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Shoulda separated the saucer?

I don't know the specific episodes to use an example, but wonder if using the battle bridge set for whatever other bridge of the week set, also contributed to them not separating the saucer.
 
It's not necessarily pejorative, but it does try to point out elements of lore that aren't actually canon even though they're so commonly repeated people assume they must be. ... it was something that had just been repeated often enough people assumed it was canon and treated it that way. Thus, fanon.
Ahh. Pulaski was mean to Data! I likened it to a Star Trek Mandela effect. Fanon feels more inkeeping.
 
The original idea, as presented in the first season, of separating the saucer section to get people out of danger, seems to have been dropped pretty quickly, probably to avoid slowing down the story. And also because of the visual effects expense of doing so.

From the second season on, it seems sort of retconned to be that you only separate the saucer section in an extreme emergency, such as an impending warp core breach (i.e., Generations) or in rare circumstances when there is a tactical advantage to doing so (i.e., "Best of Both Worlds"). For better or for worse, it seems that it is accepted and expected that the civilians, even children, on board the ship are going to be along for the ride regardless of how dangerous the situation is.
 
I always think of fanon as the group version of head canon and I don't think of it as a negative so much but as an important distinction between it and canon. People will make assumptions or theories and spread them and they can be so compelling they take on such a life of their own that they can be taken for gospel, or you start to rationalize and explain every production issue, and I'm guilty of that. I guess I'm just saying it's okay to have that distinction. The cool thing is when fanon does become canon like Enterprise naming the founders of the Federation or Discovery with Ni'var
 
There are many things over the year that have become accepted as fact when they were never once stated on screen. For example, is there anything anywhere at all that says that Will Decker was Matt Decker's son? I certainly don't recall that being stated anywhere on screen ever. Yet, it is accepted as absolute fact by Trek fans. That to me is fanon.
 
Not TNG, but I do think it would have made more sense if the USS Odyssey on DS9 had left its saucer behind at the station and the secondary hull went into the Gamma Quadrant. As it is, there is a line in the episode saying all non-essential personnel are being off-loaded (the basic purpose of saucer separation) and they used a set for the bridge which was significantly smaller than what you'd think a Galaxy class ship should have, which wouldn't be as glaring if that were indeed the battle bridge.
For example, is there anything anywhere at all that says that Will Decker was Matt Decker's son? I certainly don't recall that being stated anywhere on screen ever.
That has never been stated onscreen, yet somehow has some sort of official status to the point the box for the VHS release of The Doomsday Machine actually states Matt Decker is Will Decker's father.
 
I agree that it would have been cool if only the stardrive section of Odyssey had gone on the rescue mission, but, as it was, I appreciated them including the line about evacuating non-essential personnel. As evidenced, it was a very sensible decision on Keogh's part. I wish we could have seen more of him before that mission.
 
Ahh. Pulaski was mean to Data! I likened it to a Star Trek Mandela effect. Fanon feels more inkeeping.

Ahh, this is where I saw this comment. I thought it looked familiar. You made similar argument in the the thread "Ethics".

I respectfully disagree. The idea of Pulaski being mean to Data is not fanon or an example of the Mandela effect. She was, in fact, rude to him. Specifically, she called him an "it", which is a derogatory slur likening him to a tricorder. In the other thread someone tried minimizing the insult by arguing Pulaski spoke from ignorance, but that's not true. At the time she made the comment she'd read his service record and was fully aware that he operated as an independent, sentient being.

For the record, I agree that most of other supposed examples of her being rude to Data don't hold water. For instance, it's no big deal that she mispronounced his name. That was ignorance. But even if she was rude to him only once, the fact remains that she was indeed rude to him. It might be fanon to say she was routinely rude to him, but you can't say she was never rude to him at all.
 
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Though it was a bit weird that she asked why it mattered how it was pronounced. She wouldn't have asked that if she'd mispronounced Troi or Picard's names.

People mispronounce my name all the time. It doesn't bother me. To me, a name is just a sound people make to get my attention. I don't place any greater significance on it. But I realize I'm an outlier.

Of course, if someone intentionally mispronounces my name to ridicule me I won't like it, but that's not happened to me since I was a child and dealt with bullies. As an adult, I believe mispronunciations of my name can always be attributed to unfamiliarity or difficulty. Unless it's someone I plan to be dealing with again, I usually don't bother correcting them.

The same is true for misspelling my name. Even my closest friends get it wrong. Doesn't bother me in the least.
 
It might be fanon to say she was routinely rude to him, but you can't say she was never rude to him at all.
I have never said she was never rude to him, it was as you imply...

You'd think she shat in his positronics every episode how people carry on.
 
One big ship > two little ships

It's not necessarily pejorative, but it does try to point out elements of lore that aren't actually canon even though they're so commonly repeated people assume they must be.

"Canon" isn't actually a thing either. There are simply various stories that take various storytelling perspectives. Spock's Brain, Spock's World, and the hottest Spock slash are all equally real, which is to say, not real at all.
 
I'm curious about what would have happened in "Cause and Effect" if they'd separated the stardrive and saucer sections when they realized they were stuck in a time loop. How widespread was the effect?
Who knows? is the honest answer to that. But if the ship had gotten into that time loop before that, then seperating the ship IMHO wouldn't have made any real difference.
 
Who knows? is the honest answer to that. But if the ship had gotten into that time loop before that, then seperating the ship IMHO wouldn't have made any real difference.
Probably not.

But the drive section does have two shuttlebays, so the decompression trick might work, too. (They are smaller bays, but the drive section is smaller and almost certainly the saucer section has a huge chunk of the overall weight, so it balances out for the solution at the end.)
 
It could have been interesting...though would have required some creativity...to see versions of the loop, once Our Heroes were aware of what was going on, where they tried different approaches that were unsuccessful.
 
There are times when it seems they should separate the saucer, but don’t. A few examples I’ve noticed lately.


11001001

Maybe just no time to separate during this crisis. The stardrive is being sent away to go kerblooey, why is the saucer going with it?


The Neutral Zone

You’re heading to the Neutral Zone to investigate the destruction of outposts and possibly confront Romulan warships. It’s a very dangerous mission. Why are you bringing civvies into it? Leave the saucer behind.


The Child

PICARD: Picard.
PULASKI [OC]: I just wanted you to know what risks we're about to take.
PICARD: Go on.
PULASKI: If the most innocuous specimen on the manifest list gets loose, it will destroy all life on the Enterprise in a matter of hours.
PICARD: I understand, Doctor. Do you have a recommendation?
PULASKI: Considering how desperately this is needed, no, I don't. I just wanted you to know what we were carrying.
PICARD: Thank you.

Here’s a recommendation: take the stardrive with only the people needed for the mission, and leave everyone else behind.


The Enemy

This is a big one, because it’s consequential.

Tomalak says, you have our man and he’s dying. You don’t have the means to save him and we do. Deliver him before he dies in your custody.

Picard refuses because he won’t abandon the search for Geordi and the investigation into the Romulan presence.

He has two ships. The stardrive can deliver the dying Romulan and deal with any potential hostilities while the saucer stays behind to search for Geordi and any remaining Romulan agents. Instead, Picard lets the man die.



What do you think of these examples? How about some others?
The real problem with saucer separation, is why? If the whole shop is meant to function together, perfectly, then why?

What I mean is that this is the twenty -fourth century. Even assuming that Mankind is relatively innocent, in terms of prolonged star flight, three centuries there of, don't equal nothing.

The probability of actually encountering something so new, and dangerous that any Federation ship would be destroyed with out warning, is nil, at best. In the oldest versions of the Star Trek The Next Generations Writers Guide, the main Phases, still run off the main warp core. With that gone...

Just how powerful would the Main Hull phasers be?
 
The whole point was that the saucer section could be used to evacuate civilians before taking the ship into a hostile situation.

In any scenario where the E-D encountered the Borg, for instance, bringing civilians into the confrontation if there was time to evacuate them would just be negligent.
 
The problem is to know when to them, know when to fold, know when to Walk away, and know when to run...

Okay so Federation builds their new Uber ship.

After three hundred years of star flight, and it meets things that can overwhelm it? Not realistic.
 
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