ENT's Twilight is one of my favourite Trek episodes. I love time travel, even when it doesn't make much sense.
Getting sick of Alternate Timeline/Time Travel stories
- Thread starter GulBahana
- Start date
When done right, time travel stories are fun (ie "The City On The Edge Of Forever"), when done badly, well, they're bad. As far as alternate realities, they really should drop two of the three alternate realities from Trek (Kelvin timeline and STD timeline) and concentrate on the prime timeline, since it's been proved that good Trek can be done in the prime universe that doesn't need Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Uhura, Scotty, Picard, et al. Just look at Axanar.
No, thanks. You stick with what you like, and we'll have the rest. I happen to love my Disco and Kelvin.
Prelude to Axanar was a fun 20 minute diversion. Sadly the project was ruined by the guy in charge, and everyone who made Prelude as good as it was has left the project.
You should track down Mr. Peters. I'm sure he'll sell you a bag of coffee and a square of carpet for a small fee.
I wasn't too upset by the last Voyager episode with the 2 Janeways.
What bugged me to no end was "Relativity." What a joke. I thought they did a terrible job of this whole "timeline manipulation" premise, and "correcting" timelines. "Temporal psychosis" -- please. And 3 Braxtons that would have to be "reintegrated"? WTF? It was entertaining but so much suspension of disbelief was required. PATHETIC screenplay.
What bugged me to no end was "Relativity." What a joke. I thought they did a terrible job of this whole "timeline manipulation" premise, and "correcting" timelines. "Temporal psychosis" -- please. And 3 Braxtons that would have to be "reintegrated"? WTF? It was entertaining but so much suspension of disbelief was required. PATHETIC screenplay.
At some point, I think in Voyager, time travel lost any sense of being special. It became as routine as warp drive or beaming. Perhaps moreso. At least the warp drive or the transporter might take you somewhere new. Time travel was just an excuse to remix elements we already had, maybe treat it as an "event," apply some technobabble, and leave no lasting repercussions.
No reason you can't so that in a time travel story.
If you're going to discuss DSC plot points outside of the DSC Forum -- ANY plot points -- can you please have the courtesy to use SPOILER TEXT? I don't appreciate having stuff spoiled for me without warning on a season of television I haven't been able to watch yet. Not everyone watches everything at the same time you do.
I've edited the post to add the spoiler tags.
Does that include the time you're going to do it five years from now in a book published three years ago?I'll cop to having gone to the time-travel well at least twice in my Trek novels.
No, wait, three times . . . .
'Cause there are no moral dilemmas in "City in the Edge of Forever"? Or any number of episodes where they debate the ethics of changing history, or come face to face with past atrocities, like, say, the homeless districts in those DS9 eps?
You can do moral dilemmas and social commentary with time-travel just as easily as you can with spaceships or aliens, if you're so inclined.
Does that include the time you're going to do it five years from now in a book published three years ago?
How do you think I make my deadlines?
I think there's a bigger oversaturation problem with time travel than there is other plot devices. Having constant time travel stories where all of history is at risk of becoming undone impacts your perception of the fragility of the universe. Also unless the writers establish and stick to strict rules about time travel works (Which of course they never do) it breaks the illusion and makes the storytelling seem more arbitrary. Making it seem like it's easy to just erase events you don't like erodes the finality of all other stories.
Having, say, one time travel episode every year or two can work really well. But having 2, 3 episodes a year like Voyager did toward the end, or having the entire story revolving around constant time traveler intervention like Enterprise turns the cohesion of your universe to paper.
In general, I think time travel is like any other plot device, it can be used well or badly, and has been both at any time throughout Trek history. It can be used to do serious drama (Time Squared, City on the Edge, The Visitor, Wrongs Darker Than Death or Night), comedy (The Voyage Home, Little Green Men, A Matter of Time), social commentary (Past Tense, The Voyage Home), mystery (Cause and Effect, All Good Things), nostalgia (Trials and Tribbleations, Shattered), or a way to just try out a new spin on our universe (E^2, Yesterday's Enterprise, Endgame, Timeless)
It's very versatile, and that's why it gets used so often. You can even do episodes which are really time travel stories but don't fit the usual mold so seem quite different (The Sound of Her Voice, Children of Time)
The one thing I would say is that I think the prequel series, Enterprise and Discovery so far, would do well to leave alone the "time traveler from the future interferes with our timeline" thing. [That's not a spoiler, if you're watching DSC, it's speculation on what they might do]. The problem with prequels doing that (outside of the Trekverse, I'm reminded of Days of Future Past) in my view is the way it passes narrative control back to the "correct" time period in the "present" (i.e. the future of the show's setting). To me it undercuts the independent narrative being established by the new prequel work, and makes it seem like it is only of relevance because of how it affects later events. It is a little like setting your show in Tudor London and having someone from 2019 pop up every now and then to set the course of events toward their future. It diminishes, in my eye, the storyline of your Tudors to present them not as an unfolding story in their own right, but simply a step in the road to something else.
It's very versatile, and that's why it gets used so often. You can even do episodes which are really time travel stories but don't fit the usual mold so seem quite different (The Sound of Her Voice, Children of Time)
The one thing I would say is that I think the prequel series, Enterprise and Discovery so far, would do well to leave alone the "time traveler from the future interferes with our timeline" thing. [That's not a spoiler, if you're watching DSC, it's speculation on what they might do]. The problem with prequels doing that (outside of the Trekverse, I'm reminded of Days of Future Past) in my view is the way it passes narrative control back to the "correct" time period in the "present" (i.e. the future of the show's setting). To me it undercuts the independent narrative being established by the new prequel work, and makes it seem like it is only of relevance because of how it affects later events. It is a little like setting your show in Tudor London and having someone from 2019 pop up every now and then to set the course of events toward their future. It diminishes, in my eye, the storyline of your Tudors to present them not as an unfolding story in their own right, but simply a step in the road to something else.
Funnily enough, I think ENT had some pretty great time-travel episodes, whereas I'm one of those people who thoroughly dislikes the Kira-frolics-around-in-the-past-because-Dukat-did-her-ma one. Ugh. But that's a matter of personal taste.
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