Out of Contreks

For the first time in more than a year, Ryan and Brady are putting out a special on a new season of Star Trek, this one the initial outing of Starfleet Academy. But where does it rank in the annals of nu-Trek? Is the dialogue actually youth-oriented, or is it a bunch of millennials and Xers trying to sound young? Has Jett Reno ever done anything wrong? (No.) All that and more inside this piping hot mp3 file!

(Note: As this is a special, it was recorded the day before release and is such a little rougher, audio-wise, than our normal episodes)

Ryan and Brady look into a Voyager episode that examines the nuances of the Doctor's relationship with the rest of the crew. While we aren't entirely satisfied with the ending, the episode itself is a pretty interesting one, allowing us much fodder for discussion on how exactly the message of "Latent Image" can be mapped onto a real-world situation, if at all.

Quick production note: We try to keep most Out of Contreks episodes reasonably family-friendly, but this episode does have a lot of swearing in it, primarily inspired by the horrible events of Jan. 2025 that were carried out by government thugs in the Twin Cities, where one of the hosts lives. If you don't mind that, give it a listen, because it's a pretty fun and wide-ranging discussion after the opening 10 minutes, and even in the opening 10 minutes we come up with a variety of colorful terms to impugn Elon Musk and Stephen Miller, who are two of the dumbest and most evil people on the planet Earth (also, since we recorded this episode, Elon Musk's name has come up in the Epstein Files because he was begging to get onto the island).

It had been a while since either Brady or Ryan had seen Shore Leave, the famous, fever-dreamesque outing of the Original Series in which Bones is literally killed and then brought back to life -- an incident that probably isn't even the weirdest thing that happens in the episode -- and boy, had we forgotten some of the finer points. Join us as we discuss Trek's descent into madness, courtesy of the strange, brief Trek career of writer Theodore Sturgeon.

In this wide-ranging episode about a very good episode of Deep Space 9, Ryan and Brady go off on several tangents, everything from nostalgia for parenting young kids to the efficacy of sci-fi metaphor to classic VeggieTales music to which Star Trek species would be the nastiest to bone down with. In between, we talk about the Jem'Hadar and an unsung performance from Bumper Robinson.

Ryan and Brady look into the first part of one of the most famous Voyager episodes, and what we find is something... all right. Join us as we look at why this episode is so famous, where it sits in Voyager lore, and what this show does well and not so well.

Happy New Year! In this episode, Ryan and Brady get their annual Ric Olie reference out of the way quick before discussing a DS9 episode that has a lot of fun little character bits for Sisko as it explores the nature of responsibility. Also, I chose the episode image because of O'Brien's incredible turtleneck. A true god among men.

Ryan and Brady aren't sure what to make of this Enterprise episode that doesn't even seem quite sure of what to make of itself. Still, though, it got us to open some cool Star Trek cards, and it's a rare truly Out of Contreks episode for the both of us.

Would this be a good episode to watch while high? Ryan and Brady discuss the (mostly aesthetic) positives of this late Season 2 TOS episode and generally have a good time talking about a shaggy thing that isn't really very good, but it's got those TOS vibes. Sometimes, that's all you need.

We got a rare opportunity to expose a new person to Wesley Crusher without the burden of expectation, and boy howdy does it not disappoint. Join Ryan and Brady as we talk about Trek's most famous self-insert character, old SNL sketches, the one cool effect sequence in this episode, and how dumb this episode's resolution is.