A Geek History of Time - Episode 77 - Deep Space Nine Watch Along Part III

Episode Date: October 17, 2020

The World Disney Yes, beloved, beloved figure of our pop culture. That's how they get you. And out of Yada, she eventually causes her own husband to be born to death. And that makes me so happy on cold nights. Especially in the badly for the idiot Pecker Woods.

You have a bottle of scotch. Okay, that's twice that he's mentioned redheads. It is un-American to get in the way of our freedom to restrict people's freedom. That was the part where I was. I know plenty about this thing. I love me some Bobby Drake. Well, if that's all we've got then we're being really lazy. Yeah.

Y'all both. You can literally poke a hole in it as soon as someone gets pneumonia. Well, I'm not as old as you. Well, ha ha mother fucker, I got a wizard. This is a geek history of time. Where we connect Nurgere to the real world. My name is Ed Blalock. I am a world history teacher via virtual learning here in Northern California

and part time in English teacher as well. Coming to you live as I come to my students from my kitchen table where it is currently 79 degrees in my living room when our air conditioner is supposed to be keeping it at 74. So you can imagine how much confidence I have in my air room when our air conditioner is supposed to be keeping it at 74. So you can imagine how much confidence I have in my air conditioner at this point. And of course, I'm going to place this in time for anybody listening by telling you that this weekend, as we record it, we are expecting to have temperatures of 110 here in our part of northern California. So I have a lovely, lovely sauna like weekend to look forward to. Who are you, sir?

I'm Damien Harmony. I am a distance Latin teacher here in Northern California. My air conditioning does work, so humble brag. And yet it's still going to be hotter than hell. But the good news is I'll be stuck inside and yet another negotiation meeting. I would like to say that that dates things. But anybody who knows what district you work for would know that it really doesn't really doesn't like I'm like I kind of I kind of want to harness my inner like red from from Shawshank Redemption you know I wish I wish I like to say that it means that we got our negotiations over with But we both know that

My district is not not particularly kind of doing so Yeah, yep, so I would I would phrase it as negotiations or endless negotiations or infinite Negotiations pure we are we are on a eternal. Yeah. So let's cheer ourselves up instead. Yeah.

With some science fiction. So, the safest sci-fi. Last week. No. Last week. We watched deep space nine. And we watched episode 11

from season two. We watched episode 11 Last week? No. No. Last week, we watched Deep Space Nine. And we watched Episode 11 from Season 3, called Past Tents. And I promised that we would watch Episode 12, Past Tents, Deep Space Nine, Season 3, Episode 12. So, everyone, get out your Amazon's get out your who lose do what you got to do and it's going to be season three episode 12 part two past tense and everyone needs to get that puppy going and get that thing queued up now the way we're

going to do it is we're going to say 3, 2, 1, go. And when I say go, we hit that play button. Okay. So get it cute up. Make sure you got your, I'm telling you this Ed, make sure you got your close captioning on. Everyone else, because put us up one ear and listen to it in the other. Yeah. Yep. All right. You ready for this? I'm ready. All right. So we'll do a test run, right?

So this is the test run. Three, two, one, go. And then you would have pushed it. All right. Now for real z's. Here we go. Three. Two, one, go.

All right and Recounts yeah, so they went back in time. Yeah Techno Babble Techno Babble Techno Babble Techno Babble Techno Babble Historical Babble Exposition Exposition Exposition historical, Babel, exposition, exposition, exposition. Watershed events of the 21st century. Yes.

The Gabriel Bell riots. Yes. I know, I know in the midst of everything else we're talking about this, this is going to sound really shallow, because it really is really shallow. But um, Jetsie really cleans up really well. Like, like yes she is a beauty yeah like holy cow all right all right and so yeah we see yeah the riots and firing shotgun chill in the air and kid rock yeah we're just gonna call it that for the rest yeah might as well right down to the fucking hat like yeah and and the scruffy not beard and long ass hair. Yeah. Yeah. And now the conclusion. Yeah. And now moving on. All right. What are you looking at? So yeah, he's named himself as Gabriel Bell. They have hostages who are cops who've been roughed up.

Yeah. And the social worker. Yeah. Now, you've not seen this in a long time, so let's do the over under on anybody being killed in this. Specifically, who and yeah and buy. Okay. Okay.

I'm going to say, Kid Rock. I'm going to give you, oh, let's see. I'm going to say three to two odds. Kid Rock winds up smoking one of the cops. I'm going to give you about the same odds that he's responsible for murdering the social worker. And, hey, it's that guy here is about, is about to get, oh, no, okay. He's getting, he's getting saved. All right. So, yeah, I think, I think, yeah, kid rock basically has a, has a, he's got a check-offs gun. Yeah, he's got a, he's got a three to two odds of killing somebody. It is, in fact, check-ups gun. Although the handgun that Cisco just took from, you know, hey, it's that guy, might just actually be check-ups gun here since I'm new to rewatching this episode.

Now, you know, it's interesting to me that for us as the viewers in now the 21st century, when this came out in the late 20th century, there was inevitably going to be racial coding about, you know, looking at, you know, who's pointing a gun at home. Right, yeah. But there's no, although there's very serious class distinctions going on here, and there is subliminal racial stuff going on. Nobody is mentioning it at all. So even in this very clearly, really intensely dystopian future, it's a raceless, seemingly on the surface colorblind dystopian future, which is still very rodent and barren.

Yep. Okay, and so that was our cold open. Yes. And here is our, you know, called a cold open, by the way, this is a thing I don't know. It's okay if you don't either. We can always just know. No, it's, it to do with with the idea that

The the opening credits it kind of treats that phrase treats the the opening credits It's kind of the warm-up to get you into okay. This is this is who we all are This is what we're all doing, you know, this is our show Like right here. We have you know the titles coming up and and so if the show opened with The the titles coming up. So if the show opened with the titles like that, it wouldn't be a cold open. But in this case, it's okay. And you're coming from whatever ad you're coming to, straight into the show. And so it's a cold open.

Which is kind of a sibling trope to zero to corpse, which is from like law and order and other police procedures where it's you know you go from you know it's it's it's almost always a cold open and the cold open ends with the the finding of the dead body that's going to be the the murder you know the the McGuffin for the whole plot of the episode. Now interestingly Star Trek, usually your cold open gets you to touch the A story, but usually it's your following the B or the C story, or you're just kind of developing something

that will show up thematically through the season. Yeah. It's very rarely like, here's the big story, but in a two-parter your cold opens can end up probably telling you, here's the big story. But in a two-parter, your cold opens can end up probably telling you, here's everything that you need to know. Yeah, well, because, and this may or may not, this may or may not have actually been a cold open

simply because we had the last time on Deep Space 9, I don't know if that obvates it being a cold open or if it's just admitting midi or rest or what right Alright, so we know national guard state governor district is secured There we go Feel free to hang out of the district for weeks Oh, by the way, Clint Howard's in this one. Oh, okay. Just kind of a fun little fact. So, a reasonable guy that they met before who wants to organize, they're sending him out

to organize, and they're giving him kind of his purpose in all of this, and he's actually very cooperative and heading the right way. Now here's a funny thing and our audience might not know this, but it's just kind of interesting that when you have people talking to each other, the close captioning is all in caps, but when you're watching something, hearing a recording or hearing a video, everything is standard, like not just all the time.

Yeah, normal, normal type face. So I always found that to be kind of nice. Yeah. I do like that connection. Yeah. And again, he's a gradualist. Like this is not a problem I have to deal with so we can find out stuff later.

And she's like, no, I've got friends who could get killed. Yeah, it's an interesting point of bringing up the idea of privilege without actually pointing out, you know, privilege. Also, he's friends with the police because he's, you know, and he's a guy that would have no reason to deal with the police, too, because he's rich. So yeah. But yeah.

Yadda, yadda, yadda, yadda, yadda, technical, yadda techno babble techno babble Bit of business with the tablet babble babble babble Reday out there shown why I'm doing his his usual very good I'm deeply impatient like you know figure this the hell out Where you also dim yep like, you know, figure this to hell out. Why are you all so dim? Yep. She broke her nose. Yeah, I love that they're camouflaging her, her alien features with a, with a breather, right?

Strip. That's, that's. Wow. Okay, maybe a better state. Nothing I'll do to talking. Right. Right, cause here we go back to period in the past, we're not 100% certain. Have they said when they're going to know that's the fun part of these little vignettes. So they went to the 30s. Well, great.

Mm-hmm. Resisting for standard charge. So this is them unsuccessfully looking for Cisco and Bashir again, let's get them into the film or into the episode, let's get them doing something that's visually kind of appealing, but this is the B story. We'll need them at the end when they rescue them. Yeah, and it's an empty street. Right. And so you can see a boxing advertisement

there. You can see the fur coat. You can see very rich people. It is the thirties. Yeah, coming out of a undoubtedly coming out of the speak easy. Yeah, told you not to say anything. Yeah. Yeah, I told you not to say anything. Yeah. Yeah, and I do have to say the set design here is very well done. The sense that you get of stress, overwork, everything else is remarkable. And you know, looking closely at Kid Rocks costuming here. I think he's actually wearing a hat that I own. Only mine's in much better shape because mine hasn't been abused by a costume designer to make it look like it's being worn by a hobo. I want to point out it's not a cheap hat. I'm sure there's cheap versions of it though. Yeah, okay, could be, but it... So here's where you start to see the difference in approaches to what's going on.

He is very much caring only about himself. Cisco cares about the future and can't tell anyone about it. And... Confluent was born in Tasmania. And then the other guy cares about the overall community. So yeah. Let them get their own hostages. Yeah. And this is him knowing what's going to happen and using it to inspire people.

Yeah. Now, I'll log on to the interface because they have the internet because they had the internet. It was nascent as hell. And so this is projecting forward what it would have be. He's got the face, he's got the family, he's the guy next door. Yeah, he was in life goes on for the last three years. Like, from 89 to 93, he did life goes on. Yeah, that's true. So you have a data link, I mean, again, they're generalizing and they're trying to figure it out.

And what have you. Yeah. But, you know, again, I like the detail that they put into this place. You have really good overhead lighting, but it's kind of terrible. And you've got even a camera in the upper corner there. Yeah.

So, oh, check your email, buddy. Wow. Yeah. Edgy. Yeah. Yeah. You overrun her on a VIN getting out of here is not good. Well, okay, it's not, but think narratively, by the way, that's like the chief of police that's trying to negotiate with them in front of an army truck, which I kind of like,

because it talks about the militarization of the police. Yeah. But what do you call it? If you have him who is an unrestrained bigot, I think he's gonna live because narratively, you need someone to have changed, to show that if I can change, you can change. We all can change.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We are just so people know we're at the 16 minute 5, 6, 7 second mark. The social worker has just been, you know, roughed up, man handled by Kid Rock in front of the terminal here. Because again, nobody imagined mobile devices in, you devices in 1995.

Correct. I'm not sure if you're going to be able to do that. I'm not sure if you're going to be able to do that. I'm not sure if you're going to be able to do that. I'm not sure if you're going to be able to do that. Yep. Yeah, um, just for the record that had, looks, the hell of a lot better in the first way, because right now, he looks like a complete fucking moron but anyway sorry no worries like he ends the gun to the doctor by the way yeah yeah I would also point out though that your chief of police is she presents I would

say his panic yeah I could I can see that definitely. Yeah, so Now, ideologically, what's going on there? He's, you know, we don't deserve to be locked up. I get that, but very much like we want to work, we want a chance to do such and such and so. And so, by the way, you're going to tell the governor for us which in 2024 may or may not be Gavin Newsom but I would like to there's there's something about that ideology of like all we want is is a chance I don't know what I would call that. It feels a little booker T. Washington Esk. It's it's it's it's Protestant work ethic. It is that. Okay. You know, it's

it's you know, the dignity, the dignity of being able to have a job. The, you know, all of the, I mean, it's it's still capitalism. The thing is, you know, Roddenberry designed a socialist utopia, but in the writing that we have here, they're fighting to try to, you know, get the right in a capitalist society to work, which is actually Marxist at its core because capitalism is the last stage before you can get to the utopia that is.

Yeah, good point. Yeah, according to, according to Marxist theory, right? I got in a little trouble. Did when you put his real name on a computer. Oh, okay. So she's, she's now kind of dangerous to the timeline because she's spotted, you know, difference in the name there. Okay, mother, not being able to take her over child. And just kind of appealing to the humanity. And then now you see how social workers get ground down to just pushing papers. Yeah.

Yeah. Done my job. Yeah. You get these little monologues that would absolutely work as audition pieces? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. No, they'd be great for that. And they kind of come, they sound like they're out of, you know, stegles work.

Stegles, single. Anyway, yeah. No, they're, they're, you know, slice of life. Working, you know, kind of, kind of inner monologue, kind of stuff. Sure. Oh, no. No, I think only one picturinginn having a Trump sticker on his truck. Like, you know, call on all losers.

He's the one wanting to be the big hero, getting up. Right. You know, I think this guy might also be trying to look and say I'm like, Art Carney. Honey, what would the hat and everything? I would say that there probably is something to that. Oh, you're not helping yourself here, Keto. Just shut up and let your, let your fellow revolutionary, you know, or letility of the system. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah, good point. It was in a great Cisco moment here. Yes. Again, Cisco understands what's at stake here completely. And he's trying to talk some sense into the guy and this is just some fantastic acting on his part because you see his face break just a little bit there. Yeah, yeah, around his eyes. Yeah. And and corners of his mouth and the breathing he's doing right here. He's clearly, yeah.

The way he closed his mouth there. I gotta keep it together. Yep. But I really want to just like completely freak out. Serious moment, let me up moment. Yeah. And we can't hear it, but I think they're playing Jimmy Hendrix there. Yeah. Yeah. Thatrix there. Yeah.

Yeah. That would suit. Yeah. I love the flashing light coming out of the window behind him. And oh dear. Wow. Yep. Like did, did, did, did did did did doing all this good writing

and then you did this. And then and then and then and then this is our portrait of SF in the 60s. This is supposed to be Haydash Berry. Something like that. Like, yeah, no. Like I could I could tell you. Wow.

English muffins are still a thing. Tell you, wow. English muffins are still a thing. Well, you know, you need to get breakfast for 10,000 people. Oh yeah. You know, relatively utilitarian way of getting it done. Kind of makes me want one tomorrow. Not gonna lie me too.

Yeah. When you're done, oh no, if they killed a kid, I'm gonna be pissed. Not even lying. I'm gonna be so mad. Yeah, well the cost of this revolution. Yeah. Sorry, kind of don't care if they killed the kid I'm gonna be pissed I'm just saying narratively Yeah, well, yeah, Luke and Jenna was left with the clinic

Yeah, you have been thinking it's being all scheming like yeah, yeah, it's his family. Look, you gotta let him go. You gotta let us all go. Yeah, how about you, you know, recognize that like you're keeping a whole bunch of innocent people fucking prisoner. Well, more importantly than his, so he's like kind of manipulating, but you know what, the cops there are switching places in some ways. Then has shown shreds of humanity. This guy is kind of hardening up because it's affecting him personally now. Before he was sympathetic. And now he's hardening because he's thinking more about himself.

Yeah. And I love that I just want to get home. It's like, yes, so do I. Yeah. That does sound nice. Yeah, form a committee. And he immediately goes to your the governor is not going to let the situation continue forever. We're going to roll the trucks in and start shooting people. Right. Feels a little, um, Portland D, doesn't it?

A little bit. Yeah, for, for those of us watching this, you know, in this time and place. Yeah. Yeah. Also, I'm getting kind of a laymissy rob, the vibe too. Oh yeah. Her haircut helps too. Yeah, well, her haircut and her whole outfit don't hurt. No, I mean, it gives that laymiss feel. is feel like she's the boy goes selecting the bullets.

Oh, yeah, yeah, a little bit. Oh, no, it's going to be trouble because here she is. Oh, my God, speaking of that guy. That's Clint Howard. That's, okay. So fun fact, this is just for like, you know, hey, there's some people who have worse mental issues. And I'll come back to them when we see them again. So now they're trying to hack the net. Yeah. Yeah. And now we finally get everybody reunited. Thank God. Mm-hmm. I really would have watched her smear him all over the floor. Yeah, I know. Because it's dead.

No, she could. Totally disappoints him. I feel like during the filming of this, Vince Hairgot died because he's old. I doubt that it did, but it just in that scene it Yeah. So now we've got the plan. And he knows that he has to see it through to the end because no Gabriel Bell means no everything. No, no timeline. And we know that there's no timeline. They don't know that yet. But we definitely know.

Yeah. And and Bashir coming out of his fuck boyness to be offered to be one of the ones to stay behind. Yep. And this is how they get the net access. Here we go. Just, you know, privilege. Yeah, thing. Privilege has its perks. Takes him persuading, but I think it'll do.

I think this is where we get to see Clint Howard again. Yeah, probably, since he was, you know, loathing behind her beforehand, he would be one of the ones who took her combat. Exactly. I'm trying to remember what happened to Cisco and Bashir's combat is in the first place. Never explained. Never explained. Okay. Yeah, they just existed without them.

Yep, Clint Howard. He was too young. Okay, so Clint Howard is Ron Howard's little brother. He shows up in every movie Ron Howard directs. Maybe it's his older brother, I don't remember, but he was also in one of the first episodes of Star Trek where they run into a child who is actually an adult and he's about three or four years old and they dubbed over his voice. And he basically just wanted people to come play with him on his ship.

Yep, I remember that. And I got to say, this is going to be awful, but I mean, now that you point out that he is Ron Howard's brother, I can definitely see the family resemblance. And in a family where Ron Howard is the pretty one, that's... Yep. Kind of saying something. Yeah, don't want to be like I Know that's not End of me, but Yeah, I just recently watched Farron away and Clint Howard is in that too. Really?

Yeah, he's the guy that runs like the chicken processing plant. All right. Yeah. All right, back down the manhole we go mm-hmm Let me see if I understand what you're asking me to do here's some more They're acting like criminals that have done this. They're taking the hostages. So the power of the media. So here's something that they got right, they just didn't get it

in the right way. We all have our individual phones to do this now. You've got zebra productions to do this now. This was, this is a conglomerate and he's going to make use of all of the interfaces, which is essentially very similar, just ar ours are wireless and pocket held, and he's doing it for the sake of ratings, whereas other people are doing it to raise awareness. But regardless, you do have people publicizing

an event and making it so everyone has to confront it and cannot work away. Yeah. Yeah. It eliminates their ability to look away. Yeah. Yeah. It eliminates their ability to look away. Yeah. Well, you'd be surprised. Well, we're not surprised.

We're living it. But it's surprising how much people do look away. Oh, well, yeah. The capacity of people to look away is continually disappointing. Oh, in other sanctuaries, they're starting to have disturbances, so kind of nationwide. And now she's being ordered to storm the building, I think, because you don't want these things rising up and people to pay attention.

Yep. At the moment, the media attention starts happening and gets... Now, the saying the governor is doing it instead of the president is doing it because it makes sense you're in city, you talk to the governor, and also saying that the president is doing it, it would be ridiculous to assume that the president would send in troops to a city to put down protests. But we have a history of governors doing that and of mayors doing that, say Chicago, 1968. Yeah, and well, and we actually have presidents ordering it in the case of the bonus riots. Yeah, there's a good point. But that was in DC proper, though. So in some,

you know, that's in his backyard. Yeah, granted, but you get what I'm saying. Yeah, that's a really good question for the whiskey rebellion for Fox. Like, you know, I mean, but was it the governor or the president that ordered the putting down of the New York riots? I think that was the governor probably shreshered by the president you i'm sure i'm sure the president was you know on the telegram you know making a telegraph wires pretty hot but uh... i'd be it was probably a governor decision all right now they finally found it

found acts are accurate acts All right now they finally found it. I found DAX. All right, CuraDax. DAX, do you hear me? Ah, I know where that is. Yeah. Yeah, plenty of people do. It's a recognizable recognizable landmark. It looks nothing like that by the way. Yeah, I know. It looks nothing like that by the way. Yeah, no, it's nothing like that Actually a friend of the show Derrick is a San Francisco Denizen So you might also like knowing that reference of Polk in California He could probably tell us where some like really good food is around there. They're talking baseball, by the way. This timeline, the kings I believe played for London. So baseball has become a national.

How's the cash roll? Able. Yeah. Which is interesting. Yeah, well, baseball is one of Cisco's passions, as a kid. It is. It's one of his things. And he really follows Buck.

I forget Buck's last name. But Buck, what's that? It just got mentioned, Buck Bokai. Oh, yeah, yeah. Bokai, who is the greatest baseball player ever. so it's a Japanese player playing for a team in England but They'd previously mentioned that Europe had fallen apart Yeah, so it's kind of interesting. They'd still have baseball there

well You know keep in mind that you know the person who said you know Europe is falling apart was an American tourist true and In conversation with the group of other hoi di toi, you know, Europe is falling apart, was an American tourist. True. And in conversation with the group of other hoyditoy, you know, people talking about that continent too. Yeah, you know, so statements like that get made. Oh, here you go. Conversationally owned.

You're sending the sun home. Shit. the the sun is wearing the same hat is this guy now no Now, he wouldn't have cocked that long, long ago. Yeah, well, you know, as a gun nut, stuff like that happens all that's just learned to ignore it. Yeah. But yeah, it's the way of saying I'm ready now.

Yeah. It's, again, it's, it's a visual mechanical shorthand. Yeah. For that. I get it. When we talk about, oh, I was writing an email, people's hands will look like they were writing an email. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah. Oh. Oh, wow. Yeah. Oh. That's, this is remarkably graphic for For a Star Trek episode. Yep

You know I like that the the state police come in and fuck it up where the local police have not. It's a problem. Yeah, or passify the building. Yeah, passify. Yeah, did a great job. I also would point out that the police are remarkably unarmored. They definitely got that wrong. Like police nowadays are just insanely armored.

Yeah, they're heavily armored. Yeah. You know, like carrier plate, stop at 223 round, armored. Well, okay, when they're doing something like this, they're very heavily armored, rest of the time not as much. All right, so. A bunch of people have been hurt. A bunch of people have been injured. BZ, no BZ, no BD, BD. Hat dude looks like a hobo. He's been shot dead.

Webb has been shot dead. The dad from life goes on. The sun is still alive. So far. Yeah. Episode eight over yet. Oh, trust it. Look at that.

How could we have let this happen? Yeah. Oh. And this is how we can still have a Gabriel Bell who died in the Bell riots. Can Tanker's guy would have been can tankerous anyway. Yeah. I Yeah, narrative layer it. Yeah. Now,

Turning to the present, we were going to discover. There are timelines been restored because Gabriel Bell did die. Okay. What I like also about this ship is the quarters, there's bunks. Yeah, it's not a yacht. It actually, yeah, it actually looks like a real military vessel. I'm not looking forward to explaining this to Starfleet command. Yeah. Well, at least it's a good picture.

Yeah, about that temporal displacement policy. Oh, here's the more or less at the end. Well, you see to me. That's a good question. How could they have gotten things to get so bad? Everyone Yeah, some animals need to be dropped. Yeah All right, yeah, so there you go

So good escapist science fiction So good escapist science fiction, totally not tied to what's going on now. Pure, pure, pure, I can always count on Star Trek to just take me out of the reality I'm dealing with. Get out of whatever stressful social justice situation you find yourself in. Except there was that one episode of the next generation that was very preachy, where Picard becomes Robinhood. It felt it was very heavy-handed. It was very clearly a reference to the triangle shirt. Mark's the spark of propaganda. Was that? Oh, okay. Yeah, triangle shirt, mate.

Nicely done. Nicely done. Thank you. Yeah, I mean, yeah, it does it does have its episodes of your kidding, right? Right. But yeah, I mean like where's Crusher fucks a Irish ghost? Oh Lord. Yeah. And that that should happen. I think in the seventh season, there's no excuse. Oh. Oh yeah, no there was absolutely no excuse for it or You know any of the any of the clip episodes in any any seer in any any season Oh, see I'll give them that because that tells me they ran low on their budget for the other ones and So they they didn't have the budget for a good episode. So they just put together a bunch of clips.

Yeah, well, I know, but I'm just saying as, you know, storytelling goes, those are ones that you're like, oh, okay, it's going to be one of these, you know, yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So, yeah, that's that. So yeah, that's that. That's, yeah, I got to say, I'm a little disappointed in, and I mean, it's an artifact of it having been the 90s, but I'm a little disappointed in DAX not having more to do if you know what I mean.

Yeah. I mean, her role she plays is important, but it's very clearly not a co-A plot. It's very clearly a B plot. And, you know, I mean, we're talking about, you know, a great character. Again, there really weren't any, well, okay, I won't say there weren't any, but there were very few weak characters on the show

and there were no, even when a character wasn't all that great, the person portraying them, the actors were all amazing. I mean, they just had a great cast. Oh, yeah. And I feel any of the times that they leave any of these folks without enough to do, I just feel kind of robbed. Right. You know, like if you have an episode and as you pointed out at the beginning of part

one, you know, they've shoehorned the whole ops team onto the bridge of the defiant. Like why is everybody there? Like I feel like it would have been a better choice to just be like, okay, no, look, they're going to Earth. These are the characters that we're going to see. They're going to be here and like let everybody else have a life on screen that we don't have to know about every minute of every episode. Yeah. You know, and just just let the audience realize, okay, we're going to be focusing on these characters for this couple of episodes, like there we go. And yeah, I don't know. I mean, I get narratively why they had to have

Kira and O'Brien doing the vignettes in the different decades of the chasing them down. I understand why they had to do that. It feels clunky, but it might have been unavoidable. Right. You know, to bring the whole plot together and explain how the heck it is, they made it back without it looking like a Deus Ex Machina. You got to show your work or it winds up looking like God from the machine, which I understand, but I don't know, still feels kind of clunky. But yeah, I mean by and large,

it's a great couple of episodes of TV, and as, as anvils being dropped by a Star Trek show goes, it's very well done. You know, and I give a lot of credit to the writers for DS9, when they did this kind of overt, no, no, we're making a statement. Kind of thing, they, they did it. I think with morphinist and Roddenberry ever did. Oh, yeah. You know, and I know, I know there, there, there is a, a faction or a, or a sect of, of Star Trek fandom that like it, saying anything like that about Roddenberry is, Star Trek fandom that like it saying anything like that about Roddenberry is heretical

But he he had a great many strengths subtlety was never one of them right and and I mean there are some things that just don't need to be subtle I totally get that but You know him him and Rod Sirling could compete with each other over my sledgehammer is bigger. No, my sledgehammer is bigger and mine is made out of new tronium, like, dude, and they manage to make the points here in a way that never feels contrived, like, well, but it's obvious, can't you see? Yes. Black on the left side of his face and white on the

right. And I'm right on the left side of my face and black on the left like, dude, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, like, like, I get that and that that that was a, I think any treatment of that issue in the original Star Trek in the time that it was happening would need to be pointed like that. But like, you know, maybe not quite delivered with the same level of, of, of, of, toastness. I don't know how else to say. Amphisted. Amph, yeah, there you go. It's, it was, yeah. And, and I think, I think I think here all of those beats all of those moments of You know, oh hey, we're making a statement. I think managed to stay very true

to the characters and to the To the to the arc and the milieu In which they were existing all all of the characters in the past you in which they were existing, all of the characters in the past, even though they're very briefly sketched because we only have two episodes to get to know them. They're characters. They have some level of a personality, they have some level of back story and and everything they do manages to be clearly motivated by that. You know, but by by who they are within that world that they inhabit. And and I just yeah, that's that's if you want to make a story resonate, I think it's easier to make

a story resonate when you're able to keep it grounded in character that way. Yeah, so yeah. Yeah, I don't really have that much to add. I did a lot of the research up front on it. I think that it's scary how prescient it is because these were problems that they saw as a problem in 1994.

And here we are, damn near 30 years later, and we're still running into the same problems. And so it's not so much they predicted the future as they called out what was happening in the past and we haven't fixed it. Yeah. Which is those very last two lines. How did this happen?

And how can we prevent this from happening again? And as you mentioned in the last episode in the first episode of the show, the Sheer's line is very pointed about, you know, if we ever get desperate enough, we're going to be true to our principles. Yeah. I think it's is, you know, one of those moments like, oh, wow, just add us. Why don't you like? Yeah, no kidding. Only crap. 2000 one called and they said oops, brutal. Yeah, yeah. You know, yeah, you know, and one of the things that kind of struck me about the description

of how the Roddenberryverse Earth of 2024 got the way it did. Feels, again, I'm gonna say almost kind of naive, is Cisco said, well, the problems just felt insurmountable when they just they gave up. And you know, the thing is, and we've had this conversation with other people on Facebook talking specifically about homelessness, and this was kind of interesting that we had because we had this conversation earlier today that we know that

mental health care is if we were able to figure out how to fund mental health care, community-based mental health support and care for people who in this show were dims. If we could figure out how to help people in a community way, and we actually, we know how to do it, we just haven't put the money there. Yeah. If we put the money to work doing that, we prioritize that and

If we just said okay no look If you are homeless Here is a tiny house, you know, mm-hmm 600 square foot on a plot Here you go and we're gonna house you we're gonna give you an address and lot. Here you go. And we're going to house you. We're going to give you an address. And like studies of shit like the fins. And I hate giving the fins credit for anything because I hate it's one of my few prejudices because my my ex wife was a fin. Um, but you know, like the fins figured out how to solve it. Like no, you give them a house. And most of them

who can are going to go back to work. And the ones who can't are the ones that you need to be giving The addiction support to them health support to the other whatever whatever else it is They've got going on if they're cognitively impaired or whatever they you know Like they're the ones that you need to be providing services to and you know what that gets a shit load easier If you just give them a place to fucking live. Yep. Absolutely. But here's the thing. We know that. Anybody who reads the studies and reads what the Fins didn't read how the stuff works.

We know that the problem is that there is this faction within our society. And again, this gets back to, hey, all we want is we want to get out of here and we want to get jobs. The problem is we have this idea of the idea of the deserving poor as opposed to the undeserving poor. And there are people who are so stuck on this idea of whether somebody is deserving or undeserving that they're not willing to solve the problem for the people who do deserve it. Right. Because God forbid some lazy fucker just gets a free house like... Okay.

Which is funny because when you're rich... Yeah. That's completely acceptable. Yeah. Yeah. Well, because, and now I'm going to put on my pointy, pointy headed religion nerd hat, you know, that all comes down to, again, it's related to the Protestant work ethic, the idea of predestination, and well, you know, if you're wealthy, then that's a sign that God loves you.

You know, because you're either going to go to heaven or you're not, and that's a sign that God loves you. Because you're either going to go to heaven or you're not, and there's no way for you to know, but we all need to know whether we're going to go to heaven or not. And so if you're successful, it means you're more likely to be predestined. You're one of the elect. You're more likely to be one of the elect, which is where prosperity gospel comes from. I mean, it's bullshit. Speaking, of course, is a Catholic, but like if you read the fucking Bible and if you stick

to what Christ actually says, if you're following Christ, that's not how it works, but through multiple generations of Protestant fuckery. And I say that with the greatest respect for, my practicing Protestant friends, I don't mean you, but when you look at the doctrines that developed over time out of that, you get the Puritans and you get this literally this idea of success being a sign of God's earthly favor. And you know, God wants

you to be wealthy. You just have to do the right things and make God happy and you'll be good in this life, which is an unchristian idea. Like that's antithetical to the idea of what you're supposed to be trying to do as a Christian. If you're a Christian, you should be St. Francis of Assisi, which is say, I don't own anything. You know, everything, everything I have, I'm giving over to those who are less fortunate than me. I'm working, you know, my motive is to is is other people, you know, and anyway. So, you know, this episode, unfortunately, you know, because you mentioned, you know, this, I don't know what to call this thing of, you know, which is one of the jobs. And what it is, is it's this, it's this Protestant work ethic, this idea that there are deserving poor and there are undeserving poor.

Right. And this episode, I think, is naive in that we don't ever see anybody go like, well, you know, we can't, you know, nobody ever says we can't eliminate the sanctuaries and re-institute employment and dualists. We can't do any of that because you know like they don't deserve it right you know so they're gonna game the system you know they're not they're not they're not really gonna look for jobs they're gonna they're gonna try to get you know booze and drugs or well they had a name for them those are gimmies yeah people looking for free handouts yeah they were g, there were gimmies and there were ghosts. Ghosts are the ones who are essentially criminals. They've given up.

They're now not even the underbelly. And then there are dims, people who can't help it. So gimmies are greedy, ghosts are predatious or predatory. And dims can't help it. But none of them deserve it. And that's really the thing. See what gets me about the whole thing is that, like he said it in the beginning, he's like,

it's not that they don't care. It's that they've given up trying to fix it. And that feels very much like what you're talking about. It's not that society has stopped caring because people care from about 8 o'clock to 11 o'clock every Sunday. But they have kind of given up and I think a society where predestination exists might or as a theme or as a cultural holdover might give itself more over to that.

But I also think that shit's hard, man. And when people have been breaking this system for the last 60 years, 50 years, and at that time it was an imperfect system. It was a system that needed to be torn down a bit and and reformed. And instead of reforming it, people were like, no, let's just break it down because deserve versus not. I think that that that what they're saying is is clearly an outcropping of that. Yeah. You know, and and part of, you know, the

whole idea of DIMS, and we have multiple characters showing up who are some kind of law enforcement in uniforms with weapons. Identified by such. Yeah, goes back to another conversation we had outside of the show where, you know, in the 70s, public institutions for mental health were defunded and abolished. And they needed, like you said, parts of that So that system needed to be torn down. Mm-hmm. You know, and they were, but what was supposed to happen was that money was supposed to go into community, as I mentioned before, community-based mental health.

And instead, it wound up going to more cops. It wound up going to training cops to operate the way the army was operating in Vietnam with cruisers and long-distance patrols, whereas in Vietnam they were using helicopters. And separating them further from the community, which then winds up rolling over into what these episodes didn't touch on because it's Roddenberry's future, which is the idea that, you know, in our real world, there's a really, really powerful racial component to all of this. And, you know, we get a little bit of that from Cisco. We got a little bit of that from from Cisco. We got a little bit of that. I think we get that visually and we get that kind of subrosa, but we don't get that overtly stated in any way. But you like you

said, and like I said, like look at who gets put where, look at the casting from the different scenes and what have you. So yeah, no, I think you're absolutely right. I mean, if anything in the last, geez, since camera phones have been a thing has shown us, it's that that is absolutely 100% a true thing that's happened for a long, long time in this country and continues to happen. I mean, we are, I think, a week removed from the shooting in Kenosha, and that was after

three months of demonstrations and protests about what happened one stayed over in Minneapolis. So clearly there's a racial component to it. Yeah. Yeah. And a Caprice toward black folks and toward their bodies and their lives that there does not exist for white folks. Yeah. So and again, how did we let it get there? Well, some people would point out that it's always been that way. We've just been hitting the snooze button. And somebody would point out that that absolutely it's gotten here because people, it's not that they don't care, it's that they gave up. because people, it's not that they don't care, it's that they gave up. Yeah. Yeah, I don't have any solutions. Unfortunately, Star Trek doesn't tell us how we're going to get to, um, getting to replicate

whatever we want, um, for food. That would be neat, but it wouldn't suck. Yeah, but it does say we have to go through something called the Eugenics War first. So that's, that doesn't sound good. Awful.. Yeah, that's that really I don't like that. Yeah But anyway, so all right. What's your reading anything? Well, I'm I'm again going to as I did a couple of episodes ago I'm gonna plug the flying tigers by Sam Kleiner, which is the story of the pilots who fought against the Japanese in China,

even before our entry into World War II, which even at the time was being turned into at the time was being turned into a movie, myth-making, John Wayne, of course, made the famous film, The Flying Tigers, which is actually a pretty good war movie, I gotta say. And I mean, it suffers from being a relic of the 40s, but you know, so yeah, I'm gonna recommend that. It's a very good read and a really remarkable story out of history.

Nice. How about you? I'm gonna recommend another TV show this week. Now I am looking for an escape every once in a while, probably because I've spent more than 40 hours this week just negotiating with my district. So I would like to say that that's time stamping this episode too, but we will see. So I'm going to say watch Letter Kenny. I've mentioned it before.

I watched a few more episodes again. Got another buddy of mine into it. It just, oh my God, so clever, such wonderful writing, escapes a lot of what you got going on in your world and just tells a fun little story about a few people in a place. And it's nice. You get to see some cool character arcs in it too. Alright, I have been meaning to check it out. I need to actually take the time and sit down and really watch it. Is that Amazon or is that Hulu? I found it on Hulu. I forget what studio makes it. You could probably find their own streaming service.

Everybody has one. But get your wife to sit down with you and watch it. But turn on the subtitles. Well, you're going to do that anyway because you're a parent. But turn on subtitles because you absolutely need subtitles for it because they're Canadians. So. Okay. Yeah. Sounds good. Where can we find you on social medias? All right. So on the social medias, speaking of letter Kenny, Squirley Dan, I can be found on the TikToks at EH Playlock.

And on Twitter, on the Twitter machine, at the same address, eHPlayLock. On Instagram, I am at MrBlayLock, MRBLAYLOCK. And as I always point out, we can collectively be found on Twitter as Geek History Time. And where can you be found? Oh, there's one last place. You can always find me in a beer garden when one is open, socially distancing now, of course,

but it's a good place to look if you're trying to find where I am. Where can you be found? Oh, it's funny too, because you mentioned the beer garden. When I was in Berlin two years ago, for only three days, there's a whole group of teachers. Got an argument with one of them in the topography

of Terror Museum, which used to be the old SS headquarters. I got to tell that story sometime. But after that night, where I took the really radical stance of attacking Nazis is acceptable. Yeah. You communist, you know? Well, really it's because I was doing, I was advocating violence,

and that's just as bad as advocating genocide apparently, because yeah, I was, ooh, so they all went to yet another beer garden. Like, you know, third day in, they went to a beer garden, I went and found a comedy club and performed at it. Yeah, well, so we all have our different unhealthy coping mechanisms. Exactly. So, I just talk into a microphone and insist that people listen for eight minutes at a time. But anyway,

social media wise, you can find me at Duh Harmony on the Twitter and on the Insta. Duh Harmony has two Hs in it. You can also find me every Tuesday night at 830 at twitch.tv forward slash capital puns and you'll see my unhealthy coping habits there too because I'll be punning so that's that's about it. So for a geek history of time I'm Damien Harmony and I'm Ed Blaylock and may you all live long and prosper. And I'm Ed Blaylock and may you all live long and prosper.

Well done.