The Biology of a Ceti Eel

[cardinal biggles]

Didn't we discuss this not too long ago? I seem to remember mentioning the fact that Chekov is moving up to a standing position from a squatting position when we see him aim the phaser at Kirk.

It's deja vu all over again.

 

[Basill]

Well, I'm sure its been argued to death on any of a number of venues, but its news to me. Besides the fun, I'm just working to get my avatar.

Though now that you mention it, Chekov does appear to be moving up in the manner in which you describe. He's definately still getting his phaser into position as Terrel asks them "Please, don't move."

 

[Unicron]

I think you might be correct, Basill, about the phasers switching places when the scene was reshot. I hadn't really thought about Jedda being unarmed when he is killed (though I'd have to look and see if his hands are visible, or he could still be holding his phaser offscreen). I'll also check and see if the novelization says anything.

 

[Therin of Andor]

Unicron said:
^^ I'm not so sure about that, because there's nothing to suggest he stole Jedda's phaser.

IIRC, it's in the script's stage directions.

 

[Basill]

Unicron said:
I think you might be correct, Basill, about the phasers switching places when the scene was reshot. I hadn't really thought about Jedda being unarmed when he is killed (though I'd have to look and see if his hands are visible, or he could still be holding his phaser offscreen). I'll also check and see if the novelization says anything.

[image]http://img30.photobucket.com/albums/v90/Unicron55/sunshine1.gif[/image]

From what I could tell, he had no phaser in his hands. All his poor little fingers are visible as they disappear in the animated mist. His right arm is closest to the camera and is the first to go, and his left reaches up and is visible right before oblivion. I would think that if the phaser was in either hand he would have clinched it tighter in the shock, but he certainly didn't have time to drop it or loft in into the air, where it would surely have been visible.

Heh... this feels like CSI: Regula I.

Or should I say SFCIS?

 

[SmoothieX]

Maybe "...madness and... death." is optimal

I've wondered if in some cases the death comes from the madness, not the eel.

The eel techncially doesn't kill Terell, he loses his sanity and fries himself.

A madman may kill himself or put himself in a position where someone else has to kill him.

 

[Kryton]

I don't think he was mad...he FELT himself BEGINNING to turn mad but did the right and honorable thing by offing himself instead of being Khan's tool.

Remember, it was his resistance to Khan's order to kill Kirk that caused him to snap.

 

[137th Gebirg]

That whole eel egress scene bothered me from the beginning:

1) Why didn't McCoy give them a complete med-tricorder scan upon their discovery at Regula 1. They could all see how out of it Chekov and Terrel were, not behaving normally. At the very least, McCoy should have suspected some kind of drug-induced behavior and scanned for narcotics or other pathogens. A quick scan would have found a foreign body in both men's heads, and a more effective solution (micro beam-out) could have been initiated without either men having died or gone insane.
2) Why did Kirk kill the eel when he could have allowed McCoy to study it? The first rule of being bit by an insect or snake is to try to preserve it so that doctors know which kind of venom/toxin to treat. If there had been a residual after-effect of the eel's influence, there would have been no way to counteract it.

I loved the movie, but the eel thing really pissed me off.

 

[Data Holmes]

137th Gebirg said:
That whole eel egress scene bothered me from the beginning:

1) Why didn't McCoy give them a complete med-tricorder scan upon their discovery at Regula 1. They could all see how out of it Chekov and Terrel were, not behaving normally. At the very least, McCoy should have suspected some kind of drug-induced behavior and scanned for narcotics or other pathogens. A quick scan would have found a foreign body in both men's heads, and a more effective solution (micro beam-out) could have been initiated without either men having died or gone insane.

McCoy did do that, that's why Checkov told them "he put creatures in our bodies. Do things, But the captain..."

2) Why did Kirk kill the eel when he could have allowed McCoy to study it? The first rule of being bit by an insect or snake is to try to preserve it so that doctors know which kind of venom/toxin to treat. If there had been a residual after-effect of the eel's influence, there would have been no way to counteract it.

He couldn't risk it getting into another member of his crew. Perhaps the Ceti eel and it's pecular effects on the human system were actually already known by starfleet medical by this point in time.



[/QUOTE]I loved the movie, but the eel thing really pissed me off.

[/QUOTE]

Please. You let a scene played for emotion reaction get you "really pissed"?

 

[Basill]

SmoothieX said:

Maybe "...madness... and death." is optimal

I've wondered if in some cases the death comes from the madness, not the eel.

The eel techncially doesn't kill Terell, he loses his sanity and fries himself.

A madman may kill himself or put himself in a position where someone else has to kill him.

True, I've wondered the same, and as I pointed out, that was clearly the way Terrel was offed; by his own hand. But would Chekov have survived if McCoy hadn't been there for emergency triage? Could he have bleed to death of cerebral hemorage had he say been alone in that cave? Did the eel have to come out and might it have gone back in had Kirk not fried it?

Recall Khan mentioning that it killed 20 of his people, and he was careful to stress "it." That's a pretty good study group for the most obvious symptoms at least. Surely not every one of those people managed to blugeon or gut themselves, or leap off a high cliff... etc. Surely the unaffected were able to restrain some of the victims, especially in their suggestive phase, to at least prevent them from harming others later in the madness phase. I wouldn't rule out them euthanizing someone had they reached a horribly agitated state, and they may have had to kill some of the earliest victims in self defense, especially if they had no idea what crisis was upon them. Of course we don't know how many of those 20 victims were affected at the same time or how long there was between the first and final deaths as a result of the eel. Fact is, we simply don't know how the madness and death came about in those subjects. But Khan had studied the creature somewhat and knew to a degree how the eel and his captors would get on with one another. And even if there is no evidence, I have this sneaking suspicion that Khan was right there next to Marla when she died... I wonder what state she was in... Madness or comatose. Fun brain candy (no pun intended)

 

[Basill]

On a side note... did the eels "wrap" themselves, or "rub" themselves around the cerebral cortex? That occupies a pretty large surface area of brain matter does it not? I don't have my DVD handy at the moment to check the subtitles, but I've often heard it referred to both ways. According to Belar in the opening message, the script indicates wrap. But that just sounds goofy to me. Seems to me like it should be "rub" (with a somewhat exotic pronunciation via Ricardo Montalban's accent) since "wrap" sounds like something that couldn't be done without totally destroying brain tissue and rendering the victim completely vegetative much sooner than portrayed. I think that is how my mind interpreted it years ago and to this day I hear it as "rub." I know there are certain old songs I love, that no matter what you tell me the lyrics actually are, I WILL HEAR what I have sung in my head since I first started listening to it.

 

[Therin of Andor]

Basill said:
On a side note... did the eels "wrap" themselves, or "rub" themselves around the cerebral cortex?

Movie, captions, script and novelization all say "wrap", IIRC.

 

[David cgc]

Of course, Khan wasn't exactly in possession of an MRI machine, so it was probably an educated guess what exactly the eels did ones they got to the victim's brain.

 

[Data Holmes]

David cgc said:
Of course, Khan wasn't exactly in possession of an MRI machine, so it was probably an educated guess what exactly the eels did ones they got to the victim's brain.

No doubt based on autopsies performed after their "deaths"...

 

[David cgc]

Well, it's debatable how helpful it would be. After all, the mature eel has to leave whatever part of the brain it rests in or upon at some point, and it probably wouldn't leave the brain in a very neat and tidy state.

Of course, Khan was a hard-core despot. It's possible that he killed someone who had been infected before it ran its course, in order to see how the eel did it's work for the good of everyone else.

 

[Data Holmes]

David cgc said:
Well, it's debatable how helpful it would be. After all, the mature eel has to leave whatever part of the brain it rests in or upon at some point, and it probably wouldn't leave the brain in a very neat and tidy state.

Of course, Khan was a hard-core despot. It's possible that he killed someone who had been infected before it ran its course, in order to see how the eel did it's work for the good of everyone else.

But, surely if he killed the person it would start to leave.

Much better to dissect the cranium of a living host to cunduct such observations...

 

[Timo]

One also wonders how 20 people could be infected by a tiny creature that needs to creep into their ears... Almost two meters up.

Did they all catch the bug while asleep? Or did one or two (including McGivers) catch the bug that way, and Khan and his cohorts then used the bugs in their power struggles on a couple of dozen other victims, much like they were used on Chekov and Terrell? Khan doesn't especially lament the other dead...

On the "where did they get the phasers?" issue, I'm quite satisfied with the explanations given. There are at least three loose phasers there: Jedda, McCoy, Saavik. Then there are three phasers in the hands of the previously unarmed Chekov and Terrell. And the two have an excellent motivation to gather all the phasers they can, disarming their opponents - and they have a good reason to do it quietly and off camera! Quite possibly they also collect Kirk's dropped weapon. (Where does Kirk get the gun he uses for killing the bug, BTW? Does he pick up Chekov's dropped phaser?)

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Therin of Andor]

Timo said:
One also wonders how 20 people could be infected by a tiny creature that needs to creep into their ears... Almost two meters up.

All explained most eloquently in "To Reign in Hell" by Greg Cox.

 

[guardian]

The reason the eel leaves Chekov in the movie is because McCoy injects him with some hypo full of sedative and the eel doesn't like it.

The edit is very fast and poorly shown.

As Chekov collapes in agony, McCoy whips out his hypo and goes to inject him.

Then there is a cut of McCoy holding a different gizmo and looking at him and then the eel leaves and he says, "Good god, what is it?"

They were looking to make the scene fast paced and really couldn't waste seconds showing an insert shot of the injection and the few seconds to give the impression the eel was fleeing from the medicine.
There a lot of little shots missing from the TOS movies that cause slights continuity errors and 'WTF' moments.

 

[SmoothieX]

Therin of Andor said:

Timo said:
One also wonders how 20 people could be infected by a tiny creature that needs to creep into their ears... Almost two meters up.

All explained most eloquently in "To Reign in Hell" by Greg Cox.

That was a damned good read.