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kiranxrys · 4 years

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Alone Together Episode 1 Transcript - Alexander Siddig & Andrew Robinson

I hadn’t seen a transcript for this episode going around on Tumblr yet and I thought I would quickly make one to share with anyone who would prefer to read or wants to read along/revisit the first episode in text form (and the YouTube subtitles are mostly useless, annoyingly). Please let me know if you think I’ve made an error anywhere and I’ll amend it!

watch: one | two | three | four

read: two | three | four

ANNOUNCER (ON-SCREEN): ‘Alone Together’ - a DS9 companion, Episode 1 - ‘These Days’. It has been about 25 years since the Dominion War ended. The Federation isn’t quite the same. Starfleet is much more consistently militarized these days. Earth may be paradise, but humanity is less ideologically empathetic. Since the recent Romulan attempts to extinguish synthetic life by infiltrating Starfleet Command, benevolence is taking a backseat to security these days.

Elim Garak has been Castellan of the Cardassian Assembly since the new order was established following the Dominion War. Garak, of course, also has direct control over a newly resurrected Obsidian Order, though not by title.

Julian Bashir is still a doctor on Deep Space 9 but is also coordinating the activities of Section 31. What we’ve learned is that upon sharing a consciousness with Luther Sloane using stolen Romulan technology, his genetically enhanced brain committed much of what he learned to his eidetic memory. That information had to be contained but could be put to good use. He was given little choice in the matter. Maintaining his cover as a Chief Medical Officer in the Bajoran sector met his needs, and he saw no reason to change.

[fade to black]

JULIAN BASHIR (VOICE ONLY): Mission log, stardate 737114. I’m approaching Cardassia Prime in response to a rather enigmatic request for medical aid from Castellan Garak, the leader of the Cardassian government. Though it’s hardly surprising that Garak might be withholding information, it seems that a reunion of sorts will be forthcoming. I’ve left the Infirmary in the capable hands of Doctor Jabara while I’m off the station. I must admit, I’m not entirely sure what to expect.

JULIAN (ON-SCREEN): Bashir to Central Command, I’ve just entered orbit of Cardassia Prime, requesting approval to transport to Cardassia.

ELIM GARAK (VOICE ONLY): Stand by, Doctor. Don’t be in such a hurry.

JULIAN: Garak. I didn’t expect you to be at the Central Command, it’s good to hear your voice.

GARAK: My dear doctor, are we starting the lies already?

JULIAN (LAUGHING): It’s true, Garak. It’s good to hear your voice! That’s not a- Look, more importantly, if you’ll grant approval I can beam to your current location.

GARAK: Doctor, I’m not at Central Command. I’ve merely intercepted your subspace communications link. Unfortunately, Doctor, the Federation will not be setting foot on Cardassia today, and, to be quite honest, you don’t want to be here.

JULIAN: Garak, your message suggested some urgency in my arrival. Quite frankly, what the hell am I doing here if I can’t beam down?

GARAK: Would you uh- [laughs] believe pure, unadulterated nostalgia?

JULIAN: Would you?

GARAK (ON-SCREEN): [laughs] I missed you too Doctor. So, how is life on the station?

JULIAN: Well, Bajoran fashions just aren’t the same since you left.

GARAK: I’m sure.

JULIAN: But much of life has returned to what it once was, as much as it ever could, I suppose. Now-

GARAK: I was sorry to hear about Dax.

JULIAN: Thank you. I um… I miss Ezri every day. Ten years. I, well, that is- we, Dax and I, we tried to make it work. I- I was so happy Dax made it back to Trill on time. Cairn and I, we were very different people. He’s a botanist – can you imagine? Dax as a botanist. I suppose it’s why Keiko didn’t seem to mind my business as much. She and Dax had so much to talk about but, well, once the Symbiosis Commission discovered our continued relationship, well, we just uh- we couldn’t-

GARAK: Doctor, there’s no need to explain.

JULIAN: No. Dax always encouraged me to talk about my feelings, though there’s not much else to say, really. I had never really considered being in love with another man, but it was Dax. Ezri, Jadzia, even Cairn, it was Dax, is Dax. But we- we just couldn’t- I didn’t-

GARAK: It is difficult to find a good counselor to sort out our deepest sorrows these days.

JULIAN: I suppose it is.

GARAK: You’re an honourable man, Doctor. You loved Dax, you could do nothing less than your heart demanded. I know the pain of love all too well, especially a love that has everything working against it.

JULIAN: Ziyal.

GARAK: Ziyal, yes. Yes, even exiles have hearts, Doctor. Even [laughs] Elim Garak. When it comes right down to it, he has a heart as well. In fact, my heart is partially the reason why I’m here.

JULIAN: So, this is a house call? Damn it, Garak, why didn’t you tell me on subspace? What- what are your symptoms? Why don’t you want me to beam down?

GARAK: Well, so many questions, one hardly knows which to answer first.

JULIAN: Your symptoms, Garak. What is wrong with your heart?

GARAK: Well, it’s not just my heart, Doctor. Actually the most concerning symptom seems to be a degenerative condition that causes the ill to be especially susceptible to suggestion. Luckily my infection is relatively new, and rather unexplained as my exposure to the public tends to be limited to state functions and the like, you know, the life of a politician.

JULIAN: The ill? Garak, what are you saying?

GARAK: A virus, Doctor. Cardassia appears to be facing a- a minor health issue. We’re trying to contain the infection to one region, but we may have moved… far too late.

JULIAN: A minor health issue? You are a champion of understatement! ‘The ill’ suggests that this isn’t just about you but your ability to hide the facts seems to have been tainted over the years.

GARAK: Doctor?

JULIAN: Since your speech at the Lakarian City memorial, the ridges on your neck have grown paler and your breathing rate has increased.

GARAK: You liked my speech?

JULIAN: Damn it, Garak, you contacted me! How is this the first time that I’m hearing about this? Why is the planet not being quarantined? Your message said ‘medical aid’ – I assumed that I was just coming here as a preliminary consultation having something to do with one of your colonies. Now it sounds like an outbreak that needs to be contained.

GARAK: Doctor, quarantine means announcing the problem to the galaxy. This is an internal matter. You obviously don’t appreciate the severity of this virus, but you needn’t worry – no one is allowed to leave Cardassia, no one is currently being permitted to enter the atmosphere.

JULIAN: I cannot imagine you can contain the population without a reason. Just how bad is it?

GARAK: Oh, I’ve given them a reason, Doctor, but you shouldn’t worry about that. There are more important things requiring your focus right now.

JULIAN: Of course. How much- how many are infected?

GARAK: At last count, the virus had been contained to three continents. Nearly 68% of the population in those regions has been infected.

JULIAN: And you call it a ‘minor issue’ Garak?! That’s a pandemic!

GARAK: Doctor, when I say that the ill have developed a degenerative condition, I speak specifically of their thought processes. It is true that we have determined that it is a virus – a biological contaminant of sorts – but the Central Command is hardly a healthcare organization and while the degeneration is affecting the cardiopulmonary system as well, all of the symptoms seem to be driven by misfiring neurons, and therein lies the problem.

JULIAN: A virus that affects the brain is no small problem. The fact that early infections are showing in terms of dysfunction relatively mild systems doesn’t mean people won’t start to die.

GARAK: Yes, Doctor. And I haven’t.

JULIAN: My God, Garak. You’re infected.

GARAK: Why do you think I contacted you? I want the best.

JULIAN: And hoping that my genetic enhancements will allow me to diagnose your symptoms without scanning equipment?

GARAK: I really have missed your mistrust, Doctor. The physicians here have the tendency to avoid the necessary dispassion for harder truths. You, however, have a refreshingly forthright bedside manner.

JULIAN: Wow, a compliment. You must be neurologically compromised. Well of course, of course I’ll do everything that I can. Do you know anything more about the virus? How is it passed on? How does it proliferate in the body? Have your doctors attempted any therapies that show any promise?

GARAK: Well, it seems to take several days to propagate in the carrier. During that time, sufferers develop a rather serious cough... [inaudible] …the dispatcher reaches the brain so our assumption it that it is spread through the air. Most hospitals have been closed to all but the infected to try and control the outbreak. As a result, our doctors are learning from their patients as they are treating them. As it stands now, they can only treat symptoms. Medical staff is reporting to external bodies to ensure that anyone studying the infection isn’t also battling a neurological disease. Progress is limited and all too slow.

JULIAN: Garak, I’m not sure how I can help you if I can’t examine you or access your data.

GARAK: Doctor, I’m afraid I can’t allow you to put yourself at risk. After all, I’m counting on you to save us all. And I believe that an outside perspective may be exactly what we need.

JULIAN: So no pressure?

GARAK: You’re a bright man, Doctor – put that genetically-enhanced brain of yours to work.

JULIAN: Well, I can’t examine you from orbit. My shuttlecraft sensors may be able to me that you’re alive, they can isolate you for transport, but they can hardly determine more than the most modest of life signs, and while I can see outward symptoms, Garak, I can’t for the life of me figure out how to see through your skull. I suppose I could transport a tricorder down there for a preliminary scan.

GARAK: I’m afraid I can’t allow that, Doctor.

JULIAN: Oh, of course you can’t. Can you send me your most recent medical scans?

GARAK: Unfortunately, no.

JULIAN: And why not?

GARAK: All of my genuine medical records are routinely deleted and replaced with falsified data. All data rods in which those records once existed have been destroyed, all computers in which the data rods were placed have been vaporized. My dear doctor, I’m the leader of the Cardassian people! Especially now, I can’t afford to broadcast my weaknesses to all, to anyone who feels they could exploit them.

JULIAN: The more things change, the more they remain the same.

GARAK: Meaning?

JULIAN: A presumption of godliness, most certainly a great paranoia. You haven’t managed to find yourself a staff that you trust to protect your life. To be quite honest, I’m surprised your staff doesn’t have implants that allow you to control them.

GARAK: Oh, Doctor, your assumptions hurt me deeply! Of course they do. If news of this infection gets out, and I can’t be clearer than this, Cardassia will be devastated. And we won’t be the only world that will fall.

JULIAN: Garak, you seem to believe that I can cure this virus from orbit, without any information.

GARAK: Well, Doctor, this virus doesn’t only infect the average citizen. Everyone is at risk. Everyone – the government, the military. Imagine if only a few of their people were infected. They find it difficult to concentrate. They’re finding themselves susceptible to suggestion. And what if intelligence agents of foreign governments found their way to Cardassia during this crisis?

JULIAN: It could destroy the Cardassia you’ve been rebuilding for over two decades.

GARAK: Yes.

JULIAN: But quarantine would keep foreign nationals off-planet and keep the rest of us safe from infection, assuming it can even infect off-worlders.

GARAK: Again, Doctor, it would announce the problem before we have a solution.

JULIAN: But it could help produce the solution you so desperately need!

GARAK: The risk is too great, Doctor.

JULIAN: Garak! Lives are at stake!

GARAK: Hundreds, perhaps thousands, to save billions. Doctor – will. You. Help. Me?

JULIAN: First and foremost, I’m a doctor, Garak. And I’m your friend.

GARAK: Yes. One more thing we should keep to ourselves.

JULIAN: You know Garak… you are being more paranoid than usual. You remind me of the exiled tailor I met so many years ago.

GARAK: Ah, but as you said yourself Doctor, the more things change-

JULIAN: The more they stay the same. But Garak, so much has changed. You’re the leader of your people.

GARAK: Julian… let’s drop the pretensions, shall we?

JULIAN: Whatever do you mean?

GARAK: You know that I have rebuilt the Obsidian Order, and the reason that I know that you know is because I know that you are working for Starfleet Intelligence. Your posting at Deep Space 9 is merely your cover. Why would a religious sanctuary like Deep Space 9 need a doctor of your capability, with such a limited Starfleet presence? I must admit, you have done an excellent job of obscuring your intelligence role.

JULIAN: Dear, dear Garak. Have you been keeping tabs on me? I suppose of all people you would be the only person I might be able to trust with such information. Assuming any of your conclusions are true. But Starfleet still has a presence and Deep Space 9 is still a major way station for commerce and diplomacy in the Bajoran sector.

GARAK: Of course you can trust me with sensitive information Julian-

JULIAN: [chuckles]

GARAK: -at least until there’s a reason you can’t. Oh, but let’s hope it never comes to that. I do like you; I did from the very beginning. You may be my only true friend. Since Mila’s passing, our all too infrequent exchanges have been my only respite from a world without trust. The political world on Cardassia deplores a vacuum and the old ways are clung to, even after the war. It took me years to bring Cardassians around to another way of thinking. The arts are celebrated, the people are fed. Life is no longer a struggle, but… paranoia is rampant once more.

JULIAN: Then I suppose you’ve been the ideal leader.

GARAK: Well, I do appear to have the appropriate skill set and experience, yes.

JULIAN: You could always go back to being a plain, simple tailor.

GARAK (LAUGHING): You would be surprised by how many of my old vocations I still dabble in. I’ve even taken up taxidermy! Yes, it’s true! But stuffing a tribble isn’t as challenging as perhaps a six-legged [uncertain] marsupial, but it passes the time. And so many wonderful things fit inside an animal that need only trill to appear alive.

JULIAN: [laughs]

GARAK: But as you said Julian, you are my friend, and one of the things I learned from working in the Obsidian Order under Enabran Tain, was that friends are a liability. Enemies are easy. Friends… friends are the challenge. When I was his protégé I had a job to do, relationships were tools to achieve my objectives. I don’t have time for friends, I don’t have room for emotional attachments.

JULIAN: And then you were exiled.

GARAK: And then… I was exiled.

JULIAN: I had no idea.

GARAK: About what?

JULIAN: Am I your only friend?

GARAK: Well… the only one living.

JULIAN: You said that your cardiopulmonary system seems to be demonstrating symptoms consistent with this neurolytic virus.

GARAK: Mm-hmm.

JULIAN: I need to at least access the database being used by the off-site researchers working on a cure.

GARAK: I’m sorry to disappoint you, Doctor – I’ve never been an ideal patient, as you well know. But while I trust you, I cannot risk any access that Starfleet Intelligence might have built into your shuttle.

JULIAN: Garak, you’re tying my hands. Do you have access to a medical scanner? Can you scan yourself?

GARAK: I’ve been a tailor, a gardener, a spy, who’s to say I’m not a doctor as well?

JULIAN: I suppose stranger things have happened.

GARAK: Oh, a shapeshifter saved the galaxy by going for a swim, a Starfleet captain turned out to be a god, a Cardassian legate turned out to be the devil, you were married to a woman three centuries your senior – stranger things, my dear doctor, happen all the time.

JULIAN: You may have a point. Although to be fair, Dax is three hundred years older, not Ezri. Ezri was several years younger than me.

GARAK: Semantics, Doctor.

JULIAN: Ah, here we are.

GARAK: I’m sorry?

JULIAN: I’ve created an encrypted backdoor to your central database.

GARAK: Ooh, of course you did. Yes, but it won’t help you. Our researches are working in a closed system, it is impossible to access their research through the central network.

JULIAN: Damn it, Garak, I’m trying to help you! I encrypted the access, there was no danger to you or you people! I used a fractal regression to develop access points at either end.

GARAK: And I sincerely appreciate your efforts, Julian. That’s why you’re here. And of course that is why I am convinced no one else will be able to save us.

JULIAN: I cannot do this without any information about the pathogen. And even the smartest person in the galaxy would be hard-pressed to develop a cure to an unknown virus quickly enough to prevent its spread or knowledge of its existence to the outside world.

GARAK: I have faith in you, Doctor. And to put your mind at ease, you should know that very few citizens on Cardassia are even aware that they are infected. And I’ve committed the Order to a substantial misinformation campaign to keep it that way.

JULIAN: How long do you expect that to last? The longer the infected believe that they’re free to live their normal lives or even to travel to and from health centers for treatment for whatever malady they believe they have, the faster the real virus will spread.

GARAK: Well, it seems its symptoms vary in their intensity. The cough can be persistent or periodic. And when that initial symptom passes, the neurological symptoms cause sufferers to present a variety of ailments. It is only those doctors who discovered the virus and were subsequently visited by some associates that are aware of the larger problem. And they are the very physicians currently researching the virus on my behalf.

JULIAN: If you are able to contact them then there’s no reason that I can’t access their data!

GARAK: Doctor, we’ve been through this.

JULIAN: Garak, we’ve been through a lot of things!

GARAK (LAUGHING): Yes.

JULIAN: You didn’t call me here to explain Cardassia’s post-war isolationist bureaucracy!

GARAK: [laughs]

JULIAN: I came because a friend in need asked me!

GARAK: You didn’t know why I called you, Doctor. So please, don’t offer me your selfless pretense.

JULIAN: Pretense?! You think after all this time your lives and deceptions would keep me from helping you? I can tell when you’re lying Garak, and you know when I’m telling the truth. I promise you that no one will ever know about your role in the cover-up of the virus, at least not from me.

GARAK: I… I want you to set course for the southern polar region of Cardassia Prime. The magnetic interference will make it more difficult for prying eyes to access your subspace signal. You’ll find that my alleged paranoia has a purpose.

JULIAN: Computer, set course 118 mark 72.

COMPUTER: [chimes] Acknowledged.

JULIAN: Engage at one-quarter impulse.

COMPUTER: Course laid in. [chimes]

JULIAN: My signal was encrypted from the very beginning. I assume the same is true of the signal you used to isolate and redirect my subspace carrier wave. Isn’t it a little bit late to begin worrying now, Garak?

GARAK: Our signal may be secure between one another, but any system can be breached given enough time and expertise. And what I have to tell you…

JULIAN: Just tell me, Garak. I’m over the polar region as you asked.

GARAK: Yes, so you are, so you are. Now, good, wait- wait… Good. Now that we’re comfortably alone, let me ask you this: do viruses normally pop up undetected in a population with little to no prior warning? And how many unknown pathogens exist in a planetary ecosystem with our level of technological development?

JULIAN: Well, to be quite honest, pathogens can unexpectedly adapt or cross species barriers. Centuries ago on Earth, industrial pollution led to a climate change which in turn caused previously isolated microorganisms to be released into the biosphere.

GARAK: Yes, you truly have an answer for everything.

JULIAN: It comes in handy. But I suspect you’re going somewhere with this so please, continue.

GARAK: Our research has found some… peculiarities in the viral RNA, and admittedly I don’t understand all of the specifics, but, to put it bluntly, the virus has been engineered. I’m sending you two images of the viral RNA we’ve discovered. The images are all that I can risk sending you now. If you can find the source, you may find a cure. Alternatively, if a cure was not developed… you can avenge my death.

JULIAN: Not currently one of my skill sets, Garak. But why the pretense? You could’ve told me this immediately- actually, don’t answer that. I’ll need some time to do an analysis of this to determine what might work to counteract the viral infection. Annoyingly, there is no systemic treatment that I can even begin to research without knowing the underlying cause. But over the last twenty-five years, you must’ve made all sorts of new enemies. According to the latest intelligence, the only dangerous political intrigue is coming out of the Romulan Empire these days.

GARAK: Yes, well, leading a government comes with its own risks, to be sure, Doctor. But why do they have to be new enemies? Of course the Romulans have never been great fans of mine – I mean I left their embassy’s grounds-keeping staff so many years ago. Oh, those poor orchids, they’ll never be the same. And there’s always Kai.

JULIAN: The Kai.

GARAK: Ah, Kira- Kira, dear Kira’s never been a fan of mine.

JULIAN: We both know that Nerys would have never worked this slowly if she wanted to kill you.

GARAK: [laughs]

JULIAN: And she would only kill you. But Nerys is hardly the same person since she left the militia to join the Vedek Assembly, and now that she’s the Kai, this level of genetic manipulation would have to accomplished by someone with intimate knowledge of the Cardassian physiology as well as the capacity to evade security of your medical system.

GARAK: Yes, although like I said, it is an internal Cardassian matter. I’m sure there are plenty of elder Cardassians who would enjoy watching my life come to an end from torture. Dukat’s father- I mean, uh… [laughs] to one kanar-induced tryst with the man himself, to finally becoming involved with Ziyal, and whatever else-

JULIAN: Wait- wait, wait, wait you- hang on, you- you and Dukat?

GARAK: Ooh, yes. Surprising, isn’t it? Yes, two nights, maybe, before my exile, I’d been feeling quite powerful. I wouldn’t have normally lowered my guard even among my fellow Cardassians. Dukat was enjoying his second bottle of kanar, was looking for someone to blame for his most recent failures to overcome the Bajoran resistance, and there I was. He promised my death from across Quark’s bar. Later that evening he found his way back to my table to apologize – uncharacteristic, absolutely, to be sure. But kanar can do that to a man. We stole away to a quiet corner on the second level to talk, and then we found our way to an unoccupied holosuite.

JULIAN: I don’t know what to say.

GARAK: Well, I don’t need to tell you, Doctor – it was an unplanned direction for my evening to take. And suffice to say it didn’t soften Dukat’s general opinion of me. [laughs] He did keep his distance for a long time afterward.

JULIAN: So, that story had a happy ending, if you’ll pardon the pun.

GARAK: Pun?

JULIAN: Uh, it- it’d be funny on Earth. Though tragic, too – sort of like a sad clown, really. Miles will love it.

GARAK: Doctor, could we perhaps find out what is slowly eating away at me before revealing my darkest secrets to Professor O’Brien over an ale.

JULIAN: Of course, of course. I think the first step is to cross-reference known immunogenic agents that could have been introduced into your system. Even if the virus is a new pathogen, its mode of infection could be a million different things. You should review your schedule and try and determine an environment over which your control was limited, a place where the food and drink could’ve been tampered with or perhaps a place where you could have been unexpectedly exposed to an air assault. But… about this dalliance with Dukat-

GARAK: Oh Doctor, please. Provincial human attitudes aside-

JULIAN: Of course.

GARAK: -your species didn’t always have synthehol, and every species seems to go through a period of poor choices. Believe it or not, Cardassians are a passionate people, a people who yearn to find joy wherever it may lie. And remember, that we were in the midst of a Bajoran occupation and there wasn’t much joy to be had for those of us assigned to Terok Nor. Decades later, my reforms are helping to shape a modern Cardassia.

JULIAN: Understood. Though I take exception to the word ‘provincial’.

GARAK: Oh, of course you do. Now, let me take a look at my agenda… According to my doctors, I could have been exposed more than a month ago.

JULIAN: A month? Well, you certainly waited long enough to contact me.

GARAK: Well, well we do have doctors on Cardassia, and I wouldn’t be much of a leader if I didn’t look to my own people before seeking outside assistance. However, I’m not naïve enough to trust them completely. And what kind of leader would I be if I did?

JULIAN: Fair enough. I need to get some biometric information, please, from you if I’m even to begin researching cures. Can you transport yourself to a hospital with proper scanning equipment that I can access?

GARAK: Oh dear, I- I- I can do better than that, Doctor. I can do better than that. My residence is equipped with some of the best holographic technology in the quadrant – what type of equipment do we need?

JULIAN: I didn’t realize Cardassia had made such strides in holography.

GARAK: Oh, the technology is Federation, actually. Cardassian engineers build wonderful ships, but their work with artificial intelligence isn’t what it should be. Political life has its perks – I even have an EMH.

JULIAN: Well can I talk to him?

GARAK: Doctor, he’s obviously offline during this crisis. We’re wasting time better spent on the issue at hand! Now shall we begin?

JULIAN: Alright. Well the first thing we’ll need is a standard biobed with-

GARAK: Doctor, doctor, wait- I’m detecting a coherent signal directed at your shuttle. Yes, the magnetic currents over the poles should’ve obscured your presence. We may have a problem.

JULIAN: Hang on, it looks like an encrypted subspace signal… but I can’t determine the origin. Stand by, I’m trying- it’s… it’s from Earth. Well, I think I’ve got it. One moment… Jake?

[fade to black]

[CREDITS]

#ds9 #deep space nine #garashir #julian bashir #elim garak #alone together #long post #writing this out forced me to write about garak and d*kat f*cking and i absolutely hate that

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calliecat93 · 3 years

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Top 15 Star Trek TOS Episodes (Part Two)

(Part One)

Continuing from the last post, here are the remaining seven episodes~! Also picking Number One was SUPER hard. I was stuck between it and two for a long while. But I finally picked, so here we go!

#7. The Trouble With Tribbles

Up to this point, I hadn’t been crazy over some of the goofier episodes of Star Trek. Shore Leave was a mindscrew that left me uncertain about what was even happening by the end, though my opinion has lightened up upon looking back. The Squire of Gothos had a villain that I found far more annoying than entertaining and it remains one of my least favorite episodes. The only more silly one I did like was I, Mudd which remains an utter laugh riot once everyone acts as illogical as possible, including Spock. But then this episode came along, and Dear Lord it is hilarious. Our heroes stop at a space station, but it’s also occupied by Klingons. But wait, it gets better! A sleezy guy convinces Uhura to buy a Tribble, these little puff ball things that are kind of cute... until they begin to reproduce so rapidly that they infest the ship and base. To put it simply, it’s not a good time for Kirk. Honestly Kirk is the best part just because of how much he LOATHES every single thing about this episode. The scene where a whole bunch of Tribbles just topple over him and he just resigns himself to his fate and later his epic death glare at Bones when he orders him to figure out what killed the things. And then there’s what makes him come aorund to them, their shared hatred of Klingons. Seriosuly, Kirk is just So Done in this episode and it is amazing~

But seriously, it’s a very entertianing episode. Far more than I thought it was going to be when I read the description. It’s not an episode taken seriosuly, but not in the ‘they just gave up’ kind of way like in certain S3 episodes. The cast seem to be legit having a fun time with this one. The brawl between Scotty, Chekov, and a few other guys against the Klingons was super fun as was Kirk sulking when Scotty revelas that he got provoked over the Enteprise being insulted and not the captain. Poor Jim XD Cyrano Jones was also just a fun delight with how scummy yet amusing he is. The scene with him and the drinks during the brawl had me laughing so much XD Seriosuly there’s just so many good moments. Spock not being immune to the Tribble’s comforting effect and being embarassed at this revelaiton, Spock and McCoy’s snark, the Klingons utter horror at the tiny little furballs, it’s just an entertaining ride from beginning to end.

Not anything to really note flaws wise to justify the ranking. It doesn’t have that emotional or philosophical umph that I normally seek out in shows like this, so it’s here at seven. But that ain’t a bad thing at all. Not every episode has to have deep meanings or complex stories. Sometimes it can just be something fun and amusing, and the effort was still there to make it entertaining. It’s one of those episodes that I would watch above the others on a bad day just so I can laugh. Probably the most fun episode I have on this list, and that’s nothing to snuff at~!

#6. The Doomsday Machine

Our heroes find a Starship where the only survivor is Commadore Decker, his crew having all been killed when he beamed them to a planet that a planet destroyer... well, destroyed shortly after. The destroyer is still active and now the Enterprise is in danger. As Kirk remains on that ship, Decker is determined to destroyt he doomsday machine once and for all, including taking command of the Enteprrise and risking their lives to do so. Yeah, this is a pretty intense one. Decker, while his sucicdal actions were wrong, is VERY sympathetic. His crew was killed through no fault of his own, the machine that did it is still loose, and the losses have left him utterly broken. He’s very much traumatized but as he is the highest ranking officer and they can’t officially prove that he’s too mentlaly unfit to be relieved (which imo is idiotic cause even someone who isn’t a psycologist can tell he’s mentally unfit, but whatever), they can’t do much to stop him. Spock DOES finally manage to do so, and it leads to Decker’s ultimate choice that leads to his tragic end.

This one really gripped me. There’s this tension throughout. We have an unstable, suicidal man taking control of the Enterprise and willing to get them all killed to stop the doomsday machine. It’s scary to see how broken the man is. Again, he’s wrong to be willing to sacrifice everyone on The Enterprise to destroy the thing even though none of them want to die, but you understand why. I mean imagine if that happened to Kirk, he’d probably snap too if his actions in Obsession is any indication of how he handles major losses like that. Then we have Decker’s final act. Once relieved of command, he steals a shuttle and goes at the machine himself. He knows that he’s going to die and accepts that fact if it means some chance, any chance of destroying the machine once and for all. While he fails to destory it, he DOES give Kirk the opprotunity needed to do so with the ruined ship. A move that almost gets Kirk killed, but still Decker’s act was not in vain. It’s a very interesting character study with themes of guilt, trauma, and desperation. Kind of like in Obsession in a way, only Kirk manages to survive and pull himself together before it was too late. Decker’s only goal was to take down the machine that took his crew’s lives, even if that meant losing his own.

As I said, these are the kinds of episodes I live for. I guess self-sacrifice is also genetic consideirng what happened with his son in The Motion Picture, haha. Flaws... ugh... I guess McCoy disappeairng after the first half sucked? But that’s a me thing that doesn’t affect anything. I just remember watching it wide-eyed despite fully well knowing that everyone I cared about were going to be perfectly fine. It really gripped me! A great episode with great character exploration and themes which for a one off character, is pretty dang impressive!

#5. Journey to Babel

Meet the parents epidsode! Yay! The Enteprise is transporting various ambassadors of various planets to the Babel Conference. This includes the Vulcan Ambassador Sarek and his human wife Amanda, aka Spock’s parents. Yep, it’s time for some good ol’ fashioned family issues! Sarek wasn’t exactly happy with Spock choosing Starfleet and their relationship has been strained ever since. But when Sarek has severe heart problems, the only way to save him is via blood transfusion with Spock the only one compatible. But to make it worse, Kirk gets stabbed and put out of comission, forcing Spock to take command... at the same time that his father needs the surgery. Yeah... it sucks to be Spock in this episode. I know that Sarek is a bit divisive, but I like Spock’s parents. Sarek comes off as good at his job, but not great as a parent. He’s far fromt he worst and we do see that he does seem to still care about his son, he’s just God awful at admitting it and his previous mistakes. Like father, like son I guess. Amanda was a delight, especially when she tells McCoy about the sehlat aka giant teddy bear. Anyone who can make Bones smile that big deserves our thanks. Spock trying to make it less embarassing only made it funnier XD But back on topic, they come off as interesitng characters. They ain’t ideal, but they seem to genuinely be in love, which is nice.

Spock was just great here as we see him in one of the roughest spots he’s been in. He’s naturally not happy about being around the father that cast him aside again, though after his heart issues it’s clear that he IS concerned. Leonard Nimoy once again does such a fantastic job at having Spock express so much but without breaking character. It’s all in the eyes and the strained tone of voice. Then when Spock is more than willing to go through with the tranfusion, Kirk is injured. He has no choice but to take command, knowing that in doing so his father will die. While he COULD give command to Scotty, with the VERY intense circumstances of an assaliant on board and a ship ready to attack wit a number of ambassadors on board, he’s the best bet in handling it. Amanda is of course upset and even smacks him which IS overly harsh, but she’s about to lose her husband and her son, despite clealry hating the fact, has to place his duty above all else. Sarek dying is the least worst outcome to everyone else being killed. It’s the most logical route. Fortunately Kirk is able to pull himself together long enough to take over and the transfusion goes through perfectly despite the fight making it more difficult. Which again, McCoy is the true MVP here for managing to pull that off successfully under those conditions and Thank God that the episode rewarded him by letting him finally get the last word. He earned that one!

It’s such a great episode for me. Family drama, Spock conflict, political tensions, and just some relaly fun bits. Seriosuly, the teddy bear bit will NEVER stop being funny. Hoenstly these last five were all pretty tight and this ende dup here cause the other four had just a little bit mroe to keep me invested for reasons. Spock and Sarek don’t really reach a resolution but we do see that it has the chance to improve, and the movies do show that Sarek DOES truly care about his son and even admits that he had been wrong. It takes a lot for a man, even a Vulcan man, to do that. Although I DID double take when I realized that Sarek is played by the same guy who did the Romulan Captain in Balance of Terror. Guess he was that good XD. But yeah, a really great episode and very much my favorite Spock-centric episode.

#4. The Empath

TRIUMVIRATE FEELS BABY~! Our heroes end up trapped by a duo of aliens and encounter a mute empath woman that McCoy names Gem. They try to figure out how to escape as the aliens known as Vians plan to use them for an experiment as they have others. Shenanigains happen while elad to Kirk getting totured p, and then given the ultimate sadistic choice in having to decide if either Spock or McCoy get tortured to the point of either death (McCoy) or permenant brain damage (Spock). Now the episode has it’s issues, like why the Vians needed to do this to decide that Gem’s people were worth saivng is..l really baffling. But I’m also not a Vian so what do I know anout their mindset? But due to those kinds of plot holes, it landed here at four. It also kind of reads like a hurt/comfort fanfic, which isn’t a surprise when you find out that this was written and submitted by a fan. Which is freakin’ awesome and I can’t complain tbh cause it’s a good hurt/comfort fic. What it fails in some plot tightning it succeeds at in emphasizing the relationship between the main trio and it’s themes of emotion and self-sacrifice. Because OF COURSE that would be relevant for these three numbskulls at some point!

The second half is really what sells it. Kirk of course can’t make a choice like that, so Bones hypos him so that he’ll be spared of it. But that means that Spock is in command and he fully intends to hand himself over to the Vians to spare the two. Just the scene where he looks at Kirk, knowing that it’ll likely be the last time he sees him and Gem touching him to feel his emotions. Her smile sums it sll up. Which sidenote, the actress for Gem was freakin’ fantastic in how she displayed so much emotion and character without saying one word. Excellent acting. Anyways, Spock’s plan seems full-proof... except that he forgot that he’s dealing with McCoy, who promptly hypos him as well and sacrifices himself to the Vians. That was when McCoy became my favorite character, the moment he chose to be tortured to near death to save his two best friends and an innocent woman and even took the time to try and comfort her before being taken away. When we see the ifnal result and are greeted to DeForest Kelley looking at the camera with the most dead expression that he can muster... yeah the image STILL haunts me. Then Bones is dying with the two unable to do anything but try to give him some comfort and Gem is just so distraught and... heah this episode mad eit this high simply because it hit the emotional beats perfectly. That’s not even going into Gem trying to heal him to drive home the themes of the episode, also done VERY well.

This episode really shows how much the three care for one another. They’re all willing to be tortured and die to spare the other two. Ultimately McCoy gets the ‘honor’, but Kirk and Spock were absolutely ready to throw themselves to the fire. The characterization, interactions, and dynamic are just done so well that it’s why I can forgive the plot issues. I’m a sucker for feelings okay?! So yeah it’s not perfect but what it got right it got right. As such, it managed to land here at Number Four with only those plot holes keeping it from Number One. And trust me, I was tempted.

#3. The Tholian Web

Season 3 hadn’t been doing it for me with only one or two episodes really getitng my attention up to that point. This one though? This was the best episode in the seaosn bar none. Our heroes end up in a subspace where they find a starship and it’s crew all dead. Whien they teleport back to The Enterprise, it disappears... and takes Kirk with it. Okay, doesn’t sound liek anythignt hat new right? Kirk goes missing, the crew have to deal without him and find him as quickly as posisble. But this one has a bit of a twist... they cut Kirk out completely. Yeah, from the moment he vanishes in the first act to the very end he is out of the episode. Not only does the crew not know what happened to him, but neither does the audience, this ramps up the fear and emotional weight big time as the longer the crew is int hat space, the influence of it drives them to insanity. Bones wants to get out because of this, while Spock is unwilling to leave Kirk if he is alive. Needles to say, things go off the rails quickly.

With Kirk out of the equation, we keep our focus on Spock and McCoy. Their arguing is probably at the most personal it’s ever been with Kirk seming dead, the crew losing their minds, and it looking more and more uncertain that they can both treat the crew and ge tout alive. While one can say that McCoy may be too harsh here, I think along with the space affecting him in a less intense way, he’s also stressed from all the patients as well as his grief about Jim. Spock is the only one that he can take it out on, especially since his chocie to not leave is why they’re now int he mess that they’re in. Spock is trying to perform his duties despite the hostilities and his own grief that he’s trying to keep a grip on with all the responsibility of the crew and whatever happens due to his choice firmly sititng on his shoulders. What finally starts to get them to resolve this? A tape that Kirk made for them in the event of his death. He gives them his confidence that they can perform their duties withiut him, but that they need to lsiten to and support each other. They CAN go on without him. It’ll hurt but they’re now all that they each have and they need to work together now more than ever. It’s a sobering moment for both with McCoy realizng how ovelry harsh he had been and Spock expressing genuine grief. They do still bicke rone more time, but McCoy catches himself before it goes too far, apologizes, and Spock simply says what Jim would: “Forget it, Bones”. Cue Bones fainting like the Southern Bell that he is, haha!

Now of course Kirk is alive and they manage to save him and get out of the situation fine. But I just loved this because of the focus on Spock and McCoy without Kirk. Why? Because Kirk is the one thing that can unite them. It’s not the only thing, but if anything can make them get over their disagreements quickly, it’s Kirk. So what happens when it looks like he’s gone and never coming back? How will the two deal with it now that that balance is gone? They don’t deal with it well, being at each other’s throats until they see that tape. But it DOES show that if they did lose Kirk, they CAN work together and go on. Like I said, I adore these two’s relationship and while not as slashy as All Our Yesterdays, this is such an excellent one for that relationship as we see that yes, they will bicker but they will also be there for each other when it all comes down to it. It’s such a great episode for that reason and the plot was just well done. Like I said, casitng out Jim and leaving us unsure of what happened to him was an excellent move for this one and I enjoyed the exploration that it allowed.

#2. The Immunity Syndrome

Out heroes are scent to investigate what caused a whole solar system to disappear just as they also receive a message from a Vulcan science vessel. Unfortunately, Spock senses he vessel’s destruction and the Enterprise finds itself against a giant space amoeba that will devour everything unless stopped. That may not sound like much, but it leads into what I think was the most intense situation that the Enterprise has been in. Everything, and I mean everything, is pushed to their limits here. This amoeba can outright destroy galaxies and utterly mindless, so there’s no reasoning with it. But it gets especially tense when, in order to understand exactly what’s going on, Kirk has to send someone in the space shuttle to observe, but in doing so, he’s sending someone to most likely die. And his choices? Either Spock or Bones... yeah.

This is what makes this episode great. Spock and Bones are already on rockier than usual terms due to McCoy treating the Vulcan deaths more like a statistic while Spock sensed all of it outright. That itself is an interesting observation on how we treat these kinds of things, not really understanding how horrific it is unless we’re involved in it outright, otherwise it’s sad and unfortunate but just another number. But then we have the suicide mission. Bones originally volunteers himself, after all he’s a doctor and would have the knowledge to make the necessary observaitons and likely the most fit for it. But Spock is not only also perfectly capable even if not specialized in medical science, but he’s also more fit physically and emotionally to undergo the risk and come out alive. In the end, Kirk picks Spock and McCoy ain’t happy about it. The scene with Spock about ready to go with McCoy still unhappy even when Spock asks him to wish him luck. He does... once the doors have shut and Spock can’t hear him anymore. It’s a very strong scene and it only gets more painful when it looks like Spock is truly going to die and his final words are that McCoy should have wished him luck. Bones’ face says everything.

The episode is just excellent. Great character moments. Great emotional weight. Great stakes that keep going up and up and it truly feels like the darkest hour for the crew. Kirk and Spock outright begin to record their respective final words. Even they’re convinced that this is most likely the end, which is just... dang man. I couldn’t look away during this one. They hit everything perfectly with pretty much everything. If I have any issues, none of them come to mind. It’s just an excellent episode and the best of Season 2. I had a REALLY hard time picking between this and my Number One for the top slot. The top one just had a little bit more emotional impact to get it, but it just barely topped this one. Regardless, it is still an excellent episode and one of the best by far. But what is Number One? Well...

#1. The City on the Edge of Forever

Yeah, yeah, obvious pick I know. I normally don’t go wth popular opinion... but sometimes it’s that way for a reason, and this one I can’t argue about. When McCoy gets badly drugged on accident, he goes into a derranged state and beams onto a planet. The crew is unable to stop him from entering a portal known as the Guardian of Forever that sends him into the distant past where he does something to change histry. In order to figure out what changed and to stop McCoy, Kirk and Spock travel into the 1930’s a few days earlier to cut him off and must now navigate their way though the time period where they end up at a soup kitchen run by a woman named Edith Keller. Which Edith is an excellent character. She’s kind, optimistic, charming, hard-working, ad caring towards those who need it. Kirk ends up falling for her, and... it’s legit really cute. Kirk isn’t being forced to make out with a woman or doing so for information. We see how Kirk is when he genunely likes someone, having been drawn to Edith’s optimism and hopes for a better future. A future that he is from and knows will be reality. He’s really sweet and it’s just cute... which makes what happens at the end all the more tragic.

The 1930’s were fun with Kirk trying to come up with an excuse for Spock’s ears having me dying from laughter. The acting was excellent with DeForest Kelley as drugged!Bones especially being both crazy and scary. I quit doubting that he played villains in Westerns after this episode, haha. But of course Spock soon discovers that the change that McCoy is to make is saving Edith form death, and in doing so she leads a pacifist campaign that delays America’s entry into World War II and... well, things go badly. They are in a time where sadly optimism and peace are simply not options, which is even crueler. In order for time to be restored, they have to let Edith die. Kirk is horrified by this and when the time comes (sidenote, the Triumvirate reunion is utterly adorable), he just grabs Bones, keeps his back turned, and can only listen as Edith screams and is killed via car colission. Whatever grievances I have about William Shatner, he absoluteley nailed Kirk’s utter heartbreak and pain as Kirk just looks utterly boken. His final wordds after they return to the 23rd Century simply being a bitter “Let’s get the Hell out of here” sums it all up perfectly. Bones’ horror at it, especially since he DID have to watch it and him being upset at Kirk is also heartbreaking as he asks him if he knows what he just did. Spock can only somberly inform him that yes, he does.

It’s one of those cases where I wish serialization was more of a thign cause DAMN this is some major emotional baggage for everyone but as per usual. It happens and they go on from there with no lingering development. I guess if I had to complain, that would be it but that’s jut the nature of these shows at the time. Kind of feel like Bones getting as bady overdosed as he did pretty much got forgotten after they enter the 1930’s, but I also know nothing about 23rd Century drugs so... ah well. But the rest of the episode is so good that I can forgive those issues and they clealry did nothing to impact the placing. It had a storgn story, great emotion, great acting, great pacing, and a heartbreaking but fitting ending. The episode has a LOT of history behind it’s making that could be a post all it’s own, but no mater how this episode came to be, it is very much the best of Star Trek TOS. It was fun yet sad and had me gripped form beginning to ed and just htinkign about it now still makes me sad. Thus, it earns it’s place as my favorite episode of Star Trek TOS.

And we are done! There were a lot of really good episodes and some i REALLY did consider. A Piece of the Action, The Enemy Within (that was skipped for... certian reasons), Is There in Truth No Beauty?, This Side of Paradise, and plenty of others that I enjoyed. There were others I.. well, didn’t, but I can’t recall outright hating anything. Regardless I came in apathetic at best, and I left a fan for it’s characters, interesting ideas, and I just had a lot of fun. It’s outdated in many ways, but still relevant in others. Overall, I’m glad to have finally watched it, and I hope that I enjoy TNG just as much. But if not, I’ll always have this~!

(Image Source: TrekCore TOS Gallery)

#star trek tos #callie reviews

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cicaklah · 4 years

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Star Trek Picard 1x08

Some initial thoughts because I’m up early again, beware I am full of cold, therefore my brain is not working hugely cogently.

Beautiful Flower, Beautiful Flower, a man called Beautiful Flower. There’s a male synth. The name is SO a clue, seeing as the synth girls have very deliberate non-clue names. Vanna Dahj Soji and...their brother, Beautiful Flower. It’s in line with what I would think of as a chinese method of naming with a name having a literal meaning from a idiogram or logogram method of writing? I’m not a linguist though. I worry if I think too hard about this I’ll guess it as I’ve been pretty good at guessing stuff about this so far, and I hate guessing stuff.

(Beautiful Flower inherited Data’s drawing skill...or is just Data, who knows.)

I think that Beautiful Flower will be a synth in the fashion of Soong, i.e. he’ll be a Maddox. Rios describes the first contact pair as an older man with a young aide. He’s either going to be Maddox, or played by old Brent Spiner, but I’m erring on the side of Maddox, and the Maddox who Agnes killed was a synth, so she won’t need to turn herself in for murder as she didn’t actually murder the real Maddox, who is on the home planet, preserving Agnes for season 2.

(I kind of wish there wasn’t a season 2 at this point, because I want there to be consequences and I still wish we had the anthology series that Bryan Fuller had originally had greenlit however much I love this and Disco. ur girl loves tragedy, and tragedy is hard in serial television if people have seven season contracts.)

The timeline is curious for me, did Rios say nine years ago the whole Ibn Majid thing happened? So Maddox built the first round of synth girls and a synth boy in 5 years...and probably loads and loads of others if Dahj and Soji are only 3 years old, plus these unknown synth boys we’re just learning about.

There’s SO something else going on. I think the lack of discussion of Lore is probably key. He was dismantled and probably passed to Daystrom, but I don’t think they’ll be bringing him back. Lore wouldn’t have aged at all from how Brent Spiner looked in what, 1993? The deaging technology is good, but not that good.

I think this is all getting a bit muddy, and maybe thats my cold-filled brain. Too many moving parts.

Still not sure what the point of Elnor, the Borg cube, Seven, the Romulannisters, the whole xB storyline is and how how they all tie in? I thought that maybe there’d be a cube full of borg with Seven as their queen, but nope, that got knocked off very quickly.

I really liked the episode though, especially the levity of the five Rios holograms, the varying quality of the accents, the backstory of the Ibn Majid, the TERRIBLE photoshop to make Rios clean shaven, all highlights of this episode. As was Raffi yelling that Picard is a fool, because he is and should feel bad for how much he’s fucked up, Agnes meeting Soji.

I still hold out hope that they filmed an extra scene after the end of main filming with a clean shaven Santiago Cabrera and the actual scene on the Ibn Majid where it reveals who Beautiful Flower is if it is going to be data, just because I do want the scrubbed clean with regulation sideburns Rios in the lovely late-era uniform. But if they did, I’m sure they would have just taken a photo and not clone-tooled off his beard, and we haven’t seen a federation starship interior so the set doesn’t exist, so I am dreaming sadly.

So, the secret lady cabal of romulans destroyed Mars. How did they find the flaw in the Synth’s code? Did they have someone inside of Daystrom? Did Oh just download it off the starfleet github? Was it the secret lady cabal who sped up the destruction of the Romulan star, as implied in the last great hope? Why did they do that? Other than because the evacuation was going well and they needed to inflame Federation tensions? Speaking of, did we see all the faces of the secret lady cabal members? Because I was kind of expect Agnes would be one of them and be a deep cover Romulan spy, though this would have been the episode to reveal it if so.

What really hit me this episode was how much I didn’t care that Picard was there. The writers have done a good job making him redundant to the story now, he’s so slow, so out of touch, so ancillary to the story. Which is good, in my opinion. I love the new characters and I think they’ll kill off Picard at some point anyway, and rename the ship the JLP.

I am not ready for this to end. A two part finale sounds good, I just hope it works better than the Disco season 2 finale, which I did not enjoy all that much.

#star trek picard #picard spoilers #broken pieces

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v-thinks-on · 4 years

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Generations - Part 3

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There was no reason to delay. Kirk didn’t even have a career to sacrifice. He would rather not steal a starship, but having recently returned from the dead, he didn’t have many options.

“Computer, put me through to Admiral Brackett-” Kirk began.

The beep of his communicator cut him off.

“Wait on that,” Kirk ordered and tapped on his communicator.

It was Picard. “Jim, we’ve received a transmission from Ambassador Spock.”

Kirk’s heart leaped. “I’m on my way.” He turned off the communicator, cancelled the call to the admiral and nearly ran down to Picard’s quarters.

“What did Spock say?” Kirk demanded as the doors slid open to let him inside.

Picard was at his desk, working on the computer terminal. He turned it off when Kirk entered and answered with a smile, “He’s on his way. We’ll meet him between here and the Neutral Zone.”

It took Kirk a few moments to truly register what Picard had said. Spock was on his way. There was no need to go to Romulus. He would see Spock soon, in a matter of days. He remembered seeing Spock off like it was just a month ago, but it had been eighty years since Spock had last seen him, since their minds had touched - a whole lifetime. Kirk couldn’t imagine how much had changed in his absence.

A jittery rush of nerves and excitement spread through his veins. He couldn’t hold back a grin.

“Good,” Kirk said, “great.”

“I imagine he’ll be pleased to see you.”

“I hope so,” Kirk said, though he couldn’t really bring himself to doubt it. “Is there anything I can do around here in the meantime?” With nothing left to plan, he could easily go crazy just waiting around.

Picard shook his head. “The Farragut is over staffed as is. I’ve just been doing my best to stay out of the way.”

Kirk couldn’t help but sympathize with the captain stuck on another’s ship. “I don’t envy your position.”

“It gives me some time to catch up on my reading.” Picard gestured toward the book on his desk.

“You collect antique books too?”

“I find it makes for a richer experience.”

Kirk nodded in agreement. He glanced at the novel and exclaimed in surprise, “The Tale of Two Cities?”

“Are you familiar with it?”

Kirk grinned. “It’s a favorite of mine.”

“I didn’t realize you were interested in history.”

“I am, but that one was a gift.”

“I was curious about its portrayal of the French revolution, but it’s clearly written from an English perspective.” Picard frowned at the thought.

“You’re actually French?”

“Yes, I was raised on an old-fashioned vineyard near the border with Switzerland.”

“With your accent, it’s easy to forget,” Kirk said with a wry smile. “I have a similar interest in American history.”

“I know less French history than maybe I should,” Picard admitted. “Usually I prefer archeology; studying lost alien civilizations.”

“Sounds exciting. You’re in the right place to do it, though I was usually preoccupied with the civilizations we found.”

“That’s often the case,” Picard said with a touch of disappointment, “But occasionally I have the chance to uncover something no one has seen in millennia.”

“There’s so much out here, we can barely even brush the surface,” Kirk marveled, leaning back in his chair.

“I’m certain the admiral’s offer stands.”

Kirk waved it off. “I’m retired.” After a moment’s thought he asked, “She said something happened to the fleet?”

Picard nodded. “The Borg. They’re part organic and part machine. They assimilate sentient species into their empire - for lack of a better word. They’re adaptable and relentless, just one of their ships destroyed most of the fleet. They would be centuries away, but a powerful alien we’ve encountered a few times decided to introduce us to them as a sort of practical joke.”

“And there’s no reasoning with them?”

“No, at least not until they see us as a real threat.”

Kirk glanced away, his mind already racing far ahead of him, trying to figure out how to beat such an opponent.

“I’m sorry, I’ve brought you into a dangerous time,” Picard said, jolting Kirk back to reality. “Thankfully, we think most of their fleet is still years away, so we should have some time to improve our defenses before we have to face them again.”

“Every age has its challenges.”

Picard nodded. “I wouldn’t have wanted to get in a fight with the Klingons.”

“We didn’t fight them face to face much. It was mostly just competing over allies and resources, but they did play dirty.”

“The Klingons? They can be ruthless, but they have their honor - for the most part. The Romulans on the other hand…”

“Maybe things have changed in eighty years. We only encountered the Romulans a few times, but they seemed to be honorable in their way.”

“I’ve just read about your times, but it seemed like the galaxy was a very different place.”

“I have a lot of catching up to do,” Kirk said with a smile.

“If you want any lighter reading, you’re welcome to borrow a book,” Picard offered. “My quarters were mostly undamaged in the crash.”

“What do you have?”

Picard led him over to a small cabinet in the corner, full of books. Some were a little charred around the edges and others had been banged up pretty badly, but they all looked readable. Kirk bent over to peruse the titles. There was Shakespere, some Klingon poetry, a few books in French, and other classics from all over the galaxy, even some Vulcan philosophy.

Kirk was considering the Vulcan philosophy when something else caught his eye - “The Campaigns of Alexander, it’s been years since I last read that!”

“You’re welcome to it.”

“Thank you.” Kirk carefully drew the old book out of the cabinet and flipped through the pages, scanning for familiar names and places - in all honesty, he was mostly looking for Alexander’s loyal companion, Hephaestion.

Picard hesitated. “If you get tired of reading, I’ve been meaning to go fencing when I have the time, you could join me,” he suggested a little awkwardly.

“I’ve never fenced before, but I could give it a try.”

“I can teach you the basics.”

“Sure. Just tell me when and I’ll meet you in the gym - this ship does have one?”

“Yes.”

“It has about everything else.” More seriously, Kirk said, “Thank you.”

“Not at all.”

Kirk took the book and returned to his quarters, but he knew he wouldn’t be able to focus on reading - maybe later in the evening it could distract him from tossing and turning in bed. Instead, he left The Campaigns of Alexander on the table and made his way up to the ship’s bar. It was still bustling, but he recognized a few familiar faces in the crowd. Guinan waved to him from the bar and he spotted Riker and Worf at a table, not far from where they had been sitting when he ran into them the day before.

Kirk greeted Guinan with a nod and headed over to the table staked out by the senior officers.

“Captain Kirk,” Riker exclaimed, “I see you’re as bored as the rest of us.”

Kirk shrugged. “I’m helping by staying out of the way.”

“Those are the captain’s orders,” Worf grumbled.

Riker stood and insisted, “Have a seat.”

After much rearranging and polite apologies, Kirk ended up in a chair that had been hastily vacated by a timid ensign, who would not reclaim it despite all his protests, and promptly fled to the far corner of the room.

“Rank has its privileges,” Riker said wryly.

Kirk just shook his head.

“So, Ambassador Spock is on his way,” Riker remarked once Kirk was settled.

Kirk grinned. “News travels fast.”

“I heard you married him to keep him from being assigned to another ship when he was your first officer,” Riker said, though he was careful to neither endorse nor deny the assertion.

“No, it was for the joint shore leaves once Spock had a ship of his own,” Kirk countered.

Worf glanced between them, as though he couldn’t decide if it was worse if they were lying or telling the truth. “I thought Vulcans were supposed to be logical,” he said at last.

“But when a man is in love…” Riker trailed off.

Worf looked dubious.

“I’m surprised you decided to get married at all, or do the history books have you pegged all wrong?” Riker asked.

“Vulcans have a different idea of marriage than humans,” Kirk said, though he couldn’t say much more.

“I see,” Riker said with a grin. “And it sounds like he was one hell of a first officer too.”

“I couldn’t ask for any better. Does Mr. Data have much command experience?”

“Putting together a command team already?”

“No” - Kirk waved off the suggestion - “I was just wondering what the crew makes of him.”

“He took a little getting used to,” Riker admitted. “But I don’t think there’s anyone who’s gotten to know him that doesn’t like him.”

Worf nodded in agreement.

“What about you?” Kirk asked. “Do you have your eyes set on a first officer?”

Riker shook his head. “I’ll probably get a command one day, but I’m happy here for now.”

“Really? I was probably promoted too young, but I’m surprised you’re not ready to get out of here.”

“So am I, But I’m happier as first officer on the Enterprise than I’ve been anywhere else, and I think that’s more important than a promotion.”

“Who am I to argue with that? I accepted a promotion to admiral and where did it get me?”

“Was it really that bad?”

“For someone else, maybe not, but I don’t belong on Earth commanding a console. There’s nowhere better than the bridge of the Enterprise.”

“I’d toast to that.” Riker raised his glass and tipped it back.

“Hear!” Worf exclaimed and followed suit.

“She was a good ship. I hope the Enterprise-E will live up to the name, but I don’t know if it’ll ever be quite the same.”

“It isn’t,” Kirk said. “You were in command when she was destroyed?”

Riker nodded.

“I sacrificed the first Enterprise for a lot less. It was still worth it, but the Enterprise-A never felt like home in the same way.”

Riker finished the dregs of his drink. “Speaking of, I should probably get back to approving those transfers for when we do get the Enterprise-E. It was good talking to you, Worf, Captain.” With that, he stood and took his leave.

Another officer promptly stole the vacated chair to take it to another table, and Kirk found himself alone with the Klingon. They seemed to size each other up, neither quite ready to make the first move.

To Kirk’s surprise, Worf spoke up, “At Starfleet Academy, I read about your battles with the Klingons.”

Kirk nodded. He would have been lying to say he regretted them.

“You were a true warrior,” Worf concluded.

“I admit, I was sometimes lacking in diplomacy, but our mission was peaceful exploration,” Kirk attempted.

“But you fought well,” Worf protested.

It sounded like it was intended as a compliment, but Kirk wasn’t quite ready to take it. Instead, he asked as casually as he could, “Are you the only Klingon in Starfleet?”

“Yes,” Worf said.

“Why? The Klingons must still have their own fleet.”

“After my family was killed in the Khitomer massacre, I was raised by humans,” Worf explained, but with the way he said it, he might as well have been talking about someone else’s family.

Still, Kirk’s eyes widened in surprise. “Oh, I didn’t realize. That can’t have been easy.”

“I faced some challenges,” Worf acknowledged stoically.

“You almost sound more like a Vulcan than a Klingon,” Kirk suggested with a smile.

“Vulcans are pacifists” - Worf said the word “pacifist” with some disdain.

“That’s usually the logical course of action,” Kirk argued, “But there’s no one I’d rather have on my side in a fight.”

Worf gave him a look of disbelief.

Wryly, Kirk asked, “You’re set on being a Klingon?”

“That is what I am,” Worf insisted.

“You’re right,” Kirk said. It had been unfair of him to suggest otherwise. “How is it, serving on a ship full of humans?”

“They are not warriors, but they are good colleagues” - Worf hesitated - “And friends.”

“Good. I don’t know what I would have done if I’d been assigned a Klingon officer,” Kirk admitted. “I can only hope I would have followed your Captain Picard’s example.”

“Many Klingons still have a difficult time accepting the Federation as our allies. Most humans would not fare well on a Klingon ship - they do not understand the glory of war.”

“Some do, but they usually end up as the villains.”

“Yes, I do not understand why humans place so much value in reluctance.”

“Maybe we’re just indecisive,” Kirk suggested with a wry smile.

“That is not how I would describe my human colleagues.”

Kirk tried again - “Isn’t it better to go to war for a good cause than a bad one?”

“Perhaps,” Worf acknowledged, “But humans seem to place no value in the glory of battle.”

“No, I suppose we don’t. We’re not so fond of death and destruction.”

“You fear it,” Worf charged.

“With good reason.”

“Why fear the inevitable? At least a warrior can die well.”

“Is anything really inevitable?”

“All things die.”

“I don’t know, I’ve managed to cheat death well enough myself.”

“Your case is a unique one,” Worf admitted, “But eventually you will die.”

“Maybe, but I don’t believe in no-win scenarios. Even if everything supposedly dies, there’s no reason to surrender and let it happen.”

“You would consider charging into battle, prepared to die, a surrender?” Worf demanded.

“Isn’t it better to live to fight another day?”

“Not if all your days are spent fleeing in fear of death.”

“Maybe you’re right, but if there’s a way…” Kirk trailed off, his eyes gazed out the windows that made up the far wall.

For a moment Worf drank in silence. Abruptly, he remarked, “I don’t understand how you humans can spend days on end doing nothing but waiting.”

Kirk looked back at the Klingon with a smile. “We don’t like it any more than you do. We just try to distract ourselves.”

Worf seemed to consider the suggestion. “Maybe I will go see if the Farragut’s holodeck has a suitable calisthenics program. You are welcome to join me.”

Kirk was curious, but shook his head. “Maybe another time.”

“Very well.” Worf finished his drink and took his leave.

Kirk was in his quarters reading when Counselor Troi dropped by. She joined him at the desk, no doubt ready with another barrage of questions.

“Good afternoon, Counselor,” he said, putting the book aside. “What can I help you with?”

To his surprise, she asked, “What are you reading?”

He smiled. “The Campaigns of Alexander. I borrowed it from your Captain Picard.”

“Alexander the Great?” she clarified.

He nodded.

“May I ask why that book in particular?”

“It’s a classic.”

Troi could tell there was another reason, but she didn’t press him on it. Instead she said, “The captain told me that Ambassador Spock is on his way.”

Kirk grinned. “Yes, I know.”

“How do you feel about seeing him after so long?” Troi attempted.

“It’ll be good to see him again,” Kirk said with half a shrug, as though there wasn’t anything else to be said, but the counselor could sense a deeper turmoil of nerves and uncertainty.

She decided it was time to take another approach. Starting on more solid ground, she asked, “When did you last see your husband?”

Kirk glanced away in recollection. “It was a little over a month before the launch of the Enterprise-B - Spock could tell you exactly how long. He was on Earth for just a few days between meetings with the Klingons. He wasn’t an ambassador yet, but he was well on his way.” Troi could feel some bitterness amidst his pride.

“Did you have many chances to talk to him while he was away?” she asked.

Kirk gave her a wry smile. “A few.” Troi could tell that it was intended as a joke, but she didn’t know why.

“You spoke with him frequently?” she clarified.

“You could say that,” Kirk said with that same private bemusement.

“Is there anything you wish you could have told him before you fell into the Nexus?”

He shook his head. “If I knew I wasn’t going to be in there forever, it would have been nice to let him know, but there weren’t any secrets between us.”

Kirk was carefully keeping something out of the conversation, Troi could feel it, but she didn’t know what. Unless… She hesitated. “When I first met you, in sickbay, I sensed that you were attempting to contact someone telepathically. I am aware that Vulcans have significant telepathic abilities, did you and Ambassador Spock have a telepathic connection?”

Kirk grinned and she could feel that she was correct. “Vulcans are a very private people, Counselor.”

“I see…” she said. Delicately, she continued, “I take it you and Ambassador Spock have not been in contact since you left the Nexus?”

He shook his head. “Not a word.”

“I’m sorry. To go from constant communication to nothing must be very unsettling.”

Kirk grimaced. “We were ‘out of contact’ for a few years after Spock’s death. It was a lot worse then, but it is still unsettling.”

“How do you think your husband is feeling right now, on his way to see you?”

“He is a Vulcan,” Kirk said with a wry smile.

She just gave him a look.

Again, Kirk glanced away, out the window, in thought. “I don’t know,” Kirk admitted at last. “I know I miss him, but it’s been so long… Eighty years… It’s longer than I’ve been alive. I can’t imagine… Maybe he’s just coming here to prevent me from going to Romulus.”

“Do you actually believe that?”

“No. But it might be easier for him if I hadn’t come back.”

“Why?”

“I’ve given him a lot to worry about.”

“You seem to worry a lot about him,” she pointed out.

“While I was in the Nexus, at least I was safe. I can’t say as much about him.”

“If your connection really was severed” - Kirk winced at the thought - “He may not have known you were safe,” Troi remarked.

“I don’t know…” Kirk trailed off. He hoped the bond hadn’t been broken. Even if it hadn’t, it was probably silent on Spock’s end, but he was a proper telepath, maybe he could sense something that Kirk couldn’t.

“How do you think he feels?” Troi prompted again.

“I hope he hasn’t been too worried. Jean Luc said Spock still feels guilty for the time I spent on Rura Penthe, but I don’t even think an illogical human could spend eighty years worrying.” He gazed out the window, lost in thought. “I wonder how much he’s changed…”

“En garde!” Picard called out.

Kirk raised his sword for another attack - it was surprisingly heavy between his fingers. The stiff uniform was stifling, the helmet like a cage over his head. He peered at Picard through the mesh - not that he could see his opponent’s face - his sword bouncing in his hand.

Kirk let Picard come to him - they had barely bothered with footwork. Their swords met. He could tell Picard was going easy on him, maneuvering his blade this way and that in small neat motions that Kirk was sure left him wide open for an attack that Picard was kind enough not to take. Kirk circled Picard’s blade with his own in an attempt to replicate them, but it didn’t get him anywhere.

Finally, he threw caution to the wind and took a wild stab.

The alarm went off - the tip of Picard’s blade had caught on Kirk’s glove, winning him the match.

Picard raised his blade in a salute and Kirk only belatedly remembered to follow suit before pulling off his helmet. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath of fresh air.

“Good bout,” Picard said.

Kirk opened his eyes and accepted Picard’s gloved hand with a wry smile.

“It’s a lot harder than it looks,” Kirk remarked as he tried to shrug off the thick jacket.

“It just takes practice,” Picard said, though he looked a little smug. “Not up for another?”

Kirk shook his head. “I think I’ll stick to wrestling.”

Kirk accepted a towel from Picard, grabbed a glass of water from the replicator and let himself fall onto the bench by the wall to catch his breath. Picard soon joined him.

They sat in silence, catching their breath. Abruptly, Picard asked, “You’re married - I don’t suppose you ever had children?”

A grimace flitted across Kirk’s face. “I had a son, but I barely knew him.” More lightly, he asked, “Do you have kids?”

“No,” Picard said. “The closest thing I had to a son was my nephew, René, but he and my brother were killed in a fire recently.”

“I’m sorry. David died a few years ago - give or take a few decades - but I never really mourned him.”

“I never liked children,” Picard continued, “But René was the exception. Now, I wonder if I made a mistake not settling down and having children of my own.”

“I don’t know. I didn’t settle down either. David wasn’t really mine. I was his father, but his mother and I weren’t together; she didn’t want him taking after me and running off across the galaxy, so I stayed away. I didn’t think twice.”

“Do you regret it?” Picard asked.

“Of course I regret not being there when I should have, but I wasn’t ready then and I don’t know if I’ve ever been ready. Spock certainly didn't want kids," he added a little less seriously - though he didn’t know what Spock wanted now.

"I didn’t think I did either, but now I’m not so sure.” Picard hesitated. “That’s what the Nexus showed me - a whole family in a stately old home. I thought that was what my brother wanted, that I’d moved beyond it somehow, but maybe we were more similar after all.”

“Maybe,” Kirk said, “But it would be hard to captain the Enterprise from the family homestead.”

“True. Perhaps the Nexus merely shows us a path not taken rather than our hearts’ desires.”

“I would rather be on a bridge than that old cabin any day,” Kirk said with a smile.

“Why did you retire?”

Kirk’s smile quickly faded. “I gave up too much. Spock died because of me. He came back, but I couldn’t risk it happening again.”

“Surely it was dangerous before,” Picard attempted.

“We always made it out alive somehow.”

Picard hesitated. “I didn’t die, but I was assimilated by the Borg to be their representative to humanity. I lost my identity - part of myself. I considered leaving Starfleet, that it wasn’t worth the risk, but with more than a little help I learned to live with it.”

“You’re a braver man than I am, Captain.”

“I don’t know. Perhaps I just have less to lose.”

#v writes #Star Trek: The Original Series #Star Trek: The Next Generation #Star Trek: Generations #Spirk #Generations

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antimatterpod · 4 years

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Transcript - 47. Pride And Prejudice In the Original Romulan

If you found the audio on this ep a little painful (and I don’t blame you at all, so did I!), here is the transcript!

Liz: Welcome to Antimatter Pod, a Star Trek podcast where we discuss fashion, feminism, subtext and subspace, hosted by Anika and Liz. Today we're going to TRY to talk about the TOS novel My Enemy, My Ally -- but it's raining at both of our houses, and we both have internet that drops out in the rain. So…

Anika: [laughs]

Liz: This is our second go at recording the opening. [laughs] And it's really bucketing down out there!

Anika: We bring the drama.

Liz: We do! We do. Anyway, I am so glad that I finally read this classic tie-in novel, because I had such a good time.

Anika: It's a lot of fun. I have long loved these books. I have a great deal of affection for the Rihannsu novels, and the characters within them. I don't think I've ever actually sat down and read the whole book in a really long time. So I noticed a lot of things that I don't remember when I'm thinking about the book. These aren't the things that I remember, or think on fondly when I go back and read my favourite passages and things. Those, I know practically by heart, but there was a lot that I just sort of glossed over.

Liz: I have been hearing or reading about these books for almost as long as I've been in Star Trek fandom. And I never read them before, because I knew that Duane's worldbuilding for the Romulans was so different from what we ultimately got.

And yes, there's a lot of stuff that's really outdated, and no longer current, and I laughed out loud at the bit where the Starfleet intelligence report is like, "There have been a lot of assassinations happening in the Romulan Senate!" And everyone's like, "That's not like the Romulans! That's so weird!" Guys, it's Tuesday, there's an assassination.

But I was so impressed by how well it still fits with -- and I think Picard actually has a lot to do with that, because it's added so many layers of nuance and details to Romulan culture that Duane's ideas can just slip neatly in.

Anika: Right. Yes. especially when -- whenever Ael talked or thought about the Klingons, she is so anti-Klingon, and it was sort of hilarious, because everything that she said about the Klingons was sort of what the TNG Romulans do.

Liz: Yeah!

Anika: And everything that she believes in about the Romulans is pretty much TNG Klingons.

Liz: Right!

Anika: And so it was this weird, you know -- and so this book came out in 1984, and the movie, Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, which was really the first time we saw modern Klingons. -- was in Star Trek III.

Liz: And they were not particularly honourable.

Anika: But they did have -- like, Valkris? Something like that. She has a V-kris name. At the very beginning of Star Trek III, she does the whole little, "I have to die, now, for honour" Klingon thing. That was new.

Liz: Oh, you're right! It's been so long since I saw that.

Anika: So I feel like [Duane] was writing about these Romulans while they were writing about those Klingons, and they decided to move in that direction. Because, you know, like, five years later, I guess? Maybe three years later, Next Generation came out. I'm sure they were already writing Next Generation. So--

Liz: They actually weren't! Planning for Next Gen was going on really, really late in 1986.

Anika: Really!

Liz: Yeah, listening to the podcast The Trek Files, they go through a lot of the early Next Gen planning documents, and it's actually a little scary how close to the release for "Encounter at Farpoint" they're still working out things like, "Should there be a doctor?" and "Maybe we should cast someone as the android?"

Anika: Maybe.

Liz: It gives me a lot of secondhand stress. [laughs]

Anika: That's funny. Although, looking at the beginnings of Next Generation, I believe it.

Liz: Oh yeah, absolutely. It explains a lot. But yeah, it's interesting that Duane kept going with these books -- and was allowed to keep going with these books -- even after Next Gen started up and basically -- I think the term in fandom is still "jossed"? For Joss Whedon? Jossed all of her ideas about Romulans. And I just think it's really wonderful that Star Trek: Picard has started restoring some of these ideas.

And some of them are quite different, you know, Romulans have three names (including a secret name), not four. But the seeds are there. And I believe I read somewhere that Chabon actually considered using the Rihannsu language that Duane created, but it was decided that it was too different from everything else we've seen of Romulan language on screen.

Anika: Interesting.

Liz: I just wanna point out, species can have more than one language. Just putting that out there.

Anika: What? Are you sure?

Liz: I know. I know. I've heard it's possible.

Anika: I don't think that's true.

Liz: I hear there are people on Earth right now who don't speak English.

Anika: [laughing] I'm sorry, just the idea that that would be shocking to anyone? Is a little scary.

Liz: I know.

Anika: But we can say that they were dialects, even. It doesn't even have to be a different language. But one of the things I really love about these books is that at least five percent of the book is in Romulan, and she puts in no effort of translating it. She just expects you to be able to understand what's going on based on the rest of it. I've always appreciated that.

Liz: See, that kind of annoyed me. Because, like, I have no problem with subtitles, and I'm not one of those people who was complaining about all the subtitled Klingon in early Discovery. But here, I'm like, IT'S A BOOK! I DON'T NEED TO READ THESE FAKE WORDS! But when they start talking about, um, mmmmnesssahiiii… [Transcriber's note: the word is "mnhei’sahe". Good luck.]

Anika: Yeah, I know. My second point is, I can't pronounce any of it.

Liz: No!

Anika: I read The Romulan Way first.

Liz: Oh, I think you've said that before, yes. That's the one set on Romulus, with the spy?

Anika: Yes. I was not reading Star Trek novels in 1984. But I read The Romulan Way, and then I went backwards for My Enemy, My Ally, because Ael is in The Romulan Way, and she's amazing. And she's, like, a superhero that shows up at the end, so I was like, I need to know the story of that. So I went back to it. But at the back of The Romulan Way, there's a glossary of Romulan words. It's only three pages long. It's nothing like the Klingon-English dictionary. And I am still, to this day, angry that I can't learn Romulan the way I could learn Klingon. Like, you can learn Klingon in Duolingo.

Liz: You can! It's outrageous.

Anika: But no one's ever taken the time to do that for Romulan, and I'm just annoyed, because that's the -- since I was a small child, that's the language I've wanted to speak.

Liz: It sounds like they have put in the work of creating a conlang for Romulan now, with Picard, so maybe you can learn that? But it won't be Duane's Rihannsu.

Anika: But it'll be at least something. I would love for someone to take the time and translate a novel into Romulan, or something. Like Jane Austen. If the Klingons get Shakespear--

Liz: The Romulans get Austen.

Anika: Yeah.

Liz: I feel like the Romulans would rather have John LeCarre. But no, they're getting Austen and they're going to like it.

Anika: Pride And Prejudice in the original Romulan is something I desperately want to read.

Liz: "It is a truth universally acknowledged that a subcommander in possession of a great fortune must be in want of a…" yeah. Anyway. I'm gonna have to take some time to think about how this translates.

I wasn't so keen on the passages of Romulan, but I liked the Romulan words and concepts that we were introduced to, and I like that now we have -- like, Duane gives us names of Romulan animals? And the significance that they attach to names, names of ships and names of people, I really groove on that sort of thing. And Ael's idea that the name of the Enterprise is very unlucky because it's such a big, powerful concept.

Anika: Sounds accurate. And it also makes me think about the Enterprise. Like, obviously -- when I was a kid, watching Next Generation, watching The Original Series, watching the one with the whales -- you know, it's exciting that they get the Enterprise back in the end, right? It's a big deal, and the Enterprise is obviously the best ship in the fleet. Because it's the Enterprise, and these are the stories of the people who are on it!

But, if I think about the name, I hate it! It's so capitalist. It's so military. It's so American, and I just -- I hate it!

Liz: It really is. I say this with all due love and respect. And I know it was a British Navy ship first, but come on.

Anika: So, yeah, that's how I feel about it. So I appreciate that she makes me think about these things.

Liz: Yeah, I really love her take on it. And it makes me like the name of the Enterprise, too. I think, you know, Discovery and Voyager are much more positive and less iconic names, and even Defiant -- you know, that's a big concept, and it's not so positive as "discovery" or "voyaging", but it's necessary to what the Defiant was built for.

Anika: And I like that, in Discovery and in Picard, they have actually named some ships with non-English words and concepts and people. They're taking those tiny baby steps towards making it a little less--

Liz: I know! For all that I've dunked on Chabon throughout our podcast, he made a deliberate choice to name starships after non-western explorers, and I really, really love that. Still all men, but, you know, we'll get there.

Anika: Baby steps!

Liz: My thing in fic is that I always name starships after women of science or science fiction. So when I am in charge of Star Trek, it will be a much better show. I promise.

I just wanna say how much I love Ael as a character.

Anika: Absolutely.

Liz: She's basically the perfect character for me -- she's not quite cranky enough, although she puts on a good facade of it early in the book, when she's deceiving the crew she's about to sacrifice. But she's -- I like characters who are old enough to have a past, and young enough to have a future. And she's perfect [for me]! She has her ship, she has her crew, she has her adult son, who serves underneath her as her first office. It's really wonderful. And I read that Duane created her as a woman who could sort of match Kirk at his own game, but in doing so, she created a wonderful character in her own right.

Anika: I had to write this one sentence down. It's on page 93, when Ael beams onto the ship, onto the Enterprise, and so our Enterprise crew first see her. I underlined the sentence that I'm going to read, and then I wrote in the margins, "So that's why I fell so hard and so immediately for Admiral Kat."

Liz: [laughs] Yes?

Anika: And this is the sentence: "She carried herself like a banner or a weapon, like something proud and dangerous, but momentarily at rest."

Liz: Yes! And I think she and Kat have a lot in common, because Ael is so pragmatic, and so ruthless in how she abandons the crew of the Cuirass to their own destruction -- which she has set up for them! And these were not particularly good people, they intended to betray her, but she still feels that twinge of regret, because this is her honour that she is destroying. And then she does it anyway. And I love that in a character. I love characters who are -- particularly women -- who are capable of terrible things, but know what they have done.

Anika: Right. And, as you said, that she's old enough to have a past, and young enough to have a future. I think that that has that same -- and so I was like -- again, I read these books young. And so I really looked up to Ael as a role model, you know? I really was drawn to that. The character in The Romulan Way, the main character, is the character that I would want to be, and then she looked up to Ael. So it was like this whole thing.

So, going back and, again, reading it -- and really reading it, this time, not just skimming and skipping to my favourite parts, but really taking the time to read each passage -- there was just so much of things that I love about Star Trek and other mediums, and other fandoms, that were in this book. And it's like, oh, it formed -- it informed the future me, when I was reading it as a small girl. Because I was inspired by those things, and then I went looking for more of that.

Liz: It's just the most wonderful piece of space opera, with empires attempting to push and shift the balance of power, and individuals working for the betterment of the community, the galactic community as a whole. I love that! And at one point, I was like, the worldbuilding in this story is so rich, and the plot itself is so interesting, this didn't need to be a tie-in. This could be an original piece of work. But, at the same time, would we still be talking about it if this "original novel" had been published in 1984? Like, there is a lot of great science fiction written by women in the '80s, which is just straight forgotten.

Anika: Right. I agree.

Liz: That's not to say that's okay, you know, I think there's a lot of joy to be had in rediscovering that stuff, like Vonda McIntyre's original work, but--

Anika: And I also don't think it cheapens her worldbuilding and the effort that she clearly put in to make fifty original characters for this book--

Liz: Fifty! Did you count?

Anika: I didn't count them.

Liz: Okay.

Anika: I'm just saying, I started naming them, and there are people that are just -- and they reoccur in all of her other novels. Which is great. I looked up -- because Lia Burke, the nurse, I was like, is Lia Burke a "real character", quote-unquote, or is she only in these books? Because I couldn't tell. I really, firmly believed that she was a member of the Enterprise [crew] in The Original Series, or my guess was that she was introduced in the animated series. And since I'm never going to watch the animated series, I wouldn't know. So I looked it up, and no, she was introduced in The Wounded Sky, Duane's first book.

Liz: Huh!

Anika: But she appears in all of them, and is such a rich character, even with her two scenes and her four lines. But I know exactly who she is.

Liz: She is such a rich character that I almost looked at her -- and you know I really hate the concept of the Mary Sue, but I looked at her and went, "Are you maybe TOO RICH to be a supporting character? You need to have your own series, love, you need to step out of the Star Trek universe and into your own thing. Because you are taking over."

And I think that's a really difficult line to walk with tie-in fiction, because you need to deepen the universe with original characters, and they need to be GOOD original characters, they need to be complicated and interesting. But at the same time, they're not what the audience is there for.

Anika: Right. But I think she's amazing, and the way that [Duane] makes this rich supporting cast, and I firmly believe that they're a part of the Enterprise.

Liz: Yes. Even the Horta officer, Ensign Naraht--

Anika: I love him!

Liz: He's so great! Kirk keeps comparing him to a pan pizza, and I'm like, (a) he is clearly a deep dish; (b) that's pretty racist, mate.

Anika: [laughs] PRETTY racist? He's saying that he looks edible!

Liz: Yes!

Anika: That's a problem!

Liz: And then TrekCore, yesterday, posted the stills from Discovery showing the Horta in the background of Lorca's chamber of horrors, and I'm like, was Lorca going to eat the Horta???

Anika: But speaking of racism--

Liz: I just want to say, like Duane's original characters always encompass non-humanoid Starfleet officers. And it's so great. I find it really distracting because, like, I've seen what the ship looks like, and I know that it doesn't accommodate these people? But at the same time, what she is doing is really good, and that I personally find it distracting is not actually a point of failure on Duane's part.

Anika: I get confused trying to imagine -- like, she describes them, and I just cannot. I need someone to draw me fan art, or something, so I get it.

Liz: I agree. Because, like, the three Denebian races, and one of them has tentacles -- I lost track of all of them, but I love them. What were you going to say about racism?

Anika: I was just going to say, I find it interesting that there are a few times where our human characters, Kirk, Uhura, etc -- even Spock, I think -- will start saying something anti-Romulan, and then stop themselves and apologise to whichever Romulan they were interacting with. And the Romulan's like, "No, no, no, it's okay." And in -- I don't think Ael ever does it, but in her inner monologue, she sometimes will think about -- she has a whole couple of paragraphs about how she thought the Vulcans were one thing, but it turns out they're not. So it's like there's this whole, interesting "confronting racism" part.

Liz: Yeah, there's a bit where she enters the rec room, and looks around at the relatively diverse Enterprise crew and goes, "This should be horrifying me maybe more than it is? Am I … a bad Romulan?"

Anika: But then -- and I only wrote this one down, and, again, it's an old book, and we are all still grappling with racism and cultural appropriation and PC language, or whatever. But on page 135, it says, "What would you call Shanghaiing the Intrepid?" And again, I wrote in my margins, "I would call it racism!" Because, what the hell are you doing in saying that in the 22nd century -- whatever century it's supposed to be.

Liz: Years and years ago, I used the term "shanghai" to mean, you know, kidnap someone and press them into service. And my friend Stephanie, who is Chinese-Malaysian, was like, "Um, Elizabeth?" She has this particular tone. And I apologised, but internally, I was really defensive about it, you know, [Well Actually voice] "That was a BRITISH term, and it was referring to stealing English people and taking them to serve in Shanghai, and blah, blah, blah, blah." But then it just dropped out of my vocabulary, and I haven't really felt the loss, to be honest. Like, you can say "pressed into service" if you need it. And so, yeah, that jumped out at me, too, it's such an archaic term, and something which has taken on a meaning that it did not originally have.

Anika: Right. And that's the thing, language is constantly changing.

Liz: And I noticed Duane uses the archaic M-Z spelling for "Mz" for Uhura and the other female officers.

Anika: Yes!

Liz: Which is great! Like, I love that artefact of 1984.

Anika: There's a lot in this book. There's a lot more than we could possibly talk about. There's the part where she's thinking, you know, "The Federation doesn't understand that they have so much more than we do, and so we're hostile because we want what they have -- but they're so rich, and that's just the way they've always been, so they don't know." And I was like, oh, look at that.

There are so many of these things that we're talking about now, you know, in Picard and in Discovery. And I love that it was in this novel, that it was -- "I'm going to bring this up, and the Romulans aren't going to be just cookie cutter 'other' who we have to fight, but there are reasons for the ways that they are."

Liz: It made me think, this is not incompatible with what we see of Romulans in the Next Gen era. Not wholly. Because Ael is very much a character who looks to a glorious and honourable past, and is sort of only dimly aware of how corrupt the present is. And that makes me think of the Klingons, who are also always talking about their great, honourable, glorious past, and, the Klingon Empire, make it great again! And, really, they also have this terrible cultural rot that's destroying them from the inside out.

Whereas the Federation -- particularly humanity -- we look at our past and go, "Wow, that is messed up. Oh God, we have failed so badly, we need to do so much better!" And I feel like these different attitudes are why the Federation -- part of why the Federation is more flexible and more dynamic than the Romulans and the Klingons. It's not looking towards this imaginary nostalgic past.

And that got me thinking about, you know, make America great again, and contemporary politics, and conservative nostalgia for the 1950s.

Anika: That never actually existed! I did a paper on this!

Liz: Right! And I'm sure that Ael's great, honourable empire never really existed either. But she herself is an honourable person. Mnhei’sahe…

Anika: Meh-nehs-eye. That's how I say it.

Liz: Mnhei’sahe! Mnhei’sahe. That makes it sound like a real word.

Anika: I don't know if that's right.

Liz: This complicated concept that is not quite honour, and not quite loyalty, and it's not quite brotherhood -- there's a whole vaguely sexist conversation about 'brotherhood'. But it's that sense of owing something to your family and to your people and to your culture, and they, in turn, owe you the same.

I think, because Ael believes in mnhei’sahe so firmly, she has a bit of a rosy-eyed view of the past. But we've met other Romulans in TNG who had mnhei’sahe.

Anika: Yeah. "The Defector".

Liz: Not just that, but the guy that Geordi meets down on the planet…

Anika: "The Enemy".

Liz: Yeah! They have very different values, but they come to respect each other, and that particular Romulan comes to recognise that Geordie has mnhei’sahe. Aside from treating assassination as an aberration rather than a hobby, I really do think that this is consistent with Romulan culture as we know it.

Anika: Yes, I think it is, too. Especially because Ael is a very -- she has a very strong point of view. So she's saying, "This is wrong, and this is the way it should be, and our new Romulans are doing this." So if you imagine that the 'new Romulans' win, then they're the ones who are doing all the shenanigans and nonsense in The Next Generation, as opposed to the ones who are still clinging to that idea of honour.

Liz: I have this fairly elaborate headcanon about the Romulans, and how they sort of almost withdraw into their own space -- aside from bombing the Khitomer outpost -- after the Federation makes peace with the Klingons. And then they emerge at the end of season 1 of Next Gen.

And when they emerge, they're a lot more physically uniform, they're a lot more -- you know, they all have the bowl cut, they all have the shoulder pads. Their society has changed. And they're less diverse in their personal presentation than they were in the previous century. And I think we can argue -- especially after Picard, and the great diversity that's exploded in the wake of the destruction of Romulus -- that this was a deliberate thing, that their culture became more oppressive than it had been in the past.

Anika: I can absolutely believe that. And it became an authoritarian version of their empire.

Liz: Yeah, I'm sure that it was never a democracy, but it seems like most Romulans maybe had more personal freedom in the 23rd century.

Anika: Okay, at one point the chief linguists officer starts randomly reciting a Roman poem in the middle of the briefing?

Liz: Right!

Anika: [laughs] Which is hilarious, and I was like, okay, this is a little too on the nose for me.

Liz: So on the nose.

Anika: You know, like, wink, wink, not really into it. But--

Liz: Especially when Duane has been separating the Rihannsu from the Roman-inspired Romulans.

Anika: Right. But, obviously, the fact that they have their praetor and their senate -- they are very based on Rome. And the Roman Empire.

Liz: There was a concept in Rome called 'romanitas', and it's basically mnhei’sahe. It's loyalty to the state, and it's personal honour, and it's being a responsible member of your family, and what you owe to your patron, or what you owe to your clients if you are the patron. Or the paterfamilias. It's all of that. It's mnhei’sahe.

Anika: Okay, so we are in the year 2020, right?

Liz: Allegedly. Time has no meaning where I am, but yes.

Anika: Well, I'm just saying that that means that within -- 2000 years ago, the Roman Empire still existed. Right?

Liz: Yes.

Anika: Here on good old Earth. But we have moved -- we still have politics, and we still learn algebra, and we still look at philosophy in a very Graeco-Roman way. Okay?

Liz: We still post, "Today I baked bread", we just post it on Instagram instead of carving it into a wall.

Anika: But we also have changed. We've evolved from Roman times. Right? Would you say that we've evolved from Roman times?

Liz: Yeah, absolutely.

Anika: All right. According to this book--

Liz: [laughs]

Anika: --the Romulan Empire has stayed the same as ancient Rome for more than 5000 years. And, like, the Vulcans were also ancient Romans 5000 years ago.

Liz: Yes.

Anika: And I'm just, like, no.

Liz: It's like this thing in a lot of fantasy and science fiction where the timescales are just massively inflated. George R R Martin does it all the time, and it drives me crazy!

Anika: [laughing] That is not how that works!

Liz: No.

Anika: No way.

Liz: It is absolutely not, but it's one of those things where I look at it and go, you're a trope. You annoy me. But fine, we'll live with it.

Anika: See, it really bothers me. Because I can't just handwave that. I can't just be, like, sure. Because it's like, no. The whole plot is based on this whole, we're gonna steal Vulcan brain matter, and we're gonna graft it into Romulan brains, and then the Romulans are gonna have Vulcan powers. Right? That's the whole plot.

Liz: But also, there's going to be this massive super brain that can control and paralyse Vulcans.

Anika: That's one of the things that I skim over. I just even go to the massive brain part.

Liz: [laughs] It was just so gross that I really liked it! It made me think of the brain room in Harry Potter?

Anika: Ew. But yes, okay, I see that.

Liz: Also not a highlight of that series.

Anika: Vulcans and Romulans had space travel 5000 years ago. And then they split up. And the Romulans decided to not evolve from that point on. Meanwhile, the Vulcans grew brain powers. Like -- no! Just no.

Liz: I always assumed that there was some sort of genetic drift, and maybe the genetic predisposition in the people who left and became Romulans meant that those genes just fell dormant and were eventually bred out. Because 5000 years is a really long time.

Anika: Is a really long time! I can believe the dormancy of the Romulans. I cannot believe that the Vulcans -- that part doesn't happen.

Liz: Yeah, I don't believe that they developed that -- no. No.

Anika: I think it's more likely that all of them had the brain powers 5000 years ago, in Roman times, when they had space travel. And they split off, and what happened is that all the Romulans who were, like, the best brain powered Romulans were all murdered by the other Romulans, because that's what Spock says would happen.

Liz: Right.

Anika: So, sure.

Liz: Also, I wonder, if they left and found their own home planet before they had faster than light technology, if the -- the limitations of a very long journey under those circumstances are part of what made Romulan culture so pragmatic and ruthless in its treatment of the disabled, for example. Because I know, in "The Enemy", the Romulan with all the mnhei’sahe is like, "Oh, if a baby was born blind on Romulus, we'd just kill it!" And Geordie's like--

Anika: "Yikes."

Liz: --"What the hell, man, that's not cool."

Anika: "Super yikes!"

Liz: Yeah. Mate. But, from a worldbuilding perspective, it would make sense if they developed that attitude in space.

Anika: I agree. While we're on this subject, in that part where Spock says, you know, "Oh my gosh, if Romulans had Vulcan mind powers, it would be armageddon." Which is also, like, okay. But--

Liz: I feel like his biases are showing.

Anika: But that paragraph is very interesting to me from, you know -- my note here is, "Not to make everything about the Jedi, but…"

Liz: [laughs]

Anika: Spock basically describes Jedi mind tricks in that paragraph, and says that they're evil. And I would just like to put that out there into the ether.

Liz: See, this makes me want to hit Diane up on Tumblr and go, "So, do you have any particular opinions about Star Wars? Did you have any particular opinions about Star Wars in 1984 that you would like to share with the class?

Anika: It was just really funny to me.

Liz: I really do like the idea of Romulans attempting to graft and weaponise Vulcan telepathy. I think that's brilliant.

Anika: It is brilliant! It's great. And I have to appreciate that Kirk has the thought that, if the Federation got its hands on that, it would absolutely be the same problem. Like, he is self-aware enough to realise that it would be just as bad in the Federation as it would be for the Romulans or the Klingons to have it. Yes, the Vulcans are the only ones we can trust with this, which -- I don't trust all the Vulcans, but--

Liz: We know from Next Gen and "Gambit" that even Vulcans can't always be trusted with psychic weapons. But, okay, go off. Yep.

Anika: So what did you think of the characterisation of our main crew?

Liz: I really enjoyed Duane's take on McCoy. He felt so McCoy-like, but also, he's, like, secretly -- not a chess champion, but a highly ranked player? He just likes watching the game, it's a spectator sport. I really liked that, and I really liked the bit where he starts ranting at Ael, and everyone's like, oh yeah, this means he likes you, this means you're one of his people now.

Anika: Yes. McCoy, I think, is the strongest.

Liz: I quite liked her Kirk? We were saying in Discord, you know, no drawing of Kirk ever looks the same, and no drawing of Kirk ever looks like William Shatner? He's basically a cryptid. And that's sort of how I feel about his characterisation -- well, everywhere. Because he fits so many archetypes, and some of them are mutually exclusive. But I liked the direction that Duane took him in here. I felt like he was a very likable character, and he was a great foil for Ael … or maybe the other way around, apparently he's the main character, I don't know.

Anika: No.

Liz: But a fundamentally decent man, who respects and enjoys getting to know one of his most honourable enemies. That's great!

Anika: I like that they have a pre-rivalry. They know who each other is before this book, before they meet in person. And respect each other.

Liz: Yes. Yes. They know that they're equals, and they like that, but in certain situations they would not hesitate to kill each other. And I love the bit where Ael is listing the ships that have been sent into the Neutral Zone. And there's the Intrepid, and the other one, and the other one -- and then, "worst of all, the Enterprise." Just great.

And Spock … I don't think it was a bad characterisation of Spock, but, as much as I liked the mindmeld scene where he enters Ael's mind and sees that she is telling the truth, or at least, what she believes to be the truth -- I felt like, giving his connection with her niece, the Romulan Commander of "The Enterprise Incident", there should have been some more discussion of that?

Anika: Especially because it's eventually an important plot point.

Liz: Right! And that sort of came out of nowhere, and it wasn't clear to me whether he even knew that she had this connection to the unnamed Commander. But I loved that she was the Commander's aunt, and the Commander had been her heir, and that her son, Tafv, ultimately betrays her because he is so angry that the Romulan Commander was stripped of her identity and made an unperson and exiled.

Anika: Yes. You can imagine that I love everything about that relationship.

Liz: Yes?

Anika: I am so -- like, I can't be angry with Tafv, because I'm like--

Liz: Oh, I can!

Anika: --that is a really good motivation, and I am 100% on board with it, and I just want all of -- like, I want to see them as young Narek and Narissa types. In their version of Romulus.

Liz: We'll get to that.

Anika: I love it.

Liz: I have something to say about that. I loved that he wanted to take the Enterprise, and that he wanted to get revenge on Kirk and Spock for what they did to his cousin. But I was furious that he was also betraying his mother, and that he also wanted to see her executed. Like, you little shit! She did her best!

Anika: [laughs] Yes, but it was all the same feeling, where he chose his cousin over his mother. He chose one family over the other. And it was -- but before we move off of -- because I want to go into all of that, but before we move off of characterisation, I just want to say that I've never really liked Duane's version of Spock. I don't dislike it, like, I'm not saying it's bad, it's just that her Spock is not my Spock.

Liz: No, and I think that's fair.

Anika: And that's okay.

Liz: I don't think it's bad, but he's clearly not her favourite. And that's fine.

Anika: And it's true in -- again, across all of her novels. They're barely in The Romulan Way. It's mostly -- McCoy is the only one. And he's her best.

Liz: And McCoy is clearly her favourite.

Anika: Yes. but then, Spock's World is obviously -- it's like the version -- they go into all of the Vulcan mythology, and they have a whole court-senate-crazy thing on Vulcan, and all of our crew get to make speeches to all of Vulcan. Because not only are there thousands in the stadium, but also, it's, you know, live streaming to all of Vulcan. And they're all making their speech, and it's just -- it's interesting to me that 96% percent of Vulcans are into politics and pay attention and vote, and stuff. Like. That's crazy, because here on Earth, it's, like, in the 30s or 40s. So that's always interesting to me.

Liz: Right, even in Australia, we have compulsory voting, and I think it comes out at about 86%.

Anika: But her characterisation of Spock, and particularly Sarek, in Spock's World, is really -- it's like, I appreciate it, but it's not where I would go. It's not how I see them. And also T'Pring.

Liz: It's not that it's bad, it's just that her headcanons are not your headcanons.

Anika: Yeah, it's just different. Exactly. And so I really appreciate the writing, but it's an AU version of those characters for me. And this one, also -- like, he kept joking, and he kept -- I don't know. It was just a little bit off. At one point he says -- he asks the doctor how you would hold hands with a mother hen?

Liz: Yes!

Anika: And I was like, no. Spock would never. I just couldn't see it. I had troubles.

Liz: No, and I really liked that scene. It's a scene where Kirk tells McCoy and Spock, you know, "You don't need to hold my hand and protect me," and McCoy is like, "Yeah, the way rumours spread on this ship, you're not holding hands with Spock, ever." And I was like, I see what you did there, Duane, and I love it!

Anika: Wink, wink.

Liz: But we didn't need to overegg the pudding with the mother hen/how do you hold hands bit.

I was going to say, with regards to Narek and Narissa, I'm so delighted and fascinated that Duane posits that inheritances are passed down to nieces and nephews, and the concept of the sister-daughter. And then we have Ramdha raising her niece and nephew, and it's like -- again, is that an intentional reference?

Anika: Because I knew -- I remembered that Ael was her aunt, was the Romulan Commander's (who still doesn't have a name) aunt. But I didn't -- like, I thought it was just an offhand -- but it goes into, like you say, this whole inheritance thing, and there's this whole -- and the whole Tafv -- "the cousins were as close as anyone could be" kind of thing. And I was like, oh, that is so -- it IS transferred over into Ramdha and Narek and Narissa, and I love it, and I'm -- yes.

Liz: And, as a concept, it's just such a nice bit where the worldbuilding is not default western … white people culture. And it raises questions, like, do they practice first cousin marriage, or is that as taboo as a sibling marriage? And what happens if your sibling doesn't have children? And what happens if -- you know, there are so many questions!

Anika: Right, exactly.

Liz: Romulan inheritance law is suddenly really interesting to me!

Anika: [laughs] I love them. I love my Romulans, I love my Romulan families, it's all I want from the world.

Liz: You know, I only decided to read this because Picard had sort of revived some of its ideas. And I'm so glad that I did, and I would really like to pitch a loose adaptation of this novel as season 2 of Star Trek: Picard.

Anika: So have Ael, or a version of Ael, who comes to Picard?

Liz: Yeah! Who has survived the destruction of Romulus, and is attempting to serve the Romulan Free State with honour, with mnhei’sahe. And who has learned that either the Free State or the Romulan Rebirthers are doing this terrible thing with Vulcan mind powers, and -- you know, it's awful, it's horrifying. So she seeks out the man who went to toe to toe with Commander Tomalak, and who commanded the evacuation. And then, along the way, she discovers with horror that her lost sister is alive and well and living on a vineyard--

Anika: [laughs] Because she's Laris's sister????

Liz: Look -- you know, from the beginning, I have decided that Laris is linked to the original Romulan Commander, Joanne Linville.

Anika: Yes.

Liz: And Ael is canonically linked to that character. And the loss of a family member is really important to Ael's arc, so to find that her sister is alive, and has almost abandoned mnhei’sahe -- abandoned her people, not only in choosing to go into this exile, but in joining the Tal Shiar, which is the sort of organisation Ael would loathe and detest -- I think it's a really interesting way to adapt the internal conflict within Ael's family from the novel to the present canon.

Anika: I really like it. I really like it. I have one question, that is a very me question, and that listeners are probably gonna get angry at me for.

Liz: Go!

Anika: Does it involve getting Narek out of Federation prison, Tom Paris style?

Liz: [deep breath] This wasn't in my head, but yes, I think it does.

Anika: Okay. That's all I want.

Liz: No, it would be sort of great, because if Ael has to kill her son after he betrays them and all that, and maybe chooses to save Laris over Tafv, then she can adopt Narek and introduce him to the radical concept of mnhei’sahe.

Anika: Yes! See?

Liz: Yes.

Anika: Call us!

Liz: I actually think one great thing about the whole Covid disaster -- and this is really insensitive to say, given the scale of death -- but at least the Star Trek writers have a lot more time to work on their seasons before filming starts? [Transcriber's note: this was said in a deliberately facetious and self-mocking tone; obviously a shitty season and no pandemic would be better.]

Anika: [laughs] Oh dear.

Liz: But yes, that's my pitch for an adaptation. And I gave a lot of thought to who would play Ael, and because their first thought on meeting her is that she's so small, I was like, who is a very small, powerful older woman? And my first thought was Nana Visitor.

Anika: Ooops. That's not gonna work out.

Liz: Yeah, there's a problem there.

Anika: That's not gonna work. I have--

Liz: No, so then I went -- go.

Anika: No, go ahead, if you want to say yours first.

Liz: Oh, well, I have two. I sort of went in a different direction and went, okay, who could plausibly be Orla Brady's sister? Who is dark, and has great cheekbones and nice eyebrows, and has that sort of power? And so my first thought was Oscar-winner Olivia Colman.

Anika: Okay.

Liz: And then, as a back-up, because she might be busy doing other stuff, was Helen McCrory.

Anika: Helen McCrory! Oh my gosh! Sorry. My brain had to catch up with what you were actually saying.

Liz: [laughs]

Anika: That is brilliant, I love it, I would cast her in anything, and I love the idea of her as Orla Brady -- Laris's sister. Make it happen. I went in a completely different direction, but I really, really love it.

Liz: Oh! Go!

Anika: So I decided -- I was sort of, like, I need somebody at least in their forties, and as you said, tiny but powerful. So I decided on Archie Panjabi.

Liz: Ooooohhhhhhh!

Anika: You know, olive-skinned-ish.

Liz: Yeah, yeah! Obviously this breaks my Orla Brady's sister bit--

Anika: Yeah, sorry, I didn't know that she was supposed to be Orla Brady's sister when you said we were fancasting.

Liz: I wanted to surprise you with that twist! I wanted to give you a nice surprise! But no, I think she'd be quite good in the role!

Anika: Yes, I think that, at least as written on the page in this book, I can imagine her even saying some of the things. And definitely I can imagine her going toe to toe with Kirk.

Liz: Definitely.

Anika: And also sort of having that flirtation happening.

Liz: Absolutely. No, I think she would be really good. I didn't really look at, like, size once I moved on from Nana Visitor, because, you know, on TV everyone is sort of the same size? But yeah, I really like your take. Apparently Gene Roddenberry did not care for this series. Which only makes me like it more.

Anika: [laughs] I mean, good on [Duane] for getting it done anyway, is all I can say to that. Like, I'll believe it. I haven't actually read your thing, and I'm gonna let you get to it in a minute, that you have linked here.

But I absolutely believe that -- given that, like I said, she creates so many different characters, she creates new departments on the Enterprise and then people to be in them. And entire other ships, and they're friends with Kirk, and they go back so-and-so time, and there's just so much that she creates for Star Trek. But it's her version of Star Trek. That I can absolutely imagine him being annoyed at the idea that she's going to create -- she's gonna give the Romulans culture? No? That's his job, and just because he never cared to doesn't mean that someone else should.

So it's sort of, like, great men do great things, but they also have great egos. And get annoyed. It's like they -- to pull something contemporary, the fact that Rose Tico is not in The Rise of Skywalker at all seems to me--

Liz: Oh, I'm still mad.

Anika: --solely because JJ Abrams didn't create that character, and so he was going to create two or three new characters to take over her part, because he was annoyed. And I don't think he -- and I don't know JJ Abrams.

Liz: He is not a close personal friend of yours?

Anika: I don't think he would necessarily even consciously -- you know, I don't think he would even consciously do it. But I can imagine that he would subconsciously do it.

Liz: The preponderance of original characters was at the heart of Roddenberry's objections, particularly to The Romulan Way. Apparently he tried to block publication because he felt it was an original novel that used the Romulan names and had McCoy in it just to get it published as a Star Trek novel.

Anika: I mean, that's true, but it's also really good.

Liz: I know, I'm like, you're saying this like it's a bad thing? My source for this is vintage 1994 wank on Usenet. There's a link to the archive which I will share, but basically, Roddenberry's former assistant, Richard Arnold, spent -- seems like a good portion of the early '90s fighting with tie-in authors on the internet?

And it's not even that he's wrong, he's saying, you know, if you wrote a Star Trek novel, that doesn't mean you wrote for Star Trek, that means you wrote for hire tie-in fiction. It's not that this is untrue, it's just that … I don't like him? And I don't like the way he says it? Anyway there are all sorts of spurious allegations of defamation, and libel, and "I don't know what Duane Duane's husband has to do with this," he only co-wrote The Romulan Way, "so I'm not going to answer that."

But I had a lot of fun going through rec.arts.startrek.fandom fights from the early '90s. Especially the bit where I stumbled into a thread where they were looking at the premise of Deep Space 9 and going, "Oh my gosh, these people don't care about Star Trek, this is a blatant money grab, this is going to destroy Star Trek forever, look at all this political correctness with a black man in charge and a female first officer. I mean, God, Star Trek, it's just not going to survive."

Anika: Oooh, that was one thing I wanted to bring up, too. Very early in this novel, here, on page 27, in fact, Uhura basically says that Starfleet is the worst. And then, two pages later, Kirk straight-up says that his and the Enterprise's priorities are usually different from Starfleet's. And I was just, like, you know what? She didn't pull that out of nowhere, that was in TOS. So everybody who's complaining that, in Picard, suddenly Starfleet is on the other side, and we're against them, has not been watching Star Trek.

Liz: There's people who think that Star Trek is wholly utopian and perfect, and then there's people who agree with us.

Anika: I just loved it. I was like, you go. And also, while I'm on the subject of Uhura, nearly every time she was in this book, she was described as beautiful, gorgeous, handsome. And I'm not complaining about this, but I love it. I love that she could not not describe Uhura as amazing and stunning.

Liz: And it didn't feel objectifying. It wasn't, like, the male gaze. Yeah. I also enjoyed the Sulu POV when Tafv's people have attacked the ship, and he's climbing through the Jeffries tubes, and he's like, "I think I'm becoming claustrophobic. Maybe I should talk to the doctor about that. Eh, that's a future Sulu problem."

Anika: And I love Khiy, the young Romulan who's hanging out with them, and fighting back because HIS honour has also been besmirched. It's so heartwarming! I just love them all.

Liz: That was one of the things -- the conflict between mnhei’sahe, where one owes honour to different and competing parties, and this is not a flaw on your part, it's a problem to be solved -- I really liked that as a piece of cultural worldbuilding.

Anika: Oh, and -- okay, so at one point she's saying, "Okay, here are the three ships that have been sent to meet up with us." And Nniol says, "My sister's on that ship, my sister's on Javelin, I don't know if I can fight my sister." Which is perfectly fair. And he says, "I have to go back to the other ship, I can't be trusted to be in battle against her." I loved that. I loved that it set up the whole "We're gonna punch each other and then start flirting" scene -- that was great -- between Kirk and Ael. That was awesome.

Liz: Right?

Anika: But then Javelin is destroyed! And I am so upset that Nniol's sister got blown up! I'm really, really heartbroken for Nniol, because he loved his sister. And she wasn't the captain, she wasn't one of the bad guys, she just happened to be on that ship. She was probably -- he was a really low-level person, she was probably a really low-level person, too, who just happened to be assigned to a tyrant. Like, the worst one. Javelin was the one where the captain took his own little shuttlecraft away to get back-up, and he's the captain who refuses to go down with his ship, and in fact, allows his ship to be sacrificed in order to allow him to escape. He's the worst.

Liz: The mirror!Lorca of Romulans.

Anika: So, of course, she's not -- I think that Nniol's sister probably had mnhei’sahe for her brother, and she would have been happy to join up with Ael and Bloodwing, and I'm really sad that she's dead.

Liz: I found the TV Tropes page for this subseries of novels. And apparently Nniol's family come back in the later ones, and most of them have cast him -- except for one cousin, who's like, "Yeah, I think you did the right thing. I'm sorry. I love you, bro."

Anika: Hugs.

Liz: The later Rihannsu books were published in the early 21st century, and I have to admit that I'm less enthusiastic about reading them.

Anika: They're not great. I will say, they're not great. I like that Arrhae -- she has to go be a junior politician, like, a junior senator for the Romulan Empire. And they're negotiating with the Federation, or whatever, and she has to go do this, she has to do politics, which I'm totally always into. And she is asked to be a spy. And she's already a spy, as we recall--

Liz: I was gonna say!

Anika: --she's a human who's spying on the Romulans, but she--

Liz: I haven't read The Romulan Way yet, but I remember you telling me about it.

Anika: [laughing] But she's asked by the Romulans to spy on the humans. So it's great, right? So she's, like, double-spying. And she's spying for the humans, she's spying for the rebels -- they're like the good Romulans. She's spying for the good Romulans and the humans, and she's trying to be a politician. All sorts of people already hate her because she was, like, a housekeeper who became a senator, and they're totally against that because they're super into, you know, pure blood and descent, and you should have 800 houses before you get to be a senator.

Liz: Right. Nothing like the real world.

Anika: And so I really like her plot, or the idea of her plot, because she doesn't really get to do much of it -- and she has this little sort-of romance that I'm into, as well, with the rebel. But it goes nowhere, and it becomes this whole treatise on Ael's honour, and -- it stops being about anything, and it starts being, "I'm going to preach about what I think things should be"?

I don't know, there stops being a plot, and it becomes entirely inner monologues. And I'm just, like, I'm over this, we're done, the people I care about are no longer here, so I'm going to move on. And there's no -- if I recall correctly, there are zero Star Trek characters in these books! I do not remember a single -- like, I'm pretty sure the Enterprise is involved in some way, but they're not a part of the plot at all.

Liz: According to TV Tropes, the series ends with Ael becoming empress of the Romulan Empire, and she and Kirk exchange a kiss before he leaves and they never see each other again. And IN THEORY, I'm really into it, but -- like, I was googling around to see what people said about this series, and the thing that kept coming is, "Is Ael a Mary Sue?" And I'm like, mate, I don't care!

Anika: [laughs]

Liz: But I feel like making her empress is maybe a step too far. I love space politics, but I like the stories to be about the people functioning within that system rather than leading it.

Anika: I think I've read the -- I read the third one, and that's the one where we get Arrhae's plot, and there's stuff happening. And it's, like, a cliffhanger where she -- something happens, and it's bad. And then there's two more books, and nothing happens in them! And they're really long, too, they're like, fourth Harry Potter novel long.

Liz: Oh my God!

Anika: And it's, like, I can't with this, I can't. And I don't remember Ael being empress, that's how -- you know how I said that I skim eventually? When they start talking about tentacles, I'm like, I don't need to know this. So my brain just shuts off, I have to try to read at some point, when the plot gets away from me, or I'm not following it. I read very quickly, and sometimes I'll read too quickly, where it's like, I decide that's unimportant--

Liz: And miss things.

Anika: --and I just say, that goes away. So, okay, at the end of the third Hunger Games novel, her sister is killed? I had to read that four times before I realised that her sister was killed.

Liz: [laughs]

Anika: I could not follow what was going on!

Liz: No, I have the same problem. I read the Murderbot novel last night, and I really enjoyed it, it was so good, but I kept having to stop and go back because I was inhaling it so fast that I was missing things.

Anika: So I don't remember them kissing! Are you serious? This has been an OTP of mine since I was nine! What? How is that possible?

Liz: I'm just going with what TV Tropes says! Maybe it's a lie!

Anika: No, I'm sure it's right, but all I remember of the last two books is being angry at them. So I completely believe that halfway through the fifth one, I was like, "Nah," and didn't even finish it. Very possible.

Liz: It's a bit like season 7 of Next Gen, where things happen that you really, really wanted, like Picard and Crusher talk about their relationship? And then the outcome is so disappointing that you're, like, ummmmmm, I dunno. It's the seventh season of [these novels].

Anika: Yes. But The Romulan Way is always going to be one of my favourite books, ever, in the world, and I really like My Enemy, My Ally.

Liz: And, at a future time, probably when the international postal system is working again, and I can order a copy -- because I don't really like the ebook versions of the old Star Trek tie-ins, they tend to be really poorly formatted -- I will buy it, and read it, and we can talk about it on this very podcast.

Anika: Excellent!

Liz: But what are we talking about next week?

[outro music]

Anika: Sorry, I had to move over into my --

Liz: Yeah.

Anika: Thank you for listening to Antimatter Pod. You can find our show notes at antimatterpod.tumblr.com, including links to our social media and credits for our theme music.

You can also follow us on Twitter at @antimatterpod. Sometimes we post cat pictures, and questions for our audience.

If you like us, leave a review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you consume your podcasts -- the more reviews, the easier it is for new listeners to find us.

And join us in two weeks when we’ll be discussing medicine and medical practitioners in the Star Trek universe.

Liz: You said you were going to talk about ER, right?

Anika: Yes.

Liz: Does this mean that I need to watch some Chicago Hope, so I can talk about that?

Anika: Yes!

Liz: Awesome!

Anika: We can have duelling Chicago hospitals in spaaaaaace!

Liz: Yay!

#rihannsu #star trek #antimatter pod #podcast transcripts

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zenosanalytic · 6 years

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Discovery: Despite Yourself

Ok, so obvsl I’ve already watched this one so it’s a second viewing, but I tried to get at my initial reactions even if, now, from a perspective of having seen up to ep 12.

Saru says “almost nothing else is where it’s supposed to be!” having the position of celestial bodies be different in the Mirrorverse is wonderful attention to detail ouo Having even their targeting computers and sensors confused is another great way to convey that the MV is different down to the atomic level.

“Quantum signature” is typical technobabble, but functional and better than the obsession with “resonance” in the more string-theory-obsessed 90s.

I’ve never noticed it before, but one of their casting directors is named Orly Sitowitz. Imagine living to see your perfectly ordinary name rendered unfortunate by Memes :|

Another clue for Lorca’s jump double-cross I missed the first time: he claims Stamets was “eager” to work with him on multiple universe tech after the war. Taking advantage of Stamets’s non-responsive state puts a time-limit on his plans which I’m not sure really fits with how nebulous they end up being, but I guess there’s little choice. Also: maybe he was hoping communication with Discovery would be difficult once he got Burnham off the ship.

The cloak algorithm! The first time I watched that I didn’t really think about it, but if Discovery ever had made it back, then Klingon cloak-tech would have been useless. So either 1)Discovery doesn’t make it back or 2)this is a way to allow the Klingons to still get their cloak tech from the Romulans as pre-Disc canon states; the Fed has a solution to their “native” cloak tech, but then they bought a different vers from the Romulans that was invulnerable to the algorithm.

Unrelated, but I just realized that the way Disc establishes Klingon cloak -as a secret specific to T’Kuvma’s house before the war- works really well with the idea of Klingon tech being based mostly on salvaging from Hur’q tech after they were driven off. If the only surviving Hur’q ship with a cloaking device able to be studied belonged to T’Kuvma’s ancestors for some reason, then it’d make sense that they’d keep its secrets to themselves in an aristocratic society like theirs. I doubt that’s what they were going for, of course.

He waves them off even LOOKING at the NavLogs: yeah that wasn’t suspicious at all X| X| I do like, however, the way the writers have him do that -defraying suspicion by blaming himself, bamboozling them with a believable but technical explanation, then using emotional appeal through hyping the danger of the situation to direct their attention elsewhere-, which is the way an actual manipulator would protect themselves in that situation. Stuff like this is the difference between writers who know what they’re talking about, and writers faking it by writing what they think a certain type of character should be like based on tropes.

Tilly is so great, and I love that they allow her to know things, and to use that knowledge creatively. Rare to see women characters written like that, and rarer still when the character is not just allowed to be emotionally competent, but the Most Emotionally Competent person on the show. Ditto with Culber on that actually: emotional competence does not preclude technical competence and I’m glad for at least one show that doesn’t argue it does.

“Paul is your superior officer; he gave you an order. You’re not responsible for this.” Can I also just say how wonderful this portrayal of a sensitive, nurturing, truth-abiding military organization which cares about the people who make it up Discovery continues to be?

Discovery’s virtual U-Is are excellent, and I like how they activate and use them through specific hand-postures. I don’t really talk about it much, but the “chunkier” sci-fi aspects of Discovery like this are very satisfying.

The intersection of brainwashing, dubcon, secret-agent, double-life, hurt-comfort, psychdrama in the Voq storyline -and particularly the Prayer scene- is just so Delicious&Ficcy owo owo owo

It is both supremely painful, and supremely sympathetic, to watch Burnham open up to someone in a way she never has before, to trust them in a fashion her Vulcan culture completely discourages, and see it used to betray her. I do wish we’d see more flashes of Vulcan in this second half of the season, though.

Tilly’s first attempt at Evil!Tilly ans Issac’s Scottish accent are Wonderful and Good u_u Also well acted.

This is kind of detail oriented but: the “comet” the Fed uses on their command insignia strikes me as almost an inversion of the sword through earth insignia the Empire uses. Don’t know if that’s intentional or just some iconoclastic observation of my own but, if it IS intentional, that’s another great little world-building detail.

That the Emperor would 1)send Burnham to deal with a rebellion personally, and 2) personally respond to Burnham’s death, when their initial intel spoke of a “faceless emperor”(suggesting a buffering bureaucracy) is a big sign they had a personal connection.

The “Destiny” exchange was weird at the time, but much creepier knowing Mirror!Lorca’s history of grooming Burnham.

Obvsl there was nothing on Defiant in the datacube. The Rebels Burnham finds know nothing of the Federation or Defiant(if such intel were on a random datacube, it’d have to be well-known), and the files accessible from Shenzhou are under heavy security(such that Burnham has to access them clandestinely), only to those captain or higher, and heavily redacted even then. And the complete, unredacted files are only available from the Palace-ship. There’s no way the rebels would have gotten access to that.

I feel like Tyler not, actually, being Tyler is going to be important to the Lorca plotline somehow. Like: Perhaps Lorca knew Mirror!Tyler, and that’s why he recruited him, and he’s relying on Tyler to act in certain vague ways like the Tyler he knew(as he is with Burnham and others), but at some significant point Tyler’s going to do something Voqish that upsets Lorca’s plans significantly.

“Well my mother would definitely approve” at her straightened, blonded hair, is such a small line, but it adds so much more nuance to Tilly’s relationship with her mom which, until now, has been portrayed as entirely positive(at least, iirc). Also a bit disappointing that negative attitudes towards curly and red hair still persist in the 23rd century |:T |:T

Burnham’s mastery of metaphor is… Masterful(X| X| X|) “Painted Rust” damn! I wonder if that’s a Vulcan thing; they do love aphorisms

I don’t like that they killed Culber. I understand the narrative inevitability of it -there has to be a payoff to Tyler being, I’m pretty sure, an engram patterned over a surgically altered Voq and Culber’s the only doctor we know on the ship- but given the persistence of “kill your gays” writing, and how good this show typically is on that and many other fronts, I’d have preferred them writing something else. Even if they find a way to “resurrect” him.

Voq knowing all the access codes on Discovery is… Ominous :| :|

The short, shifting look of pride/affection/approval/attraction on Keyla’s face when Burnham walks into the bridge over Connor’s corpse gives me Life u_u

I feel like there is A Lot of Voq in that speech Tyler gives to Burnham at the end of the ep; as if he’s speaking from Voq’s own experience hiding among enemies without realizing it.

#Star Trek #ST: Discovery #ST: Disc s1 e10 #Despite Yourself(Episode)#Discovery Spoilers #Gr8 Art #zA's Outside Viewing #TV Reviews #Reaction Posts

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youre-on-a-starship · 7 years

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Prompt: “one where reader just had a break up with her abusive boyfriend and kirk becomes her new one?” - Anon

Word Count: 2,273

Warnings: Mentions of abuse, physical, emotional, and mental to varying degrees.

Author’s Note: This story has been eating at me for a while. It was incredibly challenging to get into this mindspace and ultimately to write this piece. I have mercifully never been in an abusive relationship, so I am not sure how this would realistically play out. I want to extend my gratitude to my friend who shared some experiences with me so that I could try to make this sound in some way correct. Please heed the warnings here. We’re getting pretty much exactly what Anon asked for. Take care of yourselves. I pray that you can find someone, either a partner or a friend, who makes you feel as safe as you deserve to be.

—

This was a bad idea. This was a bad idea. This was a bad idea.

You clutched your glass of water and stared at the condensation patterns on the side. Nyota touched her elbow to yours. You looked up and she gave you a small smile and a nod, encouraging you that you were doing well. If staying in one place for half an hour while the bar slowly filled up with people was doing well, well then.

Lifting the glass to your lips, you took a long sip as someone took the empty seat on your other side.

“Lieutenant, haven’t seen you out in a while.”

You touched the glass back to the soggy cardboard coaster and looked sideways at your captain.

“I’ve been busy, Sir.”

“Oh come on, we’re on leave. Call me anything but that.”

“Um…” you glanced down at your hands before looking at his, draped gracefully around a scotch tumbler. The acrid aroma tickled your nostrils and you tried not to cringe at the smell.

“Kirk. Jim,” he suggested, leaning in slightly.

“Kirk,” you felt a grin looming on your lips. His easy smile made you feel at ease, and that made the pit in your stomach twinge.

“How have things been? Ensign Roberts left awfully abruptly, then we didn’t see you much after that. I was starting to get worried,” he set his lips earnestly and squinted as he listened.

“I’ve just had a lot of paperwork lately,” you muttered noncommittally, nudging Nyota’s arm with your elbow.

She turned to look at you and you heard her make a low noise.

“Kirk,” she said in an upbeat tone. You knew the two were already good friends. Maybe he’d rather talk to her. “When did you get here?”

“Just sat down,” he nodded behind him at the Snooker tables, “been cheating Bones out of his spending money.”

“You’re horrible to him,” she snickered, leaning in closer so that her arm pressed against yours reassuringly.

She talked you into coming out tonight. After five weeks, it was time you got out just to see other lifeforms, she said. Granted, Nyota came to visit you nearly every day to make sure you were alright, particularly on the days you had off and she worked. Eric left last month in a flurry of activity. No one ever asked why he requested his transfer. You never told anyone. Nyota danced around the subject once or twice, but you wouldn’t tell her. You didn’t plan on telling her or anyone else what happened. All you needed was a nice, tidy break and then maybe, one day, you’d start feeling like a normal person again.

“He has his moments too, you know,” Kirk grinned and sucked back the rest of his glass. “So what are you ladies up to? You’ve been sitting here for a while, gonna come play something?”

“I think I’m good here,” you said, trying to keep the mounting worry in your chest instead of your throat where he could hear it.

“We’ll think about it,” Nyota said.

Kirk nodded and looked down at his empty glass, pushing it back.

“I don’t think we’ve ever talked much, Lieutenant,” he said.

Your eyes widened as you wished he’d leave you be, especially with that damn smell on his breath.

“We haven’t,” you agreed.

“What do you do for fun?” Kirk asked.

“Nothing much,” you answered, squeezing your glass in your hand, letting it chill your skin through.

“We’ve been out here for two years, you’re telling me you don’t do anything fun?” he looked sideways at you with a playful grin on his face.

“I read,” you conceded, feeling that familiar pang in your chest that you got when you spoke with Nyota.

“Reading is good,” Kirk nodded, “I read, too. Read anything good lately?”

You balked inside, trying to remember what the last thing was you read. The words were all mushing together in your head in a sort of cognitive soup.

“I just finished the latest issue of the Journal of Applied Xenolinguistics,” you said. Was that the last issue? You acquired that months ago…

“The one with the article about Romulan morphology?”

“Yes.”

Thank God, it was the right one.

“I had trouble pulling that one apart, maybe we could hash it out together sometime?” he suggested.

“Maybe,” you couldn’t bring yourself to say no, even though you so desperately wanted to. This was a bad idea.

“I’d be happy to run over it with you, Kirk,” Nyota piped up on your other side.

“Uh, yeah, thanks,” he said sniffing and looking over the bar at the lines of bottles on the wall.

After his third whiskey, Eric usually switched it up to a local specialty. This starbase had a lot of interesting liquors to choose from. He’d have a field day.

The bartender passed by and followed Kirk’s gaze.

“What’ll it be?”

“You know what, I think I’ll just have water, thanks,” he flashed a charming smile before turning his attention back to you. He didn’t start talking right away as though he could see the relief flowing through your chest.

“Y/N, are you okay here for a moment? I need to find the little girls’ room,” Nyota touched your arm. When you nodded at her, she slipped out of her stool and crossed the bar.

“I love this song,” Kirk said, nudging you in the ribs as he started swaying slightly in his seat. It took you a second to realize he was, in fact, swaying to the music. “Do you want to dance?” He laid a hand on your forearm, tugging slightly to urge you out of your seat.

Your heart clenched at the firm contact and you felt your jaw clench. Kirk seemed to notice, too, because he loosened his grip, although he didn’t lift his hand. Taking the initiative, you raised your other hand and closed your hand around his wrist, only touching him with the pads of your thumb and middle finger and lifting him from your skin.

“I’d prefer not to, thank you,” you said.

Kirk was quiet for a moment after he retracted his hand, rubbing his palms together and staring at the glass of water the bartender placed in front of him. He reached out and lifted the glass to his lips, draining the entirety of it before replacing it and sliding from his chair.

“I’m really sorry,” he said, looking you straight in the eye. “Uhura’s back.”

You turned slightly to see Nyota retaking her seat and when you looked back Kirk was already half-way back into the crowd.

–

“Lieutenant!” it was Kirk’s voice behind you as you walked down the boardwalk enjoying the sun.

You took a deep breath and turned around.

“Captain,” you greeted, lifting your hand to shield your eyes from the light.

Kirk was jogging to catch up. He skidded to a halt about six feet from you, leaving you lots of space. A shot of ice ran down your spine. Did he know?

“How are you today?” he asked.

“Just fine, and yourself?”

“Good, I’m, I’m good,” he stuffed his hands in his pockets before withdrawing them again and pressing his palms together. “I’m really sorry about last night.”

“There’s nothing to apologize for, Captain,” you said, the knot you spent the morning unwinding in your stomach beginning to reform itself.

“I feel the need to anyway,” he couldn’t figure out what to do with his hands while he spoke. He clasped them behind his back as you pressed your lips together. “I don’t want to press, but I… I think I understand. At least a little. My step-dad… he wasn’t a very nice guy. Isn’t a very nice guy. Anyway, if you need… if you need someone to talk to, or if you need someone bigger than Uhura to walk with you anywhere, please let me know.”

“Thank you, Captain, that’s…” what was that? It was nice. It was unsettling. It was reassuring. “Thank you.”

He nodded with a hesitant smile.

“Have a good day, Lieutenant.”

“The same to you, Captain,” just as Kirk started to turn away you had an impulsive thought. Was it a bad idea? “Um, if you’re walking this way, I wouldn’t say no to some company.”

Kirk blinked at you for a moment, chewing on his lip before falling into step a pace to your left.

The pair of you walked in silence for several minutes, coming up alongside a farmer’s market dealing in all kinds of colourful fruit and vegetables from every planet you could think of.

“Hungry?” Kirk asked, pointing at a stand of pears.

The closer you looked at them the more they looked like real, honest-to-God Bartlett pears.

“I haven’t had one of those in ages,” you breathed, recalling the sweet taste and gritty texture, one of the flavours of your childhood.

“May I get you one?” he asked.

You nodded with a small smile, feeling that pang again. You couldn’t suppress a smile as you bit into the pear he handed you. The sweet juice filled your mouth and made memories of summers with your family explode in the forefront of your mind.

Kirk started eating his own with a similar smile.

“Thank you,” you said when you swallowed. “That’s really nice of you.”

“My pleasure,” he smiled. “God, this is good.”

“My mom used to buy these all the time,” you said, as you started leading him between the stalls, passing a stand of Andorian moonfruit. “We used to go sit at the park, one of the old fashioned ones, and we’d eat them while we sat on the swings. Last time I was home she had some out on the table when I got there.”

“These were a treat for me,” Kirk said. “Mom only bought them once in a blue moon. They just didn’t occur to us. We were an apples and oranges kind of family.”

“Mom’s really into food,” you said as you took another bite.

“I think it’s starting to grow on me,” Kirk said as he finished his fruit. “All this diplomacy has really pulled me away from the meat and potatoes.”

“What’s the best thing you’ve ever had?”

“I had this… I don’t even know, it was kind of like a curry but it was sweet? It had these pearl-looking things in it that exploded when you bit them. That was on Lothasi Gamma a few months ago.”

“I remember Spock remarking on that meal, actually,” you said, waving a finger. “He doesn’t usually discuss his food. It must have been some meal.”

“It really was,” Kirk agreed. “What’s your favourite?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” you thought about all the wonderful food your mom made you when you were at home, and about all the food you had the opportunity to try while you were out here. You thought about the comments Eric would inevitably make every time you finished your plate when you ate together. Your pear rested between your fingers half eaten. The temptation to finish it was starting to flower in your stomach; it was not a feeling you were used to. “Pears, I guess.”

Kirk looked at the ground. Had he heard the downturn in your voice?

“Did you have plans today?” he asked.

“Not particularly,” you said before quickly following up with, “I have some new journals that I need to read at some point.”

“As riveting as that sounds,” Kirk looked sideways at you, “I heard about this communal concert thing happening a few blocks from the barracks this afternoon. Do you like music?”

“I do.”

“Would you maybe want to go see it?”

“How does a communal concert work?” you asked, following him back onto the boardwalk as you emerged from the fruit stalls.

“From what I understand everyone just brings their own instrument, or they don’t, and everyone just kind of… jams together. It happens every so often, and they’re supposed to be well attended, so it’s kind of loud; I’d understand if you didn’t want to come along.”

“That sounds like fun,” you considered the scenario. This feeling in your gut wasn’t something you got every day. You got it around Nyota. You occasionally got it around Spock. And now here’s Kirk, making that same feeling of safeness wash through you. It was broad daylight. Afternoon on a planet not known for its drinking culture. Maybe this wasn’t a bad idea.

“I think Uhura and Spock might like it, too,” Kirk added on.

“When we get back over that way we can find them and see,” you said, sidestepping a few inches closer to him as you made your way down the boardwalk. He didn’t make a move to touch you but you saw the edges of his features crinkle in a small smile.

“When?” he repeated with a note of happiness in his voice.

“It’s such a nice day out, it would be a waste of real sunshine to go rushing right back,” you looked at him as you continued down the street. “Unless you have some journals that need reading, too?”

He laughed.

“No, I think those can wait a day or two. Or three. I’d like to pretend to be a normal person for a little while longer.”

He looked at you sideways again and you felt your feet carry you another few inches closer to him so that you were only a foot apart at the elbows. Although there was still a knot in your stomach, the rushing of panic in your ears was finally quiet. Maybe this wasn’t a bad idea.

#star trek #star trek imagine #imagine star trek #jim kirk #captain kirk #james t kirk #kirk imagine #imagine kirk #jim imagine #imagine jim #kirk x reader #reader x kirk #jim x reader #reader x jim

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britesparc · 5 years

Text

Weekend Top Ten #367

Top Ten Star Trek Characters I’d Like to See in the New Picard Series

I grew up as a Star Wars fan, but I’ve always had a soft spot for Star Trek. Slow-paced and contemplative, I like its depiction of futuristic submarine warfare in space; its focus on morality and ethics over bombastic heroism; and, above all, its depiction of a future where we all, more or less, get along. I came to the franchise via the original movies (The Voyage Home and The Wrath of Khan being particular favourites when I was young), but my introduction to the various series came via The Next Generation. Although it’s understandably dated now (it’s over thirty years old, after all), I think it best nails what I consider the core Trek trait of morally upright people trying to maintain their sense of decency as they navigate the choppy waters of space and intergalactic diplomacy. Central to this, of course, is Sir Patrick Stewart’s epoch-defining portrayal of everyone’s favourite patriarch, Captain Jean-Luc Picard. Unquestionably the best captain, but also – like Martin Sheen’s Jed Bartlet or Chris Evans’ Steve Rogers – a profound performance of a super-straight, moral, upstanding bloke who is dedicated to being a firm ethical foundation upon which an entire franchise can be built.

All this is a typically long-winded way of saying I’m super-stoked about the upcoming Star Trek series that will catch up with Picard twenty years after we last saw him in Nemesis.

I’m primed for it, too: as well as enjoyed the new episodes of Discovery, I’m also about halfway through a re-watch of The Next Generation. I say re-watch, but to be honest I’ve probably only seen about a third of the episodes before (like I said, I came to the franchise through the films); and even then, I watched it in a disorganised and random fashion, catching episodes on TV over the years. So following the story from beginning to end for the first time has been something of a revelation, and one I’m thoroughly enjoying revelling in.

Anyway, if you’re bringing back Picard and going back to the best era of Star Trek – the Next Gen era – then who else do you bring back? I’m not expecting (or even desiring, really) a new Enterprise-focused series with the whole crew. But pretty much all versions of Trek are defined by their characters, by the interplay between the actors, and the sense of a constructed family that emerges. I’m assuming that some reference, at least, will be made to all of the main crew – Riker, Troi, Crusher, La Forge, and Worf – but what about the various supporting characters, love interests, nemeses, and – yes – dear departed Datas? Well, as you can imagine, I’ve got a few ideas. So here we go: ten Star Trek characters I’d like to see back in the Picard show (apart from the ones listed above, natch).

Data: what? But he’s (a) one of the main cast and (b) dead! Well, yes. I know in the comics at least Data’s android brother B-4 absorbed Data’s memories and, essentially, our favourite android was resurrected. Well, I’m sort-of in favour of that, but I’d like it to be a slow, painful, morally-compromised affair; perhaps Data’s personality is surfacing underneath B-4’s rudimentary programming, leading to an android in some degree of pain. Whatever, having Brent Spiner come back as a reminder of Picard’s lost friend and also what I imagine he would see as his own personal failure, would serve as a valuable plot point and also tie up the loose end left dangling in Nemesis (but, for what it’s worth, it would also be nice for a Trek character to die and stay dead).

Q: it has to be Q. He has to be in it. I would be entirely in support of Q being the main antagonist or even co-lead of the show; Q taking a tired and ageing Picard on one last bizarre voyage. Maybe Q claims he can “cure” Data and restore his personality, and Picard follows him on a quest to “save” his friend? See, two birds with one stone. Triple bonus points if they get John de Lancie to make some kind of My Little Pony in-joke.

Guinan: her wisdom and counsel was often very beneficial to Picard during TNG, so it would be great to see her back, even if it’s just for a cameo. I know from her recent interview with David Tennant that Whoopee Goldberg would be up for it. Plus maybe we could get more of her contentious backstory with Q?

The Borg Queen: Picard’s relationship with her in First Contact, and the delicious, flirtatious portrayal of her by Alice Krige, was a highlight of that film. I’ve not seen all of Voyager, but my understanding is that a great deal of the Borg threat is neutralised by the end of the series, so seeing the Queen return to further torment Picard would be interesting. Alternatively, perhaps he’s having some kind of regressive visions due to his old assimilation?

Wesley Crusher: yes, I know, I’m trying to avoid “main” characters, but Young Wesley left the show halfway through, so I’m counting him in this time. His final appearance saw him flitting off with the weird space-wizard “Traveler” to learn the Force, or something. I know he cameoed in Nemesis at Riker and Troi’s wedding, but I don’t recall seeing him in the final film, unless he’s in the background somewhere. Nevertheless, I like the idea that he rejoined Starfleet, and perhaps by now he’s a Captain himself. But what’s his relationship with Picard like nowadays, seeing as he saw the Captain as a surrogate father-figure during his time on the Enterprise? And if he does have mystical space-wizard powers, how is he putting them to use?

The USS Enterprise: yes, that’s right, I’m counting it as a character even though it’s a spaceship. Is the Enterprise-E still in operation twenty or so years later? Probably, as they seem to use starships for quite a long time (maybe because they go back to stardock every three episodes to get a refit or something). But even though I don’t think the series should be set on the Enterprise, it’d still be good to catch up with the old ship and see how life is progressing back there. Who’s the captain now? Riker would be the obvious choice, but I’m gonna go with Worf. I like Worf.

Sela: my apparent predilection for resurrecting actors knows no bounds! Last we saw of Sela, I seem to remember, was when her attempted invasion of Vulcan went tits-up. She didn’t appear on Romulus during Nemesis; where is she now, what’s she doing? Romulus was destroyed at the beginning of 2009’s Star Trek; let’s assume she escaped that tragedy. Is she in favour or better relations with the Federation? Was she disgraced following the Vulcan incident? Did she, like Nero, blame Spock for the destruction of Romulus? Regardless, it’d just be nice to bring back Denise Crosby for an episode or so, and seeing that (as far as I can gather, reading between the lines), the aftermath of Romulus’ destruction will play into the storyline, we need some recognisable Romulans.

O’Brien: I’m gonna be honest, this is just because I want to see more Colm Meany. I love his appearances in TNG, and he was often a good source of humour on the show. Plus we need more Irishmen in space. I think the plot of the series should involve Picard essentially commandeering a ship to follow Q on a quest to resurrect Data, and the captain of this ship should be O’Brien. There you go. Writes itself.

A character from the wider world of Trek: we’re all used to shared universes nowadays, but arguably Trek got there first, with characters flitting from TNG to DS9 to Voyager back in the day. I mean, O’Brien is king of this, really, going from recurring in TNG to starring in DS9. But he’s a special case and I love me some Colm Meany regardless. No, it’d be nice if we could briefly catch up with some of the other contemporary Trek families. Perhaps Sisko? Or Voyager’s Doctor? Alternatively – and this is where I’m descending into rampant fanning speculation – what about a time-displaced Michael Burnham? I’ve got this crazy theory that, in Discovery, she is the Red Angel and the current season will end with her catapulted into the future. Perhaps she bumps into Picard? Or – and this idea has literally just come to me – the Prime-universe Gabriel Lorca, who was similarly thrust through time when trying to escape from the Mirror Universe.

Ian McKellen: I mean, good god, how great would that be?

So there you go. Sadly no time for Vash, my favourite of Picard’s love interests, and who would be fun to bump into for an episode. I also think serial Trek-actors like James Cromwell, Clint Howard, and Jeffrey Combs should cameo as various aliens. And, like I said at the beginning, I want to see all the TNG regulars at some point. This might be the list bite of the TNG cherry, so what became of our faves? We demand to know! Well, not demand, but it’d certainly be nice.

Finally, a suggestion: it is common among Star Trek series for the title to be the name of the ship or station upon which the story is set. Deep Space Nine, Voyager, Enterprise, Discovery. In this vein, I think the plot of the new series should involve the launch of a new starship, which is called… the USS Picard. Picard himself, a retired admiral now, is on board for the maiden voyage when… something happens. The plot intervenes. And then they’re off on some grand quest in the galaxy (like I said, maybe involving Q, Data, and Captain O’Brien). As such, the title of the series would be… Star Trek: Picard.

You’re welcome, fellas.

#top ten #tv #star trek #picard #discovery #the next generation #movies #patrick stewart #q

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antimatterpod · 3 years

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Transcript - Transcript - 57. A Tale of Two Romulan Commanders

You can listen to the original episode here.

Anika: It seems like everyone is maneuvering and everyone is looking out for themselves or their interests.

Liz: I mean, hashtag Romulans.

Liz: Welcome to Antimatter Pod, a Star Trek podcast where we discuss fashion, feminism, subtext and subspace, hosted by Anika and Liz. That's me.

This week, we're talking about the only two episodes of The Original Series to feature Romulans: "Balance of Terror" and "The Enterprise Incident".

Anika: A first season episode and a third season episode.

Liz: Isn't it wild that the Romulans are so important to Star Trek and yet they only appear twice?

Anika: I think it's -- they're very memorable.

Liz: Yeah. And unlike the Klingons, they have that connection with Vulcan and--

Anika: Vulcan.

Liz: Spock, basically.

Anika: Yes, precisely. And the Klingons took over. As soon as the movies and Next Generation were around, the Romulans had much -- the Romulans were almost working for the Klingons in those later--

Liz: Yeah, they were sidelined.

Anika: It's interesting. It's interesting. And we've discussed how thrilled I am that they're having a renaissance.

Liz: This is a pro-Romulan podcast.

Anika: It's interesting to go back to the beginning of the Romulans and try to really watch it from a perspective of, you know, not "these are my favorite aliens since I was--"

Liz: Yes.

Anika: "--twelve." You know, it's interesting.

Liz: Sort of trying to piece together how we would feel about them without the baggage of everything else.

Anika: Right. It's hard, especially "The Enterprise Incident", it's really hard.

Liz: Oh, I know. I know.

Anika: "Balance of Terror" is more -- even within the context of that episode, we learn so little about Romulans in that episode, and it's much more about the personalities of the Romulans and the humans than it is about the race.

Liz: We get intriguing glimpses though, the business about the Praetor, and the junior officer who is more loyal to the politics and the Praetor than to his own commander, and so forth. I really love that stuff. And it feels like the foundation for everything that will come.

Anika: Those Roman Romulans!

Liz: I'm on the record as saying that I -- like, I think "Balance of Terror" is good, and I respect it, but I don't enjoy watching it. I was surprised at how much fun I had this time. And I think that's, in part, because I've watched a lot of submarine movies since the last time I watched the episode, and I have more appreciation for the tropes.

Anika: I was gonna say, so you see that that part of it? And respect it as a genre as opposed to just Star Trek?

Liz: Yes. And submarine movies are not really something that I watch because I love the characters, they're because I love the tension. So that that really worked this time.

But also, in talking to you about the character of Kirk, I really enjoyed what they did with him in "Balance of Terror", and the way he's so young, but he's so paternal with his officers. It's so interesting. McCoy's whole, "don't destroy the one named Kirk," you know, "there are millions of galaxies and billions of people, and only one James Kirk" felt like such a wonderful statement of the series' humanism.

Anika: Yes, I agree. And I think this episode does a lot of heavy lifting for the relationships between Kirk and McCoy, and how Spock is viewed by the rest of the crew. You know, how even if he didn't have a connection to the Romulans, like, he's sort of an -- he's the outsider. And I know that intellectually, like, that's his character description. But, again, because Spock has now been around for so long, and he's so central to Star Trek, it's hard to think of him as the underdog.

Liz: Yes, yes. And it's interesting to me that we have "Balance of Terror", where Spock is subject to the bigotry of another crewman, and then we have "The Enterprise Incident" two years later, where the Romulans are sort of trying to play on his experience of bigotry to say, "Wouldn't you be happier among Romulans?" and he's going, "Actually, no, I belong with the Federation. I'm not not fully human and not fully Vulcan, but I'm totally Federation."

Anika: It's definitely clear in "The Enterprise Incident" that they have a giant file on everybody in the Enterprise and that's what I want to know [about]. I want all of the details on how they are getting this information, and how it's presented to the Romulans, you know, to the Praetor and then the military, and then to the individuals. There's these layers there. That's why I'm so obsessed with these Romulans, there are just so many layers to it.

Liz: I was wondering if the Romulan officers have standing orders to try to recruit any Vulcan they encounter. Like, ideally high ranked Starfleet officers, but literally any Vulcan they can get their hands on. I think that feels very political, and sort of in line with the allegations that North Korea is very into abducting South Koreans when they can, and also ties in with Diane Duane's plot about the Romulans sort of being a bit obsessed with Vulcans and their abilities, and hating and fearing them, but also really wanting to be part of them.

Anika: I think that that is definitely a throughline through the Romulan stories, even in the first, in "Balance of Terror", when all they know about each other is this military intel spy stuff, right? They don't have any personal interactions or knowledge.

And the Romulan Commander -- Not Spock's Dad -- he envies the Federation, in that he -- this is gonna sound not to be super political, but I'm very political these days. Because I'd like to, you know, here's my world. It's horrible, and very political, literally everything you do is political. And with this pandemic, all of the problems existed before the pandemic, but now they are exposed for literally everyone to see, like, no one can escape them at this point. And one of those is that we force people to work until they die.

So this guy, this one Romulan Commander, he just wants to go home and be a farmer, and live out his life. He reminds me of people who are, like, forced into the military for whatever reason, either because it's actually a mandate for their culture, or because they can't afford to, like, go to medical school otherwise, kind of thing. And then they're stuck, you know, working off this debt to their society. And it's like, they've done it, he's done it.

This guy should be allowed to retire and have his wife and his family and his farm, and instead, he dies. And it's just like, why? Why did that happen? Other than that we don't care about people. And so, you know, not to say that America has more in common with the Romulans. But...

Liz: But...

What strikes me is that, between these two episodes, the Federation doesn't really necessarily have much of a moral high ground? Like, yes, the Romulans have been carrying out these unprovoked attacks on what appears to be civilian outposts along the neutral zone.

But two years later, Kirk is just literally going into Romulan space to conduct an espionage mission, and plausible deniability is literally discussed. It's interesting that the Federation has not held up as morally superior to the Romulans.

Anika: I mean, you don't think it is? Because I got the impression that, because it was Kirk and Spock, we were on their side and they're doing the right thing.

Liz: Oh, yeah, absolutely.

Anika: So it didn't seem to me, like, if there is a moral we -- it was definitely, "the Romulans are bad and whatever we have to do to beat them is okay". Which isn't something I agree with on any level, but--

Liz: I don't know if it's necessarily that black and white, because if it were, the Romulans would not be so likable.

You know, we really respect the Mark Lenard Romulan Commander, and he's been basically carrying out terrorist attacks along the border. And the Joanne Linville Romulan Commander is so smart and charming, and a character you really enjoy spending time with. I don't think they would be that likable if the intent was for us to hate them.

Anika: I can see that. They're definitely likable. I don't know that they're -- well, yeah, no. Okay. I will concede the point.

Liz: Not necessarily admirable. But...

Anika: Maybe sympathetic.

Liz: I think that's it. I think, you know, Spock genuinely hurts the Linville Commander when he betrays her. And you get the impression, that in another life, the Lenard Commander would have been a really stand up, decent guy.

Anika: Right? Yes. If he wasn't stuck being that guy? Yeah.

Liz: Yeah. Well, that's the thing. He is so decent and honorable that we just overlook all the people he's killed.

I just want to say the Linville Commander doesn't have a body count.

Anika: Well, I mean, even if I completely erase Diane Duane's take on it from my mind, the Linville Commander, simply because she's a woman in the '60s...

Liz: Yes.

Anika: I assume that she had to work three times as much for every inch of power that she got in that society. Now, I know that, since then, we've seen the Romulans as kind of matriarchal, that they definitely have a lot of women in high places.

Liz: But that's a new thing. And it's sort of evolved from the force of Linville's presence.

Anika: Right. And definitely, in this one, again, simply because it was made in, you know, 1969, and where feminism was at that point, I just assume that she's this ... I don't know, like a Hillary Clinton figure, who, by the time she gets to be in power, everyone hates her because of all the things she had to do to get there.

Liz: You certainly don't get the impression that her subcommander has any strong feelings for her either way. Subcommander Tal, who looks like Peter Capaldi.

Speaking of feminism in the '60s, I was going through old zines, and I was really surprised to learn that the fans, the female fans of the '70s really, really hated this character. And it was partially that she made the moves on Spock, and how dare she, and partially because she does lose in the end, and they felt like it was a story about putting a woman in her place and depriving her of her power.

Anika: I mean, I guess I can see that argument, but I didn't -- I don't know. It probably is because I am biased, but I never felt like -- I felt like she -- her power is very tenuous to begin with. And honestly, Mark Lenard's, too.

Liz: Yeah, you constantly expect them to get a knife in the back.

Anika: Neither of them seem to be, like, commanding their crews in a way -- they're not they're not Kirk, you know? People aren't going to line up to fall on a bomb for him. Like, neither of them seem to have that ... Loyalty? I don't know. That … that presence. They just have the--

Liz: The camaraderie comes from being part of a democracy.

Anika: Yeah. Yes. It seems like everyone is maneuvering and everyone is looking out for themselves or their interests.

Liz: I mean, hashtag Romulans.

Anika: Right, exactly. But it doesn't feel to me like Spock put this woman in her place, who -- no, she wasn't she wasn't a woman in power to begin with.

Liz: But I think it's also that, but also, that sort of urge that any female character must be perfect and flawless and never make mistakes. And she does make mistakes -- she's attracted to Spock, she lets that interfere with her judgement. And he is also attracted to her, but he is a Vulcan and therefore doesn't. And I guess one point to logic, zero points to Romulans.

Anika: But don't you think Spock would be happier if he ... just saying.

Liz: I would love to see AOS Spock where the AOS Romulan Commander is somehow helping Spock with the rebirth of Vulcan.

Anika: Oh yeah, you know what? In AOS they definitely got to make up with the Romans much quicker.

Liz: Yeah, I realise that at this point in time, they still don't know that the Romulans are related to Vulcans. But that could be a whole movie. Call me, Paramount!

Anika: Apparently it was trending on Twitter earlier that Zachary Quinto wants to play Spock again. So let's go.

Liz: Yeah, yeah, we'll go for it. I love his work.

Anika: And I should say it was trending on Star Trek Twitter. Actual Twitter is very busy right now.

Liz: There's some stuff going on.

Anika: Yeah, just a few things.

Liz: But yeah, I think despite her flaws -- maybe because of her flaws -- I love the Romulan Commander, the Linville one. I quite like Sarek Commander, and I like to think that he has a nice husband at home. And he's a really, really good dad, and he has a great relationship with all of his kids. And...

Anika: He's the anti-Sarek. I mean, I love the Romulan -- wait. The Linville Romulan -- this is hard. They need names.

Liz: I'm very mad that neither of them have names. Why does her subcommander have a name, and she doesn't?

Anika: Right? Because if you they were trying to make a whole, you know, the commanders don't have -- this is one of those things that it's like, now we, the fandom and, and the authors in -- the [tie-in] authors, in particular, but everybody has come up with reasons why all of these things are. And we've made it part of Romulan culture, but in reality, I think it was just that they didn't give them names.

Liz: It's weird. I wish Dorothy Fontana was around to ask.

Anika: Like, why, what is this? What is going on here? Because, yeah, other people do have names. It's just them.

Liz: Yeah. And all the Klingons we meet have names. So I guess it's part of that whole Romulan secrecy thing, and, you know, their public name and their family name and their secret name. Thank you very much, Michael Chabon, you're forgiven on this count.

But couldn't we at least find out their public names so we don't have to refer to them by their actors'?

Anika: Right. Because it's annoying, especially, like, Lenard Romulan Commander and Linville. It just sounds -- it takes me out of the discussion.

Liz: I'm always on the verge of saying Linley instead of Linville. And I believe Joanne Linley was a different actress altogether. So...

Anika: Whoops! Right.

Liz: This is just one of the things I would change if I could go back in time to fix Star Trek, but it's on my list.

I'm really interested in how Kirk is mirrored with the Lenard Commander, who is -- I won't say logical, but he's sort of stoic and duty bound like Spock. Spock is mirrored with the Linville Commander, who is emotional and sensuous and strategic like Kirk.

Anika: Interesting, I like this.

Liz: It just occurred to me this morning as I was making our outline, and I thought, my goodness, that would be an amazing double date. And it's just -- shipping aside, it's just really interesting how these character types bounce so well off each other.

And, of course, there's also a great deal in common between Kirk and the Lenard Commander, and whereas Spock and the Linville Commander have the sort of contrast you get in a really spiky het pairing. It's a very 1960s seduction.

Anika: It reminds me of how,, in James Bond, there's always like the hot girl that is a tragic figure or a side piece. And then there's the hot girl that is like, he can't be with her for some reason. And, and in the best Bond films, it's that she's on the other side, that she's the enemy. And it reminds me of that kind of relationship.

Liz: So what you're saying is that Mark Lenard is a Bond girl?

Anika: Yes. I mean, I think it can work, you know?

Liz: No, I think I think it makes sense. And I don't really ship anyone with Lenard Commander, because, like, he doesn't even meet these people face to face. And he kills a lot of people, but still, I--

Anika: You keep saying that! I don't even think of it. Like, yes, he's the enemy, and he's the Romulan, and he is -- because he's at that level, like, he's -- again, he's at retirement age, so of course he must have killed people that our crew knew. He's that level of person. And yet it does not factor into my appreciation of him at all.

Liz: That's the thing! It has not factored into mine either! And I'm so interested in how willing I am to overlook that. And will I change my opinion if I keep reiterating, to myself as much as our listeners, that he killed a bunch of people?

And it's kind of like, No, I think he's a great character and I wish he hadn't died, or we could have spent more time with him and ... yeah. Adventures of Romulans in Federation Captivity.

Anika: It reminds me of my strong feelings for the defector Romulan.

Liz: Yes.

Anika: And how I like he is -- in that episode, they straight up say, like, this is his resume of death. Here are all the people he personally killed. And yet, I'm so upset that he dies. I'm so upset that --, you know, his family won't remember him, and they'll destroy his name. And he won't get that Romulan legacy thing. And I'm just really distraught that he -- that the one good thing that he does, in defecting to the Federation and trying to save both sides, is what destroys him. Both physically and, you know, spiritually, I guess. It's just really upsetting.

Liz: Well, you know, we love a redemption arc.

And I think -- we know that the Lenard Commander and the defector whose name I'm blanking on, even though I should know it, neither of them actually had a choice in following out their orders. Romulus is not the sort of state where you can go, "Uh, sir, that is an illegal order, and I'm entitled to not follow it." That's the sort of thing that will get you and your family killed.

It's like the thing we discussed, I think, in our episode about, you know, odo being a terrible fascist collaborator, and how living under a totalitarian regime compromises everyone? [Transcriber's note: That was episode 46: #MeToo: Terok Nor - https://antimatterpod.tumblr.com/post/616682290664357888/46-metoo-terok-nor]

Anika: Yes. And it's -- anytime we bring up Emperor Georgiou, it's like, Emperor Georgiou is a horrible person, yes, but that doesn't mean that she can't have a redemption arc, because she didn't have a choice. That was it. That was the only choice she had.

Liz: Even as a person in power, if she wanted to live, and she wanted her family to live, then, yeah, she had to go along with it. She probably didn't need to eat so many people. But this is why she needs a redemption arc.

Anika: Right. It's just -- I'm always on the side of the people who are terrible, but want to be -- like, for me, all it takes is that you want to be better. That's all. That's all I need from you, and I will be on your side, and I will help you do it.

So, of course, the worse the things you've done -- it's gonna take longer. There's gonna be a lot you have to make up for, you know, but I just -- I always come from a place of, if you're going to go on this road, then I will help you on the road. I will be on the road with you.

Liz: Yeah, yeah, exactly. And so I don't think that Lenard Commander is irredeemable. I just -- I'm so interested that we overlook his crimes.

Let's talk about Lieutenant Riley, the bigoted dickhead on the bridge.

[Liz's note: yes, obviously I meant Lieutenant Stiles. In my defence, Stiles and Riley are basically identical, in that they both have hair and faces and wear the same outfits. Yes, Stiles is addressed by name in dialogue. No, I don't know what difference that makes.]

Anika: Yeah. Well, I -- yes. So I put in our notes here, like, two seconds before we started, that the line -- it's, like, famous, really, at this point, that Kirk says to our bigot, that "bigotry doesn't belong in the bridge. Keep that in your quarters."

Liz: Yes.

Anika: Something like that. And you know, it's like, "Oh, what an amazing, progressive thought to have in the '60s."

First of all, the '60s were progressive, so let's just put that aside. But second of all, it's not actually super progressive to be like, hide your bigotry and it's okay. That's not it, guys.

Liz: It's sort of the starting point for being in a professional environment where there are no telepaths, but...

Anika: It's sort of like sexual harassment in the workplace. You know, I'm sure anyone, everyone, everywhere has had one of those trainings, sexual harassment in the workplace trainings, and like what they hammer into you is that it doesn't matter if you think it's sexual harassment, if the person who's being sexually harassed does, and you are creating a hostile environment by ignoring it, then you are in the wrong.

Liz: Yeah. And there's no need for Riley to confront his bigotry. Like, he's rude about Spock, and then Spock saves his life, regardless of that. And then we're friends again. And it's kind of like ... it's just a bit weak.

Anika: Yeah. I understand that they only had, whatever, 15 minutes to do this whole thing. And he's not in any other episode. He's just this random guy. I understand the shortcomings of the medium for this.

Liz: But to have it still held up in 2020 as an aspirational high point is really...

Anika: Exactly. It's really sad. We really need to progress, guys.

Liz: Yeah. Guys. Come on.

Anika: We need to move forward. Because the truth of the matter is, is that we're probably more bigoted as a society, or -- not as a society, but as individuals with individual groups within the society, because we're so partisan, and we're so entrenched.

The people who are bigots are, you know, we've been fighting against them for forty, fifty, sixty, eighty years, right? So they've become very defensive. They're very entrenched in their beliefs. And it just makes us all become more vocal and more loud. And I'm not saying that's a bad thing. I am super for being as loud and as vocal as possible in opposition to their open bigotry.

But because of that, we can't look at this one moment from 1966, where Kirk says, "Hide your bigotry," as if it's a good thing. Like, we just can't -- we need to say no, no hiding. Get rid of that.

Liz: I also want to say that it's just bizarre to me that Riley is holding a grudge about a war a hundred years ago. Like, my great grandfather fought in the First World War. I don't have any negative feelings towards Germans because of that.

Anika: There's the people who worship the Confederacy, and they're upset about getting rid of their Confederate statues, or saying that you shouldn't fly the Confederate flag at, like, national sporting events. Like, those people exist, and they are those loud, entrenched bigots. And so it's weird. It's weird. It's like that is not unbelievable to me. That, if he was raised in that community of people that -- and he was taught from a very young age that, you know, you hate Romulans.

Liz: Also, I wonder, on a worldbuilding level, is it -- is there this sense of unfinished business? Because we don't know anything about them, we don't know what they look like, we've never met a Romulan face to face, so it's very easy for them to become this terrible boogeyman.

Anika: Oh, absolutely. I mean, imagine if your grandfather fought the Germans, but you never learned about them? Like you never--

Liz: Yeah.

Anika: You never learned about Snow White. You know, like, you only ever learned about people who killed your grandfather's friends.

Liz: Yeah.

Anika: I don't know.

Liz: That is a really interesting way to look at it. I like it a lot.

Anika: I mean, as I said, like, five minutes ago, I am the opposite of this. However, I understand it, or I understand why it would happen. And again, it's all environmental, and what you're brought up with, and what you learn, and what you're surrounded by at all times. Those are the things that are going to affect you the most. Not to be all nature versus nurture, but I think we all have the natural ability to be open minded. But if you're only ever told one story, then that's the story that you're going to cling to.

Liz: Yeah, that's a really good point. And it's sort of -- I'm trying to bring it back to the actual episode and I can't. The pollen is in my brain and it's reproducing.

Fashion!

Anika: Yes! I love it. Okay. So Romulans had terrible fashion.

Liz: Oh, I think it's great.

Anika: As a rule, Romulans have terrible fashion, like, they are the worst. And these episodes are no different. Like, it's worse in TNG, and their ridiculous shoulder pads, and the fact that they all look like they're wearing, you know, used car leather outfits.

Liz: And their pants always look like culottes.

Anika: Oh my god, they're so bad. Everything is bad in The Next Generation. But the tweed, the different layers of bronze and magenta. Like, I don't even know what to call that color blue. But that blue--

Liz: It's like a deep electric blue.

Anika: --tweed is also a bad -- they all look like they kinda -- it kind of reminds me of T'Pol's sofa jumpsuit that she wears for the first two seasons. And so I kind of like that. It's like, oh, look, the Vulcans and the Romulans both wear ridiculous--

Liz: Upholstery....

Anika: Right. Exactly. Upholstery clothes instead of actual fabrics. You know, clothing fabrics, as opposed to making what you make your furniture out of. But...

Liz: But.

Anika: But.

Liz: I always thought that the Romulan costumes, the Romulan uniforms, were crochet. And I finally watched it in HD and I was so disappointed to learn that it's just the print on the fabric. I loved the idea of this evil empire wearing grandma's blankets,

Anika: Me too. Oh my goodness. Like, that's another point in the matriarchy.

Liz: Yes. I guess...

Anika: There we go. But then they also have that ridiculous helmet. Amazing, ridiculous helmet.

Liz: Can we assume the helmet is because they couldn't afford ears for everyone?

Anika: Yes, definitely. We can. But it's also hilarious in every way. I mean, it's, like, spray painted gold. It is so good and so bad. I love it. And then, obviously, I love Linville Romulan Commander. All of her outfits, they're both amazing. She is like, "I'm going to make this tweet work for me, so you better be ready for my tall boots and short skirt."

Liz: It's [the] 1960[s] so she's going to command in thigh high leather boots and a skirt so short that, at one point, it rides up to show her undies.

Anika: It is so ridiculous. But again, this is why I can't take her completely -- I can't take -- like I can take her completely seriously, but I can't take the idea that everyone on that ship respects her as the captain completely seriously.

Liz: I think we just have to uspend disbelief. Like, everyone takes Uhura seriously, and she's wearing an equally brief skirt. I feel like we've become more prudish in the ensuing decades about showing vast expanses of thigh.

Anika: But then she wears that other dress with the swirls.

Liz: I love that dress so much.

Anika: That dress is amazing. That's dress I would wear now--

Liz: I was about to say that!

Anika: --with no qualms. I am ready to wear it. It is perfection and it's timeless.

Liz: It's really wonderful. And I look at the way the print on the fabric works, and how it follows the lines of the dress, and I'm just so impressed with that piece of dressmaking. Like, you know, how HD sometimes makes the costumes look a bit shite? Aside from a little wobbliness in the seams on that dress, I think it holds up really nicely.

Anika: So are we -- do you have anything else to say about fashion? Because I have a ridiculous comment.

Liz: I just enjoy how Spock is kind of offended at Kirk running around in what I'm gonna call earface.

Anika: Yes. I mean, I'm kind of offended. But it's not the ears, it's the makeup.

Liz: Yeah, it really...

Anika: The ears, you know, whatever, even the eyebrows are, you know, passable, but the fact they make him very swarthy is a little upsetting.

Liz: Yeah. And I think they've done the same with Linville, too. Harder to say with Lenard. I don't think he's in so much bronzer, but that -- this was very much an era where they're like, "Hmm. aliens. Let's get some white people and paint them brown."

Anika: It's not great. It's not great, guys.

Liz: I understand that, like, our perception of what brownface is has expanded since the '60s. Like, blackface and brownface, I'm sure, were controversial at the time. But no one would have looked at, for example, T'Kuvma wearing full-length, black latex and gone, "Oh my God, this man is in blackface," which happened with Discovery. And I'm not saying that's an incorrect reaction. I just think that our standards have shifted, and we've become more sensitive to this sort of thing.

Anika: I mean, I think that's probably true that we definitely -- I mean, I would hope.

Liz: Oh, yeah.

Anika: And I hope that we're getting better. I hope that we will continue to grow in this area. And you're right, I think that at that time, it was just makeup.

Liz: Yeah.

Anika: They weren't trying -- I don't even think they were -- like, maybe they were, I'm not gonna say -- I don't know. But it's possible that they weren't consciously trying to be racist, or they weren't saying that this kind of person is evil, and so we're going to color our white people to look like that. I think they were just using the -- again, using the story they knew.

Liz: Yeah, I think it is that -- the makeup for the Klingons and the Romulans is steeped in Orientalism, but I don't think that was a conscious choice.

Anika: Right, exactly. That's what I'm trying to say, that it was definitely true that it was -- that it happened. But it wasn't like they were going out of their way to do it. It just happened because they didn't know any better. And that is not an excuse. And that is a good thing. But it's a reason. I understand, again, where it comes from.

Liz: Exactly.

Anika: I'm not gonna be angry at Joanne Linville for -- she didn't have any control over that. You know, William Shatner didn't have any control over that. So you know, whatever. It's not his fault. I'm not mad at Kirk and I'm not mad at William Shatner. But I am mad at the fact that it happens.

Liz: Mad at the world in general for -- yeah, yeah.

Anika: I'm all over the place today. I'm sorry.

Liz: No, me too. And I guess this is a good time to give our listeners a heads up that I am moving house in a couple of weeks. And for the next two weekends, I will be painting the house I'm moving into. So our next episode could be a little scattershot. Because I'm probably going to have to get up very early in the morning to record it before we go and paint. So sorry.

Anika: Oh my goodness. Well, good luck with all of that.

Liz: Thank you. I've never painted anything except, you know, a canvas. So it's exciting!

Anika: It's a lot of fun, actually to paint walls. You're painting, like, walls and --?

Liz: Yeah.

Anika: It's actually very relaxing. And then, when you're done, you have an amazing sense of accomplishment. In my experience.

[Liz's note: I had an amazing sense of exhaustion. And fresh walls.]

Liz: I'm thinking of putting in, like, a bright magenta feature wall so I can make my study feel like the Linville Commander's office.

Anika: Yes, do it.

Liz: Divide it with a trendy with a translucent pink curtain for Spock to hide behind.

Anika: I really, I mean, you know, I ship them a lot.

Liz: I know.

Anika: That's where I was gonna go earlier. And so I know you have a headcanon that Laris is related to the Romulan Commander, and I'm one hundred percent for that. That's great. And I just want to say that I definitely at one point plotted a whole arc about how Saavik was their daughter.

Liz: I mean, she was half-Romulan, half-Vulcan!

Anika: Right. She was half-Romulan and half-Vulcan and like, Kirstie Alley kinda has the facial features. And then Robin Curtis has the hair. So it's sort of like, I can see it.

Liz: No, I can see it.

Anika: It works.

Liz: And it's like, "Well, I've had this kid and I don't think she's going to be very happy, she's not very happy growing up as a Romulan, maybe you would like to take care of her.". And Sarek is like, "A surprise grandchild?!"

Anika: Exactly! See, like, I think it would actually -- we wouldn't have to change anything in canon, although except maybe when she helped him through Pon Farr.

Liz: I was gonna say, we have to change the bit where they have sex.

Anika: But we can just ignore that.

Liz: I already do.

Anika: David can help him through Pon Farr.

Liz: Oh no, that's a new pairing.

Anika: I think it's kind of sweet.

Liz: I think Kirk is going to have some issues.

Anika: Anyway, I think that my main comment is that I'm really sad that she's never mentioned ever again in canon. Like, there's this whole book series, which I love. We've discussed that. [See episode 47: Pride and Prejudice in the Original Romulan - https://antimatterpod.tumblr.com/post/617951478179676160/47-pride-and-prejudice-in-the-original-romulan] But even there, she's gone, she's exiled. And so she's like a ghost, she's not actually physically there.

And then, like you and I have come up with, like, hey-- and people are like, "Oh, the universe is too small if everyone's related to everyone." And it's like, yeah, okay, but also...

Liz: Which I believe! But some opportunities are too good to pass up.

Anika: Right? And if Harry Mudd gets to have a Renaissance, where is my Romulan Commander? That's all I have to say.

Liz: Okay, concept. Concept, concept. The next AOS movie features the Romulan Commander, Jennifer Garner plays her.

Anika: Yes!

Liz: You know, she's a bit older than Quinto, and she has that sort of sexy maternal vibe. We know she can handle an action scene, but she also has buckets of charisma.

Anika: And we all met her as a spy!

Liz: Yes!

Anika: It's perfect.

Liz: Yep. As usual, it's a mystery to me why the entertainment industry isn't literally beating down my door

Anika: You know what, I wouldn't -- like, they don't even have to pay me at this point.

Liz: Oh, no, they have to pay me. I don't work for free. But I will accept payment in Australian dollars, which is a great deal if you're American. I was going to say, do we have much more to say? Could we just make this a short episode and I can take my pollen-filled head and--

Anika: The only thing I want to say is that I -- I wanted to discuss McCoy. Because I think he has an interesting role in both of these episodes.

Liz: More than usually, he's the voice of reason and humanity.

Anika: Yes. And I think I said earlier that "Balance of Terror" does a lot of heavy lifting for the McCoy and Kirk relationship. And I think just establishing McCoy as that, you know, center, heart and conscience of the Enterprise crew.

Liz: It's actually interesting how little Spock has in terms of an emotional arc in "Balance of Terror".

Anika: What's interesting about Spock in "Balance of Terror" is that it's not about him.

Liz: Yeah. Which I think is sort of a metaphor for bigotry, in a way, that it doesn't really matter who a person is.

But the most interesting thing for Spock in this episode is that he makes a mistake and gives away their location. And that's so unlike him, and it's the closest hint we ever get to the emotional turmoil he may or may not be suffering in terms of the revelations about the Romulans.

I'm sorry, I just need to duck out for five minutes, but just keep recording and resume when I get back?

Anika: Okay.

Liz: Sorry.

Anika: That's okay.

Liz: Are you there?

Anika: Yes.

Liz: So sorry, my breakfast all of a sudden disagreed with me.

I was going to say, it is so interesting how there are things that have sort of been tacked on to the Romulans later on, like the cultural drive for privacy and secrecy, they're sort of present in this episode, particularly the bit in "The Enterprise Incident" where the Romulan Commander receives a message from one of her officers. And it's not an intercom. It's like, conveyed through an earpiece. And just little things like that really pull it all together and make it consistent accidentally.

Anika: But those are the bones that we built all of our canon on.

Liz: I know. And it's great!

Anika: And those headcanons became Romulan culture, because, you know, it's sort of like [how] Hikaru Sulu wasn't Sulu's name until Star Trek VI. Like, he didn't have a first name, but it became his name. It was like the fandom's accepted name. I think it was in a novel at one point. And then in Star Trek VI, he was like, I'm Captain Hikaru Sulu. And that was his name from then on, you know, it was like, it became canon.

And in similar ways, like, everybody talks about Romulan culture until a point where it becomes real, and it becomes part of the actual story.

Liz: Yes, I just love being able to go back and see the seeds of these ideas.

Anika: That's, yeah, absolutely. That's super fun. But so what I was saying about McCoy--

Liz: Oh, yeah, I'm so sorry.

Anika: It's, it's fine. You have to edit this.

It's just that it's interesting to me that in the first episode in "Balance of Terror", he is very, like, "Hey, we should, you know, be friendly, and we shouldn't go to war, we shouldn't assume that they're going to attack us, we definitely shouldn't attack first." And, "Hey, everybody, you know, and let's take some steps back and take a breather."

And in "The Enterprise Incident", he's like, so "I'm meant to pretend that Kirk dies, and then we're going to turn him into a Romulan, so he can totally steal a cloaking device."

And it's like, Okay, what happened to Dr McCoy? But I think it was the first episode, like, I can sort of see an arc for it. And I think that's interesting.

Liz: Yes, and also, I think that there's still a cloaking device mission. If they pull it off, which they did, there are very few casualties. Like, I think one guy's injured, and that's it. And I feel like McCoy--

Anika: From the McCoy standpoint, I think this is what I was getting at poorly. But now I'm going to get at it well. From a McCoy standpoint, "If I help, you know, Kirk plan the trademark Kirk plan, to work and and not kill off anybody on our side or their side, and have this bloodless battle and war, then I will have helped the cause and stopped the battle that would have occurred and the deaths that would have occurred if I didn't do this." I can totally see McCoy talking himself into that.

Liz: Yes, yes. And I also wonder if he came up with the ruse of faking Kirk's death, because it seems to be kind of a go-to move for him generally.

Anika: He did that. He knows how to do that well.

Liz: Yeah. He's had a lot of experience!

Anika: And he's now tricked Vulcans and Romulans into thinking that Kirk's dead, which is, I think, a particular achievement.

Liz: Hashtag goals. Am I right?

Anika: I like that. I mean, obviously, Kirk, Spock and McCoy are the trinity. And so obviously, they're gonna have big roles and stuff, but I liked that they did all get something to do in each of these episodes.

Liz: Yes. I also felt very bad for Chekov, the way Kirk snaps at him in the opening scene. Like, the poor boy is just doing his job, but he doesn't know you're playing a role. Maybe we need some sort of Original Series Lower Decks that's just Chekov going, "Why is the captain picking on me?"

Anika: Poor Chekov. Honestly, Chekov gets yelled at a lot.

Liz: Justice for Chekov.

Anika: He could form a support group with Harry Kim. Which I would love to read if anyone wants to write that for me.

Liz: Yeah, I would go for that. Please, someone write it and send it to us.

Anika: And then, you know, in "Balance of Terror", we have Janice Rand [being] sort of like, "Hey, Captain Kirk, I'm here for you." And then, in "The Enterprise Incident", we sort of have the, "Hey, I know that I've already lost Spock but I'm still gonna keep trying to get Spock" scene with Chapel. It's like, I don't know, they both have this weird -- it's both sort of sad and desperate, but also, you know, okay.

Liz: Yeah, I think it's a mistake to have both the significant recurring female characters in positions of unrequited love. Put it that way.

Anika: Unrequited love. Yeah. And they both had a sort of similar aesthetic. They're very feminine. They're very, like, I don't know, I guess -- it's not like Uhura isn't feminine, so it's all of them, all women on the show.

Liz: I think, particularly, Rand and Chapel seem similar because they're both blonde and they're both a little older than you would expect for that sort of ingenue role. Which is not a criticism. It's just an interesting casting choice.

Anika: I can see that. And they're both in pretty subservient roles. Supportive roles. And because, again, because it was the '60s, they were more subservient than they should have been, perhaps.

Liz: Yes. And they both go on to positions of more authority in the movies.

Anika: Right.

Liz: Not that we ever see much of Chapel as a doctor, but...

Anika: But we know that it happens. And Rand, too, you know, we only get a few glimpses of her, but--

Liz: And the whole Voyager episode--

Anika: The Voyager episode is really -- like, I love that that's our last view of Rand. And it's it's such -- it really, like, repairs her legacy for me, because I can I can imagine everything she was doing in between. And it makes me happy.

Liz: And the way we know Grace Lee Whitney was mistreated on set, it feels like a vindication for her as well. That she gets to have a position of authority, and she gets to have scenes with the first female captain.

Anika: Okay, I'm gonna cry. Anyway--

Liz: Oh, one final thing before we wrap up! You know all these scenes in "Balance of Terror" in phaser control, and manually charging the phasers?

Anika: Yes.

Liz: I think that's really cool. And I really wish that it had been a regular thing in Discovery.

Anika: I mean, that's a super, like, submarine plot thing, right? I feel like every -- and I don't go out of my way to watch submarine movies, but I've definitely seen the popular ones. And I those are the scenes I remember--

Liz: Yeah.

Anika: It takes so long to do everything on a submarine.

Liz: Yes! If that had been incorporated into Discovery, I feel like it would have been a really good way to demonstrate that, even though the effects and the sets and the trappings are much more modern than The Original Series--

Anika: Yes! You know, you're right.

Liz: --this is still an older setting than what we're used to.

Anika: And, you know what, you could even have, like, everything except the spore drive be that way. So the spore drive is its own thing, like, you could have this instantaneous dangerous side. But everything else would be in the old style. I like that idea for grounding Discovery.

Liz: And also for ramping up the tension, and I can just imagine, you know, Lorca drilling the phaser crews endlessly. Not that that show really needs more side characters, but what if it had more side characters?

Anika: Well, I mean, yeah.

Liz: Yeah.

Anika: It'd be good. It'd be good. I like it.

Alright, so do you have any final thoughts on TOS Romulans before we wrap up?

Liz: Mainly that I'm just really glad that Picard has returned us to an era where Romulans can have a variety of hairstyles.

Anika: Yes. I mean, and personalities.

Liz: Yeah! And also, I think Elnor would look super cute in the electric blue uniform with the culottes and the crochet and ... yeah.

Anika: That's kind of cute. Someone out there, draw that for us. Okay? I'll commission you. 'Cos Liz is right and we shouldn't work for free.

Liz: Yeah, yeah. Art is valuable. Even if it's really silly.

Anika: Send me your requirements, and I'll get back to you.

Thank you for listening to Antimatter Pod. You can find our show notes at antimatterpod.tumblr.com, including links to our social media and credits for our theme music.

You can also follow us on Twitter at @antimatterpod, and at Facebook -- search for Antimatter Pod.

If you like us, leave a review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you consume your podcasts. The more reviews, the easier it is for new listeners to find us. We get raised up.

Liz: Yeah.

Anika: And join us in two weeks we'll be discussing the season premiere of Star Trek: Discovery. It's back, guys!

Liz: I'm so, so excited to move on from my feelings about season two. New Trek, new hair, it's going to be great.

Anika: Yes, exactly. I want to put it all down because I continuously get annoyed with Discovery, and I want to go back to loving it.

Liz: I would like have new things to be annoyed at

Anika: That too! That'll work. I just want to be passionate. Any passion is good.

Liz: It's 2020 and I just want to feel something.

Anika: Oh my gosh.

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