184: Star Trek TOS Season 2, “The Trouble With Tribbles”

 In today’s episode of Trek In Time, we’re talking about getting out of Tribble completely by accident.

Mm,

that’s right. We’re talking about the Trouble with Tribbles. This is Star Trek the original series, originally broadcast on December 29th, 1967, episode number 42 in shooting order, 44th in broadcast order, 15th of the second season. Welcome to Trek in Time. I’m Sean Ferrell. I’m a writer. I write some sci-fi.

I write some stuff for kids. And with me as always, is my brother Matt, of Undecided with Matt Ferrell, which takes a look at tech and its impact on our lives. And on this podcast, we take a look at Star Trek. We take a look at it in the context of its original broadcast. We talk about history, we’re talking about 1967.

We’re almost talking about 1968. We’re missing it by just a couple of days, and we’re talking about the original series season two. Welcome everybody to Trek in Time. Matt, how are you doing today?

I’m doing pretty well, having fun, watching a lot of TV shows, catching up on Andor. Started watching Ludwig, Sean, that you recommended to me.

Yes. Very good show.

Yes it is. I’m glad you’re enjoying it. I haven’t started the second season of Andor, I’ve been rewatching the first season and I’m hoping to get through that pretty soon and then jump into the second season, which I am hearing nothing but amazing things about. Andor recently passed the Empire Strikes back on the Rotten Tomatoes scale.

Really? The highest rated Star Wars project. Whoa. Yeah. And it was, Empire is at something like 96% fresh and, Andor has hit 90, I think it’s 98. So remarkable achievement, all

for a mere $25 million in episode, Sean. That’s all it takes.

That’s all I’m saying. If you’re willing to lay out the cash. Well, the people will follow.

So before we go too far into this, Matt and I have been, we just had a conversation and for our other podcast, which is a follow up to his main channel, uh, Still To Be Determined is our other podcast. And we recorded that and I revealed at the end that there’s a reason why I am looking down. It is because I’m not in my usual setup.

I am having to move to a separate room for today’s recording, which means I don’t have my normal monitor set up and everything I need to look at. Well, I. It’s down here. He looks like he’s navel gazing. Yes. I look like I’m maybe shy and I’m just being coy, but not looking at the viewer. But trust me, I know where you are.

I know your eyes are up here, so are mine, but I apologize so. Back to my notes on, we go to our usual conversation. Before we get into the conversation about this week’s episode, we always like to see what you had to say about us last week. So Matt, what have you found in the comments for us this week?

Well, from Slick 80 86 on the episode, I Mudd. Harcourt Fenton Mudd. That lady’s voice is burned in my brain from childhood, to which I have to say yes. Yes, yes it is. Yes it

is.

I also have to say, Matt, that was a

pretty good impression.

You like that?

Yeah, that was very good.

I’ve been working on it all week, so paid off.

We have one from Baba Rudra who wrote, I’ve always wished they would’ve carried story arcs across series like Trelaine from the original series in Squire of Gothos. Could have very easily been an early encounter with Q. Of course, you may have said the same thing, but I’m not up to your coverage of the original series except for current episodes.

Damn it guys. I’m not a machine. And I’m a bit disappointed in Matt’s delivery on my comment, Sean, which was meant to be KHAAN.

I mean, with that singing voice, I guess I expected a bit more. Hmm. Hopefully that was better this time around.

Absolutely, it was. And then was Mark Love? Yeah. Mark Love wrote and good luck catching up. I know there’s a lot of these episodes. Yes. We’ve been doing this now for a couple of years.

Yes. Mark Loveless wrote, oh my God, the prisoner, danger man.

Now more to add to my rewatch list. I’ve seen then before, ready to rewatch them, there was even a game on the Apple two during the early eighties based on the prisoner. Are you serious? Which was fantastic. Wow, Thanks, nerds. I had no idea there was a prisoner video game. Sean, did you, I I know

there’ve been various permutations of the prisoner.

I did not know there was a video game. Back in the nineties there was a brief, uh, comic book that came out that was actually really, really good and of. Uh, one of my favorite books is actually a novelization of the Prisoner, okay. Which was by Gordon Dixon. He was a sci-fi writer at the time, and he basically turned the several episodes that he did, they were given, he was given the screenplays for the episodes, and he kind of crafted it into a standalone novel that I think is arguably as good, and it’s extremely tight compared to the TV show.

Which at a certain point, the TV show, um, I don’t know if you’ve ever seen it, Matt. The TV show ends with episodes that are incomprehensible. Yeah,

that makes no sense. It’s

just like a fever dream and remarkable stuff that would just like, well what if we have this guy speaking in jazz? I mean like, what’s happening now?

But, um, they did a lot of acid shots. Yeah, they did. Somebody was doing a lot of something.

Then we also have wrong answers. Only new, new person today. Thomas Carl wrote Tribbles’ Troubles, a targ, a sehlat, and a Soviet dog Laika arrive on a planet Alpha 1 7 7 before nightfall and spend time with a local unicorn dog that the crew has named Tribbles.

Tribbles is duplicated during transport. Evil Tribbles doesn’t survive long and Bones surmises the animal died from stress, but calm Tribbles finds a loving home aboard the Enterprise, and in a few weeks gives birth to a healthy litter of furry cooing, insatiable lumps. Can you imagine the trouble we’d have if the evil Tribble had a litter, Bones conjectures?

It’s fascinating that Tribbles offspring appear as they do, as they are unrelated genetically says Spock. Q in uniform turns and looks into the camera and smiles as the episode ends.

The ultimate fan fiction. Wow. Yes. You managed to tie every series of Star Trek together, multiple episodes of the original series.

Figures who, I mean, you, you said Q, it could have been Trelaine as, as Babarudra pointed out, and yes, Babarudra, you’re trying to play catch up. We did have a discussion about Trelaine is he a Q? And in fact, we’re gonna be talking about him today because guess what? He appears in this episode. Yes. That noise you hear, the flashing lights you see?

It’s not the acid kicking in, it’s the Reed alert. That means it’s time for Matt to tackle the Wikipedia description.

Tribbles, purring, fluffy and fertile creatures. Disrupt the exploitation of a dis of a disputed planet between the Klingon Empire and the Federation. The Enterprise responds to a priority one distress signal from Space Station K7 on the edge of the neutral zone and close, close to Sherman’s planet.

Mr. Baris asks Kirk to provide protection to storage facility on the Space Station to preserve an improved grain that will help the federation to gain control of Sherman’s planet and prevent the Klingons from capturing it. Kirk sanctions the security guard. Wait, wait. He sanctions the security guard. Is that correct?

That’s how it was written. Okay. Kirk sanctions the security guard and also gives shore leave to the crew aboard the enterprise. Uhura and Chekov find an interesting creature called a Tribble on the station and bring it board of the enterprise. Tribbles begin to reproduce exponentially and spread everywhere on the enterprise.

A Klingon ship also reaches the K7 facility for shore leave, and Kirk allows it under the Enterprise’s protection. Okay, Tribbles begin to enter the vent systems of the Enterprise and Space station K7, destroying the crop. Later it is revealed that the crop was poisoned by a Klingon spy aboard the space station.

The poison also killed the Tribbles that ate the grain. Wow. They kind of reversed that around. Kirk finds the spy, and Scotty finds a way to get rid of the Tribbles from the Enterprise. Wow, that was a poorly written description.

Ladies and gentlemen, if you ever needed proof that AI will not replace the writing of humans, that description is all the proof you need because I think no AI would write something as strange and convoluted as that.

Yes, boy does it miss the mark. This episode, season two, episode 15th in broadcast order, originally broadcast in December 29th, 1967. Guest appearances include William Schallert as Under Secretary Nilz Baris, William Campbell returning there we have Trelaine returning as Captain Koloth raising an interesting question, is this all a game by Koloth? Stanley Adams as Cyrano Jones, Whit Bissell as Station Manager Lurry, Michael Pataki as Korax, Ed Reimers as Admiral Fitzpatrick, Charlie Brill as Arne Darvin, Paul Baxley as Ensign Freeman, Eddie Pasky as a guard, David L. Ross as a guard, and Guy Raymond as a trader. This episode written by David Gerrold is part of David Gerrold, responded to the introduction of Star Trek as an 22-year-old.

He very quickly reached out trying to write for the show, and it was within days. According to the Wikipedia page about Mr. Gerrold, within days of having seen Star Trek’s premiere the Man Trap, he wrote a 60 page outline for a two part episode called Tomorrow Was Yesterday, about the Enterprise discovering a ship launch from Earth centuries earlier.

This is the part that I find most surprising. Somehow he managed to get this to Gene L Koon. Producer on the show.

Yeah,

and they rejected the outline, but he knew that Gerrold was talented and basically reached out to him. And then they began to pitch ideas. He pitched multiple ideas, including something that would be based on work similar to Norman Spindrad’s work, the Doomsday Machine.

He put out a premise that was effectively a a West side story sort of story. And he was behind a lot of attempts to write stories that would end up filling in storytelling in, not necessarily just Star Trek, the original series, but in the Next Generation, which I think is interesting. We also, as I mentioned, we have Bill Campbell as tr as the Captain Koloth in this.

He of course, played Trelaine, so this is a return for him. And we have Michael Pataki as his number one Korax. Michael Pataki is a favorite of mine. He will return in Next Generation. He played a character in an episode of that, but he’s a favorite of mine, mainly because of the Mystery Science theater episode Side Hackers in which he plays the antagonist in that story.

And I am sure I’m talking to the choir when I say this. Check out side hackers. What was the world like at the time of original broadcast? Well, we’re talking about December 29th, 1967, which is kind of from our current perspective, kind of a surprise because new original programming released on the days between Christmas and New Year’s?

You do not see that anymore, so. I actually wonder about the placement of this episode, which this episode is a fan favorite, but it was originally broadcast at a time where I don’t think they thought anybody was gonna be tuning in. Mm-hmm. December 29th, 1967. Very clearly intended to just be, this is one for the kids while the parents are probably getting ready to go out and drink their ever loving faces off.

What were people listening to? Well Matt, you know better than most? Yes. That’s because you are a Daydream believer. Yes. It’s the Monkeys still at number one. They held that spot for most of the end of 1967. Take it away, Matt and a homecoming queen. That’s right. Well done. Matt, as always. And the movies people were lining up to see a film called Valley of the Dolls.

Valley of the Dolls is a 1967 American drama. Directed by Mark Robson and starring Barbara Parkins, Patty Duke, and Sharon Tate as three young women, who are you wondering? Yes, in fact, they do become addicted to barbiturates. It’s about their attempted entry into the entertainment industry, and they all become fatally addicted to barbiturates.

It was a strange movie based on a strange novel by Jacqueline Suzanne, and it would go on to make $44 million in the theaters on television. We’ve been trying to take a look at programs and comparing Nielsen ratings to Star Trek’s Nielsen ratings, season two of Star Trek. They were getting about an 11.6 on average and to compare that to various shows.

Well, we’re already in looking at the list of shows from 1967. We’ve skipped a lot of the programs that we talked about during season one of the original series, so we’re down to number 26 on the list of Nielsen ratings, and we’re still in the twenties, so these shows are all beating Star Trek. It was not by any stretch of the imagination leading the pack in viewership. At number 26, we have Ironside.

Ironside is an American crime drama that started in 1967 after a Made for TV movie proved very popular and it would last eight seasons until 1975. It started Raymond Burr as Robert T Ironside, who plays a police detective who is injured while on duty. He’s paralyzed, spends his time in a wheelchair, but becomes a consultant to the police where he helps solve crimes.

I remember the show fondly, mainly because in syndication it would be on in the afternoons when I was watching television and the opening sequence and theme song always captured my attention. I could not follow the storytelling whatsoever. I was a child. So crime, drama, finding clues, catching the bad guy.

That was all a little bit beyond me, but it has a very stark and dramatic opening sequence in which they, I kid you not show the snipers aim as he is about to be paralyzed with a bullet to the spine, uh, family entertainment. And in the news on this day, Friday, December 29th, 1967, amongst the headlines on the New York Times on this day, the one that stood out the most to me.

Is a little headline saying, Dirkson doubts Johnson Policy points to peace. Yes, it is the escalating costs of the Vietnam War, which have begun to chip away at belief in President Johnson’s plan. For a conclusion to a growingly unpopular war. We will see in 1968 how that impacts Johnson’s decision to run for reelection.

On now to our discussion about this episode. As I mentioned a few moments ago, this is a fan favorite. There is no disputing that there are t-shirts and mugs. There are memes about being buried neck deep in Tribbles. There is the recurring. A theme of this, this episode alone, I think is probably largely responsible for producers knowing that a show like Lower Decks could work.

Mm-hmm. For the creation of a show like The Orville, which takes a effectively a Star Trek setting and injects it with more humor than had originally been in every episode. Way more humor. But this episode, I mean, correct me if you think I’m wrong, Matt, I, in watching this was like, this is basically just a sitcom.

This episode is just basically, I dream of Jeanie wrapped up in Star Trek clothing. And I don’t know about you. I’m gonna cut to the chase here for myself. I have such fond memories of this episode, but this has come up from your angle multiple times in the recent weeks as we’ve talked about episodes. I have not been the one to voice this, but ho boy, in watching this one this week, did I find myself in a place of.

Uh, what is happening?

Thank you. I feel vindicated. Sean, I feel vindicated. I feel heard, Sean. Yeah, I feel heard.

Yeah. I will wrap up my feelings thusly, Uhhuh. I still like this episode, but only because I liked it when I was a child. The nostalgia alone is what makes me like it because there are moments of this, I see why it was broadcast on December 29th.

I don’t think there was any intention to make an episode here that would sustain or push any kind of dramatic edge. I get the feeling this is, this is. It doesn’t look like a bottle episode because they do spend a good amount of time on the space station. So new sets were built for this. They built a set for the bar.

They built a set for the storage locker area. They built a set for the offices of the head of the station so that they could have these meetings with the bureaucrat that Kirk pushes back so hard on, but none of this feels like it was in any way an attempt to write or create a full-blown, genuinely dramatic episode.

It feels like it was an attempt to probably give all of the actors a much lighter lift than usual. Give them an opportunity to kind of wink at the camera. In particular, William Shatner, it would not surprise me if there was a desire to give him an opportunity to flex some comedic muscles that up to this point, he’s only had to do occasionally.

And what you’re left with is it doesn’t quite feel like Star Trek. And I say that despite the fact, as I said. This is such a iconic episode for Star Trek, like the imagery, the ideas behind the moments. But as I was watching it, I was like, whoa, this is not, this is not working.

So here, here’s, here’s a little secret, Sean, I’ve never liked this episode.

Oh boy. E, even as a kid. I didn’t like this episode. I thought, this is so goofy. This is so goofy. And yes, there are iconic moments and I love the iconic moments. Like Kirk standing there with all the stuff falling in his head. He’s standing in the pile of Tribbles. I love that imagery. I love it. So there’s like, there’s like Tableaus that I love from this episode, but this is one of those episodes where it’s like.

I think anybody that likes this needs to look inside themselves and recognize you like this because of nostalgia. You don’t like this because it’s good. You know what I mean? Like you may have liked it as a child, and so you look at it fondly through rose-colored glasses, but you can’t objectively look at this episode today.

And go, wow, that was a great episode. And that fits tonally within everything else that we see in this show, because it doesn’t, this is kind of like, to me, it’s like the record scratch of Strange New Worlds. The musical episode, it was like record scratch. What was this? It came across as they just wanted to have fun with the actors, like it was tonally, like wildly outta place in that show.

And this is the same thing here. My notes as I was rewatching it, let me, I, I’m being harsh on it. I find it an enjoyable watch. Lemme put it that way. Yeah. It’s enjoyable to watch. I just don’t like it as a Star Trek episode, and I don’t, I think it’s overrated, but one of the notes I wrote was like, this is like pure Laurel and Hardy slapstick.

Like the scene where the, what’s his name? The guy who sells the Tribbles. He, the fight is breaking out in the bar and he fills two glasses, and then he’s walking slowly with the two glasses, and then he gets to the door and he does that exaggerated ee like this. Yeah. And then somebody comes in and takes it, and then he does a little har laurel and hardy pantomime, and then pulls another one outta his pocket.

It was like, am I watching a 1920s science, uh, silent movie here? It’s like, what? What are they doing? This is the sixties. It’s like that, that wasn’t even the style of humor for the sixties. It’s like that looked dated even for the time, and so that’s why it’s kinda like I look at this and think who was in charge of this and who thought this was a good idea because this just feels so out of place.

The thing is, I will, I will say, go ahead. Go ahead. Shatner. Shatner rocks in this episode. Shatner destroys everybody. Yeah. Like he looks like he’s having a good time. Yeah. And some of his line readings are just chef’s kiss. Yeah. Beautiful. Like some of the stuff he says, like, I didn’t realize that that was considered a swarm.

He makes these sarcastic remarks. Yeah. And just biting comments that are so freaking funny. And he delivers them perfectly. And you can tell Shatner has good comic timing and he was probably having fun doing this. Yeah. So on that note. I’m glad he had some fun with this. It’s just a shame it couldn’t have been in a better episode.

Yeah. I feel like this version of Kirk is what Anson Mount may have studied in preparing to play Pike yeah in Strange New Worlds. Because Pike is depicted in Strange New Worlds along these lines of, I’m gonna be kind of just a guy I am in charge, but I’m kind of just a guy who you can tell when I’m upset.

You can tell when things are getting under my skin. You think of a show like Next Generation, where by design Picard is presented. Presented as somebody who is attempting to keep the crew at arm’s length at the beginning of it because he is viewing it as if they see weakness in me, they will not want to follow.

And Kirk plays with a kind of swagger, like his understanding of his leadership skills is, I’m so unquestionably better at this than anybody that everybody will want to follow me. This episode takes a slightly different tack. It is. Kirk wants to do the job and sees these things as being put in his way to keep him from doing what he thinks of as the more important work, which is he thinks he’s supposed to be out there patrolling the neutral zone.

Yep. And he gets brought in on a code one alert, which he effectively says This is a misuse of the code one alert. He’s then forced by an admiral to actually pay respect to the guy who called for that misuse. So he’s bitter, he’s sarcastic, and like you said, Shatner plays all of that beautifully. But it’s a kind of depiction of back and forth with the offic nature of a bureaucracy that we don’t see otherwise.

In Star Trek, the only times we see it are maybe a character visits the ship or they have a run in with an individual that ends briefly. This one, the entire point of it is Kirk doesn’t want to be doing any of this. He thinks all of this is beneath him, and then the ship is also invaded by these fuzzy things that everybody thinks are cute.

I have a feeling everybody on the crew, everybody on the cast had a good time being inundated with fuzzy little things, some of which are somehow robotic looking. You know, you get the one that’s crawling, you get the one that’s like shuttering a little bit. So you imagine like Nichelle Nichols gets a lot of screen time in this one.

Yeah, she gets to talk a bit. She was probably pleased with that. Get a lot of, of, of Scotty in this one as well. You get some McCoy where he gets to say funny things about like. Turns out they’re born pregnant, like you stop feeding ’em, they’ll stop having babies and you get this kind of sci-fi like comedy that at the time was very well received.

That’s one of the things that I think is a standout detail about this one, is that this was nominated for a, for a Hugo Award. It lost to sitting on the edge of forever. So Star Trek beat, that’s shocking itself.

That is to

get that board. That is shocking. But this was nominated. It is, as I mentioned, this is viewed as an icon, iconic episode, and at the time, it appealed strongly to a sector of the audience that didn’t normally think of itself as a sci-fi audience, because as you and I have just been saying.

This is not, it’s not, it’s not sci-fi. It is, it’s, it’s

be, it’s Bewitched. It’s, I Love Lucy. It’s like there’s dialogue that feels like it’s trying to be like the movie, what’s Up Doc? Or Neil Simon play. Yeah. There’s some quick dialogue, especially in the beginning where Kirk, there’s, I can’t remember what the word is that he doesn’t know and he keeps saying it over and over again.

Like, will somebody tell me, am I hearing this right? It’s like he keeps. Like people almost talking over each other. And it’s really funny. It’s really funny. Well done. They’re like, we’re

taking this grain. He’s like, grain. Grain. What Grain? What Grain. Like he keeps repeating the lines and it is, it is funny.

And it is the kind of thing where as he’s doing all of that, are those Howard Bannister’s rocks? That Exactly. It keeps so coming across to me. It keeps cutting to, uh, Spock. They keep having Spock in the shots. Which adds to the comedic response by Kirk because Spock continues to be non-responsive from an emotional perspective.

He is at no point saying like, you’re right Jim, this is stupid. He’s just sitting there very quietly, and so you get Kirk saying like. Grain. Grain, what Grain. And then Spock is like, oh, it’s a grain that was developed because of blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And he’s going to keep going. He is like, it was first developed in Canada.

He’s like, enough, why are we here? Like it’s, it’s comedically sharp. It is well, it is well written. I don’t have to like, you don’t have to like it as sci-fi in order to defend it as a well-written thing. As you mentioned, it’s tight dialogue. It, the plotting of it is fine. You end up though with all of the.

The fight in the bar is effectively a three stooges fight. Yes, it is a setup for a joke. Yes. Oh, why did you get into a fight when I told you specifically not to fight? Well, they insulted you captain first and like, oh, and that’s when you threw a punch. No, not until they said that the enterprise was a garbage scout, like wah, wah wa.

And I could imagine kids watching this with the grandparents and both of those groups laughing at the silliness of this.

Every Star Trek series has at least one of these episodes. Every single one of them. Next generation has a few, Voyager has some, Deep Space 9 has some where they go full on comedy and they do this.

We’re just gonna have fun. The musical episode, you know, it’s, it’s like, it’s kind of par for the course that this is gonna happen and they can, they can be divisive and they can really rub people something the wrong way. And other people, they might love it. And this is one of those episodes where for me, even as a kid, it rubbed me the wrong way.

Like even as a kid, I recognized this doesn’t feel like the other episodes I’ve this I’ve seen. Yeah. Like it felt weird. It felt off. And that’s why I didn’t like it. And as an adult, I’m watching this thinking, how did anybody think the slapstick three Stooges, Laurel and Hardy routine stuff that’s going on here made any tonal sense for this show.

They’ve never done anything remotely like it. And, and can I talk about the ending? Oh my God. But when they get all the Tribbles off the ship, Sean, and, and I I love this comment from Kirk. He’s like, did you beam them into space?

Yeah.

And and Scotty’s reaction is like, no, we’re not inhumane. Yeah. We beam them under the Klingon ship and my note was, which is gonna mean all the Klingons will kill these Tribbles.

Yeah. So it’s like, you might as well beam them into space. So I didn’t understand like that.

It.

It’s written for the

punchline. Yes. It’ll be no trouble at all. It’s just like that’s the point. Yes. It’s just that, yes. And little details that I think for me stand out as like there are things like David Gerrold, he was a Trek fan.

He loved the show. So the, this episode is actually got little nuggets of things in it that connect it to the larger universe, like they keep referring to the Organian Treaty. Yes. That’s a reference to the Errand of Mercy episode in which both the Federation and the Klingons go to Organia. We watched it. We talked about it, and both of them are like, we’re here and we’re in charge.

And the Oregonians are like, no, actually, we’re these very powerful beings and we can wave a hand and stop everything. So you gotta bend to our will. That experience ended with a treaty apparently, which is still in force. It’s keeping the peace between the Klingons and the Federation, and they keep referring to this episode, and I found myself thinking they put that golden nugget in in this.

It’s like that treaty is a neat part of Trek lore and so the, they viewed this as like, we’re part of the same universe. The fact that you have the Klingon show up and you get them going aboard and they go to, they go to the bar. This is not all that un difficult to understand how that would happen when Deep Space Nine would do that all the time.

You would have the bar, there would be some somewhat cantankerous group of people would show up and then fights would break out and that was part of the gist of it. But in this particular depiction, the thing that stands out to me the most is the various Klingons and Enterprise crew members who very clearly are just stunt men waiting for the fight to break out.

Yep. There is a federation, uh, officer who looks like he weighs about 230 pounds. He’s, he’s jacked. He’s, he’s really kind of big and burly. Yeah. He looks a little bit like his hair has probably gone gray, but he is dyeing it a weird kind of orangeish brown color that doesn’t quite fit his skin tone. And he doesn’t have a word to say.

He makes like nods at people and just gestures in that sort of general way. He is sitting there drinking with Scotty and Chekov and the moment you see him, you think he’s only there because he is gonna pick somebody up with both hands and throw them over a table. That’s why he’s there. And on the Klingon side, you get Pataki playing a great Klingon.

He’s insulting and he’s pushing everything. He does a much better job of portraying the Klingon than Bill Campbell who is playing a Klingon almost like he is Trelaine. He is effectively just, he’s a little too flamboyant as a Klingon. Very just like, he’s just like, like how showy, or, he’s very showy. Very demonstrative, and said like, so you’re gonna stop me from coming on the station and like that?

That’s not really, Pataki does a better job, but my favorite Klingon by far, is they show Pataki at one point and over his shoulder. You see the other Klingon sitting at the table and they’re all getting ready, like, yeah, yeah, we’re gonna show these Federation people. And there’s one guy who is a bald Klingon.

I was like, represent brother. That’s great. Bald Klingon. Yeah. Not with like the Ridges forehead, but like this forehead, like that’s, he’s just sitting there and he is just like, yeah, these guys are jerks and he’s got this little wisps on the side. He’s like, he’s from Clan Ferrell, Sean. He’s from House of Ferrell.

House of Ferrell. But it’s like the whole thing continued to be a, like, I still look at it and say like, yeah, the kid in me still loves that episode. I still, I still look at it and say, yeah, that when that one comes on, I’m excited. But at the end of the day, I was like. Yeah. Wow. Did I not see what I thought I was gonna see?

Yeah. I I, I would, I do wanna make it clear. I don’t think anybody who likes this is wrong. It’s like, good, I’m glad you like it. It’s like, I understand why people do like this episode, I get it. But for me it’s just, it’s never clicked for me. Yeah. So when I, when I saw it was this one week to Sean this week, it was kinda like my first thought was.

Oh boy. Here we go again. What’s the first thing that went through my head.

On that note? As far as, oh boy. Next week. Wrong answers only in the comments, please. What is next week’s episode about, bread and circuses? That’s right. Oh my God.

Strap yourself in. Mark Loveless is probably gonna have a doozy for this one.

Yeah.

Oh boy. As always, we appreciate your taking the time to watch or listen and we look forward to seeing your comments. How did you feel about this one? Are you with us that, yeah, this is ostensibly Trek, but is it really Star Trek or are you the person that Matt was talking to and saying, no, I absolutely love this.

It sits out of the park and it is completely Trek to me. Let us know in the comments what you have to say. Before we sign off, Matt, is there anything you wanted to let our audience know about what you have coming up on your main channel?

Well, we’re actually taking a week off. We’re gonna pause for a week.

Uh, but when we come back, we’re gonna be doing a video on wave energy, capturing wave energy for electricity. Um, there’s a lot of Yeah. Wave energy. Sean is, Sean is doing it right now. Uh, it’s, it, there’s a lot of advances that have happened over the past year or so that we’ve made a video about it that’s worth talking about.

Now my arm is tired. Yep. As for me, if you wanna check out my writing, you can go to my website, Sean Ferrell dot com, or you can just go wherever it is that you buy your books. That includes the public library. My books are available everywhere, and if you’d like to support the show, of course, commenting, liking, subscribing, sharing with your friends.

Those are all very easy ways for you to support the channel, and they don’t cost you a thing. But Matt and I would love to cost you a thing. How do you do that? You’re asking, you go to Trek in Time show. That’s how you do it, and you click the join button there. Not only does that allow you to throw coins at our heads, which we appreciate, but it also signs you up to Out of Time, our spinoff podcast in which we talk about things that don’t fit within the confines of this program.

I would like to say that I’m very proud of myself for being able to say all that while looking directly in the camera and not at my notes at all, and I’m sure Matt’s impressed as well. Thank you so much everybody, for taking the time to watch or listen. We’ll talk to you next time.