Yep, and the writers were NOT happy (personally when I heard that I thought - Man that really WOULD have been great. Had this idea surfaced in the 1966-1969 era, you can bet they WOULD NOT have used aliens as the protagonists.)
Conspiracy
- Thread starter Gigas
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Yep, and the writers were NOT happy (personally when I heard that I thought - Man that really WOULD have been great. Had this idea surfaced in the 1966-1969 era, you can bet they WOULD NOT have used aliens as the protagonists.)
The books you're thinking of are the DS9 "relaunch" or "Season 8". Very good series.
I didn't mention any books, since I haven't read any of the Trek books. I just heard from other posters that the Aliens made a return. That was good enough for me.
Or possibly "The Lives of Dax."
Well not specifically by title, but it was the " I know they address them in the books" comment I was referring to.
"The Lives of Dax." That was it!
I seem to remember that one fondly, though I can barely remember it.
And they were only added because Rick Berman didn't want to include the Andorians. He thought they were a silly looking race.
I thought the story was good,but glad that they didn't make it into a two parter. I'm not a great fan of two pater stories. When they are first aired there is always the risk that you will miss the second part, then you haveto wait for it to be repeated or buy the DVD. Also, I notice that too many two parters can ruin a good show, just look at the Enterprise, towards the end there never appeared to a story that could be done in one episode.
I think it was a great episode. Something very different. Leaving it hanging begged for a follow up but not a two parter. Even to have pulled it out in the last season would have been a big mind f*ck for the fans too. 'Oh wow. Forgot about them!' Kinda thing.
"The Lives of Dax" is considered to be a part of the "relaunch" (retrospectively),
I too had hoped that the parsites would be brought back. When they weren't, I had hoped that, like Space Seed was used as the basis for TWOK, Contagion would be used to set up a MFTV movie or miniseries that would include various characters from all three 24th century series and maybe even New Frontiers and Van Guard. Expanding the story to include numerous perspectives and actions would show that it would take many people, many groups of people to address such a threat to the Federation, rather than a single ship and its crew.
They sort of achieved that already within the confines of TNG: dialogue in "Conspiracy" was used to indicate the scope of the conspiracy when direct visuals could not be used, and it was also used to indicate that plenty of other personnel were involved beyond those the episode could afford to hire in the form of actual actors. "Drumhead" further expanded on that.
I'm not sure the body-snatchers-do-Star-Trek idea would have worked beyond this. The audience now knows that there are these critters that can be spotted by sighting the little stinger sticking out of the neck of the host, and by the host losing some of his or her memories. Our heroes know this as well. Where's the suspense? Hunting down the Space Commies is now a trivial task, and all we have left is drama based on the McCarthyism of it all. And they did that in "Drumhead" already.
Parasites and mind control are scary in theory. In Star Trek, not so much. They have biofilters and telepaths and stun guns and fantastically competent surgeons; nobody should be the worse off from a little bit of parasite possession...
So yeah, a story arc or a movie might have been made. But to make those interesting would have been a gargantuan challenge when the source material was so humdrum.
Timo Saloniemi
I'm not sure the body-snatchers-do-Star-Trek idea would have worked beyond this. The audience now knows that there are these critters that can be spotted by sighting the little stinger sticking out of the neck of the host, and by the host losing some of his or her memories. Our heroes know this as well. Where's the suspense? Hunting down the Space Commies is now a trivial task, and all we have left is drama based on the McCarthyism of it all. And they did that in "Drumhead" already.
Parasites and mind control are scary in theory. In Star Trek, not so much. They have biofilters and telepaths and stun guns and fantastically competent surgeons; nobody should be the worse off from a little bit of parasite possession...
So yeah, a story arc or a movie might have been made. But to make those interesting would have been a gargantuan challenge when the source material was so humdrum.
Timo Saloniemi
I thought the same thing! Also, the whole "we're the brains, you're the brawn" thing was, I don't know, a little too straightforward and predictable for my taste.
I just watched this again last night and yes, the pacing was a little off. But it was in the days before TNG two-parters and IMO still holds up really well.
One scene I'd forgotten about that had me howling with laughter was the scene between Data and the Enterprise computer (when he's scanning for irregularities in Starfleet orders). Data starts spouting the dictionary as he's prone to doing and the computer gets tetchy with him. This puts Data in a mood!
The Remmick explosion and alien mother-creature at the end of the episode were edited out of the BBC version when it was first broadcast. It was nice to see that fully.
One scene I'd forgotten about that had me howling with laughter was the scene between Data and the Enterprise computer (when he's scanning for irregularities in Starfleet orders). Data starts spouting the dictionary as he's prone to doing and the computer gets tetchy with him. This puts Data in a mood!
The Remmick explosion and alien mother-creature at the end of the episode were edited out of the BBC version when it was first broadcast. It was nice to see that fully.
I bet it would have been better than ST: Nemesis!
Conspiracy was the sequal. They introduced the story line in Coming of Age and finished it in Conspiracy. I enjoyed Conspiracy's darkness and forboding. It was only enhanced by being surrounded by GR's utopian fantasy in all the other episodes. Where did the signal go? I think a follow up story in the last season or even a movie could have been outstanding. By the way, did you notice that the "grid" that was used to send the signal is also present in The Measure of a Man? Hmmm. Maybe Data was planning on signalling the aliens to come wipe out Starfleet if he was forced to be disassembled......
Hope I'm not out of line, but I will point out that the fan produced audio drama Star Trek: Excelsior has a story line that will definitely be interesting to those who find the parasites interesting. Check out our latest episode "Sunset" at www.starshipexcelsior.com. As an aside, I worked with a guy in a radio newsroom who looked enough like Remmick to be his twin brother.
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