What are your controversial Star Trek opinions?

I don't want to see Benedict Cumberbatch in Barbara Bouchet's costume.

 

I think Dr Stubbs was absolutely correct in suggesting that they exterminate the nanites. Giving a race of sentient, self-replicating nano-machines with unclear motives their own planet seems like it is inevitably going to lead to the destruction of the Federation and/or the galaxy. I've seen enough SG-1 to convince me that replicators of that sort are a terrible idea.

 

Agreed. I'll add to this to say: without the Earth/Romulan War, there would be no Romulan Star Empire.

 

Do we know that? I'm not saying it isn't true. But where does that come from?

Do we REALLY know that? And what do we know that from?

 

The events of the ENT trilogy "BABEL ONE", "UNITED", and "THE AENAR" put all four founding races on a united front for the first time... ever. That was the stepping stone to getting the Coalition of Planets, which in turn became the Federation.

 

WOw..... Yeah ok, never mind.

 

What about the Medusans? Doesn't a person after seeing a Medusan modify the engines or something and send them outside the galaxy? Then they just make it back. Seems like a helpful tech to have.

 

Sure, if you’re going to make like Stargate Command and repeatedly betray and murder the entities that trusted you at first, just in case, because it’s a risk.

I enjoyed SG1, but there was an ugly realpolitick side to it that I bounced off hard — see also how they ultimately dealt with Lord Yu, who for a System Lord dealt with them pretty fairly.

Because at that point, why aren’t you just taking a Dark Forest approach and exterminating every species you can that might develop the ability to hit you, chucking nukes through to every address in the gate system? (At which point, you deserve whatever they do to you.)

 

Supposition on my part, but I suspect that had they not discovered a true rival nearby in the Federation - after all, they had the guile to ally with and subvert the Klingons per TNG - that they would not have become the empire that they became.

 

Ben Sisko's 1st season look was better.

Wait, wait, hear me out! The shaved head and the beard fit the character and certainly the actor. But it's kind of "What you see it what you get."

But I just watched The Maquis Part II and seeing "clean cut and proper" Benjamin Sisko delivering his lines with such unflinching steel to Cardassians and Humans alike? Oh my goodness. The bad ass looking later seasons is almost gilding the lily.

 

I’ve always wondered if there’s any significance to the fact it’s called the “Earth-Romulan War.”

In the real world, it’s an artifact that “Balance of Terror” was produced for TOS before the Federation or Starfleet had even been given names and created as concepts for the show.

But in-universe, I wonder that since the name is not “Coalition-Romulan War” that it signifies the Romulans were able to divide the Coalition we see in Enterprise (maybe at least in the beginning), and Earth may have stood alone initially? It’s interesting that Enterprise shows a lot of delegates for the coalition, but only the Vulcans, Tellarites and Andorians join with us to become the founders of the Federation.

Sisko has a line in DS9 that’s always intrigued me. He warns the Federation president that if the Dominion are able to land Jem’Hadar troops on Earth, the planet will see the sort of conflict it hasn’t experienced “since the founding of the Federation.” I’ve always wondered if that implies the Romulans were able to attack Earth in some sort of massive way during the war. And the reason it’s called the Earth-Romulan War is that we took the brunt of the fighting.

 

Agreed. But we'll also have to add to that that this isn't just any other species. This species would have a rate of development no other species could keep up with, which they can use for good or for ill (and their intentions don't seem to have settled yet). For example, with only a few days of development, they probably could be having the Borg nanotechnology for lunch, liberating all drones wherever they went. But if they decided to 'clean' the galaxy from 'biological infestations', there'd be equally little other species could do against that, save perhaps for those that already had attained god-like powers.

 

That's always pretty much what I figured; Archer's "we'll go it alone" speech almost writes itself.

I've never thought about that fully, but it makes sense. Reman shock troops trying to land on Earth perhaps? There are similar lines regarding the Breen attack and Earth having not seen a direct attack like that for some time, though I cannot remember the specific line. Martok does note that not even the Klingons dared attack Earth directly, which is interesting juxtaposed with your idea.

 

Maybe the Nanites evolved into the tentacled AI in Picard?

 

Controversial Opinion/Personal Headcanon: The Battle of Cheron (which in canon is supposed to be the pivotal battle of the Earth-Romulan War) and occurs in some fictional star system (that may be the home to the half-white, half-black people from "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield"), should be retconned to be the "Battle of Charon" and occur around Pluto's moon, Charon.

I think that makes more sense given the fact that in TNG's "The Defector" it's referred to as a "humiliating" defeat that still bothers the Romulans two centuries later. Think about a huge Romulan fleet on the edge of our solar system, having already got some of their ships through in attacking Earth, poised to achieve a stunning victory against humanity, only to be turned back in the end at a pivotal battle near Pluto.

 

Edit: I completely misread your post. But I agree that it's much more dramatic the way you proposed.

 

Of course even if ENT had done the Romulan War they would have turned this all on its head in the interest of "subverting expectations".

 

I mean, it should have all been space based.