Inglorious Treksperts - Podcast Rankings and reviews

Really fun show that will touch on the lore of Trek, but specializes in discussing the production of the shows/films through investigating what really went on behind the scenes. That plus analysis of what does and doesn’t work within Trek from hosts who have the experience within Film and Television to back up what they say.

I just found this gem within the last month and have been binging all the episodes from the beginning. I thoroughly enjoy the content they put out and the camaraderie they present it with. Their reverence for TOS has drawn me into watching through the original series with fresh eyes. I love listening to them.

Just as much as the Enterprise crew were my childhood heroes, I lived for the stories from the writers who brought Star Trek alive in magazines like Cinefantastique, StarLog and books like Trek Navigator and the DS9 and Captains’ Logs. So when I met Mark Altman at the New York 50th, I spent the weekend at his panels, getting his autographs on Free Enterprise (original and deluxe editions) and the books that helped me write so many law school Trek-themed papers my professors started expecting them. Alongside a cosplay winning female Khan, I also harangued him incessantly to create a Trek podcast….

We’re talking about memories, as Darren would say, and with every episode, The Inglorious Treksperts preserve and advance the meaning of Star Trek, from everything that goes into making it, to the gestalt of Trek worldwide, to its influence on our future. Sure, with a universe so expansive, fans will debate favorite shows, characters, movies, and books. The arguments get pretty heated. On any list of important characters, for example, O’Brien beats Ruk, and Captain Michael Burnham is in the top twenty. And maybe Pike keeps asking senior officers for opinions because it keeps his mind off where he’s heading and it makes him feel better to know he’s preparing them for the future all those strange new worlds will reveal. But our differences dissolve when the Treksperts – and of course this includes Rob Burnett – dive into what makes Trek work and why we all love it. They take us along for the journey, and reveal time and time again that Trek, at its core, is a belief system, and the only positive vision for our future that our species has ever created.

Thematically, the Treksperts get it. They have the knowledge. They have the passion. Collectively they possess centuries of wisdom, have spent their lives getting to know everyone in the industry, behind and in front of the camera. Every one of their interviews is a treasure chest, whether it’s with Anson Mount (!!), David Gerrold, Michael Sussman, Walter, Eddie Egan, Rekha Sharma, Nana (!!), Michael Westmore, Rafe Needleman, Laurence Luckinbill (!!), Harold Livingston (!!), Brannon Braga, Armin, Stashwick, Jeffrey Combs, Ira Steven Behr (!!), Brian Volk-Weiss (!!), Terry Farrell, Ralph Senensky (!!), Andreea Kindryd (!!!), Kirk Thatcher, Doug Drexler, or the Okudas, to name just a few.

The Treksperts get that talking about Trek is talking about the human condition: psychology at an Australian prison, science at a New York teleportation laboratory, house parties with Lou Reed, Ticonderoga and Elvis, Shatner’s view of his view of the Earth from space.

They recently asked fans why we love Trek. What keeps us watching Kirk and Scotty in a shuttlecraft circling the Enterprise, or being enthralled by that comet heralding our approach to DS9 (“Take Me Out to the Holosuite” is both the ultimate guilty pleasure and also the ground ball to get your sports friends into the show.), or breaking out into Where My Heart Will Take Me no matter how much we cringe, or watching two Starfleet officers draw a delta in the sand. These are just some of the reasons.

The problem, for them, is that due to their unique skill sets and knowledge bases they have begun to create a living history, and have now earned the responsibility to keep it alive. Fortunately, eight years in, we have some evidence that they are grooming a next generation of caretakers.

So long as the Treksperts provide the course headings, may we all keep on Trekking, Ingloriously, of course.

I now give this show 5 stars instead of 4, mostly because these guys get what makes Star Trek “Star Trek.” This show has consistently provided valuable behind the scenes insight into the production of Star Trek and has provided countless hours of entertainment. While my original review mostly holds up, they’ve gotten better in their discussion of Star Trek beyond DS9. Their holiday specials are the stuff of legend.

Original Review: 4 Stars for the Show. I really like this show, but it’s unfortunate that they can’t get past TOS at times. In a recent episode they invited Roger Lay to talk about the TNG remaster and they probably devoted 10 minutes of the hour to actually talking TNG while it was mostly talking about TOS and the Roddenberry Vault. I get that that’s what they like, and they want to talk about what they like, but when you are doing shows about the other series, please talk about those series and do a separate episode on the Roddenberry vault! Their best episodes are the ones that delve into behind the scenes of TOS and the TOS movies. The podcast is weak when they try to do shows that require any discussion past Deep Space Nine. I’ll give the final star just for calling out Trump when they do (which isn’t all that often). How anyone can really understand like Star Trek and be a Trump fan is beyond me. Trump is antithesis of everything Star Trek stands for.

I gave this show a chance, but the pervasive negativity makes it hard for me to tolerate. Others might disagree, and that’s fine—unlike the hosts who treat their own opinions as objective fact, I get that my view is subjective. But I wanted to submit this review to give fair warning to those who don’t like this show’s kind of snobbery.

It’s really quite paradoxical: Most people who listen to Star Trek podcasts do so because they love the franchise, not because they want to hear idiosyncratic and ultra-pedantic takes on many beloved episodes and movies—week in and week out. Yet that’s what this show has devolved into.

Would you like an example or two? How about openly musing about doing an episode on non-Trek movies that did Star Trek “better than Star Trek”—in order to teach the writers how to make a good Star Trek movie? That was the final straw for me. Apparently, these guys think even the best Trek films were mediocre at best. Well, I for one think a lot of the movies were actually great, and I think the writers deserve some credit. Or just take a listen to their various episodes relentlessly trashing First Contact—a movie that a wide consensus of fans and critics think is one of the best. Or repeatedly insulting Patrick Stewart by blaming him for various story elements they don’t like, based on pure speculation about his ego and creative control. What benefit does a person who loves Star Trek get from listening to that?

The uncreative and endless pejoratives are another stain on this show. I was ready to throw my phone down if I heard the phrase “train wreck” one more time. It grates my ears to hear this over and over and over again, particularly when it’s used to describe something that’s far from such. For folks who love to criticize every aspect of the writing and hard work done to make these shows, the overuse of a few tired tropes is particularly obnoxious.

It would be one thing if the hosts were actually experts like they claim, but a lot of their critiques are half-baked and based on straw men. Half the constant criticisms are lazy and ill-formed “it doesn’t make sense” style claims (with the term “train wreck” inevitably strewn in multiple times) that, if these guys actually took the time to contextualize, do indeed fit in well and make sense.

If I were a listener who had never watched Star Trek, I would come away from this show thinking Trek was one of the most poorly written, nonsensical franchises ever created, with a few decent episodes strewn in on rare occasions. Sorry, that’s just not my view of the franchise.

I honestly don’t know why these guys even watch a franchise they despise so much. Gluttons for punishment I guess, just like Trek fans who listen to this show.