LOL, yeah he name checks an "ancestor". That's a fun continuity discussion coming up
Which can be interpreted two ways. Is Spock claiming Holmes as his ancestor -- or Arthur Conan Doyle? Since Doyle is actually the source of the line Spock quotes.
Poll Is continuity important?
- Thread starter F. King Daniel
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Which can be interpreted two ways. Is Spock claiming Holmes as his ancestor -- or Arthur Conan Doyle? Since Doyle is actually the source of the line Spock quotes.
There’s a seven percent chance you’re right.
Well, most of Conan Doyle's/Watson's Sherlock Holmes stories give at least a year when they took place, so that was a big hint.
We know that Holmes and Watson met in 1881, Holmes was presumed dead in 1891, returned to London in 1894, and retired in 1903. It varies beyond that, but that's the basic framework of the stories. (Keep in mind that Doyle wrote 60 Holmes stories over the course of 40 years, from 1887 until 1927, and he wasn't too focused on keeping the dates straight, so all sorts of errors and contradictions occur.)But hey, if you think that Star Trek chronologies get funky, they're nothing compared to Sherlock Holmes chronologies! Hardly any two Holmes chronologists can agree on the dates of any two cases or how many times Watson was married! My own Holmes chronology is here.
I might as well plug my Trek chronology on the same site, too. Part 1, covering the ancient world up to the 23rd Century, is here, and Part 2, covering the 24th Century and the future beyond that, is here. (I need to update it, but I haven't seen the second season of Picard yet.)
There was an article in The Best of Trek back in the day speculating that Sherlock Holmes was really a Vulcan stranded on Earth. It was a fun bit of creative speculation.
I dunno, seven per-cent doesn't sound like much of a solution to me.
Well, most of Conan Doyle's/Watson's Sherlock Holmes stories give at least a year when they took place, so that was a big hint.
If the year is given for when each Holmes film takes place then that counts as establishing the setting for each story, no? Does someone whip out a time-traveling machine to hop back to an earlier film where the audience would see such continuity?
I was going to say it had to be Doyle (and NOT because "O'Doyle Rules!") because Holmes is a fictitious character, and then I had to laugh at myself because so is Spock. But if Holmes is a fiction within the Trek universe - which he appears to be - then Spock could related to Doyle through his mom. There really wouldn't be a need to add unnecessary complications by placing a Vulcan back in Earth's timeline. But what if he was a half-Vulcan... could Spock be his own grandpa? 
I was talking about Doyle's original stories, not the films. The films are a whole different thing. Some of them are directly adapted from Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories, but a lot of them aren't.If the year is given for when each Holmes film takes place then that counts as establishing the setting for each story, no? Does someone whip out a time-traveling machine to hop back to an earlier film where the audience would see such continuity?
Forget the time-travel option. I suggested another perfectly mundane "explanation" in terms of, "oh, this is Sherlock Holmes, Jr." that Universal Studios could have resorted to had they felt it necessary. Plain old heredity certainly exists in the mainstream universe of detective stories, so that option was available.
But my point is the audiences didn't demand or expect any sort of explanation, not even a non-SF one, nor did the filmmakers feel obliged to prove any internal explanation -- beyond wartime patriotism. "Even Sherlock Holmes is joining the fight against the Axis. Buy War Bonds!"
And yet the series continued merrily on its way for another 12 movies without anybody worrying about this grievous violation of continuity. Or demanding an "explanation."
So why are modern audiences so much more obsessed with "canon"? To the extent that it sometimes seems to be getting in the way of them, well, actually enjoying this stuff.
You might have heard about the Our Gang or LIttle Rascals series of silent, and later sound, short films featuring an ever changing cast of children?
When I was a child they were on television and I watched them. And when they showed General Spanky (1936) set during the Civil War, I was shocked. How could the familiar child characters from the early 20th century be fighting the 19th century US Army? That didn't make any sense chronologically to me when I was aged 10 or younger.
And a few years later I read Marco Polo's account of how the Mongols defeated the Assassinas and killed their leader, The Old Man of the Mountains, sometime between about 1250 and 1300 - I didn't rmeember the precise year. And then maybe a year or two later I was reading Eleanor the Queen by Norah Lufts (1955) and during the Second Crusade someone mentioned tthe Old Man of the Mountains and I woundered how he could already be old more than a century before he was killed!
So some readers and viewers did care about fictional characters remaining in their proper historical periods, even before Star Trek or Star Wars or James Bond was ever created.
Have you ever thought about the frame story which ficitionally explains how knowledge of events centurie sin the future has come back in time to the creators of Star Trek? Since no official frame story has ever been created, and probably none will eever be created, there is no way to know how complete the information available to the creators of Star Trek is.
Lots of people complain that many recent shows have starships with more advanced technology happening before shows with less advanced technology. And I wonde rif those complainers have ever stopped to think about how - in the fictional universe of Star Trek with an unknown frame story - much the creators of Star Trek know about the "actual" user interfaces and control systems of starships. With a - presumably forever - unknown frame story no fan can be certain that any creator of any Star Trek production has an accurate knowledge of even one starship's controls.
So the depiction of ship's controls in varius productions may be just guesess by the set designers.
And probably by the eraof even Enterprise real life control systems will ivolve sitting in a chair andputting on a thought control helmet tha puts the neede d data directlyinto the commander's mind and sends his command toughts as instructions to the ship's systems. All the computerinterfaces and control systems in all versions of Star Trek are probably much too primative to be fictionally justified excapt by Starfleet being consciously retro in their cotntrol systems for some reason - which makes varying degrees of retro in various productions a minor detail easy to accept.
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If the year is given for when each Holmes film takes place then that counts as establishing the setting for each story, no? Does someone whip out a time-traveling machine to hop back to an earlier film where the audience would see such continuity?
Some of the Sherlock Holmes stories have full or partial fictional dates, phases of the moon, mentions of contempoarary events, etc. Several books have been written about the chronology of Sherlock Holmes in the Doyle canon.
I note that what is said about the relationship between Holmes and Moriarty in "The Final Problem" and "The Empty House" on one hand, and The Valley of Fear on the other hand, indicates that the two stories happen in an alternate universe from the novel.
Neither Doyle nor his readers had ever heard of alternate universes when they were published, of course. But we have today. And i say that if an author is careless enough to write stories in one series that can only happen in alternate universes, then that series includes stories in alternate universes.
And as I remember, in one story Holmes tells Watson about his first mystery ever, when Holmes was in college. And in another story Holmes tells Watson about his second mystery. And judging by the chronlogical evidence in the two stories, the second story happens later during the lifetime of Holmes, but during an earlier year. Therefore Holmes must have travelled back in time a few years somehow between the two stories.
Neither Doyle nor his readers would have been aware of the time travel concept back when those stories were first published. But we are. And i say that if an author is careless enough to write stories in one series where all of the chronological clues can only be accurate if the main character travels in time between some stories, then that character must travel in time.
Two ways? Only two ways? How unimaginative for a science fiction writer. Possibly the ancestor was an actor who said that while portraying Sherlock Holmes, like Jeremy Brett, Basil Rathbone, William Gillette, and dozens of others. Or maybe some real person like Joseph Bell who may have said something similar that which inspired Doyle.
I was going to say it had to be Doyle (and NOT because "O'Doyle Rules!") because Holmes is a fictitious character, and then I had to laugh at myself because so is Spock. But if Holmes is a fiction within the Trek universe - which he appears to be - then Spock could related to Doyle through his mom. There really wouldn't be a need to add unnecessary complications by placing a Vulcan back in Earth's timeline. But what if he was a half-Vulcan... could Spock be his own grandpa?
A really weird idea would be that Spock in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country was quoting his ancestor Leonard Nimoy portraying Spock in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country!
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There was that one Bravestar episode...
