Doomsday Machine Question-What Does Decker Exclaim?

[Knight Templar]

The only thing that puzzled me was how it could be from another galaxy if it needed to keep feeding on planets all the time. Not very many of them in the intergalactic void.

That was a point addressed in the ST:TNG novel "Vendetta" where Cadet Picard, during a lecture on the Doomsday Machine comments that it could not have come from "too far" outside of the galaxy due to the lack of planetary bodies in the void.

So the novel later explains that it was built actually just outside the galactic barrier.

But the above poster is right.

If say the Doomsday Machine was in the Andromeda galaxy and accelerated to near light speed, and then drifted, it would enter the Milky Way in about 2.2 million years. Just by coasting.

By the way, there was a line in the James Blish novelization (more like short story the way Blish did it) of the episode that mentioned the machine was 3 billion years old.

 

[T'Bonz]

I personally never understood why some people hated the design of the Planet Killer (including Norman Spinrad).

'cause it looked like a Bugle, a snack food from back then. (Don't know if they still make them) As much as I like this ep, the planet killer always makes me laugh.

 

[Redfern]

I guess that thing is a bit like an "ink blot" test. Everybody perceices something different. I see a robotic "shark" that would give Galactus serious competition; you see a snack food. (And yes, Bugles are still manufactured.)

Sincerely,

Bill

 

[BoredShipCapt'n]

I personally never understood why some people hated the design of the Planet Killer (including Norman Spinrad).

'cause it looked like a Bugle, a snack food from back then. (Don't know if they still make them) As much as I like this ep, the planet killer always makes me laugh.

Exactly! It's all I can ever think of when I see it.

 

[GSchnitzer]

"They say there's no devil, Jim, but there is. Right out of hell--I saw it!"

 

[Timo]

The only thing that puzzled me was how it could be from another galaxy if it needed to keep feeding on planets all the time.

..What I wonder is how Spock could claim that it did come from outside the galaxy.

Or that it gained energy from eating the planets. Spock seems to base this on his study of Decker's tapes, but we never learn how Spock or Masada figured it out, as there's no relevant discussion of the beast's energy levels during the actual episode.

If energy levels were critical to the machine's ability to hop from star to star, they should have been a key concern in the episode. The beast's obsession with eating all the planets may speak of programming aiming at total destruction of targets regardless of their worth (unrealistic for a "doomsday machine", but that part was odd speculation, too, not rationally backed up), or then of a great hunger - but star systems can't provide a steady diet, as they vary in size, so we or the heroes couldn't really draw conclusions on the thing's "unrefueled" range.

For all we know from the episode and its backstory, the DDM had an independent internal power source for motion, and/or for destruction, and could have crossed intergalactic distances with ease - but quite possibly never did.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Tribble Herder]

What I liked about the design of the planet killer is that it looked completely alien. No identifiable features, just this big, metallic, predatory thing.

 

[Alrik]

I personally never understood why some people hated the design of the Planet Killer (including Norman Spinrad).

'cause it looked like a Bugle, a snack food from back then. (Don't know if they still make them) As much as I like this ep, the planet killer always makes me laugh.

Funny Bonz, I always thought the same thing, and yes, Bugles are still around.

The official site published an interview with Spinrad not too long ago. He wasn't very impressed either.

Q: What did you make of the machine they devised?

Spinrad: That was the only thing that was disappointing about it. The original idea, which was complicated, is maybe a machine, but it’s maybe an artificial organism, to serve the same purpose. Then you have the question, “When does an artificial organism become a machine and when does a machine become an artificial organism?" The thing I had in my head was not like the thing that they shot. Gene said to me after I finished the script, “Look, can you draw the thing for us, please?” I’m not much of an artist. I paint a little bit now, but I still can’t do it very well. So I really worked on it. I drew the thing. It had complicated tentacle things that had the laser or whatever on the tips. So the thing looked ambiguous; you wondered looking at it, “Is this alive or is it a robot?” Then, when they shot it, they showed me what they’d do it with. I said to Gene, “After I went through all the work on this, this is what you shoot? It looks like a wind sock dipped in cement.” Gene, having been a pilot, said to me, “That’s what it is, it’s a wind sock dipped in cement. We didn’t have any money for anything else.”

Full article here.

A windsock dipped in cement?

 

[GSchnitzer]

Q: What did you make of the machine they devised?

Spinrad: That was the only thing that was disappointing about it. The original idea, which was complicated, is maybe a machine, but it’s maybe an artificial organism, to serve the same purpose. Then you have the question, “When does an artificial organism become a machine and when does a machine become an artificial organism?" The thing I had in my head was not like the thing that they shot. Gene said to me after I finished the script, “Look, can you draw the thing for us, please?” I’m not much of an artist. I paint a little bit now, but I still can’t do it very well. So I really worked on it. I drew the thing. It had complicated tentacle things that had the laser or whatever on the tips. So the thing looked ambiguous; you wondered looking at it, “Is this alive or is it a robot?” Then, when they shot it, they showed me what they’d do it with. I said to Gene, “After I went through all the work on this, this is what you shoot? It looks like a wind sock dipped in cement.” Gene, having been a pilot, said to me, “That’s what it is, it’s a wind sock dipped in cement. We didn’t have any money for anything else.”

So when Spinrad writes:

"We see the huge funnel mouth, with a blue-hot LIGHT
EFFECT glowing within. An ATOMIC BEAM EFFECT (a
solid beam of blue light) that seems to come from
within the funnel lances out..."

...what he is attempting to describe is:

"It had complicated tentacle things that had the laser or whatever on the tips."

 

[Wingsley]

Exactly! It's all I can ever think of when I see it.

Oh, hilarious!

All these years, I and other family members referred to it as "the giant, rotten carrot". Of course, we never ate Bugles.

I'm glad TOS-R didn't replace the Bugle with something entirely different.

As for the momentum/energy/intergalactic issue, consider this passage:

[Constellation Auxiliary Control]

KIRK: Did you run a scanner check on it? What kind of a beam?

DECKER: Pure antiproton. Absolutely pure.

KIRK: (answers communicator) Kirk here.

SPOCK (OC): Spock here, Captain.



[Enterprise Bridge]

SPOCK: Unable to raise Starfleet Command due to heavy subspace interference.



[Constellation Auxiliary Control]

SPOCK (OC): Attempting to remedy.

KIRK: What about the Constellation's tapes?

[Enterprise Bridge]

SPOCK: She was attacked by what appears to be essentially a robot, an automated weapon of immense size and power. Its apparent function is to smash planets to rubble and then digest the debris for fuel. It is, therefore, self-sustaining as long as there are planetary bodies for it to feed on.



[Constellation Auxiliary Control]

KIRK: A robot weapon that purposely destroys entire solar systems. Why?



[Enterprise Bridge]

SPOCK: Unknown, Captain. However, Mister Sulu has computed the path of the machine, using the destroyed solar systems as a base course. Projecting back on our star charts, we find that it came from outside, from another galaxy.

KIRK (OC): What is the projected course of this thing?

SPOCK: If it follows its present path, it will go through the most densely populated section of our galaxy.



[Constellation Auxiliary Control]

KIRK: Thank you. Stand by, Mister Spock. Kirk out.

MCCOY: This whole thing's incredible. A robot? A machine like that, who would build it?

KIRK: We don't know. An alien race, apparently from another galaxy.

MCCOY: But why?

KIRK: Bones, did you ever hear of a doomsday machine?

MCCOY: No. I'm a doctor, not a mechanic.

KIRK: It's a weapon built primarily as a bluff. It's never meant to be used. So strong, it could destroy both sides in a war. Something like the old H-Bomb was supposed to be. That's what I think this is. A doomsday machine that somebody used in a war uncounted years ago. They don't exist anymore, but the machine is still destroying.

DECKER: Oh, forget about your theories! That thing is on the way to the heart of our galaxy. What are you going to do about it?

From Spock's report of Sulu's findings, I always assumed (and quite a bit of this show is based on imagination, not show-and-tell) that the Starship Constellation encountered a trail of devastated star systems first, followed the the heavy subspace interference, and only later found the alien machine in the L-374 system after having followed well behind it for some time.

There was never any mention of how long the Constellation had been in deep space before confronting the alien machine.

Note that Spock's report about the Constellation's "tapes" (a quaint throwback to another time?) and Sulu's findings does rely as much on conjecture as on actual analysis.

But Spock and Sulu do note a drop in the machine's energy once Decker's shuttlecraft exploded, clearly indicating that Federation starship sensors and/or scanners were somehow capable of gathering enough data to make that analysis and conjecture at least plausible, in-Universe.

 

[Green Shirt]

"They say there's no devil, Jim, but there is. Right out of hell--I saw it!"

Maybe so, but at least they're better tasting than Pringles.

 

[Tribble Herder]

Q: What did you make of the machine they devised?

Spinrad: That was the only thing that was disappointing about it. The original idea, which was complicated, is maybe a machine, but it’s maybe an artificial organism, to serve the same purpose. Then you have the question, “When does an artificial organism become a machine and when does a machine become an artificial organism?" The thing I had in my head was not like the thing that they shot. Gene said to me after I finished the script, “Look, can you draw the thing for us, please?” I’m not much of an artist. I paint a little bit now, but I still can’t do it very well. So I really worked on it. I drew the thing. It had complicated tentacle things that had the laser or whatever on the tips. So the thing looked ambiguous; you wondered looking at it, “Is this alive or is it a robot?” Then, when they shot it, they showed me what they’d do it with. I said to Gene, “After I went through all the work on this, this is what you shoot? It looks like a wind sock dipped in cement.” Gene, having been a pilot, said to me, “That’s what it is, it’s a wind sock dipped in cement. We didn’t have any money for anything else.”

So when Spinrad writes:

"We see the huge funnel mouth, with a blue-hot LIGHT
EFFECT glowing within. An ATOMIC BEAM EFFECT (a
solid beam of blue light) that seems to come from
within the funnel lances out..."

...what he is attempting to describe is:

"It had complicated tentacle things that had the laser or whatever on the tips."

I can just hear the conversation as that drawing circulated through the offices...

RODDENBERRY: Well, can we make this?

JUSTMAN: Sure. Which episode do we drop from the schedule so we can afford this?

JEFFERIES: And what part of next season do we slot this one in?

RODDENBERRY: Okay, so what do we do instead?

JUSTMAN: Well, the script makes a big deal out of the funnel sticking out of the front of this thing. Let's just focus on that, maybe make the whole thing a funnel.

JEFFERIES: (sketches out design) Like this?

RODDENBERRY: That looks good. How cheap can we make that?

JEFFERIES: Just need some wire, a few rolls of Reynolds Wrap, and a small stage light with a rotating filter.

RODDENBERRY: Great! Do it! Now, about "The Immunity Syndrome"...

 

[Maurice]

Note that Spock's report about the Constellation's "tapes" (a quaint throwback to another time?) and Sulu's findings does rely as much on conjecture as on actual analysis.

But Spock and Sulu do note a drop in the machine's energy once Decker's shuttlecraft exploded, clearly indicating that Federation starship sensors and/or scanners were somehow capable of gathering enough data to make that analysis and conjecture at least plausible, in-Universe.

You may have forgotten this exchange, which verifies that the DDM consumes the rubble:

DECKER: Maintain speed and distance.
SULU: It's sucking in space rubble from those destroyed planets. Refueling itself.
SPOCK: We can maintain this speed for only seven hours before we exhaust our fuel, but it can refuel itself indefinitely.

 

[Timo]

Agreed, it is entirely plausible for our heroes to verify Decker's offscreen findings that the thing gets more energetic after eating. It's just something that is never explicated. The tapes make Spock declare that such a thing is "apparent", and Sulu to interpret the feeding behavior as "refueling"; we just lack references to direct sensor evidence, so we can't tell if our heroes are jumping to fatally faulty conclusions here or not. For the sake of the story, we can choose who dropped the ball: was Decker's "Quick, before it feeds again!" approach the only sane one, or should even a hungry DDM have been declared off limits until reinforcements arrived?

the Starship Constellation encountered a trail of devastated star systems first, followed the the heavy subspace interference, and only later found the alien machine in the L-374 system

...Which is somewhat absurd behavior from Decker. He finds destruction, and notes that he can't report it to Starfleet. He moves on, finds more destruction, and finds it's even more difficult to reach Starfleet. He moves on, finds even more, and the jamming gets worse. What command should he give next? Forward, or hard about?

A very short chase through, say, three systems would be justified; Decker could locate a small, vulnerable if incredibly destructive miscreant there and deal with that himself. But any sort of "mounting evidence" (which would be needed for determining that the beast came from outside the galaxy) should logically make Decker veer away and call for help, rather than so obviously waste precious days in doomed pursuit. Or then turn away from the path that has come apparent, and get ahead of the enemy!

Regarding getting help, Kirk knew Decker would be around, although he wasn't 100% sure that a starship sending an SOS would be Decker's. Surely Decker would have known that Kirk would be nearby? And if he didn't know, all the more reason for us to believe that there would be dozens of starships milling about within range, any one of them a possible source of the SOS Kirk hears, any one of them a possible help for Decker in the chase which clearly required the resources of multiple ships even before the enemy was engaged.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Knight Templar]

One of the questions I always had about TDDM was that when the machine first appears, Enterprise had basically been just hovering near the Constellation.

Yet moments later (literally about five seconds) the Enterprise is "being pursued" by the planet killer apparently some distance (though still within transporter range) of the Constellation.

One of the fan remakes of the effects for the episode addressed this by cutting to a scene of Enterprise towing Constellation with a tractor beam while transporting McCoy and Decker aboard. The tractor abruptly cuts off and the Constellation and Enterprise begin to separate (presumably when the planet killer was sited).

 

[Timo]

We have to wonder about the speeds and accelerations involved. If the DDM had such severe trouble outrunning a starship capable of just 1/3 impulse power, the beast should have been absolutely no threat to neighboring solar systems; Decker could have broken off and prepared a defense against it by siring sons and raising them to be efficient DDM-killers! That is, unless 1/3 impulse already represented serious acceleration. And if so, then five seconds of chase should indeed give the two starships wide separation...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Knight Templar]

We have to wonder about the speeds and accelerations involved. If the DDM had such severe trouble outrunning a starship capable of just 1/3 impulse power, the beast should have been absolutely no threat to neighboring solar systems; Decker could have broken off and prepared a defense against it by siring sons and raising them to be efficient DDM-killers! That is, unless 1/3 impulse already represented serious acceleration. And if so, then five seconds of chase should indeed give the two starships wide separation...

Timo Saloniemi

Well, all through the OS there were problems rectifying from of the differences between warp speed and impulse travel. It wasn't basically until TNG that it was made absolutely clear that "impulse" was below light speed ONLY.

In regards to one third impulse, it seems it has been mentioned in both fan and official publications that traveling at "maximum impulse" only amounts to about a quarter of the speed of light and that it takes quite a bit of time to get up near the speed of light on impulse alone.

I would say that the DDM was obviously capable of faster than light travel. Probably pretty fast ultimately. But it took considerable amounts of time to build up its speed which theoretically alllowed a swift starship to evade it (but did nothing for the planets in its path) and while it was also pretty mobile at sublight speeds, its huge bulk made it ponderous with low acceleration which again gave starships a chance to evade.

 

[Timo]

it has been mentioned in both fan and official publications that traveling at "maximum impulse" only amounts to about a quarter of the speed of light

Not in official publications, not as such. The TNG Tech Manual states on p.78 that "normal impulse operations are limited to a velocity of 0.25 c" to avoid time dilation confusion - but speaks on p.75 of "high impulse operations, specifically velocities above 0.75 c". And our heroic heroes would seldom do "normal"...

it takes quite a bit of time to get up near the speed of light on impulse alone

Probably so. Runabouts in DS9 take two to six hours to reach Bajor, even in an emergency - suggesting they take two hours when Bajor is on the same side to the star as the station, and six when it's on the other side, and further suggesting that two hours covers the orbital radius of Bajor. That radius is likely to be in the ballpark of ten light-minutes, just as with Earth, so even at emergency levels of impulse acceleration the runabouts can only average something like 1/6 c over this trip. Starships might do much better, though. And it appears that one only needs to accelerate on such a trip; deceleration is assisted by some sort of weird physics that break the symmetry of Newtonian thrust, and a ship can come to a standstill with minimal engine use. (Subspace drag anchors or something?)

I would say that the DDM was obviously capable of faster than light travel.

...The only other option left open in the episode is that the L-series star systems are much closer to each other than any known real ones. Kirk did establish in the beginning that L-370 was destroyed no earlier than six months ago, yet the beast had moved on to L-374 already. But perhaps the serial designation refers to a very tight cluster of stars? In the Trek world, it appears that even stars that orbit each other can have their own planetary systems.

So yeah, FTL is implicit and basically explicit, but with this little caveat.

And yes, it sounds intuitively correct that the bulky thing would accelerate slowly, even when it comes to achieving warp speed. The other possibility is that the creature could only engage its FTL engines by diverting power from its formidable weapons, and did not wish to do so lightly.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[TOSalltheway]

On the subject of Doomsday Machine I have to admit that Matt Decker is my favourite guest star in TOS. I was so happy when I learned that he did not die in this episode and lived a comfortable life on Earth dying decades later of old age.

What ? You didn't know that? Check out "Star Trek Th New Voyages" episode "In Harms Way" with Williom Windon reprising his role as Decker. I challenge any TOS fan to state that his appearerance does not give you goose bumps

 

[Knight Templar]

Well, if you believe that ST:TNG novel a few years ago, the Doomsday Machine did not "die" in this episode either but simply went dormant.

It died years later after destroying four of the "baby Borg" ships when the Borg mothership consumed it.