Six-Night Rule (ENT S3E13)

Here's to the finest crew in starving.

When it comes to my crew, you won't get any argument from me.

This is a parody.

Paramount owns the song.

Welcome to the Greatest Generation.

It's a Star Trek podcast by a couple of guys just a little bit embarrassed about having a Star Trek podcast.

I'm Adam Pranica.

I'm Ben Harrison.

This is the Monday of STLV.

Whoa.

And we're recording this.

This is not the Monday of Pranica Banna, though.

No.

That's next Monday.

Yeah.

Okay.

I mean, if you're listening to this episode on the day it comes out, this could be my last week of life.

This is a prolonged exposure to the temptations of Vegas that Adam Pranica has not accustomed himself to.

I've set up barriers that have served me very well up until this point.

Barriers that most of my friends know about.

Friends that have reached out since we started making it clear that we're going to be at STLV for as long as we are.

People on the side going, hey, I heard about what is now a six-night rule.

If you want to transfer your power of attorney, I might be a good candidate for that.

I'm getting that kind of solicitation.

That's smart.

You could transfer it to me.

I'm not going to do anything.

Oh, I know you wouldn't do anything with that.

Ben, I love you, dude, but you'd be the last person I'd give power of attorney to.

People need to be able to reach you in an emergency situation.

Sure, yeah.

But it might surprise you.

You'd be my fourth person

to whom that has been granted.

What?

Yeah.

I'm going to need you to slide the contact information of those people to me so I can

I think I need to tell them some things

about how much I can be trusted with six days in Vegas, for example.

What are you most worried about?

Like, let's set some expectations.

What?

Because

Vegas is a land of temptation.

Sure.

But it's also temptations that you're not crazy about.

Like

you love a gamble, but you don't have a gambling problem.

And I've seen you drink and enjoy yourself greatly, but you don't have a drinking problem.

No.

You whore around a lot, but I've never seen you take one of those little slips of paper from a guy that's flicking it at you on the strip.

I think you're close to accurate on all of those points.

Yeah, I'm not afraid of the gamble and I'm not afraid of the consumption.

I think what I'm afraid of most, like the number one with a bullet, like, I don't want to get sick.

Yeah.

Being in Vegas that many days, like meeting that many people.

We've run into this on tour.

When we've gone out on tour before and we've met hundreds of people many days in a row, like even an Adam Pranica will come down with something.

Like, as sturdy as my defenses are, you hear about Concrud all the time by the folks that do conventions

as a life, and I don't want that.

Yeah, when I used to work at Endgadget, like when we would come home from CES, which is an absolutely massive convention in Vegas, like you know, three-quarters of the team would come home with some horrific

pathogen infecting them just inevitably.

And I think we may need to get like a 55-gallon drum of Purel to keep at our booth.

Except we can't do that because we heard that people steal your Purel.

Like, what kind of people are these?

These convention folks?

If it's a 55-gallon drum, they're like, it's too

cumbersome, you know?

Yeah.

Should we get like a like a reasonable size Purel, but put like a pretty intense bike lock on it?

I like this idea.

Yeah, the Pee-Wee's big adventure bike lock.

Yeah, nobody could get that, except it didn't work for Pee Wee.

It's mainly just two things I'm worried about.

It's the getting sick and it's the going broke.

And I don't mean in a gambling way.

I just mean like this is one of those things where as a business, we got to front a bunch of money to do travel, hotel, and merch.

And hopefully we sell the merch to break us even.

Like that's the bottom line.

Yeah.

I mean, it's not a nothing we do has ever been really profit-driven.

Right.

So it'd be nice to break even on this.

That'd be good.

That would be good.

Also, maybe third, not insignificant, is like,

I don't want to disappoint anyone out there with the, like,

a lot of our folks are going to be there, and a lot of them are going to want to hang out.

And it's like, I'm just one man

with one plan.

Tim ma'am.

Like, if I'm invited to to dinner, I'm going to go to that dinner, but that means not going to dinner with someone else.

Like, that's how hurt feelings happen.

I don't like that.

Yeah.

Well, I think that on that point, it's a marathon, not a sprint.

And also, like, there are only so many port-a-potties along the marathon route, and we can only...

Listen to this role reversal.

I'm talking about disappointing people that I shouldn't have to worry about disappointing.

And you're talking me off of that ledge, like so many times I've tried to do for you.

We can do this, man.

We've done tour.

We got each other's backs on the reminding to wash hands after we've shaken dozens and dozens of hands in the meet and greet line.

Yeah, we're so good at that.

You know, we've covered for each other when we had to leave stage to go take a shit.

We're going to be fine.

You know, that'll happen at a booth.

Yeah.

Anytime you see just one of us at the booth, you know what's happening with the other person.

Yeah, yeah.

My son has a little like unfoldable toilet that, you know, has like a plastic bag liner that you can just deploy anywhere.

Maybe we should bring one of those for the booth so we don't have to leave for as long.

Vegas Casino Hotel toilet, one of the great toilets, I feel like.

It's a top toilet.

I think we're doing fine on toilets in Vegas, unless something unspeakable has happened to the Rio.

Something unspeakabler, I should say, given

the general reputation of the Rio.

Have you been on your like Vegas Reddit?

Have you heard tell of what the situation is there?

Because it seemed like two years ago the Rio was on life support and we weren't sure if it was going to make it.

And then last year it was like, oh, like new food court with a couple of actually pretty solid options.

Like, are we thinking Rio is on the rebound?

Or was that like a death bounce?

on the way to the grave.

I think we should expect to see improvements at the Rio.

I've read about them.

I don't think the full refurbishment is complete, but I know they continue to tinker and make things better.

That's good.

That's good.

Any predictions about the purple zebra?

Oh, boy.

I went to, for the 4th of July, my wife and I went to Palm Springs and went to a tiki restaurant that served a Mai Tai inside a zebra vessel that wasn't just the leg.

It was like the zebra.

The whole zebra.

The whole zeb.

Yeah.

And the server was like,

hey,

this is really great glass, isn't it?

Me and my wife are like, oh, yeah, this is one of the greats.

Really cool.

What's the story with this?

He's like, the story?

We have two of these left and we bought 50 because everyone's stealing them.

And we were aghast.

Like, people are the worst.

Do you know how hard it is to run a fucking bar and restaurant without people stealing the glassware?

I was expecting you to say that that was available for an upcharge as a take-home, but no.

God damn.

Idiots ruined it for everyone.

Yeah, you can't take that home unless you're stealing it.

Ugh.

Brutal, right?

Anyway, which is all to say, I was tangential to a zebra drink not that long ago.

I hope to have one again in Vegas.

I hope to have one too.

I've gotten a lot of like social media messages like, looking forward to seeing you guys at Vegas and going to the convention for the first time.

It's that and hoofs that I'm looking forward to the most.

And I'm like, I don't know what to say, man.

Like, the hoofs might not happen, you know?

Ben's like, I really hope not to disappoint you twice.

I mean, I know that I'm going to disappoint them one time.

I mean, but that's what the hoof is for, to soften the blow.

And if the hoof isn't there, what do you got?

The hoof's not there.

Brutal.

You're drinking disappointment.

Yeah.

That's what you're doing.

Well, it's going to be a bit of a crucible for us this year, Adam.

Like, this is, we're doing the convention in a way we never have before.

You might call it a proving ground.

You might.

I do, actually.

Just like the name of today's episode of Star Trek Enterprise, let's get into it, Ben.

It's season three, episode 13,

proving ground.

Gotta free to speech and the time.

We get such a detailed last time on.

Yeah.

So much more detailed than we've become accustomed to.

Let me ask you a question about this, because it's so long and detailed.

Do you think you're on a production side knowing this?

You can't know this, right?

Like in order to get your footage and make your day for the assembly?

Like this is all being decided in the edit, how much you're going to cut off to allow for a last time on, right?

That's interesting because, yeah,

they're chewing up.

precious minutes that would otherwise be given to story.

Like in the streaming era, this doesn't matter.

Like, you could have a 10-minute last time on and still have 45 to 55 minutes of episode.

You think Jeffrey Combs, like, sits down to watch the episode, like, to review it QA style?

He sees this giant preamble and he's like, fuck, fuck.

That could have been Tran.

So much more Shran.

I'm not in this at all.

Are you?

How about show some of the other timeless roles I've portrayed on Star Trek just to remind people what a fucking legend I am?

Get some Brunt in there.

Get some Way Yoon in there.

That would be so great.

Yeah, more Jeffrey Combs.

Just Jeffrey Combs highlight reel for three minutes, and then we're in the episode.

Somebody that does those

like fun YouTube re-edits, do that.

Like last time on Star Trek and just show a bunch of times Jeffrey Combs was on Star Trek.

Right now, there is a Jeffrey Combs sitting at home, uncelebrated for the moment.

As you watch all these scenes, you can make a difference in Jeffrey Combs' level of happiness.

I rode on an elevator with him one time at a SF Sketch Fest.

I'm not, I can't ask the follow-up question.

I'm, fuck.

I'm going to ask the follow-up question.

What did you talk about, Ben?

I left him alone.

Hey, can I recreate the scene?

Oh, sure.

Okay, so did you get on the elevator and Jeffrey Combs already on it?

No, we were waiting in the elevator lobby together at the same time for quite a while.

Okay, so this is fine for an audio medium.

You're not going to see very much visually if you're watching the stream right now.

Okay, so atmospheric elevator sound.

Here's Ben and Jeffrey Combs walking into the elevator.

Could you hit seven, please?

And scene.

Yeah, yeah.

And to be clear, that's Jeffrey Jeffrey Combs asking me to hit seven, not the other way around.

Yeah, no, yeah, you would never.

No.

I'm not making Jeffrey Combs do work for me.

Come on.

Anyways, yeah, we get a lot of catch-up on ChemoSight and,

you know, the weapon and the

Zindi Council of Men of All Races.

Interesting that it's all men in that Zindi Council.

No one of the various species that arose on the Zindi home homeworld has done much in the way of equality of the sexes.

Boy, that train came a little late.

Yeah.

I was expecting that observation a little earlier.

I've been drunk.

Let's get to the cold open.

We got Shran being called to the bridge of his ship, his blue ship.

Was he drinking on the job or was that water?

I was wondering about that.

It's hard to know what is alcohol and what isn't in an Andorian context, you know?

Because like in an earth context, you would never have a decanter full of water, you know?

Like you'd have a carafe, but that's clearly whatever the

Andorian equivalent of baccarat is.

Sure.

The name is unpronounceable.

It's hypnotic, and then the camera closes in like very close in a different bottle.

Hypnotic NA.

Oh, that's nice.

And then crystal hypnotic.

Yeah.

Like, what's the point of crystal hypnotic?

That's...

They're taking away everything that's fun about hypnotic.

Shran should probably start drinking.

He gets some bad news.

They lost track of the ship they're looking for.

And what's striking about Shran's crew is that in this case, just like that ice desk episode, he's got a lady absolutely smashing his nuts on his decisions that she does not agree with.

We've been searching for weeks.

And we'll continue searching until we've accomplished our mission.

Or until we're destroyed?

Yeah, she doesn't want to keep doing this, but they have their orders.

And that we have our orders imperative

winds up being a bigger deal in this episode than I think you might realize at first blush.

I love the spirit of the way this scene ends, though, because, like, yeah, the expanse is dangerous.

Hell no, I'm not afraid of it.

If the fucking pink skins can navigate this place, so can we, right?

We're so much better than them.

That sturdies their resolve.

Yeah.

How about like people from Earth that don't have pink skin?

Do you think that they are extra insulted by this Andorian epithet?

This is like the Crayola scandal of crayon being called flesh.

This is flesh all over again.

Yeah, yeah.

The Andorians' research on what racial slurs to call humans was based entirely on what color band-aids are.

Yeah.

Yeah.

We cut over to the Zindi Council.

Degra

is pretty annoyed that some of the guys that he called into this thing aren't here yet because he's got urgent info and they're like, cool, great.

Weapons ready.

We can just go ahead and destroy Earth.

He's like, no, let's not get over our skis.

It's just the prototype.

Another prototype, Degra?

How many fucking iterations does this design need?

Look, I understand the goal being to create a weapon that destroys Earth, that prevents the Zindi from being exterminated.

That is a great reward at the end of this.

It's a good goal that we can all get behind.

But when I try to understand Degra's deal, he is putting up with so much shit.

Enough shit to where I would probably assume that there is a percentage, a growing percentage inside Degra that's like, it is not worth this.

It is not worth the shit I'm having to eat by these fucking Zindi.

Yeah.

Did Degra agree to some like fucked up contract terms where he only gets 10% on signing and then the rest is like on delivery or something like that?

I know we shouldn't ever say poor Degra, but I'm starting to feel sorry for Degra.

Like, I wish I could remember if he was nominated to this position or if he volunteered, because this seems like a pretty shit deal for Degra.

It's a bad deal for Degra.

I think as freelancers, we can all sympathize with Degra.

Yeah.

Degra is producing a Zendi Super Weapon underscore final, and they're wanting another cut.

God fucking damn it.

And it's like,

you know, and as freelancers, I've not always had the luxury of looking into the like ethical purity of the companies I work with.

It's why we made so many videos for Raytheon.

Right.

So many Wraytheon videos.

Listen, I've spent a lot of time in undisclosed locations making videos about how great it is to be able to rain hellfire on the enemies of something.

Tell you what, man, no one parties like a Raytheon company retreat.

Tell you that much.

They get the best comics, the most booze.

Yeah.

Amazing.

I mean, comics being the hired entertainment that costs the least on one of those weekends.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

I hope nobody believes that we have actually done that.

Let them if they believe that.

Whatever.

Come party at Prana Cabana and see how much it's like a Raytheon party.

It's testing time for this prototype because the real weapon isn't ready yet.

Can they get a Wraytheon banner just for the Prana Cabana this year?

You fucking hate Prana Cabana.

You're just trying to destroy it with these ideas.

Stop.

I think it's a good idea.

Prana Cabana is going to live.

We moved Prana Cabana to Mondays because there are a bunch of other people that stay after the con and do cabanas.

And so we're there in the conversation with those people.

Like

last year, there was was a guy that came up to me and was like, I invented this.

And I was like, cool.

I invented this.

And he holds out like both of his hands are shaped like a bowl and just filled with mixed pills.

Why are these pills wet?

I'm just saying it would be fun and on brand for us to have a weird combative relationship with the previous cabana having organizations and groups.

If we make it to Monday and the Prana Cabana, cut to you and me, just asleep in the cabana,

just being weekend at Bernie's.

It's just Bernie

by the FODs who have come to see us and party together.

Bree Belke is like trying to work our arms and legs, and Anne-Marie is like, you know, I'm a physician and I don't think I can do anything for them.

Yeah, you said it.

I won't cease

At this point, Degra's big project is a month away from the real thing getting ready to fire.

And that's what we know before we cut over to the Enterprise and the Command Center, where Hoshi has told Archer and TePaul that they figured out where the Zindi weapon is thanks to the chemo site that got planted during that Planet of the Apes episode not that long ago.

And also, you remember all their files getting deleted?

They've been able to put together like 30%

of those lost files.

There is no mention of there being a backup hard drive or a secondary backup the way any video professional would have in a moment like this.

These guys fully like paid somebody $100

to try to resurrect the CF card after they found out it got corrupted.

The way everyone has.

Everybody's done it.

Yeah.

30% is good

in that context.

Yeah.

You could do something with 30%.

Yeah.

Like I'm constantly telling my wife this.

Issue is with that 30%, they've like charted where they are to where the chemo site that they've been tracking is.

And there's a whole bunch of anomalies in between them and it.

And it's a don't have time to go around it.

We're going to have to go through it kind of situation.

Alert the crew.

It's going to get rough.

Yeah.

So they start flying through these things and the reports from the science station are pretty intense that this field of anomalies is kind of like foaming and frothing and anomalies are interacting with each other and expanding in ways that they haven't encountered yet.

So they are in big trouble way before they can really wrap their minds around that.

And one of these anomalies really greens the shit out of the ship.

It looks like the Baryon sweep sweep in a lot of ways, where it kind of like passes through a bunch of rooms and, you know, knocks guys off ladders, lots of sparks flying, lots of ripples.

It's notable how burbly it is, right?

Every time they go through an anomaly, there's burbles.

And this green sweep, like the comp to the Baryon sweep is spot on, except the baryon sweep is mechanical moving, and this one's very burbly.

It's foamy.

Yeah.

And it kind of feels like they're all the way inside the anomaly by the time the bangers very suddenly abate, and it is announced that somebody has dropped a tractor on them and pulled them out of it.

Yeah.

Who could it be?

It's Shran.

Captain Archer.

Look at the trouble you've gotten your pink skin into this time.

Are we happy to see Shran?

I think we are.

Pretty happy to see Shran.

Very funny opening shot.

I talked about this last week when we were looking at

the thumbnail for the episode being the back of Archer's head with Shran antennae up on top.

It is unmotivated.

It is just a camera move for the lulls, which I love.

Like, do that all the time.

There is a number of

playful antenna moments this episode that if all you're paying attention to are the antenna, you're going to be very satisfied with this episode.

Sure.

Like, I think that the antenna on this show are so impressive.

The fact that they are like remote puppeted and like they don't do that on Star Trek Discovery with the Andorians on that show.

There's a version of articulation that feels very servo-driven in a way that you can detect like, oh, there's five points of articulation on the antenna and look at it move and in a way that would suggest a guy with a joystick is like kind of stirring the stick.

But these things seem so lifelike in their moves, and I can't tell how many parts of articulation they have.

They're really great.

The puppeteering is so

considered, also, like when they are expressing emotion.

Like, I was thinking in a couple of these scenes, like, Shran would be awesome to play poker with, you know?

Because, like, it doesn't seem like he has a lot of control over what the antenna are doing, but they really express feeling.

That's what I was going to ask.

They betray the face below, right?

Like, these are like the tails on a dog.

The antenna don't lie.

And Dorian Tyra Banks smiles only with the antenna.

It's true.

Yeah.

That's well put.

Shran comes over to Enterprise for a visit and to gloat

because it's fun to be the savior, right?

It rules.

Kind of a lot of questions from Archer, though, for Shran's taste.

I mean,

why are you getting all of my business?

I was the one that rescued you.

Why can't you just be grateful?

Yeah.

The Imperial Guard have taken an interest in the plight of the Earth, according to Shran.

Real shame that nobody else rode to your defense.

I mean, I know we're like months late

in doing so, but the Vulcans didn't do that.

And there's some suspicion about how much he knows about the attack on Florida and how many people it got, but he is really selling this as an act of pure altruism.

Like, we're just here to help, man.

It's clear there is a kind of ally or friendship vacuum here.

Like, absent the Vulcans being on the scene for the humans, maybe the Andorians can slide in while the seat's still warm, you know?

Yeah.

And the help doesn't stop at just tractoring them out.

Like, Reed brings up how dead all of their weapon systems are, and an Andorian tactical officer is offered to help.

I I mean, this is like Starfleet on the receiving end of something that they go around offering all the time.

It's weird to get it in the other direction, huh?

Yeah, yeah.

It's nice.

Feels good.

In engineering, Archer gets a summary of all the damage to their defensive systems that need repairing.

And the short version is, they're fucked.

But one of Shran's tactical crew people might be useful, right?

There's only gentle pushback here by Reed in the idea that he would accept this kind of help.

Yeah.

But ultimately, he has to acquiesce.

To Paul, in a very North Korean way, is like, we should have

apparatchiks follow these guys around and keep an eye on what they're pointing their cameras at.

Because there is some talk of like, well, if they're up in the weapon system's guts, they're going to be getting like vital NATO secrets and battle plans and things.

Yeah,

it's like someone with a machine gun looking up what a slingshot schematic is, though.

You know, like, cool.

You don't love that they have access to all of your information, but when that information isn't really useful to them, it kind of makes some sense.

Tapala has another interesting idea here, which is like

they, and by they I mean the Vulcans, do not get along with the Andorians.

And Archer's response is, that has nothing to do with me, slash the humans.

Like, we've got our own thing with the Andorians, totally separate.

It's an interesting conversation because, like,

the conversation turns on the issue of trust and the Vulcans having found that the Andorians just aren't plain dealers.

Like, when we, when we met them, it seemed cool, and then it wasn't because we kept catching them, like, doing shit that was not what we agreed upon, but was in their own interest.

And we just don't feel like they, as as a species are really like that but archer is like broad sweeping racial characterizations aside i know shran and shran is cool i think i can trust that guy it's a weird bit of stereotyping going in opposite directions like what you're saying to paul going andorians cannot be trusted and archer being like well yeah i mean Look, TePaul, I can be just as racist as you are.

I don't trust Andorians either.

But one of my best friends is Andorian.

Ergo,

we're going to go along with one of them for this mission.

Yeah.

Speaking of going along with an Andorian, Lieutenant Reed meets Lieutenant Talus.

She's the officer that's going to be working with him.

She stomps his nuts just as enthusiastically as she stomps trans nuts because she finds Reed in the mess hall and not frantically working to get webs back online.

If you've got a tactical officer, you definitely want them to be able to wing a shot at a pair of nuts from very far away.

Oh, yeah.

She is doling out these nut shots in rapid succession here.

What an entrance.

And you are Lieutenant Talus of the Imperial Warship Kumari.

I've been ordered to assist you.

Indeed.

You must be disappointed in me.

Yeah, Lieutenant Talis does not miss.

No.

No, neither does Trip miss while eating a hoagie and crinkle chips.

I could not help but notice the wavy lays

on his plate.

This is how you can tell that it's an ideal future.

I love having the option of a wavy chip.

It looks really good, looks really crunchy.

Yeah.

Trip looks happy.

Trip may be the happiest because he doesn't have to work with this lady.

Like,

sure, he takes an incidental nutshot just for being next to Reed, but he's like, lordy,

I'm going to go enjoy my sandwich over there while Reed and Lieutenant Talis go do their work.

Forgive me if I don't roll up my sleeves and get to work around y'all, and I ain't talking about my arm nipples.

You're never going to let that go, are you?

If we change the words,

then it's fair use all day long.

It's also mealtime for Shan and Archer over in the captain's mess, but Shan is more interested in drinking and Dorian ale.

Yeah.

And he's not going to take no for an answer.

Archer's doing that thing, like, I got an early morning, Tran.

You know how it is when you're the captain?

Yeah.

Tran is like, you got underlings to do all that shit for you.

I was also interested in the fact that it's called ale, but like they shoot it, you know, like, like, they're taking big gulpos of it.

They're not, like, drinking it like a glass of beer.

Sure.

Yeah.

This feels bigger than a shot, though, doesn't it?

Yeah, it is.

It is like a half-pilsner glass.

It is.

Yeah, it's like...

A schooner?

Yeah, what do they call it

in, like, England when you go into a pub and get a little beer?

It's whatever that is.

Is that a schooner?

Maybe.

I thought a schooner was a sailboat where the front mast is taller than the back mast or something like that.

Oh, geez.

I feel like, oh, man, the sailing friends of DeSoto just mass unsubscribe.

Hey, leave the answer to this trivia question in a review you leave of the show.

Yeah, we want to know what is a schooner, both in the sailboat sense and in the beer glass sense.

There you go.

And was it a schooner in this scene?

Five stars.

Archer and Tran toast the victory ahead, the obvious victory ahead for both of them.

This is going to be great.

After they toast, Archer asks Shran, why he's being so...

Helpful and cool all the time.

Why are you acting so not messed up towards me?

And Tran explains that he still feels in debt to him for that whole secret Vulcan base tussle that they got into.

I thought that was evened out.

I did too, but I was shocked to find that Tran still feels like he owes.

I think that it's hard to like balance the ledger when it's something as abstract as secret Vulcan base tussle.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But needless to say, Tran wants to convince Archer.

I think it's important to say.

Doesn't seem like he actually believes this later on in the episode, but wants to convince Archer that he believes that there's an unpaid debt here.

And also, like a potential opportunity for a more formalized alliance between the Andorians and the humans, which sounds like a good deal, because maybe the Andorians wouldn't be putting the governors on everything the way the Vulcans have been.

Fair.

Yeah.

Over in engineering, it struck me how long it's been since we've seen Trip Tucker and TePaul together together since the whole clone incident.

I thought you might be avoiding me.

She's there wanting an update on the repairs, and he thought it was going to be a few more days until they could get warp power back.

No, the Andorians are there, and they're going to cut that timeline in half.

If not, by more.

He says 12 hours to completion.

But all of the repairs are not going as evenly and smoothly.

Reed is kind of treating Talus like an unpaid intern, like making her do do a lot of photocopies and stuff while he's in the guts of their weapon systems doing the hard stuff.

This also felt a little gendered too, right?

In a dad working under the hood of a pickup truck, asking for socket wrenches from the little kid.

Yeah.

Maybe gendered isn't the right word, but there is some infant.

fantilization happening here.

You can speak to us normally.

Which is ironic because when she flips the script on him, she's like, I don't want your stupid secrets.

My secrets are way better.

Like, your secrets suck.

She is like the hulk of ball smashing.

Like, she absolutely turns the tables on Reed here.

Like, ugh.

Yeah.

Reed's balls are hamburger at this point.

Yeah, but let's just say that

Susie Plaxon walked so Molly Brink could run.

Yeah.

As far as an Andorian lady smashing nuts.

I'm kind of getting inspired to write some slash fiction about the three of them: the Terra character, the Shran character, and the Talus.

Get them all around an ice desk and see what happens.

Oh, yeah.

There's like ice high-heel shoes grinding into ice nuts.

Oh, yeah.

You know, there is.

Reed is so fucking happy for Talus to leave until

Talus is like, hey, don't electrocute yourself while I leave.

He's like, oh, oh, why is that?

She's like, because you hooked up the jumper cables wrong, dipshit.

And this earns the respect of Reed in this moment because she notices something that he did not.

It's also just like a very funny commentary on Starfleet in general.

Like, I feel like they're always like, okay, let's turn it on, see if it works.

And then, like, explosion of sparks.

You are so right about that.

See if it works is the Starfleet way.

Yeah.

That's why I love them so much.

They're just like me.

So Archer's log is next and it tells us that things are good.

They're avoiding anomalies.

They're back underway inside the expanse and on their way to the original target.

But the problem is their sensors can't pick up very much.

And Tran, noticing this, volunteers his own sensor data, which is transferred immediately to Enterprise.

Amazing that their systems can talk that well, right?

I know.

He's just like shunted over and it's there.

They're looking at like blurry long-range sensor data of this system.

The file name ends in like dot

and, and they just like highlight the and and switch it to

what would be the appendage for Starfleet?

STR?

STF?

Yeah, or is it like one of those like post-OS 10 appendages where it's like STFLT or something like that?

Fuck the hoops Adobe makes us jump through constantly, but like it's branded content for Adobe like they're both PDFs and fans like see how easy it is?

We both have completely different operating systems and we both can work with PDFs This document looks the same on both of our screens It's amazing We don't even have the same set of fonts on installed on our computers and yet it means that what they both can watch on their screens are the four Zendi ships ganging up on a moon nearby and we learn after enhancing a couple of times these moons are pretty messed up and they're messed up because uh one of them is covered with a giant butthole yeah and archer says he's used to seeing something like that in a bikini like the bikini atoll yeah

everybody's like what do you mean archer

he explains uh nuclear testing and he's like well we got to go in there and like take these guys out and sharen is like i don't want to do that There are a lot more of them than there are of us.

This is not going to be a frontal assault if I'm involved.

What I like about this moment is that Shran doesn't turn into Burke here with some sort of flimsy defense of like, no, we shouldn't go in there.

Weapons.

Ha, that weapons platform has a very high dollar value.

Like, you don't even get a whiff of that off of Shran here.

And I think that's really important.

This sells the deception so well.

Yeah.

There's another moment where Tripp and Shran are like walking down a hallway and Tripp is talking about some kind of component for warp engines that he'd love to like borrow a part from Shran if a part is available.

Like, man, that would soup up our engines.

Great.

Isn't it crazy that Shran walks around Enterprise by himself to just get approached like this by Trip?

This felt to me like a celebrity walking by themselves and just getting seized upon by like

some hanger-on that wants an autograph or something.

Right, some fucking weirdo sitting in the, in the seat next to them that just like won't leave them alone on the flight back from STLV.

You know, you should fly back from STLV.

We got to rerun the experiment.

Man, you think we could figure out what flight Frakes is on?

This would take some intel gathering because it was just, it was just.

What you're describing is stalking pin.

And I think that's the opposite of not talking to Frakes while you're sitting next to him on a plane.

That's the thing.

The pendulum swung too far.

I mean, he's addressed it, you know.

At this point, he's addressed it.

I don't think we need to go any further.

Good luck with the greatest generation.

The next time I see you in a plane, I will, um, I won't say anything to you either.

I think that's probably the best bet.

Bye-bye.

We should, on stage at STLV, like, we should make that one of our panels just a therapy session between you and Jonathan Freaks.

I absolutely love that.

If you could make it happen, I would agree to being up there.

I would love to moderate that because I've got a ton of questions for you both about what would actually be the best possible outcome from that moment.

I want to know if he was impressed by how quickly I solved the Sunday crossword puzzle on that flight, mostly out of like stress.

Like I am going to focus so fucking hard on solving this crossword puzzle and not bothering him.

That's an energy though that you can feel.

It's a good thing that flight's only 40 minutes.

Legally it's just a fart joke.

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You will never take the greatest kid alive.

Shran and Tripp talk a little bit about what it's like to have a dead sibling and the feelings of remorse and desires for revenge that it may or may not inspire in someone.

This is kind of a aliens kicking the tires on each other.

Like, are you guys like us?

Like, do you love your families?

Like,

are you fully sentient in the way that we consider it to be?

Do you like revenge?

Like, that's such a weird curvature to this moment because on the one hand, Shran is like, yeah, sorry about your dead sister.

On the other hand, Shran is like, How bloodthirsty are you?

You thirsty for blood?

And Trip has such an interesting answer.

Trip has, I wouldn't say gotten over it, but like what was revenge is more of a feeling of like, I just don't want other sisters to get killed by the Zindi weapon.

Make mine the last.

This is my opportunity to stop the murder of sisters going forward.

Yeah.

Back in the Legion of Doom, Degra is showing off the weapon.

Degra's with the fleet, though, in this case.

Like, he's not on the...

Yeah, he's on FaceTime with the guys in the gathering hall, especially built gathering hall to accommodate aquatics, I guess.

I think it's important that he's there on site.

Yeah, yeah.

He's the contractor for this weapon.

They are getting ready to run a test fire, and they have to abort very suddenly because an unknown ship enters the system, and

the Legion is not happy.

They're like, What are you doing?

And I swear, there's a ship.

Yeah, there's no fucking way we can, you know.

It's from Canada, you can't see it.

Like, there's something, there's something with our FaceTime.

I can't, like, flip it around to show you what we're seeing, but I'm telling you, the ship is bearing down on us.

Yeah, so he ends the call and does a FaceTime with Shran,

who's like, hey,

I'm just here from the Andorian mining coalition or whatever,

doing an assay of this system.

There are valuable resources to be gotten on this G-class planet.

What do you think?

This is a very fun scene because of the line reading spin that Jeffrey Combs gives this dialogue.

He is so much fun here with choosing where he emphasizes things and the upward, downward downward motion of his sentences, and his gesticulations.

Like, he's never been more handsy

and performative than he is in this moment.

He's so good.

There's like the Mrs.

Doubtfire moment where he names the mineral that they're trying to mine after Captain Archer.

There's the like arch villain the Antorian Mining Consortium runs from no one line.

Yeah.

Shran is there to bullshit.

Is Degra a bullshitter?

He is not.

He threatens them with destruction.

And so Tran has to turn his ship around and get the hell out of there.

But one thing he was at great pains to explain away was how penetrative their scans were being.

Turns out, what we now have is a very detailed scan of the prototype weapon that Degra was about to test.

And back in the command center, Tran is like, hey, why don't we let them test this thing?

Like,

let's see what they can do with this thing.

Don't you think that that would be interesting?

And Archer's like, I have a better idea.

Let's fucking get it.

It's pretty fun.

Let's, what do you say?

We turn this episode into a caper.

Yeah.

Can I sell you on that?

I was so delighted that

the halfway mark, this turned into a heist episode.

Yeah.

In the armory, Reed and Lieutenant Talas are working well together.

And no one's balls are getting kicked.

It's so clear, though, that both of them are wearing lipstick.

This is another hardcore read lipstick episode, and when he's in a scene with Talus, who's wearing the dark blue shade, like

it looks a little ridiculous to me.

I keep not seeing this lipstick that you're talking about.

I swear to God, it's there.

I mean, I don't disbelieve you.

I believe Adam, but I should send you a screen grab of what I'm looking at.

Yeah.

What I have is motion smoothing on at 500%.

Like, smooth the hell out of it.

Oh, yeah.

You've got like the vivid gamer picture

settings all cranked up, I imagine.

Epic HDR jacked up for sure.

And I guess that might have done something with the lipstick shade.

Hmm.

Oh, weird.

Maybe.

Yeah.

Anyways, yeah, they've built some mutual respect, but we get a little hint of something suspicious going on when Reed walks away and she's like scanning something in a way that indicates that maybe she's like not scanning for entirely benevolent reasons.

So we get to see this test.

We get to see the test fire of the weapon and it's like major, right?

Like it, you know, if this was the Earth, if this kind of destruction was visited on the Earth, it would not be a livable planet afterwards.

But it didn't do what the Death Star did to Princess Leia's homeworld.

What's it called?

Alderan?

You know, I think that they were looking for an Alderan and they didn't quite get it.

It is interesting how, like, when you and I watched this, I was thinking, great success.

Good job.

Degra's going to get a high five for this.

Oh, boy, the reaction is mixed.

The Zindi Council not psyched because they wanted it to blow big, like you were saying.

And they're like, Degra, what the fuck, man?

We want to one-shot, one-kill Earth, and this thing is going to need to shoot several times.

That's not going to work.

He is saying, I need time to analyze the data.

Like, it was about to overload.

We don't know what was causing that.

And the bugs and the lizards and the aquatics are like, you're fucking up.

Like, we might have to go in a different direction at this point.

You're not going to get the remaining 90% of your contract.

God, Degra's patience to not shove this in the aquatics' face in every possible scene.

The restraint of that.

I know.

I know.

I'd like to see you fucking flipper fin

assholes try to put together a bomb from inside a tank full of water.

Fucking assholes.

Shut the fuck up.

Bloom, bloom, bloom, bloom, blue.

That's my impression of you guys.

Bloom, bloom, bloom, bloom, blue, blue.

Yeah, learn to speak an intelligible language, and then we'll fucking talk about whether you think I'm up for the job.

Same goes for you, insects.

So in the command center, Tepal has observed this weapons fire too.

I like that Tran is kind of on Degra's side.

He's like, I mean, that looked pretty bad.

They realize that this thing is easily overloaded.

So that's what makes this test a failure.

I mean, not only can it not destroy an Earth-sized planet with a single shot, it's going to overheat were it to try to do that.

And so, you know, for the moment, Degra's team is waiting for the radiation on this prototype to dissipate before they pick it up.

And Archer asked to Paul, maybe they could bring it on board while it's just being left out in space like this, right?

Yeah.

But they can't bring it on board safely due to how radioactive it is.

We should also point out that Archer thinks Graylick may have adulterated the Kibo site that they use to fire the weapon.

And this is Graylick being a real one on their behalf.

Hell yeah.

Shran is like, okay, my ship is way better than yours.

Like,

we can get the sphere on board and use force fields to protect ourselves from the radiation.

But you're going to need to have operational weapons

if we're going to roll in here and raid the proving ground.

So it is really on Reed and Talus to get their shit together.

And they do in a fun and flirty way, don't they?

Yeah.

It's not the weapon.

It's the soldier who wields it.

Do you think Talus is going to start to get letters from Reed every time he thinks he's in a mildly life-threatening situation?

I bet.

Yeah.

Yeah, they haven't gotten very far down the road, and I think she might be letter-worthy.

Even though you betrayed me at the proven ground,

there's a lack of closure between us that I must address at this, the time of my death.

I must make you understand that much like

my behavior changed the direction and orientation of your antenna, you have affected my one single antenna

below my waist.

Mine stands at full erection for you.

And I've got faith of the far-heart.

Legally, it's just a virtue.

Back with Archer and Tran.

Would Tran allow Archer to command his ship during the retrieval?

Because it's clear, you know, the Andorian ship's going to be the one to do it, run and point on that.

There's some pretty serious pushback to this idea.

I mean, this almost turns into a fistfight.

Tran is like, no, fuck you, and fuck that idea forever.

And Archer is like, it's my mission.

It's my planet that we're trying to save here.

Like, if you're offering your help, I need to be there.

I need to be the one calling shots to make sure that this thing gets grabbed.

properly.

What I love about this argument is that if you can possibly set aside how suspicious Shan has acted at times during this episode, it makes all the sense in the world that Shan doesn't want Archer being the commander of his ship.

That would suck.

Yeah, it's like your buddy inviting you on a road trip and then being like, I'm driving.

It's like, well, hold on, it's my car.

Yeah.

The Imperial Guard doesn't serve at your leisure, Pinkskin.

We don't see the resolution here, but we do see Shran getting on FaceTime with his superior officer, an Andorian general, who,

unlike Shran, Shran, has zero affection for Archer.

Like, like, Shan is fine fucking Archer over, but he doesn't relish it the way this general seems to.

This general does not see any advantage of an alliance with humans.

He wants Shran to do the thing he's been ordered to do, whatever that is.

We don't know yet.

We cut down to the weapons bay where Reed and Talus are still working.

And this is where it becomes clear, like, how washed Reed is.

Like, she really has him wrapped around her little finger at this point.

Reed's taking a break from eating a dozen cherry popsicles to confront her

about what she's doing.

A dozen cherry popsicles and one blue one.

Yeah.

Reed asks Lieutenant Talas what she's doing peeping on the sensor array without him knowing about it.

That's not an area of your work order that you're supposed to be giving attention.

And she comes up with some flimsy excuse that Reed seems to accept.

She's credible to him.

At least he makes her think she is.

Yeah, she was doing something to the sensors.

She claims to be repairing them.

The entrepreneur approaches the Zindi with Tepal in command.

And

this is, you know, a source of great consternation for Degra and company.

So they kind of scramble ships to go deal with the approaching human ship, and that leaves the weapon relatively undefended for Archer to take Shan's ship in to grab it.

And a great big space battle breaks out.

I thought it was conspicuous that Enterprise fired first here.

I thought that was neat.

Yeah, it was good.

Good job.

Not a lot of Starfleet vessels Falcon Hello quite so well.

The Entrepreneur is fighting a couple of Zindi ships.

The weapon, the orb was way smaller than I was expecting.

It

tucks into Shuttle Bay on Shran's ship.

Yeah, I thought the same thing.

So, you know, they disable a couple of Zindi ships and the others don't pursue and the two ships bug out.

But is it time to meet at the rendezvous point that they set prior to the engagement?

Nope.

Shran reveals that this was all in the service of the Andorians getting a hold of the Zindi weapon.

Now I see why you generously offered to let us use your ship.

You son of a bitch.

ben

is this the first time son of a bitch has been said on star trek and is son of a bitch actually interpreted as a compliment in andorian given what we know about terra and talus like does it does is it like yeah thank you you get a cool ass mom who doesn't take no shit from anyone yeah i think it's good great line read by bakula though like he he really gave this some extra energy.

Well, mustard on that.

Yeah.

What we learn is that the Andorians plan to use the Zindi weapon as sort of like a nuclear deterrent.

Like, if we have a planet killer weapon, we can just be like, hey, fuck with us at your peril.

But we recommend not.

Shran is eating a couple of deli sandwiches out of a bag when he explains the situation to Archer.

And he's like, look, I'm just following orders.

My hands are tied.

My hands are tied, but also like,

this is good for you, too.

We got the weapon that was imperiling your planet.

Like, the Zindi will think twice before trying to, like, proceed on this path.

Like,

you got a lot of what you want, Archer.

Like, maybe take this as the W that it actually is.

Shran doesn't know exactly how accurate he is when he says that,

look, a powerful planet exploding weapon for the Vulcans especially seem like would be an incredible deterrent, right?

Like, like, I'm talking about just the Vulcan people seem to have a sort of sensitivity about their planet being exploded.

They would hate that.

Trans should buy a lottery ticket.

He should.

The other reveal here is that Talus was fucking with the entrepreneur's sensor array, so the entrepreneur will never be able to find the Andorians before they're long gone.

Don't worry, Archer.

We're going to leave you in an escape pod.

You're going to be fine.

They ditch Archer, but the second he's back aboard the Entrepreneur, it is revealed that he was wise to Shran the whole time.

Or, if not wise, like double-checking everybody's math.

And Reed and TePaul caught the subterfuge as it was happening.

So they got the sensors back online.

Like, they're ready to chase these Andorians.

And they catch right up to him, which is great.

Yeah, like Shran is on the phone with the general going, like, hey, like, big mission success, Jen,

when the entrepreneur shows up and Archer reveals that his team got the remote trigger signals for the weapon, so they can start it up right inside Shr's shuttle bay if he wants.

I love this.

It seems like Archer isn't bluffing.

Like, the longer this conversation goes, the less bluff seems to be apparent.

There's like a curb your enthusiasm style stare-down scene between them.

Before Shran gets a report that the weapon's been activated and there's a 30-second countdown and at 20 seconds, Shran is forced.

to dump it out.

I love the curb comparison because those scenes are always about like, would you really do something like that?

Like playing on the morality.

An archer is basically doing that with a gun to Shran's head.

It's great.

It's so great.

I was surprised at the endgame here when this prototype exploded.

That surprised me.

I was shocked because it seemed like such a crucial piece of intelligence that they were sacrificing just to say fuck you to the Andorians.

Like it seemed like once he dumped it out, maybe you like turn off the signal.

Sometimes a really great fuck you, like, deployed incredibly well, is worth all of it.

Yeah, yeah.

I got a huge laugh the other day.

I was in a left turn lane, one of the rare left turn lanes in LA.

Uh-oh.

And I watched a pedestrian crossing the street nearly get killed by a Prius that hit the left like a little bit after the light turned red.

He just like

drummed on the back hood of the Prius and gave him a big fuck you

in the rear view mirror.

Oh, it was so beautiful.

That's a righteous finger.

Yeah, so beautiful not to see a man murdered by a motorist and so beautiful to see him able to actually convey his displeasure to that motorist who might have just been blithely unaware otherwise.

He lives to flick off another day.

Yeah, yeah.

And that's kind of what happened here.

This game of Zindi Weapon Chicken ends up with Archer as the big winner.

It fucks up Shran's ship.

They're not going to be moving anytime soon.

And I love the,

let's offer all the help they need.

We can come aboard with engineering crews and help them fix their shit up.

Yeah, table turn right there.

Shran, not interested.

He's going to limp home and do the repairs on his own.

But in the command center, it is very surprising that they have received a secret coded message.

Yeah.

And the message contains detailed scans of the Zindi weapon.

And it is clear that this message has been sent to them from the Andorian ship.

Basically, you're sort of led to believe that this is as good as it could get of having information about the Zendi weapon without having the weapon itself.

And yes,

somebody on that Andorian ship sent it to them.

Kind of think it was Shan, but unclear.

Gotta be Shan, right?

Yeah, actually.

Shran's playing 3D checkers.

Yeah,

he

is for sure playing 3D checkers.

Did you like this episode of Star Trek Enterprise, Adam?

I can't pay.

Couldn't for late.

Got no key.

Tempting fate.

Ben.

I really think after this, Andorians might be my favorite Enterprise alien.

Okay.

And definitely on the mountain of Star Trek aliens.

They'll give you some fucking lip.

Yeah.

They'll kick you in the nuts.

They'll give you a ton of help.

Like, they're basically everything that TePal described, but it's so circumstantial.

Like,

I think her characterization is largely

objective.

Yeah,

we've got trust issues with the Andorians, but circumstantially, circumstances like this episode, you can trust them.

There's a messiness to them that is clear up until the end of this episode, but eventually they got what they needed by the friend they've got on Shan's ship.

It's so much more complex than just chaotic neutral.

Like, Shan is chaotic neutral with aspirations toward...

chaotic good, I think.

And he's such a juicy character for that reason.

Like, he's always got a chaotic evil lieutenant, it seems like.

But they seem maybe like the most human of any Star Trek alien in some ways.

Like, it's not just they're warriors, or they're logical, or they're tricky, or they love money.

It's a more complex shading than that.

Like, you can't distill it down to one word.

Yeah, I think that's fair.

Yeah, I like this episode a lot.

I mean, like, that long ass

last time on felt really earned by the end of this.

Like there was so much

story building that was done.

Like they don't, they can't do this anymore.

Like we're 13 episodes into a season and this is drawing on all 13 episodes.

This is a fucking

series finale in today's terms.

Yeah, it really is.

And we're at the halfway mark.

Like this is like tagging the myth arc before we can do a couple more monster of the weeks and, you know, Archer has to go back in time and, you know, be a knight in King Arthur's court episode or something.

It's true.

Yeah.

Yeah, those days aren't coming back, man.

No.

Appreciate them while they're here.

Yeah.

This is like right in that era where they still made 26 episodes of a TV show per season, but they were writing in the way that they are now, or like tons of threads come together and split back apart over the course of seasons.

So really cool to see.

And I liked it.

You want to see if there's anything fun in the Priority One inbox?

Maybe we've got 26 Priority One messages in there, Ben.

That would be huge for us.

Priority one message from Starfleet coming in on secured channel.

Need a supplemental income.

Supplemental income.

Supplemental.

Supplemental income.

Yeah, it's extra.

But the interest alone could be enough to buy this ship.

Let's start off with this one, Ben.

It's a promotional message.

Okay.

Here's how that one goes.

He who is my husband got laid off while he was out on medical leave and bounced back by starting his own business.

Hell yeah.

I'm so proud of you, Dan.

I'm blowing $200 to promote your handy human and drain cleaning biz.

And if that isn't support, what is?

Get out there and clear our clogs everywhere.

Also, if there's time in honor of what Dan does for a living, I'd love to hear Ben say, if a pile of poo had a ghost again, as in season two, episode 10 at 30 minutes, 20 seconds or so.

If a pile of poo had a ghost.

See, that's nice, right?

Burianfixandflow.com is where you can contact Dan and get your pipes cleared.

And I mean that in a plumbing sense, a professional home ownership context, and not any other way at all.

This is legal as far as we know, what Dan does.

Burian, one of the great South Seattle townships.

No shortage of clogged pipes in Burian and a very, very supportive partner here in Liz.

I'm guessing we've got a lot of like pipes that have been in the ground for you know 70, 80 years now.

Oh yeah.

That

you know got a lot of roots growing into them and things.

Get Dan on your side.

Come on.

Look, I don't want to oversell Dan, but I'm sure Dan's got one of those cameras on the end of a big hose.

Run that hose in the hole.

Start looking at what's going on in your pipes.

Hydro jet that shit out.

Again, I mean the pipes underneath your home and no other type of pipe.

No inappropriate pipes.

Dan is not sticking a camera into you, okay?

No, that's not the sort of plumber he is.

No, I mean, I don't know what he does with his wife, who clearly loves him a lot.

But,

you know, we got a lot of friends at DeSoto in the Seattle area.

Yeah.

I'm guessing some of them

own homes in South Seattle specifically.

Get Dan on your side.

It's burianfixandflow.com.

Here's what I'll tell you.

Having lived in Seattle for many years, I had to call a

blank router.

Like there are 10 companies with router in the name for plumbing needs.

You don't have to do that when Burian Fixandflow is there.

Our next P1 is from Mistress Phantom, and it's to Dungeon Kappa.

Goes like this.

We have differences.

You like feet.

I like latex.

But we're both from the Great Lakes, like curvy shapes, and have hot takes.

Arguing about media is fun, but also sometimes profound, special, and healing.

Glad you like Greatest Gen.

Glad you journeyed with me on this trek across the stars.

Live long and prosper.

Thanks for being a friend.

I can see Dungeon Kappa has a humiliation kink from Mistress Phantom, who's put them on blast in the Priority One messages.

Nothing more humiliating than being associated publicly with the Greatest Generation, and the various nuts are being busted very hard right now in the dungeon.

I can only imagine.

You should be so ashamed, Dungeon Kappa.

There they go again, busting once more.

Let's just say on behalf of me and Adam and Wendy and Bill and Rob and the whole expert Shimoda team, we're deeply ashamed of you, Dungeon Kappa.

Finally, Ben, we have a message here from Pete, and it's to Ben and Adam.

Here's that message: Thanks, Ben and Adam, for all the great pod over the years.

If I'm feeling down or just need a good laugh, my go-to is listening to your backstacks.

Aww.

With DS9 being my fave,

I'm currently re-listening, and there are so many great bits, drops, and characters that come out of that run.

Wanted to throw some extra scarves your way as a thanks.

And can I get the toast drop?

Toast!

Wow.

That's a deep-cut drop at this point.

That was a good drop.

That drop had a moment for six episodes.

There's like two versions of it, too, right?

There were two different lieutenant toasts, I think.

Oh, geez, and there's two different drop versions?

Yeah, so let's get both of them.

Lieutenant George Priman, Starfleet Security.

I'm Lieutenant Commander Michael Eddington, Starfleet Security.

Good stuff.

Thanks, Pete.

Thanks for the kind words.

Thanks to everyone who gets a P1.

It is maximumfund.org slash jumbotron to set one up and we sure appreciate it.

Helps us cover costs over here.

There are two versions of Priority One messages, aren't there, Ben?

Sure.

Personal, promotional, kinky, and not kinky.

Oh, yeah.

That's what I meant.

You heard both kinds.

Yeah.

Hey, Adam.

What?

Did you find yourself a drunk Shimoda?

Incredible.

Drunk Shimoda!

Man,

it's gotta be Shran

until it's not.

He is so compelling.

Yeah.

I don't know, man.

Like, if you're gonna rank all the Jeffrey Combs characters, this might just be recency bias, but I'm really picking up what Shan's putting down.

I like that he's drinking at his desk.

I like that he's having conversations with generals that go one way and doing things in a completely different way

out of sight.

I like that he's playing all sides.

To what end?

I don't know.

Tran's out there for Shran, first and foremost.

Like, he took an oath, I'm sure, to get his command, but Tran's doing what's best for number one.

Yeah.

I didn't like his ship, though.

The bridge really has lobby of an orthodontist vibes.

Yeah.

Like, I wish it looked a little more tactical.

I think it's the carpeted floor that does a lot of that work.

I'm impressed with how much of that ship that they built.

It kind of makes me think that they have some designs for this ship in future episodes.

Yeah, we'll be back there someday.

Yeah.

I'm going to give it to Talis just because if I wanted to inhabit a character, it would be the one that gets to nutshot Reed a bunch of times.

Reed gets the better of Talis ultimately, but she gets to have all the fun along the way.

Do you think she got a lot of shit growing up for being named after after uh tolosians

don't don't get close to her she'll melt your fucking mind

yeah

yeah maybe that's why she's got such a chip on her shoulder yeah you could see that yeah i mean like nobody cuts their hair like that because they're like super well adjusted right

yeah

you know that is an aspect we didn't bring up she is cutting her own bangs and that means uh

that means trauma yeah Yeah.

In the language of television, that means going through some shit.

And she's going to be a little bit of a crazy fucker, I think, in maybe the best way.

Yeah.

Faith of the fart.

Let's talk about what we're going to watch next week, Ben.

Let's do it.

You're going to give us the scoop on that while I go over to gock.biz slash game and the game of buttholes.

We'll with the Riker Quantum Leap to see how that review will be experienced.

Next episode is season three, episode 14.

Stratagem.

Archer finds himself face to face with Degra, designer of the Zindi super weapon, and tries to get him to reveal its location.

Archer's like, how long is it going to take, man?

Kind of seems like you've had a lot of time, and Degra's like, fuck, fuck, not this again.

It's like constant.

I fucking hate this.

I can't get a fucking break anywhere.

Let's see if we get a break about how we're going to experience the episode, Ben.

Currently, we're on square 50, but by the time I roll this die, the runabout could be anywhere.

Sure could.

You're required to learn as you play.

Roll.

Oh, Ben.

I've rolled a 19, which means we have once again landed on square 69.

Oh, shit.

A decontamination chamber episode where we will be once again recording in underpants.

I guess I'm glad it's during the hot summer months.

The studio is absolutely sweltering right now.

It is really fucking hot.

I might actually feel better were I to disrobe.

And that'll be the style of episode we do next week.

A regular old episode for our audio listeners.

A terrifying vision of a couple of aging male bodies on the video version.

Not a great thing to put up on social media and feel super good about the series of choices in your life that led you to this point.

Hey, Rob, thanks for not turning off the comments on those posts.

Cool.

You know, I'm talking about Rob Adler there, one of the great folks who helps us with our socials media all across the internet.

Yeah.

But also, fuck you, Rob.

We would never say fuck you to Wendy Pretty, who keeps this show on the rails.

No, nor the legions of friends of DeSoto who support at maximumfund.org slash join.

Yeah.

Look at us loop-de-loop through the credits.

This is nice.

Got to thank Bill Tilly, our Cindy Wartime consigliary.

You're not going to be shirtless on camera.

He's got too much fucking dignity.

Completely absent dignity, Adam Ragusia,

who makes the theme and interstitial music for our programs, while we still honor the contribution of Dark Materia, who plays our credits music for every episode of Greatest Gen.

With that we will be back at you next time with another great episode of Star Trek Enterprise, another episode of the Greatest Generation Enterprise where Adam and Ben are like meeting for the first time in a

second time in a really weird way.

You know?

And it's like...

What are you doing at this orgy?

Again.

I honestly don't want Adam to reveal the location of his super weapon to me if if it's going to be like this.

No.

Nope, that changes the show forever.

No.

Not going to do it.

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