Episode 3 - Point Of Light

[Gingerbread Demon]

Well as far back as episode 3 "Point of light" it's mentioned that Spock allegedly murdered the doctors at the medical facility he was at.

But.....

We know now from the end of the series that was the work of Control, but what bugs me is how exactly were they killed if it wasn't Spock?

How far back did Control start acting bad, because if that was the original setup why frame Spock for murder when the AI had no idea who or what Spock knew?

 

[Alan Roi]

I don't remember being presented with any actual evidence that deep fake was even the work of Control or that those doctors were even doctors, or were even killed.

 

[DaveyNY]

Yeah, I thought that whole thing turned out to be a video scam perpetrated by Section-31?

But at the time we didn't know about Control and I don't remember anyone ever putting the two things together in actual conversations.

 

[Timo]

I could easily accept a S31 agent or three entering Starbase 5 and gunning down the doctors, simply because Control told them to. I mean, that's what these guys and gals do for a living, right? Their superiors have superior ideas about what is good for the Federation, and they carry out the necessary missions, including all sorts of extremely illegal ones.

I gather Control would know all about Spock's visions as soon as Spock told his doctors about those. Control would also know about the Red Angel project, and would immediately realize that the Angel suit was involved here. But Control itself did not travel in time, so it would not yet know about the Sphere and its attractive Data - its desire to eliminate Spock would thus not yet be centered around its desire to become a better sentience through acquiring that Data. Rather, it would merely wish to have some sort of supreme control over the Angel thing, and Spock's knowledge thus worried it.

Sounds like yer standard mad AI fare. Control is all about control, so anybody in possession of knowledge that it wants to control is a threat to be eliminated. And Spock's knowledge indeed was unique and pertinent to a high-risk project Control originally thought it had all to itself - eliminating Spock really was an obvious move for the AI, then.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

I could easily accept a S31 agent or three entering Starbase 5 and gunning down the doctors, simply because Control told them to. I mean, that's what these guys and gals do for a living, right? Their superiors have superior ideas about what is good for the Federation, and they carry out the necessary missions, including all sorts of extremely illegal ones.

I gather Control would know all about Spock's visions as soon as Spock told his doctors about those. Control would also know about the Red Angel project, and would immediately realize that the Angel suit was involved here. But Control itself did not travel in time, so it would not yet know about the Sphere and its attractive Data - its desire to eliminate Spock would thus not yet be centered around its desire to become a better sentience through acquiring that Data. Rather, it would merely wish to have some sort of supreme control over the Angel thing, and Spock's knowledge thus worried it.

Sounds like yer standard mad AI fare. Control is all about control, so anybody in possession of knowledge that it wants to control is a threat to be eliminated. And Spock's knowledge indeed was unique and pertinent to a high-risk project Control originally thought it had all to itself - eliminating Spock really was an obvious move for the AI, then.

Timo Saloniemi

Good points and I didn't think of it that way.

 

[F. King Daniel]

I thought it was faked evidence framing Spock so that Section 31 could apprehend him and use their mind-sifter on him. They knew or at least suspected he'd lost his marbles after mind melding with a Red Angel, a potential threat.

 

[Qonundrum]

Good points and I didn't think of it that way.

Ditto. It's perspectives like these that might lead me to another attempt at viewing. It probably helps if one hasn't already sat through years' worth of Spock material to all of a sudden see a "prequel" where he's doing bat**** apocryphal actions (like allegedly killing his three doctors?!), just for it to be pawned off as classified hushy hushy material. (Given early season 1 TOS where he's grinning and shouty and other things before his character got properly refined (first glimpses of that are in "Charlie X"), which would allow an avenue for being more emotionally varied I suppose...

 

[Rahul]

I could easily accept a S31 agent or three entering Starbase 5 and gunning down the doctors, simply because Control told them to. I mean, that's what these guys and gals do for a living, right? Their superiors have superior ideas about what is good for the Federation, and they carry out the necessary missions, including all sorts of extremely illegal ones.

I gather Control would know all about Spock's visions as soon as Spock told his doctors about those. Control would also know about the Red Angel project, and would immediately realize that the Angel suit was involved here. But Control itself did not travel in time, so it would not yet know about the Sphere and its attractive Data - its desire to eliminate Spock would thus not yet be centered around its desire to become a better sentience through acquiring that Data. Rather, it would merely wish to have some sort of supreme control over the Angel thing, and Spock's knowledge thus worried it.

Sounds like yer standard mad AI fare. Control is all about control, so anybody in possession of knowledge that it wants to control is a threat to be eliminated. And Spock's knowledge indeed was unique and pertinent to a high-risk project Control originally thought it had all to itself - eliminating Spock really was an obvious move for the AI, then.

Timo Saloniemi

This theory is very good, but sadly not corroborated by the actual show.

At that time, Control didn't knew about Spock. Only Leland, who wanted to probe his mind to gather evidence about the seven signals. And yet, Leland himself didn't order the murder of the three.

So we have to accept that either Control knew from the very beginning about Spock, but didn't act on it other than that one deep-fake and then forgot about Spock. Or there was a whole third party involved. Or, more likely, the thing wasn't entirety thought out at that point and made up on the fly, and this is one of the things where things don't add up 100%.

 

[Timo]

I thought it was faked evidence framing Spock so that Section 31 could apprehend him and use their mind-sifter on him. They knew or at least suspected he'd lost his marbles after mind melding with a Red Angel, a potential threat.

The thing is, both Georgiou and Leland freely admitted to knowing all about the Red Angel already - that is, they had access to the fact that it was in fact a Section 31 -sponsored and indeed -run project for time travel. Instead of a "potential threat", S31 would probably consider the phenomenon a "potential leak" - no less a threat to the organization, but not a mystery by any means.

It's not as if S31 could easily come out and tell Starfleet "don't worry, it's just us", though. After all, it wasn't them - a private citizen was using the suit for her own personal goals. And everybody had seen the Signs. Better pretend it was a cosmic mystery, then.

This theory is very good, but sadly not corroborated by the actual show. At that time, Control didn't knew about Spock.

How so? What excuse would Control have for not knowing? Its business is to know all. And we never get hints that it would have failed to know. As soon as Spock decides he's not mad after all and starts making sense to his doctors, his life suddenly is forfeit, supposedly due to Control immediately learning about this.

So we have to accept that either Control knew from the very beginning about Spock, but didn't act on it other than that one deep-fake and then forgot about Spock.

Didn't act? It apparently sent assassins in his way - only they missed him by a few hours, and had to murder his doctors instead.

After this, the hunt was on. Control sent S31 assets after Spock, and one of them soon managed to intercept his getaway vehicle (only Spock wasn't on it, having outwitted his enemies even in a half-wit state).

But Control didn't have hands. It had to tell lies to its field operatives. And thus folks like Leland performed operations that weren't actually necessary, because they tried to solve mysteries that were no mysteries to their de facto boss. Yet the attempt to "probe for information" was quickly revealed to be but another shot at the assassination: even if Leland was blind to this and acted in good faith, Georgiou already knew/guessed better.

Timo Saloniemi