To Boldly Go Where Everyone Has Gone Before

VOY: “Caretaker: Parts 1 & 2”

Date: September 7, 2020

Season 1, Episode 1

Musical Accompaniment: I’m feeling this violin mix today

Interstellar News: For the first time in at least five years, I did not have Labor Day off. Husband did, though, and was able to get some things done that have been on his to do list for some time. Oh, and we bought a couch that won’t be ready until November and I’m not sure why.

As we’re starting a new series, I though it was time for a bit of a change. The summary, now titled “TL;DR” will be just enough to remind you what the episode was about. If you’ve never seen it, this is probably not the post you should be reading. I’ll still keep my favorite quote(s) and my thoughts, as always.

TL;DR: A Maquis ship (led by Chakotay) goes missing and Voyager (captained by Janeway) goes after them in the hopes to rescue their Security Chief (Tuvok) and arrest the Maquis. An entity known as “the Caretaker” abducts both ships in the hopes of finding a suitable replacement as he’s dying and has been taking care of the Ocampa people. Unfortunately for them the Caretaker lives in the Delta quadrant, 70,000 light years (75 calendar years) away from home. The crews work together to rescue Kim (Starfleet) and Torres (Maquis) and they receive help from Neelix and Kes, but eventually Janeway makes the decision to destroy the array once the Caretaker dies so that the enemies of the Ocampa will not destroy them. They combine the crews, determined to still explore new worlds, but also to make it home before 75 years have elapsed.

The Caretaker's array — *“It’s not crunch time yet, Mister Kim. I’ll let you know when.”*

Favorite Quote:

Emergency Medical Hologram: That’s enough. This is a sickbay, not a conference room. Visiting hours are over. Everyone except my patient is to leave immediately.
Janeway: Computer, end Medical Holographic Program.
The EMH disappears.
Having already met Robert Picardo in “Doctor Bashir, I Presume?“, I’m super excited about the EMH

“Didn’t they warn you about Ferengi at the Academy?”: A new crew, a new introduction with new music, and a new format to my posts. The beginning of the episode gets me interested in all of these new characters, though it was great to get a glimpse of Quark and Morn. Also, the beginning of the episode started with a Satr Wars-esque word scroll, so that was fun.

Neelix, Kim, Kes, Paris, EMH (back row). Chakotay, Janeway, Tuvok, Torres (front row) — All the people

Chakotay is the first indigenous character I’ve seen outside of one TOS episode and when the Cardassians were being bullies in TNG and I’m happy to see him in a starring role. Torres is another half-Klingon half-human character who I’m instantly excited about because of my love for Klingons and K’Ehleyr. As soon as Janeway mentioned someone had infiltrated the Maquis, I knew it was Tuvok because Vulcans and renegades don’t really make sense. I’m also pretty sure Tuvok was in one of the DS9 Mirror Universe episodes, because he looks familiar. Paris is going to be a complete and utter tool and I’m pretty sure I’m going to hate him, especially with the things he said to Chakotay… simply vile. Kim is the green one on the team but I think I’m going to like watching him grow up. Most of the medical staff is killed so we get the EMH and I am totally going to love him, I can just tell. Neelix and Kes did not leave much of an impression for me, but maybe they’ll get better as time goes on. Last, but certainly not least, is Captain Janeway. She’s already so fantastic because she prefers to be addressed by her rank, which makes so much more sense than calling everyone “sir” , and does what she needs to do. I loved how she was a disheveled mess but multi tasked on the way down to engineering and fixed her hair because she’s the captain damn it and she needs to look nonplussed. Her decision at the end was perplexing, but she made the call and right away it shows us what kind of captain she’s going to be.

The parents from the Beverly Hillbillies TV show — Tell me the woman offering lemonade doesn’t look just like mama here…

I spent a lot of the episode muttering “what the fuck?”, especially when it looked like the Beverly Hillbillies had taken over the episode. I would have liked it better if the self-destruct had just worked and Janeway didn’t make the conscious decision to destroy the array, but I also understand she felt responsible once the Caretaker died. I didn’t understand, however, how the Kazon lived on a desert planet and couldn’t find water… but they had spaceships with firepower. Yeah, that totally makes sense (as I wave my hands in abject sarcasm). I was also disappointed that the speech at the end was so upbeat and there was no mention of the crew members on either side that were killed. I get during the middle of everything that there was so much going on and they were stranded, you don’t really have time to think about it. Once things settled down, however, there should have been some mention of the First Officer, the Chief Engineering, the entire damn medical staff, and any Maquis that were lost… but there was nothing. Stadi, for example, I was excited to get to know and I even gasped when she died because I thought she would at least be a recurring character. Overall I’m already invested in finding out how they cut 75 years into 7, but there’s still a lot of questions and some things that I just didn’t jive with. That leaves this season and series opener with 6.5 pumpkin spice donuts.

TA Out!

Star Trek: Insurrection

Date: September 6, 2020

Musical Accompaniment: Ahsoka Tano meditation music

Interstellar News: Today’s Sunday morning movie was Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins. I rooted for three very smart dogs and the minor part played by Captain Janeway, who I will get to meet tomorrow when I start Voyager.

Luis-style Summary: We open to a scene that reminds me of “Paradise” followed by a duck blind as seen in “Who Watches the Watchers“. Data, apparently, has begun to run amok and he shoots at the duck blind exposing the Starfleet and So’na officers to the Ba’ku. On the Enterprise-E Worf arrives in the midst of the senior staff entertaining a new protectorate of the Federation and they get news of Data’s sudden behavior, so they ditch the party and head that way. Meanwhile, Data shoots at the So’na ship and we find out the So’na were allies of the Dominion. Picard and Worf try several tactics to try to recover Data but in the end it’s a song from a play that distracts Data enough for Worf to neutralize him.

“Mr. Worf, do you know Gilbert and Sullivan?”

The away team, with Picard because apparently Riker gave up that rule, beam down and meet the leaders of the village who have warp capability and know technology but have refused to use it (just like in “Paradise”!). La Forge finds out that Data was shot by the So’na and that’s what enacted his fail safe, so they travel to where he was shot and find a cloaked ship that’s set up as a holodeck that looks exactly like the planet they’re on. Turns on the So’na and Starfleet were going to pull a “Homeward” and transport those on the planet out while they were sleeping so they can harness the metaphasic radiation that keeps its inhabitants from growing older. In fact the Ba’ku have been there for over 300 years and the Enterprise‘s crew starts to see the effects, literally, as La Forge’s eyes work for the first time ever.

A cat with large eyes "Oh God! I can see forever!" — La Forge’s eyes were suuuuuuuper dilated.

The So’na and Admiral Dougherty meet up with Picard and Dougherty explains the mission, which Picard believes is an attack on the Prime Directive. Picard gets in civilian gear where he is joined by the rest of the senior staff, save Riker and La Forge who will take the Enterprise and go appear to the Federation Council while the others evacuate the village. About 100 people are transported out during the evacuation but the crew does everything they can to interfere. The So’na send ships to intercept the Enterprise and, guys, RIKER IS IN CHARGE OF THE SHIP. The ship is beat up but Riker is able to fend them off and not kill everyone, whew. The Ba’ku head into the caves, Picard and Anij fall in love, Data tries to understand Artim, and Crusher discovers the So’na are really Ba’ku.

Spider-man pointing at Spider-man — The Ba’ku and the So’na pointing at each other, right?

Apparently 100 years ago some of the younger Ba’ku wanted to explore, tried a coup, and were exiled when they failed. Two of those are Ru’afo and Gallatin who created the probe and are working with Dougherty. Ru’afo kills Dougherty when he’s asked to stop but Gallatin decides to help Picard because there are people still on the surface. With help from Worf and Data they are able to transport Ru’afo and his bridge to the holodeck of the ship from the planet to make them think the probe was successful when, in fact, it was stopped.Ru’afo figures out how to transport to the collector probe and Picard goes in after him. Picard sabotages it and Riker transports him out, leaving Ru’afo to die. Gallatin embraces his mother back on the planet and the So’na surrender. Picard vows to come visit Anij with his leave time, Data plays with Artim, and Riker and Troi hold hands as the credits roll and they beam up to the Enterprise.

TL;DR: An asshole admiral makes a deal with the So’na so that everyone can live forever, or at least for a long time. Picard and crew find out and put a stop to it because that would mean relocating the inhabitants of the planet, which is against the Prime Directive.

Favorite quotes:

Picard’s Poetry: “Some of the darkest chapters in the history of my world involve the forced relocation of a small group of people to satisfy the demands of a large one. I’d hoped we had learned from our mistakes, but it seems that some of us haven’t.”

Gallatin, seeing the Enterprise hurtling towards him: He wouldn’t?
Worf, talking about Riker: Yes, he would.
Worf may only say a few words but he says them with such gusto.

“How many people does it take before it becomes wrong?”: So this boils down to another asshole admiral in Starfleet who thinks they are doing something for “the greater good” but they never learn. While it’s awesome that the So’na try to relocate rather than kill the Ba’ku, Picard makes the very valid statement that it doesn’t matter how many people… it’s always wrong.

Frozone: "we're talking about the greater good" — *“Honey, have you seen my super suit?”*

There’s a little bit of everything in this movie. There’s humor when Data is a floating head, gets tricked into singing along, and when Crusher, Troi, Picard, and Riker are all talking at top speed because they’ve all been together for so long. Riker and Troi flirt in the most adorable way possible, Riker looks jovial and Troi looks like she’s having fun in the moment, but it’s all for the fans and doesn’t do anything for the plot. La Forge gets his moment to see, Worf suffers through Klingon puberty again, and Picard gets to have a romance with supernatural benefits. I do wish they talked more about slowing down time, because it was quite interesting and more supernatural than science fiction. I loved that Data’s “feral” state is to always be the good guy and that he tries so hard to be loved by all, especially children. He’s always been fascinated by children (looking at you “Pen Pals“) and he admits it’s because he never had a childhood so he can’t really understand it. I loved that everyone got to shoot the drones, Crusher and Troi included, and it felt very much like Duck Hunt.

Duck Hunt video game screen — *“Definitely feeling aggressive tendencies, sir.”*

I dislike that they let Ru’afo die in such a horrible manner, they are not supposed to kill the bad guys unless absolutely necessary. Riker could have totally locked onto both lifeforms and gotten them both out before the explosion. I also didn’t really like the dress whites and that’s mostly because that’s a HORRIBLE decision to have WHITE be the primary color. You can always tell when something gets dirty when it’s white, always. I’m sure there are other things wrong with this movie, but nothing bothered me as much as this. I mean yeah, why is the Federation doing shady deals with Dominion allies? Who were the aliens on the Enterprise and why don’t we get to know more about them? Why did the Federation have a cloaked vessel? How are they going to stop people from finding this planet? Although there wasn’t a lot of “bad” in this movie, it somehow didn’t have as much gusto as First Contact and it certainly wasn’t as compelling as the story of II – IV. In the end, it’s all about the message… don’t remove people from their homes.

Movie rating: In comparison to the other movies on my Rankings page, I believe it earns itself a warp 6.7, but this is only because I rate it between The Search for Spock and The Undiscovered Country and my movie rating system is all messed up. I truly enjoyed the trio of Star Trek II, III, and IV and this movie was a bit of an mixture of several different episodes.

TA Out!

Dragon Con Goes Virtual

Date: September 5, 2020

As everything since March 2020 has been basically cancelled and conventions have gone online, so has Dragon Con this year.

As such, they have 24 hours of programming on three different channels plus the different tracks have their programming.

My favorite, by far, is the American Sci-Fi Classics Track run by Gary and Joe.

Tonight they announced a special Roll-A-Panel and I can’t miss it, so my post on Star Trek: Insurrection will have to wait until tomorrow.

Enjoy the Con and be safe.

TA Out!

DS9: Series Finale “What You Leave Behind: Parts 1 & 2”

Odo leaving Kira behind to go into the great link

Date: September 4, 2020

Season 7, Episode 25

Musical Accompaniment: The Shadow soundtrack

Interstellar News: Another Day of Dragon Con Goes Virtual with two panels this evening and watching DCTV all day. I’m still so bummed about missing out on everything this year. Tomorrow I will watch Insurrection and on Sunday I will begin Voyager.

So what had happened was…: Bashir and Ezri wake up together and make a pact not to die in the war. O’Brien is going to teach at the Academy after the war is over, but hasn’t had the heart to tell Bashir yet. Yates has awful morning sickness. Odo is joining the crew of the new-Defiant in the hopes of finding Kira. Sisko gets a vision from his Prophet Mother. Quark and Vic play cards while everyone is off finishing the war.

Go Fish card game — Quark and Vic play “Go Fish” because *tongo* isn’t in Vic’s programming

The Founder promises the Breen whatever they want, specifically Earth and Romulus, because she just wants the war over. Garak, Damar, and Kira inspire the workers to revolt and there’s power failure all over Cardassia. The Founder orders a city to be leveled as penance for the people uprising, but that simply inspires more Cardassians to turn. The battle on the front lines begins and the Founder has no idea at how it’s progressing. The trio is caught in Mila’s basement, she is killed for her trouble, but the Cardassian guards shoot the Jem’Hadar so the trio can escape. Communication is restored and they see the Cardassian fleet has started to fire on the Dominion, so the Founder orders all Cardassians to be destroyed, immediately. The Breen move to the front lines and most of the Jem’Hadar are carrying out the Cardassian genocide orders when Damar, Garak, and Kira storm the castle. Damar dies, Garak kills Weyoun, and Kira tries to reason with the Founder who is insistent on the Federation and its allies losing resources even if the Dominion fails, it won’t surrender.

Never give up, never surrender - from Galaxy Quest — What’s more perfect than a *Star Trek* meme? A *Galaxy Quest* meme.

By this time the Federation/Klingon/Romulan forces have made it to Cardassia Prime and Odo beams down to try to reason with the Founder. He links with her, cures her, and she finally orders the troops to stand down. She will stand trial to be judged for her crimes while Odo will return to the Great Link to heal them and teach them about all he’s learned from the solids. Ross and Sisko pour out some bloodwine for their homies while Martok drinks straight from the bottle remembering his. Garak is bittersweet about being home.

Dr. Evil "pour one out for my homies" — I loved it when Martok said “Humans. Pah.” and something in Klingon with such disgust.

On Bajor Dukat and his sight are back. He and Winn go to free the Pah-wraiths, but first Winn has to bring fire to the fire caves. Winn blesses some wine and shares it with Dukat only for him to find out it’s poisoned and he dies as the sacrifice the Pah-wraiths demanded. The senior staff return to DS9 and everyone heads to a party at Vic’s. Sisko has to leave abruptly as he senses a disturbance in the Force. The Pah-wraiths have taken over Dukat, Winn belatedly tries to destroy the book but is engulfed in flames for her trouble, so Sisko tackles Dukat over the cliff and into the flames. Sisko is met by his mother who tells him the Pah-wraiths are now forever sealed in the cave and he can now stay in the Celestial Temple to help bridge the gap between the Bajorans and the wormhole aliens.

HERCULES (disney) on the steps of Mount Olympus — Sisko being asked to join the Celestial Temple reminded me of when Hercules was asked to join the gods on Mount Olympus.

Back on the station Yates has a vision from Sisko who tells her he’ll be back at some point, but his work isn’t done. She takes care of Jake who puts the finishing touches on the model house. Worf and Martok head to Qo’noS so Worf can be the Federation Ambassador to the Klingon Empire and Martok can do Chancellor things. The O’Briens pack up and move to Earth and the rest of the crew, including Quark, reminisce and have flashbacks. Odo tries to do the Irish goodbye, but is stopped by Quark, and he and Kira get to the Great Link so Odo can save them. Kira becomes the commander of DS9 and Nog is promoted. The episode ends with Jake looking out and the wormhole opening.

Favorite Quotes:

Bashir: I’m sure we’ll see each other again.
Garak: I’d like to think so, but one can never say. We live in uncertain times.
Garak certainly captures the mood of 2020.

Everyone at Vic's — *“This may be the last time we’re all together, but no matter what the future holds, no matter how far we travel, a part of us, a very important part, will always remain here on Deep Space Nine.”*

Vic: Hey, pallie. If you’re here for another game of ‘go fish,’ I’m a little busy right now.
QUARK: Actually, I’m here for the end of the war goodbye to Chief O’Brien goodbye to Odo goodbye to Worf party.
Apparently, they have a lot to celebrate.

“All right, I’ll prepare some food. Nobody should die on an empty stomach.”: A few items before I begin. An “Irish goodbye”, as described to me by one of my Irish friends is when you duck out of the party without saying goodbye to anyone because you don’t want to make a big deal out of leaving. This is contrasted with the “Italian goodbye” where it takes two hours to leave the party because you have to say goodbye to each person and then you start bullshitting with one another, and all of a sudden it’s 2 am. I say all that because Mila is totally the Italian grandmother of the bunch, making sure they’re all fed before they go off to war.

I thought the episode was over, and then it kept going. The pacing felt weird and they kept wrapping things up. In fact, I completely forgot about Winn and Dukat in the caves and was thinking the party at Vic’s and a little montage would be the end, but nooooooooo we still had like 20 minutes of episode left. The beginning of the episode was great as it showed what everyone was doing on the station, on Cardassia, and even on Bajor. There was a lot to wrap up and eventually we got there. The Dominion was going to kill as many solids as they could even if they were going to lose, because those resources could not be replaced as easily. There’s an urgency with the Klingons, Federation, and Romulans (not that they’re seen really) to have this war over even if it will cost, because it’s been going on for too long. This wasn’t the strongest series finale ever, but it at least answered a ton of questions that were still lingering and wrapped up several story lines. Odo realizes it’s finally time to heal his people not just from the disease but also from their fear of the solids, it’s why he was sent out in the first place. Sisko also realizes he needs to bridge the gap between his people (humans/Bajorans) and his other people (the wormhole aliens/Prophets) and he knows that Jake and Yates will have each other while he is gone doing important Emissary work. I still rank DS9 as my favorite Trek so far but this season finale lowers the overall rank of the season a bit for me. 6 shots of flavored rum, pick your favorite.

The title of this episode reminds me of a song by Sister Hazel:

“Take It With Me” from Lighter in the Dark, an excellent and recent album

TA Out!

DS9: “Extreme Measures: Part 7” and “The Dogs of War: Part 8”

Rom and Leeta SHOCKED at the Nagus announcement

Date: September 3, 2020

Season 7, Episodes 23 and 24

Musical Accompaniment: American Sci-Fi Classics Track panel that lasted over 2 hours and then some instrumental guitar ballads

Interstellar News: Dragon Con Goes Virtual began today, free for everyone so check it out!

So what had happened in “Extreme Measures” was…: Odo is in super rough shape but he still wants Kira to help Damar and the Cardassians. O’Brien and Bashir tell Sisko about their Section 31 theory just as Sloan shows up and gets phasered for his trouble. Bashir reveals he’s going to use a Romulan mind probe so Sloan triggers a self-destruct button in his brain. Bashir does some magic to save Sloan for a bit and him and O’Brien reenact The Cell, going into Sloan’s brain for the cure. They meet happy Sloan and angry Sloan but eventually wake up and Sloan dies… except he doesn’t, Bashir realized it was Sloan’s mind trying to keep them out again. They finally find the room with all of Sloan’s memories and Sloan tries to tempt Bashir with information to dismantle Section 31, but O’Brien keeps him on task and they are able to save Odo.

Happy Sloan with his wife, holding a padd — *“I can’t tell you how happy I am to see you.”*

So what had happened in “The Dogs of War” was…: Ezri and Bashir are super awkward with each other. They decide to have “the talk” and decide their friendship is much more important to each other, so they’ll just stay friends even though they both want more. The wind up making out in the turbolift and Worf is the best wingman ever. Bashir also tells Odo about Section 31 and everyone says “genocide is wrong, but we’re in a war” and I can’t even deal with that.

The Nagus calls and Quark answers, though there’s a lot of static, announcing he’s going to retire and he’s arriving soon to name his successor. Brunt comes to the station to suck up and also fills Quark in on all of the changes on Ferenginar, to which Quark is pissed. Rom thinks the changes make sense but buys the bar from Quark so Quark can worry about being the Nagus. Turns out Zek and Ishka want Rom to be Nagus, which makes sense given all the reforms, so Rom gives the bar back to Quark.

Damar, Kira, and Garak arrive on Cardassia to meet with those who want to join their cause, but it’s a trap and they are stuck hiding in Mila’s basement. Weyoun delivers the news that Damar is dead and the rebellion is crushed but Mila reports that people on the street are abuzz with rumor, so Kira decides to help stroke the thoughts of revolution. Garak plants a bomb, Kira shoots a Jam’Hadar, and Damar makes a speech to the people. The Dominion plans to fall back so the Federation, Romulan, and Klingon forces decide to attack. Oh, and Yates is pregnant because Sisko forgot his birth control and the San Paulo arrives but is rechristened the Defiant.

Favorite Quotes:

Bashir: Of course you love her. She’s your wife.
O’Brien: Yeah.
Bashir: I’m just saying maybe you like me a bit more, that’s all.
O’Brien: I do not.
O’Brien doth protest too much.

Bashir and O'Brien sitting after being "shot" — *“I must say I’m a bit disappointed. I expected it to be more elaborate.”*

Garak: Then we might have a revolution on our hands.
Mila: Or you might really get yourselves killed.
Damar: Anything’s better than rotting in this cellar.
Three Cardassians just talking about a little revolution.

Part 7 – “So, am I supposed to guess what’s going on or do I have to lay here in terror waiting for you to tell me?”: So I’m a little pissed they spent AN ENTIRE EPISODE at the end of the series only talking about the cure. We get two seconds of Odo and Kira saying a tearful goodbye and reminding us that she’s lost a love before and the rest of the episode is the Section 31 mishegoss. Bashir does O’Brien a solid and he lies to Sisko telling him that he “ordered” O’Brien to not tell Sisko, another perk of O’Brien being enlisted. When they enter Sloan’s mind they talk about how little time they have and then they spend FOREVER in the turbolift and everything just seemed to take too long. When they I haven’t been as in love with O’Brien as I was when he was on TNG, but Bashir should be thankful his best friend can keep his eye on the prize otherwise they all would have died. I will say, however, I did enjoy the scenes in his mind and how the trap really worked.

Odo is cured — *“If you mean it’s going to be painful, just say so.”*

Part 8 – “I am the Emissary of the Prophets and I know that nothing is going to happen. Everything is going to be all right.”: I’ll start with the Ezri and Bashir romance that seems forced as all get out. At least Worf was a bro about it. As I said earlier, I’m not even going to go off on a rant about that because it’s too damn late and there is not enough coffee for what I have to say. I love that Zek and Ishka are going to retire and that they chose Rom to take over to usher in the new age of Ferenginar. It’s wonderful to see the Ferengi are taking to progressive views quite well. The scenes on Cardassia are great because they find out they’ve been betrayed and are trying to figure out what to do, and it’s Kira who really saves their asses because she’s never one to back down from a challenge. Garak is also fantastic, as always, and his true love for Cardassia shines through. It’s possible he can go home after helping Damar, wouldn’t that be nice! I hate that Jake hasn’t really been around, I’d like to know what he thinks about being a big brother.

Overall rating for the 8-part arc: The best episode was, by far, “Tacking Into the Wind” and the worst was “Extreme Measures”. The rest, however, all sort of fell into the middle because you have to tell the whole story. I think they could have left out some things and did this in four or five parts, but overall I think it sets up the finale with just the final battle. Odo is cured, people are in love,everyone in the Alpha Quadrant wants the Dominion gone, and Sloan is no longer a threat. I’m rating the arc 7 soft shell tacos, each with their own different fillings because I love variety, and a side of sweet potato flautas with avocado, sour cream, and tomatoes.

TA Out!