The SFFaudio Podcast #865 – Jesse, Tony De Simone, and Maissa Bessada talk about A Stitch In Time by Andrew Robinson

Talked about on today’s show:

the last Deep Space Nine novel, Armin Shimmerman co-wrote The 34th Rule, The Laertian Gamble, Robert Sheckley, John Gregory Betancourt, Kristine Kathryn Rush, Esther Friesner, performing Quark, pinches his nose, Maissa will like this book, so right, very actoryly, an actor prepares sort of thing, how do I get into my role?, diary entries, apparently yeah, that’s the story, elements, scenes that are from the show, the way it is told, moments, backstory is the bulk of the book, after the show’s over, deep into season 7, destruction of Cardassia, his mother, Neela, episodes with her?, the housekeeper, months ago, coming, he’s the whole show, the focus of the show, steals the spotlight, great screen presence, how he got his start as a movie star?, Jeffrey Combs, Re-Animator, H.P. Lovecraft 80s movies, Brunt, Lower Decks, alternate universe Garak, delete it, there’s no such thing as a prequel to a prequel, getting the plans, what’s gonna happen next, a prequel to a prequel, fuck you with the spoilers, when the movie Alien 3 was gonna come out, walk straight into the middle of the theater, a terrible movie, fragility statements, you’re on a boat, your gonna get seasick, don’t worry about it, you can’t help them by hiding information, popular to ‘ship Garak and Bashir, neither characters are gay, Bashir is intrigued by Garak, very lonely, what’s canon, he writes Garak as bisexual, one line, the guy that he murdered later, everybody finds him attractive, palindrome, set to marry, if you were really lovers, you would have, hurt by that, happy to be close to people, that’s not really it, made lonely, closed off society, a very good deep dive on a weird society, Deep Space Nine, if it is a metaphor what is it a metaphor for?, Cardassians, TNG, Ensign Ro, in the build up of those worlds, a 1984 planet, the Obsidian Order, the occupation of Bajor, israelis occupying palestine, the occupation of Ireland by England, not a perfect match 1 to 1 for anything, all those circular conversation, all true but all lies, he built it into this backstory, his father is not his father, that girl is not his lover but she is, he’s his uncle, not just being cucked, he does love him, a man who’s raising you, the shipping thing is at its worst, at its most parodic in all the mirror universe episode, just Ezri, kissed on and kissing Kira, a lesbian in the alternate universe, Ferengi Zek, to ‘ship people, have sex with Jadzia, like a cartoon universe, not terrible trek show, more of that, in the original Trek too, episodes written by fans, The Empath, torture Spock and McCoy, interesting, but terrible, what’s going on really, not some idea they’re exploring, pick your favourite episode of Deep Space Nine, a clone of himself and he doesn’t know it, a ripoff of a great Philip K. Dick story, a sad one, Molly falls into a time hole, a ripoff of Iceman (1984), Rom bunts, declare victory, what it is actually is philosophy, pastime, recapitulation, working together as a group, so many things going on in that episode, a way to defeat the vulcans, what a great episode, kicks him off the team, doing life wrong, the heart of the show, he looks like a loser, thinks he’s cute, awkward dumb and smart, Ferengi kids, what Garak thinks about baseball, wrestling and boxing, team games, basketball and baseball, incomprehensibly inane, sent to boarding school, very similar to what the Spartans did to their children, denied enough food, denied safety, thrive or die, loses an eye, happy to have, time with their mothers, learn the war arts, have to steal, caught stealing food, learn to be resourceful and tricky, graduation, surrounding a Sparta, Helots, secretly murder, told from the Athenian point of view, apprenticeship, this class of people, the elites, the sons of the nobility, famous boarding schools, Sandhurst, rule parts of the world, John Buchan, many many such cases, abusive and fucked up and weird system, kills a bunch of Romulans, false flag, In The Pale Moonlight, the machinations behind it, evil vs. necessary, used to create that character, forced his teammate to kill himself, trained and brought up, little pet, kidnapped from its family in the desert, “Meela”, contradicts the fact, learns to blend in and disappear, essentially a chameleon, a gecko, his skin can’t change colour, the background for it, trolls, they’re more like frogs, always raining on Ferenganar, round mud huts, the Wayoun character, Odo, an uplifted species, ape-like, squirrels, living on nuts and berries, give them a gift, turned into slaves, a built in false-consciousness built into your genetic code, a little bit of blue on the spoon, did they evolve from reptiles?, possibly also bajorans, it doesn’t have to be he literally is a reptile, being reptilian, be so mean and torturey, they’re just like us, Quark is praying, a slip of latinum in the ear of the divine treasury guy, bribes the god with the coin and sneaks in with a mask later and steals it back, dark and mysterious, a great backstory that allows it, Kira’s backstory, her spiritual religion prophet stuff, all there already, the most mysterious character has the most fitting backstory, written in first person, best written, better written than most books, the actor was using this stuff to help tell the story, the sympathetic character, awful things, a real theater person, one other way of thinking about this is a one man play, 12 hours long, impressive, indulgent, paid all the receipts, his Odo is pretty good, Dabo girl trying to kill him, does Kira fine, we’re getting it from his POV, backstory is enough, is this a science fiction novel?, no it is not, a one man show set in a science fiction universe, “science fiction wallpaper”, no exploration of technologies, the wire, that episode is about it, a character focused story, a really good book, a really good exploration of how you come up with a character that’s interesting, make it fit the facts, working backwards, he had those things, how, why, referring back to the show, nicely woven, stitched up, the wholecloth of this book, where Garak is introduced, the only Cardassian on the station, nobody knows, why is he acting that way?, in continual use, he could handle the isolation and the hate, that signature smile, evil smile, hiding his feelings, pain becomes pleasure, he’s floating, a really good thing to add in, always has to reflect back of what’s on the show, a disjointment there, Sisko has sex with Jadzia, taints their relationship, lusting after Jadzia, Quark, Worf, Bashir, Kira’s after her, when she dies, Ezri is terrific, a really good character, more of a counsellor than Deanna Troi ever was, remember Barkley?, a mix of really good science fiction ideas, social ideas, what does it mean to forgive your enemies, silly episodes, Sisko thinks he’s a science fiction writer in the 1950s, the canonical stuff, what’s going on with Jake Sisko, or Nog, what a great arc Nog has, the best Star Trek show, one of the most interesting characters is Garak, Andrew Robinson, the main badguy in the first Dirty Harry movie, Clint Eastwood needs to kill him, typecast, Hellraiser movie, psycho-killer, he’s just a stage actor who likes meaty roles, tried out for Odo, Rene Auberjonois, the biggest and most interesting acting role for almost any actor, the expanded the role, interesting character, because of what he did with it, this doofus, the Rom and Leeta episode, he’s a cartoon, tries to get Vic Fontaine to take him as his opening act, making it all fit together, tailoring it, what do you do on a show like that?, build sets, sew costumes, put on a lot of makeup, can’t I be a human this episode, guest stars not wearing their makeup, interactive with the material, prescriptive, a premise, a weak one, Bashir falls with the weak boned girl, flying planet, never comes up again, she’s in a wheelchair, let’s put a blind person on the bridge, doesn’t come up that much, let’s do something a little interesting, what do they need a tailor for, bartender, replicator, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, gardener, tending the memorials, he loves his country, Family (TNG episode), after the famous Locutus of Borg, vineyard, post traumatic stress, fall down in the mud, get back to the show next week, such a rich world, soft science fiction, it is not about technology, it is about society, David Ogden Steirs is an elderly scientist, make their star better, handwavium, a program where the kill everybody after a certain age, break with his society?, not accepting euthanasia, a thing that comes up as an idea, shell shock, another name for it, drink yourself to death, awareness of this concept, the soft sciences, where is the idea in here?, there really isn’t one, what Paul called this, spaceships on the wall, robots, non-science fiction novels by Philip K. Dick, the principal is a real bitch, he just can’t say the word robot, he’s trying to understand why people are so weird, quite a personality, robot taxi drivers, please don’t stiff me on this fare, one of the weird things about Star Trek, robots, the Doctor or Vic Fontaine, sentient ais, where are you drawing the distinction, a very specific tradition, slavery, a story about slavery, replicas, sewer cleaners, not usually the best episodes, Voyager, 7 of 9, being freed, that kid she frees from the borg, you are put into a cult, the bad cardassian, is this Gul Dukat, his father died, a Pah Wraith cult on Empok Nor, obsessively sexing after Kira, kidnapped by her childhood priest, current teams plan, are you serious, this meeting