The Bicks Pod

By the time The Search for Spock was announced, it was fairly clear that the Star Trek brand was more than strong enough to justify its continued return to box offices; within a few years, it would return to TV screens, as well. But not before Kirk & Co. return to the Genesis planet from The Wrath of Khan to rescue Spock. Which is what we're going to be talking about today.  Episode Sponsor: I Can...

The second film entry for our original cast -- Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan -- reinvigorated the franchise after The Motion Picture drew big bucks but tepid critical reviews. A lesser version of Khan might have put the nail in Star Trek's coffin. Thankfully, it didn't, and forty years later we're still chugging away through the Alpha Quadrant. Let's explore why, with Kirk & Khaaaaaaan!, Kirk &...

Star Trek's first foray onto the big screen has experienced a recent reevaluation by fans, but what we wanted to know is how was it seen by original fans at the time of its release? Lucky for us we have a pair of OG fans in the family -- so today we're welcoming Aidan's parents to the podcast to talk all about that original experience in all its glory! Episode Sponsor: Kivas Fajo's Toy Emporium Bi...

After one of the most competitive polls in our short lived Twitter campaign (which, if you don't follow us there, we're likely abandoning soon), this watchalong came down to a coin toss, followed by a unilateral decision to negate the coin toss entirely. The result is our watchalong with The Lorelei Signal, one of the better Animated Series episodes, and the only one to feature (acting) Captain Uh...

This episode is about one of the least known shows in Star Trek, but one we thoroughly enjoyed. The Animated Series holds a special place in Star Trek history, as a bridge between TOS and the films, and also as the first series to truly be freed from the constraints of what was possible to film in a live action series. The result is a strange, sometimes silly/sometimes serious batch of episodes th...

This time our lovely Twitter voters ( follow us on there if you want to decide future watchalongs!) chose one of Aidan's all-time favourite Trek episodes "The Tholian Web" to enjoy alongside you, dear listeners! In one of the few high points of Season 3, this episode had it all: a great sci-fi premise, interesting character moments, and most importantly, a break for dear William Shatner. Join us t...

If you've ever wondered what frustration sounds like - congratulations, you've found it in this episode of The Bicks Do Star Trek! Season 3 of The Original Series is one of the more frustrating seasons in Star Trek history - for producers, writers, actors, and even the creator - and that frustration seeps into the episodes themselves, and by conduit, your hosts. In a season filled with episodes th...

In which we sit down and watch through the classic Season 2 episode "The Trouble With Tribbles" with you, dear listeners! So cue it up and boldly go with us as we learn about just why, in fact, the Klingons and the Tribbles have such a rich history of animosity...(jk we don't know why and no one ever really explains it in this episode, it's just a thing that is and we have to learn to accept it......

In this foray into pretty well known, we're examining the second season of The Original Series in all its didactic glory. Whether your joy is faraway trips to places that feel very much like home, or a few light-hearted romps through the less serious parts of the galaxy, the second season has a lot to offer, and a fair bit for us to talk about. So sit back (or walk, or commute, or do whatever you...

Friends of the podcast, welcome to something new from The Bicks. A watch along episode! Join us for a viewing of one of the most acclaimed Star Trek episodes of all time: The City on the Edge of Forever. As our first watch along, our apologies if it's a little rough, but we were just excited by the thought of plunging our voices into your eardrums as you watch an episode of Trek. So throw us on in...

...in which your stalwart Ensigns Aidan and Lindsay take you on a tour of Star Trek's very first blockbuster season. The one that started it all! Join us for a retrospective look at the origin of the series, the ups and downs of getting it on the air (with a little help from America's favourite redhead!), highlights and lowlights of the episodes and story arcs, as well as our... Episode Sponsor: F...

Earth date September 8, 2022. Happy Star Trek Day to one and all! To commemorate this once-a-year occasion, we'd like to welcome listeners both new and old to this podcast with a (re)introduction to The Bicks. After plumbing the depths of Mark Frost and David Lynch, then William Shakespeare, we're back to talk about Star Trek in all its many forms: the TV series, the films, the universe, and the f...

We've always appreciated the saying, "Save the Best for Last" and we followed it for this Shakespeare podcast. Nothing may draw more interest in the popular imagination of Shakespeare than whether or not he was actually the author of the works ascribed to him. So we wanted to send off our little podcast with a big topic: who was Shakespeare, if it wasn't Shakespeare? Notes: The Wikipedia master li...

“Our revels now are ended. These our actors, As I foretold you, were all spirits and Are melted into air, into thin air: And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, The cloud-capp’d towers, the gorgeous palaces, The solemn temples, the great globe itself, Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff As dreams are...

The incomparably funny and poignant comedian Hannah Gadsby said it best: “This adoration of the artist as a lone genius is quite misled, I think, because they are very much a part of their time and their community.” Sometimes we all need a community. Whether it’s because our own expertise has fallen short or because two heads are better than one, no one among us can say that we are perfectly capab...

Another problem/romance play, Cymbeline is noteworthy most of all for its intricate, multi-layered plot, and one of the bard's most noteworthy heroines in Imogen. Unlike the famous tragedies or better known comedies (but very much like his other later plays), this one is marked by the refusal to commit to any grand sweeping statement of the human condition beyond, maybe, "It's complicated." Join u...

Much like many of our modern stories, Shakespeare used the family as the core of many of his tales, so we dove into the many vagaries of families in Shakespeare's plays to see what made them tick. What was the family "supposed" to look like in Elizabethan times, and how did Shakespeare play with that idea? Which plays feature the most damaged families, and which ones, if any, feature the happy var...

If you ever travel to England (or live there), you'll know there's a lot of Shakespeare places to go and see, in particular around his hometown of Stratford-upon-Avon. As far as tourist sites go, they're basically what you'd expect. But for a pair of English language/history/literature nerds, they're a bit more interesting. Visiting the Globe to see a Shakespeare play as it was written to be perfo...

What do you get when you combine three acts of a tragedy, two acts of a pastoral romantic comedy, and a sprinkle of the supernatural on top for good measure? A problem play for the ages: The Winter's Tale. If it feels like we've been down this road before, it's because this late Romance borrows many of its themes from some of the great tragedies of Shakespeare's career, like Othello. Jealous husba...

Religion is always a touchy subject, but for most of the world today it's not nearly as dangerous a point of discussion as it was during Shakespeare's lifetime. Protestant and Catholic debates hadn't just destroyed previously unassailable assumptions on articles of faith, they'd led to war, religious persecution to the point of murder, and constant political and religious upheaval. While Shakespea...

For a place almost synonymous with class distinctions, England was only occasionally the site of class confrontations in Shakespeare's plays. He saved the really juicy bits for his final Roman play - Coriolanus. Join us for a chat about the class distinctions, gender conflict, and (naturally for us) politics prevalent across one of Shakespeare's darker plays. Notes: Despite Lindsay and Aidan's bes...

We are not Shakespeare scholars. We have neither the education, resources, or frankly the intelligence to engage with Shakespeare’s work the way anyone who’s actually published a paper about Shakespeare does. We are amateurs. But none of the names we’re talking about today are amateurs. All of them have left some sort of important imprint on the study of Shakespeare. And we've rounded up the highl...

Getting into the late romances -- starting here with Pericles -- means we're nearing the end of our sojourn through William Shakespeare's career. But these are a fascinating quartet of plays, and Pericles is a fantastic introduction to the complicated morality and plot cues that we find Shakespeare playing with throughout these final plays, after years of creativity and success under his belt. And...

It's something we've talked about relentlessly on this podcast: teaching Shakespeare is hard. Between the dense language, historical context, and cultural weight of the name "Shakespeare" there are a ton of barriers to getting students invested in the words of Billy S. So this episode we gathered together three teachers (including Lindsay) and talked all about the educational process. Resources, s...

It's a play all about dualities that don't duel quite as much as we might think. Antony and Cleopatra - man and woman - Rome and Egypt - Love and War - every way you look at this play there are nice, clean delineations... until there aren't. We enjoyed reading and talking about this one because it refuses to be pinned down or defined, much like its titular characters. We hope you enjoy the convers...