Star Trek: Axanar

[beamMe]

Earth/Terra - it's the same word.

I also think using Terra instead of Earth may be something from the 80s novels which this film takes after.

It's not the same word. One's a dead language and the other's the English name of the planet. Star Trek always referred to Earth which is natural. They also referred to our race as human so they wouldn't sound like a 50's B movie.

I understand that at this time there would be people from Earth who were not human but I always like the way the folks on B5 referred to them as Earthers and their funny foreign ways.

Yes, it is the same word.
There is nothing "natural" about calling our planet "Earth" in a sci-fi setting unless you happen to speak English as your first language. "Erde" would be a hell of a lot more "natural" to me in reference to that big blue marble.

Like the names of Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Venus, Neptune, Uranus were used for the other planets, Terra "gave" hers to the Earth.

Why would aliens in a sci-fi setting prefer a certain modern language over an older and neutral name?

 

[Deckerd]

Well duh I guess because they're all speaking English maybe?

 

[Psion]

Anyone here good at the Klingon language (or at least passable) - could spell out in Klingon (using Marc Oakrand Klingon dictionary and Phrase book) what Admiral Rameriz is saying in Klingon "The strategy of least respect" thing as well as Sam Travis saying about the Klingon tactic called the "devourer" . please

Funny you should ask. Before going to bed this morning, I sat down and tried to work out the proper translations and came to the conclusion they just made up their own words rather than refer to Okrand's work. Which, given the unusual grammar and structure, is probably okay when you're worried about bigger things.

Devour/Devourer:
You heard the English word differently than I did. I heard "devour" only, so translated based on that. Okrand's Klingon hasn't defined a specific word meaning "devour" (although it's possible for there to be one), so what you do is find one that's close and then modify it using prefixes and suffixes. The closest word in Klingon is "Sop" which means "eat" in English. Obviously, there's a different connotation between eat and devour; the latter being more aggressive and definitive. There's an emphatic suffix for Klingon verbs "-qu'" which verbally underscores the word which precedes it. So eat's Sop becomes devour as Sopqu'.

The er on devourer is probably best handled with the suffix "-wi'" which turns an action into a noun. Sopwi' means one who eats. Sopwi'qu' -- one who devours.

Strategy of Least Respect:
This caused me some trouble. I don't claim to be an expert on Klingon grammar, but the order is generally object-verb-subject, the opposite of English. "I feel good" in English is constructed as "Good feel I" in Klingon. But there's no real subject in "strategy of least respect", just an object "strategy" and a verb "respect".

Respect is "vuv" in Klingon, and there are a couple of adverbial words we can apply to show less respect. "loQ" means "slight" or "a little bit", and "not" means "never". Thus we get "loq vuv" or "not vuv" to mean little respect or no respect ... uh ... respectively.

The word "strategy" is the simple noun "Dup". I see no need to modify it here. It's not a big strategy, or a little strategy, so let's just stick with "Dup."

Putting the sentence together, we get "loq vuv Dup" or "not vuv Dup" to mean little or no respect strategy. Even better, let's put a conjunction in there to say "little or no respect" -- "loq not ghap vuv", although I'm not certain I can do that with adverbs like that. But if I can, the whole sentence "little or no respect strategy" is "loq not ghap vuv Dup".

 

[skree]

@Psion. I have to agree that the words seem to be made up rather than actually using Mr Okrand's work. The closest thing I could come up with (to what Rameriz and Travis are saying and this is phonetically by the way): vucha'chu'vItu = Strategy of least respect (strategy), naQcha'wIS = devourer (tactic). Also, the "Strategy of least respect" could be further (or better) translated as the strategy of contempt or Stratagem of contempt or Method of contempt. This is just my two cents worth by the way.

 

[dswynne1]

No we don't. There are plenty of people that have no issues whatsoever with that, so that's a gross overstatement.

No, it's not. And I'm not talking JUST on the issue of Sonya Alexander being called names. Some don't like how the new 'Trek films are being produced. Some don't like one fan production over another. Heck, some don't like TOS, preferring TNG due to it being more utopian and less "military" bent. In other words, we ALL have our biases as to how 'Trek should post-TOS, and NONE of the productions since TOS are like TOS in tone and scope, include the the first six films. So, don't tell me that what I said is a "gross overestimate" of the issue at hand. Personally, I don't have problem with PtA, because, as I alluded to in my statement, regarding the depiction of Peter Kirk in Phase II, it's this production interpretation of 'Trek lore. Haven't there been people here critiquing the crew over the use of the ships seen in Star Trek '09? Exactly. Again, I no problem with PtA because it is their story to tell. And if that story is done well, more power to them.

And trying to pick a fight with me is a tad counter-productive, especially since you missed the entire point of what I said to begin with.

Not picking a fight here. Just saying you said we ALL have issues. I don't. I know more people that don't. I know people that accept all series and movies for what they are (even fan-films), without issues. You can believe that or not, that's your choice. All I know is, saying ALL is an overstatement.

If you think that's picking a fight, well.... Lemme just say that telling people to get bent (one of your other posts) says more about who's picking fights here then you might like to think.

Anyway, for the full feature, I hope that there will be actual battle scenes that will have the characters demonstrate what happened at the Battle of Axanar, which would be the highlight of the entire production.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Fact of the matter is that we ALL have issues with how fan productions have depicted the TOS era through a modern lens.

No.

That's definitely untrue. Not all of us have issues with how fan productions have depicted the TOS era through a modern lens.

 

[137th Gebirg]

^^^ Agreed. They all have their positives and negatives but I have yet to see a fan film project so totally bereft of merit that it would have been better off not being made. It could also be argued that this project would likely never have existed without the others that came before it.

Unilaterally stating that everyone has problems with them would be patently false.

 

[urbandefault]

"Queen bitch whore" was probably the literal translation. In the original Klingon the insult was probably much more elegant. Klingons are like that. Elegant.

On the other hand, I think JGH's pronunciation of whatever it was he said in Klingon was a bit enthusiastic for a human.

I'm fairly certain that it's Martok, playing the role of J.G. Hertzler.

Good call.

 

[Amaris]

"Queen bitch whore" was probably the literal translation. In the original Klingon the insult was probably much more elegant. Klingons are like that. Elegant.

On the other hand, I think JGH's pronunciation of whatever it was he said in Klingon was a bit enthusiastic for a human.

I'm fairly certain that it's Martok, playing the role of J.G. Hertzler.

Good call.

I got to meet him a few years back, his hair was white and cut short, he was wearing a cowboy hat, and sunglasses, and I heard his voice before I saw him, and of course I knew right away who it was.

Bob O'Reilly on the other hand, I sat by him at a table, in a bar, for hours before I realized it was him.

 

[beamMe]

Well duh I guess because they're all speaking English maybe?

That's the real-life explanation; though in Germany they are all speaking German, and in Italy they are all speaking Italian...

"Terra" is universal, neutral in all languages, which is why it makes sense that in a sci-fi setting the political entity that is our planet would be called by that name.

 

[Ithekro]

Interesting that they didn't use Sol. Though I guess they were being specific to the planets rather than their stars.

But yes, Terra tends to be a goto word for Earth by some alien races. One assumes that it is a majority term for those that would be viewing the documentary in-universe, so it was used by the likes of John Gill rather than Earth, which is used by at least part of the Human population for the third planet in that solar system.

 

[F. King Daniel]

I was reminded of Worf's "Sector 001... the Terran system" from "Best of Both Worlds"

"Terra" was used in the FASA Trek game, from which PtA draws inspiration. I'm guessing that's ultimately why. In one of their manuals (I forget which), they specify that "Terra" is used by non-natives whereas "Earth" is used by those born there.



Back to the film for a second, I loved that Tony Todd mentioned Robau as one of his three best captains. I was really hoping to see Faran Tahir pop up as a talking head!

Also, the new movie stardates were a big help in figuring out when everything took place.

 

[Deckerd]

Interesting that they didn't use Sol. Though I guess they were being specific to the planets rather than their stars.

But yes, Terra tends to be a goto word for Earth by some alien races. One assumes that it is a majority term for those that would be viewing the documentary in-universe, so it was used by the likes of John Gill rather than Earth, which is used by at least part of the Human population for the third planet in that solar system.

But this is a pre-TOS production and in ST they called it Earth. So even in-universe it's wrong.

 

[beamMe]

Interesting that they didn't use Sol. Though I guess they were being specific to the planets rather than their stars.

But yes, Terra tends to be a goto word for Earth by some alien races. One assumes that it is a majority term for those that would be viewing the documentary in-universe, so it was used by the likes of John Gill rather than Earth, which is used by at least part of the Human population for the third planet in that solar system.

But this is a pre-TOS production and in ST they called it Earth. So even in-universe it's wrong.

From Memory Beta

It is often called Terra, its Latin name, by many non-Humans throughout the Federation.

Or we could go by the Enterprise opening credits and all call it Erde.

 

[Deckerd]

Funny how aliens are all Latin scholars.

 

[Ithekro]

They thought it sounded better than calling the planet Dirt.

 

[Mage]

They thought it sounded better than calling the planet Dirt.

You know, as horrible as Transformers 2 was, that line cracks me up every time.

Personally, although it's fun to theorize about why aliens and humans alike keep mixing up Sol, Terra and Earth in so many sf-films, series and novels, in the end.... does it really matter, as long as the point comes acros? The point being, what planet they are talking about?

 

[beamMe]

They thought it sounded better than calling the planet Dirt.

You know, as horrible as Transformers 2 was, that line cracks me up every time.

Personally, although it's fun to theorize about why aliens and humans alike keep mixing up Sol, Terra and Earth in so many sf-films, series and novels, in the end.... does it really matter, as long as the point comes acros? The point being, what planet they are talking about?

Larsaf III, if you'd ask someone from the Planet Arkon in the Perry Rhodan-Universe.

 

[Mage]

They thought it sounded better than calling the planet Dirt.

You know, as horrible as Transformers 2 was, that line cracks me up every time.

Personally, although it's fun to theorize about why aliens and humans alike keep mixing up Sol, Terra and Earth in so many sf-films, series and novels, in the end.... does it really matter, as long as the point comes acros? The point being, what planet they are talking about?

Larsaf III, if you'd ask someone from the Planet Arkon in the Perry Rhodan-Universe.

See, that makes it all completely clear.

 

[Jeyl]

And I'm trying to say you should be offended by it.

How about you let others decide for themselves what they should and should not be offended by?

Ohhhh shoooooot. That was an error on my part. Let me make my stance perfectly clear.

I DO NOT WANT TO TELL YOU HOW YOU SHOULD FEEL ABOUT THIS SUBJECT. If you're not offended by that moment in Axanar or don't think much of it at all, that's perfectly fine.

Due to my negligence I didn't catch that the sentence was missing the word "not" and it came out saying that you should feel offended. That is a completely wrong thing to say. If I have offended, I am sorry. I really don't want to tell anyone what to think.