Ariel: I promise I'm going to be good this time.
Sasha: Let's not even talk about it. Just tell everybody to put their spoiler blankets on and then we can jump right in.
Ariel: Great! Put your spoiler blankets on, everybody, if you don't want all kinds of stuff given away about Star Trek: That Bald Guy Season Three! Or at least about the first three episodes. If you're reading this and there's already more than three episodes out, don't worry about your blanket because we haven't seen any past number three. Sash, since I kinda sorta hogged all the talking last time, I think you should go first now.
Sasha: Cool. Thanks!
Ariel: You're welcome!
Sasha: First, the good things. Okay, your turn!
Ariel: Well, but you didn't say any good things.
Sasha: Exactly.
Ariel: Oh my gosh, come on. It wasn't that bad!
Sasha: Yeah, I know, I was mostly just trying to be funny.
Ariel: Haha, I get it now. But, so, was there something you thought was good?
Sasha: I liked that Captain Pshaw was a big jerk-bag but was basically right about everything he said and did. Except the part where he didn't immediately have Commander Face-Accessory confined to quarters and the part later on where he didn't immediately have Admiral Bald Guy and Captain Smugbeard put in the brig after he rescued them.
Ariel: Well he wasn't right about always calling Commander Face-Accessory by her wrong name instead of her number name.
Sasha: That's true. Especially since if he wanted to be a jerk-bag about what he called her, he could have called her Commander Of Nine.
Ariel: Or even just "Number One" since that would be totally accurate for her position but also kind of jerk-baggy because her real number is seven.
Sasha: Ooh, that would have been good.
Ariel: But seriously, you liked him?
Sasha: I liked that he was treating Admiral Bald Guy and Smugbeard like dumb-asses, because they were being so dumb-assy.
Ariel: There is a lot of dumb-assery in this show for sure.
Sasha: "Hi, Captain Pshaw! We're coming on board to do a surprise inspection of your maiden voyage. Don't mind us, we're not trying to undermine you during your big moment or get in the way or anything. You'll hardly notice we're here. Oh, and could you turn the ship in the exact opposite direction of where you're going on your maiden voyage so we can visit this completely other place for no particular reason?"
Ariel: Like, why were they surprised when he said no about that?
Sasha: Apparently because even though they both hate being made to do things they don't want to do, they figured Pshaw would be fine with it, regardless of Smugbeard warning Bald Guy up front that Pshaw was a jerk-bag.
Ariel: Right? He was all, "Admiral, I know you said Doctor Crushher said, 'No Starfleet,' but since I'm a Starfleet guy and the first thing you did after she told you that was come to me, listen to this plan I've got that involves us getting on a Starfleet ship and making a super-high-profile entrance where every Starfleet person on board will be looking over their shoulders for us because we're supposedly doing a surprise Starfleet inspection. By the way, the Starfleet Captain of this Starfleet ship is a total sack of yark and could be trouble, but probably he won't say no to us and especially won't contact Starfleet and ask, 'Hey, are Bald Guy and Smugbeard really supposed to be inspecting this ship that was just refitted and therefore must have already had a bunch of major inspecting done on it?'"
Sasha: Exactly. And Bald Guy just shrugs and says, "Well, I've got absolutely no other ideas even though I know the galaxy like the back of my hand and have five or six decades worth of contacts who might be able to help us built up from my extremely long career. So sure, let's go with that, Smugbeard."
Ariel: And then the looks on their faces when Pshaw said no!
Sasha: Especially Smugbeard. His eyes got as big as a Starfleet starship saucer section and you could tell he was thinking, "Oh shit, I did not see that coming. Now we're totally fucked!"
Ariel: I have to admit, even though he was a jerk-bag about it, I did think Captain Pshaw was being totally reasonable in saying, "No, I won't do that."
Sasha: Even if he wasn't being reasonable, how could they not be ready with some sort of fallback plan? Because the looks on their faces said they didn't have a fallback plan.
Ariel: I guess maybe their fallback plan was to have their friend Commander Of Nine throw away her career committing mutiny by hijacking the ship to go where they wanted to go once Pshaw hit the sack for the night. And when she had just barely gotten that career back the year before!
Sasha: I honestly don't think it was a fallback plan. I think they just came up with that on the fly.
Ariel: Super-weird that it more or less worked, as long as they didn't mind the whole ruining-our-friend's-career thing.
Sasha: Anyway, long story short, since Captain Pshaw was the only one behaving like he had a lick of sense, obviously by episode three it was time for him to go.
Ariel: I could tell you were upset when that happened.
Sasha: Like I couldn't see it coming, though ... you'd have to be That Bald Guy or Smugbeard to not realize Pshaw was only there to be antagonizing to our legendary heroes, and once the actual bad guys show up, he was just in the way of the real characters being in charge of the ship and able to make their terrible decisions for everybody on board.
Ariel: Gosh. I mean ... I was surprised.
Sasha: Sure, but let's be honest, the main thing you work at predicting during shows is, will your popcorn hold out until it's over.
Ariel: That's true. If I don't pay attention, suddenly the show's only half over and I'm like, "What the -- where's all my popcorn?"
Sasha: Anyhow, I don't have high hopes for episodes four and up now that Pshaw conked his head and broke his leg.
Ariel: And they made sure to show the bone sticking out so we'd go, "Yuck! That's bad! I guess he's not coming back from sickbay anytime soon!"
Sasha: Which of course doesn't make any sense either since they could totally put some kind of "phase induction skeletal integrity" boot on his leg and hit him with some painkillers and he'd be good to go.
Ariel: Maybe they will!
Sasha: I'm not holding my breath. Anyhow ... were there things you liked about the season so far?
Ariel: Well ... I guess I did like Doctor Crushher a little better in this show than that similar character, Doctor Crusher in the Star Trek: That Not-bald Guy series. And she's played by a better actress. That lady from the old series stank.
Sasha: I'm pretty sure it's the same character and the same actress, Aers.
Ariel: Really? But I haven't noticed her doing anything really stupid in most of these episodes like she did in all the old show ones, and the actress actually changes her facial expression sometimes and doesn't talk like she's been sipping too much of sickbay's Nyquil supply.
Sasha: Yes, but she's literally had thirty years to up her acting game. Maybe she took some lessons.
Ariel: Hmm. Now that I know it's the same lady, I feel like I like her less again.
Sasha: Sorry to spoil that for you.
Ariel: Now that I think about it, she did reveal in that one scene that even though she knew That Bald Guy didn't want kids and even though their relationship was on the rocks, she still had sex with him without any kind of protection and got pregnant and then decided to keep the kid and not tell him.
Sasha: Maybe she used protection but it just failed.
Ariel: Well then she's a terrible doctor, isn't she? I mean, she is supposed to know how this stuff works, and in the old show she was like, surprised one time when the captain had a headache because in the future they've totally cured headaches and the common cold. Have they really not figured out how to make the pill any more reliable?
Sasha: It does seem like if she wanted to be sure to not get pregnant because he didn't want kids, then she could make sure she didn't get pregnant.
Ariel: Exactly. With future medicine or something.
Sasha: Or maybe in the future there's a pill that works perfectly and also a pill for dudes that works perfectly, and both of them just assumed that the other one was taking the right pill, only neither of them was taking anything.
Ariel: I think that seems a lot like these two characters, actually. Anyway, I'm still going to call her Doctor Crushher instead of Doctor Crusher just because it's funnier.
Sasha: I honestly thought that was the whole reason you were saying it that way in the first place.
Ariel: I mean, it was a pretty big part of why.
Sasha: I will say, the title of that number three episode was really accurate, though.
Ariel: What do you mean?
Sasha: I mean, in the flashback scene at the start of the episode, Captain Smugbeard is telling Admiral Bald Guy about how there was a scare when his son was being born and it took him seventeen seconds to get to sick bay, and it was the longest seventeen seconds of his life.
Ariel: Right, and then later that same thing happened to Bald Guy when his grown-up son from pill-skipping Doctor Crushher was dying in sick bay. Even I predicted that. (Though I admit I only predicted it after I got seconds on popcorn and my bowl was super-full so I could pay more attention to the show.) But is being predictable the same thing as being accurate?
Sasha: No, what I meant was, pretty much every seventeen seconds watching this show, I was thinking, "Well that was the longest seventeen seconds of my life."
Ariel: Haha! You have to admit, though, seventeen seconds of the TNG show was usually a lot longer feeling than seventeen seconds of TBG.
Sasha: Yeah, some of those TNG scenes you can pretty much hear the accountant saying, "Keep posing! We don't have any budget to do anything else this episode!"
Ariel: I can totally see why people who liked TNG seem to really like TBG.
Sasha: Yeah, they're bringing back all the same characters, but even if the story doesn't make any sense, at least a lot more happens scene to scene than in some of those TNG clunker episodes. It must feel especially action-packed for people who liked that show.
Ariel: Even if the action mostly results from bad decisions by our good guys.
Sasha: I'm definitely happy for all the people who are liking this show, and I'm glad for the people who make the show that there are people liking it. Even if I'm not one of those people.
Ariel: Wait, do you mean the people making the show or the people liking the show?
Sasha: Uh ... what? I'm not either one of them.
Ariel: Okay, I just wanted to make sure I knew which one of them you meant you weren't, and now I know it's both.
Sasha: Didn't you already know that, though?
Ariel: I knew you're not either of them, but I didn't know you meant you weren't either of them.
Sasha: Uh-huh.
Ariel: I feel like its feeling like maybe we should wrap this one up.
Sasha: I feel like your feeling is probably right.
Ariel and Sasha: Bye, everybody!
Sasha: Let's not even talk about it. Just tell everybody to put their spoiler blankets on and then we can jump right in.
Ariel: Great! Put your spoiler blankets on, everybody, if you don't want all kinds of stuff given away about Star Trek: That Bald Guy Season Three! Or at least about the first three episodes. If you're reading this and there's already more than three episodes out, don't worry about your blanket because we haven't seen any past number three. Sash, since I kinda sorta hogged all the talking last time, I think you should go first now.
Sasha: Cool. Thanks!
Ariel: You're welcome!
Sasha: First, the good things. Okay, your turn!
Ariel: Well, but you didn't say any good things.
Sasha: Exactly.
Ariel: Oh my gosh, come on. It wasn't that bad!
Sasha: Yeah, I know, I was mostly just trying to be funny.
Ariel: Haha, I get it now. But, so, was there something you thought was good?
Sasha: I liked that Captain Pshaw was a big jerk-bag but was basically right about everything he said and did. Except the part where he didn't immediately have Commander Face-Accessory confined to quarters and the part later on where he didn't immediately have Admiral Bald Guy and Captain Smugbeard put in the brig after he rescued them.
Ariel: Well he wasn't right about always calling Commander Face-Accessory by her wrong name instead of her number name.
Sasha: That's true. Especially since if he wanted to be a jerk-bag about what he called her, he could have called her Commander Of Nine.
Ariel: Or even just "Number One" since that would be totally accurate for her position but also kind of jerk-baggy because her real number is seven.
Sasha: Ooh, that would have been good.
Ariel: But seriously, you liked him?
Sasha: I liked that he was treating Admiral Bald Guy and Smugbeard like dumb-asses, because they were being so dumb-assy.
Ariel: There is a lot of dumb-assery in this show for sure.
Sasha: "Hi, Captain Pshaw! We're coming on board to do a surprise inspection of your maiden voyage. Don't mind us, we're not trying to undermine you during your big moment or get in the way or anything. You'll hardly notice we're here. Oh, and could you turn the ship in the exact opposite direction of where you're going on your maiden voyage so we can visit this completely other place for no particular reason?"
Ariel: Like, why were they surprised when he said no about that?
Sasha: Apparently because even though they both hate being made to do things they don't want to do, they figured Pshaw would be fine with it, regardless of Smugbeard warning Bald Guy up front that Pshaw was a jerk-bag.
Ariel: Right? He was all, "Admiral, I know you said Doctor Crushher said, 'No Starfleet,' but since I'm a Starfleet guy and the first thing you did after she told you that was come to me, listen to this plan I've got that involves us getting on a Starfleet ship and making a super-high-profile entrance where every Starfleet person on board will be looking over their shoulders for us because we're supposedly doing a surprise Starfleet inspection. By the way, the Starfleet Captain of this Starfleet ship is a total sack of yark and could be trouble, but probably he won't say no to us and especially won't contact Starfleet and ask, 'Hey, are Bald Guy and Smugbeard really supposed to be inspecting this ship that was just refitted and therefore must have already had a bunch of major inspecting done on it?'"
Sasha: Exactly. And Bald Guy just shrugs and says, "Well, I've got absolutely no other ideas even though I know the galaxy like the back of my hand and have five or six decades worth of contacts who might be able to help us built up from my extremely long career. So sure, let's go with that, Smugbeard."
Ariel: And then the looks on their faces when Pshaw said no!
Sasha: Especially Smugbeard. His eyes got as big as a Starfleet starship saucer section and you could tell he was thinking, "Oh shit, I did not see that coming. Now we're totally fucked!"
Ariel: I have to admit, even though he was a jerk-bag about it, I did think Captain Pshaw was being totally reasonable in saying, "No, I won't do that."
Sasha: Even if he wasn't being reasonable, how could they not be ready with some sort of fallback plan? Because the looks on their faces said they didn't have a fallback plan.
Ariel: I guess maybe their fallback plan was to have their friend Commander Of Nine throw away her career committing mutiny by hijacking the ship to go where they wanted to go once Pshaw hit the sack for the night. And when she had just barely gotten that career back the year before!
Sasha: I honestly don't think it was a fallback plan. I think they just came up with that on the fly.
Ariel: Super-weird that it more or less worked, as long as they didn't mind the whole ruining-our-friend's-career thing.
Sasha: Anyway, long story short, since Captain Pshaw was the only one behaving like he had a lick of sense, obviously by episode three it was time for him to go.
Ariel: I could tell you were upset when that happened.
Sasha: Like I couldn't see it coming, though ... you'd have to be That Bald Guy or Smugbeard to not realize Pshaw was only there to be antagonizing to our legendary heroes, and once the actual bad guys show up, he was just in the way of the real characters being in charge of the ship and able to make their terrible decisions for everybody on board.
Ariel: Gosh. I mean ... I was surprised.
Sasha: Sure, but let's be honest, the main thing you work at predicting during shows is, will your popcorn hold out until it's over.
Ariel: That's true. If I don't pay attention, suddenly the show's only half over and I'm like, "What the -- where's all my popcorn?"
Sasha: Anyhow, I don't have high hopes for episodes four and up now that Pshaw conked his head and broke his leg.
Ariel: And they made sure to show the bone sticking out so we'd go, "Yuck! That's bad! I guess he's not coming back from sickbay anytime soon!"
Sasha: Which of course doesn't make any sense either since they could totally put some kind of "phase induction skeletal integrity" boot on his leg and hit him with some painkillers and he'd be good to go.
Ariel: Maybe they will!
Sasha: I'm not holding my breath. Anyhow ... were there things you liked about the season so far?
Ariel: Well ... I guess I did like Doctor Crushher a little better in this show than that similar character, Doctor Crusher in the Star Trek: That Not-bald Guy series. And she's played by a better actress. That lady from the old series stank.
Sasha: I'm pretty sure it's the same character and the same actress, Aers.
Ariel: Really? But I haven't noticed her doing anything really stupid in most of these episodes like she did in all the old show ones, and the actress actually changes her facial expression sometimes and doesn't talk like she's been sipping too much of sickbay's Nyquil supply.
Sasha: Yes, but she's literally had thirty years to up her acting game. Maybe she took some lessons.
Ariel: Hmm. Now that I know it's the same lady, I feel like I like her less again.
Sasha: Sorry to spoil that for you.
Ariel: Now that I think about it, she did reveal in that one scene that even though she knew That Bald Guy didn't want kids and even though their relationship was on the rocks, she still had sex with him without any kind of protection and got pregnant and then decided to keep the kid and not tell him.
Sasha: Maybe she used protection but it just failed.
Ariel: Well then she's a terrible doctor, isn't she? I mean, she is supposed to know how this stuff works, and in the old show she was like, surprised one time when the captain had a headache because in the future they've totally cured headaches and the common cold. Have they really not figured out how to make the pill any more reliable?
Sasha: It does seem like if she wanted to be sure to not get pregnant because he didn't want kids, then she could make sure she didn't get pregnant.
Ariel: Exactly. With future medicine or something.
Sasha: Or maybe in the future there's a pill that works perfectly and also a pill for dudes that works perfectly, and both of them just assumed that the other one was taking the right pill, only neither of them was taking anything.
Ariel: I think that seems a lot like these two characters, actually. Anyway, I'm still going to call her Doctor Crushher instead of Doctor Crusher just because it's funnier.
Sasha: I honestly thought that was the whole reason you were saying it that way in the first place.
Ariel: I mean, it was a pretty big part of why.
Sasha: I will say, the title of that number three episode was really accurate, though.
Ariel: What do you mean?
Sasha: I mean, in the flashback scene at the start of the episode, Captain Smugbeard is telling Admiral Bald Guy about how there was a scare when his son was being born and it took him seventeen seconds to get to sick bay, and it was the longest seventeen seconds of his life.
Ariel: Right, and then later that same thing happened to Bald Guy when his grown-up son from pill-skipping Doctor Crushher was dying in sick bay. Even I predicted that. (Though I admit I only predicted it after I got seconds on popcorn and my bowl was super-full so I could pay more attention to the show.) But is being predictable the same thing as being accurate?
Sasha: No, what I meant was, pretty much every seventeen seconds watching this show, I was thinking, "Well that was the longest seventeen seconds of my life."
Ariel: Haha! You have to admit, though, seventeen seconds of the TNG show was usually a lot longer feeling than seventeen seconds of TBG.
Sasha: Yeah, some of those TNG scenes you can pretty much hear the accountant saying, "Keep posing! We don't have any budget to do anything else this episode!"
Ariel: I can totally see why people who liked TNG seem to really like TBG.
Sasha: Yeah, they're bringing back all the same characters, but even if the story doesn't make any sense, at least a lot more happens scene to scene than in some of those TNG clunker episodes. It must feel especially action-packed for people who liked that show.
Ariel: Even if the action mostly results from bad decisions by our good guys.
Sasha: I'm definitely happy for all the people who are liking this show, and I'm glad for the people who make the show that there are people liking it. Even if I'm not one of those people.
Ariel: Wait, do you mean the people making the show or the people liking the show?
Sasha: Uh ... what? I'm not either one of them.
Ariel: Okay, I just wanted to make sure I knew which one of them you meant you weren't, and now I know it's both.
Sasha: Didn't you already know that, though?
Ariel: I knew you're not either of them, but I didn't know you meant you weren't either of them.
Sasha: Uh-huh.
Ariel: I feel like its feeling like maybe we should wrap this one up.
Sasha: I feel like your feeling is probably right.
Ariel and Sasha: Bye, everybody!
