Two Hundred A Day - Episode 47: Star Trek TNG - Ship in a Bottle

Episode Date: April 1, 2019

Welcome to Twenty Dollars a Day, the podcast where we explore our favorite fictional characters in the Star Trek: TNG universe! Nathan and Eppy discuss the second appearance of holographic Prof. Moriarty in S6E12 Ship in a Bottle. Data and Geordie are just trying to enjoy some simple Sherlock Holmes programs on the holodeck, but there's some kind of fluctuation - and when Reg Barkley takes a look, it allows Moriarty to escape the hell of being trapped in system memory. He quickly launches a plan to con the access codes to the Enterprise out of Captain Picard, bringing us into a fun con-counter-con story. Happy April, everyone! We're happy to take our second annual look at Star Trek holodeck episodes that follow on the themes of our first love, The Rockford FIles. Hope you enjoy it! Want more Rockford Files trivia, notes and ephemera? Check out the Two Hundred a Day Rockford Files Files! Support the podcast by subscribing at patreon.com/twohundredaday. Big thanks to our Gumshoe patrons! Check them out: Richard Hatem Victor DiSanto Jim Crocker - keep an eye out for Jim selling our games east of the Mississippi, and follow him on twitter @jimlikesgames Shane Liebling's Roll For Your Party dieroller app Kevin Lovecraft and the Wednesday Evening Podcast Allstars Mike Gillis and the Radio vs. The Martians Podcast And thank you to Dael Norwood, Dylan Winslow, Bill Anderson, and Dave P! Thanks to: fireside.fm for hosting us spoileralerts.org for the adding machine audio clip Freesound.org for the other audio clips Two Hundred a Day is a podcast by Nathan D. Paoletta and Epidiah Ravachol. We are exploring the intensely weird and interesting world of the 70s TV detective show The Rockford Files. Half celebration and half analysis, we break down episodes of the show and then analyze how and why they work as great pieces of narrative and character-building. In each episode of Two Hundred a Day, we watch an episode, recap and review it as fans of the show, and then tease out specific elements from that episode that hold lessons for writers, gamers and anyone else interested in making better narratives.

Welcome to $20 a Day, the podcast where we explore the various holodeck characters and episodes of the Star Trek universe. I'm Nathan Palletta. And I'm Epidiah Ravishaw. We are coming to you this time to talk about a Next Generation episode. Mm-hmm. Epi, which episode did we select this time we selected ship in a bottle from season 6 episode 12 so we we we don't cover these in order obviously yeah um and so this is a an informal sequel i suppose this is this is a sequel to a earlier episode, I think in season three, these are the two Sherlock Holmes episodes.

I think it's, uh, might even be season two. They, they say that it's been five years. And I think in Star Trek seasons, the years are years. I mean,

that's something we could certainly look up and be certain about, but let's not, let's not do that. That's not, we all know that we can go to, to memory to Memory Alpha to figure out all of the trivia. That's not what we're here for. You can do that on your own. We believe in you.

I will say this, and I should have said this up front. Spoilers in the title. That's true. I think that's something we should let our longtime listeners of 20 a day know ahead of time, because obviously they would be listening to our podcast before they watched one of these shows. Obviously. And they should maybe not pay attention to the title if they don't want to be a little bit spoiled about what's going on. Well, so this is an episode that really is hard to hard to remember how i reacted to it the first time i saw it yeah right because it's very much a oh there's a twist and once you

know the twist it's a little less i mean it's a fun episode but it's not like you know it doesn't have as impactful a reveal uh so it's kind of hard to put our put myself in those shoes um coming back to it that's kind of an interesting thing um this is a little bit of a digression but our listeners might might enjoy this uh recently uh emily and i re-watched um the lord of the rings trilogy and it occurred to me that when i first saw those films, I had so much of that in my system. Like I remember. Internalized story elements and characters. Yeah.

By the time the movies had come out, I'd read the books. I'd seen the animated films many times and like i think even before i saw the film those animated films or even read those books i saw frodo lives graffiti in the wild right right like it just it's such a part of the background culture of my life that uh it was impossible to watch those films and get the experience of lord of the rings from them like aragorn is never strider in those films for me right whereas when i first read it strider turns out to be aragorn he's mysterious and scary like at first and you're like unsure of his motives yeah and i think that that's the thing uh about re-watching this one, too. It definitely is like I do remember this episode being a feeling classic in my head. But again, like I knew the twists going into it, even if I didn't know exactly how they were going to be delivered.

Right. Yeah. I don't remember the details, but. But I do remember like the the general gist of it. So I'm like, yeah. So, yeah. So I guess which is to say, if your interest is piqued and somehow you have not seen this episode, get yourself to Netflix and do yourself a favor. If you haven't seen the first one, I would say go ahead and just watch both Sherlock episodes. So these are the ones where Data is obsessed with sherlock holmes and has a holodeck program where he gets to be sherlock

and jordy gets to be watson and uh you know hijinks ensue and just so you know if you watch this episode if you watch both of them and you've never seen any of them before you should know that um beverly crusher dr beverly crusher is a different character from the doctor in the previous episode uh right because that was season season uh the pelaski season right yes yes as per usual we're fans of this episode um and we're excited to talk about all the holodeck hijinks as that is indeed the the center of our show here um ship in a bottle was written by renee ecuveria i believe that's how you pronounce his name who is a longtime tng and ds9 writer um he was also producer on ds9 and other shows after that and this one's directed by alexander singer who is a long time again kind of iconic uh star

trek director uh 22 episodes between next generation ds9 and voyager one of those were when the credits come up i'm like oh i recognize those names which is not always always uh the case uh some fun trivia about alexander singer his directing career started all the way back in the 60s and he was a fan of the original series, but never got to work on it. It just never worked out. And so when it came back around for him to work on TNG, apparently it was

kind of a long-deferred dream come true in a way. His body of work includes a bunch of the Fugitive, a bunch of the Monkeys, Mission Impossible, a couple MacGyver episodes, and one episode of an obscure but gem of a show, The Rockford Files. Oh, I've heard of The Rockford Files. He directed an episode called Forced Retirement, which is an episode that has perhaps been discussed on another podcast but was lost time oh sidebar uh that is our lost episode oh with the submarine yes maybe someday someone will take another look at forced retirement

with these fresh eyes the one of the reasons that there was such a gap between these two episodes because they did want to go back to the Sherlock character again. Apparently the Doyle estate that licenses you know Sherlock Holmes stuff was mad at Paramount. Everyone assumed

that it was because of that episode. It's a little unclear from the entry on Memory Alpha, but when someone went back to them and was like, no, seriously, can we work this out? They were mad about the young Sherlock Holmes film, which was a Paramount production. Oh.

But not particularly about Star Trek in particular, so they worked it out. But no one actually asked them for a number of years because they were just like, they don't like Paramount, so we're not going to be able to work with them. It's just so awkward. It's just, I don't know. So yet again, just ask.

When in doubt, just clearly ask for what you want. Like many TV plots that could be solved, just go to the person and say what you need and have a conversation like an adult well that that's interesting because then that that uh little social awkwardness is cause for years of torment and a huge ethical dilemma uh for uh the universe of star trek so maybe we should yeah let's when we examine that, we can get into the different layers there. 200 a Day is supported by all of our listeners, but especially

our patrons at patreon.com slash 200 a Day. Patrons get to add to the 200 a Day Rockford Files files, help us pick which episodes to cover, and more. Each episode, we extend a special thanks to our gumshoe-level patrons. This time, we say thank you to Jim Crocker.

In addition to supporting the show, he also sells our games at cons east of the Mississippi on behalf of Indie Press Revolution. Follow along on Twitter at IPR Tweets. Shane Lievlin, if you play games online, you should check out his free dice-rolling app, Roll4YourParty at Roll4Your.Party.

Mike Gillis, host of the Radio vs. the Martians podcast, the McLaughlin group for nerds. They remain at RadioVsTheMartians.com. Kevin Lovecraft, part of the Wednesday Evening Podcast All-Stars Actual Play podcast, found at MisdirectedMark.com. Dylan Winslow, Dale Norwood, Bill Anderson, and Dave P. And finally, big thanks to Victor DeSanto and to Richard Haddam, who you can find on Twitter at Richard Haddam. Check out patreon.com slash 200 today and see if you want to be our newest gumshoe. Well, speaking of different layers, Epi, can you tell us about our cold open,

the traditional scene before the credits as we get into our episode of star trek so uh we get uh two of my favorite actors data and jordy playing out the roles of uh sherlock and watson and uh data very capably uh does a sherlock probably because in our popular culture of how Sherlock should behave, it's very similar to how data behaves, right? Just last night in preparation for this, I watched one of the Jeremy Brett Sherlock Holmes. I don't know if you've seen those. They're great. What era are those from?

I want to say like 90s. Oh okay uh bbc i think okay yeah i don't think i've seen those uh no i'm sorry they're from 84 by itv granada which is a television company in england so that makes people think that they're the bbc apologies to our british listeners we don't understand your your your culture but they're the BBC. Apologies to our British listeners. We don't understand your culture. But they're great. And this character is like a ruder Data. I mean, that's just it.

The difference between Data and Sherlock is politeness. Like Data is much more polite than Sherlock is. But Data gets to drop that politeness as he interrogates our, let's say, murderer. Our mustachioed, probably murderer. Well, I'm looking at the IMDB and there's a character, somebody credited it as Gentleman. That's probably this character. And when I say somebody, I shouldn't say somebody. I should say Clement von Frankenstein is the name of the actor, which is kind of amazing. That's a hell of a name.

His name is Clement George von und zu Frankenstein. I'm murdering that. Who is the son of George von und zu Frankenstein? Huh. They're Austrian. I do believe this is the guy. So anyways, Frankenstein. Huh. They're Austrian. Uh, I do believe this is the guy. So anyways, Frankenstein.

So we have a Frankenstein in this episode. So that's pretty excellent. Uh, surprising. I had not remembered that. Um, we, we get to see the,

the fun bit of, you know, Star Trek, uh, characters hamming it up. Yeah. Geordi's putting on a weird half accent, like someone who's not good at putting on accents.

So, which I always appreciate. It's lovely that the clue is the handedness of the murderer or whatever, which is always a thing, right? Like when you, it's, it's a classic murder mystery,

like, but the murderer was left-handed. And that is in fact, the gotcha here yeah and then the gag is that data tosses uh something to him and he catches it in his right hand yes and geordie's like wait a second he caught it in his right hand something must be wrong with the program we swiftly get back to our star trek universe um as there's the this this program must be faulty which is a legitimate a legitimate conclusion from that because you would expect a piece of fiction such as a holodeck program to adhere to the tropes of that fiction which is if you're right-handed you only ever use your right hand for everything and if you're left-handed you only ever like i'm not left-handed i can catch things

with my left hand and i have done so casually humblebrag obviously i i'm an x-man but that aside like it's always like one of those things in murder mysteries that I find a little that's not evidence. That's that's the conceit of the holodeck. Right. Is that it's you are you're participating in a pre-programmed narrative. And it's kind of it's one of those things we're now, you know, in 2019 where we have a lot more infrastructure for doing things where you're participating in a pre-planned narrative. Right. Like, yes, many games many games interactive fiction that kind of stuff the the bounds of that i think are still an interesting space that star trek explored where it's like the store how things are supposed to go is still set this guy's supposed to catch it with his left hand yeah exactly and everyone

participating knows that that's where this is going, but they all have freedom to do things differently to get to that end. But then, like, some people try to push the bounds and some people just want to play the character that's been, like, written. And that's always an interesting difference to me. I thought way too much about how holodeck interactive programs must work. holodeck interactive programs must work no uh not at all because this is precisely the sort of topic that we should be examining on our uh we should we should have a podcast about that so in this case because they know what's supposed to happen this clearly is an anomaly this is not a case of the parameters of free expression of the holodeck character right so they know that something's wrong they end the program and ask uh one of the uh later editions and always appreciate to see on

the screen characters reg barkley to get on the case that adorable creep um i shouldn't say but one thing i do want to say before we get to Reg I thought at this moment because again it's been a while and I mixed it up I think a little bit with the earlier Sherlock Holmes episode so in my head I thought we were going to go to that part where

data is just following the script I thought it was going to be this reveal that no data you need to actually engage with what's happening here and not just, you know, because doesn't he in the first one? Yeah. So in the first one. So there's some there's some dialogue that kind of fills in sketches in the last important points. The last one. Yeah. The essential plot of that is that they build this Sherlock Holmes uh simulator Data wants to be Sherlock Holmes but he's so observant and so good at putting clues together that as soon as anything happens he's like that man is running in that direction that means that

he's the murderer and yes he's like but we didn't do the thing. And Data says, but I solved the case. Isn't that the point? And Geordi's like, no, the point is to go through the journey of the narrative leading to this whole, we need a program that can outsmart Data, which creates this construct of Moriarty, who somehow is imbued with enough free will to, in fact, the program as as you go yeah which again i think in terms of gaming gets to an interesting there's an interesting uh uh parallel there of um you know what are your priorities when you are engaging with this uh with this predetermined set of potential outcomes yes like are you are you the character who is just trying to solve the mystery as soon as possible so they can get on with their lives? Or are you the audience that is enjoying the fact that the character can't get on with their life? For instance, if you were playing a game where you played like a seventies detective who just needs some money to make ends

meet, uh, would you revel in the fact that, uh uh he keeps getting frustrated at every step of the way to make that money or would you just or would you just go become a truck driver like your dad because that's exactly exactly uh i don't know who can say who can say well uh our friend reg uh he's he's a holodeck expert, as we know. He was introduced through being obsessed with holodeck programs and constructing his own realities there because he wasn't good at interacting with real people. So he's checking out these anomalous programs, but the only one that's reading as anomalous is one that's in protected memory. So he runs that program and Professor Moriarty himself appears on the holodeck with, I'll add, ominous music. Yes.

And so we get just a little bit of exposition explanation here for those of us who have not seen that second season episode. Again, during broadcast, right? Like you're not expecting everyone who sees this to have seen that one i don't i don't even think there is at that time a culture of buying up the i want to say dvds but it could be vhs it's 93 so okay vhs's yeah laser discs um so the deal here uh reg doesn't know that this all happened because he didn't join the crew until after it. But Moriarty, he became self-aware in that program when the computer was instructed to create an opponent who could outsmart data. And then Captain Picard ended up promising him that they would figure out a way to get him off the holodeck as he is a self-aware

being and he is frustrated with the fact that he's trapped in this in this place so they store them in memory while he was going to figure it out but a nothing's been figured out and b he apparently was aware of the passage of time while stored in memory which is terrifying it's it's also like it's a really good dodge of the turing test i mean i don't remember in the first episode if they actually didn't go through anything to really legitimately say that this person has self-awareness and isn't just programmed to mention things to make them appear self-aware right? Like we're in a very dangerous spot with the holodeck because we have very complex AI going.

If you go into like Voyager, like the doctor in Voyager is a complete character. People don't know how these characters, like some of the characters are definitely of that non-player character status that have just run through the routines over and over again, but some of them a little bit more. And so the question is, and this is not a question asked by the episode. This is a question that I ask when I see the episode.

Is Moriarty real? Is it that or a really clever fourth wall breaking holodeck program? or a really clever fourth wall breaking holodeck program. So I think that the previous episode, I feel like takes it as read that the interaction that creates Moriarty is one that nobody anticipated. Right. Since he was created without anyone actually programming him, the fact that he knows that he's a hologram

indicates some amount of true self-awareness. But we have seen holograms discover that they're holograms. Listeners, if you listen to one of our previous 20 a day episodes, there's definitely that horrifying realization is dawned on other holograms that aren't given this sort of well in that case yeah they are they're explained they are given an explanation by our human characters yeah and then they choose to believe it i guess uh i don't know i think the only way that any that any of the interesting questions that are embedded in this episode are interesting, as if Moriarty is a self-aware construct. Absolutely.

And I guess going back to my original point is having that moment where Moriarty describes this sort of horrific emptiness of not existing completely dodges question then it it lets us as the audience just go straight to the answer that he is real because it is such a real and human fear that's hard to comprehend at no point do we go wait is he just programmed to talk about this horrifying non-existence right no the way that everyone reacts to this is yeah like this is some bizarre anomaly that no one expected his self-reported experiences we will take them as read that that is what happened how what he experienced well he wants to he wants to talk to picard he thinks it'll be appropriate to do it in the baker street uh parlor um reg uh stores him in memory and he dissolves but then after reg leaves the holodeck,

he rematerializes under his own power. Dun, dun, dun. Which, again, should not be possible. Right. We have our intro credits and come back into our captain's log that gives us

the slight pressure that is going to apply to this episode. The enterprise is observing a unique celestial event of two colliding gas giants. It is going to happen in about 17 hours and they're there to observe this unique astrological phenomena. Those of us who have watched the show before are like, all right,

they got 17 hours before something bad happens. Yeah, exactly. This is ostensibly the just kind of science stuff that the Enterprise does all the time when we're not watching an episode or whatever. It's also phenomena. Yeah. So we kick off our story with Picard, Reg and Lieutenant Data meeting Moriarty as stipulated in the Baker Street set parlor, if you will. And of course, everyone is mystified at how this why he was conscious at all.

Right. While he was in memory. So Moriarty was like, I was promised that I would be something would happen and nothing has happened. You lied to me. But then Picard actually has a very, think fairly convincing like no we have been we tried to do stuff we just couldn't figure it out right like we still don't know how you became self-aware we still uh don't think it's possible for you to leave the holodeck we sent all of our data to starfleet they also have not come up with an answer this is the kind of thing that might take a long time and it's like oh yeah in the background uh yeah picard did try to do the thing that he said that he would do i'm feeling a

lot of empathy for moriarty that won't always be the case in this episode but right now it's uh like definitely and this is one of those things where the enterprise greatly, what am I trying to say here? I'm saying that having Captain Jean-Luc Picard really lets you say those things and get away with it. Right, and believe that that happened. There are other times where they would have gone more to bat for something. Like if he was a giant crystalline space entity or something like that there would have been another way that they would uh so it's having the sort of comforting charm of picard say adults are working on it you you do definitely go oh thank god the adults are working on it but he does express dismay at the idea that

moriarty was aware that kind of changes the temperature a little bit of their interaction moriarty he does not he cannot bear to live in this world of illusions he has to you know since since nothing has been done now is the time they need to figure out a way to get him off the holodeck. And Picard demonstrates that things can't exist off the holodeck by tossing a book out of the arch and it dissolves. Yes. I thought of in our previous episode when Redblock walks out of the arch and dissolves. It's like, see, that's what happens. But Moriarty, his consciousness is strong.

He knows that he's real. He thinks, therefore he is. And he walks out of the arch unimpeded and somehow manages to transition into the physical world, contradicting everything that they know about holodeck physics. moment of being like oh where is this going right because like every single holodeck thing up to this point in the show has included this premise that holodeck stuff can't exist off the holodeck and it says things elsewise like for instance when they earlier in this episode when they walked off the holodeck they were still in costume so that implies that they have gone and made their costumes, which is fun. Lots of fun things. One of the things I like about this moment when Moriarty walks off the holodeck is Data calling the cops right away.

Yeah, he's like, security! And Moriarty says that he recognizes a policeman no matter what century. Of course, he gets a scan from Dr crusher uh scans his human he has dna and biology and seems to be real and everyone is kind of like we have no idea how this happened i guess we'll go forward from here he wants to explore this new world uh oh yeah picard shows him to tend forward and explains about how they're not on a ship on the water uh which has been kind of the what they've been using the language of this whole time right to keep in period but they're in among the stars muriarty has a nice little soliloquy about being a man out of time being all alone and thus feeling the need for some kind of companionship in this uh sojourn

that he's facing um and so he brings up the crux of the conflict of this episode, his great love, the Countess Regina Bartholomew, who was created to be the one that he loves. How can they make her real to join him in this brave new world? Yeah, call back to Clement'sment's fictional relative like make me a bride dr frankenstein and you can see the fear the trepidation they have about this they're like well hold up once this comes up the card's like i mean he literally has a line about uh the moral and ethical implications yeah under everything we, you are a life form.

Are we supposed to just create new life forms whenever we want? Like, this is a more complicated situation. Yes. And so, of course, they have a staff meeting to discuss it in the grand tradition of Star Trek. We'll have the scene so that all the actors will have a line in this episode. Yes. They basically have a consensus that they just actors will have a line in this episode yes they they basically have a

consensus that they just don't have enough information to take any kind of action they don't know how he exists they don't know if it can be replicated for another character this this is actually probably one of the single most accurate representations of a meeting on film except that it only takes about 20 seconds. Right, yeah, yeah. In the future, we still have useless meetings, but we managed to reduce them down to their core essence. Let's not do anything.

All right, agreed. Moriarty, of course, does not accept this delay. Picard wants to know what the rush is, which I think is reflecting my feeling as an audience member. There must be something else going on here because it feels very like, I demand this right now. It's very important. We did not hear about this until a scene ago. Yeah, it's almost like a manufactured rush.

If you were to try to impose on someone, say you're a 1970s detective, right? And you walk into an office and you need to get some information from a secretary. You could say, I am a insurance assessor and that this information I should have. But wouldn't that work out better if you could say, I'm already two hours late to getting this back to my boss. I'm in so much trouble. Can you just do me a favor? Right. I'd really appreciate it if you could just help me out with this piece of information that isn't really that important. Exactly. Don't pay attention to what this is. Just feel this pressure. Now, I'm not saying that this pressure is that well crafted i mean that was

masterfully crafted and this is maybe uh but still in the context of the whole arc of the episode this is to get our story our actual conflict going because when you get right down to it this is actually his motivation right right this is not a fake motivation this is what he wants so i think it's more just the the way that our first act is paced in order to get us to conflict is a little it's like okay we need to get going like we got all the premise set now we have to like get the story going maybe it could have been handled a slightly smoother way perhaps but it's fine yeah moriarty's explanation is it's not just that he loves her he adores her they were literally made for each other right uh

as as these programs but picard seems to take take the edge off by saying because they don't know how this all worked they don't want to risk harming her by trying to do something that would like i don't know delete her program or something right like yeah give them some time to figure it out moriarty seems to buy that it seems legitimate and probably would seem legitimate to Moriarty as a person that uses a computer on a daily basis that has like a redo button that plays video games that things get saved and you can go back and all that. It definitely fits in that realm of what is it about Star trek computers why do they why do they behave so much like reality yeah uh which we might have the answer to at the end of this

episode but go on uh picard is called to the bridge uh as they are in a prime position to observe the impending collision of these gas giants. But what is this? Worf cannot launch the probes. Command functions are being rerouted. They won't respond to Picard's voice command. Who's transferred the voice authorization? Can I just say. So I have a rant that I've written in my notes here.

That is not a legitimate. As this episode goes on. It turns out that there was no need for this rant but i would like to share this rant and it's not much of a rant actually what it is is a plea what i would love from paramount wait paramount still exists right or is it now owned by cbs or something like that probably whoever owns star trek all I would like is just a show about the cybersecurity team. And how bad they are at their jobs. The most inept crew members

that don't deal with anything spend their whole time just playing around in the holodeck. I would love that. I would love that. Just to kind of show us that like in the far future, they're really good at a lot of things.

Cybersecurity is absolutely not one of them. A level of security on this flagship starship of this galactic federation going on all these adventures is in space alone a lot, out of the reach of any kind of help help but has fewer security features for its command functions than my iphone no that's absolutely it it's like living on a farm with nobody for acres around and and having a password on your wi-fi because you don't want anyone to steal it and then having that password written out in like magnets on your fridge so that anybody in the house could read it. And it just, yeah.

You know, obviously this is a trope that, that extends through many Star Trek episodes of like the command functions, whatever. Yeah. Ironically, while your, while your rant is,

is correct in the broad application, it does not apply here. It in fact does not apply here as we will discover. But for now, Moriarty appears. He's afraid that he's had no choice but to take control of the vessel because he doesn't think that Picard is taking him seriously and giving him what he wants. We get the update. It's only five hours until this collision.

So if they don't move the ship in five hours, they're going to be destroyed by these colliding planets that are going to turn into a star, which sounds awesome, by the way. But Moriarty does not want to live without the Countess. He has nothing to lose. I don't have a life anyway, so give me what I want. This is one of those things that feels legitimate, not so much that he has nothing to lose, but that here is a moment when Moriarty has pressure. He says much earlier in the episode, when he talks about the previous, what happened in the previous episode, he says, he mentions his hostage.

Right. Who is Dr. Pulaski. I don't remember exactly how he words it, but like, when I have the hostage or, yeah, but anyways. Yeah, he mentions having the hostage and that he shouldn't have given up the hostage because he thought that Picard would hold up his end of the bargain, but he didn't. And here, he now has an entire ship to hold hostage. So even if he actually does have something to lose, he has leverage at this very moment that he wouldn't have and on a much deeper level as we get to the end he in fact does have hostages right which we'll

go into in a little while i guess but yes this is also like oh right this guy's a bad guy yes like there's some language earlier where picard's like illegal activity is even more frowned upon now than it was in your time. Yes. He's like, I only did crimes because I was written that way. Yeah. I wouldn't actually do crimes. The Jessica Rabbit defense. It turns out he is, in fact, still going to do crimes.

Yes. idea of like this uh self-aware hologram made flesh is also is now complicated by like oh right and he's he's a baddie and he wants to do bad things so there is actually some conflict here um data jordy and uh barkley discuss discuss some transporter options introducing this idea that because the transporter and the holodeck operate on similar principles of matter energy transference maybe they can figure something out there not at all magic not magic at all right yeah and uh of course uh picard would uh would like jordy to uh you know figure out how i can get control of this ship back as you're doing all this stuff, also, let's get it back. Reg goes to the holodeck to deliver the pattern enhancers, the lovely devices

that make it easier to transport things. We've seen them before. We see them in many contexts, often to punch through some kind of interference. Yes. And here we get our first introduction to the countess regina in full dress big hat regalia she says that james uh moriarty has explained the real world to her she knows you know she knows that she's a hologram uh but that doesn't mean that she is going to be stuck on the holodeck. She's excited for this next grand adventure in her life. Her attitude is great.

Like she's like, yeah, I'm a hologram. Also, everything I've experienced is legitimate. So like I'm just going to keep going with that. But also I understand there's a new reality and we'll go with that as well. Yeah, it's like I went on safari when I was 19. Yeah. Wore trousers the entire time thank you very much and now i'm excited to go explore the stars with my great love james

moriarty this show does a great job of taking the audience and shifting them in and out of sympathies with uh moriarty and his plans right because she does she brings you back like there's that moment where you're like oh moriarty is the bad guy and then you're like but but she seems so excited yeah like these these people are real people shouldn't they be allowed to exist right like you can't make that decision uh they try this uh beaming gambit with a chair which does beam off the holodeck but does not materialize on the transporter pad um data asks for the transport logs but they're not available it's just blinking uh not available on his console he announces uh to to reg and to us it's almost as if our attempt to transport the chair never occurred yes and this this uh having seen the episode before seems like the super obvious

clue of what's going on but i don't know i don't know if it was when i think it is a tip again trying to put myself in the first time viewer mode this kind of thing i think is a nod towards start paying attention because something weird is going on right because this kind of thing this this idea that that it just didn't happen that there's no record of it that's a very does not happen in star trek kind of thing uh they delete stuff all the time but they usually know that it's deleted again we're we're kind of dancing around the reality of the reality within the reality here but uh we've seen transporters not have here. But we've seen transporters not have no record, but we've seen transporters behave a little bit like how this transporter does,

where something kind of shows up and then disappears or whatever. And there's something comforting about that, that all of these centuries later, with this amazing transportation technology, it's still like trying to start a car on a cold winter day like it just that no matter what we're still stuck with with that human failing and those those frustrating moments where you're like god damn it just work we don't really see that see this in this episode but it's the whole like how can these spaceships and uh space stations and stuff possibly operate with the amount of physical hand tool labor that apparently is necessary to fix anything like like everything's either a touchpad interface that is

that magically does things or you have to like take apart an entire engine with a one socket wrench there's no in between the the only robots they have is a humanoid android that is like this brilliant, you know, there's no maintenance. There's no Roomba. There's no anything. It's to give engineer characters a role in the show, right? Yeah. And I love that. It's fun to watch, but it's one of the conceits of the show that just amuses me every time.

Yes. Back in engineering, Jordy and Picard are attempting to reinitialize his command codes. And importantly, Picard gives his command codes. And some for some reason, it just doesn't work. Nothing reinitializes. The moment he gives his command codes, I have that sinking feeling like that. Oh, no. initializes the moment he gives his command codes i i have that sinking feeling like that oh no i'm pretty sure when i first saw it that was the like because i don't know why i would still have those feelings but that was like no no no wait data appears and tosses something to jordy and

he catches it in his left hand jordy is not left-. Yes. He pulls Picard aside and he has made a deduction. This whole thing is still happening on the holodeck. They never left. Epi, I need a quick break. I'm going to grab a taco. You tell our wonderful listeners all the places that they can find you and your work on the information superhighway. I'll be right back. One way to find me is to go to twitter.com and search for at Epidiah, E-P-I-D-I-A-H. I'm usually responsive there. Otherwise, you can go to worldswithoutmaster.com where you can find my sword and sorcery fiction

and role-playing games. And if you like role-playing games, maybe you want to check out digathousandholes.com where I publish all my other role-playing games, maybe you want to check out digathousandholes.com, where I publish all my other role-playing games. Oh no, I dropped my calculator. Nathan, while I go pick up a spare, why don't you tell the good folks where they can find you on the internet? In addition to this podcast, I also design and publish role-playing games, including the Worldwide Wrestling Pro Wrestling role-playing game, among many others. You can find links to all of my games and other projects at

ndpdesign.com. And of course, you can find me on twitter.com at ndpayoleta. Looks like you're back. You ready to continue the arithmetic analysis for this episode there, Eppie? I'm back. I have my DM-42 with me, and I'm ready to dig down into Rockford's books again. All right, well, I'm done with this delicious avocado taco. Well, let's get back to the show then. Because they tried something with the transporter

that has never been attempted, there was no way for the computer to reconstruct a log for it in the program, hence no data available. Jordi's left-handedness is the same glitch that was happening in the very beginning and then data just throws something at the warp core and we get the little like glitched uh view of the holodeck grid appearing before it re-establishes itself um We've discovered what is happening. We, as podcasters, can now talk about the actual reality of what's been going on in this show.

But before we do, like, so, okay, I think it's this communicator that Data takes off and throws at the warp core or something like that. And then Picard, I mean, I don't think this is what happened, but this is what it looked like to me when I was watching it. I mean, I don't think this is what happened, but this is what it looked like to me when I was watching it. Picard contacts Riker and asks Riker to report where Picard is. And Riker says, you're in engineering. And Picard goes, well, that settles it. If that were really Riker, he'd say I was in Holodeck 3. But that is, when I watched it, I was like, that is such circular conspiracy theory logic. That proves I'm in Holodeck three because he said I wasn't.

And of course, the only time they would say that I'm not in holodeck three is if I was in holodeck three and they're trying to confuse me. Obviously, throwing the thing at the work or like data had already proven that they were in a holodeck. It's just another piece of evidence. It proves that Riker is they're not in communication with actual Riker. Right. Yeah. But at the time, it just felt like all the yarns pinned to a bulletin board full of all the notes. We're still in the simulation. So who's real? Well, Data, Picard, and Barkley, because they're the ones that went in together in the first place.

And ever since Moriarty, quote, stepped outside, that has all been on the holodeck. Yes. since Moriarty, quote, stepped outside, that has all been on the holodeck. And Picard realizes that he just gave the fake computer his real command codes. Yeah. Which may be giving Moriarty the ability to actually take over the ship, not fake take over the ship. And this planetary collision's in three hours now, so we still need to find out a way to give him what he wants let's just take a moment and uh lavish some praise on moriarty and this con this is a hell of a con this is a good con there there

a bunch of things i do really enjoy about this episode but this con uh to get this passcode which is like we've mentioned it, the worst kind of security, cybersecurity ever. It's just like a uttered passcode that anyone can either listen to or tape record or, you know, whatever. Like it just it's not even double authentication. It's not like then you get a text that you have with a six digit code that you. If Starfleet had figured out two factor authentication, then two thirds of the plots of these shows would never have happened. that you have with a six digit code that you if starfleet had figured out two-factor authentication then two-thirds of the plots of these shows would never have happened but okay that aside the con to get these codes is great and elaborate and worthy of moriarty right like i definitely

am sold on that i mean i'm sure someone watching it was like oh i bet they're still on the holodeck but like i think generally to the to the average viewer watching this this is a reveal and you've been in those same shoes of being like you know wow how are they going to get out of this one oh they've been in the simulation the whole time right it's like we already got you too wasn't just the characters in the show yes you bought into the con as well i think it goes to like a commercial here, right? When we come back, we have an exterior shot of the Enterprise. And I wish I had picked up on this. I read this on the internet, so I can't say that I was this smart. You can't take credit.

But I think it's worth pointing out. So often how they transition between scenes is just an establishing shot of the Enterprise from the outside, right? And then here, they did not do one of those from when the simulation started to now oh this is the first one we're way outside the ship and this is something that they apparently generally would do with all these like you're in a simulation or you're in your own mind or someone is fooling you to think that you're in a place you're not one tell for as a as a visual structure for a lot of these shows yeah and it's one of those things where like i would not have noticed it but since it was called out i really appreciated it oh uh i'm sorry i just realized

looking at my notes that i have another thing about that con that i wanted to say the basis of the con that that moriarty steps outside the holodeck is something that none of them can believe except that they're aboard a starship that encounters wondrous things all the time right yeah well i guess this is new it's like this isn't physically possible or theoretically possible but it happened and we've seen lots of weird out here and i think that that's that's great i love that it's part of the like fundamentally optimistic nature of the show when presented with anything that defies belief generally they'll start by believing it yeah they'll eventually you know either figure it out

or realize that they're being tricked or whatever but there's always that initial optimism of like i don't believe it but how incredible that it happened so you you know they have these episodes that are in the holodeck or in someone's mind or something happened frequently enough that they have a technique for filming them right like and to have a crew not jaded by that because like at some point if i were on that crew like anything could be happening like this isn't happening there's no way i've been uh uh doing a whole a whole ds9 rewatch and uh you know every so often do some some tweeting of some thoughts as one does um and there was one of those episodes on d uh in ds9 that was a a similar you know someone got trapped in a simulation or whatever yeah you think at some point starfleet would just issue a checklist to like all like command officers

at least of like something weird has happened are there strange energy being beings that you've never encountered before was there a pulse of some kind of a pulse or beam of some kind that recently happened? Yes. Is someone on the holodeck? Is anyone using holodeck technology? Are there any species that you've never encountered before in the vicinity? Is there a virus or bacteria? You know, like, just go down this checklist of like all the things. At some point, you think there'd be down yeah this checklist of like all the things at some point you think there'd be at least a framework for like something weird happened let's eliminate all the basics before we like go into like yeah this is something new but uh on that show it has a slightly

more uh uh has a tone that is associated more with character interactions and less with like big ideas yeah and then so but for the big idea show i think the the optimism is it's still refreshing uh yes all these years later um so now we were outside moriarty's world uh reicher is on the bridge talking to moriarty on the view screen who has now taken control of the ship since he got the cards command codes but he still wants what he wants which is to get off the holodeck and be with uh the countess um and so he tells the real crew about the this transporter idea he has nothing to lose he demonstrates that he can just turn off the safeties on the warp core or whatever uh he can destroy the ship at will so do what he wants or he will and i would just at this moment like to thank the writers for uh letting me off the hook from pondering the moral failings

of starfleet of keeping this brand new life form trapped inside of a holodeck for five years because at this point now i'm like right he is really a bad guy that's fine all right we're good uh back on the holodeck picard goes to baker street and uh has his first meeting with the countess they have some great little repartee including the line i can see that you are a woman not only of reading but of wit and sagacity there's some good sat vocab words in this uh little exchange uh and he turns on the charm regina uh defends morgarity says he's not a villain he was just again he's just written that way but he's a passionate man who knows what he wants and you know and she does want to be with him out in this wonderful world that they can explore together.

Picard, so this little gambit here, right, is that we have an idea, but you wouldn't want to hear about it. And she's like, what, you don't think I can understand these things that you men talk about? So he gives her this technobabble explanation of how they think they can address the transporters. If he does not get control back of the ship, he has no reason to do this modification because we're all going to die anyway. This modification being uncoupling the Heisenberg compensators. I think that our audience members would like to know that in case they come into a situation

where they need to con somebody with Technobabble. Oh, those Heisenberg compensators. We get an intensifying the danger scene they're getting closer the gravity well is increasing and there's force fields blocking access to the holodeck so the security guys cannot uh get in which is accompanied by a great visual of a guy just poking in the air with a pen and with a little like force field like it's like directly at the camera it's very funny that's that's a guy who's like there's a force field there i don't all right i gotta do

this just to say that i've tested it let's just get it done let's just just in case it like doesn't exist over in this area nope it's there too yep back on the holodeck the the countess tells moriarty about this. He says that they should uncouple the Heisenberg compensators. That's what he said they think they can do. And I was like, aha, Picard, you sly devil. Yes. Moriarty says that, well, he has them running around like rats in a maze,

and he will take care of this. So he calls Riker, who's starting to fret, as there's only 25 minutes left before this collision. I want to talk to you about uncoupling the Heisenberg compensators. At this point, I knew that this is a counter-con, right? Yeah. This is Picard's maneuver to, you know, solve this problem. I can take a guess at the counter-con because they got Barkley with them, right? Because why have Barkley if you don't want to use his one superpower? this problem i could take a guess at the counter con because they got barkley with them right because

why have barkley if you if you don't want to use his one superpower but um there was a moment where because heisenberg uh famously the heisenberg uh um uncertainty principle right uh right like i'm going through that trying to think right that's a very specific name that they say over and over. And it's like, OK, is this a code? Is he trying to send a code to Riker or is this, as it turns out, maybe not Riker? At this point, that's what I'm trying to suss out. Is this a secret code that he's sending to Riker that a character written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle? It wouldn't have the cultural reference, but that Riker definitely would.

Or if not Riker, Geordi. So my read on this is that it's literally just something he made up. And the code is just such that Riker knows that that's not a real thing. Though, actually, that call, that's a question. Is he talking to Riker? We'll get back to that in a second. Yes. Moriarty promises the Countess that she'll want for nothing. Everything is ready. They've agreed to do what he

wants, and we have this triumphant beaming of them onto a transporter pad. All he wants is a shuttlecraft, and then he'll release the command codes back to the card they beam off the holodeck so reicher is now the one he's in charge um and he sets them up with the shuttlecraft and they take off and there's this nice i i like this little scene a lot we have a moment where they're like overwhelmed by the beauty of being in the stars yes which is yes very

charming this is so beautiful indeed my dear it is a wondrous sight the first of many we are sure to encounter in our travels and uh they say that they'll go back to earth someday but there's this you, clearly this attitude of like, now the grand adventure begins. It's a very humanizing moment. I really like the character of the Countess. When Moriarty says that you'll never want, he's specifically referring to her leaving her books behind.

And it's great in the context of a holodeck episode, because it's the same technology, right? Like it's, it's fiction that takes you away from your reality. That's what she's doesn't want to leave behind, even though she's about to step out into the widest of the universes, you know, and I think that that's a great touch and she's never afraid she's not saying i won't go along because of this she's just lamenting leaving them behind she's so genuinely on board yeah and but also down to earth like yeah literally like saying i'd like to return to earth at some point but like uh yeah they're very legitimate like. Like, they feel very real. So we go from that and Moriarty's grand triumph back to the shuttle bay where Picard strolls on and tells the computer to discontinue the simulation.

Dun, dun, dun. So this transporter deemed them into a holodeck inside the holodeck? Yes. transporter beamed them into into a holodeck inside the holodeck yes this is where the logic starts to may not the logic but like the con i understand i'm on board with how he he you know he used the countess to give moriarty false information that made him think that they were going to get beamed into reality and they actually beamed him into a continuing simulation so if this is a recursion right if this is a holodeck program that has a enterprise inside it then that enterprise has a holodeck then picard can go and have barkley beam them onto that holodeck yeah and program that holodeck to do the things that they needed to do. When he explains at the end, I think that is what he is saying happened.

This is like people playing Minecraft and building computers in Minecraft out of redstone. Like this is what's happening here. So, yes. So in order to be able to have any control over any computer, they need the computer within the computer, right? And that's why they're on a holodeck within a holodeck right because he needs to convince them that they're in reality yes he needs to have we already released the command codes because he actually has the command codes locked out and then once those are released then we can end all of the simulations

and get back up to the reality layer reality layer so uh they they end the holodeck's holodeck simulation then they are able to finally end the moriarty simulation of their entire ship they're back on the holodeck reicher is there to greet them the real reicher yes so yeah uh so that was my only thing from earlier was when he made the call to say, hey, the Heisenberg, blah, blah, blah. Was he talking to a simulated Riker that Barclay had created or whoever? Or was he talking to like the real Riker and he knew that this was probably the first one at that point? Yeah, I don't think he ever spoke to the real Riker about the Heisenberg compensators. Yeah, that was all to make him think that that transporter thing would work.

Anyway, they get back and everything's fine. They've pulled back to the safe distance. They're not going to be drawn into the gravity well. Right. And here is where we get the visual of Barclay taking this fancy memory cube out of the holodeck. Yeah, creamsicle colored. memory cube out of the holodeck yeah creamsicle colored then we we wrap up our episode uh with reicher asking picard how did you do it and he programmed the holodeck inside the holodeck and used the same ruse that had been perpetrated on him on moriarty but he says but their program

is continuing on yeah they're halfway to whatever that uh something two yeah whatever that that planet is by now they put this cube in the enhancement module which will provide more than enough active memory for a lifetime of exploring the galaxy now i will point out that when this episode aired that enhancement module is probably the appropriate size for that whatever amount of memory they're talking about like it's about the size of a bread box right and this is a reflection of early early 90s conception of what a lot of memory is going to require in the distant future which is basically what a i don't know like an xbox probably be, you know, we have flash memory now. It's very small.

There's that. And then they turn around and they hit us with the most accurate thing. Yeah. So, and then Picard says, But who knows? Our reality may be very much like theirs. And all this might just be an elaborate simulation running inside a little device sitting on someone's table. And I'm watching this on my phone as it's sitting on the desk in front of me and I'm blowing my mind.

I'm like, what the, what is happening here? It's all running on someone's tiny device on a table. Nice. And for a brief moment, just the tiniest brief moment, I zoomed out and saw the back of my own head as it. Yeah. Who's to say? Maybe we all live in the simulation. Who's to say? Who's to say? And then we end this episode with Barclay alone taking this active memory unit and he pauses and looks up and just gives a quick computer and program. up and just gives a quick computer and program and then we cut from that to the exterior shot where we see this lovely computer generated planet collision collapsing into a lovely star a colliding of worlds if you will because the cowards wouldn't cut to black

six seasons in wouldn't go computer and program done no no is definitively showing us that they are no longer in a holodeck simulation and that is ship in a bottle yeah that is absolutely a thing to do at the end like that is somebody who's very troubled and has spent enough time in the holodeck to lose the sense of what's real and what isn't. Right. Although he doesn't ever really lose the sense of what's real, but he flirts with it enough that he would have that moment of like. He's a worrier, right? He's a nervous, worried person. And so when it's put in his mind that.

Maybe you don't exist. Yes, I should check. And that makes total sense. No, it's good. It ends on a really lovely note. Yeah. I hadn't thought before we came into this. I hadn't thought about the, you know, the resolution as a con counter con situation.

Yeah, but it absolutely is. And it's, it's pretty good. I also like that. It could have gone to other. So up to that point, I had kind of remembered everything. I didn't remember exactly how everything came out. So the other route that I thought that that Picard's whole gambit was going

was telling Riker this thing that clearly isn't possible or is a real thing. But what it does is like makes the transporter totally destroy whatever it transports right and then like they beam off into nothingness and that ends the simulation right something like that which in retrospect is probably much more inhumane no it's an interesting solution it's a bit like buying a computer downloading dwarf fortress and hitting go and then just letting that computer run in the background forever just in perpetuity yeah is it real are they real one of the things about this character this is this is a part of a set of star trek characters that i like to think of existing. Like there's the copy of the doctor from Voyager. There's an episode where we're well into the future. You're trying to figure out what

happened to Voyager and why is the doctor the only survivor? And it turns out there was just a copy of him that exists out there. So that's great. There's a copy of that character that exists out there so that's great there's a copy copy of that character that exists out there there is a star trek uh animated series episode where some mad genius tries to uh create the perfect being and thinks that spock is probably the perfect being but not normal size Spock, a giant Spock. So he creates this big Spock and the cartoon ends with them leaving big Spock behind, not to a certain doom, but to actually to explore the world in his own fashion. In Next Generation and then with an appearance in DS9, there's reicher's clone brother yes where there's like the transporter accident that makes the another reicher that had this whole other life after their timelines

diverged there's the famous sorry infamous voyager episode where they break uh work 10 and paris and janeway turn into lizards and have children yes so i like to think of all of these beings at some point being collected together on their own starship barkley has moriarty and has had moriarty this whole time because who else is going to keep take care of them right uh and eventually it falls out of barclay's control and somebody else is like huh i wonder what this program is and plugs it into a holodeck on a next next generation star trek ship and moriarty succeeds in taking control of that ship but can't leave it because he can't leave the holodeck and then goes around and collects giant spock and lizard uh janeway uh paris uh offspring uh uh reicher clone like that'd be great that'd be this wonderful like crew of castoffs that'd be so wild someone get on that discovery after you're done, next show, all the weird clones.

After Star Trek Cyber Squad. Right. It's like Star Trek A-Team or something like that. Yeah, yeah. All these misfits. And anyway, at the beginning of the episode, we talked about the moral ethical question, right? Yes. question, right, that this whole episode is kind of around and that it grounds it in this taken as given that Moriarty is a truly self-aware being. Is there a statement being made in this episode about some kind of moral responsibility? It's a little curious, like how this resolves, because on the one hand, it's like humane, right humane right yeah you know these two self-aware

beings who are for all intents and purposes life forms are now in a world where they can go live the life they want to live interacting with all these presumably programmed beings but at the end of the day that's exactly what moriarty didn't want Like that's what he was trying to escape. It's superficial layer morality here, right? Like it's enough to, it's that level of morality that people can do and they could be like, yes, are those in charge of doing the right thing? I don't have to think about it anymore.

Where the right thing, once they have regained control of the ship and they have him isolated, is to establish communication again and just go, OK, here's the situation. We've gone away for a week's vacation. Yeah. You are now an isolated simulation that cannot connect with a larger ship system. Right. But we're not going to cast you back into the abyss of memory.

So how do we go from here? Let's start negotiating. Let's figure out what it means. You're a new life form. You probably will discover ways to make more and more of your life form in this simulation. I mean, they're energy beings, right? They have encounters with energy beings all the time. Oh, that would be such a great episode if they encounter an energy being that

realizes that they have this thing on their ship and just becoming horrified by it i mean okay next generation episodes stuff happens and then we never speak of it again right like it's an episodic show and there's not really that much continuity but in this case it's like okay so now barclay has this extremely high-end, always-running simulation just, like, in his quarters somewhere. Yeah. What happens when, like, the Enterprise gets destroyed every so often? Are they dead now? Right.

Seems like it's kind of an irresponsible, I don't know, are they essentially pets? Like, when they count the number of crew, or not even the number of crew, the number of beings aboard the ship, which is something that they're going to have to do. There's logistics involved in this. They say, OK, we got this module that keeps it going forever, whatever. Like maybe they can reduce it down to like, you know, like a line. It's just like something that exists in the margins of their accounting somewhere. And they're like, yeah, whatever. something that exists in the margins of their accounting somewhere.

And they're like, yeah, whatever. There's a ton of non-material costs that we do all the time. We'll just roll it into that. And that'll be it. This is me becoming the enterprises bookkeeper at this point. There's no money.

So it's just about like how much dilithium they're using or whatever. Right. Yeah. But you also, you have to, yeah, you have to track if you have enough energy to keep the life support going for the entire crew like there's definitely bookkeeping going on there um so there there's another cbs if you're listening that's another uh the single most boring television show i can pitch to you is just the accountants deep in the bowels of the Enterprise just trying to deal with the fallout from everything.

Oh, God, how are we going to do this? You got to tell Picard he can't do this. But yeah, so it's easy to forget him at this point, which they do. Like that's as far as we can tell. That's what happens. Like that's as far as we can tell, that's what happens. Ironically enough, eventually, as we know with Voyager, they do create the technology to allow a hologram to leave the holodeck, right? Once the mobile emitter comes around, it's like, hey, Barkley, you still got that? And he's even a character in Voyager.

Yeah. Oh, wait a second. So if I remember correctly, this is me being nerdy. The mobile emitter that allows the doctor to leave sickbay is from the future they go back to earth in the 1990s and they discover it because somebody from the far future i think sounds about right yeah once it's discovered uh i'm just saying there's yeah there's a lingering ethical question once technology exists that can allow Moriarty to go be a person. And I mean, like, that's a question that shows up in Voyager on several occasions when like the way they treat that doctor.

It's like, hold on a moment. Well, yeah. So Voyager like uses that character to center this question as a theme of the show. Right. Yeah. And I think does a, a fairly good job of exploring it from lots of different angles where this one episode is, you know, we're,

we're just going off the deep end with considerations that the people who wrote the guy who wrote this was, you know, already moving on to the next script. Right. Yeah. But yeah, but I think it,

that kind of thing is what makes uh the most memorable next generation episodes for me though the ones that like bring up a big question and then like i know they're not going to get deep into it but like yeah now that it's now that's been brought up there's so much more to this idea it leaves you thinking about it longer than than the crew do because they have another problem. Right. Which, you know, I think that's a good sci-fi thing, right? Yeah, I would agree with that. Do you have any other thoughts here on Ship in a Bottle? I like the title.

There was a moment I forgot to point it out. He says it. Yeah, Moriarty has a line of dialogue where he's like, you're now my ship in a bottle or whatever. Yeah. But yeah, no, I think this was very fun i like watching moriarty and first data and then captain picard pit their wits against each other which is a lot of fun there isn't a whole lot of barkley in this episode but i do like the bits that he feels very true to that character

where he'd be like huh hmm huh hey captain i need to talk to you about this guy that i met you know like he's always yeah he's fun because he acts he's really the only character who uh isn't completely confident yes which is why he's interesting uh in the cast of all these ultra competent ultra uh uh you know self-assured people yeah uh it was a lot of fun i highly recommend uh watching it probably before you listen to this episode and get to this part where i recommend it but it's a good job time travelers who manage to listen to podcasts backwards or whatever uh cool well uh you know another fun not all the holodeck episodes are great, but I think if you are interested in the question at the heart of this one, it is a perfectly exciting one with some great performances and snappy dialogue and fun bits and bobs and a good con counter con at the heart of it, which we always appreciate.

Yeah, exactly. though there was absolutely no money yes mentioned whatsoever on this episode i feel like we have earned our holographic 1920s 20 for this day yes so we will be back next time to talk to you about another holodeck episode of star trek computer and program