Reverse Groundhog (ENT S3E8)

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 who are just a little bit embarrassed about having a Star Trek podcast.

I'm Ben Harrison.

I'm Adam Pranica.

You ever watch the Twilight films or read the books?

No, even though I grew up near the area where they were filmed.

Yeah.

And the little logging towns where they were shot became, you know, famous for a time as being these locations.

Like tour buses would go through them and stuff, kind of a thing.

Yeah, I mean, you roll through them now, though.

I mean, I would presume you'd roll through them then and now.

and see that they are just like a diner and a hardware store and that's it.

Like, what is a fucking tour bus full of people going to do?

Order 16 tall stacks of pancakes and then blow out of town?

Like, what does that do for anyone?

Yeah.

I never saw those movies.

I think they're responsible for a great amount of sexual awakening

to a generation of folks.

I wasn't one of them.

I have a cousin who...

was like right at the right age for those when they started coming out and she would like send me copies of them and be like, You really need to read this.

It's like really good.

And I'd be like, Oh, okay.

And then I'd, I feel bad.

I didn't do it.

I didn't read the book.

Why do you have to feel bad?

I don't know.

Because it was my, it was like a very beloved family member trying to connect with me.

And like, you have big feelings about people suggesting things to you, though.

Even at a very young age, I imagine they were there.

Yeah.

This was not like

out of the blue.

Like, she and I have like exchanged books in the past.

And like, we we have shared a great fondness for the Golden Compass series of books and

have talked about that a lot.

And she like recently got a very beautiful edition of the Golden Compass for my kids.

So it's not like it wasn't crazy of her to like think I would read the horny vampire book that she was into.

What's the clock that casts a shadow to tell time?

Sundial.

Is there a prequel series called the Golden Sundial?

Are we making that?

Oh, it's an interesting concept.

It's a good pitch.

That's all I got.

I know nothing of the franchise.

Oh, you'd love it.

It's about a bunch of kids that team up with

various magical creatures to go across the multiverse and ultimately kill God.

That sounds exciting.

Trilogy of kids' books about killing the Almighty, which is,

I think the author is kind of like an

intense atheist.

I wonder if it's because I am of an advanced age.

You know, like you reach a certain age and all you do is read biographies and autobiographies.

I feel like for the past 10 years, that's been me.

I really have not had any sort of appetite for the fiction in my life.

And I don't know why that is.

Like, I start fiction books and I'm like, this isn't holding my attention.

I need to read about someone's unfortunate childhood upbringing and a car crash that changed everything or whatever on their way to great success.

The way heroin influenced their second album, but they're really glad that they're not on it anymore.

I mean, you're not wrong about that.

I'm halfway through a Guns N' Roses book where I learn a bunch about the neighborhoods around where I live, where they like to party.

I'm reading the Lorne Michaels book right now, the new one, and that's been super fun.

Oh, yeah.

A lot of horse in that guy's past.

For sure.

Yeah.

I admire your appetite in general for book consumption and podcast consumption too.

But like in this specific area, I don't know what, what's holding me back from finding that kind of book that works for me.

You like a book on tape?

Because we've both really enjoyed some Star Trek novelizations, or not novelizations, but like extended universe Star Trek novels that were...

That's how I do it.

Maybe that's your way in.

That's such a great call.

Yeah.

The book on tape I thought to note was Patrick Stewart's autobiography, and I was like, wrong.

Bad example.

I got a book on tape to recommend to you.

Let me see if I can remember what the author is.

This is a novel by Ben H.

Winters called Golden State.

And it's...

I wouldn't say it's exactly a sci-fi, but it's also not...

not a sci-fi.

In the way that Donny Darko is sci-fi and not exactly sci-fi, like that kind of thing?

Yeah, I would say that's fair.

Okay.

More of a detective story, but it has some

elements of world building that are sci-fi adjacent,

at least.

And really good book on tape.

Really fun, well-read book on tape.

Are there

sexy elements to it that titillate?

Yeah, I think there's probably some horny bits.

Eh, maybe not.

I don't remember.

You know, if you want a sexy one, you got to go to Stuart Wellington for that.

that he's like he's he's the oh he's a sex book reader he's like always posted you know social media videos of uh shopping trips he takes to the ripped bodice and stuff like that

i feel like there was a time when i was in middle school where like everyone was reading the jurassic park book And that wasn't a sexy book.

But then there was like, I feel like another Michael Crichton book that followed that a lot of kids were like, oh, Michael Crichton's my author.

This is the sort of book I want to be reading.

And it ended up being very horny.

Do you remember this?

I'm trying to figure out which Michael Crichton book it could have been.

God,

Timeline?

Was Timeline horny?

That was his time travel book.

I read that.

I read Sphere.

Was Sphere horny?

I don't think Sphere was horny.

Sphere's got to be from before Jurassic Park, too.

Yeah.

No, Sphere couldn't have been horny.

Sphere was wet, as I remember.

Oh, sure.

Yeah.

Maybe an FOD will write in to what the horny Michael Crichton book was that I'm thinking of that me and my classmates read.

Was it the one about how climate change is a hoax?

Was that the one that made you horny?

I feel like Michael Douglas was in the movie about it.

Hmm.

Let's look up Michael Douglas movies.

Michael Douglas horny.

Oh, oh, ben, a whole bunch of stuff is coming up here.

Oh.

Let's see.

Oh, Jesus.

This is terrible radio.

Did you grow up watching Romancing the Stone?

I watched that movie like a thousand times growing up.

I didn't.

And I only watched it like pretty recently, like in the last five years.

It was like not in...

the cultural zeitgeist around me in any way.

Like I, I was like, what's this movie?

And I was delighted by it.

But yeah, it was like I watched it with no context, having not seen a trailer or ever heard anyone talk about it, as far as I could remember.

Maybe, was it Disclosure?

Hmm, that sounds horny.

Yeah, I mean, an Apex Demi Moore was in it, and Michael Douglas.

Oh.

Donald Sutherland is Bob Garvin.

Hmm.

It sounds horny as fuck.

Yeah, it sounds pretty good.

Maybe I'll go back and revisit that one.

I see the word sexually in the blurb description if I hover over disclosure on Michael Crichton's Wikipedia page.

That had to be it.

That's got to be it.

Yeah.

What a horny book for a bunch of horny middle schoolers.

I like a nice little sex scene in a book, you know?

Yeah.

Isn't that nice?

It's just your little secret.

You're out at the beach reading horny stuff.

No one has to know.

Yeah.

Not as long as that towel is wrapped tightly around you.

To bring it back to Twilight, the 50 Shades of Gray was like a horny fanfic of that originally, right?

Was it?

How horny was Twilight even?

I thought it was just about longing, like teenage longing.

Yeah.

Like werewolves looking at women longingly.

Right.

And I think, and those women enjoying being looked at

in that longing way.

And then I think 50 Shades was like, what if they actually fucked?

Can we just get with the fucking already?

So we'll see which kind of Twilight we get into on today's episode.

I wonder which.

I really do.

It's Star Trek Enterprise Season 3, Episode 8.

And you know it's called Twilight.

Gotta be a speech, and it's all.

Imagine being the captain of a ship and waking up to bangers.

That's got to be the worst feeling of all.

The worst kind of wake-up, I think.

Yeah.

We talked about how a Richard Crenna, not the Richard Crenna, is in this episode, Adam.

And I think this is the guy when Archer goes out of his quarters and punches out a security guard who's been ordered to keep him in his room.

It's a Richard Crenna.

He is the son of Emmy award-winning actor Richard Crenna.

Is that really Richard Crenna's description?

Emmy award winner?

Richard Crenna occupies the mounts, that guy more in my mind.

He's up there.

His body of work, incredible.

What a guy.

His son really looks like him, too.

Like, if we ever reboot Rambo with a younger cast, get Richard Anthony Crenna.

Yeah, this guy's good looking.

Unconcerned with how he looks is Captain Archer.

He just wants to get to the bridge, but the guard's like, nuh.

No, actually, you've been ordered to be confined to your quarters by

the captain.

And that's weird, right?

Because isn't Archer the captain?

Hmm.

Hmm.

Thought so.

On the bridge, we see shit going down.

The captain in this scene is TePal, and she's wearing a captain's uniform with all the pips, with all the rights and privileges associated with a four-pipper.

Yeah,

she's marrying a couple.

Yeah.

She's doing all the things.

She's making dinner plans in that captain's mess.

Right.

Got a lot going on.

She's spinning plates because like also on the view screen, we see that the Zindi weapon is cruising toward Earth.

And she wants Archer kicked off the bridge.

Like, get him the fuck out of here.

I'm very busy marrying this couple, you know?

When a shirtless and boxer-wearing Archer bursts onto the bridge, he just doesn't look right.

being there.

He looks a little casual for the moment.

Right.

Yeah.

You came underdressed for the party, party, sir.

We need you to put on a jacket.

You think he's flopping around under there?

There's some steps up into the main bridge area.

There might be a little bit of flop action here.

Do you think he puts on a pair of underpants under his pajama pants?

Ben, I was just uh out of town for a couple of days and I forgot to pack my athletic shorts.

Like, I'll wear basketball shorts to bed.

I don't just sleep in underwear.

I can't.

Wow.

So I'm looking at Archer here and I'm like,

he can, can't he?

He's fine with that.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Out in space is something just as terrifying and enormous as what might be under Archer's Boxers.

The massive Zindi planet-killing weapon has made an appearance over Earth and it is just an enormous version of that thing we saw before.

It's, I love like the clockwork of it, like all of the like the interlocking spheres turning in different directions it looks like a thing like an executive desk decoration that that like you shouldn't touch because those things will bite

they'll bite the tip of your finger off yeah you set it moving and you pretty much just have to let it kind of kind of finish its thing you know yeah

this thing

it has a little escort of a couple of other ships and the entrepreneur is not fast enough to to stop it.

It takes out Earth.

Spectacular explosion.

Let's talk about the speed that this goes down.

Like, this is so much faster than Vulcan being destroyed in that JJ Abrams movie.

Yeah.

And I feel like that's the expression on Captain Archer's face here.

When we push in with the React, the Earth has blown up a reaction shot from him.

I think what he's thinking is, fuck, that was fast.

Like, that really blew big and fast.

There's no chance of even salvaging some of the mission at this point.

That's it.

Mission failure.

Critical fail.

And you blew it!

He blew it.

He's trying to wipe up the mess of the Earth's destruction

with a nose tissue.

Yeah, they never give it any napkins with this Indie Planet killing weapon.

What am I supposed to use?

So with that horrible thing to contemplate, old Archer wakes up and he's like, you know, getting up in an unfamiliar bedroom and we get a very quantum leap mirror moment where he sees himself old and is surprised to see himself old.

I'm glad they didn't go full burlap with him with the aging.

Yeah.

At this point, he just looks like he was in a jackass episode where they were antiquing each other by throwing a bunch of flour at their heads.

Poor Bam's dad just getting antiqued out of a deep sleep.

That's what looks like has happened here with Archer.

He also got a little bit of a haircut.

Did you notice this?

Yeah, yeah.

I wonder if, like, I was thinking about this because we learned pretty soon that this is 12 years later.

I was thinking, like, if when we started the greatest generation nine-something years ago,

could we have like if we'd right then and there done a like, let's shoot like a shot of Ben and and Adam in the future would we have aged ourselves accurately to what we look like 12 years later

are those frown lines

why so many frown and stress lines yeah way more than I was expecting from a couple of Star Trek podcasters

generally speaking the podcast went pretty well

why did it make them so miserable

uh it's not just different hair it's not just different hair color.

It's not just a different place to live.

It's who you're living with.

Captain Archer appears to be living with Tepal, who has different hair in her own right, very long hair, and she is making them breakfast.

The breakfast that you would get at a restaurant where you can't decide which breakfast to get, like the quote-unquote all-American breakfast of like eggs and hash brown and toast and orange juice.

You get it all.

You know, you hear about the full English or the full Irish.

You never hear about the full American.

It's the all-American.

It is.

Why is it the all-American?

I like beans at breakfast.

I think it's fun.

Beans at breakfast is good.

I like the little, like the mushrooms and tomatoes that you cook off in the pan.

That's pretty good.

Yeah, that's nice.

I like that.

There's no place for jelly in an English breakfast, though.

And I do like an English muffin with jelly on it.

So she's not acting like wifey.

She's being pretty bossy.

Like, she's like, sit down and I'll answer your questions.

Like, I understand you have a lot of questions, but you need to sit down.

Jonathan, please sit down.

I think that aspect of this is important.

She seems to be expecting how simple he is in this scene.

And she begins with the question, what's the last thing you remember, Jonathan?

And he's like, oh, you know, now that you think of it, the command center 12 years ago.

Yeah.

And we flash back to there.

I can make movie night mandatory for senior officers.

You'll enjoy it.

Rosemary's a baby.

It'll scare the hell out of you.

There are bangers being dropped.

Archer to the bridge, report.

And on the bridge, they're like, whoa,

we did not expect this amount of anomalies in this kind of density to be in this area of space.

We're in a lot of trouble.

And so in the corridor, Tepal and Archer have kind of bailed out of the command center and bangers get dropped on them.

Anomalous bangers.

Yeah, they have to do that thing where there's like a ripple chasing them down the hallway and they got to run from it and they get away from the first one, but it like knocks some equipment out of the ceiling that pins TePaul's leg down.

It's a like race against time.

Can Archer heave this heavy thing off of the leg before another

blip blurps down the hall?

Archer's first instinct is to bite that leg off and who could blame him?

I mean mean, it's a race against time at this point.

Right.

Yeah.

I think he frees her, but he gets caught in the blip and wakes up in 6 bay.

Flox has some questions for him.

What do you think of what Flox is doing here in this moment?

I thought John Billingsley was absolutely fantastic, like giving us the full spectrum of what this doctor can be like based on the prognosis.

He seems profoundly troubled by what's happening here.

Yeah, because this is still pretty early days.

He explains, you've got a parasitic infection in your hippocampus.

Did you by any chance,

you know, just use plain tap water in your neti pot, Captain?

It's looking pretty bad in there.

It was all that was available.

You know, we didn't have time to go to a CVS and get baby water.

Yeah, I thought it would be cool to just make it as hot as possible.

What are you saying, Doc?

What the doc is saying, that parasites are eating his brains.

And the consequence is that, and then he's very dramatic about this.

He wheels in a TV VCR combo and he pushes in the VHS cassette of Memento.

This is you.

Yeah.

As he gestures to the screen.

By the end of the movie, Archer can't really remember how it began.

And he's like,

I'm a little confused.

No, where was I?

You are a real Sammy Jenkin type, Captain Archer.

He's been here for three days.

So Flox has had this conversation with him three days in a row.

And we talk about

how

over the next several days, like the ship was a little bit unsure how to react to its captain having memento disease.

So there were like attempts at McLaughlin groups where they would like catch him up on what was going on.

But it kind of got embarrassing because Archer would have the same ideas and the same suggestions over and over and over again.

I think anyone who's had a relative with some cognitive impairment or old age-related dementia or even just dementia not related to anything, related to Alzheimer's or whatever, is familiar with this scene in the mess hall where it's like

to Paul and Tripp being...

good sports about Archer not being really with it,

but also the feelings of frustration of being like, God, this guy used to be with it and smart and our captain, right?

And like that, the evidence so apparently is that like he is not, he is not anymore.

And that being so tragic for them to bear, like Trip, especially, like the look on his face.

You know, Tapal is going to be fine with this facially.

She's not going to betray how she's truly feeling, but man, you got a better poker face than Trip.

Yeah, Trip is mega-bummed about this, and who wouldn't be?

Trip kind of shuffles off, and TePaul is like, hey, like, thank you for rescuing me and throwing me out of the way of that subspace anomaly.

I appreciate not having been mementoed.

Like, that was a really solid move by you.

Yeah, thank God I didn't end up like you.

And I can tell you that straight to your face because you're not going to remember it you asshole i hate you archer you suck yeah so the single brass instrument of mental decline plays as tapaul gets a hail from sexual icon admiral forrest from starfleet the news is he has relieved archer of command and has field promoted to paul to captain what a relief yeah i mean i guess

It's a relief on one hand.

On the other hand, it's like, what are we going to do with this guy?

We're kind of far out here, and I guess he's going to stay.

Yeah.

Having been demoted.

And TePaul tells Archer this, not on Enterprise at the time.

We go back to the house that they share.

And what we learn here, in addition to the demotion, is that these brain parasites are from a different dimension, and that makes them impossible to remove.

Yeah, they exist in a state of interspatial flux.

How on mission is Archer here?

He's like, huh, interesting.

Whatever happened to the mission we were on?

There's stuff in your brains right now, Archer.

How incurious are you about that?

There's not a moment of him going, get it out, get it out.

Nominate this guy to

Secretary of Health and Human Services or something, because he is so focused on what drives him and so unconcerned with what impairments he might have from this.

Tabal's like, well, if you really want to know how the Zindi weapon mission went,

I can tell you that horrible story, which I have every day for the last 12 years, I guess.

Yeah.

So they found the weapon, and so the Zindi knew that they were getting close and sent a bunch of ships to attack.

So we get some really intense space combat and corridor combat.

Like there's two Zindi ships, one of them clamps on, and a boarding party is being fought by Makos and stuff.

I think before the boarding party even arrives, RSVP Mayweather, right?

Like, he's down.

He's down and dead.

Oh, man, I must have been writing a note.

I didn't even see that.

Ben, I completely forgive you for that because I had missed it the first time, too.

There's like a whip pan from Hoshi to Tepal, and then Tepal bends down to see the dead Mayweather, and then she steps right back onto her feet and like gives another order.

I don't think Mayweather even has dialogue in this episode.

I think the camera just focuses on him for a moment.

They covered him with blood, and then that's it.

Easy week, you know?

I guess.

Kind of unfortunate that Mayweather dies first, though.

Yeah.

I didn't love that.

Anyway, he's not the only one to die because these Zindi are kicking all kinds of ass, right?

They really are.

And one of them makes it to Captain's quarters, and Archer has hid in a broom closet with his Zephyrim Cochrane statue, which he's using as a cudgel to Star Trek fight this guy, and eventually stabs like the leg of the broken statue and into a Zindy reptiloid's chest.

I gotta believe in whatever cosmic ether you may believe a dead person's soul goes into after dying,

Zephyrim Cochrane's pretty thrilled about what his statue is being used for here, right?

That's Zephyrim Cochrane.

Pretty rad.

Pretty good stuff.

Hey, Ben, whatever happened to the whole neutralizing the rifle worms plan that they were working on?

As soon as the Zindi start attacking and shooting, I'm like, any moment someone's going to break the glass, hit the button, and then a bunch of dead macaroni-sized worms are going to go flying out of these rifles.

Oh.

And then that's going to be it.

That would be great.

Nothing ever happened with that, huh?

The Zindi don't lose webs.

The Enterprise loses webs.

Sure thing.

Yeah.

Tapaul, when she learns this, learns that they cannot defend themselves anymore, takes the helm and steers the ship that still has one of the two Zindi ship clamped onto it so that the two Zindi ships collide with each other and sheer away from the docking port of the Entrepreneur.

This car crash in space.

was fucking awesome.

It was so cool.

It was so great.

Like, I just re-watched

Rogue One, and there's

a couple of Star Destroyers get crashed into each other in that.

And I was kind of like, oh, I wonder if Rogue One kind of bit this rhyme.

Pretty great.

It's so cool.

The best Star Wars movie is Rogue One.

Yeah.

In the aftermath, we learn about all the death and damage from this incident, which was considerable, and that it will take six months to repair the warp nacelle sufficient to get it back to warp five.

So until then, they're just gonna be crawling around at warp one

which is shit and trip tucker in this scene is dark as hell he is as dark as dark archer has ever been his attitude is bad he's getting lippy with tapal yeah since the captain got sick this mission's taken one wrong turn after another there's a discussion about where to house the zindi that they took prisoner and and he's like blow him off the fucking airlock man yeah yeah he's real heart of darkness trip tucker here He really is.

Tapal in her defense, like, does not come at him directly, but instead is like, hey, one of our systems that still does work is comms.

So why don't you call daddy if you don't like how mommy is parenting you?

She's like, get the fuck out of here, Trip.

Her job is hard.

So we're back in the future now.

And this is when, like, I don't think it had quite struck me yet that Archer doesn't remember the scene where the Zindi weapon killed Earth.

Yeah.

So he has to ask about it.

And we learn that not only did they kill the Earth, but they went around and found any other human outpost they could find and took those out as well.

This is my mistake whenever I play Civ

going for domination.

Like, I've destroyed a capital, but I feel like I want to go clean.

I want to get all of the cities that that Civ has.

And you don't have to waste your time doing that.

Oh, you don't.

I thought you had to completely remove their borders from the game.

Not in my experience.

I think it's just capitals that do the job.

Wow.

Yeah.

That's great news for me.

That's going to make it so much easier going forward.

It feels good to go clean, though.

Yeah.

It feels good to go clean, believe me.

Get them all out of there.

You know what I really love to see is when I look at a map, everything under the control of one government that has swept in to destroy anyone that would mount a resistance.

I think the distinction you draw is interesting in this case.

It does not appear as though the Zindi want to conquer and take.

They are just all about the destruction.

They're not colonizing any of these places.

No, they're holocausting.

And we learn that fewer than 6,000 humans are thought to be left alive.

So close.

The banger revelation of this episode is what planet the remaining survivors have settled on.

This is SETI Alpha 5!

When Archer is made to process his grief outside by like burying his hands in the soil of

some gardening area outside of his hut,

I'm like, buddy.

I would watch out for what's crawling in the soil of SETI Alpha 5.

Oh, man.

What was he thinking?

I guess he doesn't know, right?

No one knows, right?

Oh, God.

Like, do you consider this restraint by the episode or an absolutely insane missed opportunity that the episode does not become just like the dying last gasp of humanity is about them getting SETI eeled over and over again?

I mean, one of the things about great screenwriting is that like a movie or a TV show teaches you how to watch it.

It teaches you what its rules are and so forth.

But one of my favorite spins on that is the bag over the head punch in the face of, we think we know how the rules of this story are.

And then you just get whack.

Like,

the idea that we could go through 15 minutes of like a very sad Archer dementia story into like a SETI eel origin story.

is hilarious to me.

It's like a from dusk till dawn.

Like, wait, what movie is this?

Maybe the brain parasites are the progenitor for the SETI eels in some way.

Is that the story we're going to get here?

I don't know.

I know.

Like, my mind went in so many directions, but the episode's mind does not.

It goes back to the entrepreneur.

We learn that most of the crew still stationed on it, and it kind of is the defense of the human colony.

It just stays in orbit keeping an eye on things.

Let me ask you something.

You've got the choice in the aftermath.

Do you want to be on Steady Alpha 5 or do you want to be on the ship?

For an undetermined amount of time and possibly forever.

Knowing what I know, I want to be on the ship, but I think

in that context.

Yeah.

I mean, I think that like the people on the ship are like mission-driven people, you know?

They seem tired as hell, though.

Like, I wonder how much they want to be there after this many years.

I know.

But they don't have anywhere to go.

The Zindu will find them no matter what.

I mean, it's so fucked up that the the fucking Vulcans wouldn't let them have like a refugee colony or something.

That is the dark underbelly of this episode is like, Tipal says it later on.

Like, you know, humans would have had a fucking chance if we didn't hold back our technical know-how.

It could have allowed for them to defend themselves in a way that worked for them.

But also, like, not extending a moon to them.

or the technology to survive and flourish on any planet besides SETI Alpha 5.

Kind of a bum deal.

Why are they listening to the Vulcans anymore anyway?

If that's what's happening.

Yeah.

Legally it's just a fart jump.

We concern ourselves around here with optimistic views of the future.

And the future of hiring looks much brighter because ZipRecruiter's latest tools and features help speed up finding the right people for your roles.

So you save valuable time.

And now you can try ZipRecruiter for free at ziprecruiter.com/slash scarves.

Listen, we got over 320,000 new resumes added every month, which means you can reach more potential hires and fill roles sooner with ZipRecruiter.

Four out of five employers who post on ZipRecruiter get a quality candidate within the first day.

If you go to ziprecruiter.com slash scarves right now, you can try it for free.

Again, that's ziprecruiter.com/slash scarves.

ZipRecruiter, the smartest way to hire.

Friends of DeSoto, we survived Star Trek Las Vegas 2025.

All seven days of it.

And boy, oh boy, do we have thoughts?

So many thoughts that we just had to record a very special bonus episode about our experiences with me and Ben, but also producer Wendy and our social media concigliary Bill.

You'll get an honest review of things, all the gossip, the stuff that worked, the stuff that didn't, and some big takeaways as we plan for next year.

So, if you want to know what STLV was really like, the bonus feed is how you find it.

By the way, this bonus episode, like all of our monthly bonus episodes, are available to everyone who supports the shows at maximumfund.org slash join.

It's easy to do, so go to maximumfund.org/slash join to get our special episode about STLV 2025 and all the great episodes that we put out every month.

month.

You know, we've been doing My Brother, My Brother, Me for 15 years.

And

maybe you stopped listening for a while, maybe you never listened.

And you're probably assuming three white guys talking for 15 years, I know where this has ended up.

But no, no, you would be wrong.

We're as shocked as you are that we have not fallen into some sort of horrific scandal or just turned into a big crypto thing.

Yeah, you don't even really know how crypto works.

The only NFTs I'm into are naughty, funny things, which is what we talk about on My Brother, My Brother, and Me.

We serve it up every Monday for you if you're listening.

And if not, we just leave it out back and goes rotten.

So check it out on Maximum Fun or wherever you get your podcasts.

All right, we're over 70 episodes into our show.

Let's learn everything.

So let's do a quick progress check.

Have we learned about quantum physics?

Yes, episode 59.

We haven't learned about the history of gossip yet, have we?

Yes, we have.

Same episode, actually.

Have we talked to Tom Scott about his love of roller coasters?

Episode 64.

So how close are we to learning everything?

Bad news.

We still haven't learned everything yet.

Oh, we're ruined.

No, no, no.

It's good news as well.

There is still a lot to learn.

Woo!

I'm Dr.

Ella Hubber.

I'm regular Tom Law.

I'm Caroline Roper, and on Let's Learn Everything, we learn about science and a bit of everything else too.

And although we haven't learned everything yet, I've got a pretty good feeling about this next episode.

Join Join us every other Thursday on Maximum Fun.

You will never take the greatest shit alive.

Ben would rather die.

So back in the present, we have Captain Tepal leading a convoy of survivors.

And speak of the devil, Saval comes to like roast her outfit.

That uniform doesn't suit you.

Captain.

And then try and convince her to come back to Vulcan.

I mean, the Vulcans are seen as like evolved creatures of the type that are worthy of great respect.

But Saval's starting a conversation with a woman about her appearance.

Not very evolved.

Didn't love it.

Yeah, Saval's canceled for this.

For this and many other things.

He's there to be like, hey, what are you doing?

Slumming it here with these about-to-be-exterminated humans.

It's not too late to change teams and get with the Vulcan way.

you know.

And besides, like, the thing I'm not saying that I probably should say out loud, you're gonna die if you stay with them.

Like, eventually, the Zindi are gonna get you, and I don't think they're gonna do much filtration between the bodies that are Vulcan and human on SETI Alpha 5.

They're just gonna nuke the site from orbit.

Fucking hey, yeah, we learned that there are like other convoys trying to get to SETI Alpha 5, and the Zindi Holocaust has just kind of continued apace in the background.

And she's like, Well, I would would never leave Archer.

And he's like, no, he can come.

He's the one human we will allow to come.

And we've even got some specialists that can maybe work on the parasite deal.

But it's a no from TePaul.

She is really done with Saval's condescending bullshit.

Yeah, she has, through the years, found some very strong anti-Vulk sentiment within her.

She's got some resentment about what the Vulcans have done.

Yeah.

W slash R slash T

the Zindi and their fight against the humans.

After the meeting, Archer tells TePaul that he wants to do something more than just have meals and daily briefings.

And sadly, TePaul tells him that they've tried that kind of a lot and it never worked.

The only thing that even came close to working was you being a curiosity for some primary school kids.

That stung.

I didn't like that.

The children enjoy hearing about our earlier missions.

You're simple enough to hold hold their attention, but no one else.

You probably remember this, Archer?

Like, when you were in elementary school and, like, a guy in a wheelchair came and gave a motivational speech about how, like, becoming a paraplegic doesn't have to end your, you know, your happiness or whatever.

And he's like, are you saying I'm the guy in the wheelchair?

Really?

Yeah, it...

It sucks.

This is a bad scene for Archer.

So the story continues.

After a year, they make it to SETI Alpha 5 with this convoy of refugees.

And in the clarinet rental room, Trip Tucker is not impressed with the topography of this planet.

Maybe we should have picked one with a little more blue and green on it.

No water.

This place is adult.

He's about to be even more disappointed by the career decision Tepal is making here.

She's announcing that she's resigning.

from Starfleet in order to be Archer's full-time caretaker.

And that's really sad, too.

It doesn't seem like her first and best destiny, to put it in Spock terms, you know.

Is it less tragic because she's going to live for a long, long time, and this isn't going to be like all of it for her?

This will be a very short chapter.

The way that, like, aging grandparents have to care for each other in a way that is like inherently tragic when shit goes down like this.

I was thinking also, like, her Vulcan temperament would be a unique asset in having to explain the same shit over and over again.

Yeah.

Like, she's not going to get frustrated with the repetition of that in the way that I think most people would.

How many days, then,

before you're looking for the exit?

I know, man.

I think I would try to find new spins on the story to entertain myself, but eventually that goes away.

There are no more new spins.

You're going to run out.

Yeah.

What do you think they mean

when,

you know, we're back on the planet.

We're back with their little house, the little house of TePaul and Archer.

And Tepal tells Archer, you know, like there have been times when you've become so paranoid.

Do you think this is going to be a whole Riker, My Name is Baresh situation down here?

The thought did cross my mind.

But this isn't it, and I can prove it.

And there's like that whole Margaret Mullen shibboleth that confirms that this is all very real.

And that isn't the craziest part.

What do you think TePaul means when she says our relationship has evolved?

I think this.

Oh, Ben's shoving a fist through

a

garbage can he's picked up off the floor.

Really?

Yeah.

Really, Ben?

Jesus.

Yeah, I think that, I mean, that takes some, you know, sustained work, some practice, some evolution to get yourself ready for something like that.

What really sold the visual was that you had like leftover lunch in your waste bin and it was like enchiladas.

And so like when you pushed your fist into that garbage, like all that red enchilada sauce squirted out.

All the refried beans from inside.

Yeah.

Jesus.

I should just finish my meals, you know.

You wonder why you have bugs in your studio.

It could be that I'm throwing enchies into the waste paper basket.

Yeah, that's a good point.

I might want to start taking those out to the outdoor trash can.

Later, Dr.

Flox is there to give Archer an exam.

This is back on SETI Alpha 5, remember?

And his story is that after the settlement was settled, I guess, he fucked off to Denabula to do some research about how to remove these brain parasites.

And in the 10 years he spent studying this problem, he might finally be close to a treatment.

He not only came up with a treatment, but invented a bunch of new technology to make it possible and has now brought it back here and installed it on the entrepreneur.

And today is the day that they're going to try it out.

Amazing.

So they go up to the entrepreneur and Captain Old Trip greets them.

Very happy to see them.

The crew are all here.

Everyone's been antiqued and has been given a command.

Oh, except Hoshi.

Yeah.

Oh, everyone gets a ship at Hoshi.

Yeah.

I mean, there are not that many ships, so this makes sense.

What do you think of Reed's enormous biker goatee?

It's a real choice.

I feel like this is what Dominic Keating, like, actually rocks, right?

Is it?

Like, I think he has.

I thought what he rocks now, it grows down more.

Oh, does it?

This thing was a fucking bush.

Yeah.

Let's see.

His Wikipedia picture is of him in 2016, so hard to know.

But

he and Connor Tranier, I feel like when I've seen them at STLV, like they get a booth next to each other and seem to be thick as thieves in a fun way.

We should do that.

We should get booths next to each other.

I'm going to try and get one from pretty far across the hall from you.

Oh.

Yeah.

See if I can get one over by, you know, Frakes or something.

You know, someone fun.

Oh, yeah.

It's someone for you to ignore.

That would go great over there.

Tell me about how your neighbor Frakes is in the next booth.

Hey, Ben, it's Jonathan Frakes.

I won't say anything to you either.

I think that's probably the best bet.

Bye-bye.

I feel like if we're staring across the booths at each other for long enough, he'll have to make the first move, right?

The line of hundreds and hundreds of people and me sitting there by myself alone with nobody even wanting to come up and talk to me.

Eventually, he'll take pity.

I mean, that's that farmer's market moment of like, God,

I don't need any mushrooms, but mushroom lady has not talked to anyone since I've been walking through.

Maybe I'll say hi.

So Flox shows off his new parasite killing gadget, and it looks a bit like a torpedo tube with a clip show device inside of it that's been plugged into the warp core.

You know, we get the briefest of tours, and then we cut to post a welcome reception that has been hosted on the ship in Archer's honor.

And Archer is like chilling out in his quarters alone after, and TePaul comes in and he's like, Yeah, I didn't like that.

Like,

to me, all of those people were a lot younger yesterday, and I was the captain, and everything was like going okay.

This was about the moment where I was missing the detail of when his memory would overwrite.

Were you exactly clear on the exact amount of time he would be with it enough to understand what was going on before his memory was erased?

I think they said three hours at some point.

Yeah.

But I mean, he says a few hours ago in this scene.

Like, he says, like, like, these people were all 10 years younger a few hours ago, from my point of view.

My point with that is there does not seem to be any sort of anxiety over time in that way.

Like, God, I really do not want to explain this plan to him one more time.

Like, let's get him in the fucking clip show booth.

Right, because you would have to.

Like, if it's every three hours, you would have to kind of constantly reset with him what's going on.

This is the the whole reason Dr.

Flox moved back to Denobula.

You didn't want to deal with that shit anymore.

I mean, this is the scene where Archer addresses that TePaul has had to have the same conversation with him over and over for 12 years.

Yeah.

And that's appreciated, you know.

This is like what they do in Star Trek.

There's like the most intimate you could possibly get is Picard going, I should have done this a long time ago at a poker table with crew people that he truly loves.

For Archer to not even get close close to a,

I really appreciate what you've done here and it means the world to me and it must have been frustrating as hell for you, like none of that is here.

There's a little gratitude, but I kind of wanted more.

Yeah.

When DePaul said to Sauval, I'm doing this because he saved my life, is it specifically the time he saved her life by pushing her out of the way of the anomaly?

Yeah.

That she's talking about.

Yeah.

I don't think I really got that the first time.

Yeah, I think that's what it was.

And now she's trapped in a curse of her own making.

She's trapped in the total reverse Groundhog.

Yeah.

Reverse Groundhog is when Groundhog is on top but facing the other way.

Yeah, you just look at that Groundhog booty sliding up and down.

You're going to break your dick getting six more weeks of winter trying that shit.

You're going to need those six weeks.

The Groundhog's not going to be walking straight.

I won't cease or desist.

So Fox is ready to do the science experiment, but on the bridge, they are getting readings that there may be a ship in the system, which is an emergency that the Enterprise is going to respond to.

So they're heading toward the sun.

which I guess would be SETI Alpha, while Archer is in the clip show device.

And what we see on the screen is really reassuring.

We're seeing, you know, black crud disappearing from what is presumably his super zoomed in hippocampus.

And

that seems like exactly the result you're looking for, right?

I've had now, I think, three MRIs of my brain.

I wish you could watch it during.

Yeah.

Like, this seems to be a thing that Archer could even be able to do.

Like, how reassuring must that be to go, oh, yeah, those black things aren't there anymore?

That's great.

Nope.

No such luck.

Even in the future, everything still sucks.

Yeah.

So yeah, positive result.

And they get him out and the ship approaches the sun.

And this thing that they picked up is in fact a little ship.

And it ain't Zindy.

No.

It is familiar, though.

To folks who watch Star Trek.

Thought it was very interesting that there was a Iridian on board.

Yeah.

Those squirrely guys can't be trusted.

They knock out his warp drive, and Captain Tucker orders this ship pulled into the launch bay.

Meanwhile, Flox and Paul talk a little bit more about, like, does she really sweat, Archer?

Is this like a...

Like, how much fisting has happened?

It's nothing to be ashamed of.

On a scale of one, two, five enchiladas, like, what are you guys getting up to?

It's funny how there is not even a whiff of sexual attraction to this reasoning.

It's more of a, I've grown fond of the big lug,

you know, through the course of making a big American breakfast for him every morning for the last 12 years, you know?

Like, I kind of want to keep doing that.

And what I love about what Dr.

Flox says in reaction to this is the thing he's saying without saying it.

I think there's a tragedy to Tipal's choice, this great sacrifice she's making that is difficult for Dr.

Flox to appreciate.

But also what he says is, look, if this procedure works for Archer, like your relationship to him is going to change.

So this idea that this guilt relationship has been constructed between you two and that will maintain going forward after this therapy we're doing, like buckle up.

You're going to get a different Archer out of this, so be ready.

Like, don't make your commitment so soon.

The scene ends with Tepal noticing a discrepancy in the scans, and we don't find out what that is because we cuts to the brig where this Euridian in custody gets questioned by Trip and Reed, and they're both playing bad cop.

Is there a type of alien that Worf hates more than Euridians?

I just remember so many Euridians getting roughed up by Worf on TNG.

He fucking hates these guys.

If you're a lying, I will kill you.

I feel like they were pretty hateable on Deep Space Nine, too.

For sure.

For sure.

I mean, not that Trip and Reid aren't rough here.

They've both gone pretty dark in their treatment of him.

Not going to put up with his shit.

They want to know, like, if he's working with the Zindi because they know that the Iridians are information dealers.

Turns out he has been tracking flocks, and it sort of seems like he doesn't really know

on behalf of who.

Like, he's very interested in knowing information, but not who his customers are.

So

either that or he's lying about it.

But Tripp comes to visit Flox and Tabal and is like, yeah, sorry, like we got to use all the power we've got for WEPS because

some Zindi are coming.

So that means no more Archer treatment.

And Flox is very upset by this because

He thinks that treating Archer may be the way to solve everything because the cluster that they removed was not just removed from Archer's brain now, but it was also removed from Archer's brain in the past.

All of their past scans no longer contain evidence of this.

It disappeared like a fucking Marty McFly sibling.

This is the moment where I started to think even more about all good things.

Like, are we going to get three Archers in this episode?

A past, present, and future where, like, we've got to destroy these brain parasites in one to take care of the other?

That's the story that Dr.

Flox is telling.

Like, destroy the parasites now.

They won't even be there in the past.

And if they aren't there in the past, that means past archers' future is different.

And it's definitely not the future we're in right now.

Yeah.

And it's got to be better than this, right?

This present fucking sucks.

Yeah.

This is Riker and Worf on the Bridge of the D.

Yeah.

And the war is going far worse for the the Federation than it's generally known.

Yeah, absolutely.

But they can't finish up this argument.

I mean, there are six Zindi ships closing in fast.

And on the bridge, Trip Tucker is ordering the ship to shoot first.

Loved this.

And then fly toward a bunch of backup Earth ships that are waiting to pick a few of them off.

Yeah.

It's like the strategy you have when you have overwhelming numbers against you.

Like, they got to be tricky.

Right.

You got to be tricky.

You got to do the sucker punching.

And we get some good space combat.

I would say, like, for three on six, the Earth ships are doing pretty well.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Archer like runs up to the bridge.

They're really getting hammered now.

And Archer is like trying to make it his way there.

They get to a turbo lift and it won't even open.

So it's ladder climbing time.

You don't think about how crucial this turbo lift outage is for a few more moments.

But holy moly, are they glad those lifts aren't working?

Because we cut to this the space shots and the intrepid like gets a nacelle completely cut off of it.

And then some more cutting beams hit the entrepreneur and just cut the bridge right off of the ship.

What's crazy is like how much enchilada sauce comes out of the bridge section once the lid is taken off.

Yeah.

Yeah, and they got the they got the Christmas kind.

So there's green and red.

So delicious.

Yeah.

I don't think, I mean, correct me if I'm wrong.

We've heard bridges targeted, but we've never seen a bridge get destroyed in this way on screen, in my memory.

Yeah, like where you can see down into it from the exterior like that.

You can see like a little reed.

kind of like somersaulting into space and he has seconds left of life and you can see him like go into a back pocket and take out a little pad of paper.

And he starts writing to an ex and then like he starts freezing.

Yeah.

And that's it.

RSVP reached.

It's really tragic.

That ex is never going to get that letter.

That ex is dead anyway

from the genocide.

Yeah, why is he writing?

Why did he bother writing it?

Like, she's gone.

She's been gone for years.

It's force of habit.

It's all he knows.

Okay.

I need something to do with this ship, Commander.

so archer and depaul make it to the door to the bridge and uh find that there's nothing on the other side of it so i love the logic here they're like i guess like the captain's dead so like nobody is gonna order us not to do the procedure now yeah the parents are at home so they get to to do whatever they want Except for the Zendi have now boarded the ship and started gunning people down.

That's how committed they are to a zero humans lifestyle as their plan.

Like, they don't need to board the ship.

They could destroy it from their ship.

Yeah.

No.

They're going room to room.

They're going room to room, to be sure.

The chamber in engineering has been damaged.

So the last best hope is to set off a subspace implosion, which will destroy the ship.

So Archer tries to get them to go to the shuttle pod and get away, but they're like, fuck that.

You're going to need us.

And it it is now a race against time as the Cindy maraud about the ship and try to stop them from doing whatever they're doing to the warp core.

These last moments here, I thought, were so exciting, so dynamic, so kinetic.

B-Dunks directed this episode, and the action of this is so great because you only have so much time to get this thing going.

Archer has to live to hit this switch.

And when you see Dr.

Flox get shot and he A-teams over a railing and you see Tepal get shot a couple of times and it only leaves Archer left to hit the last few buttons and switches here.

Like just the way everything concentrates into his one moment of truth.

Yeah.

I thought it was really great.

So exciting.

When we talk about like an episode telling you the rules so that you know like what conditions need to be satisfied for success.

One thing I wish I knew was if the subspace implosion happens and he's already dead, will it still work or not?

I thought the same thing.

Yeah, because I guess if you go to work on the parasites as a corpse, they would still be removed from his body in the past, right?

So maybe that works.

It seems like it.

Yeah.

Anyways, with his last remaining strength, he runs the overload.

Get a great big explosion of the ship from the exterior.

Archer wakes up in Six Bay.

And another thing I wish I knew was:

will

somehow, because of the parasites, he have a memory of this whole adventure or not?

But no, he does not.

It's just a like, oh yeah, you got your bell rung jumping out of the way of that spatial anomaly.

I mean, because of the year this was made, Dr.

Flox is like, look, you just got a concussion.

We're going to put you right back into the game.

You can go back to work.

It's not a big deal.

Yeah.

We end the episode with, this almost felt like B.

Dunks was doing a bit at Star Trek Enterprise with the number of times we see the back of TePaul's head in this scene.

Yep.

She's trying to leave Six Bay, and Archer keeps calling her back to

put another pillow under his head or dim the lights or whatever.

And you see her start to walk out.

Oh, oh, got to go back for something.

Oh, got to go back for another thing.

Oh, okay.

okay how many days pass before you ask for sponge bath do you think

i think i want one on that second day i like a regular shower time i think i want one right now no

that would be a great ending it's like hey hey tipal could i have a pillow and a sponge bath

the idea of a superior officer telling you You would be a good nurse.

Hard to know how to take that, right?

I mean, and and Paul won't let you know how that hits her.

Right.

It's a very strange comment to make.

Like, I feel less that she's insulted and more that she dodged the caretaker bullet, you know?

Right.

But I think that, like, it's sort of there to imply, you know, like he brought something back of the experience with him, even if he's not, like, totally aware of it himself.

But it's such a fucking weird thing to say.

Yeah.

Weird thing to say at the end of a pretty weird episode ben did you like it i can't pay could

late got okay

tempting fate i did like this episode i you know reading the the little blurb last week not knowing what this was gonna be i was like how the fuck are they gonna like have archer have memento disease for the rest of the season or the rest of the series or whatever.

Like, of course, he's like not going to have it at the end, but this episode goes into some very dark places before you get any glimmer that the day is going to be saved.

And I thought they did a really nice job with that.

I like the way the mystery unfolds, too.

Like, I love that, like, it doesn't make any sense that a blurp in subspace would put parasites into your brain until you learn that they're like subspace parasites.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And then you learn that they're way weirder than they thought for the first 12 years they were aware of them.

That's such a great Star Trek sci-fi idea, I think.

Yeah.

It is.

I think I've told you this before.

I think mental decline is the scariest possible outcome to my personal health.

I fear it.

I fear it because I've seen it.

And when I watch an episode like this, it is so clear that the focus of the story is on the reaction and not the character going through it.

Yeah.

And I thought it would be an opportunity to feel more for Archer if we were to get a little bit of more of that spin, which is something I'm really interested in.

Like, I want to care more about the captain of the hero ship of a Star Trek show than I do.

And that he is so focused on the mission, so caring for his crew, so generous with how he feels about his circumstances.

It's so barely about him.

Yeah.

He's super upset when he learns about Earth being destroyed.

But I almost wanted something more personal.

Like, what happened to Porthos?

That's the moment I want him to walk out into the dirt and like potentially touch a SETI eel like underground.

There's something too big about the destruction of Earth.

We got to SETI Alpha 5 with Porthos, and

he slept outside in the garden one day, and then he was like the most easily trained beagle after that.

Like you just, he was just so suggestible.

It was unbelievable.

We don't really know why.

That's a great punch up.

I would have loved that.

And like, what's interesting, if that had been in the episode, Archer would have presumed like a good and natural death and not the horrible Seti eel death that we know to be the case.

But I think in using Porthos as an example, like

the scope of the destruction of Earth is too big to convey in one person's grief.

But I absolutely understand the death of a dog and how that hits someone.

And that's sort of what I wanted to see more as a reaction, as a way for me to appreciate Archer's deal a little bit better.

Yeah.

Yeah, fun, weird episode, though.

Fun, weird episode.

You want to see if there's anything fun and/or weird in the priority one inbox?

God, I hope so.

Priority one message from Starfleet coming in on secured channel.

Need a supplemental income.

Supplement.

Oh.

Supplemental.

Supplemental.

Yeah, it's extra.

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

Promotional message here, Adam.

Inspired by shows like TGG and The Dollop,

This Is Getting Graphic is a comedy podcast with two best friends, Andrew, a fellow FOD, and Phil,

looking at the wildest and wackiest that comic books have to offer.

With each episode featuring analysis of a comic story, research on the background, and creators, jokes, commentary, and hijinks throughout.

Each episode stands alone, so you can start anywhere.

From the X-Men fighting Dracula to the time Superman almost made an adult film.

Wow.

Oh, this is cool.

So, like, I feel like there are a lot of shows about comics and their greatness, but this one seems to be focused on the weirdest version of these comic franchises.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I like that.

So, look for this is getting graphic on your podcatcher of choice and subscribe today and remember to stay super.

Is that the sign-off?

Pretty good sign-off.

Fucking better than anything we've come up with in almost 10 years.

Stay super weird.

Amazing.

Man, this is getting graphic.

Also a great title.

I was not aware that Superman nearly made a porno.

That immediately made me think of that line in Mall Rats about when he busts a nut, it like shooting out the lower back of whoever he came in like a shotgun.

Oh, yeah.

And he would need another super person to conceive with because

that would be the only way they'd be strong enough to take what he's shooting.

I mean, yes, and he probably couldn't even jack off

Superman.

He couldn't do that to himself.

What are you going to do?

Unstoppable force, immovable object kind of thing.

I mean, he's going to nut and like blow out a wall of his house.

So he only has, he can only do it like

just outside the Fortress of Solitude.

He's an outside masturbator.

That's what he is.

He's got to be outside.

That makes it safe.

Man, what an interesting prospect.

An outside masturbator.

Ben, our next priority one message is from Rico, and it's to my brother.

Here's that message.

Happy birthday.

I write this from your past.

As I finish up Voyager to let you know I will someday catch up to you in TGG colon bacula.

I've been stuck in the brone zone, and sometimes your trembles turn to rages.

I take it, you're in charge here.

Team Leader Brone, 4th Moray Defense Contingent.

I gotta get a pump.

That's it.

Get it.

May your birthday be full of good times and brews.

Specially ordered birthday-themed real doll from Kevin is in the mail.

Ensign Roadrop.

Oh, man.

It's a pretty intense birthday gift for a brother to send another brother.

But

I don't know.

You do you, Rico.

Maybe that's the relationship you guys have.

You know, there was a time when we used to have a number of advertisers on this show.

One of them being famously a bush hedge trimmer.

And they would send us Ben several, several a quarter even.

I don't know what you did with yours, but there was a time where I had several in my house.

I gave one to my brother for Christmas for the express interest of watching him open it like in front of my parents next to the Christmas tree.

It was a spectacular moment in my household.

Oh, that's tremendous.

Sounds like something Rico and their brother would get with.

It sounds like it went way better than when I gave my brother-in-law the same thing for the same reason.

Two great minds, man.

Our final P1 today is from Agra to LZ.

And it goes like this.

Throwing Ben and Adams some scarves to celebrate S3 of Enterprise and the arrival of our favorite that guy, Stephen Culp.

Major in Enterprise, special agent in Jag,

district attorney in Bosch.

Wow.

Speaker of the House in the the West Wing.

President in The Last Ship.

Oh,

our boy gets around.

Thanks for all the pod and hoping we eventually get a major haze drop.

Wow.

I love the idea of a major haze drop.

I definitely recognized Stephen Culp from Bosch and I had the cursor hovering over the last ship the other day.

I almost started watching that.

Per my interest in...

canceled TV shows that nobody will try to talk to me about.

It's almost the perfect show.

Yeah.

I think there's like four seasons of that.

Can you imagine?

It's perfect.

You got a great summer ahead, Ben.

Yeah, it's gonna be awesome.

Hopefully, we'll have a great summer with shows filled up with Priority One messages.

You can be among the FODs having their messages read on the show by going to maximumfun.org/slash Jobotron.

Do it today.

Do it.

Hey, Ben.

What's that, Adam?

Did you find yourself a drunk Shimoda in the present or past?

Drunk Shimoda!

Man,

I think I have to give it to Mayweather for getting

his card punched so early.

There has to be a production reason for that.

You know what?

Fuck that.

I'm not going to give it to Mayweather.

He's my runner-up.

I'm giving it to

Richard Anthony Crenna.

For...

Presumably, this is like several weeks or months into Archer's confinement to quarters.

Ensign Richard Krenna needs to have something to tell him, you know?

Something to be like, no, no, no, like you've lost your memory.

You may not realize it, but you're brain damaged.

You cannot leave your quarters right now.

So that Archer doesn't just clock him in the face.

He has to have practiced this.

He seems like he's never thought of what might happen if Archer comes out and is confused about not being captain anymore.

If Archer comes out of his quarters all confused, you just better remember one thing.

What's that?

A good supply of body bags.

It's just nothing but first blood dialogue.

Yeah.

How wonderful.

I love it.

Yeah, I'm going to make mine, Mayweather.

Just because

I'm hypothesizing a production reason for this, Anthony Montgomery had something to do this week.

Maybe he put in his time off request a little late and I was like, oh, fuck, fuck.

Look, I'll be a part of the show.

You don't have to write me off the show.

I'll be in it.

I'll be in this episode.

But

you have one hour.

And that's what he did.

Good act dead, too.

Yeah.

I mean, I'll take your word for it.

I didn't actually see it.

You didn't.

I'm telling you.

It was good.

Faith of the fart.

Okay, Adam, let's talk about what's coming up next week on the program.

It's season three, episode nine, North Star,

when a settlement of humans living a 19th century Western lifestyle is discovered on a Delphic expanse planet, Archer and Cruz set out to learn how they got there.

It's always Western, isn't it?

You legally cannot make a Star Trek show.

God, we should have asked Aaron Walkie about this.

How did you get away with making a Star Trek show without a Western episode?

I don't know.

It seems like they have to bring back season three.

I agree.

For that reason, to right that wrong.

I'm seeing Glenn Moorshower is going to be in this episode.

I love it, Glenn Moorshower.

Always fun to see.

Guess we got to find out how we're going to be doing it.

So for that, I'm heading to goch.biz slash game.

And I'm going to go ahead and roll this 100-sided die and find out exactly how we will be going back to Star Trek's Western roots.

You're required to learn as you play.

Roll.

We're currently on square 90, Adam.

And I've rolled something.

Oh.

Oh, have you?

I have rolled.

I've rolled a 79, which landed us on square 69.

Nice.

That is the decontamination chamber square in in which we are required to record in underpants.

Amazing.

I'm going to be moving my camera up to like...

Up to just showing my head.

It'll be like FaceTiming with your parents.

Yeah.

Just

cut off at

the level of the eyes.

It's going to be great.

Yeah.

Wow.

Looking forward to that.

Get your undies ready, everyone.

I feel like the only thing that this will change about the episode is just that the social media clip that Rob edits will look crazy because you're topless.

I hope the clip that gets used says nothing about why we aren't wearing shirts.

It's just totally about Star Trek in some other way.

It's like the nerdiest possible.

And then 40 comments asking, why are they not wearing shirts?

Yeah.

This will be like the best engagement we ever get, you know?

Can't wait.

Love it.

That'll be next week.

In the meantime, we have some thanks to give out.

We got to thank Wendy Pretty, our producer and editor.

Got to thank Rob Adler, our social media guy, and Bill Tilley, our social media guy emeritus, who's making trading cards that you can catch on the At Greatest Trek accounts on Insta and Blue Sky.

And we got to thank Adam Ragusia, who made the Diane Warren song Reemix

that you hear at the top of the episode.

And, of course, Dr.

Materia for the Picard song you hear at the end of every episode of this program.

Make it so.

What a combo.

Make it so.

With that, we will be back at you next week with another great episode of Star Trek Enterprise and an episode of the Greatest Generation Enterprise that proves that we're as adept with a shooting iron as we are with a woman's

It's fun every time.

Make it so.

Captain Jon Lu Picard of the U.S.

Tenth Cry.

Make it so.

Make it so.

Maximum Fun, a worker-owned network of artist-owned shows supported directly by you.