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Jokes and References | |
| This section had been suggested to me a number of times. Some of the jokes in the various parodies at 5MV seem to make absolutely no sense. Sometimes they do, in fact, make no sense, but usually there's a method to our madness. If there's a gag bugging you, or if there's a bit you think is a reference but you don't know what it refers to, submit it to us at jokes@sci-fivers.com.ar and the writer in question will answer you right here on this page! | |
| 2/17/04: ANDROMEDA, Five-Minute "Ouroboros" | |
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Andromeda: Thank you. Without further ado, here is the much-delayed "Ouroboros" parody, along with a special bonus: hidden in the fiver are the titles of five Star Trek episodes which, ahem, inspired this episode. Harper: And they're all at the ends of sentAAARRRRRRRRGH! Stop doing that! Andromeda: This concludes our introduction. We hope you enjoy the parody as much as I enjoy injuring Harper. Harper: Sigh....
I was reading 5MA's "Ouroboros" again the other day, and I spent an hour agonizing over what/where the five Star Trek titles were (yeah, I know, no life...). Anyway, I caught three: "Disaster," "Twisted," and "Visionary." Could you tell me what the other two are? Thanks! Zeke: No problem. The other two are "Shattered" (S7 Voyager) and "Past Tense" (S3 DS9). The latter is explained in Dylan's previous line:
Dylan: So you came from the future to replace a past figure... or is that "you will come"? | |
| 1/6/04: ENTERPRISE, Five-Minute "The Shipment" | |
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Phlox: I've been testing radiation on those rifle worms. Delta radiation kills them, while Deltan radiation makes them reproduce like rabbits in decon. Tucker: I think we'll stick with delta. Did you try antimatter radiation? Phlox: I was about to, but some red-haired woman showed up with a huge phase pistol-looking thing and demanded I stop.
Ok, I know I'm gonna sound illiterate or something, but who is this "red-haired woman" a reference to? Zeke: Captain Janeway. Her war against antimatter radiation started way back in 2001 with "Friendship One," where she was the only one to notice how absurd this major plot element was. I've used it three times since: "All Good Things...", TJI #28, and this Ent fiver. It's also been referenced by Marc in "One Small Step" and IJD in "One of Our Planets is Missing." | |
| 12/31/03: ENTERPRISE, Five-Minute "Two Days and Two Nights" | |
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Hey - I have a question about one of the references in Five-Minute Enterprise:
Porthos: RUFF! Grrrrrr....
I don't understand the thing about the Aibo, and I know it was in 5M Andorian Incident too. Was the Aibo in TOS or TNG? Zeke: I've been waiting for someone to ask this one. The Aibo thing in "Two Days and Two Nights" confused a lot of people at the time, and apparently still confuses new readers. It all started with this Penny Arcade strip. I'm a huge PA fan, and that strip is one of my favourites (like this one, referenced in TJI #13). So the inherent humour of Aibos was something I'd been thinking of using, and the opportunity came when some Five-Minute "Terra Nova" readers on Usenet protested about the ambiguous fate of Porthos. To tweak them, I brought in the Aibo the next week for "Andorian Incident." Conveniently, his line in Penny Arcade -- "Rowf" -- resembles Porthos' line. But the Aibo's return in "Two Nights"... I really have no idea what was in my head. All I know is that I was on the fourth fiver of a four-fivers-in-one-day writing marathon. Maybe I was starting to zonk out. For whatever reason, I thought about the dog in the episode and decided he should be the Aibo. Even weirder, I decided there would be some history between him and the Enterprise crew that we hadn't seen. You didn't miss a fiver or a message board post or something between "Andorian" and "Two Nights" -- the Aibo's near-destruction of the ship is never explained, only referred to by the characters. It was a peculiar idea even by my standards, and readers told me so. And yet... it's become one of my favourite 5ME jokes, and I've made two references to it since. Why? Who knows? Sometimes I think I write best when I'm thinking strangely: "Two Nights" and Voyager's "Natural Law" both happened that way, and I'm prouder of them than of a lot of fivers I've written "sober." Comedy works in mysterious ways. | |
| 1/16/03: NEXT GENERATION, Five-Minute "11001001" | |
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This has been bugging me ever since I first saw it: does the blurb to the episode 11001001 have any meaning at all?
BLURB: 110 01 01101 01 0 11110 10. 01 001 1 10010 10 001 01. BLURB IN DECIMAL: 6 1 13 1 0 30 2. 1 1 1 18 2 1 1.
I have thought and overthought this and I can't find a pattern. Is there one? Or is it gibberish? Zeke: You certainly have. Sorry, Derek -- there's no pattern to be found. I can't remember whether I had anything in mind as I typed it, but I'm pretty sure I didn't. | |
| 1/16/03: NEXT GENERATION, Five-Minute Star Trek: Nemesis | |
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Picard: What are you reading, B-4? B-4: A book with pretty pictures. Picard: Let me see. Hmm -- "A Visitor's Guide to Mount Seleya." An interesting choice. Well, when you get tired of reading, here's a musical recording you might enjoy. B-4: "H.M.S. Pinafore"? Why is this good music to listen to? Picard: Come with me to the shuttlebay and I'll explain.
The lines that B-4 reads in the last scene in the movie are from Irving Berlin's "Blue Skies," not from the HMS Pinafore... at least, I think they are. Marc: You're quite correct, but the joke at the end of the fiver is not intended to be a reference to Irving Berlin's "Blue Skies". It's a reference to the fact that, in "Star Trek: Insurrection," Picard and Worf help Data recover his memory by singing "A British Tar" from "H.M.S. Pinafore" while flying in a shuttlecraft (hence my mention of the shuttlebay). I did include a reference to Irving Berlin in the fiver, but it comes earlier, in the scene where Shinzon is told that the android spy has been recovered. | |
| 1/16/03: NEXT GENERATION, Five-Minute "Attached" | |
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Crusher: Beverly calling Jean-Luc. Answer me or I'll throw a croissant at you.... Picard: I'm sorry...my attention must have drifted. Crusher: Are you preoccupied about our upcoming Away Mission? Picard: No, I just find your stories about Nurse Ogawa boring. (BONK!) Picard: Ouch. Crusher: Just be glad I didn't put jam on it first.
Marc, we need more jokes explained for this page. Tell the nice people about the hidden joke in the opening scene of "Attached." Marc: The "BONK!" sound effect for the flying croissant is a tip of the hat to BONC, a fan mailing list devoted to the Picard/Crusher ("Beverly ON jean-luC") relationship. "Attached" is to P/C 'shippers what "Resolutions" is to the J/C crowd, so I thought it would be the ideal place for a stealthy reference to the BONC group. Other than Five-Minute Farscape author (and senior BONC administrator) Merlin Missy, I doubt that many people noticed this hidden joke. | |
| 11/26/02: ENTERPRISE, Five-Minute "Rogue Planet" | |
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Buzaan: This is no joke, kid. The animals are so dangerous we can't even describe them with existing words. We have to make up our own, like "manxome" and "mospinispinosp" and "zelazny." Reed: Ha! Zelazny is my middle name! I scoff at ospenifpenoff! ...or whatever.
What's with those words? Zeke: "Manxome" is from Lewis Carroll's famous nonsense poem Jabberwocky. "Mospinispinosp" is a reference to this Sluggy cartoon. "Zelazny," believe it or not, really is somebody's middle name: one of Andromeda's main characters is Seamus Zelazny Harper. (Addendum: After I wrote this, a couple of readers informed me that there was a major sf writer named Roger Zelazny. That was undoubtedly the inspiration for Andromeda's writing staff.) | |
| 11/26/02: ENTERPRISE, Five-Minute "Fortunate Son" | |
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Prisoner: What's the magic word? Ryan: Hmm...'syzygy'?
Is that word significant, or did you choose it randomly? Zeke: It's significant, partly because it's just a really cool word, and partly because it happened to be the title of an X-Files episode. | |
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