John Lupicata, John Lupicata. Maximum Fun,

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