50th Anniversary Rewatch Thread

Discussion in 'Star Trek - The Original & Animated Series' started by dahj, Aug 29, 2016.

  1. The Old Mixer

    The Old Mixer Mih ssim, mih ssim, nam, daed si Xim. Moderator

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    /butt
     
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  2. Poltargyst

    Poltargyst Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    You cannot beat Kirk Fu.
     
  3. Poltargyst

    Poltargyst Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    Oh, I disagree wholeheartedly. In TOS, the Klingons were the backstabbing weasels. The Romulans had a sense of honor. Check Mark Lenard's Romulan commander. In TNG, suddenly the Klingons had honor, and the Romulans were the backstabbing weasels. I don't mind the changes they made to the Klingons as I found them mostly entertaining, but I always resented what they did to the Romulans.
     
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  4. The Old Mixer

    The Old Mixer Mih ssim, mih ssim, nam, daed si Xim. Moderator

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    "Balance of Terror" shows Lenard's commander to be somewhat out of step with what the Empire wants and at least the younger officers under his command. He's not necessarily typical of Romulans. And are Kor and Kang portrayed as any less honorable opponents than he is? When watching "Errand" this time, the Kirk/Kor interactions were very much giving me a vibe of "this is what it might have been like if Kirk and the Romulan commander had interacted face-to-face."

    And it's well-known that "Errand" was originally written for the Romulans, and they created the Klingons so they could use cheaper make-up. I doubt that they decided to rewrite the script to make everyone less honorable and more backstabbing once that decision was made.

    Also, I recall Lenard's commander talking a lot about duty, and in a jaded way...and some talk among the Romulan crew about glory...but did the word "honor" ever pass their lips? And if it did, was done so in any more specific way than a human might speak of honor?
     
  5. Poltargyst

    Poltargyst Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    Well, your mileage obviously varies. I say throughout the course of TOS (in all two episodes in which we actually see them) we never see a Romulan lie. They are aggressive. They do their duty as their Emperor commands. They may never use the word honor, but it is their adherence to their duty even to the point of committing suicide that makes me feel they have honor. I don't see anything particularly duplicitous about any of the Romulans in TOS. From TNG on, I do not find the Romulans as having that same kind of honor.
     
  6. The Old Mixer

    The Old Mixer Mih ssim, mih ssim, nam, daed si Xim. Moderator

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    Duty (to something/someone else, such as the state) and personal honor aren't necessarily the same thing. And on the subject of "Errand" Klingons being a substitute for the Romulans, compare the Romulans' value of duty established in "Balance" to this:
    Duty to the state...the Romulans became the Klingons serving as Space Russians.

    TNG-era Klingons...they're something else entirely, a third entity.
     
    Last edited: Mar 26, 2017
  7. wayne66

    wayne66 Lieutenant Commander Red Shirt

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    Errand of Mercy is one of my favorites. John Colicos is the perfect Klingon. He really chews the scenery. "Good honest hatred" I love how he says the word vegetable. I tend to say it just like him when I have vegetables. Very distinctive. John Abbott as the Organian leader is quite authoritative too. I like it when he asks KIrk if he is really defending the killing of billions of people and Kirk has to backtrack. This is such a great episode and McCoy is not even in it. I think this is the last episode that Deforest Kelley missed. He would be in all the rest of them.
     
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  8. The Old Mixer

    The Old Mixer Mih ssim, mih ssim, nam, daed si Xim. Moderator

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    Last week's other 50th Anniversary Viewings

    _______

    50 years ago this week:

    New on the U.S. charts:

    "My Back Pages," The Byrds

    (#30 US; Written by Bob Dylan)

    "Get Me to the World on Time," The Electric Prunes

    (#27 US)

    "You Got What It Takes," The Dave Clark Five

    (#7 US; #28 UK; Cover of a song that was originally a hit for Marv Johnson in 1959)

    "Somebody to Love," Jefferson Airplane

    (#5 US; #274 on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Songs of All Time)


    And airing Thursday night:

    Star Trek
    "The Alternative Factor"
    Stardate 3087.6
     
    Last edited: Mar 26, 2017
  9. 3D ChessMaster

    3D ChessMaster Lieutenant Red Shirt

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    Now if you could combine Bread with the Circus that might make a good episode of Star Trek perhaps?
     
  10. The Old Mixer

    The Old Mixer Mih ssim, mih ssim, nam, daed si Xim. Moderator

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    ^ Sorry, Bread didn't have a hit single until 1970.
     
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  11. 3D ChessMaster

    3D ChessMaster Lieutenant Red Shirt

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    I like when Abbott as Ayelborne says to Kirk something along the lines of 'Your primitive impulses are extremely painful to us' and often find it jumps into my mind when interacting with others at work and while watching the news.
    Will check out the vegetable pronunciation and try and work it into meal times and shopping.
     
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  12. UnknownSample

    UnknownSample Commodore Commodore

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    Therefore they don't lie? Ever?
    ----------
    They did sort of switch roles a bit, Klingons and Romulans. Let's keep in mind though that they're all vicious conquerors, and that "honor" thing is more of a conceit Klingons have about themselves.
     
  13. Poltargyst

    Poltargyst Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    It's night and day to me how Romulans are presented in TOS as opposed to TNG. I'm really surprised there's this much argument about it.
     
  14. UnknownSample

    UnknownSample Commodore Commodore

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    They're more appealing in TOS, and not necessarily any more devious than other villains. They had less of a negative feel to them than Klingons. Still subjugators though, still very violent. They were the bad guys, after all.
    ---------
    What's night-and-day is the Klingons' attitude toward the Romulans, allies toward the end of TOS, sworn enemies by Next Gen. We get swept along by that, but we shouldn't be.
     
  15. The Old Mixer

    The Old Mixer Mih ssim, mih ssim, nam, daed si Xim. Moderator

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    While it has been the widespread assumption going way back, TOS doesn't actually establish that Romulans and Klingons became allies...just that the Romulans started using Klingon designs. They could have stolen the designs, or the ships themselves, in conflict with the Klingons.

    That actually goes along with an unused idea for "Balance of Terror," that the Romulan BOP was meant to have been based on stolen Federation tech, hence some visible design similarities.
     
  16. erastus25

    erastus25 Commodore Commodore

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    Errand of Mercy is fine, overall, but drags. Obviously Colicos is really good and the Kor/Kirk interplay comes across nicely. But it feels like there is way too much padding. I had completely forgotten that Kirk and Spock bomb the munitions depot, get caught, escape, and go on another tryst. Add in Kirk's repetitive convos with the Organians and it feels like this one would have been better in a 30-minute or 45-minute time slot.
     
  17. Tallguy

    Tallguy Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Anytime I want to get bent out of shape about what TNG "did" to Romulans I have to remind myself that we only ever saw Romulans twice (three including TAS. I'm not counting Deadly Years.)

    In BoT and The Practical Joker the Romulans initiate unprovoked sneak attacks. Of course, in The Enterprise Incident it's the Federation that is the aggressor.
     
  18. dahj

    dahj Vice Admiral Admiral

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    The Klingons in Errand may be slightly less rowdy than their future conterparts, and that lieutenant that gave up all the info to Kirk immediately was an un-klingon-like coward, but you could pluck out Kor and transplant him into 24th century without a hitch ;)
     
  19. Poltargyst

    Poltargyst Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    Of course the Romulans did bad things, they were bad guys. The question is were they presented as cool?

    TOS Romulans: Cool.
    TNG Romulans: Lame.

    Although now that I think about it, it might just be that my opinion of the two shows in general is

    TOS: Cool.
    TNG: Lame.
     
  20. dahj

    dahj Vice Admiral Admiral

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    "The Alternative Factor", Episode 27, March 30th

    Tonight's Episode: A man with a magical beard visits the Enterprise.
    After a string of excellent episodes surely we're onto another winner here...