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 ;)

Comments

Not enough silicon-based life forms on Star Trek?

[tenzig_112]

Silicon-based life forms protest the Star Trek premiere for its aparent xenophobia.

"There are simply not television shows featuring silicon-based characters on your earth television. Sure, there is the occasional silicon-based token character- usually just a humanoid who claims to be made of silicon. But it very often dies in the first ten minutes of an episode. That is wrong and we wish to see that rectified."

"... In truth the science fiction industry has done a lousy job of representing non-human species. A glob of putty on the nose here, a pointed ear there and presto- an alien. Even the shows that strive for some level of originality stick human-centric arms and legs on them."

full story:
http://www.ridiculopathy.com/news_detail.php?displ ay=20010829

Anyone ready to place bets...

[Masem]

on how long into the series until Bakula's character has to say "Oh, boy!"?

Transporters that Kill:

[AMuse]

they will have transporters, but they won't be trusted because they randomly kill people

Cool! Just like the Muni buses in San Francisco. :>

Re:still nothing as good as ....

[Mike Buddha]

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!

Contrived plot (Yeah, he was a troll, but...)

[Midnight Ryder]

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.

Star Trek is a Superhero Series

[joneshenry]

...and that's what concerns me about the current series. It seems to me that Paramount and/or the creative team in charge of the Star Trek franchise is deliberately trying to downplay the essence of Star Trek as not just about ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances but about being able to fantasize about superheroes.

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.