Why was Vena disfigured in The Cage?

[Admiral Buzzkill]

The "never seen a human" line never persuaded me, either. The Talosians were bilaterally symmetrical and looked very much like human beings. It shouldn't have been challenging for them to realize that Vina's species was very much the same.

They may simply have lacked any aesthetic sense. Perhaps they had limited empathy for her or didn't appreciate the extent to which human beings possessed self-aware identity.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Apparently the Columbia's computer system (if it had one) was completely destroyed in the crash, otherwise the Talosians could have read its memory banks.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Come on, did you see what passes for computer graphics aboard Pike's Enterprise a generation or so later? Vina's lucky that she didn't wind up looking like Lyndon Johnson.

 

[Gary7]

Well, already a few people have agreed with the idea that there was enough visual evidence for them to see that Vina had a humanoid body much like their own. Symmetrical on the outside. And so, they should have at least been able to repair her body to be properly symmetrical, not a bend-over cripple. The issue would be internal organ repair and placement. Vina said "everything works", so they got that part right. If so, well... you can stretch organs only so much. They must have gotten them mostly in the right place, because of the inherent length of connecting tissue between organs.

I appreciate people are trying to defend the episode, but let's face it--it's an oversight. The plausible explanation for her appearance would be a lack of surgical skill (matching up with the Talosian's statement of forgetting how to repair machinery), and that Vina luckily didn't suffer any mortal injuries to her organs. She just suffered a really badly banged up body, and all the Talosians could do for her was prevent gangrene encroaching (so no amputation was necessary), help her heal without infection, and give her the illusion that she didn't have a decrepit body.

 

[Solarbaby]

It could be considered a weak spot, if one assumes they could read her mind after the crash, and before whatever medical procedures they performed - BUT, I would think Vina would be comatose with those level of injuries; and it may be in that state, the Talosians COULDN'T access her mind or memories. (Hell, they couldn't read through strong emotions either.)

The Talosians could have read themind of the crew before they crashed. They were capabale of making the Enterprise crew in orbit see illusions.

 

[Noname Given]

It could be considered a weak spot, if one assumes they could read her mind after the crash, and before whatever medical procedures they performed - BUT, I would think Vina would be comatose with those level of injuries; and it may be in that state, the Talosians COULDN'T access her mind or memories. (Hell, they couldn't read through strong emotions either.)

The Talosians could have read themind of the crew before they crashed. They were capabale of making the Enterprise crew in orbit see illusions.

They efectively laid a baited trap for the Enterprise; so they knew when they arrived. The crash of Vena's ship could have been a surprise. They're mind readers, not omniscient.

(Honestly, the line always bothered me too; but hey there are WAY LARGER inconsistencies in Star Trek that have been rationalized away. )

 

[Timo]

I appreciate people are trying to defend the episode, but let's face it--it's an oversight.

It sounds more like a stupid obsession to me - what oversight is there? It would be utterly absurd that "seeing a human before" would mean "being able to build a beautiful human out of a cripple". That's not what the dialogue meant back then, that's not how it should be read today, and that's not an interpretation that's ever going to make any sense.

The Talosians could have carved a perfect statue of a beautiful human woman, by reading Vina's mind or going through the wreckage for visuals or by guessing. But there's no sense in thinking that this ability to make beautiful statues would somehow enable them to straighten Vina's hump. They'd know Vina looked wrong; they obviously do know it when we first meet Vina, and they don't do anything about it, so the clear implication is that they can't do anything about it.

If (when!) they could take a heap of starfall-mauled meat and make a humpback Vina out of it, then it more or less follows they could take humpack Vina and perform further medical procedures on her. They haven't done so (unless we assume they are faking Vina's crippled appearance), and they don't give a reason for not wanting to do so, so it's clear they don't know how to do so.

Jeez. It's like saying that Pike's "I should have smelled trouble when I saw the swords and the armour" is an inconsistency because trouble doesn't smell.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Ssosmcin]

Vina's lucky that she didn't wind up looking like Lyndon Johnson.

That made me laugh out loud.

 

[The Squire of Gothos]

It accrues to me that Vina might not have been all Vina. Bones, organs and skin might have come from the bodies of the SS Columbia's many fatalities.

The reason she was so "bent" was because Vina possessed a composite skeleton of multiple people

I like that explanation as a nod toward's Vernon Vinge's A Fire Upon the Deep

 

[Neutral Zone]

The Talosians came across as a super intelliegent race, so I can't why theu didn't put her the way she should have looked. Alternatively once they realalised their errors why do some form of reconstructive surgery. They could've checked the wrecked ship to if there was any retrievablr data or books on human physiology. And there would have been corpses of the rest of the crew, I'm sure they weren' all bloobs of meat, they could've used them as templates. Looks like a botch job to me, they weren't bothered too much about appearances at the beginning so long as they had their specimen. It was only after when they wanted them to mate did they care about the looks of the woman.

 

[Pauln6]

The Talosians came across as a super intelliegent race, so I can't why theu didn't put her the way she should have looked. Alternatively once they realalised their errors why do some form of reconstructive surgery. They could've checked the wrecked ship to if there was any retrievablr data or books on human physiology. And there would have been corpses of the rest of the crew, I'm sure they weren' all bloobs of meat, they could've used them as templates. Looks like a botch job to me, they weren't bothered too much about appearances at the beginning so long as they had their specimen. It was only after when they wanted them to mate did they care about the looks of the woman.

Saving her life was their priority - it may simply be that the concept of external beauty meant nothing to them when they fixed her and only after spending years probing her did they realise that she viewed it as important.

They probably were performing fresh reconstructive surgery periodically and the version of Vina that we see is an improvement! She is a work in progress. But don't forget, she was no spring chicken - she was pushing 40 so fully correcting her posture and scars may have been beyond the levels of human endurance.

 

[Captrek]

I think people may be interpreting “they had never seen a human” too literally. It doesn’t necessarily mean “they had no idea what humans are supposed to look like.” I take it to mean that the Talosians had no previous contact with humans, hence no familiarity with humans, hence insufficient knowledge about humans to repair Vina’s body properly.