TALKING POINTS
Here are just a few brief written commentaries on the some of the talking points and oddities of Star Trek in all its incarnations. From the selection below you can jump to the chosen sections. Please note that everything written here is by me, and is my opinion, and interpretation only...
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Designations Of Time Universal Translators Time Travel
Comparative Biology The Klingon Question
Designations of time (of Human time) seem to be understood by race after
race, such as hours, days, months and years. All terms have been used most
frequently on all of the Trek shows. In ‘FACE OF THE ENEMY’, Troi (Rakal)
said she’d been with the Tal Shiar ‘for several months’. Toreth would not
understand the word month, or at least immediately recognise it as a Human word.
Would ‘month’ be translated into the Romulan equivalent? And what are the
chances this length of time is the same as a Human month? This Human monopoly
over the galaxy has extended to the Delta Quadrant too. In ‘FAIR TRADE’, the
Voyager happens across upon a large alien space station. No sooner had
communication been established, when the station commander asked Janeway to meet
with him in ‘one hour’. How the hell would he know how long a Human hour
was?
Furthermore, there’s no way that a Human year would be the same amount of time on another world, or day either. All planets, one would suppose, rotate around their star at a different distance at a different rate. But only very rarely would we hear a non-Human race say ‘one of your hours’ (or days, or whatever). This also throws the length of light years into the air too. For each extraterrestrial race, a year, therefore light year would be a completely different distance. This fact is never observed either. But I do understand that all of this to do with the compartmentalising of time, and all the stuff to do with planetary conditions, plus the universal translator enigma, has to be put to one side and toned down for the sake of good storytelling and effective drama.
A similar argument to stardates applies to the ambiguous and elusive
Universal Translator (UT), and the fact that all alien races whether from the
Alpha Quadrant or not, all seem to speak perfect (Americanised) English. We do
finally get clues as to how personal translators work in the DS9 episode
‘LITTLE GREEN MEN’. But with what the creators thought was an ingenious way
to explain away the mystery of translators, they created fresh problems.
Is everyone meant to have one implanted in their ear or on their Combadge? In
the aforementioned episode, I can comprehend that when the UT’s of Quark and
co. reactivated after their crash, they could then understand the language of
the Humans. But how could they, the Army personnel understand the language of
the Ferengi? For they obviously don’t have translators in their ears. It has
to be a two way thing. I cannot believe that one translator can read,
decode and translate an incoming alien language, and at the same time convert your
own lingo into the alien’s, and transmit the translated dialogue whilst using some
kind of audio dampening field to blanket the unintelligible words you’ve
already spoken –all in an instant in order to maintain a real time
conversation! No way is that plausible.
So what about when Worf deliberately speaks Klingon, wouldn’t everyone hear
it in English, or in whatever language they understand? And in the same vein,
what about Picard? He is supposed to be French, yet he speaks perfect English
with a perfect English accent. Obviously he’s an English actor from the 20th
century, but, one might say that his character speaks French, and the UT
translates it all into English for us and everyone else around him to
understand. But this can’t be so, because early on in the show’s history he
on occasion spoke French, such as "Merde!" If he spoke French
from day to day, this would’ve been translated into "Shit!" for
everyone to hear. So he must always be speaking English.
And what if someone in the crew is multilingual? What language do they speak,
and what language is stuff translated into for them?
Furthermore, the languages of other races are referred to as Vulcan, Bajoran, Romulan or
whatever. What is English referred to in the galactic community –‘Earthian’?
One would suppose that each of these other worlds have many, many languages,
Earth for instance has hundreds. Yet English is the only one to be used. So is
English the official Federation language? Checkov was a non-English speaking
officer, being Russian, so was he trained to speak English as per Federation protocol?
It seems a bit narcissistic of us English speakers, but very convenient. So, in
the 24th century have other Earth languages been forgotten, outworn,
suppressed!?
There’s little doubt that English is the dominant language of the world, so it’s only natural that this progression was carried forward into the Star Trek universe, (and it’s made in America by Americans). But it doesn’t seem particularly fair. For realism’s sake they could, from time to time use the occasional subtitle, or accent. Perhaps, a Swede could visit the ship, someone from Australia, or Iceland or something!
Nearly all (Human) officers of all the series’ have been American, or British (that includes Picard who played a Frenchman). The one that wasn’t was Checkov. Sulu was a Japanese American we're led to believe, O’Brien was Irish, although English speaking. Bashir had Arab routes, but is English. There have been a few minor bit players, such as the TNG first season Assistant Chief Engineer, Lieutenant Commander Singh, who was killed off in ‘LONELY AMONG US’. He was probably from India or Pakistan, along with another who played a brief part over a viewscreen from a stricken vessel (the Saratoga I believe) in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home. Torres on Voyager has a touch of Hispanic about her, Chakotay has a native American heritage. Kim is another Asian-American. So they’ve balanced things out a bit on that show. But the general trend remains. Perhaps we could assume that because everyone, including the aliens, has one of these remarkable UT devices, that everything is simply translated into English, and with an American accent...
I really could go on for ever about time travel (everyone's favourite plot device) and all its inconsistencies, but I'm not going to. But more points are made for individual episodes of TNG found on the Nitpicks page. But this commentary centres around the control of temporal violations and paradoxes.
In ‘FUTURE’S END’ on Voyager, we see Braxton’s time ship and
hear about the ‘Temporal Integrity Commission’ –whose job it is to oversee
the time line, any disruptions within it, and all the basic shortcomings of
temporal screw-ups. If this is so, where the hell were these guys in ‘PAST
TENSE’? A big screw-up in the making there, eh boys? What was more important
to keep them so otherwise engaged!? Having said that, what more pressing
commitments did they have during the events of ‘TIME’S ARROW’,
‘YESTERDAY’S ENTERPRISE’, ‘THE CITY ON THE EDGE OF FOREVER’,
‘ASSIGNMENT EARTH’, ALL GOOD THINGS’, ‘Star Trek IV’, ‘Star Trek
VIII’ ETC. ETC??!!. At least we saw some effort in DS9’s ‘TRIALS
AND TRIBBLE-ATIONS’, then involving Starfleet's 'Temporal Investigations'..
But all the former events could have caused some major foul-ups in the space
time continuum for Braxton's 29th century. So why did they not
intervene at any point? Granted, ‘FUTURE’S END’ had the destruction of the
solar system at stake, not quite the same as any possible problems with Kirk and
Spock visiting the 1930’s. But the ‘Star Trek: First Contact’ scenario
may have caused the odd problem or two in the 29th century, what with
the Borg paying a little visit to 21st century earth, and the
subsequent assimilation of the entire Human race – a basic metaphor for simply
planting a Borg flag into the soil of one of the plush lawns at Starfleet
headquarters. Did Braxton and co get off their arses to look into this small
matter? Nope, it was all down to Picard to save the day. So this begs the
question, why suddenly bring in a concept (a good one as well), that can’t
possibly jell with what has gone before, and has been previously established?
One slightly possible explanation is that they were present during these
events, but patched things up in secret, or least attempted to influence their
fortuitous outcomes behind the scenes. But in Voyager’s
‘RELATIVITY’, Braxton is back, and their involvement in this time crisis
does seem to be quite hands on, ie, get in there and sort it out at all costs,
with perhaps tidying up the loose ends later.
Going off on a slight tangent though, one major nitpick in ‘FUTURE’S END’ is that we see the crew of Voyager waltzing around Los Angeles in 1996. All is as it should be. The world is how we know it and expect it to be as this is our present. But in the Trek universe, 1996 was meant to be a time of terrible upheaval, for the Eugenics wars had gripped the planet and chaos had reigned for the last few years. In 1996 itself, Khan Noonian Singh escaped planet Earth aboard the Botany Bay, leaving the world under the influence of other evil genetic supermen-like overseers. But the 1996 of this episode portrays no such upheaval, war, or tyrannical dictatorship. One little, but hardly noticeable touch was that on Rain Robinson's desk was a small model of the DY-100 spacecraft -Khan's ship, The Botany Bay.
Another interesting concept associated with time travel was the biological distortion and 'out of phase' metabolism of the duplicate Picard in 'TIME SQUARED'. Unfortunately this is never acknowledged again in subsequent time travel episodes. There has since been reports that this episode was originally going to be a Q story, and that it was he who directly influenced events by sending Picard back in time a few hours to rendezvous with the Enterprise before its destruction to attempt to prevent it from occurring. It was going to be directly tied in with the events of 'Q WHO?', and would end with Q requesting to join the crew of the Enterprise. Gene Roddenberry was not keen on the idea, and Q's involvement was eventually pulled from the 'TIME SQUARED' story. As a result, the events of this episode are up in the air -what it was about, what the anomaly was, how Picard was sent back in time and what was behind it all are all a mystery.
Again, analogous to stardates and translators etc. there's
also a problem with alien biology. For these 'aliens' aren't very alien....
For why is it that most of the planets (with intelligent
lifeforms) that are visited seem to harbour a compatible environment to Human needs? Oxygen,
atmospheric pressure, and gravity –all appear to be tolerable to the crew. In
addition to that, not all crew members are Human, yet they seem to function in
the standard life support protocols on the Enterprise, and DS9, etc.
They all seem to be calibrated to Human needs. What are the chances that all
the races aboard a starship like the Enterprise come from planets that
are identical, environmentally and atmospherically to Earth? Well I suppose they
have to if they’re going to work for Starfleet!
Only a few exceptions have been seen. Along with other examples we see Mordock the Benzite using a special breathing device to operate amongst Humans (‘COMING OF AGE’), another Benzite appears in ‘A MATTER OF HONOR’. In ‘MELORA’ on DS9 we see an Elysian female who cannot exist freely in our gravity, and has to use a uniquely converted wheelchair. It was also good to see the continuation of Cardassian environmental preferences. Being cold blooded and partially reptilian, they have a distinct aversion to the cold, and subsequently prefer life support systems to be calibrated to very warm temperatures and high humidity levels. This was observed throughout DS9's seven years, so kudos to the creators for that. It should be done more often for realism's sake, because a show with imagination is interesting!
Finally, the great Klingon question: Where did they suddenly acquire those interesting cranial features? What are those pastie heads about?!
There has over time been many explanations and theories for one of the most blatant incontinuities in Star Trek –that oft mentioned ‘why and how did Klingons get these ridged foreheads’?, (when in the Original Series they looked more or less like Humans). My theory is (was) this:
-After first contact with the Federation, and subsequent cultural interchange and the eventual war, Klingons became (naturally, as we know) to detest humans and everything they stood for. But at this time (during TOS), their physical appearance pretty much mirrored our own. Apart from an accentuated beard, our two races were virtually the same in appearance. So as time passed, I submit that the Klingons deliberately engineered themselves to distinguish and differentiate their ‘superior’ Klingon virtues and honour, and subjugate the more passive human form. We know of certain Klingon creatures like the ‘Targ’, and the dinosaur-like Worf from ‘GENESIS’. So perhaps Klingon scientists blended their own DNA with that of prehistoric reptilian beasts to purposefully emphasise their fierce and combative nature. Perhaps now, after the ‘physical upgrade’, the Klingon High Council and their citizens might be a tad embarrassed by their genetic vanity, which would account for Worf admitting that they do not like to talk about it (the physical change) with ‘outsiders’, in ‘TRIALS AND TRIBBLE-ATIONS’.
But this is yet something else
that has been screwed up and destroyed by Enterprise. The appearance of
ridged-head Klingons in the 22nd century forces us to concede that something
else is behind it all. So I've had to adjust the theory, indeed all our
theories of the change in Klingon physiology between 2269 and 2271 have to be
thought out again.
It would seem to suggest, by logic alone, that their foreheads are naturally
ridged, they always were, and in the 23rd century, for whatever reason, this
changed. The only sensible thing I go along with is that all members of the
Klingon military were genetically altered to blend/infiltrate Federation
circles, as many believe.
But there's still a problem. Because if you think about it, in the 23rd century
the Federation know very well that Klingons have ridged foreheads,
because of the knowledge first gathered a century before in the Archer era.
So my theory is this:
In the mid 23rd century the Klingons genetically alter their appearance to look
like humans, so they could infiltrate Federation circles to spy, undermine
subvert, etc.... A vast army of 'genetically altered soldiers' of the Klingon
Defense Forces received the treatment, and the mission began. Somehow, somwehere
along the line it failed. The Federation discovered the treachery and the spies
within, and the game was up. So, hundreds, if not thousands of now smooth headed
Klingon officers and operatives had to return to regular duty. This is why we
see them as they are on TOS. Over the years treatment to reverse the initial
alterations take effect and they return to their normal, ridged forehead
appearance. The experiment becomes largely forgotten, and not spoken about with
outsiders.
Inconsistencies The very best of Trek
