Rob: Hello and welcome back to Subspace Radio.
I am your host Rob, and with me also is our other host,
Kevin: Kevin
Rob: We are here to talk about and look at the latest Star Trek episode out
there in the subspace world, that is The Inner Fight, episode 9, the penultimate
episode of Season 4 of Lower Decks.
That is right.
The arcs that have been set up all season are now coming to a head.
Kevin: It's all coming together, Rob.
Rob: And that of course will springboard us into a wider topic that we will explore
in the second half of this podcast.
So, The Inner Fight,
Kevin: I was very excited as soon as I saw the title of this episode,
because it is a reference to The Inner Light, which is like, for many people,
their favorite Next Gen episode.
It is, it is kind of a Picard solo episode, which is the only, only thing
that I can say against The Inner Light.
Otherwise, it is a masterpiece, and so seeing Patrick Stewart out of character,
on his own, dealing with family and loss and it is a beautiful thing and I
thought oh, oh, they're referencing it.
I wonder if we're gonna get something approaching that in
this episode and it was not that.
I mean, I think, okay, well, Mariner's obviously fighting a
fight inside herself and therefore we'll call it The Inner Fight.
Like that, that's probably about as deep as we went with this, uh, title here.
But for what it was, I really loved it.
Rob: Yeah, it was a really, really solid, uh, episode.
One of the...
definitely stronger, um, penultimate episodes of the season
leading into that grand finale.
Um, lot of easter eggs and nuggets in there for us all.
And this finally was, even though as we've mentioned it many, many times before,
this has been a constant arc, and the hurdle coming back, or an obstacle for
us to come over with Mariner, but now we finally get another explanation for
it, which seems to be the definitive explanation for why she is just, you
know, a couple of steps forward, then three steps back, and then a couple of
steps forward, then three steps back.
Kevin: I really wondered what you made of this episode because of that factor.
Like, first of all, the references in this episode are very Next Gen heavy.
There's the title, there's going back to The First Duty with Sito Jaxa
in Nova Squadron, and her eventual death in Lower Decks, the episode
that gave this series its name.
But all of that is linked heavily with the lore of Next Gen, which
I think would not be pushing your nostalgia buttons quite as...
effectively as it would mine.
And at the same time, it was going back to the well of Mariner's, um,
self destructive tendencies, which I know you're pretty sick of already.
So I was sitting there going, I am loving this, but I would not be surprised if
Rob is rolling his eyes through this one.
Rob: Look, I was loving it and, um, this podcast has been
a great assistance for me.
So even though I'm not, uh, as well versed in the Next Gen, uh, universe as you are,
I have definitely learned a lot from you.
So I picked up those references very, uh, quickly.
Um.
And, of course, of course, it all had to tie back to the
original Lower Decks episode.
They had to be tied in, uh, in some way, shape or form.
It's the natural progression that, uh, Mariner is so, you know, inherently
connected to the characters from that episode, and particularly one.
Um, I, look, I have been completely tied with the fact that...
Um, that they have brought this up and returned to the well over and over
again when there's, it's not character development, it's even worse than that
restart button from 80s sitcoms or dramas.
Um, but sure we're doing it again, but we'll connect it to Lower Decks,
the original episode from Next Gen.
How are you with that, Rob?
And I'm going, oh, okay.
Um, I'll take that.
Kevin: There was something about this episode that I think probably
did play to your specific interests, and that was, this felt more than
perhaps any other episode of star Trek I could point to, like, It
played with the style of Star Wars.
There were transition wipes.
There were ships parked on top of buildings.
Uh, there was like the Den of Iniquity that our characters were descending into
in order to get the information they needed from some secret scummy something.
And, um, yeah, that that I was like, Okay, now they've got Rob.
Rob: That was the thing that I was really going to say.
This felt like a Star Wars animated, uh, show.
Not only was it the transitions with the screen wipes and, uh, certain bars
and stuff like that, but the locations.
So, uh, New Axton felt like Tatooine.
You had Sherbal 4 that felt, in some parts, it felt like Dagobah.
In other parts, it felt like, uh, Endor from Return of the Jedi.
The music, especially, like the part where the, um, the runabout came to land at New
Axton sounded just like Star Wars music when ships come landing into a planet.
I'm just going, they, yeah, there's
Kevin: score was there, it had the melodic sort of, dooo.
And at the same time, I think the ships sounded unusually Star Wars y.
They had that kind of guttural, woo woo woo woo woo sort of engine thing going on
that we don't normally hear in Star Trek.
So, um, Yeah, they, leaned into this is, uh, this is the seedy end of the galaxy.
Rob: Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.
Kevin: What did they say?
Twice as lawless as Old Axton without any of the charm.
Rob: Yes, there was those elements there that I particularly loved.
There were some shots and imagery that was more evocative of
Star Wars than anything else.
Um, and that brought a scope of bringing in back all those cultures and all those
alien species that we've, uh, come to know and putting them all together.
I love a good, Menagerie of, of alien species, hence Deep
Space Nine is my favorite.
The Promenade is just like almost a, you know, Zootopia of
all the, uh, different species.
Kevin: And we had a bit of that in both the A story and the B story here.
The A story was kind of our primary kind of villains that pushed together and
forced out of necessity to work together under Beckett Mariner's leadership.
And meanwhile on New Axton we had, uh, we had all of, the, um, snakes drinking green
liquid that, uh, not be explained further.
Rob: And, uh, and creatures that are definitely, definitely not
puppets, but are acting like puppets.
Kevin: Oh, that was the high point for the episode for me.
That is a reference to Balok, uh, from, um, The Corbomite Maneuver, which if I
remember right is the second ever episode of Star Trek, The Original Series, they,
uh, encounter this giant, uh, spherical ship in space and all they like when
they try to communicate with it, they get is like a wavy image of that exact
puppet, um, you know, in true sixties budget TV style, counting down the minutes
until their inevitable destruction.
Uh, and of course, uh, Kirk, Kirk calls the bluff and beams aboard the ship and
finds it's a tiny little boy who is, uh, who is actually running the ship and he's
got a puppet to make himself look tough.
Rob: and I believe the boy, the boy Clint Howard?
Kevin: is
Rob: Is Clint
Kevin: Clint Howard, so there you go.
Rob: The first many appearances.
So yeah, a lot of easter eggs in there for you as well.
A lot of, uh, Next Gen references, of course, at the start with Ransom
listing off, uh, the ex Starfleet members who are now being the target.
So we had Seven of Nine, of course, from Voyager.
We had Beverly Crusher,
Kevin: Teach me how to tap dance Beverly crusher.
Rob: Which did excite, um, Boimler no end.
There was Thomas Riker and also Nick Locarno.
Kevin: Nick Locarno, yes.
He did stand out on that list as the least important person in that list, which,
which suits our, our Cerritos crew to be the ones assigned to collecting him.
Um, it was a strangely, a strangely short list.
So these, these, uh, kidnappers are going after ex Starfleet, we are told.
Rob: Yes,
Kevin: and they have a specific list of five, which I think, that is, that was
one of those small universe moments, that there was, they didn't even put
a, uh, a, you know, a name we wouldn't recognize on the list just to pad it
out and make the world feel bigger.
It was like, oh yeah, here's these five people that, uh, you have all seen before.
Rob: Reference, reference, reference, reference, Easter egg,
Easter egg, Easter egg, Easter egg,
Kevin: But, uh, yeah, as soon as they said Nick Locarno, I said, Ooh, Robert
Duncan McNeil's coming back, and they are going to surely make a joke about
how he looks just like Tom Paris.
It hasn't happened yet, but I am looking forward to it.
Rob: There has to be in there at some point.
Um, so yeah, how did you find, um, when we, uh, it was a beautiful, one
of my, I think the highlight of this, of the episode for me was, and this
is saying something because of all my, anger towards, uh, the Mariner loop,
as I now call it, uh, her, her heart to heart with, uh, the Klingon, uh,
as they shelter from the glass storm.
Kevin: I loved the glass storm.
Stupid knife rain!
Rob: How was your feelings towards such a deep, like,
Kevin: I Yeah, I'm with you.
It touched me as well.
And, um, yeah, the, the feeling one of them was gonna die so she could
say, uh, anything that she had on her mind and it, uh, and wouldn't be
held to it later was the thing that allowed her to make a breakthrough.
And who knew that the counselor she needed was a Klingon planning to kill her.
But, um, yeah I loved… love that little speech.
Rob: Much more effective than Migleemo.
That's for damn sure.
Kevin: I loved how it flipped back and forth of like, no,
no, you fight me, you fight me.
And the other one saying, no, I, we can't, it's too small.
We'll wait till morning.
And then at the end, the Klingon's like, okay, now you fight me.
And she's like, no, I'm going to hug you instead.
Rob: Yeah, and the great, the great line of sort of like, go on your adventures,
you know, explore new planets and, uh, you know, and research your plants?
Kevin: Sometimes it's plants.
yeah,
Lower Decks is not in the habit of kind of holding back the end of
the story for A big end of season cliffhanger, so I appreciate that
we've got one more episode this season that I assume is going to resolve the,
the, the ship, uh, kidnappings, sort of, yeah, the mystery ship, uh, arc,
and, uh, I'm looking forward to that.
Um, but at the same time, if they had gone to the season break with
To Be Continued at the end of this episode, it would have felt worthy,
like this, this was good enough to have been the season finale in my mind.
Rob: Definitely.
For it all to be, uh, hinging on that our, uh, man behind this whole thing
is, as you said, the least important name on list of easter eggs at the start
of an episode, is pure Lower Decks.
That they have turned Nick Locarno, a one episode appearance by Robert
Duncan McNeil, before he goes on to do Voyager, to be their lead villain,
that is the ultimate representation of Lower Decks lower decking themselves.
Kevin: He is very much a proto Tom Paris.
I feel like I'm, I'm getting deja vu, like I have said that on this podcast before.
The up and coming overachiever at Starfleet who then like washes
out because of one bad decision.
That is kind of the state we find Tom Paris in at the start of Voyager and,
uh, Tom Paris kind of redeems himself over the, pretty quickly, in fact,
at the start of Voyager and becomes a full fledged member of that crew.
But Nick Locarno is kind of the answer to the question, what if he
had rotted in prison and gotten more and more resentful because of it?
Like, that is, that is who we are meeting with Nick Locarno.
Rob: Yeah, I mean, yeah, definitely is a sense of there was a redemption arc and,
uh, for Paris and Paris, um, definitely taking responsibility for his own actions.
It'll be very interesting to see, uh, what we get from Locarno when he, uh,
uh, has his first chat with Mariner and what her thoughts are towards him.
Kevin: Yeah.
But, um, I think the, uh, the thing that stood out to us as a pattern
from Treks past that we wanted to delve into was this, this coming
together of a bunch of aliens who would normally not be working together,
uh, this, um, teaming up, as it were.
Um, Yeah, and I've got a few, I've got a few examples of
that that we can talk about.
Rob: Yes, and mine is more of a overriding example, so covering, uh, a
couple of episodes and seasons as you can probably pick up where I'm going
Kevin: Oh, okay.
No, I, I will, I will wait to be surprised.
Rob: So where would you start?
Let's go in chronological order as we always do here
in the Subspace Radio world.
Kevin: Sure.
Well, my first one is, uh, unusually, an animated series episode.
Rob: Hey, oh yeah.
Kevin: This is The Time Trap, which is, uh, the animated series,
season one, episode twelve.
Where, uh, the Enterprise is in a skirmish with a Klingon battlecruiser, and they
both get sucked into a pocket universe, which is like the Bermuda Triangle of
space, and they find a bunch of centuries old ships stuck there, and they have
learned to live together in harmony, in part, uh, by force of the psionic
powers of some of the ruling council,
Rob: that's right.
Kevin: who have enforced a, uh, a law that if anyone is violent to any other
member Of the society, they will, they will have their, the batteries
pulled out of their ship for 100 years.
I'm not sure how well that holds together on scrutiny, but, um, nevertheless, it is
interesting to see all of those different aliens kind of arrayed around a table.
I think they said something like, their society is made up
of 123 thereabouts, different species from, uh, from the galaxy.
And, uh, yeah the, the main guy Vulcan with a, with a raspy voice who, if I was
listening right, is, uh, Jimmy Doohan and his, uh, his second in command is
an Orion woman who dances her Green Lady dances, uh, for entertainment, but also,
is an especially enthusiastic enforcer of the no violence rule in their society.
Rob: Yes, and I do believe we see in shot, in some of it, we see a
Gorn, we see an Andorian, um, yeah, it gives that very much that sense
of the United Nations type of feel.
It's all quite formal and all, you know, it's more delegation than actual,
socializing type environment even though we have Orions dancing but
then, uh, but that's just commonplace for the Orions are either dancing or
smuggling or bartering or, playing weird drinking games with deadly animals.
Kevin: Having rewatched it today, it's, it has many of the
problems of The Animated Series.
And if you want to hear us delve into The Animated Series in general, including this
episode, you can go back and listen to Subspace Radio episode 20, which was our,
our rundown of the entire animated series.
We're going into a break after this season finale.
So if you want to go and revisit some episodes you may have
missed, that's a good one.
Rob: It's, it's, it's a fabulous mess of us going, well, we're going
to talk about one, two, or three, and Kevin Yank just going, let's
talk about the whole two seasons.
Kevin: Let's go through them all.
Rob: So there's some of us going, clearly recognizing and remembering
the episodes that we watched, and others going, which is this one?
Is this the one where they have Jimmy Doohan doing a, a voice?
Kevin: That's all of them, Rob.
Rob: Ha-ha-ha, That was the joke, Kevin.
Come on.
Kevin: Yep.
It is a slow mover, this one.
Like, I am, I am continually amazed at how slow a 30 minute animated episode
Rob: ha ha ha
Kevin: can feel.
There's a lot of talking, not a whole lot of doing in this episode.
Rob: It is the animated series superpower.
go, alright, let's stretch out this 30 minutes and make it
feel like you're watching, you know, a whole binging series.
Kevin: Yeah.
But the interesting duality of this episode is what if all of these species
who are normally at each other's throats learn to live together in peace and
harmony, and it was, uh, it was scary to our crew who want to situation.
Like, that sense of we will do anything to escape utopia is a
typically Star Trek idea, isn't it?
Rob: Well yeah, and they talk about it a little bit in this episode of like,
uh, Mariner is so angry going, you know, We joined Starfleet not to be spies.
You you're joining Starfleet to explore and find new things and discovery
and hope and working towards unity.
And this is very much an episode where they're going, look, We,
as Starfleet, are working towards Utopia, but when, but we want to do
it on our terms, not this Utopia.
This, this is wrong Utopia.
It's not our
Kevin: Enforced utopia.
Yeah.
Rob: Yeah,
Kevin: Mmm.
Yeah, the, the big visual of this episode is that the Enterprise and the Klingon
battlecruiser end up, like, hooking up in order to combine their engine
power to escape this void at the end.
Rob: It's a little bit, uh, opening shot of Doctor Strangelove.
It's a little bit saucy.
It is a little bit, uh, yeah, it gets, it gets my juices flowing, uh, Kevin.
Um, and it's amazing shots in there of all the different ships together.
Um, which is uh, yeah.
Kevin: The 11th hour twist of this episode is just as they
have made their escape plan.
They have like a farewell reception or a dinner on board the
Enterprise or something like that.
And all of the, all of the other trapped species are like, it's not going to work.
You're not going to be able to escape, but we'll come for dinner anyway.
I'm not going to turn at dinner.
Uh, and, uh, yeah, so, and the
Rob: very, that's very middle class Christmas, isn't it?
Where you're just there going, there's no way of escape, but we've
still gotta come around for dinner and go through the pleasantries.
Kevin: The Klingons use this reception as an opportunity to plant
a bomb on board the Enterprise so that when they do escape, only the
Klingons will get out of it alive.
And the, the, um, the Klingon who is assigned the job of placing this little
red pill in a, in a locker of some kind, she is a, it's a female Klingon.
Which is unusual, like, you're like, oh, female Klingon, uh, she's even got
an afro and everything, like, Klingon with an afro, it's pretty interesting.
She does not have a single line of dialogue.
Rob: No, she doesn't.
No.
And she does look more like she's come out of, um, a Pam Grier film from the
Kevin: Yeah, I wanted to know more about this, uh, this, Um, sneaky
Klingon lady, but, uh, sadly, she was, um, she, she exceeded the,
uh, voice cast budget of episode.
Rob: We have to go back to the, uh, dancing Orion bikini girl.
Kevin: Yep.
What's your, uh, what's your first one, Rob?
you want take us into your big picture that you mentioned?
Rob: Let's, let's go to my big picture.
Um, I've talked about it a little bit in previous, uh,
episodes and stuff like that.
I'm gonna explore it, because it's my favorite element of Star Trek, where they
broke out of the mold of what had been, and they've kind of gone back to it in
some ways, which kind of annoy me as well.
I'm looking at the whole Dominion War type structure, and the machinations,
but also the alliances that come out from that, particularly in, who would
have guessed it, Deep Space Nine.
I've mentioned it before, I particularly love the fact that...
I like the Federation and the Klingons working together.
I like that alliance.
I love that alliance and it worked beautifully in Deep Space Nine when they
were able to come to an agreement and an understanding and a sort of like this
respect in some ways for each other.
There's, like, there's a bit, there's a bittersweet moment at the end with
the, you know, the glory of victory and stuff like that and, uh, Sisko
and, uh, the Admiral don't really want to fully embrace the glory of it
because so many lives have been lost.
But there's this begrudging respect and connection, um, that plays out.
And like the, all the alliances like bringing in the Romulans
and the Breen joining up with the Dominion, all this type of stuff.
I love seeing those big broad cultures.
It really made the...
the galaxy of the Federation seem immense and huge and seeing, as opposed to just
week to week, seeing a different species come along with the same ridges or bumps
on the noses, this is where we build in these cultures and how they interact
and plan and strategize and negotiate.
Um, so, and so many episodes where they just have war meetings where you'd have
Klingons, Romulans, um, you know, uh, uh, Vulcans, Ferengis, all in the same...
You know, uh, all together, um, Bajorans, all there discussing, collaborating,
working together, and working for the common goal of ending this war.
So I loved how that played out, not just over, um, one season or a couple
of episodes, over multiple seasons.
You know, we had start of season four, Way of the Warrior, where the Klingons
were attacking Deep Space Nine, to the end of, uh, season five, where the
Klingons are helping the Federation get...
Uh, Deep Space Nine, Terok Nor, back.
So, it's that type of stuff that I love that element of Deep Space Nine that
has now been embraced by a lot of modern Star Trek is that arc storyline that
they, uh, pioneered and really, um, For a series that pioneered that overarching
and multiple series storytelling, for them to pioneer it in the early, uh,
in the mid to late 90s is a remarkable achievement for it to still hold up now.
Kevin: Yeah.
Yeah.
Lots of unlikely alliances in there.
I feel like, um, going into that war, if you imagine the Federation and the
Klingons allies in a war, you would imagine that the Klingons do all the
dirty work, they do all the fighting, and Starfleet is doing all of the diplomacy
and negotiations, but it's not that.
We see a lot of, like, uh, of the toll of battle that is taken on the Federation,
and I think that that alliance and the fact that the Klingons get to see the
Federation holding up their end of the alliance and bleeding along with them is,
it, it creates a, a singular opportunity for Klingons to respect the Federation for
doing the things that Klingons respect.
Rob: Very much so, very much so.
And especially building up characters like Martok, um, and stuff like that too.
And his connection with Worf.
Worf not just being the only character to, to walk that line between Federation
loyalty and Klingon, uh, tradition, uh, for Martok to come into that as well
and how he deals with that and his own relationship with his family line, with
his wife, with his relation to, to the, the dynasties, uh, back in, on Kronos.
Um, so yeah, that, that was, like, I think the highest achievement of,
Kevin: agree.
Rob: showing those different, different cultures working together.
And, and from the other side as well, how, you know, the, the, the Founders,
um, the Breen, the Jem'Hadar, uh, the Vorta, uh, the Cardassians, their, and
the, well, the Cardassians forming an alliance and then rebelling against them.
All that type of stuff is just played out beautifully and
Kevin: and course that pivotal episode where the Romulans switch sides in the
war because, uh, because Sisko plays a dirty trick that he will have to live
with for the rest of his days is, uh,
Rob: Pale Moonlight, baby.
Kevin: Yeah.
Rob: baby.
But unlike, unlike Sisko, we won't be deleting this
entry just when we finish it.
Kevin: In fact, I am going to follow that thread to another episode where
the Romulans play a strong role.
And This is Star Trek: The Next Generation, Season
3, Episode 7, The Enemy.
Uh, it takes place at a muddy, lightning filled planet called Galorndon Core,
where the Enterprise, tracks a signal to the source, which is a crashed Romulan
ship in the middle of Federation space, and they find one survivor in the
wreckage and beam him back to the ship.
At the same time on this away mission, Geordi LaForge gets separated from
the group and falls down a hole, and, uh, they have to beam up without him.
Geordi goes on to find a second Romulan on the surface of the planet, and they...
They have a very similar heart to heart scene in a cave together where they,
they talk about their two perspectives.
The Romulan is incredulous about Geordi's, uh, visor, his prosthesis that
helps him see and he's like, you humans wasted resources on a defective child.
Like, where they start.
This is a great Geordi episode, if nothing else, uh, pretty early on in season three.
The...
Romulan who we end up finding is named Centurion Bakra.
He won't even identify himself to begin with because, of course, the Romulans are
not meant to be on this planet, so he does not to provide any kind of intelligence
to the Federation, but, uh, Geordi deals with the tight lipped Romulan in classic,
uh, Geordi LaForge style, and he just starts calling him Commodore, because
he's like, yeah, I guess we'll call you Commodore, and the says, uh, when my, when
the Romulan ship arrives to rescue us, you will beam up with me, and Geordi is
bluffing and says, oh, I don't think so.
The fleet's in, Commodore!
The sky is full of Federation starships.
You're not getting this.
Um, so yeah, they have a nice kind of prickly back and forth.
And then over time, like, the lightning and the, uh, the magnetic
fields on the surface start to play havoc with Geordi's visor.
And he goes blind, and they end up having to, like, work together.
The Romulan injured has to be Geordi's eyes and Geordi has to
be his hands, and they to, uh, to make it out together alive.
Just as, uh, just as Tomalak comes in in his Romulan ship and demands
his, um, his crew back from Picard.
Centurion Bakra vouches for Geordi and says, I was not mistreated, I did not give
him any information, but this, this human saved my life, and it just, it diffuses
the, uh, diplomatic incident very nicely.
Rob: excellent,
Kevin: Yeah, there's a beautiful, uh, B plot, because, um, like I said,
they beam up one of the two survivors at the start of the episode, and
he is injured and dying and needs a transfusion, and of course, the only,
crew member, on board, the entire Enterprise D, whose blood is compatible
with this injured Romulan, is Worf.
And Worf is faced with the dilemma of, do I help my enemy by, uh,
by giving him the transfusion he needs to survive, uh, or not.
The Romulans, of course, famously, murdered Worf's parents, and so
Worf definitely holds a grudge.
If there's one thing we know about Worf is that he holds a grudge.
But in the end, you know, they have a, he has a great scene with Picard in his
ready room where Picard walks right up to the line of ordering Worf to give the
transfusion and then dismisses him because that's not an order he wants to give.
Uh, Worf goes and visits the Romulan in sickbay and the Romulan
says, I would rather die than pollute my body with Klingon filth.
Uh, and so, of course, Worf is let off the hook.
The Romulan dies.
Uh, but,
Rob: ha,
Kevin: can see in Worf's eyes that he almost changed
his mind at the last minute.
Rob: And that's all that matters.
Thought was almost there.
Kevin: It's a big step for Worf.
Rob: Yeah, and early days as well, like early season three, so that's uh, yeah.
Worf's still, uh, slowly coming to terms with everything that he is.
And journey he goes on for many decades to come.
Kevin: Yeah.
But this taste of what um what the Starfleet and the Romulans In the right
circumstances, when they, when they do work together, what becomes possible is a
real kind of, like, foreshadowing of what we eventually get in the Dominion War.
Rob: And I do, I do like that balance of, sort of like the current
prejudices and the perceptions of Romulans and members of the Federation
and the Klingons with the B story.
But the potential of what could happen, like you said, with
Geordi and, uh, the Commodore.
So, I love that balance when Star Trek does that, shows all sides.
And I've found, I've found in modern series of Star Trek,
they've gone back to that more...
You know, Black Caps, White Caps type of thing, or Black Hats, White Hats, so
you've got, you know, Discovery in that first season, the Klingons were just, you
know, pure evil, even to a lesser extent, Strange New Worlds, because it's still so
soon after that Klingon Federation War.
But definitely the episode with Clint Howard in it where, you know, they're
that dark evil menace where they're just unstoppable killing machines that
could rip humans apart type of stuff.
love the fact when we see, when they, the alliances start working and just, just
the, the idea of them all just sitting around talking about battle strategies
with each other takes away a lot of that mysticism and just has them as,
You know, as people, as people that you can communicate with, and just another
culture, another, another form of, um, you know sentient being as opposed to the
myth and the legend and the monster and the, you know, all that type of stuff.
I love that evolution and for Geordi to be able to explore that so early in the new
incarnation, I'd say what the Silver Age, if we're looking at it, if at, you know,
the, you know, those old scientists of the Golden Age of Star Trek, I'm talking all
comic book era now, you look at the 90s Berman era, is, yeah, is the silver age,
and now we're in the, uh, the modern age.
Kevin: Yeah, absolutely.
The last one that I had, uh, that, that came to mind here
was another Next Gen Season 3.
It seems like this is, this is some stuff they were playing
with in, in Season 3 of Next Gen.
This is Episode 18, Allegiance, which I have mentioned recently before
because, um, we had, we had a Chalnoth appear on Lower Decks this season.
The alien with the scraggly teeth sticking out,
Rob: Putting on the Mark Twain outfit.
Kevin: That's right.
Yes.
Um, and in
Rob: Speaking in a southern accent from my part of the, the planet where I'm from.
Ha ha ha ha ha ha.
A
Kevin: kidnapped from his quarters at the start of this episode, and is placed in
a small room with four beds in it, and in each of the other three beds, there is
another prisoner from a different race.
There is a young Starfleet cadet who is a Bolian.
There is a Mizarian from Mizar 2.
Um, he's got this cool kind of like concertina hood on that, that I thought
was a pretty cool bit of costume work.
And of course the Chalnoth appears later.
And they're stuck in this cell and they work together to, well, they start
to work together in order to escape.
But pretty soon Picard realizes that not all is as it seems.
Picard is able to put two and two together and figure out that these,
these four people were not chosen at random, that Picard is a trained
leader, that the Mizarian, their race is famous for collaborating or
capitulating, they have been conquered several times in short succession, and
they just go along with it each time.
The Chalnoth, of course, as we learned in Lower Decks, is like, completely
resistant to any form of authority.
And, the cadet, of course, her training tells her to do whatever Picard says.
Um, so yeah, this turns out to be an experiment in observing authority and
different species' reactions to it.
The real delight of this episode is what goes on back on, on the Enterprise,
because of course Picard is kidnapped, but he is replaced with a doppelganger
who is like Picard, but not quite right.
And watching the crew slowly realize that this is not their captain is really
delightful when the, the, the apex of this is when Picard is singing naval
tunes with his crew in Ten Forward.
That's the moment where Geordi and Riker go, Ah, that's not the captain I know.
And
Rob: ha ha.
we all know he, he only sings, uh, Gilbert and Sullivan.
Kevin: That's right.
But certainly not in front of the ensigns.
Rob: Of course not.
Well, who would do that?
He only does it to save someone's life when they're in a, you know,
hurtling towards a planet with, uh, a short circuited android on board.
Kevin: One of the other memorable, uncharacteristic things this doppelganger
of Picard does is he invites, Beverly Crusher to his quarters for
a date, and it is completely strange.
Like, it is exactly how you would expect an alien who has read about
dates in a book to conduct a date.
Uh, and uh, Crusher is, is bamboozled by this.
But at the same time, there is this heat of like, oh, like, are we exploring this?
Um, do you want to go there?
I'm not sure I want to go there.
Um, so yeah, lots of, lots of tasty stuff in this relatively
simple plot wise episode.
Rob: Excellent, excellent.
Well, I've got more moments and feels of that type of, you know, collection
of, of species working together.
So, for me, on Deep Space Nine, it was always entering Quark's Bar and all the
promenade where you just see that whole...
menagerie of different species either at the bar drinking together because
you had Morn, you had Ferengi, you had Bajorans, you had all different
species hanging out and um, so like the intergalactic Cheers was great space to
just see all the species just hanging out.
Um, there was moments of tension going where you'd have like, the Vulcan
party all on their own or whatever.
But there was always all these cultures blending together, walking
around, sharing the space was great.
And the first real big notice for it for me, where I got a sense of Star
Trek trying to do, like that iconic cantina scene in Star Wars, where they
just walk in and they spend a whole, like, three or four minutes just
showing you all the different species
Kevin: Mmm.
Rob: When they did Star Trek, I never really felt that because
it was always more, you know, humanoid looking type creations.
But in Star Trek IV, the voyage home, there's that great scene right at the
end when the crew are put on trial and you just see, like Nimoy as the director,
filled the auditorium all these species.
Some, you know, some kind of look familiar.
So there's an Andorian in there.
There's a almost cat like creature that we could relate to the cat
species in the animated series and also in Lower Decks, but then you've
got really bizarre creations, um, like the almost Kewpie doll headed
Kevin: yeah, with the black eyes.
Rob: with the black eyes and they, faces don't move, they're like painted
on, um, and all just, all there in
Kevin: They're probably puppets, Rob.
They're probably puppets.
Rob: There's only one way to find out.
Pick them up and shake them vigorously.
Uh, that was a, uh, you know, Nimoy, uh, Nimoy's attempt at capturing
that type of weird menagerie
Kevin: I thought you were going to say Star Trek III because, um, the bar where,
uh, where McCoy is trying to charter a ship to get him back to the Genesis planet
is another kind of taste of the melting pot that the Federation can be as well.
Rob: Yeah, there is that, You know, as I've mentioned many times before,
Star Trek III is one I don't visit that often, but I have gone back to
it now, and I am putting it back on my watch list on a regular rotation.
Like in Star Trek V, they do it as well, like the weird cat dancing
stripper thing in Star Trek V.
Kevin: I don't think I've that one, Rob.
I don't
Rob: you've never seen Star Trek V?
You, yeah, okay, well, it's, you should definitely check it out.
William Shatner is
Kevin: is it a good one?
Is it a good one, Rob?
Rob: Judge for yourself.
Judge for yourself.
You know, it's all,
Kevin: You wouldn't steer me wrong.
Rob: I would, I would never steer you wrong, Kevin Yank.
So yeah, that's what we love about Star Trek is...
for me, personally, is when we get out of the, for me, for me, it's like getting
out of the generic, uh, humanoid esque creature week to and giving us a whole
range of different cultures and different species and how they can collaborate as
opposed to, yeah, just simplifying them down into a one word description or a one
sentence description and then they're to antagonize our heroes, the Federation.
Kevin: The promenade of Space Nine was, like, that, that idea was baked into the
production design of that set, which was the standing set for the entire series.
And, and, like, there is no detail more uh, tied to that than that, that kind
of, um, the sign or the obelisk, which they, I think they took to calling
the Rosetta Stone, the production And it's kind of like a, a backlit
terminal that is taller than a person.
And it's got the same text in like eight different scripts on it in
different And it was that sense of, this is a coming together place where,
where people will speak different languages and we need to provide those
like translations for people here.
So yeah, right, it was baked right into the production design early on.
Rob: Yeah, we talked about it a couple of episodes ago with um, I think it was
Heart of Stone, I think it's in that one.
Beautiful shot of the promenade and it's Bashir and Sisko walking through.
So you see extras coming through in different costumes and collaborations
and they're talking about one of their crew members, one of
the members of the Federation.
Uh, the male identifying is, is pregnant and so they're having the baby shower.
Um, and that's very 90s Star Trek going, Look!
Kevin: Yep.
People aren't all the same.
Rob: Yeah, we're all sci fi here.
Um, but that type of gives that element of embracing the, the
different cultures, the different species, the different biologies,
and um, and it's just commonplace.
Every, you've, you've got extras from different cultures just popping in
and out of shot and it's a bustling, thriving, uh, the city of Babel.
Kevin: Yeah, wow.
Alright, well I can't wait to see if our, uh, if our newly minted alliance
of aliens manage to defeat the scourge of Nick Locarno in our season finale.
Rob: And to see what Nick has in store for the Federation and for Mariner.
Kevin: Yes.