Literary Figures | TNG 6.01, "Times Arrow, Part II" | T7R #357 - The 7th Rule -- A Star Trek Podcast with DS9's Cirroc Lofton

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Jack London is going to Alaska. Data can now be
called an old head, and Missus Carmichael is a perfect Tatiana.
Hello everybody, and welcome to the Seventh Rule. Was sar
rock Lofton. Hello, Hello, he was eating some really good
chips early. I'm so jealous. It was so good. My
name is Ryan T. Huskin. Today we're doing a review

(00:25):
of Star Trek the Next Generation Season six, episode one
times Aero, Part two. Story by Joe Minoski. Teleplay by
the legendary Jerry Taylor. This is directed by less Landaut
just like the previous episodes, so that's interesting. Keep that continuity.

(00:45):
This was September nineteenth, nineteen ninety two of Memory Serve.
September nineteenth is talk like a pirate day. Talk like
a pirate day. It really is where were you and
how are you doing today?

Speaker 2 (00:59):
Sarah, I'm doing trade talk like a pirate day.

Speaker 3 (01:05):
That's just a weird day to have.

Speaker 1 (01:08):
Well, come September, you know you know the rules?

Speaker 3 (01:12):
Yeah, yeah, Do they have a walk like an Egyptian?

Speaker 1 (01:16):
Nice? Beautiful that we should find out when walk like
an Egyptian was first dropped, and that will be walk
like an Egyptian day. That's a good one. Everybody. Please
make sure you like this video. Subscribe to the channel,
hit the bal icon for notifications. If you're listening in,
please give us a five star rating and a nice review.
We'd really appreciate that, and join us on patreon dot

(01:39):
com Slash the Seventh Rull once again, that's Patreon dot
com Slash the Seventh Rull. To support the show and
be our pals. That would be a great thing. So srok,
this was a three month hiatus. The previous episode was
June thirteenth. Hey, this is Those are two friends birthdays.
June thirteenth, my friend Leah that's her birthday and September nineteenth.

(02:04):
Talk like a pirate days our buddy Darth Shoey's birthday. Right, So,
what did you think of this episode as a kickoff
to season six?

Speaker 4 (02:19):
Uh?

Speaker 3 (02:21):
Uh, you know, not as good as Best of Both
Worlds as a two parter for me, you know, as
a series finale slash kickoff to the next season. You know,
the period pieces are limited to just in general for me,

(02:43):
because you know, this is throwback into the you know,
early nineteen hundreds or whatever it is, and so you know,
it doesn't have the same kind of futuristic science fiction
kind of feel to it. It does have a good
Star Trek episode feel to it, and I enjoyed it.

(03:07):
But yeah, you know, it was it was it was okay.
There were moments in here that I actually did like
that we'll talk about. But you know, for the most part,
you know, you're waiting three months for this, uh second part,
it's that's a long time. I know we've seen longer

(03:28):
waits nowadays.

Speaker 1 (03:29):
But nowadays, Yeah.

Speaker 3 (03:31):
It's still you know, it's I knew it was going
to get wrapped up into some degree, but you know,
it was well written. There's some concepts that they thought
were original in this or at least you know, original
for Star Trek, and mainly the idea of these time

(03:54):
travelers that hunt on people's energy during times of play.

Speaker 1 (04:01):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (04:01):
Smart, that was a smart Like just just that concept alone.
It's like, oh, okay, that's cool. I get that. That's
that's clever. That's a good science fiction kind of concept.
And so for that reason, I thought, you know, checked
that box of being interesting and innovative and you know,

(04:23):
an original concept.

Speaker 1 (04:26):
Yeah, and everybody at home that's wondering, what's the answer
about Walk Like an Egyptian. Well, the best I can
find is January tenth, nineteen eighty six. January tenth, nineteen
eighty six was when the album was released with the song.

(04:47):
September eighty sixth was the music video, I guess. But
the point is January tenth is Walk Like an Egyptian day,
even though the whole, the whole album was released at
that time. But if you have a better answer, when
was the single released? Maybe the single was released before
the album, which happens a lot are used to and
people even really have albums. I don't know. Let us

(05:09):
know in the comments below exactly the date that Walk
Like in Egyptian premiered on the radio or on the
album was released or whatever. That's it. Okay, so back
to work everybody. Now we all have that song stuck
in our head, you know.

Speaker 3 (05:29):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (05:31):
I have to be honest, this episode did not move
me in the same way that this episode has never
moved me. Like I remember, like so many times I
watched an episode when I was a kid, or I
watched an episode five years ago or fifteen years ago,

(05:55):
and then I was like, eh, it wasn't great, So
I never really rewatched it, and then we watch it
again and I go, actually, I really like this episode.
It's really grown on me. A lot of Deep Space
nine episodes are like that, you know, usually the bottle episodes,
and I go, actually, I was wrong about this episode.
It's really good. For example, take me out to the

(06:16):
Hollow Suite. I love that episode. Now Explorers love that episode.
Now the Inner Light. I never moved me before watched
it a few years ago and I was like, this
is great. I love it. This one has not changed.
I expected it to do that. I expected to say,
you know what, I was wrong about this episode, but

(06:38):
I maybe I am wrong, but I'm still wrong about
it because I watched it and I was like, it's
just weird. It's just there's just so many weird elements
of like the snake and the aliens, and there's a
lot of smart stuff, but a lot of stuff that
I thought was lacking. And I'd love to kind of

(06:58):
dig through the good and the bad with you because
it sounds like you kind of have a similar feel
to this. What did you actually like about this episode?

Speaker 3 (07:09):
Okay, what did I like about it? I liked the
moments that Guynan had with the card I felt like
they have really good chemistry together. There was a there's
a a sensitivity that Picard has for Guynan. He really

(07:31):
cares about her, He really liked you know, he stayed
behind when that portal opened up, and he's like, I'm
gonna be with her, essentially risking his own being stuck
in that time period, essentially for for all we know.
So I like those moments. I like the fact that,

(07:51):
you know, when she said have we met before and
he was like, you know, not yet.

Speaker 1 (07:56):
But right he got to finally the KOI because usually
he's asking in ten forty, he's asking questions and she's
like I'll never tell. She's all, yeah, koy and T.
And now he got to do it to her. He's like,
oh not yet. Or she's like do you know me?
He's like, yes, I do, and she's like do I
know you? He's like not yet.

Speaker 3 (08:20):
Yeah. And so that those moments I liked. I thought
that was good. I like even Data and guyn and
you know, talking about Mark Twain or whatever, you know,
being intrusive and just the whole guyn it. I like,
I liked her in this episode. What I did find
a little bit too uh, you you hit it with

(08:45):
the with the snake on the cane, the bag that beams,
these two characters that don't talk until you know the
very end. It just just like and then, you know,
I think Mark Twain is the distraction for me in
this and you know, and I think I heard Jason Oakin,
you know, say that he didn't much care for that

(09:08):
aspect of it because it's a real life person, a
real life character that we know. And the reason I
don't necessarily appreciate the tie in is because from what
I know Mark Twain, of his writing, none of it
implicates or indicates.

Speaker 1 (09:30):
Any sci fi aspect, any sci fi. Yeah, that's a
good point. I never thought of that. But you're right,
Like he wasn't known as some sci fi writer that
would write like poor the worlds or anything like that.

Speaker 3 (09:44):
You know, yes, exactly. So if this character was somebody
who's tied into the space program, the you know, NASA development,
or you know, something else, or even a science fiction writer, uh,

(10:05):
you know Octavia Butler, you know who wrote early science
fiction stuff. If it was something else, even Orson Wells,
you know who you know directed you know, this whole.

Speaker 1 (10:22):
The War of the World's thing, yeah.

Speaker 3 (10:23):
War the worlds and basically the idea of aliens, and
you know, you get some some of that there. You know,
for for example, the bill Bill hop that was helping
Bilbos No, not Bilbo Baggins, but uh, you know, the
guy that was helping data, the young Bill Hopp.

Speaker 1 (10:43):
Is Jack London, who wrote White Fang, if I remember correctly.

Speaker 3 (10:49):
Another non science fiction Jack London is not known.

Speaker 1 (10:54):
I don't know. I think he's the guy that wrote
White Fang. And the only reason I know that is
because growing up as a kid in the Bay Area,
we know that Jack London was from the Bay Areas,
from San Francisco, and in San Francisco there's a place
called Jack London Square, you know, off him, So so
us San Franciscan areas. I mean, I'm San Jose, but

(11:16):
we're like, oh, Jack London. But if you say, what
is he written, I'd be like seventy percent sure he
wrote White Fang and zero percent of any other thing
he's written. So I have no idea. And by the way,
being a San Franciscan, what better time? This episode took
place in San Francisco, so of course I had to
break out a San Francisco Giants shirt. But that's the

(11:38):
only reason my San Francisco Giants shirt. I was like,
which giant shirt should I wear for this episode? And
I chose this one, which is one of the most Anyway,
So and siroc just to add to what we're talking about,
something even funnier is well, because you remember that one

(11:59):
of the things that Samuel Klenman's aka Mark Twain said
was he said, Oh, it's just like the book I
wrote about this time traveler, this and that. So I
was like, that must be a real book. There's no
way he would say that. Clearly they're saying that to
the audience. So I look it up. He did indeed
write science fiction. Obviously, you and I we know him

(12:21):
for Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer. But it says here
that he wrote from the from the London Times of
nineteen oh four and Visit to Heaven and all these
weird things, and they're about like that time traveling whatever. Anyway,
He's just not known for that, but I guess they
did their research. It's kind of weird, but you know,

(12:44):
obviously they're they're going to do more research than we are.
When we hear Mark Twain. The first thing we think
is Huckleberry Finn.

Speaker 3 (12:49):
Yeah. Well, I mean I know the writers are well
aware of the body of work of these guys. You know,
he just didn't tie and well enough for me. I mean,
you know Jack London again, you know he was He
did write White Fang, but he also wrote The Call
of the Wild, So like, again.

Speaker 1 (13:11):
Oh that's the one. Maybe that's the one. Did he
also write White Thing? I don't know, but I know
he did Allow the Wild. Is that's a that's an
even bigger one.

Speaker 3 (13:19):
I think, yeah, it is. I would say it is.

Speaker 1 (13:23):
But the thing is, it's like that was a huge one.

Speaker 3 (13:28):
It was a huge one. But that most of his work,
I think is about nature and like totalderness.

Speaker 1 (13:39):
Right, you're right, I'm looking at it right now. The
Call of the Wild was the first one. White Fang,
the Sea Wolf, the Ironheel, Martin Eden, the Valley of
the Moon, the Scarlet Plague. Yeah, this is all like
nature and life kind of things.

Speaker 3 (13:53):
Yeah. So again he's not really known, like you know,
yeah as this big science.

Speaker 1 (14:04):
Fiction everybody at home, let us know what you think
of the Call of the Wild and White Fang, because
those were pretty those were pretty big in their time,
especially the Call of the Wild. I think you're right
that was probably his biggest and his first. So that
being said, I had a few other things and my
biggest one hit me only now. I don't think it's

(14:28):
what bothered me about it back in the day. But
what bothered me about this is, Okay, this is what
it feels like. It feels like they wanted a time
travel thing where Picard goes back and sees guying, and
they had all this, they had all that kind of
worked out, and then they're just like, Okay, well we
need a big bad we need a bad person or

(14:52):
a thing to solve, and then the alien energy beams
was a great concept, but it just felt so weird
now a place to me, I don't know. Again, I
don't mean to be nitpicking this because I think a
lot of people really like this one. But for me,
there was just so many weird aspects, and I wonder,
I want to know why people like this episode so much?
Because people do love this episode. Was it because Guynan

(15:14):
and Picard? Was it because they love you know, the
old literary works of the old timers?

Speaker 3 (15:19):
Was you know?

Speaker 1 (15:21):
What is it? But I'll tell you, the one thing
that bothered me the most, I think, and I just
kind of realized it this.

Speaker 5 (15:28):
Time was.

Speaker 1 (15:31):
The Guynan and Picard stuff. Felt like it needed way
more time because we're rushed into it. Picard's practically acting
like it's a romantic thing, and I can't even tell him,
like is it He says, Oh, it's much more than
a friendship, and he's cradling her in his arms, reminiscent

(15:52):
of the season one episode that I can't remember with
the with the eggs of stalking pantyhose with Tasha Yar
and Picard and Crusher fall into a pit and she
like breaks her arm and he's holding her and they're
almost like kind of confessing their love for each other.
That's what was happening with Guyan. But I'm like, there's
no lead up to this. If we want this to work,

(16:15):
because we like both these characters and we want them
to have this special kind of bond, you know, whatever
it is. But they're just kind of just dropped it
in and have this scene, and I'm like, where did
this come from? I would have liked to see basically
this entire episode be more about that, Like, let that
be the main story. He's trapped in the past, Guynan
is injured, and they're getting to know each other and

(16:38):
they're talking and we're finding out more about her people
and about how they trust each other and things like that,
and then Reiker and Data can save them later or whatever.
But that part, it just it felt forced rather than
the natural build up that it deserved to have, I thought.
And so that was just a little weird to me.

Speaker 3 (17:01):
I mean, here's where I got confused from the even
from the first episode, the part one of this and
now going into part two, this question hasn't been answered
to me. When they go into the cave, there's these translucent,

(17:25):
glowing entities that come out of a hole somewhere and
take some food something out of somebody's head or mouth.

Speaker 1 (17:36):
Energy, yeah, energy or neural energy, that's what it was.

Speaker 3 (17:41):
Okay, And then they go back into the hole and
disappear right and I'm thinking to myself, what the hell
is that? Like, why was that scene playing out over
in the cave? What does that have to do with
the two people that are out one around beaming people

(18:01):
with briefcase bags? Are they beaming people with briefcase bags?
And then sending it over to the cave so that
the other angheities can eat it. Like, I don't get
the process.

Speaker 1 (18:16):
They're the hunter and gatherers of the tribe. I guess
they kind of go out and they they have their disguise. Yeah,
I don't know. I feel like you're going through the
same thoughts and emotions I had when I first watched it,
where I was just kind of.

Speaker 3 (18:32):
Like it was too much. It was too many.

Speaker 1 (18:36):
Maybe that's what it is, the juggle. They were trying
to do too much. They're like, we have a two
part episode, so we can put a lot, which is true,
you can double the amount of elements in a two
part theoretically, but it.

Speaker 6 (18:51):
Don't.

Speaker 1 (18:51):
I can't explain it. And they're better writers than I'll
ever be, but it just didn't mesh for me. It
just didn't work. It all kind of felt weird and
put together. And I know they're going And what I
can't wait for is for people, maybe in the live
chat or in the comments below or in our free
for all, to tell us what they liked about this

(19:12):
episode so much, Because some people they love it. It's
like a top five episode for them, and I would
love to know why.

Speaker 3 (19:20):
Well, people, some people like period pieces and dress up
and stuff like that. Does you know, people, that's a
good point go out of their way to just keep
those kinds of periods alive by dressing in those styles
and stuff like that. So I get that if you're
into that period stuff. But what I have an issue
with is logically, I mean, Mark Twain on The Enterprise

(19:49):
is almost an episode by itself, right, That's.

Speaker 1 (19:51):
Just that could be exactly exactly.

Speaker 3 (19:55):
But they just like threw that in there. Like you said,
Guy Nan and the card in the cave with the
ability to communicate to their own crew five hundred years later,
that could have been a whole thing too, like oh well,
maybe I could write something on the cave wall or

(20:17):
you know, and and leave these clues right, and so
you know, none of that and then and then I
just couldn't get how they were able to It felt
like quantum Leap to me, remember Quantum Leap with.

Speaker 1 (20:34):
Scott Yeah, you know, I know, Quantum Leap man. I
love me some Scott Bacula, Yeah me too, and ghim Lee,
John Ryse Davies, Reese Davies.

Speaker 3 (20:46):
I grew up on watching that show, and I thought
it was a great show. But in the Quantum Leap,
Scott Bacula appears in somebody else's body. He looks in
the mirror and he's like, oh, I'm a black woman
in South in the nineteen fifty twenties, right.

Speaker 1 (21:03):
And then he says, oh boy, every time, right right?

Speaker 3 (21:07):
And then So what I'm saying is he inhabits somebody's body,
and so he's experiencing what it's like to be them.
But everybody else sees the person that he's you know,
exterior wise, they see the person they know already. They
don't see Scott Bacula. So my point is miss Carmichael's

(21:33):
boarding house. The scene opens with her saying, you know
that rent is due on the one o'clock on Wednesday? Well,
how do they know that? If they just popped into
this into this scenery?

Speaker 1 (21:48):
Yeah, like what makes you think, like how much time
has gone by? Has there? Maybe maybe maybe it's been
three months, Maybe that summer that happened in real time
also happened on the show, because yeah, they jump in
as if you know when Rent is these guys are
working on this data has his engine almost fixed? Like

(22:11):
how much time actually went by? Like something happened.

Speaker 3 (22:15):
Yeah, yeah, like and some like I couldn't get that.
I was like, how does she know them? Like I
would have like that would have been a whole scene
in itself, like them walking around the streets trying to
figure out how to get wardrobe, or let's say they
beam in with the wardrobe already, it would be finding

(22:36):
a place to stay. Hey, let's go over here, let's
get a room, or let's you know, let's see what's
going And it just felt like they popped into them.
They were already in a hotel and the ladies yelling
at them like she's known them for a lifetime, Like
it was quantum leap, Like they just appeared like you
know what I mean, Like they appeared in someone else's body.

(22:58):
But I'm like, no, these are like these are characters,
like what time has elapsed? And there were other moments
of that where it felt like people knew them that
shouldn't know them. You know, they're they're they're basically coming
out of nowhere. So oh, here's the other example of that.

(23:23):
The doctor Crusher is in the infirmary prior to the
alien showing up, right, and the head doctor walks into
the infirmary and he says, uh, you know, I've got
in a meeting. I've got a meeting. I've got to
go somewhere here, and you know, make sure you check
on the patients. He's talking to Crusher like he knows her.

Speaker 1 (23:45):
How quickly did how quickly did she get hired? In
a similar yeah, right right exactly, like like how long
has she been working there?

Speaker 6 (23:55):
Like you know what I mean?

Speaker 3 (23:56):
Or does he not recognize somebody in his own staff
or think.

Speaker 1 (23:59):
It must just be that three months had a lapse,
just like summer, But then any indication would have been nice.
They don't even have to say three months later in text,
but they could just be like, well, we've been searching
for captain's log supplemental, We've been searching for mister data
for three months on the planet blah blah blah, right,
like done good everything we have found lodging with missus

(24:24):
Carmichaels blah blah blah blah blah, w renters do on
the first at one, Any little thing like that, we'd
be like, got it. Three months have gone by, she's
getten hired, they found a place to stay, their work
and things understood. But yeah, we didn't. I don't think
we got that unless we both missed it. But there's
more to jump into. We're gonna take our quick break

(24:46):
and we're gonna talk about how much we love this episode.
You watch, you watch, all of you times Aero fanatics.
You just watch. We'll be right back on the Seventh Rule. Body,
Welcome back to the Seventh Rule with sarrock lofton Yellow.
All right, you know, uh oh, no trivioids this week.

(25:09):
My computer deleted them. Sorry, maybe that's punishment because I'm
pooping on everybody's favorite episode. No trivioids, So sorry. I
had some really good ones too, I promise. But during
the break, we were talking about how funny it is
that Stroke's wearing a Dodger's hat and I'm wearing a
Giant shirt. We are such rivals. Oh boy boy, this

(25:29):
is why we tussle in these episode reviews. Anyway, So
back to this episode review. Just to kind of close
out me being a cry baby about it, I think
the bottom line is, and before I never really put it.
You know, I never really had to think why I

(25:50):
didn't care for the episode, and I don't dislike it.
It just didn't do anything for me. But now I
do have to think and explain myself. I think what
I kind of touched on earlier. I think they just
had too much and never gave anything enough time to breathe.
This could have been I understand, it's the two parties,
so they have way more time so they can add

(26:11):
more elements. But I mean there was Mark Twain and
Jack London and Data and Jack London and Guynan and
Samuel Clements aka Mark Twain, and there was the nineteen hundreds,
and there was also the dying guy coughing and all that,
and he got a bunch of scenes and these were
all great scenes. But was that dying guy even necessary

(26:35):
to the story. He was not. He portrayed it very
well and it was really cool, but that was a
lot of screen time that really wasn't needed. I mean,
we could have just showed him for five seconds coughing.
The point was cholera, and then the people come and
zap them and take him away. Boom done. We didn't
need all this extra stuff. The poker card thing game.

(26:57):
They flew through that pretty quickly. I was happy with that.
You have these aliens sucking energy, snake people, nurses, they've
got Data's head, they have guiding and I mean they
were just so many things. Just because you have a
two parter doesn't mean you have to have ten different
elements that all get eight minutes worth of time. Then

(27:18):
nothing really gets the amount of time that it needs
for it to be a good story. If that makes sense.
At least that's how I'm looking at it.

Speaker 3 (27:28):
Yeah, when you brought up the snakehead things and I
was like, what what what were those snake things?

Speaker 1 (27:33):
Like Fidians?

Speaker 3 (27:35):
Those are the Affians?

Speaker 1 (27:36):
Well that's what that was, Yeah, And.

Speaker 3 (27:39):
So what were the entities in the cave? Were they
also the snake Offidians or they were something else?

Speaker 1 (27:45):
Now they're just some alien with that Data was describing.
Remember in the first one that was actually really good.
When Data was describing them, he says like, you know,
they have four limbs and no discernible eyes or mouth,
or they have a one single or and therefore it
you know, that was that was cooler. If we didn't
even see them, yes at all, that would have been better.

(28:08):
They would have saved time and we would have only
just been like, wow, this there's some scary bad guys.
You know that Data sof because that was terrific. I
really liked that scene when he was describing.

Speaker 3 (28:18):
That, I like, I did, I did like that. I
guess they were alluding to the big earthquake that happens
in San Francisco and nineteen oh six, nineteen oh six, right,
so they did that. I mean, you know, I just

(28:40):
had a problem with some of the tie ins not
tying in for me. Jack London, Okay, but he goes on.
So after this experience, he sees data working on a
time machine. He helps him get all the parts that
he needs to build it, and then he goes on
and Bills writes books about the wilderness and you know,

(29:05):
coyotes and stead like. Okay, Like that doesn't translate to
the experience. If they were trying to make the point
that the Federation and their crew go down, go back
in the past and meet these influential people that end
up going on to change the world because of their

(29:26):
experience and interaction with them, it would have made more
sense if those people actually were in fields are specifically
known for fields that would be relative to that subject matter.
So for example, and I know Henry Ford probably wasn't

(29:49):
living in San Francisco, at this particular time period in
nineteen old whatever it was, right, But it would make
sense if Henry Ford was the hotel worker and he's
watching data put together this mechodi and then he's like, oh, right, right,
I you know, I would like to I could think
I could use something like this to build a car design.

(30:11):
You know, like show me something where you know what
I mean, or the right.

Speaker 1 (30:17):
Or Henry Winkler, you know, said hey, yeah.

Speaker 3 (30:22):
Or so like something where the technology that you were
exposed to, or the information of the idea of aliens
inhabiting the planet or time travel. Let that then translate
to how the person career wise developed into an engineer,

(30:45):
an astronaut, or whatever you want to call it. And
then we can say, oh, that's cool. It was Jules
Verne who was there. It was Jules Verne was the assistant,
and then he went on to write all of these
crazy stories about you know, aliens and preachers under this
stort Nicola Tesla.

Speaker 1 (31:04):
I mean, I don't think I don't know if he
was alive at that time yet, but we don't.

Speaker 3 (31:08):
Like that something like that. Maybe Tesla isn't there for
the World's Fair, and you know, maybe they're doing in
the World's Fair and Tesla's in town for I don't know,
there's there's there's a thousand different ways to tie that in.

Speaker 1 (31:19):
But oh, he was alive. He was born in eighteen
fifty six.

Speaker 3 (31:25):
He was Yes, he was there.

Speaker 1 (31:27):
He was definitely inventing stuff at that time.

Speaker 3 (31:30):
Yes, and Albert Einstein would have been alive. And so
I'm saying there would have been people who could have
used that interaction and then go on to make inventions
and stuff. You know, So Tesla would have been a
good person. Oh that's Tesla there, Oh wow, Or that's
Jules Verne and he went on to write about you know,
fantasy and science fiction, you know what I mean. Then

(31:52):
it makes sense to me. But yeah, well Mark Twain
was kind of I was like, that's where the first
Twaining comes from.

Speaker 1 (32:02):
Yeah, that's so good. Well, you know what I'm thinking though,
and this is the last thing I'll say about that
is writers like to write about writers. They want the
main character to be a writer. They want to be
the main character to be Jesse, a struggling writer in

(32:23):
New York that just needs a break, you know, or
you know what I mean. Like they it's like with
any with any field, or any group or any person,
they kind of think that the world revolves around them.
I'm not saying that about writers, but you know, you
write what you know. So writers like to write about
other writers, you know, That's that's what it is. People

(32:44):
in New York like to write a script about people
in New York. Somebody that's from Chicago, even if they
move to LA they're going to write a script about
people in Chicago because that's what they know. And they're like, no, no, no, no,
trust me. The people in the sobs of Chicago. They're
so funny because and then you know, whatever, here's the story.

(33:05):
But anyway, I will say, you know, obviously there are
a lot of great things that we did, Like like,
for example, this is a small, minor thing, but for
some reason it really stood out to me. I thought,
whoever did the wardrobe for Beverly Crusher as a nurse

(33:27):
was so good. And the hair because those those round
glasses and the hair, I was like, oh my god,
she totally looks like this stereotypical nurse that I feel
like I've seen a thousand times. The others whatever, they're
just dressed up as whatever. But for her, I was like,
this is so good with the little hat and the glasses.
I think probably people would have loved all of the outfits,

(33:49):
but for me, that was the one that really stood out.
I thought that the moments with you know, mister Pickard
and the Irish lady misses Rmichael were funny. You know,
Jordie was holding the book upside down. You know, we've
seen that joke before, but it's always funny and we
do like, oh, dude, bro, we should have started with this.

(34:12):
JORDI got to knock someone out. He finally got he
knocked out, like the copp or whatever. No, it wasn't
the cop, it was someone else. It was like the
bad guys.

Speaker 3 (34:23):
He rushed the bad guy dude with the snake, with
the snake.

Speaker 1 (34:28):
With Riker there. Riker was like, oh oh man, he was.
I was, I was going to knock him out, but
Jordie was just closer to him and faster. Jordan just
was like, ah, finally I'm out of engineering room. I
can show off this stuff.

Speaker 3 (34:40):
Man.

Speaker 1 (34:41):
That was I was happy to see him get a
little action there, that kind of action.

Speaker 3 (34:49):
And the other thing I was wondering about Jordie was, uh,
I think they had a like he wouldn't be able
to see that in that time period, right, right.

Speaker 1 (35:00):
That's why every time someone showed up he would take
off his visor and put on sunglasses and pretend like
he wasn't playing, because I was like, how are they
going to hide the the blinking lights he has there?
And that's why they put on like the sunglasses that
kind of covered that, But does that really hide the
blinking lights on his head?

Speaker 3 (35:20):
Yeah? You know, so, yeah, that there were there were
moments of this that I did, like, I like the
fact that Wharf was dead wrong again. No, yeah, exactly, terrible,
that was hilarious, but no, that he was like a

(35:40):
permission to speak freely. And then he says, I think
we need to destroy the habitat, the alien habitat, right,
which is the exact wrong thing to do.

Speaker 1 (35:50):
That's our wharf every time.

Speaker 3 (35:53):
So that made me laugh. Well it's like, yeah, Wharf,
you got it wrong again, And.

Speaker 7 (35:58):
He went out on a limbit interrupted everybody's I think
we need to do this and then Troy actually counter
a co signed for the wrong action and she's like
he's right, he's.

Speaker 1 (36:09):
Frite, Yeah, yeah, he's always right, you know, right, you know.
Then there are other moments that made me laugh. Number one,
when Guynan says, shame on you, mister Clemens. Shame Like wow,
in the late eighteen hundreds, they really come at you hard.

(36:29):
Shame shame uh. And then yeah when he called uh
when Samuel Clemons called Wharf a were wolf. That was great.
When Picard kissed Missus Carmichael and she he was like,
He's like, oh, you're so wonderful or whatever. It was. Oh.
The other thing that I'm so nitpicky when there's an

(36:50):
episode that I'm like, eh, when they got when they
got away on the horse and carriage, five of them
climbing into that carriage being carried by like two horses.
I'm like, people could catch that. They're not going that fast.
If you run, you can catch They're not going that
fast at all. Those horses are dragging five people in

(37:14):
the carriage plus data, that's six people you can catch that.
They weren't they were going like six miles per hour anyway.
That was just one thing where I'm like, why are
you giving up? Copstill get you can catch them? And
they're like yeah, but I look back and I just
get we can't catch and we gotta let them go.

Speaker 8 (37:37):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (37:37):
It made me think how easy it would be to
get away with crimes back in those things, Like really,
that's it.

Speaker 1 (37:42):
You just gotta just run away, get a little head start.

Speaker 3 (37:48):
They're gonna give him. They're like, you know, it's not
even worth it. He's like literally like forty ft in
front of us.

Speaker 1 (37:54):
Yeah, no, chick, never mind, forget it.

Speaker 3 (37:58):
Ugh. Uh. You know what I thought was cool was
that O'Brien got a nam. Yes, so I know your
name's got deleted too, but that rude.

Speaker 1 (38:14):
Yeah. Well, what was cool about the O'Brien non appearance
mentioned was that when he said, you know O'Brien, you know,
transport one to transport right, get him out of there. Yeah,
And when he said, uh that, I was like, oh,
non appearance mentioned for O'Brien. But I was like, well, wait,

(38:35):
when Picard beams in, there's either going to be a
scene that shows him, we're gonna have to see O'Brien,
or when Riiker calls in, we're gonna hear O'Brien. But
I know that there's no way at this point Colomini
is an actual character. He's not just some guy with
one or two lines, So I'm like, how are they
They're not going to bring him in for one line

(38:57):
at the end of the episode, so how are they
gonna work around I was really curious. And when he said,
you know, get him out of there, he said, transporter room,
do you have him? First of all, he didn't say, Brian,
do you have him? He said transporter room, do you
have card goes? He got me. I'm like, Ah, that's
how they That's how they worked around it.

Speaker 3 (39:15):
That was a good work around. M you know, let's
let's got a chance to do this two parter. There
were there were some moments that I actually did, like
I really liked that last shot that he took with
the in the cave where he kind of close ups
on that watch that Twain leaves behind it and he

(39:35):
moves over to date his head. That was a good, little,
just sweep, sweeping shot. So there were moments that I
thought he did pretty good. But you know, he's having
to squeeze in. I think the alien entity stuff in
the cave, and and and and all of those elements
were a little bit too much. If Mark Twain's character

(39:59):
was wasn't Mark Twain, it was let's say they didn't
have to be an influential person. Let's say it was
just a nosy police officer, you know, or a town
mayor or something like that. You know, then I probably
would have allowed myself to because it felt like Mark

(40:22):
Twain was the star of this episode. I mean, he
had every scene. He was in every scene if there was,
you know, it felt like he was. I'm sure he
had the most lines. I'm I'm one hundred percent sure.

Speaker 1 (40:35):
Him and then Data maybe two.

Speaker 3 (40:38):
Yeah, but I mean even Data was out of commission
for a while during the end of the episode, he
had he really had the most lines because he remember
that whole time where he was like, uh, you know,
you know Chess Whitley, you know, uh, Chess Whitley. And
I heard you went down to the to the mining
and the geology thing and then you were over here,

(41:00):
did he was, That's a lot of lines.

Speaker 1 (41:02):
That's a good impression.

Speaker 3 (41:04):
Yeah, but it was a lot of lines too, you know,
And so I thought, I thought, like, did they really
want Mark Twain to be the star of this episode?
You know? And I guess they did. They did.

Speaker 1 (41:17):
Someone was a big Mark Twains fan.

Speaker 3 (41:19):
Which is crazy because you know, Data's head being found
in the cave. You would never think that Mark Twain
is gonna be the start of that episode.

Speaker 1 (41:30):
Yeah. Yeah, So there are a few other things. First
of all, they uh, they put the setting of the
phaser to zero, sorry, to point zero four seven. So
there's the number forty seven popping up. When they kept
talking about second People's energy, I kept thinking of transformers,
enter John Cubes. I was like, that's what they need.
They need to go get some ener John Cubes and

(41:55):
the Bowleyan. When the Bowleyan walks by on the next
generator on the on the Enterprise, Sam Clemens got a
fun little giggle. The actor like, did it had a
good moment there? He was like, oh, you know, he
kind of enjoyed it. So I thought that was cool.
That's another thing. Oh, I thought it was really cute

(42:15):
when Picard says when when Samuel Clemens is like go
and Picard says, there's a bill to be settled on
Miss Carmichael's boarding house, and he says, I'll settle it.
Like that's so cute like that that that's Picard's biggest worry.
He's like, before I go, there's a bill. I had
this poor lady. I thought that was that was a

(42:36):
really that was well written. That was good because that
is that's a Picard thing to do, you know, keep
it honorable.

Speaker 3 (42:43):
Yeah. I liked also when Mark Twain was having that
discussion with Troy and he was trying to like, you know,
see if the future was better than the era that
in the time that he comes from, and Troy explains
that there is no money and this and that, and
he had a line where he says, where I come from,
wealthy managed to stand on the backs of the poor,

(43:06):
you know, and and it was kind of a you know,
an honest analogy of you know, the time period that
we live in where you know, money is the main
drive of everything. Another line that I really liked as well.
I liked the moment when Picard is with Guyning and

(43:29):
just before he's about to leave her and he and
she says to him, I'll see you in five hundred years,
and he says, and I'll see you later today, so.

Speaker 1 (43:40):
I'll see you in five minutes exactly.

Speaker 3 (43:44):
And I like that. I thought that was a great
line as well.

Speaker 1 (43:47):
You know, yeah, it would have been nice for the
episode to just be about Guyning and Picard the more
I think, yeah, yeah, that would have been cool with
the with the with the side of with the side
of data.

Speaker 3 (44:03):
Data, with the side of data. It had been about
the first time they met. It'd been about how they
spent this time, you know, fighting aliens, you know, inner
dimensional time traveling aliens.

Speaker 1 (44:16):
Yeah, and she went like this to them.

Speaker 3 (44:19):
And it didn't have to have the Mark Twain aspect.
They could have. She could have been the driver, give
his lines over to to Whoopee, Let Whoopee have more
of those lines, let her carry more.

Speaker 1 (44:34):
So you can still have and you can still have
a Mark Twain, you can still have a Jack London.
But you know, you could have given the main character,
could have been one of our crew, you know. Anyway,
just kind of I'm kind of beating that to death.
But it's just there are so many elements and I
like them all and I wish they had more chance

(44:57):
to develop because.

Speaker 3 (44:59):
There were great moments. There was a moment there, for example,
when the moment when Guynan says that Picard do you
know me? You know, and the way he is he's
very gently he takes off his hat and he's wearing
the hat and he eats he's like, Wow, I'm getting
a chance to meet her for them, you know what
I mean. And that was like a nice moment, Like

(45:21):
I enjoyed that moment. I'm like, oh, look how much
respect that they has for her. He's removing his hat.
He's like he's in all of this moment. And then
she says are we friends? And he says it goes
far beyond friendship? Another great line, great delivery by Patrick Stewart.

(45:45):
So yeah, and then she had that little koy look
on her face when she was telling Riker history has
to fulfill itself. There was a great cut there too
from less Less said, you know, there was a line
with cards saying history has to fulfill itself and then
they cut to guying and saying the exact same thing

(46:06):
to Riker. That was a good transition. They're good cut. Yeah,
so less on that and also the writer, So yeah,
there was just there were moments that I wanted to
go for it. Yeah, but it felt like they were
trying to too many different It can't be futuristic aliens

(46:27):
and also the past and also.

Speaker 1 (46:29):
A writer's story.

Speaker 3 (46:31):
Yeah yeah, It's just like I was like.

Speaker 1 (46:34):
The inventor story. Yeah, yeah, no, well, you're definitely on
the same page. However, good news here, it's time for
the home run of the episode.

Speaker 3 (46:48):
Okay, this may sound crazy, but I'm actually going to
give the home run to Mark Dwayne and the gentleman
who played Mark Dwayne. He had the most lines. He
delivered his performance the way they asked him to. He
was obnoxious, he was intrusive, he was relentless. I think

(47:09):
mankind has a right to know about what you know
he was. But he was also a fantastic actor. And
that's why I said there were elements of his performance
that I can almost see Renee Alberson Wall pulling that
same thing off, because he was also a fantastic actor.
And you know, you just give him some makeup and

(47:30):
a pipe and a cigar, and you know he'll he
would do it exactly almost exactly like what we just saw.
So to me, he hit the home run. I mean,
as much as I would have liked to not have
him be the vocal point of the episode, he was
the focal point of the episode, and he was good
at it. And I'm not going to fault him for,

(47:54):
you know, delivering a great performance on a script that
I my and I agree with. So Mark Twain and
gentleman who plays him and gets the home run for me.

Speaker 1 (48:07):
That's really funny because I thought I was going to
be edgy and saying the exact same thing you just said.
I thought that I was going to blow you away
and say the actor that plays Mark Twain because it's
not up to him to decide what lines he's given.
All it's up to him to decide is how well
he's going to deliver them. And he hit a home run.

(48:29):
That's it. He killed it. He was awesome, he was amazing.
You know that. That was an easy home run for me.
Dude nailed it. Actor nailed it. Very happy for him.
All right, now it's time to oh no, did.

Speaker 3 (48:47):
Yeah you deleted the list too? Of everybody? Oh wow, No,
I was going to say Mark Twain had a moment
there when Riker says you have to go on and
write all those great books, and he's like, oh, thank you.
He had a moment of pride that I thought was
the actor was great.

Speaker 1 (49:08):
I'm gonna find the list here it is, so we'd
like to give a very special thanks to uh yeah,
doctor you should have it. Memories Doctor Hemery Siegel, Eve
England out in Wales, You've got black men, Tom TJ.
Jackson Bountain, is there a Titus Muller, doctor Mohammad Norr
and Neil O Palatte. I feel like these are in

(49:29):
a different order. Mike Gou, Joe Balcearati, doctor Stephanie Baker,
Carrie Schwent, Faith Howell, Edward Sorry Faith, Edward Foltz, the
map Boardman, Chris McGee, Jake Barrett, Henry Hunger, Alison Leech Hide,
Julie Menosfi, Jed Thompson, doctor Susan V.

Speaker 3 (49:48):
Gruner.

Speaker 1 (49:50):
Uh, Where'd I go? And this is a lot harder this.

Speaker 9 (49:53):
Way, Chris Scars, I'm try h Glenn Iverson, Dave Gregory,
I think this is an old list. Chris Sternet, Greg
k Wickster Mountain, Hawaii, Cassandra Gerrard Chuck A, Chris Garis,
Steve k Case, Oliver Manali and of course Jason m Oakin.

Speaker 1 (50:14):
I got my homework. I got to redo that list.
All right, everybody stick around, We've got the free for
all up. Next we will be right back on the
seventh rule. Hey, everybody, welcome back to the seventh Rule
with Sarak Lofton. This is the Free for All with
Melissa pink earphones, Longo hy Jason Jason m Oakin is

(50:40):
here as well. Carrie Schwent in a burgundy shirt, not
the last person in one. TJ Jackson bays on the
bridge of the Enterprise. D Eve England's wearing her shirt
from the Abyssinian Kiosk. Steve case Is aka Joe Bugbuster,
you know him. Chuck A's got the other burgundy shirt.

(51:00):
He's got his prune juice and chill Oh. Alison Leech
hides got a cool sweah head. You could get that
at Walking Art made by Melissa. Chris McGee has Darmack
and Jela Goodbye to season five and Chris Garris is
in his cool isolinear chip shirt. All right, everybody. Jake
Cisco guesses the IMDb score.

Speaker 3 (51:31):
Seven seven.

Speaker 1 (51:34):
The Old Minute Bowl, George Mirason, does anybody else have
any guesses that doesn't already know?

Speaker 3 (51:42):
Eight zero.

Speaker 5 (51:45):
Seven point nine five?

Speaker 1 (51:50):
All right, So racket's pretty interesting that we just spent
like fifty minutes saying why we didn't like this episode.
Then you go seven to seven, So that means you
assume that other people rated it pretty high on IMDb,
and you be correct, everybody loves this episode. Eight point
two eight point two for this one. Did we have

(52:13):
any some kinds of or some sorts of Chris McGee?

Speaker 10 (52:17):
Indeed, we're kicking off season six with two of them.
We've got, first of all, Jordie saying, you know, we
might be we might even be able to drink some
kind of alien alarm system. And then later as they
go into the cavern and he says, these Cavin walls
have undergone some kind of selective molecular polarization.

Speaker 1 (52:39):
How's it, tongue twister that last one, Thank you very much?
Non appearance mentioned. We all heard, O'Brien. Right, did we
get any others?

Speaker 5 (52:50):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (52:50):
I mean neither. All right, Melissa p Longo, will you
please get us started off on the right track by
telling us what you thought of this episode?

Speaker 11 (53:00):
Yeah, we actually enjoyed this episode. Some fun facts I
was reading this episode was being filmed at the same
time as the pilot episode of Deep Space nine.

Speaker 1 (53:17):
Oh that's I know.

Speaker 12 (53:21):
I'm just like, wow, that's crazy amazing.

Speaker 4 (53:25):
And Marina Surtis has a bit of a tan in
this episode because she got married during the break and
was on honeymoon somewhere sunny, So that's fun too. Now
I enjoyed this episode. I enjoyed that we get to

(53:46):
see the Enterprise crews dropping around old time San Francisco
in their nanzy get ups, old timey get ups. I
do enjoy Mark Twain and this even though there are
a lot of people who complained that his voice was annoying.

(54:09):
But uh, another fun fact is that, uh, while there
are no recordings of Mark Twain, actual recordings of Mark Twain,
there were recordings of his neighbor doing imitations of Twain.

(54:29):
So the actor listened to those recordings and imitated that.
So that's where he got the voice from. Uh there, yeah,
I mean there. There are some plot holes and what
have you, but I enjoyed it overall. I enjoy the

(54:50):
thing that I enjoyed the most and is the relationship
between Guynon and Bookard. If if that is the only
reason to watch this episode, that is the reason I
love the scenes between them. I love Guynon for one thing,
I love Picard for another thing. And this episode actually

(55:15):
put into my head the thought of why why don't
people ship Gynon and Picard? Because to me, I've got
a little chemistry there towards the end when he's like, oh,
it goes far beyond friendship. So now I'm shipping Gynon
and Picard because I think that could work.

Speaker 12 (55:38):
I think it could work. And there's what there is
something else that I was just.

Speaker 4 (55:51):
I just read something really funny and now it's distracted me.
I was gonna say something and I don't remember what
it is. Sorry, I'll have to save it for Things
left and said, but mostly enjoyable.

Speaker 1 (56:06):
Nice, So stay tuned for that, everybody, Things left unsaid,
and you'll find out what Melissa p Longo was going
to say. All right, Jason m oakin What's Up Bubbles,
did you love this episode?

Speaker 13 (56:21):
Well?

Speaker 14 (56:22):
Interesting enough? I think I had a better impression of
it this time around. It's never been my favorite. It
moves along pretty fast and if you, you know, leave
your thinking cap but the door, it's pretty enjoyable. I
think there's a feeling as you're watching it, as you're
sort of going through the story itself, that it's a
little bit tortured in a way that it seems like

(56:42):
they try to sort of wrap everything up in about
forty minutes and it wasn't really wrappable, and in a
very convincing way. And you know, Melisa mentioned some plot
holes in there, and there's some things a plenty that
frankly took me out of it, and.

Speaker 5 (56:55):
I'll save that for later.

Speaker 14 (56:57):
But again, it's it's an enjoyable thing to watch. I
think it's well directed, but it didn't look as good
to me as the first part. Visually. There was something
about the soft filled whatever they used in the back
lot scenes because they couldn't shoot in the scene, they
didn't shoot in the same location, so whatever it is
that they used for the nineteenth century shoot, some of
this just didn't sit right with me. Just didn't look

(57:20):
particularly good. I mean, I know it was a stylistic choice,
and you know, everybody has their own taste. It didn't
work for me as well as parts one did. I think,
you know, in a way, if you have somebody like
you know, Samuel Clements, Mark Twain, it's just it seemed
a little preachy to me. I mean, I know that
trying to send a message and tell you what Star

(57:40):
Trek is, but I think it has to be more
than just one person walking down the hall sort of
making these conclusions. It's a bit of a fast turnaround.
I think for a character, I think he has to
go through more of an evolution. And it's just as
I said before, bringing some historical figure into Star Trek
isn't necessarily the greatest thing in the world. It gives
you perspective, but I would have preferred there being somebody else,
maybe a made up character sort of who goes to

(58:02):
a transformation and sort of finds this out. But it
is what it is. It's a fun ride. I think
you know, certainly it's It's very well acted, and I said,
I'll save the last the rest for later.

Speaker 1 (58:16):
Great stuff, Thank you very much. Jason m Oakan, all right,
Carrie Schwent is aka Crafty Bear, what do you think
of this one? Do you love it?

Speaker 8 (58:26):
I do? I definitely do we get even more of,
like Melissa was saying, the awesome fashion, because I love
period stuff. Everybody looked. Everybody looked fantastic. And I read
on Memory Alpha that Gates McFadden got to and when
she's dressed in the nurse's outfit in those scenes, that

(58:47):
was her actual hair that she got to have for
of those scenes. They curled it and pinned it up.
She looked the way they did Her hair looked beautiful,
absolutely beautiful, A couple of fun things about a couple
of the couple of the guest stars. We've already gone
gone overtween the reporter Alexander Edberg goes on to play

(59:10):
a couple of different vocals once in season seven and
then a bunch on Voyager and I didn't notice the
first time, and I found this out in between, So
when I watched it the second time, the second I
heard his voice, I'm like, oh, yeah, yeah, my superpower
failed minorly failed me on that one. But what didn't

(59:32):
was missus Carmichael. More more on her character later, but
the actress. I've seen her in a few things. She
did an episode of Charmed, episode of Gilmore Girls, a
whole bunch of Days of Our Lives before I started
actively watching it when I was when I was little,
but my favorite and when I immediately remembered her from

(59:52):
were two episodes plus one of the movies that came
out after the after the show ended, of Doctor Quinn
Medicine Woman. She plays the housekeeper at her her mother's
house in Boston and looking up where they filmed the
outdoor scenes for those That two part episode episode was
on the Universal back lot where they would have shot

(01:00:15):
the outdoor scenes for for this episode if Plan A
had gone forward. But by the time they were ready,
Paramount's backlot area was ready, so they ended up using
that instead. So I would have loved if they had
done it on the Universal's backlot, because then it would
have been like, oh, yeah, that's you know, the Doctor
Craig characters. You'll walk to walk past this once. I

(01:00:35):
loved when when I can recognize a shooting location across across,
across multiple, multiple, multiple episodes.

Speaker 10 (01:00:45):
More on her in a minute.

Speaker 8 (01:00:46):
I thought Deanna was wonderfully patient with with Clemens once
he tagged along, and once he was up on the ship,
she takes someone under her wing. And I had the
thought that the other day that her she had a
specific training I think for dealing dealing with Clements, having
grown up with her her mom, who is a very

(01:01:09):
big personality and could sometimes be difficult to wrangle. So
that's I think how she was able to be so
patient with Clements because he probably he probably reminded her
of her mom. That's sort of my head canon on things.
I've got a few head cannon thoughts about what Melissa
was saying with John Luke and Guynan.

Speaker 3 (01:01:30):
I will save that.

Speaker 8 (01:01:31):
For things left on unsaid, but I will circle back
to missus Carmardicle as I promised. The two scenes that
she is in are probably the funniest of the entire
of the entire episode. She's adorable, Jean luc is fantastic,
fantastic with her. And then when she comes in and
they start reading from the play, which is my second

(01:01:53):
favorite Shakespeare play, by the way, I love it when
they work they were Shakespeare in Midsummer Night's Dream is
one of my favorites. That whole bit is hysterical, especially
with Deanna turning the book right right side up in
Jordy's hand because it was it was upside down, and
if you watch their faces very carefully, right as the

(01:02:15):
book turns around, Jordy starts to starts to crack. He
starts this big olds and Mile starts cracking on his face.
I absolutely love that. That sort of inspired though the
background behind me so we get the well met by moonlight.
The wriker read that line very very very very nicely,

(01:02:37):
but of course the limericks for the episode had had
to come from her. It practically wrote itself another one
of those that did. And I'm going to try to
do it in my best kind of old lady voice.
So bear with me on that. If it's I practiced it,
we'll see how well it goes. Mister Pickard, you know

(01:02:57):
full well rents do. I don't like a fuss and
look like a shrew. You seem like a fine actor.
Count that as a factor. Thank you for letting me
act with your troop. I love how she got also
flustered when the card pecks are on the cheek and
just giggle.

Speaker 3 (01:03:16):
She I love her.

Speaker 1 (01:03:20):
Great stuff. Thank you very much. Carrie Schwent aka Crafty Bear.
All right, TJ, what's up? Welcome back? What do you
think of this one?

Speaker 3 (01:03:30):
Oh?

Speaker 6 (01:03:30):
Everybody loves the Davidian opinion. It's always fun when that
thing's around. I enjoyed this episode and and uh, you know,
I thought that, you know, the the choices for voicing
Twain or Clemens. Uh, I enjoyed that as well. It

(01:03:51):
was something different. I didn't know the reference of the
of the Neighbors recording, but but I did note. I
was like, these are some interesting choices, you know, to
voice it that way. I didn't see it as annoying
at all.

Speaker 3 (01:04:07):
That was.

Speaker 6 (01:04:09):
I hadn't heard that observation before either, but I can
see how people would think that, especially if they didn't
know that story. But I mean, there's room for people
to be different people. I thought. Speaking of Clemens, one
of the things that stood out to me was when
he's poking around the room and they catch him in
the closet. The look on Guynon's face just she looked

(01:04:35):
at me like that I were probably melting the floor.
It was daggers, daggers from her eyes, and I thought
that was well played. One thing and I felt pretty
strongly while watching this episode, and this isn't not necessarily
specific to this episode, but when I'm watching The Next Generation,

(01:04:55):
and it seemed especially apparent in this one, since I
kind of remember the feeling of the cliffhanger in the
break and coming back to see what happened.

Speaker 3 (01:05:06):
Uh.

Speaker 6 (01:05:07):
And I'm pretty sure that before I watched it, I
had it recorded on VHS because at the end of
every act, I had the strongest urge to fast forward
through the commercials and I thought that was that was funny,
But you know, it also you know, made me, you know,

(01:05:27):
just think about you know, what it was like to wait,
you know, for the end of a cliffhanger. Oh my,
Howard just flashed.

Speaker 3 (01:05:36):
Is weird.

Speaker 6 (01:05:37):
But AnyWho, I also thought that it was a pretty
interesting journey for guynon the Guiyning that stayed on the ship.
I thought I played a very interesting part, and that
she already knows what's going to happen. And several people,

(01:05:59):
you know, throughout the two episodes come up to her
asking her questions, uh, and she she doesn't give any
of it up other than nudging Percard to go down
to the planet in the first place. And after that
her lips are sealed. And you know, that made me
think of how not like that most people are. They

(01:06:21):
want to they want you to know that they know
I know the answer, I'm gonna You're gonna see that
I was right and and all that stuff. But she's
not doing any of that. She knows the answers and
she's just gonna let them, you know, go through the
journey and figure it out for themselves. She's doing it
to protect the timeline. But also you know, I mean,

(01:06:42):
she probably could have whispered to somebody, hey watch this,
or she doesn't do any of that. As a matter
of fact, when they started to press her, she just
stood there in silence and looked away. And I thought
that was a that was a strong character moment for her.
So I thought, Uh, someone you know mentioned this before

(01:07:02):
the journey that Cleming's on in the line that he said.
That stood out to me after you know, he's kind
of heard and debated, you know with Deanna is maybe
it is worth giving up cigars if you know the
things like you know, hunger and racism. Uh, if we're
if that stuff is behind humanity, then I can not

(01:07:25):
smoke cigars. And that's okay. I always think it's interesting,
you know, as people talk about the show and you know,
all that we see humanity move through, Uh, ask the
question how did we get there? And you know that
remains a question. How do we get from where we

(01:07:47):
are today to get being worth giving up cigars? So
I got a lot of stuff left to say. I'll
say it later.

Speaker 1 (01:07:58):
In Things Left Unset everybody, Thanks very much. TJ. Jackson
bay out in Missouri. All right, Eve England, you've never
seen it. Oh and by the way, TJ, good luck
with the power out of that was kind of scary.
It doesn't go out like Eve England is out in Wales.
She stayed up super late for this one because she

(01:08:19):
loved this episode. She's never seen it before, right, No.

Speaker 8 (01:08:22):
I haven't.

Speaker 15 (01:08:22):
Actually I actually thought this was Yeah, this was good.
I enjoyed this. After lating season five a little bit,
I was quite happy with this episode. I thought, I mean,
it was a it just felt like a solid episode.
I just enjoyed watching it. It kind of the time
went really quickly, and there was, like like what everyone
else said, lots of fun sort of stuff happening, lots

(01:08:45):
of good interactions. I mean, I really liked just moving
off from was what TJ was saying about Gyn, and
I just loved how we had two guyn Ins and
we had five hundred years ago going in and how
different she is and how she was a sort of
a bit of a loose cannon seemed back back five
and years and how she's matured and how she's evolved
to where we know her. And I thought that was

(01:09:06):
a really interesting concept, and I think I wanted to know,
wanted to have more of that, I think, so hopefully
you'll get more of that over the next couple of seasons.
What I really liked to some little details. Is when
they were all sort of having the chat in that
sort of drawing room parlor room at the start, and
they're all there and you had Troy and Crusher just
sat there fiddling with their corsets the whole time, and
I just thought that was really cool detail. And I

(01:09:27):
don't know if they were sort of directed to do that,
but I just thought that was a really good way
because they would have been so uncomfortable that in those outfits,
and I just thought that was a really good little
detail that just made me sort of chuckle. But yeah,
I think I might that were Wolf comment when he
thought I just thought that was again that was a

(01:09:49):
was hilarious and how pissed off Warf was, although he
probably didn't know, Well, that was just hilarious. Well, it
was just brilliant, and I think just a very just
very quickly, I did feel that they didn't need clements
in it. He for me, he was distracting. His voice

(01:10:09):
was just way too totally different to everyone else and
kind of cut through some of the tension where you
had because everything just seemed quite soft. I found the
whole episode was kind of a soft, sort of slightly
foreboding episode and then he was just like, just I
was just shut the up. I was just like, you're
just too loud.

Speaker 13 (01:10:27):
Yeah.

Speaker 15 (01:10:27):
So I think if they take and I think as
Jason said, I think that he could have just been
anyone else. He didn't need to be a famous person.
I think that would have worked well with just They
just needed some outside observer, I think to what they
were doing. But yeah, overall, I thought it was really
a really solid episode and I really enjoyed it.

Speaker 1 (01:10:44):
Thank you very much, Eve England. As it turns out,
British people hate American writers, weird, but that was great stuff.
Thank you. Chris Garris is up next. What do you
think of this one in Southeast Texas?

Speaker 2 (01:10:57):
Oh, I've like I said, I like the first one
and I like this one. I just liked this episod,
this these two episodes. I liked the whole I liked
how they had Mark Twain in it, Samuel Clemens and
just you know how he kind of threw his what
threw himself into the middle of all of it, even
though they didn't want him in there. And then when

(01:11:18):
he jumps over and comes on the enterprise and he's
you know, he I felt like he just made it
better for me. And like I said, like other people said,
I didn't even know about the people not liking the
accident until I started reading about it. I think it's fine.
I'm cool with it, and uh, I think it's totally

(01:11:39):
fine with it. So yeah, no, this is a good episode.
I think we're gonna getting ready to have a good
season six here. Oh my god, I had something. Oh
I forgot I was gonna say. I was gonna add
about the reporter. That what he's that's Jerry Taylor's.

Speaker 1 (01:11:57):
Son m hm, who wrote the episode.

Speaker 2 (01:12:01):
Mm hm, So you know she was even doing it
back then before she went the voyager. But again, good episode.
I laughed a lot, especially because of Clemens. He just
to me, he was like the comedy part of this episode.
And so it was a good episode and I look
forward to more.

Speaker 1 (01:12:23):
Kicking off season six with Chris Garris, Thanks very much, Chris.
All Right, Steve Case aka Joe Bugbuster, how many times
have you seen this one? And did you love it
this time? Yeah?

Speaker 5 (01:12:35):
This was my third time. Maybe I almost watched it
again today because I pre what I pre rewatched it
last week, But I mainly I share Jason's observations about
the Samuel clarrens Uh Samuel Clemens character and how much

(01:12:56):
they tried to put on his back. It was an
awful lot of stuff to have one character saying and
doing and figuring out. And he actually kind of started
degrade on me after a while, but I did generally
like him. I enjoyed the beginnings of his relationship with
the bell boy, how he was on the one hand

(01:13:19):
kind of taking advantage of him and on the other
hand kind of mentoring him. And then we find out
that his name he wants to write a book, and
his name is Jack London. What a coincidence. Their discussions
left me feeling the urge to read more of Samuel

(01:13:40):
Clinton's fantasy oriented stories, like a Connecticut Yankee in King
Arthur's Court. I don't think I ever read that one,
but now I really feel like I need to. I
noticed a clue in part one, episode one. If you
look at the pocket watch that we saw in the

(01:14:00):
cave at the beginning by Data's head. I paused it
because I wondered I actually rewounded a couple of times too,
like what exactly is the engraving on that watch? And
it says to SLC with Love thirty November eighteen eighty nine.
So the SLC is presumably Samuel L. Clemens, but I

(01:14:22):
thought was that from Gyn. They didn't resolve that part.
That was an interesting little piece they dropped in there
at the end. I really liked how Picard was so
great about making sure everything was right before he let
himself head home get being back. He made sure that

(01:14:46):
Gyndon would be taking care of the old guyn her
young guy I guess actually, and also that the apartment
owner would get paid, and Clemens agreed to do both
of those, and then guy says I'll see you in
five hundred years Picard, and Picard says I'll see you

(01:15:06):
in just a few minutes. So I really like that,
and the reunion between Picard and and ten forward, which
is image I jose, mm.

Speaker 1 (01:15:17):
Hmm, great stuff. Thanks very much. Steve Case aka Joe
Bugbuster Jason, maybe you could check me on this, But
I think that line originally when he said when she
said I'll see you in five hundred years, he said
I'll see you in hell. But then they changed it,
like in one of the players who chuck a is
up next. Everybody he's the TNG fanatic. What do you
think of this one?

Speaker 13 (01:15:38):
Well, I like this just as much as Part one.
A couple of different things that I did like about it.
I liked when Clements went to the Enterprise, he had
some good interactions with Data LaForge and then he said
to Troy, did you ever run into Haley's comment? That

(01:15:59):
was pretty fun to expand on. Alexander Emberg was mentioned.
There was Jerry Taylor's son. His father was sportscaster Dick
Emberg Huge. She was married to Jerry Taylor at the time.
I actually saw Dick Emberg at the San Diego Zoo
back early in the eighties and he had a boy

(01:16:21):
there with him. I'm not sure if it was Alexander
Emberg or not, but I said alow to him. But
again I think he had multiple children. So going back
to the episode, the gentleman who played the police officer
that Riker punches out, his name was William Boyett and

(01:16:42):
he was in The Big Goodbye. He was played a
detective that was interrogating a card. A card seemed to
enjoy the interrogation, but William boy It was actually Sergeant MacDonald.
On the Old Jack Web series Adam twelve the same
actor he was, you know, very good in that. The

(01:17:06):
other thing too is I don't know if Carrie mentioned this,
but the actress that played Pamela who her name was
Pamela Koch. She played missus Carmichael. She wound up being
in All Good Things too. I won't spoil what she played,
but she had the same actress was in All Good Things.
Uh really enjoyed the episode. I enjoyed Jerry Harden in

(01:17:29):
a dual role as Samuel Clements and Mark Twain. He
played both of them good.

Speaker 6 (01:17:34):
Uh.

Speaker 13 (01:17:36):
And Uh I was mentioned that Whoopi Goldberg as Guynan
and as a young guy and a guy, and that
was on the enterprise that was also extremely well played.
Uh loved the episode. Like I said, it's a to me.
I think I enjoyed it just as much as the
first part. They're both very good.

Speaker 1 (01:17:57):
Thanks very much, Chuck A A K A T and
g Finet. A few of us were like, wait, what
role did she play in All Good Things in? Jason
m Oak and let us know in the zoom chat,
I know I was trying to figure it out, all right,
Allison Leech hide in the Heart of New Mexico. What'd
you think of this one?

Speaker 4 (01:18:14):
Oh, I've always liked this one.

Speaker 16 (01:18:15):
It's fun having our crew in period costumes running around
San Francisco trying to find data.

Speaker 4 (01:18:23):
It's a ton of fun.

Speaker 1 (01:18:25):
You know.

Speaker 16 (01:18:25):
I think Jordi is the unsung hero in this episode.
He's you know, attacking aliens for Crusher. He's taking off
his visor whenever anyone comes in, putting on his sunglasses,
you know, to keep up appearances, fixing five hundred year
old data's head to not that old body.

Speaker 1 (01:18:46):
Like.

Speaker 16 (01:18:46):
I think they all would have been screwed if there
was no Jordy in this episode, especially figuring out you know,
the little iron filings getting Data all fixed up. So
have to give Jordy his props. And he had less
technobabble in this one, which is always nice. And I
too noticed Troy messing with her corset and thought that

(01:19:09):
was a wonderful, wonderful little addition for Marina to do
because they are so uncomfortable and especially sitting in them,
like that's just Oh, it's the worst. The one. Two
Emmys for this one for both costuming and hairdressing, so.

Speaker 4 (01:19:28):
Well worth it. And yeah, it's a ton of fun.

Speaker 16 (01:19:31):
And I do love the end scene with Pocard and
Guy and and just staring at each other like She's like, finally,
my friend is truly here and you get to talk
about everything. And I thought it was wonderful that they
didn't have any lines. They just had that moment between
the two of them because they didn't need it, and
I thought that was quite beautiful.

Speaker 1 (01:19:54):
Yeah, great stuff, that's true. That was a good moment.
Thank you very much, Alison Leech. Hide out in the
heart of New Mexico, all right, Chris McGee, he's never
been to New Mexico probably, what'd you think of this one?

Speaker 10 (01:20:06):
No, sure, haven't been.

Speaker 4 (01:20:07):
Well.

Speaker 10 (01:20:08):
I think this is a fine conclusion to Time's Arrow
that wraps things up neatly. It might be a little
too convenient and pandering to have Samuel Clemons come to
the twenty fourth century and be given a tour of
the Enterprise, but it does lead to some nice comedic moments.
I'm not sure if the episode is introducing a new
season so much as a delayed closing of the previous one,

(01:20:31):
but that's what we've come to expect now of season
spanning cliffhangers. Regardless, I definitely enjoy it. I kind of
like that there's at least a brief period of time
where the audience could believe that Patrick Stewart was being
written off the show, similar to the best of both
World Cliffhanger, by having Picard remain behind while the rest

(01:20:51):
of the crew returns to the twenty fourth century. Be course,
that doesn't last very long. We finally get the bell
boy's name, Jack London. I was so oh happy the
first time I heard that line, because The Call of
the Wild was my very first real novel, given to
me as a present on my twelfth birthday.

Speaker 13 (01:21:10):
Wow.

Speaker 10 (01:21:12):
As carry observed, of course, the rehearsal scene that Missus
Carmichael interrupts as a delightful bit of comic relief, especially
with Jeordie holding the s ripped upside down and Troy
turning it right side of without looking silly, yes, but fun.
I like the scene that TJ mentioned, where, unlike in
other time travel episodes, they at least tried to do
the smart thing by having Richer ask Guynan what happened

(01:21:34):
in the cavern so he would know what course of
action to take, and of course guyn And doesn't tell
him using Data's five hundred year old head to reactivate
him reminds me a little of what happens to Marvin,
the Paranoid Android and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
series in those novels. Due to time travel shenanigains Marvin

(01:21:55):
mound up waiting, shall we say, a lot longer before
his crew made could reunite with him, And I'll just
leave it at that. My memorable quote of the episode
is the car near the end saying I wish time
would have allowed me to know you better. Mm hmm.

Speaker 1 (01:22:13):
Great stuff. Thank you very much, Chris McGee. And we
all well know that sometimes when a character gets left
in the past, they do get written off. Like Captain Rios,
all right, I know, poor guy. He was great. Jake's
final take. Any final thoughts on this rock?

Speaker 3 (01:22:35):
Yeah, you know the scene where Twain had the Cold
forty five in his hand. He was pointing it at
Data and I was thinking to myself, that's not going
to hurt Data like this could literally just walk up
on that and grab it out of his hand, but
he opted not to. He stepped back. The cop who
went to investigate what was happening in the hospital like

(01:23:00):
he was crooked because he was like, I think I'm
gonna have to confiscate this cane right here, which you know,
as a writing tool, I think to make you accept
the fact that Riker's about to punch this guy. So
it's like, oh, this guy's crooked anyways, He's about to
steal a cane, so he deserves a good old punch.

(01:23:20):
It's really clever little tool there. When Data finally was
put back together by Jordi, he had like a torpedo,
you know, he was going through this like quick little
relay of stuff that he had to say really quickly.

(01:23:42):
You know. The first thing he wanted to say, and
I liked that moment was I thought Brent did that
pretty well. It was it was believable for me. And
then the last thing I'll say is did Data leave
a time machine behind or a time reading machine behind
in the past for somebody to discover and play with

(01:24:08):
and you know study so I you know, I feel
like the celebrity guest appearances, you know, the supposed Mark
Twain's and Jack London's, they don't fit for me relative
to science fiction. I mean, they're writers, but they're not
known as science fiction writers. The technology that was left

(01:24:32):
behind could have went to an Elon Musk, I mean,
a Tesla, Nikola Tesla could have found that and maybe,
you know, deconstructed that device and figured out how to
do something else with it. It could have been so
many other people besides Mark Twain and Jack London or

(01:24:53):
neither one or known for scientific engineering, space travel, science fiction.
So I'm sorry that's where I was thrown off. Let
I think the character could have been somebody who would
have benefited from the experience of being around the crew,

(01:25:14):
and then their work would have gone on to show
us how they changed the world, because you know, they
were exposed to this technology, and the right brothers went
on to invent the plane or something, you know, Let
it be something like that. This was not a good
tie in for me. Mark Twain wasn't a tie in

(01:25:34):
for science fiction.

Speaker 1 (01:25:36):
That's my figure, all right, boy man, Carrie's got some
things to say and things left unsaid. She was like,
you guys, better stop talking job about my second favorite episode.
That's it for us. Thank you to Chris McGee, Alison Leech, Hide,
Chuck A, Steve Case, Chris Garris Eve England, TJ. Jackson,
Bay out in Missouri. He's also piloting the ship right now.

(01:25:58):
Carrie Schwent, Jason m Oak and Melissa Longo for myself, Siah, Melissa,
and of course mister Aron Eisberg. Thank you all very
much for hanging out with us. We will see you
next time, and until then, always remember the seventh Rule

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Literary Figures | TNG 6.01, "Times Arrow, Part II" | T7R #357

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Literary Figures | TNG 6.01, "Times Arrow, Part II" | T7R #357