Some of the greatest Star Trek In-Jokes
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00:00Do you get it? Do you get it? Yeah you kind of had to be there. In jokes are often fun if you're on
00:07the in of them, forgive the pun, whereas if you are not they can be about as much fun as dry rot.
00:14None of these actually count as that though. Dry rot I mean, they all count as in jokes. With that
00:18in mind I'm Sean Ferrick for Trek Culture and here are the 10 greatest Star Trek in jokes.
00:24Number 10, 47. 47 is 42, credit for inflation. Executive producer Rick Berman once joked,
00:30the ultimate answer might cost you more in Star Trek, but what is the question? Well have you
00:34ever wondered why Ronan in Sobrosa, Sex Ghost, said he was born in 1647, why shields were often down
00:41to 47%, or why Captain Janeway was really from Bloomington, Indiana? The reason is writer Joe
00:47Minoski, who began his Star Trek career in season 4 of The Next Generation and has worked on Deep Space
00:539 Voyager and Discovery. Minoski graduated from California's Pomona College, which apart from
00:58excelling in the liberal arts is known for having a thing for 47. The college even has a club dedicated
01:04to the number, the 47 Society, that Minoski was part of as a student. He then brought this university
01:09in-joke into Star Trek and it has stuck with the writers ever since. Bloomington, Indiana, zip codes
01:1547401-47408 is more properly an homage to Voyager producer Jerry Taylor, who was born there, but there
01:24are pages of other examples of the 47 phenomenon. Here are just a small few. In Family, Picard is given
01:29the 47 vintage. In Conundrum, there are 47 Lycian sentry pods. In DS9, pads are often labelled 4747 and
01:39weapons lockers 47. In Voyager, the temporal variance of the Cranum Cranaton torpedo is
01:441.47 microseconds and I have just needed between 4 to 7 Aldebaran whiskies.
01:51Number 9. Some kinds of Star Trek. Rarely is anything more meta than the time Star Trek looked
01:56through a telescope and saw itself. Star Trek First Contact is one big self-reference, a trek
02:01to the past to ensure its own future. Zefram Cochran needs some kind of Star Trek as much as it
02:06needs him. In that film, First Contact gets a direct nod, although that was far from the
02:11first or last movie or episode title, name drop and dialogue. They toasted the undiscovered
02:16country in The Undiscovered Country and Captain Janeway provided a counterpoint, counterpoint
02:21in Counterpoint, amongst many other examples. Star Trek is also more subtly self-referential
02:26at times. In The Next Generation's 80th episode, Legacy, the Enterprise D has to bypass an archaeological
02:32survey of Caymus II, which happens to be the last planet visited by another Enterprise in
02:37its 79th and final episode. Yes, we are counting them like that. According to the Star Trek encyclopedia,
02:43the Caymus II mention was a deliberate tip of the hat to turnabout intruder on the part
02:48of Rick Berman, Jonathan Frakes and producer Eric Stilwell. Of course, the end of the beginning
02:53of this kind of Star Trek is a prophecy of itself. We've only postponed the invasion until,
02:58what, the 24th century? Number 8. Carmer Seals and Blaine's twin brother.
03:04Our lovely writer Jack has already discussed television's demise in Star Trek, but it deserves
03:08a second mention here. Beyond the canonical prediction, the medium didn't last much past
03:132040, for humanity at least, the writers clearly take great delight in having assigned television
03:18to the history books. It's the perfect in-joke. By relying on a lack of awareness of the characters,
03:22the writers can poke fun at their own industry without having to totally demolish that fourth wall.
03:27The gag is perhaps also a gentle reminder to appreciate Star Trek for what it ultimately
03:32is, a piece of television, for as long as we have it. After all, in Star Trek, nobody's
03:36watching Star Trek. After Data's revelation in the Neutral Zone, there have been a few
03:40direct references to TV. When Voyager went back to the 90s, Kes and Neelix were tasked with
03:46reviewing Earth broadcasts and became addicted to the soap opera. We still don't know if Blaine's
03:50twin brother was the father of Jessica's baby. More recently, spoiler alert, in Lower Decks,
03:55trailer got hilariously hooked on Ferengi television, ironically unfamiliar with the commercials.
04:00Commer-seals? And the serial drama, Cop Landlords Needs It's Own Spin-off. Moreover, the title
04:06of that Lower Decks episode was itself a TV reference. Number 7, Riker. I mean, how could
04:13we not? There are plenty of reasons to love Lower Decks, and top amongst them are the Easter
04:18eggs, in-jokes, and altogether weirdly specific references. In a similar vein, Strange New
04:23Worlds has delighted fans by returning to the roots of Star Trek, all the while pushing the
04:28franchise forward. As I well know from Cetacean Observations, one episode alone of Lower Decks
04:33could have filled this list. But we're here for the Strange New Worlds crossover, leg over.
04:39The episode's title is itself an in-joke, Those Old Scientists, a phrase first used by Commander
04:44Ransom to describe the 23rd century in no small parts. Then, when Boimler and Mariner are flung
04:49through a time portal to said century, they both basically become two excited fans at the
04:55greatest ever Star Trek convention. Actors Jack Quaid and Tawny Newsome even took selfies
04:59on set during their own time. It's Ensign Boimler with the Riker maneuver in the ready room,
05:04however, that will surely go down, up and over, as the in-joke to end all in-jokes. In-universe,
05:10Boimler briefly served with the animated Riker on the Titan. On the set of Those Old Scientists,
05:15Jonathan Frakes was directing and Quaid improvised the Riker leg-swing, pike-saddle moment in front
05:21of him. Number 6. Smoothing Things Over.
05:24The Klingons have gone through many, many changes since their original appearance in
05:28Errand of Mercy. At first conceived by writer Jean L. Kuhn as the Soviet half of his Cold War
05:34allegory, core actor John Kalikos reportedly looked more to the likes of Genghis Khan for inspiration
05:39for the character, leading to some fairly problematic make-up choices. They certainly didn't have
05:44the budget in the original series that they did by the time the Klingons reared their ridges
05:48in the motion picture. The make-up and general look was further designed and redesigned in
05:52the films with Klingons that followed, then again and again in The Next Generation and Deep
05:57Space Nine, with no explanation given. As Michael Dorn knowingly commented in an interview with
06:03Cinefantastique volume 32 numbers 4 and 5, I guess they never thought they'd have to deal
06:08with it on screen at some point. Therein lies the in-joke when DS9 decided to tackle the changes
06:13in Klingon appearance head-on, ish, in Trials and Tribulations. If you can't put ridges on
06:17it, hang a lantern on it instead. Worf's laconic, it is a long story, we do not discuss it with
06:22outsiders, was all about the answer we needed and probably the only one we're going to get
06:27until the Enterprise Exploration which everybody loved and there's been no problems about since.
06:32Number 5. Who writes for Mourne? We all know Mourne, the famously loose-lipped Lurian with a liking for
06:37Jumja Sticks, a small fortune in one of his stomachs and his own seat at Quark's Bar. His name alone
06:43is an in-joke, Mourne is an anagram of Norm, the permanent patron of Cheers. The character's reputation as
06:49a chatty Cathy might well precede him, but of course Mourne never actually had any lines.
06:53This was far from the plan for Mourne from the beginning, however. According to the making of
06:57Star Trek Deep Space Nine, on the very first day of filming for Emissary, the man beneath the then
07:02nameless Mourne mask, Mark Alan Shepard, was asked by director David Carson to tell the funniest joke
07:07in the universe, and he did. We won't spoil it for you, but it involves a coconut concertina cosmological
07:12argument and a honeysuckle garbage-polstery rimfire. Mourne made it into the pilot, but evidently the joke
07:17did not. Later, lines that were planned for the character were written out before shooting.
07:22Eventually, it was far funnier for the great raconteur to say nothing at all, becoming what is
07:27certainly one of Star Trek's longest running inside jokes, especially when you take into account the
07:32Cerritos' season 3 stop at Deep Space Nine. Number four, Okudagrams. We owe graphic designers
07:38Michael and Denise Okuda a great deal for the look, lore and feel of Star Trek from the voyage home
07:45onwards. Not to forget the Star Trek Encyclopedia through four editions, the Next Generation Technical
07:50Manual and other reference books that have become veritable fan bibles. Creator of the computer
07:55screen and console graphics for Star Trek IV and the Elkar's designs for the Next Generation and
07:59Beyond, Michael Okuda's instantly recognisable work was lovingly nicknamed the Okudagram. An artistic
08:05marvel in their own right, Okudagrams have also provided plenty of opportunities for a good in-joker
08:10too, often never intended to be visible on screen and mostly replaced in the remasterings. For example,
08:15Troy's search for a family tree in the neutral zone pre-remaster gives some very interesting results,
08:21including the first six actors to have played the Doctor in Doctor Who, Miss Piggy and Kermit
08:26T Frog. The Okudagram of the Enterprise D's engineering master display features, if you stare hard
08:32enough, a duck, a mouse, an airplane, a car, a nomad. Usually covered up for filming, these editions even
08:39made it into HD at around 38 minutes and 35 seconds of the remastered Galaxy's Child. Technically that
08:46makes them canon. Number 3, Great Birds of the Galaxy. In the far future, Miles O'Brien was and
08:52will be rightly in statute as perhaps the most important person in Starfleet history. Right along
08:57there with him was the less glowingly remembered Brad Boimler. History has its own effect, on Boimler's
09:02forever memorialised left arm was one of the Great Birds of the Galaxy, an in-joke which has a history in
09:08itself. You might well know by now that THE Great Bird of the Galaxy was Gene Roddenberry, or rather
09:13it was the nickname given to him by producer Robert Justman early in the run of the original series.
09:18In point of fact, in The Man Trap, Sulu says to Janice Rand, may the Great Bird of the Galaxy
09:24bless your planet. The epithet for Star Trek's creator certainly caught on. By the time of the
09:29next generation, the bird began to make an appearance in graphic form. For Roddenberry's 60th birthday gift,
09:34in 1987, senior next generation illustrator Andrew Probert painted a full colour Roddenberry-headed
09:39bird of the galaxy with Command Uniform Plumage, Com Badge and NCC-1701 nacelles as tail feathers. A
09:46green okudogram sketch version of the painting was then used on screen as part of the rapid computer
09:52searches carried out by data in The Naked Now and Conspiracy. Number 2, Tubes of Jeffreys. Walter
09:58Matthew Matt Jeffreys, his full name is of importance later, is the man well known for
10:03designing the original Enterprise model, now so iconic it hangs in the Smithsonian. Jeffreys was
10:09also largely responsible for the majority of the Enterprise's interior design, as well as that of
10:13the shuttlecraft, the Klingon D-7 cruiser, the hand phaser and a plethora of other props, sets and
10:19landscapes. As shown in the Star Trek sketchbook, the original series, Jeffreys equally designed what he
10:24called the Engineering Power Shaft in his sketch for The Enemy Within. As he recalled, we needed a
10:29space where Scotty could fix things without taking up too much room, so I made a tube with all kinds
10:34of complicated looking stuff in it. Somebody hung the name Jeffreys Tube on it and the name stuck.
10:39And Stick It did, but only behind the scenes on TOS. It wasn't until the Next Generation Season 3
10:44episode The Hunted that the term Jeffreys Tube was said on screen. On TOS, designers also liked to add
10:50the label GNDN for Goes Nowhere Does Nothing to the pipes on Jeffreys Tube sets. In canon, it is
10:56generally accepted that the famous crawlways were named after NX project designer of the 22nd century
11:03W. M. Jeffreys. Number 1. The Writer and the Principal. Far Beyond the Stars will forever be
11:09considered one of the best Star Trek episodes ever made. Powerhouse performances from the cast,
11:13from Avery Brooks in particular who also directed, and the episode's brilliant narrative conceit bring
11:18the theme of racial prejudice and its harrowing consequences into sharp focus in a manner never
11:23before managed so directly in Star Trek. The episode is also notable for its use of insider references.
11:28The 1950s style drawing of Deep Space Nine that inspires Benny Russell to write his story in the
11:33first place was a nice touch, and you perhaps noticed the original series matte painting of
11:37Starbase 11 on the cover of competitor magazine Galaxy. For Benny Russell's group of writers' own
11:42publication, Incredible Tales of Scientific Wonder, the front cover of the March 1953 edition
11:48sports an image of Delta Vega from Where No Man Has Gone Before. The issue then features the stories
11:53first of a new series, The Cage by E. W. Roddenberry, The Corbamite Maneuver by Jerry Soule, illustrated
11:59by Matt Jeffreys, Journey to Babel by DC Fontana, Metamorphosis by Jean L. Kuhn, and Where No Man Has
12:06Gone Before by Samuel Peoples. Finally, in a memo from editor Douglas Pabst to Herbert Rossoff, being played
12:12by Armin Jimmerman, apparently used as set dressing but never visible on screen, was written,
12:17no one would believe that a cheerleader can kill vampires. The snide principal Snyder might also
12:23have been but a writer's dream. Hello, I'm Duncan Rillick, no relation, and my friend Sean Blass has
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12:54tell them Rillick sent you. No relation. Good luck, Sean Blass. Hope everything goes okay with the toenail.
13:02That's everything for our list. Do you reckon we missed any in here? Let us know in the comments below.
13:06Thank you so much to Jack Coydy for writing the original article that this is based on,
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