This week on Priority One — Santiago Cabrera discusses Holos, Frakes reflects on finding Riker, Pete Challenges Pat to Trivia, and Short Treks gets a Hard Copy. In Gaming news, we sit down with Star Trek Online Lead Designer Al “Captain Geko” Rivera and review the latest happenings in the Star Trek gaming multiverse…. Then, we look On Screen to episode 8 of Star Trek Picard – “Broken Pieces”
Of course, as always, before we wrap up the show, we’ll open hailing frequencies for your incoming messages
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This Weeks Community Questions Are:
CQ: Who is your favorite Rios – the original or one of his Holograms?
AND
CQ: Did you catch our interview with Al Rivera about “Measure of Morality”? What did you think?
by Jake Morgan
This week’s “Star Trek: Picard” – “Broken Pieces” – gave us a clearer look at La Serena Captain, Cris Rios. SYFY Wire sat down with the man behind Rios and all of his holos, Santiago Cabrera, to talk about the many faces of the haunted Captain.
Cabrera told SYFY Wire that he didn’t want the holos to be a gimmick ”There had to be substance to it. What hooked me and what I loved about it was the psychology behind a man who is alone and happens to be with these versions of himself. It’s better when you can reveal something about a character without saying too much.”
The portrayal of so many holograms likely wouldn’t have worked if not for clear distinctions…like those glorious accents. ”They said: ‘What accents can you do?’ and I said, ‘I can do anything!’ Which was mostly true. Some accents are very easy and accessible for me”. That includes Emmett’s, the Spanish speaking Tactical hologram. But, according to Cabrera, the Scottish accent proved a bit more difficult ”That was the one I had to work on the most. Michael [Chabon] really wanted to do an homage to Scotty, so he was like, ‘Can you do Scottish?’ That was a tricky one. So I got a Scottish friend of mine to help read the lines with me. I just made sure I had the lines down very, very early. It was one of my favorites because I had more time with it.”
For more of the interview, which includes Cabrera’s preparation for playing the jet-setting Rios, and his thoughts on working alongside Sir Patrick Stewart, follow the link in our show notes.
Busy week for SyFy wire. They also sat down with Actor, Director, and fan-favorite Jonathan Frakes to talk about what it was like to get back in front of the camera as Will Riker.
Frakes admitted that, like co-stars Jeri Ryan and Jonathan Del Arco, finding his former role’s voice was challenging. Only through collaboration with showrunner Michael Chabon was the 67 year-old Star Trek veteran able to find his cadence. ”I had very long, very specific conversations with Michael about Riker’s turn-of-phrase. For every scene. He slipped me the script early, and I worked on it for a long time. We had a line-by-line, word-by-word process. He understood completely and what ended up on the page was a total collaboration. I didn’t change the story, but I changed certain rhythms. I’m not sure if they felt more like Frakes or more like Riker.”
Regarding the Troi-Riker’s long-running relationship, Frakes said ”At the beginning of The Next Generation, Troi and Riker were lovers before they transferred to the Enterprise, and then that [story] was buried so that they could be whatever — available to relationships with random aliens. But, we held onto this relationship and insisted to each other that we maintain it. And as a result —I think — it resurfaced in the final movie [Nemesis] in which the two characters were married. It was very important, this relationship, we take it very personally and we feel wonderfully vindicated to see them return.”
Frakes, who is also involved BEHIND the camera, gave an update on Star Trek’s other show, Discovery. ”As we know, they’ve gone 930 years into the future. And in that is optimism. Certainly for Michael Burnham. She’s had a life-changing experience over the break between seasons. The new season isn’t driven by fears of the past. It’s driven primarily by this second chance that the crew of Discovery is given. It’s brighter. More complex. I think it’s thrilling.”
There was a lot covered in the interview – including his directing Picard and fans reception of Trek’s two newest series. Follow the link for a closer look!
On March 13th, former Presidential hopeful Pete Buttigieg took the reigns of Jimmy Kimmel Live. During the episode, Buttigieg – a well documented Trekkie – interviewed Sir Patrick Sterwart – before challenging the legend to Star Trek trivia
In a segment titled “Who’s the Captain Now”, Buttigieg and Stewart answered questions from former TNG co-star LeVar Burton. The inquiries ranged from “The title of Star Trek: The Next Generation’s first episode” to “the character that made Picard facepalm”, and ended with Sir Patrick winning – barely!
It was a fun segment, and worth the watch if only for the ribbing Burton gives to both Stewart and Buttigieg.
If you haven’t watched Star Trek’s “Short Treks” because of their limited distribution, you’ll soon have the opportunity to partake in the bite-sized trekisodes! On Sunday, March 15th, Star Trek.com announced the release of “Short Treks” on Blu Ray and DVD. In addition to the episodes “Runaway,” “Calypso,” “The Brightest Star,” “The Escape Artist,” “Q&A,” “The Trouble With Edward,” “Ask Not,” “Ephraim & Dot,” and “The Girl Who Made the Stars.”, you will also get a look behind the scenes with “making of” Documentaries and commentary. Both Blu Ray and DVD versions are set for release on June 2nd, and the Blu Ray can be pre-ordered at Amazon.com for 25.99 USD at the time of this recording.
by Shane Hoover
This week, we were joined by very special guest Al “Captain Geko” Rivera – Star Trek Online’s lead designer. In addition to discussing the state and future of the game, we also had the privilege of playing Star Trek Online’s newest mission – “Measure of Morality: Part One”. Be sure to Trek out our livestream on Youtube, and keep an eye out for Part II coming soon.
Cryptic Studios have announced an upcoming special video premiering on YouTube March 23rd. The video, titled “Behind the Scenes: Measure of Morality”, will offer viewers a glimpse into the minds behind the 10th Anniversary episodes. Sitting down for the round table discussion will be Sr. Content Designer Jesse Heinig, Lead Designer Al Rivera, Lead Environment Artist Scott Boyd, Animator Weston Pierce, and Environment Artist David Lopez. These Cryptic developers will each offer their takes on the episodes and their experiences contributing to the development process.
Star Trek Online’s “Mudd’s Market” section of the C-Store will be running another 80% off sale from March 19th through March 23rd. Mudd’s Market offers players a chance to use Zen to purchase items that were previously exclusively available during past Events or Giveaways. With “regular” pricing on the Market being prohibitively high, these recurring sales are the expected windows of opportunity for players looking to pick up these items. And like with previous sales, Mudd’s Market is adding new items for this iteration. Joining the Market are the Kelvin Timeline Admiral Uniform, the T6 Vulcan T’Pau Scout Ship, and the Terran Guerilla Combat Armor. The Kelvin Timeline Admiral Uniform is a costume option that was originally a giveaway during the 50th Anniversary of Star Trek back in 2016. The T6 Vulcan T’Pau Scout Ship was the free prize ship during last year’s 9th Anniversary event. And the Terran Guerilla Combat Armor was originally rewarded for initial completion of the “Peril Over Pahvo” Featured Task Force Operation in March of 2019.
Cryptic Studios released a special message to players on Monday, March 16th. In the message, Cryptic speaks to players about how the current pandemic response is affecting the studio. While the studio is taking steps to protect its staff, their intentions are to keep all games running by working remotely. The message closes with /QUOTE/ We appreciate your understanding while we adapt to both ensure a positive play experience for all of you and keep our studio family safe. /ENDQUOTE/
In another Tweet posted by Star Trek Online, they informed players that the Tribble and Redshirt test servers will be unavailable to the public for at least a few weeks. Those servers will be used by the development teams for remote development and testing.
Join us for TFO Thursday – each Thursday we team up with other Armada members to earn marks and dilithium.
Chabon on IG and THR, Jonathan Del Arco talks Hugh, Star Trek V Covid-19, STO’s Legacy Bundle bugs get fixed, Summer Event ship,and “Nepenthe” is On Screen.
seannewboy on 2020-03-24
Wonderful show everyone, great job.
Everyone stay safe.
Tyler Maxwell on 2020-03-24
Who is your favorite Rios – the original or one of his Holograms?
All of the above? I mean, technically all of the ‘Holo-Rios’ represent a fragment of original recipe Rios anyways, right? So, liking him is the same as liking ALL of them, right? 😀
Though I’m a little disappointed that they went with a sort of hokey, comedic moment between the Holo-Rios’, as opposed to something that better explained Rios, and what part of his personality and identity that each of them is meant to represent. Yeah, having all of the Holo-Rios’ knock themselves on the head at the same time was kinda cute, but not really THAT much.
Did you catch our interview with Al Rivera about “Measure of Morality”? What did you think?
🙂 Having Sir Patrick Stewart do stuff in-game is still on the table, right?
Star Trek: Picard, Episode 8 — “Broken Pieces”
IT’S ALL CONNECTED!!! Everything from Rios and the death of his former captain, to Raffi’s obsession with “Conclave of Eight” which is not actually a group but a place, Oh’s attack on Mars and the synth ban…also, Narissa visits auntie, Seven becomes Borg Queen-for-a-Day, and Elnor needs a hug. Okidokes. I dunno, I think that after the sluggishness of the first few episodes, now Picard is actually moving at a pretty decent pace; all of the main plotlines are converging, the crew is coming together (and Jurati ‘promises’ not to murder more people :p ), and we’re on the way to Soji’s homeworld. And Picard’s line about facing down “secrecy and fear” with “openness, optimism, and the spirit of curiosity”; well, that’s core Trek, right?
I actually appreciate that Chabon specifically namedropped the Tkon Empire, because they were the first folks that I thought of when the idea of ‘constructed star systems’ came up. Though apparently the Tkon Empire disappeared after their home star went supernova and destroyed them all. (How’s THAT for irony? :p ) I wonder what their ‘Portals‘/guardians/(maybe synths?) have to say about that; maybe we’ll see in Season 2? 😀
Jerry Stokes on 2020-03-21
I love the Engineering Halogram. He reminded me of Scotty.
ChiyoUmiku on 2020-03-21
I cannot lie, being someone who was adopted by a family of Irish heritage, I loved his irish accent the most, but just the same i also loved his Scottish one as it reminded me of James and Chris Doohan. Live long and Prosper Scotty!
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