Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Going to start recording because we are both set up in our respective areas, which are not exactly where we thought we were going to be, but we are not.
[00:00:11] Speaker B: Snuggle with the dog while watching Star Trek.
This is a travesty right now. I'm so sorry. Nothing is working.
It's like we're living on a city on the edge of Forever. Forever stuck in an infinite loop. Right. I started out this morning sitting at this place at 630, this morning, working. Now it's at an undisclosed time from an undisclosed location outside of Seattle, Washington. And I am still at the same chair talking to you, working on things. This is great. I'm having a lot of fun here.
[00:00:52] Speaker A: I was excited because I was going to watch it on my big gaming TV in the gaming room, and I can't do it because the app we're using doesn't allow it. So I'm sitting in a nice, comfortable chair, looking at a delicious television that I can't use.
[00:01:13] Speaker B: Well, Greg, what are we watching?
[00:01:15] Speaker A: Well, we are going to watch Episode 28 of season one, Star Trek the original Series.
[00:01:23] Speaker B: Episode 28, yes. How do you get to 28 episodes?
[00:01:28] Speaker A: Well, they're written and produced and put on by CBS.
[00:01:35] Speaker B: That was brilliant. That's a great point. And do you know where you can watch Star Trek, the original series on everything?
[00:01:45] Speaker A: You can watch it on Amazon prime, on Paramount, on Netflix. Netflix.
[00:01:53] Speaker B: I assume Hulu, too. I mean, I just probably literally everywhere. If you can't find Star Trek, you are in some serious.
[00:02:00] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:02:01] Speaker B: You're.
[00:02:01] Speaker A: You're stuck in an infinite Time loop in a city on the Edge of tomorrow, which doesn't.
[00:02:06] Speaker B: I assume it's on TV. Wrestling. I was surprised. I don't think it's on.
And then it was like, well, next Generation would move to every new. Like, it was on Spike TV, and then it was on BBC America had it. I was like, okay, I guess that makes sense. I would think BBC America would play, know, British shows, that they were coming here, but no, they played Star Trek the Next Generation. It made sense. It made total sense.
This is what I watch BBC for. I'm not trying to get Doctor who or anything. No, I'm trying to get, like, more.
[00:02:48] Speaker A: Star Trek Red Dwarf.
[00:02:50] Speaker B: It's cold outside. There's no kind of atmosphere.
[00:02:53] Speaker A: It's true.
[00:02:54] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:02:55] Speaker A: So.
[00:02:56] Speaker B: Or the IT crowd. That's not on BBC. That's on Channel Four. I've already messed that up.
[00:03:01] Speaker A: Yeah. There's a lot of good stuff on British TV, which.
[00:03:06] Speaker B: But we're not talking about that today.
[00:03:07] Speaker A: We're not here to talk about.
[00:03:09] Speaker B: No, we're not talking about Red Dwarf. That was the parody of, oh, such a good show.
[00:03:16] Speaker A: So many days spent at home sick or playing sick, watching those red Dwarf tapes off PBS.
Yes.
[00:03:26] Speaker B: Anyway, and so thank you, JJ Penman, for starting me on Red Dwarf.
You had no idea.
So now we're back in. By the way, just as a side note, before we get started, I want everybody out there to know that JJ Penman is a real life train conductor. Yes. He has the job everybody wanted when they were three.
[00:03:50] Speaker A: He gets the hat, he has the.
[00:03:52] Speaker B: Suspender or the overalls if he wants them. I don't think you tell. Pretty much, like, if JJ wants to do something, I don't think people really argue with him.
[00:04:03] Speaker A: No, you don't.
He tells you what to do.
[00:04:07] Speaker B: Right? Like, he will beat you in the argument, but also he will just move you out of the way or just tell you what to do.
[00:04:13] Speaker A: I think he's picked me up once or twice, and I'm a pretty formidable person myself.
[00:04:20] Speaker B: I tended to have a little bit of a mouth when I was younger, and somebody wanted to punch me and I wanted to punch them back. And instead of letting me do that, he just moved me.
[00:04:29] Speaker A: Oh, jeez.
[00:04:30] Speaker B: Like, literally just lifted me up and moved me.
[00:04:32] Speaker A: He said, no, not today.
[00:04:34] Speaker B: Yeah, it's not today. I mean, kind of know Beckwith in the last few comic book issues would just move Spock out of the way or out of the way when he wanted to go murder.
So, remember Beckwith? Like, he went back in time. So, yeah, we're back on the Harlan Ellison script. See? On the Edge of Forever. Except it's not the Harlan Ellison script anymore. What? Yep. It's now the Hugo Award winning television script inspired by Harlan Ellison and rewritten by the Star Trek Writing Clue. I think maybe DC Fontana.
[00:05:09] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:05:10] Speaker B: And definitely a little bit of the man himself.
[00:05:16] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:05:17] Speaker B: So, yeah, let's get into what. What are we expecting? Are you expecting to be exactly the same? I'm excited.
[00:05:25] Speaker A: Oh.
If I hadn't seen it already as a youngster, my expectations after reading this would be, yeah, this is going to be exactly the same. But I have an understanding.
[00:05:45] Speaker B: You have an understanding? Well, this is my favorite original series episode and my favorite original series. Not episode based on what we just read. So I'm pretty excited to get started. So what do we say? Three, two, one. Press play.
[00:06:02] Speaker A: It is played.
Oh, my.
[00:06:05] Speaker B: Oh, yes, it's there. NCC 170. Yeah, this is fun because I.
And here we go.
There's a lot of things happening right now.
[00:06:30] Speaker A: Oh, my gosh. Yes.
So much that's happening. The volume on my computer was so loud.
It was just Claxons.
[00:06:44] Speaker B: There's a lot of shaking going on. Oh, no, Sulu.
[00:06:48] Speaker A: Sulu.
[00:06:51] Speaker B: I don't remember this happening.
Where are the drugs?
[00:07:01] Speaker A: I don't see him yet.
[00:07:03] Speaker B: There's that guy that looks like he was on drugs, though. Yeah, at the helm. That's interesting.
[00:07:08] Speaker A: Is that Beckwith? Oh, no.
[00:07:13] Speaker B: Crystal guy.
[00:07:14] Speaker A: Crystal guy.
Oh, man.
[00:07:19] Speaker B: Bones.
[00:07:20] Speaker A: Bones. Well, I mean, he's got to help Sulu.
[00:07:24] Speaker B: That's true. I don't remember seeing Bones for a while. Sulu looks hurt, man.
[00:07:28] Speaker A: Yeah, he does. He had a fire explode on him, George.
[00:07:31] Speaker B: Decay should not be treated like this.
[00:07:33] Speaker A: No, not at all.
[00:07:34] Speaker B: Treasure. He is a national treasure. Oh, he's fine. That's good. Miracles of modern medicine. He looks very.
[00:07:46] Speaker A: Oh, medical comment.
[00:07:50] Speaker B: Guess the banter boy saves the day. What is Scotty doing on the bridge?
[00:07:55] Speaker A: Well, I mean, he's everywhere and anywhere he needs to.
[00:08:02] Speaker B: Okay. Oh, we got another. No.
[00:08:06] Speaker A: What happened?
He got himself with the thing. No, the doctor's down now. We've got a medical issue.
[00:08:16] Speaker B: Yeah, I guess there was a lot of stroke. Well, what was in there?
Oh, gosh, he looks very sweaty.
[00:08:23] Speaker A: Overdose.
[00:08:29] Speaker B: Murders, assassins.
[00:08:32] Speaker A: He's freaking out.
[00:08:33] Speaker B: I don't know. Whatever he took, though, he's screaming murderers, killers. Bones is no all powerful at his slight 135 pounds.
[00:08:46] Speaker A: Yeah, the last time I saw somebody freak out like that was at Evergreen.
[00:08:52] Speaker B: DID they have bad granola?
[00:08:54] Speaker A: Yeah, bad granola.
It was a bad batch of Granola, man.
Oh, wow.
[00:09:01] Speaker B: And we're into the intro.
[00:09:02] Speaker A: Oh, yeah.
There's something about this intro. When I was a kid, I knew when this show came on and the intro was kicking off.
[00:09:13] Speaker B: There's just something really important here going on.
[00:09:16] Speaker A: Yeah. Because the music would kick in, and there's something about that music, and it is kind of timeless when you think about relaxing. It is.
It's that cool, Jazzy, Spacey feel.
[00:09:33] Speaker B: I loved how the ship would come by as they were listing the folks in the show. Right?
[00:09:39] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:09:40] Speaker B: Oh, here it is. The title. The city on the Edge of Forever.
[00:09:44] Speaker A: Oh, yeah.
[00:09:45] Speaker B: Okay, so we've had some time issues here.
[00:09:47] Speaker A: Mmhmm.
[00:09:54] Speaker B: 100 times the amount of cortisine you need.
[00:09:58] Speaker A: That's too many.
[00:10:00] Speaker B: I would like some cortisone for my knee today. That would be okay.
[00:10:04] Speaker A: Well, he had cortisine. That's slightly different, man.
[00:10:08] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:10:10] Speaker A: The look on his face is like, he is a determined man.
[00:10:16] Speaker B: He's looking all of a sudden. He went from.
He was a raving, crazy person a couple of minutes ago.
[00:10:24] Speaker A: And composed.
[00:10:26] Speaker B: He's chopping people, and he's very composed, like he now knows how to use the transporter.
[00:10:31] Speaker A: Yeah, well, it heightened his awareness and his senses. He hit that guy in all the pressure points.
Yeah.
[00:10:40] Speaker B: It was just very interesting that.
Okay, now they're confirming it's paranoia.
Okay.
Spock just explained everything. Okay, so he's wanting to escape at all costs. McCoy, mortal danger. Yep. McCoy's getting away.
[00:11:03] Speaker A: He's beaming himself somewhere.
Okay.
[00:11:13] Speaker B: This is a time disturbance on the planet. Okay.
[00:11:16] Speaker A: And McCoy is in the heart of it.
[00:11:18] Speaker B: We're identifying a. You know, it's interesting because you said that other script is really long, and we just went through the entire first comic book, I think, in, like, three minutes.
[00:11:28] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:11:29] Speaker B: Yeah. Because we're. Yeah.
[00:11:31] Speaker A: Less than five minutes.
[00:11:34] Speaker B: Okay. And that's everything. So we've got three red shirts, but one of them is. Yeah, well, I guess technically.
[00:11:43] Speaker A: Mm hmm.
[00:11:45] Speaker B: And then we've got an obelisk.
[00:11:47] Speaker A: Oh, those are hard to make.
[00:11:52] Speaker B: Did we see a city on the horizon?
[00:11:55] Speaker A: Not quite.
[00:11:56] Speaker B: He Just said there was one. Right.
[00:11:58] Speaker A: It looked like it had the appearance of. But not quite.
It's just the runes.
[00:12:05] Speaker B: It looks like an obelisk. Yeah, it looks like an obelisk. Then they just tossed around some old sets from Ben Hur.
[00:12:14] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:12:15] Speaker B: And just broken. They went to the back lot. They grabbed some. Are those Corinthian columns?
[00:12:21] Speaker A: Yeah, Corinthian columns.
[00:12:24] Speaker B: I really don't know my columns.
[00:12:26] Speaker A: Well, I mean, they're definitely. It's very fitting. I mean, I know we're recording it and no one else knows when this gets put out, but they could have.
[00:12:35] Speaker B: Pressed play when we said press play.
[00:12:37] Speaker A: Yeah, they could have pressed play, but I was going to say no, yesterday was the IDs of March.
[00:12:46] Speaker B: That's fair.
I was not thinking about the IDs of March. But Spock now explaining everything about this obelisk, he says it shouldn't exist. And it's got a whole bunch of time energy.
[00:12:59] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:13:00] Speaker B: And time travel. Nothing ever goes wrong with time travel.
[00:13:04] Speaker A: No, nothing at all. There he is again. There's popping up everywhere.
[00:13:08] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:13:08] Speaker A: What is he?
[00:13:09] Speaker B: He's kind of speckly. Yeah, he's just kind of running around in the background.
[00:13:15] Speaker A: Well, he's got to sneak around a question.
[00:13:22] Speaker B: Okay, so now we're talking to the obelisk. This is good.
[00:13:25] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:13:28] Speaker B: I have awaited. It doesn't sound like you.
[00:13:31] Speaker A: It doesn't. You do I have awaited the question.
[00:13:37] Speaker B: I love the like. That's one of my favorite comic characters.
[00:13:41] Speaker A: None of that, Dan. None of that.
He's both a machine and a bean. I am both a machine and a bean.
[00:13:51] Speaker B: I do think it's cool the way he's talking, though.
[00:13:55] Speaker A: And the lights.
Think about that. I mean, technology wise, when they're making this, to have to put all the lights in there to make that work. LED lights, like some cool kids playing Fortnite.
[00:14:10] Speaker B: They just put some Christmas lights in a plastic obelisk from a set.
[00:14:15] Speaker A: I want to make one of these for my living room now.
[00:14:19] Speaker B: I would endorse this behavior.
[00:14:21] Speaker A: You think I could do that in the dining room area, which we play games in?
[00:14:25] Speaker B: Yeah. Can I come and talk to it?
[00:14:27] Speaker A: Yeah. And I'll sit on the other side with a megaphone.
Your question.
And we'll put the smoke machine up.
It'll just be a smoke machine that just, like, pours down. Oh, that's cool.
[00:14:44] Speaker B: So we've got Egypt here.
[00:14:46] Speaker A: Egypt.
[00:14:47] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:14:48] Speaker A: Oh, man. I've seen this movie before. And then Kurt Russell's on the other side of it. Oh, man. Don't go in there.
[00:14:58] Speaker B: Okay, here comes McCoy. What is going on? So we're looking at time assassins.
He'll kill.
[00:15:05] Speaker A: They're. They're trying to hold him back.
[00:15:07] Speaker B: McCoy.
[00:15:08] Speaker A: Red shirts. Spock with a pinch. Putting him down.
[00:15:11] Speaker B: This is very different. Very different. Took out everybody in the other story.
[00:15:15] Speaker A: Took everybody out.
[00:15:17] Speaker B: Like, McCoy gets just taken down, like, right away.
[00:15:20] Speaker A: Boom.
[00:15:20] Speaker B: Just wipes him out.
[00:15:23] Speaker A: Oh, Kirk, could we somehow.
No, you can't just jump through a time hole and relive the day.
[00:15:38] Speaker B: So the goal is not to use medicine to save the day? Yeah, the goal is to go back in time by a day to prevent Dr. McCoy from injecting himself with the cortisine.
Okay.
I could sort of see why Harlan Ellison would have been annoyed by that little prop point there.
[00:16:03] Speaker A: Yeah, because the whole idea is not to tweak time, to go back to fix something that could be fixed.
There's no sense of where's the real payoff. Right?
McCoy's back again. Oh, he's running. He's going for it. Oh, look at that.
[00:16:30] Speaker B: Boom.
[00:16:31] Speaker A: Right in.
[00:16:32] Speaker B: He dove into the time stream. Okay.
[00:16:35] Speaker A: Yep. He's lost to it.
[00:16:37] Speaker B: Well, we're done now.
[00:16:38] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:16:38] Speaker B: They are like root.
[00:16:43] Speaker A: What was.
[00:16:45] Speaker B: These are the most incompetent guards.
[00:16:49] Speaker A: Oh, man.
They lost contact with the ship. Things are messed up.
[00:16:55] Speaker B: Uhura has one job. Communicate with the ship.
[00:16:59] Speaker A: Well, she was doing it until it disappeared and now it's gone.
[00:17:05] Speaker B: I just want to say, Nichelle Nichols is, like, one of the greatest people.
[00:17:08] Speaker A: Oh, yeah.
Oh, no.
[00:17:14] Speaker B: Everything knew was gone.
[00:17:16] Speaker A: All that you knew was what can.
[00:17:20] Speaker B: Mess up time that much?
[00:17:22] Speaker A: McCoy.
[00:17:26] Speaker B: Apparently, McCoy went crazy. Okay.
[00:17:28] Speaker A: Yeah.
No past, no future, no present.
Her earrings are pretty sweet, that color.
[00:17:39] Speaker B: That was cool, too, because I like how Uhura just looked up and said, I'm frightened. Like, acknowledges the state of.
[00:17:48] Speaker A: Hmm.
[00:17:51] Speaker B: It's interesting, though, too, how in the comic it was like an empowerment and for Yeoman Rand and her is sort of just sitting here in the background in this story with the Red shirts.
It does look like she's leading Scotty, though. They do have her position in front of him.
[00:18:17] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:18:20] Speaker B: But they're just kind of silent in the background.
[00:18:23] Speaker A: She definitely does have that feel of being more in charge of those three.
[00:18:30] Speaker B: Yahoos, but definitely not, like, leading people in a fight against others in an alternative chip.
[00:18:38] Speaker A: Not holding down against the Marauders or whoever. What were they, the Ravagers?
[00:18:44] Speaker B: Yeah. The Ravenchers.
[00:18:48] Speaker A: I know that wasn't their name, but the warriors, the outsiders, they're fighting the Warriors.
[00:18:54] Speaker B: Warriors.
[00:18:58] Speaker A: Oh, warriors.
Clink, Clink, clink. I only had some bottles in here. I cleaned the game room.
[00:19:16] Speaker B: Scotty interrupts you mansplain.
[00:19:20] Speaker A: Hey, man, it was totally okay back then. It was never okay.
[00:19:27] Speaker B: Never okay back then.
[00:19:34] Speaker A: It is interesting to watch older TV shows and see that kind of stuff, and you're like, man.
[00:19:44] Speaker B: Well, then she just mansplayed for.
[00:19:46] Speaker A: Yeah, that's okay.
[00:19:51] Speaker B: So what do we got?
[00:19:52] Speaker A: Looks like, was that Truman?
[00:19:54] Speaker B: Great Depression. Yeah. No, it was not Truman.
[00:19:57] Speaker A: Oh, Roosevelt.
[00:19:59] Speaker B: Yep.
Okay, we're here. So we got in the background, Madison Square Garden right there. Okay. And now we look like we're on a Wild west set. So we went to the back lot, and we've got the bank and a bird. Trash barrel.
[00:20:19] Speaker A: Yeah, that trash barrel would never have been made back then.
Quite barbaric.
[00:20:30] Speaker B: Okay, so he's identified the depression as barbaric, which is very different than the original story. Right, where they're being looked at by these women, but they're chased, and he calls them barbarians. Right?
[00:20:41] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:20:44] Speaker B: Killer Kid is boxing.
[00:20:46] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:20:47] Speaker B: Will Bailey, Gus Barnes, and Ricky Mason. But I don't see who they're fighting in this.
[00:20:53] Speaker A: Spock actually says he's going to be the one that's difficult to explain to people and hard to hide in this time, where Kirk in the book makes the comment that he's going to be noticed and will have to downplay his image.
[00:21:11] Speaker B: They almost get hit by a car. That's great.
[00:21:14] Speaker A: What's that?
[00:21:15] Speaker B: This is a very interesting approach that they take at the sTart, too, because they take away the xenophobia. Right. And eliminate it from the story.
And they sort of immediately put them as people out of time. Right.
[00:21:31] Speaker A: Just funny dressed people.
[00:21:34] Speaker B: We just don't know what going on. We're going to walk in front of cars. We're going to go steal clothing.
[00:21:39] Speaker A: Yeah.
Kirk being always. So what do you want to say that he's an engineer of. He's a social engineer, if you will.
[00:21:50] Speaker B: And we get the clever Kirk music in the background whenever he's doing something clever or funny. Okay.
[00:21:55] Speaker A: Yeah.
Getting those clothes.
[00:21:57] Speaker B: Hey. So they've stolen clothes.
They steal clothes and run right into a police officer.
[00:22:10] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:22:14] Speaker B: I believe they just ran into Chris Hemsworth.
[00:22:21] Speaker A: Kind of looks like. Yeah, for sure.
[00:22:25] Speaker B: So that means he just ran into his.
[00:22:31] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:22:31] Speaker B: So his dad is the police officer.
[00:22:34] Speaker A: Chris Hemsworth or Chris Pine? Chris Pine.
[00:22:38] Speaker B: Chris Hemsworth.
[00:22:39] Speaker A: Chris Hemsworth, yes.
[00:22:42] Speaker B: Who played George Kirk in the Chris Pine movie.
[00:22:46] Speaker A: What?
[00:22:48] Speaker B: Ten minutes of the scene.
[00:22:51] Speaker A: Whoa.
Put the clothes down. You're in deep.
Uh oh. Spock with the pinch.
[00:23:09] Speaker B: Wow. These police are not the New York police of today.
[00:23:13] Speaker A: No, not at all.
[00:23:14] Speaker B: Did have maybe a little bit of stop and frisk there, but then it.
[00:23:19] Speaker A: Was a pinch and run. Really a pinch and pinch because they pinched the clothes and then he pinched his neck, and now they're running.
[00:23:27] Speaker B: Those Vulcan grips are powerful.
[00:23:29] Speaker A: They are.
[00:23:30] Speaker B: Okay, so we're passing the 21st Street Mission here. Okay.
[00:23:34] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:23:35] Speaker B: And they're headed down some stairs. I remember this part.
[00:23:37] Speaker A: Yeah. Down the stairs into the basement. Oh, hey.
[00:23:41] Speaker B: Looks just like the basement and things. Okay, so they made it to a basement. They ran away with their clothes. But this is very different. They're running away from the police instead of a mob of people.
So it's almost like they're the ones causing this disruption as opposed to just the inherent hatred of people.
[00:23:58] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:24:01] Speaker B: Remember, I'm saying this because we just read the other story, but I love this episode. I don't want anybody to think any different.
[00:24:09] Speaker A: At times, you seem so human.
You gotta love the dialogue.
[00:24:24] Speaker B: People speak English in outer Mongolia, Captain?
[00:24:27] Speaker A: Yeah, a certain time.
[00:24:38] Speaker B: I'm glad to know that the English dialect doesn't change over time, and it's used all over space.
[00:24:46] Speaker A: It is good.
They're snappy dressers for their stolen clothes off the drying rack.
[00:25:01] Speaker B: That's interesting.
[00:25:03] Speaker A: What, the computer aid and the vacuum tube culture line.
[00:25:07] Speaker B: Yeah, the line's pretty similar, but it's like Kirk insults him into. Know, in the original story, Kirk destroys the tricorder, right?
[00:25:16] Speaker A: Oh, yeah.
[00:25:17] Speaker B: And in this case, he manipulates Spock into doing what he.
[00:25:23] Speaker A: Oh.
[00:25:30] Speaker B: Well, we just destroyed about eight subplots.
[00:25:33] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:25:34] Speaker B: And here's Joan Collins.
[00:25:36] Speaker A: Hey.
[00:25:43] Speaker B: So they're below the mission, I assume, right?
[00:25:45] Speaker A: Yeah, I'm assuming so.
[00:25:46] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:25:49] Speaker A: For these clothes. We stole them. Didn't have any money.
[00:25:53] Speaker B: Well, there's a woman.
[00:25:55] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:25:56] Speaker B: And she has a large sun looking brooch.
[00:26:01] Speaker A: None of that matters in this story, Dan. None of that matters.
[00:26:05] Speaker B: I know.
They didn't really tell them what they had to do, right? No, they just said something. You had to prevent something. Right.
[00:26:16] Speaker A: She's giving him a job.
Ten cents a day.
It's so funny to watch how everything is so compressed. Yeah.
[00:26:41] Speaker B: It'S extremely compressed. We don't have any context for why Edith Keeler would just appear in the story, right?
[00:26:48] Speaker A: Yeah. Well, she runs the mission, Dan.
That's why.
[00:26:53] Speaker B: Yeah. It's just very different from the original story. Like, I can see why Ellison, again, would have been frustrated by the changes, right. Because he spent so much time setting up, finding and, you know, give you that tension about the relationship immediately. And this is different because if you follow the series, right. Kirk is a womanizer. And it's said in the Ellison story. But here we simply get, like, we think Kirk's just being a womanizer, right?
[00:27:24] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:27:24] Speaker B: Like he's just staring down the pretty girl.
[00:27:27] Speaker A: Yeah. He's making short talk with her or small talk. And he's trying to charm his way.
Oh, gotta listen to Goody two shoes.
She's a. She's a lady with a mission, on a mission.
Kirk is.
He wants to hear what she has to say.
[00:28:04] Speaker B: Kirk's being very defensive when the man was being vulgar.
It's interesting here, too, because in the original story, she's set up as somebody who's followed by everyone. Right? People come to the corner to listen to her.
And the very first commentary we get in this story is somebody being dismissive and bored and criticizing her and making Edith a sex object.
[00:28:38] Speaker A: Just pointing out that she's nice to look at. But what else does she have to offer except for food and a boring message?
[00:28:50] Speaker B: Yeah, but we didn't get this in the original script at all.
[00:28:53] Speaker A: No.
We had a very strong leader.
Yeah.
[00:29:02] Speaker B: It was almost like her message was secondary. It was just that she was a very powerful leader. Right. Like she existed and she had a message, but they didn't really dive into that message here. They get immediately into the message.
[00:29:14] Speaker A: Yeah, get into the message in this story, but we lose all the strong female.
It's an interesting, I can definitely see where Ellison, if he wrote very strong character arcs for these women and then lost them to this because they wanted to push the story.
[00:29:48] Speaker B: Yeoman Rand was empowering a character. Right. That hadn't been empowered before and now.
[00:29:56] Speaker A: Totally cut out of. I mean, you never saw her.
It's almost like she didn't exist because she wasn't there.
[00:30:05] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, and then Edith invites Kirk to her apartment building.
[00:30:12] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:30:13] Speaker B: They're sort of starting flirting, which is fine. I'm okay with this piece of the story.
I think the other piece, though, the two that was disempowering, is she wasn't really leading the mission. I mean, she was, but she was also back in the kitchen serving people.
[00:30:29] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:30:31] Speaker B: Which is a little different than the other script we're looking at.
[00:30:37] Speaker A: Was. Yeah, she was definitely the figurehead of it and doing all the different stuff and running the show here. She's just kind of like the marm, though.
[00:30:47] Speaker B: She did make dinner for Kirk later in the comic book story. Right. And had the angel food cake. So there was that of a.
[00:30:56] Speaker A: That was more part of the romanticness and I guess the domestic portion of them in the relationship.
[00:31:05] Speaker B: Right. As they showed the relationship prOgress.
[00:31:08] Speaker A: That makes sense.
Spock has got the Doctor.
It's very Doc Brown.
Rebuilding the time machine. Back to feature three. Trying to fix this tricorder.
[00:31:31] Speaker B: This is.
[00:31:37] Speaker A: Knives and bear skates.
[00:31:47] Speaker B: Kirk, for being a captain of a starship, seems fairly ignorant to technology in this episode.
[00:31:53] Speaker A: Yeah, you would think. I mean, but then know cream rises to the top.
[00:32:00] Speaker B: What is happening, right?
[00:32:02] Speaker A: What?
Kirk wanted to make a sandwich.
[00:32:06] Speaker B: Wow, that was phallic.
[00:32:12] Speaker A: They only made bread, like, know, in giant loaves, and he was just holding it.
[00:32:19] Speaker B: That baloney had a first name.
[00:32:26] Speaker A: Wow.
Stone Eyes and bare skins.
It's a good line.
[00:32:34] Speaker B: I love the Beanie cap that Spock has to wear.
[00:32:37] Speaker A: I have one of those.
They're comfortable.
Dockyard cap.
[00:32:46] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, I thought they were there going to be fixing something, but it was somebody else fixing clocks.
[00:32:50] Speaker A: Okay. Now they're just the cleanup guys.
[00:32:55] Speaker B: That's kind of interesting. I'm looking at the scene here, and Spock's looking at the fine tools and the clockmaking. And the clockmaking kit. And this is very reminiscent of Watchmen.
[00:33:09] Speaker A: Oh, yeah.
Interesting.
[00:33:14] Speaker B: I wonder if there was some inspiration there.
[00:33:16] Speaker A: Maybe possibly.
Oh.
[00:33:25] Speaker B: That combination lock didn't look 1930s.
[00:33:28] Speaker A: No, it looked like a gym lock locker. Like a locker lock reminded me very much of junior high.
[00:33:39] Speaker B: Yeah, it did. It was very interesting.
Well, not everything can be period, I guess.
[00:33:46] Speaker A: Yeah, this is true.
[00:33:49] Speaker B: Spock borrowed the tools, and Edith caught him.
[00:33:52] Speaker A: Oh, he is busted. But Kirk's pouring on the charm.
Uh oh. She's got questions.
Questions.
[00:34:09] Speaker B: Oh, she is really good at playing this character.
[00:34:13] Speaker A: Yeah.
It's almost like she's a very good actress.
[00:34:26] Speaker B: Yeah, I paused for a minute watching. I know this is a good podcast for everybody, but I was watching Edith's dialogue. Right. John Collins deliver this and peel apart their relationship.
[00:34:38] Speaker A: Yeah. Just kind of like looking into who and how Spock and Kirk work together and why they're always together.
[00:34:51] Speaker B: When she points out the captain thing. And it's almost like, too. She's trying to separate them so she can start the relationship with Kirk.
IdentifYing that Kirk's worried about his friend and won't hang out with her.
[00:35:05] Speaker A: Now they're holding hands, walking down the street.
[00:35:09] Speaker B: Progressed quickly.
[00:35:10] Speaker A: Yeah. Is that for rent? For $3. Man, that's a good deal.
[00:35:16] Speaker B: Must be in downtown Seattle.
Back to Floyd's barbershop. That's neat.
[00:35:24] Speaker A: They serve together where they're in the war together, because that makes sense.
[00:35:31] Speaker B: I like her hat.
[00:35:33] Speaker A: Yeah, it's pretty cool.
[00:35:39] Speaker B: This is really interesting how fast the relationship progresses and how much she's prying into it. Right. Spot Kirk relationship.
And I guess maybe they had to do this just to move the story along quicker, right?
[00:35:52] Speaker A: Yeah, definitely. I mean, they only have 50 minutes to crank the story out and a 300 page script to trim up.
[00:36:07] Speaker B: It's almost interesting, too, how much power she holds in the relationships. And it's not threat based power. It's intelligence based power. Right. And Kirk is not used to this.
[00:36:20] Speaker A: Yeah, he's usually the one that engages, starts, I guess, the engagement of whatever with any of the ladies that he's talking.
[00:36:36] Speaker B: Oh, now we have the time Scopes back on, and it says, social worker killed Edith Keeler with her picture.
[00:36:44] Speaker A: Spock.
[00:36:44] Speaker B: And then stuff starts going down.
[00:36:47] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:36:48] Speaker B: Spock's making some adjustments here.
[00:36:51] Speaker A: He's learning some of the history in the past.
[00:36:54] Speaker B: Man, he's got a lot of light bulbs going on.
Oh, those are vacuum tubes, aren't they? Where did they get vacuum tubes?
[00:37:05] Speaker A: Oh, you know, radios.
[00:37:08] Speaker B: These buildings weren't made for the Internet, that's for sure.
[00:37:11] Speaker A: Yeah. No, so if each one of those went into a radio, and he's got probably 1234-5678 910. And then there's another ten behind him. 20.
[00:37:27] Speaker B: Well, the really cool thing here is when he starts mining bitcoin with these, he's going to be very rich later.
[00:37:33] Speaker A: Oh, he will be.
What?
[00:37:44] Speaker B: I don't remember the president. Edith Keeler. I don't remember the Edith Keeler Franklin Delano Roosevelt mashup.
[00:37:53] Speaker A: From the book. You didn't read that chapter?
[00:37:56] Speaker B: No. That didn't seem to be in the original story at all.
[00:37:59] Speaker A: No, not at all.
But it was in the timeline that we're from.
Don't you remember history books?
[00:38:07] Speaker B: That's just weird how that just blew up and I felt like I was smelling burning wires.
[00:38:13] Speaker A: Right.
[00:38:16] Speaker B: That was a good cinematography there.
[00:38:19] Speaker A: Yeah.
There's two options.
[00:38:29] Speaker B: There's two futures, two features. One where somebody we've never heard of starts meeting with the president, and another where they die.
[00:38:40] Speaker A: What will happen?
[00:38:43] Speaker B: They both can't be. Yeah, like Kirk is wooden here. This is interesting. He is paralyzed by this.
[00:38:52] Speaker A: Well, I mean, he's found the woman he is starting to fall in love with.
McCoy, random element.
We don't know which McCoy has to die. He's going to either be the killer or the preventer of death.
[00:39:24] Speaker B: They do move the story through quickly.
Okay, Spock's already getting to the.
[00:39:34] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah.
[00:39:35] Speaker B: To set things straight, we discover Edith Keeler must die, and all we just get is a pan out on Kirk. So we don't get the big argument that we got in the original script. We do get a little bit of the effect. Right. Of that look.
[00:39:47] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, there was definitely. Well, I think the way that they did that cut to the milkman.
[00:39:58] Speaker B: They definitely cut down on the violence in the script, too.
[00:40:01] Speaker A: Right.
[00:40:01] Speaker B: You don't have Beckwith, like, going around shooting people. We don't have a bunch of people shooting each other.
[00:40:06] Speaker A: Yeah, I'm pretty sure that they kind of had to do that for standards.
[00:40:15] Speaker B: We have a man stealing some milk here. Hey, and there's Dr. McCoy.
[00:40:19] Speaker A: He just popped in time.
[00:40:22] Speaker B: Assassins. Murderers.
[00:40:26] Speaker A: He's freaking.
[00:40:28] Speaker B: He's very red still.
[00:40:29] Speaker A: He's very.
That.
[00:40:32] Speaker B: Is that a side effect? Is the red blotches on the skin?
[00:40:37] Speaker A: What time is this?
[00:40:39] Speaker B: That guy with the milk, he's about to get.
[00:40:45] Speaker A: He dropped the milk.
[00:40:48] Speaker B: There it goes. On the ground. No crying over staying in an alley. And I saw murderers and assassins. I might drop milk, too.
Oh, here we go. Yeah, Edith and Kirk are back together again.
[00:41:06] Speaker A: He's looking dapper.
[00:41:09] Speaker B: He's looking dapper in his flannel.
He is dressed for a mid 90s, early 90s Northwest party. Yeah, he is, I would say mid 90s. This is more of the evergreen flavor, honestly. Right. Than the original early. Yeah, it just would have been a flannel with some cut up jeans or sweats down below. Now he's got a jacket on that's definitely dressed up.
[00:41:32] Speaker A: That's a wedding.
[00:41:33] Speaker B: That's like the toodle Washington prom right there.
[00:41:36] Speaker A: We're ready to go 100%. Oh, that scared me, actually. That was a good jump scare.
[00:41:44] Speaker B: Yeah.
I do like how they're cutting from the relationship to Kirk or to McCoy running around trying to find out things.
[00:41:55] Speaker A: Where are.
He is such just a heated man. Right?
Oh, I think he's going to take this guy's clothes.
[00:42:14] Speaker B: I did sort of like how Beckwith was just this villain that was sort of unnamed. Right. Like, we knew he did bad things and he just kept doing bad things.
[00:42:24] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:42:25] Speaker B: It's very different where McCoy is sort of, like, rediscovering his humanity here. And as the drugs work through the system. I thought he was incurable, though. Right? Wasn't that the.
[00:42:37] Speaker A: Yeah, he's just on another level.
But it's like when you're on some really good drugs and you're just like, got to touch everything and everything's making so much sense, but you don't know what the reality is.
[00:42:57] Speaker B: It's very nice that he wears his wedding ring on set.
[00:43:04] Speaker A: Oh, my gosh.
[00:43:05] Speaker B: Also interesting, he was talking about concrete columns while holding a big metal pole.
Oh, wow.
That didn't go well.
[00:43:15] Speaker A: He's crashing.
This dude doesn't know what to do.
You okay, buddy?
[00:43:25] Speaker B: Wow.
What's that guy is all over. McCoy knocked out.
[00:43:31] Speaker A: Cool.
[00:43:32] Speaker B: It's a thief, man.
[00:43:33] Speaker A: I found a thing. I'm going to take it.
McCoy.
[00:43:37] Speaker B: No idea what it is. What could possibly go wrong here? He stoles a phaser.
[00:43:42] Speaker A: Yeah, nothing could go wrong, right? I mean, phaser in time. What's this guy? What's this do?
[00:43:50] Speaker B: Whoa.
You set it to maximum. That's not such a good idea.
He just evaporated himself. That was great.
So much for the thief to get for stealing.
[00:44:05] Speaker A: Yeah, that's what you get, buddy.
[00:44:07] Speaker B: Don't take things that aren't yours.
Danger right there. My God, look at that light right there. Jeez. That light hooking up his thing.
[00:44:17] Speaker A: Yeah, but they changed.
[00:44:18] Speaker B: He's running all of his power out of that one light socket.
[00:44:21] Speaker A: Well, they only got the one, but.
[00:44:23] Speaker B: That light socket is not dying.
[00:44:25] Speaker A: Well, you got to remember, they're probably not using 210 at the time.
[00:44:31] Speaker B: That's one stout light socket. You mean definitely don't want to put.
[00:44:35] Speaker A: Your finger in there.
Fused and burned circuits.
He's got to know.
[00:44:47] Speaker B: So Kirk has now sent Spock on this whole mission just to discover if his girlfriend is going to live or die. Yeah, it's interesting. Okay, we've got some folks sleeping in a doorway at Walt's restaurant. Photographer, barbershop. He's out of business. People are going back to the mission.
[00:45:06] Speaker A: Yeah.
McCoy is looking. He's looking haggard. His face is just. I mean, he looks badly.
[00:45:18] Speaker B: Only men walk the streets in this century.
[00:45:22] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:45:22] Speaker B: And Edith Keeler.
[00:45:27] Speaker A: I need a cup of coffee.
You can't let them find him.
She takes him off to the back.
[00:45:40] Speaker B: Room and walks right in after her. Says, Spock's serving the coffee now.
[00:45:46] Speaker A: It was one of those moments.
They crossed paths, but they missed, like, two ships in the night.
[00:45:54] Speaker B: And only because Edith is such a great person.
Okay.
[00:46:02] Speaker A: Late 1930s pacifist movement.
[00:46:11] Speaker B: Okay, so this is interesting. So there was a peace movement in the US, and it allowed the Germans to complete the nuclear bomb before we did.
[00:46:27] Speaker A: Okay, interesting.
[00:46:29] Speaker B: And that was all caused by Edith. A peace movement? All caused by.
Are we sure who caused Keeler? Okay, here we go. He just said Edith Keeler founded a peace movement that destroyed the world.
Yeah, that's fascinating. Especially at the time this was shot. Right. Because we're in the middle of a peace movement.
[00:46:52] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:46:53] Speaker B: So is this a dig then, protesters, or is it just a thing to make us think?
[00:46:59] Speaker A: Just maybe a think piece at the time? Probably.
[00:47:05] Speaker B: Because you think about it too. There's no mention of this in the Ellison script. Right. That we read.
[00:47:09] Speaker A: No, not at all.
[00:47:10] Speaker B: And so there's no implication.
Like, they don't explicitly say what she does to change the time stream. Right. They just say she's an important piece. And that's a big discussion in the story. Right. Is what is an important piece. Because the old soldier from World War I, from Verdun or Verdun dies, and that wasn't enough to change things, but she was important enough. And here they're firmly establishing in the storyline that she must die to stop peace because. So we can go to World War II and murder people.
This is a very different story. Right?
[00:47:54] Speaker A: Yeah, totally. 100%. It's very different.
[00:47:59] Speaker B: But she's still wearing the sun brooch, so that didn't go away.
[00:48:03] Speaker A: No, but they never mentioned it.
[00:48:05] Speaker B: Talk about it?
[00:48:06] Speaker A: No, not at all.
Ah, where am I?
[00:48:27] Speaker B: McCoy is so good.
The character is good. I do like as a substitute. I'm okay with this substitution to a point. But again, it just creates a very different story because now I'm feeling empathy for him for being stabbed right at the beginning with the drugs, whereas in the original story, drugs were bad. Right. And here it's just an accident.
[00:48:52] Speaker A: Yeah.
It's just.
[00:49:00] Speaker B: He'S lucid enough to know his job. I'm a surgeon, not a psychologist.
[00:49:04] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:49:13] Speaker B: And he says his name and position, which doesn't make him look crazy at all.
[00:49:16] Speaker A: No, not at all.
It's not a Navy uniform.
Because he doesn't believe in her. Because he thinks he is dreaming.
[00:49:34] Speaker B: Well, it's an interesting scene. Yeah. Because he's paranoid and thinks he's dreaming. And she thinks he's very strange wearing the uniform and talking about the USS Enterprise outside of a Navy uniform.
[00:49:45] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:49:46] Speaker B: So, yeah, it's a nice little scene character development there.
[00:49:51] Speaker A: I don't think the actual USS Enterprise was built and put into service until well after. Oh, the staircase scene. She almost fell down the stairs.
Yeah.
[00:50:10] Speaker B: But the interesting thing there is in the original script, she falls all the way down the stairs. Right.
[00:50:14] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:50:15] Speaker B: And crashes hard.
[00:50:17] Speaker A: Spock is totally spurned because I don't think he wanted to die necessarily right then. But he.
[00:50:28] Speaker B: Well, again, I think they do play this part of the scene out, though. We talked about in the other episodes how he goes native. Right? To an extent. Right. That was Spock's line in the original script.
[00:50:41] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:50:43] Speaker B: Not my line, to be clear. Spock's line in the original script.
[00:50:46] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:50:47] Speaker B: And it's easier for Kirk to assimilate into the culture where if you're Spock and you're from another culture, it's going to Be difficult to assimilate. So should Kirk take the love choice and doom his friends? Right. And then which reality is real?
And we're getting into the discussion right now, and, you know, you have to make the right choice. And Kirk just leaves him. There's not a big argument, and he just walks away.
Just leaves him right there, completely refusing to engage in the discussion.
[00:51:27] Speaker A: An evening paper.
[00:51:29] Speaker B: Dr. McCoy's healing up. All the red blotches are gone. Looks like the cortisine is out of the system.
[00:51:49] Speaker A: He's trying to figure it out.
[00:51:53] Speaker B: Edith doesn't believe Edith continues to interact with McCoy, too.
[00:52:00] Speaker A: She's not pushing him off, know, calling the authorities or anything for him.
[00:52:07] Speaker B: She wants to help the goodness of Keeler, too. Instead of her interacting with the large crowds. We're getting into the insight into what makes her tick, why she would do the things she does.
[00:52:18] Speaker A: Yeah. She finds the good people.
[00:52:25] Speaker B: She's almost like, seems a religious, but she was kind of carrying a Bible earlier, but they more sort of. Sort of combine religious philosophy for.
[00:52:35] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:52:35] Speaker B: And sort of peace philosophy.
Well, apparently James T. Kirk is taking her to a Clark Gable movie, but she identifies him as her young man is taking her to a Gable movie.
[00:52:49] Speaker A: Ah, yes.
[00:52:50] Speaker B: Well, here they head out of the mission and there's Kirk and Edith. And they're headed out and Spock is headed away from them.
[00:52:59] Speaker A: Almost got hit by a car.
[00:53:01] Speaker B: Kirk still hasn't figured out cars.
[00:53:03] Speaker A: No.
[00:53:10] Speaker B: Oh, she mentions McCoy.
And there goes Kirk to take care of McCoy. Okay. Tells Edith to stay there. Edith has no idea what's going on.
I'm not sure how she would react. And she starts wandering aimlessly out into the then. Okay. And that's interesting. So McCoy goes to save her and Kirk gives him a bear hug and holds them back.
[00:53:50] Speaker A: Oh, you deliberately stopped me.
[00:53:56] Speaker B: And the interesting twist. Right. Because now it's McCoy chastising him.
[00:54:00] Speaker A: Right.
[00:54:00] Speaker B: For what happened.
[00:54:01] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:54:03] Speaker B: And I love the anguish on his face because I do think Shatner plays as well.
[00:54:08] Speaker A: Oh, yeah.
[00:54:09] Speaker B: The look. And McCoy asks Spock if he knows what he did. And he sAys, yeah, he knows. He knows.
I do like the similarity there in the story. I think that they hold that part of the story well and they jump out together.
[00:54:24] Speaker A: Only a moment ago, the three of.
[00:54:25] Speaker B: Them come out together, which is the piece of the series, too. Right. It's always surrounds those three characters. So it does make sense that they would go on the adventure together in the rewrite.
[00:54:34] Speaker A: Yeah.
It's resumed.
[00:54:39] Speaker B: And Church is not talking.
[00:54:41] Speaker A: No.
He's got that thousand yard stare.
[00:54:45] Speaker B: Yep.
Well, it's kind of interesting, too. It's almost like I love reading history. Right. Because you can dig into history and you find these characters that people don't know a lot about but were very influential in history. And it's almost like they picked a story at a time, but instead of just reading about it, he had to live it. Right. And so he has this let's get the hell out of here reaction. I would guess that saying, let's get the hell out of here was pretty strong language on television at the time.
[00:55:15] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:55:18] Speaker B: And now we get the credits written by Harlan Ellison, which is interesting.
[00:55:22] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:55:26] Speaker B: And executive producer Gene Roddenberry. So they acknowledge Harlan Ellison, but definitely a lot of rewriting there.
[00:55:33] Speaker A: And maybe that's probably why he disliked this episode so much.
[00:55:37] Speaker B: I just wonder too, right. There's Joan Collins guest star DeForest Kelly, obviously, and everybody else. Yeah. It's interesting too, when you're watching this. I wonder how much of it.
I wonder how much influence he actually had. Right.
That would now. Yeah, but he obviously sued them because he sued them for rights.
For the rights or the money from anything produced from this episode. Right.
[00:56:12] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:56:13] Speaker B: And a desi Lou production, which always impresses me that Desi Ardez, Lucy Ball Company helped produce Star Trek, because I can't think of anything more different than I Love Lucy and Star Trek, the original series.
[00:56:30] Speaker A: Yeah. But she was such a proponent for the show, and she believed in the.
[00:56:36] Speaker B: Vision that, you know, and that future.
[00:56:41] Speaker A: Right.
[00:56:41] Speaker B: And the way to explore do. I think this is one of my favorites because even with the cheesy sets, and it's very clear they went to the back lot and grabbed some old Roman columns, and they went to a backlot, standard city set. Right. And filmed it. It's powerful dialogue, a powerful story. And you leave kind of feeling like Captain Kirk. Right. It's not like a normal Star Trek episode where you leave happy. They solve the riddle, but you don't leave the episode feeling good.
[00:57:13] Speaker A: No, you don't.
You're left with that anguish that both Captain Kirk and McCoy have, that they're both dealing with that moment on two different levels. Because I think Kirk obviously found love and had to watch his love die.
And McCoy, he was finding a friend at that moment. And he was like, I can't believe you just did.
[00:58:04] Speaker B: So. You may not be aware, but Star Trek Discovery recently brought back the Guardians of Forever.
[00:58:12] Speaker A: Oh, my goodness.
[00:58:13] Speaker B: And I was not very happy with the way they dealt with it. And the reason I was not happy with the way they dealt with it is because they took one of the characters, Emperor Philippa.
Philippa Giorgio. And when Giorgio went through, she relived her own life.
And I didn't like that because the whole point of this was to step out of your own life and live something else. Right.
The idea that time would change, and instead they had her changing her own timeline.
And there's a little bit more to it because you've got some mirror universe stuff going on. And so there's a little bit more to it. But I didn't like it as much when it was that. Right. I liked the notion that somebody would go and live, meet something else. We'd find a little chunk of history that wasn't real. Right. But was real, but wasn't real. And then you're finding out this piece, and then to sort of go back and live your own time. I didn't like that as much.
[00:59:30] Speaker A: Yeah, because it's like you already know what to fix or what you can't fix if it's your own timeline.
[00:59:37] Speaker B: Right. Or even pointing out the futility of trying to fix your own timeline. Right. Like, there may be a futility there, but it wasn't the same. It didn't have the same feel to this. And I like the lessons you learn, maybe from going outside of your own life. Right. Instead of this idea of living your own life. I just didn't like the approach.
[00:59:57] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:59:59] Speaker B: And so I instantly went back and watched this episode and said, well, I like this one better because that's my Star Trek, and this is the new Star Trek, and I'm not going to like it as much.
[01:00:08] Speaker A: Fair enough.
[01:00:09] Speaker B: Because that's how I have to be.
But the episode, if you want to dig into discovery, it's called Terra firma. There's two parts.
And the interesting thing was, too, it's in the third season, I think. Is that what we're on? Yeah, season three, episode nine and ten. I think the interesting part there, too, is they got to do it for two episodes, which I would have loved to see this happen for two episodes.
[01:00:33] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. No, this would have been a great two episode piece where they go through all the motions and then get there and it leaves on a cliffhanger of like, oh, my gosh, we're stuck. What are we going to do?
How are we going to find McCoy?
And then the next episode is them going through the rest of the motions, and Spock's building this giant tube device and everything like that. And there's more, I guess, more of the meat that we got in the actual book itself, which was good to read and fun to go through.
There was so much.
I really would have liked to see our. Our soldier character.
[01:01:27] Speaker B: Yeah. Or something. Right. To set up something in that duality. Right. Of who could be sacrificed, who's important, and who's not important.
And just even that notion of discussion, of importance. Right. Of attacking people's notion of their own self importance.
[01:01:51] Speaker A: Definitely. Because it leaves you to really ponder those questions and to kind of wonder and also just think about, like, Spock asked the question in the book, why would he sacrifice himself?
Why would he do that for you? And it kind of leads to why people do things later in the story, as would. Why would Beckwith do that if he didn't know her and you do things. He's drawn to it. Some people run away from the fire. Some people run into it.
[01:02:31] Speaker B: Well. And we even get here, the looks between Kirk and Spock. But I think a longer play would have watched their relationship deteriorate as this moved forward. And it just kind of leaves. They jump through the thing. Know, I almost would have thought it would been even more interesting from. If I was going to shoot this all over again after looking at the original script, I would have had Kirk come through first or last. And McCoy and Spock come through together.
[01:03:00] Speaker A: Or come in at separate. Like each of them coming out of it separately.
[01:03:05] Speaker B: Yeah. With different expressions. Right.
Because Spock should be overjoyed that he's back. Right?
[01:03:11] Speaker A: He's back.
McCoy.
Like it would be interesting. So Spock comes in first and comes out first. And he's like overjoyed that he's back. McCoy comes through second and he's just got this look of just kind of melancholy. And everybody's like, oh my gosh. It's almost like, what happened?
And then Kurt comes through and you're like. And he's just 1000 yards.
[01:03:50] Speaker B: Just. That makes a very different ending to the story. I still like the ending. I still love how the looks. I do think Shatner does a great job with his facial expressions at the end.
Just adding hell in language at the time was a nice touch.
Get the hell out. Let's get the hell out of here. Something to that.
And so had a bite to it.
[01:04:13] Speaker A: I think one of the things like you're saying about just stretching it out too, and having more of those character beats and those moments from the teleplay put into the actual episode that was aired, having the humanization of Spock as you're starting to see that the human side, or the more those moments where he's looking around and he's seeing how the time is and how people are and their actions and how he's either going to react or not react.
And the choices that he makes as he's going through those moments. I felt like there was so much in the story when we're reading the comic itself that were missed opportunities in the episode.
ANd I'm not saying that I didn't like it. I'm just saying that I felt like there just could have been a little bit more.
[01:05:23] Speaker B: Yeah, it could. And it's interesting too, when you see the original script contrasted with this story. Right. Because I really love this episode. I think it's one of the better episodes of the original series, if not the best. It's my favorite. So you can judge me for however you want, but it's my very favorite episode. And when you're looking at it now and comparing it to what we could do in another medium. We're just asking for more, even though we still think it's.
[01:05:55] Speaker A: Are we, are those, oh, my gosh. This is the Snyder cut moment. We are asking for more.
[01:06:04] Speaker B: We were asking for the Snyder cut. So are we saying we liked the Snyder cut better?
[01:06:09] Speaker A: I think we did.
I think when it comes down to brass, definitely there was a lot of moments from the comic that were so good and so strong.
If you married the two together and you got a great amalgamation of the two on the screen, I think it would hit harder. I think you're right. If this was two actual episodes and we got a little bit of column A and a little bit of column B, I know we can't have everything, but if we had just a titch more here and there and even having rand in there.
Sorry, dogs.
[01:06:53] Speaker B: I'll keep going. You're on your rolls in the background.
[01:06:58] Speaker A: Yeah, I know.
If we had those moments with Yeoman Rand at the beginning and stuff like that, with the landing party and some of those moments, I just think that it just would have given the viewer so much more to ponder.
[01:07:23] Speaker B: More depth.
[01:07:24] Speaker A: Right. Yeah. Maybe the time just was. Maybe people just weren't ready for it.
[01:07:30] Speaker B: If I recall, the only women walking around on the street were those first couple of women that looked at them strangely when they appeared. Right.
[01:07:38] Speaker A: Yeah. And then the only other woman you saw was Edith herself.
[01:07:45] Speaker B: And that was just sort of weird, the way that played out.
So. Yeah, I don't say weird. It does highlight her as extremely powerful and there is a level of empowerment. And if you think about in the Great Depression, in the early thirty s, you think of who's the most, at least according to history books. Right. So we'll emphasize that who is the most powerful woman at that time period?
[01:08:16] Speaker A: I don't know. Tell me, Dan.
[01:08:17] Speaker B: Well, I just figured you.
[01:08:23] Speaker A: Disagree. No, I don't. Do you think she was an analog then, for.
[01:08:28] Speaker B: I don't think she was an analog for Eleanor Roosevelt at a very different character. But I'm just thinking there didn't seem to be a lot of placement. But maybe not the analog. So she's not married to Franklin Roosevelt. Right. But maybe the analog is like she is the woman that takes the place of Eleanor Roosevelt from the perspective of advocacy.
[01:08:53] Speaker A: Right.
[01:08:54] Speaker B: She becomes almost so powerful, she becomes the most powerful woman in the United States and presumably the most powerful person. Right. Because her movement overcomes the president. And we get a little bit of a hint of, you know, it's not just becoming the most powerful woman, but it's becoming the most powerful person in the United States.
[01:09:12] Speaker A: That makes.
[01:09:16] Speaker B: You know, if I was really getting into critique mode, not that we would do this here, but if I was really critiquing, I might say that they might have been implying that if a woman got powerful enough to spread that message, that the United States would fall.
[01:09:33] Speaker A: Oh, I could see where you're going with that. In the sense of the alternate history timeline.
[01:09:42] Speaker B: Yeah. If I was really digging into the critique, and again, I don't think that was author's intent, but I could easily see how that could be read into the story.
And I think we have to be really careful when we're writing. Right. Because you have to make sure that you're not implying that. Right. And that's. Maybe we're not balancing the story out with other strong female characters. Could lead you to believe that, though, right. When we have rand in the other story, I'm not thinking about that. Of course, we don't have this peace movement thing that's created. Right. We just have a powerful character who's influential, that's murdered and dies. Right. And we don't really know what their future would have held. But in this case, with not really strong, other strong female characters. I don't see the outgrowth. Right. I don't see, like, a powerful yeoman Rand holding off an army of people. Right.
[01:10:38] Speaker A: Yeah. You don't get that.
[01:10:40] Speaker B: And so I don't get any sort of balance to this. And so the only time I see a powerful female character is somebody whose belief system corrupts, supposedly others. Right. This corrupts them with peace. And then.
[01:10:56] Speaker A: Weird concept.
[01:10:57] Speaker B: Yeah. And then we lose the war, because if we don't have a powerful male at the helm leading us into war, which is traditionally a very masculine action, then we die.
[01:11:11] Speaker A: Very interesting.
[01:11:12] Speaker B: So, if I was putting on my critique hat, I could easily critique it that way and argue that. And I think there's a pretty strong argument for that. And the change in the story.
[01:11:21] Speaker A: Yeah.
Okay, I'm following it.
[01:11:27] Speaker B: Well, we've critiqued the heck out of this one or the hell out of this one.
[01:11:33] Speaker A: Is it now time to get the hell out of here?
[01:11:35] Speaker B: It may be time to get the hell out of here, but I think. Great story, important notes. And I think again, too, when we critique things, we're critiquing them for a reason. We want to open your eyes up to different plotlines, different story pieces, different types of storytelling. But also, I think it's important to critique what we've seen. Right. And what we enjoy because if you're not doing that, you're not really thinking about the media that you're consuming and engaging in. And if you're not thinking about it, well, that basically allows others to program your brain, and I'm not a big fan of that. Yeah, Fox Brain is a really bad episode of the original series.
[01:12:11] Speaker A: Do you want to watch that one next?
[01:12:14] Speaker B: No, I don't. I really don't.
[01:12:18] Speaker A: Was it done as a comic book, Greg?
[01:12:21] Speaker B: There's not enough herbal substance in the house for me to watch that tonight.
[01:12:25] Speaker A: Okay, fair enough.
[01:12:28] Speaker B: So we're just not going to go there. I mean, we could go for another hour, but I would definitely need some sort of supplement to help me get through that episode.
[01:12:40] Speaker A: I can't as well.
[01:12:44] Speaker B: You can't for a lot of reasons. But with that said, we've talked about a lot. And so you got five issues of a know retelling of a Harlan Ellison script in three episodes or three previous episodes. And here you go with the watch along. So hopefully you pressed play when we did and watched along with us and got to dig into it. And even if you were listening in the car or somewhere else, we hope you enjoyed the analysis here on Funny book forensics. And Greg, where can they learn about the show?
[01:13:13] Speaker A: You can learn about the show at the spoiler verse. You can learn about the show on Twitter, at funny Book Forensics, that is.
Oh, man.
[01:13:25] Speaker B: Wow. You did the greatest outro ever. You can learn about us where Greg? On Twitter. And you said it on Facebook.
[01:13:32] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:13:33] Speaker B: Instagram.
[01:13:34] Speaker A: Yeah, Facebook. Funny book.
[01:13:35] Speaker B: Four N Six, right?
[01:13:37] Speaker A: Yeah, those are the places.
[01:13:39] Speaker B: That's the places, right. And the mothership would be so proud of us right now because we nailed that one.
[01:13:45] Speaker A: Totally nailed it.
[01:13:47] Speaker B: Thanks, mothership. And what other shows could we see on the network?
[01:13:51] Speaker A: On the network you can find narrative gunslingers as well as nerds from the crypt shooting the Sith.
The spoiler verse itself. You could find what? I can't. I can't think of the other, well.
[01:14:09] Speaker B: All of those other great shows, there's.
[01:14:12] Speaker A: 2020 shows on those.
[01:14:14] Speaker B: There's content everywhere. We have all sorts of great, adding.
[01:14:17] Speaker A: New ones every month.
[01:14:19] Speaker B: We've got spoiler country. They just celebrated a big anniversary on episodes and some really great stuff. Of course, I listen to spoiler country for the great interviews with comic book creators, but you all may listen to it for all of their interviews with different Sci-Fi actors and fantasy and superhero actors and writers from all over the place. So it's neat. There's a little bit of something for everybody. So we encourage you to listen.
And I just want to let you know that we would never make you watch the Snyder cut. In fact, we prefer the Harlan Ellison cut.
[01:14:52] Speaker A: That's right.
[01:14:54] Speaker B: But if you do choose to watch the Snyder cut, remember, Darkseid's a better villain than Steppenwolf.
[01:15:03] Speaker A: Steppenwolf's a great band, though. Oh, my gosh. I was listening to some the other day, and I just couldn't stop. I just, like, I flipped that bad oil pee right over scratches and all. And you know what?
[01:15:14] Speaker B: 185 grams still plays, and there you go. And that's really what we're looking for. So that takes us out of here on funny book forensics. But thank you for listening. All of our one listeners, we appreciate you. If you are our one listener, go ahead and tweet us and we will respond.
Actually, Greg will respond. But the most important thing there is we've got one listener and engage us. Tell us what you're looking for. Tell us what you want next.
[01:15:43] Speaker A: If you like the episode like this where Dan and I watch something and talk about it, tell us if you like it, because this was an experiment for us. But there are other things that were made, other books that were made into things to be watched, and it would be interesting to read those things and then watch those things if you like this kind of thing. So tell us if you like this kind of thing. We'll do that kind of thing because that's what we do. We do the thing for you because we care.
[01:16:14] Speaker B: Well, the thing for us because we talk about stuff we like. But besides that, we'll just keep making it fun because really, fans all about.
[01:16:25] Speaker A: I was trying to bring it back to them, but you wanted to just tell them that we only did it because we like to do the things that we like to do. But I wanted to tell them that.
[01:16:32] Speaker B: Well, that's the most fun of it, though. We can do things that we like to do, that you also like to do, that we like to do because we just like to talk about things that we like to talk about. And it's fun. And you can talk. Everybody can talk, and it's all good.
[01:16:43] Speaker A: That's true. So our one listener out there, please let us know what you think, and.
[01:16:50] Speaker B: We will oblige you so darn Tooten.
Listen to spoiler country, get into the spoiler verse. And thank you for listening to our show. This was one more fine episode of Funny Book Forensics with the best intro ever. Well, maybe not, but definitely the best outro ever. So thank you for joining us. And we're signing off.
[01:17:10] Speaker A: Signing off.
Quit questions.
