Yamok Sauce! A Star Trek Podcast

Episode 00: Introductions

Amy  00:00

Hello, I'm Amy.

Cathryn  00:02

I'm Cathryn.

Iona  00:03

I'm Iona. And this is Yamok Sauce, our Star Trek podcast.

Amy  00:07

Yay!

Cathryn  00:08

Yay!

Amy  00:10

Hello intrepid listeners. This is the first episode of our podcast, Yamok Sauce, a podcast all about Star Trek, which is very good you guys. I don't know if that's actually going to be our tagline, or if it's just going to be a thing I say all the time. That's basically the same thing. So, for this podcast we are going to have, each episode is going to focus on an episode of the Star Trek canon, as selected by one of us for reasons that we will explain during the episode. But essentially, it'll be an episode that we are particularly fond of, or that we think is particularly interesting to talk about, based on our specific set of Star Trek related interests, which we will get into in this intro episode, just to explain a little bit more about who we are, how we got into Star Trek, what we like about it, and what kind of stuff you might be able to expect from the podcast is essentially the concept. It's really just an excuse to talk to two of my very favorite people about one of my very favorite things in the world. So I'm excited I was able to rope them into the terrible hardship of, you know, watching Star Trek, talking about Star Trek, and other things that they would usually hate to do. So. Thank you for your service Iona and Cathryn and for indulging me in this thing that I know otherwise you really don't care about at all.

Cathryn  01:36

Hate Star Trek, to be honest, secretly.

Amy  01:39

Yeah, yeah, no, in no way are we all like massive lifelong fans. And I feel like in many ways, the origin of this podcast, particularly kind of goes back to the Nine Worlds convention, which is a little niche for anybody outside of the kind of London nerd circuit, but was a convention that ran in London for a few years. And which one year Iona and Cathryn ran a phenomenally fabulous Star Trek track. So just loads and loads of Star Trek content over a weekend was the best thing. And that was really why I was like, I want to talk about Star Trek more with them specifically, because I feel like you've really sort of cultivated a talking about Star Trek expertise. So yeah, should we start there as much as as much as anything else? Like, where did that track come from? And what kind of stuff did you guys put into it? And why was it awesome?

Cathryn  02:38

Where did that come from? I can't even remember now who had the idea?

Iona  02:43

I don't know, I think it might have been some beautiful moment of synchronicity.

Cathryn  02:47

Yeah. Yeah.

Iona  02:49

You and me are really good at and what is the thing we talk about all the time? I mean my favorite thing about that track, which I was going to say anyway, so I might as well say up front is that we absolutely ran it as a niche thing. We were going to do a little bit of Star Trek content, have people turn up. And then on the day, we did, you know, little talks on Star Trek, Star Trek Pictionary, a few other things, a Star Trek vidshow. And in every case, people were banging down the door to get in, it was standing room only at Star Trek Pictionary.

Cathryn  03:27

I think it was literally every session there, there wasn't a seat left in the house.

Iona  03:33

So you know, if you build it, they will come. But I think they were gonna come anyway.

Cathryn  03:39

It just seems like, although we've been talking about Star Trek, sort of, you know, as a society since the 60s, people just still want to talk about it and listen to other people talking about it.

Amy  03:50

I think that one of the lovely things about Star Trek is the way that it can, you know, it's obviously similar to Doctor Who in lots of ways, but one of them being there keep being these kind of new generations of fans that come in, because there's a new thing happening in the canon, and then it's like, oh, wait, there's so much more for you to discover. You know, I feel like at any given time, I know, at least a handful of people that are watching a series of Star Trek for the first time, often Deep Space Nine or Voyager, or just you know, anywhere else in the canon really, and it just, it's lovely. It feels like it has this real kind of perennial appeal to people kind of across all of the content, not just the new stuff, or not just the old stuff, but yeah, cuz it's just, it's really good, you guys.

Iona  04:33

It's really good. I have a friend who recently watched Discovery for the first time and then asked her Twitter friends "Is the rest of it like this?" Oh, I'm so happy for you! What a great day this is for you. So much is about to happen that is gonna make you so happy.

Cathryn  04:52

That's wonderful.

Iona  04:53

Isn't it great?

Cathryn  04:55

I also love how much that's not a yes or no question. "Is the rest of it like this?" I mean yeah, how do you answer that?

Amy  05:06

Production values... no. Extremely high quality characters and absolute nonsense but totally compelling storylines. Yes. Vulcans -  so many.

Iona  05:19

Vulcans... is it time to talk about Vulcans? Can we talk about Vulcans?

Amy  05:22

It's always going to be time to talk about Vulcans.

Iona  05:26

So I'm this show's very own Vulcan correspondent. I love Vulcans. Vulcans speak to me on a deep and heartfelt level. I love Spock, I love Tuvok. I love Michael Burnham. I really love Spock, though. I love him a lot. And I also really love Tuvok and I just feel like I can be counted upon to bring the Vulcan perspective to everything in life. Not just Star Trek but particularly Star Trek. I'm done now.

Amy  05:56

I am going to get you a t-shirt and a little you know, a lanyard or something just like you know, Vulcan correspondent, it's very important.

Iona  06:04

I mean, the one thing that got me through lockdown number one was buying myself a t shirt that said Vulcan Pon Farr Hotel and Resort and Spa.

Cathryn  06:18

That's beautiful

Amy  06:19

 Perfect, yeah

Iona  06:20

Isn't it? It's just so wonderfully offensive.

Amy  06:26

Oh my God. I want to go on a spiral talking about that. But I think we should save that for something else. Because so we wanted to record this intro episode after we'd done a couple of what are going to be our regular episodes to start getting a feel for it. And then to think about how we wanted to introduce the whole thing. And so far, the pattern that is emerging that I'm very happy about is a random throwaway detail, event, remark in the episode will fuel us for a good 20 minutes, just to really just dig into what on earth that means, think about it far more than anyone involved in the production of the show ever did. And get to some exciting places with it, which is my whole jam. It's my favorite thing to do. So yeah, I can already feel the pull of that now going into like the Pon Farr hotel, but we're gonna save that. It's gonna come up again, I feel very confident about that. So I think it's fair to say that we pretty much all were introduced to Star Trek at a very young age. I mean, I feel like I was introduced to it kind of pre-birth. Because my parents were big TNG fans. And that was just you know, I don't know when I watched my first episode, because there was no time before Star Trek in my life. It was just all the time. Are both of you quite as like, from birth, or do you actually remember coming into contact with Star Trek?

Cathryn  07:54

I definitely remember watching season one of Next Gen on BBC very early on. So maybe when it originally aired, I suppose I would have been - would I have been too small? I think I would have been maybe just about old enough to remember the first airing of Next Gen on BBC Two. So I think it was probably from then. And then we had a sort of like a family library of illegal VHS recordings from the TV that we just kind of kept up from that point on. So we just kind of had a huge stack of VHS tapes, all meticulously labeled with which episodes they had and then in the summer holidays me and my brother would just kind of put the tape in and then just watch it all day. And that was what we would do with our wonderful summer freedom, was just close all the curtains, block out the sun, just watch six episodes of Star Trek in a row.

Amy  08:52

Indoor kids for life. Absolutely.

Iona  08:59

Well, I just looked up what year season one of TNG came out, Cathryn, it was 1987 so possibly you weren't born maybe?

Amy  09:08

When would it have been on the BBC though?

Iona  09:10

Oh, good point. Good point.

Cathryn  09:12

I do wonder if there was, was there like a slightly later like repeat run on the BBC or something? I feel like I feel like I I probably caught some in the very early 90s

Iona  09:25

I mean, it did take time to cross the pond in those days. I mean, is that also a point to just quickly shout out to Memory Alpha, without which

Amy  09:34

Oh, yeah, this podcast is not sponsored by but is

Iona  09:38

Might as well be sponsored by...  We'll just advertise for them for free. They don't need to pay us. That is memory alpha.fandom.com, the Star Trek Wikipedia, run by nerds, different sort of nerds from us, but very, very civic minded, useful nerds.

Cathryn  09:57

The fandom wiki that will ruin you for all other fandoms and their wikis

Amy  10:01

Right?

Cathryn  10:03

Like if you want to look something up about Star Trek, it's right there. And then the other day, I was looking something up about a different fandom. And I think it was, okay, it was Call the Midwife, I contain multitudes.

Amy  10:13

That fully tracks from Star Trek, I think.

Cathryn  10:19

I think it genuinely does. Um, but I was looking for a particular character on Call the Midwife and I wanted to know something about them. And I went to their wiki page, and it just had like, the most basic of biographical information, and like barely anything about like, you know, itemized lists of what they've done in every episode. And I was just like, what are you doing Call the Midwife fan wiki. But I realize that's an unfair standard to hold everybody to.

Iona  10:46

Yeah, Memory Alpha is to Star Trek as Wikipedia is to real life.

Amy  10:52

And also, I also feel very fondly of it because and I think, Cathryn, we have this in common that a much-cherished present I received as a child was the Star Trek Encyclopedia.

Cathryn  11:04

So beautiful

Amy  11:06

It was this huge, beautiful book that I read cover to cover, like a normal seven year old and also would subject my babysitters to it. I would like take them through some of the kind of key pages that I thought were most interesting and be like, okay, so this is B'Elanna Torres and she's really cool. I was a delight.

Iona  11:28

You absolutely were!

Cathryn  11:31

Oh, I loved that book.

Iona  11:33

I wasn't quite that young when I came across it for the first time. I remember when the, that period where I was coming home from school, I must have been about 10 or 11. And I used to get home from school about five and my parents would show up at 6:30 or so. And in that gap, one of the channels, probably BBC Two, it could have been one of the Sky channels, showed an episode of either TNG or Voyager every day, every weekday at that time, and I just used to watch it. And after a while, I got interested. And after a while, I got very interested. And then it just sort of worked its way very gently into my life. I didn't watch DS9 until I was in my 20s. And then it changed the fabric of my existence, because I'm definitely restrained and moderate in my assessment of DS9.

Amy  12:30

I mean, this is a restrained and moderate podcast for sure. That's exactly what we're all here to do.

Cathryn  12:35

That's what our tagline should be. Yamok Sauce, a restrained and moderate podcast.

Amy  12:39

We like Star Trek, a normal amount.

Iona  12:44

My favorite thing about when I was a kid watching is that my dad used to get home first and sometimes reasonably often for the last five or 10 minutes of TNG or Voyager. So he formulated a slightly inaccurate impression of what the show was like. And he also decided very early on that the only important character in any of it was Janeway because it was always her who was on the screen. Like, you know, she tends to finish off Voyager episodes and like...

Cathryn  13:17

Reasonable conclusion.

Amy  13:18

I mean, yeah.

Iona  13:20

If you only watch the last five minutes of Voyager it's invariably Janeway saying something and then something else blows up.

Amy  13:27

I mean, that not the worst summary of Voyager. I feel like you just need to be like, also, here's Tuvok. And you've got a pretty good starter pack.

Iona  13:39

Yeah, so that's how I came to it. I think slightly later in life than the two of you but no less, moderately.

Amy  13:49

Yeah, I watched a lot of reruns on Sky One. I feel like this is very much shout out to like everybody else who watched TV in the UK and Ireland in the 90s. Everybody else sorry, deal with it. Because a lot of my memories of Star Trek are watching it at five o'clock on Sky One. And particularly because I remember getting home from primary school and being like, right, if I can finish my homework by half past four, there's an episode of Pokemon, but I will definitely finish it by five and then there'll be Star Trek. And that's a good time. So yeah, that was pretty much my routine. And then I also remember that Sky would kind of rerun the same couple of seasons of things because whatever they had the rights to, so I feel like around season three and four of Deep Space Nine and Voyager I've seen a lot because there were some episodes were just on again and you know, you're like yeah, okay, this is what's on, cool. But then also watching the whatever was airing currently on like a Monday evening or whatever it was with my parents, which I mostly remember being Voyager but I probably would have caught some late Deep Space Nine as well. So kind of having catching up on sort of reruns and also watching whatever the currently airing thing was. And then for me the kind of, I don't know what the story structure term is, but the sort ofthe middle crisis that happened was the confluence of a few things. One, started secondary school and suddenly realized that other kids did not think it was cool that I was into Star Trek, and I wanted to have friends. And also the only currently airing Star Trek at that time was Enterprise, which, you know, I persevered with, because regrettably there is evidence of this committed to time, which is so this is the just, this is very on brand. While Season One of Enterprise was airing, I in all of my, I don't know, 11, 12 year old wisdom, wrote to Star Trek Monthly, which obviously, I got every month, because all of the letters in Star Trek Monthly at that time, were people bitching about how bad Enterprise was. And I thought this wasn't fair, particularly because I recalled how patchy say Season One of TNG is. And so I wrote about it being like, dear sirs, I am a child, and I would like to say, I think you're all a bunch of whiners and really, we should give this more of a chance. Because when you think about it, whichever series of Star Trek is your favorite took a little while to get going. You know, Riker had to grow a beard, you know. And so I basically was just like, all of these grownups suck, we should give the show a chance for which I was awarded prize letter, and won an incredibly complicated Star Trek computer game that I never figured out how to get past the like, tutorial. And with the information I had, at the time, it was a reasonable statement to make. However, I was proved wrong, and didn't really get on with Enterprise in the end. So that's who I am as a person.

Iona  17:12

It's so peak you, Amy, I love it so much. I wish you had been correct.

Amy  17:18

I know. I think it's probably also worth saying to that that generally speaking, although obviously, we all have our favorite bits of Star Trek and other bits we don't like as much, I think, for the most part, like, we're just not going to talk about the bits that we're not into, because that's fine. You know, and I think we are going to go back to some episodes of Enterprise that are interesting and kind of talk about things we do like, but yeah, if you're listening to this as a massive Enterprise fan, that's cool. We don't, we're not here to harsh anyone's squee because the world does that. It's fine. So that was me at the kind of the beginning of secondary school. I drifted away from it. I just, I couldn't deal with the Russell Watson anymore. That plus it being very uncool at school, and because really, in that period of time, in the kind of sort of early to mid 2000s sci-fi was just very, not super not cool. Like, fantasy was much more acceptable, really, you know, Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, all of that stuff was fine. But yeah, sci fi was very much like, oh, you are a middle aged, male, overweight nerd living in his mum's basement. And those are all things that we should mock people for. It's like, okay, well, this sucks. And so really, what got me back into it was the 2009 film, the JJ Abrams reboot. Because suddenly, everyone was talking about Star Trek, and the trailer came out and I was like, oh, it looks fun, I'll go see it. And then I really vividly remember being in a cinema and it starting and me being like, oh my god, I fucking love Star Trek I forgot,  take me back, I'm going, I'm back in baby, let's go. This is incredible. Just like as soon as the Enterprise appeared, I was just like, aaaahhhh, my whole ch... you know, and I never really watched that much Original Series, but just the whole thing. I was, I was back just fully back. And yeah, it's been a good time. And I feel like that generally, kind of really, kind of kicked both the Star Trek franchise into gear again, in terms of making new stuff, but also of getting lots of more people to check out the old stuff as well, which was very cool.

Cathryn  19:27

But yeah, that's also the year that I ended up getting back into Star Trek in a big way. Like, I don't think I'd ever really left or sort of backed away from it the same way that you had, but I had had a few more years of being sort of more focused on Doctor Who, and then going to see the film with my then new girlfriend now wife, and

Amy  19:47

Oh, you guys had that as a date?

Cathryn  19:49

Yeah! I don't know, I can't remember if we had it as a date-date, but we definitely went to see it together. And then she was like, oh, so, so like, I'd be into watching a little bit more Star Trek, and I was like, yeah, if this is gonna be a serious relationship, I have to show you a lot of Star Trek so that we understand whether we're compatible. And then I think over the next year, I basically forced her to watch pretty much all of Star Trek that was available up to that date. And now we're married. So what does that tell you? Star Trek is cool.

Iona  20:22

I mean, your wife is very cool. I will grant you that.

Cathryn  20:24

She's incredibly cool.

Amy  20:25

And I don't think regrets watching all the Star Trek. I think that was a very good thing that you did for her.

Cathryn  20:31

Yeah, yeah. She's she's never said she regrets it. I feel like maybe we could have gone through it a little bit slower. Like, we really went at a clip.

Amy  20:40

I mean, to be fair, like Cara is also not a person who's prone to loving things a normal amount, like, you know, I feel like of the three of us I think Iona's spouse is perhaps the one most prone to liking things a normal amount, but you know, we drag him along for the ride anyway.

Iona  21:00

He has watched more Star Trek than a man who doesn't like Star Trek ought to have watched.

Amy  21:05

And got really into Lower Decks, which is very charming.

Iona  21:13

Yes. And also the Ferengi episodes of DS9. That's what Star Trek is to him.

Amy  21:22

Yeah, Iona, your husband is perfect. I don't know if you knew.

Iona  21:29

I would like to share my favorite thing that he's ever said about this show that we love so much. Which is, he referred to the submarine episode of Deep Space Nine as DS Boot.

Amy  21:42

Wow. Yep. My wife Katy is a much more kind of fannish person. But is a fairly casual Star Trek fan. She likes it. But a weirdly normal amount. And she doesn't like a lot of things a normal amount. So like, I don't really know what to do with that. Yeah, so I guess that's our kind of backstory of Star Trek. And then do we maybe want to talk a little bit about I mean, I feel like we've already started talking about what our various kind of favorite elements of it are, you know, Vulcans being very important, but. And, you know, we all kind of grew up with the sort of 80s, 90s Star Trek as sort of the blueprint, I think. So yeah, I went back and watched quite a bit of the Original Series, post the 2009 films because I realized I hadn't really seen any of it apart from like, Amok Time and a couple of other, you know, seminal classics of heartbreaking genius. But that was my first time going through a little bit more methodically. And yeah, I think the kind of yeah, TNG, Deep Space Nine and Voyager are always sort of going to be my three faves collectively. And just so many feelings about all of those characters. And I think when we've been going back and watching a few of them, sort of, for me Next Gen very feels like, kind of feels like my family, and in like quite a parental way. I think because I watched it when I was so young. And they're all very competent, and sort of at the top of their game that you're like, these are very responsible people, and I feel safe and good around them. And then you get to Deep Space Nine and Voyager and it's like, oh, my trash babies. Hi, guys. There's usually a couple of competent ones. But also, like, there's a lot of mess here. And I love it.

Cathryn  23:27

God, Voyager, especially the first time around watching that I was like, oh, yeah, these are all grown ups. They know what they're doing. And then you rewatch it as an adult, and you're like, why would anybody put them in charge of a spaceship?

Amy  23:39

And at least Voyager has kind of an excuse. It's like, well a lot of the competent people died. Deep Space Nine, you're like, Well, I guess this is what we're doing.

Iona  23:49

I object, I object to this characterization of DS9.

Amy  23:53

Sorry, they're all very competent. All the time.

Iona  23:55

Thank you! Also they weren't meant to be, remember, they all go and they all get parked on this space station in the middle of nowhere with bits falling off of it, and nobody actually expects anything exciting to happen.

Amy  24:06

It's true, but they do still look at Julian Bashir, Season One Julian Bashir, and go yes, you can be a Federation chief medical officer, we have no questions about it. And they were right. And he's perfect. But also that's hilarious.

Iona  24:19

Okay, fine. I retract the objection.

Amy  24:22

Yeah, you know, just like, I feel like Deep Space Nine in particular has a real, the competence is not evenly spread.

Iona  24:30

No.

Amy  24:31

Sisko, Dax, wildly competent. Like, I mean, you know, their personal lives might be a mess from time to time, but generally speaking, feel pretty good. Then, you know, some of the others have very specific areas of competence, you know, kind of, Kira's good at what she's good at, which isn't always what she's being asked to do at that particular moment. But that's kind of her that's what's going on for her, you know, O'Brien is sort of set up for total failure because short of magic, there's nothing to be done about a terrible Cardassian station. So it's really not a reflection on him. And then yeah, you just have like, Bashir is a disaster and it's amazing.

Iona  25:13

But he is a very good doctor, that's the problem.

Amy  25:16

Yeah.

Iona  25:17

And then you've got Quark who is not a very good petty criminal.

Amy  25:22

How very dare you.

Cathryn  25:24

He tries. He wants to be like a bad horrible guy and he just keeps not quite doing it.

Amy  25:32

He really dreams of being a mob boss, but he doesn't have the stomach for it.

Cathryn  25:37

Keeps like accidentally helping Bajoran orphans.

Amy  25:42

He sold that stuff to them at cost.

Iona  25:47

He tried to be an arms dealer for a while. And then he felt bad. So he stopped.

Amy  25:55

He's never had a feeling in his life. How dare you. This is slander. You will be hearing from his lawyer. Yeah, and then I feel like Voyager just so many of them are tiny babies and

Iona  26:10

Harry!

Amy  26:10

The most beautiful baby of them all, Harry Kim, but you know, they kind of have this thing of a lot of the senior staff aren't really supposed to be senior staff. But oh, here we go. Which is cool, and good for mess.

Iona  26:10

Oh, yes. I feel that very, very similarly about it all. I think with TNG, I enjoyed it when I was a kid. But I think Voyager was my favorite. I came around to TNG again when I was a grown up. Because this is around the time I decided that I wanted to be Jean-Luc Picard when I grew up. And then, it's because Picard is really good, you guys. He's a role model.

Cathryn  26:52

He is a role model.

Amy  26:53

And he's really awkward about it, it's the best.

Iona  26:55

I just, I love him so, I legit wanted to be him when I grew up and I still do. Like, if anybody ever puts me in charge of a spaceship, I will run it like he runs his.

Amy  27:08

Excellent.

Iona  27:09

I appreciate the level of contingency in the statement that I just made. But still.

Amy  27:15

You know what? That's, that's good. Yeah, I think, you know, the characters I really imprinted on were kind of, and this will be deeply shocking to anyone who's ever met me, were Dax, Kira, and Seven of Nine. Which is, which is you know, another way of saying I'm a lesbian now, but you know. You know, like, I mean, I, you know, I love the main cast of all of the shows very much. But I think those three in particular really kind of spoke to me as a wee one, and definitely are part of my... you know, I feel like I am the kind of cyborgs and aliens correspondent here because I just, I love robots. Did you guys know that? I love them. They're very good. And sometimes they have feelings. And maybe they didn't want to have feelings, or they do want to have feelings. And then they have feelings about the feelings. And this is why I am the way that I am and have a philosophy degree and just all the you know, just blame it all, you know, kind of started with Data, and then it just really we were off to the races.

Iona  28:24

I don't know if you saw One Day at a Time, the Netflix sitcom, but that...

Amy  28:29

No, I've not watched it yet.

Iona  28:31

But that, the series four of that was made in the year of our Lord 2021, and they still have a joke about teenage lesbians arguing about whether Seven of Nine is a lesbian. Like it's important.

Amy  28:45

It's very important.

Cathryn  28:46

It's so good.

Iona  28:47

It's important that we continue to investigate that question.

Amy  28:50

Yes! And you know, she could be some other variety of queer as well. Like there are, you know, there is worthy, there's worthy discussion to be had. It's not a closed book, you know, and that's important.

Iona  29:01

Although we do know for sure that she's some kind of queer because Picard.

Amy  29:05

Yes.

Iona  29:06

Because of her thing with Raffi, which I hope I didn't spoil that for anybody, but it was really great.

Amy  29:13

I heard about it instantly.

Cathryn  29:16

Yeah. The whole Star Trek internet was, well, my Star Trek internet, which is, you know, primarily queer women was just like "oh my god!"

Iona  29:28

And it was very important.

Amy  29:30

Yeah, like I forget that there is like, cishet white dude Star Trek internet's like quite a big thing? I don't understand.

Cathryn  29:39

I never, I mean, is it? I never really see those guys.

Amy  29:43

Yeah,

Iona  29:44

I guess we don't really hang out the places that they're in?

Amy  29:46

No, no, they've kind of formed weird other subcultures somewhere else. You know. That's nice for them, you know, it's good to be, it's good to be among their own people, I suppose. And we love that for them. And I almost want to apologize for being quite so disparaging, but no, I'm not sorry. So let's not lie.

Iona  30:05

We've recorded this now for 31 minutes and 44 seconds. I feel like we've already shed the contingent who would be offended by that.

Amy  30:13

Yes. And also, like, this is a podcast about opinions, not about like, fair and balanced whatevers because like, I have to be a grown up and do that at my day job. I don't need to do that here.

Iona  30:24

Definitely not.

Cathryn  30:26

I've got an opinion.

Iona  30:28

Let's hear it.

Cathryn  30:29

Deanna Troi

Iona  30:30

Yeah?

Cathryn  30:31

Is the best fictional character who has ever existed.

Iona  30:35

Yeah, that is an opinion.

Amy  30:37

And I love it about you.

Cathryn  30:40

And while I kind of, you know, I recognize the many ways in which that is not true. I don't care about them. She's the best. So, so yeah, that's that's kind of why I'm the the Deanna Troi correspondent slash apologist slash...

Amy  30:56

What could you apologize for? Nothing. She's perfect.

Cathryn  30:58

Yeah, yeah, she's perfect. She's wonderful. I love her. I would fight to the death anybody who criticizes her.

Amy  31:06

As you should? I will. I will hold your stuff.

Cathryn  31:09

Thank you.

Iona  31:11

Cathryn, we've been friends for many years. But you know, that was the first conversation we ever had, right?

Amy  31:17

Was it really?

Cathryn  31:18

It was, wasn't it?

Amy  31:19

That's so magical.

Iona  31:21

The first conversation you and I ever had on any subject, meeting for the first time, was about that Riker/Troi novel that you hate so much.

Amy  31:30

Imzadi!

Cathryn  31:30

Imzadi!

Amy  31:32

Which we are a million per cent gonna do an episode about because

Cathryn  31:35

We should do a Special Episode

Amy  31:35

I read it at a very impressionable age. And it was, it was the first book I read that had a sex scene in

Cathryn  31:38

Oh god, what a way to start!

Amy  31:46

I know! Because my parents, they were like, oh, cuz they, you know, they had a bunch of Star Trek tie-in novels, did not think to screen them. You know, there were other things  they didn't let me read. I remember when my mum was very into the Clan of the Cave Bear books. And I was like, oh that sounds interesting and she was like no it's not, absolutely not. You may not read that small child. Like, yeah, have at it at the Star Trek section. And I read Imzadi and was like, I don't know what this means. What's happening?

Iona  32:13

I still have never read it. And I don't feel like I'm missing out.

Cathryn  32:15

Well, when we do our special episode, you're gonna have to read it.

Iona  32:18

All right. Yeah, okay, I'll read it. I'll read it. I will live text it to you. And you can read out the results.

Amy  32:27

I'm so happy that not only was your first conversation about Deanna, but it was about that specifically, that's truly incredible.

Cathryn  32:35

What did I say about it?

Iona  32:36

I don't remember! I just remember that you were talking about it to somebody else? And I sat down, like hello, I am your local friendly neighborhood sea lion. I wish to talk about this with you.

Amy  32:51

Okay. Should we attempt to do like introductions about ourselves that aren't just Star Trek related? I guess we've covered Star Trek and our spouses. Those are the two things we've covered so far. Yeah, I mean, I feel like obviously, there are kind of some things that the three of us have in common, we're sort of all in our 30s in London, you know, two years into whatever the fuck this whole pandemic situation is, which we will not be discussing at any length or in any detail, because, as several people have pointed out, we got so far into COVID before the compulsively starting a podcast, so you know, go us.

Cathryn  33:30

Almost made it.

Iona  33:33

Almost!

Amy  33:34

This one's good. It's fine. And I think it was definitely like, after just a lot of bad stuff all the time. I was like, you know, what would be a nice distraction from just reality? Let's just do this. So there's definitely a little bit of escapism, and just like, it's fine, we don't have to talk about real stuff at all. So yeah, I'm Amy, my pronouns are she and her. But you can find me on the internet at such_heights basically everywhere, where I will often be talking about Star Trek, or occasionally Doctor Who, for variety, because long-running sci fi shows are very good. And yeah, I live in London with my wife and our perfect cats who are named Miles and Julian after Deep Space Nine's Miles and Julian. If they were girls, they were going to be Jadzia and Ezri, you know, it's important. I think we are all interested in space bureaucracy is is a big thing we all care about a lot. And also interested in how Star Trek deals with kind of social and political issues and kind of marginalized identities as they've been conceptualized over time and all of that kind of thing. So yeah, I'm queer I'm white I am neurodivergent and disabled and have a bunch of weird health stuff, which is definitely interesting to look at Star Trek's being not as bad as some people make out I feel like like, it has some it has some bad ones, but also some pretty good ones. Yeah, there are all things that I am interested within the context of Star Trek I suppose.

Iona  35:05

I'm Iona, I am a speculative fiction writer and middle-aged bureaucrat. I also live in London. You can find me on Twitter as singlecrow, you can also find links to my fiction and other professional writing, none of which is specifically concerned with Star Trek, but quite a lot of which is concerned with space bureaucracy.

Amy  35:31

You do have a, you had an essay on The Toast about Spock, didn't you?

Iona  35:34

Um, Strange Horizons. Yes. If yes, if you want to hear me on Spock, then that is the place to find me.

Amy  35:41

And if you don't, this podcast may not be for you and also you'll be missing out.

Iona  35:49

I love Star Trek as a whole but I'm particularly interested in it as an a story about immigration and diaspora which it has a huge amount to say on much more than I think than people immediately grasp when seeing that it's a show about people on spaceships. I'm non-binary although that doesn't come up a lot. My pronouns are they and them and I am our very own Vulcan correspondent. I think that's all I need to say about me.

Cathryn  36:25

It's just very important to remember about the Vulcans, get that mention it, we should mention it every episode

Iona  36:33

We have so far!

Amy  36:36

What our intro could actually be is like you know, "Hi, I'm Iona, I'm our Vulcan Correspondent", just put that right in at the top.

Cathryn  36:43

Get a little like news programme sound effect in the background.

Amy  36:48

This week in Vulcan news.

Cathryn  36:55

So I'm Cathryn, my pronouns are she/her? I am a Welsh person who lives in London. And my main interest in the world of Star Trek is, I guess, in order Deanna Troi, Kathryn Janeway, and then sort of taking a crowbar into every weird little corner of Star Trek, and just kind of prising it open and being like, what, what if we take this to its natural conclusion? What if, what if the replicators on the Enterprise did do this thing?

Amy  37:32

You know, for me personally, you know, highlights really include getting deep into whether or not Seska is a good Cardassian spy, I enjoyed very much. Obviously, actually talking about actual yamok sauce. Oh, yeah, that's probably a thing. We will get into the origins of our name Yamok Sauce, don't worry. I mean, there's no reason why you would have listened to this episode and been like, Huh, I wonder why they call it Yamok sauce, because it's a perfectly cromulent name for a Star Trek podcast. So you won't have questions. But in the event that someone you knew did, they will be answered and we'll get there. We'll get into it. I think very much that we would like to take a crowbar to Star Trek world building. And, you know, not in our kind of nitpicky way. Although I did have the nitpickers guides to Star Trek as a child. They were great. I enjoyed them.

Cathryn  38:27

I got on the official nitpickers register,

Amy  38:30

what? Oh my god I'm meeting a celebrity?

Cathryn  38:34

There was a website and if you sent in an original nitpick a nit that nobody else had picked, and you got to be on the list. The list of the like the nitpickers guild, I think it was called. My nit that I picked, do you want to know? Yeah, so there's an episode of Voyager that deals with Tom's youth, I think and then you see, you see like a picture of what's supposed to be Tom at the academy. It's not Tom. It's Nick Locarno. The next gen episode, The First Duty.

Amy  39:11

who was also played by Robert Duncan McNeill? Yeah,

Iona  39:16

Can I share the bit of trivia that I always share about that? The reason that it isn't Locarno in Voyager, even though that seemed like such a good idea at the time is that the they would have had to pay royalties to the original writer of the TNG episode for every single episode of Voyager, so they had to give him a new name and a new backstory, but

Amy  39:36

essentially was the same. Yes, amazing. Iona, I don't want to alarm you but you've got a Star Trek monthly prize letter winner and an official nitpicker. So really, you know, I don't even think you're a real Star Trek fan. Honestly.

Iona  39:51

I know, I know, what is a middle-aged bureaucrat to do.

Amy  39:55

I think write some more things about or heavily inspired by Star Trek. Please just keep doing

Iona  40:00

Yeah, I could do that I can definitely do that. Excellent. Do we want to trail the episode from our first episode?

Amy  40:09

Okay, so our next episode our first proper episode will be us discussing the The Next Generation classic A Fistful of Datas for only somewhat Deanna Troi related reasons I think Iona you pretty much picked that partly because it's great and partly to lure Cathryn into doing this with us. I feel

Iona  40:32

I was very careful to pick an episode that has a good role for Deanna

Cathryn  40:35

I'm very easily lured

Amy  40:40

Yeah, our group chat has a picture of Deana from that episode as our you know, icon because it's important. So I think we are very much recording these episodes not expecting that people have watched it in advance, we will be summarizing the plot. Oh, that's a good point, actually. In terms of spoilers, I think pretty much if it aired in the 90s or soon or earlier, we're not really going to give spoiler warnings we might put a note in if we happen to mention something outside of that episodes. It's like a massive spoiler, but I wouldn't rely on us being good about that. But when it comes to currently airing shows, we will note spoilers if they come up in episodes not about the show and in the show etc so because I haven't I am not up to speed on all the current Star Trek because there's so much of it. So yeah, it's kind of blanket spoiler warning if you are trying to avoid spoilers for previous shows, although we'll try note them but you know, I don't want to promise that but we will warn for any spoilers for currently airing stuff so do not worry if like me you are not super up to speed on all the Star Trek, which is a problem I never dreamed of having as a child. You know,

Iona  41:51

Is it worth saying that at the time of recording this the currently airing Star Treks are season four of Discovery we're between seasons one seasons two and three of Lower Decks and season two of Picard and season one of Strange New Worlds are about to come out. Yeah, so

Amy  42:08

I think we'll try and and kind of note spoilers for anything from Disco onwards, essentially but particularly for like recently airing stuff as we're recording. Yeah, and hopefully we will be covering the kind of the whole gamut of things eventually. But yeah, we, yeah, the first few episodes I think we've picked aren't because they are any of our necessarily like top five faves of all time, but they're fun and we liked talking about them and we wanted to do a range of stuff and we'll keep doing that and we'll save some of our like, either all time faves or perhaps all time most important we've got to get into it for dole out along the way. You know, I think I'm really holding on to Threshold it's like an important milestone episode. And then it's gonna be a great time. Because the thin g that Cathryn has taught me is Threshold as a surprisingly reasonable episode up into the last bit, which is true, rewatching it that is true

Cathryn  43:03

I will die on this hill.

Amy  43:05

Balls to the wall. batshit the whole time. It just takes that hard turn at some point you're like, oh no, now this is absolutely bananas.

Iona  43:18

I haven't seen it since like the early 2000s. I can't wait

Amy  43:21

Have we not made you rewatch it any point

Iona  43:24

I remember the plot and have chosen never to re watch it.

Amy  43:29

I don't understand how those two things could be true at the same time. Okay, so Yeah, stick around, we will get to Janeway and Paris's lizard babies do not worry. We  haven't really decided a posting schedule probably every couple of weeks, roughly over the weekend. But also like, you know, let's not...  if what you need in a podcast is absolute reliability this is probably going to be the one for you because like stuff happens and sometimes our brains don't work and sometimes the tech doesn't work and you know, we're doing our best out here

Iona  44:03

We're doing our best and you know, I'm sure we will put out a few because we've got so much stuff to say.

Amy  44:11

And just this is very delightful to do. So you know the kind of the fact it's being recorded for other people's benefit is really just a gift to everyone else.