The Greatest Generation - That’s How You Grow Creepy Chickens (S4E24)

Episode Date: December 28, 2016

When Geordi gets Manchurian Candidated by Romulans, Data has to do a whole lot of research to uncover the plot, and we suspect that a Klingon ambassador might be from Shaolin Island. Is Deanna hitting on Geordi? Is Chief O’Brien the most potted of all the plants on the ship? Why is Data downrange when they test-fire the gun for ballistics? It might be the most racist episode of Trek yet.

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 FriendsOfDecotoForLabor.com. Link in the episode description. Okay, now let's get on with the show. Here's to the finest crew in a Star Trek podcast by a couple of guys who are a little bit embarrassed to have a Star Trek podcast. I'm Ben Harrison.

I'm Adam Pryanaka. Adam I received a package. It was a little weird because it came not to you or to me or even to Max Fun, but to the bar that is owned by Stuart Wellington, one of the co-hosts of the flop house part. Oh, Ben, you know when you start getting male at a bar, that's when you know you have a problem, right? Yeah, well, and I like I I really appreciate the person that sent this in I will say for future reference for anybody listening Please don't send things to

To Stuart's bar. It's not my mailing address It is what you have on your business card though, Ben Here's what I'll say if you email us and you don't seem weird, we'll probably just give you an address to mail something to. But if you don't want to email us, send it to MaximumFund. We'll pick it up the next time we're in LA. But in the package, there's a bunch of Star Trek magazines. There's like a full-color glossy magazine

of Star Trek the next generation. And I guess there's two issues of that. One is the writer's issue. And one is a Q centric issue. Am I seeing bags and boards over there like are those are those Bagged up and boarded and and like yeah, I probably I've probably diminished the value significantly below What a natural yager goes for these days wow and then there's also to I

Don't know I don't know I guess they they're comic books. Oh yeah, they sure are. They're comic books about the individual characters, I guess. Oh man, there's a, there's a, there's a Jordi one that has a dip dick of Vovar Burton as Jordi and also as Kuntikinte. Oh no. Oh, now. Oh, now. Oh, now. So, this is some wild shit. Yeah, I'm not going to read it on here, but... Yeah, more of a visual medium.

This came from Joseph Koch. Oh, this is Koch Comics, I think, on Twitter. Oh, that's awesome. Yeah, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I Wow, that's very nice. I will have to put the address of my local bar out there on the internet so I can start getting mail there. That sounds great. Did they, did they slide you a frosty beverage and your mail all in one motion? Yeah, and it came down the bar in slow motion like that scene and back to the future. Milk chocolate. and slow motion. Like that scene and back to the future.

Milk chocolate. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha within striking distance. I highly encourage you to go check it out. Nice plug. The guy received mail for me. I felt really bad. I meant that totally sincerely. He is great and if I only lived in in Brooklyn or its environs, I would be going there on the regular. So I'm glad. I'm glad you're going there enough to get your mail. You know the next step of bar patronage is getting that brass plaque on your seat. So hope you're more than halfway there at this point.

I would love the brass plaque, but I would never have the guts to actually like invoke authority over a seat, you know? Yeah. I would never ask somebody to get up because that's got, that's technically my seat. Anyways, Adam speaking of Brooklyn, I want to propose something to live on air right now. Let's do an East Coast tour this year in addition to greatest GenCon 2017.

People are demanding it. And I think we could, I think we could do big stuff. Well, Ben, there's three more days left in the year when this episode drops. I mean, that's even less lead time than we had on our West Coast tour. Yeah, how do you keep track of when these come out? Because we have like eight episodes recorded that aren't released at this point.

I keep a calendar open during our podcast session. And that way you're always a little bit distracted. Yeah, yeah, I'm just looking at what I need to do next. So that's all. Yeah, of course, I'm prepared to agree to those terms. Absolutely. I'm totally into an East Coast tour. But I mean, we had talked about doing a Midwest tour. Also, are you taking that can down the road? No, I think we'll want to take this off, Mike. But I think we should have serious conversations

about what cities we can hit, what the best way to do it is? Whether or not to do four and four days. Someone said something really funny on the internet about that live show tour that we did, which was before I saw you guys live, I thought Adam was burns and Ben was greasy, but after seeing them live I know that the exact opposite is true I wasn't sure how to take that at all like I get the reference but Ooh, I think that we've maybe set the table for that a little bit because usually like I'll self-deprecate and praise you and vice versa. And then I think like people like get in on that joke and then our feelings get hurt because

we're like, hey, you're not allowed to deprecate us. Leave the deprecation to us. But probably our faults. Speaking of things worth making fun of, the episode today is season 4, episode 24, The Minds Eye. The first U.T. of every starfish officer, I picked up a troop, find any troops, or a historical troop of best-function. Jordy LaForge, Ben, he's hopped into a flat-pack bunk bed shuttle.

He's going on a long trip. I feel like this is a message that gets sent to Jordy from the crew. Like, the entrepreneur is doing Uber runs all the time. We know they have shuttles capable of warp drive, but they're going to stick Jordy in the impulse engine only shuttle and send him out into space for like three weeks. The time it takes to to transit his trip. It's sort of cruel and he doesn't seem to get the joke.

Yeah, yeah, they need a break from him. And with a data-like level of credulity, Jardy accepts this as a thing that he's gonna go do. So he's gonna go to Rysa for an AI conference. And he's like getting into the groove of of things in the shuttlecraft when a romulan

warbird decloaks dead ahead of him computer sequins zero one zero maximum power to the shields kill the music yes like like a moment of panic and you know,

that's our inciting incident for the episode. We get a good long ease into the hot tub in this episode too. Like we get to see what Jordy does when he's alone, utterly alone, and it's a little terrifying. Like he's a real computer talker. He's clearly the one who uses Siri, the only person who uses Siri, I think. I think.

I don't know, I feel like if we can use our cell phones as an analog to having a computer you can talk to. Like a device that has lots of interesting ways that you can interact with it from checking Twitter to playing a game to, you know, reading a book, whatever, like you can do a lot of things. He kind of acts like he's like kind of new to this. Like he's like computer of new to this.

He's like computer like, do you have any game? Psychic play? Like the first time you ever used a computer and you found mine sweeper and you were like, oh my god, this is the greatest. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, it's like he's new to it. And so he's like just kind of getting up to speed on this whole having a computer situation

when the Romulans get him. And that's the push to opening credits. When we come back, it's all like cling on politics. It's almost like the show forgot this really exciting thing happened, which I think is fun writing. It's like, you have that moment of tension where you're gonna watch the credits

and then the first spate of commercials for the episode. And when you come back, they're like, nope, tension is still going. We're not even going to explain what's going on there to you. Initially, we're going to have some farty old cling on diplomat talking to Picard about some things they're going to do. Did you think they did a good job of building the tension toward the end of that Jordy Shuttle scene because they filled his view screen with that Romulan ship and the power imbalance

seems pretty apparent, but man, I was almost screaming at the TV, like go to the exterior because I wanted to see the size difference, like I wanted to see the tiny shuttle and the giant ship. And we never got that. And we know there's comps of both. It seems like it was- I was-

It would have been easy to do. So I was thinking that it might have been, like the size difference is so vast that the shuttle would have, like it might have been like a standard definition television thing where they can't show something that small next to something that big. Yeah, I mean, like there's ways to do it, but I also just like wish they would have cut back

to the shot through the windshield one more time. Yeah, because the way they do it is they cut to a single of Jordy like frantically working on his computer, and then he, like, gets beamed out. And I think it would have been more interesting to see him get beamed out looking back at the ship that's doing it to him, and more scary. Oh, yeah. Interesting.

He does a great job with that guy in the control tower as the F-14 does the flyby. Like he's totally startled to the point of spilling his coffee or whatever. Yeah. He sells it great. Well, anyways, the deal with the entrepreneur is as follows. They're going to go answer a claim of federation meddling in an outlying colony of the Klingon Empire. There's like a colony that has like a separatist group that's trying to declare independence

from the Klingons and the, you know, the like loyalist governor of the colony has accused the Federation of supplying weapons to the rebels, which is not how the Federation gets down, so they take the securization really seriously, and they're going with the Klingon Ambassador to look into this shit and see what they can see. And the Klingon Ambassador is like, you know, he loves Picard. He's like, hey, I've heard you've spoken to the high council a couple of times. That's pretty cool. He also has some of the best Klingon loaf I think we've ever seen.

But look at that. Let me call it a moment. Call it. Yeah, this is some epic. I feel like they're starting to establish a premise that the older a Klingon gets, the more like involved their love gets. I once I noticed this I couldn't take my my eyes off of it, he's got Wu Tang headloat. Like he has a very pronounced W, like right in between his eyes. Which sort of sets him up as a character that maybe I can't trust. He might be up to no good. Yeah, you could have watched that guy for liquid swords. He's just surrounded by a swarm of bees.

One time I saw the jizzah live in concert in New Haven, Connecticut. And I can't even remember what song it was, but he forgot the lyrics like midway through one of the songs and got like really embarrassed like up on stage and he was like listen i'm a touring musician i don't do that song all that often and i like i gotta be honest i didn't practice it enough before we got up here on stage but i don't want you to think i'm some kind of punk i don't want you to think I'm some kind of punk. I don't want you to think that I can't rap So just to prove that to you. Let me just come off the top of my head and rap for 10 minutes And he had the DJ drop a beat and just like freestyle over it for 10 minutes without stopping and it was great and He like he totally had the crowd like like worried about the situation and then won them back. That's nice. That's a nice reversal.

It was pretty cool. Have you seen that Marvel show and Netflix loot cage? No. Method Man has a cameo in that. And it's one of the best cameos. Because I think he He has so much charisma like he is just like so fun and everything that he's in he really yeah, he He I mean, it's like it's sort of like I think he kind of takes a page out of ice cubes playbook Just like let's have this be really fun whether or not it's like it rises to the level of good

Yeah, like let's let's like it rises to the level of good. Yeah. Like, let's have it be real, real fun. You can, you can forgive something for not being good if it's fun instead. I think most of the time. Totally. That's a, that's a, that's a great anecdote about our show, for example. Yeah. Sort of fell backwards into that one. Yeah. I fell backwards into our brand, Ben. The Klingons are pretty exercised over this idea and Picard has to break it to the ambassador

that part of this trip is going to involve him working directly with Worf. Ambassador, I will ask our chief security officer Lieutenant Worf to make a report. Captain, Worf's discrimination makes that very awkward. Once again, Picard has to get Warf's back around some Klingon who finds it offensive to have to be in a room with him. If I could work with one of the other security officers, Lieutenant Warf is my chief of security and my tactical officer.

This matter clearly falls within his jurisdiction. I really love that about Picard. Like he always backs Wararf up, like 100%. You know? It's interesting. I mean, this is a few times that he's done this. And it's always from the perspective of the other guy. Or I should say, it's frequently from the perspective

of the other guy and rarely from the perspective of how uncomfortable it would make Wurf. You get the one time where Wurf is like, look, Captain, there's gonna be a bad idea. And part of the fucking shuts that up real fast. And then every other time we get it from the other, and it makes me wonder, like I would like to check back

in a little bit with Wurf on if he's still super bummed about that. Because I don't think you get much of that perspective anymore after the first time he did it. Yeah, I mean, I think the one time we've gotten anything about that is when Jay Dan was making fun of him. Yeah, and he got a back fist to the dome. Yeah, and Jay Dan isn't even a member of the Wu.

He's on the record label though. Very unpopular. Not many of the people coming out of Shell in rose to the level that Wu Teng did. Feeling Jaydan can't sell 10,000 albums. Sad. They're going to go back to the Romulanship. And this is like the horror scene where they are kind of like clockwork-oranging, Jordy. They have their own clip show device on their Romulanship, and they wheel it over

and plug Jordy into it. And they've taken off his visor, and they've got some plungers that connect to the little bly contacts on his temples and they're pumping horrifying images directly into his brain. And there's a shadowy figure in the corner at him that the camera keeps cutting to despite the fact that you can't see her face.

Yeah, there's a creepy bread box in the corner. You know, we're made to think that the Romulans have equivalent military technology, but I found myself pretty impressed that they have equivalent clip show technology also. They, what they're capable of is mutually assured clip show. Oh yeah, you don't want that. I mean, maybe that's why we haven't had a clip show

since since the clip show. Right. It's like, oh, you want to show a clip show? Then we'll show a clip show. You have that one clip show crisis in the first couple of seasons and that sets the tone for everything that comes after. Yeah. It's not clip show crisis and the first couple of seasons and that sets the tone for everything that comes after. Yeah, it's not clip show war, it's clip show Holocaust.

You get bread brought, God, this is a tough line reading. You get bread box, cruise jive in the corner, give an order to her. Oh, we got there Adam, it was worth it. It was worth getting there. You know what? The only reason I bring up Chris Chiv is because I want to hear you do your your great and very popular Russian accent. That's my check of the accent, Adam.

You've done Chris Jeff before. Off of my? Yeah, you you bounce past it off of my terrible JFK impression I don't know what to say Adam. I feel like I'm being pimped here. This is really pod on pod right now. We gotta get out of this Well anyways, they're what they're doing is they are They've sent like a a proxy Jordi to attend the AI conference. And.

This is the worst Jordi. Like, yeah. So the world's shitty is Jordi. Their plan real quick is like, so they're showing them the show in this terrible footage in order to desensitize him to the horrors of what they might make him do later. So they're playing basically event horizon captain's log footage on a loo.

And so they're like, well, someone's gonna miss this guy on Rysa, even though that's the most laughable part. Like, no one's going to miss Jordy on Rysa. They're actually probably pretty relieved he's not going to be there creeping by the pool and their idea so that no one notices he's gone is to send proxy Jordy and he is he couldn't even be a stunt double for Jordy. He's like this is basketball player Tallin Lean. It's it's an extremely racist moment. It is so racist. And also, this show has shown people going through prosthetic makeup

to look like something they're not plenty of times. Why can't they just have a replicant Jordi, a guy that looks exactly like Jordi? Why can't they do a camera trick where there's two Jordies on screen at once? Yeah, they could have done that. They had the technology. They had the technology and instead they did the most racist possible thing, which is, oh, this black guy looks enough like this other black guy. It's like, it's like Keenan Thompson playing Charles Barkley.

Like... Now the NBA has weighed less violent than the world 20 years ago. Man when I was on the court I got hit all the time. He's the black cast member so he's the fit. Yeah. Even though like to be quite honest Keenan Thompson's Charles Barkley is maybe the funniest thing that he does on his own and I love it. So yeah, they're turning Jordy into a Manchuria and Engineer and they run a little test where they have a holographic 10 forward done up and they're going to have Jordy put a hit on chief O'Brien and see if he'll respond to their suggestion. And this episode made me realize that chief O'Brien is like more pot of a plant than either

of the female main cast members at this point. Yeah. Like, like he's so one note that, that, like I don't even know if he has lines in this. It's just like, we need somebody that we kind of know a bit, so we'll feel a little bit bad if Jordy walks up and phasers him. But like, not somebody that we care care about. I feel like the show began to get a little self-aware

about how they use Beverly and Diana, and we're like, look, people are going to start to notice how bad we are with these characters. Let's put O'Brien in where ordinarily we would have used them, and then we can get them off our case. Right. Well, anyways, back on the ship, Worurf and the Klingon Ambassador are doing great work together, coming up with a, like a, a, Franny work for how they're going to deal with this colony situation, and data is receiving Jordy back in the Shuttle bay. Jordy's in high spirits, got some real pepiness

step because he has had a great time on his vacation that he remembers despite the fact that he was in the brainwashing department on the Romulan ship the entire time. I feel like Riker basically sells time share to Riza to the rest of the crew and he couldn't be more Disinterested in the fact that Jordy was just there or had intended to go there from the start, you know, yeah Where's Riker on all this? Yeah, I mean Yeah, I think data receives Jordy

But then it winds up being Troy that like walks around the ship with him and There's a weird scene at him. Did you get the sense that Troy was a little bit hitting on Jordy? No, I didn't I mean she's like excited to hear about whether he got got that dick wet like in a way where like when he goes into his quarters She stands there kind of just outside them and I was like, oh she wanted to go in there. I, I just got the sense that, you know, there's always one, one person in the group of friends who is not the one who makes out at a party is not the one who like gets down the, like the chased friend.

Yeah. And everyone, the non gets down, like the chased friend. And everyone- The non-hook-uping friend. Yeah, and everyone in the group tends to either tease them lightly or when a hook-up has happened, like really probe them for the details. And I felt like that's what this was. Like, Troy's almost making fun of him

for his inability to do stuff like this and so when she senses that he may have gotten down over there, like I didn't think she was cruelly doing it but I thought I thought she was sort of making fun of the situation by by peppering him with all these questions. Alright well you might be right. My love is a people long and chill for that which long and I said the bestie. Tell me more, you're not the boy, yeah. Anyways, the captain and the riker and the ambassador beam down to the Klingon colony planet. I think it is and uh... sure they meet governor vaugh and governor vaugh is just in a like random generic cling on like totally indistinguishable from other clings on at least

The ambassador has like a weird robe Like the governor is just in like cling on war kit and He gives them a rifle that they war kit and he gives them a rifle that they pulled off of some dead rebels and it's a Federation phaser rifle and they're like, well fuck, like this is like kind of a smoking gun so to speak. I mean, like if you guys have a Federation phaser rifle that you pulled off a rebel, it's hard to deny that the Federation supplied it So we're gonna have to like go back and test this thing and make sure it is what it appears to be

Yeah, it's basically a stamped with united Federation of planets logos on the side Yeah, it was taken out of a crate with the logo on it. Yeah, I think like data and Jordy get tasked with testing this thing. And like, like, I think this is around when Jordy goes into 10 forward and dumps a glass of cranberry juice on Chifo Brian. And it's this like test moment

or the Romulans are testing whether they in fact have Jordy under control. Yeah a few times in the episode you get to see Jordy's POV and there's some weird Romulan iconography when it cuts to that shot and there's like a there's some cross hairs coming down and separating. And that's how that's how the viewer is supposed to see that he's receiving those orders. Yeah, his'm sorry. And that's how the viewer is supposed to see that he's receiving those orders. Yeah, his coded orders. Just before he spills his drink, he gets one of those.

So that sort of sets up the rest of the episode and how he's receiving these and why he's acting the way he is. Yeah, and I guess data is starting to notice that there are these weird blips in the radio spectrum that they can't explain otherwise. And every time you see one of those POVs, data will be talking to rakers, something, and be like, hey, there's this weird thing that keeps happening, and I'm wondering if it's

some kind of surreptitious communication. And I really liked this kind of C storyline in the episode of Data and Riker running this little side investigation that winds up cracking the whole thing open. Yeah. It was cool to see Riker like supervising something that isn't really worth like escalating to Captain,

but also like, you know, they're curious enough about that the second officer is gonna be working on it like when he's got free time. And also, like, it's a project that doesn't have a sexual goal. It's just for the sake of solving a mystery. And also, data solving a mystery, any doesn't have a fucking pipe in his mouth. Like, he can actually play it pretty straight.

Yeah, there's a lot to like about it. Yeah. Ben, is this the first time we've seen Jordy's POV since season one? It feels like it's been a long time since we've seen through the visor. Right, there was that episode where they're like, this is how he sees.

Interesting that at the time, it felt like we would get a whole lot more of that going forward and they just sort of dropped it. I mean, maybe because they could tell that it wasn't that cool. Yeah, I mean, it's like a, it's like a posterized false color effect. Yeah. It's hard to imagine it being better than than normal eyesight, which they've also implied several times. Right. Yeah, it sort of looks like, you know, when the predator is cycling through it's different ways of seeing things in the classic film Predator. Oh, I'm familiar. I'm glad you called it a film and not a movie because it deserves that designation. It is most certainly a film.

I need to get out of this simile. The only way I can do it is by getting to the chopper. I've been accused of not laughing at your jokes enough, Finn. It's because they're terrible. Yeah, maybe that's really the answer. It's not that I'm not a giving comic. Who accused you of that? Oh, a lot of people accuse me of that.

Well, I can see you chuckling sometimes. You just do it inaudibly. Yeah, I'm an inaudible laffer. Laffer for money. Do what you want me to do. No one's gonna get that. Cut that app. We're just grinding to a halt here. You're just grinding metal, Ben. He's down. I am a cuter of all. You will assist us. I am a cuter of all. You are all. So it's kind of an interesting plot, right?

Jordy is going to research this rifle that is secretly a Romulan rifle. While he is under the sway of the Romulans. Yeah, and the tension of this is fucking brutal because they're in engineering and they've set up these two stations, one with the rifle and one that's going to catch the beam of the rifle. And data is just walking around on the pointy end of the spear basically waiting to get shot by this. Energy flows within normal parameters from the prefired chamber to the emission aperture. Rapid Nadian pose, right on target. Anybody that is ever worked in like the ballistics lab of a police precinct will tell you

that you're not supposed to be down range when you test fire the gun. This is the most intense scene of the whole episode, I thought. I was totally blown away by this. It's pretty crazy. And yeah, they also just do it like, I mean, fortunately, it's not also pointed at the warp core. Like, they have the sense to point it away from

the warp core, but it's just in the middle of engineering, like anybody could walk in. This is a good time to ask the ultimate question, Ben. Like, is the Romulan's mission flawed? Should their mission not be to have Jordy wheel around and shoot the warp core and destroy the enterprise. Like, would that not accomplish their goal even more than trying to start a war inside the Klingon Empire? I thought about that, but then I, like, the Romulans are like, mainly devious. And I think that, like, my first reaction was not even like, shoot the, shoot the warp core,

but it was like, this is a terrible plan. They're gonna have Jordi prove that these are Romulan rifles. While he is their Manchurian candidate, like, why the fuck would they do that? Then I realized it's so that they can discredit Jordi to the Klingons, like, so that they can discredit Jordy to the klingons, like so that when he starts beaming the arm, arm shipments down to Creos, they already like don't trust him that much.

Right, right, okay. Yeah. So anyways. It's always a chess match with the Romulans. That's a good point, Adam. So they catch that these rifles got beamed down to the surface and they're like, well, shit, how do we backtrack on this and they find out that it went out from a cargo bay and there's four people on the ship that

know enough about how to hide your transport or traces to do it. And Jordy is the only one that doesn't have an alibi of where he was when the shipment was made. Even though we know there are cameras everywhere on this ship, like no one thinks to look at the transport room footage of where the ship was being doubted. Where Jordi was at the time, like he's like, oh, I was in my quarters

and it's like, can you imagine a situation where a ship, where you can ask it, where anybody is on the ship at any time, doesn't keep a record of that also? You could dust the isolininear chips for fingerprints, and they don't do that. They're like, oh yeah, these were clearly mangled and switched around.

We'll never know who did it. Make it, make it, make it so. Make it so. Jordi goes into the ambassadors quarters while he's picking out on some fling on food, and the ambassador gives Jordy his final orders. I'm in Mr. O'Ford. I will transport to the surface of when I return. I'll have governor Vogue with me.

He's captain and I will bring him to the cargo bay. I want you to kill him there, or for the many witnesses. Use a hand phaser. bring him to the cargo bay. I want you to kill him there in front of many witnesses. Use a hand phaser. The rest of the episode's kind of like a race against time where Jerti is on a Y-dass lens walking up a hallway on his way to do a murder. And data is like all over the ship doing research

on these like blips and he finds sketchy isolinear chips in the shuttle pod, and decides that the blips are probably brainwaves. I feel like you could play this from this part of the episode to the end, and the end of the first naked gun movie where Reggie Jackson has been programmed to kill the queen, like the pacing and the tension are almost perfectly aligned. There's some things about the pace that are a little silly,

but I think that one of the things that makes this episode work for me is the music is great. It's like a movie level score. It seems to be on a much higher level than we generally get. And data manages to warn Worf over the radio that Jordy needs to get taken into custody. Data to Lieutenant Worf.

To my order, you want? Go ahead. Take Commander LeForge into custody immediately. And so Worf is like trainer run across the cargo bay to get in between Jordy and the assembled crowd. Because like the governor and the ambassador and Picard are all there. And when Wurf starts moving quickly,

like the Klingon lackeys like jump on. And he's like, no, I'm trying to stop this. And so it winds up having to be pecard, like turning around and grabbing Jordy's arm right at the right moment and getting the phaser out of the way. Once again, a phaser goes into the ceiling and we don't get the cutaway to the the guy cutting into like a pot roast You know one floor up when and like a beam of light comes up through the plate on his table It's sinches his hair. Yeah I thought his wife wife calls from the other room. It's not burnt is it?

It's it's O'Brien and Keko sitting down to one of Keko's awful meals. O'Brien's like, oh thank god, I don't have to eat it. It's like instead of O'Brien having to scrape his plate into a napkin, he's like, oh done, I ate it all. She turns around and sees the crater, the smoking crater that was his plate and goes, wow, you really like that. I'll have to make that more often. And he goes, oh boy. Wurf is on this ladder when he sees Jordy approach the gang.

And I thought it was an interesting choice that he yelled La Forge instead of Jordy. Did this register with you at all? Like, I did, I mean, really hear anyone yell someone else's name, using their last name on the show. If you were to get his attention, I thought that was a strange choice and maybe wonder if they recorded it several times.

If they shot it several times and then that was the best take. Hmm, interesting. I mean, I sort of wonder, like, because Wurf doesn't really know much at that point, right? Like, for all Wurf knows, Jordy could be like freely deciding to kill the governor and that would be just as plausible an explanation of what's going on as anything. Like Data has just said, take Jordi into custody. And so maybe in Warf's mind at that point, like Jordi has flipped sides and he is not going to be familiar with him because of that. I thought it might be just more of a professional yell from Warfoot that point like

Jordy sounds a little sing-songy like if he's not gonna call him by his full first name like Jordan He's gonna call him LaForge LaForge sounds much more powerful and official if you're acting in a security context. What is Jordy's full name? Jordy's clearly short for something. You don't want more yelling, yelling, yelling, jordesh across the shuttle bay. They've got to pay for that product placement. Yeah. This episode has one of the great creepy buttons and it's J Jordy and Troy in a room in like a therapy session and he is like insisting that he remembers this trip to Rysa and like these are real things that

happen to him and she does a little like verbal aquito and and gets him like into the like into the slipstream of recalling the Romulan attack on his shuttlecraft and and it like it like blows him away and then she makes this promise that we know will not be fulfilled at the end of the episode which is that they're gonna like put him back together piece by piece and it's gonna take a long time and he's going to be a wounded character after this. I mean, it's a great, it's a promise to Jordy the character and it's a promise to the viewer that I am wondering if they will ever call back. I don't think they can.

Like, I think that they're so pot committed on it just kind of starting fresh every episode, especially for Jordy, that like, I mean, I mean, you know, he's not a damaged character in the next episode. Yeah, and that sucks. I mean, I don't even know what the next episode is yet, and I know that he won't be a damaged character. Yeah, yeah, I mean, I asked the question, knowing the answer, but it's just, it's too bad when it's that explicit,

and it doesn't get paid off, but yeah, yeah, really dark button, the darkest button. There is no music box that Troy can produce to put Jordy back together. Did you like this episode, Ben? I did. I think that as a who done it, it is less well executed than some of the other episodes we've seen, but there's a lot to like about it. And I think brainwashing stories are fun, and it's always fun to have a character that is supposed to be one of the good guys, perhaps acting like a bad guy. And I thought that this may have been unintentional,

but some of the kind of creepiness stuff that we've talked about with Jordy kind of played well in this particular episode. Because like we've kind of talked about like what a creepo he is. And when he's doing creepy things in this episode because his brain washing has happened. It's like extra effective. Yeah, yeah, because he's already,

he's already sewn those creepy seeds. Yeah, now those creepy chickens are coming home to roost. That's how you grow creepy chickens. Oh. How much yourself did you like it? Yeah, I did. This was the most law and orderly start track episode. I think we've gotten, like it's got the political intrigue part. It's got the police doing detective work in the B story.

It's got real stakes. I thought it was good. It has an ambiguous ending, which I think is especially unique for this particular show. So yeah, I liked it a lot. Solid-ip. You know what else is solid is my desire to make money from priority one message is Adam. Should we see if we have any for this episode? Alright.

Yeah, it's like you're not doing this for the love anymore, Ben. You changed, man. You changed. Priority one message from Starfleet coming in on Secured Channel. I need a supplement on top of the month? Supplement. Yeah, it's extra. How do you interest alone? Could be enough to buy this ship!

Adam, our first P1 is 16 years ago. I met a girl and thought, she looks great now. But imagine how hot she'll be when she's middle aged. Have be 40 at sweetie. Hahaha. Hahaha. Hahaha. Hahaha.

Did we just announce someone's divorce? Hahaha. Oh no, don't do it. Hahaha. I ran this one by my wife and she had a similar reaction to you. I choose to believe that they have a cool relationship where they enjoy giving each other a good ribbon God, I hope so I mean they've been getting it been together a long time if you hear this the morning it comes out and you get some cold feet about it

Hit us up at the drunk Shimoda email address. We'll see what we can do about pulling this Yeah, or Twitter if you want like fast response. I'm looking out for you, man. We have a second one Adam and it is from the BBB crew. Hey! Sounds familiar? It's to Brian Hickman. It says, you thought you escaped retaliatory real doll shaming

when your special day came and went, but you were sorely mistaken. BBB wishes an embarrassing revenge, happy birthday to Brian. For sure, Kevin's omniscience can reveal forbidden birthday wishes even we don't know about. And remember, what happens in Barrego stays in Barrego You humans have the superstition that if you share your wish out loud it won't come true I'm here to tell you brain Hickman. I know your wishes and they are very filthy They make me want to destroy all wishes everywhere You you made friend that hypocritical coming from a man in my line of work. A man who makes rubber fuckholes for people of all stripes. I make rubber fuck does at price points that cater to the very wealthy.

All the redaire and you working men and women who just want an automaton to use an abuse. They come home from a factory job, just wanting to stick their junk into a rubber hurl, and I've made that you desire, the things that you want to do when you come home, the things that you think about before you blow candles out, the way I blew so many who snuck out. They disgust me, they shake me to my core. I'm a man of special conscience. I think you would be well advised to become one as well. Brian Hickman, your lack of conscience affends me.

Fiery to enjoy these kinds of messages can go to Maximum Friend Dadorg slash Jembo Tron. And by all Jembo Trons everywhere, it is $100 for a personal message and $200 for a commercial message or a message that will end the lives of all who snack. And it helps this idiotic podcast stay in business Boy, Ben you really went off-roading in that impression didn't you? You went way off script that's great You did things to that impression I didn't know where possible yeah, woo Good job intense Well, I hope you got what you wanted, BBB Crew.

That's what you get when you double dip. 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 Sherry Re 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 Sherry Reembarishment 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 Non-Giani. 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. Oh, Russ, hey, hey, oh, I'm about to count you in mine. 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 neck.

But I'm hearing we need to get on this. We've got to get on the art. It is about terrain, it's about 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 Kerry? 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 to by two. What do you think?

Ono Ross and Carrie, available on MaximumFun.org. Hey Ben! Adam! Did you find yourself a drunk shibona? I did, Adam. I have been developing a theory that Jury is a high-functioning alcoholic and I got perhaps the best proof of that that I could ever want in this episode. In the opening scene, he's hanging out in the shuttle by himself.

And he's on his way to Rysa. He asked the shuttle when he's going to get there. And it says at 0932 hours. And he says, fuck, that's three hours from now. So it is 630 in the morning his time and he is fucking drinking. He has a cocktail going. He has a teaky drink essentially.

He has the pink punch of masturbation. If that's does not a drunk Shimoda make, I don't know what does, Adam. Yeah, yeah, that's a drunk Shimoda make, I don't know what does Adam. Yeah, that's the literal Shimoda right there. How about yourself? For me, it was Fugazi Jordi. And you only get him, God, you just, you get him for maybe two seconds, right? Like they do, they do sort of a swish pan across him

as he leaves the scene, but good Lord. You gotta do better guys. Like his visor fits so ill-fittingly. It's like crooked, it's like you wear glasses. So like if you were to lose one nose piece, like how ill-f fitting your glasses would rest on your nose, that's how bad he looks. It's like the SNL Star Trek parody when Captain Picard is like the captain of the love boat. Yeah, and and Farley plays Riker. Do you remember that casting?

Yeah, that's good stuff. And Farley chooses to like, the one part of the impression that he sees us on is how Riker walks. It's fucking great. Yeah, and they have like, they have like, Tim Meadows, that's Jordy, right? Yeah, yeah. Jordy! Two banana deckeres!

On a side! Yeah, he's got Tim Meadows' visor on. Yeah, he's totally... He's Tim Meadows' visoring in this episode. There are so many times in this show where I feel like Love Arberton feels like he's being made fun of. And that's got to be one of those scenes. I mean, one thing that we talked about in our...

in our generations episode that we did for our live tour was like the idea of Lovar Burton keeping a list of grievances as they go through the process of making that film. And it's hard to imagine that he doesn't have like in the closet on his trailer, like a construction paper chart on the, you know, in the inside of his closet that he's just keeping track of all the like exquisitely racist things that are happening to his character over the course of making the show. If he weren't such a nice, gracious, good person, I would totally imagine he'd be doing that.

Like, if they're gonna be making fun of everyone, they're sort of fortunate that they're making fun of him. Yeah. What do we have coming up on the next episode? The next episode is season four, episode 25 in theory. In theory. In theory. In theory. Data experiments with love by pursuing a romantic relationship with a fellow crew member. Do you remember this episode Adam? Why would data do this? Why would data subject another crew member to his very powerful pelvic thrusts. I was just thinking like it's been like, it's been like almost four years since he got laid last as far as we know.

That's a drought, man. You know what's crazy is that more women fall for data than they do for Jordy. And it's not even close. Yeah. God, that's got to make Jordy feel like shit. Can you imagine? I do remember this episode. I'm excited to watch it again.

I am excited too. I would never veto this episode. I think it's a, I think it's a very interesting premise at the very least. You know the thing about data on the show is that people want to be data. People want to be with data. Mm-hmm. All the time. Yeah. Poor Jordi.

And he's got to be Jordi's friend too. It's like when you're the... It's like when you're not super popular in school but you happen to be like luckily friends with someone who is extremely popular, that's his life. Yeah. What a lifestyle. Jordi has got the Letterman's jacket with the band letter on it and

Dada's got the Letterman's jacket that's just covered in like football and wrestling and all the other letters. Yeah, there's there's more letters than jacket at this point. Yeah, well I'm excited for that. You know what constantly letters are jacket, Ben? What's that Adam? The support our viewers give us by going to MaximumFun.org slash Donate. Yeah.

Their support keeps our light zone. They keep the show going. They keep the wind beneath our wings. Yeah, it's a, it makes a big difference to be able to justify the amount of time we spend on this by keeping ourselves in podcast fluid at the very least. So thanks to everybody that contributes and thanks to everybody that has gone to maxfunstore.com, Coptik T-Shirt or two, hugely appreciated. Thanks to Dark Material for our theme music and Alan Ragusia for our other music.

And just about does it, does it not, Adam? It does the job. Well, with that, we will be back at you next week with another great episode of Star Trek the Next Generation and a powerfully thr heat because of the broken pelvis is lining up outside of a six-way. Oh yeah, I touched when I should have rolled. Oh man, so many people having to wear like the cast around the pelvis just looks like

cast pants. Yeah. Do you think that the data's erection is powerful enough to just destroy the the front of his uniform every time it happens? I think there can be little doubt. Maximumfund.org. Comedy and culture. Artists don't.

Listen or supported. Maximumfund.org. Comedy and culture. Artists don't. Listen or supported.