Yet Another Star Trek Podcast - Ep 018: (SNW S01E08) The Elysian Kingdom

Episode Date: June 28, 2022

This week The Gang takes a trip to a magical realm where M'Benga is King... and is confused as all heck.  We watch as he tries to solve what happened to the crew of the Enterprise.  Majeed hosts and Brad inadvertently gaslights Drew.  Will Brad make it out of this episode alive?  Listen in to find out! Be sure to check out our website, social media, and join our Discord! Links for all are listed below: Website | Discord | Facebook | Instagram | Twitter | TikTok | YouTube Drop us an email at [e-mail]! “Warp Speed” and "To the Stars" was written and performed by William Grobbelaar Music: https://soundcloud.com/williamgrobbelaarmusic Additional artwork by George Rateau: https://www.fiverr.com/georgerateau

Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, welcome to yet another Star Trek podcast. I'm your host for today's episode. My name is Mitch. With me are my two lovely, lovely cohorts, Brad and Drew. Hi guys. Oh, hail the King, Salah. Oh, hail the King. I can't do accents.

It's not an accent though. I was trying to think of how I could do like a medieval reading for you, but how can I possibly outshine Brad? That was just one. I'll try and Brad or you give me no credit whatsoever? Well, I was getting to that, but you're the king. So, I mean, you need your own section of flattery. That's fair. Speaking of which, right before we started recording,

I saw Brad take a sip of coffee through a straw and I'm confused. Hey, Brad, can you just, oh my God. Can you tell me why you're sipping coffee through a straw and making eye contact with me? Hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on. Before he explains himself, can I berate him for 10 minutes?

I don't think we have that much time. Go for it, man, go for it. contact hold on hold on before he explains himself can I berate him for 10 minutes? I don't think we have that much time go for man go for it Brad what is wrong with you? Why would you sip a hot beverage? What sort what sort of and then you're making eye contact with us? Oh the eye contact on purpose Fiddle me guess technically the straw is on purpose too, but um, but no, no, I got used to it. Like, I think it was, I don't know, three years ago, um, my wife was really on the, oh, we need to do teeth whitening. And of course, like, in order for you to do teeth whitening, like, you're not supposed to have any, uh, any drinks that stain your teeth. And I was like, well, that BS, I'm not going to do teeth whitening And I was like, well, yes, I'm not gonna do teeth wedding.

She's like, well, you could drink it through a straw. I was like, okay, cool. I guess I'll do it. And so therefore, I kind of got used to it. And so it's just like a habit now at this point. That's a bad habit. You should break it. You should just stain your teeth.

Right. There are other ways. You don't have to sit on the coffee. Just like, so stay down your throat. So it's tilt my head back and just like, right, get a funnel. Yeah. Yeah.

Right. It will miss a team to your system. It will miss a team entirely. You know, for some reason, I'm now picturing back to the Feature 3. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Dog Brown is getting the wake up drink for down this throat. I'm picturing that.

Oh, that's, that's, that's the alternative, I guess. But I think I'll just stick with the straw because I do actually enjoy the taste. Well, since we're actually on coffee, I don't know if I told you guys. A very tragic event happened in my life this week. My coffee machine broke. You can't, hang on, you can't sell a tragedy by first saying speaking of coffee and then segue into tragedy. Like it, I don't buy it at that point.

Well, it was a tragedy for me. My coffee machine broke. And so therefore I had to find a alternative method to having coffee. So, um, let allow me, allow me to mourn for you in the most star trek way possible. It was, it was a very annoying event where I'm like pouring the, or having the coffee machine brew everything. And, and all of a sudden I noticed like the very bottom of the coffee pot was filled and it was like hey Why is it making some weird noises?

Apparently something's broken Well, obviously so something got stuck in the the piping and so therefore is like trying to to pass through water Like it was trying to pass through a kidney stone like trying to pass through water, like it was trying to pass through kidney stone. This is the most horrible phrase I've heard in the video. Yeah, kidney stones, I don't want to picture that. I was wrong with you.

But what it was, unfortunately, no longer effective. My buddy Finch, however, came to the rescue and he reminded me that he had purchased a French press for me for Christmas this past year and I completely forgot about it because I've used it maybe like two or three times and then the entire week I've been using it every single day. So, Finch, is that the same fish from the discord because he's cool? Yes. Wait, no, different Finch. Finch, not Fitch. Oh, well, I like, I like Fitch. Yeah, he's cool. I don't know, Finch. Maybe I should create a new nickname

for him. Wait, you just gave out his whole government. Like, that's his whole name. Oof. You know, we, you know, Brad, we do things to protect people's identity and, know, we, you know, Brad, we do things to protect people's identity and, and they're, uh, you know, there will be, that's why we say, Frank's instead of, oh, I almost did it. I almost did it. I almost did it. Oh, man. I also, what we see Wayne instead of the other name, because even though he doesn't listen to the podcast, I think you could probably just call those real name and then nobody would ever notice. Well, he'll never know.

Because he doesn't listen to the podcast. Sure. Yeah. Guys, listen, it's Friday morning. I'm literally fresh out the gym. I think we started this full call, Brad and I after I left. So I'm pumped up with energy. Speaking of coffee, by the way, my protein shake is called a coffee kick. It's chocolate protein, coffee grounds, and peanut

butter. Sounds terrible. It's amazing. It is so But it, if you're not careful, you will absolutely have to run to the bathroom. I was thinking I was like, man, it sounds like if you dog out into it, the same thing would happen. Yeah, you know, again, this, I'm so happy that Kylo is, is in the house sleeping. He doesn't know I'm home yet, by the way. I just kind of snuck into the house. I haven't seen him. You're ninja. Yeah, I'm, I'm not going, by the way. I just kind of snuck into the house. I haven't seen him. You're ninja. Yeah, I'm not going to because he wants my full attention. If we were recording like last week,

how many times we had to take a break? Because he just kept bothering me. Well, the audience doesn't know that. The audience who has oblivious to it, thanks to Drew. Mm-hmm. So maybe we cut that? We cut that. So normally in the summer we have, you know, not a lot of TV shows to watch, but umbrella

Academy just premiered this week. I'm looking forward to that. That looked pretty exciting. Dude, 20 minutes into the first episode, I'm like, ooh man, I need season four already. Like they got a green light, they get it out. Do you ever watch it? Yeah, I'm caught up with it. I haven't started the new season yet,

but good show, not great show, in my opinion. It took me a moment to get into. I think the first season, I watched the first episode, it was very met and I kind of gave up on it. And then I think it first the first season like I watched like the first episode was like very met and I kind of gave up on it and then I think it was you, Mjid, who kind of pushed me into being like, come on, do it, do it, just watch it. And I finally caved and I watched the rest of it. And I think once I got through the second season, I was like, this is, this

is awesome. I really loved it. Yeah, you just told everyone that I appear pressured you and it's watching something. I mean, isn't that what you do normally? That's fair. I had a similar experience with it too, Brad. Like the first episode, it was really like, yeah, this does not seem like it's worth my time, but my wife wanted to watch it, so I stuck around with it.

And, you know, first season was fine. Second season, I thought was much, much better. It's a similar thing that's kind of happening with Obi-Wan for me. I remember I like I watched the first episode with my wife and we're just very like meh. It don't really care so much and however, Majeed and some of my other friends

are kind of parapressioning me to watch it again. And I'm like, well, I guess I'll watch it on my lunch and break. And that's what I've been doing. I unfortunately can't say the same thing is happening with this one as I'm really kind of me. I'm kind of still not really interested. It's just kind of on there for background noise. This is affecting our friendship. Every second you go on. This is affecting our friendship.

At least he's watching it. I haven't watched it yet. I mean, listen, Obi-Wan for me is probably the best star wars show. There goes with a coffee in the show. I get it. I can't. Do it. Just don't make the eye contacts, I guess.

God, Brad, I guess. God, Brad, geez. I can't. Anyway, Lobby One is just so good for me. And we have Miss Marvel and the boys, the hero gas in episode, Hina today. I'm so glad. And the warning. The warning for that episode is,

it's not suitable for any of us. I saw that post. Yeah. Did you read the book? No, even if it's anything like the common book, it will 100% be not suitable for anybody. Anthony star, the actor who plays home lender. And I think Jensen Ackles, who looks like Frank's, by the way, or vice versa, says that they can't

watch the episode because it's so bad. Yeah, I can understand. Yeah, that's good publicity right there. But you know, we did watch this week so far. Was the Elysian Kingdom. Nice pivot. Well done, sir. All right, let's take a second to bask in that maybe add a little applause

True that's all you that's all you buddy at it. It's right here. Oh He's like he's like he's a new king in town. In Banga, my favorite character, by the way, in Banga, takes center stage in this wee set-basute delusion kingdom. A straight entity takes hold of the Enterprise as a survey in Nebula preventing them from leaving. The crew attempts to break free by only succeeding, getting injured. In Banga gets called to the bridge and that's when things get weird.

He finds that all crew members are acting as if they are straight out of a fairy tale with no memory of who they were. Pike is now a bit of a flaky bumbley fool, why or take his shines as a faithful servant to the king. And who might that king be? You guessed it, my man and banker. I know, honestly, I really like the whole premise just from the get go there. Like him being king king the whole get up

Yo man that that was so so original Star Trek kind of feel to it like that is something that I think I've been waiting for for a while now Yeah, they lost they lost five hours It was totally worth it. I was getting some real TNG vibes. Oh, totally. Episode two, you know, with Q and then Robin Hood. You know, so the episode's what? An hour, right? Yeah. Nope.

He didn't feel like an hour. No, no, no. It floed really well. Yeah. Yeah. It was really just, yeah. There was no dull moment in the episode. In Benga realizes that the crew were acting his characters from the book he was reading to his daughter earlier. Trying to figure out what is going on quickly makes his way to sick bay where he encounters Nurse Chapel as a lovely healer. In Benga finds that nothing is abnormal with his scans, however, the crew seems to have

high dopamine levels, or Tegas arrives with seeing acting as the delightfully annoying Princess Talia, or Tegas in seeing an encouragement from Benga to use the Misskall Mercury Stone weapon. Out in the hallway, we hear guards dragging the capture prisoner. That prisoner turns out to be Hemmer, And in this case, it actually hemmer, unsure of what's happening to him. Embangue or Tegas and Pike make the way to rescue hemmer and eventually come across a dark and mysterious wizard

with luxurious locks, which rhymes with Spock. Well played. Well played. Well played. That was unintentional. He did have some luxurious locks. Yeah. You know, everything that happened with these characters being revealed, I didn't recognize

them at first. Oh, especially saying. Like, yeah, I was confused for a while. I'm like, that can't be saying. I thought that was just like some random guest star and then it was like, oh my God, saying. That can't be say I thought that was just like some random guest are and then it was like oh my god saying Fun fun fact about that the dog that she's carrying around is actually hers. Oh no really. That's awesome. Yeah Yeah, she could have fun a dog sitter. I guess that

The dog was well trained though. Oh, yeah, he was great. We're sure right. I'm unlike Kylo Can you imagine carrying Kylo around in the middle of a scene like that? Did you like that? Listen, I imagine taking Kylo to Home Depot with me. Cause you see all these dog parents taking their dog with them to Home Depot and they're either sitting patiently in the cart or they're walking around, Comley.

Home Depot? Yeah. When the home dep house is in there. Home Depot is in a pet friendly place. So apparently, the official ruling for Home Depot is that you can take a dog with you to Home Depot as long as it's a service animal. That's the official hard line rule, however.

How many people actually do that? Exactly. The store doesn't actually follow the rule. The store will let actually follow the rule. The store will let you bring your dog inside apparently, as long as the dog is behaving. I would get kicked out of that store. Yeah, you were totally. You were totally.

I love this dog, but he's just so happy. He's just so energetic. He would be so excited that he's surrounded by so many trees that he would pee on them all all the all the cut all the lumber Yeah, you know, it's funny. You said all these trees on my wait a minute. Oh Right there are trees at home depot, you know, I don't go to the section. I'm mostly in the lumber Yeah, you you head to the wood section I was trying to avoid that joke. You okay with that rat. You want to you want to have Drew cut that?

No, we can keep it in. You wanna keep it? Sure, just keep it in. You want to keep the wood in, guys? Yeah, but we don't swear on this podcast. Remember that. No, no, no, no, swearing, no swearing. That's, that's, that's, that's malarkey.

Oh, goodness. In Banga decides to follow Spock to Hemer, and it turns out to be a trap. The encounter cream you hurrah in her guards. She quickly throws them in the dungeon, which is really a gated off transport room. Thankfully, this is where Hemer, and through science, is able to let them out. As to why he didn't do that sooner as anyone's guess. As they think the cosmic entity is using in Mbinga's mind to cause this fantasy, he realizes it's actually coming from his daughter because the story changed

when number one showed up and Ortega's new character. When arriving at Sick Bay, Mbinga's daughter is nowhere to be found. Queue Traumatic music and commercial break. Queen Yehura is in form of the child is the actual powerful weapon and she convinces Pike to betray the king. Yehura had her gang of thugs. I didn't realize it Brad wrote the word thugs here.

I love you Brad. Yehura had her gang of thugs show up with Pike having captured the king. It appears that all his laws, but hella using magical powers of science, beams you her and her followers to a cargo bay. And Bangal find his daughter in his quarters. She had been communicating with the strange being all along. Hammer volunteers as a conduit to allow the alien being to communicate with them. Now, this is where emotion starts to run high for me as a father. We find that the being is lonely just like his daughter and they made a connection.

It healed her. But once they leave, she quickly, you know, she will become ill. And Banga is left with a very difficult choice. Take his daughter with him, or leave her behind where she will live forever. In the end, he lets her go. She vanishes in the light, but quickly returns as a young woman. Years have passed for her. She's happy and she's healthy and thankful for her father's sacrifice. Oh, there's a...

There's Magi tearing up a pit. Listen, as a father, I think we talked about it when Begg was first introduced. And his daughter was introduced and yielded us. You know, it was, I said this is not gonna end well. You know, she only has what mere hours, because he keeps taking out her out of the buffer. So, you know, I knew it was gonna end well. I'm glad she didn't die,

but you know, it's still a pretty sad, bittersweet ending. A lot of emotional damage here for me. But to some of the episode, science is Brad's favorite type of magic. Or Tegas is a badass sword world war. And long lived the king. I couldn't do the whole synopsis in a medieval accent, but uh...

You tried. Yeah, you tried. Well, again, I can say certain things below it, but not the entire thing. You know, Mijee, it's funny you said about the daughter,, like the whole emotional scene got to you and I was, I'm not even a dad yet and it's like that stuff's getting to me too. And I'm just like, oh God, the heart clenched. Yeah. I mean, I don't have kids, but I was, you know, I got a little misty item, not going to

lie. You have fur baby, so it counts story. The scene was done really well. It was, right? So we have Embanca, you know, tearfully saying goodbye to his child daughter. And then moments later, this light comes back in, and it's her as a young woman, as an adult. And as they talk, you know, she says that she's healed, she's happy, and in Vegas says that she has grown up to look like her mother, which again, very touching stuff.

So I wanna start with the beginning of this episode. When we see Ortega's and her different personality. And it seemed to be a pipe too. When we first meet Ortega's in Pike, I swear, I think that is when this episode really started to fall into one of my favors. Ortega's, like I feel the actress did such a, kind of a really good job of reversing the character type going from the typical or tegas to the faithful sword, wielder, um, servant.

And like I really liked or take us as that. Like that really resonated with me. Yeah, I didn't hate the character this episode. Well, she wasn't playing the character. She was playing the character. Right, exactly right. She was a different character, you know, completely. Yeah.

I mean, I think that, you know, shows the range of the actress and really all the actors on the show that they were able to kind of flip that switch and become something else. Speaking of range, speak of range. Pikes hair. Oh God, yeah. No more Pikes peak.

No more Pikes peak, or at least for most of the episode. Can we talk about Anson Mout and Justin General in this? Pike did great as the bumbling full of a, of a jester. It was like honestly, like it was a complete 180 from his super confident super courageous character that he plays. Zaddy. Yeah, Zaddy. I wasn't expecting the level of zaniness from him and you know for me that's often a detractor in an episode but when they are going all in on it like they did with this one, I think it's welcome and it worked and for the character that he was playing,

that silliness and zanius I think really paid off. Yeah, no, it was it was fantastic. I think the the one character that I wish they did a little different for was chapel. Like, all the characters, like, you know, the opposites of everybody, she was the one that was the least, I wouldn't say necessarily developed in that character role. It just was very plain, very boring, didn't really stand out so much. Even there was like a helmsman in the beginning that turned into like the red guard, I believe.

And like that character stood out to me more so than chapel did. Yeah. Well, I mean, they've given chapel a lot to work with over the past few episodes, so maybe they felt that they needed to spread the love a little bit more. Oh, yeah, no, no. But I agree with you. I think that it would have made more sense to have her not necessarily play the role that Ortega's played, but be like that second sidekick with Embangas, especially considering how close she works with them on a regular basis. So we also got the pairing of Hammer and Embega this episode.

I didn't love it. Really? Yeah, I get that we need to, you know, try certain things with new pairings. I think Embega works better with, uh, with, uh, God, who, with number one, I think he, it works better with, with, oh god, who, with number one, I think he, it was a good pairing. And Hemer, obviously, the best pairing was him and you, Hura. But I don't like Embangga and Hemer.

You know, I actually enjoyed Hemer and Embangga. Like, I thought that was fine. I actually really would like to see more of Hemer. I'm hoping before the seasons out, we get a more focused episode around that character. Yeah, speaking of which, how much time do we have until the end of the season? How many episodes? Two more. Two more.

Yeah. It makes me sad. To kind of talk a little bit more about Hammer, and you know, up to this point, he's been a very crumbudgeon-like character, you know, very grumpy, very, just like, uh, I'll do it myself because nobody else could do it right. And it was nice to see him have like some personality, you know, in comparison to his. He was a very compassionate character too. Yeah, it was, it was fleeting though, because he doesn't remember anything.

No, he remembers everything. Well, well, no, it doesn't. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,'t remember anything. No, he remembers everything. Well, well No, it doesn't know and yeah, yes correct. All right my mistake. Yeah, mark that for at it Nope It doesn't matter right because you can just cut it out anyway. I'm not gonna But I actually enjoyed I actually enjoyed him um in this one and yeah I did find it was like one little silly part where like he's captured and then and Yeah, basically, because the plot wouldn't move along if he just did. You know, Majid, you're always talking about how we have guest appearances from Kylo, where we make you to guest appearance from Metro. He just busted into the room. He's like, he's like, let me in, dang it.

I'm imagining Metro on his hind paws, kicking the door open and walking in like, smite room now. I mean, that's basically what just happened. Hi buddy. My cat is kinda like the, trying to open the door by putting her hand underneath it, be like, come on, let it open.

And I'm like, it doesn't open that her hand underneath it be like come on let it open and I'm like it doesn't Open that way. Yes to push Oh, there's the kitty I like Metro. Yeah me too. Metro's a cool kitty. Yeah But he keeps bumping into the mic stand and this is gonna be a problem Yeah, it can't be worse than what Kylo was doing to me last week. That's fair. Yeah, that's fair The Yeah, hi Metro

And there's a lot in this episode, but there's so little because of the fact that it was so fast paced, you know There was a there was a flow to the episode where it just kind of the story progressed There was a lot less jumping around. I think that's one of the things that does bother me in a lot of Star Trek episodes, is that there is often jumping between points and different characters into different areas of the ship or the away mission, and it keeps jumping around like that. Whereas this episode, it's just a continuous flow of one focal point and you just see that progression. And I actually really enjoyed that part about this. Yeah, I just, you know, this throws a monkey wrench into my theory about where

Mimbangas arc was going to go., and Halem left scrambling to think, okay, well, what happens with him next? It can't just be all over. Yeah. I mean, so should we get into that right now? Because I have a lot of thoughts about what happened there. Hi, Dax.

I see Dax too. Yeah, Dax, both of them are in here. Neither of them can leave me alone. So, hit me with your theory before I continue before I get started I have to move Metro because he's literally biting me all right so I feel like they pulled the trigger on and bang a story too quick His I Like I like what they did, but the, I don't know, I kind of feel like they,

they just, they missed the boat. Like they had an opportunity to do something that had like major impact, uh, to the character. And I'm not sure that this was it, you know, this still has a major impact on him. But where are they going to go with it though? Like, I don't know what. So here's the problem that they had drew is that the actress who plays his daughter is obviously a young actress. Yeah.

And he's supposedly putting her into the transporter buffers. And so to me, I kind of feel like they wrote themselves into a corner where this situation had to be resolved this season. Because if they didn't resolve it this season, the actress would eventually grow up to a point where they can't really use it. They can't use that whole gimmick

of her being in the transport buffers. And so I do agree in the sense that I was a bit surprised that they chose this route to end that story arc, but I understand why they did it. It makes sense to me. I'm curious, though, to see if they're actually going to have anything lasting from this because Star Trek has a tendency

to have major character Impact that doesn't have lasting repercussions I'm hoping they do because they I hope so too. Well, they continued like with with his daughter being in the transporter buffer. You could see he would get frustrated. In previous episodes, it was like just a small little blur. It wasn't anything big. It was just like a five minute scene and then it was done.

It was mentioned again in the rest of the episode. I I hope they do though. I don't know. I just I feel like there could have been a better story to tell and I'm concerned that you know this is the end of it and we'll never hear of it again except in passing. You know, whereas I think you know they could have taken this and done something that really changed the character in a visible way on the show. This is gonna change, I think it's gonna change his character the way that he does things.

But in terms of in effecting the entire ship, I don't think so, right? Because remember, only a handful of people knew about it, even Hammer was like, well no, I wasn't expecting, you know, the entire crew to be affected by it. I unfortunately feel that the answer that you're looking for, Drew, is probably not gonna be resolved

until we get another focused episode on Bang. And that's probably not gonna be till the next season. Yeah, based upon that. So I understand what you're concerned is though. I fully expect this story to be done. I mean, my understanding or my gut feeling is that we'll never hear of his daughter again. Genuinely, I genuinely believe that's going to be the case. Yeah, I think it beg is, I'm going to leave the ship at some point. He has to.

Well, no, it's not there. Isn't there a two-way? I think he's in the original series. Yeah, he's like a backup doctor on the enterprise, but not the chief medical officer. No, he's chief officer right now, right? Yeah. Yeah.

So then I wonder if like something's going to happen in like the next focused episode for him where he to your point, maybe he's going to leave. Um, Magi, he's going to like, Hey, I can't deal with the emotional strain of losing my daughter. Yeah, it takes a leave of absence. Maybe his work gets affected. Well, we can always speculate, but man, that would actually explain why he's no longer a chief medical officer if he takes a lease.

Speculating is half the fun though. Yeah, no, no, I'm not saying, I'm just saying, I think that would explain why he's not still chief medical when Kirk takes over. Yeah, Sam Kirk. Yeah, Sam Kirk. He's still on a coma. Yeah, listen, when when when Pike said, sub in the Justin, really, you were told he'd say, pop up.

No, I was hoping that Sam Kirk is a limpson. Yeah, yeah. That would have been wonderful. And then he gets beheaded because he's not a very good chester. And then that's the best. It's funny. We keep wanting him to be the Kenny,

but he has never been the Kenny. Right. Again, I really wonder, like was he an afterthought? Because he shows up in the very first episode and he shows up in the second episode and he could stock that. I don't have a cameo appearance. And then that's it.

I don't think he wasn't the engineer. I don't think it was an afterthought. I think it was more of, um, they just wanted to throw in a easter egg. It's more than an easter egg though. Kind of, but kind of not, but like I think, so like, for example, in this episode, we had a really, really interesting Easter egg, at least I thought so. While I was watching it, I noticed the book that he was reading the Kingdom of Lucian. And I saw the author listed, I think it was Benny Russell.

And I had to take a quick, like a double take for that, because I was like, wait, that can't be the same. And so Majidja, unfortunately, not going to know this, but Benny Russell is a throwback to Deep Space 9. I can't remember which episode it was but Cisco kind of has some sort of delusion or something from Space Aliens because you know that's how things go and he portrays a character called Benny Russell and from what it

seems like they're saying that that was actually a real character in history who wrote books. And I was like, pretty excited about that little Easter egg there. And the name of the episode is far beyond the stars. It's a season six episode. And one of the best. I think you won a bunch of awards for that did. So, Mjid, if you ever do take a deep space line, that is an episode you should never miss. Yeah, they dive deep into racism in the 1920s and, or 1950s, yeah, 50s, my mistake. Racism against aliens. No, no, no, it's like a it's like a

flashback really isn't the right word. Yeah, time travel. That's now so not the right word. No, somewhere in between all that. Yeah, but but but they so they really address racism in the United States and Because it was the whole the whole premise behind that was the the main character goes back on this Time travel venture thing and he's a science fiction writer who and he's You know faced with prejudice because of his skin color. Right. Oh. And he's an extremely talented author who cannot get published

because he's black. Ooh. Yeah. And it works. It was direct. I'm sorry to cut you off, Brad. Avery Brooks directed the episode too. So, you know, it's a lot of books.

He plays Benjamin Cisco in Deep Space. He's the captain in that series. It's funny. Midgey, you'll probably hear us talk about it. He does a phenomenal job in the whole series, but that episode specifically is just one of the best episodes. Wasn't the captain of Deep Space Nine's ship the guy from Quantum Leap? No, that's underpriced. No, that's underpriced.

It's got a backula. Backula. Yes, it was. But no, the whole little history of having that being who wrote the book was actually pretty exciting for me. I just thought that I was like, oh my gosh, that's so it's pretty cool that they kind of threw that little little nugget in there. That's a super deep cut. Yeah. Yeah, really is. Kudos to you Brad for catching that. Yeah, it's good. Good catch. I was watching it and I was just like, I the name Benny I was like wait what so I had to actually pause it rewind it and I don't usually like doing that mid episode But I you know had to go back to it and I was like oh snap that's freaking awesome good catch Brad

So proud of you and proud of you to get Brad a golf clap I appreciate you guys For patronizing me. Yeah, no, in the most obvious way, by the way. Can we talk about how good of a villain a hero was, by the way? It was great. Oh, she was fantastic. Yeah.

I thought, so I think you and I were all of us were talking last night. When I got home from Lowe's at like nine, 10 o'clock. You shop at Lowe's too, you traitor. So just a quick segue about Lowe's. Lowe's in their garden section, they is cheaper for their plants and their gardening stuff because unlike Home Depot,

lows grow stuff in house. So there's no need to ship anything in to the store because everything's grown there. That's a difference. That's why they're able to get those better price. So, Loz isn't paying me yet for saying this, but if you need gardening stuff, plants and shrubs, go to Loz. No, tell him I sent you and maybe they'll give me money. My dad shops the Loz because he gets a senior citizen discount So they give him money. Okay. Yeah, yeah, they don't give me money

That's fine. We can we can get sponsored by lows one day right true I'm not sure it's right, you know sponsorship, but we can try All right, well work it out When I come back from Lowe's though, I started watching the episode and I think you all berated me for wanting to watch it this morning at the gym. Mm-hmm.

You said, no, watch it tonight or else I'll kill you. So I watched it that night. I watched it last night and my wife and daughter were glued to the screen. Where are they? Oh, they watched it with you. Yeah, they, they, they, and they ended up watching you with me and they were, they were in, in thrall, like, you know, they just couldn't take their eyes off the screen. I'm, I'm hoping because they liked it. Well, they did. And part of what they were saying was, oh man, that's bad acting from these characters, right?

So, Talia, right, sing as Talia. Oh, yeah, yeah. You heard as the queen, Pike, as the... Who was he, the squire? I don't remember. You use some sort of... I don't remember. So, Pike has the clergyman.

So she was like, oh, these are just these are bad acting, bad writing, bad lines. I'm like, well, you have to understand the premise of the episode. They're acting out characters from a children's book. So while in Banga is playing it straight, for the most part, right? Because he's playing himself. The rest of these characters are our campy as hell because they are playing these characters. I said, that's just a beauty of it. That's why it's so good.

Everyone's out of their minds. And in Bangga's like, all right, well, I'm not, I'm not doing that. Because I have things to do. I have things to do. I have more important things to do. I will say it was funny when Hammer got into it and he's selling the whole, I will send you to the star program or something like that. The horizon. So like, the horizon and, and, and luxurious lockspock was like, no such thing exists. That was pretty good.

Yeah, he just transports them away. I, I thought was hilarious. My wife and daughter didn't laugh as hard as I did or at all. That was great. Don't worry. I was laughing alongside with you at the very moment too. It was, it was really good, really good for me at least. Alright guys, I really want to get into the rating of the episode. I think it's good that we get there, but before I jump ahead to that, is there anything

that you guys want to talk about this episode? Anything that I missed that we overlooked. What did you think of the set design and how they use the enterprise to create a fantasy world? I thought it was perfect, man. Like that was great. Oh, because to Majid's point, it's campy as hell,

but it's supposed to be. It's like, you're going to that high school like Renaissance fair and they're trying to make the whole high school look like a castle. And you see the lockers in the background and everything like that. That's what it's supposed to be. And I loved it.

It was perfect for the tone of the episode. Yeah, they could have easily, the being could have easily transported them somewhere else. Yeah, but they kept them on the ship. I'm glad they didn't. There's, at first I wasn't really crazy about it because we've seen so many holodeck episodes over the years where they're fully immersed in this world.

So I was a little skeptical. I was like, I only thought maybe it first took the lazy way out. But I love the way that they lit everything. The set design, the camera angles in these areas were I think perfect. It really made the the whole, what's the word I'm looking for? It made it more immersive than I thought it would. And to your point, Brad, I think that was a great way to explain it, you know, high school Renaissance Fair. I'd never even thought about that until you just mentioned it.

And I don't think there's a better way to describe it. I don't know what high school is, you guys went to, but I've never had a high school in a science fair. You never had a high school like themed whatever where like they changed the look of the high school where they put like construction paper on the walls and it's just like this giant you know 50 foot long construction paper trying to cover like the water fountain and everything. Yeah. Now my high school sucked. Clearly.

Well, my high school was garbage. I had none of that. We had our junior prom in the cafeteria, so I'm very familiar with what Brad's talking about. Yeah. We had, I think, I think one of ours was like, well, our school dances and all that stuff was all in the gymnasium. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. This is all news to me. Like I thought that the stuff you're talking about is only in like, save by the bell. No, we think they got those ideas from save by the bell. Yeah, clearly. Um, but, but I do agree with you. Drew the set design was really nice. The one thing that I kind of wanted to touch base

and before we move on to the ratings was that the alien being the nebula that gains consciousness. I think the explanation was a little bit cheesy, but we have experiences before, at least you and I, I'm pretty sure it's been in like the original series or maybe if not that then the next generation. I mean, they two point what Q beams the the crew of the enterprise and to like a Robin Hood setting it felt very much like that and I'm kind of glad they didn't do the the like for like where they beam did it beam to everybody into like an outdoors world

It I feel like this way made it a lot more palatable at least in my mind. It was unique. It stood out in a positive way. But how did you guys feel the you know with that ending where the daughter comes back. Where it kind of, to me, that kind of brought a little closure to the situation. I would have been as emotional if they didn't bring her back. I think I would have been more emotional. I would have been. I think they missed, see, this is kind of going back to what I was saying before. I feel like they, they buttoned up his story too quick. Like they could have they could have made it so that he goes back to visit the nebula in season two and he sees her and now she's an adult. And you know, even though a year has passed in his time, ten years have passed in her

time. And she's experienced so much, and she's done so much that he wasn't able to be a part of, but they just kind of hit the fast forward button on all of that. If this were a show that was serialized in its storytelling, I could easily see them saving that for a season two. But they're walking that line already, right? Yes, each episode is within itself, but they've been serializing in Bengus plot up to this point. Well, to be fair, Drew, they do that somewhat

even in the next generation. They do that in Voyager Deep Space. I mean Deep Space and I guess it doesn't really count because that eventually then becomes like one full arc in the later years. But they do kind of have like undertones, overtones, whichever that kind of helped guide the episodes. And I don't think it really,

they are their own series. And I think they're allowed to do this path. I'm okay with it. We also shouldn't qualify the character developments in the same category as serialized storytelling because character development can, character development and character growth can follow each episode, regardless if it's a weekly or serialized. No, I agree 100%.

I'm not saying that they don't. Right, so like sing and her trauma carries from episode to episode. And her development carries from episode to episode. Right, right. I mean to episode right right I mean we're not we're not the original series more or less is wiping the slate clean every single time the credits roll right yeah like when they travel back in time three days yeah exactly but I mean like for the most part like credits roll the episode is over the next one comes up and with few exceptions,

it's a brand new day and yesterday didn't happen. Or the three days ago didn't happen. Oh god damn it. They don't do that in other shows, right? So there is that character growth that you're speaking of. And what I'm saying is, is that I feel like there was just a lack of patience because they could have really just, I don't know, I think they could have had more impact. To me, like, they want to tie up that story arc and I can understand why.

I do agree with you, Drew Drew that I feel like they could have taken a slower approach to it, but I'm interested to see more about Mango because there's obviously more to him than just his daughter. Of course. And I think that by having his daughter on there and being the focus point is that's all we're gonna ever see. And it's gonna be hard for them to push onto other things.

Well, it's also, I- Somebody hold hold on hold on. Somebody can be two things. I get that but like I feel like because they have her, they've kind of put her and put him into this situation where they need to tie that up. Okay, so now they've got her off the ship. Right. Why reveal her 10 years later or as an adult in the same breath? I can understand it, but I think it's closure, yeah. I think it's a missed opportunity. Okay, fair enough. I mean, I mean, it's hinted that that Embangad does other great things in his career, right? He helped switch back that Embangue does other great things in his career, right? He helped switch back, um, spock and to print.

But again, somebody can be more than one thing. Like just because his daughter isn't on the ship, doesn't mean his story ends. Hey, I don't. You guys are looking at this. You guys are looking at my complaint. Like it's a black and white thing and it's not. No, I don't think his story is going to. I think his story is going to end either't think his story is gonna end either, bud.

I think the perspective from, from Miyamajid is that it's not ending his story, it's more of helping push along other story arcs beyond just his daughter. And my point is, is that you can do both of those things at the same time. You know, I kind of disagree in a little bit only because I feel like the daughter

is such a pivocal point for the character that it's hard to devise a story where anything that won't impact it. Like that's just how I feel in that sense. But I feel like you're missing, I don't think you're fully understanding me. No, no, I do understand. Like you feel that you can still tell additional stories without having to wrap all that. No, no, I do understand. Like, you feel that you can still tell additional stories without having to wrap all that. No, no, no, no, you're you're addressing my complaint by assuming that she's still on the ship. And I'm agreeing that now that she's off the ship. Like, okay, fine,

she's off the ship. Now there's still other stories to tell. You don't have to bring her back immediately. He can loop back to that three seasons from now. It doesn't have to. Oh sure. So you basically, I get that, but you're not saying that you get that. You're explaining it. I'm literally saying I get that. I keep telling you the way you were expressing it is like as if that was his only driving force and I'm saying no like no No, no and I and I agree with you Drew like I that's I Think in this situation is that I truly do understand what you're saying

But my perspective is and I think this Maggi may be able to understand it What I'm trying to say a little bit better is that because his daughter is such a pivocal point, it's going to be really hard to truly do justice for the character, wherever he does, his daughter's not going to impact that story one way or another. I just think what Drew is saying is that

instead of her coming back moments later, eight, 10, 20 years. If she never came back, if she never came back, are you immediately going to assume that we're going to see her again? Just like, as a viewer, as a viewer,

as a viewer, as a viewer, as a viewer, as a viewer, as a viewer, as a viewer, as a viewer, as a viewer, as a viewer, as a viewer, I'm gonna say that we're probably never gonna see her again. Exactly. That's my point. And which means if they were to do it next year, next season, two seasons from now, it would have more impact, it would have meaning.

I'm just saying, I feel like it just would be very hard for the character. No, no, it wouldn't. You're agreeing with me and then disagreeing with me. God damn it, Brett. Move on. I think we should go to the ratings. Drew, you know what just happened, yes.

No, I love you, Drew, right? I know. I know. Hey, Majeed wanted a Drew rant, so he just got one. Well, I want to, I mean, let's just be clear. I want to Drew yelling at the clouds. Not the nebula. I want to drew yelling at the clouds. Not the nebula.

I want to drew yelling at the clouds. At least he's not like, ran to get you this time. At least it's at me. We know. I mean, equal. Do we like me to give Brad a dimer? Sure.

Let's go with it. Well, it's too bad. I'm not going to give you a dimer because you want to do that. I want to hear what drew, how drew race this episode first Is that possible Majid you're the host this week? Well, we're sorry for the buddy

Hey, hey mr. Host mr. King. It's on you buddy. We'll move into the ratings Sorry, a work message came in, so I had to pivot. So, oh, by the way, just really quick, and Banga talking to the computer and everyone confused like, computer? Do you mean the Orocosah? That was funny. That was pretty nice.

Yeah. I enjoyed that. I enjoyed that. I enjoyed that. I enjoyed that. I enjoyed that. I enjoyed that. I enjoyed that. I enjoyed that. I enjoyed that. I enjoyed that. I enjoyed that.

I enjoyed that. All right, guys, let's go to the episode rating. All right, guys, let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating.

Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to the episode rating. Let's go to he asked to say first. Well, is my rating contingent or whether or not Brad understands me? I mean, oh, wow. Wow, you know, I really thought a relationship was beyond this, sir,

but apparently not. Okay, you know what, you do. I'm not sure if you call it a relationship. Yeah, clearly it's not. All right, despite my frustrations with Brad, oh, I really enjoyed this. All right, despite my frustrations with Brad. Oh, I really enjoyed this. Now this was a good episode. I do stand behind everything I said about the ending.

I think they, what do you say about the ending again? I think that they rushed the plot line with his daughter. I think if they're going to pull the trigger on it this early, I think they rushed the second half of it where they could tell the story about his daughter becoming a woman. So that said, I still really enjoyed the episode. I thought it was fun, thought it was unique. I thought it was clever. It was a twist on the holodeck episodes from TNG that I've always enjoyed.

Inbanga is great. I mean, full stop. He might be my favorite character on the show as well. He's just tremendous. But everybody played their part wonderfully. Top to bottom. MVP of silly faces goes to Pike for just being a complete goofball.

With Sarah. I was going to give this a nine. But after spending some time thinking about it overnight, I feel like my complaints will bring it down to an eight. You know, so funny. I thought you were going to say, I wasn't going to give this a nine, but after my complaints, I'm giving it a 10. I don't know why I thought you were going to say that.

I thought it was actually going to be like, I was going to give this a five. Right. I'm absolutely right. You were that rant? Man, totally was expecting him this a five. Right. You were that rant. Man, totally was the expected thing to say five. Listen, I love a Drew Rantz. I love them. I think they're great.

And I think it's great that you gaslit him. I'm really pleasant trying to. I was really just saying, I truly understood what he's saying. I just have a different perspective. That's all. Yeah, the perspective that doesn't get it. You handle him. You handle him, you're like, yes sir, I totally get it. Oh, you're the cross-breastard.

That's all I know. Sir, I'm so sorry for your incorrect opinion. That's basically what you said to do. That's what it is. I mean, it's like, you know, like, I don't really, I really think I just have a different perspective That's it and I'm allowed to have my own opinion but but the perspective that you had was not Oh, no, I feel like Drew's trying to say your perspective is wrong Brad. It's right. Like I love no

And as a friend your perspective isn't wrong. You understood my perspective wrong No, but I understand your perspective correctly. I just disagree with it. You see what I just did there? I just guessed it. You're casting both of us now. I just got to go to you. You're casting both of us now.

Brad Buddy, what did you think of the episode? Oh man, oh man, this is a fun conversation guys. You know, from the very beginning, the whole story arc with Embaigai's daughter, I was really wondering how they're gonna tie it up. I do agree to Drew's point that I felt that they could have, they could have changed it a bit. Like, they could have given it more time to develop. I do understand that part.

However, looking at the episode as a whole, the way the rest of the crew was acting, I loved Pike or Tegas is probably, this is one of my favorite episode to have her in, even seeing a complete 180 from her character as the normal uptight security officer. I was just loving this episode. And I think even with the faults

of how they tied up Mango's story with his daughter, I still loved every single moment of it and I'm at a solid 10. Wow. Wow. Wow. This episode really resonated with me and I was laughing, I was enjoying myself and this has to be my favorite episode so far.

I um, all right. Well, that's great because I feel the same as that way. And I absolutely agree with Drew. I think this was a perfect way to cap off in Banga's story with his daughter. Nope. Can't gaslight you again. All right. Listen, yeah, I said at time and time again, I love in bangas a character.

Um, I think the, the 180 they did with a lot of these characters. Right. So number one and, and Pike and Spock with his, uh, lovely, lovely, flowing hair. Lovely, lovely, lovely, lovely, lock, Spock's, Spock's, locks, and, uh, and you her as the evil queen and just hammer all around like buying into it, you know, full scent. He just, he just went there with the magic and the wizard tree. Um, again, very emotional as a, as a father and, uh, while I won't give it a 10, I'm pretty close, I'm giving it a 5. I'm joking, I'm messing, I'm messing with you,

I'm giving it a 9. 9. I don't know if I can justify a 10, even though I loved it so much, but it's definitely one of the best Star Trek hours I've ever seen, even though it didn't feel like an hour. I could easily see myself watching this episode again if it was on and I hadn't a remote. By the way, I think I used my phone, I had to forcibly use my phone while watching the episode, like normally it's just inadvertently.

I had to actually send some text, I had to send some messages and order some things for the yard, but I didn't want to. I didn't want to pick up my phone. My question for you, Mijid, is Did you regret our warnings last night about not watching this at the gym? Did I regret them? I didn't watch it at the gym. Did I regret them? I didn't watch it at the gym. Well, no, no, but I mean, like, like maybe regress not the right word. Are you glad that we insisted that you watch it last night? Because I feel like if you had watched it at the gym, it either would have destroyed

your workout or you would have just missed like most of the episode. Yeah. Yeah. No, I'm totally glad I didn't watch this episode, Jim. So if I start breaking down in tears on a treadmill, when it's slipping fall, you know. They may look at you a little odd. You shut up, I'm not crying, it was a good set. No, no, I'm glad you bullied me into watching it at home last night.

Because that's essentially what you did, you bullied me into watching it. And if no one believes me, please let's share, just a snippet of our channel on social media, sorry if I see how you believe it. This is peer pressure at its finest. But I give it a nine, you know, 9.5 if I can do that. We have a couple of 0.5s in the scores. Good. Yeah, so 9.5. All right, so we had a good episode of TV. We had a good episode of recording, you know, Gaslit Drew is always the best. Anything else you guys want to discuss before we wrap it up and call it a weekend? What character do you think is going to be you know, sped up with their storyline next?

I think there's still more. So I read an article that's, well, I read a headline. I didn't want to dive into the article, but it said that there's the return of a Star Track villain this season. Now, that can mean a number of things. I mean, we've already had one last episode. Was it an older or undercooler? Nope, this was something that just came back.

This was something I just recently came out. So after last week's episode with Captain Angel. They weren't talking about side-bock. No. Okay. I don't know. I don't know. I like what was the headline. So for me, again, I like speculating. So we could get Sybok, we could get Captain Angel, we can get the Gorn. So in terms of those potential villains, I think that there's room to explore maybe more of Sing's story. We could explore more of Pike's story. I would like to see more from Ortega's. She's starting to not be as annoying.

I think she's starting to, you know, settle into her like, niche. I was having a conversation with somebody on Twitter overnight about Ortega's and you know as as long as her character doesn't just become nothing but quips which she kind of already is. You know, I think I think there's something there, but like they need to do something with the character. She can't just be one liners. It's very one dimensional. Yeah, I would like to see her or Hammer more developed. Yeah, it's tough because 10 episodes in a season just feels too short for what they're

doing. I think 10 episodes is a really good way to carry a season. So you don't have fluff, you have limited fluff, you have limited filler, right? You set out the tell a story and it's very tight. You may end up even cutting things you don't need. Yeah, I guess if they were focusing on pike a little bit more and the bridge crew kind of a little bit broader I think perhaps but It seems like they're kind of checking off boxes for each member of the crew

with kind of going over their background and You know, I think just 10 episodes isn't really It's not really possible to do that sufficiently. So unless they're saving stuff for season two, they're definitely gonna be leaving people out. This is like two more episodes, you know? This, yeah, and the next episode is called all those who wander?

Yes, we're gonna have another medieval episode. No, well, I had to be able to get the medieval accent in again before we end the episode. I appreciate that. But the name of the episode is called All Those Who Wander. Thank you, Drew. I'll look into it. So, all right, guys, I look forward to looking at this next episode at Jim. I'm not sure about the movie.

Into watching it before we record. Either or, we'll take it as we get it. But I could lower its' ladies. Won't you say goodbye to the good old people? Have a good one. How do they say goodbye in the old days? Farewell. It's posh. Good day.

Tally Wager. No, that's not right. No, that's... Folks have a good day. Good night everyone. Bye! Thank you so much for listening to another episode of Yet Another Star-Trike Podcast. We're a part of the Retro Sessions Network. This episode was recorded on June 24, 2022, and is hosted by Brad, Drew, and me, Mijie. Drew added to the episodes to make it sound good, Brad writes the synopsis for us every

single week. I take care of the artwork. Our music warped speed and to the stars was written and performed by William Grobalar Music. Be sure to check him out on SoundCloud we'll have a link in the show notes. Show us some love on social media. We're available everywhere.

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