That's right. He went nuts in "Is There in Truth No Beauty." Really nuts.
Mental illness in TOS
- Thread starter Laura Cynthia Chambers
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That's right. He went nuts in "Is There in Truth No Beauty." Really nuts.
What leads you to that conclusion? Granted, TOS slapped a little color or ears or other peripheral on a human actor and called it an alien. And Garth had the shape-shifting, but Master Po, er, Dr. Cory explained that was derived from a technique Garth had learned from "the people of Antos."
Garth said "You Earth people are a stiff necked lot" when Kirk resisted him, which I took to be an ethnic reference, like "you Italians." Even the Axanar productions play Garth as human. I understand Axanar is not "canon," but the creators seemed to follow TOS canon, so far as I can see. They explained that "Garth of Izar" was a name given by a Klingon, which means it is probably a slur. Is Izar the Klingon Hell, or perhaps Cleveland? Going strictly by "Whom Gods Destroy," Izar could be a Federation colony. ("Leonardo da Vinci" or "Aristarchus of Samos") So Garth could still be human. The episode simply did not give enough to determine otherwise. (Unless I am forgetting something. I have not watched it all the way through recently.)
Not all humans are from Earth in TOS. Dr. Miranda Jones, for instance, said in "Is There in Truth No Beauty?" that she had never been to Earth.
Izar is a real star (Epsilon Bootis, 236LY from Earth) so I’ve been under the impression that Izar is an old Earth colony. By Kirk’s time Humanity has been among the stars for at least 270 years if the SS Botany Bay is anything to go by, more than enough time for people to distinguish between Earthlings, Izarites, Centaurians, et cetera.
There's no evidence of that. It's a straightforward conversation. And Kirk not getting the joke is not only too subtle, it's very unlikely. It's Jim Kirk. He gets jokes.
There's no evidence of that. It's a straightforward conversation. And Kirk not getting the joke is not only too subtle, it's very unlikely. It's Jim Kirk. He gets jokes.
Regarding the idea that Scotty resents women, going into "Wolf in the Fold" — Granted, this is not the episode's (unfortunate) intention, but is there enough wiggle room in-universe for McCoy and Kirk to be saying it tongue-in-cheek?
Then Scotty's mythical problem is just their humorous pretext for stopping at a strip joint they wanted to hit anyway. Saying it all serious-like is part of the gag, because they'd never go to a place like that without good reason. This also covers why the expository dialogue is awkward: that's part of their inside joke, too.
Here's the thing: if you have to look for "wiggle room" and interpretation in order to make the dialog less crummy, then you're trying too hard. It's a 60's TV show written primarily by men who overruled a lot of what the lone woman on the writing staff wanted to accomplish.
There are seldom hidden meanings and subtext to dialog like this. It is just an unfortunate byproduct of the era.
The lines are meant to be taken at face value in order for the audience to even slightly believe that Scotty may have committed the crimes subconsciously. That's really it. Scott's accident was caused by a woman. This made Scotty resent women for a short time. The blow on the head was suspected of making him act out violently. I never, in the 50 years I've been watching Star Trek, ever felt there was anything other than what they said. Don't excuse the 60's to make it fit in the present day. Accept it.
There are seldom hidden meanings and subtext to dialog like this. It is just an unfortunate byproduct of the era.
The lines are meant to be taken at face value in order for the audience to even slightly believe that Scotty may have committed the crimes subconsciously. That's really it. Scott's accident was caused by a woman. This made Scotty resent women for a short time. The blow on the head was suspected of making him act out violently. I never, in the 50 years I've been watching Star Trek, ever felt there was anything other than what they said. Don't excuse the 60's to make it fit in the present day. Accept it.
Yeah, I always took the 'Scotty needs to overcome his hatred of women' thing at face value. Of course it's silly and sexist, but Star Trek is frequently silly and sexist.
That being said, I see no problem in fans coming up with alternate explanations, as long as its not being touted as canon or what the writers intended. Part of the fun of fandom (for me, at least) is overthinking things and coming up with explanations to fill in gaps or explain inconsistencies. I think the whole thing being an elaborate inside joke- or perhaps just a way to get in some shore leave with a half hearted medical excuse- are pretty solid as headcanons.
You are a fair-minded person. I respect that.
Certainly people are entitled to expend their mental energy as they wish, and I agree it can be fun, but suggesting that McCoy was being sarcastic and Kirk didn’t get the joke makes Kirk kind of a dullard, doesn’t it? Especially since they keep talking about it. Scotty was so ridiculously emotional about women, it’s totally in his wheelhouse to go off the deep end to compensate when he was injured. Scotty actually became more frantic as the series went on.
The episode is a weird one. It's fun though to hear Piglet screaming "kill kill kill you all!"
I guess so. McCoy is just diagnosing it as a hatred (when he likely knows Scotty well enough to believe he'll be back to his old self when a pretty one comes along and catches his fancy) in order to justify what they're doing on this hedonistic planet. His prescription is expose Scotty to nice, non-clumsy, not getting in his way in main engineering pretty girls, with himself and Kirk as "chaperones".
Sort of the equivalent of cop shows characters going, "Did you hear that scream? I heard a scream." "Yeah, I guess we'll just have to bust down the door and see what's up."
Sort of the equivalent of cop shows characters going, "Did you hear that scream? I heard a scream." "Yeah, I guess we'll just have to bust down the door and see what's up."
That's literally what fans do and have done for decades now. Why stop now?
I can totally see doing it to explain away a plot hole or fill in a blank. Making up reasons to make a clearly stated concept more appealing is, for me, kind of odd. It doesn't need that, it's just a kind of lame relic of the day. But the only unanswered question is who was the woman and how did she cause the accident? I would find that to be a more fun mental exercise.
I do totally buy the idea that McCoy and Kirk cheekily used Scotty's injury to justify a trip to the sex planet. McCoy would probably be well aware that Scotty's resentment would pass on its own, the moment another blue skirted crewperson walked into Engineering.
I do totally buy the idea that McCoy and Kirk cheekily used Scotty's injury to justify a trip to the sex planet. McCoy would probably be well aware that Scotty's resentment would pass on its own, the moment another blue skirted crewperson walked into Engineering.
Ok, but it's kind of how we sift information. Simple acceptance is not easy.
Would you say that mental illness is used as a crutch in Trek and elsewhere to explain the actions of a character writers suspect fans will like in spite of their awful actions, and this is an easy way to get them off the hook (in case they wish to use them again sometime).
I know there are characters whom people can't help but like/pity/admire, regardless of their role in the episode as the antagonist. But you don't want to keep faking out their death/incarceration and bringing the character back over and over again, either.
I know there are characters whom people can't help but like/pity/admire, regardless of their role in the episode as the antagonist. But you don't want to keep faking out their death/incarceration and bringing the character back over and over again, either.
I think what's attractive in use of mental illness within a story is that there is a lot of uncertainty associated with it. It carries with it mystery, and can be used as a wildcard in many ways. In regards to your question; I think pity for sure, we can empathize with a character with mental illness. Do we like a character with mental illness? I think in some sense they act on urges and bad moral choices that we all have but would not act on. Perhaps watching them is akin to playing some violent video game, a way to satisfy those urges without acting on them ourselves. But in that sense they could just be evil, is mental illness necessary in that sense to get them "off the hook"? Perhaps as you said if they wish to reuse those characters. It could also be that none of us think ourselves as evil. Many people who we say have committed evil acts might have thought the same. Mental illness though, again, a mystery. We don't know in what state of mind we might be sometime in the future. It's an interesting topic.
I think mental illness is helpful as a hook, as well as a convenient excuse. Not everyone understands mental illness, or is willing to try and understand it. So it creates a bit of a mysterious background but one that can be explained quickly enough to wrap up an episode.
The other side of that coin is that it provides a convenient "othering" of a person. They don't need to need to be fully understood because they're different enough that they're actions, though maybe kind of explainable, are still not like most people. So I don't have to worry about becoming "like them."
It's a strange place, but a nice shorthand in writing.
You can write a story about somebody's bizarre actions, but keep them in play because they can always return to normal later, or go on medication.
It's like having alternate universe versions of a character appear. Built in reset button if you want to tell different stories about them not centered around their instability/issues/personality/past actions, though you could also reference them if you want, while not being required to re-create that particular characterization.
It's like having alternate universe versions of a character appear. Built in reset button if you want to tell different stories about them not centered around their instability/issues/personality/past actions, though you could also reference them if you want, while not being required to re-create that particular characterization.
There is, and it's frustrating that many people get othered for something that will occur to 1 in 5 of the population currently, at least in the United States.