The Enterprise Incident - Why does Sub-Commander Tal allow herself to be taken prisoner?
- Thread starter cgervasi
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I'm pretty sure I remember Klingons having cloaking devices in TAS, so it never bothered me to see Klingon ships with cloaking devices in the movies.
I think Tal was really into Spock.
That would be the logical choice, what with his slate/green eyes and all!
It was intended to be even smaller by Fontana. Her idea was that it was some key component that could be slipped into a pocket or bag by Kirk, so he wasn’t walking around with this huge lamp under his shoulder.
It also explains why, when Kirk goes into the cloaking device room, he looks everywhere but the giant glowing white orb in the center of the compartment while searching for it, and then he has to trick the Romulan guard into showing him where it is by telling the guard someone wants to steal the cloaking device and following his gaze when he checks if it’s still there, even though it’s the most obvious possible object in the room.
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My treknobabble head canon: Those things are the important security and technological features of the cloaking device. Firstly, the cloaking device is portable for security reasons; it can be removed and locked up when not in use, and it can be easily destroyed to keep it from falling into enemy hands. Secondly, the device itself is a marvel of technology that controls a ship's deflector shields such to bend light around the ship. It is also designed to universally adaptable to all makes and models of ships used in the Romulan fleet. YMMV
I do not find any reference to a Klingon cloaking device in TAS. I believe you might be thinking of the Stasis Field Generator weapon the Klingon ships used in "More Troubles, More Tribbles"
She's probably had a dozen different names in the various novels.
My favorite is the one that the 'extended novelverse' had gone with, Liviana Charvanek.
Not sure how. Starfleet was aware of cloaking back in "Balance of Terror" and then this new device was updated and require additional espionage in the "Enterprise Incident." It definitely looks more like an arms race, with data needed and updates required to keep the device relevant.
Which answers nicely the question as to why/how such an important device could be carried under someone's arm. Kirk didn't need to steal the entire cloaking device. He just needed to steal the new/updated component. Starfleet already knew the basic mechanics of the cloak and that's why Scotty was able to integrate the new component into the Enterprise's existing shield system.
Kinda like the flux capacitor. You don't need to steal the entire DeLorean. You just need to steal the flux capacitor.
I wonder if that was inspired by Livia, the wife of Augustus?She's probably had a dozen different names in the various novels.
My favorite is the one that the 'extended novelverse' had gone with, Liviana Charvanek.
Memory Alpha asserts that "Liviana" is probably from a role Joanne Linville played in an episode of The Twilight Zone, a character called Lavinia, though I think it's also possible it was riffing on her last name.
I figured it wasn't exactly one of Scotty's picture-perfect installs, just enough to scoot past the Romulans and back into the Federation. Kind of like how you can't put a Honda part in a Toyota car...weeeeeeellll, maybe you can, and it'll definitely void the warranty, but the car might run...if it doesn't blow up. (Which I think Scotty said as he was switching on the cloak.)
She's probably had a dozen different names in the various novels.
My favorite is the one that the 'extended novelverse' had gone with, Liviana Charvanek.
LOL
I must've missed that before and don't think I've read the book. Spock heard her name and said it was "rare and beautiful" but that must've been some pretty good Romulan Ale, because to me "Liviana Charvanek" sounds like the name of a school librarian in the upper midwest.
I think they developed it to work with existing shield systems. These systems were already installed on ships and they projected a forcefield that would block objects and weapons. The cloaking system was similar, except it refracted light and sensor pings so they would pass through as if nothing were there.
We know from Balance of Terror and ST:III The Search for Spock that cloaking devices are not perfect. If ships are doing a careful scan, they can detect the presence of a cloaked ship. I imagine Kirk used such methods to detect the distortion from the bird of prey. Kirk only used glasses for near vision; if he had been watching a display closer than a meter away, he would have needed glasses.
I imagine there being an "arms race" of sorts where one power develops a stealthier cloaking device and their enemies develop better sensors to detect the latest cloaking system. The mission in The Enterprise Incident was to steal the cloaking device to develop better detection systems or a Federation cloaking device. As @Ssosmcin points out, Spock and the Romulan acknowledge that the advantage from stealing the clocking device will be fleeting. This "arms race" led to the controversial Treaty of Algeron, in which the Federation agreed not to develop any cloaking device, possibly in the hopes of obviating the need for future covert missions to steal technology from one another.
To me the cloaking device being good but not 100% effective makes logical sense and it works for story plots.
We may not have seen it used but the Klingons did have cloaking technology or mentioned having it in TAS
JB
JB
It's great fun but its plot holes do grate more as I get older. For me, the main annoyances are that it makes no sense that Kirk could simply beam onto the Romulan ship.
Why would the Romulans keep their shields down unless they were beaming themselves? Why couldn't their sensors detect a transporter beam? Why couldn't their internal sensors detect the intruder? The technology has been around for a hundred years and they have no basic countermeasures? Why wasn't one of the Romulan ships battle ready?
I do agree that plumbing alien tech into the Enterprise in mere moments was silly.
I think, as a more Mission Impossible 2-parter, they would have had time to work out solutions to those problems rather than ignoring them.
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There is another possibility.In The Enterprise Incident, why does the Romulan commander allow herself to be taken prisoner?
Possible motivations:
What's going on in the turboshaft conversation?
- She doesn't want to face the consequences of allowing the Federation to steal the cloaking device. She figures the Enterprise will be destroyed. If she's captured and dies on the Enterprise, her record will show she was killed in the line of duty.
- She wants to be with Spock. - This seems unlikely. It seems she's sincere about planning to have him executed immediately after his final statement is recorded.
- She thinks she has a chance of retrieving the stolen clocking device. - We don't see her attempt to do that.
- She hopes her proximity to Spock will abort the transport and keep Spock from escaping.
SPOCK: Deck two. It is regrettable that you were made an unwilling passenger. It was not intentional. All the Federation wanted was the cloaking device.
Unwilling implies she didn't try to get beamed aboard, contrary to what we saw on screen moments earlier.
COMMANDER: The Federation. And what did you want?
SPOCK: It was my only interest when I boarded your vessel.
She's asking if he had any real interest in her. Spock says not at first, implying maybe he had some real feelings for her later.
COMMANDER: And that's exactly all you came away with.
SPOCK: You underestimate yourself, Commander.
She says you got the cloaking device, but you didn't get me because I'm done with you after your betrayal. Spock's disagreeing with that sounds creepy. Maybe he's saying he got to be intimate with her for an hour or so, so he's alright if she hates him now. Worse, since she's a prisoner, it could be construed as saying he actually does have her as a prize of war, whether she wants it or not. She's probably thinking about Kirk smirking when he said moments earlier that rather than putting her in the brig he'd have Spock take her to her quarters.
SPOCK: Obviously. Military secrets are the most fleeting of all. I hope that you and I exchanged something more permanent.
COMMANDER: It was your choice.
SPOCK: It was the only choice possible. You would not respect any other.
I don't know whether "it" was betraying her or being intimate with her. I could see her respecting him for betraying her out of a sense of duty, but I don't see why she would ever respect him deceiving her into being intimate with him.
COMMANDER: It will be our secret.
This implies "it" is their intimacy, since that was secret while everyone knew he betrayed her.
Or is she implying, maybe telling herself, that they both were sort-of falling in love with each other and tempted to betray their countries to be together? I just don't see evidence of that. When Spock was caught, he immediately said in front of witnesses that he was acting on behalf of the Federation to steal the cloaking device. She was going to execute him. I didn't see them as having been in love after the betrayal.
Maybe they just wanted to titillate the audience with the notion of Spock being intimate with a woman, and they just shoehorned that idea into this plot, without intending to be creepy.
Does anyone know why she would allow herself to be taken prisoner and what's up with their turboshaft conversation?
In the real world, they finally determined why women reject some men...
Pharmons.
A woman can smell men who are too closely related...
All Romulan men smell off.
The Romulans had too small a pool.
So the Romulan Commander, got one scent of Spock, and knew. It was a survival imperative.
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