It wasn't even a Genesis device since that provably could restore a dead person to life.
It was at most a giant more advanced replicator.
Spoilers Star Trek: Discovery 5x10 - "Life, Itself"
- Thread starter Commander Richard
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It was at most a giant more advanced replicator.
I'd argue that all the Genesis device did was make a Spock clone from the corpse's genetic material and then McCoy conveniently had the katra memories to place back into said clone.
So basically, if Moll and L'ak had the foresight to have T'Rina or someone mind meld with L'ak before he died, the Progenitor tech could've built a mindless L'ak clone, T'Rina then transfer L'ak's memories back into said clone, and we have a resurrected L'ak.
I don’t have an issue with the one-dimensional bridge characters. Trek always has recurring glorified extras who are there to spout exposition. In this case, they all happen to be on the bridge and are in every episode (as opposed to 50 different people sitting next to Data in 50 episodes). The actors don’t even get guest star billing and are listed in the bit part section.
Yeah, I assume actor availability had them write off the old crew, but then when they shot the ending, they couldn't get any of the new crew back either. Also Nilsson wasn't there even though they brought back someone they wrote off in S4 (whose name I can't remember).
Kovich: And now that I have dramatically revealed my identity as a time traveler, I have a message for you from your stepbrother Spock.
Burnham: What? What is it?
Kovich: He said.... (dramatic music plays along with a drumroll)
Burnham: What? That's it? That's all he left for me?
Kovich: What did you expect him to say?
Burnham: That weird little half-breed!
Burnham: What? What is it?
Kovich: He said.... (dramatic music plays along with a drumroll)
Live long and prosper.
Burnham: What? That's it? That's all he left for me?
Kovich: What did you expect him to say?
Burnham: That weird little half-breed!
This is something I had been thinking of... what is the point of the technology? We don't know why the original aliens created it, but the Progenitors used it to basically spread versions of themselves as they were going extinct. But what use would the Federation have with it when they can terraform planets? Maybe my imagination is small, but it's only practical use is as a weapon - basically an infinite Jem'Hadar creation machine.
There's probably a bigger point that life is more than just the mechanical/biological parts, that even hundreds of thousands of years of science can't find a way to replicate a "soul" or at least recreate the parts of the brain that make up individuals (even though they know how to delete memories), but yeah... then it's basically just a replicator.
They must've been the estranged part of the family!
Although, given the ignominious sendoff that Owo and Detmer got, I would've thought they were in that group.
For me, that was the most profound part of the episode. That and the message of why the Progenitors created other lifeform (the diversity) to begin with. As whole, that's the ultimate Trek theme.
I agree. And even Owo and Detmer were brought back in the cheapest possible way as ND (no dialog) characters.
They’re not even main cast members. They were day players, they were as likely to get a character centric episode as Sulu or Uhura in TOS. I accepted that fact very early on. Just because Tom Paris was a helmsman doesn’t necessarily mean every helmsman from there on must be a main cast member that gets character development, BECAUSE OF PRECEDENTS! Every show kind of shuffles bridge positions in terms of main cast members, recurring, dayplayers, extras with no lines. ENT/TOS had communications officers, while TNG/VOY didn’t, requiring their tactical officers to do double duty in that regard. It all kind of fluctuates depending on who the writers want to focus on and what their assignments are.
In the instance of DISCO, our main characters starting in S1 had the traditional roles of Captain, XO, Tactical, Science Officer, but with the addition of a “specialist” and a Academy cadet filling various roles, which are atypical positions. As a result, a lot of the traditional bridge positions and Chief of Engineering were not played by regulars. Culber was CMO, but he wasn’t a main cast member in S1.
In the instance of DISCO, our main characters starting in S1 had the traditional roles of Captain, XO, Tactical, Science Officer, but with the addition of a “specialist” and a Academy cadet filling various roles, which are atypical positions. As a result, a lot of the traditional bridge positions and Chief of Engineering were not played by regulars. Culber was CMO, but he wasn’t a main cast member in S1.
They made it into the equivalent of TNG's Poker Scene. It's clear we're meant to see Detmer, Owoshukun, Rhys, and the other guys as part of their "family".
If they didn't matter, I assume the producers wouldn't have spent the money to hire them back to shoot that scene.
Agreed. That's a key reason why I wish they hadn't done the epilogue. It's a real downer. Definitely left me feeling sad. It's all the worse because they officially determined she was sentient!
They only matter in the sense that they were with Michael through the thick of the show, especially coming from their century of origin. If those actors hadn’t stuck around for as long as they did, I doubt they would have been brought back for what is essentially Michael’s daydream hugfest.
Pretty much.
I mean, the Genesis Device was already able to create an entire planet... from a nebula no less (one of the probable reasons the Genesis Planet was unstable because the raw material which was used in the creation of the planet simply wasn't enough to sustain it - aka, a nebula doesn't nearly have enough density or matter to be used as a building blocks of a planet... so the planet which was created was inherently unstable... not because of the protomatter used, but because the nebula simply wasn't dense enough to give the planet enough matter to remain stable).
Part of it is Fuller's original intent on having a show focused on Michael instead of a crew, and they didn't correct that in the next three seasons, but if it didn't matter there wouldn't be a need for continuity. Toronto has a large enough pool of actors that you wouldn't need to bring the same people back if your intent is that these are just throwaway characters.
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I get that. And I didn't need to see more of them. But it's still funny!
Maybe it was the Iconian like portal portion of the technology that the Breen had used as the actual weapon and Burnham just wrongly assumed it was the biological replicator portion?
Because that makes a lot more sense.
Well, it's also a bit odd in that we know from Mortal Coil that under certain circumstances Borg technology was capable of reviving someone up to 18 hours after their death.
The problem is that this was framed as "meaning of life" stuff... and while instantaneous travel across the universe is certainly life changing, clearly they were talking about how the ability to create life out of nothing. Except if they can't recreate the soul, what's the point other than a vanity project of trying to preserve your species?
Only seven of the people in that daydream are full fledged main cast members (Burnham, Saru, Stamets, Tilly, Culber, Tal, and Rayner) while the rest were the recurring/dayplayers (Reno, Rhys, Bryce, Owo, Detmer, Linus).
That’s 13 people in that daydream, not even including the other main character Booker. Given how limited streaming series are in terms of episode numbers, I don’t think there was ever time to give all of those characters development, especially the non-main characters. At best they’re familiar faces to viewers, but still important to Michael.
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