Robau is disappointed in you guys for letting this thread go off the rails. Say 100 Hail Robaus and think about what you heathen just did.
Let's talk about the elephant in the room, this series violates Roddenberry's vision big time
- Thread starter Sci-fi fan
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I'm not sure if it even counts as such if there are no funds changing hands in the moneyless utopian future.
Kor
They were getting close in the 2260s.
The future belongs to Lorca.
Another Starfleet as military argument? Oh, joy.
This is the final and definitive word on the matter, straight from the 1967 Star Trek writer's guide:
Now let's change the subject and try to decide whether Earth and the Federation use money in the era of Star Trek: Discovery, and how that would fit into Roddenberry's Vision (tm).
Kor
Well Kirk says they don't use money in the 23rd century. Oh sure, he said "you've earned your pay" in one episode, but I'm going to be selective and ignore that phrase just like others who ignores Picard's "Starfleet is not military" comment to fit their views.
Joking aside, I always took Starfleet to basically be NASA that also doubles as a necessary military. There are some posters here suggesting that Starfleet being a military is their main priority and that science and exploration is just a small part of Starfleet. Ok, if that were true I think the Captain's Oath would be more like "peace through superior firepower" rather than the hippy liberal pinko "seek out new life yada yada yada".
Like others said, it all depends on who's running Trek. Sometimes it leans on exploration (early TNG), sometimes it leans more military (TWOK), and most of the time it's a nice balance of both and I'm pretty much in preference of that. I'm not one extreme or the other. But I get why there are two factions of fans that clash about what Starfleet is because it has absolutely nothing to do with nuTrek emphasizing PEW PEW PEWs. Has nothing to do with that at all.
Well Kirk says they don't use money in the 23rd century. Oh sure, he said "you've earned your pay" in one episode, but I'm going to be selective and ignore that phrase just like others who ignores Picard's "Starfleet is not military" comment to fit their views.
Joking aside, I always took Starfleet to basically be NASA that also doubles as a necessary military. There are some posters here suggesting that Starfleet being a military is their main priority and that science and exploration is just a small part of Starfleet. Ok, if that were true I think the Captain's Oath would be more like "peace through superior firepower" rather than the hippy liberal pinko "seek out new life yada yada yada".
Like others said, it all depends on who's running Trek. Sometimes it leans on exploration (early TNG), sometimes it leans more military (TWOK), and most of the time it's a nice balance of both and I'm pretty much in preference of that. I'm not one extreme or the other. But I get why there are two factions of fans that clash about what Starfleet is because it has absolutely nothing to do with nuTrek emphasizing PEW PEW PEWs. Has nothing to do with that at all.
Mind you, I think a large part of this is born from the fact Trekkies are the original obsessive nerd stereotype. Before we became mainstream and the internet showed EVERYONE loved dissecting minutia, we were always trying to read things into things.
Kirk once calls himself a soldier not a diplomat.
Picard says it's not a military.
This is really more insight into their personalities than their actual professions.
Starfleet functions in the following manner:
* Scientific research
* Exploration
* Diplomacy
* Humanitarian relief/Alientarian
* Defense
So, it's correct it's not a military in that it's just part of its larger mandate. However, it also serves in the role of soldiers and a space navy when the time requires--which is OFTEN. I think exploring that is something which DISC is going to tackle A LOT because the DISC seems to be made of scientists and soldiers mixed together.
I also think "We don't have money in the future" is also a loose description. I think they have CREDIT in the future.
Yup, I think DS9 is the most explicit about the Federation running some kind of credit system.
I never took Kirk's "I'm a soldier" comment very seriously because if he were he'd make a poor one. He's more of a cowboy than anything, constantly breaking or bending the rules and often getting away with it because he's Kirk goddammit.
Sisko, on the other hand, definitely feels more like a soldier. Picard is certainly the philosophical diplomat. Janeway is the scientist in a command uniform. Then there's Archer, the gazelle.
I never took Kirk's "I'm a soldier" comment very seriously because if he were he'd make a poor one. He's more of a cowboy than anything, constantly breaking or bending the rules and often getting away with it because he's Kirk goddammit.
Sisko, on the other hand, definitely feels more like a soldier. Picard is certainly the philosophical diplomat. Janeway is the scientist in a command uniform. Then there's Archer, the gazelle.
Sisko is more the midnight toker.
Some of us don't have money right now lol
Along with Profit & Lace, it's the only bad episode of Trek I find literally unwatchable. I mean, Spock's Brain, Threshold, and A Night in Sickbay are awful, but you can at least either hate-watch them or ironically enjoy them ala Mystery Science Theater 3000. Not so with those two stinkers.
Then there's Archer, the gazelle.
We all know Porthos was the real drive behind that command.
"Profit and Lace" is painful because you expect so much better from that show that it's a shock to the system. "Spock's Brain" and "Threshold" are definitely entertaining train wrecks in the "I can't believe they're doing this" factor.
I think you're being a little simplistic here about GR's vision. TOS was full of unstable, unsavory, and even criminal characters. Harry Mudd was a swindler, Ronald Tracy, Matt Decker and Garth of Izar were all psycho. Just because general norms have progressed, it doesn't follow that human nature has changed. Even in TNG not every person in command was a Picard. Look at Admiral Nachayev or Admiral Dougherty. Even if those characters arose after Roddenberry passed away, they fit into the TNG that he started. In TNG, Enterprise is first a ship of exploration. Picard's style of command works there, but he is quite capable of being the military commander. Sisko is forced to be a real hard core military commander. Lorca is in a situation more like Sisko's, and we have yet to see how his personality will play out. Is he more like Matt Decker? That seems quite possible, but I am not convinced yet one way or another. There may be real method to his "madness." I use quotation marks because I am not at all convinced that he is mad at all. He is very determined, for sure. Is he obsessed like Decker became? We'll see.
Ultimately, I think we have to recognize that the Federation and Starfleet in particular, are organizations. They are going to evolve and that evolution involves trial and error, whether it is on the genetic or social level. Not even the Vulcans are perfect and it took a long time to move from their primal past to their logic-oriented present. It took learning lessons as a society. I don't expect Starfleet or the Federation to ever be perfect. "Discovery" is set a hundred years before TNG, and just under a hundred years after ENT and the establishment of the Federation. ENT's greatest success, IMO, was to show that relations between Terrans and Vulcans weren't exactly smooth at first, and that Vulcans had their own problems. It is all a work in progress and I don't think that depicting that violates Roddenberry's vision in the least, even if he generally focused on the positive. Figures like Tracey and Decker and Garth all demonstrate that he didn't see the future as a time of perfection, just more progress.
Finally, if you think that the Federation in the TNG era was a utopia, take a serious look at DS9, especially the episode "Paradise Lost." They make it very clear that while Earth has become paradise, that paradise is very fragile and it doesn't exist throughout the federation. There is the Orion Syndicate, for one. "Star Trek" needs to have grit. It needs to have questionable and even outright corrupt characters. It needs them, if for no other reason, than to give viewers reason to think about why the noble characters make the decisions they do. That came out over and over again in TNG. It might not seem directly relevant at first, but I recommend the TNG episode "The First Duty" and especially the scene in which Picard reams Wesley out.. It is one of my favorite episodes because it depicts illicit behavior and the consequences. It's not like that kind of thing doesn't happen in Starfleet, at least not if Starfleet is to be at all credible.
YES!!!!!!
That's why the Kelvin universe was so different. They lost Porthos' influence
"Way to Eden?" Yeah, it's one of the few I'll pass on. "And the Children Shall Lead" is my all time least favorite across the entire Trek franchise. I cannot stand that episode. But then, most episodes of TOS that I don't like are from the third season, though there are a few in that season I really like, such as "All Our Yesterdays" and "The Turnabout Intruder." Both of those I didn't like so much as a kid. Zarabeth caught my attention more when I was a teenager.
