Discovery's Harry Mudd, Theories, & 'Magic To Make The Sanest Man Go Mad'

Hello and welcome to Future Imperfect. I'm your

host Steve and C Phillips and in this episode

of the show I plan on talking about, well, some

of the latest stuff to drop on Star Trek Discovery,

including the latest episode featuring Harry

Mudd. So without further ado, getting into some

of the Star Trek Discovery news, it will obviously

return for a second season, which Kind of is

not surprising. I think they were just waiting

for the Official count to come in from the all

-access service, which they said that uh It's

been a huge success so far with the subscriber

growth and It's landed the second season of the

show. So obviously no second season details are

given because season one still going and they

don't want to kind of spoil it Will say that

it's starting to surprise me in actually doing

something halfway decent Those first few episodes

I was just like WTF like seriously it was it

was so Backwater woods Star Trek that I just

I couldn't get beyond it the instant travel and

some of the content they're in and some of the

the high -techness of it I still can't get past

and same with the Klingons I know I've harped

on that a million times over But this episode

actually was pretty good and we got to see Harry

Mudd in action. So it's our second episode with

Harry Mudd And him kind of talking about his

dear sweet Stella and it's interesting because

it starts out with a party at the beginning of

the episode and Burnham's awkwardness therein

and the first time because this episode is about

a time paradox time loop situation where only

two people remember the events of that day one

of which being Harry Mudd who stows away aboard

an alien creature that's on the endangered list

of the Federation and so they're supposed to

take it to whatever outpost that they needed

to take to. And within is a soldier that comes

out of the mouth and shoots and obliterates a

bunch of Federation Starfleet members and burn

them and just call the bridge. And Harry Mudd

is blowing his way through the system until he

gets locked in a shaft and He keeps repeating

the same 30 minutes over and over and over and

getting closer and closer to his objective of

the the spore drive because he wants to learn

how it all works and eventually you get to see

it adds a little bit of laughter and in funny

moments to the episode because you get for one

Harry Mudd hates hates Lorca so much that he's

killed him 50 plus times as explained in the

episode which was quite humorous and then you

get to see a montage of a variety of ways that

Harry Mudd has taken out Lorca which was kind

of fun to watch and although a bit brutal on

some of it and then he had these like little

He got to go to Lorca's hidden chamber at one

point and finds these little purple globes as

well as a certain gun that he, which looks kind

of like a disruptor, like a human disruptor in

some degree, and he shoots Lorca with it and

obliterates him, and this little purple dot thing,

he takes out some of the crew. I believe it was

Ash Tyler. Yeah, Ash Tyler. He took out Ash with

the little purple dot and it incinerated him.

And so after they've noticed that Harry's going

to win, Burnham goes to Harry Mudd in the captain's

ready room to inform him that she's too valuable

of a prize and explains who she is. And Harry

is about to take her in and she grabs the other

purple dot swallows it and incinerates herself

so that when they come back Ash Tyler will be

back with her so she didn't have to live without

him and Lieutenant Stamets is kind of interesting

in this episode because not only is he a little

bit more kind of space loopy out there He remembers

all of it because he's had the tardigrade infusion

into his blood as well as the bio adapters onto

his wrists so that he can basically plug into

the tardigrade spore chamber without it impaling

his torso. So they made adaptations to it. he's

the only one that remembers on the crew so he

has to continuously come earlier and earlier

to burn them to get Ash Tyler and so the three

of them can apprehend Mudd and they come up with

this unique plan of dissolving Harry Mudd's con

to sell the ship to the Klingons and so it's

a pretty interesting episode and I'll say that

this is Probably one of my favorite of this season

so far Because we got now mind you the party

bit. I didn't really care for I know that you

know They've had it in all the shows to some

degree some kind of a party. It was never like

this. This is like a You know 21st century tracks,

so you're gonna get that kind of set up and I

don't particularly care for the party scene as

an individual anyway, so that doesn't resonate

with me, but It shows that they can have some

down -to -earth time, and that was kind of nice

to see. And seeing the awkwardness of Burnham

trying to escape from her Vulcan emotionless

mentality of how she's going to deal with liking

Ash Tyler, who likes her as well. But no, I think

that the two stand out. roles in this were Stamets

and Harry Mudd and it made the episode very fun.

It made it very timeline centric because you

get to the point of why, well you get a little

bit of why of Harry's conmanisms and how he ends

up the way he is in the original series with

Kirk. the few times that he shows up. He shows

up twice in the original series and then once

in the animated series. But nonetheless, he's

still a formidable foe, regardless. And he always

seems to get his hands on this really high -tech

technology. And they mention how he has these

chronocrystals that are on his ship, which is

inside of the alien creature. And that's how

he keeps replaying time. over and over and over

and so they eventually have to figure out that

in order to beat him they have to in order to

survive they have to do exactly what he wants

and live within that 30 minute time frame so

he doesn't reset the time and I think that they

actually came up with a pretty solid episode

here and it looks like it's going to get a little

interesting you're going to probably see a lot

more of the Unique alien creature characters

kind of come and go as the season progresses

In the show since they're obviously not afraid

to lose cast members like the second episode

we lost Georgiou and the third episode we lost

the security officer of the of the or fourth

episode we lost the security officer of the the

discovery who was then replaced in episode 5

by Ash Tyler and so It's I think that they're

they're riding the line pretty well here at this

point Other than you know, my few gripes about

some of the changes they've made It's turning

out to be pretty solid at this point kind of

like how you know TNG Voyager DS9 the original

series a lot of them they had to kind of catch

their footing first and I Think finally discoveries

caught its footing And I think that we've kind

of finally hit the stride that it's going to

project through the rest of the season. The only

downside is that we're getting close to Thanksgiving

and this half season arc. That they're doing

right now is going to be done and they'll pick

it up with the the second half of the season

But the different story arc kind of continuation

of season one In January which is a little saddening

that they're going that route, but I kind of

get it But it'll be interesting to see who lives

and who dies how the the Klingon situation changes

and how they get to look like their TOS counterparts

and maybe how they explain why they look the

way they do at the beginning of the series from

the fact that Enterprise looks like the TNG versions

and then you have the original series which are

the plain faced and then in the motion picture

they're back to the the forehead ridges and brown

and I just would like some explanation on the

Klingons and why they're so warped at this point

in history. Just before the original series so

Yeah, I really enjoyed Harry mud and the the

the funny part is is I have some limited knowledge

of Harry mud as a character prior to this but

the the funny part is he He is kind of this this

Every man yet con man and it kind of gives you

this reason why he hates Starfleet so much and

it makes him that much more of a a menace and

kind of gives him more reason to be this notorious

con man that hates the federation as bad as he

does but yeah he you get to see his wife albeit

briefly and how he talks about Stella at all

times and how her family did not approve of them

and that he borrowed a large sum of money and

you know all this other garbage, but he kind

of explains how he escapes the Klingon ship and

you get to find out that Lorca and Tyler, well

the crew figure out that they know him. But yeah,

I really like the fact that Stamets was kind

of a standout role in this because ultimately

when I first saw him I hated the character with

The utmost I disliked him up until he started

using the spore drive and then he kind of loosened

up. So He's definitely the standout and I like

that this was kind of like the the cause and

effect TNG like, you know causality, you know

loop of You know living the last 30 seconds over

and over of you know a whole breach smash boom

restart You know, so it's it was it was a lot

of fun to watch but Yeah, the the the previous

encounters at least with the enterprise mud uses

the illegal illegal venus drug And attempted

to sell it to a group of lithium miners led by

Ben Childress on Rigel 12, and it gives the impression

that the women are beautiful, which in fact they're

not, which the minors married anyway. So, yeah,

and Kirk is constantly pressing charges and locking

up Harry in jail. It's funny to see his police

record because it says Harcourt Fenton -Mudd,

and this is in the original series anyway. It

says smuggling sentence suspended transport of

stolen goods purchase of space vessel with counterfeit

currency sentences psychiatric treatment effectiveness

disputed future police record code and then you

know his information and what he looks like and

Says any information pertaining to mud, please

notify authorities just because he's that massive

of a pain in the rear and He's he's always got

like these weird alien technologies, which is

is kind of intriguing and it kind of makes you

wonder how he gets his hands on it because he

He ends up on this this Android planet to during

the the second encounter on the original series

and Manages to commandeer the enterprise a bit

briefly and the androids actually take over and

so It's funny to see the older Stella Mudd androids

that are attacking or yelling at Harry Mudd in

that Enterprise episode, or the original series

episode. And then he comes back with the love

potion crystals on the third appearance in the

animated series. I'm definitely interested to

see where they go with his character and as much

as I disliked the original thoughts on some of

these people portraying older versions of these

characters, or younger versions I should say,

I think they've done pretty solid so far. So

it's not been entirely that bad. So I don't know,

what do you guys think about... the whole Harry

Mudd episode and the fact that Harry's not this,

not necessarily this bad character, but not necessarily

this heroic character either, because again,

he's a space pirate, conman, thief, swindler.

He's just very inventive and intelligent and

usually underestimated. But I think it's it's

funny the other so it's called magic to make

the sanest man go wild or go mad Because he just

constantly is going against it the sarcasm ebbing

from His character is probably the most fun part

and The fact that he's he's managed to single

-handedly take over this ship because he learns

each time and takes it over and eventually gets

to the point where he's so bored of killing Lorca

at taking over the ship he just kind of doesn't

know what to do anymore about the last two and

then the last one throws him off completely and

he's like oh and he lets his guard down like

it's it's hilarious so I definitely give this

this episode high props I don't know like how

well the next one's going to be because that

one's going to be featured on Saru, and that

kind of lead to the premise that he may die,

but they don't necessarily say who dies, or it

could be the fact that the admiral is taken,

and that reminds me of another situation entirely,

of that they mention that the admiral it could

possibly be another character from the original

series. And I'm a little lost on what they think

on this particular aspect. It's the Admiral,

what's her name? That's right, Admiral Cornwell.

They led to believe that even though it's not

a reference to an obscure original series character

of the same name, instead, even though it was

shot down, they speculated on social media that

in Dagger of the Mind, there was a character

that Lethe and Admiral Cornwell could be the

same person, which they look very similar. because

Lethe was brainwashed, former inmate working

as a therapist at a Federation penal colony.

The reasons for her being at the penal colony

is the first place were in mystery. When Captain

Kirk asked what she was in for, she dodged the

question now because discovery takes place about

10 years before the events of Dagger of the Mine.

It was postulated that Lethe was once Admiral

Cornwell, but has had her memories entirely erased

of her previous life, which it sounds crazy,

but it could be plausible. So I guess we'll have

to find out what happens on that, whether that's

true or not. And the other thing is, is they

wonder if Lorca could be from the Mirror universe,

but not necessarily bad. And that if they use

this unused storyline from the final season of

Enterprise, and that was kind of mentioned in

Mirror Mirror, where Kirk had this thing called

the Tantalus Field. which transports its victims

to other dimensions. Maybe they sent Lorca to

this universe, and that's why he's got this dark

of a past and this battle -hungry, ready kind

of guy, but yet... He's kind of grounded at the

same point that his crew still mean more, so

I don't know It could lead to that as well. I'm

not entirely sure what they're gonna go with

at this point And then there's of course the

Ash Tyler thing about you know is he a Klingon

isn't he you know so it's It's it's interesting

so That there's also the The whole thing with

Spock will not will not be showing up in the

series as far as they've mentioned So I Guess

we'll just kind of have to wait and see what

happens. It's It's definitely Going in different

directions than what I expected and I think that

that's kind of a good thing The other thing that's

kind of cool is that They've they've mentioned

obviously that it's it's going to have the the

new season and that it's been renewed but I wonder

if It's going to start getting brighter and More

tonally just nicer grounded towards the original

series type of thing And if they're gonna kind

of go the less war And kind of look closer to

the the original series and in how their their

costumes and how their Uniform ships and in production

and everything how it will look and start to

resemble but I guess that uh Production designers

for the show hinted that the look of Starfleet

will eventually start to resemble what fans are

used to from the original series, which means

that we could see full -on recreation of the

1960s retro future tech. You know, weirder things

have happened. Maybe that could be why Star Trek

continues its disbanding after episode 11. Kind

of makes you wonder though doesn't it like I

wonder if if discovery because mind you all other

Star Trek productions were kind of Cease and

desist and yet Star Trek continues managed to

continue Something's a little a little fishy

there. I think but Either way like I'm glad that

continues people got to finish out there their

round of 11 episodes basically They still have

one more that's gonna be coming out. They just

released episode 10 which is the They're touching

on the great barrier thing which was the where

no man has gone before with Kirk's friend that

Gary Mitchell who ended up with the godlike powers

and So it's I like where they're going with it.

It just kind of remains to be seen what they're

gonna do for the last episode and The the look

that they managed to to get for the Romulan commander

the female Romulan commander and make her look

just like Which I thought it was the same actress

like to some degree, but it's actually funny

because it's actually her daughter So it was

very fitting that they used her but I'm wondering

if they're the reason why the show is ending

Is not only because they're finishing the the

run And it's kind of bumping into the motion

picture timeline, but I'm wondering if They're

going to lend their their set to discovery for

some actual shooting and some Constitution class

starships because we haven't seen any yet And

it would definitely make it easier on production

if they didn't have to CG at all other than maybe

you know kind of sprucing it up a little bit,

but I would be interested to see what they do

with this. It's it's definitely one of my my

kind of out there theories that I hope is true

so I guess we'll see what happens in that that

regard but I think that this if they hit you

know with the season 2 I think we'll see how

after the war is over because I feel like, I

mean, Kurtzman said he doesn't want to bring

the Klingon War to season two, but I feel like

they're going to go a lighter tone in season

two, and I think that we're going to see less

military ships and see more kind of light -toned

plans and plot lines and ships and... Technology

is kind of balancing out a little bit and less

high -techness. I think that the discovery is

going to be this giant Purposeful MacGuffin that

they're going to use and reasons why that they

should mothball some of this tech until later

Until it gets some of the kinks worked out and

because they don't want This falling into the

wrong hands. And so I feel like they're going

to Purposely make some of this tech not accessible

at some point so That that may come to the point

they also may I'm kind of wondering if If if

Saru does die, I'm wondering if Burnham's gonna

get promoted to first officer At which point

she would be back in the same boat as she was

with Giorgio and I feel like Lorca He's kind

of like you get this this strict militaristic

Type of captain and at the same time he started

to loosen up a little bit because even when the

creature came on board He's like yeah, do whatever

you got to do like, you know, you know, just

take care of it so I'm wondering if he knows

that Burnham's destined for some kind of greatness

to some degree and I'm wondering if maybe There's

something with Lorca like maybe he's section

31. Maybe he's mirror universe. Maybe he's from

the future and things had to play out a certain

way, and so he's lived through part of this timeline.

It kind of makes me wonder if he knows something,

and that's why things are so shady with him.

So it'll be interesting to see how this whole

thing plays out, but I'm wondering if Burnham's

going to be the captain in season two. And that's

why we're building up Burnham to be a normal,

functional human being for the second season.

Obviously, the Discovery is not going to last

forever. It will probably only last the duration

of the show. But it would be kind of interesting

if they made it a time travel situation where

the Discovery randomly shows up in different

timelines. kind of intersects at some point.

And because you've got to remember there's no

mention of this ship in the future. Granted,

this didn't exist back then, but this tech was

a bit advanced for the entire fleet at this point

because it was a prototype and actually one of

two of the only kind and now the only one of

its kind. So I'm wondering if some of this technology

doesn't... get plugged in until much much later

so I guess we'll see I guess we'll see and and

like I said I'm very shocked by how well this

episode went and all of the the naysayers myself

included now granted I'm not one of the people

that just blatantly hates discovery I don't,

I never said I hated it, I didn't have high hopes

for it, that was more so my thoughts and mentality

on it, but I think that they've kinda hit their

stride, I'll see where it goes, I'm still interested,

I'm still invested, but it's, it's not, it's

still got a lot of explaining to do. So I'll

just leave it at that. I wonder, I still wonder

if Ash Tyler is Valk transformed to look human.

Just because looking at their facial builds and

just kinda how they look, I'm wondering if it's

the same guy. And there's just a lot of similarities.

I think they're playing coy with it, but... I

think the only reason this actor only has this

one credit on Discovery is because he's made

up. So I think we'll have to wait and see what

that divulges. But I have a feeling it's going

to be the same guy. That he's Valk. And the before

and after photo that's on TrekMovie .com. with

the postulation of it that Discovery is possibly

a Section 31 ship to some degree. I think that

that Ash Tyler is going to be one of those characters

that proves to be interesting as we progress.

He could very well be one of the first converted

augmented Klingons to to look the TOS style kind

of like Darwin from Trouble with Tribbles, so

I Would not be surprised in the slightest if

it's actually him because of the way that they

said the Watcher clan and Transforming him losing

everything sacrificial And and being there as

long as he has. However, there's also the whole

thing of him saying it's been six months and

he's been on this ship for seven months. It's

hard to say. We'll see what happens. Regardless,

I think the show is going to show that... There

there's still a lot to play with in this universe,

so I'm not really sure what we're going for anymore

It's kind of trending new ground which again

is a good thing But on a side note I had a discussion

on Twitter last week with an individual from

another Star Trek podcast and I was using the

the altered geek handle and in talking to this

guy, and he's wearing the Disco Star Trek Discovery

shirt, which you can get from StarTrek .com,

which I made the kind of smart aleck remark of

the character being... of them trying to change

the acronym of Star Trek. So I said to him, you

know, I wonder if they're changing Star Trek

Discovery to Disco. You know, trying to remove

the STD acronym with Disco by having it on the

crew shirts. As opposed to the three letter Trek.

Because TOS, TAS, TNG, DS9, VOI, ENT, and then

DIS. He said no, that's trying to remove anything

the three -liter abbreviation is DSC and has

been since the show was announced Actually, initially

it was STD which I realized that they do another

Star Trek podcast and they have connections with

CBS, which I don't have unfortunately but the

they did start out as STD and changed it to DSC

only because They realized the mistake of the

acronym. So then he tried to correct me and say

that Voyager is VGR, not Voy. And I says, I've

never seen VGR as the acronym for Voyager in

any place. The DSC I've not seen, but that makes

more sense, literally only seen this. And so

I pulled up memory alpha, and you see TOS and

TAS, TNG, DS9, VOY, ENT, and the DIS. And he

says, if you ask CBS, they've said for some time

that VOI is not the official abbreviation. And

I made the comment, so everyone in the world

is wrong and CBS is correct. Is that like the

same mentality of how discovery fits in Canon

2? And he says, CBS is the owner and they say

the abbreviation is VGR and DSC. Those are the

official abbreviations. Obviously, some use different

ones. I said, so the official site's wrong. And

I took a screenshot of... of Voyager on StarTrek

.com, and it says Star Trek Voyager, parentheses,

V -O -Y parentheses. And it says focuses on the

21st century, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And

he says, I'm not telling you anything of the

kind, I'm telling you what CBS has told me, and

that's all. The official abbreviation is VGR.

And... I says well, obviously they've got something

wrong then because I've never seen it as VGR.

I know that they use that as the production thing

while they were shooting it, but it was officially

VOY for years after that. So if anybody has any

contact with CBS, I would love to talk to somebody

on CBS about the Star Trek abbreviations and

how this series even connects to Canon. Even

if it was for an off -the -record interview just

so that I can kind of relay, you know I because

I see this is this the certain point right now

with Star Trek that The only ones privy to any

information or any kind of like oh we have the

specialty are the people that are directly tied

with CBS and I feel like These mainstream media

quote -unquote fans or people that are directly,

you know paid by CBS or people that are Talking

with any of that Or got special privilege to

the premiere and whatnot. I feel like they've

They're hyping the series but they're not really

explaining anything and they've been like gung

-ho from the get -go instead of little bit cynical

of it just from what we've seen and I Don't feel

like that's a true honest review Of the series

or any of the content like I understand it's

Star Trek But I feel like I'm getting a better

Star Trek experience out of the Orville Despite

the comedy that's involved and yes, it's making

social commentary and stuff, but it's it's the

same time it's it's playing with with things

that are a little bit lighter, but they're very

serious things, such as the social media trap

and the gender swap at birth and all that kind

of mentality. And Discovery, while it's touching

on Star Trek stuff to some degree, I feel like

everybody that's reviewing one or the other is

like, they're all in or there's no like questionability

or No hesitation on anything and I feel like

with me doing My review is somebody that is not

gung -ho on Star Trek discovery and who's not

you know I mean yes, I'm all in on the orville,

but Regardless I'm I'm a Star Trek fan, so I'm

going to enjoy sci -fi but I just want to know

how this is going to fit and And so coming into

it as someone who's disliked Majority of the

season so far and starting to get into the point

where I'm enjoying it I feel like I'm not as

Biased in my opinion of track so I Don't know.

What do you guys think and sound off in the episode

post on? Alter geek this week in geek net and

geek cast radio comm so let me know what you

guys think and until next time live long and

prosper Look at this place, Picard rubbing elbows

with Kirk, Romulence and Ferengi arguing like

old hens. I should have known better than to

trust a mortal. You're incapable of rising above

the mundane.