Star Trek: Strangers From the Sky by Margaret Wander Bonanno

[Christopher]

But they could have still done all that and still had some advancements in the culture. Sort of like Chakotay's people in Voyager. They respected their traditions, still wore the traditional clothing. But they had and were aware of technology.

Realistically, yes. But it was an episode of a '60s TV show, made for '60s audiences who had preconceptions about what "Indians" were like -- preconceptions shared by the writers and producers. A lot of TOS aliens, especially in season 2, were just stock '60s TV ethnic tropes transposed into outer space, and this was one of the most literal instances of that. When you watch other '60s shows, you see how much TOS was steeped in the preconceptions and tropes of its time.

Maybe they really were just doofuses after all. Perhaps that's why they aren't around anymore. They forgot their own asteroid deflector.

Who says they aren't around? I still think they're the Vians.

 

[Damian]

Realistically, yes. But it was an episode of a '60s TV show, made for '60s audiences who had preconceptions about what "Indians" were like -- preconceptions shared by the writers and producers. A lot of TOS aliens, especially in season 2, were just stock '60s TV ethnic tropes transposed into outer space, and this was one of the most literal instances of that. When you watch other '60s shows, you see how much TOS was steeped in the preconceptions and tropes of its time.




Who says they aren't around? I still think they're the Vians.

Yeah, I guess that's true enough. Star Trek tried to break some boundaries but it still was a product of its time. I compliment Voyager for trying to strike a balance by bringing Native Americans into the future in a way that still followed their traditions.

Weren't the Vians wiped out by a supernova? Was that their home planet they were on?

I wonder, has any novels ever followed up on the Vians? Might make for an interesting follow up story someday for someone.

 

[Christopher]

Weren't the Vians wiped out by a supernova? Was that their home planet they were on?

No, they were there to rescue the population of one of the Minaran planets, but they could only save one and were testing whether Gem's people were worthy. If it had been their own system, presumably they would've picked themselves. (And given Trek naming conventions, they wouldn't have been called Vians if they were from Minara.)

I wonder, has any novels ever followed up on the Vians? Might make for an interesting follow up story someday for someone.

I'm a little surprised I haven't gotten around to it yet, honestly. There is a Strange New World story that reveals that Gem's people ended up in the Delta Quadrant and are encountered by Voyager, but the Vians aren't in it, IIRC.

 

[Damian]

I'm a little surprised I haven't gotten around to it yet, honestly.

Well, there you go. Something for you to start thinking about for a future book. Maybe you could combine that with your theory about the Preservers in "The Paradise Syndrome" and explain some of the issues with that episode away as well. I have faith in you

That's like a two for one deal

I have to admit I never thought of the Vians as being the Preservers. I guess because in the original series they were generally treated as separate stories so I'm just not used to combining two different episodes unless they use the same character (like Harry Mudd). It's an interesting idea.

 

[Damian]

Well, two for one for use readers. I guess from your perspective it's double the work

 

[Falconer]

Going back, I may, to Alpha Centaurans, specifically my post #86 above, in which I cull info from a lot of different sourcebooks…

I have to wonder if LUG and Decipher were specifically forbidden to use any info which only appeared in 80s sources (such as Worlds of the Federation). I have read that “not a single piece of information was taken into account” from 80s sources when the Okudas compiled their Chronology and Encyclopedia. I say this because the LUG/Decipher material seems almost to go out of its way to contradict the 80s sources—eg., Egyptian* flavor rather than Greek; Alpha Centauri IV instead of VII.

* - Ah hah, like Number One’s “Nile valley” looks!

 

[Tallguy]

@Falconer the 80's were such a fertile time with works such as Strangers From the Sky being a real high point to say nothing of the fan works that were going crazy (in a great way) during the "in between" years. So it was kind of disappointing (though in retrospect not very surprising) when it was all left by the wayside when Star Trek came back to television.

Of course the Chronology and Encyclopedia were probably the most influential works to cement "on screen or it didn't happen" that persists to this day. Probably to the good, I suppose. How many different versions of The Enterprise Incident's Romulan Commander were there?

Wasn't there also a scene in Spock's World where someone mentions Earth's first encounter with Vulcan and Kirk and Spock kind of wink at each other because they know the real story from Strangers?

I don't have a copy of Strangers at the moment. Might have to fix that.

 

[Christopher]

Wasn't there also a scene in Spock's World where someone mentions Earth's first encounter with Vulcan and Kirk and Spock kind of wink at each other because they know the real story from Strangers?

Yes, that's from the scene I mentioned in post #14 of this thread.

 

[Therin of Andor]

First Contact blew all that out an airlock and I was like WTF? First Contact was with Alpha Centauri and officially we didn't even encounter Vulcans until over a decade later. DIDN'T THEY READ STRANGERS FROM THE SKY? It's all right there.

For me it still works. There was a coverup and no one knows the actual real story. Also time travel interference. Roll "Carbon Creek" into the mystery.

 

[Damian]

For me it still works. There was a coverup and no one knows the actual real story. Also time travel interference. Roll "Carbon Creek" into the mystery.

I don't know. It's pretty hard to reconcile First Contact with Strangers from the Sky. At the time Strangers take place WWIII would have been raging according to the current timeline. After just reading it there's almost nothing that fits, except for maybe the events that take place in the 23rd century.

 

[WebLurker]

Going back, I may, to Alpha Centaurans, specifically my post #86 above, in which I cull info from a lot of different sourcebooks…

I have to wonder if LUG and Decipher were specifically forbidden to use any info which only appeared in 80s sources (such as Worlds of the Federation). I have read that “not a single piece of information was taken into account” from 80s sources when the Okudas compiled their Chronology and Encyclopedia. I say this because the LUG/Decipher material seems almost to go out of its way to contradict the 80s sources—eg., Egyptian* flavor rather than Greek; Alpha Centauri IV instead of VII.

* - Ah hah, like Number One’s “Nile valley” looks!

Could be. I know the cartoon was off-limits; the "Regulans" were a renamed version of the Caitians to get around that.

I don't know. It's pretty hard to reconcile First Contact with Strangers from the Sky. At the time Strangers take place WWIII would have been raging according to the current timeline. After just reading it there's almost nothing that fits, except for maybe the events that take place in the 23rd century.

Yeah, it's very much its own thing, although I think the modern novel-verse has occasionally referenced it as a piece of fiction that exists in that reality.

 

[JonnyQuest037]

It's like if some TOS novelist claimed that there was some hitherto-unseen member of Kirk's senior command crew who'd been there all along, standing just off-camera the whole time. Kirk, Spock, McCoy, and Larry.

Wow, so we're just totally discounting Welshy?

Yeah, I'll admit I was just a bit put off by that. At the time I still wasn't all that familiar with canon vs. tie ins. The way the beginning of "Strangers..." was written I thought the history of the Federation and first contact with Alpha Centauri was based on some already established Star Trek backstory. For the few years before First Contact came out I thought that was how the history was. First Contact blew all that out an airlock and I was like WTF? First Contact was with Alpha Centauri and officially we didn't even encounter Vulcans until over a decade later. DIDN'T THEY READ STRANGERS FROM THE SKY? It's all right there. That was my first real lesson in what was what we call canon nowadays. NOW, it did help that otherwise I loved First Contact and it's one of my favorite Star Trek films.

Yeah, I know the feeling. I like First Contact as a movie, but I hate that it totally contradicts the novels Federation (in the Zephram Cochrane bits) and Strangers From the Sky (in the Vulcan first contact bits). In my personal headcanon, the novel versions are what really happened.

Re: "Metamorphosis" I have to admit when I first saw the episode (way back in the late 1980s when I first became a Trekkie) I thoughts when they said "of Alpha Centauri" I had just assumed he was from Alpha Centauri.

Which is funny, since practically the first thing that Cochrane does is ask Kirk & company if they're from Earth:

COCHRANE [OC]: Hello! Hello!
(A figure in an orange jumpsuit waves and runs towards them.)
SPOCK: Fascinating.
KIRK: Bones, get a physiological reading on that, whatever it is.
COCHRANE: Hello! Are you real? I mean, I'm not imagining you, am I?
KIRK: We're real enough.
COCHRANE: You speak English. Earth people?