Chapel has been teased in both movies so maybe should appear in 3 and Rand was originally planned to be one of the original cast so should really turn up for the 50th too. But it looks like they have C Marcus as one of the crew now so Rand and Chapel would possibly have to be minor roles like Chekov in STID. Anyway wonder who they could cast if they appear. Obviously someone abit M Barrett and GLW looking EDIT- oh crap I thought was posting this in the other movie section. Can it be moved in there?
Slightly disappointed because I thought this was going to be analysis of their presence in the classic films.
The writers and producers were quoted first time round as stating that they did not want to use the women if they could not do them justice before giving Chapel her cameo and then effectively writing her out of the franchise in an impliedly misogynistic, horrific way in the sequel (although I personally choose to believe that even Kirk would remember the name of a woman he'd slept with so Chapel was a crewman who was aware of his reputation but who never had much direct contact with him). I was hoping that the comic would re-introduce Chapel in their version of WaLGmo since she wanted to be on the fringe to get closer to Exo 2 but they seem to be moving away from re-tellings for the moment at least. Yeoman Rand has appeared in the comic as a security-trained crewman and they are clearly aware of Chapel so I can keep my fingers crossed but if I'm honest, there has been a profound lack of imagination when it comes to utilising potential female characters, despite astonishingly obvious ways to do so. Number One and T'Pau are the most obvious but Rand could have been used as a transporter chief or security chief in any one of several scenes and Chapel could have been made a scientist drafted in as a nurse instead of making her a second fiddle subservient medical assistant. I really want to see the women and see them with a decent chunk of dialogue to secure them as secondary characters where they deserve to be but I'm not hopeful.
I can't quite get my head around Chapel, in a world where Spock was taken, being a conquest of Kirk! I guess the Enterprise might visit the frontier outpost she was reassigned to (Exo III, anyone?) leading to some awkward moments between the two. As for Rand, she might have been the blonde in red we saw on the bridge in ID, at a station near Sulu (IIRC, it's Internal Security or somesuch). There isn't a place for a feeble secretary in this modern version of Trek, so making her a security officer or engineer would be a logical step.
TOS never did enough with it's female characters. I would like to have seen Number One back in NuTrek, as the Captain of her own ship by the 2260's. Instead, TOS had what basically amounted to the Cute Yeoman Society. There were quite a few of them, but they were mostly one-episode wonders who went nowhere. Rand wasn't, but she seemed only to serve the purpose of a potential love interest before being dumped. In the movies, Saavik and Ilia were very interesting, but they basically kill off Ilia, and Saavik hits a glass ceiling. I think they wanted her initially to be part of the assassination plot in STVI but that would have been nonsensical and ludicrously out of character. I am glad they dropped that. I would rather not see her at all, than have them to that to the character. First officer of the Excelsior would have been better. NuTrek, and I could care less about the comics, has so far been awful for women. It's nice to see Marcus, though, and I would like to see a Dr. Chapel as well. But honestly I would like to see a lot more than that. NuTrek has a long way to go to be better than TOS. As of right now, they might actually be slightly worse. With only one movie left, I doubt we will see any substantial change in that regard.
Actually, the comics have started doing a little better with Marcus doing story-appropriate appearances and Lt Zahra as semi-regular security support, and Sulu's sister, although Zahra turned from North-African/South Asian to blonde Caucasian over the course of about 5 issues but I suppose with Khan, we had a bit of a glut of South Asian characters so it's understandable The main problem is numbers. Not enough thought goes into making background and guest characters female incidental to the plot.
I wouldn't even mind seeing Janice Lester, as long as she isn't an hysterical, unhinged lunatic. There were a fair amount of TOS era female characters. It is a matter of yes, working them more into the stories. Flesh them out, promote them in rank, show female Captains and first officers, even if they are incidental. At this point I would take a female Captain knocking back a couple with Kirk in an Officers club. Not just enlisted Yeomen and Lieutenants. By mining the already established TOS and TAS females you already have an inventory of characters to work with. M'Ress, for instance, would look great with modern and big budget make-up and prosthetics.
That would certainly make for a even more interesting Kirk/Chapel reunion! (although IIRC, Peter David played around with the similar likenesses of Morgan Primus and Lwaxana Troi too, so it's hard to draw the line between uncanny lookalike and them actually being the same person)
A bit like nearly everyone in TAS sounding suspiciously like Chapel and Scotty. I am assuming that different actresses would be cast for No.1 and Chapel in NuTrek, so that shouldn't come up.
With so many established characters, it's easy breezy to just use some of them. Helen Noel could be ship's counselor. Chapel could be in sickbay, M'Ress could be on the bridge, with all or any of the others doted around as needed, etc.
Considering this one hasn't yet been moved to the proper section... It's interesting to note Chapel and Rand together in the final scenes of STIV (as opposed to their more close-up cameos earlier in the movie). Never noticed until recently that they're both there in the background, rooting for our heroes, and indeed they can be seen running down to embrace the crew when Kirk's "punishment" is finally passed down onto them. Although they don't interact with Kirk or Spock, only with the other cast. Although Janice Rand appeared several times later, this trial scene was officially Majel's last time playing Christine Chapel.
I was quite annoyed with the comic writers. They wrote out Elizabeth Dehner in a really sexist fashion and, instead of saying well, let's use Helen Noel instead, they carried on like they had no alternative. So, if a member of the crew transfers, they would not bother to replace them, which probably explains why they promoted a junior navigator to chief engineer...
Oh that was ridiculous. Sending Chekov down to run Engineering. Hahaha! Oh, for god's sake! Apparently the swarm of red shirts down in the cavernous Engineering section cant handle it. Naturally there would be a chain of command and dozens of people down there who could and would take over. But maybe they have Chekov handle the ship counselor job as well! I know O&K have had a lot of commercial success as screenwriters, but holy crap these guys have written a lot of junk.
In TOS Chekov filled in for Spock quite a bit.(Pretty much anytime Spock was unavailable) Surely there were junior Science officers on board, yet the job always went to Chekov. The reson being if you're gonna have someone spouting dialogue, use the guy already on the payroll.
Then set up your characters to make it believable. Every crewman can use a scanner. It's part of basic training - you don't have to be a science officer. Every crewman can perform basic engineering. It's part of basic training, you don't have to be a fully qualified engineer. However, not every crewman can be a department head. It requires experience, administration skills, and rank, since some of the crewman who will be sub-ordinate to you will be Lts and Lt-commanders. Make Chekov an engineering liaison but don't make an 18-year old ensign who qualified out of Starfleet a year ago, chief engineer. That's just plain daft.
I don't think its any more believable for Chekov to run the Science station in a crisis situation, a job usually performed by the Chief Science Officer, than it is for him to step in as Chief Engineer. Though in both cases they hand wave it by saying the Chekovs have been studying under Spock and Scotty Its a conceit of the media, not "bad writing"