The Greatest Generation - A Tat for Every Tit (S2E21)

Episode Date: July 4, 2016

When the Enterprise engages in war games, their opponent is the biggest WOPR of them all: Commander Riker. Unfortunately for Captain Picard, Riker's team includes Ensign Crusher (the Boy?), and a threat from an unexpected foe. Who gave Picard a hickey? Is one of Riker's crew giving off Laura Dern vibes? What are the chances of getting a "Natural Yeager"? It's the episode with excellent finger dexterity!

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

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

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

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

and season two of Star Trek Picard. We've set up a page where you can also contribute. It's at friendsofdecotoforlabor.com. That's friendsofdececoto for Labor.com. That's FriendsOfDecoto for Labor.com. Link in the episode description. Okay, now let's get on with the show. Here's to the finest crew in Star Trek Podcast by two guys who are a little bit embarrassed to have a Star Trek Podcast. I'm your host Adam Pranico. Name the other host Ben Harrison.

Oh, listen to that. It's becoming as much hour sound effect as it is the flop houses. Should we just open some cards? Yeah, let's open some cards. Are you opening a pack? Yeah, I'm opening a pack. All right. First is for an episode called The First Duty. Oh, this is that one where Wesley Crusher and Tom Paris

get in big trouble because they did a bad maneuver and got one of their wingman killed. Remember that episode? You can't do that. Yeah, that's no good. I think that's where that whole, the first duty of every circulated officer is to the truth Jag comes from. Yeah, it's too bad, Wesley... A boy couldn't use his traveler powers to save that kid's life.

Yeah. He's the Mozart of warp design, but not of piloting apparently. He's not a great, starfleet Blue Angels pilot. Okay, here's another one. It's card number one. It's encounter at far point, part one. I guess that means there's a part two card also. Does it have the blanket, the Pendleton blanket? It doesn't. It's got Picard in profile and then a like a over top shot of the Enterprise with like a concentric series of rainbow rings on the saucer section.

These cards are so fucking cool. They're so new, wavy and fun. Like I would totally get posters of this. Yeah, if and when I ever have a man cave. Here's one for an episode called The Masterpiece Society. It's another over top shot of the Enterprise. Looks like it's flying past a planet. This is from that one where they have to stop a chunk of a star that's going to destroy a planet.

They're always doing that. Oh, here's one for Samaritan snare. This is kind of fun. It's a silhouette of Jordy. The Enterprise is in white against the silhouette and there's an eyeball on the saucer section, and then there's a fish hook dangling down trying to catch the enterprise. The titular snare? Yeah.

It's a really a real deep abstraction of the premise of the episode. I like it. Last one is hero worship. Oh yeah, this is that one where they find a kid that's like trapped on a wreckage of a ship that went down. Yeah, I think it's data on a pedestal and a small child looking up at him. Much the way I put Leslie Crusher on a pedestal when a small child looking up at him. Much the way I put, Leslie Crusher on a pedestal when I was a small child.

You certainly did. And soon enough people will be putting Wesley on their bodies. Yeah. Hopefully by this point in time we'll be inching ever closer to 500 iTunes votes, which will unlock our ability to print T-shirts. You're going to put that thing on and parade around like one of them? Yeah, and if people want to enter our contest, just take a screenshot of your

Five Star review and send it to drunkshamodapluscontest at gmail.com. And you're automatically entered to win both in the random selection and in the meritocracy. There's two opportunities to win a shirt. One is for funniest and one is for just a random pick. And there's one opportunity to win two shirts, it sounds like, because if you win the meritocracy and then on the next roll, you hit the lotto. Yeah. That'd be kind of amazing. That would be amazing. That would be like you pulling two signature cards out in succession.

It would be like doing some sort of listener pull and then not doing anything about the result. We took it under advisement. Did you see the people are buying Biffyager cards on eBay? I did see that. I think they are pushing up the value of that card. I really hope that we get one. I want to get a natural yager to be honest.

Like I do not want to buy a Biffyager. Here's the two ways I'll accept getting a yager are opening a packet that one is inside or meeting Biffyager and him giving me one as like a token as like a challenge coin of having met Biff Yeager. Oh God, I totally believe the idea of Biff Yeager walking around in a denim vest that he then like opens up like a watch salesman and time square and he just brandishes a ton of signed Biffy-Agric cards. Oh boy this is not interesting. This is becoming a speech.

So episode 20 of season two, peak performance. Or as I'm calling it Star Trek Laser Tag. It is kind of Star Trek Laser Tag, not a bad comparison. So the enterprise has been sort of bullied into taking part in some simulated combat to by a Starfleet command. And Picard's like not crazy about it, but this alien... Is the Zach Dorne Master Strategist, Sierna Kolrami?

He's like the master, master military strategist that the Federation has sent to help whip the Enterprise crew into shape for any combat that they might encounter. And Colrami is also repeated to be a master of a game called Stratagema, not to be confused with Stratigo. -"Stratagema!" So this guy Colrami is brought in as sort of a Robert McNamara figure. Like he's sort of like, he looks like a melted soft serve ice cream

cone. Yeah, he's super melty. But he's got like the comic book guy personality from The Simpsons. Sure. He's extremely condescending because the whole idea is like, they got whipped so bad by the Borgon, their first interaction that somehow a war game with a 40-year-old starship is going to somehow whip the enterprise into shape tactically. What exactly are they supposed to learn here? I totally agree. If it's about board preparedness, this is not the kind of... I guess if the enterprise is the best ship in the fleet, there's nothing that they can

really do to simulate something tougher than it. Yeah. But it is a strange choice. There's a lot of grumbling like, nobody is really into the idea of this. Worf hates the idea. Worf hates the idea that this whiny, shuffly little man that's poking around the ship is supposed to be some kind of advanced warrior.

It's sort of the remick problem again, right? Like every time the Enterprise crew is introduced to someone who is supposed to be their superior in any way, everyone just kind of resents it, you know? Like who is this guy to tell us what to do? Like they really have a problem with authority. Yeah, Picard is supposed to be their daddy and anybody that kind of has anything on Picard

is not welcome aboard. So it might sound like this story isn't solid because, I mean, we've already poked a great big hole in it just the idea on its face doesn't seem like it makes a ton of sense. However, the story that follows I thought was really fun and satisfying. So the idea is Riker gets to pick his dodgeball team of Enterprise Cruman and bring them over to this old ship and he's supposed to staff this old ship, get it up and running so that it

can play laser tag with the Enterprise. Right, so they're like disconnecting all the weapons and plugging in laser blasters that don't inflict damage but will register, you know, like this ship will kind of simulate as though that section was in fact blown up and shut it down. Yeah, they're putting like big light up vests on both ships. Yeah. And the hathaway, the ships that they're going to be taking the enterprise on is decommissioned. It's like it's essentially been all but scuttled in orbit of this planet. And so the 48 hours leading up to the game

are all about Riker and Wharf and Jordy and Wesley like fixing it up to combat readiness because you know like the warp engine is offline like the when I beam over like none of the lights on the on the bridge are on and there's wires and crap, stream everywhere. This place is a dope. It's really like an art director's dream.

Yeah. This whole setup, it's great. I mean, it's a really good bridge. Like, they really know how to do a dope bridge, even if it's a single use set, you know? Yeah, it's great. I mean, it's sort of like the house that's been boarded up Mm-hmm on the street for like 20 years with the with the weeds growing up in front of the the windows It's like that level of disrepair

Meanwhile, there's a B storyline going where This this game that this storyline going where this game that this Colourami guy is supposed to be so great at. Apparently they have a setup for it in 10 forward, and so Riker challenges him to a game of strategy a- I enjoy challenge. ...and is drugged immediately. And there's a pretty funny scene where Riker and Jordy are like walking to 10 forward where Riker is about to take on Kolrami and Jordy is like, so you're going to kick his ass commander and he's like, nope, I'm going to lose. And he explains

the Jordy that the honor is in playing the game at all. I was pretty surprised with how badly Riker lost because just to like set the scene for what this game looks like, the two players sit across sort of a Pac-Man arcade game at a pizza parlor style table. Yeah, it's the one that sometimes you have to ask people to get up with their pizza because it's also a table. Yeah, and they put like five cow milkers on each hand, on each finger, on each hand.

And they're definitely like actually cow milkers, right? Like they have like milk tubes attached to them. They couldn't possibly be anything else. And a hologram pops up in front of them that sort of spins around. And really it's a totally inscrutable game. The only part of it that makes sense is the score that you see in the upper corner of

the screen. And when you watch Riker play Colrami, I mean Colrami's score is just rocketing towards a thousand and Riker's stuck on like 60. And it was really disappointing because Riker is a guy I would expect to have really good finger dexterity. Yeah, we're given like a mystique for the type of alien that Colramia is by data when he explains to Wharf that they've remained unattacked for 9,000 years because they have such a badass reputation as strategists.

It's sort of like prison reputation as strategists. It's sort of like prison reputation rules. Yeah. A guy gets a rep for stabbing a guy in the dick and that guy's left alone for the entire length of his sentence. Like that's sort of the rep for this guy's race. Yeah. For 9,000 years. Yeah. What did they do to go to prison that long? I don't know. They definitely, like, they're not as advanced in fashion

as they are in strategy. Yeah, they might. This dude is wearing, like, essentially, like a coffee sack with like a space brooch. That space brooch game is strong. So let's go over who Riker is picked for dodgeball. He picks Jority because this ship really needs a lot of engineering help.

Jority's like, I already packed my lunchbox. Right, and he picks Worf because he clearly needs a sound tactician at his side. Right. And then strangely, he picks Wesley. The boy. Right, because I guess, I don't know, he likes field trips as any student would.

He just, he knew that the kid needed a break from Picard's coming around his bedroom at all hours of the night. Yeah, I mean, kids love laser tag. Yeah. And that along with a random blonde lady, I think there's the only people that record fix. Yeah, random blonde lady who is not up to the like two lines that she has given,

not up to delivering those in a naturalistic way. Random blonde lady totally gave me Laura Dern vibes. Yeah, but she's like, she's like low rent me Laura Dern vibes. Yeah, but she's like, she's like low rent as Laura Dern. That's some broke ass Laura Dern. Okay, so here's what the half of the way is up against. The team gets over there, they're able to like get the power going and get the ship more or less operational, but they're not

going to have any warp power, which is a real big bummer, you know, especially if you wanted to pull a Picard maneuver. And then the other thing that they're trying to deal with is the fact that, you know, even though the weapons are all simulated, like this ship is less maneuverable and less well-armed, even in simulation than the enterprise. So they want to like come up with some kind of edge that they can use in the battle. So Warf comes up with this idea that they'll trick the enterprise into thinking

that there's another ship there, and they'll use this distraction to get off some cheap shots. Everyone on the Hathaway knows that the only way that they're going to beat the enterprise in a war game is through some sort of trickery. And so Warf proposes the idea of hacking into the enterprise computer sensors and throwing up a false positive on another ship that's attacking it. Warf seems to think that he can just hack into the

enterprises if it's like a hotmail password or something. Yeah, it's just password. That's the kind of thing an idiot would have on his luggage. There's a lot of Picard like, you know, walking around ringing his hands, worried about the prep for forgetting the enterprise ready. And Colourami just keeps going like, like you're an idiot to even be worried about this.

This ship is going to lose and Picard is like no, like Ryker is a substantial opponent and he is going to find a way to come at us in a way that we don't expect and so I want to be ready for anything. And there's a lot of like talk about this, you know this. There's a big extended scene with counselor Troy and data like talking about the psychology that Riker will be bringing to bear in this attack, which is really great because up to that point in this episode, her only function seems to have been putting milk suckers

on people's fingers. Right. Because the doctor, having seen Colrami play this game, sort of doops data into a situation where data has challenged Colrami to a match of strategy. And they play in front of everybody. And we should say that like when people are playing this game, they're just sitting with their hands sort of like out as though they're about to clap,

but with all these like cables coming off of all their fingers, and they're just like wiggling their fingers in midair, and then a dozen crew members are standing around going like, yeah, oh, you can get them, get them, get them, data, oh, you can go for it, oh, you can get him, get him, get him, data, oh, you can go for it. Oh, ah! It's somehow, like, less interesting than watching Watts and Play Jeopardy. It is so bad, so bad.

It's like, it's a real, like, black mark on another way, it's like, pretty decent episode. It really feels like, like, if you were to go, like, I don't even know if there are video arcades out there anymore, but like, if you were to go to one today, and you were to watch kids play a video game that you didn't understand, that's the amount of satisfaction you get watching these scenes, like, you just,

you can't make sense of it. Yeah, there's no, like, there's no apparent object to the game at all. It's really like, you think they could have spent 15 minutes coming up with a better thing. For a show that does so much world building, it seems like game building might be more difficult. They really fail at it, consistently across the entire series. Yeah, but the main takeaway from this scene is Col Rami sort of desks data pretty hard.

The computer beaten by flesh and blood? And it's not even close. Data gets a lot further than Riker does, but it's not good. I met your disposal for a rematch. Thank you. But what would be the point? It's not a good look and data Recuses himself from duty after this because

It feels like if he can't beat a an organic then He shouldn't he shouldn't be in service because it means that there's something wrong with him It really speaks to his air of superiority Like in a way that he doesn't really demonstrate himself in any other way like It's really the come to Jesus moment for him As far as like am I better than everyone else? I can't be if I can't beat this fucking guy. This guy's super annoying. Yeah. Yeah Yeah, I'm great at milking cows. Alright, so back to the A storyline briefly.

They come up with this idea that if they had some antimatter, they could get the tiny little fragments of dilithium that they have to react and give them a little bit of warp energy, which would be a big surprise that they could pull on the enterprise. And if they have two surprises in their pocket, like you know, it's still not a fair fight, but they have a better chance. So Wesley pulls this gambit where he's gonna beam aboard the enterprise and get his science experiment, which is in like a dish cupboard in the engineering section. It's over in the Shimoda corner, right?

It is, and what's great about this scene is that he's escorted there by someone we're introduced to as Lieutenant Burke, who is the substitute security officer in Warf's absence. Who's got like super David Caruso vibes. I have very strong associations with him as like the head of the secret service detail in 24. In 24, yeah. And he was great on that show. I feel like he's played like secret service a bunch and like military guys a bunch. Yeah It's a good actor Glenn Moore shower. I really dig his deal

He's real young in this like if you look at like what Patrick Stewart looks like standing next to him in in shots on this show and then if you looked at them today You'd be like wow Patrick Stewart has an aged even a moment, and Glenn Moore's shower has aged 35 years. Yeah, I mean, he looks almost pre-pubescent in Star Trek compared to how he looks in 24. Yeah. Looks like a totally different person.

So anyways, this gambit of West is successful, but he gets back aboard the halfway, and Riker's like, what's you cheated? Riker wants to turn the chair around and be like, Wes, let me tell you about playing fair and square. Yeah. And like, and like, Jordi is clearly like, awkward because he like sticks his head

under the dilithium chamber and is like, I'm just back here working and not a part of this part of the conversation. Even though Jordi was totally part of this part of the conversation. Even though Jordy was totally party to the plan from the start. Totally. He's like, he's like, I don't even know that guy officer.

I don't know him. When Riker realizes that this is actually going to give them an edge, he totally forgives the quasi-criminal act that Wesley has perpetrated. Are we good? In bed of a great brilliant, it's gonna be fun. Carry on.

About 200 times before the game pops off, Jordy makes a point of like walking around his console and like standing in front of Riker and going like we don't know if this is even gonna work okay yeah he's not very confident in the system as it is right now and for some reason like West has no opinion at all about his experiments efficacy and if it'll work under these circumstances which I thought was a little weird too. Yeah. It's all on Jordy to have it set up.

Right. Well, maybe less is just like, well, you're not gonna fucking get my back when Riker starts breathing down my neck. Maybe you can fucking fix the fucking warp engine yourself, asshole. Right, right. Jordy's never been a confidence fan, though.

I think we know that. So they get the game game underway and pretty quickly the enterprise is distracted by the fact that a Romulan warbird is coming up from behind and is stepping to them in a very aggro way and Colrami is like really delighted to see that the the halfway his scored the first several hits of the match. And it's described as like pretty severe, but not debilitating damage that they've virtually inflicted to the enterprise. Yeah, I mean, everyone on the enterprise sort of has that clever girl moment from Jurassic Park.

And Riker is like draped over the command chair on the hathaway by the way. His posture of command is just full spread. Full man spread. Like, my balls are the size of footballs and I need my legs to not be touching them. We can't be sure he doesn't have scoliosis. Hahaha. But not long after this little first gambit unfolds, before the enterprise has another ship coming up on them

and they detect that they're like great, another fucking fake ship, good job, Mr. Wharf. And then this ship opens up on them and actually is shooting hot rounds at them. Continue the simulation. And it is a Ferengy warship. Which I think for the first time in the series is the moment where the Ferengy have been threatening.

Right. The actuality. Totally. This is a fun one because this is I think the first appearance by Armin Shimmerman who goes on to be a main cast character in Deep Space 9. He's playing Diamond Bractore who's really bewildered by the idea of a war game. Why was your ship compatible for another federation vessel of lesser desire? And why do you now protect your former target?

The only thing his feeble, for-angie brain can think of is that there's something valuable on that other ship and they want the enterprise to fuck off so that they can claim it. This is one thing that happens that I feel like is kind of a bummer in Star Trek, which is the amount of damage a ship sustains is always perfectly tuned to what the plot is going to be about. It's like, okay, our weapons are fused, so we can't switch back to actual phasers and our shields are up, so we can't beam everybody back over. There's a tat for every tit. Yeah, and it's just like, I feel like there could be an artful way to do it, but they didn't quite do it here. And it just feels like, okay, great.

Like every recourse you would possibly have for dealing with these idiots has been fucked up by the fact that they scored a couple of cheap shots on you. You're right, it just speaks to a convenience of challenge that just aligns perfectly to both the problem and the solution to follow. And they come up with a pretty creative solution in the 10 Earth minutes they're given by Frankie, which is also like another classic bad guy move. Like, I've got you on the ropes.

I could destroy you and get exactly what I want right now, but instead I will give you 10 minutes to regroup and think of a way to defeat me. Which also I think maybe speaks to how stupid the Faringiar. Right. Man, poor Armin Shimmerman, do you think he was in the makeup chair for this episode? And I was like, all right. Another acting job on Star Trek, this is great. Then an hour later in the makeup chair he's like,

God, this fucking sucks actually. I still have two more hours to go in this makeup chair. Well, at least it's a job. And then, do you think he could imagine that he would have another 12 years of putting on those fucking ears, the ears in the butt head? Yeah.

Oh man. Pretty rough. What a moment. So here's the plan that they come up with. The enterprise manages to get a handful of photon torpedoes back online. And what they're going to do is launch them at the Hathaway. Hathaway is going to use its very limited and as

Jordi is, it pains to insist at all times uncertain warp capabilities and they're going to blow up the torpedoes right as the as the half the way warps out of the spot and that will make it look as though the half away has been blown up and the Frankie will be convinced that whatever was valuable on it has also been destroyed. It's so fucking bonkers because they're, I mean, this is their only plan and they're basing it on Jordy's terrible idea

of its success. I think I hate this plan. Jordy is not confident at all. If I'm riker, I'm probably shitting my pants at this point. Right. Is this really the best we can do. If the warp engines failed to function, the result could be unfortunate. Very unfortunate. We will be dead. But Riker is not shitting his pants. He is brimming with confidence.

What the hell? Nobody said life was safe. So they throw this plan into action. They make it look like the Hathaway's blown up. The Frangie are completely blindsided by how stupid the Federation is getting rid of something as valuable as whatever it was. And then the Hathaway comes in behind them. The Frangie decide that they've been outmatched and they split. Pretty satisfying end. Like the gambit worked. High fives all around.

Yeah. I think there are no losers because the game got stopped in the middle. I don't think Riker or Procard feels like they lost the war game specifically because they were able to join forces against Right. It gets a common enemy. It was fun. And it was, it all went in a way where Col Rami underestimated them time and time again. Like Col Rami was like, get out of here, leave those idiots on the other ship to, to their doom.

Like we got to save a thousand lives here and, and, uh, Picard and Riker team up and show that the teamwork, that teamwork outdoes strategy every time. Riker once again demonstrates that he should be a captain, but would rather not be. Yeah, they're all put back together and data challenges Colrami to one more strategy game. And this time, like the scores are just completely off the charts. It's like 3,000 to 3,500 or something.

And Colourami gets totally frustrated and pulls all the milk suckers off his fingers and storms off. You know, he says, you have made a mockery of me. And they're like, how'd you do it, data? I mean, that's like the longest game of Stratagema has ever Do a data, like, I mean, that's like the longest a game of Stratagema has ever gone. And data says that he changed his premise for play, not to try and win, but to try and stop Colrami from winning. And in so doing, could indefinitely play the game.

I busted him up. Yeah. Yeah. That is the like, half line on which the episode concludes. Data got his groove back. Yeah. It was a pretty decent episode, I thought. Definitely not without its flaws, but you know, hold your interest.

There's some fun, fun in games. And like, not a non-annoying appearance by the Ferengy. Like, the Ferengy being Ferengi and doing what Ferengi do, but not in a way that made me like want to crawl out of my skin and leave. Right. Right. They feel a little bit more developed as a threat. Yeah. They actually have a bridge on their ship this time,

which is a nice change of pace from the... Instead of seamless white. White seamless that they usually have. Yeah, that was a good touch. They felt a little complete this time. Yeah. I really liked this episode. I am a total sucker for a war game.

A war game episode of any television series. I enjoyed it quite a bit. And the combat is cool. Like the ships flying around and lasering each other and the Romulan ships swooping in all looked really good. And it was fun from a special effects standpoint. Yeah, this was another big success for the remastered version too, because the old ship looked awesome. Totally. All of the battle scenes look great.

The sort of delivered on the promise of all that remastering Absolutely. Did you Find yourself a drunk Shimoda while watching the episode? Did the drunk Shimoda? Did the drunk Shimoda? I would just be curious to hear yours first. Yeah, you always go first, huh? I mean sometimes sometimes I sometimes I ask for years. Sometimes we go at

the same time. Sometimes we touch tips. My Shimoda is actually wharf because I'm not sure he doesn't have a profound gambling problem. This is the second time he's bet on a fellow crewman in some sort of sport. If you remember, he bet on Tasha Yarr during the cage match. And both times they imply that there's a gambling culture on the ship where there's a ship's pool and he has bet in that pool. So he bet on Yarr and one. He bets on Riker and loses. He's clearly really good at poker.

He was on a heater the last time he played poker before they got called out of the game. Like, he might be the best gambler on the ship. I'm excited to see where this goes as a character development. Me too. Let's see how he does a dabo. I get that reference. My drink, Shemota, is Burke, the tactical ensign that we were talking about earlier.

He's obviously new to the job. It's the first time we've seen him. A lot of the Dustbuster club guys that we're used to seeing are absent in this episode. And when Wesley Beams over, Burke is tasked with escorting him around the ship. And he really lets Wesley steal antimatter while he is watching, which is a real drunk charmotomove. And it happens in the Jim Charmotoda Memorial Corner, nonetheless. It seems like a security guy would be more interested in controlling the antimatter than he is. Look, is this going to take much longer?

I guess he was just really excited to get back to his post. He's never there, right? Right. God, and why stick him on Wesley duty? I don't know. Yeah, I dug his whole deal. This is the only time we see on Wesley duty? I don't know. Yeah, I dug his whole deal. This is the only time we see him, right?

I think, yeah, I don't know if he comes back. I have a, I actually have a second Shimoda for this episode. Whoa. And it is okay. Are we allowed to do this? Well, this is a special circumstance. All right. Second, second Shimoda in this episode is Sir Patrick

Stewart. If you go to 23 minutes and 23 seconds of this episode, you will see a shot in which I believe Patrick Stewart has a hickey on his neck. What the fuck? I shit you not. I've been looking pretty closely at this since I noticed it. And I'm pretty sure that's what it is. And I think that's pretty fucking great.

23 what? What was the time code? 23 23. Oh my God. Ha ha ha. This really made my day when I saw this and I just want to tip my hat to Captain Picard. I tip my hat to the makeup artist who chose not to cover that up. Boy, HD reveals It doesn't it sure does a greatest gen live show is something you don't want to miss why well it's a great opportunity to see me and Ben in person that that's not all

f.o.d's from all over gather at these shows to cosplay to do pre and post show hangs to make friends and share their embarrassment. Hey, let's make a pretty great name for a tour. Let's do it. The Share Your Embarrassment Tour is coming in August 2023, and we've got a bunch of dates in a lot of great places. Go to GreatestGenTour.com to get more info. That's GreatestGenTour.com for dates and ticketing information

for the Share your embarrassment tour. I'm Jordan Morris. And I'm Jesse Thorne. On Jordan Jesse Go, we make pure, delightful nonsense. We were open awesome guests and bring them down to our level. We get stupid with Judy Greer. My friend Molly and I call it having the spaceweards. Pat Noswald.

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Give Jordan Jesse Goatry. Being smart is hard. Be dumb instead. Whoa, Russ. Hey, hey, how you doing? I'm glad I count you in line. These clouds are really freaking me out. I hate having to stand in line.

And boy, what do I? These giraffes do not smell good. No, they do not, and they've such short nacks. But I'm here and we need to get on this. We've got to get on the art. It is about terrain, about a spout to destroy humanity. Hey, oh, sorry, sorry, sorry. Are you Noah?

Yeah, I know we look like humans. We're actually, we're podcasters. We are podcasters, so it's different. Have you heard of Ono Ross and Kerry? We investigate spirituality, claims of the paranormal, stuff like that. And you have a boat and say the world's gonna end, so same life, something for us to check out. We would love to be on the boats. We came two by two. What do you think? Ono Ross and, available on MaximumFun.org. Hey Ben, what do we have coming up on our next episode? Our next episode is the final episode of season two, a very notorious episode, Shades

of Grey. Commander Riker is struck down by a deadly microbe, which invades his central nervous system and attacks his brain. As soon as I blew the countervito on you, we got a ton of email and Twitter traffic saying that I really fucked us because this is where it should have been used. See, I think we always knew we were going to Shades of Grey, Turkier know, because the idea of doing a clip show with our show is really fun to both of us.

I mean, we've talked about it from the beginning. And I think that if we were going to invoke Vito's wisely, it would have been for manhunt and the space Irish episode that I tried to veto. I don't think anyone expects us to deploy our Vito's wisely. I think they know by now. Yeah, well, would you like to know the reception for this episode? I'd love to. Maurice Hurley, who co-wrote the episode, commented that it was a piece of shit.

Terrible, just terrible, and a way to save some money. I was on my way out the door. People in Lloristan said, never again. I don't ever want to remember it. Ronald D. Moore called it embarrassing. And director Rob Bowman. Oh no, it's a lot of Bowman episode. No. Oh, you expect so much from him. Shades of Grey was basically a money-saving episode. All we shout was three days of framework and they just stuck in flashbacks. That's all it was. So he was pretty diplomatic

about it. But I think if you're him, you know you could have done better with more shoot days and better material. I certainly don't hang this on his shingle. This is not his fault. You're told by a studio how much money you have and he worked within the framework he had. Like, that's pretty brutal. Yeah, I'm excited for what we may do for this one. I think we have got some fun ideas. Yeah, I'm excited for the episode. But let's be clear, that's going to be a five minute recap before we go on to doing

the fun stuff. But, ouch. And then after this, it's season three. It's smooth sailing, right? on to doing the fun stuff, but... Yeah. Ouch. Ouch. And then, you know, after this, it's season three. It's smooth sailing, right? Yeah. We got some great episodes coming up. I'm looking forward to. And that's when the real trouble starts for us as a comedy podcast.

Yeah, harder to make fun of the good ones. Yeah. Well, if you'd like to talk about this episode, the next episode, or any other episode we've talked about, be sure to find us on Twitter using the hashtag GreatestGen. I'm over there as At Cut for Time and Benz over there as At BenjaminR, a.e.h.r. If you would like to go to our Reddit, you can check us out on Reddit as Great as Jen and also as Maximum Fun. Maximum Fun is best behavior land and Great as Jen is let your hair down.

Do what you want to do. Great as Jen is where you can be a piece of shit. That banner is getting better and better. Have you seen they added a Previa to it? Previa with little Nacells, no less. Awesome. I love it. And Wesley's sticking his head out of it. Go to the Facebook group, greatest generation, and last but not least, if you'd like to support

our show, but feel like you'd like to tip your trek tenders. Leave us a couple of scarves at Maximumfund.org slash Donate. Thanks. What do we say after that? Leave us a couple of scarves at Maximumfund.org slash Donate. Thanks! What do we say after that? I think we just say we'll be back at you next time with another episode of Star Trek the Next Generation, Great and or Terrible, and also whatever this is. Get it, you'll look at God of the U.S. Get it, you'll look at God of the U.S. Get it, you'll look at God of the U.S. Make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, make it, Listener supported.