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Spoilers Star Trek: Discovery 2x12 - "Through the Valley of Shadows"

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Dilithum Crystals… no problem. Totally scientific.

Time Crystals… complete BS. Totally bad science.

Trekkies are weird about the fictional magic crystal tropes they’ll accept, even when one of them (Time Crystals) is loosely based on an actual scientific thing.

Many of them have been trained by watching Berman era Trek for years that if even actual science doesn't sound "sciency" enough, its not worthy of being included in their chroniton-rich Star Trek diet.
 
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I'm not sure I really trust these Boreth monks. Tenavik said everyone who came for a time crystal left broken. So every single person who came in has a horrific future? I find that hard to believe.

We all know someone in real life who nothing ever bad happens to. No matter what cruelty or misdeeds they may have committed. We need look no further than the news and history to see that many dictators and war criminals live to an old age peacefully on their ill-gotten gains. I doubt it's different in Trek--which means people coming for the crystals all can't have bad futures.

How do we know the Boreth monks aren't inducing bad future visions and then causing them to happen? That way fear of the time crystals means no one will ever dare take them.

Pike could have had a Klingon spy shadowing him for years waiting for the right time to rupture a baffle plate.

Well, we've seen what messing with time crystals does to people. First Harry Mudd, then Gabriell Burnham and now Christopher Pike. I can buy their reasoning why the most people leave them well enough alone and should if they can possibly avoid it.
 
Well, we've seen what messing with time crystals does to people. First Harry Mudd, then Gabriell Burnham and now Christopher Pike. I can buy their reasoning why the most people leave them well enough alone.
Harry Mudd is probably the textbook example of someone who gets away with practically all of his criminal activity.
 
The drama of listening to how the fustamachingit will detringnomulate the bazingalawhobits out of the wandoodlelahoits before the automajingamabob can reclimanariate the extrobolongnuminator doesn't thrill you as much as watching Kirk going down the maw of the Doomsday Machine while Scotty is cursing the machinery that's buggering the transporter?
We now know what an episode of Voyager written by Dr. Seuss would sound like.;)
 
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I just want to say I hate the term Time Crystal and hate the whole idea of them.

Just bad.
Just curious if you also hate the term given to its real-life counterpart (even though, yes, I know they are different). I've said this in another thread, while I don't really like the term either, I'll give it a pass this time because there are real things called that.
 
Then you'd possibly get a "Final Destination" scenario whereby the same end result under different circumstances.

Star Trek has never been like that. Now of course, if Pike doesn't have the accident, the events of the Menagerie never happen, and that affects TOS canon. It would change the timeline and defeat the purpose of Discovery taking place in the Prime Universe, though Pike's accident is a good 10 years away.

Like I said, his recommendation to Starfleet to up it's maintenance of engineering systems could be coming in season 3 and save plenty of lives, staying with the cadets saves even more. So that by the time he comes to that one incident, his determination to stay has saved a lot more lives than if he'd walked away altogether.

He could stay with the cadets and not have the accident.

That was Kirk, the guy who reprogrammed the Kobiyashi Maru test to make sure he could win a test that wasn't intended to be won. This may seem odd to you, but Kirk and Pike are two different people. Different people chart different paths.

So are you saying Kirk is smart and Pike is stupid? Because not to take precautions is pretty stupid. Hell, he could do everything the same and wear a radiation suit.

Because it could put others in harms way, something Pike will not do due to his nature as a person. Telling Pike to avoid is telling him not to be true to himself.

When I say avoid, I don't mean not show up. I mean take precautions to prevent the explosion that caused the accident. Have a gazillion safety checks. Wear radiation suits. It's noble to give your life to save the lives of others, but if you can save those lives without hurting yourself, I think that's the better path.


No, he knows he will not be horribly mutilated until the "accident." He could be harmed quite a bit between now and then.

If he was harmed quite a bit, then he wouldn't have been capable of saving those kids.

No, he really couldn't. He would have to have left the time crystals behind and abandoned the only course of action they know of to possibly defeat Control. You can't sacrifice the lives of an entire galaxy and come out a hero.

This is something the episode didn't make clear. Why? Let's say Pike does everything exactly the same--takes the time crystals. Now we are 10 years later. Why not take precautions to change his fate? It made absolutely no sense that his fate is sealed if he takes the crystals. What changes if he takes them or not? Why can he change his fate if he leaves the crystals behind and not change them if he takes them--unless taking them erases his vision? And there's no evidence his vision was erased.

Again, They said he could walk away from that fate if he chose another path. They did not say in choosing another path his fate would be a better one. We also know that if Control succeeds all sentient life will ultimately die therefore he would be paying for another uncertain roll of Fate's dice with the blood of an entire galaxy. Talk about going to the Dark Side!

But again, he takes the crystal and defeats Control. Now it's all good. He goes back to Enterprise for a few more years, and gives up command to Kirk. So he still knows that in his future, he will be in that room with those cadets. However, what stops him from making sure that training exercise doesn't go wrong?

It's almost as if Star Trek is saying fate is sealed, and that's that. It takes away free will.

Commodore Decker didn't have to die. If he had knowledge that shoving a Constitution class vessel into the Doomsday Machine would work, he wouldn't have piloted the shuttle into it. The Doomsday Machine would still be destroyed, but a life wouldn't have been needlessly lost. Pike is kind of in that position.
 
Just curious if you also hate the term given to its real-life counterpart (even though, yes, I know they are different). I've said this in another thread, while I don't really like the term either, I'll give it a pass this time because there are real things called that.

Yes.
 
I find that ["We don't really know how "accidental" it was. Section 31 could have been behind it."] very unlikely.

Accidents are "very unlikely" as well. In any event we do not actually know much about Pike's impending unfortunate event. We do know if a future writer of Star Trek were to add Section 31 into that scenario one could not claim it violated canon.
 
When I say avoid, I don't mean not show up. I mean take precautions to prevent the explosion that caused the accident. Have a gazillion safety checks. Wear radiation suits. It's noble to give your life to save the lives of others, but if you can save those lives without hurting yourself, I think that's the better path.
And even if he does so, and takes all the precautions in the world, and it still happens, then what? Even the most highly trained of individuals can still suffer accidents.
 
I think the way Pike keeps things to himself and doesn't tell anyone is illogical and jarring. Look immediately how Riker and La Forge handle things in TNG. It made TNG feel more like a family--

DATA: In relative terms, perhaps not. Nevertheless, it seems clear that my life is to end in the late nineteenth century.
RIKER: Not if we can help it.
DATA: There is no way anyone can prevent it, sir. At some future date, I will be transported back to nineteenth century Earth, where I will die. It has occurred. It will occur.

LAFORGE: So, do you want to talk about it?
DATA: Are you referring to the foreknowledge of my death?
LAFORGE: Yeah.
DATA: I have no particular desire to discuss the matter. Do you need to talk about it?
LAFORGE: Yeah.
DATA: Why?
LAFORGE: Data, this has got to bother you a little.

To put it bluntly, Pike is acting like a non-emotional android Data, not like a human being who would do everything possible to prevent the accident after getting the crystal.
 
Star Trek has never been like that ["Final Destination"].

"Never been like that" is past tense. The whole "time crystal" thing feels more Doctor Who than Star Trek to me, but there you go. It's "never been like that" until it is.
 
To put it bluntly, Pike is acting like a non-emotional android Data, not like a human being who would do everything possible to prevent the accident after getting the crystal.
To me it strikes me as a man who has accepted this as his fate, that it will come about because of the man that he is, not trying to be something he is not.

To put it bluntly, he sees a possible consequence and deems it acceptable and will not change. Stubborn, perhaps, but very human.
 
Yup, these Time Crystals have a curse...sorry, Temporal...spanking....field....thing, oh fuck it, who knows.

All we know is that anyone who takes one, even with the best of all intentions, no matter how selfless, is punished for taking it.

For, reasons?
 
To put it bluntly, Pike is acting like a non-emotional android Data, not like a human being who would do everything possible to prevent the accident after getting the crystal.

Not at all. Captain Pike is behaving like a true hero! "The needs of the many out weigh the needs of the few or the one" and all that. His future terrified him as it was very much worse than death. Sorry, but your statement strikes me as nonsensical.
 
Star Trek has never been like that. Now of course, if Pike doesn't have the accident, the events of the Menagerie never happen, and that affects TOS canon. It would change the timeline and defeat the purpose of Discovery taking place in the Prime Universe, though Pike's accident is a good 10 years away.



He could stay with the cadets and not have the accident.



So are you saying Kirk is smart and Pike is stupid? Because not to take precautions is pretty stupid. Hell, he could do everything the same and wear a radiation suit.



When I say avoid, I don't mean not show up. I mean take precautions to prevent the explosion that caused the accident. Have a gazillion safety checks. Wear radiation suits. It's noble to give your life to save the lives of others, but if you can save those lives without hurting yourself, I think that's the better path.




If he was harmed quite a bit, then he wouldn't have been capable of saving those kids.



This is something the episode didn't make clear. Why? Let's say Pike does everything exactly the same--takes the time crystals. Now we are 10 years later. Why not take precautions to change his fate? It made absolutely no sense that his fate is sealed if he takes the crystals. What changes if he takes them or not? Why can he change his fate if he leaves the crystals behind and not change them if he takes them--unless taking them erases his vision? And there's no evidence his vision was erased.



But again, he takes the crystal and defeats Control. Now it's all good. He goes back to Enterprise for a few more years, and gives up command to Kirk. So he still knows that in his future, he will be in that room with those cadets. However, what stops him from making sure that training exercise doesn't go wrong?

It's almost as if Star Trek is saying fate is sealed, and that's that. It takes away free will.

Commodore Decker didn't have to die. If he had knowledge that shoving a Constitution class vessel into the Doomsday Machine would work, he wouldn't have piloted the shuttle into it. The Doomsday Machine would still be destroyed, but a life wouldn't have been needlessly lost. Pike is kind of in that position.

Because what might happen is that he prepares and dresses (in a radiation suit) for training missions. A (very) similar accident happens which he believes is what he saw. He goes on normally and the actual accident happens.
 
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