Details, details, details

[Lighthammer]

This isn't something that is going to make or break a new series, but I've been thinking a bit about what entertainment is today versus what it was years ago.

If you look at any one series in Star Trek, they all share one negative quality in common even if you compare their on screen information exclusively: they often trip over their own details.

When you watch a lot of today's series such as Lost or Young Justice, they all share one major asset in common --- they all have a huge emphasis on details.

As I see it, Star Trek's future can either make a play to ensure they hit every dot and cross every T to ensure each detail is thought out (and doesn't resort to technobabble that doesn't come into question later) or they can take it more in the direction of B5 and focus on story and attempt to eliminate details as much as possible.

Rewatching things like DS9 and Voyager today, I find myself wondering if they could really compete against series today that go out of their way to ensure a high level of planning in almost every detail.

/edit grammar (wrote when I was tired =( )

 

[F. King Daniel]

Trek made the mistake of quantifying waaaaaay too much stuff over the decades. Endless technical details were given that simply weren't ever necessary. Look at Stargate - we never learned exactly how fast their hyperdrives were meant to be, we were just told "[species X] are [faster/slower] than we are" a few times - but Trek gives us complex warp factors and time/distance formulas which keep being rewritten and ignored (look at the comparison between warp 9.975 in "Caretaker" and warp 8.4 in "That Which Survives" in the video in my sig) creating contradictions which never had to happen.

Other shows don't go into the same level of detail as Trek. Vaguer is better.

 

[horatio83]

You mistake tech manuals for the show in and of itself.

 

[F. King Daniel]

You mistake tech manuals for the show in and of itself.

Nope, just the shows themselves. "That Which Survives" says a journey of 1000 light years can be made in 11.5 hours at warp 8.4

"Caretaker" says a journey of 70,000 lightyears "even at maximum speeds" (given as warp 9.975 earlier in the episode) would take 75 years.

At TOS warp 8.4, Voyager would be home in a month.

At Voyager's warp 9.975, the Enterprise's 1000 light year journey would have taken around a year.

 

[horatio83]

There aren't any formulas in the show, merely writers who rightly do not giving a shit about the consistency of something entirely irrelevant and nitpicking fans who care about such trivia.

Warp factors are mentioned in Trek to keep the technical side of the background realistic. When you watch a movie with a submarine in it you do not complain about some technical lingo in it either.
Wavering between extremes, obsessively caring about warp factors and wanting them to be totally absent, misses their simple and obvious dramatic purpose.

 

[Knight Templar]

Speed and distance have always been variable across television and movies depending on the plot.

Anyone ever seen the Charlie Sheen movie "Terminal Velocity"? One reviewer of it pointed out that the only way it makes sense is if the entire American southwest is about the size of a small town. Because the main characters despite air plane trips, long car drives, rocket sleds (?) keep stumbling over each other.​

 

[Kemaiku]

You mistake tech manuals for the show in and of itself.

Nope, just the shows themselves. "That Which Survives" says a journey of 1000 light years can be made in 11.5 hours at warp 8.4

"Caretaker" says a journey of 70,000 lightyears "even at maximum speeds" (given as warp 9.975 earlier in the episode) would take 75 years.

At TOS warp 8.4, Voyager would be home in a month.

At Voyager's warp 9.975, the Enterprise's 1000 light year journey would have taken around a year.

And that's where more technicality comes into play.

TOS used the Old Scale, 1-15
TNG+ used the New Scale 1-10

TOS warp 8.4 is meant to be along the lines of Warp 6 on the new scale. If warp 6 on the TNG scale = 1000LY in half a day well...

Warp 9 on the new scale capable of around a few thousand light years in half a day. Non stop travel would have Voyager home in less than a week actually.

It's all terribly inconsistent, vague is better in this case.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Jack Bauer's antics required him to drive 600 mph in LA traffic to make any sense. That didn't stop people from watching 24.

 

[Maurice]

This isn't something that is going to make or break a new series, but I've been thinking a bit about what entertainment is today versus what it was years ago.

If you look at any one series in Star Trek, they all share one negative quality in common even if you compare their on screen information exclusively: they often trip over their own details.

When you watch a lot of today's series from series like Lost to Young Justice, they all share one major asset in common --- they all have a huge emphasis on details.

As I see it, Star Trek's future can either make a play to ensure they hit every dot and cross every T to ensure each detail is thought out (and doesn't resort to technobabble that doesn't come into question later).

Rewatching things like DS9 and Voyager today, I find myself wondering if they could really compete against series today that go out of their way to ensure a high level of planning in almost every detail.

"Your proceed from a false assumption." Who says it's the details that make a show successful?

And what, exactly, do you mean by "details" anyway?

Most audiences have no idea if something is technically correct, especially when dealing with fantastical stuff like warp drives. It's only the hardcore fans that get lost is such minutia. Sure, some hardcore followers of Mad Men will jump up and down if they see an anachronism, but most watchers just drink up the scenery as the setting and are concerned with the drama and characters.

 

[C.E. Evans]

There's no way Trek can win. People will find something to complain about no matter what they do.

 

[Lighthammer]

Well, a lot of series today put an extreme focus on details before the series ever debuts. No Star Trek series ever did this. They've always focused on an episodic type progression with an occasional longer story or some sort of end goal.

Voyager of course had the conclusion of getting home and DS9 of course had the end goal of bringing conclusion to the war, but each series didn't have a grand story to connect point A to point B. They largely just threw in episodes along the way that progressed the overall story.

In my mind, in order to get a new trek series off the ground, I don't think any perspective series can be founded on any premise other then a complete story that's planned from start to finish with signification milestones planned at conception. I'm finding myself wondering if today's audience will allow any room to explore stories that don't progress the whole story.

 

[C.E. Evans]

Procedural-type dramas do that. Today's audiences seem to accept them just fine.

 

[horatio83]

Well, a lot of series today put an extreme focus on details before the series ever debuts. No Star Trek series ever did this. They've always focused on an episodic type progression with an occasional longer story or some sort of end goal.

Voyager of course had the conclusion of getting home and DS9 of course had the end goal of bringing conclusion to the war, but each series didn't have a grand story to connect point A to point B. They largely just threw in episodes along the way that progressed the overall story.

In my mind, in order to get a new trek series off the ground, I don't think any perspective series can be founded on any premise other then a complete story that's planned from start to finish with signification milestones planned at conception. I'm finding myself wondering if today's audience will allow any room to explore stories that don't progress the whole story.

Serialization has and caring about details (as Maurice already asked, what kind of details are you talking about?) are two different pairs of shoes.

 

[Knight Templar]

I think an over abundance of details are more important on a science fiction show than other genres because you need details to 'bring the show alive" and "make it seem real".

No one is going to question the basic reality of a police procedural.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

No one is going to question the basic reality of a police procedural.

Oh yeah?

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CSI:_Crime_Scene_Investigation#Law_enforcement_reaction:

Another criticism of the show is the depiction of police procedure, which some[42] consider to be decidedly lacking in realism.[43] For instance, the show's characters not only investigate ("process") crime scenes, but they also conduct raids, engage in suspect pursuit and arrest, interrogate suspects, and solve cases, which falls under the responsibility of uniformed officers and detectives, not CSI personnel. Although some detectives are also registered CSIs, this is exceedingly rare in actual life. It is considered an inappropriate and improbable practice to allow CSI personnel to be involved in detective work as it would compromise the impartiality of scientific evidence and would be impracticably time-consuming. Additionally, it is inappropriate for the CSIs who process a crime scene to be involved in the examination and testing of any evidence collected from that scene. CSI shares this characteristic with similar British drama series, Silent Witness.

(...)

Some police and district attorneys have criticized the show for giving members of the public an inaccurate perception of how police solve crimes. Victims and their families are coming to expect instant answers from showcased techniques such as DNA analysis and fingerprinting, when actual forensic processing often takes days or weeks, with no guarantee of revealing a 'smoking gun' for the prosecution's case. District attorneys state that the conviction rate in cases with little physical evidence has decreased, largely due to the influence of CSI on jury members.[44]

(...)

42. ^ USATODAY.com - 'CSI effect' has juries wanting more evidence
43. ^ Ross MacDowell. "The Real CSI". Australian Sunday Herald. Archived from the original on September 18, 2006. Retrieved 2006-10-14.
44. ^ Willing, Richard (2004-08-05). "'CSI effect' has juries wanting more evidence". USA Today. Retrieved April 30, 2010.

 

[MacLeod]

To be fair to Star Trek in total it amounts to 28 seasons (700+ episodes) over 40 or so years. There are bound to be some contradictions in details.

The middle shows TNG/DSN/VOY at times were being produced at the same time by different people. So it's not as if you had one person in overall charge.

If you want to talk technical details such as Warp Drive.

In TMP we are told that Vulcan is 4 days away. As the vulcan system is 16ly from Earth, this gives us a speed of 4ly/day. Gibes us a speed of ~1400ly/ year. Which would put VOY's trip back at ~50 years.

In "Where No One has Gone Before" We are told that a trip back from the M33 (Triangulam Galaxy) a distance of 2.3million ly or so would take 300 years. Which would have to be 9000ly/year or so.

Sometimes the writers simply don't care about such things. (i.e no backup for the EMH in VOY to suddenly having one). Other times it's us fans doing the maths for such things as warp speeds, and saying they don't add up with what was previously established (on screen)

So it's a combination of things.

 

[Maurice]

I'm still awaiting a definition of "details" as the OP sees them.

 

[C.E. Evans]

To be fair to Star Trek in total it amounts to 28 seasons (700+ episodes) over 40 or so years. There are bound to be some contradictions in details.

The middle shows TNG/DSN/VOY at times were being produced at the same time by different people. So it's not as if you had one person in overall charge.

If you want to talk technical details such as Warp Drive.

In TMP we are told that Vulcan is 4 days away. As the vulcan system is 16ly from Earth, this gives us a speed of 4ly/day. Gibes us a speed of ~1400ly/ year. Which would put VOY's trip back at ~50 years.

In "Where No One has Gone Before" We are told that a trip back from the M33 (Triangulam Galaxy) a distance of 2.3million ly or so would take 300 years. Which would have to be 9000ly/year or so.

Sometimes the writers simply don't care about such things. (i.e no backup for the EMH in VOY to suddenly having one). Other times it's us fans doing the maths for such things as warp speeds, and saying they don't add up with what was previously established (on screen)

So it's a combination of things.

There is also the issue of dramatic necessity. Anyone who's written a Trek story (even a fanfic) and tried to maintain accuracy with the so-called warp scales will quickly realize that warp drive is really too slow for storytelling purposes. Eventually our heroes will reach a point in their journey where they will be too far away to get from sector X to sector Y within a feasible amount of time to save the day. If one is unwilling to have a ship move at the speed of plot, the alternatives are either is to make sure that everything happens within convenient range of the ship, or to reduce the urgency of the emergency so that it unfolds over a long period of time (weeks or months).*

*A Trekkie might have preferred if it took NX-01 four months to get to Qo'noS instead of four days, or a statement that it will take nearly two weeks for the Enterprise-E to get from the Neutral Zone to join the Battle of Sector 001, but it kills the dramatic pacing of the story for everyone else.

 

[Knight Templar]

Of course if you want to talk about dramatic necessily look at sensor ranges.

Some episodes like "Transfigurations" the Enterprise-D detects the Zalconian ship when it is many hours away at Warp 9.72.

The VERY NEXT episode the Enterprise-D does NOT detect the Borg cube even though it is only a little over an hour away at Warp 9 (the Enterprise knew where it was only due to the distress call from the U.S.S. Lalo).

 

[Maurice]

The silly thing is there's no reason to be inconsistent if you simply don't add needless information. If, instead of saying the exact distance of something they merely said "just within sensor range" that eliminates a lot of potential discrepancies. Sometimes less detail is more, especially when the numbers don't actually mean anything.