The Greatest Generation - Space Pinecone (S3E20)

Episode Date: September 14, 2016

When low rent Michael Rapaport comes aboard, the Enterprise finds itself in a race to capture a living starship that the Romulans really want. Will putting Rapaport on suspension stop the mayor from breathing down Picard’s neck? How big can a banger get? What's this proctology exam going to turn up? It’s an episode where Ben and Adam have creative differences about the show.

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 friendsofdecisoto for labor.com. That's friendsofdisoto for labor.com. Link in the episode description. Okay, now let's get on with the show. Here's to the finest crew in Starfleet. Engage! Welcome to the greatest generation Star Trek podcast. I'd like to ask you guys who are a little bit embarrassed to have a Star Trek podcast.

I'm Ben Harrison. I'm Adam Pranaka. Are you? Are you? Today I am. I'm Adam Pranaka in the streets and something hateful that Twitter people are calling me in the sheets. Yeah.

I do get some hateful tweets, don't I? Yeah, really do. I'm hitting the block button lately. Are you? Because I saw I hit the mute button, but if you... I recommended the mute button to you as a effective strategy and I and then I thought about it a little more and I was

like why do I want to give someone else access to me? Who hates me? Let's talk about anything else Ben. I could bring us an even more uncomfortable conversation if you if you're interested. Oh, boy. Is it uncomfortable fun or uncomfortable awful? Well, it could be an interesting peak behind the kimono for the viewers. Well, we really love doing that, don't we?

So we had a little difference of opinion today, and when this episode comes out, this will be an episode distant in the past, but you know, we each edit roughly equal number of episodes and occasionally, I think we both make choices that the other maybe wouldn't have made. At all boils down to us trying to do what's best for the show and making creative decisions that that reflect those sensibilities and in moments where both of us cannot reach an agreement or we're not together or we're not talking, it's incumbent on one of the hosts to make those decisions at the time. And so when the specific decision was made,

I had felt possessive about its original creation because it was a decision that I made initially. Well, let's be specific, so we're not dancing around it. I think this is, and actually an East Coast West Coast thing, because you have a different ice cream truck music than I have, and I dropped in a different ice cream truck sound for Kevin Xbridge and then I like chopped and screwed it to make it sound the way closer to the way the music box sounded in the Kevin Xbridge episode. You applied the Xbridge filter? Yes. I was like sitting there editing it like oh my god like I can't wait for Adam to hear this I think this is so great but then when you heard it, you had a different reaction.

Yeah, and that sucks because it clearly, I don't know whether that's the version that'll go out at this point, like who knows? But talking about that version is like, it's great and it shows so much fucking time put into it. But like the pithy, possessive, creative, sensitive heart of me felt hurt that my initial creative decision was paved over in favor of something else. And so I totally, I got defensive about it. And I totally admit that. So I think I, here's something that I discovered on my commute home today in kind of thinking

about this after we talked about it over the flawless communication medium of text messaging. The thing you should use to talk to people you really care about about things that are very serious, you mean? Yeah, yeah, that one. I listened back to a previous Kevin Usbridge bit, and I realized that, so I grew up in Oakland, California, and I had West Coast ice cream truck music. Now I live in Brooklyn, New York,

and I have East Coast ice cream truck music, and I don't think that I realized that I had changed the music itself. I think that I think I Googled Mr. Softy because that's like the the song that I think of when I think of ice cream truck now but I also think of the song that you used which is I think is Turkey and the straw and I think of ice cream truck now, but I also think of the song that you used, which I think is Turkey and the straw, and I think that somehow my brain made those the same thing when they really aren't the same thing. So I was like, initially, like, what the fuck is he talking about?

I didn't change the song. I just added a filter. Like, worst case scenario, we take the filter back off, you know, and because we were speaking in this perfect medium, obviously all of that was clear to you. Right, right, and by all we both agree none. Can I propose a compromise? Of course. What if-

Are you trying to lawyer me right now? Well, I'm just saying, like, easier for me to, at the end of tonight, not re-edit the episode much. But what if we agree to use both tracks and I will remove the filters because I think that they make it too spooky? Okay. And by, yeah, I'm fine with that. Okay.

By use both tracks, are you saying that on episodes that you will be using East Coast ice cream truck music and on my episodes, the episodes in my custody on my visitation days, I will be playing West Coast ice cream truck music. I don't even think we need to be that prescriptive. I mean, this is not a paint by numbers podcast. Sure isn't.

So I would say like if we have both of them in our shared Dropbox folder, you know, whatever the spirit moves you to use at any given instance. How about that? Sounds great. Good talk, Adam. Let's make a podcast. Let's do it. This is season three episode twenty ten man.

I'm glad you pronounced it that way because everyone else puts the emphasis on the man in this episode. If you notice that, when Picard does a log, he's like, we're on a way to visit the Tin Man. Tin Man. Doesn't that what I said? That's what I'm saying. Like, everyone emphasizes the man part of Tin Man,

which just sounds weird. It sounds weird to the earpin. It's sort of like Wilford Brimley talking about diabetes. Right. It's just like, how did you arrive at that decision? Like, you never heard anybody say that way before. It is never Tin Man. It is always Tin Man. Tin Mountain is never Tin Man. It is always Tin Man.

Tin Man. Tin Man. Tin Man. The ship is up to some routine bizz when they get run up on in these streets by the USS Hood. It's always the Hood, isn't it? Yeah, every time you go to the Hood,

you get run up on. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, Every time you go to the hood, you get run up on. Just before we started recording, I saw on the Wikipedia page that the USS Hood gets mentioned in the first episode of the show as being like Riker's previous posting. Oh. And so, so like, there's like a weird, like, the captain's like, Hey Will. Yeah, you're doing. That's a very long arc, you know? Like, we've only heard this ship mentioned and then, like, one time we see it, and it's like, we're supposed to be super familiar with who the captain is

and what his relationship is to the characters. You know, to this day, Will, no one can stay in recorders. It's been completely taped off. Hey Will We had to put into a starbase and have our holodex fully removed and replaced We had them beamed out and destroyed Yeah, it's just like

Couple kilometers off the starboard bow of the ship. This is it Like they use way more photon torpedoes that are necessary. Full spread, the works. So this is like not what ships usually do to each other, but they're doing this because the enterprise is being put on an emergency detail, and they need the fastest ship in the fleet and the best and brightest

and captain de Soto of the hood is eager to acknowledge that that's not his ship. It is the enterprise and he's sort of small dogging Picard. He's like, you, you got a great ship. I got a pilot garbage. You got Commander Riker. I've got this stupid first officer who doesn't have nearly as much sex as him. Like he's really disparaging about his own ship and crew. You've got one of the best gimp's in the fleet. My gimp box has a very inferior gimp in it.

You are very attractive. I am gross and disgusting. Yeah, just short of going, we're not worthy. Yeah, yeah. And then Picard goes, you know, it actually comes from the Algonquin word, Millywalkay. Riker is just licking this up, though. He loves getting compliments in front of other people. Yeah, but it's like, he just sort of sits up in his chair and gives a little wiggle.

But his mood changes from good to bad when it is announced that they are gonna be taking on a mission specialist by the name of Tam Elbrun. And Riker's like, the Tam Elbrun from the thing, the something-something, which I guess is some catastrophe in the past that, you know, Riker seems, Riker seems to be the only person on the ship that cares about this catastrophe, by the way.

Like everybody else is like, yeah, yeah, Tam Elbrun, that one. I've found that when a historical moment is known as a catastrophe, it's pretty bad. It's a bad sign. Yeah, but Troy is personally familiar with this guy and Picard is like, oh, you guys used to hang and she's like, no, I used to treat him for mental.

That's the throw to title. That's the diagnosis. Yeah. I used to treat him for mine stuff. With my mind. So they go to the transporter room to meet this guy and onto the transporter pad beams low rent Michael Rappaport. Who is wearing like a Mikhail Barishnikov male ballet costume? Yeah, it's like it really has serious, original series Star Trek vibes.

Yeah. And also just some like, space pajama vibes. Man, Ben, this show can really, like, lean into a pleat, can't they? Yeah, there are more pleats than are strictly speaking legal on this costume. Like a costume designer is having a conversation somewhere that goes like, I can't put any more pleats in these pants. It's impossible. Yeah. And the costume department's like, do it! Double it!

You're not going home until there's ten times as many pleats on that shirt. You're not going home until there's 10 times as many pleats on that shirt. A thousand more pleats are your fired. The pleat sweat. What's it called? A sweat box? Sweat lodge? Yeah, a sweatshop. Sweat. Oh boy. I would not be good at a game show. Ben, you also got me drunk on your previous, on your other podcast. Oh yeah, you're a guest on, on a episode of Let's Drink About It. I have no way of calculating when that will

have come out with regard, relation to this, but I think, I think it will beat this to, to press. Okay. So if you go listen to a recent episode of Let's Drink About It, it's co- It's gisted by none other than Adam Puranica. It could be canonical greatest gen if you if you make a big enough case for it. Yeah well let's not get it carried away. Yeah. That's not. Yeah. So Tam is here because he is a super telepath. He was born with telepathy. He's a Betzoid and most Betzoids like Superman become developed their superpowers in adolescence. He was born able to read minds. And I guess this usually means that people with this condition on beta-Z are crazy pants typically speaking. He must have been a real fussy baby. Yeah, I mean just think about all the things he would have heard in his mind as a baby. Imagine being born and having the empathy

code upon you. Yeah. You're feeling the birth in a pretty unique way, Abbot. Yeah. Yeah. And so his specialty is getting the federation in touch with, he's worked very hard his whole life to be somewhat normal, but he's very eccentric. He doesn't fit in, like Picard definitely is like scowling right off the bat

cause he just doesn't dig this guy's vibe, but his specialty is. He's the best mine guy in the Federation. But he's a loose cannon. No one wants to work with Tam Albron. That guy's a dick. Tam, I'm gonna need your shield and your peace. You've gone too far this time and the mayor's breathing down my neck.

Do you want me to solve crime or do you want me to do it right? I'm not gonna go buy the book, not for you, not for anybody. There's minds out there that need to be read, and I'm the man to do the job. Who's gonna do it? You, Captain? I don't think so. So wouldn't you know it? Picards are pretty buy the book kinda guy. And isn't, does never a whole lot of patience for Michael Rapoport's loose canon behavior. Yeah, but they need him because he is an expert in getting the federation in touch with species that don't necessarily make an easy group to

interact with on a linguistic basis because he can go into their minds. And he's been like the delegate to some world with non-humanoid species that have a very different pace of life. And it's some fun world building, like just kind of offhand remarks about this guy's backstory, like different stuff he's done, he's like, oh man, like they must be in touch with species that are super weird and cool that they're at peace with so they don't like get brought up in episodes, you know. I have nothing to say about that, I'm sorry, Ben. That was a comprehensive description of his backstory.

And so what he's here for is they've discovered a ship slash creature in orbit of a star that is on the verge of collapse. And it is a ship slash creature in a way that they're like, this thing is alive. It lives in space. It's huge. It's like the size of a starship, but it has a mind. And we want to do what the Federation do and make first contact with it. But this star is going to blow.

And if it blows, it's taking the Tin Man out with it. And to make matters just slightly more complicated, the stars in Romulan territory. And what Tam neglects to mention right off the bat is that the Romulans are aware of this thing and are in You know like moving very quickly to go be first to to meeting it Right, it's a it's a race to meet the space pine cone and and so the enterprise hits the gas heads out there. So is there in route we start finding out more and more about this Tam Elbrun guy and and what it's like to be him. He's he's complaining a bunch

about being on the ship and and hearing everyone's thoughts and feelings all at once. He's got to be a real pain in the ass. Here's a guy who has said he loves being alone, he loves working solo on the missions that he takes. Now he's on this great big ship with thousands of people. So he naturally gravitates towards data as a guy to hang out with because he's not a challenge in that way. There's nothing for him to read with data. He's just what you see is what

you get kind of guy. Yeah, and that's a great comfort to Tam. Who, you know, we come to learn is because of his unique ability kind of, kind of ironically, a terribly lonely character. Yeah. He is swamped by other people's thoughts at all times and this kind of forces him into this eccentricity and loneliness. There's a very interesting scene where like Picard and Dr. Crusher and Councillor Troy kind of talk about about this. There's a lot of character building with this guy. And like while they're building this his character

they'll kind of intercut between his story of just trying to bite his time while they while they rush to get to this star. And the bridge, which is largely under the command of commander data, when they're realizing that they have a Romulan on their tail. And the Romulans are doing something with their engine that is making their cloak not work quite as well as it normally would. So they're just barely able to detect that this is happening,

but it means that they're not going to beat the Romulans like they thought they were. It's sort of like that submarine analog of like when, when something squeaks on the red October, everyone can hear it. So it's not totally invisible anymore. The same thing goes for these cloaked ships, right? They need a ton of energy to keep the cloak up, to keep them perfectly invisible. And if they're stressing any other system that cloaks not working perfectly. And so they're just barely read on the sensors. Yeah. That's a great, that's a great analogy to one of my favorite films at him.

I try to include red October references whenever I can just for you bin. I really appreciate that. This has been a very therapeutic episode for me so far. One episode only. So we come to know more and more about Tin Man as well. It is thought to be a creature that may have been bred or may just naturally have occurred in some evolutionary way. But it's out there and it's like the last of its kind. And Tam has actually been sort of in touch with it more than he initially led on. And he says it's not like he's been conscious, and Troy is like completely baffled by this, because they've been light years away from it, which I feel like the range of

beta-zoid mind reading has been kind of vaguely ill-defined. Probably for good reason. Like, it's something that you can kind of like make the plot, make work for the plot rather than the other way around. Yeah, but it really blows Troy's mind when Tam discloses that he evidently has a range of empathic powers that is like light years. Light years upon light years. We're light years away. That's impossible, even for you. Impossible for me

Maybe not impossible for Tin Man, which yeah, it's kind of crazy Yeah, we get the idea that the Tin Man Tin Man is very old and very wise because whenever anyone talks about it Native American pan flute plays plays. Yeah, which is the lazy man's way of underscoring wisdom on an early 90s TV show, I guess. I was sort of wondering when I was watching it, like whether that music was as fucked out as it seems from our modern perspective at the time, or whether that was like an early use of that kind of music, like if it was already a cliche, or if it only seems like a cliche in retrospect.

That's a great question. I, God, I'm trying to think of anything to compare it to at the time, like early 90s style. I mean, I can only tell you that, that sensitivities then weren't what they are now. And so, I mean, I doubt there was much of a needle to peg on this stuff. But yeah, I definitely picked up on it and it was a little bit smirky. I didn't mind the music in this.

I definitely noticed it, but I didn't hate it. They get to the star system and as they're getting there, the Romulans come out of warp and essentially pull like a drive-by shooting on the Enterprise. They like nail it a bunch of times with disruptors before they really can do anything. These are some of the biggest bangers we've seen, like massive bangers. Big, big bad bangers, but the biggest bangers yet to come. The Romulans have really fucked the ship up and they've drained their shields and that means means they've got to like pull an all stop and give Jordi half an hour to like, to patch everything up.

And like, it's like one of those scenes where like they cut down to engineering and Jordi's like running around like a chicken with his head cut off. And he's like, I have a 30 minute to work to do down here before we can do anything. And Picard's like, you've got 10. And cut to like data and 10, chilling in data's quarters like they have all the time in the

world. If you need one guy to solve an engineering problem at the maximum amount of speed, it's data. And he's like, it's weird, right? Right. And it's condo. Yeah. Not only that, right? And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right?

And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right?

And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right?

And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right? And he's cleared, right? say that this is their space. And I think that they must have known enough about like what the Romulans claim to own, that they didn't want to start like a war over first contact with a weird alien spaceship just because, you know, like if they started firing, they don't have any like good pretense of being there on a scientific mission. Yeah, I mean, they know that they're kind of in the wrong, it sounds like. Yeah, but you know, this is like not the neutral zone or anything, this is like, I guess the Romulans claim

on this space is fairly dubious. So, but it's an interesting point. So Tam at this point has said that this alien, the only reason this alien ship person is here, the Tin Man. Tin Man. It is to commit suicide, right? Like, it wants to hang out by this

about to explode star so it can die in peace. It's like a whale washing itself up on a beach. Yeah, that's it. But it's been in touch with Tam. So it's like, it's definitely hedging a little bit on this whole suicide plan. And Tam's in the heads of all parties. Like Tam knows with the pine cones thinking,

he knows what the Romulans are thinking. He gets with the card right away and he's like, look, those Romulans have tried to talk to the space pine cone and it's not working so they're gonna try to blow it up. Right, and he like runs up to the view screen and puts his hands on his temples. I don't know if he actually puts his hands on his temples, but I feel like I remember it that way.

And he gets the pine cone to do a spin around, which emits a bunch of crazy light that totally destroys the Romulan ship. And it's like the blast wave that knocks Captain Sulu's ship off its rocker in the beginning of undiscovered country. We're like, by the time it gets out to the Enterprise, it's the price is pretty hard. Yeah, and it fucks their shit up. Like, Picard goes flying across the bridge. Oh, yeah.

This is a correction because this was the biggest banger I think we've ever seen on the show. I think so, yeah. I wrote down big banger in all caps in my notes. Yeah, Flings Picard against the wall. He normally doesn't get that much distance. No. There's two Romulanships in Et Play here, and they know that the other one is like further behind. The one that had come was like, had pushed itself so hard that it was, and like, serious,

you know, it was like seriously fucked its engine up, getting there. And they know the others are not far away, but they're still like between the Romulan attack and this banger, the enterprise is in pretty rough shape and they're still fairly far away from the star. So they've got some work to do before they can kind of get the show back on the road. Yeah, and it all comes down to Jordy's ability to do it. Yeah.

I mean, this throughline continues throughout the series. Like, is the best place for data really on the bridge at this moment? Steering the ship around, doing sensor stuff. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, like, he's definitely really good at ops, he's just also really good at engineering. Yeah, I don't know. Maybe he could take off an arm, stick it over in engineering. So divide his effort a little bit. Well, the other like rising tension at this point is that Tam really wants to go aboard Tin Man.

And Picard, can we just talk to it, screen to screen? What are you talking about? Tin Man. Tin Man. Tin Man. Sorry, what did I say? You said Tin Man. And I wasn't sure who you were talking about.

Total brain fart, my sincere apologies. I don't even know how you could get those two things confused. I know. But yeah, like Picard is very impressed with Tam's abilities and I don't think anybody thinks that Tam doesn't want to do the right thing, but they're pretty sure he's bonkers. And so he doesn't really trust Tam's judgment enough to like put him on this away mission. And it really takes a lot of McLaughlin grouping. If you want to get Picard to a place

where he's willing to beam Tam and data over to Tin Man. And when they do, it's like one of those like laparoscopic but-hole proctology videos inside there. It's, you know, it's like the insulidable video. It looks very flatulent. Yeah. It's like, you know, when they're like looking for polyps and they show, they show, you know, Katie Quirks' Keyster on TV or whatever. It is exactly that. Anyone who's seen that footage, I think we'll tell you that they basically stole that footage and used it for this scientific purpose.

The B story is that when you turn 40, you should go, get the exam, we know you don't wanna get it. It's not the most fun thing in the world. Yeah, they walk around and Tam is able to kind of interact with this thing in a way that data is not at one point he puts his hand against the wall and it sinks into it. The wall is like a plane that Tam can just reach into and data tries to do the same thing and it's just a solid surface. It's making a bunch of noises too, like it's kind of burping and farting and... Yeah.

It's all gooey. And Tam can even kind of cause the ship to reconfigure itself, like he puts his hand against a surface and a chair, like, appears in the middle of the, you middle of the equivalent of Tin Man's bridge. You're talking about the gooey Eams chair. Yeah. He makes a little gooey Eams. Yeah, it looked like maybe they made that model out of wax and then melted it and then played the footage in reverse.

It definitely looked like that. It was pretty sweet. Yeah, it looked like an attempt at practical. It was definitely better looking than what it would have looked like 10 years later with a similar show trying to make that look like something that happened with CG, you know? Yeah, like it's sort of related to the Odo effect. And it looks better here than the Odo effect looks. Ten years down the road. It's less glossy. It's more, it's grosser to its benefit.

Like it should look sloppy. And that actually helps with the world building. Yeah, and Tam is like a different man. The second he gets aboard this thing, he's like way more at ease. He's initially like kind of overwhelmed because Tin Man is so excited to have him that it like starts downloading its memories into his head.

And he's like, oh, Jill. But then it like they find like an equilibrium and he's like, hey, data, like, thank you for coming and experiencing this super cool thing with me. I'm not going back to the Federation with Tin Man. I'm we're going to go do our own thing. But I really appreciate you guys ubering me over here.

Five stars. My love is a people long and chill for that, which longer than us as the busy. stars. At this point, like a supernova's imminent and up until now, the enterprise has not been able to communicate with either Tam or data. So over on the enterprise, she's just getting really stressful. Well, on the Pine Cone, everything is really blissed out. Yeah, man. So the A and the B stories are in pretty tight conflict. Emotional, really.

Yeah. And the second Romulan ship shows up, and they're like, Enterprise, your presence here is a violation of Romulan space. You will leave immediately. It's a very... Art typical... conversation between Picard and the Romulan, which is like, what? We were just here doing science. What are you talking about, you know?

Wouldn't you like to science with us? Yeah. And the Romulans are like, what the fuck? No! I do not want to do science with you. I do not want to be your lab partner. Dissect your own fucking frog. You aren't even in this class.

They start to realize that the the supernova is imminent and they're like, not sure if they're going to be able to get out of there in time to avoid being destroyed by this star. And the Tin Man, Tin Mow, does another pulse that has the effect of sending the Romulans in the Enterprise well outside of the blast radius of the star. And they like watch the star know that out from a distance. And it's a real like shocking moment because they realize the data was like still on the other ship. The

You see the flash? You know you're so far away, you're too far away to do anything about it. Feels like you might be gone this time. He might have finally succeeded in committing suicide. I feel like they really sold this moment for me. I think that when I watched it as a kid, I fully felt it because I didn't know what next week's episode was going to hold. But it really worked for me on this viewing as well. And data eventually kind of reappears on the bridge and tells them that Tam is going to be out of touch for a little while.

I felt like the end of the episode indicated that we weren't sure if Tam and the alien died in the Nova. Oh, that's interesting. I mean, could you take that from it? But I know it. I know it. Yeah, I guess, I guess you can't other than that data appeared so far after the explosion. So like, where was he? Like, if, like, how could, how could it have set a delay on his beam out like that?

I guess the way that I read the character part of this was that Tam was in so much stress and was seeking like the sort of peace that could only come by being by himself. This old alien pine cone was also seeking, you know, a way out together, like they sort of felt the same way about their circumstances. Maybe they decided to go out together or, conversely, they could have found in each other what they were unable to find by themselves. And then that's probably the more hopeful outcome in that they continue on together much happier

than they were apart. Yeah, well, Data winds up at his bumming out window, which he's ended an episode or two at before. And he tells, he tells Deanna Troy that his experience with Tam made him realize that, you know, Tam had searched his whole life for a place to call home and finally found it on Tin Man. Tin Man. And data really felt like the Enterprise was his home. And it's kind of a touching little sentimental moment at the end of the app.

Yeah. The enterprise is his, to man. To man. To man. To man. Pretty cool. Did you like this episode, Adam? I liked some performances in it.

I thought I liked Tam's performance, even though I painted it with a Michael Rappaport brush. I kind of meant that as a backhanded compliment because I really dig Michael Rappaport brush. I kind of meant that as a backhanded compliment because I really dig Michael Rappaport. But like he plays so unhinged in a really cool way. And he also like helps world build a little bit of the beta zoids, which up until now, just seemed like really benign.

Like yeah, they're just like deep thinkers and empaths and what could be the struggle for them, but knowing that childhood could be as difficult as it was for him, I thought it did a lot of heavy lifting in terms of what bad-as-oid life and culture might be like. So as a world builder, he did great work, but as an actor and as a character, I really enjoyed him. Totally. I totally agree.

I love this episode. I'm saying that by saying I'm not sure how I feel about the episode. I like the episode less than I like the performances, but you like it. You like the episode. I thought it was terrific. Yeah. It's one of my faves, and I can definitely see some problems with it, but they don't bother me that much. And I love the idea of Starfleet, like, you know, like, this is a mission we're sending like our best man on. And it's like, hey, we really want to meet this new species. You know, like, Starfleet's idea of a high priority situation is often like,

there's some cool science we could do. Yeah, it feels like four out of five missions are Uber missions or eliminating a plague somewhere. It's nice to see a first contact mission, you know. It feels like what Star Trek's about. Yeah, totally. Adam, I think we have some interesting information coming to us over subspace radio.

We better get to it then. Yeah. Priority one message from Starfleet coming in on Secured Channel. Need a supplement only. supplement? supplement. supplement. Yes, extra.

The interest alone could be enough to buy this ship. We only have one priority one message today, extra. How the interest alone could be enough to buy this ship! We only have one prayer-y-one message today, Adam. It's for Laura from her husband, Jeff. A Jeff says it's hard to believe that after a decade of being married, we still share the same love of things that brought us together. Things like stupid Star Trek night, holiday fun time, and the perfect male form, known as William T. Recker. You'll always be my number one

to greatest Gen Con, Q. Air horn. My natural yager, and most important, my drunk Shimoda. I love you. Wow, that's our sweet. That is really sweet. I love that Jeff gave us

production notes for this. Like, like, cues for drops and stuff. Yeah. Did I say you'll always be my number one? It says, you'll always be my plus one to greatest GenCon. Right. I like that we know that Jeff and Laura are going to be in attendance at greatest GenCon.

So that's exciting. There's two. At least no two people are coming In addition to us Please please Buy some food and beverage. We are getting killed on deposit Wow, that is a very sweet. I wonder if that's like an anniversary message or just Or just a nice, nice message.

They sound pretty close. Well, no, it says her husband Jeff. So they're, they gotta be already married, right? Yeah. You know what, they're gonna be super comfortable in the full size bed, in the one hotel room we're getting for greatest gent con. And so far it sounds like they called dibs. They sound sweet enough that I will sleep on the floor so they can shed a bed.

I won't. Like they sound sweet in everything, but come on man, it's greatest gen cunt. Yeah, I guess we are the stars of greatest gen cunt. It's true. Now come on. Yeager's the star. Yeah. We're just hosting it.

Yeager is getting above the title treatment for this one. Yeah. Biff Yeager presents greatest GenCon 2017. 2017. Well, if you'd like to send a priority one message, very easy. You just go to maximumfund.org slash jumbo-tron. You can do a personal

message for a hundred bucks or a commercial message for 200 bucks every single one of these helps us keep the lights on around here and we really appreciate the folks that step up and do them so thank you. It's so easy to do Ben it seems like something that that would happen when you get drunk right? two clicks away yeah that would be good. I'm gonna drunk priority message this one in. We'd get some pretty nonsensical ones coming. Yeah.

I encourage that behavior. I think so. I think I do too. All right. Good stuff. Dumbuck Angelod. Denarger. 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. www.jjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj Noswald. Can 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 open. Just pull it out. Give Jordan Jesse Goatry.

Being smart is hard. Be dumb instead. Whoa, Russ. 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 have such short neck. But I'm hearing we need to get on this off. We've got to get on the arc. It is about terrain, about a spout to destroy humanity. Hey, oh, sorry, sorry, sorry. Are you Noah? Yeah, I know we look like humans. We're actually, we're podcasters.

We are podcasters, so it's different. Have you heard of Ono Ross and Carrie? We investigate spirituality, claims of the paranormal, stuff like that. And you have a boat and say the world's gonna end, so same like something for us to check out. We would love to be on the boats. We came to by two. What do you think? Ono Ross and Carrie, available on MaximumFund.org Hey Ben, what's that at him?

Did you find yourself a drunk Shimoda? Grinimal, drunk Shimoda! See how I put the emphasis on the other word that time? You like that? You put the wrong emphasis on the wrong syllable. I appreciated that. Yep, my drink's promoted in this episode is data. And it's for a little moment.

We talked about that kind of 10 minutes that he and Tam treat like they got plenty of time to go down to data's quarters and have a hang. Yeah. A tam at one point goes and lifts up a cloth that data has hanging over an easel. Data has totally painted a space butthole. I really just, I thought it was so funny. Oh yeah, like, data's fantasizing about something he could die in.

Oh man, yeah, that looked so familiar. Like the nonverbal acting in that scene, I thought was really fun too. Yeah. Tam's like, is this what I think it is? And data with his eyes is like, oh yeah, that's what you think it is. Put the curtain down. Pretty great.

How about yourself? Occasionally, I will spotlight a moment of physical acting that gives me great pleasure. In this episode, I found a great example. So Tin Man has hit the button and Frisbee golfed the enterprise far away from its position. And so we get that cutscene to the interior of the ship where the bridge crew is sort of rumbling around. And we know what a banger looks like Ben. You've seen bangers before. Bangers are when people get bangers are when people get get flung out of their station, flung into walls. We see some in this episode. But this frisbee scene involves...

involves a riker and the card standing and spinning in place, like counter-directional to each other. Everyone else is sort of like shaking around and they are like... stand and spin, like square dancing. It is so silly. It's ridiculous. And what's amazing is like they cut to it, then they cut to exterior and they cut back to it. I feel like if there's only one shot at the interior,

you miss it and you don't get it and it's not funny, but to show it and then come back to it is like, oh, writing your face. So, the idea that someone's giving them the direction to just, no, you don't have to bang it. There's no banging here. Just spin around. There you go.

That's it. No, no spin in different directions, guys. There it is. And cut. That was like that. Like, it was hilarious to me. So, double Shimoda. What do we have coming up on the next episode?

The next episode is season three episode 21, Hollow Pursuits. The crew struggles to help a young engineer whose obsession with a fantasy world on the holodeck is endangering the ship. Do you remember this episode, Adam? I do. I do. This episode is the realization of something we've been talking about for quite a while. Mm-hmm. And which is, how much trouble can you get into on the holodeck?

Evidently quite a bit. Quite a bit. Well, we don't have any way to get around watching it, so I suppose we shall watch it. The only way out is through. If you're going through hell at him, keep going. If you're going through this podcast, a great way to support it is by going to MaximumFun.org slash Donate. Yeah. Joining a bunch of our viewers in in their support of the production of this show. And we could really use your

support proprietor of Maximum Fun Jesse Thorne recently referred all of Jordan Jesse Goes listeners who have problems with factual statements on their program to take them up with us. So, bluey, I guess we have that to deal with. Our viewers are not shy about sharing the things that we miss on our own. Yeah, that's true. That could be a nightmare for us.

So anybody that's willing to step up and financially support the production of this program is massively appreciated. Who else is appreciated? There's a thriving and chatty Twitterverse out there talking about our show using the hashtag greatestgen. They're also talking to us.

I'm on there as at Cut for Time. And Ben is on there as at Benjamin R. That's a HR. You can also go on Reddit and Facebook. There are very busy communities there as well. I think there's probably a lot of crossover between the three. But all our fun places to go have a chat and talk about the episodes and also like see other stuff people are posting.

And it's just a really like sweet group of people that I feel really touched to be involved with. So I feel very lucky there. We should thank Dark Materia for our theme music and Adam Ragusia for the music that plays during our special Jembo Tron messages. With that, we will be back at you next time with another great episode of Star Trek, the Next Generation, and an episode of the greatest generation that will largely circle around masturbation jokes probably. That episode will be a cross-posted in our slash jerk in it. Hahaha.

Yeah, if you want to, you can cross-post this episode in our slash no-fap. Hahaha. Oh, that's a reddit joke I get. Hahaha. reddit joke I get Yo, look at God of the U, and fit, fit, fit, by, Yo, get to, yo, look at God of the U, and fit, fit, by, Yo, make it sound, make it sound. Yo, look at God of God of God of God of God of God of God of God. Maximumfund.org. Comedy and culture.

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