Damn straight!There were no "Away Teams" in the original series! They had LANDING PARTIES!
The Tholian Web Spacesuits
- Thread starter Spock's Barber
- Start date
The type of suit that the TOS suits were supposed to be maintained pressure in the body through mechanical action. The suits squeeze the body across it surface -- in effect, enabling it to withstand hard vacuum. Only the area within the helmet actually has pressurized air in it. This is a simplistic description of an actual suit technology that was on the drawing board back then. It is still being considered today since it gives much more freedom of movement than the current pressurized suit designs. Niven and Pournelle describe a more advanced, SF version of this type of suit in The Mote in God's Eye (1974) which was semi-permeable -- allowing the natural perspiration-based temperature regulation system of the body to work with the suit to regulate temperature. Perhaps this is what they had in mind when hypo-ing through the suit.
At any rate, I've always loved the TOS suits since they seem much more advanced than any of the others we've seen in the Trek universe. Some of the pressurized suits from the Next Gen movies look as out of place as 2010's CRT monitors after 2001's prophetic flat screens...
M.
I'm not sure what "articulation" would add to this - the suits either look like skinsuits or then not, betraying the intent behind their design.
It just happens that they don't look like skinsuits at all. They are saggy, just like the contemporary Mercury "Navy Mk IV" suits which were intended to be filled with breathing gases and supposed to balloon in the unlikely event of being forced to venture to vacuum.
But the TOS suits don't balloon, despite being saggy. Does that mean they are skinsuits after all, or perhaps saggy outer layers to a skintight inner pressure suit? Or merely that we only ever see them worn in atmospheric pressure (even if said atmosphere is unbreathable)?
If Theiss wanted skinsuits, he would probably have gone for the rubbery elbow and knee joints associated with such back then (and utilized in 2001 et al.)...
Timo Saloniemi
It just happens that they don't look like skinsuits at all. They are saggy, just like the contemporary Mercury "Navy Mk IV" suits which were intended to be filled with breathing gases and supposed to balloon in the unlikely event of being forced to venture to vacuum.
But the TOS suits don't balloon, despite being saggy. Does that mean they are skinsuits after all, or perhaps saggy outer layers to a skintight inner pressure suit? Or merely that we only ever see them worn in atmospheric pressure (even if said atmosphere is unbreathable)?
If Theiss wanted skinsuits, he would probably have gone for the rubbery elbow and knee joints associated with such back then (and utilized in 2001 et al.)...
Timo Saloniemi
I think the "saggy" part is the most evident in a rear view... (As in so many cases.)
What we see around the knees and crotches admittedly does its best to try and cling to the legs, but the failure ought to translate to ballooning if (and when) the inside were filled with 1 atm breathing air (and not, say, 0.2 atm oxygen, considering how our heroes operate these suits).
But perhaps we're seeing advanced materials in action, and the sagging only goes away when there's a need.
And as we never see these suits being pulled on or off, we're free to believe in a skintight inner layer that produces the pressure without allowing any air in.
Timo Saloniemi
What we see around the knees and crotches admittedly does its best to try and cling to the legs, but the failure ought to translate to ballooning if (and when) the inside were filled with 1 atm breathing air (and not, say, 0.2 atm oxygen, considering how our heroes operate these suits).
But perhaps we're seeing advanced materials in action, and the sagging only goes away when there's a need.
And as we never see these suits being pulled on or off, we're free to believe in a skintight inner layer that produces the pressure without allowing any air in.
Timo Saloniemi
It should be pointed out that apparently Matt Jefferies designed the suits, and Theiss executed the designs.
http://www.trekcore.com/specials/albums/sketches/STTOS_Sketch_Endorian_Jefferies.jpg
The helmets have been criticized as impractical and lacking anything but a forward view, with the visor wrapping behind being a waste of glass. That wouldn’t be true if the visor worked both ways as an augmented reality screen, allowing simultaneous forward and rearward views, and even views in all directions.
The suit is a great, forward looking design. The red and blue hoses evoke an oxygen exchange system for rebreathing. Within the limits of the material used, they also evoke the skintight pressure suits discussed above. Could they be done better today? By tweaking them here and there, sure. But conceptually, they are still among the most futuristic, still undated spacesuits in filmed science fiction.
http://www.trekcore.com/specials/albums/sketches/STTOS_Sketch_Endorian_Jefferies.jpg
The helmets have been criticized as impractical and lacking anything but a forward view, with the visor wrapping behind being a waste of glass. That wouldn’t be true if the visor worked both ways as an augmented reality screen, allowing simultaneous forward and rearward views, and even views in all directions.
The suit is a great, forward looking design. The red and blue hoses evoke an oxygen exchange system for rebreathing. Within the limits of the material used, they also evoke the skintight pressure suits discussed above. Could they be done better today? By tweaking them here and there, sure. But conceptually, they are still among the most futuristic, still undated spacesuits in filmed science fiction.
I agree; they look great and contribute to a fantastic episode. Still drives me nuts that Spock didn't have a tricorder, though.
You would think that far in the future they would have a better solution. Heck, NASA was already doing better right at that time.
TAS found the better answer. Just use a force field. It's more futuristic and does not get you fired.
TAS found the better answer. Just use a force field. It's more futuristic and does not get you fired.
If those suits are interpreted as having a force field for a visor and a rebreather instead of air tanks, they are just as far out and futuristic as the belts in TAS. Add an augmented reality feature and you don’t need a tricorder, which would be tough to see anyway.
I am not saying any of this was intended, only that the design of those suits leave the possibility open far more than any traditional spacesuit would have.
I am not saying any of this was intended, only that the design of those suits leave the possibility open far more than any traditional spacesuit would have.
Agreed.
Unlike most people here I wasn't fond of any of the TOS or TOS movies space suits. However you got the gist of it. You understood what the suits for even if they didn't seems practical,
Loved the Kelvin movie space suits though,
I doubt that TOS could've afforded to put any kind of optical effect around all the actors in every shot they were in spacesuits in that episode, especially in the third season where the budget was slashed. And having them be completely invisible force fields would've looked cheap and cheesy as hell.
The life support belts were originally considered for "The Tholian Web."
From Memory Alpha:
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Life_support_belt
From Memory Alpha:
Although used exclusively in TAS, the life support belt was invented during the run of Star Trek: The Original Series. Judy Burns, co-writer of "The Tholian Web", thought of using battery-powered "force field belts" in that episode, but the series' producers decided to feature EV suits instead. "They felt strongly that if they started something like a force field belt," explained Burns, "it might have ramifications down the line on other stories. I was a novice in those days, but today I probably would have countered that it was a prototype model that had been given to us this one time. In 25 years, we would get it back again." (Captains' Logs: The Unauthorized Complete Trek Voyages, 3rd ed., p. 72)
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Life_support_belt
Huh. Learn something new every day.
Lot's of things look cheap and cheesy on that show. I remember Spock entering the critical "antimater-intermix" formula into the portable box computer. He throws 3 toggle switches and somehow that enters the intermix formula. But, we are free to imagine that the future technology is so advanced that it looks like nothing. I still think cheesy is better than the show representing technology 300 years in the future using "NASA 1960s" type of technology.
That said, I still have a memory of my 4 year old self in the late 1960s seeing those suits on a black and white TV. I'm sure that memory would not exist if they were invisible force fields. So, my opinion is teetering on shaky ground.
Black and white television was where none of us really knew what colours the costumes were in Trek! All we were sure of was Kirk's outfit was lighter than Spock and McCoy's and Scotty's was darker than either of theirs! 
I had a portable television set that I was still using upstairs right up to 1982!
JB
I had a portable television set that I was still using upstairs right up to 1982!JB
That still did not save the red-shirts, although it might have preserved the mystery on who was gonna die.
Yep, the dark grey costumed guys got killed every week but the lighter grey guys survived!
JB
JB
Yeah, we got color in 1981, so grayshirts it was! Luckily I had photonovels, posterbooks, posters, book covers et al. to show me the colors. Seeing the eps in color was pretty cool though.
The big surprise I remember when I saw color at friends' houses was the ending screen of all the mail order ads for records and such where the addresses were in bright colors on a different, solid color background. Striking!
The big surprise I remember when I saw color at friends' houses was the ending screen of all the mail order ads for records and such where the addresses were in bright colors on a different, solid color background. Striking!
As said, as regards invisible magic serving our heroes, TOS hinged on the very thing with the transporter. Cheesy as all hell, but definitely elemental to Star Trek.
Forcefields in TOS (and all the spinoffs) were invisible, too, unless challenged. Modern VFX allows DSC to show more of this challenging than, say, DS9 or TOS did. And TAS just happened to enjoy even greater production freedom there...
Happily, we don't have to think of this exclusively in terms of production economies and invent excuses for the "reality" behind what we see. Star Trek has done the work for us already, by showing a range of options, even if not all of them were seen in the same place and at the exact same time. Kirk in TOS would probably indeed have the belts of TAS (we see something very similar in "Squire of Gothos"), and Kirk in TAS would have the suits of TOS. But there would be a time and a place for both, just like there's a time for t-shirts and parkas ITRW.
Invisible forcefields are always an option, as an interpretation of what we (don't) see. It's just too bad we don't glimpse physical spacesuits in TAS. Or these "lightweight" suits in DSC, although Burnham in the pilot certainly is fully entitled to choosing the heaviest possible armor available!
Timo Saloniemi
Forcefields in TOS (and all the spinoffs) were invisible, too, unless challenged. Modern VFX allows DSC to show more of this challenging than, say, DS9 or TOS did. And TAS just happened to enjoy even greater production freedom there...
Happily, we don't have to think of this exclusively in terms of production economies and invent excuses for the "reality" behind what we see. Star Trek has done the work for us already, by showing a range of options, even if not all of them were seen in the same place and at the exact same time. Kirk in TOS would probably indeed have the belts of TAS (we see something very similar in "Squire of Gothos"), and Kirk in TAS would have the suits of TOS. But there would be a time and a place for both, just like there's a time for t-shirts and parkas ITRW.
Invisible forcefields are always an option, as an interpretation of what we (don't) see. It's just too bad we don't glimpse physical spacesuits in TAS. Or these "lightweight" suits in DSC, although Burnham in the pilot certainly is fully entitled to choosing the heaviest possible armor available!
Timo Saloniemi
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