November 1, 2014 1:34 pm

This Sunday, Neil chats with Captain Kirk, Carl Sagan and Moe Szyslak

 

Photo of Neil deGrasse Tyson and Hank Azaria in Neil's office at the Hayden Planetarium, taken by Leslie Mullen

Neil deGrasse Tyson and Hank Azaria in Neil’s office at the Hayden Planetarium. Photo Credit: Leslie Mullen

This week’s episode title may be misleading.

Yes, technically, Neil has a conversation with Hank Azaria.

But during the course of the interview, we get to hear Captain Kirk, Sylvester Stallone, Woody Allen, Johnny Carson, Carl Sagan, and Boris Karloff.

We also get to hear Hank do the voices that he’s been doing for 26 years that we’ve come to know and love: Moe Szyslak, Apu Nahasapeemapetilon, Chief Wiggum, and yes, even Comic Book Guy.

(Can you believe The Simpsons has been on for 26 years?)

Neil and Hank talk a lot about The Simpsons, including why there are some many math and science “easter eggs” in the show, as well as so many guest scientists.

But they also talk about Star Trek, because it turns out Hank is a huge Star Trek “freak.” In fact, from an early age, Hank began impersonating his hero, Captain Kirk. Not only do the two get into a discussion about Kirk vs Picard (they’re both on Team Kirk) but they end up reminiscing about one of my favorite episodes of original Trek, The Corbomite Maneuver. We also get to find out who is the current owner of the Gorn’s actual costume head.

Hank is a big comic book fan, too, and he talks about how he developed the voice for Eddie Brock and Venom on the animated Spider-Man series.

My favorite part of the episode is the anecdote Hank tells about the time Stephen Hawking came to a table read for an episode of The Simpsons, but since Hank tells it so much better than I could, I’ll leave that one for the show.

Join us this Sunday, November 2, at 7:00 PM ET on our website, iTunes, Stitcher, SoundCloud and TuneIn.

That’s it for now. Keep Looking Up!

–Jeffrey Simons

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