The Greatest Generation - Vermeer as a Brand (TGG Retrospective)

Episode Date: October 9, 2017

When Star Trek: The Next Generation trots out its greatest ambassador for a special retrospective episode, it's only fair that The Greatest Generation does the same. But when the hosts start arguing over the best and worst episodes of the series, it could take more than an intergalactic cheerleader to put their relationship back together. Where did Frakes get his wardrobe? Are Members Only jackets cool again? Is this educational programming? It's the episode that takes advantage of what pretty ladies we are.

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

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

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

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

and season two of Star Trek Picard. We've set up a page where you can also contribute. It's at friendsofdecotoforlabor.com. That's friendsofdececoto for Labor.com. That's FriendsOfDecoto for Labor.com. Link in the episode description. Okay, now let's get on with the show. Andage! Welcome to the greatest generation. A Star Trek podcast by a couple of guys who are a little bit embarrassed to now be looking back at the 176 episodes of Pod that they have made about Star Trek the next generation, I'm Ben Harrison. I'm Adam Pranaka. Ben, are you wearing a suit jacket with wide lapels for the occasion?

Yeah, a suit jacket with wide lapels and a shirt that is nearly the identical color to the suit jacket? I like that. Just sort of disappears, doesn't it? Yeah. It's a future, baby. Speaking of the future, you are in LA right now, aren't you? I am in it. California. I am up in you.

How is that going? Have you had any celebrity run-ins? Have people recognized you on the street? I had three great celebsightings the day that I traveled here. That's a good sign. Baratunde, Thurston and JB Smoove were both on my flight. Were they together like their friends? No, they were... because that would be amazing. Yeah, they were just, just, you know, just two luminous, luminous stand-up comedians happen to be on the same airplane at the same time. And then, Jay Farrow was eating in the restaurant that we ate in for our

celebratory welcome to California meal. I love Jay Farrow. Yeah, it was really crazy. My wife and I have seen him do stand up a couple of times now. He's great. Amazing. Yeah, but those are my only celebs thus far. Well, you haven't been there that long and you already got three big ones, so. Good job, by you. And mostly celebrities are not hunting

for the same apartments that we are hunting for. So that's the only thing that we've been outside the house doing at this point. How's that going? Have you had a lot of great tacos? Are you choosing a home due to its proximity to great tacos? That's what I do. I'd say that it would be hard to choose a home that doesn't have a proximity to great tacos. Yeah. In a town like this, Adam. that doesn't have a proximity to great tacos. In a town like this, Adam. Now, as we were traveling around,

we have in a walk past a building that was doing an open house, and it was not one of the places on our list. My wife has done just an unbelievably extensive amount of research on places we might choose to rent. And this had not come up, so we walked in and asked what the deal was, and there's a guy sitting on a stoop presumably the property manager or something. He's like, hey, what do you living in the neighborhood or something? And I was like, ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha It seems like we both live in this neighborhood being that we have these cool California accents and whatnot Wow a good old-fashioned New York slice of hospitality right around the corner there. Yeah, that's great. Yeah

so Yeah, but it's going good and I I felt weird like our big final episode came out on a day that had like a whole bunch of really depressing news. Also, like it was kind of hard to focus on that being our big finale. So hopefully this episode will come out on a day that is less gut wrenchingly awful.

Let's hope so, huh? Yeah. Each day is better than the next. Do you want to get into it, Adam? Yeah, let's do it. We have so much to talk about on this, our retro-spective episode. I guess are we even going to give it a number? I don't suppose we should. Let's, let's turn the page over to the greatest generations,

journeys and the saga of the greatest generation. This is becoming a speech. You're the captain, so very entitled. Mm. I'm not typing a ram below on about something everyone knows. Ben, the thing that struck me right away about this was that the production value seems straight out of like Sunday morning station mandated educational programming.

Yeah, so part of what we're going to talk about here is this, and I don't think it is on Amazon Prime, but it is on Netflix, this thing that they aired around the same time or maybe immediately after the final episode of Star Trek, the next generation, is a Jonathan Freaks hosted television documentary about the series. And it is almost entirely structuralist, totally overwritten. And yeah, the production values are like IBM internal industrial film level, I wanna say. It feels like one of those zoo animals, half hour specials that plays after cartoon

on Saturday morning. Like it's got that sort of granularity to its video. And we do learn a lot about Akindas. She's uncovered a colony event and uses her long sticky tongue to slurp them up. It's not nearly as polished as the show is and I thought at least they would try, you know? It's very much a video.

It's shot on video. That's for sure. It has like video like camera work. The the shot was shot on 35 millimeter film and that is an expensive and labor intensive way of making moving images and I mean. Right. This was shot like a super long entertainment tonight episode. Yeah, it also just has super 90s Design choices like the fonts are all like completely mismatched and bad and don't have anything to do with Star Trek or What we're here to talk about the colors are weird. There's like lots of kind of gratuitous CGI that doesn't really add anything to the program. It looks a little video-tasted.

Yeah. Sure. Ben, I mean, there's a lot to make fun of here in terms of its technical quality or lack of that. And, you know, like, I think a big point of our show is to make fun of a lot of the choices that were made on a show this old. Like, time makes fools of us all, right? Like, but, freaks is not the one at fault here. Like, in many ways, he's the only person who could carry something like this and have it work. Like, he's sincere and charismatic.

And the writing is so terrible. Do you ever wonder how we accomplished that violent rocking motion as if we were just struck by a photon torpedo blast? Yeah. But like, he works so hard to like, lift that stilt out of the writing and make it personable and nice.

Like, this is not his fault. No, it's like, he's the only thing charismatic about the whole thing. He's the only thing that makes it watchable. And I was thinking about like, was there even a second place for who could host this? Maybe Levar Burton? Bullshit, man.

It's just bullshit. Like because he sort of has the reps as this sort of host anyway. Yeah. But I don't think anyone else could have. No. It was very interesting to see interviews, especially with Brent Spiner and Michael Dorn out of character. They seem to be the most radically different from their characters. I guess Marina Serdisk kind of did too. Like she's so much more casual seeming of a person in this.

And he's also interesting to see interviews with the people at the top, you know, like Rick Burman has like an extended chunk about how proud he was that they managed to improve the look of Deanna Troy to take advantage of what a pretty lady Marina is. To him, the great accomplishment was changing how she looked. She had a bizarre hair, too. And not at all about maybe developing her character,

or any other female character on the show. It just seems incredibly tone-deaf. And I mean, that's something that we have talked about a lot over the course of our series, is like how many times they've given her just a little something to do with her character and how, how amazing she was when she, when she had that, you know, like, I think, I think Marina Serdice, like far and away to me, the most under, underutilized acting talent on the program. And in this, at this point in the show's history, that was still not clear to the executive producer of the show.

It's interesting how celebrity is treated so differently than Star Trek celebrity. How celebrity is treated so differently than Star Trek celebrity? I think that is starting to change a little bit with a new show, but I think it speaks volumes about how exciting it is to see these actors out of costume because you so rarely got to see them that way at the time the show came out. I mean, they were Star Trek celebrities, but not celebrities at the time. And I think that's only now starting to change. Like, I think Saniqua Martin Green is a capital C celebrity, or at least she's on her way there in a way that few of them besides Patrick Stewart ever got the opportunity to be. Yeah. Patrick Stewart definitely carries himself like a celebrity in this little documentary.

He could not give any fewer fucks. Then his on-screen as interviewed persona here, like, wow. Literally wearing a member's own like jacket. If you wouldn't mind, I'm just gonna leave the jacket on. Yeah. You know someone told him to take up the jacket. Fuck that, he said. Hey Pat.

We're worried that the member's only jacket is gonna make you look a little aloof and maybe like you're kind of big dogging the crew here. Precisely. This documentary was shooting concurrently with the finale, and I think we mentioned during the finale that there was a little bit of friction between Patrick Stewart and the production crew of this

doc, it does not surprise me having seen the interview that took place as a result that there was a little bit of that. Yeah. I was also a little bit surprised that you know everyone's out of costume and makeup except for poor Armin Shimmerman who they who they interview as Armin Shimmerman but he's fully corked out. Yeah that's a poor guy. That is gotta be the most I mean you, you think about how uncomfortable that makeup has got to be to be in all day, every day, like every day you go to work and you sit there for

hours while they put you in it and then more hours while they take you out of it. And they're like, hey, I mean, we need you to like spend an extra hour in this makeup so we can interview you. For this thing. Imagine. Oh man. They did a nice sort of tour of sets thing before they threw to cart. Yeah.

Like you saw engineering. Where those ever popular dilithium crystals fuel the warp drive engines. You saw the bridge. This is where the captain or myself might look out into space and see a, Romulan. Warbird decloaking or some amazing space anomaly out there somewhere. What else did you see?

You sat ten forward when brakes was an old age makeup, sort of doing a sort of OJ turned the camera like between scenes. That was sort of neat. Yeah, I mean, that's definitely brakes going going like how can we make this less awful? Okay, I'll do some I'll do a bit about how This is how old I actually look now He's so game like you need to ever does this to be game because good lord like if they're not if they fight it the least bit It's more awful than it is

if they're not, if they fight it the least bit, it's more awful than it is. And then we get a little bit about deep space nine and like the motivation for that. And like we get very like oblique hints at Voyager and what's coming up with that. I mean, they don't say anything about what the plot of Voyager is gonna be, but they show some kind of very early concept sketches of what the

ship might look like. And then they also talk about Star Trek generations. And like more than anyone piece due is they're doing like the sales pitch for Star Trek generations. I've seen everything. I've seen it all. I don't think he mentioned it, but someone else associated with the production did. Their hopes that it would be the best Star Trek movie ever made. And how could it not be given who was involved? Given the amount of star power that they're bringing to bear on it. Oof.

You know, the warning signs were all there been. Like, for your argument, for generations to be great, to be entirely supported by the idea of stellar cartography, being a great set. I think is fairly weak, you know? Like, no one mentioned story. And that's a killer. Well yeah, I mean, Pistue talks about how he feels like it should be a transitional film. And I think that was a good instinct. Like that might be the last time anybody had a good instinct in the production of that film though. It's not a thing to make fun of them for, because I think when you work on a project that's as difficult as making a film,

you can embark on that sort of thing without, you know, a shitload of optimism, earned or otherwise. Right. You just need that to get you through the night. I think that like, I don't know, like having this podcast get any amount of success has been a very instructive thing in my life

as a person who wants to make creative work that other people consume. Cause you know, like when, you know, like bad movies are made all the time, but it is pretty unusual for a bunch of people to get ready to get together and make a movie that they know to be bad You know right right. I think there's always attention in creative work between the idealism of the Creative aspect and the idea of making something that anyone will want to see ever. Yeah. I mean, I wonder, you know, did Vermeer, like, put out a few paintings that were well received and then go,

oh, people like this, you know, lighting it from the window game that I have figured out. So, I gotta give the people what they want. I gotta make a lot more pictures of people with interesting window light on them. I gotta start thinking of Vermeer as a brand. Yeah. Like, I imagine that that was to some extent at play there. I mean, yeah. And like you think about, okay, like a studio is giving them like 50 or 60 million dollars or something to make Star Trek generations and they're

dusting off the characters of Kirk and bones and Scotty and like they're gonna really take a swing at it and it is not a satisfying watch at the end of the day. Like and there's nothing there's nothing you can do after you've burned all those resources. Yeah, it's interesting how maybe in Star Trek more than any other place, the characters are consumable. their place, the characters are consumable, and you can run out of them as things to consume in the process of creation. Which probably is why the franchise has historically been so reluctant to consume characters in interesting ways, because they are a finite resource. Spark dies and comes right back. Well, in addition to some glimpses at some other series,

we get, I thought it was interesting that we got some different takes for all good things. Then we got on the television broadcast. Whenever they were in intercut scenes from the series finale, we were getting different audio takes. Did you notice that? I didn't.

Specifically, the moment that really got me was when Picard at the end was addressing the season one crew. And he says in the special... You are the finest crew in the fleet. And I would trust my life with each one of you. And in the actual finale, it reverses that line of dialogue. You are the finest crew in the fleet, and I would trust each of you with my life. I wondered why they did that, and it made me think that maybe the productions were so different

and separate that, you know, the doc could only use the diogetic audio and the sound bikes that it got and it could not borrow from what was happening during the actual shooting. It's pretty clear to me that whoever was cutting the doc had like four favorite episodes, too. Right. Speaking of favorite episodes, Ben, I think one of the things that I'm excited to do with you for this one is to recap our favorite episodes

from every season, our least favorite episodes of every season, and then maybe assemble our mountains. Mountains which we have referred to throughout the series, which contain our favorite and least favorite episodes. What do you think about that? You want to get into some arguments? Mountain Assemble! Season 1 in retrospect had a surprising number of good episodes in it, I thought.

Episodes that I really like. Now, for the purposes of our conversation here, like I am personally not choosing the critical best episodes, but instead I've tried to choose my favorite episodes based on my personal qualifications of rewatch ability or how weird it may be or if it gave me the chills. I like those episodes the best. What were the qualifiers for you that made you select which ones you liked the most? Yeah, I put it in terms of like, if I'm looking at this season and I'm just gonna pick one

to watch, which one do I want to rewatch the most, which one do I have the fondest memories of? And I think that that is a little different from the way I reacted to each one in review. Right, right. So I feel like I could be naming a couple here that maybe I even gave bad reviews to, you know, said I didn't like them on balance, but for some reason in retrospect they look like the ones I like to watch as I look at the list. I really like three episodes in season one a lot.

And for me, those are the Bynars Steel the Ship episode, the 11001001 episode. I really liked conspiracy, and I really liked Arsenal freedom. But in the end, I liked conspiracy the best. Because I think it's one of the most rewatchable episodes of the series. It is so different from any other episode, not just in the season, but in the entire series, or in Star Trek, really. Yeah.

And it felt legitimately dangerous. It felt like there are three-ish episodes in TNG where the whole thing could end And this is one of them and I thought the balls to do that in season one was great and so Season one favorite for me is conspiracy. What about you Ben? I felt the same way like the like looking at season one was so it just feels like a billion years ago. I have no idea how we're gonna do this if we do an analogous episode when we get to the end of Deep Space Nine because it's gonna take us twice as long to get through it.

Sure. But on my rubric of the one that I want to rewatch the most, I put justice. Not just because it gave us the timeless phrase, rock and knuck. Ha, ha, ha. But, you know, like largely because of that. And it's, I don't it's it's one of those ones that is just seared in my memory as

being So much of what track is about like this kind of like this guy like there are things about Interacting with other cultures that kind of feel feel senseless and trying to make sense of those interactions is something that the show was just kind of figuring out how to do. And I mean, like that's true, even within our own cultures here on planet Earth today. Like I go to other countries and it can be really confusing

at times because people have different assumptions about how everything works than you do. So I think that there's something about justice that captures that in a fun way. And also, you just get to see a lot of lumpy man package. It is peak Star Trek for sure. It's also besides the pilot episode, the highest, the most viewers watch this episode. Really? Really? In season one, which is just hilarious to me. That's hilarious.

A bunch of horny sci-fi fans. Yeah, well, if you're looking for an episode to crank it to There probably aren't many others in the series that are better than justice Personally, I was cranking it to those nobins and conspiracy I tried to I tried to time my nut to Quinn's roundhouse That's a beautiful image. I tried to time, time mine to the guys head coming apart. Season one has no shortage of, of, of mischances, I thought. But for me, where the show was the worst was where it got boring.

And to me, few episodes are as boring as we'll always have Paris. One of the classic old scientist guys, like old recluse scientist guys with a hot wife, doing dangerous science for a wife who just doesn't understand. Doesn't understand my science man. And really what might be the introduction to like sad lonely Picard as a late motif. So just sort of a waste I thought. Yeah. And that that that reclusive old white scientist guy with the hot young wife trope was so hard for this series to get away from too. Yeah. Yeah. For some reason, it just like really captured their imaginations. My, I don't think anybody will be surprised that my least favorite season one episode is Code of Honor. Date and fire.

I feel like it is an episode that they knew at the time was way off the rails and making bad statements that they didn't want to be making. And it really seems like something that they should have just buried and not even maybe just started over or rewritten and reshot or something. But it's a bad look to skip a week. Right after the pilot. For your third episode. But I would have understood completely.

Code of Honor is the answer to what's the worst season one episode. Like I don't think there's any question about that. Mm-hmm. So like we are in total agreement on the atrocity that that episode is. I just tried to be weird with mine. I'm I'm I'm all for it, Adam. I just don't want to be painted after this as someone who who thinks code of honor is okay. We all know that you endorse racism, Adam. You're trying to make this a race hate podcast and we know that.

Where in code of honor do you time your net? To me, it's when the spiky bird hits the crowd. Yeah, it's when it flies off her hand and hits that guy in the crowd. Spiky bird, the baseball card is when I knew Bill Tilly had something. That was a great moment. That was, yeah, really, really wash over me that this might be something. Season 2 Adam. So I did go weird on some of these, but I think maybe my season 2 fave is not that weird. Measure of a man. I think it's a great start track as a place. It's a great, you know, the... I've been watching... I've watched a few

episodes now of the Orville, and they tried to have their measure of a man episode, which was a character on the show comes from a species that is all male, and then he has a baby, and the baby is female, and they have like a star trek TNG style trial to determine whether he should be able to get the baby a sex change and you know everybody flips sides multiple times as they think through the like the gravity of the ethics of this and it's about, you know, cultural ethics and values versus objective ethics and values. And boy, I just fucking hated every moment of it because it was so, like, it was so gender normative at the end of the day. It was like, like, they have, they reveal that one member of this species

is a woman and it's like she has every, like cultural signifier of woman that you could possibly imagine. And it's like, she grew up in a cave around only men. Like why? It's just, it's so fucking absurd. It's just, it's just a very, very bad and dumb episode. And this, and measure of a man is like the opposite.

You know, it takes like a fun, chewy, made up space idea and like actually gets you to think about like objective ethics versus cultural ethics and like you know gets you to think about what it would mean if a machine became sentient and wanted to you know have rights and that's that's Star Trek it is best in my opinion. Yeah, I mean, measure of a man is Star Trek for adults. It is thoughtful and smart and good. But it was not show boobs.

But it is not re-watchable enough for me, which is why I chose Peak Performance as my favorite season two episode. Because I like knowing how the world works. And Peak Performance was was I felt like the first time TNG showed us how Starfleet functions as as in Armada like they have to do training they have to do war games like any other sort of military group they have they have specialists come in and do drills and the idea that

this is a thing that happens, you know, even on the flagship, was and is super exciting to me. And, you know, that a story combined with the B story of data playing. Playing strategy, Emma. Was super fun. You get one of your great writer episodes, you know, of him just like draped over the bridge of his gelapu ship, taking on the flagship of the Federation. Like, I feel like in many ways, like this turned the lights on in the universe in a way that had not been up to this point. I really enjoyed this episode. And if I'm turning on a season 2 app for just pure joy, this is one of them

for me. Right on. I'm wondering if we're both in agreement on the least favorite episode, which has to be Shades of Grey, right? Are we in agreement on that? Yep. Take and fire. What can you say about Shades of Grey that hasn't already been said and then said and then flashback said and then and then said again

That's a kiss going and going and going and going Just a massive misstep in season two. I don't know why you need to go clip show in season two but they did It's very bad. It's very lazy. It shouldn't have been produced, it shouldn't have been released. So we're two for two in seasons with episodes that should never have been released. I feel about which longer than I said, let me see. How long you're up for, yeah. Season three was sort of packed with good episodes, I thought. I was looking at season three and I was like, this might be my favorite season if I have one.

But due to personal metrics, chills being one of them. I don't think an episode has given me more chills than yesterday's Enterprise. I watch that episode all the time. I get the chills and the chokeups and all the same places. It doesn't matter how many times I see it. Best of both worlds won is a great episode. Sarik's a great episode.

So many great episodes in season three, but yesterday's Enterprise for me is the best of the bunch. I went with the most toys. That's a great episode for similar reasons. I mean, it's, it's not quite as chill as giving, but there is that moment at the end where data takes the life of the man who has been holding him captive, and it is, I don't think you can call it anything, but a murder.

And a murder that the episode works very hard to get us to feel like is kind of justified. And that's a pretty amazing accomplishment in a kind of unflinchingly positive world as this, you know. It's interesting how much more you feel that moment in terms of murder than you do in Wolf 359, which is just a spectacular scale of destruction. But when you bring it down to the micro level, you really feel something at the end of the most toys, a really great episode been your right. And it also has that part where data goes, lulululuuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluuluulu Did you have a least favorite episode in season 3 despite it being such a great season?

Yeah, um, to me, there were a few episodes as bad in season 3 as the offspring. Dane and fireloose! Uh, mostly because, uh, both the idea and the execution of Laal, I thought, was just terribly awkward. I have so many questions about why data would do such a thing that he is unable to articulate himself. Why the rest of the crew just sort of co-signs his desire to make another his in his image as if no one has seen Terminator 2 It's a cry of viewing in the first year at the Academy. I never Reach for this episode when I'm doing a season shuffle of TNG for enjoyment. What about you Ben? My my least favorite is Manage Atroy.

Dane and fire. Oh! It is just such a tiresome, bullia base of Ferengi's and Loaxana. Yeah. Can't argue with you there. I am a cute disaball. There are four lights.

Let's flip it around. Let's talk about least favorite in season 4. As much as I love Q mostly most of the time he is not good enough to counteract the idea of a holodeck holodeck wearing tight story and so for me Q-Pid is the low point of season 4 It turns an interesting character in that of Vash into a shitty damsel and distress character which is what this show seems to do a lot of times to strong female characters. Vash introduced as a strong female character and then totally diminished by an episode like this. Broken and humiliated in this episode.

Yeah, and also just really, I don't like holiday episodes in general. And so that combination cannot possibly counteract how great I think Q is. So, Q-Pid for me, least favorite. What about you, Ben? I also wrote down Q-Pid at him. Hey, our first double, I would go so far as to say Q-Pid is stupid. I wish they'd sent a poet. What about Fave? Season 4, not as strong as season 3, I feel like, in terms of overall quality. But to me, there are two standouts in my mind.

Remember me, which may surprise you, I really like that episode. That, of course, being the episode where Beverly Crusher is existing in a rapidly shrinking universe. It's really like the Twilight Zone aspect of that ep. It's one of the few really good Beverly Crusher episodes where she runs the whole thing. And the story legit scared me when I was little and I was watching this. Like that idea, I don't know, really affected me. So I love that episode. I really liked Future Imperfect, which was the episode where Riker wakes up in a Romulan holodic. Yeah, that's a great app. Really solid up for me, but in the end I'm

gonna give the nod to remember me. Based on the tie-breakers probably rewatchability. I really like watching remember me. What about you, Ben? I had to go with first contact for this season. It's an episode that is very dear to me for a lot of reasons, not at least of which is that Riker uses sex to get out of a detention area in a hospital. But I also just, I remember, I very clearly remember as a kid being like really excited by the idea of getting a secret visit from aliens that think you're a special smart person that they want to talk to. Yeah. It's a great little crucible for a lot of interesting premises that you can get to in the Star Trek universe.

And it also manages to be really fun along the way. It is incredibly Star Trek-y too in a fun way. If being Star Trek is a measurement, I think we're finding a lot of our favorite episodes qualify. I also just think it's really well written. Like the Prime Minister character has that line about, you know, when I woke up, I was episodes, Qualify. I also just think it's really well written like the prime minister character has that line about, you know, when I woke up, I was the leader of the No Universe.

And when I go to bed tonight, I'll be, you know, just one mode of dust in a galaxy that is far bigger than I could possibly understand. Or, you know, that's not a direct quote. But I mean, just really or, you know, that's not a direct quote, but I mean, just really nicely drawn characters that have interesting perspectives. And, you know, even the villain is treated sympathetically in that, in that episode.

It is a miracle that this show could ever tell such a nuanced story with such fully colored characters in 40 minutes. This is a great example of how they were able to pull that off. Yeah. This is becoming a speech. You're the cat monster. Very entitled. Hmm.

I'm going to type a Rambo on and I'll have something everyone knows. My least favorite episode in season five is Imaginary Friend. Take and fire. Oh. Yeah, me too. Dane and fire. I've been painted as a child hater by our greater viewership. It is not that I hate children.

It is that the storylines involving them on this show are especially weak and treacle, and the imaginary friend is just the peak example of that. I just don't care. Yeah, it's, it's a real slog to get through that one. It doesn't really add anything to the show. It's not an interesting premise. They say Isabella in this episode, as often as they say, exocomp, in that exocomp episode. They really exocomp the shit out of Isabella. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha It was hard for me to choose between cause and effect and the game, but I in the end

give the nod to cause and effect. Just a fun mystery inside of a peak sci-fi episode. And which is also like an action film in disguise. Like you get all the explosions you could ever want. And you get Kelsey Grammer. And I think Kelsey Grammer is gonna break your tie. Kelsey Grammer definitely went to the riker school of how to drape yourself in that captain's chair.

You know, like sometimes in sports cars there will be like the side bolsters that are like, that are like on the top part of the seat. In, in starships, they are just spread wide. They, they really encourage the lean. Yeah. Good times. What was your favorite episode in season five?

Darmak. Yeah. Darmak's great. Darmak's so fun. I mean, I think that we've probably said as much as we can say about Darmak. But, you know, and I think that it is debatable whether the premise of the episode is solid or not,

it is all execution for me and Darmak. It's fucking great acting, like the the monsters really cool and scary, like more inventive and interesting than normal. The aliens are interesting and it has a lot of those things that I talked about with justice where it can be really confusing trying to interact with somebody from a different culture. And it's a very hopeful episode in the end. It's about making the ultimate sacrifice for peace and understanding. And I love that about it.

What you mentioned in the beginning about Peremis versus execution, I think, is a great description here, because I think the worst episode... The worst episodes fail on execution no matter how good the premise is. And for this episode to not have a great premise or maybe have a premise that is weaker than one would think given its relative standing in the Star Trek the next generation episode universe, its execution is nearly flawless, it's great. ["Six of the

Star Trek"] ["Six of the Star Trek"] My favorite app from season six is Relix. I just think it is such a fun reprisal of the character of Scottie and it also has the Dyson Sphere which is an awesome depiction you know whether or not it's realistic it is really cool to have them encounter something that is totally unlike anything that they've encountered and have it be really beautiful to look at on screen, you know, like all the effects are

really cool and impressive and at its core it's it's Jordy and a friend having a non-gross hang. When I think about Relics, I think the thing that endures for me is how sad it is. Yeah. Like at its core. And when I cruise through the rest of the episodes in season six, that feeling plays throughout. I think season six is a fairly sad season. I mean, chain of command one and two, I think are, you know, there's a heightened sense of stress and stakes.

Yeah. But those are, but that is a crew dealing with great loss and grieving that loss. Tapestry is also, I think, a profoundly sad episode in a number of ways. It's almost as if a young Picard said, I want my episode to be in a terribly sad season. I want it to be in a sad season.

Now! Now, now, now, now, now! We're saving my least favorite for a little bit later that I can tell you that season six, in season six, my favorite episode is tapestry, though, because those, that look at choices made and not made, the idea that a man in Picard, we've come to know, love and admire, would have the regrets that he does, the idea of a person that we know as well as we do could ever find himself on a track in his life or he would be unexceptional. I think the thing that I took away from that is how closely we all are

to that track, you know, unless we strive and try. It's easy to be anonymous and sad. Easier than I think is generally known. And when I watch that episode, it makes me think a lot about my life and the choices I've made. And it encourages me to make better ones. But yeah, Rascal sucks ass. That's pretty rough. It's pretty rough. I remember being especially offended as a kid because it's not that bad. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that.

I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. and fire. Yeah, that's pretty rough. It's pretty rough.

I remember being especially offended as a kid because I thought of Cowboys and Indians as being a world apart from astronauts. Like when I would like make friends, they would be interested in one or the other. And like a decision about whether we could hang with largely hinge on whether they were going to want to like get out the Playmobile Cowboys and Indian toys or the space station Legos or whatever. Young Ben had two unique eccentricities. One, he didn't like his foods to touch on his plate.

He did not like his cowboys and Indians touching his sci-fi. I had no interest in cowboys and Indians period when I was a kid. And having them invade my precious star trek really did not sit right with me. The thing that I'll always think about when I think of Fistful of Data's is how somehow Warf turns his combat into a personal shield. Yeah. Like, where did that come from, Warf? Ha, ha, ha, ha.

Check out the big brains on Warf. Ha, ha, ha. Pretty weak. Pretty weak, Sos there. It's a tiny principle with a pretty face. Have you run finding within yourself to stand up on a truth? Pretty weak sauce there. Alright Adam, we are here at Season 7. We sure are Season 7, which before we got there in the greatest generation, we were cautioned about Season 7 sucks they said. Season 7 really home of some of the worst episodes in the series I disagree I think season seven was far far better than than a lot

of people said it was going to be in the rewatch it got off to a bit of a rocky start but I think I think it's a lot stronger than people represented to be. I had a tough time choosing between three exemplary episodes in season seven. I really liked preemptive strike. I really liked parallels and I really liked lower decks. Parallels is a lot like tapestry to me in the way it tells the story of choices that could have been made. Yeah, and it's interesting because it tells the story in a way that isn't insulting to a lot of people the way tapestry is. Yeah, you could say that. You would say that. I am going to, in an upset, choose Lower Decks, my favorite season 7 episode. Adam, we are so simpatico on Lower Decks being the best episode of season 7.

It is so different. I ache for a Lower Decks in every other season. Like, we should have gotten this every season. We were talking about on our other project, the greatest discovery, how episode three of Star Trek Discovery has a lot of lower decks vibes to it. And that was one of the things about that episode that I liked the most. Season seven, the least favorite episode, Ben. What do you got?

I put the episode, Dark Page. Dark and Fire. Woo! The Mayquees. Mayquees? And the walks on an episode. Just couldn't help but put another walks on an episode. Probably not her worst.

Her worst episode, but just not one that I ever want to rewatch. I never want to rewatch that episode either, but it's not the worst to me because it really tried to be sincere with her in a way that I didn't feel like she was for most of the series. As much as I dislike the character and the episode, it still made me feel something, and some sort of empathy for her. And so, yeah, I admire that they tried. Masks is an episode that is my least favorite episode in season 7. 7, 8 and 5, 6, 7, 8. It does not seem like they tried in that episode at all. It is just an atrocity from beginning to end. The only interesting way to watch masks is unmute, because I think visually it's super interesting,

but in every other way, I can't stand it. I think masks is fun. Well, Ben, it's time to unveil our mountains. To my knowledge, we do not have a name for the mountain that is our favorite episodes, do we? Why don't we start with our Mount Armour and see if in the process of getting through that we can't come up with something finally for the good mountain? Mount armus, the mountain below the all-time great mountain, Dankenvile, my mountain contains these four episodes, Ben. Shades of Grey,

Cupid, Mashed, and Rascals. Those are the four least favorite episodes for me. Who do you get? We have 50% parity here, buddy. My This is Codavonor, Shades of Grey, Cupid, Imaginary Friend. Yeah. Nice, nice one. Nice ugly mountain you got there. Ben, what are your all-time favorite episodes of Star Trek the Next Generation? Alright, well, here they are. The ones that I put at the risks by as I made my little chart. I've got on there a measure of a man, first contact, darmok and lower decks. That's a DVD set that I would buy. Yeah. The Benjamin R. Harrison edition. So that Buzzfeed quiz of greatest

gen. One of my favorite quiz questions that I would never have occurred to me was, which is your favorite slick back? Yeah, I love that one. I picked the one that wanted to be Commander Data personally. Yeah, that guy's peak slick back. Yeah. Alright Adam, what's your mountain? Bann on my mountain is conspiracy,

yesterday's enterprise, cause and effect, and tapestry. Those are some great episodes. Yeah. I feel like they have a lot in common too. Yeah. They're darker and more action heavy. And timey. Yeah. Time spacey. Yeah. They're like darker and more action heavy. And timey. Yeah. Time spacey. Definitely.

I don't know what that says about me. What do your favorite start trick the next generation episode say about you? Cosmicollatin headline that we'll never see. Yeah. I guess we all will never know what that mountain is called at him. But there it is. Priority one message from Starfleet coming in on Secured Channel. You need a supplement on top. supplement on top? supplement.

supplement. Yeah it's extra. The interest alone could be enough to buy this ship. Ben our first priority 1 message is a continuation of a priority one message from the last episode we have. It's from Dylan R. It is to the finest viewers in Podfleet, aka the GG2 or 2017 Milwaukee folks. And it goes like this. Last time on priority one. My boyfriend and I broke up.

Hell at work. Potential employer passed on my application. And now the conclusion. Then I went to the show. Ben and Adam brought the funny, and the after show viewer hang was beyond wonderful. I needed that win that night, and you all delivered from the bottom of my heart, thank you.

Roll credits. Oh. I am glad that we were able to provide a positive experience at the end of an extremely shitty run of bad luck, and I'm also really glad that we were able to edit in all that music bad from best of both worlds. We aim to please, Ben. I'm really glad people keep reminding us of things that happen at the Milwaukee show, because I remember so little of it. Yeah, no, it might as well not have happened if not for folks reminding us what happened. Yeah.

Adam, our second priority one message here is from Doe, first of two, and it is for Doh, second of two. It goes like this. Doh, it was damn good to be with you and Mrs Doh in Montana. I can't believe we ran into Oxbridge in that abandoned mind during our hike. Lucky he didn't realize you are one quarter who snuck on your mother's side. Whew, the llama was a quadruped, made the log of your channels always be an integer. Best of luck opening your winery and living your dream. I'd say of the spy codes we've read out on this that are clearly, you know, Russian

operatives transmitting information back to Moscow. Best of luck opening your winery and living your dream might be my favorite. I usually wait for the third day to open my winery. Yeah. Well, you're trying to show good judgment, but that's not always how these things work at them. Definitely not. Well, if you have a priority one message, you can do that over at MaximumFund.dorks.last

JemboTron, where commercial messages are $200 and personal messages are $100. They're a great, great way to help the ongoing production of our program. Thanks, guys. Thank you. Ben, did our show find itself a drunk Shimoda? The metrics are in. the ballots have been tallied. We haven't all time drunk Shimoda for the show. The drunk Shimoda of the entire series, contrary to what Levi Burden told us that one time, is worth. Finally, a warrior must be forged like a sword, temperate by good tea. The path of a warrior begins with nice house.

I have enhanced the targeting system for increased accuracy. This is a real interesting story, Adam, because Worf did not get a Shemota at all in season one. He totally managed to avoid getting a Shimoda in season one and then came raging from behind. And for a brief moment in season seven, Riker was a little bit ahead of him, but he surged at the end and got almost 35 episodes where he got named the Shimoda. And the thing about Wurf being the Shimoda at this point is I don't think anyone's going to catch him.

Yeah, because he's got, he's still got like four extra seasons of Deep Space 9 to rack up more points. A record that may never be broken. Props to Worf. Our listener at Colin Dinsmore on Twitter has done these amazing charts that track all of the Chamotas everywhere and has released them on Twitter like as we've wrapped each season as this to say about Worf. Worf had the most double Chamotas and the most consecutive Chamotas of any character as well. Here's a fun chart he made also that was characters that were only in one episode but both but got both Chamotas. You want to hear this list Adam? Yeah, lay it on me. Well the the eponymous Jim Shimoda, that scene, the 24th century dare scene, where Tasha Yartel's

tells Wesley Drago's about sunny clements, Rivas Dick Valley, the episode from season three, The Price, from season three, The Price, Ensign Castillo, aka Shooter McGavin, the mayor of La Bar France, and Merle Henry, force field prober, Klingon Gusman, Sam LaValle from Lower Decks,

and season seven episode 19, Jenishish. That's a hell of a list. That's a list that could be episode titles too. Like outside of Genesis, but like all the other stuff. Yeah, those are all dingworthy. Totally. Wow, just a ton of work by Colin here. We really need to thank him.

Yeah. A lot of people have asked us to name the Shimoda for encounter at far point because we had not, you had not invented that segment at that point, Adam. But I don't think that I think we should leave that undisclosed. That'll just be a little bit of ambiguity that we leave you with. Yeah, that'll just be for you and me, right? Yeah. Sounds good. Maybe we'll disclose it on a Donors Only episode sometime deep in the future. That works. Good plan.

Dommok and Jalat and Denarga. A greatest-gen live show is something you don't want to miss. Why? Well, it's a great opportunity to see me and Ben in person, but that's not all. FODs from all over gather at these shows to cosplay, to do pre and post show hangs, to make friends, and share their embarrassment. Hey, let's make a pretty great name for a tour. Let's do it.

The Share Your Embarrassment Tour is coming in August 2023, and we've got a bunch of dates in a lot of great places. Go to GreatestGenTour.com to get more info. That's GreatestGenTour.com for dates and ticketing information for the Share Your Embarrassment Tour. I'm Jordan Morris. And I'm Jesse Thorne. On Jordan Jesse Go, we make pure, delightful nonsense.

We were open awesome guests and bring them down to our level. We got stupid with Judy Greer. My friend Molly and I call it having the spaceweards. Pat Noswald. Could I get a Balrog burger and some air-gorn fries? Thank you. And Kumail Nanjiani. I've come back with cat toothbrushes, which is impossible to use. Come get stupider with us at MaximumFun.org. Look, your podcast apps already open, just pull it out. Give Jordan Jesse Goatry.

Being smart is hard. Be dumb instead. just pull it out, give Jordan Jesse Goat try. Being smart is hard, be dumb instead. Oh, rats, hey, hey, 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 are lines? These giraffes do not smell good. No, they do not, and they have such short connects. But I'm hearing we need to get on this arc. 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, but we're actually, we're podcasters. We are podcasters, so it's different. Have you heard of Ono Ross and Carrie? We investigate spirituality, claims of the paranormal, stuff like that. And you have a boat and say the world's gonna end, so seem like something for us to check out. We would love to be on the boat. We came two by two.

What do you think? Oh no Ross and Kerry, available on MaximumFun.org. Here. Here. Here. Come on, episode one, emissary on a distant outpost, an untested crew of barks on an unprecedented journey.

Do you remember this episode Adam? I remember fragments from this episode, mostly how much Cisco hates Picard. Yeah, I remember that too. Taken is getting his orders from a man. He considers to be a mass murderer. I Am going to really appreciate the Slowly pulling off the band-aid of starting to us nine while there's a little bit of of

Next gen overlap. I think I'm really going to crave seeing the characters that we've come to know and love over the years, so yeah, give me all of them. Well, looking forward to it. Well, I really had a lot of fun here recapping the show, and it was nice to go back through our favorite and least favorite seasons. Sort of do a little bit of a little bit of a census. Yeah. And what we've done here. We'll survey. And next week we're going to be kicking off our first deep space nine episode. About that. New series. Here we come. Sparkly new SD series. Yeah. Gonna watch it on my watch. It's the only screen that it'll truly look good on these days.

Yeah. Well, I really hope everyone comes along to watch DS9 with us. I would personally take it as an insult if you didn't. Yeah, and if you're wishing there was more track in your pod catcher, now that we've gone to one a week please tune into the greatest discovery our new sister show hosted by me and Adam and if you still need more pod in your life you can always check out all the great stuff at MaximumFund.org if this show has meant anything to you over the past two years we sure would appreciate a visit to Maximumfund.org slash donate. The show takes a ton of time, effort, and resources to produce, and support for the show ensures that we can continue to do it for years to come.

So thanks very much for that. We've got a lot of things to give anybody that has contributed in financial aid or just by making artwork or sending us something in the mail or whatever. The amount of goodwill that we have received has just been amazing and touching and mind blowing. So thanks to everybody that is a part of this community that has contributed in any way, I mean this project would not be the success it has been without all of you listening. And it's the best part of doing the show i think yeah and i think i mean we kind of did all of this all the uh... misty-eyed tearfulness

on the show last week so maybe we'll keep it to a dull roar on this one but uh... again if you didn't hear it last time thank you thanks so much guys thank dark materia our the music and adam regusee for a lot of the other music you hear on the show.

And with that, we will be back at you next time with another great episode of Star Trek Deep Space 9. Sorry, with a great episode of Star Trek Deep Space 9 and an episode of the greatest generation that, you know, is a little bit rundown and fucked over because of the previous occupants. Sounds a little bit like, like, how something for you. Yeah. Maximumfund.org. Comedy and culture. Artists owned. Listen or supported. Maximumfund.org Comedy and Culture, Artistone Listener Supported