While his role as Commander Riker on Star Trek: The Next Generation might be his most prominent acting credit, Jonathan Frakes' time as the host of Beyond Belief: Fact or Fiction is quickly gaining in popularity.
Recently, the internet got a huge giggle out of a compilation video of Frakes telling you how wrong you are for 47 seconds straight. There's something to his smug demeanor that is too funny to ignore.
Now he's back to ask you a question.
Can you handle a random interrogation?
The cut was put together by Twitter user Zane Golia for, as he puts it, "no one and no reason." And it's somehow just as entertaining as the original video.
Unlike the previous supercuts, which were pulled from Frakes telling you how stories end, these ones are from the introductions, setting you up for the possibly real or fake stories.
Some fit very well with what you imagine a series trying to trick you with implausibly real would ask, such as:
"Do you believe in the power of a curse?"
Or
"How superstitious are you?"
Others feel a lot more out of place, particularly because the set is such a contrast to the image Frakes provides.
While a dimly lit, fog filled room is nice and mysterious, it becomes ridiculous when paired with props and an odd question.
Surprisingly, these videos work because of how formulaic the original show was.
Beyond Belief set up five stories, connected by some kind of theme or moral. After the stories are told, Frakes would inform you which stories were true and which were false.
This formula is what makes these videos so entertaining. The repetitive nature of his questions, or telling you how wrong you are, brings out patterns and an almost hypnotic cadence broken up by different or longer phrases.
In the case of questions, sometimes they can be useful too.
It's not just the pattern that makes this so entertaining, however.
The outlandish nature of some of the questions when pulled out of context and put right next to each other displays the strangeness of the show.
One moment, Frakes is asking how much money it'd take for you to consider sleeping in a graveyard, the next, he's asking if you like to go "a-wanderin' beneath the clear blue sky."
The music only adds to the effect, as the mesmerizing tune backs each question, drawing you into the madness.
Despite knowing the premise for the series and having watched plenty of episodes back in the day, I'm still forced to ask my own question.
What even is this show?
Luckily, this question has an answer.
It's great!
The smug smile of Jonathan Frakes is here whether you need to tell someone they're wrong, tell them they're right, or just ask them a question.
And of course, these situations are made all the better if you do so in a dimly lit, lightly fogged room, while ominous music plays in the background.
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