Star Trek has always been bad at establishing a consistent scale. Discovery probably being the worst (since they gave hard numbers a bit more than others), but I know Voyager did it a lot too. And yeah, TNG and TOS with fleet size.
What are your controversial Star Trek opinions?
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Star Trek has always been bad at establishing a consistent scale. Discovery probably being the worst (since they gave hard numbers a bit more than others), but I know Voyager did it a lot too. And yeah, TNG and TOS with fleet size.
Controversial opinion/personal headcanon: The THREE bright stars of the Federation insignia represents the FOUR founding members of the Federation.
The three stars are the systems of Vulcan, Andoria, and Tellar as seen from Earth. Since Earth is the capital, the perspective of the insignia is from Earth's frame of reference.
That's an interesting idea. Can someone test it with a star chart construction?*
Controversial opinion/personal headcanon: The THREE bright stars of the Federation insignia represents the FOUR founding members of the Federation.
The three stars are the systems of Vulcan, Andoria, and Tellar as seen from Earth. Since Earth is the capital, the perspective of the insignia is from Earth's frame of reference.
* - I'd love to do it myself, but time doesn't permit it, presently.
SNL skit from 1994 Love Boat The Next Generation featuring Patrick Stewart.
You wouldn't think so at first, but there are a lot of similarities between the Love Boat and Star Trek : The Next Generation television shows, for example...
https://gsllcblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/st-love-boat.jpg
Similarities between Love Boat and TNG
1. Bald Captain
2. Black Bartender
3. Teenage crew member child of senor staff member
4. Ship's doctor main character
5. Julie/Troi is sexy but annoying
6. Gopher/Data Socially awkward crew member has name as job description
7. Julie/Beverly one crew member inexplicably replaced then returns
8. Captain straightens uniform when frustrated, angry, or nervous
9. Visits exotic ports of call
10. Is syndicated
"She urinates through her skin like a shark" may be one of the all-time greatest SNL lines.
Love Boat was an ABC show, paired with Fantasy Island. They even crossed over at least once.
My all-out favorite SNL/Trek gag is when Dana Carvey's conventioneer brings up the Kirk's safe in THIS SIDE OF PARADISE and asks Shatner ''What was the combination?'' Priceless facial reply from the Shat.
"Get a Life!" is one of the all-time greatest SNL skits.
That's an interesting idea. Can someone test it with a star chart construction?*
* - I'd love to do it myself, but time doesn't permit it, presently.
Lemme pull out the old starmap from the NL -
The Vulan system is 40 Eridani, labelled sometimes as Omicron 2 Eridani...
The Andorian system is Procyon,
The Tellar system is said to be 61 Cygni....
Uh, nah, it wouldn't really work, it forms a triangle of sorts. Tellar is also 'above' us, toward the core, and trailing 'behind' us, being antispinward, Procyon and 40 Eridani (Omicron 2 Eridani) are on the same rough 'plane' as us but are Rimward, with Procyon racing ahead of sol a bit, being more spinward.
One of the stars would have to be off to the side, at least. Here they are with Sol, all highlighted in green:
Maybe it's a POV of the Federation from Romulus or wherever Charon is? Haha...
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The tonal reboot we always needed but never had the courage to request from TPTB.
Sternbach et al in the art department did do this. And it was promptly ignored by the writers. Even if we did a total reset, the first time the writers would be told they couldn't tell a 2-day story because it would take months to get somewhere, it would get tossed again. Modern writers are far too used to the modern world being accessible within 24 hours by plane, and it comes across in their stories. If they put themselves in the same mindset as a 17th century explorer where parts of the world were months away and you were truly cut off from home, we might get better results.
So by "modern" you mean writers from the 80 and even the 60s? These stories are always going to move at the speed of plot. Which was probably even true in Homer's day.
We might. But (speaking with the experience of being a historian and teaching history for over 30 years) it’s just as likely that others besides the writers (producers, directors, studio executives) would show impatience and interfere. Even historical dramas that make a serious attempt at accuracy (albeit never close to perfectly) most frequently compress time, ahead of other compromises, to advance the narrative.
"The Cage" moved at the speed of plot. Hell, they even used hand signals to denote the warp factor when they were all standing on the bridge listening to the cool transitional music. 
This will be my favorite post today.
While I totally accept that ships have always "moved at the speed of plot" I disagree a bit about this happening the same way in TOS. (I'm sure there's an episode that will contradict me.) Not because there were better or more disciplined writers, but because they didn't have anyplace to go that we'd heard of. Plus, in most TOS episodes where there was serious travel within the episode, the time was a feature, not a bug. "We can't possibly get there by then!"
You want them to go far away? They started out far away. They certainly didn't have "We're exploring the Romulan Neutral Zone when we were called back to Earth. So that afternoon when I walked into Admiral Hoodydood's office..."
TOS even made a point (most of the time) of having them far enough away to be unable to even have real time communication with HQ. I can't think of the last time that even TNG did that.
That's another thing: Modern TOS (and modern Doctor Who) really has a hangup with the crew being able to go home at the end of the day. (There are only TWO Star Trek movies that don't have scenes on Earth!)
Which is the very definition of "Speed of Plot".
Very true, TNG abandoned the " exploring the unknown" early on in favor of a lot of known space stories. Even DS9 fell victim.
Totally needs of plot. In Amok Time the communications are pretty real time, because the plot required Starfleet to override Kirk.
I think Kirk real timed with four admirals: Fitzgerald, Fitzpatrick, Komack and Komack's twin/clone/cousin Westervliet and at least one Commodore, Barstow. Interacted with more Commodores either face to face or on short range comms.
Not really. I mean, there's a drug deal going down in Tokyo this morning and all Our Heroes are in London. "We can't possibly get there by then!" There's nothing "speed of plot" about that.
Speed of plot is the above scenario and then scene two is Our Heroes getting off the plane, maybe one of them looking comically airsick and saying "Don't EVER do that again!" The chief then says "Pull it together Tycho. We only have an hour until this goes down."
Speed of plot is when something happens at the speed needed for the plot to work.
No matter how nonsensical, as in how fast the Enterprise-A got to the Great Barrier at the center of the galaxy. Sure, the movie novelization explained how it was done, but since none of that made it onto the screen all we're left with is "DAMN, HOW'D THEY DO THAT" and that's speed of plot.
It got the job done, even if it was clumsy as Hell even by speed of plot standards.
It got the job done, even if it was clumsy as Hell even by speed of plot standards.
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