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Star Trek Enterprise Tidbits
Carlo di Bonk writes: "I found a good article about the new Star Trek Enterprise television evil forces. These evil villains are from the future and the mirror universe. It seems to be an interesting chance that it is a different mirror universe though, to one seen in Star Trek The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine and other Star Trek television." Lots of little plot bits too, like the fact that they will have transporters, but they won't be trusted because they randomly kill people (like the first movie!) With Farscape running start to finish, my copy of Lexx Season 1 on DVD en route, and the new Star Trek a few weeks away, I think I need to take a week off ... a scifi sabbatical ;)
full story:
http://www.ridiculopathy.com/news_detail.php?disp
"Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
"I can see my house from here!" - ST:
they will have transporters, but they won't be trusted because they randomly kill people
:>
Cool! Just like the Muni buses in San Francisco.
They were silicon based, turned out to be good guys, and had no manipulative digits. Looked like dog vomit, from a large dog, though.
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the original ST series .... all the chicks in those mini-dresses, yowzaa!
I like the alternate universe from Deep Space 9 where ALL the hot chicks are lesbians! Woot! Set phasers for XXX Action!
by Mike Buddha -- Someday the mountain might get him, but the law never will.
The first thing that jumps out at me from this description is that there's no potential for morality plays, which was the basis of the original series and the Next Generation (while Roddenberry lived).
I'm not here to say that this is better or worse, or to whine about things not being the same since Roddenberry died, but rather to discuss what has changed. Whether or not this is a good thing varies depending on your taste.
Star Trek was set up as a mechanism for telling stories, not a story in itself. The characters represented archetypes (or even the id, ego, and superego -- guess which one is which). The Enterprise itself and its mission were just metaphors, and the fantastic nature was intended to give people the freedom to explore a variety of subjects in metaphorical, exaggerated, or "what if" ways. Just like a lot of great sci-fi.
This doesn't deny the new series' potential to be very entertaining and very good. But the new series is clearly different. In the new series, the situation is clearly defined. Aliens are just aliens, not symbols of ourselves in various guises. The new series presents an interesting point of view: Star Trek represented a utopian vision of our future; this series could be a vehicle to explore how we can achieve that particular utopia.
Although that's pretty limited compared to the scope of the original series, where various utopian ideals could be compared and contrasted from show to show, it still could be very fascinating, because many of us would have different ideas for how such a utopia could be reach, and in this age of irony, most of us probably doubt we could achieve it at all.
Yeah, but at least Kirk *pretended* to be peaceful.
"Alien..general we.......meanyounoharm (Sulu ready phasers)....Our culture is.......one of peace and........tranquility (Spock get a lock on).......We can settle......our differences.....peacefully....FIRE!"
It seems to me that this plot is too contrived to be taken seriously. "evil mirror-villains from the future"??
Gee, isn't a much richer plotline and a sense of deeper continuity a good part of what people said made Bab5 such a great show? Seems like P'mont is "getting it" this time, and trying the same tricks. Sounds like a perfectly good idea to me!
The other shows all had simple, realistic premises-the Enterprise is exploring the universe, Voyager is trying to get back home, the Enterprise is exploring the universe with a much crappier crew.
Well, for ST:TNG if you take the first episode and the last episode they used to try and tie up the entire series with, then the plot becomes a bit larger than just exploring the universe. It's humanity's trial by fire by a much greater power that sees potental within us. Q tells Picard at the begining we are on trial. At the end, Q give Picard both the power to destroy ourselves as a species, and gives him the power to expand his abilities beyond the human norm, to experience the universe ever so slightly like the Q does. Picard managed wrap his mind around the situation finally (but never completely understands it) and humanity (with Picard as it's representative) makes it past it's trial by fire.
Too bad they never followed up on it at all in the movies or other series. They really could have had fun with humanity beinging to awaken it's self, instead of relying on technology solely.
(In TNG's final episode, if you want to try and search to find deeper meaning, you can. But ya gotta try really hard - pretty much streaching it and giving the writers more credit than is really due. I'm definitely not going to give that synopsis here on Slashdot to have it picked through ;-)
Anyway, the point of this is that clearly the plot is degenerating as new shows are produced. This obviously means that each successive "Star Trek" show is worse than the last. This means that Kirk is much, much better than Picard. QED.
Troll. Really.
Davis Ray Sickmon, Jr - looking for something to read? Check out my three free novels at MidnightRyder.org
I argue the story of Star Trek: The Original Series is not about Kirk, it's about Spock. And from my perspective, Spock is a superhero. He can read minds. He's stronger than the average human. He has extreme intelligence and knowledge. Spock's abilities quite frequently solve the episode's problem.
Similarly Star Trek: The Next Generation has Data, even stronger than Spock. Deep Space Nine has the shapeshifter Odo. Odo is not quite as impressive as Data, so notice that Paramount has to make emergency repairs midway in the show bringing back the character of Worf, now the unbeatable fighting knight-equivalent. And Bashir has to be souped up to have extreme intelligence.
With Star Trek I The Motion Picture, Wesley in The Next Generation, and Sisko in Deep Space Nine, Paramount establishes quite a string of humans becoming gods/prophets.
And then there's Voyager. The Data character is degraded into the balding holographic Doctor. Kes is the female Wesley who eventually becomes a godlike being, only she's too wimpy to do anything before she leaves. The series is teetering on collapse when Paramount finally makes the sensible decision to return to the roots and bring in a new superhero, 7 of 9. Once again we have a figure who is stronger than the average human, knows more, and is struggling to deal with emotions.
I am frustrated by what seems to be an endless repeating cycle where Paramount continues to deny the essence of the show as being about superheroes, lets the series tank a couple of years, and then finally rescues the show by increasing the powers of the characters. I think that the claim of many fans that it takes a few years for the writers to get acclimated is a myth. The writers aren't given the raw materials to work with to produce entertaining superhero stories for the first few years, then they are authorized to use good materials, then the episodes improve. They could write a thousand stories about Harry Kim or Tom Paris or whatever vanilla characters they want and never find a groove. It's strictly a decision from above when the series is to improve, and that decision is simply whether to soup up the characters as superheroes.
As UPN was saved by adding the World Wrestling Federation's Smackdown to their lineup, maybe they can learn what makes this show successful. It's called by the wrestling fans BOOKING. Yes, it is the responsibility of the owner/promoter to make decisions to hype one wrestler over another, to promote certain wrestlers above all others for long stretches of time. The World Wrestling Federation the past two decades has been carried first by the character of Hulk Hogan, then Stone Cold Steve Austin, and now The Rock. Perhaps with careful booking in the future it will be Kurt Angle or HHH.
There is already another niche where people who are sort of ordinary interact in a tension-filled extraordinary situation. It's called reality television. It's Survivor, Big Brother, etc. Star Trek can't match that, Star Trek doesn't pretend to be giving ordinary people off the street a shot at fame and fortune. Star Trek has to create its fantasies in a different way. It has to be booked in a different fashion, to emphasize certain characters as superheroes.