Antimatter Pod

206. Her Body, Pike's Choice (SNW 3.03)

Anika and Liz go on a nice road trip to pick some flowers, and nothing bad happens to anyone. 

Okay, fine, we are discussing Star Trek: Strange New Worlds season 3, episode 3, "Shuttle to Kenfori", including...

• First of all, WHAT IS HAPPENING ON REBECCA ROMIJN'S HEAD
• Season 3 has a recurring motif where a woman states explicitly what she wants, and her romantic partner decides to do the opposite
• Batel and M'Benga both tell Pike repeatedly that Batel has the right to make her own medical choices, and Pike never actually agrees
• "I really have to finish my Tuvok/Azetbur fan fiction."
• RIP Liz's Klingon wife
• Our only beef with Erica's storyline is that it worked by making Una hold the idiot ball
• Joseph M'Benga: the only doctor in Starfleet who respects people's privacy

205. The Girlfriend Edit (SNW 3.02)

Anika and Liz put on their cutest wedding outfits and settle in to discuss episode 2 of Strange New Worlds' third season: "Wedding Bell Blues". Liz is gonna try not to talk about Pike. Anika is going to do her best not to implode. It's fun! 

• This episode was engineered in a lab to target Anika personally
• Is this a mean-spirited commentary on shippers? 
• We did not need a second sequel to "The Q and the Gray". Or a first sequel. Or "The Q and the Gray". 
• Christine: I don't want any big romantic gestures
  Spock: Big romantic gesture, got it
• It's weird how we're being gaslit into thinking Korby is a decent guy
• "It's gonna be really hard for me to not talk about dinosaurs on my podcast."
• We're so happy for an Orgetas subplot that we're not even mad it's the same as Detmer in season 3 of Discovery
• Batel is firmly in the Girlfriend Box, not the Captain Box
• The snake/garden of Eden/Taylor Swift's Reputation era styling of Christine's "wedding dress" was a … choice

204. Berman Era Level Misogyny (SNW 3.01)

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is back, baby! Anika and Liz fight off some Gorn and settle in to discuss the premiere! 

(We did not realise, when we recorded, that "Hegemony" part 2 would be dropping along with "Wedding Bell Blues", so we're only discussing that first episode now.)

• This is certainly an episode of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds
• Is Chris Pike the human embodiment of a Democratic Party fundraising email? Are men too emotional to be in command?
• Pelia is single-handedly inventing Scotty
• Thank God we've confirmed that Ortegas is the pilot and flies the ship, we were really confused on that point
• We are really optimistic for La'an's story to keep evolving this season
• "They are actively trying to destroy Christine Chapel, and I take it personally." There's some worrying stuff in this episode, and even more alarming comments made by Akiva Goldsman at the premiere
• We are very much in favour of religion in Star Trek, but Pike praying before telling his girlfriend her consent and bodily autonomy don't matter is…
• The USS Pablo Picasso was … a choice
• Concept: Christine and Marie should ditch their boyfriends and date each other
• We're glad Captain Batel isn't dead; now we're concerned she's gonna get the Bix ending
• Has SNW killed Pike/Una as a thing people ship?

203. Hair Trek (part 2)

Anika and Liz let their hair down, and as it tumbles over their shoulders in perfect beach waves identical to the hair of every other woman on television in the 2020s, they return to their discussion of hair and hair styling in Star Trek...

• Liz has a theory about why Janeway's early hair was … like that. And we're sorry, but it does involve Margaret Thatcher and Madeleine Albright
• Enterprise: the end of the torturous updo
• WASP beauty standards, "professionalism" and Michael Burnham
• The Romulans of season 1 of Picard (yes, Anika is going to wax lyrical about the Romulannisters, and you WILL like it)
• Every single woman in season 3 of Star Trek: Picard except Raffi has American Girl Doll Samantha hair (Anika will explain American Girl Dolls and Samantha) (Una and Batel have The Hair too)
• Tasha's hair did not necessarily signify queerness in the 1980s, but Ortegas's hair absolutely does today, and so it's weird that they don't … you know … 
• We actually don't have much to say about Pike's hair, save that it looks … sticky

202. Hair Trek (part 1)

Anika and Liz put their hair up and settle in to discuss the most pressing topic of our time -- hairstyles in Star Trek. 

We talked for so long that we wound up splitting this into a two-parter, which is PEAK Antimatter Pod, but in this first half, we discuss...

• Janice Rand, Marie Antoinette and Sabrina Carpenter
• Pavel Chekov, The Monkees and appealing to girls
• WASP beauty standards, "professionalism" and Deanna Troi
• Tasha Yar and the changing meanings of short hair on women since 1987
• "I'm sorry, I'm thinking of Reagan again, and it makes me angry."
• Beverly's hair is always changing, but without much intentionality behind it
• Sisko's hair tells a story (sometimes that story is about racism)
• Kira's "busy suburban mother of a toddler" hair

201. Very Sixth Season TNG (Derogatory) (TNG 6.22)

Anika and Liz put on their least comfortable lounging clothes and settle in to discuss Star Trek: The Next Generation, season 6, episode 22, "Suspicions".

• Why is Beverly Crusher hosting an astrophysics conference? And other questions that will forever go unanswered
• However, this episode, which makes no sense in the context of TNG, makes a LOT of sense in the context of Star Trek: Picard, and its theme of marginalised people doing SCIENCE is resonant in 2025
• You're not gonna believe this, but you can't actually just substitute Beverly for Geordi and Worf and not make any other changes to a story
• Breaking down the Star Trek monocultures
• This unremarkable episode has one of Picard's best speeches in the entire franchise
• Beverly Crusher puts on heels and pantyhose to lounge around at home, because athleisurewear had not yet been invited in 1993
• PITCH: the next streaming movie should be about Philippa Georgiou and Guinan DOING A HEIST

200. Performative Femininity

It's our 200th episode! A victory for quantity over quality and our small, chill audience of friends!

To celebrate, Anika and Liz are talking about Star Trek: Open A Channel - A Woman's Trek, Nana Visitor's book about women in Star Trek. 

• Open A Channel is much more substantial than just girl power feminism.
• How Lucille Ball was erased from Star Trek's narrative
• The throughline of mentorship
• We gently interrogate Nana Visitor's second wave biases
• We also have two separate (but related) rants about Janice Rand and the "glorified secretary" concept
• Hair Trek
• Marina Sirtis versus … a lot of people
• Bodyshaming from fandom. "The idea that fat people should not exist in your utopia is really horrible and RFK Jr coded."
• The editorial decision to exclude Michelle Hurd

199. Arm Day (Star Trek: Of Gods And Men)

Anika and Liz don their sparkliest shirts and biggest earrings, and sit down to watch Star Trek: Of Gods And Men, a fan film starring Nichelle Nichols, Alan Ruck, Walter Koenig and more.

You can watch it here, or -- in a much smaller window -- watch an unauthorised HD remaster. 

• We're in our Alan Ruck era, but we were not prepared for the unbelievable hotness of Garrett Wang, or the SURPRISE LIBERTARIANISM.
• We take … issue. With the timeline-changing catalyst. 
• This comment from a Redditor who claims to have worked on the production sets it in context. 
• Of Gods and Men is in conversation with the other science fiction of its era (2006-2008) in an interesting way.
• Nichelle Nichols carried this movie, and it is tragic she never got a showcase like this in official Trek
• Alternate Universe Chekov is a LIBERTARIAN FREEDOM FIGHTER with an unspeakable wig
• Alan Ruck and Chase Masterton have great chemistry
• The costumes are … hmm. Well.
• You should know that the entire time Anika is talking about Alien Nation, Liz was thinking of Coneheads

198. Plus A Change

Liz takes a deep dive into Usenet archives and tells Anika about fandom's earliest discussions of Star Trek: Deep Space 9! (Please note, we are still having audio problems -- despite literally nothing changing in our set ups, Liz's feed is echoing on Anika's channel. This means Anika had to be muted for a lot of the time. At this point we may have to get two tin cans and a really big ball of string to record…) 

• What was Usenet? (Please do not fact check Liz on the technical details.)
• And who was using it?
• The initial response to DS9 before "Emissary" aired…
• …and after. Here's Roger Tang's 5 January 1993 post with his impressions: "EMISSARY betrayed far too many of the storytelling flaws that have plague[d] TNG over the last two-three years."
• The very gendered language of the era: Picard and Bashir are "weenies", Dax and Kira are "chicks", but Dax is also a "bimbo" or "airhead" and Kira "has balls". And that's before we get to the slurs…
• Anika defends Terry Farrell from the Trekkies of 32 years ago.
• We may not be a Pittcast, but we ARE ride or die for Trinity Santos, thank you for asking.
• Michael Lee Jacobs' commentary on "Emissary": "It was almost painful to watch TNG right after the two wonderful hours of DS9 this evening." How much are these Usenet posters representative of the wider fandom? Where were other conversations taking place? 
• Babylon 5 was The Orville of the 1990s, in terms of its fans coming into Star Trek spaces to say, "Stop watching that new Trek with the Black lead, this show with the white dude is way better!"
• A really fascinating (and incomplete) debate about whether the Garak/Bashir interactions in "Past Prologue" were intended as a homophobic depiction of queerness. A bunch of straight men say no! 
• The one thing from this era (and the years following it) that we would like to bring back is people sharing their long-form thoughts on new episodes of TV. Like this post on "Duet" which Liz didn't get around to talking about!
• Finally, shout out to this prediction, a week after "Emissary" aired, which was completely wrong but also … kind of right?

197. Gel Budget (TNG 3.15)

Anika and Liz apply a normal amount of hair gel and step into a grim alternate universe to discuss Star Trek: The Next Generation's "Yesterday's Enterprise", including...

• Is this TNG's best episode? It could be!
• This story turns on Picard absolutely trusting the word of a Black woman
• Rachel Garrett was Liz's very first female starship captain
• The original premise for this episode is FULLY BONKERS
• "Yesterday's Enterprise" takes a completely novel approach to writing Tasha: what if she's just good at her job? 
• We engage in a bit of Sela Discourse, because why not?
• "Yesterday's Enterprise" sets the template for Discovery