038 - The Lost Episode

This week:

• Home Soil, Coming of Age, Heart of Glory

• Devil in the Dark, redux?

• Ugly bags of mostly water

• What is life?

• Is Data alive?  Is Data human?

• Is Data just ChatGPT in a synthetic skin suit?

• I step away while Abbie and Nate continue the conversation, looking ahead to things I haven’t seen

• The love of being wrong

• Observations of ADR and television production

• Picard’s maturity

• Distinct storylines that don’t come together

• Series continuity

• Worf the Stoic

• A Gentleman in Moscow

• I relate to the bad guy – sort of

• Sometimes life isn’t fair

• Only competing against yourself

• Starfleet entrance exams.  What is the test?

• Worf isn’t yet who Abbie remembers

• The challenge of Tasha Yar

• Geordi-vision

• Nate is the biggest nerd on the podcast

• Death in the Federation

• Is TNG better than TOS at this point?

• Picard, the hot head

037 - 11001001

This week:

• 11001001, Too Short a Season, When the Bough Breaks

• Nate concedes a point

• Season 1 has been underwhelming, but we have the best episode yet

• More commentary on the medium of network or syndicated TV

• The holodeck

• Abbie’s anesthesia dream

• Deliberate scientific inaccuracies in Star Trek

• An unrelated story in the Star Trek universe

• 21st century ozone hole

• An appropriate use for Wesley

• What is a society?

• Stories that would work for other series

• Nate really hates Code of Honor

• Looking ahead

036 - The Battle, Hide and Q, Haven

This week:

• Ferengi less cartoonish

• Still difficult to take them seriously as adversaries

• Lore and worldbuilding

• Nate sees Picard giving up early

• A/B storylines and storytelling in Star Trek

• Improvements in the medium over the 1960s

• Suspension of disbelief and faster than light travel

• Solar system versus other star systems

• Nostalgia

• Music in Next Gen

• Returning characters

• Q is kind of weird

• Using Q to explore human nature

• Assuming Q isn’t gone

• More solar system discussion

• We’re nerds

• Personal anecdotes about mutual friends

• Reusing footage from other episodes and movies

• Season 1 released immediately in syndication

• “Bill” Riker?

• Security lapses

• Character actors

• Thoughts on Lwaxana

• More worldbuilding and lore

• Filming order

• Things we miss from The Original Series

• Conflict in Star Trek

035 - Dammit, Wesley!

This week:

• A tribute to Scott Adams

• Where No One Has Gone Before, Lonely Among Us, Justice

• Abbie realizes how annoying Wesley is

• Similar to The Original Series, but different enough

• Thoughts and prayers to get home

• What is the time range of this iteration of the Enterprise?

• Curiosity

• Stoic philosophy

• Self-proclaimed experts and hubris

• Confidence without arrogance

• A body-swap episode?  No way!

• Sherlock Data

• Sometimes efforts and attempts just don’t work

• Security fails again

• Detectives’ Credo and Bayesian analysis

• Unbelievable!!!!! The Movie rabbit hole (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bIaySADwGp4)

• A better job telling an ok story

• Prime Directive

• Captain’s Calculus

• Did Picard consider just surrendering the ship?

• Life is an exercise in exceptions

• Wesley is smart but naïve

• The death penalty

• Broken Window Theory

034 - Never Give Up...Sometimes Surrender

In this episode:

• The Naked Now, Code of Honor, The Last Outpost

• I feel like we’ve seen this before

• An homage?

• Gregg’s 9s and 10s and his one problem with the series

• Gregg doesn’t like Wesley

• Stories are more refined

• Too early to have a “different characters” episode?

• Visionary vs executor

• Aaron’s Data moment

• Feeling like Original Series episodes

• Issues with Tasha Yar

• Even bad Star Trek is still great Star Trek

• Prime Directive discussion

• Minimal character development and bad storytelling

• Terrible ship security

• The Ferengi

• TNG villains

• Picard surrendered the Enterprise

• TNG vs TOS beginnings

• Expectations moving forward

• Swearing in Star Trek

• Excited for more

033 - Encounter at Farpoint

In this episode:

• The premiere of Star Trek: The Next Generation – Encounter at Farpoint

• Joined by my old friend, Gregg

• Gregg’s background with Star Trek

• Felt like a pilot episode, but overall good

• Original Series comparisons

• Star Trek feel with a much bigger scope

• A hopeful future with a bleak near-term view

• Gregg rates a 9 and says it can only go up from here

• Nate’s old technical manuals

• Next Generation trailer

• Target demographics

• Who is the main character?

• Differences between the two series

• Androids and AI

• My questions or things I hope to see

• What we are all looking forward to

• Interesting characters

• Wesley discussion

• Nate was the captain of the quiz bowl team in high school