It's the newest and most redundant slang terms which ginormously throw me off.
But we should return to the topic of Dupe Sol-3, though it won't take us all that far.
Parallel Earth: Oh, kind'a weird. Oh well. WHAT?!
- Thread starter Admiral Jean-Luc Picard
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But we should return to the topic of Dupe Sol-3, though it won't take us all that far.
I say it all happened in a Dyson Sphere…This is literally a quarter of the series.
In Adrian Spies' script for Miri, he simply notes the planet as looking like "another Earth." I believe this was Spies' (who was not an SF writer) clumsy way of saying the planet should appear Earth-like. I think the "producers" (I know not who) simply decided to take it literally.
Sir Rhosis
Sir Rhosis
Well, as the (generally not that good) Fanfic-Author that I am, I'd say, that Miris planet is Mondas - pre Cybermen. ^^
That would make sense why it doesn't really feature after the teaser. I'd bet the "parallel worlds" concepts in play from early in production also got interpreted a little too literally as well.
I wonder how many of those were from "the pitch".
I was thinking of American flag planet when I wrote that since it was one of Roddenberry's ideas for the second pilot, so it had been around since nearly the beginning.
I always liked the implication from the ages of Wu and his dad that Earth was the duplicate planet...that Omega IV had those two things first.
(And before someone mentions it, yes I know someone who posts here wrote a tie-in novel to explain all that away. Kind of takes the fun away, IMO)
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Near the end of season 2. It's not without moments of "Huh?", but it's still, IMHO, one of the above-average "Hey look, it's a planet almost like Earth, something we've never encountered before again!" stories. The Spock/McCoy scene is always a highlight, and some of the twists and turns are really good.
This is another one was indeed a pilot option, which also kept the most "parallel Earth of it all" stuff toward the end, while also telling a creative sci-fi/horror story.
TOS did hang a lampshade on the idea:
Hodgkin's Law of Parallel Planetary Development
Hodgkin's Law of Parallel Planetary Development was a biological theory first postulated by A.E. Hodgkin. The theory was that similar planets with similar environments and similar populations tended to gravitate toward similar biological developments over time. Although initially applicable only...memory-alpha.fandom.com
It's something of a cool theory. For life, as we know it, a planet has to be within x distance of a star for proper temperature and gravity. Ditto for rotation, and other factors. That a species would develop sentience and then have a history just like humankind is where things start to get wonky, and for set construction and budget constraints and to avoid overuse of stock Trek sets redressed (the Romulan ship interior is a semi-obvious redress of Enterprise corridors), it's a neat way to still tell storytelling. Most of the "parallel Earth" stories need to have that suspension of disbelief factor at full, but there's still a gem of storytelling in there. "Bread and Circuses" and "The Omega Glory" both are oddly easy to watch. YMMV, the other thing about the parallel development episodes is tone: Some are utter serious, others are utter jokey. Depending on which tone one prefers, one will be easier to roll with...
It's been said already about budgetary issues, as having to create a new planet and monster design that can't be used elsewhere is expensive. Even if a story about sentient silicon lifeforms were to be made, how often can they be reused before "diminishing returns" takes effect? There's a reason why the Horta didn't return, other than "this big roving pile of steaming cow pie covered in ketchup and mustard" doesn't always make for compelling storytelling. The costuming was expensive, difficult to move around in, and note the silicon nodules got to be repurposed - even three ended up as bits in the Engineering section set. That said, the Horta story on its own is a pretty great example of season 1, exemplifying what made TOS great. So did "The Man Trap" despite it all, in terms of how it addressed the last living being of a near-dead species as having some very complex situations being hinted at, even if the story could have been avoided if Crater got the salt tablets right away. (Remembering, of course, that - while salt is needed as an electrolyte that plain old tap water doesn't have - too much can lead to dehydration as a result too, how cool is that... um...)
"A Piece of the Action" was inspired by the premise of "President Capone" in Roddenberry's pitch.
https://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/reports/40_years/trek_pitch.pdf
Guys, I offer an apology. My memory is not perfect, or even near perfect. Adrian Spies' script DID STATE that the planet was an EXACT duplicate of Earth in size and land masses, etc. I misremembered and posted without double checking.
No explanation, though. It just is...
Mea culpa,
Sir Rhosis
No explanation, though. It just is...
Mea culpa,
Sir Rhosis
We forget the details. I started writing a reply to your post, offering a conjectural production theory for why the fx showed exact continents when the script did not call for it. I really had it figured out.
But then I checked the transcript, and my theory disintegrated. So I never posted it.
I always thought the Horta looked like my mother's tomato meatloaf, while others have said it reminded them of lasagna or a pizza gone wrong. At least we all agree that it looked like food.
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Yarnek certainly resembled a distant relative.
I would like to say that Organia is staged to look more like Old Testament Biblical than Medieval. Except for the men wearing pants.
I kind of like the fact that the writers and producers knew they had an issue - they were under so many constraints from the studio that they almost had to do the parallel Earth (and M-class planet or *actual* Earth, twice) eps - and yet threw in knowing references or attempts to explain. The Preservers, the Old Ones, Hodgkin's Law, the Organians, Excalbians, Melkot, and Trelane creating fake environments that would suit the Starfleet crew, and in "Miri," "[ i ] t seems impossible - but there it is."
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James Blish eliminated the parallel Earth aspect and explained the place as a long-ignored Earth colony settled centuries earlier. Similarly, he posited that the Klingons were an offshoot human civilization as well.
At the time both "Errand of Mercy" and "Miri" were written, Trek continuity was open enough that one might posit that it took place as far as 800 years in the future.
A neat thing about being into Trek in the 1960s was that the interweaving of concepts and implied continuity between it and prose sf of the previous few decades were fresher, and a good deal more interesting IMO than trying to connect all the bits and pieces within the series to create some kind of separate "universe." Blish, in particular, liked to throw in bits of technology and future history from his own non-Trek stories to widen the scope of the series beyond what we saw and were told onscreen.
Writers for various media work with organizational, budget and time constraints that render "write better so you don't have to do that" moot in many cases. Yes, it's lovely to have the time and allowable verbiage and unlimited "budget" of the printed page to produce a fantasy work that's internally completely consistent as well as unchallengable in its story logic. Calling writers "lazy" or sloppy because their approach doesn't scratch your particular itch with regard to plausibility is a little bit entitled, IMO.
At the time both "Errand of Mercy" and "Miri" were written, Trek continuity was open enough that one might posit that it took place as far as 800 years in the future.
A neat thing about being into Trek in the 1960s was that the interweaving of concepts and implied continuity between it and prose sf of the previous few decades were fresher, and a good deal more interesting IMO than trying to connect all the bits and pieces within the series to create some kind of separate "universe." Blish, in particular, liked to throw in bits of technology and future history from his own non-Trek stories to widen the scope of the series beyond what we saw and were told onscreen.
Writers for various media work with organizational, budget and time constraints that render "write better so you don't have to do that" moot in many cases. Yes, it's lovely to have the time and allowable verbiage and unlimited "budget" of the printed page to produce a fantasy work that's internally completely consistent as well as unchallengable in its story logic. Calling writers "lazy" or sloppy because their approach doesn't scratch your particular itch with regard to plausibility is a little bit entitled, IMO.
Well, those periods are 500 to 1,000 years apart.
On the other hand, Organia looks like Monte Python Medieval Europe.
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