Yet Another Star Trek Podcast - Ep 057: (TOS S02E04) Mirror, Mirror

Episode Date: March 19, 2024

A transporter malfunction sends Kirk and his away team to the land of beards and murder. But can he figure out how to blend in with Evil Spock and company? Will Good Spock find a way to bring him home? We cozy up in the Agony Booth for the legendary Star Trek episode "Mirror, Mirror." Be sure to check out our website, social media, and join our Discord! Links for all are listed below: Website | Discord | BlueSky | Facebook | Instagram | Threads | 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

Alright and welcome back to Get Outta The Star Trap Podcast. I am one of your three hosts. I am 33% of the gang. My name is Majig. With me is Drew. He's here. I'm like 66% of the gang? Is that what you're saying?

You call me fat? No, I mean, we still have Brad. Brad is still the other 33.1. No, you'd be 33 have Brad. Brad is still the other 33.1. No, you'd be 33.1. Where is he? Who? Brad, where is he? Where in the world is Brad?

I don't know. Maybe we'll find out later. Sometimes I think that Brad just just he has these excursions and he wants to do things with his life. Like I know he was at a Grateful Dead concert in Mexico. I heard about that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's their like farewell tour. So I know Brad's a very big fan of Grateful Dead. Yeah, yeah. I heard that he sold one of his kidneys to get in,

to get tickets. That sounds about right. You know, they were doing some pretty crazy stuff. You know, the reason it was in Mexico is because they were going to go to some, I guess, Mexican temple to try to raise Jerry Garcia from the dead for the concert. And they needed everybody that was going to the concert to supply a kidney.

It's part of the ritual. The guy from the ice cream. Yeah, actually, actually, no. But but but no, it's named after him. Yes, I had to think for a second. But yes, yes, The very same one. I had no idea. Yeah. He's, he's one dead and two from the grateful dad.

I didn't know that he died. Yeah. Quite some time ago. Yeah. Um, speaking of, of, of random dead celebrities, that's a hell of a segue and I'm sorry. Yeah. I don't know what you're thinking about. Apparently there's a George Carlin special made up completely of AI and I think that his kids were suing. I think the title was called Glad to be Dead.

It is such a disrespectful. Well, special name, right? Although maybe I don't I don't know much about George Carlin's style to say that it's a disrespectful name. But just the whole idea of using a generated voice for a comedy special. It's weird. Yeah. I would need to know more about this. I feel like George Carlin is the kind of comedian

that might see some kind of humor in the irony of the whole situation, but, uh, I feel like that's crossing some lines. Yeah, yeah. Um, you know, if we're being completely honest, you know, secret time, you and I have played with AI cloning. Um, it's, it's scary, you know, it's, it's, it's scary what we can do with AI today. Well, well, the first clone that you had, the shoulders were just massive. It was basically all shoulders.

Right, that one we haven't unveiled to our fans yet. The one I'm talking about is our AI clone voices. Oh. Yeah, you're over here voices. Oh, yeah. You're over here spoiling secrets, Drew. No, the AI cloned voice. I cloned my own voice from two sentences and I, and I just typed in some stuff, some stuff that I would say, but didn't say.

And it sounds like I said it. Um, the whole idea was to like weaken that Bernie's bread. You know, we get some of his old recordings. Yeah. You get the reference for weekend at Bernie's. No enlighten me. We can have Bernie's was a movie back in the eighties. We can have Bernie's top the boss. There was two employees. Their boss's name was Bernie. Bernie died

sometime during the weekend and they had to make it look like Bernie was still alive. So they positioned this dead corpse just throughout the entire movie. It's such a ridiculous premise. And they even made a sequel called Weekend at Bernie's 2. And it was Voodoo involved in that one. But of course, yeah. So when I say we've heard the Weekend at Bernie's Brad, Brad's not dead.

We don't we don't know that to be true. He's just dead to Drew. Grateful dead. Oh man. I love you, Brad. Come back to us. Hey, listen, this episode is great and I can't wait to get to it. But first I finished making it so the Patrick Stewart book. What did you think? I loved it.

It was great. Yeah, I think I told you this during the I think when I was like three quarters of way done, I told you that his love, his respect and admiration for Brett Spiner and. Oh, my God, why is his name? So he's the Riker. Jonathan Frank. Yeah, Jonathan Frakes. It's just it's it's so wonderful to hear.

He talks about these these two guys and there's just love there, you know? Yeah. And, you know, Patrick Stewart's apparently had some failed marriages. He talks about that too. And I don't know, he just gets really personal. And I wasn't expecting it. I wasn't expecting it to be heartfelt. Yeah, it's a tough line with autobiographies, you know. Yeah, it's a tough line with autobiographies, you know, I think very frequently the writer will try to make themselves look good in the process or be very choosy with what they allow the public to see. And you know, we'll never know for sure that whether or not he did the same here, but it didn't feel that way. Yeah. Everything felt very genuine.

Yeah, it felt very genuine. It felt like he was just laying his heart on the line. You know, yeah. I loved it. I loved it so much that I ended up grabbing blunt talk because he talked very... He spoke highly of that show, Blunt Talk. Yeah, that show was great. I loved that show.

I thought that Seth MacFarlane had more to do with it, but Seth MacFarlane was only a executive producer. But then you look at Patrick Stewart's IMDB, in addition to him voicing Avery Bullock, the CIA director, which by the way, CIA director with a British accent that no one cares about, you know? But he's also done a lot of work with Patrick Stewart. Sorry, Seth Biffard has done a lot of work with Patrick Stewart.

Right. A lot of voiceover work. It's just a really good read. It made me want to jump into next generation. And I'm trying to be very careful because I don't want to jump ahead, you know, but I don't know, I just such such a great book. I mean, you know, obviously, like you and I have discussed plans to hopefully some point cover next generation here.

Yeah, right. But if if you were to choose to venture off on your own, there's nothing about the original series that's prerequisite. You could die. That's pretty requisite. You could that's great. Yeah. Speaking of which, Gene Roddenberry did not like Patrick Stewart's. Apparently not. Not at first. Well, apparently not even in the end. That's true. You know, yeah, you just just didn't like him, didn't care for him.

And Patrick Stewart also says, you know, I wish Gene Roddenberry could have been around to see how beloved John Luke Picard is to so many people. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But sadly, whatever. And, you know, I mean, Hollywood is a fickle business and, you know, unfortunately, not everybody is liked by everybody. It's just kind of how it shakes out and you know, it is what it is, but you know, obviously I think it worked out for the better. Yeah. You know, Patrick Stewart has gone on to have an amazing career and Star Trek has a large part of that and he's changed through that character so many lives. Yeah. That's it's not an understatement to say that, you know, a lot of people grew

up wanting to be as much like him as possible. You know, and used the lessons that Star Trek portrayed as a means of developing their own more, more morality compass, you know? Yeah, yeah. I mean, you can always end up like, you know, Kirk and just murder your red shirts. Well, I mean, you'll see flashes of that in the in the original series, right? Like even an even in Mirror Mirror, you know, there there is a moment in the beginning of the episode and towards the end of the episode as well, too, where Kirk shows compassion and, you know,

acknowledges like, hey, we have the power to take this thing from you, but we're not going to, because that's not who we are and what we stand for. Yeah, I can't wait to get into that. I could honestly talk about Patrick Stewart's book All Night with you. And I think that would be great. But in person, in your backyard, with a fire pit and some hot cocoa.

Oh, that's like covering our legs. And we just talk about Patrick Stewart. Can we can we cuddle in this in this scenario, though? We're on different chairs using different blankets. Oh, so we're not cuddling. I just want to make that clear. I bought a heated blanket for my wife for Christmas. My cat took it. It's not my cat's blanket.

Metro. Of course. Give him everything. He deserves everything. Yeah. He's been through some stuff. Let him have this. Yeah.

He's been on the mean streets of Connecticut, man All right, he's a he's a yard way cat. Yeah, well yard Hey, you ready to jump into one of the all-time greats. Let's do it. Let's do it. After unsuccessfully begging the Halkins for the mining rights to their own dilett... Ew. You better keep that in. You better not edit that out. Five, four, three. I'm so tired.

After unsuccessfully begging the Halkins for dilithium mining rights, Kirk McCoy, Scotty and her being back to the enterprise, but shock, it's the wrong enterprise. And Ion storm interferes with the transport and they find themselves in a parallel universe. The usually calm Spock is now sporting a beard signaling a not so friendly dimension. It's like stepping into a bizarre star fleet where everyone swaps roles and ethics are as rare as a tribal on a Klingon ship. Spock is now the ruthless first officer and he gives a masterclass in diplomacy with the ship's phasers. He wants to destroy everybody on the Halkin planet. Well, the crew starts putting two and two together and they

realize they're in the Terran empire, which is a ruthless version of the federation. Kirk McCoy and the gang must navigate this dangerous terrain while dodging threats and dealing with Spock who desperately wants to commit genocide. He's like, come on, please let me blow them up just once. Just once. Let me hit the button. Let me hit the button. Let me hit the button. Let me hit the button You did it last time Come on captain, come on I'll be your friend

What do you think of this this intro and you intro and, you know, this, this whole set up here to this parallel dimension? Um, I thought that the, listen, the, it was a tense episode throughout. Um, and I had to bury the lead. I'm not going to spoil everything before you get to it. But the setup while they're negotiating and the thunder is in the background, it's cutting short this negotiation. And I'm like, that's a good through line. That's pretty good foreshadowing that there's clearly an issue there. Something is not as expected. I thought that was, albeit probably now overused, um, plot device, but nevertheless,

just, it's just really well done. Yeah. I, um, I found it interesting that, uh, they were using their negotiations with the Halakens as such a, uh, counterpoint in the episode two, right? Like this is like a throwaway B story, but it becomes a central theme in identifying what the Terran Empire stands for. Yeah. You know, so I wasn't so nice callback wasn't expecting that. Yeah. Same, same, same. I agree. Well, the crew hatches a plan to blend in by dining the stylish uniforms of the Terran empire. Kirk decides to play the rebel and in a surprising

twist turns assassination into a fashion statement. It desperately tried to conform to the new standards while avoiding the G word and secretly looking for a way back home. Meanwhile, as Kirk tries to modify the transporter, Spock catches him and detains him, brings it back to sick bay where Spock manages to easily defend himself against Kirk, Scotty, McCoy and her until her smashes him in the head with a vase or a bust or something. Apparently, that's enough to nearly kill the man because McCoy wants to save his life. But Kirk company get ambushed by Sulu and his security guard henchman first. But thanks to Kirk's mirror universe floozy Marlena, a powerful plot hole creating device called the tantalus

field the heads were start disappearing one by one. Eventually Spock awakens and he's confused why he's still alive. But thanks to a mind meld with McCoy, it's all he needs to find out exactly what's going on. But the dash of trickery Scotty's brilliance and Kirk strategic cunning, the crew manages to beam back finally to their own universe, leaving the Tarrant empire to its bearded Spock's and fashion forward rebellions. But Kirk does not leave before giving Spock the encouragement he needs to make a change and be better. Plus he throws us in that highly destructive weapon, tantalus device. After all, some of the episode Beardsmead business

you can get promotions through assassination. And well, you should probably never be up there in an iron storm. Yeah, it's kind of dumb, right? Yeah, it was kind of it was kind of dumb. I mean, you know, when the weather is bad, they tell you to stay indoors. Yeah, Scottie should get so she get fired. He should get demoted to America. They have like the most powerful Doppler radar system on the ship.

Right. And they shouldn't warn him beforehand. Right. You know what? You know, I'm less of a fan of Scottie. This is typical of just any weather forecaster. They just never know when the storms are going to be bad. Are you really going to dunk on them right now on weather casters? I just did. What are you going to do about it? Nothing, man. It's in the episode. It's there. That's right. I can't do. So Marlena confused the heck out of me because she just appeared out of nowhere.

Yep. Well, kind of almost literally she came out of the shadows. Yeah. And Kirk is like, all right, I'm gonna have to hook up with this chick. I don't want to, but the things I'm going to do to save my people. So come here, girl. Horn dog, Sulu. I'm going to do to save my people. So come here, girl. Horn dog, uh, Sulu. Yeah, that was, that was a, uh, interesting, uh, interesting take. Yeah. See, like, uh, you know, kind of grabby, grabby with her. So he was Helmsman and security. I guess. It's kind of kind of what they implied.

Not too bad. Speaking of you, her. You know, abs. Yeah. She's so cut. Yeah. Oh, my God. It's it's wild how cut she is. Yeah, I mean, I guess in the mirror universe, they, you know, they they take the lack of clothing to an extreme.

Yeah, they did. Silk is a commodity over there. Yeah. Like everything is about like murder and sex. And that, you know, just like just like grant the photo. I mean, basically, yeah. Grant that Star Trek. You know, to be fair, I probably would play that game. Like there was an open world Star Trek game where I can do whatever I wanted.

I do it. Tell me about your character. Yeah. Would you just go around like, you know, phasering a bunch of cadets or something or? I would. I would. I would bump into me in the hallway. You're going to die right to jail. You bump into me in the hallway, you're gonna die. Right to jail. Don't bring my coffee, right to jail, right to the airlock. What else? What else can you do to me?

That I'm just gonna throw you out of an airlock. That's what I would do, that's the punishment, it's right out the airlock. Throw people out of airlocks. Yeah, what else would I do to you? Oh, you wanna complain about my leadership style? Right to the airlock. I would be a merciful captain, but I would be ruthless. I hear no mercy in any of this.

No, we'd have pizza and dressed on Fridays. Oh, okay. Yeah. So just like our old job after a while. Yeah, it was just a dressed out every single day because no one cared anymore because they were going to fire us. Yeah. But firing in this case is just be throwing you out of an airlock. What would your character be in Grand Theft Star Trek?

I'd probably be the one that gets run over crossing the warplanes. Yeah, that's I mean, they have good doctors there. I guess so. I can't believe we're we just watched the episode like a classic episode of Star Trek and we're talking about a Star Trek, hypothetical star Trek video game. It's late. I don't know what to tell you, man. It's seven 45 by the way, I had been up since two 30 in the morning. Is that a, are you, are you bragging or complaining? Yes. So before we got on, I had to pick up my daughter and I said, yeah, you know, I just got to get home. She's like, oh, you're recording.

I said, yeah, yeah, seven o'clock p.m. or she's like a.m. or p.m. I'm like, yeah, I'm recording tonight at 7 a.m. What's wrong with you? Go back to school. I can't with this kid, man. To be fair, we have recorded a few times at 7 a.m. What's wrong with you? Go back to school. I can't with this kid, man. To be fair, we have recorded a few times at 7 a.m. But I picked her up a half hour ago. Look, man, time time is relative.

It's a manmade construct. I know. Yeah. Speaking of time, by the way, they Kirk bought himself 12 hours off. He was, listen, he was cunning. He was strategic. That's the captain Kirk. I want to see the captain Kirk. That's willing to outsmart or able to outsmart you just at every single turn. We haven't seen a ton of him. Like we've gotten little glimpses here and there, but the Captain Kirk that we've seen up to this point has primarily brute forced his way through most situations. Yeah. Don't get me wrong. We did get to see brute force Captain Kirk in this episode. You would think that with the amount of times he's tried to beat up Spock, he would learn his lesson.

Yeah. Spock backhanded the crap out of him. Yeah. He's like, ah, he's got to watch out for that left hand. And he never does. I'm glad that Uhura got the better of that situation, though, because like Spock was kind of tossing her around, too. Speaking of Uhura, she just was a bad ass the entire episode. Yeah. Yeah. She, she adapted really quickly to this horrible situation. Yeah. She, she put Sulu in this place. You know, she, she figured out how to play the game and

keep herself safe. It was, it was well done. It was smart. It was nice to see that even in the 60s, Uhura wasn't a damsel in distress. Yeah. I'm no expert on civil law, but I think that was workplace sexual harassment. And this is before the Me Too era. Sulu's lucky. Yeah. Sulu's very lucky. He hasn't come back to vitamin AS. Yeah. Well, we'll never know. Do we ever go back to Mirror Universe?

Not in the original series, no. They end up making it there in Deep Space Nine, and then again in Enterprise, and then they did it in Discovery. I remember this. That was the whole season one. Pretty much. Pretty. Yeah.

And the whole thing revolved around the mirror universe in some form of fashion. Yeah, I can't. I'm not going to give spoilers here, but man, such really good twists. Yeah. It's such really good twists. Yeah. It's such a really good quest. And I think like just, I, there's a couple of the mirror episodes that I've missed.

Um, I don't think I ever saw any of the enterprise ones, but, um, they've always been fun, you know, and I, I, the way I see it is, uh, the actors. Get an opportunity to play the same characters in a different way. And if I were an actor, that sounds like a great time to me. Yeah. I think we had like three or four mirror episodes in deep space nine and there was like an overarching story with it. And there's a lot of fun to see. Yeah. Something that Patrick Stewart talked about, which I'm probably gonna keep referencing his book a lot for the next few weeks until I forget whatever he wrote about. But he talked about how the holodick episodes of TNG allowed him to play a different

character of sorts. Yeah. Yeah. Those are the episodes he really cherished. I have to imagine that William Shatner loved doing the same thing because he just choose up scenery when he's the evil version of himself. You know, he only had two scenes, but. Well, remember in the first season, he was evil. But with. Oh, right. Shadow. You're right. I forgot about eyeshadow Kirk.

Yeah, we have eyeshadow Kirk. We have goatee Spock. Hmm. What did you think of mirror universe Kirk in this episode? We only got to see a little bit of them. We only got to see a little a little bit of him, but it was just the same as evil Kirk from season one. With the with the puppy that they put into a costume.

Yeah, yeah, the Pomeranian unicorn. Mm hmm. New chat room name right there. Pomeranian unicorn. I got to lock that in. All right. I thought it was great. I don't I don't know why they. Oh, let's see. We had a core crew of you, Hurra, Kirk, Bones and Scotty. Right. That's a pretty good mix. That's a pretty good. Mix. Yeah.

good mix. That's a pretty good mix. Yeah. And it was the same forum that crossed over to the other side. So, you know, they did a swap swap. It wasn't like, you know, Sulu ended up in our university. It was a double. Yeah. You know, we got a couple interesting technological discoveries in this episode, one of which the agonizer booth. Yep. Pretty pretty sick and twisted stuff there, man. That is very sick and twisted, which by the way, is another reference that I missed on lower decks. I'm pretty sure that was mentioned in lower decks for.

It was an episode, I extra this whatever was called in lower decks where they were doing the hologram test. I think that was a reference made. I have to rewatch it. It's it's been a while since I've seen that one. But that doesn't surprise me. Yeah. We also had the tantalus field. I don't know what that is, but Brad does, and he's not here to explain it to me.

No way I messed that line up. Normally, I know what we're talking about, but Brad doesn't. But can you explain it to hey, can you just explain it to me? Because I don't know what we're talking about, but Brad doesn't, but can you explain it to Hey, can you just explain it to me? Because I don't know what it is. Sure. Um, the stainless field is basically it's a plot hole device. Like let's be honest here, right?

Oh no. Kirk has 16 security guards coming at him. How is he possibly going to defend himself? I know. Let's just make one of them magically disappear. We'll blame it on a tantalist field. I, I would have preferred to see him do more judo, but he was John. Me too. Um, that judo throw was, I loved it. It was gorgeous. There was some pretty good stunts in this episode. Yeah You know another pothole device was the The Star Trek Siri that they used they were like hey Siri

You know, is it possible for these conditions to create another mirror universe? Oh, yeah, there is uh-huh Okay, cool. Is it possible for us to, you know, go there and recreate this? They're like, yep. And, you know, that's, I get it. You know, you need to shave off 20 minutes from your episode. You know, you need to have your heroes get to a solution and then put them in another obstacle. You know, you need to have your heroes gets you a solution and then put them in

another obstacle. You know, this episode would have worked great. If it was also a two parter, they could have let some stuff breathe. Yeah. You know, I did love that we got the famous, the forest Kelly. I'm a doctor, not an engineer. I love that. Yeah, you did drop one of those. Yeah. Yeah, I think we should track those. I think it would probably do us some good to track those and Yeah, I mean, I'm sure it's been done before So, you know if you want to take the lazy way out I'm sure would be too hard to find out how many of those are aware. Oh, I'm okay with the lazy way Let's do the lazy way forget. I say anything. We're doing a lazy way. All right, excellent

I'm definitely not tracking that I there was a point in time when we first started this podcast I was keeping track of how many times Kirk shirt got ripped. Uh-huh. I gave up after the third episode Yeah, no, you should definitely track how many times Brad shirt gets ripped Yeah It's four. It's been four times. One of those times was an accident. Every other time he just looked this dead knee eye as he ripped off his shirt on camera.

Yeah, he's like, look at you during. Yeah, he's like, Can you tell I drank four beers today as he shows us his belly button? Like, no, Brad, we can't. Oh, gosh, can't wait till he listens. Did you respect Marlena to help Kirk? Yes, I did. You did. I did.

Because Kirk is such a good kisser. The way he holds her and kisses her. She's like, okay, yeah, no, I don't want to harm this guy. Well, why would I want to harm this guy? Yeah. Well, she also, like, tried to hitch a ride with him back to the to the regular universe, too. That would have sucked for, you know, Canon Marlene. Because she would have been in Mary Universe. well, not necessarily. Well, I guess. I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. We don't really know how that works because they brought Kirk and them onto the transporter pad in the Prime Universe as well, too. So there was that swap, that exchange happened.

Oh, I thought they just disappeared from the jail cell. I don't think so. I could be wrong. Spock speculates that the counterparts returned to their enterprise at the same time the landing party arrived home. Okay. Okay, yeah, so it's never definitively said

Man this is this was such a good episode. It's such a big episode. It's ranked in so many people's like top 10 top 20 episodes. And I wish there was more for me to talk about the the whole thing is like there's no B plot in this episode. It's just one giant A plot. Everything that is happening is in service of getting them back to their mirror, to their normal universe. And there's just, there's no fat in this episode. There's no room for fats. You know, we just talked about a second ago with, with Star Trek, Siri, they just, you know, they use that as a way to figure out this predicament and save some time.

Right. It's just, it's, it's tricky when you have an episode that's, it's written as well as this, because like, I feel like some of our best episodes are the ones where we have like a really terrible episode of Star Trek, you know, cause then we can get like really silly with it and criticize it. And there's like not a lot to criticize in this one. No, there really isn't, you know, I loved everything about it. DeForest Kelly, by the way, is becoming quickly becoming one of my favorite actors on this show. Yeah. And it sucks that, you know, I won't get to see a lot of him once we move out of TOS.

Yeah. I mean, I think the movie version of McCoy offers a wit and wisdom that is unmatched in Star Trek. He really becomes like Kirk's. I'm going to say what I'm looking for. Conscience like his, his conscience, his guide and Spock is too, in a lot of ways too, like the three of them, you know, bond and become very close. But McCoy is, is that voice of reason that that sounding board that Kirk needs? And yeah, I mean, I'm a big, I'm a, I'm a McCoy fan. I, I, I really like McCoy and I like the

Forrest Kelly's interpretation of him quite a bit. Yeah, I can't help think about Carl Urban's portrayal of Bones every time I watch an episode where I think about DeForest Kelly entirely. DeForest Kelly had passed away by the time Star Trek reboot had happened, right? Oh yeah, long before. He was the first out of the group to pass away. If I recall. Yeah. So imagine that like Carl Urban did what he

did with that role, which I think was very well casted, even if people didn't agree at the time, but he had nothing to go on, man. It was just him doing his own thing. It was just Carl Urban being Carl Urban. Right, well, I mean, I don't think it's fair to say he had nothing to go on. He had 79 episodes of the original series, the six movies. Right, I'm sorry. What I mean is that he didn't get a chance to interview,

like, you know, Zoe Saldana had the ability to talk to Nichelle Nichols. And I think Chris Pine ended up talking to William Shatner as well. Sure. And of course, you know, uh, Zachary Quinto had Leonard Nimoy. Right. So, I mean, there's certainly a benefit to having access to those

characters, but, or to those actors. But I think that there's benefits to not as well too, because then you get to make your own interpretation. And I think, uh, you know, urban paid tribute without, without being like a, uh, what's the word I'm looking for without being a satire? You know? Okay, sure. Yeah. Um, it was, uh, okay.

I know what you mean. It was he was paying homage. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. All right. Yeah, no, definitely.

Definitely great stuff. But back to mirror mirror. Um, you had any negatives about this episode at all? Not really. Like I feel like this one fired on all cylinders start to finish. You know, it was a very tight episode that kept me interested and engaged from the beginning, even something that seemed like a throwaway with the the dilithium mining from the Halkins. Was it? Yeah.

Like that seemed like such a. Pointless plot line until they're standing on the bridge of the enterprise, you know, in the mirror universe, and you realize that, oh, Kirk just had that same negotiation, and now he has to destroy their planet. Yeah. So yeah, it was a through line. It was great. So everything, everything served purpose. You know, I don't I don't know that there was a ton of reason for Marlena to be there, but I feel like she kind of showed another side

that like not everybody is into all the stabbing. So it was fun seeing like characters like Chekhov and Sulu being so vindictive and just wanting to seize power by any means necessary. It was just well done. Top to bottom. I would definitely be in total stabbing. I know it's a show stabbing. I know. It's a show of power.

You know, how else are you gonna assert dominance if you can't stab? There's ways. I mean, it's not anything we can go over now. We'll talk about it later off air. So can I take a stab at, no pun intended. No pun intended. So can I take a stab at no pun intended? No pun intended.

Can I take a stab at what you what I think you would score this episode? Yeah, hit me. All right. I think you would give this a nine out of 10. Yeah, I think that's a pretty fair, fair judgment. Just not a lot fair, fair judgment. Just not a lot to dislike. Yeah. You know, there really isn't. And and I think what I like about this

more than anything is the fact that it launched such a pivotal through line in so much of Star Trek yet to come. Yeah. It's one of those. Like there's so much fascination. Like I love parallel universe stories in Star Trek and they, when they're done well, like I think Star Trek doesn't better than anybody. And this is just one example of doing it well. Yeah. It's, uh, it's one of the, it's one of the things that Star Trek is just known for. So when we did last season and we talked about

some of the best episodes ever of Star Trek, the time travel episode, which one was it? Help me out here. There's so many. Well, right. I'm talking about the one where Kirk fell in love and they hopped through that portal. Oh, City on the Edge of Forever. Right.

City on the Edge of Forever was one of the most loved episodes of Star Trek. But in my mind, there was nothing really that kind of stood the test of time and it wasn't referenced in media going forward. What I mean by that is if you look at stories with like evil twins, there's usually some kind of, you know, evil twin and there's some kind of distinguishing thing about this evil twin, whether it be a facial scar like Sulu had, or whether it be a goatee to signify that you are evil. Like if you go up to anyone and say, oh, yeah, no. How would you know that this person was evil?

Like, oh, yeah, well, yeah, that's when he has a twin with a beard. Yeah, it's it's I don't know. It's just one of those classic episodes for me. Hmm. Just like this. What would you give it a score? Take a step man again. No pun intended I feel like I Feel like you would also give it a solid nine in the words of Brad. He would give it a solid nine

Brad himself was a solid nine. Love you bread I I'm actually giving us a 10, Drew. Oh, wow. Yeah, it's so good. This episode, like we've been talking about it, there's nothing wrong with this episode. The stunt coordination was great. Like it looked like William Shatner had been taking judo lessons. That was a well executed throw, something out of John Wick. We joke about Spock kicking the ever loving crap out of Kirk, but I think in some way they learned from it because it was a four on one battle. some way they learned from it because it was a four on one battle, you know? And bones being such a good doctor. Again, I joke about bones. I crack on bones being a horrible doctor.

He just wants to get his patients drunk. He risked being stuck in a mirror universe just to check on Spock to make sure Spock was okay. He, you know, cause he has the, was it Hippocratic oath? Do they even take that in Starfleet? Sure. They do. All right. Well, great. You know, he stood behind to help his fellow man. You know, Scotty was on the ball too. Scotty was a, you know, he was an MVP. They all were MVPs. Everybody was on the top of their game. Yeah. Um, Scotty was like, yeah, no, I, all I gotta do is, uh, you know, divert power and, and dilithium crystals and give it all she's got captain. And I need to help her. And you know, bones is bones was there too. And he was helping him even though he didn't want to help him because he's a doctor and an engineer,

and he was helping him even though he didn't want to help him because he's a doctor, not an engineer. And super fit, you hurra. You know, we've seen this timid and, you know, sometimes this, I guess timid story worth to describe you hurra, you know, she's usually kind of quiet spoken, always singing. She's she was deceptive, she had to be deceptive. It's what was required of her. And she pulled it off. And Kirkman just absolutely nailing it on just quickly adapting him realizing that something was wrong and then just adapting. I didn't love the pseudo Nazi salute. Yeah, that could have maybe have been redone. But I also think that it's a good illustration of like all that's wrong with that universe too. illustration of like all that's wrong with that universe too. It's a world where the Nazis won and that's why the Terran Empire is in power.

I mean that is possible. We should write our own Terran Empire fan fiction. Oh boy. That's going to get us a lot more trouble than usual. We'll just we'll have a ghost writer. It'll be Brad. We'll put his name on it. Speaking of Brad, where is Brad? We'll just we'll have a ghostwriter. It'll be Brad. We'll put his name on it

Speaking of Brad Where is Brad? Brad okay, okay now I think I got if I go straight down this corridor past engineering and then Crap, I'm in a different dimension now Okay. All right. This this is good. This is good, right? They're just wearing mustaches. Well, that guy's wearing a mustache. That's not... he's not wearing a mustache.

Okay. All right. This is good. We're good. I should be safe here, away from the killer robot, and crap good. We're good. All right. I should be safe here away from the killer robot. And crap, they just killed people. This is not good. OK. OK. Yeah. Totally, totally digging the new digs on Spock here. He's got a full on go goatee. Yeah. Yep. That's awesome. But I feel like he's going to kill me I'm totally gonna give this a good nine but I don't think I'm going to survive here

long I need to get back to my own reality thank you very much that was that you thanks Thanks. Thanks for that. So so cringy. I love you. And sometimes I hate you, but I still love you. It's a cycle. Anyway. Dan Brad, you messed me up so much. It's just a really good episode.

The all right, the Nazi salute. Listen, there's a certain angle in which you salute. And if it gets to like, this level, certain levels below your shoulder, and right above your chest, that's that's that's, that's maybe Nazi territory there. That where you draw the line? That's that's what we gotta be careful. I don't want to say draw the line But man, everybody was doing it. Yeah Everyone was doing it. I

Wonder if anybody else online feels the same as that way. I'm not gonna Google it because I'm not Star Trek Nazi salute. Oh, what a search. I'll search it on my wife's computer. Wow. Oh, man, you're going to regret that. No. This is how you get divorced.

She will. Because she never took serious to me. She won't even know. It's going to come up in auto fill one day. Her ads are going to be ridiculous. Oh, no. Oh, God. Anyway, this episode for me is a very well deserved 10. Yeah, excellent. The one I would rank above this, believe it or not, is

spacey. I believe that I do believe that. I think I think ultimately space is a better story. Yeah. But it's OK to rank these episodes individually on, you know, their own merit. You know, like you don't have to rank an episode comparing it to the one before or the one after it. Well, I mean, if we're talking about, you know, episodes you don't have to rank an episode comparing it to the one before the one after it. Well, I mean, if we're talking about, you know, episodes that I've, I've rated really highly, I know space seed is one of the episodes I've rated highly. And I know I've also rated it above city on the edge of forever.

This episode is one of my all time favorites now. You know, I ended up giving city a little bit lower of a score than I thought it would, too. Yeah. I mean, I enjoyed it, but. Yeah, you loved it. You just didn't love it. I get it. Yeah. You love the way you weren't in love with it. Yes. I've been told that a lot, too. I know. It's OK, buddy.

Yeah. I tell you, I love you after every single podcast, because if you don't tell your co-host that you love him, what's even the point of you being alive? I don't know how to answer that. Sometimes you don't. Just throw up the hard hands like this. Just, you know, throw up right there. There's the camera. Throw up the hard hands like this. Just, you know, throw up right there. There's the camera. Throw up the hard hands sometimes. I know you love me. Oh, what was that?

Sorry. Hearts just appeared on my screen as I said, I love you. Oh, yeah. Yeah. No, that's exactly what happened. That was scary. AI is ridiculous. But enough of that. Enough of that. That was scary. AI is ridiculous. But enough of that, enough of that. This was a good episode. I loved it. You have anything else for the people?

Not for this episode, but let's talk about next week. The Apple. Two weeks, I should say. The Enterprise crew discovers an Ian-like paradise on Gamma Triangula 64. I always get those two mixed up anyway. Controlled by a machine is revered by the local human. I privatives as a god.

I've never seen this episode. It looks spicy. I saw some screen caps as I was doing graphics. They look spicy. I saw some screen caps as I was doing graphics. It looks spicy. Spicy bad. Spicy sexy. This is a bad episode. I see a freeze frame from the episode and there's a man who looks to be covered in red paint with white hair getting ready to fight Kirk.

Uh huh. Yep. There's also just sexiness going on. who looks to be covered in red paint with white hair, getting ready to fight Kirk. Yep, there's also just sexiness going on, revealing clothing and whatnot, because it's the 60s, right? It's Gene Roddenberry, why not? Do your thing. Exactly. Just keep it under three boobs, Gene Roddenberry. All right, well, hey, everyone. Thanks for tuning in. I actually, I really hope that

you love the episode as much as we did. And if you didn't, maybe give it another shot. Maybe give it some another viewing with fresh eyes. And I'd love to hear what everyone else thinks as well. If everyone else is on the same page as Drew and I, and, uh, and maybe Brad. Yeah. Let us know. Hit us up, uh, on our various forms of social media. Give you all that information in the show closing. On that note, thanks for listening everybody. We'll see you next time. Good night everyone. one. Thank you for listening to yet another Star Trek podcast.

We are a part of the Retro Sessions Network. This episode was recorded on January 29th, 2024. I'd like to thank you so much for taking the time to listen to this. Please check us out on the web at www.yetanotherstpod.com. You can hit us up on our other social media forums as well. Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or X, or whatever it is. Blue Sky, got YouTube page, got TikTok. All of our social media is under yet another ST pod and we've got links for that in the show notes. We've also got links in the show notes for two very important

people. First of all, George Rattow, thank you for making us look like lower decks characters. Go over to that link, click on it and you can commission some artwork from George as well. Secondly, William Grobelar, he wrote our music. All of our music on the show is custom and we couldn't have done it without him because he literally did it for us. Thank you, Will. Check out his music at SoundCloud. There's a link for that in the show notes as well too. Do you have a mirror universe counterpart? Are you a doppelganger? Let us know all about it by shooting us an email.

Yet another stpod at gmail.com. We'd love to hear about your doppelganger. And you can also tell us about your doppelganger in a lovely five-star review on the podcast platform of your choice, Spotify, Apple podcasts, Google shut theirs down again. I don't know why. Anyway, thank you so much for listening.

We'll see you next time. you