If Enterprise launched with the Xindi saga...

[Cyclopean]

Nebusj said:For comparison, by the way, in the same time frame ``quasar'' made The New York Times 39 times.

Actually, for comparison, you should mention how many times the NYT uses the phrases 'atomic arms' or 'atomic weapons' for 'nuclear' weapons during that time-frame. That would be more germane. To do otherwise is disingenuous.

They seem to do so often, by the way, Your source seems to indicate that the two--- nuclear and atomic--- were pretty much interchangeable in the public mind, if you can judge from headlines and leads. For instance, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.

That's 22 uses of 'atomic' describing nuclear weapons or armament, out of the first 150 search results out of 879. Many of the others use interesting phrases like 'atomic reactor,' which have fallen into disuse, and which suggest that 'nuclear' and 'atomic' are not deployed consistently even now.

Oh, and even more to the point: 'atomic' seems the far more common word in TV and film sci-fi during the period. There were 15 films with 'atomic' in its title released by 1966, and only one with 'nuclear'--- a Royal Canadian Air Force training film.

It seems ST writers felt 'atomic' was the more evocative word to use. Did they literally mean 'fission' weapons? Can we know for sure?

You know, Nazi means something.

Yeah. Given the tone of this discussion, I think 'canon-fundamentalist' is the more appropriate term.

 

[zenophite]

I can't believe you guys are making such a big deal over what are essentially generic terms. Atomic weapons, Nuclear weapons , tomayto tomahto....

either one can be used in place of the other and only current linguistic fashion really determines which one is used. It's not the same as using fission to mean fusion or vice versa.

In regards to the original subject of the post.... it may have been a boon in terms of actually having a direction that was missing in the first two seasons, the Xindi arc still had the problem of offering very little character development.

Since TNG trek has suffered from the same sort of perfect-pod-people type characters that have gone through absolutely no palpable changes between year 1 and year 7.

 

[Anwar]

zenophite said:
I can't believe you guys are making such a big deal over what are essentially generic terms. Atomic weapons, Nuclear weapons , tomayto tomahto....

either one can be used in place of the other and only current linguistic fashion really determines which one is used. It's not the same as using fission to mean fusion or vice versa.

I'm just saying that if they went with modern sensibilities for the show (to keep a modern audience) they'd use modern terms like "nuclear" or "fusion" over "atomic" but if they did then the established fanbase would have a cow for changing the term from what was said back in the 60s, essentially saying that modern sensibilities had no place in the show and neither did a modern audience.

So its a lose-lose situation: lose the established fanbase audience or lose the modern audience.

 

[Smiley]

Even to the modern viewer and the overly anal person, atomic and nuclear weapons both mean "things that make really big explosions" in the context of a TV show.

Besides, Trek fans are experts at rationalizations. If they can reconcile lithium/dilithium, United Earth/Federation/UESPA, and the many other inconsistencies in TOS, then atomic/nuclear is a piece of cake.

 

[Anwar]

Then why did they howl their guts out over all the easily rationalized stuff in ENT, like the "subspace radio" thing and "no visual communications" not really meaning that they didn't have FTL communications or viewscreens?

 

[zenophite]

Yeah. Given the tone of this discussion, I think 'canon-fundamentalist' is the more appropriate term.

"Trek-Nazi" that's my new favorite term of the week

 

[Anwar]

It's hardly new, I mean we already had Trek Nazis in "Patterns of Force" and "Storm Front"...

 

[zenophite]

Anwar said:
It's hardly new, I mean we already had Trek Nazis in "Patterns of Force" and "Storm Front"...

I mean it in the sense that Cyclopean described as a fundamentalist of trek canon.

 

[EnsignRicky]

The general viewing public probably would have gotten confused, lost interest and wandered off much sooner. That was the problem with Trek, starting with the Dominian War. The casual Trek fan does not possess an encyclopedic knowledge of the entire universe. Many of them have never seen every episode, and after a while probably fell out of the loop. Unlike the original series where you can shuffle the episodes like a deck of playing cards, the newer incarnations required a bit more dedication. For example, I love Science fiction and Fantasy, yet I've never seen 'Lost', 'Heros', '24', 'Jericho' or the likes. Why? Because I didn't see the first episodes, essentialy missing the boat. Don't get me wrong, I love the concept of a continuing story arc. Babylon 5 taught me that years before anyone else was doing it. It also taught me that it does indeed take a lot of dedication to get the most out of it. Not that this is anything new, Soap Operas have been doing it for years.

 

[Smiley]

Even in the arc episodes of DS9 and ENT, though, you could get a sense of what was happening in the galaxy at large. It's not fundamentally different from a sitcom like I Love Lucy. If you caught one of the road trip episodes at random, then you might not know the whole story of Ricky's movie deal, but you got enough exposition to make the episode make sense.

 

[Nebusj]

EnsignRicky said:
The general viewing public probably would have gotten confused, lost interest and wandered off much sooner. That was the problem with Trek, starting with the Dominian War. The casual Trek fan does not possess an encyclopedic knowledge of the entire universe.

So ... how does a story about an attack from space from a source we never really heard of before require an encyclopedic knowledge of the entire Trek universe?

Also, the ``need to watch every minute of every episode ever'' excuse to avoid continuing storylines is a really silly, overblown one. Actual TV shows provide this thing called ``exposition'' in which the essential background is provided -- either through an introductory ``previously on $show'', or better by casual references -- to people who haven't seen the previous shows. Honest, you can dip in and out of Lost. Many people do.

 

[Anwar]

Heck, if it gets really bad just have one episode be Archer compiling a message to Earth that's a recap of everything that's happened thus far in the Xindi story as military intelligence or something.

 

[zenophite]

I think the main problem I had with the Xindi arc is that it shouldn't have been the Xindi at all IMO. I think Enterprise should have been structured to build up to the Romulan War with increasing tensions each season until the pot boils over and that the Romulan War should have been largely the impetus for the original members band together into the federation.

I thought it was a bad idea that the Archer character seemed to be getting setup as the main initiator of the federation

 

[EnsignRicky]

Nebusj said:

EnsignRicky said:
The general viewing public probably would have gotten confused, lost interest and wandered off much sooner. That was the problem with Trek, starting with the Dominian War. The casual Trek fan does not possess an encyclopedic knowledge of the entire universe.

So ... how does a story about an attack from space from a source we never really heard of before require an encyclopedic knowledge of the entire Trek universe?

Also, the ``need to watch every minute of every episode ever'' excuse to avoid continuing storylines is a really silly, overblown one. Actual TV shows provide this thing called ``exposition'' in which the essential background is provided -- either through an introductory ``previously on $show'', or better by casual references -- to people who haven't seen the previous shows. Honest, you can dip in and out of Lost. Many people do.

Yeah, I concede that an encyclopedic knowledge wouldn't be of much use for this show. If anything, it would probably hurt it. And I suppose if they started the Xindi arc from the beginning there wouldn't be any problem. However, miss a few episodes and your back to my original point, a lot of people would feel out of the loop and potentialy never come back.

 

[Anwar]

zenophite said:
I think the main problem I had with the Xindi arc is that it shouldn't have been the Xindi at all IMO. I think Enterprise should have been structured to build up to the Romulan War with increasing tensions each season until the pot boils over and that the Romulan War should have been largely the impetus for the original members band together into the federation.

I thought it was a bad idea that the Archer character seemed to be getting setup as the main initiator of the federation

After "Nemesis" Paramount blamed the Romulans for the failure of the movie and told the ENT team not to do Romulan stories, and by extension lay off the Vulcans as well. That's why they didn't delve more into the Vulcan-Andor thing or use the Romulans more and had to make up a new enemy.

Also, if Archer wasn't important then why would we want to watch a show about a bunch of losers who never did anything important, while Kirk Picard and the others got to be the important figures they were?

 

[Kirby]

The real problem I had with Enterprise was season 2. Season 1 was fine for establishing characters, and showing how humans started out as minor players in the universe. The Xindi arc should have started in season 2 and continued at least part way into season 3, possibly ending with the sphere builders eradicating the Xindi (or maybe the Xindi were all sucked back into the sphere builders dimension).
From there, the show could have done the mini-arcs from season 4 and built upon the Vulcan/Andorian conflict, and then jump into the Romulan war and the founding of the Federation.
Oh yeah, and change that god forsaken theme song...

 

[MattJC]

Anwar said:


After "Nemesis" Paramount blamed the Romulans for the failure of the movie and told the ENT team not to do Romulan stories, and by extension lay off the Vulcans as well. That's why they didn't delve more into the Vulcan-Andor thing or use the Romulans more and had to make up a new enemy.

That's ridiculous.
The Romulans were barely in the damn movie.

 

[KayArr]

I wouldn't have watched. I liked season 1 best, then 2, then 3, then 4. Still loved it in the end, but I liked the first 2 seasons the best for sure.

 

[zenophite]

That's ridiculous.
The Romulans were barely in the damn movie.

Agreed. If anything its because the TNG+ Romulans were largely cardboard cutouts of the versions in TOS. I'd prefer the Romulans to be written more as they were originally intended - passionate vulcans rather than somber, evil vulcans.
And will they please stop making such obvious references to the Roman empire? Yeah we get it already - Romulans, Rome, Romulus and Remus, yeesh.

 

[Anwar]

The Romulans were almost Aliens-of-the-week on TOS. They were only in two episodes of the entire series. The Cardassians were pretty much the TOS Romulans (or TOS Klingons) of TNG.