Spoilers Should Star Trek be "our future" or an alternate timeline?

[Mr. Laser Beam]

This is clearly impossible in the real world, but it is completely logical within the "advanced spaceflight timeline" showcased by TOS and early TNG for the late 20th/early 21st century.

Exactly.

Not only has the Trek timeline had much more advanced tech than our own for decades, not even the third world war can put a damper on it.

Hell, as of PIC season 2, the SS Valiant - an interstellar spaceship, no less - will be launched in a mere 40 years...and that's 10 years after the war!

 

[fireproof78]

I still think the whole point is getting lost in semantics. I personally see little functional difference between a fictionalised version of our world and an alternate universe. Both operate in the same way and fulfil the same purpose as far as a work of fiction goes, ie: a recognisable version of our world with differences (major or minor).

It is a game of semantics for the most part, as well as a discussion about what value people put in to particular stories, i.e. do stories based in our world carry more weight. That will vary from individual to individual, which is why I think so many treat this as such a landmark issue, even though it probably isn't adding or taking away from actual enjoyment.

But, as I have stated, it's more around how the authors intend the information to be. If it isn't our real world then it is darn close to it and any differences can be worked out as involving time travel or Gary 7 and his ilk.

Circling back to my original point, this season of Picard has a manned mission to the Jovian satellites in 2024. This is clearly impossible in the real world, but it is completely logical within the "advanced spaceflight timeline" showcased by TOS and early TNG for the late 20th/early 21st century.

Exactly.

Not only has the Trek timeline had much more advanced tech than our own for decades, not even the third world war can put a damper on it.

Hell, as of PIC season 2, the SS Valiant - an interstellar spaceship, no less - will be launched in a mere 40 years...and that's 10 years after the war!

So it's not the real world. Now what? How does that impact enjoyment going forward if the Trek writers come out and stated unequivocally "It's a divergent timeline?" Does your enjoyment go up? If so, how much?

 

[Richard S. Ta]

Does your enjoyment go up? If so, how much?

How does a persons enjoyment go down?

What I’ve read in this thread is that suspension of disbelief would be destroyed by the certain knowledge that Trek takes place in a divergent timeline.

My own suspension of disbelief is wrecked by trying to reconcile the sheer amount of variance between the world of Trek and ours in order to reconcile the two.

Off the top of my head, The Godfather, Dracula, Othello and Fargo are all narratives that take place within a fictionalised version of our world. None of them need to shout that fictionalisation from the rooftops because the ‘near’ worlds they (separately) exist in are part of a centuries old dramatic tradition which we call fiction. An implicit agreement between the story and the audience.

I think it would be a very anal and strange person who would dismiss The Godfather on the basis that the characters whom the narrative focusses upon never existed. However, I think it would be a much stranger individual who insisted on folding characters and situations clearly presented as fictional into the real world, before saying that the knowledge that said characters and situations are fictional breaks their suspension of disbelief.

The idea that Trek takes place within it’s own canon is long established and the means by which it’s’ world is presented as taking place within it’s own discreet ‘bubble’ of reality goes back millennia.

As I stated, no fictional narrative needs to state it is so. This is something we are, as sapient beings, wired up to understand almost instinctively. Star Trek has never made such a statement on screen, but then neither have Lost in Space, The Boys or For All Mankind. All shows which use our world as a springboard with obvious divergences in place that allow them to tell their own stories.

But then consider Silent Witness, The Sopranos or Mad Men. Shows in which the divergences are less obvious, even to the point of being non-existent. We as the audience still understand instinctively that we are viewing fiction in a fictional world.

I don’t believe the knowledge of this should impact anyone’s enjoyment of those shows negatively. I don’t see why it should affect anyone’s enjoyment of Star Trek. It’s a fiction. It’s not real. It’s not part of our world and there’s overwhelming evidence to support that, outlined by others in this thread with eloquence.

In a sense, you are right when you ask how it affects anything and how much? I think for those that sit on the side of the fence that believe Trek takes place within it’s own world the answer is ‘negligible”. The sheer amount of canonical evidence that supports that idea make the whole argument a non-sequitur in the first place and as we as a species are consumers of fiction, we are very used to the idea that what we are consuming isn’t real anyway.

However, I’m surprised at the vehemence with which the idea has been attacked by those who believe otherwise, down to apparent destruction of suspension of disbelief. Why?

Sherlock Holmes wasn’t real, yet the character along with his similarly fictional friends and allies inhabit a fictional world. Clearly not our world, but we accept it as we accept all fiction (providing said fiction is written well).

So why are we making different rules for how we treat Star Trek’s fictional world? Why must it behave differently? Why must there be a rule that Star Trek and only Star Trek isn’t allowed the same latitude in building it’s own world as other fictional worlds?

From my point of view, the majority who believe it doesn’t matter won’t have their enjoyment increased or decreased. They are simply approaching a fiction healthily as a fiction. It’s those who want it the other way who are going to be upset, especially as the years roll on and things that happen in Star Trek don’t happen in ‘our’ world.

Like I said, Bell Riots, not gonna happen in a coming soon 2024…

Again, then I think I’m done with this discussion, fiction does not have to scream out ‘all of this takes place in a divergent world’, partly because it would be very silly, but mostly because we as an audience are keyed in to that instinctively. For All Mankind wears its divergences like badges of honour, but phrases like ‘alternate reality’ are never spoken.

Audiences don’t need to be told that the stories they are watching aren’t real, surely? And surely it’s odd to see such a negative reaction to the idea that the future of Star Trek is not real or set within the real world? I’d hope for anyone watching rationally that that fact would be obvious.

 

[fireproof78]

So why are we making different rules for how we treat Star Trek’s fictional world? Why must it behave differently? Why must there be a rule that Star Trek and only Star Trek isn’t allowed the same latitude in building it’s own world as other fictional worlds?

Largely because that was how it was treated for so long, by the authors and fans. Not as a divergence, but as an aspirational future. And, for many, I suspect, it was internalized to such a degree that separating it like regular old fiction feels like a downgrade. I think. Honestly, half the stuff fans go on about confuses me to no end.

 

[Richard S. Ta]

And, for many, I suspect, it was internalized to such a degree that separating it like regular old fiction feels like a downgrade.

I have an idea that separating it for some might even be traumatic. If (and I’m not aiming this at anyone on this board) someone is sufficiently dissatisfied with their own life, the aspirational idea that the future looks like Star Trek may be a great comfort. Removing Star Trek from their real world view might have a very negative impact.

I can see, sympathise with and understand that at least.

 

[fireproof78]

I have an idea that separating it for some might even be traumatic. If (and I’m not aiming this at anyone on this board) someone is sufficiently dissatisfied with their own life, the aspirational idea that the future looks like Star Trek may be a great comfort. Removing Star Trek from their real world view might have a very negative impact.

I can see, sympathise with and understand that at least.

I do to a certain degree, though I certainly don't hold Star Trek to the real world due to any dissatisfaction with the real world. If anything, I think that lingering in the escapism of Trek is more a negative than a positive and will result in greater and greater dissatisfaction with the real world to the point of avoidance.

Not aimed at any person here. Just an observation of various discussions of fandom over the years. The insistence that Trek must be a certain way, fit in to a box, is perhaps more emblematic of this idea, even more than Trek in the real world. However, this idea of a real world connection is not a new one. Roddenberry and others have fueled it with Hawking visiting the warp core set on TNG, the TOS crew doing a promo shot with the shuttle Enterprise, and then Voyager's time travel episode showing us a regular looking LA, or the TOS crew being in real San Francisco. These are small details that perhaps mean very little but add up to this idea of Trek is connected to our humanity as being so important as to be immutable.

That's why I think stating "this is the divergence point" (and maybe that will happen soon) will make a big difference in Trek storytelling, rather than assuming Trek fans distinguish Trek like they do Marvel or Sherlock Holmes. There is a big difference of investment in this idea.

 

[JoaquinSlowly]

For me it’s not ever really been something ‪‪I’ve considered as meant to be a “possible” future, for one big reason, and a lot of little related ones.

Aliens. And then ancient aliens interacting with humans on Earth, and historical figures being aliens, or people in our history having interacted with future beings through time travel.

For me those components have always been non-starters, because Vulcans didn’t invent Velcro, Twain never set foot on the Enterprise, and Flint wasn’t all those historical figures, etc.

‪‪I take no issue with others’ interpretations, it just always felt like a fantasy future to me.

 

[Orac]

For some the belief that the future could be like the one in Star Trek is part of their identity, like how some peoples political beliefs or faith in science or religion are part of their identity. When those beliefs are attacked it is like an attack on the self and they will respond violently like it is a physical attack. Know what I'm sayin?

 

[Rahul]

I don't care about author intentions as much as I care about what author's actually achieve. Various creators of Star Trek may or may not have intended for Star Trek to happen in our universe. But overall they did no achieve putting Star Trek in our universe, therefore it can not be in our universe.

Furthermore, I have to doubt whether many authors would choose to say that their stories happen in our universe once the concept of alternate universes was explained to them. There are a lot of stories which don't give enough information about the persons, places, events, etc. in them for their existence to be proved or disproved. But many or most stories set int he past or the present do give enough information for the existence of most of the persons, places, events, etc. in them to be disproved.

For example, in "Spectre of the Gun" several people in Tombstone, Arizona in 1881 are seen. Some, like the Earps and the Clantons and JOhnny Behan, are historical. Several seem to have been created for the story, like "Sylvia","Ed", and "Barber". And I think that the creators of the show didn't expect that Tombstone city directories or the 1880 census would show that they existed in Tombstone in 1881, and if pressed would admit that would put "Spectre of the Gun" in an alternate universe if it wasn't based on Kirk's ideas about the old west.

Another unnamed citizen of Tombstone is thrown out of a saloon and shot by what later turns out to be Morgan Earp on October 26, 881,the same day as the gunfight at the OK Corral. Morgan Earp is later called:



And I have to wonder whether Morgan Earp ever shot anyone, or ever was involved in violence, except at the gunfight at the OK Corral or had such a reputation as a deadly killer. I expect that I would have read about it in acounts of the gunfight if Morgan had shot someone earlier that day.

So I expect that if they were pressed the creaters of "Spectre of the Gun" would have said either "Yes, the episode and Star Trek happen in an alternate universe" or "The events in the episode are non historical because the Melkotians based them on Kirk's ideas about the Wild West".

And considering how much more sinister the Earps appear in "Spectre of the Gun" than in real history, let alone in the more flattering popular accounts in the 1960s, I have to wonder whether Kirk's ideas about the Gunfight at the OK Corral are based on family stories handed down over centuries from pioneer ancestors with the surname of Clanton or McLowery!

So what about episodes set in much more recent eras like "The City on the Edge of Forever" or "Tomorrow is Yesterday"?

If there actually was a 30th Street Mission run by a sister Edith Keeler in 1930 New York City they would probably be listed in old fashioned city directories or newer phone books. There was also a Floyd's Barber Shop in the NYC set, and Mr. Floyd also would have in the directories if he existed. And is there evidence that any of the boxers mentioned in the poster existed in 1930:

https://www.therpf.com/forums/threa...ng-poster-city-on-the-edge-of-forever.344880/

Since there was some uncertainty about the age of Billy Clanton at the gunfight at the OK Corral I once looked him up in the 1880 census which said he was 18, thus mking him 19 or 20 during the gunfight. I also once looked up the Apache leader Geronimo in the 1900 census.

So it should be possible to prove which of the characters in "City on the Edge of Forever" were alive in 1930.

There is a lot of information about USAF Captain John Christopher in "Tomorrow is Yesterday". Serial number 4857932. Married with 2 daughters in the late 1960s and a son Shaun Geoffrey Christopher born later. Serving in the 498th Airbase Group in the late 1960s. Lt. Colonel Fellini served in at the Omaha installation (which would be Offutt Air Force base).

So it would be easy to find evidence that they lived, if Star Trek is in our universe.



And as it happens, the first man Moon landing, Apollo 11, did launch on a Wednesday. However, it din't launch at 6 AM EST. So unless someone can find evidence that Apollo 11 was originally scheduled to take off at 6 AM EST but the launch was set back a few hours, "Tomorrow is Yesterday" must happen in an alternate universe.

And If the creators of those episodes asked me if I wanted them to only look up and usereal persons in stories set in the present or the past, and thus risk being sued by those real persons, I would have said "no, I only want you to acknowledge that Star Trek cannot possibly happen in our universe and must be in an alternate universe."

Using person, places, things, or events in a work of fiction which can be proved to be unreal automatically puts that work of fiction in an alternate universe.

So, uh, exactly like any other fictional story ever before, they put fictional characters in a real life setting?

You know, there wasn't a real Jack and Rose on the Titanic.. And yet, the movie is clearly supposed to be set in our universe.

Circling back to my original point, this season of Picard has a manned mission to the Jovian satellites in 2024. This is clearly impossible in the real world, but it is completely logical within the "advanced spaceflight timeline" showcased by TOS and early TNG for the late 20th/early 21st century.

That on the other hand is putting Vampires on the Titanic.
And I don't like it.

Too fictional/separated from reality/alternate universe or whatever you want to call or. And a major retcon.

 

[fireproof78]

Too fictional/separated from reality/alternate universe or whatever you want to call or. And a major retcon.

Not so sure, since such space missions were a regular part of the 20th/21st century Trek past. Captain Christopher's son, the Ares probe, the poor sap from "The Royale" and so on.

As many have pointed out in this thread there are a lot of divergence points, more so than I had even realized. It's an interesting thought experiment but the weight of keeping it in our universe is one that is difficult to maintain with all the differences.

I still prefer it in our reality but I can only bend this reality so far.

 

[BillJ]

I have an idea that separating it for some might even be traumatic.

Without a doubt. You see the tantrums some folks throw when someone says they don’t see it as “Prime”.

 

[Rahul]

Not so sure, since such space missions were a regular part of the 20th/21st century Trek past. Captain Christopher's son, the Ares probe, the poor sap from "The Royale" and so on.

As many have pointed out in this thread there are a lot of divergence points, more so than I had even realized. It's an interesting thought experiment but the weight of keeping it in our universe is one that is difficult to maintain with all the differences.

I still prefer it in our reality but I can only bend this reality so far.

It's all just backstory though.
Kirk's Enterprise has flown to both the center and the outer edge of the galaxy, yet the Voyager needs 78 years for that journey. Kirk's shuttles weren't warp capable at Kirk's time, yet Discovery's easily go to warp. Star Trek is full of little mistakes and inconsistencies.

I know there's people that claim every single series takes place in their own, alternate universe. But that's a bit too much for me.

 

[fireproof78]

It's all just backstory though.
Kirk's Enterprise has flown to both the center and the outer edge of the galaxy, yet the Voyager needs 78 years for that journey. Kirk's shuttles weren't warp capable at Kirk's time, yet Discovery's easily go to warp. Star Trek is full of little mistakes and inconsistencies.

True but how much backstory do you bend until it moves away from our own real world history? Hell, even adjusting Spock's backstory in Discovery and SNW causes fits of continuity. For each person it will add up differently.

 

[Nyotarules]

Trek should be a TV show

 

[Nyotarules]

For some the belief that the future could be like the one in Star Trek is part of their identity, like how some peoples political beliefs or faith in science or religion are part of their identity. When those beliefs are attacked it is like an attack on the self and they will respond violently like it is a physical attack. Know what I'm sayin?

Then they have greater problems....

 

[Kor]

I'm pretty sure the 24th century Starfleet vessel USS Voyager was not present at the beginning of our universe in real life, so it's always been an alternate timeline.

Kor

 

[Elias Vaughn]

I'm pretty sure the 24th century Starfleet vessel USS Voyager was not present at the beginning of our universe in real life, so it's always been an alternate timeline.

Kor

You can't prove that.

 

[Empok Nor Station Manager]

Not looking forward to the nuclear holocaust.... thought we avoided that back in the late 80's with perestroika.

 

[JesterFace]

What if there isn't one correct answer, everybody can create their own version.... or vision?

 

[BillJ]

Not looking forward to the nuclear holocaust.... thought we avoided that back in the late 80's with perestroika.

Meh. We're all going to die eventually anyway. Either quick strike with nukes or us slowly killing the planet's ability to support us.

What if there isn't one correct answer...

Its' entertainment. You do you.

 

[JesterFace]

Its' entertainment.

Sometimes it feels like Star Trek is more than just entertainment, in a good way.