The Tholian Web Spacesuits

[Gary7]

When I was a kid, I thought the suits looked really cool, very realistic. With high-res screens now, and remastered media, they don't look quite as good. I didn't think they needed to be so body conforming. Ditto on all the helmet complaints. I think they could have done a better job if they weren't so pressed for time with shooting.

A personal force-field would've been a great idea, if they'd had the funds to create a slight aura or other visual cue that the force-fields are active. Of course, you'd need more... portable breather of some kind, like a backpack.

Btw, those red/orange suits -- those weren't spacesuits. They were simply bio-hazard suits, and rather poor ones at that (not sealed off from the environment). Looked like they were made from shower curtains. Glad they were gone after the Naked Time episode.

 

[Maurice]

...A personal force-field would've been a great idea, if they'd had the funds to create a slight aura or other visual cue that the force-fields are active...

As I pointed out in the past, that was never ever going to happen. 1 minute of 35mm film at 24 frames second is 90 FEET of film. In one TOS memo Bob Justman quotes the cost of animation for things like phaser beams (straight lines) at $100 per foot. No way was Trek ever going to pay $9,000 per minute of film for such forcefield belt animation. <20 minutes of that would eat up an entire episode's budget. Even if they'd had the money, they would have found better ways to spend it.

 

[Gary7]

^ That's why I said "IF they had the funds."

 

[Maurice]

And that's why I said "Even if they'd had the money, they would have found better ways to spend it."

 

[JonnyQuest037]

Looked like they were made from shower curtains.

They were.

 

[Phaser Two]

Not sure what all the fuss is about; I beamed down into a hazardous environment yesterday wearing only my shower curtain and emerged none the worse for wear. Right, Richelieu? HAHAHAHAHA

 

[Commishsleer]

Not sure what all the fuss is about; I beamed down into a hazardous environment yesterday wearing only my shower curtain and emerged none the worse for wear. Right, Richelieu? HAHAHAHAHA

Yes and Spock and that other dude beamed down to the planet. Spock kept his shower curtain on and lived while the other dude took it off and he died.
And on that very planet, one of the scientists was found in a shower without a shower curtain. He died too.

 

[The Old Mixer]

It was nearly curtains for the entire crew!

 

[Marsden]

Just to be that guy:

I know how bad it looks, "They're made of shower curtains! And not even the good ones that have duckies and turtles!"
But that's just the source material the prop people used. Think about how cold it must have been at that place for those people to have frozen solid. Would you wear a shower curtain to keep warm? Those suits must have been some kind of barrier to the environment, if TORMOLEN didn't botch the contagion procedures, everything would have been fine. But did he? Maybe those suit were only for heat protection, Spock did have them decontaminated before stepping on the transporter but because the "infection" was from "water changed into a complex chain of molecules" who would decontaminate against that?

What can we conclude? Is it really Joe's fault? Were the shower curtains merely heat barriers not intending to keep out contaminates because they were going through decontamination upon return? Am I just rambling because I didn't sleep well and have the flu? Bullshit or not, you be the judge!

 

[Commishsleer]

No it was Joe's fault because he took his glove off. Took the helmet off. The camera zoomed in on it.
Classic scifi mistake.
Still he didn't deserve death for it.

Talking about it so much makes me want to get one of those shower curtains and make myself a suit for Halloween.

 

[Maurice]

He didn't take the helmet off. He reached under it.

 

[Commishsleer]

He didn't take the helmet off. He reached under it.

Yeh but he broke the invisible seal by moving his hand in there to scratch.
And if there was no invisible seal then the suits were useless as biohazard protection.

Perhaps that's why they changed suits by the time of the Tholian Web adventure. Not that those suits saved them either.

 

[Maurice]

After all these years and the scripts being sold you'd think what those suits were would be well-established. So, let's look at the final draft script...

SCENE 2
...They wear cold weather gear... take in the condition of the room, move with precision...​

Ergo not intended to be biohazard suits. Just hot shower curtains.

 

[PCz911]

They were.

Were they really... or is are you just joking?
If so....that's pretty ingenious.

 

[Maurice]

Quick aside about another question... is there a bowling alley? Well, the script doesn't answer this definitively, but Riley's dialog in the script makes it clear he's making a joke about why he picked the "bowling alley", and goes on rather longer:

RILEY​

........Attention
crew...there will be a formal
dance in the ship's bowling alley
at 1900 hours... all personnel
will have a ball.

(laughs)​

A little antique humor there. For
the occasion all female crewmen will
be issued one pint of perfume from
ship's stores. All male crewmen
will be raised one pay grade to
compensate. Stand by for further
orders.
​

When Kirk and co. finally get into engineering...

RILEY​

(with a heart filled
with regret)​

Now there won't be a dance in
the bowling alley tonight.​

Another detail, which explains why the briefing room doors were supposed to not snap open when Spock falls back against them (albeit they didn't quite film it this way):

As Spock steps through the doors and they slide shut
behind him... he swings a blind gesture at the wall beside
the door... trips the lock... presses back against the
doors... arms out... battling for control...​

...albeit Kirk still walks in with no problem, so so much for the "lock".

​

 

[aridas sofia]

After all these years and the scripts being sold you'd think what those suits were would be well-established. So, let's look at the final draft script...

SCENE 2
...They wear cold weather gear... take in the condition of the room, move with precision...​

Ergo not intended to be biohazard suits. Just hot shower curtains.

Thank you for pointing that out. Fifty years and I always assumed they were biohazard suits. After all, the temperatures on Sigma Draconis 6 in “Spock’s Brain” maxed at 40 and yet the standard uniform was able to compensate to 72. Of course, those Psi 2000 temperatures maxed well below 40, but still... Those red shower curtain suits just look like biohazard suits.

An Nuclear/Biological/Chemical protective suit:
http://c7.alamy.com/comp/F7FX8B/fir...suits-practice-for-an-emergency-in-F7FX8B.jpg

A USN anti exposure worksuit:
https://lifesavingsystems.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/Orange.jpg

 

[Commishsleer]

Quick aside about another question... is there a bowling alley? Well, the script doesn't answer this definitively, but Riley's dialog in the script makes it clear he's making a joke about why he picked the "bowling alley", and goes on rather longer:

RILEY​

........Attention
crew...there will be a formal
dance in the ship's bowling alley
at 1900 hours... all personnel
will have a ball.

(laughs)​

A little antique humor there. For
the occasion all female crewmen will
be issued one pint of perfume from
ship's stores. All male crewmen
will be raised one pay grade to
compensate. Stand by for further
orders.​

When Kirk and co. finally get into engineering...

RILEY​

(with a heart filled
with regret)​

Now there won't be a dance in
the bowling alley tonight.​

Another detail, which explains why the briefing room doors were supposed to not snap open when Spock falls back against them (albeit they didn't quite film it this way):

As Spock steps through the doors and they slide shut
behind him... he swings a blind gesture at the wall beside
the door... trips the lock... presses back against the
doors... arms out... battling for control...​

...albeit Kirk still walks in with no problem, so so much for the "lock".

​

I've read a book/fan fiction piece somewhere about the bowling alley as a holographic projection sort of like the WII game play (except better). And they could use the same area for dances, basketball etc.

Maybe Spock locked the door from the inside so if you wander about the room gesturing excitedly you're not opening the door accidentally..Maybe there's another way to lock the door to the outside.
Maybe Kirk can walk in with no problem because he's the captain and he's allowed wherever he wants to be on the ship.

After all these years and the scripts being sold you'd think what those suits were would be well-established. So, let's look at the final draft script...

SCENE 2
...They wear cold weather gear... take in the condition of the room, move with precision...​

Ergo not intended to be biohazard suits. Just hot shower curtains.

The question them becomes why weren't they wearing a biohazard suit, Same as on Tracey's ship, Miri's planet, any alien ship. Even on Decker's ship - they didn't know what had happened to the crew, they all could have had some terrible disease.

 

[Maurice]

The question them becomes why weren't they wearing a biohazard suit, Same as on Tracey's ship, Miri's planet, any alien ship. Even on Decker's ship - they didn't know what had happened to the crew, they all could have had some terrible disease.

The real answer is—or course—akin to the one they gave for why they didn't have seatbelts to keep them from falling out of their chairs: "Because then the actors couldn't fall out of their chairs." In this case, it would be: "Because then they can't catch diseases."

 

[Timo]

The stories stay consistent there, though: in general, biohazards are not expected or brought up when landing parties beam off their safe ship into the unknown, and here, nobody suspects a biohazard until after poor Tormolen catches said. And apparently, he gets drunk real fast, and thus fails to report on his touching on things.

What's less explicable there is the nature of the contamination. What is that red stuff, and why does it crawl up to attack Joe? A big drunken pet amoeba of some sort?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[ItsGreen]

Profiles In History
Icons & Legends of Hollywood Auction

June 5-8, 2018