Brian Dennehy would have been a great guest star though, and it may have actually happened if Elizabeth had joined the cast.
Rand as First Officer, Spock as (only a) Science Officer?
- Thread starter Laura Cynthia Chambers
- Start date
Interesting....
I wonder what title she'd be given? Command Senior/Master Chief seems a little militaristic and a bit of an Americanism... Chief of the Boat or Chief of Operations wouldn't be horrible... Then there's the traditional Boatswain ("Bosun" or "Buffer") or Coxswain ("Cock-sun" or "Swain"), the former is the traditional "deck foreman" and "Damage Controlman" and in some Commonwealth navies acts as 2-i-C to the XO for boarding parties and ship's disclipline, whereas the "Swain" is COB equivalent in the RCN, and also acts as senior helmsman and boat pilot in most Commonwealth navies.
Yeah, well, you don't get to be a credible "TV" CPO unless you look like a gritty and grizzled veteran. The 1966 thinking was that women are at their most appealing, their most interesting, long before they become gritty and grizzled.
That's why Kirk's female crew members were almost always quite young and in the junior positions. That, and the underlying assumption that women want children during their childbearing years, and their biological window would close if they were "lifers" aboard Starfleet ships.
You'd still have that. She'd just be the voice of the everyman/woman.
If anyone was the voice of the every man on TOS, it was Dr. McCoy. His reactions most closely reflect those of the viewers at home. Having another character serve that function would just be redundant, IMO.
I mean the people who do the things even doctors take for granted.
Honestly, if I had to re-conceive Rand as a character in the TOS format, I'd play her up more as a personal assistant/bodyguard to the Captain. TOS never had a regular from the security department, so she could be fulfilling a function that no one else on the show had. It would be cool to see Rand as a badass protector, taking down folks attacking Captain Kirk.
And perhaps you could have other crew members trying to pump her for information on what the Captain is thinking or feeling, as she would be privy to more of his private moments than practically anyone else on the ship. (He'd still have more of a friendship with Spock and McCoy, of course, but Rand would undoubtedly see Captain Kirk at moments when his guard is down, and so she sees a side of him that most people on the ship don't get to see.)
Of course, even that is playing the character rather differently from how she was conceived.
And perhaps you could have other crew members trying to pump her for information on what the Captain is thinking or feeling, as she would be privy to more of his private moments than practically anyone else on the ship. (He'd still have more of a friendship with Spock and McCoy, of course, but Rand would undoubtedly see Captain Kirk at moments when his guard is down, and so she sees a side of him that most people on the ship don't get to see.)
Of course, even that is playing the character rather differently from how she was conceived.
This is the very sort of thing DSC ought to do: Trek has yeomen, and all it needs is some sort of a futuristic way to explain why.
Pike's yeoman fell in combat, and is the one loss Pike singles out in "The Cage". Bodyguard might well fit the bill, then.
...Too bad that the right time to do something with this would have been S2, not S3+.
Timo Saloniemi
Pike's yeoman fell in combat, and is the one loss Pike singles out in "The Cage". Bodyguard might well fit the bill, then.
...Too bad that the right time to do something with this would have been S2, not S3+.
Timo Saloniemi
Isn't freeing a captain to take a hands-on approach a good enough reason?
Pike's guilt may be due to the fact that said yeoman wasn't supposed to/didn't have to come with him, but out of loyalty/friendship/volunteering/may have anyway.
Pike's guilt may be due to the fact that said yeoman wasn't supposed to/didn't have to come with him, but out of loyalty/friendship/volunteering/may have anyway.
I saw the entire run "as it came out" (I live 55 years ago) and I mostly enjoyed it. It helps that Lockwood gave me an autographed picture of Lieutenant Rice right before it premiered!
Apparently not, as neither Georgiou nor Lorca had yeomen they could take a hands-on approach at. But if sexy secretaries aren't allowed to exist in today's future, then violent secretaries are an obvious solution, because violence is still okay even if sex isn't. Might just be that Georgiou and Lorca needed a bodyguard as much as a tiger needs bicycling-fish-patterned pajamas, though.
Definitely so. Or then it's just that the boy was the youngest in the bunch, just like his female equivalents in Kirk's teams implicitly were (that is, any maturity seen in them would be a case of the costuming and makeup department failing at what they were told to accomplish). Pike would be bound to have paternal feelings about the kid even if it was his duty to do and die.
Timo Saloniemi
I meant they do the paperwork and coordinating while the captain gets to go on away teams and to meetings.
Yeah it is hard to see any point to the yeomen on landing parties if they aren't there as security support, like Martha Landon. Ironically, they are best suited on diplomatic missions and yet we almost never see one in that context. The yeoman as the default shuttle pilot for the captain would have also seen involvement in a few extra episodes.
I do see Rand very much as the Everyman, more so than McCoy, although he can fulfill that role fairly well in many stories.
The sexism angle is only one reason why secretaries would be opposed in the modern writing rooms. "Paperwork" should no longer exist in the 23rd century, either!
Of course, Trek shows it still being a thing in the 24th. Only, Picard doesn't have anybody to manage it for him, and occasionally gets buried under a pile of PADDs, even. And realistically, there's little progress being made towards eradicating paperwork today. But the writers just can't have it in DSC.
It's fortunate, then, that we never saw it being handled by the yeomen in TOS, either. Sure, they brought PADDs for Kirk to sign. But Kirk did the signing; we got no hint what the yeomen did that would relate to those documents. (Which left us with only two recognizable roles for yeomen: managing Kirk's wardrobe, and bringing Kirk's coffee.)
Timo Saloniemi
Of course, Trek shows it still being a thing in the 24th. Only, Picard doesn't have anybody to manage it for him, and occasionally gets buried under a pile of PADDs, even. And realistically, there's little progress being made towards eradicating paperwork today. But the writers just can't have it in DSC.
It's fortunate, then, that we never saw it being handled by the yeomen in TOS, either. Sure, they brought PADDs for Kirk to sign. But Kirk did the signing; we got no hint what the yeomen did that would relate to those documents. (Which left us with only two recognizable roles for yeomen: managing Kirk's wardrobe, and bringing Kirk's coffee.)
Timo Saloniemi
Why wouldn't paperwork (sans paper) be a thing? There's plenty of forms to fill out, reports to write.
By not being involved in the action and playing the role of observer or witness, yeomen are not only free to see things from an outsider's perspective, but they go mostly unnoticed and underestimated by those in the room - a valuable thing to have.
By not being involved in the action and playing the role of observer or witness, yeomen are not only free to see things from an outsider's perspective, but they go mostly unnoticed and underestimated by those in the room - a valuable thing to have.
There's always going to be some form of paperwork or reporting to do. When e-mail was introduced, people thought it would make businesses more efficient and productive. That didn't happen. Businesses still wasted the same amount of time they always did, it was just in a different way now.
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The potential of the yeomen was definitely squandered but with the loss of Grace, there was no incentive to develop the role. I really wish they had let Grace return for a guest appearance in City on the Edge of Forever with some of the gumption from Ellison's original draft. In the first draft, she fought her way free of being grappled and took charge of the security team. In the second draft, the yeoman ran off in fear to fetch the men. In the third draft Uhura did (impliedly) take command of the (white male) Security team but then confessed to being frightened, so there was something to please everyone. No overtly stating the black woman was in charge (but she totally was) but reassuringly telling all the insecure sixties men that she was scared all along. Phew.
It does feel that the writers went out of their way to keep the yeomen crap. Dagger of the Mind was the best chance to show her doing something useful.
But it made a lot of sense in "Dagger" for Kirk's assistant to be a psychiatrist. I admit, if Rand as a series regular had put Kirk under in the treatment chair, and had a furtive look of fear and desire on her face as she fed him the sex-fantasy suggestion, it would have been a more electric and indelible scene.
Incidentally, I take (kindly) exception to your avatar. Star Trek is an action-adventure series. If Kirk and Spock have to hide behind somebody who's better in a jam, then the show should be about her, not them. It deprives Kirk and Spock of their reason to exist-- which is to be the heroes of our show. They can't lead from behind and still be relevant to the action. They can't cower and still command our respect.
Lol. I put her at the front because she's the custom action figure that I wanted to showcase, but it's interesting that you find the implication immasculating for the heroes.
Actually, I think they should have beefed up the yeoman role in the reboot. As far as the sixties show went, I was just hoping for the women to be more active in decision making and agency. Uhura is a technician but also an officer, I want her to help more rather than dominate. I want Chapel to use her skills to advise McCoy occasionally to aid him in HIS decision making rather than just saying yes doctor. I'm not as radical as I seem.
Maybe Killjoys is the best example. There are three leads plus recurring guest characters. The leads all get to shine and the guest characters get their own plot threads and development but there is no doubt that Dutch is the main lead. She drives the overall story and is that bit better than the other characters. Obviously in Trek her role was jointly filled by Kirk AND Spock.
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