NüTrek: Star Trek Discovery and Section 31, Part 1

Is Star Trek Discovery in canon? What exactly is NüTrek? Just how bad was Section 31: The Movie? 

In this episode we lay down the ground work and history that lead to today's Star Trek, for better or worse. Join us for part one where we show you just how we got here.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Band names are so interesting really.

Speaker 2 (00:04):
No deep, that's some real philosophical shit right
there.

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Gentlemen, let's broaden our minds.

Speaker 2 (00:12):
Are they in the proper approach pattern for
today?
Negative, all weapons Now.

Speaker 1 (00:29):
Charge the lightning field.
Favorite non-federation alienwarship.

Speaker 2 (00:43):
Well, it's really hard to beat the Borg cube
Fucking rules.
Yeah, the utilitarian nature,the size, the scale, the weird
wonderment and mystery behind itBecause the Enterprise is sort
of built on human concepts ofaerodynamics so they wouldn't
matter in space, yeah, but it'seasier for us to think about
that was so alien and so strange.
It's like that's really reallyhard to beat.

(01:04):
I think some of the Romulanships are cool as hell.
In canon there was a technologyexchange between Romulans and
Klingons.
That's why they both have birdsof prey.

Speaker 1 (01:12):
Yeah, that always threw me off.
Yeah, growing up I was likewait, they can't both have birds
of prey.

Speaker 2 (01:17):
They do.
So.
The birds of prey that we knowas the Klingon birds of prey
were Romulan designs.
That's why they look more likebirds.
The original bird of prey wasthat sort of like teardrop shape
with the nacelles on the sideand the bird painted underneath
Caw Exactly the strength of thecrow.
That's why he keeps coming back.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:36):
That's why he puts teardrops underneath the
portholes on the that's becauseof all the people he killed in
prison.
Hey, it's Klingon prison.
It's tough, it's a repent day,man.

Speaker 2 (01:48):
I hate most of the Dominion ships.
They just look like bugs and Iknow they did that on purpose.
I'm just like, eh yeah, I don'treally care about those.
A lot of the ships that theyuse in one-off episodes, both in
DS9 and TNG, are one designthat they just keep retrofitting
for different aliens.
For instance, the Uridianshuttle is used for like a

(02:15):
thousand different alien races,just with different doodads and
greebles on it.
You know, and then, Ah, doodadsand greebles, that should be
the name of our show.
Oh, by the way, this isDispatch HX.

Speaker 1 (02:24):
Yeah, I'm observing Ensign Jake.

Speaker 2 (02:26):
Observing Ensign, Not even acting Ensign.
You're just watching.

Speaker 1 (02:30):
Yeah, I gotta figure out.
Am I gonna get into Starfleetor not?

Speaker 2 (02:33):
I don't you know I'm Cuckold Ensign Jake.

Speaker 1 (02:37):
This is my cuck chair that is on the it's on the
bridge.

Speaker 2 (02:45):
That's the one Deanna usually sits in.
So today we're going to betackling New Trek and that's new
with umlauts.
Originally we were just goingto talk about Section 31,.
And we are going to talk aboutSection 31,.
The movie quote unquote movie.
The TV movie yes, made forstreaming.
Movie the 2B original.

Speaker 1 (03:03):
I actually make that reference later.

Speaker 2 (03:04):
Okay, would you please explain to the audience
and to me exactly what new trekmeans so new trek, which is not
commonly but sometimes referredto as third wave star trek, the
first wave, of course, being theoriginal series leading into
the movies, the second wavebeing beginning of TNG and the

(03:25):
subsequent spinoffs of that,which are DS9, voyager and,
technically, enterprise.
And then the third wave isafter Star Trek, nemesis,
essentially beginning withAbrams' Star Trek, culminating
in what we have today, that is,third wave or new Trek.
Okay, in what we have today thatis third wave or new Trek.

(03:46):
Okay, the descriptor isbasically to I don't want to say
discredit, but show a certainamount of dissatisfaction with
the current state of Star Trek.
I think so.
When it looked like theoriginal series of movies, or,
better stated, the moviestarring the original series
cast, looked like it was aboutto wrap up, it had reached its
financial, its box office andbroad appeal peak with Star Trek

(04:09):
IV, the Voyage Home, directedby Leonard Mouy.
After that, of course, therewas going to be another Star
Trek movie and Shatner kind ofstrong-armed his way into
directing and controlling hisvision of Star Trek and honestly
, I guarantee it, the onlyreason he did so was because
Nimoy got to direct three andfour.

Speaker 1 (04:29):
You let that prick Nimoy direct a film.
It's my turn now.

Speaker 2 (04:33):
He just sounds like an AI chatbot.
Now, that's what somebody needsto do is do an AI chatbot with
William Shatner's voice so thatthe stilted speech doesn't sound
weird.

Speaker 1 (04:42):
Your turn is coming up.

Speaker 2 (04:44):
There'll be no uncanny valley problem because
you just go.
Oh, it's William Shatner.

Speaker 1 (04:47):
You're fine, it's fine.
Your destination is on theright.

Speaker 2 (04:53):
After a very long pause where you missed your turn
.
You missed it, you missed it.

Speaker 1 (05:04):
Basically William Shatner's complete narcissistic
pet project, star Trek 5, was.
You can just see WilliamShatner's narcissistic pet
project.
That's everything that runs thegamut.

Speaker 2 (05:10):
Well, it does, but there is another narcissistic
William Shatner project that I'mgoing to refer to soon, sorry.

Speaker 1 (05:16):
So we need to differentiate, we need to
delineate these multiple.

Speaker 2 (05:20):
That's exactly right, but because it was a critical
failure, except for Gene Shaliton the Today Show who loved it.
For some ungodly reason it'sGene Shalit.
It was Gene Shalit, yeah.
So after Star Trek V thoughstill relatively okay in the box
office, was a huge drop offfrom Star Trek IV.
Famously, in the original pitchmeeting Shatner entered the

(05:41):
room and Nimoy and Harv Bennett.
Harv Bennett was brought on asa co-writer after Star Trek the
Motion Picture basically whenthey got rid of Roddenberry,
which we'll talk about here in abit but was considered a good

(06:05):
writer and a good punch-up guyand a good showrunner-type guy
who could come in and reigneverybody in and make it viable
for Hollywood, just like Kasdandid for Spielberg and Lucas
mostly Lucas and so Harv Bennettwas a co-writer with Nimoy
going forward with Star Trek IIIand IV, and so I remember
reading an interview withBennettennett when he said that

(06:25):
in their pitch meeting andshatner comes in, the first
thing he says is I want to meetgod.
But it was like we knew we werein trouble and so they had to
figure out how to, how to poundout a script based on shatner's
pitch that was even worthputting on celluloid, and they
probably did the best they could, because there are, you know

(06:49):
what, as bad as that movie is,there are some interesting
themes in it that I think carryover from some of the other
films that are worth revisitingand I mean kind of get
counteracted later by RonaldMoore, of all people.
But it's a bad movie and it'sthe worst.
Well, it was the worst startrek movie.
Interesting, well, I'm intodarkness is gonna give it a run

(07:10):
for its money, but it was widelyI want to say universally
considered the worst star trekmovie.
But uh, when all that happened,there was this feeling that the
movie franchise was dwindling,especially since they were all
getting older and everyone kindof wanted to move on, especially
you, you know.
Like Nimoy had found his pathas a director, obviously not

(07:30):
Star Trek related and relativelywell received, like Three Men
and a Baby, which say what youwill about it.
It made a lot of money, but thewriting was on the wall that it
was coming close to the end andthe studio was kind of
conflicted as to whether or notthey wanted to continue on with
that, wrap it up or a reboot.
One of the biggest ideas thatwere being pushed at the time

(07:52):
was a prequel film which wouldfollow the original series
characters during their time atStarfleet Academy.
Gene Rodbury was actually thefirst one to pitch this, based
on an idea he had in 1968, thefirst time Star Trek got
cancelled In the 1980s.
It was then sort ofreformulated and reproposed by
Harv Bennett as a possibleplotline for what would

(08:13):
eventually become Star Trek VI,the Undiscovered Country, but it
was rejected in favor of theother projects that contemporary
Roddenberry wanted.
One reason for that, inparticular, was that Roddenberry
had been sidelined byexecutives almost immediately
after the premiere of Star Trekthe Next Generation for being
too hands-on, kind of a nuisanceand, quite frankly, full of bad

(08:35):
ideas.
I mean, he really is a Lucasanalog in a lot of ways, but
Star Trek's 25th anniversary wasupon us and they couldn't
simply cut Gene out of thefranchise during their 25th
anniversary was upon us and theycouldn't simply cut Gene out of
the franchise during their 25thanniversary.
Plus, it was understood thatthe film would be the last
voyage of these actors.
Following the critical andcommercial failure of Star Trek

(08:56):
Nemesis from 2002 and thecancellation of Star Trek
Enterprise, the franchise'sexecutive producer, rick Berman,
who replaced Gene Roddenberry,and screenwriter Eric Jenderson,
wrote an unproduced film calledStar Trek, the Beginning, which
would take place afterEnterprise.
It was supposed to be a warepic, modeled after Band of
Brothers and set during theRomulan Federation War.

(09:16):
That was completely abandonedAfter the separation of Viacom
and CBS in 2005,.
Former Paramount Picturespresident, gail Berman,
unrelated convinced CBS to allowParamount to produce a new film
.
I'll get to the reasoningbehind that in a second.
So two Hollywood writers withgeeky backgrounds Roberto Gaston

(09:38):
Orsi not making it up.
You're going to love this.
No one writes shit like Gaston100% true, and you're going to
love this.
No one writes shit like Gaston100% true, and you're going to
love this.
It gets better.
Roberto Gaston Orsi and AlexHillary Kurtzman Lock her up.
Were approached to write thefilm they were notorious for

(10:03):
writing, obviously the pinnacleof nostalgic geek IP
Transformers and then later, ofcourse, the seminal Amazing
Spider-Man 2.
But before that they had cuttheir teeth in the world of
syndicated television inUniversal Television's Action
Pack.
Do you remember Action Pack atall?

Speaker 1 (10:22):
No, I don't remember Action Pack.

Speaker 2 (10:24):
I actually do, and that's more on me for wasting my
entire life watching television.
But Action Pack was what is, inthe industry, called a wheeled
series.
So a wheeled series is an ideathat was used, but publicly not
well understood, part oftelevision programming that
originally started in 1955 withWarner Brothers Presents.
A wheeled series is where twoor more regular programs are

(10:45):
rotated in the same time slot,the most glaring example of
which would be the NBC mysterymovie which included McCloud.
Mccloud, macmillan and Wife andthe mercurial Columbo.
One more thing about Trek, justone more thing about Star Trek.
So Columbo specifically which,by the way, great show, let us

(11:06):
pray it never gets remade.
Do you remember when they triedto reboot Kojak, the Tully
Savalas vehicle, with VingRhames?
I pray to God we don't do thatwith Columbo.
Leave Columbo alone.
It was great and they weredoing those until like 2008.

Speaker 1 (11:22):
I mean, come on, there are discussions about a
colombo remake starring markruffalo.

Speaker 2 (11:29):
I do like mark ruffalo, he's just ruffled
enough, you know the more Ithink about it.

Speaker 1 (11:37):
Yeah, now that you say that, I kind of like it.

Speaker 2 (11:39):
I gotta do too.
Fuck now, I don't know.
I hate myself for liking it,but it's not actually not that
it doesn't sound that bad.

Speaker 1 (11:47):
Well, let's see what happens.

Speaker 2 (11:48):
So Columbo is really interesting too, because if you
didn't grow up on networktelevision like we did, and
you're more in the current eraof television, which also
includes things like streamingbut also back catalogs of other
TV shows, all TV used to followlike a specific structure.
You had seasons, you had timeoff, then you had another season
, you know, and traditionally inAmerica a season was well after

(12:09):
Star Trek.
Each season was like 30episodes, but after a certain
point seasons were 22, 26episodes.
Shorter seasons or half seasonswere like 13 episodes and
Columbo, no matter what Toobytells you, was not structured
that way because they listColumbo by season.

(12:30):
But that's not really how theshow worked.
That's not what a wheel serieswas.
A wheel series was basically aseries of TV movies that rotated
every two, three, four weeks.
Action Pack was a lineup ofessentially pilots in the form
of made for tv movies.
The original lineup includedwilliam shatner's desperate
attempt to create his own sci-fiuniverse, tech war oh man, yes,

(12:54):
his other narcissistic passionproject, tech war, which spawned
comic books, action figures,obviously novels, because that's
kind of where it started andthe made-for-TV pilot.
It also included Smokey and theBandit, the series Not to be
outdone.
Midnight Run the series.
Oh God, why?

(13:16):
A show called Vanishing Sun andwait for it?
Hercules, the LegendaryJourneys.
The sobofurcation of mediacommences for it.

Speaker 1 (13:24):
Hercules, the Legendary Journeys, the
sorbofrication of mediacommences.

Speaker 2 (13:29):
The pilot of which was presented as a made-for-TV
movie called Hercules and theAmazon Women.
It starred the legendary actorfrom Fellini's Lestrada and
zorba, the Greek Anthony Quinnas Zeus, but, more importantly,
a little lady named Lucy Lawless.
Hercules was produced by thegreat Sam Raimi, and this was a

(13:50):
surprise hit of the bunch.
Raimi was the one who gaveKurtzman and Orsi their big
breaks as writers.
Coincidentally, the popularityof the show wasn't the reason
for its initial spinoffs.
Pause, I just remembered KevinSorbo after Hercules then went
on to do a Gene Roddenberry notStar Trek project called

(14:12):
Andromeda.
Oh yeah, so that's a weirdtie-in.
Anyway, coincidentally, thepopularity of the show wasn't
the reason for its initialspinoffs.
That we know today.
In fact, it was because theraging MAGA head, kevin Sorbo,
suffered a stroke.
Really, yes, he had a massivestroke.
Was that God's will?
Is that what that was?
You'd have to think so, right.

(14:32):
So Kurtzman and Orsi werechallenged to continue the
Hercules universe with minimalinput from Sorbo.
Their solution A spinoff inname only, starring a character
from the very popular Herculesand the Amazon women, xena
Warrior Princess, played by theNew Zealand icon Lucy Lawless,

(14:55):
later to go on in BattlestarGalactica.
This proved to be arguably evenmore popular than the original
Herc lore and earned two24-year-old writers the
prestigious positions ofshowrunner huh.
Did not know that they were 24.
Then, in our story, enterhollywood wunderkind jeffrey

(15:16):
jacob abrams.
Abrams essentially grew up inthe hollywood system.
He was the son of a veterantelevision producer, gerald
Abrams and Carol Ann Abrams, whoin her own right, was a Peabody
Award-winning televisionexecutive producer, as well as
author and law academic.
Gerald worked at CBS in midtownManhattan, but in 1971, they

(15:39):
relocated to LA.
Jj attended Palisades HighSchool, which I don't know.
Does it exist anymore?
It probably got burned down.
That's what I'm saying.
It might not be there anymore.
The Palisades is pretty muchgone.
And at the age of 16, he wrotethe music for Don Dohler's 1982
horror movie Night Beast.
All right, I'm not going tofault you for that.

(16:01):
Okay, but he was 16.
I'm not going to fault you forthat.
Okay, but he was 16.
He wrote all the music for afilm that's nuts.

Speaker 1 (16:06):
Yeah, that's pretty crazy.

Speaker 2 (16:08):
They knew who he was, so he already had a leg up over
everyone else in the industry.
Obviously, after graduating heoriginally planned on attending
art school, but in the end hewent to Sarah Lawrence College
back in New York.
In college he successfullywrote the treatment for what
would eventually become TakingCare of Business for Touchtone
Pictures starring Charles Grodinand James Belushi, and he was

(16:31):
producer.
He was a senior in college.
He then wrote Regarding Henry,forever Young and Gone Fishin'.
If you remember that one, Imost certainly do.
Oh, what a classic.
In 1994, he joined a group ofSarah Lawrence alum known as the

(16:51):
Propellerheads not the band whowere trying to get in on the
ground floor of the field ofcomputer animation.
That led to work on theDreamWorks gamble Shrek.
In 1998, he was tapped to writethe screenplay for a little
Michael Bay joint calledArmageddon and later that year
created the early WB stapleFelicity with future, the Batman

(17:13):
and Cloverfield director MattReeves.
Then came the founding of hisown production company, bad
Robot, with collaborator BrianBurke.
After that came Alias andeventually Lost with Damon
Lindelof.
I'd love to do a whole thing onLost, I really would.
So fast forward to 2006, whenAbrams was tapped for his
directorial debut with MissionImpossible 3, written by

(17:34):
Kurtzman and Orsi.
This was around the time thathis clout landed him a meeting
with Paramount, where the studioproposed a wild idea to do the
unthinkable and reboot atentpole franchise in Star Trek,
reasons being Paramount and CBSfamously split as a parent
company and, with the divorce,split the Star Trek baby in half

(17:54):
.
Cbs I know, I know it's theonly thing I can think of CBS
would have the rights to produceany future projects, but only
on TV.
Paramount had the movie rights,so this included caveats like
the prohibition of a new StarTrek series within a certain
number of years of a Star Trekmovie and vice versa.
Now that, right there whenParamount and CBS Viacom split,

(18:20):
I think is the actual origin ofthe Kelvin universe, if you
really think about it.
Now, kurtzman and Orsi weresaid to have gained inspiration
from novels they read, and thisis based on just some of the
cursory research.
I looked at Graduate schooldissertations on the subject.
What Star Trek?
What are you talking about?
Did you write them?
Did you just hear them?
Please give me more information, as well, of course, as the

(18:42):
original series.
Now, you and I, by the way,were at Comic-Con and we were at
the Star Trek panel where theyannounced all this stuff and
they gave us those t-shirts forfree that had the date of the
premiere of Star Trek, which wassupposed to be Christmas of
2008.
It did not come out Christmas2008.
So those, I would imagine, arecollector's items now.
But so now it's 2009.

(19:03):
Star Trek is out.
The film opens on a Starfleetvessel, the USS Kelvin, in the
year 2233.
Kelvin was JJ Abrams' mother'smaiden name.
Hmm, all right, that makes moresense.
The Kelvin encounters one ofthe dumbest lines and every time
I hear it it's like chalkboardscratches in my brain A
lightning storm in space.

(19:23):
What the fuck are you talkingabout?
You say it once and you're likeoh okay, it was just like a
random description, but theykeep using it as if it's one who
knows what that is.

Speaker 1 (19:33):
As just watching any Star Trek for any length of time
, they come up with all thiswild technobabbles.
It doesn't mean anything, butit gets from point A to point B
and it sounds more technical.
It does sound more technical asopposed to just like electric
stuff going on in spaceland.

Speaker 2 (19:52):
Well, even starting with the original series and
moving forward, they would havea room of writers and then they
would leave spaces blank forthese kinds of issues.
We're explaining a phenomenon.
They would leave it blank andwe would say, like Trek talk or
Trek, no babble in the script.
And then they'd send it off toa panel of consultants, usually
who were physicists or engineers, who actually would figure out

(20:12):
a way to justify the narrative.
That was normally great and wasseamless, except one glaring
example.
I can think of a sadly rare badds9 episode where luck and
chance oh yeah were beingmanipulated and they were like
oh, it's reverse neutrinos, uh,okay, what you can tell?

(20:34):
That was just like a blankspace in the script that these
guys were like fuck, I don'tknow't know.
What do we say?
I don't fucking know.
And then you know, diggingthrough all these like
scientific papers, being likehow does this?
I mean probability, I don'tknow.
Fuck, I don't know.

Speaker 1 (20:46):
Reverse neutrinos there it is.
Yeah, the atoms are spinningbackward and I'm I don't sure.

Speaker 2 (20:52):
Because Doctor who had already cornered the market
on reversing the polarity of theneutron flow.
So you couldn't really do that,I guess.
So they just I don't knowreverse neutrons All right.
So 99% of the time it works.
That's how we get temporalrifts, which is what you could
have called it instead of alightning storm in space.

Speaker 1 (21:09):
It's what they should have called it.
It was a spatial temporal rift,exactly.

Speaker 2 (21:12):
What happened to just using the word anomaly.
It was so much easier, itcovered so much ground.
You know, that's where you getlike quantum filaments, which is
one of the greatest episodes ofTNG, the Poseidon Adventure
episode.
But no, they went withlightning storm in space which,

(21:34):
like I said the first time, yousay it OK, fine, fine, but the
Kelvin runs into this lightningstorm A, as we find out, romulan
ship, the Nerada, which is autilitarian mining vessel
retrofitted with Borg tech byincreasingly desperate Romulate

(21:55):
and we will get to why.
The current stardate that theycite is stupid, makes no sense
and about an ambassador Spockwhom he does not recognize.
So then the Narada's commander,nero, played by Eric Bana,
kills him and resumes attackingthe Kelvin.
George Kirk, the first officer,played by Chris Hemsworth,
orders the ship's personnel,including his pregnant wife
Wionna.

(22:15):
I'm sorry Wynonna.
I'm sorry Wynonna.
I'm thinking Wynonna.

Speaker 1 (22:18):
Wynonna, it's not a thing why.

Speaker 2 (22:21):
Who knows?
It's a question.
There's a question mark at theend of her name.

Speaker 1 (22:25):
Why own a wife when you can get the milk for free?
It's funny, but it makes nosense.
You get the shitty gist.

Speaker 2 (22:36):
The gist.
Oh yes, no sense you get theshitty gist the gist yes, his,
including his pregnant wife,winona judd, to abandon ship
while he pilots the kelvin.
On a collision course with anerrata.
Because the kelvin's autopilotis disabled, kirk sacrifices his
life as winona gives birth tojames tiberius.
Kirk honestly heart-wrenchingpart of that movie, genuinely.

(22:59):
Even watching it last night Iwas like, oh, that really sucks.

Speaker 1 (23:02):
It's a great opening to a film where they like thrust
you into what's going on.
You get invested in thesecharacters.
It's action-packed, it'svisually dynamic.

Speaker 2 (23:11):
Yeah, there are some flaws in it if you're looking
through the lens of Trek stuff,but for the most part,
especially if you've neverwatched Star Trek, that would
really draw you in.
It's very well done.
So then, to explain some ofthis, in Star Trek's main
continuity, which is referred toas the Prime Universe, nero had
been the captain of a miningvessel which operated out of the
Horbus star system in the BetaQuadrant, because Romulans and

(23:33):
Klingons are both based in theBeta Quadrant.
If you don't know how Star Trekdelineates quadrants, obviously
there are four Alpha, beta,Delta, gamma, and Earth is the
meridian.
Essentially, the Alpha and BetaQuadrants start and stop
directly down the middle ofEarth, and the Alpha Quadrant is
everything that the Federationcontrols or influences, and the

(23:54):
Beta Quadrant is everything theKlingon Empire, the Romulan Star
Empire, the Breen people likethat, the Borg, are in the delta
quadrant, the Dominion are inthe gamma quadrant.
So Horvath, being one of theoldest stars in the galaxy, had
become increasingly unstable andwas reaching its final phase.
Abruptly, the star went nova,but in a sort of unusual way.

(24:16):
The event did not dissipate asnormal supernovae do.
Instead exponentially expanded,potentially threatening much of
intra-galactic civilization.
On stardate 6433.4, the crew ofNarada who were mining Horbus I
for decalithium, a rare variantof dilithium and key material in

(24:38):
producing something that willcome up later.
It's ten times the lithium,folks.
Yeah right, I mean.
That's essentially.
Yes, I mean it's ten timesdilithium, or well, not ten
times, it would be five timesdilithium, or ten times lithium.
Well, yes, I know, even thoughin Star Trek, dilithium, like
the name, has nothing to do withthe actual element, lithium.
So Spock, who had been namedambassador after the

(25:00):
psychological decline of hisfather, had been working on the
possibility of the reunificationof the Vulcan and Romulan
people.
See, vulcans and Romulans sharean ancestry, they were both the
same species and they wereextremely violent and warlike.
Violent and warlike.

(25:21):
And there is a huge nearcivilization ending war, much
like in Star Trek Earthexperience during World War
Three.
And in the outcome there was aI won't say religious, but a
philosophical movement byVulcans, who do experience
emotions in a more intense waythan humans do, which is why
they were by a philosopher namedSurak, who proposed the
implementation of aquasi-religious practice of

(25:44):
using logic as their governingprinciple, both on a personal
level and then basically astheir guiding principle period.
The ones who didn't embrace that, because of course not everyone
would.
They left en masse and wentoff-world and founded a planet
called Romulus.

(26:05):
And they founded that becauseit was a planet in a faraway
system that also had a sisterplanet in a near-synchronous
orbit that was rich withresources, specifically
dilithium.
Is that Remus Remus exactly?
Ironically, that wouldn'tmatter, because eventually
Romulans stopped using dilithiumaltogether, but it was resource

(26:26):
rich and so they basicallycolonized and subjugated the
population of Remus into aproletariat workforce and all
that which you see in Star TrekNemesis.

Speaker 1 (26:37):
That's why the Remusians look so much different
Reman Okay.

Speaker 2 (26:41):
Yeah, they were already there.
The Romulans just came in, tookover this quote uninhabited
planet and then subjugated theneighboring planet.
That's why they settled there,because there was a neighboring
planet that had a.

Speaker 1 (26:52):
Yeah, I have a question for you.
Why do the Romulans appear tobe Vulcan-esque and being able
to hold their emotions in checkif they did not go through the
same methods as the Vulcanbrethren?

Speaker 2 (27:04):
was just one approach , because in Star Trek it
becomes more nuanced later, butinitially all alien races in

(27:24):
Star Trek are just differentaspects of the human condition
Frankie, greed and exploitation.
The Cardassians are fascism andauthoritarianism.
The Andorians are paranoia.
Vulcans are logic and reason.
Romulans are imperialism andcolonialism and reason.
Romulans are imperialism andcolonialism.
And then Cleons are warriorcaste sort of Viking archetypes.

(27:46):
And I think that the Romulansjust kind of proved that the
embrace of logic in the way thatit is wasn't the end all be all
.
And I think the commentary inthat is, yes, vulcan prospered,
it came together, it workedtogether, but it didn't have to
do the extreme measures it didto achieve relatively similar
goals.
And so while Vulcan embracedone idea, romulus embraced
another.
That having been said, vulcanwasn't a colonial power and

(28:09):
didn't exploit people, romulusdoes.
That's their entire setup.
I mean they are a stand-inin.
For I don't know if you'veheard the roman empire, what
wild I know, which is funnybecause a lot of klingon myths
actually are roman myths, andthen so there's all sorts of
mixing and stuff in there.
If you've seen any of the tng,and then later, yes, night stuff

(28:32):
with wharf they talk about likethe founding of the klingon
empire was two warring brothers,one who kills the other and
then founds the empire, which isexactly the story of Romulus
and Remus.

Speaker 1 (28:42):
I will hear nothing of this sir.
Yeah, it turns out, when you'rejust using human analogs,
things get muddled Well it workswhen you do the archetypal like
this is the first idea of thisrace.
But when you decide to expandthose people out over decades
and multiple shows you kind ofhave to, you know, move past

(29:03):
that basic framework.

Speaker 2 (29:05):
Yeah, when you're going to give them, like I don't
know, agency depth, you knowanything that doesn't make them
just reactionary forces butinstead characters of their own.

Speaker 1 (29:13):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (29:13):
But their origins are just in human myth.
Weird, there's crossover.
It's really strange, isn't it?
So that's why Spock devoted hispost-Enorge and the Daystorm
Institute built by the VulcanScience Academy to deploy an

(29:39):
equally experimental MacGuffincalled Red Matter.
No explanation as to what thatis in the movie.
It's Red Matter, obviously it'sred.
It's matter, it's Red Matter,it's Red Matter.
Hard to argue with that logic.
Speaking of Vulcan, he does soto halt the progress of the
supernova by artificiallycreating a black hole, but
because of the bureaucraticdelays by the Federation, the

(30:00):
reluctance of Vulcan to shareits technology because they were
the ones who actuallyresearched and developed red
matter and skepticism of theRomulan Senate.
Spock was too late to saveRomulus, because Spock had gone
to the Senate and been like dude, if this star goes, nova,
you're fucked.
And they were like what do youknow?
Get the fuck out of here.
So because of that he couldn'tsave Romulus.

(30:20):
It was destroyed, along withmost of the governing
infrastructure of the Romulanstar empire.
Spock did end up stopping thewhole thing.
He was just too late.
That meant very little to Neroand his crew, who saw the deaths
of their families and lovedones firsthand.
So Nero's crew immediatelytracked down Spock in pursuit of
vengeance.
They found him right as hedetonated the red matter.

(30:44):
But while the artificiallycreated singularity that red
matter creates apparently didits job, it resulted in the
creation of an Einstein-Rosenbridge, or a wormhole I'm
correcting Abrams' star trek, atleast terminology here which
led to the year 2233, and, uh,an electric space hole.

(31:05):
Well, they say black hole, andthen black hole on the other
side, they call it a lightningstorm in space okay
yeah, watching it again, thereare plot holes you could drive a
Mack truck through in thisfucking movie, but we don't care
because it's okay, it's a goodmovie and you're like, okay,
I'll forgive it, or whatever.
So there was a lot of fill-instuff though, and we'll get to

(31:26):
some of that too.
So the wormhole led to the year2233 for the Narada and then
reappeared again in the year2261 for Spock.
Both ships were drawn into thewormhole.
Narada's appearance led to thesplit from the prime timeline
and created the Kelvin universe,a separate timeline of events.

(31:46):
It's my speculation that theHobus supernova was as powerful
as it was because of thesystem's concentration of the
aforementioned decalithium.
I say that because its sistermaterial, trilithium, could be
used as a devastating explosivein the Die Hard episode of TNG

(32:06):
Okay, do you remember that oneVaguely, where the ship is
docked for repairs or whatever?
Everybody's on shore leave andthis group of mercenaries breaks
in to try and steal Trilithian.

Speaker 1 (32:21):
One of those is the.

Speaker 2 (32:24):
Tim Russ, who plays Tuvok later.

Speaker 1 (32:26):
There's also one of the women that plays in multiple
episodes in TNG.
She's in Babylon 5 as Helipath.
Yes, she goes with the Vorlon.

Speaker 2 (32:34):
Yes, 100%.
Yes, you are correct.
In fact, that whole crew isbasically just reoccurring star
trek actors.
Yeah, speaking of colombo, justreusing the same actors over
and over again, which star trekdoes in spades.
Did you ever see thedocumentary?
That guy that was in that thing?
No, I don't think I did.
It's really great.
It's a bunch of characteractors like d list character
actors, right and it covers.

(32:56):
So they go through this thingwhere they follow around all
these d-level character actorsthat you've seen in a thousand
things, one of which is actuallyin abram star trek, and there's
a point in the movie aboutthree quarters the way in when
one of them just goes well, weall do star trek.
And then they do an entire likemontage of each and every one
of those and how each of themhas played like 15 different

(33:17):
characters in Star Trek.
The only thing that ties themtogether is that they were all
just in Star Trek, over and overand over and over again.
It's really funny.
So yeah, like I said, this isall my speculation, but because
of Decalithium's sister material, trilithium could be used as a
devastating explosive, like inthat TNG Die Hard episode, if

(33:37):
detonated, or to inhibit nuclearfusion, if detonated within a
star which is the plot of StarTrek Generations causing a nova.
So it's my speculation that thereasons that that supernova,
which they still even in thetangential non-canon stories
they don explain, that nova ofthe hobus star was so

(33:58):
threatening to everyone elsebecause of the rich deposits of
decalithium which would haveamplified the effects of that
supernova, and that's based onwhat we know about trilithium
and I guess in some waysdilithium.
If you really want to dig down,which I do do but I don't have
time for and unfortunately, alot of this, a lot of these gaps

(34:20):
that I'm filling in here thatare not in Abrams' Star Trek,
comes from the unseen backstoryof the film's plot as laid out
originally by IDW's officialcomic book tie-ins, specifically
Star Trek Countdown.

Speaker 1 (34:33):
It happened.
Don't tell me it didn't happen.
I saw it happen.

Speaker 2 (34:38):
There are about like six times in this script where
I'm expecting one of us to makethat quote.

Speaker 1 (34:42):
I know, I was like waiting to do it.

Speaker 2 (34:44):
That's probably the most appropriate, honestly,
because Star Trek Countdown wasat least designed to be in canon
.
There are things in it thataren't, because there is.
at one point they run intocaptain data yeah so that
doesn't work, but it wasdesigned to be in canon and so,
when it comes to at least wherewe are in this movie, this is

(35:05):
all the unsaid but hopefullyimplied parts that fill in these
plot holes here.
But either way, the film was abox office success.
It really did well, grossedover $385.7 million worldwide,
even though its budget was only$150 million.
So it did pretty well.

Speaker 1 (35:23):
Which, in comparison, like what had been the last
Star Trek film, which would havebeen Nemesis, a good seven
years before you know did like$43 million, yeah, which is a
huge difference from all the youknow, $250 million in the US.

Speaker 2 (35:36):
I remember when you and I went to go see it in the
theater, we were like standingin line waiting to get in
because there were lines formingand we were like, oh cool,
everybody's gonna come to seestar trek.
And then we found out that theline was actually for it was
jennifer lopez, I think it wasmade in manhattan.
I think it was made inmanhattan, yeah, I think it was.
That they were all there to seethat.
They were in line to see that.
Not Star Trek, yeah, it wasMade in Manhattan, which

(35:58):
obviously is now a staple forevery household in America.
Come on, kids, gather around,we're gonna watch Made in
Manhattan.

Speaker 1 (36:06):
Oh, it's June 7th again, yay, woo.

Speaker 2 (36:10):
Weirdly, I think more people remember Nemesis now
than people remember Made inManhattan.

Speaker 1 (36:14):
Well, I mean, at least Nemesis had Tom Hardy in
it and Ron Perlman as a, and RonPerlman yeah.

Speaker 2 (36:19):
As a Reman and, weirdly enough, Bryan Singer as
a quote-unquote redshirt whodies in the battle scene.
Really yes, because he's a hugeStar Trek fan and we will never
see a Bryan Singer Star Trekmovie, for better or for worse.

Speaker 1 (36:34):
It's Hollywood man.
I For better or for worse, it'sHollywood man.
I would never say never.

Speaker 2 (36:37):
Ooh, I don't know.
I mean, there are certainpeople who ain't coming back.
You think people are lining upat Roman Polanski's door now.
I mean, come on, remember, wehad that whole episode about
he's free to come back to the US.
Now they dropped those charges.
Great, yeah, great, good job.
Hollywood.
Or legal system, or culture,how about culture?
Yeah, that's the real problemthere.
The fundamental issuessurrounding what we call New

(37:00):
Trek stem from what we can, Ithink, safely call original sin.
So Abrams was a Star Wars guy.
Everything that he did was sortof through.
You know, when he grew up.
He's older than us, but he'slike 15 years older than us.
So he grew up watching earlySpielberg stuff.
He grew up during that greatera of the 80s with sci-fi and
fantasy and all that kind ofthing, and Star Wars was a

(37:23):
fundamental influence in hislife.
And so, because Star Wars isn'tscience fiction, it's fantasy,
but ironically everything sci-fiwas sort of like filtered
through that lens of Star Wars,because that's just kind of how
he sees the world, you know,through that lens.
He didn't really understandStar Trek, he didn't get it and
he had never watched it and heespecially had never taken into

(37:43):
account how much Trek gestaltcame from the animated series,
the movies TNG, ds9, and Voyager, much less so Voyager.
Thus the production leanedheavily on Kurtzman and Orsi to
take care of pesky continuityand fan service and I'm calling
it that as opposed tocredibility, because that's all

(38:04):
it is is superficial fan service.
To their credit, though, toAbrams' credit, and Kurtzman and
Orsi made Spock a more pivotalcharacter rather than a simple
supporting one to Kirk.
I think that's great Because, asculture changed, society,
especially the geekier, oftenmore progressive sci-fi fantasy

(38:25):
subset, moved away fromembracing womanizing bastards
like Kirk and more toward thestoic, intellectual masculinity
of guys like Spock.
I mean, both still had appeal,but the Spock types had
certainly been elevated.
Spock, specifically, wasfocused on because of his
internal conflict, being bothhuman and Vulcan.

(38:48):
I think that's one of thethings that really drew Abrams
in.
One of the main themes of theoriginal series and especially
subsequent movies was the bondof friendship, you know,
fraternity, fellowship, all that.
The Abrams crew smartly keyedin on that, but they missed a
fundamental element of thisdynamic.
The fellowship that made Trekgood wasn't simply between Kirk

(39:10):
and Spock, it was a triumvirateKirk, spock and McCoy, and this
is where I would love to make adetailed argument that these
three could be seen as abstractrepresentations of Aristotelian
definition of philosophy aslogic, rhetoric and dialectic,
of Aristotelian definition ofphilosophy as logic, rhetoric

(39:30):
and dialectic, and I think I'monto something.
However, I am not equipped orprepared to write a
comprehensive philosophicaldissertation, especially as a
layman and without years ofacademic study.
So instead I use thesecharacters as abstract analogs
of Aristotle's elements ofcharacters, as abstract analogs
of Aristotle's elements of.
Let's just use rhetoric, logos,facts and reason, spock, pathos

(39:51):
, emotional appeal, perhapsspeaking the voice of the common
man, mccoy, and ethos, thefront-facing credibility,
sometimes summation, kirk or, ifyou like, if this is an easier
analogy or perhaps a morefitting one, the id, the
impulsive, pleasure-seeking partof the personality.
Kirk, the superego, thejudgmental part focused on

(40:13):
morality and fundamental goodand bad.
Mccoy and the ego, the logicalgo-between, spock.
I've thought about this foryears, actually In a broader
debate.
You could actually make theargument for each of these
archetypes being each of thesecharacters, and you can rotate
them and make good arguments foreach of them.
But that's good, that makesthem a good set of characters or

(40:37):
to use in a narrative.
That's what makes Star Trekgood.
When it's good, perfect exampleStar Trek 2, the Wrath of khan.
When all three watch theexplainer video for project
genesis, it's a great scene anda perfect example of why they
work together.
You know they watch the scene.
They turn to each other.
Jim's like what do you thinklooks to spock?

(40:58):
And spock's like uh,fascinating, it's life from
lifelessness, you know.
And then, and bones is likegood god, do you realize what
you're doing here?
According to myth, earth iscreated in six days.
Watch out, we can do it in sixminutes.
And he's talking about, like,the moral implications of so.
Spock interjects you know somesort of logical reasoning or
whatever, um, but with no moralframework.

(41:19):
And then they bicker.
And then kirk is sort of thedeciding factor that, like
you're both right.
Despite all that, we have todeal with this.
The fact that they fit intothese archetypes proves that
they're good characters and thattogether they work.
And if you know how to writethem, if you're a competent
fucking writer, you can writestories around these characters
or use these characters tocreate a narrative and tell this

(41:40):
story, and they tell somethingtrue and honest about the human
condition.
Unfortunately, kurtzman andOrsi don't seem to get it
Shocking from the writers ofAmazing Spider-Man 2.

Speaker 1 (41:50):
You mean the best one .

Speaker 2 (41:51):
Putting that aside, their approach to Trek is
markedly superficial.
Even in a movie in which 80% ofit they do well, with emotional
weight and characterdevelopment, or at least the
character dynamics and thingsthat work, whether it's true to
those characters or not, thatmovie still does work, but it's
also still full of these flawswhich will become more prominent

(42:14):
than good storytelling as thesemovies progress.
A perfect example is theintroduction of Dr McCoy, which
we talked about recently.
He tells Kirk he has nothingbecause his ex-wife took
everything in their divorce.
He has nothing left but hisbones and that's why Jim Kirk
calls him Bones.
This one just makes me sad.

(42:36):
How stupid this is.
It's bullshit.
He was called Bones becausethat term is the truncation of a
common slang term, Bonesbecause that term is the
truncation of a common slangterm, sawbones, which refers to
doctors who often performedamputations with a bone saw.

Speaker 1 (42:55):
I'm sorry, this is really easy to figure out, yeah
you just got to look in the ringand realize that bone saw is
ready.

Speaker 2 (43:02):
Bone saw is ready baby.

Speaker 1 (43:03):
Now is this stupid, yes, but dissenting voice here
ready baby.
Now is this stupid, yes, butdissenting voice here, hmm,
interesting.
I think bonesaw is one of thoseextremely antiquated terms you
mean sawbones.

Speaker 2 (43:17):
What'd I say?
You said bonesaw, because abonesaw is just a thing.
You could still get a bonesaw.
My grandparents used to have abonesaw.

Speaker 1 (43:23):
No, no, it's called the mega cutty cutty.
Now that's what Starting kidcutty, I think.
Saw bones is an extremely oldterm and we're talking, like you
know, civil.

Speaker 2 (43:35):
War era.

Speaker 1 (43:37):
1830s is when it first appeared in the American
Right and I think when Trekoriginally came out was one of
the first episode of Trek air 66.

Speaker 2 (43:52):
All right came out was one of the first episode of
truck air 66.
All right, we're jumping 50years, 45 years from the civil
war it was 100 years, exactlyright.

Speaker 1 (43:56):
But I think they were trying to find a new way, a new
, updated way to keep nicknamebut make it something a little
more relevant to a neweraudience who wouldn't maybe
understand the reference ofSawbones.

Speaker 2 (44:10):
But you don't have to reinvent the wheel.
All it would take was a linereferring to a doctor as a
Sawbones.

Speaker 1 (44:16):
Again, this is a devil's advocate.
This is not saying, this is theright way to go?
I think there are better waysto explain that and to tie it
into the totality of trek andactual.

Speaker 2 (44:28):
You know the sawbones nickname right I understand and
it just feels like a conceitthat well, it's just one example
, but I think it's a telling oneto me.
It shows either a fundamentalmisunderstanding of the subject
matter or an underestimation ofthe audience.
You know, know what I mean.
All they needed was like a lineor two or an exchange, and it's

(44:50):
not a phrase that's out of ourlexicon at this point.
It's not, it's still in ourlike people know what that means
, unless they watched the showBones, which don't, but there is
a precedent for that name.
I understand and you're correct.
That is one approach.
I think it's a bad faithapproach, honestly.
And yeah, not everybody knowswhat it is, but it's not that

(45:12):
hard to look up.
I mean, there are so many otheridioms that we use in American
slang that are probably evenused in that movie, that are
just as obscure the salad days,sure, the salad days, Don't Sure
.

Speaker 1 (45:25):
Well before the podcast, we were literally
talking about the term saladdays and its origin.
It was like, oh, where did thatcome from?
Why did we use that?

Speaker 2 (45:34):
But that's even hundreds of years older than
this.
It's not that far in the pastand doctors still use bone saws
to amputate.

Speaker 1 (45:41):
They are they're ready, they're always ready,
they are always ready to cutthat leg off, baby, just ask
them.
They'll do it.
You don't put a bone saw nextto a Slim Jim you just don't do
it.

Speaker 2 (45:55):
They'll snap man, they'll fucking snap right into
it Either way.
Like I said, that's just oneexample.
There are actually worseexamples.
That's just one that reallyreally stuck in my craw and
neither of those to me are good.
The abrams trek movies arechock full of these kinds of
examples, like the comedicapproach to the kopiashi maru
test.
The kopiashi maru test openingof star trek 2 is phenomenal,

(46:17):
and then they go out of theirway to make spock the guy that
created it, why there's noprecedent in there that says
that there's no reason that spcreated that other than only
within the confines of the storythey're telling.
You know why?
Because it's in your grandpa'strick.
This is new trick.
Yes, this is the Fred Durst ofStar Trek.

Speaker 1 (46:35):
Spock did it all for the Nuki, as it seems.

Speaker 2 (46:38):
He just would have break shit man.
Another great example Changingstar dates.

Speaker 1 (46:44):
I mean the star date.
It's a whole problematicchanging star dates.

Speaker 2 (46:47):
I mean the star date.
It's a whole problematic.
It is problematic, it is weird,it is difficult to pin down and
there are myths, there areuntruths, there are things that
are partially true about thosebecause they were changed, often
by different producers anddifferent showrunners and things
.
But the original concept wasthat stardates were a version of

(47:12):
the modified Julian date system, which is a real thing and
still used to this day byastronomers.
That'd be fun to go down thatrabbit hole but we don't really
have time for that.
They changed it to just beingthe current year, followed by a
decimal point, which meanssomething, I don't know what,

(47:34):
because it couldn't mean day.
But that goes directly in theface of original series canon.
Because in the original seriesstar dates were four digits and
at the beginning of the originalseries Stardates were four
digits and at the beginning ofthe original series it started
with one.
In Abrams Trek, just opening onthe USS Kelvin incident, their

(47:54):
Stardate starts with two and isfour digits.
So already you have putyourself in conflict with
official canon and because, forthe reasons that you understand
completely, you can kind of handwave, but at the same time it
is directly in conflict alreadywith the original series.
And then, of course, there's theentire movie of Into Darkness,
which is just a series ofreferences to a movie that they

(48:20):
hope you've seen, and withoutthose references is nothing.
It doesn't exist on its own.
I mean, they do the wholetorpedo thing where they're like
we're going to do surgery on atorpedo, why Not?
Because it matters in the plotall that much or that it is an
interesting thing to do.
No, it's because of a line inStar Trek six, great and Khan.

(48:43):
They completely ruined the Khanthing because they wanted the
second movie to be about Khan,just like Star Trek II was the
Wrath of Khan.
And it's baffling.
It's just references for thesake of references.
It's an entire movie and it'snot different from the first one
in this sense.
But it's an entire movieessentially going hey, I've seen

(49:06):
Star Trek, you guys, you likeStar Trek, I've seen it.
Check it out, I can prove I'veseen it here.
Look, I've seen it.
I referenced the thing.
That's not a movie that doesn'tmake it good.
Making it good would be doingnew things, you know.

Speaker 1 (49:20):
New in you.

Speaker 2 (49:23):
Yeah, you know, the only thing that really does a
good job of this is the IDWcontinuation of the Abrams
universe, because they actuallydo episodes of the original
series as if it were in theAbrams universe in, like how
things would be different.
And a lot of it is actuallygood writing and it's like oh

(49:44):
yeah, okay, yeah, I could seethat we recognize that the
universe has changed.
Some of the events will remainthe same, but we're going to
approach it from a new andmodern way Great, fine, awesome.
One of the fundamental flaws Ithink about at least just these
movies is the completecoincidental nature of a lot of
the stuff.
They find Scotty on Delta Vegaand it's like's like okay, first

(50:08):
of all, delta vega is not inthe vulcan system.
Nero abandoned spock on deltavega and then he watches vulcan
explode, like if you're thatclose, you're closer than the
moon is to earth, you're.
And on top of that, delta vegais not in that system.
It's like way far away.
They established it.
The motion picture.
You're just putting in namesthat people recognize when you
could just make it a differentthing.

(50:29):
There's no reason you can keepthe same fucking plot and not
use the references.
You know what I mean?
It's just reference forreference sake.
And more overarchingly, Ireally hate in that movie all of
these characters come together,not for the reason.
You would think it's all justcoincidence.
It just feels like cheapwriting which is an easy fix.

(50:51):
All you have to do is make somesort of statement about
predestination, even if this isanother timeline, these things
were destined to happen.
You were destined to meet eachother.
All you would have to do inthat scene where old Spock meets
new Kirk, you know, and theymind meld and they give you a
fucking expo dump.
All you'd really have to dowould be like, yes, these things

(51:11):
were meant to happen.
Because they were meant tohappen, then a lot of those
weird idiosyncratic fallacies.
I'd be like whatever youexplained it, fine, I'll go with
it, but what are the odds offinding Scotty in a weird
outpost on Delta Vega, by theway, populated with huge
carnivorous monsters?
Why would Starfleet ever put afucking depot there?

(51:32):
Why does that exist?
And then just happen to bringhim aboard the Enterprise?
That's just lazy writing, whenall you had to do was be like
well, these things were alwaysmeant to happen.
You at least understand howsci-fi works or fantasy works
Great, okay, but they don't seemto know that either.
But that wasn't even in myscript.
The audience pushback of thefilm was met by snotty and curt

(51:55):
responses by roberta orsi inpublic.
Apparently he was a dick aboutit while he was originally in
line to direct what wouldeventually become star trek.
Beyond his reactions andrumored infighting with Damon
Lindelof, who Abrams had justbrought on board as like an idea
guy, likely led to Orsi beingpushed out of the franchise and

(52:17):
an official split with Kurtzman,mostly, supposedly, orsi
himself had written 18 differentscripts for the third Star Trek
film, all of which wererejected.
18?
18.
How nuts is that?
At some point, just give up,dude.
He was so invested that he wassupposed to okay.

(52:41):
This is also weird.
He was supposed to direct thatreboot of Power Rangers.
He left the project to directstar trek 3, which he also
didn't get, so he missed out ontwo movies.
Just stop.
You know what I mean.
How many times do they have totell you no before you realize
that you're not welcome?

Speaker 1 (53:02):
maybe 18 different pitches I get, but like spending
time writing entire scripts.

Speaker 2 (53:08):
Because Kurtzman and Orsi were the official writing
staff.
Apparently, orsi and Lindelofbutted heads constantly and
Lindelof was like JJ Abrams'best friend and so he always
deferred to Lindelof.
And so what happened was Orsibasically just got fired and
they kept Kurtzman Because hewas a yes man to both of them.
So when Paramount and CBSre-merged, kurtzman alone was

(53:32):
eventually tapped as the newoverseer and steward of the Star
Trek franchise.
That role may have gone toveteran Star Trek writer Brian
Fuller, as CBS brought him onboard to helm a new flagship
show in the franchise, as CBSbrought him on board to helm a
new flagship show in thefranchise, discovery.
Now Fuller got his startwriting on TNG and then later on
Voyager.
He was a Rick Berman underling.

(53:54):
He didn't work on DS9, but thatshows the weird split between
those two camps.
Brian Fuller audiences mayremember from Pushing Daisies
Dead Like Me, wonderfalls,hannibal.
He was an established writerand so they brought him back on
board.
He had cred, he had clout.
I thought at the time, greatpick and I still think is a good

(54:14):
pick.
But unfortunately Fullerclashed with executives over his
extremely ambitious vision forDiscovery, its tone, its
aesthetics, and because hefought tooth and nail to cast
Seneca Green Martin in the leadrole.
Unfortunately, she was stillshooting the Walking Dead,
delaying production of Discoveryand fraying tensions even
further For that reason, and allthe others, fuller left to

(54:38):
concentrate on Neil Gaiman'sAmerican Gods TV show adaptation
.
Bad news for Brian Fuller, notonly because of Neil Gaiman, but
because he eventually got firedfrom that production as well.
Nice, yeah, good stuff.
So that show Discoverystruggled to establish cohesion
like at all, picking parts ofFuller's vision, but rather

(55:00):
scattershot.
One element that made it in wasprobably the show seemed
remarkably not Star Trek like.
Was that Discovery's CaptainLorca, played awesomely by Jason
Isaacs, which is one of thoseguys who are like, of course
he's in Star Trek.
Jason Isaacs being a captain ofStar Trek is one of those

(55:21):
things like I remember when theycasted Scott Bakula, I was like
, well, yeah, obviously, afterthe precedent set by Patrick
Stewart and AV Brooks, and evenKate Mulgrew to a certain extent
, like how that one time wetalked about how, like why
hasn't Rip Torn been in StarTrek at any point, doesn't he
seem like he should have been?
Jason Isaacs is just one ofthose guys.
I could see him being a villainin a Star Trek movie or

(55:42):
something.
It made sense to me, but itturns out that Jason Isaacs'
Captain Lorca was actually hisMirror Universe counterpart Dun
dun dun was actually his MirrorUniverse counterpart Dun-dun-dun
.

Speaker 1 (55:54):
Before we go further, could you explain how and where
Discovery fits in the Star Trekuniverse?

Speaker 2 (55:59):
Yes, so Star Trek Discovery specifically exists 10
years before the start of theoriginal series, so about
2255-56,.
Essentially Now, is that thenew original series or the
original as in the Kelvintimeline, or the original Prime?

Speaker 1 (56:18):
universe.
I believe that's vital for theaudience to know.

Speaker 2 (56:19):
That's fair.
Discovery exists inside thePrime universe, the original
universe, so the events inDiscovery are supposed to happen
within the original Star Trekuniverse.
Nimoy the Shatner, nimoy Right.
So Brian Fuller really wanted adifferent approach to the
Mirror Universe than had beenpreviously depicted, even for

(56:42):
the most part really well donein DS9.
Because we've seen a differentMirror Mirror Universe.

Speaker 1 (56:47):
In case someone doesn't understand the original
Mirror Mirror Universe in theoriginal series.
In case someone doesn'tunderstand the original Mirror
Mirror Universe in the originalseries, they travel to an
alternate reality where humansare ruling the universe.

Speaker 2 (57:15):
Refresh my memory, kirk.
Human race embraced its warlike, colonialist, imperial vision
and created an empire that wouldeventually conquer most of its
part of the galaxy.
And, as depicted in theoriginal series episode Mirror
Mirror, there are villainousanalogs for each carrot on the
show.
Well, how it's easy to telltheir evil versions is that they

(57:36):
have goatees.
Yeah, the ultimate evil.
What if everybody was just this?
But evil was the originalconcept.
He's not the ruler of theempire, right?
No, no, he's captain of theenterprise.

Speaker 1 (57:45):
Yeah, he's captain of the enterprise, which sets it
at a certain level.
Okay, it's just reverse imageof the Trek, we know.

Speaker 2 (57:53):
And then and this is a good distinction.
It's not just that it's analternate timeline per se, it's
presented to us as doppelgangers.
Yes, abraham Lincoln talkedabout doppelgangers.
That's a long story that weshould get into at a different
point, because that's reallyinteresting the idea that you
are yourself but the opposite ofwho you are now.
You've achieved some of thesame things and we've gotten to
some similar places, buteverything's wrong, everything's

(58:16):
bad.
But there's no context for itin the original series episode.
Why they are, why they're alltogether the same people.
We don't know why they're alltogether at the same time.
But this kind of goes to mypoint earlier about
predestination.
It would be more interesting ifyou knew why they all got to
where they were, at the samepoints in the same place, under
different circumstances.

(58:37):
Ds9 does a really good job.
The Mirror Universe appears inone original series episode,
isn't it two?
One Mirror Mirror, that's it,and was not addressed again
until DS9.

Speaker 1 (58:49):
Because there are alternate universe episodes in
TNG that are similar, Right butnot Not the Mirror Mirror
universe which they actuallyaddress.

Speaker 2 (59:00):
I hate to say this, but they do address that point
in Discovery that it's not analternate timeline, it's a
completely different reality.
Both have own alternatetimelines of themselves but are
equal, but opposite, like DC andMarvel Right, which I know
doesn't make any sense.
I mean it's weird.

Speaker 1 (59:20):
This all feels like fucking Obi-Wan being like well
from a certain point of view.

Speaker 2 (59:27):
Well, actually these episodes could have used that.
Even in the stuff that I like,in the Kelvin stuff, they do a
mirror Kelvin version.
When that timeline split off,it also split off a mirror
version.
So like, no matter what happensin the Prime universe, it's not
just an alternate timeline,like in that episode in, like I

(59:48):
want to say, season six of TNGng, where wharf goes to that
batleth tournament and he's likeon the shuttlecraft and he
comes back and everything'sweird because it's a different
timeline and then, like it turnsout, there's like multiple
timelines that he's likeshifting through.
None of that is in the mirroruniverse.
The mirror universe has its ownother multiverse, right.

(01:00:08):
It's a different version ofreality, it's a a separate
multiverse.
Now would we consider themirrorverse?

Speaker 1 (01:00:14):
akin to the Kelvin timeline.

Speaker 2 (01:00:16):
No, because the Kelvin timeline has their own
mirror universe.
Okay, this is not good, butthis is the only analogy I can
think of.
I mean it's a good analogy?
I don't think fundamentallyit's a good idea.
It's DC's dark multiverse Woofyes which is bad and dumb and
stupid and it goes againsteverything about what a
multiverse is.
But that's what it is.
It's been set up especially byDiscovery.

(01:00:38):
They're the ones that actuallyset this precedent.

Speaker 1 (01:00:40):
Okay, okay, alright.
Comic-wise, all these alternatetimelines are issues of what-if
, but the Mirror Universe is theultimate timeline.

Speaker 2 (01:00:48):
Actually, yes, that is good.
Okay, that Is the ultimatetimeline.
Actually, yes, that is good.
Okay, that's right.
It exists on its own and it hasits own what-ifs.
Yes, theoretically, but then,of course, later the ultimate
timeline gets mixed in with themultiverse.

Speaker 1 (01:00:58):
Just like the Mirror Universe.

Speaker 2 (01:00:59):
No, actually it never really gets mixed in with the
multiverse.
That's the thing Star Treknever does, that Star Trek
doesn't actually go back on liketurn it back into the
multiverse, which would makemore sense.
Well, very complicated.
It's very complicated With StarTrek Discovery.
Fuller really wanted adifferent approach to the mirror
universe.
Instead of simply havinghand-wringing evil versions of

(01:01:22):
each character, fuller wanted toshow that they were the same
people, just in a universedefined by different events,
decisions and circumstancesQuote.
So there was something in themistakes made by Burnham
decisions and circumstancesQuote.
So there was something in themistakes made by Burnham in the
Battle of the Binary Starsdiscovery that had this ripple.
But the mirror universe wasalways meant to be an
exploration of a small step in adifferent direction.

(01:01:43):
So it wasn't necessarily themirror universe we know from all
the other series.
That's a caveat that's kind ofimportant to know.
It was something that wascloser to our timeline and
experience, so you can stillrecognize the human being and go
what did I do?
How did that seem like a gooddecision for me in that moment
and how do I continue forwardwith my life?
And everything was sort of anextrapolation out on that.

(01:02:05):
So there were things that Iwanted the mirror universe to
function in, a narrativeexploration of like, oh fuck, if
I didn't just do that one thing, everything would be better, as
opposed to I don't recognizethat person.
I don't know who that person isbecause they're the diametric
opposite of who I am.
End quote.
He was trying to just bring itall back in, unfortunately, when

(01:02:26):
he was kicked out, that's whenDiscovery decided that they were
going to say that no, it's nota different timeline, it's a
separate multiverse.
So eventually Discovery broughtback Michelle Yeoh's Philippa
Georgiou, who died very early inthe show, first episode, right?
Yeah, I mean it's the beginningof the show.
Yeah, I guess it is In the formof her counterpart, the

(01:02:47):
sovereign of the Terran Empire.
She became stranded in ouruniverse, eventually utilized by
Starfleet in ending the FirstKlingon War and eventually
becoming an asset forStarfleet's darkest element, cia
.
Analog, section 31.
Section 31 was an organizationwhich claimed to protect the
security interests of the UnitedFederation of Planets.

(01:03:07):
Well, first the United Earthand then the United Federation
of Planets.
The organization claimed to bejustified by the original
Starfleet charter, article 14,section 31, of which allows for
extraordinary measures to betaken at times of extreme threat
.
It's a very patriot act in thatsense.
Now, if done right, section 31could be a powerful commentary

(01:03:29):
on post-World War II America andthe dastardly things the US did
to control the destiny of theentire world, to protect what it
saw as its interests and thehead of the CIA, which was how
it was formed later.
During the early Cold War, heoversaw the 1953 Iranian coup

(01:03:58):
d'etat, the 1954 Guatemalan coupd'etat, the Lockheed U-2
aircraft program, mkultra andthe disastrous Bay of Pigs
invasion.
As a result of that he wasfired by John F Kennedy and
there were about a thousandthings we could talk about that
he did.
That are war crimes.

Speaker 1 (01:04:16):
Well, it's also an organization that thrives and is
meant to do war crimes.
Sets them outside the rule oflaw.

Speaker 2 (01:04:22):
Yeah, in its original intent by law cannot function.
Within the United States,though they did, and they were
the ones that did exjudicialassassinations and it's crazy to
think, but jfk had to be theone that goes you can't
assassinate people, dude, youjust can't do that.

Speaker 1 (01:04:38):
I wonder what happened to him.

Speaker 2 (01:04:39):
Yeah it's almost like something happened as a direct
result of those decisions youcan't assassinate people.

Speaker 1 (01:04:48):
Cia, hold my beer, yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:04:51):
You know what it's possible?
It was just Oswald, but Oswaldwas not a conspiracy theory, a
CIA asset.

Speaker 1 (01:04:59):
I don't follow, Skip.
What's the connection?
A CIA asset?
If you need to repeat what wejust said, just get on your
phone and go from the cursorback and to the left.

Speaker 2 (01:05:12):
I was just thinking, thinking like speak closer to my
corsage.
Here's the cia alsooccasionally subcontracted the
mafia to pull off some crazyshit due to its influence and
shady network of rapscallionsrapscallions, that's a very
fanciful term in cuba, evenbecause they had shady networks.
They, you know, smuggled drugsand they did all sorts of things

(01:05:34):
that the CIA wasn't privy to,didn't have access to.
So they actually fucking hiredthe mafia, the mafia.
Interestingly, do you know whostarted the process of breaking
up the mafia?
Robert Kennedy.
Nothing happened to him, right?
He worked out just fine.
Really weird how that is, isn'tit?
This isn't even the conspiracypart.
That is all fact.

(01:05:55):
That is all acknowledged,recognized, publicly recognized
by the American government.
The conspiracy part is fillingin the gaps.
So anyway, during the mid 23rdcentury, section 31 were
considered a critical divisionof Starfleet Intelligence.
By the 24th century they werebelieved to be a rogue
organization or they didn't evenexist, which, for the first

(01:06:17):
part of the existence of the CIA, the American government denied
that the CIA exists.
They had a central intelligenceorganization, but what we think
of now as the CIA in itsinternational black ops networks
, they denied existed.
So that's the commentarythey're making there.
So in the 21st century, theywere considered either a myth or

(01:06:40):
a rogue organization, but werestill technically part of
Starfleet intelligence.
And now we come to the reasonwe were doing this episode is
discovery in canon.
And how bad was Section 31?
We could just be like well,section 31 sucked, and here's
why, which would be fine andwe'd probably have some funny
things to say about it.
But we also wanted to talkabout if discovery was in canon,

(01:07:00):
which, by the way, I hate totell you is all right again.

Speaker 1 (01:07:04):
We'll need to get into more of that because I was
told that some of the stuffisn't it.
It's been retroactively removed.
But I might need someone whoknows what's going on better
than me to explain it to me.
And if I need explaining, justimagine what the general public
needs.

Speaker 2 (01:07:21):
That's the reason I wanted to lay groundwork so
people knew where we were comingfrom and what this whole thing
was.
You know, for people who aren'tnecessarily hardcore Trek guys,
they don't know the differencebetween DS9 era and Voyager era
and new Trek and they'reprobably not even sure where the
Abrams movies fit in, or theyjust go oh, it's its own thing,
which it is, but it isn't Rightand we had to talk about if it's

(01:07:45):
in canon and if it is or isn'tin canon, we had to explain like
why and who behind it and whyis that how it is that?

Speaker 1 (01:07:52):
was a good part of the episode.

Speaker 2 (01:07:53):
I really liked that.
I think that's one of thosethings that you and I bring.
That's unique.
Other people don't talk about.
Even Star Trek podcasts don'ttalk about that kind of stuff.
The reason we're doing this isbecause we have unique things to
say and are more well-informed.
Who do these kinds of shows?
I want us to be more like thehardcore history of geek culture
than just glossing over andtalking about stuff.

(01:08:15):
Right, I guess we'll have towait for next time to answer the
questions, because canon'simportant in Star Trek, which is
why it always attracted me.
That's why I like DC.
I used to like DC when DC wasgood when I was growing up.
They share very similarcharacteristics.
They are all about canon andwhat is and isn't true.
And then, as time goes on, thelines get blurred and then

(01:08:37):
Marvel and Star Wars both havethe same problems and then it
turns out they're not really allthat different in the long run,
like they're owned by the samecompany.
I mean, star Wars and Disney arenot too different than Star
Trek and DC.
Canon became super important toStar Wars fans as well, right,
eventually.
And now you're like which StarWars shows are in Canon?
Is Solo in Canon?

(01:08:58):
I don't know, it's kind of thesame shit.

Speaker 1 (01:09:01):
Well, all of pop culture has been mashed into the
same clay at this point.

Speaker 2 (01:09:07):
It's really baffling, but that's where we are, yeah,
so we'll dive more into thatpart in part two.

Speaker 1 (01:09:16):
Dispatch Ajax.
Section 31, part two Wrath ofthe Plot.
Yeah, wrath of the Plot.
Well, we hope you've enjoyed sofar.
Please do come back for thesecond part where we get into
more of new Trek and Section 31itself.
If you have enjoyed what you'veheard, please like, share,
subscribe, if you wouldn't mindleaving us five evil goatees on

(01:09:39):
the podcast app of your choice,ideally Apple Podcasts.
That's the best way for us toget heard and seen and we would
greatly appreciate it.
Until electrical storm in spaceopens again Skip.
What should they do, thecadet's?

Speaker 2 (01:09:52):
logic is sound, Is it ?
Kurt comes on the bridge andhe's like that same event a
lightning storm in space wasseen on the day of my birth, and
therefore it's Romulans andthen Spock's, like that logic is
sound.

Speaker 1 (01:10:07):
Huh, yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:10:08):
Huh, is it though.

Speaker 1 (01:10:11):
I beg to differ for the uh machinations of this fast
moving plot.
I believe so, sir.

Speaker 2 (01:10:17):
Let's get to the action let's just skip over this
part where we have to like handwave all of it.
Don't think about too hard.
Move, move, move, but don'thand wave our show.
Please make sure you havecleaned up after yourselves to
some sort of reasonable degree,make sure you've paid your tabs,
make sure you've tipped yourcages, your bartenders, your
waitstaff, your podcasters, anddon't forget to support your

(01:10:38):
local comic shops and retailers.
And from Dispatch Ajax we wouldlike to say Godspeed, fair
wizards, engage, indeed,disengage, disengage from that
ending.

Speaker 1 (01:10:50):
Please go away, Disengage.