The characters' ages in TOS (a discussion, not a question)

[Shamrock Holmes]

One thing that we can be pretty sure about is that the insignia systems in the pilots were different from the later OS. In "The Cage" Number One (called lieutenant) and Pike wear the same insignia, whic doesn't make sense unless you think they hold the same rank.

It's perfectly possible that they do, at least in terms of substantive rank (this isn't uncommon on large or mid-sized warships in the RW) with Pike holding the title of Captain by virtue of being the CO. However, I prefer the idea that (in-universe at least) Pike's single stripe is an error (possibly he'd run out of clean shirts due to the difficulties on Rigel (?) and had to use an old officer's shirt?) and that he should have been wearing the same double braid as Kirk did in WNMHGB with the rank of Commander and the title of Captain.

Garrison, named a chief petty officer in the scripts, wears a voided, ladder-like stripe, never seen again. In WNMHGB, lieutenants and lieutenant commanders are shown to wear the same single stripe. Not to mention the fact that the shirt colors and badges were completely different than those later seen.

Personally, I think we should have seen CPOs again (but that's a slightly separate topic) and similarly to above confusion between lieutenants, lieutenant commanders and commanders wasn't unusual in TOS either (in TOS: The Alternative FactorI, Assistant Engineer Leslie (a Lieutenant) was Duty Officer on the Bridge with an unnamed Command Division Lieutenant Commander serving at Navigation (a second unnamed Command LTCDR, this one a black man, also appeared in a senior staff meeting during TOS: The Enterprise Incident).

Also, while background material might have suggested that Number One was a Lieutenant Commander (Spock's later rank might suggest this as would Mitchell, who is refered to as a LTCDR), the script refers to her only as Lieutenant, which wouldn't be inconsistent with her being an XO.

 

[Kor]

I, for one, prefer not to make in-universe explanations for every little questionable production detail.

Kor

 

[Pauln6]

O'Brien and Rand would need twin cousins to explain their weird rank progression.

Really the writers should tag an extra 15 to 20 years onto most characters' ages to reflect the fact that most people potter around with education and hobbies before charging off into space. Plus better health and technology would mean that people look younger than the equivalent biological age now. Picard was about 18 years older than Patrick Stewart. With presidential candidates ranging from 60-75 would it be hard for an audience to accept that the hot chick character is 45 with two adult children even if the actress is 25? As long as it's a trope for all characters of both genders that leads to plenty of 45 year old actresses playing 65 year old captains and not just a way of driving older actresses out of the business while employing plenty of older men.

Instead we seem to have lots of young space explorers who essentially give up all hope of having a family by spending their youth out in space. You would think that would be something Starfleet discouraged.

 

[Shamrock Holmes]

O'Brien and Rand would need twin cousins to explain their weird rank progression.

Really the writers should tag an extra 15 to 20 years onto most characters' ages to reflect the fact that most people potter around with education and hobbies before charging off into space. Plus better health and technology would mean that people look younger than the equivalent biological age now. Picard was about 18 years older than Patrick Stewart. With presidential candidates ranging from 60-75 would it be hard for an audience to accept that the hot chick character is 45 with two adult children even if the actress is 25? As long as it's a trope for all characters of both genders that leads to plenty of 45 year old actresses playing 65 year old captains and not just a way of driving older actresses out of the business while employing plenty of older men.

Instead we seem to have lots of young space explorers who essentially give u all hope of having a family by spending their youth out in space. You would think that would be something Starfleet discouraged.

O'Brien's rank progression is sometimes believed to be 'weird' due to him originally wearing ensign and later lieutenant's pips as a recuring extra, then being 'demoted' to enlisted when they decided to develop his character in TNG s4, however this is relatively easily dismissed as a goof (or 'didn't care') as he was refered to only a CONN in TNG: EaF (retconed as a Chief by TNG: AGT rather than an Ensign as his pip suggests), refered to as "Chief" through s1-3 (wearing LT pips) and ID'd as a CPO (perhaps rather SCPO given the two pips) by CPO (ret'd) Rozhenko in TNG: Family, and then transfering to DS9 as Chief of Operations (a sideways promotion similar to 'Command Senior Chief', 'Chief of the Boat' or 'Coxswain' in the modern USN/CG & RN). If you take the dialogue/script as primacy rather than the fine detail of the uniform there is no inconsistency there.

As far as Rand goes, if we ignore the "Woman in the Cafeteria" (a Commander played by GLW in STIII), Rand is a Petty Officer in 2266, a Chief in mid 2270s (initially Transporters on the Enterprise, later Communications at SFHQ), by 2293 (after around 30yrs in service) she had taken officer training, been commissioned as an ensign and then promoted to Lt-JG (STVI) or LTC (VOY: Flashback) (given her seniority & time in service I would favour Rand being LTCDR during the '90s), conversly Excelsior Helmsman Lojur and Science Officer Valtane (despite being uniformed as LTCDRs) play better as Lieutenants being played by actors in their thirties compared to GLW's 61.

 

[JonnyQuest037]

In the 2230s and 2250s of the Kelvin universe...

Ah, okay. It didn't occur to me that you were pulling stuff in from the JJ Abrams movies. I personally prefer just to draw information about TOS from TOS & its in-universe movies. YMMV.

 

[kkt]

Ah, okay. It didn't occur to me that you were pulling stuff in from the JJ Abrams movies. I personally prefer just to draw information about TOS from TOS & its in-universe movies. YMMV.

The Abramsverse has nothing to do with TOS. You might as well try to draw conclusions from the bling they wore in Mirror Mirror.

 

[Nyotarules]

I, for one, prefer not to make in-universe explanations for every little questionable production detail.

Kor

So you don't want to read the in universe thesis on the influence of the 1960's Terran Western culture on Starfleet fashions from 2265 to 2270?

 

[The Old Mixer]

would it be hard for an audience to accept that the hot chick character is 45 with two adult children even if the actress is 25?

Doesn't the CW already do that sort of thing?

 

[Pauln6]

Doesn't the CW already do that sort of thing?

Hollywood does it for sure. Plenty of 60 year old husbands with 25 year old wives and 18 year old children, but then Denzel Washington hasn't aged a day for thirty years...

 

[Nerys Myk]

Hollywood does it for sure. Plenty of 60 year old husbands with 25 year old wives and 18 year old children, but then Denzel Washington hasn't aged a day for thirty years...

Examples?

 

[Nyotarules]

Examples?

Mel Gibson just had his 9th baby with his granddaughter's age range
As did Mick Jagger
Keith Richards
If there is a famous person in the entertainment past 60 still married to someone over 55 is a miracle

 

[Nerys Myk]

Mel Gibson just had his 9th baby with his granddaughter's age range
As did Mick Jagger
Keith Richards
If there is a famous person in the entertainment past 60 still married to someone over 55 is a miracle

I thought we were talking about fiction.

 

[The Old Mixer]

If there is a famous person in the entertainment past 60 still married to someone over 55 is a miracle

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_McCartney#Wives
Nancy Shevell is 57. Also, Paul was happily married to his first wife for 29 years when she died of cancer, and she was a bit older than him.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ringo_Starr#Personal_life
Barbara Bach is 69.

 

[Nyotarules]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_McCartney#Wives
Nancy Shevell is 57. Also, Paul was happily married to his first wife for 29 years when she died of cancer, and she was a bit older than him.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ringo_Starr#Personal_life
Barbara Bach is 69.

I think Paul and Linda would still be married if she was alive today, they seemed a true love match and Paul did not seem to have 'I need a younger' model syndrome, unlike other rock colleagues e.g Rod Stewart, all his exes are younger versions of the previous model.

 

[Tenacity]

the script refers to her only as Lieutenant, which wouldn't be inconsistent with her being an XO.

With a total crew of slightly more than 200, why would it be odd for the executive officer to be a lieutenant?

It wouldn't have been too hard to see Pike as holding the rank of Lt. Commander, although he most likely was a full commander.

 

[Nerys Myk]

With a total crew of slightly more than 200, why would it be odd for the executive officer to be a lieutenant?

It's Star Trek, every CO is Captain and every XO is a Lt Commander/ Commander/

 

[Timo]

Ah, okay. It didn't occur to me that you were pulling stuff in from the JJ Abrams movies. I personally prefer just to draw information about TOS from TOS & its in-universe movies. YMMV.

Well, Abrams' 2230s should fall in that category, again in-universe. As should ENT where the couple of examples of rank braid (mainly Flag, but also a quick glimpse at Line in the finale) seem to follow the TOS pattern.

That select spinoffs should be excluded from consideration has never appealed to me. Star Trek is patchwork, and TOS itself more so than any other of its incarnations. When spinoffs do such good work at reproducing TOS production details (better than TOS itself, internally), my hat's off to them.

It wouldn't have been too hard to see Pike as holding the rank of Lt. Commander, although he most likely was a full commander.

Since Pike's command is lesser than Kirk's, and Kirk appears to wear Commander braid in his pilot appearance, Lt. Cmdr would be rather fitting for Pike. Now we just have to figure out why this rank is denoted by a single stripe, rather than 1.5, in both of the pilots...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Nyotarules]

Why not just admit the costume department messed up or that getting military ranks correct was not a priority when they produced the first few TOS episodes. Probably believed the audience won't notice or its the future, braids might change by then.

 

[Shamrock Holmes]

Why not just admit the costume department messed up or that getting military ranks correct was not a priority when the produced the first few TOS episodes. Probably believed the audience won't notice or its the future, braids might change by then.

I can definatedly accept this.

With a total crew of slightly more than 200, why would it be odd for the executive officer to be a lieutenant?

It wouldn't have been too hard to see Pike as holding the rank of Lt. Commander, although he most likely was a full commander.

Fairly likely, especially given that Kirk may have been a Commander during WNMHGB (as noted above, his insignia jumped from two stripes (otherwise associated with Commander in TOS) in the pilot to his usual two-and-a-half stripes in The Man Trap (first appearance of the TOS uniforms), implying a possible promotion from Commander to (Junior) Captain.

It's Star Trek, every CO is Captain and every XO is a Lt Commander/Commander/

That's not necessarily true (Sisko was CO as a Commander, Data, Dax and possibly Worf were Acting CO as Lieutenant Commanders and the Equinox's XO was only a Lieutenant). However, I agree that the CO="Captain by rank" thing appears a lot more common than it should be. BTW, as an aside, most people agree that the Defiant should have had it's own CO (or at least it's own Duty Officers) and ChEng, does anyone think that the runabouts (which were always descriped as 'starships' rather than 'shuttles' should have had their own flight crews?

 

[kkt]

When did they describe the runabouts as 'starships'? I don't remember that. They are small craft that anyone, even civilians, can pilot with a little training, more like a seagoing ship's boats. Realistic or not, that's how they were treated, and it would have changed the dynamic to have a flight crew along when, for instance, Worf, Jadzia, Bashir, Leeta, and Quark all headed off to Risa.