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Speaker 2: Hello, and welcome to this episode of Superhero Ethics. Today,
Speaker 2: myself Matthew, my co host Riki, and returning guest Abby
Speaker 2: are gonna be talking about Section thirty one. What is
Speaker 2: this part of Starfleet? How does it fit into our
Speaker 2: understanding of Starfleet, How does it fit into our understanding
Speaker 2: of Gene Roddenberry's creation of star Trek and what was
Speaker 2: happening with a star Trek Section thirty one movie? And so,
Speaker 2: first of we just let folks introduce themselves and Abby,
Speaker 2: you want to say hello, Hi.
Speaker 6: I'm Abby. Pronounce er shethe awesome.
Speaker 2: Awesome Riky as always, you're joining us.
Speaker 7: Yes, I'm here mostly to be the cabbage head to
Speaker 7: you all. I'm familiar with like older star Trek, but
Speaker 7: I haven't really kept up and I haven't watched this movie,
Speaker 7: so I'm very curious to hear your thoughts on it well.
Speaker 2: And that's exactly why we wanted Riky on here, because
Speaker 2: we know in a lot of media, sometimes someone here
Speaker 2: hasn't a lot of the folks in the audience haven't
Speaker 2: seen the movie or haven't seen the TV show that
Speaker 2: we're talking about, and we do want to make sure
Speaker 2: we're focusing on issues and the questions, not just like
Speaker 2: a review of the movie, but we want to make
Speaker 2: sure that we're saying enough to help the the people
Speaker 2: who haven't seen it follow the discussion. So originally we
Speaker 2: thought this was going to be an envy that was
Speaker 2: going to spark a lot of discussion about section thirty one,
Speaker 2: and thus having Riki here who hadn't seen the movie
Speaker 2: would be great. As it turns out, the movie was
Speaker 2: quite awful, like.
Speaker 6: It's a wonder statement, oh dear.
Speaker 2: Some people have enjoyed it just as an action like
Speaker 2: spy adventure movie. I thought, even as that it was
Speaker 2: pretty terrible, but it is absolutely not a like when
Speaker 2: I heard this movie was gonna exist, I thought it
Speaker 2: was going to be about people in Section thirty one
Speaker 2: and why do they exist in their conflict with like
Speaker 2: you know, cause we've seen a lot of like Picard
Speaker 2: or Discovery or DS nine, those people having to come
Speaker 2: up against Section thirty one and not be sure if
Speaker 2: it shouldn't exist or not. And I want to see
Speaker 2: a movie that was all of that from the other side.
Speaker 2: We don't get that. We get a movie that's just
Speaker 2: thirty one, which I was playing in a second who
Speaker 2: they are having an adventure in space with as many
Speaker 2: bad sexual innuendo jokes as you can make, which normally
Speaker 2: I love, but.
Speaker 8: A Star Trek it was a lot not though Star
Speaker 8: Trek is sexy, like it's sexy, like not just like.
Speaker 6: The characters and stuff, but like they are. There's so
Speaker 6: many episodes of both the original and of TG where
Speaker 6: they just like go to some random planet and screw.
Speaker 2: Sure. Yeah, but the window part felt weird, it felt new,
Speaker 2: but yeah, it just it was just not a very
Speaker 2: good movie, and it didn't really introduce the topic of
Speaker 2: Section thirty one very well. So we're going to actually
Speaker 2: talk mostly about Section thirty one itself, and so here's
Speaker 2: what the movie, Yeah, exactly, well, because these questions haven't
Speaker 2: raised by other things. So Abby, let me start with you,
Speaker 2: what is your understanding of what is section thirty one?
Speaker 6: So from my understanding, section thirty one is kind of
Speaker 6: like the CIA of Starfleet or the Federation. They are
Speaker 6: the spies who are pulling the strings and doing the
Speaker 6: things that the Federation won't do.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's the perfect way to put it.
Speaker 2: It gets compared to the Obsidian Order of the Kardassians
Speaker 2: or of the Tashiak of the Romulans Tashi a thank you,
Speaker 2: which are often presented as like, oh, we are so
Speaker 2: much better because we don't have those things. But in
Speaker 2: a number of episodes we've learned no star Trek has
Speaker 2: this group as well, and it's been explored in DS
Speaker 2: nine is when it first got started, in the episode
Speaker 2: called Inquisition, but we've also seen in Discovery, in Picard
Speaker 2: in a number of other shows acting as though it
Speaker 2: has an agenda for the good of Starfleet. But that's
Speaker 2: very much like the CIA, kind of like we're gonna
Speaker 2: do back room assassinations and secret deals with terrible people
Speaker 2: and all these things in order to do what we
Speaker 2: think is for the best, but with no accountability.
Speaker 7: Yeah, the CIA comparison, I've seen that made, and I
Speaker 7: think it's fair because you have this organization that is
Speaker 7: carrying out like assassinations, presumably torture, and like genetic experiments,
Speaker 7: which are otherwise illegal, so they're doing things that are illegal.
Speaker 7: What's interesting in comparison to the CIA is that the
Speaker 7: CIA is still a legal, outfront branch of a government agency,
Speaker 7: right and Starfleet does have Starfleet Intelligence, which is like
Speaker 7: spies and stuff who you know, do intelligence work. So
Speaker 7: Section thirty one goes beyond that into a different territory
Speaker 7: and it various points. The implication is that a lot
Speaker 7: of people in the Federation don't even know about Section
Speaker 7: thirty one. So that's where the comparison to the CIA
Speaker 7: kind of breaks down. In my opinion, is that there
Speaker 7: seems to be less accountability for Section thirty one. You know,
Speaker 7: we could argue that there's not great accountability for the CIA,
Speaker 7: but there's supposed to be.
Speaker 6: Do you think it's more fair to say that this
Speaker 6: is like that Section thirty one is kind of like
Speaker 6: the arm of the CIA that does like the assassinations
Speaker 6: and the backroom cups.
Speaker 2: Yeah, like if you think about the what I'm trying
Speaker 2: to think of, like, yeah, a real comparison to that,
Speaker 2: because certainly the CIA does a lot of things, so
Speaker 2: does the NSA. But do you think that there's like
Speaker 2: I mean, it's always more like the Men in Black
Speaker 2: or something like that. Like think of some sort of
Speaker 2: like shadowy secret organization that most of the government denies.
Speaker 2: You know, that's that's Nati, Yes, Illunati. It's the Kingsman.
Speaker 2: It's the like whatever.
Speaker 7: I don't okay, I thought about this, Matthew. I don't
Speaker 7: think the Kingsman is technically a government agency. I believe
Speaker 7: it's privately funded.
Speaker 2: I just rewatched started as a government agent, if I remember,
Speaker 2: it started as a group founded by Queen Victoria or
Speaker 2: one of the kings. But you are correct, it does
Speaker 2: become its own like privately spun off thing.
Speaker 7: But I thought it was like rich people who yes,
Speaker 7: do have connections to government, like the rich barons of
Speaker 7: the time were like, we need something.
Speaker 2: So that's not the best example, but either way, yeah,
Speaker 2: it is this and I think a lot of times
Speaker 2: it's been presented as an antagonist to the story, and
Speaker 2: in Discovery it provides more of a you know, partnership
Speaker 2: role to some of our characters, but it's always presented
Speaker 2: as the group that's willing to cut the corners that
Speaker 2: Starfleet wouldn't normally accept. And do you remember what exactly
Speaker 2: what the role they play is in in Inquisition.
Speaker 7: That was the first episode, So they're the Sloane the
Speaker 7: character Sloane is the agent. I believe he was trying
Speaker 7: to recruit doctor Bashir, or in fact, he is accusing
Speaker 7: doctor Basher of being a spy for like the dominion.
Speaker 2: Oh yes, that's right.
Speaker 7: In doing so, like, he runs him through a series
Speaker 7: of Holidax simulations that I think Bashir thinks are real
Speaker 7: at some point to try to get him to admit
Speaker 7: that he's an agent. And when he finally like admits
Speaker 7: that he isn't, or like proves that he isn't, then
Speaker 7: Sloan is like, yeah, but I just wanted to make
Speaker 7: sure because I actually want to recruit you to be
Speaker 7: a part of Section thirty one.
Speaker 2: Right, I think, And then and he's pretty upset about this.
Speaker 7: Yeah, And then there's the interesting episode where Sloan and
Speaker 7: Bashir travel to Romulus in order to do some spying
Speaker 7: slash assassinating, slash manipulating of the Romulin governments, which that
Speaker 7: one was one of my favorite episodes DS nine because
Speaker 7: there's so much backstabbing and like not knowing like what's
Speaker 7: real and whose loyalties are where going on? Like that
Speaker 7: was a really good, like spy episode.
Speaker 2: Well it's funny too, because the episode I have to
Speaker 2: remind myself that probably my favorite episode of DS nine,
Speaker 2: A lot of feel's favorite episode in the Pale Moonlight
Speaker 2: actually has nothing to do with Section thirty one, because
Speaker 2: this is the episode where Cisco winds up working with
Speaker 2: not Galen what's the name of the Credassian Taylor, Derek, Dererik, thank.
Speaker 7: You find simple.
Speaker 2: Garrick winds up working the two of them work together
Speaker 2: to basically bring the Romulins into the war with the Dominion,
Speaker 2: and it winds up involving the killing of a Romulan
Speaker 2: and then framing the Dominion for doing it to get
Speaker 2: the Romuin involved. And I've always thought like, like, if
Speaker 2: I don't think about it, I always think like, oh,
Speaker 2: Section thirty one must have been involved they were. They
Speaker 2: weren't mentioned that episode at all, but I feel like
Speaker 2: it's the kind of thing where Section thirty one found
Speaker 2: out about it, they'd be like, yeah, maybe we should
Speaker 2: recruit Benjamin, like he could be one to find.
Speaker 7: Yeah, the episode I was referencing, the title is this
Speaker 7: is Latin I believe inter Arma nm celent legs, which
Speaker 7: translates to in times of war, the law falls silent,
Speaker 7: which is a fascinating phrase and goes to like what
Speaker 7: the ethos of Section thirty one is. And my favorite
Speaker 7: part about this episode is that Section thirty one assassinates
Speaker 7: a pro Federation Romulin senator to install a person who
Speaker 7: is like anti federation in like public, but is secretly
Speaker 7: working with them, right, And it just like it it
Speaker 7: makes you think so much about like politics and loyalties
Speaker 7: and all that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and all these ideas of like we have to
Speaker 2: you know. To me, that's why it feels so similar
Speaker 2: to the killing of the Romulan in order to get
Speaker 2: the Ramuans to help the Federation, you know, because it's
Speaker 2: all about like double dealing and things like this, and
Speaker 2: that quote about in times of war the law fall
Speaker 2: silent feels really relevant to what we know now is
Speaker 2: the origins of section thirty one, and Riky you know
Speaker 2: you did some digging on that.
Speaker 7: Yeah, so the claim made and I don't I don't
Speaker 7: know if there's any way to actually verify this, but
Speaker 7: the claim made, I think by Sloan at one point,
Speaker 7: is that the origins of section thirty one go all
Speaker 7: the way back to the Starfleet Charter A Article fourteen,
Speaker 7: Section thirty one, which is where they get the name that.
Speaker 7: According to him, the article allows for extraordinary measures to
Speaker 7: be taken in times of extreme threat, which is just
Speaker 7: a very broad thing that you can interpret in any
Speaker 7: way you want and do whatever illegal things you want.
Speaker 7: Section thirty one.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, it's kind of like the building idea for
Speaker 2: martial law or for you know, the total executive immunity
Speaker 2: or whatever it is, where it says that if if
Speaker 2: the leadership thinks this has to be done, then no
Speaker 2: one gets to question them.
Speaker 7: Yeah, like extraordinary measures like what does that mean?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 7: Like extreme threat? Like you get to define what those
Speaker 7: are and then do what you feel needs to be done.
Speaker 7: And then it's like pre justified, like it's baked in
Speaker 7: because there's no there's no clear guidelines and I think
Speaker 7: that's part of the problem with Section thirty one as
Speaker 7: it's presented in Star Trek is that they seem to
Speaker 7: be able to do whatever the heck they want for
Speaker 7: the story, and that's not great, and that's why a
Speaker 7: lot of people don't like section thirty one stories like
Speaker 7: in Star Trek.
Speaker 2: Right, and we'll talk. We're gonna talk about both how
Speaker 2: it exists in terms of Starfleet itself and then pull
Speaker 2: the camera back someone and talk about how does it
Speaker 2: fit into you know, Roddenberry's creation and also what star
Speaker 2: Treks become now. And so let me actually talk a
Speaker 2: little bit about what's been happening in Discovery and some
Speaker 2: of those modern shows which freaky you know you haven't seen.
Speaker 2: I'll confess I don't remember all the ins and outs,
Speaker 2: but basically, you know, one of the main plot lines
Speaker 2: of Discovery is that the Federation and the Klingons have
Speaker 2: this major war in the years leading up to the
Speaker 2: events of the original series. And this war is kind
Speaker 2: of it's not completely pulled out a whole cloth. It's
Speaker 2: referenced a good deal in the original series. They talk
Speaker 2: about how that there's a ceasefire and stuff like that.
Speaker 2: Although it does kind of not fit with the plot,
Speaker 2: but we're putting it aside. And during it there's a
Speaker 2: lot of attempts to get sort of secret agents inside
Speaker 2: Cleanon high Command and to figure out what's happening, and
Speaker 2: in part because there are conflicts within the Klingons and
Speaker 2: that there are all these different Klingon groups that are
Speaker 2: fighting with each other for leadership, and so we discover
Speaker 2: Section thirty one is this group that's doing sort of
Speaker 2: clandestine things to figure all this out. And the biggest
Speaker 2: thing they do, and the one that I think I
Speaker 2: can kind of point to as really were there their
Speaker 2: most shady is also during this part of the series
Speaker 2: spoilers for season one of Discovery, but a character who
Speaker 2: had appeared in the original pilot and had died in
Speaker 2: the original pilot, Philippa Georgio played by Michelle Yeo incredible character,
Speaker 2: wonderfully played. Her character dies, but then halfway through the season,
Speaker 2: the version of her from the Mirror Universe, from the
Speaker 2: Terran Empire comes back over to this side and she
Speaker 2: was the emperor of the Terrant Empire, and there's all
Speaker 2: kinds of shenanigans that get involved, but the end result
Speaker 2: of it is she is, you know, finally, like Cornered.
Speaker 2: She's done all sorts of crazy shenanigans in our universe
Speaker 2: as well as the Mirror universe. She's caused the deaths
Speaker 2: of hundreds of people. She's going to go on trial,
Speaker 2: at which point Section thirty one steps in, and I
Speaker 2: think they fake her death or some other way to
Speaker 2: sort of get her off the board, but they basically
Speaker 2: make it clear to our protagonists, Look, she has an
Speaker 2: incredibly devious mind. We need her for Section thirty one.
Speaker 2: We've made a deal to, you know, give her a
Speaker 2: pardon for all the terrible things she's done in order
Speaker 2: for her to work for us. For some this shadowy organization,
Speaker 2: and our heroes are all pretty freaked out by this, because,
Speaker 2: you know, eight this means that she's not having any
Speaker 2: accountability for the terrible thing she does. But also if
Speaker 2: the idea is that it's the most trustworthy person who's
Speaker 2: running Section thirty one and therefore can say I won't
Speaker 2: abuse the power to do things when I shouldn't do them.
Speaker 2: Having her in that role, I think she becomes the
Speaker 2: head of Section thirty one or shortly one of the
Speaker 2: top leaders. Seems like a really bad idea.
Speaker 6: Which leaving off there makes the start of this section
Speaker 6: thirty one movie even more confusing and bad because she's
Speaker 6: suddenly now like on another planet not involved in Section
Speaker 6: thirty one, like semi on the lamp from them, but
Speaker 6: they know where she is.
Speaker 7: So and my understanding is that because it's Star Trek,
Speaker 7: there's time travel involved, which will make things even more
Speaker 7: confusing because you have people from multiple time periods interacting
Speaker 7: and it's like you don't quite know when you are.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think the Discovery winds up jumping like eight
Speaker 2: hundred years into the future after a very rough Season
Speaker 2: two that's all about time travel. I don't know if
Speaker 2: the second thirty one part of it jumps with them.
Speaker 2: I don't remember it referenced to Section thirty one in
Speaker 2: the eight hundred years in the Future timeline, but certainly
Speaker 2: it plays a major part in their original series.
Speaker 6: I don't remember in Discovery, but I know in lower
Speaker 6: decks we get plenty of Section thirty one references and mentions,
Speaker 6: and that's more God like post Voyager timeline.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, so it certainly is existing at a number
Speaker 2: of these times. Well, so let's talk about it within Starfleet. Riki,
Speaker 2: you were saying about Section thirty one. I think the
Speaker 2: the justification for it is that they need to have
Speaker 2: it in times of crisis. As far as you can tell,
Speaker 2: does it seem to make sense for Starfleet to have
Speaker 2: this organization?
Speaker 7: Yes, and no standard answer, right, I think in the
Speaker 7: context of this fictional universe, I think it makes sense.
Speaker 7: The way that we have the CIA and that other
Speaker 7: governments have intelligence agencies, I don't think it's good that
Speaker 7: we have these agencies. And again, like the things that
Speaker 7: they do are bad, and there should be more accountability,
Speaker 7: even within your own country's power structure for the things
Speaker 7: that people do, and there should not be off the
Speaker 7: books things going on. But I think the idea that
Speaker 7: when you are a superpower, like in the Galaxy, that
Speaker 7: you have an organization that does things like clandestine operations
Speaker 7: should happen.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 7: But then, like in the context of Star Trek the
Speaker 7: TV show, I'm one of those people that I enjoyed
Speaker 7: the episodes that I watched on Deep Space nine, but
Speaker 7: I don't really like it as a concept to explore
Speaker 7: in Star Trek, right, is what I would say.
Speaker 2: We'll talk about more with the Star Trek part. I
Speaker 2: just want to start first with a starfleet aspect, abby
Speaker 2: kind of what's your take.
Speaker 6: I think it shouldn't exist, but the fact that it
Speaker 6: does more proves my lifelong contention that Starfleet is the
Speaker 6: military as much as they claim they're not.
Speaker 2: No. Yeah, and I think that's a really good way
Speaker 2: to put it, because I was thinking when I said
Speaker 2: starfleet should I have asked the Federation and Starfleet is
Speaker 2: often like the arm of the Federation. It's the part
Speaker 2: of the Federation that most non Federation worlds will first experience.
Speaker 2: And it feels like so much of what the Federation
Speaker 2: is all about is these ideals that it has of
Speaker 2: transparency and of open dialogue and of all, you know,
Speaker 2: races being equal and welcome at the table. And yeah,
Speaker 2: it feels like the Federation would never want to have it,
Speaker 2: but that Starfleet would. And I actually kind of wonder
Speaker 2: if that that's part of who it is kept from it,
Speaker 2: Like do Federation high officials even know about this, or
Speaker 2: is this very much a like creation of the military itself,
Speaker 2: Because as you said, we do know star Trek intelligence.
Speaker 2: Starfleet intelligence does exist, and we know they do spying missions.
Speaker 2: A major part of the setup for Voyager is that
Speaker 2: Tuvac was a Maquis on the ship of the Maquis,
Speaker 2: but that he was actually working for star Trek Intelligence
Speaker 2: as a spy to learn more about the Maquis and
Speaker 2: help Janeway hunt them down. And I think, I just
Speaker 2: keep going back to Riki what you're saying about, like
Speaker 2: the accountability for me. Yeah, having a clandestine organization of
Speaker 2: some kind in a world with a lot of secrets,
Speaker 2: in a world with a lot of alliances and shifting alliances.
Speaker 2: I don't love it, but it makes sense. But when
Speaker 2: it crosses that line into we are no longer accountable,
Speaker 2: we are no longer within the chain of command, We
Speaker 2: get to just do our own thing and other people
Speaker 2: don't know about us, that's where to me both it
Speaker 2: violates the spirit of what the Federation and Starfleet are
Speaker 2: supposed to be about. But also I think to your
Speaker 2: point Abby, like it is also completely believable that a
Speaker 2: military that is set up to fight for these ideals
Speaker 2: at some point say we've got to get our hands dirty.
Speaker 7: Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. I have always
Speaker 7: questioned what the heck Starfleet is and it changes from
Speaker 7: show to show, and like who the characters are because
Speaker 7: obviously in the second half of Deep Space nine, it's
Speaker 7: just the military, right, But for most of the next
Speaker 7: generation they're focused on exploration. Yeah, they get into conflicts,
Speaker 7: they have weapons on their ships, but it's very clear
Speaker 7: that in that era they are explorers and diplomats primarily.
Speaker 2: And like in the original series era, on the one hand,
Speaker 2: they are explorers, they are diplomats. But my personal favorite movie,
Speaker 2: Raf of Khan, one of the plot points is that
Speaker 2: doctor Carol Marcus is a scientist and she does not
Speaker 2: want Starfleet getting her hands getting their hands on her
Speaker 2: Genesis project because then I think there's a direct line
Speaker 2: by one of her underlings talking about how we don't
Speaker 2: want the military to get a hold of this. So
Speaker 2: it does at least feel like that's been a tension
Speaker 2: throughout Starfleet's history, and maybe at some points people see
Speaker 2: it more as a military and some point less I.
Speaker 6: Think, you know, Starfleet definitely presents themselves as we are
Speaker 6: here for exploration, but it comes, I think, in actuality,
Speaker 6: it ends up being a little bit more of a
Speaker 6: colonialist mission of even when they're exploring there, we're going
Speaker 6: to try and you know, meet these new planets and
Speaker 6: get them into the Federation as opposed to right, you know,
Speaker 6: let's learn about their cultures and then take off because
Speaker 6: they're not our planet, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it's good way to put it.
Speaker 7: Yeah, that's exactly what I was thinking. AVI was the
Speaker 7: idea of explorers in like the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries,
Speaker 7: you know, of European expansion. They they were explorers from
Speaker 7: a European perspective, but those ships were armed and they
Speaker 7: were also participating in military conquest and colonialism of other cultures.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 7: Now Starfleet it's a little different because they have prime directive,
Speaker 7: but it's clear that yeh, Starfleet is also the armed
Speaker 7: military branch of the Federation.
Speaker 2: For sure. Yeah. Yeah, and so it kind of makes sense,
Speaker 2: and I think that's It's also why I don't like
Speaker 2: the idea of it always having been part of Starfleet,
Speaker 2: because always built into their charter. Because one thing I
Speaker 2: think that DS nine does well and I think Discovery
Speaker 2: does well, although they kind of now don't match up
Speaker 2: the timeline too well, But is the idea of the
Speaker 2: Federation and Starfleet are organizations that I built by idealists,
Speaker 2: populated by idealists who, because of some of the terrible
Speaker 2: things happening, most specifically the Dominion War, but also maybe
Speaker 2: this war with the Klingons further back in time, that
Speaker 2: there's a loss of that idealism. And so for me,
Speaker 2: a story about how like I would love to see
Speaker 2: a story about how some group of Starfleet officers during
Speaker 2: the Clingon War or during the Dominion War kind of
Speaker 2: get together and say, Okay, well, we've always had this
Speaker 2: line in the Charter that i'veyone's forgotten about and no
Speaker 2: one does anything with. But now sort of the skins
Speaker 2: have fallen from our eyes, we think we can't just
Speaker 2: keep playing taking the high road. We've got to create
Speaker 2: this organization ourselves. And then using that bit of the
Speaker 2: Charter section thirty one is justification because like, I like
Speaker 2: that story a lot. I still wouldn't support it, but
Speaker 2: I'd be like, that makes sense that in the in
Speaker 2: these horrible events, the cynicism is starting to take over.
Speaker 2: But the idea that it's just always been part of
Speaker 2: Starfleet doesn't make sense to me.
Speaker 7: Well, I do want to say, like, I'm not it's
Speaker 7: not entirely clear that they've always been a part of Starfleet.
Speaker 7: Like the citation is that they they are citing the
Speaker 7: Starfleet charter as justification. But I'm not sure if it's like, okay,
Speaker 7: like we've got the charter and now we're going to
Speaker 7: create this secret organization. I think what you're saying is
Speaker 7: probably more correct that at some point, maybe some part
Speaker 7: of the official Starfleet intelligence was like, we need we
Speaker 7: need some black ops, and this is how we're going
Speaker 7: to justify it within our ideals, like we don't have
Speaker 7: to change anything.
Speaker 2: And the Dominion War where you literally didn't know who
Speaker 2: was who and who was a changeling instead of a
Speaker 2: real person, that would have made sense. Yeah, gosh, wouldn't
Speaker 2: it have been a great movie.
Speaker 7: I'm very disappointed by ural's reaction to the movie. Obviously
Speaker 7: the movie was disappointing to you, But yeah, I mean
Speaker 7: what happened.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't know. Not a lot. Yeah, yeah, I
Speaker 2: you know, and like they wanted in an Entry movie,
Speaker 2: I guess, And here we go. Well, and so with that,
Speaker 2: in terms of like the direction of Star Trek itself
Speaker 2: and things like that, let's pull that camera back a
Speaker 2: little bit, uh Riki, you're starting to get into this.
Speaker 2: How do you think section thirty one fits in not
Speaker 2: only just to like in the universe of Star Trek,
Speaker 2: but for us as viewers to what we understand Star
Speaker 2: Trek to be and what we understand Gene Roddenberry's vision
Speaker 2: to be and all that.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I mean you get into this with Star Trek fandom,
Speaker 7: right of like what it's like Star Trek as Gene
Speaker 7: Roddenberry intended or his vision or whatever. Like there's the optimism,
Speaker 7: like the utopian, post scarcity future, and then you have
Speaker 7: you know, people like even like Captain Kirk, who is
Speaker 7: a swashbuckler in space, but it's still a diplomat, like
Speaker 7: he does seek out diplomatic resolution to most of his
Speaker 7: interactions with people, especially like the Klingons.
Speaker 2: Right, So I I you know, I said.
Speaker 7: Earlier, I'm not a big fan of Section thirty one
Speaker 7: stories existing in the context of Star Trek because I
Speaker 7: do think like I'm a little bit more on that
Speaker 7: side of Yeah, Like, I like Geene Roddenberry had this
Speaker 7: vision of a future in this way, and I get
Speaker 7: that to be a realistic portrayal. These things make sense
Speaker 7: to have in the world, but it doesn't mean necessarily
Speaker 7: mean we have to keep telling stories about them, right,
Speaker 7: And maybe like the interesting stories are like in Deep
Speaker 7: Space nine when the main characters come across them, and
Speaker 7: then Section thirty one is played as an antagonist within
Speaker 7: your own government.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, just to kind of spell that out even further,
Speaker 2: because Jean Roddenberry part of his idea was that he
Speaker 2: didn't want internal conflict within the Federation. He wanted it
Speaker 2: to be like that there weren't lots of back deals
Speaker 2: and backstabbing and this kind of stuff, that everybody was
Speaker 2: basically on the same page, and that got honored. I
Speaker 2: mean even by season two of the original show, they
Speaker 2: were starting to play with that a little bit, because
Speaker 2: it turns out conflict actually makes a lot better story
Speaker 2: then a lot of people just all getting along with
Speaker 2: each other. But it does feel like it's gone further
Speaker 2: and further. I know a lot of people who don't
Speaker 2: like DS nine often cite it as example of like, oh,
Speaker 2: this is exactly everything that Gene didn't want, and you know,
Speaker 2: to me, that isn't necessarily the wrong thing. But I
Speaker 2: think having some idea of like, we want Star Trek
Speaker 2: to feel like Star Trek and Section thirty one doesn't
Speaker 2: do that does feel very fair to me. What about
Speaker 2: for you, Abby, Like we were watching all of it
Speaker 2: kind of in back to back succession. How much of
Speaker 2: a departure did Section thirty one field.
Speaker 6: From the original series. It was definitely a departure that
Speaker 6: it felt almost nothing like anything that was mentioned there.
Speaker 6: But I actually don't feel like the original series is
Speaker 6: a good representation of Star Trek anymore because we have
Speaker 6: so much media that's not the original series that like, right,
Speaker 6: and the original is fun to watch, But the episodes
Speaker 6: that like, I really like and really remember are mostly
Speaker 6: the ones where they do have these big, like ethical questions, right,
Speaker 6: And I think we get those with the Section thirty
Speaker 6: one episodes, a lot of like, yeah, they're doing something terrible,
Speaker 6: but they're doing it, they say for the right reason.
Speaker 6: Usually does that justify it? Who gets to decide if
Speaker 6: that justifies it? Should you help them, should you stop them,
Speaker 6: report on it? Whatever? Those are like the questions that
Speaker 6: I want anyone who comes in contact with Section thirty
Speaker 6: one to be asking, and this movie asked none of them.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it's very fair. Yeah, I think that's
Speaker 2: a good way to put it. Like, I think there's
Speaker 2: room in Star Trek, especially because, yeah, it has grown
Speaker 2: a lot from where it started under Roddenberry and I
Speaker 2: think that's a good thing, and we'll talk more about
Speaker 2: that in our bonus member section. But to encompass more
Speaker 2: of the DS nine of the world and stuff like that.
Speaker 2: But yeah, I think I always want if Section thirty
Speaker 2: one has to exist, I always want it to be
Speaker 2: an antagonist and for it to be a protagonist. But
Speaker 2: to us be asking hard questions makes a lot of sense.
Speaker 2: But the movie, to me, is where it really crosses
Speaker 2: the line, where it is it's just a protagonist and
Speaker 2: there's a Star Trek officer who's there to be like,
Speaker 2: oh gosh, we shouldn't do this, But it's mostly played
Speaker 2: for laughs. It's never like a serious question of is
Speaker 2: this right?
Speaker 6: For the Federation doesn't stop them for doing anything.
Speaker 7: Yeah, So I looked at the cast list and the characters,
Speaker 7: and so you're referencing Rachel Garrett right correct, who For
Speaker 7: fans who have not watched the movie, she was the
Speaker 7: captain of the Enterprise CE and makes an appearance a
Speaker 7: guest appearance in the very popular episode Yesterday's Yesterday's Enterprise
Speaker 7: where her ship travels from the past, their past to
Speaker 7: the next generation present and so like, she is a
Speaker 7: very prominent character in Star Trek history making an appearance
Speaker 7: here and not really doing what's expected.
Speaker 8: I guess, yeah, I'm not.
Speaker 2: I'm not a huge Star Trek lower person, Like I
Speaker 2: know most of the stories, but I haven't memorized all
Speaker 2: the names, so I'm I'm not surprised that I missed
Speaker 2: that name, but they were thinking on it. Now. There's
Speaker 2: nothing in that character that we saw in the show
Speaker 2: that matches up to the person in that episode. Yeah.
Speaker 7: I mean when I say prominent character like she was
Speaker 7: in one episode, but in the the fictional history of
Speaker 7: Star Trek, like being the captain of an enterprise is.
Speaker 2: A big deal.
Speaker 7: It's usually the flagship, and she played a very prominent
Speaker 7: role in the conflict with the Klingons to like secure peace.
Speaker 2: Well, and if I remember, she does that by dying,
Speaker 2: that's yeah. One of the hardest parts of the story
Speaker 2: is that her ship, because they get pulled through this wormhole,
Speaker 2: they don't get destroyed at the time they were supposed to,
Speaker 2: and like her being destroyed does something like for the morale.
Speaker 2: I don't know what, I don't remember with the details,
Speaker 2: but basically it causes an important uh you know, it's
Speaker 2: kind of like Edith Gault no srong person. It's kind
Speaker 2: of like the person who dies in that episode of
Speaker 2: the original series where because a woman who was going
Speaker 2: to grow up to be a peace nick doesn't die,
Speaker 2: who was a peacenick already she's grown up, but because
Speaker 2: she doesn't die, she convinces America to go pacifist, and
Speaker 2: so Hitler wins. It's the same Edith Keeler, Edith Keeler,
Speaker 2: thank you, and it was. Yeah.
Speaker 7: So the Enterprise see is destroyed by Romulins defending a
Speaker 7: Klingon base, and then the Romulins that as an honorable
Speaker 7: act and that helps pave the way for better relations
Speaker 7: with the Kingons. That's it, her time traveling disappearing, the
Speaker 7: Klingon bas is destroyed, the Federation didn't come to help,
Speaker 7: and then the Klingons are just keep staying mad.
Speaker 4: Right, and it leads to a war.
Speaker 2: That makes sense. That makes sense. Yeah, you're right, And
Speaker 2: she's this important character and does not show up at
Speaker 2: any other place. And the other characters I don't have
Speaker 2: did we recognize any of them, Like one of them
Speaker 2: is in theory of Vulcan but it's actually like it's
Speaker 2: a Vulcan robot driven by this like much much smaller
Speaker 2: wormlike thing, but instead of it being a trill, it
Speaker 2: just drives a humanoid shaped robot. I don't think any
Speaker 2: It seemed like a cool idea. They didn't really do anything.
Speaker 6: I mean they kind of did. It was kind of
Speaker 6: like the climax of the movie.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean there's a plot. Good, Yeah, that's fair. Yeah.
Speaker 6: I didn't recognize any of the other characters except for Georgio.
Speaker 2: Mm hm.
Speaker 6: There is you know, worm for brains and then Mechman,
Speaker 6: who is just a guy in a mech.
Speaker 2: There's nothing wrong with that. They do make they do
Speaker 2: with the mech guy. They do make a comment about
Speaker 2: like just how connected is he to the mech and
Speaker 2: like they phrase it as though he has this like
Speaker 2: disorder that sounds an awful lot like gender dysphoria. It's
Speaker 2: like mecha dysphoria or something like that. And again they're
Speaker 2: like a couple of people I've seen. We're like, this
Speaker 2: could have been a really interesting commentary on like adaptive
Speaker 2: technology and how much that becomes a part of you
Speaker 2: and like how does that connect to like, you know,
Speaker 2: changing who you are in terms of gender or in
Speaker 2: terms of these other things.
Speaker 6: I do think they handled that pretty well in uh
Speaker 6: Lower Decks.
Speaker 2: Though, Yes, definitely definitely, which is again part like it's
Speaker 2: funny when I understood Lower Decks to be mostly kind
Speaker 2: of like sophomore humor and parody of Star Trek, and
Speaker 2: I think there is some of that, but it also
Speaker 2: handles serious issues far better than a lot of Star
Speaker 2: Trek and especially better than this movie.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I one hundred percent I agree with that. I
Speaker 7: think Lower Decks is a very underrated show, Like I've
Speaker 7: only seen a maybe like one season or half a season,
Speaker 7: but I enjoyed it a lot.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, anyway, we're gonna wrap up with talking about
Speaker 2: what this movie could have been. I've thrown out my
Speaker 2: proposal that I would like to see the movie about,
Speaker 2: like during DS nine, the members of Star Trek Intelligence
Speaker 2: Starfleet Intelligence who decide they have to form a Section
Speaker 2: thirty one Avieriki, what do you think would have been
Speaker 2: a better version of this movie?
Speaker 7: Just like Spy Stuff, The best to me, the best
Speaker 7: section thirty one stories are when it's like Spy Things.
Speaker 7: And this my reading of reviews and stuff is that
Speaker 7: this is a heist movie like Ocean's eleven. Like Ocean's
Speaker 7: eleven in space with the Gardens of the Galaxy. So yeah,
Speaker 7: like I don't I don't understand what happened, of course,
Speaker 7: like the to pull back, like the production of this
Speaker 7: movie started as a TV show and changed partly because
Speaker 7: Michelle Yeo won an Academy award I think so it
Speaker 7: was like she couldn't commit to a TV show at
Speaker 7: that point because she's super famous. But yeah, I'm not
Speaker 7: sure exactly what happened, and we may never know. And
Speaker 7: this is like, this is what happens nowadays, right, Like
Speaker 7: we see it a lot with Marvel as well, where
Speaker 7: projects change, they go from a movie to a TV show,
Speaker 7: directors change, and I don't know, it just happens, unfortunately.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it's too bad. I mean this, I don't
Speaker 2: know if you've got the sense, Abby, but it felt
Speaker 2: to me like it was the pilot of the you know,
Speaker 2: it was a two episode length pilot to the NV show.
Speaker 6: I could see that.
Speaker 7: Maybe that's how the scripture, especially.
Speaker 6: The first half.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so kind of weird because they kill off half
Speaker 2: the crew during the course of the episode included it
Speaker 2: was an interesting characters.
Speaker 6: I mean, the first episode of Discovery kills the captain.
Speaker 2: So also true, also true, Abby, What about you any
Speaker 2: other other version of the story you think we've been
Speaker 2: more interesting?
Speaker 6: I think the heist idea wasn't terrible, Like they could
Speaker 6: have made a really fun spy heist movie in space
Speaker 6: that asked ethical questions and like maybe head section thirty
Speaker 6: one questioning their orders or something along those lines, but
Speaker 6: instead they liked, let's get the gang together set up
Speaker 6: like Ocean's eleven, and then kind of turned it into
Speaker 6: for me, like the worst pieces of Guardians of the
Speaker 6: Galaxy and of Star Wars.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, because in part because there's there's a maguffin
Speaker 2: that they're trying to find, but it's never really well explained,
Speaker 2: and so it didn't really connect in any real weird
Speaker 2: way that I felt like, I think the stakes were
Speaker 2: like the universe could be destroyed, but it didn't really
Speaker 2: feel like it was very important. And the yeah, like,
Speaker 2: because I think you're right that you could have had
Speaker 2: that starfleet officer really kind of like being like, wait,
Speaker 2: why are we doing this? Should we be doing this?
Speaker 2: Or even some of them themselves being like, wait a minute,
Speaker 2: is this really our orders? But no, my.
Speaker 6: Ideal movie we start the same right we meet our crew.
Speaker 6: They're better than the characters we get but we meet them.
Speaker 6: They can even keep the same you know, crazy blow
Speaker 6: up the universe tech that is their weapon, but instead
Speaker 6: of it being we have to get this to protect
Speaker 6: like protect it from whomever, make it so that they
Speaker 6: have to plant it somewhere, and then they have to
Speaker 6: question if they actually should be doing that, or if,
Speaker 6: you know, destroying an entire universe maybe isn't the best
Speaker 6: way to deal with the conflict.
Speaker 2: Right, or even if something like maybe like the Starfleet
Speaker 2: person was told, your mission is to go destroy this
Speaker 2: weapon because no one should have it, but then section
Speaker 2: one is like, nah, we're just gonna put it in
Speaker 2: a closet in Starfleet headquarters and don't worry about it. Yeah,
Speaker 2: so well, anyway, Star Trek writers, we clearly can help
Speaker 2: fix your movies. Give us a call if you want
Speaker 2: to get any of that help. We're gonna talk more
Speaker 2: in the bonus section about Geene Roddenberry kind of other
Speaker 2: ways which Star Trek has drifted or made intentional choices
Speaker 2: to go away from his original vision. But we hear
Speaker 2: abbey any last thoughts you have on this movie or
Speaker 2: this topic of section thirty one.
Speaker 7: I have a question, would you recommend this movie to
Speaker 7: me or to the audience?
Speaker 6: Don't watch?
Speaker 7: That's what I thought, That's what I thought, but I
Speaker 7: just wanted to ask out loud.
Speaker 6: I am an extreme lover of bad movies and bad TV. Like, yeah,
Speaker 6: anything that's got like one star, I'm usually in for it.
Speaker 6: This movie was so bad.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's not even like the room bad where you
Speaker 2: get to laugh at how fun it is, or you know,
Speaker 2: like sometimes there's that like, oh my god, this smells
Speaker 2: so bad, here smell it, where you just want someone
Speaker 2: else to experience it with you. I don't want that,
Speaker 2: like if nothing else. Because Michelle Yo's care like, I
Speaker 2: think she's doing her best, but her writing is awful.
Speaker 2: They like she's an incredibly sexy woman, she's a person
Speaker 2: with incredible like magnetism and attractiveness, but they make her
Speaker 2: this like kind of clumsy stereotype of a femme fatale
Speaker 2: who's flirting and very like over the top ways that
Speaker 2: just don't make sense. And I kind of was just like, please,
Speaker 2: miss Yo, like get out of this movie, go back
Speaker 2: to winning Oscars. You're so much better than this movie.
Speaker 2: So yeah, I would not recommend it.
Speaker 7: That's kind of what I expected the answer to be.
Speaker 7: It's obviously disappointing as a Star Trek fan and as
Speaker 7: a Michelle Yo fan.
Speaker 2: But yeah, yeah, I want more content. I want more
Speaker 2: both well, if you do want more content of other kinds. Though,
Speaker 2: five dollars a month, fifty five dollars a year, you
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Speaker 2: You get free episodes once a month. We have already
Speaker 2: done our first. We're working on our second, about some
Speaker 2: of the kind of core concepts of superhero ethics and
Speaker 2: kind of looking at in depth. We did one on
Speaker 2: the topic of vengeance and vigilantes. Our next one is
Speaker 2: gonna be about who should superheroes be accountable to you?
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