Reconciling "The Tholian Web"

[Wingsley]

I'm wondering if there is any way to reconcile these passages from the TOS ep "The Tholian Web".

I've underlined specific lines, but the exchanges between characters are, at times, confusing. I'd like to read what other forum members think of how these passages go down. Is there a way to reconcile what is happening here, and how the situation unfolds, that is not so contradictory?

NOTE: this thread is about "The Tholian Web", not ENT's "In a Mirror, Darkly"

Captain's log, stardate 5693.2. The Enterprise is approaching the last reported position of the Starship Defiant, which vanished without trace three weeks ago. We are in unsurveyed territory.

[Starship Enterprise Bridge]

(You could cut the tense atmosphere with a knife.)

SPOCK: Captain, we are registering very curious readings from all sensors.

KIRK: Specify.

SPOCK: I cannot. According to our instruments, space itself is literally breaking up. There is no known phenomenon which would account for these readings.

KIRK: What about sensor failure?

SPOCK: Negative. I have run a complete check on all systems.

SCOTT: Captain, we're losing power in the warp engines!

KIRK: How bad is it?

SCOTT: We can barely read it, but I don't like the looks of it! And I cannot find out the cause!

CHEKOV: Captain? Visual detection of an object dead ahead!

KIRK: How about it, Spock?

SPOCK: Fascinating.

KIRK: Explain.

SPOCK: There is virtually no sensor contact. No mass analysis. No trace of radiation. We see it, but our sensors indicate it is not there.

(As they close in, the bright fuzzy thing on the screen becomes recognizable.)

KIRK: The Defiant!

[Starship Enterprise Transporter room]

(The landing party are wearing silvery space suits.)

O'NEIL: Locked in on the Defiant Bridge, sir.

How can O'Neil use the Transporter mechanism to be "locked in" on something the sensors cannot confirms is even there?

[ On the Bridge of the Starship Defiant ]

MCCOY: Jim. The Captain's neck is broken.

SPOCK: The ship is still functioning, Captain. It is logical to assume the mutineers are somewhere aboard.

KIRK: Use the ship's sensors to locate them. Kirk to Enterprise.

SCOTT [OC]: Scott here, sir.

KIRK: Prepare to beam over a full security squad on my orders.

SCOTT [OC]: Aye, aye, Captain.

SPOCK: Captain, there is no sign of life aboard this vessel.

KIRK: Odd, Mister Spock. Very odd. Spock, you stay here with me. Chekov, get down to Engineering and life support systems. Doctor McCoy, check out the Sickbay. Kirk to Enterprise: Cancel the security squad and stand by for further instructions.

What is "odd" about the above passage is that the Enterprise's sensors are not able to confirm the Defiant's existence, yet Spock can determine that the Defiant is still functioning (on some level?) and use Defiant's sensors to determine there are no lifeforms aboard.

If we assume that the discrepancy is due, at least in part, to the Defiant being caught in some kind of interdimensional limbo, perhaps caught between universes, then how can the Transporter and Communicators work between the Defiant and the Enterprise?

[Starship Enterprise Bridge]

SCOTT: Aye, aye, Captain. Standing by.

SULU: I can't get an accurate fix on the Defiant, Mister Scott, but I know it's drifting away from us. Shall I correct for range, sir?

SCOTT: Aye, I think you're right. Keep us within beaming range, but not too close.

Again, Sulu cannot get an accurate fix on the Starship Defiant, but O'Neil was somehow able to beam a boarding party of four officers over to the derelict vessel.

[Starship Defiant Sickbay]

MCCOY: The best I can do is get all the readings I can get and analyze them later.

[Defiant Corridor]

(McCoy kneels beside a slightly fuzzy crewman lying on the floor, and reaches out to touch him. His hand passes through the body.)

MCCOY: What the devil?!

KIRK [OC]: Bones, what is it?

[Defiant Doctor's office]

KIRK: Bones, what is it? Answer me!

(McCoy's hand passes through a PADD and a desk.)

[Defiant Bridge]

KIRK: Answer me!

[Defiant Doctor's office]

MCCOY: Jim, this ship is dissolving! My hand just passed through a man...

[Defiant Bridge]

MCCOY [OC]: ...and a table!

KIRK: GET BACK UP HERE ON THE DOUBLE!!

This scene is visually very effective and well acted, but troubling on more than one level. If the Defiant is "dissolving", how was the Enterprise Transporter mechanism able to lock onto it? And how are the boarding party officers able to walk about, use the turbo lift, and function in what looks like 1g artificial gravity?

[Enterprise Transporter room]

Scott is telecommunicating with Kirk aboard the Starship Defiant:

SCOTT: Everything! That ship you're in is fading out, and it's ripping the innards out of this one!

[Defiant Bridge]

SCOTT [OC]: It's jamming our transporter frequencies. I've only got three of them working, and I'm not sure of those! One of you has got to wait!

[Starship Enterprise Bridge]

(A strange, garish orange figure with triangular eyes (possibly) appears against a blue and pink tie-die background.)

LOSKENE [on viewscreen]: I am Commander Loskene. You are trespassing in a territorial annex of the Tholian Assembly. You must leave this area immediately.

SPOCK: Spock, in command of the Federation star ship Enterprise. Commander, according to the Federation, this area is free space.

If this is "unsurveyed territory", how can the Federation be certain that this region is "free space"? Spock's later comment about the "renowned Tholian punctuality" suggests the Federation is already familiar with the Tholians, so why wouldn't the Federation and Tholian officials have already delineated that the place where the Defiant vanished was claimed by the Tholians?

 

[MANT!]

Technology should never get in the way of a good story.. perhaps they used "visual" targeting for the transporter (Mark One Eyeball or the TLAR sight (That Looks About Right) As to unsurveyed territory The Louisiana Purchase was "Unsurveyed Territory" prior to several expeditions to determine exactly what it held..yet the British had competing claims to some of that land to the North and West..but that wasn't discovered till later..

 

[Albertese]

I would suggest that the Defiant was coming and going so the Enterprise sensors effectiveness would go up and down depending on how far removed "interuniversally" the two ships were relative to each other. Since the crew are physically in the ship which is interphasing, they would be subject to that ship's environment, and increasingly so as time goes on. I posit that as things move (such as McCoy's arm) can carry a residual spacetime lag when passing through a table or a man which are in a slightly different phase. This is how Kirk got himself caught: he being still in the physical volume of the Defiant as it finished phasing into the alternate universe.

It's all weird and complex, but I'm willing to sign off on it and enjoy the story.

--Alex

 

[Crazy Eddie]

If this is "unsurveyed territory", how can the Federation be certain that this region is "free space"?

I'll again push my pet theory that "claimed space" is only that within a certain definite radius around a planet that has been settled and developed by any particular side; say, one light year radius. Spock could very well be referring to the fact that there are no planets or stars habitable to Tholian life within that radius and therefore the Enterprise is, legally, in free space.

And the Tholians are just being jerks.

SPOCK: According to the Federation, this is free space.
LOSKENE: It is not!
SPOCK: Is too!"
LOSKENE: Is not!"
SPOCK: Is TOO!! Fuck it... we're here to rescue a stranded ship, and then we'll be on our way!"
LOSKENE: No you are not!
SPOCLK: "Are too!"
LOSKENE: "Are not!"
SPOCK: <sigh>

 

[Wingsley]

Could it be that, as the Enterprise approached the last known position of the Defiant, they were looking visually because they were already aware that their sensors and scanners had been giving them odd readings, and so they had already launched probes ("The Immunity Syndrome")?

And could it be that, after initially discovering the derelict Defiant, Enterprise launched or beamed over at least one other probot to investigate and discovered the inter-dimensional issue and learned how to deal with it?

It might go like this:

1: Enterprise sights the Defiant.
2: Off-camera action: Enterprise launches probe that flies toward Defiant, then closes in, then flies between Defiant's nacelles. The probe telemetry stopped until it came out the other side, Spock analyzed the probe's recordings, and figured out how to scan and use a transporter to beam a probe directly into Defiant's hangar deck (in case it were needed). The probe reported minimal power on-board, and negligible signs of life support mechanism activity without actually seeing any crew decks.
3: Kirk and company beam aboard Defiant.

Does that make sense?

 

[Timo]

If we assume that the discrepancy is due, at least in part, to the Defiant being caught in some kind of interdimensional limbo, perhaps caught between universes, then how can the Transporter and Communicators work between the Defiant and the Enterprise?

Bridging weird borders between realms is a known capability of the transporter ("Mirror, Mirror"), so that could be part of the explanation.

However, I think it's simply that the Defiant is winking in and out of reality, and the transporter caught the ship at a particularly advantageous moment. That moment passed, possibly without our heroes realizing the chilling implications; they got lucky again later on, but Kirk did not.

Beyond that, I agree with Albertese that the heroes aboard the derelict would slowly begin to "follow the Defiant rules", and start to interact with the ghost ship while ceasing to interact with their native realm. As with episodes of "The Next Phase" ilk, gravity would be something that works well even in weird phased realms, and adaptation is quick... First, it's their spacewalk boots that take the brunt of creating the 1g illusion, but soon it is the ghost of the Defiant's gravity systems.

If this is "unsurveyed territory", how can the Federation be certain that this region is "free space"?

By their say-so? Both sides in that discussion are posturing, to tactical gain. Spock would probably again be lying his ears full in order to end up on the winning side.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Maurice]

LOSKENE [on viewscreen]: I am Commander Loskene. You are trespassing in a territorial annex of the Tholian Assembly. You must leave this area immediately.

Annex means they've taken the territory. The Federation thinks it's unclaimed space, even if they haven't surveyed it.