Matt and Sean talk about androids and emotion in Star Trek TOS Season 3, Episode 19, "Requiem for Methuselah." Flint builds a brilliant android who can't survive her own feelings. Sean draws a line from her to Data and Lal in The Next Generation, and to the AI agents answering customer service calls today. Matt says Vision Quest asks the same old question better than any show right now.
Order Sean’s next book, “In the Fields We Thirst” here: https://undecided.link/in-the-fields-we-thirst
Chapters
- 00:00 - Intro
- 01:44 - Mailbag
- 05:07 - Episode Description
- 07:06 - This Time in History
- 11:19 - Episode Discussion
Transcript
Intro
Sean Ferrell: In today's episode of Trek in Time, we're talking about owning your age, something that Matt and I are sadly getting very accustomed to doing. Welcome, everybody, to Trek in Time. This is the podcast that takes a look at all of Star Trek in chronological stardate order. We also take a look at the world at the time of original broadcast. If you're a regular watcher or listener, you have just seen us emerge from season four of Strange New Worlds. When new series release new episodes, we like to put a pause on the rewatch, watch the new episodes, and then when we've completed that new season, we return to the rewatch. So we are reentering now the final few episodes of season three of the original series. And boy, did this one give me a lot of stuff to think about. That was very meta without intending to be meta. We'll get to that in a minute. But first, who is it that you're talking, not talking to, listening to watching? Well, I'm Sean Ferrell. I'm a writer. I write some sci fi, I write some horror. As a matter of fact, I have a new horror novel coming out in April of 2027 in the fields We Thirst. Link in the information below. Hope you'll be interested in taking a look at it. Or maybe pre ordering. Pre orders help. So help me. With me, as always, is my brother Matt. He is that Matt behind Undecided with Matt Ferrell, which takes a look at emerging tech and its impact on our lives. Matt, how are you doing today? Matt Ferrell: I've pre ordered my book, Sean.
Mailbag
Sean Ferrell: Thank you. Every pre order helps. They truly, truly help. So thank you for that. So today we're going to be talking about Requiem from Methuselah. This is from season three. It's episode 19. But before we get into our discussion about this new episode, this new, old episode, we'd like to visit the mailbag and see what you had to say about our most recent episodes. So, Matt, what did you find for us this week? Matt Ferrell: Well, it's actually not our most recent because we're in timeywimey land, Sean. Sean Ferrell: We're doing it again. I don't know how we keep doing this. How do we keep catching up with ourselves? Matt Ferrell: So I did pull some comments from the archives. These are recent comments, but some of them are older episodes from our feed. So the first one I kind of wanted to bring up was from episode 245, Once Upon a La’an. There was an additional comment. I just wanted to read about this episode which you and I had so much to say about. Sean Ferrell: We Did. Matt Ferrell: Scooteroo wrote the dragon versus the Enterprise was kind of cool visually, I guess. Otherwise this was a big fat thumbs down and not something I enjoyed or want to watch again anytime soon. Oh, and of course La'an gets her growth and problem solved by what? Magic? Wtf? What a terrible way to resolve her inner turmoil. Damn. Wish I could go and box myself to resolve anxiety. That'd be great. It was that last line that made me want to read this one because I was like, yeah, I wish I could do this sometimes too.
Sean Ferrell: Yeah, it hadn't. We hadn't even really landed on the fact that her problem is solved. Not through much action on her part, but from magic, which is not super helpful nor sci fi. Ish. And yeah, I did find myself kind of like, okay, I'm kind of grooving on this dragon attacking the Enterprise visually, but as far as like a storytelling element, I was like, no thanks. No thanks. Matt Ferrell: Then we had a comment from episode 149. This came in just a handful of days ago from the original series Balance of Terror. It was from Spengler B6K. The episode is this. It's funny. This one reminded me of Mark Loveless. By the way, this episode is unvarnished Terran propaganda. The Romulans are portrayed as militaristic automata. Nothing is further from the truth. Romulan societies are way more advanced and sophisticated when compared to the societies comprising of lamentable Federation. Oh, before I forget, Terran women cannot hold a Romulan candle to Romulan beauties. Over time, the Terran Roddenberry has outdone himself in the department of aesthetic propaganda. Let us see what is going to happen when duplicitous Terrans and their allies attempt to invade Romulan space and planets. Like chef's kiss. Sean Ferrell: Thank you. Matt Ferrell: Like, I like how you. You held to the whole like ethos there. Sean Ferrell: You were able to put on the. Put on those fake ears and keep them on the entire time. That was great.
Matt Ferrell: Yeah. And then finally, I'll tell you why I wanted to mention this one. Episode 92 Star Trek Enterprise, Demons and Terra Prime. KThor27 wrote more. John Billingsley as Phlox. Please. He should have been given his own Star Trek spinoff series. He absolutely could have carried a medical drama in space. Yes. And the reason I bring this up is just last night I watched an episode of Stargate SG1. Sean. Yes. I'm going to keep bringing this show up because you still need to watch it, buddy. John Billingsley was in it and he is so good and funny in everything he does. He is such a great actor. I love seeing him. And like when I. I've seen this episode a dozen times on Stargate SG1 when it came up like, oh yeah, this episode, this is a fun one. He's so good. Love him. Sean Ferrell: Yeah, he was great. Those lights, you see those alerts, you hear, no, it's not me having a panic attack, it's the read alert. It's time for Matt to read the Memory Alpha description. Matt Ferrell: While the Enterprise searches for the rare cure to a deadly disease, the landing party is confronted by a reclusive man who is willing to kill to preserve his privacy.
Sean Ferrell: This episode is the 76th produced, the 72nd aired overall. It is the 19th of of the third season. Given that it is the 76th produced, but it's the 72nd aired overall. I found myself surprised as I was looking at what episodes we have coming up. Yeah, we've got today's episode, Requiem for Methuselah. We've got Savage Curtain, we have All Our Yesterdays and the Turnabout Intruder. And then guess what, Matt? The Motion Picture. That's right. We are almost done with the original series and we are about to boldly go to a place that Star Trek had not gone before, which was the movie screen. I hope everybody is ready for that one. It's going to really throw a wrench into my rewatch routine because I'm accustomed to watching these episodes at some point Monday or Tuesday morning, early in the morning when I get up and I get my coffee and I'm not getting, you know, I'm still haven't gotten ready for work, but I like to watch a little bit of the show. I'm not gonna be able to do that when we have to watch a two hour plus movie. I don't know what I'm gonna do.
This Time in History
So this episode originally aired on February 14th. That's right. Valentine's Day of 1969. What was the world like at the time of original broadcast? Well, Matt, you would know this better than most what you were singing along to. That's right, you were singing along to. I'm joking. Matt wasn't even born in 1969. As a matter of fact, neither was I. Despite all appearances, Number one song this week was Tommy James and the Shondells singing Crimson and Clover. Take it away, Matt. You know, it strikes me, Matt, that the irony of that song is that the line is Crimson and clover over and over. And then you just sing that over and over. If I didn't interrupt you, would you have just continued on for the rest of time? Thankfully, we'll never know. So at the movies you thought you could escape it? Nope. The number one film this week was Funny Girl with Barbara Streisand and Omar Sharif. And on television we've been taking a look at some of the top shows of the season of 1969. And here we are with a medical drama we haven't talked about up to this point, but it's who was a mainstay of television during the 60s? Marcus Welby, MD. This is of course, a drama built around Marcus Welby, a general practitioner, and Stephen Kiley, his young assistant, as the two try to treat people as individuals in an age of specialized medicine and indifferent physicians. I love that description. It's an age of specialized medicine and in different positions. They wrote that about a show in 1969. I think they've written that about every medical drama for all of television history. Finally, some doctors who give a crap and don't use all those specialized techniques. And in the news on this day in on February 14, 1969, several headlines stood out.
Amongst the main graphic of this day's newspaper in the New York Times is about anti war protests that were breaking out on campuses around the country, including one that was a confrontation between National Guardsmen at the University of Wisconsin and protesting students. The image is striking because the National Guardsmen are actually using bayonets to hold back the protesters. So a very disturbing image, I will say. But amongst the headlines that stood out were multiple articles talking about the Vietnam War, the Paris Peace talks that we're trying to continue or start back up. This is of course very early in President Nixon's first term. And one of the headlines that stood out, the far left column, the Pentagon doubts Nixon will alter Sentinel project delay of for Soviet talks or shift to Minuteman sites called very unlikely. This is a story about there being public pushback against the Sentinel Project, which was a effectively a very early version of the kind of Star wars missile shield that President Reagan would make very popular in the 80s. It was intended to be missile systems that would protect American cities, as they put it at the time, in case of China attacking or an accidental Soviet strike. I liked the framing of that, like we don't think the Soviets are going to attack, but just in case they do something by mistake. Clearly it was intended to defend against everybody, regardless of the cause of the attack. What I found interesting about this article a month later, Nixon would in fact do exactly what this article said The Pentagon thought he would not do. He does shut down the Sentinel program. The main pushback and the main protest against this program was that people claimed that the use of these missile systems near American cities would make those cities targets instead of protecting them. That was eventually viewed as likely.
Episode Discussion
And so instead the defense shifted from American cities to the locations of the Minutemen missiles, which is ironic. We are in the late 60s moving toward the system of protecting our weapons instead of our people. And that would continue to, well, pretty much today. So on now to our discussion of this episode. First of all, I'm. I said this to Matt in a call yesterday. Requiem from Methuselah. We return to the original series. Here's the meta angle to it. The Enterprise, the captain finds himself talking to somebody who is from another time. And is he out of his element, or is he such a super capable person that he kind of transcends all eras? And I find myself, as I was watching this episode, thinking, I'm really happy to be watching the original series again because our exit from Strange New Worlds really felt kind of jarring. I found myself disappointed by season four in a number of ways that I couldn't really put a finger on until I was watching this episode. And I'm just curious, Matt, before we get into the nitty gritty of the episode itself, did you find yourself watching this show from the late 60s and enjoying it more than you had the Strange New Worlds? And do you think, like me, that part of the issue was I feel like I've just got higher standards for newer programs. And I found myself disappointed because as a new show, I felt Strange New Worlds should be better than it was. And then returning to this show, which is, for me, wrapped up in a lot of nostalgia, I found myself like, oh, yeah, I can forgive the cardboard backgrounds and I can forgive the styrofoam rocks, and I can forgive some of the dated acting because I don't have those same standards for this program that I have for a newer show. So it's kind of a backhanded compliment of a kind.
Do you find yourself with that mindset when you think about season four in Strange New Worlds, or do you have a different take on all of this? Matt Ferrell: I will say your attachment to the original series is more than my attachment to the original series. You want to talk about next gen, I'll get into a fight with you. It's like that, to me is my warm, happy place. But I understand what you're saying because when I was watching this, I felt like it was a little bit of a warm blanket. Like, oh, oh, yeah, this is Star Trek. But at the same time, as we'll get into the discussion later, I had issues with this episode. Some issues that really kind of pulled me out of it. So I did not think this was the best Star Trek episode, But it felt Star Trek. It felt like a warm blanket. And I kind of agree with you. I think we might be being more harsh on the new Star Trek because it's new, it's fresh into our eyeballs. We have no nostalgia for what they're doing yet. But this is where, for me, personally, I don't think it's as jarring as what you're talking about because I. Like we mentioned in start, in season four of Strange New Worlds, there were some episodes in there that I think are some of the best Star Trek that's ever been made. Sean Ferrell: Yeah. Matt Ferrell: And then some of the worst Star Trek that's ever been.
Matt Ferrell: That season was so all over the map. Generally speaking, it was on a train wreck of a season. It was awful for a season, but there are still like three episodes in there that I'm like, wow, those are episodes that are going to stick with me and I'm going to want to rewatch that are like some of the best I've ever seen. So I also have a soft spot for strange new worlds to a certain extent. So I'm a little bit of a strange new worlds apologist. So for me, I don't think that this disparity between the two was as big as it was for you, because I know this show. Sean, is your happy place. Well, Spock is your happy character.
Sean Ferrell: Yeah. For me, Spock was a. Hawkeye Pierce, Spock and Bugs Bunny, I think, were pretty much the three characters from my childhood that I was just like, well, if I can just merge the three of them, I have my personality. That would be great. Um, so this episode right out of the gate, we end up on a planet, and guess what? The Enterprise is facing a deadly disease yet again. That's a trope that it becomes parody. But here we are yet again. And yet again, they find somebody who's living on a planet that shouldn't have any life forms. That happens multiple times in multiple forms of Star Trek. It's going to happen again and again as we move forward through more shows. And yet again, we find that this man is doing the impossible. Both is the impossible in that he's incredibly old. He's also apparently a number of incredible figures from Earth's history. But he has also done the impossible in that he is creating androids. And as a precursor to what we will see in Next Generation, I found myself. We've had this before where there's been artificial life forms. In fact, there's been robotic life forms. And you and I, in our discussions are like, it's interesting that they didn't pick up any of these as through lines for Next Generation. As far as, like, a connective line to say, like, oh, here is Data's origin story, or a connective line to between the two shows it. And I found myself thinking of that about this one again. Did you? I'm going to kind of like. I feel like we're kind of hopping all over the place in. In discussing this one. But it really stood out as the way to talk about this show is maybe best organizing it around what felt like the kind of a. Of a ranking of themes as opposed to chronological plot points or, you know, anything like that.
So for me, the storyline that stood out as the most interesting and compelling to think about was this is effectively. It feels like a precursor to the Lal storyline in Next Generation when Data creates a child and it's the same story arc, very capable, beyond the capabilities of anybody around it. Everybody's very impressed by it. And then emotion becomes the Achilles heel that undermines it. It cannot handle it. And we find ourselves in a situation where in the Next Gen story, it's Data as the father is the preeminent relationship provided to the story. In this one, instead of leaning into the father relationship, it is. It plays with some icky elements that we'll get into in a few minutes, which is the. Which is, I'm sure the. The layering of themes. The layer that we'll get into next is the one that probably pushed Matt into a oh, boy place. Um, but as far as themes and the similarities between this and Next Gen and dealing with the idea of an incredibly capable creator making something that excels beyond arguably its peers. This depiction from the 1960s, which we would see echoed again in the 1980s with the next Generation story. But holy cow, before we started recording this, you and I were talking about, yeah, you call customer service and you're getting AI agents now who sound human, and the service you're provided with, depending on which agent they're using, some of it's actually okay, and you're comfortable with it, and it works and it does what it's supposed to. And if you say, hey, I need a human, it'll get to the human. But I feel like there's an element of very subtle prescience in this story that doesn't feel like it was actually answered by the Next Gen. It feels like it was repeated by the Next Gen episode. But we're seeing it play out now as well.
So as far as Sci fi prepping us to be able to engage with the future, I feel like that this episode is maybe. It was maybe doing a lot of lifting. That at the time felt more just like, oh, this is just sci fi drama. This is just fun. This is just like, oh, she's not. She's not human. What? You know, like, how will she deal with emotions? Will she fall in love with somebody? I feel like, yeah, that's all part of the storytelling. But ultimately I was struck by the kind of timelessness of this story. The idea of the creator making the thing that is beyond everybody around it, and yet it can't handle the simplicity of being human. The question of can it be human? Is beyond it. So there was a kind of timeless element to this that I thought was very interesting and compelling. Did you pick up on that or were you like, no, this is just. They're playing with. There's too much ooginess here. There's too much here which is like. And I will get to that too. So if you want to jump into that as your main response to that storyline, I'm perfectly comfortable with you doing that. Matt Ferrell: So this storyline about what you're talking about is a well worn sci fi trope. So for me, it didn't stand out to me the way you're talking about it, because it's the Azimov sci-fi robot books. It's in everything. Anytime an Android has come up in any sci fi movie from the 50s on and books, it's always been this. It's like they are always vacant emotion because it's a computer, it's calculating. That's all it is. It has no soul. And so yes, that theme was repeated in Next Gen, but it was never. I think it was somewhat resolved with Data and Lal and the emotion chip and all that kind of stuff of like trying to get Data to that place. They did explore it pretty well. And it's still going on today. Like just today I was just. While I was eating my lunch, I was watching the new show Vision Quest, which is the Marvel TV show about Vision, the new Vision, and him struggling with the fact that he's the reincarnated Vision and the entire show, Sean. It's created by Terry Matalas, who did the Picard Show. And so there are actors from the Picard show in the Vision Quest. And I was like, oh, he clearly likes some of these actors. So he's working with them again. But again, here's Terry Matalas, who did a lot of stuff with data and computers and stuff like that around AI in Picard. And here he is again in Vision Quest. In Vision Quest, it is so today, if anybody is interested in AI and AI agents and what things are happening today. Vision Quest is like the first mainstream media TV show I've seen that just full on right in your face. It's mostly in Vision's head. Sean Ferrell: Yeah.
Matt Ferrell: And in his head, he has AI agents that do different tasks for him based on what their skill sets are. And it's like, that is literally how people are using things like Hermes agent stuff, like, in their real lives today. Of like. Sean Ferrell: Yeah, Matt Ferrell: it's. It kind of blew my mind. I'm like, you go, Terry, good job. And so it's a continuation of the same thing of. Vision is emotionless. He's calculated. He doesn't feel love for this son that's supposed to be his son. He's concerned about him, but it's like, I don't love him. Like, so there's this whole exploration about computers and emotions and how they struggle with it and how they deal with it, and are they human? Can they ever achieve kind of like true sentience and emotions? So it's like, to me, this episode did a good job touching on that. But you hit the right on the nose, Sean. The second layer of plot, which was the love story of the Android, was bad touch through the entire thing. Sean Ferrell: Yeah. Matt Ferrell: I was so taken out of it, Sean, because not only was it just weird seeing this old man trying to make out with this woman that would just seemed completely, like, devoid of anything when he's going in to kiss her. I was like, this is. This is awkward. This is like your boss coming up into you and trying to make out with you. This is bad touch. And then you get Kirk falling in love with her. And this is the part. This is the. This makes me so angry about the 60s Star Trek, Sean. They're literally on this planet for hours. Hours. And by the end of the episode, they're basically saying they are deeply, madly in love with each other. You have known each other literally, literally for two hours. Sean Ferrell: Yeah.
Matt Ferrell: What. What is. What is happening here? You are not madly in love with this woman. You may want to take her into a room and have sex with her, but you're not in love with her. Sean Ferrell: Yeah. Matt Ferrell: And it was. It's so bonkers to me that the show leaned into this, of trying to create a love story. Sean Ferrell: Yeah. Matt Ferrell: Where older Trek, like the one where McCoy goes, you know, back in time and loses his mind. Sean Ferrell: Yeah. Matt Ferrell: That love story between the woman they meet. Sean Ferrell: Yeah. It's weeks. Matt Ferrell: It earns it. Because they're there not for hours, they're there for days and weeks. And they kind of have chance for that relationship to grow and that fondness to create. And you see them bond and the love story makes sense at the end. This was like, trust us, they love each other. Come on. Come on. It felt very 1960s. Very. Sean Ferrell: Yeah. Matt Ferrell: Gross. It just felt gross. And it just ripped me out of the episode. Sean Ferrell: I am not going to defend it at all, but I have a feeling, like, in the writer's room and in the production room and even in, like, Shatner's dressing room, like, I find myself at moments thinking, like, what are they thinking as they do this? Like, they're. They know what the story is. They're reading the script and then they go out and they shoot it. I'm like, what is the thought process? How does Shatner get into this? And Shatner in this, there, not only does he fall in love, he falls in love with her in an aggressive way. Matt Ferrell: Yes.
Sean Ferrell: He falls in love with her just like you love me at one moment and he. The moment that they're like you. No, she loves me. No, she loves me. It's almost like you can hear ding, ding, ding, and then they going to fight. And I'm just like, what are they thinking? And you mention one of the best of Trek and all the best of Trek, I think, are the episodes of the original series. We reflected our time in our commentary about them. And so I think that that's at play in, like, that Edith Keeler episode where, like, it has. It feels built almost like you could do a shot for shot version of it today and it wouldn't feel a little bit different. Matt Ferrell: Yeah.
Sean Ferrell: Whereas this would be like, what actors today would want to depict this in a shot for shot recreation of it. They wouldn't want to because it's got that layer to it. And I feel like that layer is almost Shatner and other people in the room. Shatner was a trained Shakespearean actor. He had done Shakespearean on the stage. Shakespeare on the stage. He was, I think it was. He was the understudy to Christopher Plummer and a depiction, the Canadian Royal, the Canadian Shakespeare Company depiction of Hamlet, it was Plummer, but Shatner was his understudy. And I feel like when you have a story like this, I think that it just reeks of like, somebody thought that this was a sci fi depiction along the lines of Forbidden Planet of sci fi ing up a Shakespearean storyline. They find themselves on an island. It's a bunch of sailors who find themselves on an island. And there's an ancient king and that ancient king has a daughter and he's protecting the daughter and the like. I feel like that's at play where you end up with the Shakespearean tropes of we've just met in the forest, but there's pixie dust in the air and we fall in love immediately. And it's a true and meaningful and deep love. That means we're going to get married. And you in the audience are expected to go along with all of this. And I find in an episode like this, I do not go along on that road with them. But I feel like there's that kind of energy feeding into it where they're all playing it as like, we all know we're putting on a show. We're all. This is all big archetypes. These are big, bold strokes. And I'm like. I'm like. But it doesn't. I'm not saying it works. I'm not saying it works. I'm just. I'm just looking for, like, why would they be willing to do it? Because it reeks of badness. It just doesn't.
Matt Ferrell: It just also strikes me as lazy storytelling. We've talked about this, about the end of the original series. It seems like they're phoning it in. They don't have their A team running scripts. And that's what this feels like to me. It's like, it's not a bad. It's not a bad sci fi premise. It's not a bad concept for the show. It's the execution of the Oogie factor, of that love section, where it's like they felt like to make Kirk have to fight on her behalf, he has to be in love with her. And it's like, no, he doesn't. He doesn't. You could have had her be the innocent where she. You could have still had the oogie scene where the guy goes in for the kiss and she doesn't respond. It's like, that's gross. He's a. He's a bad guy. He's got this. He's. He's willing to kill all these people for his privacy. Sean Ferrell: Yeah.
Matt Ferrell: And then he's putting the moves on this. This young woman. Why is he doing that? Oh, she's an Android. Oh, that makes even grosser. He's basically creating a sexbot. What's going on with this? And you could still have Kirk coming to her defense, and she could still potentially show attraction to him. But it doesn't have to be two way. It could just be him. Like when he discovers halfway the episode, it could have been he discovers she's an Android. And then it could have been a. Like a. She's sentient, though she's aware she has her own choice. What are you doing to her? And it could have been a very interesting discussion of, like, you're creating a sexbot for yourself because you're lonely. It's like she has her own free will now. And so that you'd still have the same exact argument they had at the end of the episode. Exact same argument they argued about. She has free will at the very end. She can make her own choice. You could have still had that. But the fact that they felt like they had to have Kirk fall madly in love with her was like, it just made it. So Sean Ferrell: I think it's falling deeply into the sexism of the 60s. Matt Ferrell: Yes. Sean Ferrell: I think it's falling into. She's having her. She has free will to choose which man she wants to be with. That's the limitation of it. This falls into the same category as other episodes we've talked about in the original series, where as soon as a woman walks in, every man is just like, well, you're very attractive. And then the next guy is just like, you're very attractive. The next guy is Spock, and he's just like, hello. And then it's just. It's. It falls into that trap Matt Ferrell: Sean. Sean Ferrell: And it's. Matt Ferrell: The note I wrote to myself on. What you just said in my notes is, why is it that they always have to have a hubba hubba kind of thing whenever a woman comes on screen?
Sean Ferrell: Yeah, yeah, it's rough. I would have loved it if it had been what you described of Kirk saying, like. Like, you've made a. A person. You don't have the right to treat it like a slave. And you certainly don't have a right to create it as a father and then turn it into a romantic partner. It would have, like. It could have been, like, groundbreaking in that way, because the 1960s was never gonna have that conversation. So I think that it's, you know, Opportunities missed. I do feel like, thematically, there's this kind of, like, 1960s openness to saying, like, well, we're kind of doing what William Shakespeare did. We're kind of doing, like, high art when we do this kind of thing, as opposed to looking for the 19. The contemporary nuance, the contemporary storytelling around. What are we trying to say about free will? What are we trying to say about even individuals who are of different sexes? She's made as a woman and is then not treated well by fictional or real measure. And that becomes. And it's not even addressed in the storytelling. So it's like, okay, they. They didn't know what they were saying. They didn't care to think about it. And this whole thing of pushing that element, it just feels very gross. But underneath that, it's a little bit like a compliment sandwich. Here I've got the. I kind of like this. I did not like this, but I kind of like this. I felt like, from a depiction of the mystery box of. Wait a minute. How are we getting all these pieces of art that are not known but are seeming so genuine? How are we getting, like, the technology of. Of the. The robot? I love that he. That. That the. That Flint refers to it as a robot. I love it when actors in the 1960s say, my robots over here. And it's just like. You mean your robot, because it's clearly spelled bot. But the threat of the robot, the depiction of, like, these things can do anything.
It's this magical lab, and the mystery box element of it, I think. I think all of that works, and it's kind of as. It is fun. It's just like, oh, yeah. This is an actual Spock's amazement at everything I love in this episode. This is a Brahms. This is his handwriting. This is an original piece of work. It's never been known. And Matt Ferrell: the Captain's like, yes, Buck, yes. Sean Ferrell: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Matt Ferrell: And I wanted. I do want to say, like, the one thing about the. Jumped to the very end. The thing with Spock and Bones at the very, very end. Sean Ferrell: Yeah. Matt Ferrell: Watching Strange New Worlds reshaped that moment for me in a profound way. Here's the Doctor going, I feel bad for you. You can never know what it's like to love and feel and all this stuff. And I'm like, well, watching strange new worlds. That's not true. That's not true. We know Spock has deep emotions and affection and love for different women in the show. And, like, he's. He's had his feelings there, McCoy. So you know, it's. It's got this weight to it that, of course, in the 60s, that wasn't there. He's just computer guy with no emotions standing there and he's making these comments. I thought, wow, hat tip again to strange new worlds for completely reshaping how I interpret a show that was made 40, 50 years before they ever made their episodes. It's like really well done. But the flip side of that is, I want to ask you, Sean, what the hell was up with Spock going to the Kirk and going, forget? It's like, what was what? Why. Why would they have him do that? It made no sense. It came out of nowhere. They didn't set it up over the episode. It was just suddenly Spock, out of nowhere is like, forget. Come on, defend it, Sean. Defend it. Well, Sean Ferrell: I will defend it. I will Matt Ferrell: defend it. I Sean Ferrell: will. Because I will. Look Matt Ferrell: at that.
Sean Ferrell: Okay, Matt Ferrell: okay. Sean Ferrell: You didn't get it, I think. What didn't you get? You got what he was doing. Matt Ferrell: Oh, I got what he's. I understood exactly what he was doing from a character motivation point of view. It came out of left field from the episode. So here's the text they give us. Here's 45 minute episode, and there's no hint of Spock wanting to do something like this for his friend. Sean Ferrell: Right? Matt Ferrell: But it's just like this little epilogue at the end of the episode and just out of nowhere, like, forget it was. It just felt so I guess the way I would put it is it felt tacked on and not earned. That's my point.
Sean Ferrell: Okay, okay, okay. I'm going to invite our viewers and listeners, jump into the comments now and let us know if it felt tacked on to you or if it felt like it was compelling, connected, like just like right now, before I give my response, because I do have. I do have a defense of it, interestingly enough, I think there are two. There are two interesting. Before I get into my personal response about it, there are two interesting little side notes about it. There is an episode of Voyager in which Janeway, in talking to somebody, says, yeah, Captain James T. Kirk always claimed that he had actually met Da Vinci. So I. I think that's a neat footnote for the episode. And the. I find it interesting that you are talking about the reframing again that Strange New Worlds does to our. Our viewership of the original series. I don't feel like this. I don't feel like that happened for me in this moment, because this moment, this ending scene with Spock, McCoy and then Spock with Kirk is one of my favorite scenes in all of the. Of all of Trek. When I was a kid watching this, I remember watching this episode. The first time I saw this, this ending moved me. I remember, like, getting verklempt and responding to this moment, because for me, this scene is almost a scene in a bottle where it is. Kirk starts the scene with. He is in such anguish and his exhaustion is so deep. He says, I wish I could forget her. And he puts his head down and he falls asleep. And then McCoy lambasts Spock for you'll never know what it means to love. You'll never know the highs, the lows, the anguish, the like goes through that whole thing, which is pretty xenophobic and cruel. But he says what he says and then he leaves.
And then Spock, in this moment, in this original series, without the reframing of strange new worlds, he goes to Kirk and does something which represents everything that McCoy said is not true. He loves Kirk. And in this moment, he steps up, he touches Kirk, and he says, forget, because he's trying to help his friend, whom he loves, get past the anguish that he knows he's in. So for me, this moment is. I always felt like it was arned. I always felt like this scene was better than the episode it's tacked onto. It feels like the rest of the episode is the tacked on part. This scene is about Spock and Kirk's relationship to each other. So that's my defense. But that's my defense of it. Matt Ferrell: That's precisely. I think you and I had the same opinion of that scene. It's a great scene with him doing that. It's like. It's very touching. It's very moving. I agree with you on that. It just felt so tacked on because there was nothing in the episode that hinted at the, you know, like the. I don't want to talk about the bromance, but, like, you know, how, like the Spock, Kirk relationship. Sean Ferrell: Yeah. Matt Ferrell: Was not any, in any way, shape or form, any key part of that episode at all. Just like, not at all. In fact, most of it was Kirk going, yes, Bach, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yes, Bach, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Just like pushing him away. And then at the end, this happens and it's like it from a storytelling perspective. I would have expected in the first part of the show there would have been a little more of that bromance between the two of them, showing that they are close friends. And then at the end it would have, like, strengthened that scene. Sean Ferrell: Yeah.
Matt Ferrell: But if you, if you cut that scene out just on its own, just watch this, like, little three minute scene. It's a lovely little scene, but it could have been even more profound if they had just the Spock, Kirk of it all in the episode itself. But they didn't. And that's what it's like. That's, to me, why it's jarring. It's just like, what is happening here? Why did they decide to do that on this episode, in this moment? It's like, it's kind of a weird thing.
Sean Ferrell: Yeah. We fall into the rewrite trap at this moment when it could have been. I mean, we know so much about what will follow. There are so many opportunities for what will follow. Where if from the 2026, we rewrite it, we could say things like, Kirk might have said something like, I haven't felt like this since I met Person X. He could refer to, you know, his. His partner with whom he has his son David. Like, there could have been like, something referred to, like, I can't believe how I'm feeling. This is so fast. But I found myself, you know, thinking like, I'd give up anything to be with her and, and Spock saying, you know, in a moment, like, I think a step that would have helped the scene feel more earned for you would have been a scene where Spock says, Jim, you need to, like, you need to come back down to ground. You need, like, there are lives at stake, Jim. And, you know, having that kind of moment would have helped it. I get what you're saying, and I don't, I don't disagree. It falls back into, like, the rest of the episode just doesn't feel strongly written at this point. They're so close to being done with this series. It kind of. It feels like a little bit like we're suffering from the same problem we have with Strange New Worlds where we were just like, did everybody on the set know this was it? And they're just like, yeah, it's just like we're just finishing out our contract at this point. I mean, at this point they had to know. They had to know that it was over. And an example of how they had to know who else is in this episode. You get a shot of the bridge, you get Uhura in the background, you get a little bit of Scotty. But they're not. They're using stock footage when it comes to a lot of the shots. We do end up with a kind of fun moment where the Enterprise is shrunken down and then Kirk looks in through the front. Matt Ferrell: Yeah.
Sean Ferrell: Screen. Which is, of course. Is it a window or is it a screen? It's a screen. So how is he looking through it? Like a window. And a little fun fact here. The actor who played Flint, James Daly, he's. He's a. That guy a little bit for me, where it's like whenever he's. He was in something, some of these old movies and TV shows, I always enjoyed his performance. Take a guess, Matt, take a guess. Like, watching this episode, I'm like, here's this old man and he's meeting, you know, the crew of the Enterprise, and he's built this young woman. Guess how old he was. Matt Ferrell: I'm gonna guess in his 50s. Sean Ferrell: He was 48. Matt Ferrell: Oh, my God. We're older than he is. Sean Ferrell: They live rough people in the city. Sean Ferrell: Yeah. Enjoy your cigarettes, everybody. Your doctor recommends them. And have a glass of whiskey. This guy's voice is just like. It's all gravel. It's just, I want you to leave my planet. It's. He is. He was 48 and he would pass away a year, 10 years later. He was in his 50s when he died. However, he left quite a legacy. His son is Tim Daly and his daughter is Tyne Daly. So. Matt Ferrell: Oh, my gosh. Sean Ferrell: Yes. So, you know two fine actors who still out there doing good work today. Tim Daly in particular, soft spot for him. He was in Wings, and he's the voice of Superman in the cartoons. So you go, Tim Matt Ferrell: Can we. So can we also, before we kind of start to wrap up, can we also just have a moment for Walter Koenig? Sean Ferrell: Oh, absolutely.
Matt Ferrell: Who just passed away and he died at 90. It's like, Good. Good for him, living to be 90. But it's one of those. It's. It's kind of sad to see all the original series actors just slowly passing away. But yet. Yet we have Shatner himself, who seems like he's going to age to about 200 years old because he is as crisp and like on it as he has been for decades. It is. He's just keeps on going.
Sean Ferrell: Yeah, he keeps on going and he keeps on doing new things. And doing new things is what keeps you young. So, like, hat tip to Walter Koenig for he. He was always very open with his experience of this level of fame for this kind of thing, and it only comes along once if you're lucky. And he was a part of the phenomenon of this and never really had anything that reached quite the same level, but he always maintained a very good relationship with the fandom. And I always thought that was wonderful because he, he would go, he. After the series ended, he hit pretty hard times. He was, at one point he was thinking about leaving Hollywood entirely. He didn't know what he would do. Gene Roddenberry threw him a bone and gave him some writing work and he ended up becoming a scriptwriter and he wrote some episodes of the animated series of Star Trek. He also wrote other TV shows in the 70s. He would go on to be a recurring character in Babylon 5 and he wrote a movie or two. He wrote a pilot for a TV series that was not picked up by NBC. But he became, you know, a behind the scenes guy and then of course came back as the movies were made. So he. I also found out after his passing in George Takei's commemoration of his passing. I don't know if you saw that, Matt. Walter Koenig was the best man for both George and his husband. And they got married on Walter Koenig's birthday. So it was, you know, and, and, and George Takei was just like, we, we started working together on the bridge of the Enterprise and we stayed friends for all those years and it's just like really kind of touching to think about. In the fictional universe, there's Sulu and Chekov and they'll always be behind that, that console together. So Matt Ferrell: yeah,
Sean Ferrell: yeah, he'll be missed. And as you said, the fact that Shatner's still out there sometimes. Yeah, but like the two of them, like Shatner being older than the other people who've already passed, like, it's really. He's keeping himself busy. Both he and George Takei keep themselves engaged and keep demonstrating that an engaged mind is the one that continues. So hat tip to both of them. So viewers, listeners, jump into the comments, let us know, what did you think about this episode? Do you agree with Matt and I that it's just, it was okay in certain ways and it was kind of a mess in other ways, or is this a different take for you? Let us know. We look forward to reading your comments. As always, liking, subscribing, sharing with friends and commenting are the easiest ways for you to support the podcast. And we do genuinely appreciate all of that support. If you want to support us more directly, you can go to trekintime.show. Click the join button there. It'll sign you up. For our spin off podcast Out of Time, in which we talk about things that don't fit within the confines of this program. We hope you'll be interested in checking that out. Thank you so much for taking the time to watch or listen, and we'll talk to you soon.
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