Not silly enough.
Poll How silly is Star Trek?
- Thread starter F. King Daniel
- Start date
I gave it a 2 to be kind.
It is mostly serious, with some silly shit to liven things up a little.
As to some aspects of the science being silly, remember SF is about ideas. The vehicle is secondary, though not to the point of being "out there."
It is mostly serious, with some silly shit to liven things up a little.
As to some aspects of the science being silly, remember SF is about ideas. The vehicle is secondary, though not to the point of being "out there."
I don't know how silly it is because I suspend my disbelief.
But I voted 3.
But I voted 3.
And yet here we are on a board devoted to people doing exactly that to the point of losing their tempers....
Sometimes the silliness is good, and sometimes it's bad. It depends on the episode or film really.
It's probably closer to a 4 than anything else to be fair but that is absolutely fine.
It's probably closer to a 4 than anything else to be fair but that is absolutely fine.
Watching it with someone who doesn’t know Trek highlights just how cringe-inducingly silly it really is, even at its best. 4
All in all, I think I'd have to vote a 4. That's because its entire premise is actually silly ('what if humanity fundamentally bettered itself and we invented a lot of technology that at the moment seems contrary to fundamental scientific principles / magical and we inhabit a galaxy that contains a lot of species that are peculiarly much like us (e.g. humanoids, at same stage of technological development, and ... <etc>').
Of course, a lot of of Science Fiction shares such tropes in order to create a setting that is still somewhat recognisable to us so that wouldn't be Star Treks fault as such.
And of course, within that "silly" premise there still are a lot of episodes that deal with "serious" themes.
Of course, a lot of of Science Fiction shares such tropes in order to create a setting that is still somewhat recognisable to us so that wouldn't be Star Treks fault as such.
And of course, within that "silly" premise there still are a lot of episodes that deal with "serious" themes.
Episode wise, I'd say Star Trek has a fairly even spread of ridiculously silly to mildly silly to not really silly to actually quite serious stories.
However, look deeper and you'll see that the series as a whole is itself underpinned by all manner of silliness that has just been so ingrained in the franchise people don't recognize how silly it is anymore (treknobabble, bumpy heads, etc).
It does still have serious elements that are wonderful in many episodes, so I can't call it entirely silly. But it's easily a 4 out of 5, no question.
However, look deeper and you'll see that the series as a whole is itself underpinned by all manner of silliness that has just been so ingrained in the franchise people don't recognize how silly it is anymore (treknobabble, bumpy heads, etc).
It does still have serious elements that are wonderful in many episodes, so I can't call it entirely silly. But it's easily a 4 out of 5, no question.
The most important part of Trek -- and any drama -- are the themes it explores. And that's not silly. These are often immense and universal.
Obviously as a mechanical take on what the future will look like - its a pure clown show. Spiner is clearly a fella decked out in gold paint and the aliens are obviously guys and gals from the Anglophone countries with lumps of plastic attached to their foreheads.
Obviously as a mechanical take on what the future will look like - its a pure clown show. Spiner is clearly a fella decked out in gold paint and the aliens are obviously guys and gals from the Anglophone countries with lumps of plastic attached to their foreheads.
I'm going to separate my fan self from my...science self? The self that creates? And say it's incredibly silly. This is because I adore Hard-scifi, mundane scifi, the works. Not much in Star Trek makes a lick of sense to science as we know it.
The Tricorder, the Warp Drive, the Impulse Drive, Artificial beings, Antimatter Reactors, Artificial Gravity, Tractor Beams, Inertia Dampeners, Phasers, Disruptors, Teleporters, Universal Translators, Humanoid Aliens, Photon Torpedoes, Subspace, Cyronics, Genesis, Cloaking Devices, Replicators, NanoTech assimilation, Shields - all of their details were scratched out later, after their introduction, put in some guidebooks and may have inspired more real science down the line, which has returned as inconclusive or negated outright, save for computing and personal communication.
Nearly everything in that list is unproven or, when hashed out, results in a lot of energy being released in an uncontained manner that is bad news for anyone near by (transporters, for instance).
But in the end it's a show with some fun stuff and a big community that creates and a few games I enjoy spending time with. It's soft science fiction. Sometime that's all you need. The lack of popular hard scifi is not because hard scifi itself is bad, but because authors who try to delve into hard scifi forget the human for the tech and produce stale stories. That's not the fault of Star Trek.
The Tricorder, the Warp Drive, the Impulse Drive, Artificial beings, Antimatter Reactors, Artificial Gravity, Tractor Beams, Inertia Dampeners, Phasers, Disruptors, Teleporters, Universal Translators, Humanoid Aliens, Photon Torpedoes, Subspace, Cyronics, Genesis, Cloaking Devices, Replicators, NanoTech assimilation, Shields - all of their details were scratched out later, after their introduction, put in some guidebooks and may have inspired more real science down the line, which has returned as inconclusive or negated outright, save for computing and personal communication.
Nearly everything in that list is unproven or, when hashed out, results in a lot of energy being released in an uncontained manner that is bad news for anyone near by (transporters, for instance).
But in the end it's a show with some fun stuff and a big community that creates and a few games I enjoy spending time with. It's soft science fiction. Sometime that's all you need. The lack of popular hard scifi is not because hard scifi itself is bad, but because authors who try to delve into hard scifi forget the human for the tech and produce stale stories. That's not the fault of Star Trek.
"Fans" are much more sillier than the shows are. Way much more sillier.
That's what separates the show from its viewers and that's a lot of the fun.
...Eight days out of ten...
Camp is in the eye of the beholder as well as well as seriousness.
There's always a balance...
When they can laugh at themselves, the circle is complete.
M
marlboro
Guest
I voted "2" . Definitely not "hard" sci-fi but I don't think there is anywhere close to a 50-50 mix of seriousness to silliness.
I voted a two. I think that Star Trek deals with a lot of serious topics including illness and liberty. The premise of the show is sci-fi, and it mainly focuses on possible sci-fi figures. It has levity, like most shows, but it also tries to address important problems.
I went with 3. I mean it really is quite silly when you think about it, for all the reasons already cited. But at the same time, rather than embracing this silliness to the franchise's benefit (like Stargate and The Orville do), Star Trek tends to take itself far too seriously, making it come off as being rather stuffy and pretentious. So it is an even mix of the serious and silly, but both to its own detriment.
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