Galaxy's Child, Gallifrey Gals Get Warped! S4Ep16

Both of you are incredibly brave, sharing all the things isn't easy. If I ever get the opportunity to meet you in person, there are some quality hugs coming your way (with your consent of course)!!

Carrie Schwent

Skipping eps that make you uncomfortable is totally valid. I hope yall do DS9 in the future.

Ashley

My church college period, it was discouraged to be friends between genders. I usually was more comfortable with female friends than male, and most of the time could keep it as only friends, and if not I respected the no, though often my friendship was seen as crush when I really didn't. But the lack of friendship made it difficult to understand everything my girlfriends felt. We felt like only romance or sex could be possible between genders. It resulted in many regrets. And recognizing when I needed to walk away because of my mistakes. I've pushed when I shouldn't, and have been pushed when I didn't want to... And I've seen much worse, and came really close to Ending someone that hurt a friend... Absolute respect for this discussion, I Listened to the whole thing. (That was disjointed, tried to fix, but still... tough to express everything, but not everything...)

Dan Williams

One of my favs.

Dan Williams

Superb after-episode discussion. But I'm gonna chime in with one teensy-weensy little quibble with Paula's assertion that "Society teaches women to put a man's feelings first". Whenever seriously mulling over the ol' Nature vs. Nurture debate, I have discovered that Nature is smarter than Nurture. It's not "Society" that makes men aggressive and women accommodating. Nature, not Nurture, is what makes men men, and women women. Personal story follows: On my first date with my ex (we were never actually married, but I still, to this day, call her "my ex" because she was my longest years-long co-habiting relationship, and my friends know who I'm talking about), we had sex. We'd met at work, hit it off, went on a date to a big party at a friend's house, and ended up back at my condo. (Just to set the picture: She wasn't a "looker". You might even call her a "Plain Jane". But she had a sharp wit, and we bantered beautifully) I put on my "smooth moves" (as smooth as a 20-something's moves can be). And, as we, shall we say, "sank" into love, I noticed a strange almost blank-yet-concerned look on her face. I can only surmise that, at the time, I tried to think nothing of it. But it struck me so much that I remembered it the next morning when she asked me if I knew what "date rape" was. I'd never heard the phrase before. Was she asking me this because she just wants to make conversation, or is something bothering her? I took a guess at what she was getting at, and it horrified me. I'd assumed, at the time (and ever since), that we'd had sex on our first date because she was afraid of saying "no" -- that she was worried that saying "no" might lead to violence. NOW, for the first time in over 30 years, I'm re-thinking my assumption. Was she, in fact, "giving in" to sex on the first date because she was, as Paula said, "putting a man's feelings before" her own? I mean, if she were about to take a bite of a juicy prime rib steak, medium rare, with fried onions in the au jus, hauntingly clinging to the end of her dinner fork, and I said "Can you please pass the salt?", would she have taken the bite first? Or, would she have deferred the bite, to accommodate me, and put the fork down to pass the salt? Maybe that's a silly analogy, but that's why it's so apt to this discussion.

Robert Jones

I’m glad I didn’t skip this one. If it gives you any hope I was a “Nice Guy” in my teens and it was the women and non-binary people in my life saying things like what you said here that changed that. I really hope to teach my godson to be better then I was.

Tegan

Very strong and important conversation. When I was young and first watching this episode on reruns it felt like it was meant to be dashed expectations, or the fantasy not living up to reality. The older I get and the more we understand this warped "nice guy" narrative the harder it is to stomach this arc. Women everywhere have it rough the majority of their lives. And so much of culture, and culture commissioned/ written and promoted by mostly men, has done us all so dirty in upholding and maintaining horrific tropes and expectations. One that comes to mind is the "chase/ realisation" that is in so many rom-coms, that a mad emotional crescendo must propell the characters together. Often when it is a woman she's clumsy or seems a little crazy, when its men they literally jump through airport security, cause accidents, crash weddings and gaslight and twist all the events in one big monologue... life does not play out like fantasy.

Hugo Fitzpatrick

I want a calzone.

Pirateman

Thank you for being open, honest, and sharing with us. Especially via the internet which introduces many problems and even serious dangers, as well as it's plentiful bounties - such as this.

Pirateman

Great breakdown. Those are such great suggestions for parts I wish I could have seen, to add to Picards scene with the unintended murder of the alien. The excellent Space Calzone story was reduced to a footnote to make way for a terrible implementation of an implications of Holodeck technology story.

Pirateman

I 'GET' it... buuuut it doesn't really effect you much if it all does it? Whereas it directly and greatly effects the Gal Gals who have a visceral experience in their lives and which is triggered by this show, that have gone to the trouble of sharing that; and then have stuff directed at them, whether it's your innocuous opinion or awful attacks. Sooo I guess its a question you have to ask yourself of which is more important to you - their reactions or your ability to say whatever you want to here - you seem to have made the choice that because you don't have the latter, you don't want the former. That's your choice to make, and the Gal Gals definitely aren't owed your money (or time), but it seems to me like its really just punishing yourself. Unless their reactions were a thing you didn't 'really' want anyway? And so the commenting on this particular issue in this particular place and time doesn't really matter either. In which case it's pretty much win-win isn't it?

Pirateman

*Tips my VISOR*

Pirateman

SPICY ENERGY.

Pirateman

I'm sorry for everyone that effect the episode in a bad way. I never skip an episode. I watch the hole of star trek every year (now over 800 episodes). I think one kind of storytelling is to show us what is wrong, so I learned my lesson.

Redjac

So…….., I’m just going to keep my opinions to myself. On we go with the rest of the series.

Andrew Hogan

Bye we shall miss you so much

Steven morgan

Hit the nail right on the head. This episode had so much potential that was squandered in the service of a badly written subplot.

Jeff Seely

I feel that, I'll admit that being unable to express thoughts on essentially half of the episode's plot is hard, not that I disagree with what was said and such, but more so my own thoughts on that particular aspect of the episode. There's not really much to talk about regarding the space baby side of things, it was really the minor plot of the episode I feel.

Chrissonator

The Ferengi in general are meant as caricatures of humanity. They often embody the worst aspects of greed, capitalism, selfishness, sexism, cowardice and general amorality. Quark himself does shed the worst of these aspects over time and with exposure to the federation, but not completely. He is a product of his society, as we all are, for good or bad.

John Welch

Hopefully not. I find them very distracting. Closed captioning, where they can be toggled on and off, would be preferable, although I don’t know if the hosting service they use for the Patreon edits supports it.

Artemis Zeidman

I am currently working on cc for the episodes, hopefully I’ll get it worked out soon!

Time Lord

I’ll limit discussion, per your previous request. I just want to thank Paula and Katrina for sharing. On a technical note, is there any way you can switch to closed captioning, so the captions can be toggled on and off? If there are subscribers who need captions as an accommodation, I don’t want them to not be able to participate, so if the only options are no captions and open captions, I’ll make due the best I can so they’re not excluded. Generally, however, I find captions to be extraordinarily distracting (to the point where I can’t even pay attention to what’s going on), and closed captioning would allow those who need captions to utilize them and those who don’t to shut them off. It wasn’t so bad when you were just captioning the episode’s dialogue, but actively trying to ignore captions over three parts of the screen is a lot for me.

Matthew Zeidman

Exactly, Quark is not human. He can't be judged in human terms. His people feel the same about humanity, but they try to live together in some sort of peace. Isn't that what this show is about?

Mark Chrisco

Love your reactions, as always. If we can't see the faults and missteps in the things we love, I don't think we can consider ourselves real fans. This episode has never been a favorite of mine. As I revisited it with you, I realized why. I think they had a great idea with the alien child story. It's a shame that they couldn't find a way to expand that to a full episode. More conversations on the situation and what had to be a huge scientific occasion would have been great. They literally found new life and a new civilization and it was reduced so much for a poorly-written Geordi story. We could have gotten a Picard/Guinan conversation about space and life, the emotion of mistakes that lead to death (Riker, Worf), thoughts on a baby left without a parent (Crusher), and the nature of life and our human need to nurture (Data). The Geordi/Leah angle should have been them trying to figure out how to use energy to communicate with the child, and as a result, learn to better communicate honestly with each other. There was so much better writing that could have made this a great episode, without the poor Geordi plot.

DC

I think also in regards to Quark, it helps a bit that he's kind of cartoony and not particularly malevolent. He's more of a scoundrel, and it certainly helps that Armin was charming in the role, but it's definitely a case of YMMV.

Chris Neumann

To Everyone that is having trouble with the fact that the Gals asked you to please not discuss a plot line in today's episode that caused a major emotional trigger moment. We ask you this out of a courtesy and consideration for another person. We are not trying to silence anyone or tell you what to think. The Gals clearly express how they felt about this episode and the reaction it caused. If you have a problem and need to tell us how we should feel or what we don't want to talk about please take a moment to self-reflect. These reactions are in the moment reactions. We do not censor ourselves. If you are not happy to be here, then don't. It's as simple as that. When someone asks to not talk about something, remember it's not about you, it's about them setting boundaries to protect themselves. -GG Producer

Time Lord

One more thing before my membership expires in a little bit...I don't think it's very right to spend so much time talking about something only to then set a rule that no one who's paying to be here is allow to comment on your conversation or the topic that is integral to the episode. It's kind of a, "we can have our opinions and we want you to pay to hear them but you're not allowed to voice your own." I don't think it's right...I don't think I'm alone in that...and I really hope you guys figures some of this stuff out.

Brandon Scott

That edit is on YouTube. <3

Firefly24601

I've skipped this episode of TNG for a long time and was not in a good mindset to watch it today. But I'm really glad I went and listened to the discussion after. Thank you both for sharing <3

Sythurizm

They could have stuck with the Alien Calzone... We'll call them the Calzonians haha.... Anyway they could have left it at that and the episode would have been better.

Jonathan Emery

This would have been a way different episode if it had been Reg that had fallen for Leah on the holo deck.

Brett Delbridge

I like calzones, too.

Joshua Gosdin

Talk about the hard things, because you know what, the hard things need to be fucking talked about.....also don't talk about the hard part of this episode.

Verteron

Well, to be fair, Quark was very much a product of his own society to begin with.

Chrissonator

Space Calzone baby: I do like the completely understandable reaction when they accidentally killed the mother. Frakes and Stewart's acting was really something for that brief moment.

Chris Lane- Venturi 3D

it was asked NOT to be discussed in the comments

Chris Lane- Venturi 3D

I feel uncomfortable even at the thought of watching this one, knowing what we know and knowing from past reactions Katrina has had. Maybe if I'm in the proper mindset I could do it, but ugh this one is beyond cringe. I need an edit that's just the space baby plot and nothing else, somehow.

Jarrod Wild

Right, and in that one Geordi blew it off as something he knew to forgot about and not take too seriously. "I fell in love in there once" doesn't sound like someone who was still thinking about it like he is here.

Joe Concepts

I'll echo someone else in here about Quark concerns. Paula is gonna have to warn and work real hard to get Katrina to preemptively look past his retrospectively-regrettable greasiness. If you can write it up as "the times" and look past it, and remember they are written mockingly rather than advocatingly, the DS9 Ferengi are great fun.

JXTN

I get the sense when you were worried the audience would respond poorly to your complaints. II don't know how it is on youtube but I think here it's pretty universally agreed these days that Geordi is a big gross fuck in this episode, haha. Is that visor secretly a 24th century space fedora?

JXTN

Remember when Geordi was giving Barclay shit about the holoedeck?

JXTN

As someone who will continue to be a subscriber, I will just say... Thank you!

Antonio

I've only watched this episode the once,and that was getting on for 30 years ago! I have watched most of TNG over again since then,but significantly NOT this episode. Nonetheless,I'm so glad it hasn't put you off Geordi - he's a very decent sort,and (for the most part) an entirely admirable character. Ok - move on to next week!

Ian Smith

I’ll just say I always skip this episode and leave it at that.

R. Chang

👏👏👏

Mark Steckel

I enjoy the subtitles, thank you!

Jason Faria

The way the Geordi is written just feels off. Putting aside the 'relationship' story, we are asked to believe he never checked up on Leah, never found out about the real person, never tried to reach out before to discuss their work. He's the Chief Engineer of the Federation Flagship, a vessel she basically designed, but never once checked in with any of the designers. This does Geordi's character a disservice by saying he's bad at his job and also, personally, a creep. LeVar has gone on record saying he felt the writers just never had a handle on his character, especially with interpersonal relationships.

Daniel Deeks

I'm getting a chuckle out of Geordi's name being misspelled in Paula's subtitles but correct on Kat's, as that's how she said she thinks his name is before she corrects herself in the past. It's a very funny subtle gag and I appreciate very much. I also always initially misspell it like he's from Newcastle, UK, instead of space (Geordie).

Kirk Deighton

Yeeeeahhhh. As much as I know Kat'll love some of the characters in DS9... I was thinking about the final line of the pilot episode and realized how much she'll HATE Quark. Back then he was on the darker side of gray, but since the cultural shifts our society has gone through, he's very much fallen out of that gray bit, one could argue. A couple other characters in that show also skid a bit too. As for this, it's always a treat to encounter space-living creatures. What a totally alien existence. Humans can live for what, 40 seconds in the vacuum of space? Can you imagine being able to LIVE in that? Word of warning, That part of the episode does get reference later, and Brahms gets brought up in the finale for a line. Spoiler, maybe, but I'd prefer you guys NOT get blindsided by them. If I squint I can see an allegory in here about parasocial relationships and expectation vs reality, but no, even then it was totally bungled. That alien baby wasn't the only thing acting like a parasite and draining others of energy...

Nolan

Wow, thank you for you thoughts. I have been there before. I never discussed it with my friends I didn't know how, Just thank you.

e com

Erm... have you read about some of Roddenberry's attitudes towards women? Don't get me wrong, the man had a great view on what *humanity* could be. Better than himself, I think even he would admit, but he was also not... great on that front. Majel did start out as the mistress in his first marriage, after all... Not that Berman wasn't also without his faults. He was very much a studio man more concerned with the bottom dollar and making sure the shows made bank than he was at pushing the Roddenberry idealism further than it was than when he got it. I mean, I think he did great at maintaining it once he got it, even though he didn't understand it, but he didn't push it forward beyond what he inherited too much either, mired as he was in some of the the more toxic ideals of the 90s which he refused, or didn't see the need to question.

Nolan

I like em But they're very inaccurate hehe sometimes very humorously so :-)

FalcorDragon

Paula I agree with you that some of the men running Trek were not forward thinking visionaries when it came to the portrayal of women and relationships. Roddenberry, Maurice Hurley and Rick Berman have all been accused of varying levels of either insensitivity or just flat out misogyny. In most tv shows from over 30 years ago it would be almost archaically amusing, like "look what idiots we were back then" but in Star Trek it is especially disappointing because the series always tended to be more forward thinking and ahead of it's time on social issues. I have to echo somebody else's comments here and say that I hope this doesn't stop the Gallifrey Gals from reacting to DS9 and other Trek series down the line. I believe instead of ignoring or avoiding these faults in Trek culture and history you should do what you did here... call them out and speak about them honestly and passionately. I know it can get personal and raw at times but I think majority of your patreon supporters are supportive and understanding. But of course your emotional wellbeing must always come first. I can only repeat that from my point of view you two were a MAJOR part in my recent medical recovery and I will support this channel as long and as far as you want to take it.

John Welch

For me, it’s mostly been appreciating and understanding different stories better. When I was younger, an episode like “the inner light” would’ve been boring to me but now it’s one of my favorites. It’s cool when your appreciation of a favorite show changes with time.

Brian Hakala

Its true Levar Burton has expressed his "disappointment" with this episode. From what I hear, the writers and producers who followed, were as well.

Mark Chrisco

Whatever else happened in the episode, the title sequence reaction is a winner.

Gjermund Higraff

I need therapy

Adam Brown

It really is something with rewatching TV from the 1990s, a decade which is now 25-30 years behind us. While people don't *look* that much different than they do today (compare 1995 to 2020, then compare 1970 to 1995 to see what I mean), cultural attitudes have shifted markedly. It sneaks up on you on a year-to-year basis, but on a generational basis...wow!

Timothy Hennon

Being in Britain wouldn't be more of a space pasty? :-)

Bruce Bromley

I'm going to echo Steve Shives and ask whose dog did Levar Burton run over to have his character get saddled with some of the writing and plotlines he got over the run of this show, with this episode as one of the primary exhibits.

Timothy Hennon

They started them last week and separated them this week between Paula's and Kat's comments. Haven't heard of any detractors so I think it may stay.

Bruce Bromley

Jonathan Emery

What's the the subtitles on the top left and right of the screen? Is that something new we'll see going forward?

Dan Crucy

I like that we can acknowledge that enjoying a show doesn't mean you think everything about it is perfect.

Dan Crucy

I'm not really sure what to say about the subject at hand... like, I understand it, but can't personally relate to it as I've never been in that situation as the cause or the recipient, and I've never had a reaction to that aspect of the episode, as I always generally focused on the alien lifeform side of the episode. 🤔

Chrissonator

Not discussing the GL thing per se, because I fully agree with your assessment of it and you asked us not to. Just want to say that the idea of the holodeck per se set them up to try and discuss implications of what was possible or not with the technology. I think they – often – jumped to their (wrong or right, wrong in this case, right in others) conclusions instead of holding it more open. I think they often missed the chance to leave two sides in place. That "nice bow at the end"-thing is, for me, where Star Trek might be a tad simplistic compared to other SciFi.

Patrick Armbruster

Great reaction. I'm totally on board on your feelings about it. Kat don't go after Roddenberry too much. The true person you want to direct your ire at is executive producer Rick Berman. He was the one that kept the show in it's 20th century attitudes instead of exploring what the future could be..

Bruce Bromley

Even though I agree with what was said at the end, and this is one of the more uncomfortable Star Trek episodes, I feel that it will help a lot to not skip those DS9 episodes. As we can see from this one, there is a lot to talk about and learn, and they could end up doing more good in the future.

Emanuel

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maurice_Hurley "Hurley was blamed for the firing of Gates McFadden, who played the role of Dr. Beverly Crusher, at the end of the show's first season." Villain!

michael mccafferty

Maurice Hurley 🙄 wrote the teleplay for this one; doesn't surprise me.

Alexander Caldwell

If the alien baby plot was a Classic Who story, it would be called SPACE CALZONES OF DOOM!

Firefly24601

I hate this episode and I've hated the writing since I first saw it as a young kid. If it made a 12 year old feel creeped out there's something very wrong.

Josh G

God that stuff with La Forge was somehow way worse then I remember. Wtf was wrong with everyone who thought this was ok?

Mike

LeVar Burton hated that Geordi was a fedora lord too, if its any consolation. Also, as always, Katrina's sci-fi instincts are on point with the "spicy energy" quip.

Glen

Thank you for the reaction.

John

When I see this episode title my immediate reaction is "Oh cool! I don't remember what this one is about!" then 1 minute into the episode my reaction is "Oh... because I ALWAYS SKIP IT." I feel sorry for the calzone aliens who had to be in the episode.

Saucy

In terms of the 'Friend Zone' thing. I fully agree with what 'nice guys' can do and expect things. Geordi doesn't strike me as that type. (I think he's a better man then that.) I think he's bad with relationships, but I think it speaks more to having false expectations and living in time where you can end up in such a 'weird' situation. Where he ended up with Leah and liking the version of her he met on the holodeck (which wasn't an intentional thing) and what reality truly is. Where he believed he was meeting someone he had already 'met' when it wasn't real. More about expectations vs reality. But you are right on the 'friend zone' thing, and this holodeck thing is always so creepy!! Also those expectations not something he was demanding from Leah (which would Geordi an a-hole) but the expectations of believing she was someone she wasn't (and coming to terms with that) given how crazy technology is in their time.

Weapon26

For better or worse, watching this series my whole life has made me have different reactions and thoughts to several episodes as I get older and have more life experience. And no ones reactions are right or wrong.

Brian Hakala

About First Contact, even in 1991 they definitely would not have done that plot point about Riker and the alien woman if the genders were reversed. And somehow they were going for "funny" I guess. The "turned on by an alien" bit was funny at first, but not where it went to.

Joe Concepts

The only thing I would like to comment on was that I really felt that GL was written out of character here and was surprised this script was OK'ed as it was. I get it that they were trying to show it was wrong, but was instead at the least very awkward. When you have a large pool of writers it can be a good thing but also can wind up with too many variations of the characters and their traits. That's why you also need good editors. One of my favorite fiction authors was Robert Asprin, specifically his Myth Adventure series (until his passing and a coauthor took over). He had another series called Thieves' World where he had guest authors write stories based on his creation, but I couldn't get into it as the characters acted too differently from author to author. Anyway, karma is waiting for Mr. La Forge....

Henchman Twenty1

The stuff with the alien baby was an adequate story. But THAT was not the reason I never liked this episode. But, enough said.

Joe Concepts

And so, we now begin the 2nd half of the series....hopefully.

David Brown