Welcome back Wolf 359 friends and fans to another installment of Wolf 359 Daily! We’re here on March 18 for Mission Day 663, the estimated mission date for Wolf 359’s live show, “Deep Space Survival Procedure and Protocol.”
Well, today I invite you to rewatch, rather than relisten, to this incredibly special special episode. “Deep Space Survival Procedure and Protocol” was performed at the Alchemical Theater Laboratory on December 19, 2015, and I will forever be haunted that I wasn’t in the fandom early enough and missed it. Thank goodness they took video and made the recording available on YouTube, if you haven’t watched it yet, I highly, highly recommend it. If only to see Zach Valenti having to play two characters live, that was a heck of a feat.
So, this is a fairly beefy episode, at least compared to season 2’s runtimes that ranged from 20-30 minutes. Coming in at one hour and four minutes, the live show is the third longest episode of Wolf 359—Though quite a distant third to special episode “Change of Mind” and the series finale “Brave New World,” which each clock over two hours. Though there wasn’t an act break, the show does feel like it has two distinct halves: the whacky space hijinks half, and then the part with Mr. Cutter. For anyone who was not previously familiar with Wolf 359 in the crowd, I think it gives a good sample of the overall Wolf 359 experience. “Haha, what’s the beeping noise, oh wait, oh no, things got tense very quickly.”
There is definitely a challenge of writing a live show for a narrative podcast. Talk shows like My Brother, My Brother and Me don’t need to worry about, like, a narrative throughline. Actual play shows can reach for the perhaps not strictly canon one-shot. But Wolf 359 decided to do a live show that would fit into the story, without being entirely necessary to the canon, and would be both enjoyable to the mega-fans and accessible and engaging to the folks who might have never listened to a podcast before. Super easy, barely an inconvenience, right? I mean, in my opinion, I think the live show does a great job. Giving Eiffel the job of the totally accurate recap of the story so far at the top of the episode was very funny, and there’s such great interactions between all the characters that we really get to see a lot of how they are with each other in just one episode. Granted, I am biased by being on the side that’s very familiar with the show before seeing “Deep Space Survival Procedure and Protocol,” but I guess I can safely say that as one of the mega-fans in the audience, I’d give it a thumbs up.
The episode begins with Eiffel having snuck out to the comms room despite being on bedrest for three more days (hence our estimation of Mission Day 663). He’s decided to investigate a strange beeping noise coming from some device somewhere in the comms room, dropping the prophetic line that though it’s not having any operational effects, “past experience suggests that doesn’t mean it won’t come back to bite us in the ass in thirty minutes.” He’s soon joined by Minkowski, Hera, and Hilbert, who speak ominously about a problem with Lovelace, before the good captain herself joins them. An issue with the Hephaestus’s navigation system has now caused an issue with Lovelace’s shuttle and she “has feelings on the matter.” She rounds up the crew that she finds useful (ie, not Eiffel) to investigate the problem and leaves Doug to continue working on the mysterious beeping.
The bit that follows is one of my favorites, as Eiffel decides to bring in some “extra help” in the form of a few choice recorded voice lines that he uses to stage a conversation with himself. I’m so glad they did a live show, because I think this bit does carry a bit better in the visual rather than pure audio. It reminds me somewhat of the Whose Line Is It Anyway “Two Line Vocabulary” game, which I always love. As if Zach hopping between Eiffel and Hilbert wasn’t good enough, now we get Eiffel somehow getting in an argument with a recording of himself.
Also, before we get too far away from it, can we talk about how good Lovelace’s entrance is? Oh captain, my captain. Talk about establishing the whole vibe of a character in 0.8 seconds. I don’t think I’ve ever opened a door with that much authority in my life.
Anyway, the others return, having discovered the source of the problem: It’s Eiffel not doing his job! See, the reason there’s no data on Lovelace’s shuttle after she tried to sync with the Hephaestus’s navigation data is because Eiffel never put any data in the system to begin with. After a hilarious couple minutes of tossing the hot potato of blame around, Minkowski decides it’s time to finally force Eiffel to actually learn the DSSPPM. This ends up with a fun role-playing exercise, which almost immediately goes off the rails. Side note, the gag of Eiffel (played by Zach Valenti) doing the worst ever impressions of Hilbert (played by Zach Valenti) will never not be funny.
Lovelace and Hilbert return to this disaster in progress, having triangulated their position from nearby stellar bodies. After one of Eiffel’s recordings goes off again, he attempts some... manual recalibration by slapping the comms panel until it stops. Lovelace remarks that maybe smacking the equipment will fix the mysterious beeping too, when Eiffel asks if she has any better ideas. She, Minkowski, and Hera end up... resolving the issue in about thirty seconds.
Anyway, were we having fun yet? Because we’re 30 minutes in and it’s time to get bitten in the ass. The mysterious beeping was an issue with the pulse beacon relay, and rebooting it allows the relay to connect, putting the Hephaestus on the phone with Mr. Cutter. Speaking of amazing entrances, Scotty standing up out of the audience? Inspired. I lose it every time, even when I know it’s coming.
Cutter lets them know that the end of the quarter is coming up, and he’s decided to call and check in. Not gonna lie, this might have hit me the hardest doing this calendar project, because the end of the quarter is coming up. I am all too aware, having had to do my self-evaluation at work last week. Hearing about the end of the quarter coming up here in Wolf 359 nearly sent me into fight or flight mode, I swear. Cutter decides to do one-on-ones with each of the crew—or both of the crew, since at this time the crew should technically only be Minkowski and Eiffel. But Marcus Cutter is clever and horrible, and he knows just how to push everyone to give away things they shouldn’t. He gets Minkowski defensive enough to let slip that Hera’s back online. He gets Hera riled up enough to reveal that Hilbert’s still alive. Eiffel... doesn’t need much pushing to be honest, he can’t keep a secret to save his life.
Okay, all the one-on-ones were rough, but Hera’s just makes me want to physically fight a fictional character. There’s a distinct difference in how he talks to Hera versus Minkowski and Eiffel, which really underscores his view of AI versus, say, Minkowski and Eiffel’s view of Hera. Also, coming back around to this episode after season 3’s “Memoria,” having Hera told point blank that she’s “not good enough” is so mean. Also, shout out to Scotty Shoemaker, he’s very talented and makes me hate Cutter so much, and he’s a very nice person. He once let me stab him with a harpoon at PodCon to complete my Minkowski cosplay. Great guy.
Anyway, back to the episode: Cutter gathers the crew to dress them down about all the lies and failures to obey orders, all under the looming threat of “immediate termination.” And according to Hilbert, that doesn’t mean mission end and a ride back home, that probably means Cutter remotely destroys the station. Eiffel makes one valiant plea for the crew’s continuance, taking the blame for many of the mission’s failings and promising to do better. He even goes so far as to promise to read and memorize the entire Deep Space Survival Procedure and Protocol manual. If only he knew, in a couple days he was definitely going to be reading the entire manual, just under... rather more dire circumstances than he’d expect. But Cutter’s convinced, and he grants the crew a 100 day extension. Of course, this journey’s going to take us through the end of September... next year. Needless to say, this mission’s getting a bit more than an extra 100 days.
Alright, I think I’ve gushed about this episode long enough. Again, if you haven’t watched the YouTube video, I highly recommend it. We’ll be back again on Friday for a triple threat on Mission Day 666: “Knock Knock,” “Who’s There?” and “Mayday”. Hope to see you then!
Today’s rejected Pryce & Carter tip:
Never doubt that, when nobody really cares, a small group of idiotic goof-offs can stumble into positions of authority.
Wolf 359 Daily is written and recorded by Rina Cerame.
Wolf 359 is a product of Kinda Evil Genius Productions. More information on the show can be found on their website at wolf359.fm
We hope you’ll join us again on March 21 for “Knock Knock,” “Who’s There?” and “Mayday.” Thank you for listening!
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