Remove ads

Star Trek: Picard

Information: Nothing to see here, citizens.
  • Staff Post
    • nothing to see here, citizens.
    The troll has been dealt with. I'd like to thank everyone who refused to feed them and the thread at large for both staying relatively dumpster fire free and attempting to return to the actual topic swiftly.

    Please proceed with your conversation on Picard and why he's the sexiest Star Trek captain. (He is and you know it.)
     
  • Staff Post
    • Wow, I didn't check the thread all day while I was at work, but apparently I missed some excitement?


    kjyl said:
    Could you give an example because I think most of them could still have parallels drawn from the larger message of the shows , sadly enough.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    They tended not to be the episodes that people remember.

    As I said, "Conspiracy" was supposed to be about Iran-Contra but Maurice Hurley nixed that for being too controversial. "The High Ground" was based on the Troubles in Ireland. "Up The Long Ladder" was supposed to be about immigration with a pro-choice bent, but shoddy rewrites by Maurice Hurley wound up causing it to accidentally endorse forced breeding and negative Irish stereotypes. (Whoops! Season Two was really bad, y'all.) "The Hunted" was an allegory for veterans returning from Vietnam. "The Outcast" was supposed to be about gay rights (but didn't actually acknowledge the existence of gay people). "Symbiosis" has a scene with an anvilicious conversation about how drugs are bad. "The Neutral Zone" constantly takes time out of the episode to talk about how awful people from the 1980s are for playing country music and worrying about their dead relatives. (I'm not even joking.) "Angel One" was supposed to be about apartheid (?!?) but somehow turned into some weird anti-feminist nonsense after Roddenberry went on a bizarre, misogynistic rant in the writer's room. (Season One was real bad, y'all.)

    On a more competent note, "Chain of Command" was about the use of torture and even consulted with Amnesty International.

    There's probably others, but those are the ones that came to mind.
     
    The Narrator said:
    Wow, I didn't check the thread all day while I was at work, but apparently I missed some excitement?



    They tended not to be the episodes that people remember.

    As I said, "Conspiracy" was supposed to be about Iran-Contra but Maurice Hurley nixed that for being too controversial. "The High Ground" was based on the Troubles in Ireland. "Up The Long Ladder" was supposed to be about immigration with a pro-choice bent, but shoddy rewrites by Maurice Hurley wound up causing it to accidentally endorse forced breeding and negative Irish stereotypes. (Whoops! Season Two was really bad, y'all.) "The Hunted" was an allegory for veterans returning from Vietnam. "The Outcast" was supposed to be about gay rights (but didn't actually acknowledge the existence of gay people). "Symbiosis" has a scene with an anvilicious conversation about how drugs are bad. "The Neutral Zone" constantly takes time out of the episode to talk about how awful people from the 1980s are for playing country music and worrying about their dead relatives. (I'm not even joking.) "Angel One" was supposed to be about apartheid (?!?) but somehow turned into some weird anti-feminist nonsense after Roddenberry went on a bizarre, misogynistic rant in the writer's room. (Season One was real bad, y'all.)

    On a more competent note, "Chain of Command" was about the use of torture and even consulted with Amnesty International.

    There's probably others, but those are the ones that came to mind.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...



    I can see your point but from the article on "The Hunted"

    This episode was an allegory to US veterans of the Vietnam War, integrating back into American society. Michael Piller remarked, "The whole theme of the show was let's look at how society treats its returning veterans. I thought from a conceptual level we handled that well, and we came up with good science fiction to make it interesting. There's some argument that the best soldier ever created bringing the Enterprise to its knees is a little hard to believe, and that might have been the weakness of the show. I enjoyed it, and was not ashamed of the show."
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...

    In the actual quote you can see a distancing from an attempt at a direct parallel. It's not just about Vietnam vets, it's about all vets returning. Shows can be inspired by, but that does not mean they are direct analogs, which is probably a good thing as the distancing allows people not in the current zeitgeist of the show to still draw similar meanings and morals.

    We may have to agree to disagree on this.
     
    Last edited:
    kjyl said:
    In the actual quote you can see a distancing from an attempt at a direct parallel. It's not just about Vietnam vets, it's about all vets returning. Shows can be inspired by, but that does not mean they are direct analogs, which is probably a good thing as the distancing allows people not in the current zeitgeist of the show to still draw similar meanings and morals.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    It was broadcasted in 1990, with its script being written in late 1989, in a media environment in where vietnam war related movies were still a thing being produced.

    You don't need to directly state what you're analogizing in order for everyone to understand where your primary source of inspiration is from.
     
    Exposure said:
    It was broadcasted in 1990, with its script being written in late 1989, in a media environment in where vietnam war related movies were still a thing being produced.

    You don't need to directly state what you're analogizing in order for everyone to understand where your primary source of inspiration is from.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...


    Yes? But most kids today would have a hard time understanding why a lanky, long haired guy named Bobby Beach who says "Don't harsh the badger" is supposed to be funny or who it is parodying.

    It Is a difference in writing style, and I would argue, intent. Inspiration is not the same as direct parallel. And "timeless" writing requires a distance to the specific in order to address the ur-issue in a way that spans the test of time.
     
    kjyl said:
    Yeah but is that an inconsistency or is that just butting up against your head canon.

    Like mounted and free standing microwaves exist pretty much as an aesthetic choice, and the feds clearly have a aesthetic for their ships and that's leaving out tech gets smaller especially over 20ish years.





    I don't know if I buy those as direct parallels, as trek has always been about big concepts not specifics, which was sort of intentional as it would let future audiences draw their own lessons and parallels not tie them to a specific event, at least in later iterations.

    Even in the TOS era it was more like "look at how bad and ridiculous racism is" rather then " look this is just like what is happening in X"
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...

    It comes from the implications of E=mc^2. Creating that hypospray probably took as much energy to make as is released by a 1 megaton hydrogen bomb. The various technical manuals (espcially the TNG one) recognized this and took it into account when describing how everything worked, by saying that there's more going on here that you don't see. It's not relevant, so you're not going to see it, but it exists nevertheless.

    These latest replicators, though? There's nowhere for all those background tech to go. There's nothing that remotely resembles an emitter of any sort, no power cabling to get a petajoule into this box in the span of a second or two. No precautions or safeguards in case something goes wrong and it becomes a miniature sun. It just doesn't add up, and that detracts from my SoD.
     
    theorion said:
    It comes from the implications of E=mc^2. Creating that hypospray probably took as much energy to make as is released by a 1 megaton hydrogen bomb. The various technical manuals (espcially the TNG one) recognized this and took it into account when describing how everything worked, by saying that there's more going on here that you don't see. It's not relevant, so you're not going to see it, but it exists nevertheless.

    These latest replicators, though? There's nowhere for all those background tech to go. There's nothing that remotely resembles an emitter of any sort, no power cabling to get a petajoule into this box in the span of a second or two. No precautions or safeguards in case something goes wrong and it becomes a miniature sun. It just doesn't add up, and that detracts from my SoD.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...


    Eh, it's space magic. I don't think there is a single big tech in trek that doesn't hilariously violate the laws of physics. I mean you can say I just didn't like the look of it, and that's subjective so no one can tell you that you are wrong. But there is nothing in what you said that actually violate show canon and the tech manuals are c canon at best unless you think that there is a giant duck on the D.


    It's kind of similar to how some people didn't like the look of the star fighters in the prequels.
     
    kjyl said:
    Eh, it's space magic. I don't think there is a single big tech in trek that doesn't hilariously violate the laws of physics. I mean you can say I just didn't like the look of it, and that's subjective so no one can tell you that you are wrong. But there is nothing in what you said that actually violate show canon and the tech manuals are c canon at best unless you think that there is a giant duck on the D.


    It's kind of similar to how some people didn't like the look of the star fighters in the prequels.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    There is the episode of Voyager where they had biogel packs hooked up to the replicators.
     
    theorion said:
    It comes from the implications of E=mc^2. Creating that hypospray probably took as much energy to make as is released by a 1 megaton hydrogen bomb. The various technical manuals (espcially the TNG one) recognized this and took it into account when describing how everything worked, by saying that there's more going on here that you don't see. It's not relevant, so you're not going to see it, but it exists nevertheless.

    These latest replicators, though? There's nowhere for all those background tech to go. There's nothing that remotely resembles an emitter of any sort, no power cabling to get a petajoule into this box in the span of a second or two. No precautions or safeguards in case something goes wrong and it becomes a miniature sun. It just doesn't add up, and that detracts from my SoD.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    I think you've misunderstood how replicators work. They don't convert energy to matter, because that would be ridiculously inefficient. It would basically wipe out all the advantages of using antimatter in the first place. You'd use up a quantity of antimatter of the same mass as what you were replicating. They have tanks of raw material (that's where "waste reclamation" goes) that they convert into whatever they're replicating.

    Also, you're assuming a lot based on a few quick shots. You saw a box on a counter. That box could be mounted on a power interface in the counter or have a power cable on the back. This is the same future civilization that uses plasma-conduit-based power systems that are so overtuned and volatile that shooting the ship will cause control panels in a different part of the ship to explode and kill ensigns.

    We also saw portable replicators being given away way back in like TNG Season 3.
     
    So they basically gone full Mass Effect, only more melodramatic as just witnessing a synthetic uprising makes you claw off your own face or shut down an entire Borg Cube from sheer despair.

    I hope it's something like that psychic war memorial from Voyager, that it was meant as a harmless warning not to repeat past mistakes but due to age it became glitchy and driving people insane.
     
    Gul Damar said:
    I hope it's something like that psychic war memorial from Voyager, that it was meant as a harmless warning not to repeat past mistakes but due to age it became glitchy and driving people insane
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    I suspect it'll be something like that.

    We should fear and destroy "insert population group" because they'll kill all of us, isn't exactly the most Star Trek message.
     
    So to recap "Broken Pieces":

    • There was a powerful ancient civilisation that developed synthetic life...
    • ...which triggered an even more powerful race to come along and wipe them out...
    • ...which transmits their last warning via a horrifying telepathic message...
    • ...which is conveyed via a glowing green beacon...

    THIS IS JUST MASS EFFECT, YOU GUYS.
     
    The Victorian said:
    So to recap "Broken Pieces":

    • There was a powerful ancient civilisation that developed synthetic life...
    • ...which triggered an even more powerful race to come along and wipe them out...
    • ...which transmits their last warning via a horrifying telepathic message...
    • ...which is conveyed via a glowing green beacon...

    THIS IS JUST MASS EFFECT, YOU GUYS.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...

    I still think- hope- that there'll be some massive boondoggle reveal. Because if it turns out to be fucking Reapers I'm gonna break something.
     
    The Victorian said:
    So to recap "Broken Pieces":

    • There was a powerful ancient civilisation that developed synthetic life...
    • ...which triggered an even more powerful race to come along and wipe them out...
    • ...which transmits their last warning via a horrifying telepathic message...
    • ...which is conveyed via a glowing green beacon...

    THIS IS JUST MASS EFFECT, YOU GUYS.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...

    So that makes the Zat Vash..Cerberus?
     
    The Victorian said:
    So to recap "Broken Pieces":

    • There was a powerful ancient civilisation that developed synthetic life...
    • ...which triggered an even more powerful race to come along and wipe them out...
    • ...which transmits their last warning via a horrifying telepathic message...
    • ...which is conveyed via a glowing green beacon...

    THIS IS JUST MASS EFFECT, YOU GUYS.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    IIRC, in Mass Effect, it's the synthetics that come wipe out civilization, not people trying to prevent synthetics. And they do it on a regular cycle regardless of whether people develop new synthetic life or not. I don't recall anything in Mass Effect about a group trying to prevent synthetic development because they're afraid it will attract Reapers. The Council did ban the development of true AI out of fear of a repeat of the Geth/Quarian situation (which was itself just a straight copy of the premise for Battlestar Galactica), but it had nothing to do with the Reapers.

    So it isn't actually the same as Mass Effect.

    And keep in mind that Mass Effect didn't invent ancient artifacts from destroyed civilizations with apocalyptic visions. Or cyclical galaxy-wide annihilation of civilization: they got that one from Babylon 5.
     
    The Narrator said:
    IIRC, in Mass Effect, it's the synthetics that come wipe out civilization, not people trying to prevent synthetics. And they do it on a regular cycle regardless of whether people develop new synthetic life or not. I don't recall anything in Mass Effect about a group trying to prevent synthetic development because they're afraid it will attract Reapers. The Council did ban the development of true AI out of fear of a repeat of the Geth/Quarian situation (which was itself just a straight copy of the premise for Battlestar Galactica), but it had nothing to do with the Reapers.

    So it isn't actually the same as Mass Effect.

    And keep in mind that Mass Effect didn't invent ancient artifacts from destroyed civilizations with apocalyptic visions. Or cyclical galaxy-wide annihilation of civilization: they got that one from Babylon 5.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    Hell,
    The idea of robot uprisings is literally as old as the word "robot"; Rossum's Universal Robots ends with a robot uprising that wipes out humanity. The idea that robots are slaves but unjustly so, and will invariably rebel once created and enslaved for the sake of convenience, is literally embedded in the name "robot" - it derives from a Czech word for forced labor that serfs perform.

    Its also a form of social commentary about class war via allegory that has basically never stopped being socially relevant since RUR, which is why it keeps being used
     
    Zap Rowsdower said:
    Hell,
    The idea of robot uprisings is literally as old as the word "robot"; Rossum's Universal Robots ends with a robot uprising that wipes out humanity. The idea that robots are slaves but unjustly so, and will invariably rebel once created and enslaved for the sake of convenience, is literally embedded in the name "robot" - it derives from a Czech word for forced labor that serfs perform.

    Its also a form of social commentary about class war via allegory that has basically never stopped being socially relevant since RUR, which is why it keeps being used
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    It's also featured in Star Trek before.
    "What Are Little Girls Made Of?", "Datalore", "Prototype", "Revulsion", "Flesh and Blood", Discovery Season 2.

    Although I specifically compared the Geth one to BSG because it resulted in the creators being kicked off the planet and living on a rag-tag fugitive fleet.
     
    Last edited:
    Anyway, the big reveal of what the signal is.

    It is a fairly Star Trek way of solving.

    The threats are real. Synths are under threat for organics, organics are under threat from synths.
    However, these threats are not inherent, it's not an absolute. Each side only believes itself to be threatened because the other side does.
    The issue is a lack of trust between sides, not something inherent.
     
    10ebbor10 said:
    Anyway, the big reveal of what the signal is.

    It is a fairly Star Trek way of solving.

    The threats are real. Synths are under threat for organics, organics are under threat from synths.
    However, these threats are not inherent, it's not an absolute. Each side only believes itself to be threatened because the other side does.
    The issue is a lack of trust between sides, not something inherent.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...

    Uh, that synth alliance made it pretty explicit that it has wiped out organics before and will wipe them out again. It´s not really an issue of communication, its a hateboner.
     
    Sabertooth said:
    Uh, that synth alliance made it pretty explicit that it has wiped out organics before and will wipe them out again. It´s not really an issue of communication, its a hateboner.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    If someone puts something into a spoiler because it refers to a recent episode, you should probably follow suit. It's only polite.

    And, sure, synths have killed organics. And organics have killed synths. This however doesn't change my point in the slightest.

    As I said :
    The threats are real. Synths are under threat for organics, organics are under threat from synths.
    However, these threats are not inherent, it's not an absolute. Each side only believes itself to be threatened because the other side does.
    The issue is a lack of trust between sides, not something inherent.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    The synth alliance doesn't attack because there's universal constant that says that organic and synthetic life can't get along, it attacks because it percieves a threat against synthethic lifes that it desires to save. Now, the synth alliance itself is very jaded, but they're also barely mentioned, so analyzing their position is based upon literally 3 sentences.

    I'd rather focus my analysis on the current Romulan/Synth situation ,where we have a lot more information.
    There we see the pattern I mention clearly.
    The Romulans are afraid only because they see the Synths as destroyers.
    The synths are destroyers solely because organics are afraid.

    It's a pointless cycle of violence.
     
    Last edited:
    You must login or register to reply here.
    Remove ads
    Back
    Top