That's kinda unfair. TOS didn't mention anybody at the beginning of the Federation. There must have been a "Star Trek George Washington", but using your logic anything showing that would be flipping off the fans.
Archer and TOS
- Thread starter RobertScorpio
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That's kinda unfair. TOS didn't mention anybody at the beginning of the Federation. There must have been a "Star Trek George Washington", but using your logic anything showing that would be flipping off the fans.
Kirk and/or the TOS Enterprise were mentioned directly or indirectly in "Enounter at Farpoint", "The Naked Now", "Unification," "Relics" and maybe one or two others but rarely in the grand scheme of things. Out of 178 episodes in the series perhaps 170 didn't mention Kirk or the 1701 whatsoever.
To be fair the TNG episode you mention, The Naked Now basically RE-USED the original script (and BADLY shoe-horned the new TNG characters in) from the original TOS episode The Naked Time.
But hell, - look at Spock - he served with Captain Christopher Pike for 7 years; yet the ONLY time Spock ever mentioned him was in the TOS episode The Menagerie. Hell, Kirk claims that Captain Garth was a legend whose exploits were wtill required reading at the Academy; yet do we hear his name mentioned anytime before or after the TOS episode Whom Gods Destroy?
Enterprise had a lot of flaws and a couple of mis-steps; but no worse than any other Star Trek series from TOS forward. Also, as you state the real reason is that the concept of 'Captain Archer' and the 'Enterprise NX-01' didn't exist in Star Trek lore before 2001. Still the absence of any mention of 'Archer' or other prior Star Fleet captains was nothing new to TOS. A 'prior captain' was usually only mentioned when it had revence to the plot that week.
Why did TNG mention Kirk and Co. (and has TOS props littering it's sets) in the first season? Because after its pilot aired, ratings dropped so fast (and didn't really start to rebuild until after half-way through season 2) that the studio was desperate to try and bring in the original TOS fanbase, and they figured name-dropping might do it.
It was premitive by 23rd century standards. Didn't really say how premative that was. That can mean a lot of things. Guns from 100 years ago are pretty premative compared to guns of today. Doesn't make them any less deadly. The references to the Romulan/Earth conflict were meant to be as vague as possible. The only thing that really bugs me about Enterprise as far as technology is that it has view screens. That was the one that wasn't as vague in BOT. But if you look at technology now, we pretty much are close to being able to have view screens in ways.
Plus, ENT ended before the Earth-Romulan War could be shown. For all we know Starfleet ended up having to dig up old nuclear warheads and designs from generations earlier just to use against the Romulans after the conventional(spatial)and early photonic torpedoes of the period failed against the enemy.
Why would he? On what occasion did Kirk's failure to mention Archer by name create an unresolvable continuity problem?
Bear in mind that Kirk never mentioned Christopher Pike until the Enterprise was summoned to the starbase where he was recuperating. (And then they never mentioned him again.) And Kirk never mentioned Robert April until he showed up in TAS. Yet these were his two direct predecessors, who had previously captained his own ship.
It only detracts from it in the sense that it exposes the myth of Spock as the "first Vulcan in Starfleet" for what it is: Made-up fanboy nonsense, unsupported by any on-screen evidence (and, arguably, directly contradicted by "The Immunity Syndrome").
Iotians. They were called Iotians.
Don't forget 'Relics', when Scotty turns up. Kirk is mentioned there as well.
I liked "Enterprise," and could not have cared less how it reconciled with the minutae of TOS.
And Spock refers to Kirk in Unification.
3D Master
Rear Admiral
That's a ridiculous reason. No founder of the Federation was named in TOS, so there was none?
However, Enterprise being creatively bankrupt, being a rehash of Voyager, rehashing old Star Trek episodes over and over, the first contact with the Klingons contradicting what is known about it, and the technology level being far too great for what Balance of Terror told us about it, ARE good reasons not to get into it.
:sighs: Spock is NOT the first Vulcan in Starfleet. Where the hell does this keep coming from? There's an entire ship full of Vulcans in TOS (and promptly dies) which must have included a Vulcan captain - who thus had to have entered the Academy before Spock did.
Spock was said to be the best first officer in Starfleet (which we don't know is actually true or just McCoy's pride speaking.)
One should remember that our Star Trek heroes usually serve in Starfleet. They mostly talk about things involving Starfleet, naturally. Their idols come from Starfleet.
And Jonathan Archer is not from Starfleet.
From the viewpoint of James Kirk or Jean-Luc Picard, Jonathan Archer is a foreigner who served in a foreign navy, back when their fatherland's motherly face was just a glint in the eye of... Well, Jonathan Archer. But Archer would still be a foreigner representing the Old, his role symbolically ending in a speech as the New began.
Archer in the Federation era would no longer be a Starfleet hero. He'd be a politician, a has-been of no known consequence to Federation history, another paper-pushing populist in an office Starfleeters don't think too highly about. Even in "TATV", he isn't really remembered as the Man Who Gave Birth to the Federation. Somebody else probably got that honor. No, Archer is remembered for his speech, which Troi had to memorize at school. And it seems Kirk either didn't find that speech all that good, or didn't think highly of Archer as a leader or thinker, and thus preferred Lincoln quotes.
Timo Saloniemi
And Jonathan Archer is not from Starfleet.
From the viewpoint of James Kirk or Jean-Luc Picard, Jonathan Archer is a foreigner who served in a foreign navy, back when their fatherland's motherly face was just a glint in the eye of... Well, Jonathan Archer. But Archer would still be a foreigner representing the Old, his role symbolically ending in a speech as the New began.
Archer in the Federation era would no longer be a Starfleet hero. He'd be a politician, a has-been of no known consequence to Federation history, another paper-pushing populist in an office Starfleeters don't think too highly about. Even in "TATV", he isn't really remembered as the Man Who Gave Birth to the Federation. Somebody else probably got that honor. No, Archer is remembered for his speech, which Troi had to memorize at school. And it seems Kirk either didn't find that speech all that good, or didn't think highly of Archer as a leader or thinker, and thus preferred Lincoln quotes.
Timo Saloniemi
Timo may be correct, but according to his bio from IAMD, wasn't he a high ranking Federation Starfleet officer?
There are plenty of reasons to dislike Enterprise - writing uneven at best, a penchant for re-using old plots, some very poor choices in terms of the show's structure, some creative moments that were just bizarre (ANIS, space Nazis) etc. .. and hey, I say this as a fan of the show.
But I always thought that the whole "They didn't mention Archer in TOS" point was just silly. Still, a surprising number of people cite that as their primary reason for disliking the show.
But I always thought that the whole "They didn't mention Archer in TOS" point was just silly. Still, a surprising number of people cite that as their primary reason for disliking the show.
3D Master
Rear Admiral
Now those two are rather contradictory.
I had to pretend Enterprise took place in an alternate universe to enjoy it at all. Thus making this whole thread nothing more than a big "pretend" when compared to "my reality." *grin* I did enjoy the show overall, when I did pretend it wasn't in the real TOS universe. But in spite of that, I think they should've used old style Klingons and left the Klingon changeover as the gigantic fan rationalization mystery it was.
Well, IMHO it just means Kirk puts Archer and Lincoln in the same category, and then picks the one he prefers. He doesn't give Archer bonus points for things like being a more recent figure, or serving in a space navy, as those don't make him feel special enough a kinship.
Kirk does mention and idolize people from a number of past eras, including post-2160s (Garth of Izar). But he's being relatively egalitarian about it. He does have a thing about 19th century United States, tho - as spelled out in "Spectre of the Gun" - so Lincoln would be a rather natural target for his idolatry.
Timo Saloniemi
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