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The General Star Trek Thread of Earl Grey Tea, Baseball, and KHHHAAAANNNN

Slayven

Member
B_Rik_Schitthaus said:
Well at least we can all agree it was the best Enterprise ever was and that it did what Voyager was suppose to.
I wouldn't say the best( I am a Picard man), but the whole show was leagues better then Voyager. It's had only two things wrong with it, first having to follow voyager and second that shit finale.
 
Slayven said:
I wouldn't say the best( I am a Picard man), but the whole show was leagues better then Voyager. It's had only two things wrong with it, first having to follow voyager and second that shit finale.
Whoa, I meant as good as the show Enterprise ever was(Still shit but a better shit) Where as most people say season 4 is better just because they filled it to the gills with references to better ST series.
 

firehawk12

Subete no aware
Hah, the Berman interview is sort of funny given how I don't "hate" him as much as I did during the DS9/VOY/ENT years. I almost... sympathize with him?

B_Rik_Schitthaus said:
Whoa, I meant as good as the show Enterprise ever was(Still shit but a better shit) Where as most people say season 4 is better just because they filled it to the gills with references to better ST series.

The Manny Coto year was the worst year of Star Trek ever. Worse than TNG season 1, I would argue.

It's a great example of why you never hire fanboys to write for a big show.
 

Zenith

Banned
firehawk12 said:
Hah, the Berman interview is sort of funny given how I don't "hate" him as much as I did during the DS9/VOY/ENT years. I almost... sympathize with him?

He wanted to reduce the Dominion War to 4 episodes instead of 2 seasons. That would have meant no "In the Pale Moonlight".

This might interest some people.

http://media.indiedb.com/images/games/1/14/13776/1.1.png
http://media.indiedb.com/images/games/1/14/13776/4.1.png
http://media.indiedb.com/images/games/1/14/13776/5.1.png
 

Sapiens

Member
The more I know about Berman, the more I'm certain that Star Trek with good in spite of him.

Kind of like how when Roddenberry was around.

Thank god DS9 and TNG turned out as good as they did.

Sad I can't say the same for VOY and ENT.
 

benjipwns

Banned
Still on early TNG, since we've had the "Conspiracy" discussion, but is "Q Who" one of the most important episodes ever?

I don't think you can call it the best TNG episode, and easily not the best Trek episode. But is it not one of the most important ones?

Beyond establishing the Borg, who were relevant until say "Descent" and Voyager, it also had Q basically saying "hey, there's shit out here that's gonna fuck you up, you sure?" And then showing them first hand on purpose.

And it results in Picard literally begging Q to get them out of it.
 

An-Det

Member
Sapiens said:
The more I know about Berman, the more I'm certain that Star Trek with good in spite of him.

Kind of like how when Roddenberry was around.

Thank god DS9 and TNG turned out as good as they did.

Sad I can't say the same for VOY and ENT.

Same for me. The more I read about him, I was fairly sure he just stumbled upon success and then had no idea what to do with it. At least we did get some great shit.
 

jaxword

Member
Zefram Cochrane WAS Gene Roddenberry.

He had this socialist utopia vision, but he was still a drunken gambling womanizer motivated by dollar signs and sleeping around with black women. However, he got lucky, and ended up inspiring millions...
 
In the past I have talked up the first two Myriad Universes books, which each contain 3 "What if?" stories, each of length about half a normal Trek novel. A third, Shattered Light, came out in December, and I've finally got around to reading it. The three stories and branching points from regular Trek are:

The Embrace of Cold Architects - The Borg arrive slightly sooner than in Best of Both Worlds, which has two major consequences: things play out differently with Data's daughter Lal and she doesn't last a single episode length, and when the Enterprise fires on the Borg ship (like the season 3 cliffhanger)... the attack succeeds.
The Tears of Eridanus - In Star Trek as we know it, the Federation is very Earthy. The capital city is on Earth, Starfleet comes from the Earth Starfleet's traditions, and beings with two arms and two legs are called humanoids. This story takes place in a world where Andor is the center of an Interstellar Union (including Earth), where people (mostly andorianoids) serve in the Interstellar Guard. The reason for this difference isn't clear at first and some will pick up on it sooner than others, so I'll leave that unsaid. This specific story then involves Sulu as commander of a vessel on a rescue mission.
Honor in the Night - In "The Trouble with Tribbles", Arne Darvin is exposed as a Klingon undercover agent. What if a shuttle accident meant the tribbles weren't around to help force this reveal? This story covers a few key players in a new history of Klingon-Federation relations from that point to TNG times.


I found the first story a bit meandering, but the other two present some pretty interesting alternate worlds.
 

DrForester

Kills Photobucket
http://trekmovie.com/2011/02/18/star-trek-bathrobes-coming-to-the-uk/

Star Trek: The Robe

Bathrobes (or ‘dressing gowns’ as they are sometimes called in the UK) are the latest bit of wearable Star Trek. In March two new Star Trek bathrobes will be released in the UK. Both are designed around the original series uniform, with one being a gold "Kirk" robe, and the other a blue "Spock" robe.
The officially licensed Star Trek robes are made from 100% cotton towelling and come in one Men’s size. They will be released at the end of March and cost £49.99 (or $80). You can pre-order the bathrobes at find-me-a-gift.com: Kirk Robe, Spock Robe.

No word yet on if or when these will make it North America, but they are made by gro who also make officially licensed Star Wars bathrobes which are carried by ThinkGeek.

trekrobe-kirk.jpg

trekrobe-spock.jpg
 

benjipwns

Banned
Watching "The Big Goodbye" and Beverly is waiting for Picard/Hill to get out of interrogation. She's imitating a "lady of the night" at the station and this cop starts hitting on her. Anyway, he gives her a piece of gum and she chews it for a bit before swallowing. :lol

Never noticed that she swallows it before. Nice touch.

I also like when the guy gets shot and she claps. But that's kinda hard to miss. Picard being giddy when he first comes back from the holodeck and seems to have called a staff meeting just to rave about it is also fun. Must have been a fun episode to write and shoot. (Well, except for working with Lawrence Tierney maybe*.)

I assume many of the time travel to contemporary ones were fun to write the dialog explaining our world to us and getting to let the characters appear ignorant and stupid for a change. I think a number of the actors have said they really enjoyed playing the characters "back in time" for episodes like this.

*From Wil Wheaton's memories of the episode:
Lawrence Tierney, who played Cyrus Redblock, was infamous around Hollywood for having much in common with the tough guys he played in the movies. I had an encounter of my own with him just outside Stage 16 (affectionately known to all who worked there as Planet Hell) while we filmed this episode.

"Hey," he said to me one afternoon between scenes, "do you play football?"

I was 15 at the time, and weighed 95 pounds . . . if I was soaking wet and carrying a ten-pound weight.

"Uh, no," I said.

He leaned into me, menacingly.

"Why the hell not? What are you, some kind of sissy faggot?"

I panicked, certain that he was going to beat the shit out of me because I was more comfortable throwing 3d6 than a pigskin.

"I'm not strong enough to play football!" I said.

"Well, maybe you wouldn't be so weak if you played football!" he growled.

An assistant director arrived just in time to call us to the set and save me from certain death.
 

Cheerilee

Member
B_Rik_Schitthaus said:
Whys he pulling the same pose for science officer as for captain.
Because his mind has retreated into his happy place as a defense mechanism and he won't be capable of cleverness and creativity until he gets home to his favorite chair and gets a few beers into himself.
 

Dupy

"it is in giving that we receive"
Didn't see it mentioned here but it looks like Netflix made a deal with CBS to instant stream a lot of their classic TV shows, including all generations of Star Trek.

http://www.engadget.com/2011/02/22/netflix-signs-up-some-tv-shows-from-cbs-library-for-watch-insta/

Episodes from the original "Hawaii Five-0" are included in the package, as are episodes from all generations of the definitive sci-fi series, "Star Trek," and the cult favorite, "Twin Peaks."

I hope that means all episodes, not just "best of" sets or some dumb shit like that.
 

Morn

Banned
I hope they actually keep the episodes/seasons available instead of cycling them off after a month like with most Netflix instant streaming.
 

Cheerilee

Member
Dupy said:
Didn't see it mentioned here but it looks like Netflix made a deal with CBS to instant stream a lot of their classic TV shows, including all generations of Star Trek.

http://www.engadget.com/2011/02/22/netflix-signs-up-some-tv-shows-from-cbs-library-for-watch-insta/

I hope that means all episodes, not just "best of" sets or some dumb shit like that.
CBS had put them all up for free on Youtube a while back (and banned Canadian IP's), but they just recently yanked them all down again.

I guess Netflix offered to pay them more than whatever you get paid for Youtube hits.
 
Dupy said:
Didn't see it mentioned here but it looks like Netflix made a deal with CBS to instant stream a lot of their classic TV shows, including all generations of Star Trek.

http://www.engadget.com/2011/02/22/netflix-signs-up-some-tv-shows-from-cbs-library-for-watch-insta/



I hope that means all episodes, not just "best of" sets or some dumb shit like that.

Finally! Now I can finally watch DS9 in its entirety. I caught episodes when I could, but I mainly grew up watching next gen. I'll never forget the Reading Rainbow episode where LeVar Burton goes behind the scenes of next gen. I think I stopped watching RR after that because none of the episodes could compare to that. So good.
 

bengraven

Member

spidye

Member
DrForester said:
Wheaton has some awesome stories. Should read the "William Fucking Shatner" story if you haven't before.

Part 1
Part 2
thx for these.
roddenberry seemed like a genuinely nice guy. I am really sad to read all these awful stories about shatner. I suppose he really is a jerk.
 

Cheerilee

Member
spidye said:
thx for these.
roddenberry seemed like a genuinely nice guy. I am really sad to read all these awful stories about shatner. I suppose he really is a jerk.
In Shatner's defense, I don't think he really wants to be a jerk. He just says things recklessly without thinking about other people's feelings first.

There are much worse kinds of jerks out there.
 

Morn

Banned
The press release only mentions "episodes", so I doubt we're going to get every single season up there streaming.
 

Dizzy-4U

Member
So, I finished watching DS9 yesterday. Can someone explain something to me?:

What was the point of the "real" Benjamin? The one that was in the mental institution creating the whole DS9 story. It was just there to remember us that the whole show was fictional? I don't get it...

and also...

Why didn't the Bajorans burnt the fricking book in the first place if it was that dangerous? Why keep it for 300/400 years? It was a ticking bomb ready to explode.

Overall, I liked the series. Characters like Garak and Quark were amazing. "In the Pale Moonlight" is still the most amazing episode of Star Trek that I've seen and kinda redeems Sisko to my eyes at some level.
 
Dizzy-4U said:
So, I finished watching DS9 yesterday. Can someone explain something to me?:

What was the point of the "real" Benjamin? The one that was in the mental institution creating the whole DS9 story. It was just there to remember us that the whole show was fictional? I don't get it...

and also...

Why didn't the Bajorans burnt the fricking book in the first place if it was that dangerous? Why keep it for 300/400 years? It was a ticking bomb ready to explode.

Overall, I liked the series. Characters like Garak and Quark were amazing. "In the Pale Moonlight" is still the most amazing episode of Star Trek that I've seen and kinda redeems Sisko to my eyes at some level.


They were going to leave it to interpretation that Benny Russel was given a prophecy by the Wormhole aliens. Just as they had with the Bajorans. And that Trek was real. Other interpretation was that Star Trek was fictional. I think its clear they nixed the latter idea. I don't think there was a "point" to Benny Russel. Just a means to tell a story.
 

Walshicus

Member
Teh Hamburglar said:
They were going to leave it to interpretation that Benny Russel was given a prophecy by the Wormhole aliens. Just as they had with the Bajorans. And that Trek was real. Other interpretation was that Star Trek was fictional. I think its clear they nixed the latter idea. I don't think there was a "point" to Benny Russel. Just a means to tell a story.
I just interpreted it as a method the Pah Wraiths used to confuse Sisko.
 

Krowley

Member
I just finished DS9 too, and it was really amazing. One of the best shows I've ever seen.
The very final episode had some minor issues for me, and I think they could have wrapped it up better, but I think it ended satisfactorily enough.
Overall, I was astounded by the quality of the show.

Also.... I just started Enterprise. I can see some of the complaints, but I'm kind of enjoying it. I can tell that it's not going to be amazing, but I like the concept, and Quantum Leap guy makes a good captain.

Honestly, I think it's time for a new television Star Trek series with a new person in charge of the franchise. Somebody with a slightly different vision who can bring the concept forward into the newer generation of television. The new movie was cool, but I don't think movies will ever be able to really do justice to the Trek universe.
 
Sir Fragula said:
I just interpreted it as a method the Pah Wraiths used to confuse Sisko.
Yup. At one point, Sisko's mother, Sarah, says that it was the Pah-Wraiths trying to prevent Sisko from opening the Orb of the Emissary.

As for why the Bajorans didn't burn the book in the first place. Nobody had read it for a long time; no one had taken out of the library or whatever. So no one knew the book could be burned. Winn figured it out when she was reading the book I suspect.
 

Dizzy-4U

Member
I see. I can live with the Pah Wraiths interpretation.

Also, the shape-shifter that Odo befriends at DS9. He's dead, right? Or does he reappears in Voyager or some book?
 
Dizzy-4U said:
I see. I can live with the Pah Wraiths interpretation.

Also, the shape-shifter that Odo befriends at DS9. He's dead, right? Or does he reappears in Voyager or some book?

Hes probably dead from the Founders disease lol
 
The other day my friend's 15 year old son was talking about the guests at an upcoming convention.

He said "Patrick Stewart is going to be there. You know? The 'facepalm' guy."


He was dead serious.





I actually took my glasses off and did a facepalm as a reaction. I wasn't trying to be funny. It was just the only thing I could do...
 

Cheerilee

Member
Dizzy-4U said:
So, I finished watching DS9 yesterday. Can someone explain something to me?:

What was the point of the "real" Benjamin? The one that was in the mental institution creating the whole DS9 story. It was just there to remember us that the whole show was fictional? I don't get it...
In the first episode with Benny Russell, Sisko was wavering and losing the will to fight, so the Prophets sent him a vision of the entire world being his creation, something personal that belonged to him and he wanted to share with others, and then the Prophets put him and his creation under attack, to trigger an emotional response and remind him of why he fights. Sisko was re-motivated to fight for what he believes in, but as a minor consequence it may have weakened his belief in his own reality and/or made him feel like a puppet.

Later when the Pah Wraiths were being threatened, they knew about the dream, so they brought it back and tried to spin it to their own advantage, telling Benny/Sisko that he wasn't really being attacked, that it was DS9 that was killing him, that he was only hurting himself by fighting to protect it, and that the smart thing to do was to sit back, relax, and let these "helpful" events wash over him. Benny/Sisko was almost convinced, but then for whatever reason he flipped out, rejected everything, and embraced DS9. This broke the Pah Wraiths dream control over him, and apparently resolved his reality/free will concerns. It probably even made up for the recent bomb-drop of the Prophets controlling his existence up to that point.

If you want to do the Total Recall thing and question which reality is real and which one is a dream, then Benny probably managed to scribble out the end of the series before the security guards arrived to beat him with clubs, but Benny eventually gets lobotomized.
 
Dizzy-4U said:
I see. I can live with the Pah Wraiths interpretation.

Also, the shape-shifter that Odo befriends at DS9. He's dead, right? Or does he reappears in Voyager or some book?
As far as the books are concerned he ended up with the Great Link, too. Don't remember whatever they had him up to between his show appearance and that.
 
I just watched "The Return of the Archons" and "A Taste of Armageddon" for the first time ever, I shit you not.

Really good stuff. Better than every episode of Voyager, with the possible exception of "Living Witness".

Kirk's interpretation of the Prime Directive is fucking hilarous and usually involves shooting at shit or blowing shit up.
 

Morn

Banned
JoshuaJSlone said:
As far as the books are concerned he ended up with the Great Link, too. Don't remember whatever they had him up to between his show appearance and that.

Books are just fan fiction that cost $7 to read. They aren't canon.
 
Morn said:
Books are just fan fiction that cost $7 to read. They aren't canon.
Teh Hamburglar said:
I'm sure we all operate under the impression that its canon until TPTB tell us otherwise. Kinda like with Star Wars.
I just see them as their own pocket continuity. If and when we ever see more filmed content from the Prime timeline past the 24th century stuff we've already seen, I pretty fully expect no consideration to be given to the books. But for now they are all the continuation I've got, and I enjoy them for what they are.

Mama Robotnik said:
As long as you're on a kick of pointing out the goofiest things in Star Trek fiction that go outside the normal book continuity, I think the biggest eyeroll I've had was from the Star Trek Online book:
The son of Picard and Crusher is married to the daughter of Riker and Troi.
 

maharg

idspispopd
Teh Hamburglar said:
I'm sure we all operate under the impression that its canon until TPTB tell us otherwise. Kinda like with Star Wars.

Yeah no. Also with Star Wars. It's called Expanded Universe for a reason.
 

jaxword

Member
Yeah, none of the Star Trek EU is considered canon, unlike the mixed-up Star Wars EU mess.

However, on rare occasions, the Star Trek book/comic writers/external sources come up with something so good that the regular series writers decide to add it in to the regular series as canon. So the official canon is still only the series, but it CAN add things from the EU if it wants.

It's so rare, though, that it's happened maybe ten or fewer times in the franchise's entire lifespan.

Some examples include the animated series, which many consider canon, and little background details like the Star Trek 6 president being essentially blind, as was referenced earlier in the thread.

Sort of the opposite of Star Wars where everything is canon until it's exorcised by Lucas.
 
jaxword said:
However, on rare occasions, the Star Trek book/comic writers/external sources come up with something so good that the regular series writers decide to add it in to the regular series as canon. So the official canon is still only the series, but it CAN add things from the EU if it wants.
Yeah. One example that comes to mind is James Kirk's father. The old series and movies said almost nothing about him. The writers of Star Trek 2009 were fans of some of the books that wrote him as a Starfleet officer and went with it, even using the same name.

More often, though, the people working on the canon stuff just don't have an idea what's going on in the other stuff and don't really care. A couple examples spring to mind, though they weren't that hard to gloss over.

1) Some DS9 episode makes small reference to some ship captained by a Shelby. As written it was apparently intended to refer to the Shelby from Best of Both Worlds, but for the books that character had become a major part of the New Frontier series. Apparently they'd even tried to make sure she wouldn't come up in the shows again before putting her in the book to prevent conflicts (at the time New Frontier was the only book with a set continuing storyline), but it was just forgotten. Easy solution though: There's more than one person with the name Shelby, and they never got more specific than the name.

2) Andorian genders. The books took some quickie comment Data made in a TNG episode and really ran with it by giving Andorians four genders necessary for procreation--in external appearance two more male-like and two more female-like. However, when Andorians showed up again in Enterprise, none of this seemed to carry over, and in the last episode we even see Shran with a daughter apparently without the aid of a couple extra genders. This one seemed a bit harder to work around, but since the books ended up taking the far-out path that the holodeck simulation Riker viewed in that last episode was wildly inaccurate, it wasn't much more a step to say there were other parents we just didn't hear about before.
 

jaxword

Member
Another example of EU making the jump is Uhura's first name. It was never mentioned at all in the official shows or movies, but in a book back in the 80s it was stated as Nyota. Reportedly the author contacted Roddenberry and he said yeah, it was a good first name.

Now, 30 years later with the new movie, it's finally recognized as canon.

Takes a while for any EU material to make the cut, but when it does, it sticks.
 

Morn

Banned
jaxword said:
Another example of EU making the jump is Uhura's first name. It was never mentioned at all in the official shows or movies, but in a book back in the 80s it was stated as Nyota. Reportedly the author contacted Roddenberry and he said yeah, it was a good first name.

Now, 30 years later with the new movie, it's finally recognized as canon.

Takes a while for any EU material to make the cut, but when it does, it sticks.

That's only because the idiots who wrote the movie (the TRANSFORMERS writers) think the books ARE canon. They said so themselves.
 
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