The Greatest Generation - So, This Monica Lewinsky (S3E18)

Episode Date: September 7, 2016

When Picard is re-re-re-body snatched and replaced by an insane impostor, the crew goes through the same routine of misgivings-leading-to-mutiny that they always do. Meanwhile, the real Captain has to escape from space jail with a blue cadet, an ersatz Nausicaan, and a big fan of Australian opera. Who will wind up doing the corny monologue jokes in this episode? Will Wesley let Picard hit on Beverly? Where we gonna poop? It’s the episode where Picard turns the music up to eleven.

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

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

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

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

and season two of Star Trek Picard. We've set up a page where you can also contribute. It's at friendsofdecotoforlabor.com. That's friendsofdecotoforlabor.com. That's friendsofdisotoforlabor.com. Link in the episode description. Okay, now let's get on with the show. Priority one message from Starfleet coming in on Secured Channel. Hey Ben. What's that Adam? Our viewers have asked and we have responded many months later Our viewers have asked and we have responded many months later with an official greatest gen t-shirt.

I don't believe this. You're going to put that thing on and parade around like one of them. That is correct. We have a West Hot American summer t-shirt in the maximum fun swag store available for your purchasing dollars now, it's a beautiful rendering of West Hot American summer. A reference to the time I as like a 10 or 11 year old went to summer camp and went around introducing myself to people as Wesley, a boy.

Because I admired the character so much. It's your shame soon to be immortalized on our viewers' bodies. Henceforth, how do you feel about that? That's really something. I mean, we couldn't have picked a more obscure reference to our show, really, to go with for our first t-shirt. Why, what is this attitude on? Like, something I think I talked about in the first maybe 10 episodes,

somewhere in that range, I think. And, uh. I think it really speaks to our marketing prowess that the name of our show is the smallest thing on this shirt. Yeah. Oh, we got our hashtag on there, so. Yeah. Yeah. Ween Twins will know what's up.

It's a beautifully rendered shirt. It's made on that super soft American apparel, super soft cotton. It feels real nice against your body, Ben. Yeah, the maximum fun people don't mess around when it comes to quality of of swag. Like this stuff is all like always printed super nice. Every maximum fun thing I've ever gotten has always really impressed me with fit and finish and I think you guys are gonna like it. So you can go to maxfunstore.com and I think it's been a long haul to get to this point.

And we have our viewers to thank and we should also thank Nick Dittmore, our friend who did the design on it. We'd really appreciate anybody that wants to spread our shame in t-shirt form. It's yet another way to support the show that you love. You know, back when I was in the Academy, we would follow every toast with a song. Here's to the finest crew in Starfleet.

Engage! Hey, welcome to the greatest generation. A Star Trek podcast by two guys who are a little bit embarrassed to have a Star Trek podcast. I'm Ben Harrison. Hey, I'm Adam Pryanaka. That was a pretty informal kick there. Yeah, we're just two chill guys chilling out and having a chill time. Is that how you greeted people when you met a few of our viewers at a gathering last night? I want to hear about this. Yeah, so the maximum fun network

through a big meetup for the New York hosts and New York viewers and or listeners for the New York hosts and New York viewers and or listeners. At Stuart Wellington's bar, The Hinterlands. Stuart Wellington, of course, one of the three co-hosts of the flop house. And a real peach of a guy, one of the nicest, one of the nicest peeps on the network, I would say. If you were a cute type person and you were choosing a corporeal body to inhabit,

if you wanted to choose someone to look like, you couldn't do better than Stu. No, no, he's a looker. Yeah. Yeah, and the bar is beautiful. It's just what you want in a neighborhood bar. It's a lot of wood. It's a lot of wood. It's a lot of wood.

It's like really nicely lit. It's got a beautiful back patio. Great selection of beers, great, great spirits lists, good cocktails, good wine. Everything about it, I thought was great. Was there an official cocktail to the scathering or either to the bar itself? I was drinking margaritas because I have been noticing that every time I drink beers these

days I feel awful. Oh no. So I've been just kind of steering clear of the suds lately. Is that your go-to cocktail? Not all the time, but I walked in and Dan McCoy, another FWOP house to go host, was nursing one and it seemed like the right move, you know. It seems like a good idea when you see someone else with one. Yeah. Yeah, and I met many viewers.

And I met many viewers and it was great. It was like, it was all really nice people, a diverse group. And that was really pleasing because sometimes I worry that we're just too white dudes making things that only white dudes want to hear, which is like, there's too much of that. So it was great to meet like all kinds of different people that listen to our show and said really nice things about it. And I probably should have like written down people's names because I'm terrible at remembering names But oh yeah, if you are a viewer and you came up and said hi to me it tickled me to know in and I was like I was like a little nervous going in because I think it was the first time I was at an event like sort of officially there to represent greatest gen

and kind of a lot of pressure. It went great. It was really fun. Did you feel cool? And I don't say that to make fun at all, but I only say that to underscore like sort of the strangeness that comes along with newfound and even undeserved popularity. You were a reason that people went to this thing, one of the reasons, I mean.

That can't be a regular feeling. Yeah, well, so we struck up a conversation with a guy in the patio, like fairly soon after arriving there. And I just kind of casually ask like what shows he listened to and he listed, you know, a bunch of Maccall Roy shows and Judge John Hodgman and Jordan Jesse Goe and I was like, okay, this is not a guy that is here for greatest gen. But we had a nice conversation and then my wife worked in that I hosted a show on the

network, and I was immediately like struck with shame. And I was like, don't do that. And he was nice. He's like, oh, I've heard good things, but I haven't listened yet. And I was like, oh, you don't have to. Please don't. Wow. That's funny. Like I could totally see my wife doing the same thing. Like you're

gonna drag me to a fucking max fun event and not even say that you're on one of the shows. Like I could see that being a resting state for me too. Good for her. Showing you out onto the dance floor. Yeah and another nice guy I met was Steve. I don't know his last name, but he hosts a podcast called Geek Life Crisis. And he had on a t-shirt of Geek Life Crisis and gave me a business card of Geek Life Crisis. And I was like, damn, Adam and I are not running a tight ship.

Either that or our ship is super tight. Like we're all about the show and not about marketing at all. Sort of like how I run a freelance video business. Like I choose not to market whatsoever. Yeah, I do feel like it would be good to have some collateral to pass out at things like that. Maybe we do need to get some like a- Isolinear Chip Business Cards.

Yeah, or just like on the download printout some of the bill-tilly trading cards to, you know, surreptitiously pass to people. On the DL, I like that. I'm down. We've seen proof now that they can be printed. It's not like trying to scan a $20 bill and Photoshop locks

up on you. Although I'm sure they're working on that. That's a thing. Yeah, oh yeah. If you try and scan money, like Photoshop will tell you you're not allowed to manipulate images of money in their software. Wow. I had no idea. Is this sort of like the pig butt thing or is this actually a thing? It's actually a thing. I've tried to do it several times because, you know, like a rap video director and I wanted to make like, it looked like we had hundreds and hundreds of dollars on a shoot one time. Two things you need to scan a lot of for a rap video is a lot of money and big booties.

Yeah, yeah. I needed more big booties than we had on hand. Oh, man. That meetup sounds great. I hope I get to do one of those sometime. I hope we get to do some together. Yeah, man. It made me really wish you would have been there.

There's probably a German word for shame and v. And that's exactly the thing I'm feeling. Ha ha ha ha ha. Shame in Cheyza. Yeah, if you speak German, please write in. From ShimodaGmail.com. Find your team at every stoppiece. Obviously, it's a truth, find the truth.

All right, it's gonna go through all the fun. You wanna talk about season three episode 18? Allegiance, Ben? Yeah, this is one of my favorite charades that we've watched so far this season. Yeah, you really get some great brogue when that someone don't ya? So the Enterprise has just finished eradicating a plague at some planet and they're going to go meet up with the USS Hood to do some terraforming and Picard finishes up recording his captain's log and he's like leaning back in a chair with a book and decides to shut

his eyes for a second and just then the obelisk from 2001 a space Odyssey appears over his chair and he disappears. Yeah, it's like a sky monolith, right? Yeah, it's pretty cool. It looks like it feels pretty pleasant, whatever it's doing to him. And I guess on the bridge, they detect that something funky just happened in Picard's quarters, but wharf in the Dustbusters Club run down there. Security override, priority one. Picard answers the door with like an old book and a sniffed or full of brandy. Something that matters a bit.

Just chilling in my room. Yeah, like nothing's wrong here. Nothing to see. Move along. And he pretty much shuts the door in their face, right? Yeah. So meanwhile, Picard wakes up in a room that's got like a column in the middle of it and four beds kind of radiating out from this column. And there is a blue Starfleet lady and a man with a Sydney Opera House hat sitting in there. And Picard, like, you know, he tries his communicator a couple of times, nothing works. He goes in, like, tries to see if the blue lady is got blood pumping through her veins,

but she thinks he's trying to strangle her. It was a very strange gambit he chooses to attempt to assess whether she's alive or not. It's like, it puts hand on her neck. Yeah. But I feel like he could just like tap her on the soul of her shoe or something. Be a little more chased. Okay. You up. Yeah.

You could have just texted her and eggplant emoji. This set just screamed at me. Cost saving option. You know, like it looks good, it looks real plain, but oh man, like this is basically home for the next 40 minutes. Yeah, well it's definitely, this is a very twilight zone slash outer limits kind of plot and it really reminded me of a set for a very similar episode of the outer limits that I have like a vague memory of from when I was a kid and I don't know did you ever watch that show? I did but I don't remember the specific episode you're talking

about. There were a couple versions of that show, right? There was like the old, old version. Yeah. And then there was like an 80s or 90s version. Yeah, there was a good, is this that version you're talking about? Yes. Yeah, it was like, you know, my father showed me an article about it in the paper and reading about it made it sound like it would be appealing to a young star trek nerd such as myself, so Ben we received some mail at the house dressed to Wesley Who is that? I'll give it to him. I'll pass it along

Your mom's like why do you keep encouraging him? It sounds like somebody isn't becoming allergic to beer. No, no, and even if I were, I would still probably power through it. Committed to the bit. I like it. The deal is Picard is in this room. The Sydney Opera House hat guy is named Kovah and he's from a race of beings that get their asses kicked a lot and insist on not having any enemies because they're so peace loving. I wrote down the name Hovah, but I guess I had Jay-Z on the mind, didn't I? Yeah, and then the cadet, the Starfleet Blue lady, is named Harrow, and she's bullion.

And I guess Sydney Opera House guy came first and then Harrow appeared, and then Picard appeared. There are red hockey pucks to be had in the column in the middle of the room that are edible but not food at least as far as COVID is concerned. He seemed like a bit of a snob though. They were tasty enough. They look like a couple of things to me. They look like the soap that the little kid has to eat his punishment in a Christmas story for cursing. Uh-huh. I've never seen that film, so I'll just have to take your word for it. Oh, boy.

I don't know how you stayed away from that one. I mean, that's actually just shocking to me. Yeah. I thought everyone had seen it. I thought it was in the zeitgeist. I don't know why. Maybe that's maybe because of you. You're not missing too much.

It's not that great. Yeah. If we do a holiday episode, maybe we'll watch it. But the whole scene sort of felt like a Sawyer in the Fish Biscuit in Lost. Like it felt very fish biscuit to me. Yeah. It was fun. Well, maybe they watched that episode and decided to kind of borrow from it.

The consensus is these little pucks are edible, but they don't look very tasty. No. And you know how like you can eat like a lot of jello and not feel filled up. Yeah. Feel like that's what's going on with these. It's kind of like torture food. They they've got the food but there's no toilet. And I think that's going to be a problem if they can't get out of here. Yeah, there's no toilet and there's also no water to speak of. Right. It's not clear like what span of time they spend in this place. I think it's like a couple of days but not like a whole bunch of days.

Maybe the aliens are just beaming the poo out of them as they go. Yeah, if they're sophisticated enough to get them here undetected, you can imagine they're all up in them guts with a transporter. What would your strategy be if you were in a room like that with a couple of strangers and it was poopy time? Like would you just kind of like select one corner of the room as the latrine and whoever's bed is next to it just has to suck it up? Well, luckily there's one empty bed at this point

in the episode, so I think you definitely ship behind that empty bed in the meantime. Also the dude that shows up doesn't look like he would particularly mind a poopy bed. No, not at all. So there's kind of the two stories that are running is there is this kind of like psychological thriller type of situation with Picard trying to figure out why he's been imprisoned by whom and to what end. And then on the other side, you've got.

You've got fake Picard wandering around the ship. And I think both of these stories are given equal weight. There's no, I don't feel like there's necessarily an A and a B here. I think we're sort of braiding back and forth between them. Tandem storylines. And that's not really how I remembered it. I felt like I feel like in my memory of this episode,

it was going to be like almost entirely set in this tiny room. Yeah. But yeah, like there's a lot of hijinks with Captain Picard behaving strangely, and the crew becoming increasingly uneasy with the strange behavior. Like he orders him to go find a pulsar instead of going to meet up with the hood and they're like, well, okay, but are you gonna explain why we're going to this pulsar or what's up with that?

The card does that thing that if anyone you were close to started to do, it would fire off so many red flags and red lights, which is like, if your wife all of a sudden were like, hey Ben, you trust me, don't you? Yeah. Like, if I were to do some weird things, you'd still be with me, right? Yeah.

And basically, that's what Picard's doing to different crew members for a while. He's like, you know, I could, I mean, the crew's used to following my orders no matter how weird, right? And everyone's like, yeah, of course, you're the captain. And he's like, but if I were to do some really weird shit, they'd still follow me, wouldn't they? And everyone to a person is like, sure, you're the captain. They don't see the red flags right in front of him.

Yeah. And so like the red flags go from like, you know, showing up to the poker game to like, you know, giving Troye a stop and saying like, hey, why don't you give me a heads up before Mutiny starts, just in case my weird behavior over the next few days essentially starts one. Yeah. She's like, okay, yeah. He goes down.

Hey, then you wouldn't mind if I just started doing Tinder, right? That wouldn't be a problem for you, would it? I just want to like see what it's like. You know, I missed the whole E-dating Appdating thing. I've never swiped left or right on anything and I just want it, you know, I'm curious. You know, I've been kind of wondering what drugs are like. Like injectable drugs.

Right. That would be okay with you, wouldn't it? Like, you know me. You know, I would not get totally out of control immediately with that, right? And this fake Picard is... If I went to Thailand and murdered a child for sport you wouldn't divorce me over something like that would you look man whatever the laws allow over there there's this narrow space that Patrick

Stewart is operating in that I think is really interesting in this in this storyline like yeah there is Acting like a good guy and acting like a bad guy and let's just say that like those are those are like podiums And what he's done as he has moved the space between them like he's narrowed that space so that Good guy and bad guy are standing very close together. I feel like. And so his acting is not broad and wild as the bad guy, just like it is overly good when he's being good. And I know that he has like a black goatee. Right.

It's the bad guy. And I think that totally works in the story's favor here. Like that was the best choice they could have done. He is so subtle in his badness. This is not something that they would have thought to do in season one, you know. No, but there was an episode in season one where Picard was taken over by the gas cloud, remember? Yeah, and there are so many beats that they borrow from that episode in this episode.

Yeah, yeah. You know, like, but they sort of write some of the wrongs, you know, when Riker starts to express some concerns, Picard isn't like, maybe you should get your health checked. Did you ever think of that? You know, it's, he actually kind of like speaks some logic into the conversation. Ben, he does that exactly in his radio room.

You don't remember that scene? Yeah, no, it's exactly the same scene. It's just better written. Yeah, yeah, it's, you know, this is like another one of those instances where... We're bingeing the show in a way that was unnatural at the time. Yeah, you would tell you to... And so you don't... You'd forgotten that garbage episode from Season 1 by this time.

Yeah, that was two years ago, and to to us it's a month and a half. It is a crazy, crazy, one with dog meaty face. Have you gone fighting within yourself to stand up, tell the truth? You don't deserve the way of that beautiful. Meanwhile back in the prison room, a new alien has shown up and this is Esok of the Chalnoth who appears and like immediately whips out a knife and is about to kill everybody but Picard manages to talk him out of it by Explaining that he has visited Isok's planet before

And I guess Isok is impressed enough by that He's like, all right. Maybe I won't gut you like a pig Isok sucks got those Nossican vibes a little bit. Yeah, he's sort of like a midpoint between a Klingon and a Nossican. He's got an under bite and Batman abs. Like the uniform abs. The abs are built into his costume. Yeah. So, Picard is trying a bunch of stuff to like disduce who the captors are, what he has in common with the other people, like when the toothy guy shows up, they have like four people, four beds, and they're like, okay, like what?

Where are we gonna shoot now? Yeah. And also besides that, what is the unifying principle here? Like, E-SaxSucks, what the fuck is that smell? They're like, that's your bunk, bro. I called tap bunk, bro. He's not a lot to go on and Sydney Opera House guys, there's a door and Sydney Opera House guys had great pains to discourage them from messing with it because he spent some time trying to open it and all he got was shot with a pain ray. And so Picard immediately ignores this advice and gets everybody working on trying to

open it up and he and tooth man and blue lady get get shot with the pain ray and it doesn't look fun. Now it sure doesn't. Not fun at all. So let's go back to the fun story line ban with Dappacart. Who walks into 10 forward and like displays false modesty of a parade leader. Yeah. Like he walks in, the doors open, the door shut behind him and he just sort of stands there waving. I love that scene. Yeah, it's like when you see Trump come out on stage and you don't see who he's waving

at but he's always waving at people. Hey, that that guy you know it's amazing the great ship everybody on this ship is great at their jobs I hire all the best people my people are amazing and there's like there's like murmuring behind him like holy shit that's Captain Picard what is he doing here and he, you know what? I'm gonna get an ale. Fuck it. I'm gonna get an ale for everyone. Any announces it to the whole deck. Yeah, nobody raises their hand is like, you know that like money doesn't exist. So like, it's not a big deal to get

around for everybody. And we all just got what we wanted and like none of us are drinking ails. Yeah, yeah. So a little bit out of earshot, Riker and Jordy are sitting at a table and they are... Entroy. ...and they're starting to feel a little bit squicked out about Doppacard. It's a captain up to it. That's not the captain I know. They've noticed his odd behavior, this being a prime example of that behavior. And at that moment, Picard breaks into song after toasting the finest crew in Starfleet. Here's to the finest crew in Starfleet.

Yeah, I feel like I've heard that sound before, but I can't put my finger on where. Yeah. Anyways, another thing Picard does is takes Dr. Crusher on a hot date to his quarters where the lights are turned low and she's in like a elegant dress and he's in a deep V off-duty captain costume She looks like a wedding cake and and his deep V is projecting an air of confidence that That you really see him. Raker like confidence.

Yeah. It's a smarmy scene. Like he's really putting the moves on her. At a certain point, she's like, listen, like this is very sweet and very surprising and very flattering, but I really think that I am happy with our relationship as it is. And he hops up and puts on some smooth jazz,

and he's like, would you care to dance? I thought you didn't dance. On special occasions. At do you think he turns on the music to distract Beverly from the box at the foot of his bed? There's like, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh Oh Shut up Wesley He's just like hitting the volume like louder and louder. Yeah, you know like when it's real Picard Wesley is down to be in that box for fairly extended periods of time, but yeah

Like having to listen to him bed his own mother is a bridge too far. It kind of breaks the rules of the game, you know? That's so brutal. Yeah. So they dance around a little bit. And then at that point Beverly is like, I feel like you're fucking with me right now.

And at that point Picard pulls one of the all-time big dog moves, honor, which is like, oh I'm not, but you may leave. And they go up to the door, opens it, and it's like gestures with his hand. Like, go on. This is the hallway. You will now go out into it. It is stone-cold. Yeah. Don't act like I want it. Yeah. It was brutal. And Beverly just sort of takes it with the little chagrin, right?

I think at this point she's hip to his, to the idea that he might not be the real thing. Yeah. The senior staff get together at Riker's quarters and start plotting a mutiny. And can you imagine the amount of tidying up Riker had to do before that gathering? He probably just has a switch on the wall that puts it into ultraviolet mode, so that, you know, like he can just work in that color for a while.

Oh man, I'm thinking that he just has a separate quarters. So yeah, like the amount of regular cleanup would just be impossible to sustain. Yeah, I mean, they only have like an ambassador on the ship every so often. So he can probably, and it's probably up to him, like, who gets assigned those rooms. So he can probably safely keep one of them pretty messy. In the Fred Durst parlance, everyone is in a greeence that something's wrong with the card at this point and they are just trying to figure out what to do about it.

Yeah, that's pretty inconclusive. So back in the cell, they've gotten the door smashed open and it opens up and it's like just a sheet of metal on the other side. It's like, give me a fucking break. It's a little bit like in a return of the Jedi when they're trying to sneak in the back door of the shield generator. It's like the same thing where they're... I'm not familiar.

Yeah, well, it's like a movie. It's like a science fiction film and they're they're monkeying with this door control and they think they've got it and then they say they've got it and another door closes You know it's a real fuck you to their whole plan of escape. Yeah It's then that Picard kind of he gets fed up and he he's done a couple of things Along the way that helped him figure everything out. And one of those things was that he dropped into the conversation what planet they just came from. And the Bollion cadet lady was like, oh yeah, you guys cured that plague, that was rad.

I really admire you for that. And he reveals that that was a covert operation. Starfleet has classified the core Karolai 5-Players secret. And therefore, he knows that she is not who she claims to be. And so she splits into three balls of light that coalesce into three J. Leno aliens. And they're like, yeah, we're kept in the car. Welcome to the show. They just do,

they do 20 minutes of really hacky monologuing. Have you ever seen the election? So this is Monica Lewinsky. She gave my Leno more of a list than you. And so they're like, they're like, you guys are real dickheads for taking us here against our will, so we'd like to be taking back. And they're like, yeah, well, we wanted to do a little bit of an experiment, but now that we know that you know that we know that you know, we'll take you back to your ships. Just another world class impression. My Ben Harrison. It's what our viewers crave.

A greatest-gen live show is something you don't want to miss. Why? Well it's a great opportunity to see me and Ben in person, but that's not all. FODs from all over gather at these shows to cosplay, to do pre and post show hangs, to make friends, and share their embarrassment. Hey, let's make a pretty great name for a tour. Let's do it! The Share Your Embarrassment Tour is coming in August 2023, and we've got a bunch of dates in a lot of great places.

Go to GreatestGenTour.com to get more info. That's greatestgentour.com for dates and ticketing information for the Share Your Embarrassment tour. I'm Jordan Morris. And I'm Jesse Thorne. On Jordan Jesse Go, we make pure, delightful nonsense. We were open awesome guests and bring them down to our level. We got stupid with Judy Greer

My friend Molly and I call it having the spaceweards. Pat Noswald, could I get a Balrog burger and some air-gorn fries? Thank you. And Kumail Nanjiani. I've come back with cat toothbrushes which is impossible to use. Come get stupider with us at MaximumFun.org. Look, your podcast apps are already open, just pull it out. Give Jordan Jesse Goatry. Being smart is hard. Be dumb instead. Whoa, rats, hey, hey, hey, oh, I'm about to count you in line.

These clouds are really freaking me out. I hate having to stand in line and boy, what do I? These giraffes do not smell good. No, they do not, and they've such short nacks. But I'm hearing we need to get on this argument. We've got to get on the art. It is about terrain, about a spout to destroy humanity. Hey, oh, sorry, sorry, sorry. Are you Noah? Yeah, I know we look like humans. Oh, we're actually, we're podcasters. We are podcasters, so it's different. Have you heard of

Ono Ross and Carrie? We investigate spirituality, claims of the paranormal, stuff like that. And you have a boat and say the world's gonna end, so seem like something for us to check out. We would love to be on the boats. We came two by two. What do you think? Ona Ross & Kerry, available on MaximumFun.org. [♪ Music playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in Doppacard has pushed the enterprise closer and closer to this quasar. Pulsar? Pulsar. That would be a pulsar due to its flashing lights. It's pulsing lights. And it's enough radiation that they're going to start to lose shields pretty soon.

And then everybody's just going to be cooked in their boots. And Riker has taken the extreme step of taking the captain out of control and ordering everybody to take the ship away from this threat. And, you know, because he's set it all up ahead of time, you know, wharf and Wesley and everybody are like, all right, yeah. Captain, the captain has totally lost his mind and he's super mental and he's gonna kill us all Well, it's like I'm finally free I thank god. Yeah, the major bullet dodged when I was in the gimp box last night but But Picard Prime and

And Jay Leno show up on the on the bridge and Jay's Leno Because there's two of them right? Well, I guess yeah, I guess Doppacard turns into a second Jay Leno right and Picard gives Riker a little wink and Riker does a little like he like taps a couple of buttons on the computer that's near him and then Data and Wesley and Warfall do a little button tapping of their own. They're on a little iCQ chat thing. Yeah, they send you some some ASCII art of of Picard of the Enterprise of little a little confinement beam.

Yeah, the confinement beam emoji. Yeah, and so they sort of like wordlessly get this confinement beam to drop and the aliens are like, have been pretty smug about the fact that they communicate with each other telepathically. So they're pretty surprised when the Enterprise crew is able to wordlessly

set up this trap for them. For the single look, I was able to inform my crew that I wanted to hold you here. But why? Because I've decided to conduct an experiment of my own. And I guess they're like super advanced aliens that are trying to study the idea of power and morality and all of these things that are alien to them because they're all identical and they all communicate telepathically. I guess they're kind of bored like, you know what?

Right? Like they sort of don't have any like individual identity. Yeah, I didn't draw that comparison until you brought it up. Huh? Yeah, I guess that works for me. I guess they're bored like in all but desire to assimilate things. They're interest in hack comedy. Yeah, they're monologue jokes are a lot worse than the Borgs. Yeah. Yeah. So they like trap them and it like teaches them a little lesson about

how annoying it is to be trapped. And then they like let them beam themselves off the ship and Picard gives the order to head toward the USS Hood and Continue with their mission there on their way when the doctor comes aboard the ship and is like high captain and There's a little slide whistle Yeah, Rikersike. It's it's really great to have you back, sir. Picard's like, what did this other guy do in my place? And Rikersike, oh, nothing.

Like with a knowing look. Yeah. And that's when you get that timpani sound, that rolling timpani, that boom. Hahaha. Yeah. that rolling timpani, that boom. Yeah, another slide whistle to closing credits we get on this one. Very strange. This show fails a lot when it attempts that little finger in the cheek at the very end, like in the last five seconds. Did this episode change your opinion of their ability to do that?

No, not at all. It was so weird in tone deaf because it wasn't like he and the doctor actually did anything. And all she would have to, like she, she wasn't on the bridge when it came clear that that was clear that that was dot Picard. So when Picard primers back, she has like, it doesn't make any sense. It doesn't. Ben, if if there were proof that one of us were abducted by aliens and we were just returned by those aliens and everyone saw it, there's proof of it. Like, this actually happened. Would you just be able to continue on with your day? Like, like Picard's in the seat, ready to go meet the USS Hood?

Yeah, it's like, let's get out of here. I've been shitting in the corner for three days. Yeah. With nothing to wipe with. They would have to debrief him and give him a box of wipes. Yeah, debrief in multiple ways. Yeah, it's incredible. And especially because this is the second time

that he's been replaced by a DAPA card. Yeah. Like, why does this keep happening? Why are they totally uninterested in doing anything to prevent this from happening again? Your iPhone has a thing that it regularly does that makes sure that you are who you are when you unlock it.

Sure. The enterprise doesn't even have that for its captain. Like the captain can order the ship and the crew to do anything. There is no swipe and unlock on any of that stuff. Well Adam that kind of ties into my drunk Shimoda. Hey Ben. What's that? Real or doppelganger did you find yourself a drunk Shimoda in this episode?

Drunk Shimoda! Did you find a dopp Shimoda? I did, and it was doppelganger Cacard. I mean, the plan that he has is insane. There's so much about this character that doesn't make sense. One of the things is like, he seems to know a lot about like what kind of people are on the ship, what roles they serve. Like, he has full functional knowledge. Like, at some point he has journey to like get the

engine efficiency up to 95%. Like, that's like a pretty a that's a detailed level of knowledge of what role you're playing. So he's not like somebody that looks like Picard but is trying to like pick it up as he goes. Yeah. So like what what are the parameters of his deception? Does he know everything that Picard knows? Does he know the command codes to set the ship to self-destruct? If so, what's the point of going to this quasar and making everybody be aware of their impending death? Well, radiation builds. Is that part of the experiment or something?

I don't know, dude. It just doesn't make any sense. What the fuck is the point of this crazy quasar trip? Pulsar. Damn it. These J-Leno aliens are fucking stupid. They're idiots. Because if they want the maximum amount of time to study real Picard and then the cruise experience with Doppacard, like, why have Doppacard steer the ship into a situation that's gonna kill everyone? Like, why don't you have Doppacard lay back in the cut

being really chill to give real Picard the maximum amount of time in that isolation chamber in that prison? Or if Doppacard is gonna go make them do something that's gonna get everybody killed, why act super weird around the time that that's happening also? You know?

Like, do it, make it seem plausible that this is like some actual star-fleet business that we're going and conducting. It's like he's not even trying. Crazy. Yeah. Yeah, that's a good Shimoda. My Shimoda was going to be Patrick Stewart himself.

Just in the spirit of drunk Shimoda, he seems like he's having the most fun, really playing with character. Playing with the character that he has portrayed for now three and a half seasons. Like, you don't see the strings because he's a better actor than that. But like, to see a great actor do this kind of work.

I mean, he wasn't given a ton to do But he made some choices here that I thought were great. Yeah Really like shades. It's like the charisqiro of evil Toppoganger characters. He really like makes it an interesting Marginal shift. Yeah, no one's having more fun than him and he gets to play both sides of the coin And he does it really well I thought that was awesome. I agree What do we have coming up on the next episode then episode 19 of season three captains holiday

Well on vacation Picard becomes entangled in the search for a missing weapon from the future. Another time travel episode. Oh goody. I know how you love those. Love them. Do you remember this episode at all? This is a Rysa episode, yeah? Yeah, I think that, I think you're right about that. Yeah, I think that I think you're right about that. Rysa is just basically the Edo planet with a little bit more clothing, right? That's all. A dab. Not much.

They'd be best friend planets, wouldn't they? Yeah. Sister planets. Yeah, and I guess like they probably aren't constantly looking for a reason to give you a lethal injection on Rysa. Oh, sure. Yeah, it's a little more chill than that. Yeah Well, I'm excited for this one. They might also be a little bit more tolerant of cultures that aren't blonde-haired and blue-eyed Oh, yeah, that was the that was the deep dark vein of the Edo wasn't it? Yeah, yeah We've solved over our crime problems by not mixing races

Yeah, we've solved all of our crime problems by not mixing races Yeah, we would not be welcome on the Edo planet. That's for sure. Yeah for a lot of reasons All right, well, we have to watch it we do we don't have any vetoes that much as a short You know, it's also a short then what's that Adam? This shows continued survival Thanks to the support of our great viewership. If any of them, if any of our viewers would like to support the show, they can go to maxmomfund.org slash donate. They can also pop us with a nice five star review on their podcast listening device of choice.

That's a big help. It helps people find the show. We should thank Adam Ragusia for our priority one music and dark material for our theme music. Special episode today, referencing the theme music. A lot of fun. If you'd like to talk about the show online, there's lots of places to go.

There's a subreddit for greatest gen. There's also the maximum fun subreddit. You can use the hashtag greatestgen on Twitter. You can follow Adam at Cut for Time or me at Benjamin A.H.R. You can go on Facebook. There's a greatest generation Facebook group and there's also a page that you can like. I've been trying to get better about posting these little videos that have like a clip of audio and a little way forward. A clip of our funnies. Yeah, and I have no idea if this is going to work, but if you share those on your Facebook

page or retweet them on Twitter or whatever, I think that there's a chance that that helps new people find the show and that would be really great for us. Yeah, let's bring some more people into this big tent. Yeah. I think we shall. Well that was a great pod bin. Yeah, it was a lot of fun talking about Star Trek the next generation with you Adam.

And we're going to be back next time with another great episode of Star Trek the Next Generation and a sunscreen smelling episode of the greatest generation. I love that smell. Make it sound. Maximumfund.org Comedy and culture, artist owned Listener support