The Greatest Generation - You Do Not Want to Get the Creams Confused (S5E25)

Episode Date: April 3, 2017

When Captain Picard is zapped by a probe from a long-lost culture, the bridge crew doesn't try to move his body. But after he starts to like the soup within his hallucination, everyone starts to wonder if their captain will ever regain consciousness. Where's the perineum, really? How do you stay looking busy during a workplace medical emergency? What's the best way to ask a houseguest to leave? It's the episode we're recording from the desert southwest!

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

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

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

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

and season two of Star Trek Picard. We've set up a page where you can also contribute. It's at friendsofdecotoforlabor.com. That's friendsofdecotoforlabor.com. That's friendsofdisotoforlabor.com. Link in the episode description. Okay, now let's get on with the show. Hey gang, this is Adam with a quick message before today's show. Ben's out of the country for a few more weeks, but I'm going to edit in some of his best dialogue from today's episode to make it sound like he's here with the both of us. Yeah.

This episode, like the next few weeks worth of episodes, was recorded a while back, but it's important that before we give you our first show after the Max Fund Drive, I really wanted to say thank you from the both of us. Yeah. At last count, we have 2001 new and upgrading members that have supported the show during Max Fund Drive. Chief of the Watch, Fulkeboi. And the way that you all stepped up to support us during a really crucial time for the show

has been really amazing and incredible. Yeah. The greatest generation is one of the newer shows on the Max Fund Network. And that network and that network is a network of shows that are wholly supported by listener donations. Yeah. It's not a place with a big office and a ton of staff, so your support not only helps

us directly, but it helps some great people whose job it is to keep us going as well. Yeah. So the 12 days of pledge drive were really critical in a couple of important ways. One, it told Ben and I that this is a sustainable project and that this is a sustainable life and to keep doing it. And that means a lot when it's late on Sunday night and an edit is messed up on Monday's episode when we've got a Russian update to that, for example. Yeah. And two, your support told the network that we are viable and valuable enough to keep around.

And that's big too, because they support us in a lot of ways that you wouldn't know unless you were on one of these mics with us. Yeah. So, just to wrap all this up, our biggest thanks to you for the support you've shown us both before and during Max Fund Drive. Thanks for buying t-shirts and glasses. Thanks for designing those shirts and glasses. We are really looking forward to doing the Crimson Tide show as soon as Ben gets back into

the country. We're also looking forward to getting out on tour and meeting as many of you as possible. So with that all being said, thank you, thank you, thank you once again, and here's today's episode. Here's to the finest crew in Starfleet. Engage! Welcome to the greatest generation. It's a Star Trek podcast by two guys who are a little bit embarrassed to have a Star Trek podcast. I'm one of your host Adam Pranaka. I am the other one, Benjamin R. Harrison.

We basically talk about an episode of Star Trek the next generation. I interrupt Ben like nine times out of 10 and we tag each other's jokes until there's absolutely no meat left on the bone. That's a pretty good description of what we came here to do today Adam. Yeah. I wanted to say note we are recording this before the Max fund drive even starts, but I think our viewers are really going to come through. And so I just wanted to take a moment to say thanks to everybody who got involved, who boosted the signal, who pledged, who upgraded, anybody created anybody that was already pledging big thanks and just a big thanks all around. Maybe we beat that 10,000 new and upgrading number by a mile.

Maybe we whiffed and stumbled. But maybe we're no longer on the maximum fun network as we're so. Who knows? Who knows? But thank you. It really means a lot to us. We feel astonishment and gratitude at the support that this show has gotten from people. So, big thumbs up. Yeah, I mean, the shows pledge drive were a little different because they were full of pledge drive bumpers and stuff and Now that we're back to regularly scheduled programming. I also just want to thank people for For putting up with that, you know like it's it's important for us to do the pledge drive and to participate in it as fully as possible

So for all of you who went through it with us, thanks. Yeah. Adam, I have a package here. Should I open it? What's the alternative then? You're just gonna leave it by the door? I can open it on the next episode. You gotta open it.

Okay. That's what I say. I'm sorry to disturb you. I'm receiving a code 47. Verify? It is code 47, sir. Stockly emergency frequency. This, I think, is the one from Scotland.

The only way I can tell that it might be is that it says something about royal mail on it. So I'm pretty excited about this one. Got a white envelope that is fairly lumpy. White envelopes usually contain summons, Finn. I'd be careful. If I had to appear before some court in Scotland, I'd be in big trouble. Yeah. All right. Let's see what we've got here. The enclosed letter. Should I do it in a deer as a man band hello from Eddenburg a little while ago I I emailed you guys about how my good buddy Britt move from Edinburgh back to the states and TNG and Greatest Jan kept us laughing despite our impending separation Britt's wife Heather and my partner Dave

does laughing despite our impending separation. Brits wife Heather and my partner Dave sure had to listen to a real load of garbage from us. Well now, Britain Heather are all settled in San Diego, but before Christmas they still thought to send me my very own Star Trek cards, having gleefully ravaged them all open. My pile of spares was looking like Jim Shemota's disorganized pile of isolated air chips. Me and Britt decided that the only other people who could appreciate them as much as us are you two. They're quite a lot, but not a full deck, so sorry for all that. I took the liberty of placing on top of the deck the Isolaneer Chip card for obvious reasons. Underneath that is my favorite card, Captain Picard's Fish, who is apparently called Livingston. I take a look at the pink colored technical data cards too,

because they are mostly poorly rendered pictures of totally random junk. Thanks for making this awesome show and enjoy the cards. Your fair viewers, Adis, Alison El-Edenberg, and Rich in San Diego. I can't think of another TV show that could do what this show does with, like, prop cards. And getting as granular as they do with that series of cards.

Yeah, the fact that an isolineer chip, a nonsense prop that has no known actual function gets a card. Man, there's a, there's one about shuttlecraft and their classifications and it's got everything from flat pack all the way up to Privia. Turned out there's five different shuttles. I don't believe that for a second. We've only seen three of them, right? It seems like we've only seen three, yeah. Well, just a few more seasons left to reveal the rest of the line.

Yeah. Alice, thank you so much for sending this pile of cards in. I now have an embarrassingly huge number of stars at cards. Wow, well that's really sweet, Ben. I'm gonna have to send you half of these. I don't like, this is grounds for an element of my marriage if my wife ever found this. Yeah, I'll give you my address later, or something.

Hahaha. Should we get to the episode that we came here to talk about today? Yeah, we might as well, Ben. Let's go ahead and discuss season 5 episode 25, the interlite. The cat concert. Very entitled. I'm typing a ramble on about something everyone knows. The entrepreneur has been doing a magnetic wave survey of the Parvenean system. Is the Parvenean the space between your lip and your nose? I think it's in between your balls and your butthole, Adam. Oh, there are some creams that you only use on one of those and you do not want to get

the creams confused. No, that would be bad. Trust me, you do not lock cream confusion on those two areas. No, no, no. So the entrepreneur finds a weird probe. It's kind of a fun, like, offset, fin design. It sort of looks like that S that people draw in an elementary school. Yeah.

The draw, the dots on the paper, and then they connect the lines. Yeah. Man, the lobbying firm that that S retains is really powerful. They have a stranglehold on middle school art projects. They really do. So like most unknown probes that Starfleet encounters, this one is a mind takeover probe. I can think of two other instances where unknown probes get into people's heads on this series alone. They didn't exactly do anything wrong here

either. I mean, they noticed something was up with the probe. It was building up some energy. They threw up their shields. What more could they have done? It's weird because they're also commenting about how it seems pretty primitive. Not a very sophisticated technology. Right, it's not a level of tech that is beyond them where they have no hope of repelling whatever influence it throws at them.

I mean, like the Barclay episode where Barclay gets super smart, that's a probe that there's no way they're ever gonna out smart, right? Yeah, yeah. This one is like, you know, Apollo era technology, and it shoots a ray, and the captain goes down. Increase speed to... Captain. The card is action-jacketed up, a ray and the captain goes down. Increase speed to the captain. The card is action jacketed up and he just falls into a heap into Riker's arms.

Riker sort of catches him by the back of the neck and then places him on the ground. Yeah, I really liked the card's performance with this. He's kind of like punch drunk looking. Yeah. Do you think it chose him because he was the only one looking at it at that exact moment? Yeah, I don't know. I mean,

because you only see that shot from behind Picard's head. It's hard to tell if anyone else is looking directly at it. Right. I mean, there's like a helmsman that was probably looking at it, right? Yeah. How great an episode with this have been if it were just a random helmsman. Ha-ha-ha.

I mean, that's a choice that this show is not afraid of making ever so often. Like, hey, let's give the episode to a seven-year-old girl. Why not? Yeah, like if Rose on duty, Rose goes to the planet Catan. Well, Picard wakes up and there is a saccharmom there. How are you feeling?

And she's like, well, you've had a fever. Okay, man. So obviously you're a little disoriented. Can you answer me? And he's like, where am I? Where's my communicator badge? What's going on? What is this place?

And he's dumbfounded. He thinks he's supposed to be on the entrepreneur. And in fact, he is on this planet that, you know, he's being told by this woman that she's his wife. He appears to be in like Albuquerque. Yeah. Like definitely like Desert Southwest. Yeah, maybe Santa Fe. Although I guess the the stucco would be like red if they were in Santa Fe. Yeah, that's true. Maybe they're ignoring the neighborhood association. They're painting their house white in defiance of the council's rules.

Right. Whatever it is, it's a very suburban place. Yeah. Yeah, and Picard is not freaking out. Everyone's treating him like he's had this high grade fever for a week. The people around Picard are just sort of, they're handling him with care.

I mean, Picard is saying crazy shit about a ship and another life. And everyone's just sort of like, okay, grandpa, like, why don't you take a nap and have some soup? Well, they didn't move to this artist colony in the Southwest to like put a lot of judgment on other people's experience of reality, man. Right.

I mean, like, you take one look at Picard and his deep V in his Tom's shoes. You know that this is a pretty chill place. Yeah. Like, there's some nice chill people they Maybe retired down here to paint paintings that are vaguely vaginal and And hang out and do art, you know they earned it Adam

Yeah, it's true. We find out that the cards wife figure in this scene is named Eileen and That's true. We find out that the card's wife figure in this scene is named Eileen. And besides her soccer mom haircut, like, she's really great. Yeah, she's a nice lady. You can't help but like her immediately. There's some weird tech in this world, right? Because it's sort of like future past tech. They have swooshy doors with remote lock panels on the doorframe.

They've got futuristic looking rice cookers. That was like a Klingon Sasi A. Yeah, but the walls are sort of stucco-y. There's an interesting combination of a future in past. Right, a little, and it looks like they've kind of developed in a way that is slightly dissimilar to us where they've leapt ahead in certain fields like pot handle technology, but maybe lag behind in their architectural capabilities.

Right. So yeah, she gives him the same soup that he's given on every planet that he goes to. And it's delicious. But, Picard usually hates soup too, so that was a surprise to me. Yeah. Yeah, she's finally mastered the recipe, Adam. Better than that garbage he had on Romulus. Yeah. He like, takes a walk around the neighborhood and they're like planting a tree in the classic

Star Trek town square that is way too small to really be a town square. And there's some talk of a drought that's being done by Richard Reel. I was having some trouble with the shifter here. It's jam. He is really great and such a welcome character actor in this moment because you can't help but befriend him the way that Picard does. He's got such a friendly carriage

about him. I have people's skills that I think you need to cast a guy like that. I was a little disoriented to see that guy without a push broom mustache, because I feel like that's pretty much always his look. That is the worst idea I've ever heard in my lifetime. Yes, yes, he's hot. Everyone's telling Picard that he is actually Camine, and he's an iron weaver, and that he has a great wife that he's already met, and that he's lived here forever.

And Picard is sort of beginning to do that Sammy Jankus thing from a memento. Like, he believes his truth about living on the enterprise at this point, but he's suppressing that a little bit and sort of going with the flow, so as not to make people suspicious. You fake it. If you think he's supposed to recognize somebody, you just pretend to. You bluff

it. Like I totally see what he's trying to do. He's trying not to act too crazy. Right. And trying to solve this mystery for himself. Yeah, he's trying to slow play his feeling of detachment from reality. And that's like a pretty sensible thing. I mean, Picard has been in enough situations where what he knows to be true is denied by everybody around him that I feel like he actually has some like tools to use in this scenario. Yeah, two of which happen to be his arms.

He is fucking jail pipes this episode. You notice that? Yeah, it of which happened to be his arms. He is fucking JL pipes this episode. Did you notice that? Yeah, it looks good. Yeah, good job, beef stew. Every time they were like, all right, we're everybody ready to roll camera, and he's like just one second, and like dropped and gave him 20 push-ups

just to like get the blood flowing in the arms. Yeah, look at it. Maybe put on a little like Dwayne N'Rock Johnson arm butter. Well, it's important that he's ripped in the arms because unfortunately throughout the episode they put him through the seven stages of Larry David here. Which get progressively more frisled. Yeah, it is, it's kind of a planet of Larry Davids and muscle shirts. Yeah, it is.

Like, it's a weird combination. Yeah, yeah, it's in Congress and yet they build a totally plausible universe somehow. So I guess he's like eating the soup with waifi and her necklace falls out of her shirt and he grabs for it and it's the probe. It's the probe that knocked him out. It's like a weird talisman from the reality that he remembers. Yeah, and this is the moment where he knows

he's not crazy in this moment, right? Yeah, it's a, I mean, you sort of wonder, I mean, I don't know, should we spoil? I think everybody, like, you sort of wonder, I mean, I don't know, should we spoil? I think everybody, like everybody watching us has already watched this or doesn't care to, right? Or doesn't care to listen to us. It's turning off the show. Yeah. The deal is that this is an alien species that is injecting a memory of themselves into some future traveler.

So, I mean, I sort of wonder like what the motive behind putting the design of their probe on the necklace of the wave. Is that there to like, just be like a signpost that says, hey, you're not crazy, just roll with this? If it is, it's like a pretty abstract way of getting that message across. Well, if the mission for the katana is to send knowledge of their culture out into the universe and this is their instrument for that, then I don't think you want the person going through that experience to reject it immediately and freak out

So it seems to me as though the program is sort of sprinkling little crumbs throughout the experience to ground That experience in a way Mm-hmm. So that whoever is going through it doesn't completely lose it See I thought that the mission for a katana was to be longer than a wakizashi. How long is a wakizashi? I mean, it's like a little bit like a katana, but slightly shorter. Do you measure from the base or do you go where do you start measuring from Ben? I believe that you measure from the Parvenium out to the tip. Right. I was in I was in Hawaii a couple of weeks ago and we were on the big island. Well, La Dida!

We did one of those tours, like a tour boat thing, where you're out in the water and the guys tell you about the volcanoes and stuff. And the guys like, yeah, you know, Mount Aloa is actually the tallest mountain in the world if you measure it from below sea level. And I was like, well, that's like cheating. That's like measuring from your asshole. And it was like crickets. No one likes my sense of humor, Ben. The school group that you went on that,

on that tour list didn't appreciate it. Yeah, the teacher who was with them, just like gathered them and told them to the other side of the boat. How many children can I cover the ears of at once? Yeah, turns out not that many. I hike to the top of that mountain one time at him. And, really?

Well, they did it feel like the tallest mountain Yeah, yeah, no joke. People were encouraging us to go to it summit and hang out and then Like do jumping jacks at the top to experience altitude sickness Like that doesn't sound like fun. I think I'd rather be on the beach drinking boat drinks. Yeah, it's sound like fun. I think I'd rather be on the beach drinking boat drinks. Yeah. It's altitude sickness is no joke and that is the only place I've ever really experienced it. Wow. How'd it feel? It's rough because you go from sea level and it's like a two-day hike to get to the top. So you start at sea level and I think you drive up to like 7,000 feet of elevation, which is where the trailhead is. And then the top is like 14,000 feet of elevation or something.

Wow. So you're real high up. It's like a subtropical climate up there. I mean, it's a sub-architect climate up there and you don't feel good. Did you, Vom? I didn't. I think maybe my buddy may have... it up there and you don't feel good. Did you vomit? I didn't. I think maybe my buddy may have. New guys in the corner, buke and his gut shot.

Yeah! Yeah! Neither of us felt great though. It's also like it feels insane to have to pack your cold weather crap to go to Hawaii because you're going on this hike. That's no fun. Yeah, silly. Well, this has been Hawaii talk.

You can like and review us on iTunes in the travel and culture section, I guess. This has been two Halleys and a microphone. Back on board the enterprise, the doctor is working on Picard, and we get an amount of bridge carpeting that is probably worthy of a baseball card, right? We really get up close and personal to the bridge carpet throughout this episode.

Yeah, this is an episode with an uncharacteristic amount of carpet close-ups. And also, I think Ryker gets to squint into every single commercial break in this episode. Yeah. Why don't they move them to Six Bay? I don't know. They don't even put a pillow under his head. I don't know. They don't even put a pillow under his head. Well, carpeting is really nice at them. I guess. It looks like it's really scotch-guardy and rough. Doesn't look comfy at all.

Well, yeah, it's a tight weave. It's not a deep carpet, but it's... It's a corporate weave. Yeah. You can spill a coffee on. Yeah, but you can see that it's really held up well over the years. It's not pilling, you know, it doesn't seem like worn thin. I mean, they've been rolling dollies across that carpet.

They've been walking across it for years. Worf's loaf has probably touched it several times. Pretty good shape. Yeah. So every time we cut back to Picard, aka Kemen, it seems to be about five years have passed and they've added an extra inch to the weave in his hair. And like, it becomes clear in this next visit in this world that he's starting to realize that he can't just cling to his memory of the enterprise.

He's been insisting that that's his real life for five years. And he doesn't have any way of proving that that's what his life really is. And I think this is like the one where where he's sort of rolling since as all right I'm gonna live I'm gonna live in the here now and be came in or whatever Which only serves to underscore how great Eline is as a wife like could you imagine your wife saying that she actually lived another life and you just like dealt with that for five years? Like her utter detachment.

And then she finally comes around in the fifth year and is like, all right, I'm ready to commit fully to the life that you have been experiencing with me the entire time. Her patience is incredible. And I think it's what makes you like her. Yeah, she's like so unbelievably unselfish that it's kind of It's impossible not to really connect with her As speaking of like the connections to the many characters on this planet. I feel like they do a really good job in very little time building rapport and befriending them in such a way. I liked everyone on the planet except

for the government official, but it brought up the question, Ben, are the katanas actually human? And do they actually look human, or is that part of the programming of the probe in order to inspire or engender an emotional attachment, or some sort of like common understanding? Well, I really wondered that. I mean, like, if it had zapped a lady, would she be in the wife role?

Would she be in the same family? Like what if it encountered a non-gendered species like the... Yeah, from Soren's planet. Yeah, what if a Soren got zapped? Like what happens? Or a knee toilet guy. Like, or a cling on. Like any number of outcomes.

Yeah, what if the the pro-games? What if the ample species encounters this thing? Yeah, does the programming suit the program? Yeah, it got pretty lucky that it got Picard who's already used to being in sunny South of France and it's like, well, you know, like Santa Fe is not that different of a hang, you know. There's that moment when the politician rolls in the town and he's like a conquering hero and he's sort of pretending that he's going to accept everything from the suggestion box.

How to fake, like you are a nice and caring person. Yeah, he's like, hey, what the fuck is that tree? And Picard is like, hey, you know, if we just, if we mock up some atmospheric scrubbers, we can start putting some water back into the ground. Be really great idea and the politicians like, we'll have no scrubbers in these parts. We need to save coal jobs. That's what we're gonna do. So I'm gonna tell you to fuck off with these atmospheric water condensers.

Like, the card wants to be uncle Owen so bad, he wants to have a moisture farm. That's the reason everyone dies, right? It has to be. That fucking guy. Yeah. It also makes me wonder, like, if we knew that in, like, I don't know, 50 years, we were definitely not gonna have a usable son. Would that be enough of a fire under our ass to figure out a way to leave and go somewhere else or to develop something that would make that not such a big issue? I think our differences are so great right now that a 50-year time span would be too little.

And I think we'd be fucked. That is my honest answer. Oh Adam. So pessimistic. I know. It's been a bad year Ben. Yeah, well, it's not great for a cameon either because the politicians like all take that great idea under advisement and goodbye.

And I'll invite you to fuck off. And so, and so... Betai, like this is another instance where Picard has sort of turned the corner on his memory. Betai is like, wow dude, that was like old Cayman, ready to involve himself in the community. Good to hear that again. That was some pre-fever Cayman shit. You just went right there.

Yeah, I like this guy. Good stuff, bud. So they go back to Cayman's house. They have some drinks and some flute. They're having a hang and Aline comes out and she's like, hey Batai, why don't you fuck off? And Picard's like, yeah, fuck off Batai, I got a baby to make. Aline does this so great.

Batai. Yes, ma'am. Go home. I can't imagine inviting one of my wife's friends to leave in that way and not having it cause a huge fucking problem Or or vice versa like I can't imagine my wife telling you to leave like that and having you not be like what the fuck are you serious But she's so gentle about it. It's I default to assuming that I'm not welcome in most places So I think if you're if I was at your house

and your wife came in and said, just leaving, where you been? I'd be like, yeah, yeah. I'm, you might have used the bathroom before it go or, I mean, I don't have to. I don't have to. If you were a batai, you wouldn't have been there that long to begin with.

Yeah, exactly. The upshot of this scene is, came in and Aline are going to start a family, which seems like last possible moment to do that, right? In terms of how old they both are. Do you think they haven't done it up until now? No, no. I mean like is he supposed to be as old as he looks?

I mean, like, is he supposed to be as old as he looks? Do you think Picard does it differently than Cayman? Like the pre-Picard Cayman? Oh. So I can trust any of his moves now. His whole repertoire could be lifted. You think Alina's like, whoa, where did this come from? He wanna put that where? He's pretty edgy stuff.

I was just going to lay a husk on the floor and let you walk over it. Yeah, that part's unclear, but they are going to make a baby this time. And so they do. Yeah. Throughout the episode, you're sort of skipping ahead by a number of years. The first time it's five years. the next time it's probably 10 years, next time it's... I don't know, the kid is maybe five years. Yeah, are we talking five year increments then? I kind of... Well, so at the end it's like you've been out 20 to 25 minutes and I was like, oh,

so like every five minutes or so that he was out seemed like maybe about five years had passed. So I don't know. The passage of time is shown through Picard's growing hair, the depth of his wrinkles. And as Picard ages, I began thinking that this is one of those episodes that is actually where the remaster doesn't work. Yeah. His aging makeup is really, it does not hold up to HD. No, really doesn't. I mean, and you know, this is an observation that's been made a million times,

but like Patrick Stewart looks just as good now as he did when he was shooting TNG, and they like definitely were excessive with how much makeup they put on him, you know. Yeah, they mean he's taking care of himself and maybe he wasn't in the Catan world. He hasn't gone full burlap sack, but he's close. Yeah, maybe came in as like a,

is a much more hard drink and hard live and guy than the scenes that we get with him, you know. Right. Right. Back on the bridge, like they're pretty concerned because they can detect a lot of brain activity in Picard, but he's totally passed out and unresponsive. So the idea comes up to try to injure interfere with the beam that is coming out of this probe and hitting him. Yeah, it's like, it's like his mind is inside finger cuffs. Like, they can't separate Picard from the machine much like they couldn't when he was a borax. Yeah. And so like, this is a pretty heated argument. Like, like, Worf is like all Ford, like, you know,

just nuking the probe and getting the F out of there. The captain is under attack. We must act. And the doctor is like, this is a terrible idea. Like, you don't pull a knife out of somebody just because they've been stabbed. Like that might make them bleed out. Riker decides it's worth trying,

turning off the mind ray, and Picard goes into pretty extreme distress. In respiratory systems in spasm, pulse is irregular and with me. Yes, flopping around on the ground. Everyone starts panicking. They gotta reestablish the beam,

and that's what data does, pretty quick. Yeah, but not before, like, he falls over in the dream world, too. Like, he's very... Yeah, there's consequences there. They're having like a brisk for his son and he's like playing the flute. There's like a cheese plate from Safeway

and Cameron like finishes his flute song and he's like hanging out with wifey and he just like he like hits the floor. And that's the influence of this of the like beam being severed I guess. Data puts the beam back together and he's back to normal. He's back to normal but in but he's back to normal. He's back to normal, but he's also much older. Yeah. He's got full, full Bernie puff on the sides of his heads. And he's the sort of age that can wear a giant straw hat out in public unironically and like basically not be regarded

as a weirdo. Yeah and like his wife has gone to a Catherine Polasky type haircut. I just feel like this was a time when it was expected of old women to have that haircut at a certain point. Yeah. Yeah. So they've got like a full grown daughter and son. The daughter is like the fourth Tanner girl. She's like straight out of full house. And she's like, she's a capable scientist. Their son is a little bit more of a stoner layabout. Just wants to focus on playing his flute and not finishing

up school. Yeah, so Picard Sun is upstairs, like playing Jeth Roteau at tap volume. Like all teenagers. Hit in the ceiling with the broom handle. That one's for you, Bill Tilly. I broke the fourth pod while there's been. It's a little weird. That's not do that anymore.

Picard leaves the house because he just can't stand the music anymore. And he's hanging out in the town square and the G-man is there. And he's like, dude, the planet is falling apart. I don't know if we're going to be able to save it at this point. And he's like, yeah, man, like, our scientists came to the same conclusion two years ago. We didn't wanna make a panic, so we're just gonna let everybody die.

Yeah, I mean, do you agree with that thinking? No, I really, like, I know you're a pessimist, but I think that, like, given all the information, people can adapt and come up with things. I just... Oh, I'm not saying I don't agree with revealing the truth and giving the information. My point earlier was about not being hopeful that we, as a society, be able to do anything productive with that once we had the information.

I'm more hopeful than that. I think that I think that somebody somebody could and you know you foreclose on there even being a possibility of that by concealing information like this. Absolutely. So I think the government should come clean about the grays. The grays have been literally fucking us up the ass for years. Literally. So, he's just getting this like, wopper of a news item laid on him when his kiddo comes running and he's like, hey, dad, mom is in bad shape. And there ain't no Polasky around to help her out.

So they run back to the house and this is like the gabai moment between Kamin and Aline. Can't remember how either of those names were pronounced in the episode. I think it's Kamman and Eileen. Cayman and Eileen. Yeah.

So yeah, she shuffles loose this mortal coil. And Picard as Cayman, like, loses it. Yeah. This is an awful moment. Yeah, and an earned moment, you know, like they've really humanized this character and her passing feels weighty, you know, and this is a tough acting moment. And I think Patrick Stewart really proves himself time and time again in this episode. Right.

It's like all of the most important moments of life. Act them. Go. The degree of difficulty seems really tough because every time we time jump, he's almost a new man. Yeah. I mean, his experiences are so different. He's moved so far forward in time.

He sort of has to reset as an actor. Yeah. I think the next jump, his daughter is now the soccer mom. And she is even wearing a big straw hat at this point. And everybody is like, yo, daddy, yo, let's go watch this big rocket launch. And he's like, I'm not going anywhere to watch that. Do I want to hang out here with my grandson? We don't have much time left.

I'm going to enjoy myself. And they're like, dad, I really think you should come see the rocket. Came in at this point as a character seems to be a little bit dattering. Yeah. And in firm and He doesn't it doesn't seem like he has a full grasp mentally of what's happening because they Because he doesn't want to go out and see the the launch

He doesn't really remember the shuttle launch is happening until he's out there He really seems like he's he's at the end of his life Yeah, and I mean, it's sort of implied that this was kind of his idea, right? Yeah. Like, let's put some genetic samples in a probe and shoot them out into space just so that some record of our planet is preserved.

What a noble mission. I mean, I imagine someone thought up the idea of actually sending katanas up in the rocket, you know, in some form of stasis, but instead they just decide to inscribe the gold records with, you know, the story of their culture and launch the shuttle out there without anyone on it. Yeah, it's kind of a poetic way of memorializing oneself, I guess. Yeah, yeah, it really is. So they watch the launch and as they're watching, they get, like, it's kind of

explained to him what's going on because suddenly people that have died are coming out of the woodwork. You get your betai coming back to life, Aline comes back to life, and they're like, thanks for living a life with us. If you remember what we were and how we lived, then we'll have found life again. It's sort of like that moment in a Disneyland ride where you come to the end and the spell of, you know, it's a small world is broken and the ushers are like, as the ride comes to a complete stop, we say it's at the vehicle to your left. Like, it changes the tone of things completely.

It breaks the spell of the programming. Make sure your hands are free of the restraint as they pop up. Right. And Picard as came and sort of snaps to it too. Yeah. Like, it's a weird scene because it's this crazy tension between like a pretty great performance on Patrick Stewart's part and maybe the worst loaf we've ever seen. Yeah. That makes it tough. It's such distracting loaf. I mean, it's like, they made his lips like unbelievably wide.

It makes it looks like his mouth was like five and a half inches wide. Yeah, it kind of has joker mouth. Yeah. And it looks like there's some seams around his hairline too that don't look great. Yeah, Ogao has got her eyes on those seams.

She's like, he's got a headsip. I still got a front zip. What gives? Yeah, this is a great Ogawe episode. That's for sure. Yeah, Ogawe is in the mix. Chopping it up. To O'Brien's detriment though.

Haven't seen O'Brien in a while. Yeah. It's been a little bit out of the loop. So, came in as confronted with the awareness that he is, in fact, a card. And he's been living this life as presented by the probe. And he realizes that the probe eventually finds him. And that just sort of closes the loop on his thinking.

And his family get in like a ghost Jedi pose little tablo for him to remember them by. Uh-huh. And his family get in like a ghost Jedi pose little little tablo for him to remember them by. And he sort of gestures to them with an imaginary camera in his hand. Yeah, click. They they almost end this moment by saying cheese. Back on the bridge Picard wakes up and they sort of bring him to his feet. Beverly is like we got to get you the hell to sick bay. You've been on the bridge, Picard wakes up and they sort of bring him to his feet. Beverly is like, we got to get you the hell to sick bay. You've been on the ground for like 40 minutes. Picard seems amenable to this.

Yeah. Yeah, you can check me out there. Six bay seems like a good idea. What's your name again? Beverly? He's putting it together. He's back on the bridge. This life is real. He knows these people it together. He's back on the bridge. This life is real.

He knows these people. There's a relief to it. Like, he walks up to the turbo lift door and pauses for a moment. Like, he's really happy to be back. To the degree that he can show happiness or satisfaction in the moment. Right.

There's a subtle relief about being back. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, like, when you think about it, the bridge is like the set that we see in this episode that isn't his alternate reality life and there might be five total minutes of bridge stuff in this whole episode. Yeah. Like they really spend a lot of time on the planet. And yeah, like as far as a production schedule goes, like they probably banged out

the bridge portion of the episode in like a day. Yeah, it's quick. I mean, like, I don't even, like, I don't think Councillor Troyes even in this episode. Yeah, I don't know. Like it's like, yeah, like we'll get in like, you know, data, Wharf and Riker. We'll have Captain Picard lying on his back and Beverly and Nersel Gava can run in. Yeah, we'll get, we'll, you know, we'll shoot this out in half a day and then we'll head to Tau's and shoot the rest. I Understand why data does it, but it's got to be hard to do your duty on the bridge when the captain's just down He's down on the ground,

and you're at the con, for example, or you're at the engineering station in the back. It's freaky. Have you ever had a medical emergency happen to someone else while you were at work? I don't think so, but I mean, it happens on film sets, especially. Like, it's not, I've been very lucky to have that not happen. How about yourself? A person in the cubicle next to mine in my previous job had a seizure and like fell out of her chair onto the ground. And it was a shocking moment because there's that there is the 10 to 15 seconds

after it happens where that time just stops and then people just immediately jump into action and triage the situation. That's an amazing thing to behold. Like people just jump in and help. Like that just seems to be like a baseline human instinct. Right. That is awesome.

But then you're like, there's always that, yeah, okay, well, I've done everything I can do to help. So now I guess what? Yeah, and that's what I mean, but it's gotta be weird to work in that environment because like, all around around us people were still working Right because like we're like checking Facebook unless you can help what what do you do it? It would be weird to just stand and watch

So yeah, that was I was I couldn't help but think about that. All this watching this scene. Yeah, strange. I am a cute, disaball. There are four lights. I think the button on the episode is in Picard's quarters and he's like he's like hanging out, just kind of like putting his hands on all the different objects, re-quainting himself with the space

and Raker comes down and he's like, hey, we pulled that probe apart and there's a little present inside for you. Gives it to Picard and takes off. And Picard opens this like chagrin case and it's the flute that he has been playing the entire episode. And we get like, I think our closing moment is him like standing in the window looking at space playing the song that he learned on this

planet. It's a real nice moment. Yeah. Did you like this episode Ben? So it'd been? No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, Yeah, I don't think it's on my mountain, but I really like it. It's not on mine either. And I was watching this with the expectation that it would be. I mean, there's a lot to like about it, but it's, and one thing I really like about it is that it's a weird episode, you know. Yeah. I love when they get weird. I do too. Why don't you think it's good enough to make our mountains when it is on everyone else's? I don't know. We're just smarter and

more incisive, I guess. I think unfortunately, to me, the makeup takes me out of it. Yeah. The aging makeup was so distracting that I couldn't fully enjoy the story in a way that I know I had the first time when I watched the episode. Yeah. It's great, but it's different to call it your favorite and that is why it is not mine. I can dig that.

Hey Ben has a probe zapped us with any P1 messages? I believe a probe has in fact zapped us. Priority one message from Starfleet coming in on Secured Channel. Need a supplement on that. supplement on that. supplement on that. supplement. Yes, extra.

The interest alone could be enough to buy this ship. Hey Ben, our first priority one message is of a personal nature. It is from Reed. It is for Philip. And it goes like this. A good friend plays NBA Jam with you when you're down. A better friend accepts a seven game,

loser buys P1 message challenge. Ha ha ha ha. A better friend accepts a 7-game, loser buys P1 message challenge. But a great friend, Shoksun Game 7, and honors the deal. Dang! Thanks for funding my chance to finally hear Adam and Ben pronounce. Ankle-o-soar, correctly. That's what you think. Reed. Can't wait to hear it as ack-spritch.

See you at the Sean Kent Memorial Barstool. Ankle your sure. The word is pronounced... Ankle your sure. Ankle your... Ankle your sure. I don't build many of my real dolls with ankle your sure tails. It's just very cruel for you to send me word like this when it's well known I have several speech impediments.

It's cruel and unusual. It's not what a good friend does. I would play NBA Jam with you and turn around and mock my manner of speech. Everyone knows my favorite team and N.B.A.J. is the Phoenix Shunz. This G.A.D. or Super Shunx. That's where I was going to go. God damn it. Who's up next, Ben? We got a message from Ash and it is to Ridge, Nathan and Abby. And it goes like this.

Actually, hold on, before I read this very short message, I think it is time. We made our big announcement. That's right viewers. We have decided officially to continue the show to do deep space, nine and Voyager. I know this is weird to do in the middle of a P1, but I wanted to get that out there. Anyway, the message reads,

Hi Ridge, Nathan, Abbey and Friends. Well, that is, we've been hacked at them. Oh God. I was so confused. Let me, uh, let me open that message. I want to see how that was constructed. Yeah, there's a, uh, there's a dot, dot, dot, and then, and then, you know, I'm, uh, I'm an automaton.

I just read the words in front of me, you know. Oh, wow. Yeah. The message body was that verbatim. I mean, Adam, what do you think? I mean, it's been said on the show. Does that make it canon? The thing is, if we agree to this, think of what we'll be encouraging. We'll be encouraging P1 messages that make us do all kinds of things. So you're taking a, we can't negotiate with terrorists standpoint on this. I am. And it's not because I disagree with the message. It's because I disagree completely with how the message was given.

Oh, so you're saying you may have just cut those terrorists to 2 million telecheck whether or not they kidnapped me. Right. Because they kidnapped me. No check! Yeah. Uh, listen, uh, who are those people? Listen, Ash and Ridge and Nathan and Abby.

Uh, when there is an announcement to make, we will make that announcement. Listen, Ash and Ridge and Nathan and Abby. When there is an announcement to make, we will make that announcement. And not before, I'm not negotiating with you, Ash. I mean, you sound great in everything. I think it is safe to say, Adam, that the shows we do in the post-TNG world will be quite pleasing to our viewers.

But we don't want to lock ourselves into anything until we're actually doing them. Yeah, that's all. I think that's understandable for most people. Yeah. You don't wanna talk about the same contract while you're under contract. Ha ha ha. That's bad negotiation. Yeah. Well thanks to everybody who sent a priority

one message this week. If you'd like to send a message of the first priority, go to Maximumfund.org slash Jumbo Tron. It's a hundred bucks for personal message and 200 bucks for a commercial message. And it's a great way to support the show keep the lights on around here and Keep us doing this even when TNG is over whatever we decide to do after that point And whenever we decide to announce that yeah Hey, Ben. What's that, Adam? Did you find yourself a drunk Shimoda? I don't know. Drunk Shimoda!

I did. It's a bit of an abstract Shimoda. And we talked about how this, uh, this memorial probe is pretty, you know, poetic, illogic way of memorializing your species, but I think it's a terrible plan because it turns itself off. It's like a message that self-destructs. Like, what?

It's a one-time use probe. It should be a pes dispenser full of flutes and just fly around the galaxy, zapping people. Remember these guys, here's your flute. I'm off to the next ship. Like, especially because when Picard dies, the memory of these people dies. Yeah. Yeah. That's the thing that is bad about it. Sort of the perfect plan is if Picard had run into this probe and then been assimilated by the Borg, then you know for sure that these people's culture lives forever.

Yeah. It's sort of shitty that it didn't happen that way. Because yeah, the expiration on the people, like the people die with Picard. Yeah. And that's a heavy fucking responsibility, I think. Totally. How about yourself?

Did you have a drunk Shimoda? This episode Shimoda is the most like the OG Shimoda. Like Jim Shimoda, a man who didn't know what he was doing while jeopardizing everyone's life, is best embodied by the guy from the central government. You had a chance to stop their world from dying and just sort of doesn't take it for action. Like so many iselinier chips, he plays with their hopes.

Their hopes for a better world, their hopes for an atmospheric condenser and throws it all away. So central government guy is my drunk Shimoda. Do the government! Ooooooooh! Yeah. Darmak and Jalat and Tanaga.

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 spaceweirds. Pat Noswald.

Could I get a ball-rock 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.

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 do I? These giraffes do not smell good. No, they do not, and they've such short nacks. But I'm hearing we need to get on this. We've got to get on the art. It is about terrain.

It's about historic 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? Ona Ross & Kerry, available on MaximumFun.org. What do we have coming up on the next episode? The next episode of the show is season five, episode 26 times arrow, part one. After data learns of his own death in the late 19th century San Francisco, a freak accident

transports him back to that period. Do you remember this episode, Adam? This is the episode with bad head. Ha ha ha. Pretty much like it's 40 minutes of bad head, isn't it? Ha ha. I do remember this episode, Ben. I don't remember liking it.

No. I don't remember liking it either. Unfortunately, we are without vetoes for this one, so we're gonna have to watch it. But if we really hate it and we don't watch the next one, Vito's will be available. That's right, we've almost turned the corner into season six. Yeah, this is the last episode of season five. This is the big cliffhanger that gets you want to come back for more next year.

Well that's exciting. Almost as exciting as talking to us on the Twitter Ben. Yeah. Using the hashtag greatest gen. People chat us up all the time on there. We're also on our many Reddit pages. We got a Facebook group and a page. So many ways to talk about the show, Ben. Yeah, thanks to everybody that contributed during the Max Fun Drive. If you would like to contribute despite the fact that the drive is over, go to maximonefun.org

and click on Donate. Really helps keep the show going. And we should thank Derek Materia for our theme music. Adam Magusia for all the other music here on the program. With that, we'll be back at you next time with another great episode of Star Trek the next generation. There's an episode of the greatest generation that's just a really dumb time paradox that doesn't make a fucking lick of sense. Do you like snakes?

We got an episode of this full of snakes and head holes. Snakes and head holes. That's what sci-fi's about. I'm, yeah, we can finish this card bit in a sec, but I found a card in here that has jugged loose vague memory from my past and that is a card for captains yacht Are you familiar with this cap with this captain's yacht situation? Adam. Yeah, yeah, it's the little bottle cap that they stole on the Below the saucer section. So when I first rewatched TNG when it came out on Netflix several years ago, I was convinced that I had a memory from my childhood of an episode in which the captains yacht was

used, like they showed it undocking and doing something. And it's not in there, but the fact that this card exists makes me wonder if I had this card as a child and just imagined that. You imagine a lot of things as a child, then. I think that's probably the most benign of all of your youthful imaginations. What are you saying, Adam? That's saying anything at all. Just saying you had a very active imagination. Maximumfund.org. Comedy and culture.

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