ok, after 25-some years I’m convinced.
Yet Another Doomsday Machine Thread
- Thread starter Ssosmcin
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That is excellent. And it vividly dramatizes why the show had to stretch out the events: an actual 30 seconds goes by too quickly to enjoy the suspense and do some nail biting.
But a better solution would have been for Scotty to set an 80 second timer. When the film was in its final cut, they could have timed it and had Doohan dub in a close-enough round figure in seconds.
I wonder how Kirk, Spock and the Enterprise crew would have dealt with Galactus instead? Or did Stan Lee rip off Norman Spinrad too?
JB
Nah. Galactus was introduced in Fantastic Four issue 48 which was published in March 1966 (which means it was written and drawn months earlier). Lee and Kirby conceived Galactus and the Silver Surfer over a year and a half before this episode aired. Spinrad did say the concept was spun of a novella that "wasn't very good" but his bibliography career doesn't seem to go back to pre-Galactus. Whoever inspired the character (if there was one particular inspiration), it wasn't Norman Spinrad.
This just shows you what a ridiculously short amount of time 30 seconds is. The simplest solution would have Scotty say “press this one, 90 seconds later...poof!”
Kirk would have have his confidence eaten away as the seconds ticked...
That's what I was trying to say...parallel events sequentially displayed.You gotta consider that maybe some of the shots are happening in parallel.
First time I saw this video. Wow, was that exciting and showed the true stressful time of events in real time.
This is fantastic, thanks for sharing.
That's interesting (if a mess audio wise—I would have killed or way lowered the volume on the ship shots). I think the timing of Scott leaping back up the tube before Kyle even says' Mr. Scott, it shorted out again" is too quick, but there's room to move it out and everything still fits.
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I think it's perfect. Scott can see and hear that it's shorted out. He's looking right up the tube as the malfunction is lighting it up. He doesn't need anybody to tell him that it's broken again, and he knows time is short for Kirk. The way @blssdwlf has it timed, it shows Scotty as being on the alert for it to short out again already before Kyle energizes, just as he indicated he would be in case his jury rigging failed.
The FASA corporation published a DDM scenario for their ST-RPG. Called "A Doomsday like any other", it allowed players of the game to face another DDM in TOS movie era.
The "starship bomb" solution doesn't work this time, so the players have to find a way inside the DDM and so destroy it's AI "brain".
Almost as exciting and challenging as the original episiode, it was one of the best scenarios for the game, and a fitting tribute to the equally amazing episode!!
The "starship bomb" solution doesn't work this time, so the players have to find a way inside the DDM and so destroy it's AI "brain".
Almost as exciting and challenging as the original episiode, it was one of the best scenarios for the game, and a fitting tribute to the equally amazing episode!!
I have that particular issue, with Galactus appearing on the last page for the first time in his red and green armour instead of his purple and blue which he wore from #49 onwards!
JB
It's a very action-oriented piece. But it's not much of a danger if the machine can't travel at warp - if I recall, propulsion is not discussed and nobody chases it or gets chased by it at warp speed and that's a good thing as it helps keep the viewer focused on the "here and now". Plot holes and issues are inevitable, the longer a plot can keep the viewer focused only makes it that much more entertaining. This episode is one of my favorites as well.
It even provides a template for "The Immunity Syndrome", an episode that makes its own thing with a sheer level of creativity from a different direction.
^^this
It starts tight and remains taut throughout. It focuses more on impending threat and character interplay that's simply perfect.
Levity has its place. But isn't easy. Margaret Armen had the knack for making quips work for sure... but I digressed big-time. TDM requires knowing already how the characters work, but it's not a show-stopper. "Tholian Web" is similar in that regard, there is no room for setup and one has to already be an established fan.
It sets the stage nicely!
I vaguely recall reading up on cast arguing on how their characters should be handled. Regardless, the tragic state of Commodore Decker was the right course of action to make. Or what was shown was so palpably strong, as well as showing the human sides of high ranking commanders. It could be argued Decker was too overwrought, but either which way Windom nails it.
Ditto.
I wonder how much of that was due to the director telling them to keep it straight. They're not as stern as in season one, but strong nonetheless.
The f/x worked for me at the time and still do. If anything, juggling "1", "0", "1", and "7" for a new registry around gets very limiting. Couldn't they dredge up a "4" or "8"? Still, it's nice to see other Starfleet ships and they did spring for the name "USS Constellation". Why not "1710" and make it as if it came off the assembly line shortly later?
The planet killer's design is novel in of itself. Glad the CGI redo kept true to its form.
incidentally, always eat bugle snacks while watching this. The coconut oil will clog your arteries faster than shoving a ball of cat hair into a sink drain, but - dang - they're ever so tasty... :9
"The Immunity Syndrome" floats my boat a little more given the originality of space amoeba and a theory of repetition and how the humans in the ship are antibodies fighting off a bigger organism... Only in the 1960s could this work, coupled with f/x that made the Jefferson Airplane envious.
The machine definitely has FTL abilities: It visits several solar systems in a short period of time.
Always wondered the same thing. I guess not much thought was put into it and it’s a shame: no one would have had issues with 1710, while 1017 forces us to all sorts of odd explanations.
Well, to be fair, in 1967, who expected the series to be watched endlessly and picked apart like this? Nobody was thinking mythology, they were just telling good yarns. Only fans would care about the 1017 and 1701 and where it fit in the chonology of the Star Trek universe. All they needed to do was make it easy to read on a small TV screen with a bad antenna signal. Just like the uniform colors: look at all those engineering guys in red, gold and blue instead of just red. Reason? They had to look colorful on the RCA TVs.
It was a TV series before it was some epic franchise.
And, in addition to DDM being an amazing TOS episode, it is also one of several TOS episodes that strays firmly into the realms of Lovecraftian cosmic horror.
A gigantic, awesome, nearly invincible, intelligent planet eater. That description could apply to both Cthulhu and the DDM!
A gigantic, awesome, nearly invincible, intelligent planet eater. That description could apply to both Cthulhu and the DDM!
Good point! I just looked up the transcript and the ability of warp speed definitely implied via the course and systems stated, as well as the state of the ship (complete with coffee cups so nobody had time to be tidy). Not sure why I hadn't picked up on it before... time for me to do a rewatch of this one.
At least the makers put in enough thought to jumble up the numbers. Thankfully they didn't do "0117". Maybe they did "1017" because "1710" looked even more "too similar" than 1017. An in-universe explanation is indeed requiring much more oddity than any number of my posts... Still, their splurging just one nickel for "1741" would have been best...
I'm just glad the robot's construction is so ineffecient that it can only attack from one direction and takes forever to shift its Z-axis.
But it is a robot looking for whatever it decided fuel was, hence implied intelligence. A parallel, it's not unlike some of today's AI. Whatever is perceived as intelligent, it's still following a set of programmed instructions with parameters that sufficiently fit the qualifiers. (And the typical 1960s anti-computer attitude prevailing as well...) If the machine is programmed to suck in some hydrogen its scanners pick up, if Lt Commander Jimmy eats some baked beans with broccoli and *pfffff* and the doomsday machine's nearby, it's going to sense it somehow, change course, and an exciting new episode begins. It doesn't care that it's hydrogen sulfide emitted by a life form that may have created the weapon, there's just some sweet sweet hydrogen. If the killer could realize how to make hydrogen then the universe should be worried. Having said that, TDM's "planet killer" is looking for things much more and other than mere hydrogen, which is so abundant in outer space that nobody would notice if some took enough to fill a dirigible with. Also, "Next week on 'The Orville' the crew investigate an unusual planet killing mechanism that feeds off of hydrogen sulfide..."
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