Rob: Hello everyone and welcome back to Subspace Radio.
We are here to talk about another episode of Star Trek that is out
there in the cos-mess, cosmos even.
Kevin: The cos mess.
What a
Rob: go with that.
What a mess that it is when you're dealing with the Cerritos.
I'm your host Rob and joining me as always Kevin.
How are you?
Kevin: Hello.
I'm excited to talk about The Best Exotic Nanite Hotel.
Rob: Exotic Nanite Hotel, because of course, that's what Lower Decks calls it.
Yes, we're up to episode 3 of Lower Decks.
It's final season.
I can't believe we're saying goodbye to it.
I said that last week and I'm gonna say it every week, no, Lower Decks, stay.
Discovery, I was glad to see the back of you, but no, no, no, Lower
Decks, we've only just got to know ya.
Stick around, please.
Kevin: Yeah.
Uh, may they can make a, a sequel series called Mid Decks.
Rob: Exactly, they'll just move up and up and up and up and up!
So, Kevin, what did you think of this most recent episode, with tendi, Tendi back?
Kevin: Yeah, Tendi's back.
She's excited to be scanning things, and I'm excited to have her scanning things.
That's great.
Um, we had Jennifer and Mariner.
Who knew that was a story we were missing the ending of?
But I am so happy.
Even though they were both pretending, I just love them being snuggly and sweet
together, so I really enjoyed that if for no other reason, this, this episode.
And also just the setting of that cruise ship.
It just seemed like they were, they were like, we, we need to
make this episode more interesting.
So every scene is going to be in a different biome, a different situation.
We're on a frozen mountain peak one moment.
We're cruising down a slow river on inner tubes.
It just, variety from scene to scene, this episode just kept,
kept it interesting throughout.
And so it was kind of a, just a rollercoaster ride of good times.
Rob: And it's almost Grecian, coastal, marketplace feel in some areas, and
look, it just gets, gets me laughing in an hysterical way when they
capture in animation form, someone who has been out in the sun too
long but they've had sunglasses on?
There's something innately funny about someone who is over red in the skin, but
the eyelines of their sunglasses are still
Kevin: just see how white they were
Rob: Yeah.
That is innately funny, especially in animation form, when it's done that way.
I think it's particularly hilarious.
Kevin: And talking of, um, Bradward Boimler's journey in this episode, uh, It
never ceases to amaze me how many angles they keep finding on the what it's like
to not be the bridge crew on a starship.
So that whole thing of, oh, you're the canary in the coal mine.
The, the first officer's using you for all the dangerous situations.
Rob: And nobody, and nobody understands the, the metaphor
of the canary and the coalmine,
Kevin: I'm not the canary!
He's not the canary, you bastards!
That even I don't know.
Rob: And the poor, yeah, the poor uh, Ensign who's lost his hands
and had to have them regrown.
Um, yeah, just the multiple layers of it, type of stuff that we, is very much
a season one, uh, Lower Decks, but still,
Kevin: Yeah, it the premise feel fresh all over.
They're all, they're all, uh, lieutenants and lieutenant junior
grades or whatever at this moment.
They're no longer the ensigns they started as and yet this episode managed
to recapture a little bit of that magic.
It was like a, a leftover premise or they, it occurred to them too late
and they were like, you know what?
It's never too late to make our, our lower deckers feel
especially, uh, like underlings.
Rob: Definitely, and trying to find new things that you create, you know,
crisis of identity with, uh, with Mariner and Boimler, especially because he's
seen this better version of himself that he wants to emulate, so much so
he's, you know, he's grown, he's grown three or four extra hairs on his face
Kevin: Mm
Rob: um, but now dealing with this Can I be that adventurous, throw myself
in the deep end, or should I just, you know, step back entirely and keep
away from that adventurous spirit?
Is it just all black and white?
Is it one or the other?
It's um, like Mariner was dealing with the crisis of, do I accept this responsibility
and has to see a literal different version of herself from another universe.
Boimler's facing these questions, you know, last week with the people
under him following his rules.
Um, and this week can I play that role of the canary or am I something more?
Kevin: It's kind of interesting, um, the pattern that's emerging in this
series, that we've gone back to a show where the bridge crew is really
in the background, that most of them don't appear in any given episode.
I don't think we've, I think we've had one, maybe two lines from Dr.
Taana at all this
Rob: Yeah.
If
Kevin: Uh, yeah, and, and most of the bridge crew are gone.
I loved Ransom this episode, but only takes one.
And Billups is not really a bridge crew.
He's kind of second secondary there, but yeah, uh, Ransom was hilarious.
I'm just trying to give you a win here, Bra.
I'm not your bra.
So good.
Um, and, and having him and argue, uh, him and Billups bickering over what
their secret identities should be for the mission was hilarious as well.
But a little goes a long way with that bridge crew and we have refocused on
our Lower Decks crew members here and I think the show is stronger for it.
Rob: And especially we needed to, what with the upheaval with Tendi
leaving and now coming back, we need to reestablish our, our four,
but now five with, with T'Lyn uh,
Kevin: Speaking of T'Lyn, she had a hilarious time with her, her fanning,
uh, her fangirling about, uh, about the, the musician Krog, Krog on the Rocks.
Rob: That's right.
Kevin: I'm having difficulty maintaining my focus in
anticipation of Krog's propinquity.
Had look that one up.
It means, uh, someone who, who, uh, you know, physical proximity.
Rob: Ah,
Kevin: She's anticipating him being near soon is what she's saying.
Rob: Excellent, excellent.
We seen that species before?
Kevin: No, well, I don't think so.
Maybe.
It strikes me as just something funny someone drew for a one line
low, low register comment a episode.
So maybe.
But, uh, yeah, the, the, the musician on the vibe tubes
was, uh, really, really good.
And the, the little back and forth they had where they were mutual admirers
of each other was funny as well.
Rob: But yeah, the focus on the vibe tubes and how important they were to, you
know, to getting to the key problem with the nanites growing and expanding and all
that type of stuff was great, and just the focus and attention it got was hilarious.
Kevin: Yeah.
Um, not a whole lot else going on here.
I mean, I guess it's worth talking a little more in detail about,
uh, what was the couple name?
Jeriner that we got uh, Jennifer and Mariner.
Rob: That's right.
Kevin: Yeah.
What did you make of, uh, Jennifer's dastardly plot to,
uh, Gaslight Mariner here?
Rob: Well it's very much, like I think what you're saying, it sort of
like played out for us the audience as it did for Mariner as well.
We're there going, what, is this still a thing?
Oh no it isn't, oh what's this?
Oh and then the truth comes out and then a beautiful, you know, coda at the end
of just, uh, you know, recognition that, the both of them are ready to move on.
And, uh, they were both deceiving each other, and you're
trying to one up each other.
It was an interesting representation of what's come before, a good representation
of what could have been, and, uh, a great resolution to, uh, to that relationship.
Which is, uh, which your part of it goes, oh, I thought we were done with
this, and then you go, oh no, I want to see a little bit more of this, and
you go, oh no, they've done enough,
Kevin: I had to go back and look, like I said, I could not, I had not, um, this
relationship on my list of unresolved things in Lower Decks, so I went back
and looked, and so Season 3 was the big season for, uh, Mariner and Jennifer,
and they get together when, uh, Jennifer saves Mariner's life, and then there's
an episode early in season three where, uh, Jennifer just sort of casually rolls
out of Mariner's bunk and, and the rest of the Lower Deckers are like, Ooh,
Rob: Hehehe
Kevin: that episode, uh, Jennifer introduces Mariner to all of her
friends who are having a, uh, intention candle making salon.
And, uh, yeah.
Mariner is second guessing all her natural tendencies and Jennifer goes, No, I love
that you don't take shits from anyone.
That's why I brought you here.
And she ends up stunning all of her friends in order to conserve oxygen
Rob: That's right.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Kevin: is out of power.
So that's kind of like the height of their relationship.
And just a few episodes later in episode nine, Trusted Sources, that's when the
reporter is on board and everyone assumes Mariner has trash talked the crew.
In fact, she's the only one who stood up for the Cerritos.
But Mariner gets sent off to Starbase 80 and like the last person Mariner confronts
before she leaves the ship is Jennifer.
And she says, you of all people have to believe me.
And Jennifer says, no, I'm returning your intent intention candle.
And, uh, Mariner says, no, keep it, give it to your friend who ran the salon.
So, um, yeah, at that point they, they didn't say we're breaking up, but also
Jennifer didn't stand up for Mariner.
And when, when Mariner does return to the ship, there is that moment where she's
in the, the, uh, observation lounge and, and Mariner just kind of walks past her
and, and nothing is made of that moment and that is what's referenced here.
So yes, that was the, uh, whirlwind tour of Jennifer and Mariner and yeah,
it was kind of unresolved and, uh, I, I loved dealing with it, if only because,
as we're about to discuss, there are so many other relationships left on the
ground in Star Trek as unresolved things or things that were apparently resolved
off screen, uh, left to the imagination.
Glad that they dealt with it here.
Rob: Yeah, very much so.
They something that we all assumed was dealt offscreen.
We actually got onscreen, so let's go have a look.
Let's have a look back at those relationships that did indeed
end offscreen and we never got any real explanation why.
Kevin: Indeed, there's a few here that I, that I found when I started looking.
And the first one should be very familiar to you, Rob.
It's Scotty and Uhura from Star Trek V.
And then not in Star Trek VI, very conspicuously.
Rob: thing.
I think, you know, you know, all, all good dramas have three acts,
a beginning, a middle, and an end.
We literally just got the middle of this relationship.
We didn't see where it came from, and we didn't see where it went.
We just see this brief moment of their sharing food together.
Kevin: Yeah, they were all that and a bag of chips, literally.
Rob: Literally a bag of chips as well.
and
Kevin: They're space dock, and at the start of Star Trek V, Scotty's trying
to fix up the Enterprise that is in no shape to take on the universe.
Rob: see what she's got, he
Kevin: Yeah.
And see what she's got.
Yeah.
The, the guts fell out of it as soon as they tried to warp
drive at the end of Star Trek IV.
And, uh, and Uhura comes to the bridge and sees Scotty's burning the midnight oil.
But she's got his back.
She's, uh, she's brought him a bag of chips to, to tide him over and it's,
it's very sweet, but also confusing.
Rob: Very, very confusing.
Yeah, I did very much feel like, y'know, the kids, and what, why are
this uncle and aunt from different relationships talking like this to each
other and giving each other some, like, rubs on the back and stuff, y'know.
We get no explanation, and no better we don't know what your
open relationships mean, come on.
Kevin: Yeah, there are many things that are wrong with Star Trek V and
we've talked about many of previous
Rob: We've done an entire commentary!
We've done an
Kevin: I'm going to take a stand, I'm going to take a stand here.
I don't know what I said in that commentary, but here and now
today, I'm going to say I am on the side of Scotty and Uhura.
I, I wanted it to work.
liked what they were doing in that scene.
It was a little out of nowhere, but I, I found it a pleasant
surprise and I'm sad it got dropped.
Rob: Me too, me too, it's, yeah, it seemed like, like I said, you
know, it seemed like we only got a little bit of this narrative.
We don't know where it came from.
It hadn't really been developed in anything else.
But it was tantalizing to go, where did this come from,
and, and, um, you know, where
Kevin: it seemed to have been created specifically so that Scotty and Uhura
would have some unprofessional or beyond professional relationship when Sybok
started messing with their brains.
So that there would be a little extra something there between
them as they faced that threat.
Rob: Other than a fan dance.
Kevin: Yeah, for sure.
Um, and
Rob: That's purely professional that fan
Kevin: Yeah, yeah, of course, it
Rob: Of course.
You've gotta do a
Kevin: the line of duty.
Rob: You've gotta do a course the Academy on fan dancing!
Kevin: Well, she teaches that
Rob: She does!
Yeah yeah yeah.
Kevin: Yeah.
I can't say I missed it in Star Trek VI when they were back to their professional
selves, but it was a fun color on them, and I, if they had lived happily ever
after, or at least, you know, long enough for, uh, Scotty to be, uh, talking about
his long lost love in Relics when he shows up out of the transporter buffer
in Star Trek The Next Generation.
That would have been a beautiful little bit of continuity and, you know, they
worked together for so many years.
It would have been a lovely little story of them.
Like, any two of them could have been, but like, Scotty and Uhura ending
up together, I feel like would have been a nice thing, uh, to kind of cap
off the story of that bridge crew.
Rob: Yeah!
I always, like, I've always saw it as, as the, when a show's running out
of ideas, a TV show is running out of
Kevin: Let's start pairing people
Rob: start pairing people up.
It happened on, uh, one of my favourite TV shows, Homicide Life on the
Street, I'm going, you're all meant to be like professional detectives,
why are you now all hooking up?
Kevin: I was going to reach for Friends.
Rob: Well, or
Kevin: that is sort of core to the premise.
Rob: Friends is ultimately, yeah, the, let's just, let's almost them making fun
of it as well with Joey and Rachel in the end, but there are some people going, Oh
no, Joey and Rachel could have worked.
I'm going, okay, I'm out.
All we know is that Ross is a horrible human being.
But, um, but yeah, it does, like, normally it is in that situation, but there's
something about the fact that whether, you know, just the charm of Jimmy Doohan
and Nichelle Nichols, to have that beautiful chemistry that they have,
I'm just like, ooh, that's tantalizing.
Ooh, that's a little yeah.
Kevin: Yeah.
And, you know, people of a certain age falling in love is also not something you,
you often see explored in pop culture.
was, it was working for a moment there on the bridge, it was working in it.
It's a shame that spark fizzled out, I feel like.
Rob: Especially within, especially within the joke that Star Trek became at
that time, it was a Simpsons joke, you know, Star Trek 12, so very, very tired.
But yeah, to have
Kevin: Is there any merit in indulging in the canon story that must have occurred
off screen there between those two films?
Like, I don't know if there's enough there for us to kind of imagine
the story of them falling out of love or the relationship ending.
I don't know, Scotty maybe spent too much time reading technical
manuals and not enough time investing in the relationship, something
Rob: Maybe it started happening because of the whole Genesis thing,
because they were, you know, abandoned on Vulcan and then getting back
Kevin: feeling young.
Rob: Feeling young.
Feeling young, man.
Um, yeah, it would be nice to explore,
Kevin: I'm sorry lassie, I'm too old.
This old space dog is too old to learn any new tricks.
Rob: on running into low, low hanging beams, you know,
I've just, I'm not the man I
Kevin: Well, that's it.
He hit his head on that beam and had some amnesia and he lost a year of memories.
And when he woke up, he couldn't remember them having any relationship.
It's tragic.
Rob: tragedy of Star Trek V just keeps on giving.
Kevin: Let's move on to Star Trek The Next Generation Season 7, where Worf and Deanna
Troi were thrust together into some dates.
on the holodeck.
Um, and, uh, by the time we came back to them in Star Trek Generations, I want to
say, if not Insurrection, um, it seemed they were, they were done and dusted.
Rob: Yeah, it seems like, yeah, cause this is always one thing I've got
clarification from you, cause I was always aware that I thought that, you know, the
Worf, Deanna thing was a lot bigger than it actually was, and you've clarified
that for me, which is good to know.
But especially in,
Kevin: of episodes.
There was, like, there was definitely Parallels is the, is one where they were
together and that's where Worf comes back from the Bat'leth tournament and
hits a space bump and splits, he starts jumping between parallel universes.
And some of them, uh, well, at the start of this episode, they are,
as far as he knows, friends, but in some of the parallel universes
he jumps to, they are together.
They are married.
Uh, they have, uh, a child together.
And that plants the seed, which in a later episode, like the second last
episode of the entire series, they are, you know, they, they, they get into a
turbolift together in their civilian clothes and they are going for a picnic
on the holodeck and it's, it again is like two, two nice characters that you
want the best for ending up together.
It's kind of like, okay.
Go, go, go for it, you crazy kids.
But I can't say there was ever any spark on screen before that episode of
Parallels when they both, they, they sold that alternate universe, uh, with
such, um, success that I guess the writers went, okay, let's run with it.
Rob: Yeah, and then like, it never carried on with the movies because, yeah, in
Generations, there's no real chemistry between anyone, it's more focused just on
uh, Picard, um, and when you get to First Contact, Worf's already moved to Deep
Kevin: on Deep Space Nine.
Yeah, the thing.
Okay, so that, I think that's what broke them up, is Worf left the
Enterprise to go be on Deep Space Nine and he said, I'm sorry, Deanna, um,
I'm sure you'll take this honorably.
Rob: Because that's the thing, as soon as we get to First Contact, Deanna's getting
drunk with, uh, with, Cochrane, and
Kevin: Oh yeah, with and Riker's coming in to like, uh,
be the, the sober party crasher,
Rob: he's got that knowing smile on his face going, this before Yeah.
Kevin: I've seen this before, for
Rob: then, Insurrection, he's, you know, smooth as an android's
bottom, and they are yeah.
Kevin: They're having the spa baths together and, uh, yeah.
Rob: And I think they're gonna call this the Riker Maneuver.
Oh, no, oh, that's something else.
Sorry, that's something else in the episode.
Kevin: Hehehehe!
Such a strange decision on Next Gen.
We're coming up to the end of the series.
What, what things do we want to wrap up?
That they would not reach for Riker and Troi and give them a happily ever after?
It's so interesting.
Even, you know, In that series finale, All Good Things, when we jump to the
future, we see, uh, Picard and, uh, Beverly have become married and divorced.
But Riker and Troi, there is no story told there, about the future.
Um, it's very interesting, isn't it?
Rob: Yeah, it'd be fascinating to see where it comes from
the writers rooms as well.
Like, I'd love to find out in the writers rooms where they came up
with the idea of Scotty and Uhura.
Um, where did that spark come from?
Where did that was it from the actors?
Was it from the writing team?
Was it from William Shatner's, you know, cocaine addled brain?
Um, no evidence according to that.
Um, allegedly.
Um, yeah, cause normally, like, we'll probably discuss in one
of the the next relationship off and on screen, Um, in Voyager.
Um, yeah, there wouldn't be some sort of impulse to, they've been
the, the will they won't they for the entire seven years, and then
Kevin: Was it like too obvious?
I mean, you and I are both improvisers, and we learned the value of doing
the obvious and asking the question, what does the audience want?
And I think, I would hope, that it would be in their mind, their awareness,
that the audience would want, Riker and Troi to live happily ever after.
But maybe they went it's too obvious or it's too easy or it's too facile.
It, you know, anything, any version of that we can think of telling and
that it wasn't the whole episode, it would be too, uh, on the nose.
And so let's just leave it.
Rob: It does happen a lot in TV shows, especially now because we're such in
the generation of the nostalgic reboot, or the nostalgic sequel, and so very
much of that time of seven years, they just never wanted to go back.
Never wanted to go back, retread ground or anything like that, always
looking forward, always moving forward.
I could see that being the justification.
They're not really having and especially within that time, it's the early days of
the internet, so fandom was not online fandom was not what it is now, so they
always had that immediate connection to what the audience is thinking, episode
to episode, or even minute to minute.
So, it's just that case of what we all saw as fandom back at that
time, we're all there going, it's so obvious, it is right there.
Riker and, you know, you know, Deanna are meant to be together.
Um, when you're so caught up in that world from a writing point of
view, you don't see it as clearly.
And so that's why every definition of their relationship has them together.
Sure, with, you know, losing a son and all that type of stuff in,
Kevin: Yeah, I'm just doing, I'm just doing a little Googling in the
background as you're speaking there.
And I'm reminded that there is a, there is a little bit of
Riker Troi in All Good Things.
And it's because when Picard travels to the future, during that episode,
he learns that Riker and Troi, like, there is bad blood, uh, because
of Troi and Worf's relationship,
Rob: Yeah, I do
Kevin: has hard feelings about it.
And when Picard comes back, he tells them about this, and they, they, there's this
moment where Worf and Riker kind of go, some things we should never let happen,
and they both go, yes, agreed, you know.
They, they, they have a, you know, a nodding man's pact between each other
to not, not let that love triangle come between their friendship.
Um, yeah, yeah.
So there is a little bit of that there.
And I guess that maybe, Somehow, a little bit spelled the end of, of Troi and Worf.
Maybe that, that time traveling glimpse of the future made
Worf say, You know what, Troi?
I value my, uh, professional relationship and friendship with
Commander Riker too much you get in between us, so I'm breaking up with
Rob: I need to move to a space station and have another tragic romance.
Kevin: Yeah, or Troi was like, you know what?
I won't be, I won't be between you two.
So I'd rather be with neither of you than come between you.
So this needs to be over.
Rob: Yeah, you go, girlfriend.
Kevin: Yeah.
Um, moving on to Voyager where there are a couple of these
relationships ended in the background.
And we'll start with the earlier one, which is Neelix and Kes.
Rob: we all went, ooh, thank heavens for that.
Kevin: Ha ha ha!
Um, such, uh, an odd thing.
Obviously, um, ill conceived on the page.
Maybe lost in casting.
Rob: there's, there's no
Kevin: Such a young ingenue in Kes.
And, you know, yes, in makeup, yes, happy go lucky, youthful
in, um, spirit and attitude.
But the age difference always made it so that you were never quite
sure if he was fatherly love towards her or romantic love towards her.
Rob: It always got awkward when there was like that love triangle thing with Paris
as well, Yeah, it was always ill advised.
Kevin: Yeah, I mean they decided not just to put them together in a relationship
that was hard to show on screen because it would be awkward, but the things
that they decided they could show on screen were Neelix being jealous.
And, and that made it no fun and was a downer in any episode where it occurred.
And so they ended up, I guess, shying away from it and, and,
uh, quietly ending it off screen.
Rob: Yes!
Yes, and
Kevin: There, there were kisses on screen.
I, uh, I read an article that said there were two or three, you know, on screen
kisses that kind of like made it official.
Um, and yeah, there was just enough in dialogue that you can't, you
can't say they were never together.
They definitely were.
But it was, it was an odd, uh, version of being together.
And, you know, two aliens, who are we to apply our human standards
to a, a romantic relationship?
Um, but yes, um, there was some attempt at writing an ending to this
one that I've read up on off screen.
There is a lost scene that was scripted and shot that the actors, or at least
Ethan Phillips who played Neelix, speaks about on a regular basis.
He describes it as like a multi page scene where Neelix and Kes were together
in the science lab, which he says was a, like a rarely used set on Voyager.
It was a standing set, but they didn't use it very often.
And so that's why he remembers it.
It was multiple pages of dialogue where they laid it out there, explained
kind of each character's perspective and decided and said, clearly,
that the relationship was over.
And, and in, to his memory, it was, um, it was a sweet, touching scene that
really gave, you know, closure to that character story for both of them and he
regrets it not making it onto the screen.
Um, there is a book called The Voyager Companion, that, uh, my,
my copy of it is in the mail.
But I have a scan of the page that talks
Rob: ha ha ha.
Kevin: and it's got at least an abridged version of this scene.
Uh, so the episode in question is Fair Trade, which is Season
3, Episode 13 of Voyager.
Um, a couple, uh, three episodes earlier, uh, In Warlord, season three, episode
10, Kes is overtaken by a, a warlord.
Um, and, and, uh, Jennifer Lien, who plays Kes, gets to play, have a really
big episode and play a very different character, uh, being possessed by this
bloodthirsty, power hungry warlord dude.
And while possessed, unbeknownst to Neelix, she meets him on the holodeck
and basically says, we need to take some time apart, you're overbearing,
you always get jealous when I make friends outside of our relationship,
and he goes, oh, uh, that's, that's not my intention, you can definitely
spend your time however you want.
She goes, maybe we need some time apart, and she leaves,
and he's like, Oh, my goodness.
And this is very close to a breakup, but it's then later revealed that it wasn't
Kes, uh, and so, but it plants that seed.
And at the end of that episode, she's talking to Tuvok of like,
this experience has changed me.
I look at all my relationships differently.
And she calls out Neelix specifically.
And, and Tuvok says, uh, you are no longer the same person and the course
of your life will change as a result.
Where that new course leads is up to you.
And so you could almost read that as that's the moment Kes decided
she wanted out of the relationship.
Uh, so then three episodes later in Fair Trade, this is an episode about
Neelix getting in over his head.
He's feeling insecure because the next piece of space that the Voyager
will be traversing is out of his expertise and he no longer feels
like he can pull his weight as the guide through the Delta Quadrant.
So he makes some bad choices trying to get a map of the the next area of space,
gets embroiled in a drug, um, trade thing.
Um, and one thing leads to another and he decides he, in order to, to
get, keep himself out of prison, he's going to have to steal some warp
plasma from Voyager and that is going to spell his end on board the ship.
So he is starting to, like, gently make his farewells secretly
to people and that I think is where this deleted scene occurs.
Um, so it says 48, Interior, Science Lab.
Kes is doing inventory on a carton of supplies when Neelix enters.
She glances at him, uncertain of what is to come.
She has no way of knowing that he believes this is the last
time he will ever see her.
Kes says, Hello, Neelix.
Neelix says, Kes, I wanted to clear the air between us.
It's very apparent that our relationship has been changing, that we aren't
close in the way we once were.
Kes.
I know, we seem to have drifted apart.
Neelix.
Maybe it's for the best, but I want you to know, you've been the
finest friend anyone could have.
I'll always cherish that.
Kes.
Neelix, you sound as though you're saying goodbye.
We'll always be friends, won't we?
Neelix.
Of course, always.
Kes moves to him and gives him a quick kiss on the cheek.
Friendship only, nothing sensual, says script.
Neelix stands like a rock and then smiles sadly at her and exits.
Kes looks after him, a bit puzzled.
So there you go.
It, it seems like at least in Ethan Phillips memory, it was a longer scene.
And I don't know, don't know if there's just some stage
directions missing or what.
But that's what we've got so far.
I'm actually like, uh, stalking eBay for the script of this
Rob: Ha ha ha ha ha ha.
Kevin: I can get the official typed version, but, uh, we'll see.
We'll see where, where that
Rob: Good luck with that
Kevin: Uh, yeah.
Thank you.
Um, so what do you think?
Neelix and Kes?
Rob: Yeah, I mean, it was always a very underwritten relationship,
but never really, um, fully, yeah.
They seemed to go, well, let's do this, and then they went, no, we can't do this.
Oh, well, let's try it this way.
No, that doesn't work.
And
Kevin: feels like their entire relationship is made up of scenes that
didn't quite work and then had to get chopped apart until they barely made
Rob: Yes, yeah, so, they, they definitely didn't work together, Kes barely works
as a character on her own, and she never really was given that chance
to, she was either just someone to fawn after, or she was, or it's always
tricky when you're that, you know, you have so much potential, you've
got so much within you that you need to let out, and so they become this,
you know, almost, um, ex machina, um,
Kevin: No fault of the actor, I say.
Every time they gave her something interesting to do, like in this
episode, Warlord, that I was talking about, She, she nails it.
Rob: Yeah, and like, I remember she leaves, and then she comes back,
Kevin: Yeah, she leaves in The Gift, season four, episode two, in
which, um, there is a little bit of a coda for their relationship.
They, before she, she evolves and leaves the ship for, for other dimensions,
uh, they have like a, a drink in the, in the lounge or whatever and Neelix
jokes that, uh, I'm, it, I never quite understood why we broke up, I bet
it was my cooking or something like
Rob: yeah.
Kevin: So there is a mention of them, like, past tense, past tense, but the
breakup definitely happened off screen.
Rob: Because then she comes back and it's more of an episode about
her and Janeway, and it's got, like, very little to do with, I think,
Kevin: Yeah, again, they, they, they re meet in that episode
and, and he, he is one of the few people who can like talk her down.
Um, the, the episode title is Fury, that's season six, episode twenty three,
and she is completely single minded.
She's been put in the, in the conviction that Voyager is responsible for her
life going completely off the rails and her discovery of her powers being
mishandled and she blames Janeway specifically for all of that and so
she is here to, uh, to exact vengeance.
Um, Neelix briefly manages to talk her down through the power of their
relationship but she, she is still angry.
And in the end what sways her is a holographic message from herself,
because in this episode, they discover this and they decide to, there's
a bit of, you know, timey wimey.
We have just enough time to go back in time and record a message to yourself
so you can talk yourself out of
Rob: Excellent.
Timey wimey, you're speaking my
Kevin: works.
Yeah.
So yeah.
Um, yeah.
Neelix and Kes, uh, yeah, one of those, One of more than a few elements of Voyager
that didn't quite work from the beginning had to be corrected along the way.
Rob: I'm amazed they kept it going as long as they did, because you're there going,
surely that ended, like, in Season 2.
No, it was still, still powering through in Season 4, you're going, ohoho!
Um, but yeah, it was definitely one where we went, well, we're glad that one's over.
Kevin: Speaking of leaving things to the last minute, let's talk
Chakotay and Seven of Nine.
Rob: like to call the WTF moment,
Kevin: Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.
Uh.
It's not completely out of nowhere, but it
Rob: you're being far too generous, Mr.
Kevin Yang, come on!
Heh heh
Kevin: I, when I look at it critically, to go, alright, Chakotay and Seven of
Nine needed some emotional jeopardy in Endgame, the final episode.
And in that final episode we learn that, left to its own devices, Voyager
would have slowly made its way back to the Alpha Quadrant, Seven of Nine would
have died along the way, and Chakotay would be a broken man for the loss.
Rob: Yeah.
Kevin: And that is one of the reasons that Admiral Janeway comes back in
time in order to change history, uh, to, you know, save them two,
save Seven of Nine's life, and save Chakotay's heart, I guess you'll say.
And so, for that to make any sense, establish a relationship.
And so like one episode before the finale, Chakotay and Seven of Nine go on a date.
And there is, in order, and I feel like they, they realized they could, that
couldn't come completely out of nowhere.
So to scaffold that, Seven of Nine is exploring her human emotions in an earlier
episode and some bit of Borg machinery kind of, uh, puts her life in jeopardy.
It detects her emotions as a malfunction and starts to shut her down, and so
she tragically decides she cannot pursue a romantic relationship
because it would kill her, but then the doctor's able to work some magic.
And so she realizes she can now pursue a relationship,
obviously with Chakotay, what a
Rob: course, what an absolute dog.
An absolute dog.
Kevin: And so, yeah, the, the, the, the wheels are in motion and she's, she's
caught practicing her dating technique on the holodeck with a, with a holo Chakotay.
Rob: right,
Kevin: Yeah, it's all kind of, kind of awkward.
Rob: It's, it's just, yeah, there's nothing about it that, I don't know
any fan that went, Oh, it's really going, I was rooting for those two.
Kevin: Unlike Worf and Deanna, who seemed sweet together, on screen
Chakotay and Seven of Nine, it always just seemed like, really?
Rob: She has more screen time with Naomi Wildman.
Kevin: Yes.
Rob: Oh, and, oh, they mentioned Naomi Wildman in episode two of Lower Decks?
And like, they said
Kevin: I loved it!
11 years old!!
Rob: So pissed off, oh please, she's 11 years old.
Kevin: So good.
Um, yeah, I don't know.
I feel like Seven of Nine and Captain Janeway would have made more sense
Rob: Much more sense.
And especially now, because what we've seen in Picard, we're
going, well, okay, alright.
Um,
Kevin: Speaking of which, so, like, Endgame finishes with Admiral Janeway
successfully changing history.
And so, as far as we know, Seven and Chakotay make it
home in their relationship.
Rob: Relationship.
Kevin: It, it has not, it is still in progress at the end of that episode.
Rob: am doing so many bunny ears.
I am doing
Kevin: And the next time, the next time we see those two characters, we see Seven
in Picard and she's a Fenris Ranger and clearly has no Chakotay in her life.
Rob: Mm hmm.
Kevin: Uh, in fact, she's following for, falling for Raffi, uh, later
Rob: Which is surprising as well, thrown in at like the final,
final seconds of season one.
Hey,
Kevin: Also didn't quite work.
Uh, there's a good audio book that the two of the, those two actors play those parts.
Like, it's a fully voiced audio drama called No Man's Land.
A little
Rob: hey.
Kevin: um, taste.
But,
Rob: a, that's, a
Kevin: if you want, if you want a story where they are together
and being together, like, it's there if you want to go find it.
And the ac, actual actors are voicing it.
So, uh, it's, it's pseudo canon.
Um, But, uh, Chakotay, the next time we see him, is in the
events of Star Trek Prodigy.
He is taking the, uh, the, um, the Prodigy into the wormhole
to, to kind of investigate it.
Rob: With his, what the hell do you have with, uh, with Janeway connection thing.
Kevin: Yeah, and he, we see the scenes where he, he bids a tearful
farewell to Janeway, gives her the gift, they're like parting and it's a
almost maybe, maybe not relationship.
And so, the idea that he would still be together with, with Seven
at that point is unbelievable.
Somewhere after the events of Endgame, in which Janeway successfully
changed history so that Seven would live and Chakotay would not have
his heart broken, they broke up.
And it almost strikes me as like, she must have died pretty quickly before
they could realize they weren't right for each other in original timeline.
Rob: I think her death is like just a couple of weeks away.
If
Kevin: Uh huh.
Rob: Um, yeah, I think they just, they just get back to civilization and the two
of them look at each other and go, oh no, this, no, no, this is, no, this, no, heh
Kevin: Can you believe that pined for you for the rest of
my life in that other timeline?
Rob: Let's just never talk about this again.
Kevin: It's a lot of pressure, right?
relationship?
To know that, you know, you would be my one true love when, and if you died,
I would, I would never love again.
Um, maybe that pressure is what sunk them.
Rob: It's holodeck pressure.
It's all that holodeck pressure.
It's built up unrealistic expectations on a relationship.
Kevin: There's some shades of Riker Troi there as well, of that
glimpse of the future changed their feelings in the present.
Rob: Yeah, maybe if Chakotay grew his beard a bit sooner.
Maybe.
Yeah.
Mmm.
Kevin: I don't know, but I don't know if it's that Chakotay was done so
well in Prodigy that I have newfound respect for that character and, uh,
I, I now don't want to believe that he would be completely inconsolable after,
uh, Seven's death in that timeline.
Rob: Yeah, it's definitely his character has gotten the best bit of writing, um,
that he has, that he ever did, really.
Like, to be honest, there's not many standalone Chakotay
episodes where you're there going, that's a good Chakotay episode.
You're just
Kevin: Maybe it's, maybe it's Seven realized that Chakotay was not,
not who she was meant to be with.
Like, she was still discovering what romantic relationships would be.
It was her first experiment.
You know, your first love is rarely your true love.
So maybe, maybe Chakotay was her first love and then she
Rob: She didn't want a penis.
Kevin: And, and the fact that she broke up with him, but lived on,
meant that Chakotay could, you know, he could, you know, you can, you can
love someone and they don't love you back, uh, but they go on in the world
and you love them at a distance.
Uh, and you, you, you mourn for what wasn't, but you
weren't meant to be together.
But she didn't die.
And so maybe it wasn't that she died and they couldn't be together
that made him inconsolable.
Maybe it was the fact that she died at all.
And he loves her, even if at a distance, enough that her death
would be a tragic event to him.
Rob: Look, Kevin, a lesser person would think that you're reaching, but I think
you've put more effort into this than the writers ever did, so, uh, you should get a
Kevin: What is, what is the premise of our episode of Substance Radio
today, if not to reach beyond the
Rob: Yeah, we go beyond.
Above and
Kevin: talking about, we spent a good five minutes talking about Scotty and Uhura.
I think we are definitely going overboard here.
Rob: And we cut ourselves way too short, we could have gone a lot longer on that.
Kevin: Alright, well, that's, that's pretty much, those are the four
that I could think of, uh, and I, I enjoy talking through them with you.
I, I, uh, I found some in each one that I hadn't thought of.
Rob: When it comes to relationships, uh, Star Trek are quite, uh You know,
it's, it's not the safest haven for where you can find relationships starting
and ending in any type of joyous way.
Um, as if, you know, just need to look at my, uh, my Deep Space Nine as
the perfect representation of that.
But to find those relationships that end off screen, it's just like fizz out.
It was a big thing in TV shows in the 90s.
When they, like we talked about, you know, pushing relationships because
they've used up every other, uh, avenue for their script writing.
Um, and sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.
It's like, well, it's just, um, you know, in between seasons it doesn't
work out, or in between episodes even.
Kevin: It's a funny thing.
In one of the interviews I read with Ethan Phillips, who plays Neelix,
he talked about, in his opinion, that kind of character story was not
something that the writers of at least Star Trek Voyager were interested in.
They wanted to tell plot driven stories.
They wanted to tell character stories that served the plot.
Purely Uh, emotional character stories, just kind of, I guess they, they needed
more than one episode do them justice.
And in a show that was very firmly rooted in the episodic tradition of
Star Trek, they didn't fit very well.
Uh, and so, yeah, I mean, we, we had Tom and B'Elanna towards the end that, um, you
could, you could argue, you know, we saw the different phases of that relationship
and they lived happily ever after.
They had their wedding, they had their baby, but, um, I would say even that
was still a little underdeveloped for,
for something that would be truly weighty and, and, uh, um, a meaningful, uh, look
at a romantic relationship between adults.
We, Star, Star Trek was never great at that, and Deep Space Nine was
probably the only one who got closest because they were telling those longer
form stories, unusually for the time.
Rob: Star Trek has always been, and always has been, and still is
now, is that battle between, are we story driven, are we character
driven, are we a balance of both?
And that's where, you know, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, was able to
flourish in a time where science fiction was perceived as plot driven.
But Deep um, but Next Generation was able to add in those, you know,
melodrama, character relationships, much to the chagrin, you know, the,
the producers and the writers of the show battling it out going, no, this is
not what Star Trek is, what it isn't.
But with Deep Space Nine you had a lot more mature versions of relationship,
I mean, um, uh, Kira's relationships with, uh, yeah, her moving from
relationship to relationship and connecting with the men that has been
connected with her resistance past is a fascinating exploration of keeping
intimacy, physical intimacy and emotional intimacy, two different things.
A lot of the relationships she was in were with people in males in higher authority.
Um, uh, Uh, same with, same with Julian Bashir, setting himself up as like a
clumsy fool, then becoming kind of like a, uh, uh, sort of like a, you know,
a man about town, seeing relationships here, there, and everywhere, and not
really being able to settle down, but then settling down with Ezri Dax.
Um, and all those type of, you know, fascinating, quite mature
approaches to relationships, uh, splintered all throughout Deep Space
Nine, because that was the show where it was allowed to happen.
They pushed for that, let's stay here, let's push those relationships, those
political relationships, those emotional relationships, whereas, once you go to
Voyager and all the other ones are going, no, no, no, it's the next thing, the
next adventure, the next species, the next story, um, it's always challenge.
Kevin: Oddly, given the premise of the show that these several hundred people
are locked together on a starship and they have nobody but each other.
Like, where, where else can you explore emotional intimacy over a period of
time than in that kind of situation?
Rob: And that's, yeah, and we've talked about it before, that was the one thing
that really shattered me with Voyager.
They set it up in such a way to be so unique and such a daring exploration,
that could be that whole next plot, next plot, but how your character relationships
evolve, and they never really did that.
They just wanted to get back to being The Next Generation, but with a different
hook, and they never really used that hook to be the basis of their entire show,
which could have been so fascinating.
Now, before we go, also, uh, some sad news, uh, Jeri Taylor behind, um, one
of the figureheads behind, uh, Star Trek in the nineties definitely passed away.
Kevin: One of the, like, people behind the, the show that, like,
were not really known at the time, but when you go back and look, their
name was on all the good episodes.
I think my favorite Jeri Taylor episode is The Drumhead.
We've talked about it several times here, where the, the half Romulan crew
member on the ship is unmasked and is going to take the fall for, for like a
bit of espionage that happened on board the Enterprise D and the, uh, the kind of
retired, uh, still honorary admiral, uh, judge comes aboard and starts grilling
them in, in like a, a witch trial.
And Picard has this amazing speech at the end, which dismantles her, uh,
written by Jeri Taylor that episode.
Um, As fine as any piece of writing we ever got in that 90s era of Star Trek:
The Next Generation, if anyone hasn't seen The Drumhead, I can think of no
better way to honor the passing of Jeri Taylor than to go back and watch that one.
Rob: Yes.
Good idea.
Everyone go out there, do some homework and honor the late great
Jeri Taylor and their contribution to, uh, uh, the final frontier.