Season SIX OFFICIAL TNG Blu-Ray Discussion Thread

Here it is (it's actually visible for about 17 frames in total -- and I must confess that I completely missed it when I first watched the remastered episode. I was focusing at the wrong moment, I guess! It's really not a big deal, but you're right, it is still there!):

 

I wonder, how DOES one take the temperature of the Sheliak?

 

It seems, with season 6 the technobabble infestation of Star Trek, which became a horrible curse with VOY, really began to raise. "Realm of Fear", "Relics" and "Schism" sometimes feature minutes of pure technobabble without much content. I guess now that I get older I am more easily bothered by that, because it shows a lack of commitment of the writers to give the characters really something to say. As an actor it would piss me off after a while - instead of character development they give you technical manuals to speak out loud.

 

RDM talked about that in the Relics commentary that they filled the episode with treknobabble because the show was about 2 engineers. I really hate the tech the tech to tech the tech talk just as much as RDM has despised it. It sucks the life out of a story and the drama. The original series got along without it, and DS9 for the most part stayed away from it as well.


Anyway I just finished birthright, and at the end when Worf tells Picard there were no survivors from Kitomer (sp), do you think Picard knew Worf was covering the case up and the official story would be no survivors, even though there were.



-Chris

 

The early seasons were refreshing in that when the crew encountered a problem (stupid or not), the solutions were based in reality and not making up some tech-sounding words to fix the problem. Case in point, they have a problem in Booby Trap. Their solution? Basically hit the accelerator really hard, and then coast away from the problem in neutral. But if the same episode happened in season 7, they would have used a tachyon interometer emitter to destabilize the assimilators, and get them out of harm's way.

Once Braga became a staff writer, the technobabble creeped in everywhere. I can't watch most of Voyager because of that crap.

 

What does Frakes say in that last blooper as he's walking away? Cant quite make it out.

My favorite is the one where Patrick Stewart slaps the desk "B****!"

 

Exactly. I think they over compensated as well in Relics. I think that was the most technobabble that ever spewed from Scotty's mouth in all of Star Trek (TOS 1-2 and the movies) combined.

What I like so much about the RDM commentaries and when he is in the other special features, he gives his honest take on what they were doing, and how it affected his future projects like Battlestar Galactica.

Be sure to listen to his commentary on Tapestry he talks about what he would like to see in a return of Star Trek in general terms. He says he doesn't have an overall vision of what a new Star Trek should be, but he does point out what he would like to see it do with the characters in terms of an overall story.

-Chris

 

The subtitles have him saying, "Melba!" Which -- I had to look this up -- refers to Dame Nellie Melba, an Australian operatic soprano from the late 19th, early 20th century. To "do a Melba" is to make repeated farewell appearances.

 

For all the fans that crap all over JJ Trek, they seem to forget the really awful fantasy tech created by TNG. The metaphasic shields, the phased cloak, and chroniton particles for their excuse for time travel events. With the exception of a handful of episodes, season 6 is more painful to watch than season 1 and 2.


-Chris

 

Season 7 is way more painful. Warp speed limit, anyone?

 

I don't mind the technobabble, it's the miraculous recoveries that get me. I'm cool with a shield that lets you fly into the sun but having your body change into an extremely old person or into a kid, and then back to your normal self is with no permanent damage is funny.

 

Or how about how Beverly's face was burned by acid in Genesis (in reality, they were getting her off screen because she was directing), and the next time we see her, her face is totally normal. Plus we have cases when people can change appearances at any time without consequences.

So why are there still disfigured people in the future? That Bajoran dude in Ensign Ro, or that Cardassian in The Darkness and the Light. Just get a handheld skin regeneration tool, DUH.

 

I don't think it's fair to pin the tech talk on Braga for VOY, it was something he hated as well. ENT at least took away the technobabble.

 

That was the worst, and it was quickly dropped.


-Chris

 

Wasted potential for one. You're treading on 2001 territory, plus courting postmodernism with the crew trapped in a bad novel. Yet they go NOWHERE with it. Kind of like first season SPACE 1999 without the self-conscious meaningless symbolism.

 

It's like STAR WARS hogwash. How do you intercept and block a blaster beam with your light saber? You see into the future to KNOW where to put your sword? FTL thinking? That's really forcing the issue.

 

Shouldn't this one go into the "I hate TNG created ..." thread.

But indeed, it was not a great idea to say the least, because it had to be expected that this idea would have become obsolete at the earliest next convenience.

I agree, but I also have headaches with the final scenes from 2001. After all, Clarke and Kubrick originally joked about putting the surviving protagonist into a Victorian environment populated with “fags” (and their original idea was finally visualized in “Contact”). Add to this that we have surviving deleted scenes footage that clearly shows that Bowman was going to redress in those final scenes (as described in Clarke’s novelization). 2001’s clever editing obfuscated the issue and elevated it somehow to some abstract meaning that simply wasn’t there.

Bob

 

any web links to that? Very interesting!

 

I think maybe you're misremembering a few things (either that or I am.) The fag reference was about life on the DISCOVERY, with machines that put our heroes at their ease.

And except for the trims in a mine in the midwest, there are NO cut scenes (stills of cut scenes, yes, not scenes) anyplace -- if there were, the Underman site on 2001 would have been all over it, and there'd be links on Doug Trumbull's site too (which does have some nice photos and conceptuals.)

There's a lot about the hotel room that has many memories confused, including people who think they remember seeing Keir Dulleau with the 'blue food' mentioned in the novel(ization.) But I've talked to a few people who did the see film before the 17 or 19 minutes got cut (including Robocop producer Jon Davison), and I'm certain there wasn't any footage of anything of the sort ... the cuts were from DAWN OF MAN, the station docking, the second EVA and maybe another dialog bit on DISCOVERY (though that probably got cut pre-premiere, the stuff with Bowman questioning HAL that is actually in the terrible-looking comic book adaptation.)

 

For those of us in the UK who have Sky HD and access to SyFy, the channel starts TNG season 6 at 9pm tomorrow night. I'm assuming (hoping) they'll be showing the new HD remasters as opposed to the old fuzzy SD upscaled.