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New Podcast! Primitive Culture #74 – Star Trek: Voyager as a Nineties Time Capsule

Posted on January 17, 2020 by Darren

Over the Christmas Break, I had the pleasure of sitting down with the wonderful Duncan Barrett and talking about Star Trek: Voyager. Duncan is a historian, and I’ve actually quoted some of his work on the blog in the past. He hosts Primitive Culture, a show wherein the hosts discuss certain historical-related items of interest in the Star Trek canon.

Duncan noticed that I had recently finished a massive rewatch of Voyager, leading me to write around 750,000 words on the show’s seven seasons. With the twenty-fifth anniversary of Voyager coming up, he suggested that it might be fun to talk about the third live-action Star Trek spin-off in a bit of depth, looking at the series as a snapshot of a particular cultural moment. More than any of its sibling series, Voyager perfectly encapsulated the American experience of the nineties, tapping into the decade’s sensibilities and its anxieties.

The result was a fun (and involved) discussion, and you can listen to it below or directly via Primitive Culture‘s homepage on trek.fm.

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Filed under: Voyager | Tagged: america, nineties, podcast, primitive culture, star trek, star trek: voyager, voyager | Leave a comment »

New Podcast! The X-Cast – Season 5, Episode 8 (“Kitsunegari”)

Posted on January 11, 2020 by Darren

Last year, I was extremely privileged to get to discuss the wonderful Pusher with the sensational Tony Black on The X-Cast. For those who don’t know, Pusher is Tony’s favourite episode ever – and comfortably sits around the edge of my top ten. So no pressure.

As such, it was a delight to get to join Tony for Kitsunegari, the fifth season sequel to Pusher. Outside of the mythology, it was relatively rare for The X-Files to do direct sequels to earlier episodes – even popular ones. Kitsunegari is an entry in a very select club that includes Tooms and Orison. However, it is also an episode with which I’ve had a very complicated relationship. It often feels like a parody of a sequel to Pusher rather than an entirely earnest follow-up, and as such as always felt like it belongs to the fifth season’s broader preoccupations with monstrous progeny as a metaphor for the show’s unexpected evolution and direction. Of course, I’ve always worried that I read too much into it.

As ever, you can make up your own mind. You can listen to the episode here, or click the link below.

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Filed under: Podcasts!, The X-Files | Tagged: kitsunegari, podcast, pusher, Television, the x-cast, tony black, x-files | Leave a comment »

New Podcast! The Time is Now – Season 2, Episode 10 (“Midnight of the Century”)

Posted on December 24, 2019 by Darren

It’s Christmas, so The Time is Now has a special treat lined up for you. It’s the night before Christmas, so it was the perfect opportunity to discuss Midnight of the Century with the wonderful Tony Black. It’s something of a companion piece to our discussion of The Curse of Frank Black at Halloween.

It’s strange to imagine Millennium producing a Christmas episode. It’s even stranger to realise that’s a pretty much perfect episode for the season, following Frank Black through his Christmas Eve as he tries to work through his own complicated feelings about the holidays. Then again, it probably shouldn’t be a surprise. After all, the second season was show run by Glen Morgan and James Wong who had written Christmas-themed episodes like Beyond the Sea on The X-Files and River of Stars on Space: Above and Beyond. It is a delight.

As ever, you can listen directly to the episode here, subscribe to the podcast here, or click the link below. Have a Merry Christmas!

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Filed under: Millennium, Podcasts! | Tagged: christmas, frank black, midnight of the century, millennium, podcast, tony black | Leave a comment »

New Podcast! Standard Orbit #297 – “Inverted Commas”

Posted on December 24, 2019 by Darren

I was thrilled to be invited to join the great Zach Moore on Standard Orbit, a Star Trek: The Original Series podcast hosted over at Trek FM. I appeared on the show the year before last to discuss the third season of the series, and returned last year to delve into the second season, and so it makes sense that I should be back to discuss the first season.

This is an interesting one, in large part because I don’t necessarily have a strong take or controversial opinion on the first season of the original Star Trek. I think it’s a remarkable season of television, one of the best in the franchise and that it’s an embarrassment of riches in places. So we talk about the order in which we watch the series, the way in which it builds, the sense in which the show was constantly revising and reinventing itself between episodes before emerging towards the end of the year as the Star Trek that most fans know and love. There’s nothing too controversial here, aside from two people sharing their love for a great piece of television. Which is perfect Christmas fodder.

Zach was, as ever, a very gracious host. I had great fun discussing it. You can hear the full discussion below or visit the episode page here.

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Filed under: Podcasts!, The Original Series | Tagged: kirk, podcast, spock, standard orbit, star trek, star trek: the original series | Leave a comment »

New Podcast! The Pensky File – Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Season 7, Episode 16 (“Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges”)

Posted on November 21, 2019 by Darren

I was thrilled to be asked back to join The Pensky Podcast to for one last conversation about Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. I joined Wes and Clay as their coverage of the seventh season winds down, as the pair prepare to jump into the so-called “Final Chapter.”

I got to talk about Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges, which is one of my favourite Deep Space Nine episodes ever produced. Arma Enim Silent Leges is the last episode to air before the multipart closing epic that launches with Penumbra, and feels like as worthy a capstone to Deep Space Nine as its companion piece Badda-Bing, Badda-Bang. It’s an exploration of moral compromise and realpolitick, but also about the practicalities of planning for a postwar status quo. It is a clever, ambitious and effective episode of Deep Space Nine, a thoughtful exploration of the show’s core themes.

We also had a lot of fun saying the title out loud multiple times.

You can find more from The Pensky Podcast here, and listen to the podcast by clicking the link or just listening below.

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Filed under: Deep Space Nine, Podcasts! | Tagged: Bajor, Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges, podcast, review, romulans, Romulus, sloan, star trek, star trek: deep space nine, william sadler | 1 Comment »

156. House of the Dead (-#8)

Posted on November 16, 2019 by Darren

Hosted by Andrew Quinn and Darren Mooney, and this week with special guests Ethan Shattock and Gerard Rooney from Disconnected Talk, The 250 is a (mostly) weekly trip through some of the best (and worst) movies ever made, as voted for by Internet Movie Database Users.

This time, Uwe Boll’s House of the Dead.

In this adaptation of the beloved arcade shooter game, a rave on a remote island goes horribly wrong. A small group of friends arrive late to the party of a lifetime, only to find it has become a literal dead zone.

At time of recording, it was ranked 8th on the list of the worst movies of all time on the Internet Movie Database.

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Filed under: The Bottom 100 | Tagged: culture war, Ethan Shattock, Gerard Rooney, house of the dead, podcast, seaga, The 250, uwe boll, video game movies, video games | Leave a comment »

154. Exorcist II: The Heretic – Halloween 2019 (-#94)

Posted on November 2, 2019 by Darren

Hosted by Andrew Quinn and Darren Mooney, and this week with Doctor Bernice Murphy and Phil Bagnall, The 250 is a (mostly) weekly trip through some of the best (and worst) movies ever made, as voted for by Internet Movie Database Users.

This time, a Halloween treat. John Boorman’s Exorcist II: The Heretic.

At time of recording, it was ranked 94th on the list of the worst movies of all time on the Internet Movie Database.