Spocklight: A Star Trek Podcast

The Spocklight crew travel back to the 1970s as we take a look at everyone's least watched iteration of Trek in our continuing mission to analyse the franchise from a non-Trekkie perspective. It's The Animated Series! As the boys watch series Pilot, 'Beyond the Farthest Star' and the Emmy award winning, 'How Sharper Than a Serpent's Tooth', Liam ponders how kids would have reacted to the animated...

Phase 2 of the Spocklight mission to analyse Star Trek from a Non-Trekkie perspective has well and truly begun and following our detour into the world of Discovery we finally journey back to where it all started – ‘The Original Series’! This month we’re joined by returning Guest, David Trumble, who tells us all about his current work at Troublemaker Studios in Austin, Texas with Robert Rodriguez,...

In a very special episode, Liam, Matt and Paul are joined by legendary Director, Richard Donner, for an Exclusive interview. Richard talks us through his illustrious career, from directing episodes of almost every classic American television show of the 50s, 60s and 70s to helming such iconic films as The Omen, Superman: The Movie, The Goonies and Lethal Weapon to his current Producing role. But w...

WARNING! This episode contains full spoilers for the first two episodes of ‘Star Trek: Discovery’ so if you’re waiting to binge and you care about spoilers come back and listen after you’ve watched ‘The Vulcan Hello’ and ‘Battle at the Binary Stars’. It’s the beginning of Phase 2 of the Spocklight crew’s journey into the Star Trek universe from a Non-Trekkie perspective as we finally take on the T...

Join us as we discuss the fate of the next movie in the Kelvin timeline in our latest Supplemental episode. Will Chris Hemsworth’s George Kirk beam back into the series from beyond the grave? Will Quentin Tarantino rein in his use of the N-word for the opportunity to direct a Trek movie? Will Karl Urban get his wish of exploring the McCoy family and could that mean a return of their famous Tenness...

The results are in! Join us (and long dead film critic Mr. Halliwell, beaming in from beyond the grave) as we rank all 13 Star Trek movies, based on our average combined scores. Has watching all of the movies converted any of the Spocklight crew to the status of bonafide Trekkie? Is there really no comparison to ‘Star Trek: The Motion Picture’? Will Mr. Halliwell give ANY film in the series a sing...

In a special episode to celebrate the 35th Anniversary re-release of 'Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan' we're joined by the film's Producer, Robert Sallin, for an exclusive interview.  Robert tells Liam, Paul and Matt how he went from directing over 2,000 commercials to producing what many consider to be the greatest Star Trek film ever made, talking them through his creative input into the iconic...

Rev those engines and cue up your classical music cause we're tellin’ y'all, it's Star Trek Beyond! Liam bemoans the trend of pathetic lip service to gay characters in Hollywood Blockbuster cinema and wishes Kirk had kicked off the Beasties assault with a 'KICK IT!' Paul notices the sexual bias towards green women on the Enterprise and Matt chuckles at McCoy’s attempts at product placement and thi...

Hear the Spocklight crew trek into darkness, over Benedict Cucumber Patch gin cocktails, as Liam wonders why anyone would care who John Harrison really is, Paul spots Chris Pine getting ever closer to the classic Shatner paunch of old, Matt wonders if the Enterprise crew are aware of the red shirt curse and Guest, Stand up Comedian, Writer for Ranker and fellow Podcaster, Rebecca Shortall, joins u...

In the latest of our occasional bonus episodes, we’re joined by film Composer, Orchestrator and Arranger, Adam Langston, as he guides us through the Star Trek movie scores and discusses how Jerry Goldsmith and James Horner have influenced his own work on Hollywood fare such as The Promise, Alien: Covenant and 10,000 BC. We also chat Trump’s unsanctioned use of the ‘Air Force One’ theme, how to pro...

The Spocklight Bridge is a sausage fest no more! Liam, Paul and Matt are joined by our first female guest, Feminist Instagram Film Critic, Woman Watches Film, as the crew go back to the start for Star Trek 2009, but while Paul may congratulate Kirk for using the most blatant cheat in academic history to beat the Kobayashi Maru test, can JJ Abrahams’ reboot pass the Furiosa, Bechdel or Mako Mori te...

The Spocklight Crew meet their nemesis in ‘Star Trek: Nemesis’! It's a rough job but someone's gotta’ do it, so raise a glass of Romulan ale (you’re gonna’ need it) as we tackle a tale of two Picards and explore the phenomenon that is Hardy before Hardy.   Liam marks Captain Picard out as a ‘Jealous Lover’ over his Best man speech at Riker and Troi’s Wedding, Paul takes Director, Stuart ‘Asshat’ B...

Freshly shaved and smoother than an android's bottom, It's Star Trek: Insurrection!   Liam believes the Prime Directive could do with some more effective advertising, Paul laments the tragic loss of Riker's beard, while Matt tries desperately to explain Data's romp in the hay with a small child.   The regular Spocklight crew are joined this month by guest star, Ross Okoye , of hot new clothing com...

With a four-alarm hangover, Team Spocklight go rogue and say 'to hell with our orders!' It's ‘Star Trek: First Contact’. Liam praises the film's nightmarish body horror influences whilst wishing Worf had more conviction behind his killer one liner, Paul pitches William Shatner's own Borg-centric, Kirk-resurrecting novel and muses on a spine snapping twist on an iconic ‘Hamlet’ moment, Matt is all...

In our second ‘Spocklight Supplemental’, occasional bonus episodes of the Podcast that fall outside our main mission, we explore Comedy in ‘Star Trek’ with the help of expert Guest Stars: up and coming Stand up Comedians, Stephen Trumble and William Stone.   Join us as we go Star Trekkin', across the universe, on the Starship Spocklight in search of the funny.   As usual you can find SPOCKLIGHT on...

Join us in Phase Two of our Mission to explore every film in the 'Star Trek' movie franchise from a non-Trekkie perspective with a perfect jumping on point for fans of ‘The Next Generation’ and new listeners in general. The Spocklight crew have an appointment with eternity and they don’t want to be late: it’s Star Trek: Generations!  Liam ponders the size of the crew’s costume department and quest...

There is an old Vulcan proverb: miss out on the latest episode of 'Spocklight' at your peril! It's Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, the last proper original crew adventure, and consequently, the end of our first chapter too. Gene Siskel once called it, “a nice movie” but do the Spocklight crew agree? Well, Liam is firmly on Team Sulu when it comes to the captains and calls out the Vulcans a...

Morality - a particular system of values and principles of conduct. In the first ever 'Spocklight Supplemental', a new series of Bonus episodes to accompany the main pod, we explore that consistently progressive set of values that Star Trek Creator, Gene Roddenberry instilled in the franchise from the very beginning which, thankfully, continue to resonate to this day. Regular hosts, Liam and Paul...

Beam in for our latest, positively delicious episode as the Spocklight crew take on God! Join us as Liam discovers a new bible in the form of William Shatner’s very own, 'Captain's Log’ and laments the loss of a murderous unicorn, Paul argues that the DVD menus have better VFX than the movie and cooks up an old McCoy family recipe - Tennessee smoked baked beans, Matt wishes for a band called 'God...

In our newest episode, The Spocklight crew examine the very 80s ‘Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home’ as Liam reveals his desire for a courtroom based Trek movie and exposes Spock's very questionable tightey whities, Paul attempts to live order a movie-accurate pizza and wonders just how long Gillian has been in charge of the museum tour and Matt calls bullshit on the crew's time travel technique and re...

Battle lines are drawn in our most divisive episode yet as the 'Spocklight' crew join the surprisingly short Search for Spock. Liam recalls his childhood 'Christopher Lloyd blindness' and reveals one of his favourite movie one-liners...Paul marvels at the easiest Starship heist in history and laments Chekov's terrible pink Pilgrim outfit...and Matt laughs at Kirk's sudden change of heart whilst ca...

Beam aboard the good ship Spocklight as our crew discuss the cinematic equivalent of Hornblower in Space, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. In this episode - Liam debates the legitimacy of Ricardo Montalban's magnificent (and physics defying) chest, Paul praises the genre-heavy cinematic year of 1982 and admits to a certain boyhood crush on one of the crew members of the Enterprise, and Matt questi...

Join your crew, Liam Dempsey, Paul Willson, Matt Brothers and Ship Mascot, Aristotle, the Axolotl, on their continuing mission to answer the question: Can someone with no real knowledge of trek become a fan with just the movies to learn from? First up, we beam back to 1979 for the film that re-started it all, 'Star Trek: The Motion Picture', there is no comparison!