"Future Imperfect" - Riker gets it all wrong
- Thread starter marsh8472
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Sure Riker was tipped off that he was being deceived when he notices he was married to a hologram. But technically holograms do marry organics in the future.
Ohhhhh. I don't feel he was mad that she was a hologram, but he knew it was fake because he knew she wasn't a real person (she's not like the Doctor or Moriarty!), so he knew he was being deceived. He already had so many concerns something was wrong, and this was just too much for him, so I don't think it's really the same?
No, that only happened in a future alternate universe as shown in the VOY finale. During the time of TNG, there was no such thing as people marrying holograms.
She might say she's a real person though. She could have been given the doctors mobile emitter technology like Janeways holographic boyfriend in "spirit folk" Riker was suspicious because of that, federation and romulans having peace talks, a ferengi ensign, computer being slow, data using contractions. Thats all stuff that could have been explained
The episode allegedly takes place in the future where Riker lost his memories of the past. We see in VOY "End game" that they extended marriage laws to include holograms.
Will knew she was a program created by the Binars, and that she was lost, I feel it's a stretch that he would feel it totally plausible she was now real and he had a child with her. All those things he might've been able to accept, but they were presented to him in a way that didn't make sense, and it was just too much all put together. If Minuet was a fully sentient hologram that he'd had a long relationship with but could never have taken it further because of marriage laws, I feel this would make a lot more sense, but that is not at all what happened. It'd be like if you were told you married your favorite character from a book or something?
It was a fake future that the Romulans made up. That has nothing to do with the alternate future seen in "Endgame." The Romulans have no knowledge of what the real future would be like.
Or maybe the Minuet hologram was based on a real person who Riker just happened to meet. It's also possible in the world of star trek that within a 16 year period he recovered Minuets program, found a way for her to leave the holodeck, and the federation instituted marriage laws for holograms. I'd call it a leap to just assume all of reality is an illusion because he found out he was married to Minuet. He could have done some more investigating there.
The Romulans making it up was fake too. It was all the work of that alien boy remember?
True. That still doesn't change anything. That alien boy has no knowledge of the future either.
Voyager gets back to the alpha quadrant much later in the alternate timeline. Holographic rights could have come sooner in the prime timeline where Voyager gets back sooner.
This would be like trip thinking reality is not real in ENT "Future Tense" because he found that ship that's bigger on the inside.
But none of what happens in VOY matters. Riker realizes he's been duped when he finds out that Min was based on Minuet. Once he realizes this, no one steps in to say, "But in the future you can marry holograms!" Why? Because that alien boy was not a time traveler and didn't know the norms of an alternate universe 20 years down the road.
But from Riker's point of view, why would it be more rational to assume reality is an illusion rather than a possible future existing where he married a hologram?
I just said: No one told him this. Not once during the entire holographic ruse did Picard, Troi, Data, Worf, Geordi, Beverly, or his fake son mention that Min was a hologram he married. Or how they could have conceived said son. And, you know, she was dead. Holograms don't die.
I feel like it'd be where you woke up and were told you married Beverly Crusher! (not Gates McFadden). He knew she was a fictional character, and he was already having doubts that things were wrong because there was so much out of character. Then he went and tested it and confirmed his fears. He has had so many experiences with altered realities so it wouldn't be such a big fear for him! He knows all of that could easily be done in a holodeck.
Like what if you woke up 20 years in the future and the sky was purple, and people were all 10 feet tall, and England and Bolivia were the same country, and you found out your wife was Arwen from Lord of the Rings, you really might not be able to accept it but might think you were on drugs or something? Will knew the Romulans were totally capable of making a simulation to try and trick him, and it's something they would do, and the inconsistencies were so much less plausible to him than that explanation, so to me it makes perfect sense.
Like what if you woke up 20 years in the future and the sky was purple, and people were all 10 feet tall, and England and Bolivia were the same country, and you found out your wife was Arwen from Lord of the Rings, you really might not be able to accept it but might think you were on drugs or something? Will knew the Romulans were totally capable of making a simulation to try and trick him, and it's something they would do, and the inconsistencies were so much less plausible to him than that explanation, so to me it makes perfect sense.
But no one said that's not how it is either. He could have asked about it first. I showed in that clip that the EMH doctor had a son too. The EMH doctor would say he can be killed. Maybe her program got destroyed
Look, feel free to come up with ways to justify your belief. I don't care. All I'm saying is that your premise is wrong. "Future Imperfect" does not have a plothole because the episode clearly shows that basing Min on Minuet was a mistake and the alien boy did not have foreknowledge of the future.
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