Spoilers Strange New Worlds General Discussion Thread

The Gorn had enough information on Starfleet to impersonate an actual Starfleet commodore. Remember that Kirk and Co were talking with the impersonator live mere seconds before they beamed down to find the Cestus III Outpost destroyed.

The Gorn also had other information that helped them approach as if they were a friendly vessel, and they open fire with no warning whatsoever. Also they ignored the surrender pleas from the Outpost even after they were informed that there were women and children.

Dialog from TOS S1 - "Arena", also indicates that the original message for the Enterprise to come there was also faked by the Gorn, because they destroyed the Outpost of full two days before the Enterprise arrived. The one Federation Survivor stated no messages came from Outpost personnel requesting the Enterprise to come there.

Also, the Commodore's message specifically requested that Kirk and his tactical people being burned down...

So a number of things are pretty clear:

- The Gorn had a lot of information regarding Starfleet ship deployments oh, and other very personal information about its personnel.

- the Gorn clearly set up a specific situation to determine Starfleet's military capabilities in the sector as well.

So given all of the above it's pretty clear that the Gorn must have captured and obtained information from other Starfleet vessels and personnel that ventured into their territory. The encounter set up in "Arena", was planned and carefully executed by the Gorn. It was not just some random First Contact as far as they were concerned.

 

The discrepancies in the Gorn looks can be just explained as regional versions. The JJVerse Star Trek game had multiple versions of Gorn in it.

 

All true. This proves that the intelligence gathering only happened in one direction. The Gorn clearly had a highly superior surveillance acquisition system developed (that would likely make Section 31 blush) to lure in an established target. On the flip-side, the Federation was completely in the dark as to the Gorn’s identity and intentions. This was likely a part of the Gorn’s SOP. The Romulans, particularly the Tal Shiar, would approve. I recall something about the Romulans having a philosophy of “To be unknowable is to be unconquerable”. The Gorn took this philosophy to an art form.

 

How so? From what I saw, the game broke canon by introducing the Gorn as one extragalactic species invading the Milky Way courtesy of an artificial spatiotemporal anomaly.

 

I mean their multiple looks only. Not what they were doing. Frankly I never actually completed the game.

 

No. It may prove the Gorn had a different philosophy than the Federation when it came to spacefaring. To wit:

- The Federation was all about peaceful exploration. It goes out and gathers what info in can peacefully as well. It scans things and learns what it can from those scan; and DOESN'T go out of it's way to capture and analyze aliens or capture and analyze alien ships that are fully operational and transiting its territory peacefully. They will always attempt peaceful contact with an alien species; and will only respond in force if they deem the alien hostile and a danger to Federation ships and outposts.

- The Gorn are predators. They capture and analyze any alien ship and crew they come across when they are able. When they have enough information, they TEST the military of neighboring species to see it they (the Gorn) are superior enough to both keep them from encroaching into Gorn space and possibly expand Gorn space into neighboring territory. Even when they have the capability and capacity to communicate with an alien species - they will use it to further their aim of testing neighboring species to determine their ability to resist.

 

I just hope they don't only click like the subspace aliens, but also sound like they have a bad cough

 

I know I'll hate myself for this, but what blessed "canon" did that violate?

 

It didn’t break anything there since it was JJVerse. It was actually referenced in Into Darkness

 

No one said where the Gorn came from in "Arena" or how long they'd claimed "their territory." No one knew anything.

 

"broke canon"? how do we know that the primary universe Gorn aren't also extragalactic, only deposited here at different times and places?

exactly

 

It was? Could you be more specific?

The only mention I recall of Gorn in Into Darkness was McCoy making a remark about performing a C-section on a pregnant Gorn. That's it.

I do not recall any mention of the Gorn's place of origin in that film.

 

Lorca had a Gorn skeleton in DIS Season 1 remember.

Though honestly, I do wonder if they might do a bait/switch, and it turns out there are two entirely different alien races which both happen to be named "Gorn."

 

Nope.

 

A TOS Gorn skeleton at that.

 

Well from the various appearances of the Gorn (TOS, ENT, the skeleton, the extragalactic ones in the Kelvin timeline) there seem to be a number of different racial subtypes.

why go through the mental gymnastics of assuming they aren't related, when a less complicated explanation would be that there are a number of different population groups that have segregated themselves or grown apart in other ways?

(i.e. the beefy TOS Gorn are from the northern planets, the skinnier ENT Gorn was from a different strain living in Sector 210498234504938, the ones who are living in an interdimensional extragalactic rift are heavily mutated by Kappa Theta Pi Radiation, etc etc etc)

 

OH NOES, NOT TEH CANNON!!!11!!!on3111!!!

 

The only firm cannon that matters when it comes to the history of the Gorn.

 

Kappa Theta Pi sorority threw the best booze bashes!

Games are at the bottom of the pile of non-canon ephemera, beneath even random name drops and cereal box toys.

 

Did someone say...