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The Not So Much The Neutral Zone Podcast

by NSMTNZ

Join Corene, Ari and Kim as we talk (and argue) about Star Trek, episode by episode, in chronological order all the way from the dawn of the franchise with The Cage (Q help us) all the way to the latest incarnations. It may take us ten years, but that’s okay. Spoiler-heavy; you’ve been warned.

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Episodes

  1. Episode 85 – “Star Trek 6: The Undiscovered Country”

    We’re finally here, everyone: the last Original Series movie, and arguably the most substantive. Definitely the most 90s, and the most modern, in terms of storytelling. Undiscovered Country was the first Trek movie that was ride-or-die Space Diplomacy, and as its central plot. It’s all about the...

  2. Episode 84 – “Star Trek 5: The Final Frontier”

    In this, the officially Most Bananas of all the Star Trek movies, a crazed cult-leader steals the Enterprise and her crew and takes a joyride to the centre of the galaxy to… find… God? I would love to know the anthropological reason for why fiction always visualizes “god” as Giant Floating Head....

  3. Episode 83 – “Star Trek 4: The Voyage Home”

    Buckle up, nerds, for MY FAVOURITE STAR TREK MOVIE, Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, AKA: The One with the Whales. This movie has it all: 1. Hand-claspingly earnest environmentalist commentary 2. The Office-style Fourth-Wall-poking Hey The Past You’re Doing It Wrong plotline 3. A starship crew...

  4. Episode 82 – “Star Trek 3: The Search for Spock”

    So, here’s the thing about the second, third, and fourth Star Trek movies: they’re a trilogy. And Search for Spock plays true to form for most two-of-threes: lots of feelings on display and not a whole lot of plot. But that’s okay! Search for Spock is one of the reasons I tend to disagree with…

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  5. Episode 81a – “Star Trek: Discovery Trailer”

    Have you seen the Discovery trailer yet? Well, spoilers: it definitely looks amazing. Great production values, a diverse cast, and some… okay, totally unrecognizable aliens. In this mini-episode, we react to the first look at the new Star Trek series. Reactions vary, from the Trek-newbie’s...

  6. Episode 81 – “Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan”

    We’re here! We’re finally here! We’re finally at my favourite era of Original Trek: all the movies after The Motion Picture! In this first good Trek movie, one of Kirk’s most powerful nemeses is back for revenge: Khan Noonien Singh, played by the incomparable Ricardo Montalban, has seized the...

  7. Episode 80 – “Star Trek: The Motion Picture”

    Welcome, nerds, to a new phase in our adventure together: the Original Series Movies! These uniforms: The Worst, or The Literal Worst? Star Trek: The Motion Picture cost $35,000,000 USD to make (~125 million in 2017 money), and made (adjusted for ticket price inflation) nearly 290 million…

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  8. Episode 79 – TOS 3×24: “Turnabout Intruder”

    Welcome to the VERY LAST EPISODE of the Original Series of Star Trek. On these episodes was based the entire, larger, extensive body of the Star Trek franchise. And while there is more Trek made after TOS than there is TOS, TOS was still the first to go where no one had gone before. Are you…

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  9. Episode 78 – TOS 3×23: “All Our Yesterdays”

    IN THIS, THE PENULTIMATE EPISODE OF THE ORIGINAL SERIES, we visit the planet Sarpeidon, a planet whose star is about to go supernova. Setting aside the crucial travel advisory that three hours out from a supernova, kids, do not beam down to the surface of a planet, this feels like a little late…

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  10. Episode 77 – TOS 3×22: “The Savage Curtain”

    So hey guys, spoiler: this episode is total nonsense. Basically, the Enterprise is at A Planet. Why? It’s never explained. But almost as soon as they arrive, a bunch of sentient-lava aliens kidnap Kirk and Spock, spontaneously generate them two new BFFs in the form of their personal long-dead...

  11. Episode 76 – TOS 3×21: “The Cloud Minders”

    Now in our home stretch for The Original Series, we come to a genuinely kinda good late-series episode, in which the Enterprise gets caught in the middle of a civil rights struggle that not-at-all-subtly mirrors the American civil rights movement, but in a floating cloud city. Federation […]

  12. Episode 75 – TOS 3×20: “The Way to Eden”

    So this week’s episode is about checking your privilege! The Enterprise trips over a stolen ship full of young space hippies who have fled the oppressive embrace of socialist Federation utopia, where all their needs and desires were met for free, to… start a commune in the desert. […]

  13. Episode 74 – TOS 3×19: “Requiem for Methuselah”

    So I nearly didn’t bother writing a post for this episode, because Corene’s intro basically… covers it all. You’ll see. But essentially this week’s story is a lecture on why no one, especially white dudes, should actually be immortal. It’s bad for everyone. You, your family, your friends, passing...

  14. Episode 73 – TOS 3×18: “The Lights of Zetar”

    In this episode, in a roundabout treatise on bodily autonomy and how you shouldn’t fuck with it, some jerkface glowy space lights impersonate The Patriarchy. (Poor, poor) Mira Romaine, Space Archivist, is on board the Enterprise to install new equipment on Memory Alpha, the Federation’s cultural...

  15. Episode 72 – TOS 3×17: “That Which Survives”

    Buckle up, nerds, because this week’s episode brings together two of our favourite things: 1. Star Trek and 2. a cozy murder mystery! We’re so excited. (Okay, 2/3 of us are excited. But Kim was loudly overruled because DEMOCRACY.) There’s no contrived excuse for tossing our crew into the mystery...

  16. Episode 71 – TOS 3×16: “The Mark of Gideon”

    This week brings us to an episode is often referenced as evidence of Trek’s pro-choice, feminist foundations. The basics are thus: Kirk gets kidnapped by the government of Gideon, subjected to involuntary medical experiments in order to extract a disease from his blood, which is then given to a...

  17. Episode 70 – TOS 3×15: “Let That Be Your Last Battlefield”

    So this episode needs little explanation, being well-known, even to those living under literal rocks, as Trek’s Clumsiest Racial Prejudice Metaphor, but just in case you were unsure about where we were, here’s a reminder: This episode gets a score of slightly below 50% for, […]

  18. Episode 69 – TOS 3×14: “Whom Gods Destroy”

    So, chances are, you have a hazy memory of a Star Trek episode that takes place in a mental hospital of some kind. Like us, you probably made it to Dagger of the Mind and went “wait, what? why is this way worse than I remember, and not just because it’s been twenty years since I last saw […]

  19. Episode 68 – TOS 3×13: “Elaan of Troyius”

    So this week’s episode would best be described as Taming of the Shrew, But in Space, but with the caveat that in no universe would any acceptable version of Kate have tolerated the spanking threats heaped upon her counterpart by our heroic captain. If you, like us, prefer Taming of the Shrew...

  20. Episode 67 – TOS 3×12: “The Empath”

    So really, this episode makes a lot more sense if you think of it as the first bad fic you ever wrote for your favourite TV show. The Empath was based off of a fan-submitted script, and we’re not sure whether to blame house-writer interpretation or the original author, but we do know one thing…

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  21. Episode 66 – TOS 3×11: “Wink of an Eye”

    This week, Kirk gets kidnapped by an alien queen to become part of her man-harem. No, literally. And we love her. It starts as all bad days for the Enterprise start: with them answering a distress call. Only when they arrive, there’s nobody home; just an entire abandoned city and a lot of…

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  22. Episode 65 – TOS 3×10: “Plato’s Stepchildren”

    So fair warning on two counts: this episode contains multiple instances of various kinds of assault, humiliation, and other hella disturbing violations of people’s rights, and you will have to listen to both William Shatner and Corene make this noise, multiple times: Plato’s Stepchildren is…

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  23. Episode 64 – TOS 3×09: “The Tholian Web”

    This week’s episode really, really wanted to be a ghost story. It almost manages it – Kirk, rather than saving the day, spends most of the episode floating at low-opacity in the background, waving his arms – but mostly this episode is about getting along. And also how you never, ever fucking…

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  24. Episode 63 – TOS 3×08: “For the World Is Hollow and I Have Touched The Sky”

    Season 3 of TOS is a strange, unpredictable beast, in that there are utterly bananas episodes that make no sense and are exhaustingly bad, like “And The Children Shall Lead,” and then there are episodes like this one, which could have stood in for a 60s/70s contemporary standalone sci-fi film and...

  25. Episode 62 – TOS 3×07: “Day of the Dove”

    So just to get this out of the way before we start: oh god, later Klingons are so much better than TOS-era Klingons. Not just in terms of, you know, a vastly more fleshed-out and consistent culture and general coolness factor, but also because of the wow, really terrible (both in terms of, you...

  26. Episode 61 – TOS 3×06: “Spectre of the Gun”

    Do you enjoy bizarre sci-fi-esque westerns like Wild Wild West and Westworld? Alternately, have you been doing a lot of drugs? Then this episode is for you! Seriously. First of all, the reason given for the Enterprise visiting this planet either makes no sense at all or makes them look like...

  27. Episode 60 – TOS 3×05: “Is There In Truth No Beauty?”

    Hold on to your hats, listeners, because something astonishing has come to pass: we all liked this one. Right on the tail of one of the worst episodes of TOS is one of the best so far, and one that comes with an interesting question, also the title of the episode: is there, in truth, no beauty? […]

  28. Episode 59 – TOS 3×04: “And The Children Shall Lead”

    This week’s episode is widely considered to be the worst of the Original Series, and while we beg to differ on “worst,” it’s still pretty damn bad. From inconsistent characterization to random dialogue to one of the most random stunt-casts in our shared experience, this ep goes from “uhh” to...

  29. Episode 58 – TOS 3×03: “The Paradise Syndrome”

    So we’ve been looking forward with – not anticipation? More like trepidation? Dread? knowing this episode was coming up pretty soon, and here we are: The One Where Kirk Gets Amnesia and Cosplays A Hollywood Native American. To give you an idea of the level of cultural sensitivity on display for...

  30. Episode 57 – TOS 3×02: “The Enterprise Incident”

    So mostly we loved this episode because it contains a novelty for TOS: a take-no-shit female leader in the form of a Romulan Commander whose authority is so unimpeachable that we don’t even get to learn her name. I mean, there are downsides. We encounter RomCom […]

  31. Episode 56 – TOS 3×01: “Spock’s Brain”

    Welcome to season 3 of both TOS and Not So Much The Neutral Zone! Can you believe we’ve been doing this for this long?? Neither can we! In less cheerful news: we are so. Sorry. America. The existential dread we feel on your behalf actually came in handy this week, though, because this episode is […]

  32. Episode 55 – TOS 2×26: “Assignment: Earth”

    In the Original Series season 2 finale, we find ourselves, inexplicably, in 1968. Inexplicably because it contradicts everything we’ve been told before or since about messing with timelines and the dangers of time travel. And why? Nominally, to do “historical research” into the “pivotal events”…

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  33. Episode 54 – TOS 2×25: “Bread and Circuses”

    Apparently no one at 1960s Desilu was listening to me, because this week’s episode involves yet another goddamn parallel Earth. And not just Earth: an Earth where the Roman Empire survived until the 20th century, and yet somehow still ended up speaking colloquial North American English. Save me. […]

  34. Episode 53 – TOS 2×24: “The Ultimate Computer”

    Now, I’m sure this will come as no surprise to you, the habitual sci-fi consumer, but here’s a pro tip: when you give a New, Amazing, Cutting Edge Computer the sole charge of a starship/town/space station, Shit Goes Down. In this episode, Dr. Richard Daystrom (who later gave his name to The...

  35. Episode 52 – TOS 2×23: “The Omega Glory”

    Okay, here’s a partial list of acceptable scenarios under which you may portray generally Earth, or specifically the United States of America, as existing on an alien planet or anywhere that is not our universe: alternate timelines alternate universes cultures that deliberately […]

  36. Episode 51 – TOS 2×22: “By Any Other Name”

    So with guest-host Trisha joining us this week, the NSMTNZ crew is 50/50 on loving this episode and finding the Kelvins some of most genuinely scary villains of TOS so far. The story begins rather generically, with the Enterprise responding to a distress call… and then being immediately taken...

  37. Episode 50 – TOS 2×21: “Patterns of Force”

    Good news: this is our 50th Episode! Holy crap! Bad news: Long story short, the official subtitle for this episode is “Nazis‽” If you’re confused: that’s an interrobang, one of the most graceful forms of punctuation in the English language. No other symbol so effectively encompasses our feelings...

  38. Episode 49 – TOS 2×20: “Return to Tomorrow”

    So in case you were still on the fence about this, here is the lesson for this episode: never, ever, ever let a semi-ascended super-being, especially one who considers you a child or ant by comparison to themselves, inhabit your body, even temporarily. Like, how […]

  39. Episode 48 – TOS 2×19: “A Private Little War”

    Pro tip #1: guns are bad. Pro tip #2: the Non-Intereference Directive is there for a fucking reason. So this episode? Was actually sort of well-delivered? In a way? I mean, if you ignore that it was originally supposed to be a Vietnam metaphor and actually ended up being about disarmament and...

  40. Episode 47 – TOS 2×18: “The Immunity Syndrome”

    This episode is called “The Immunity Syndrome,” but frankly this is a missed opportunity to title an episode “Attack of the Giant Space Amoeba,” or to gleefully over-use the word “entropy.” Because that’s what this episode wants to be about, folks: entropy, and why it’s the […]

  41. Episode 46 – TOS 2×17: “A Piece of the Action”

    So, depending on your point of view, this episode is either a condemnation of accidental colonialism, an apologist screed for colonialism, or is saying something chilling about casual gun violence. …orrrr it’s a thinly-veiled excuse to have James Kirk cosplay as Al Capone. About a hundred years […]

  42. Episode 45 – TOS 2×16: “The Gamesters of Triskelion”

    In this week’s episode, our brave (stupid?) crew is once again kidnapped by a race of jerkface omnipotent ascended aliens. There’s a whole painfully-artificial B-plot that we won’t go into much, but the A-plot is basically that Kirk, Chekov and Uhura are innocently beaming down to a planet for...

  43. Episode 44 – TOS 2×15: “The Trouble with Tribbles”

    So as a heads-up, we don’t care what anyone thinks (up to and including Gene Roddenberry, who may or may not have despised it): this episode is comedy gold. In this week’s among-the-most-famous and most universally-beloved episode, the Enterprise is summoned to space station K-7 by a Priority One...

  44. Episode 43 – TOS 2×14: “Wolf in the Fold”

    So this episode is nominally a murder mystery, which honestly, made us give it a whole lot of bonus points right at the outset. Our crew is visiting Argelius, a port world where, well, to give you an idea, the law of the land is literally love. A couple of hundred years ago Argelians decided that...

  45. Episode 42 – TOS 2×13: “Obsession”

    This week we reach the midway point in season 2 of TOS (and arguably the halfway point in the series), potentially subtitled “Old Man Kirk Yells at Cloud” (there was some debate about this, given he never actually yells at the cloud). It’s also probably the first installment in Trek’s…

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  46. Episode 41b – Bonus Content: Star Trek Beyond

    The NSMTNZ crew recently saw the new offering from the Nu!Trek franchise, and wonder of wonders, we enjoyed it! Now if Hollywood can just promise to never let J.J. Abrams touch Star Trek ever ever again, I might one day progress to a place of acceptance where I can physically stop complaining…

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  47. Episode 41a – Bonus Content: Discovery Teaser Trailer!

    Our first bonus episode of two this week, all about the upcoming return of Star Trek to its natural habitat, television. There was a panel full of announcements at SDCC 2016, among them the name of the new ship, also the title of the series: Discovery. We also got a list of new names added to the...

  48. Episode 41 – TOS 2×12: “The Deadly Years”

    This week, our crew comes upon a far-flung pseudo-colony where the members of a scientific expedition have come down with an acute case of The Olds. Naturally, they quickly discover that they’ve been infected with whatever is killing the expedition members. The medical staff springs into action,...

  49. Episode 40 – TOS 2×11: “Friday’s Child”

    This week, the Enterprise visits Capella, land of shiny rocks, where people stab each other for fun and call it a favour, and women literally belong to their male relatives. Sounds like a super-sweet potential trading partner, right? Capella, a pre-warp civilization (Prime Directive? What Prime...

  50. Episode 39 – TOS 2×10: “Journey to Babel”

    So this is probably my favourite episode so far, mostly because it’s FULL OF SPACE DIPLOMACY. It’s also the first appearance of several Grand Trek Traditions, like Complaining about Dress Uniforms, and contains this scene, where Spock shows Bones how to do the Vulcan salute: The Enterprise is...

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ABOUT THIS SHOW

Join Corene, Ari and Kim as we talk (and argue) about Star Trek, episode by episode, in chronological order all the way from the dawn of the franchise with The Cage (Q help us) all the way to the latest incarnations. It may take us ten years, but that’s okay. Spoiler-heavy; you’ve been warned.

HOSTED BY

NSMTNZ

CATEGORIES

tv film

Frequently Asked Questions

How many episodes does The Not So Much The Neutral Zone Podcast have?

The Not So Much The Neutral Zone Podcast currently has 93 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.

What is The Not So Much The Neutral Zone Podcast about?

Join Corene, Ari and Kim as we talk (and argue) about Star Trek, episode by episode, in chronological order all the way from the dawn of the franchise with The Cage (Q help us) all the way to the latest incarnations. It may take us ten years, but that’s okay. Spoiler-heavy; you’ve been warned.

How often does The Not So Much The Neutral Zone Podcast release new episodes?

The Not So Much The Neutral Zone Podcast has 93 episodes. Check the episode list to see recent publication dates and frequency.

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Who hosts The Not So Much The Neutral Zone Podcast?

The Not So Much The Neutral Zone Podcast is created and hosted by NSMTNZ.
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