I thought so. ;-)
Spock's Rank?
- Thread starter cblmc1296
- Start date
We know two things for sure from Where No Man...:
* Spock is identified as 'science officer' by Kirk.
* Only two people have the 'star' symbol on their insignia patches, Kirk and Spock. They also both are wearing the same color tunics.
Hey, wait a minute. What about this guy?
Indeed. Mr. Alden also wears the star badge on blue shirt. I made this summary a few years ago, trying to make sense of the color/badge/stripe combinations of WNMHGB, but without much success:
That's my favored approach.
--Justin
This probably belongs in the "Make up a trivia fact about ST" thread but I'm going to assume the production team worked out exactly what all the ranks, departments, divisions, and corresponding uniforms should be - but then they got drunk at an after-hours party at the studio and somebody dropped the binder and all the pages fell out and got mixed up, not to be re-sorted back into their proper sequence until after NBC ordered the first 13 episodes! ;-)
Isn't there a rule/law(?) that essentially forbids shows and movies to use 100% accurate rank insignia and uniforms?Nah, but I'd criticize MASH because they showed a lot of three-stripe buck sergeants at a time when the Army didn't use that insignia!Geez. Next thing I know you'll be attacking MASH for its "poor planning" because Klinger's bloodtype changed depending on the script.
^ That law is pretty easy to work around. Open collar with a tie, rearranged ribbons, wearing/not wearing a hat when the opposite is more appropriate, etc.
And there was the woman outside the transporter room in the corridor, same color shirt, one stripe.
Hey, wait a minute. What about this guy?
No, using accurte uniforms is allowed by US law. 10 US Code Sec. 772:
While portraying a member of the Army, Navy, Air Force, or Marine Corps, an actor in a theatrical or motion-picture production may wear the uniform of that armed force if the portrayal does not tend to discredit that armed force.
ETA:
I think that's probably right. Even so, post-pilot TOS did put more thought into the issue than a lot of other SF productions. BSG, for instance, never had any rank distinctions other than some people wore one collar pin and some wore two.
--Justin
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Indeed. Mr. Alden also wears the star badge on blue shirt. I made this summary a few years ago, trying to make sense of the color/badge/stripe combinations of WNMHGB, but without much success:
That's my favored approach.
--Justin
Have to admit I plain missed the guy on Delta Vega.
Does anyone have a screencap of Alden's badge? I haven't been able to locate any on Trekcore and haven't had the opportunity to rewatch the episode yet.
You can see it pretty well when Mitchell first comes on the bridge and relieves Alden at the helm console.
ETA:
Enlarged from Trekcore image:
--Justin
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From what I gather, the practice of "frocking" arose from the inevitable time delay imposed by the lack of faster-than-ship communications in the sailing ship era. It was an opportunity embraced by the navies: the actual promotion of an officer in the field could be delayed due to technicalities so that his full pay would not have to be given to him until the next port call, even if he started acting in his new position and rank earlier on.
Today, instantaneous communications make such "treachery" unsustainable. But Star Trek deals with a navy that once again sends its ships way beyond the communications horizon, and "frocking" might have become a common practice again - at least for ships on long range missions such as the one depicted in "Where No Man" and possibly in the subsequent S1 episodes where the Enterprise is slowly limping home from that failed mission.
That is, Spock may have been "frocked" up to full Commander due to the loss of Gary Mitchell. Both might have been LtCmdrs until that point (at least they wore identical braid), but loss of Mitchell and burndening of double duty on Spock might have more than warranted Spock's promotion in rank.
Whether Spock was the XO or the Science Officer or both in "Where No Man" remains a debatable issue. It is by no means clear if Kirk refers to him as "his science officer" in that famous piece of dialogue, or instead speaks of Dr Dehner who assuredly is one of Kirk's science officers.
At this point, Spock launches into an interrogation of Dehner. There can be two interpretations of this:
1) Kirk wants his science officer Spock to uncover unpleasant facts about Mitchell
2) Kirk wants Spock to get unpleasant facts about Mitchell out of his science officer Dehner
Considering that Spock is the guy wearing the Command star, and the one man with the gall to contradict Kirk, it would be attractive to consider him the ship's XO. But it's fully up to us to decide whether he is the SO as well. Kirk has no reason to chide Spock, yet the tone of the "it's my SO's duty" speech is accusatory, suggesting Dehner is the SO in question - but even that doesn't rule out that Spock could be the Chief SO...
Timo Saloniemi
Today, instantaneous communications make such "treachery" unsustainable. But Star Trek deals with a navy that once again sends its ships way beyond the communications horizon, and "frocking" might have become a common practice again - at least for ships on long range missions such as the one depicted in "Where No Man" and possibly in the subsequent S1 episodes where the Enterprise is slowly limping home from that failed mission.
That is, Spock may have been "frocked" up to full Commander due to the loss of Gary Mitchell. Both might have been LtCmdrs until that point (at least they wore identical braid), but loss of Mitchell and burndening of double duty on Spock might have more than warranted Spock's promotion in rank.
Whether Spock was the XO or the Science Officer or both in "Where No Man" remains a debatable issue. It is by no means clear if Kirk refers to him as "his science officer" in that famous piece of dialogue, or instead speaks of Dr Dehner who assuredly is one of Kirk's science officers.
At this point, Spock launches into an interrogation of Dehner. There can be two interpretations of this:
1) Kirk wants his science officer Spock to uncover unpleasant facts about Mitchell
2) Kirk wants Spock to get unpleasant facts about Mitchell out of his science officer Dehner
Considering that Spock is the guy wearing the Command star, and the one man with the gall to contradict Kirk, it would be attractive to consider him the ship's XO. But it's fully up to us to decide whether he is the SO as well. Kirk has no reason to chide Spock, yet the tone of the "it's my SO's duty" speech is accusatory, suggesting Dehner is the SO in question - but even that doesn't rule out that Spock could be the Chief SO...
Timo Saloniemi
Just to muddy the waters a tad, it appears that at this point in the show's development, the tunic color and the insignia didn't necessarily have anything to do with each other.
A.V.I.A.F.
Captain
Aren't we all supposed to just pretend that WNMHGB never really happened? I mean it was a dress rehearsal (a pilot) to sell the series and was never really meant to be part of the canon. I think the only reason why they aired it was because they had to meet an air-date and were still working on another episode.
Forget about the ep? Probably not. After all, two TOS episodes directly refer to the galactic barrier thing introduced in this episode, and indeed to our heroes' previous familiarity with the thing...
The episode may be forgettable, and in contradiction with what would later be established. But that's true of most Star Trek episodes, and not a particularly good reason to exclude them from overall continuity.
Timo Saloniemi
The episode may be forgettable, and in contradiction with what would later be established. But that's true of most Star Trek episodes, and not a particularly good reason to exclude them from overall continuity.
Timo Saloniemi
Once it aired, it became part of the record. If it had joined the ranks of other unaired pilots, then it could be safely ignored, but sorry, it's in, and always has been.
It also is the clincher in the airdate-order-vs-production-order debate.
Well, that's actually why I started this thread. I know there are a lot of posts to sift through so I'll try to summarize the best I can: I noticed that Spock is referred to as Lieutenant Commander early in the series, yet he wears the 2 solid gold braids of a full Commander.
After much speculation by members who posted here, it seems most likely that the producers just screwed up...and more than once actually, as the character of Giotto in The Devil in the Dark also wears 2 solid braids.
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