Things I Hate About Star Trek

[Praetor]

I think we'll need to set up a 'things I like about Star Trek' thread!

Now on with the hate,( warning: the following rant is the personal view of one Thor Damar and should not be considered canon).

1) People who either whinge about Star Trek being either too left wing or not left wing enough! The amount of times I've seen 'Liberal' or 'Conservative' used as swear words really leaves me surprised and unimpressed. (please note that this includes people from both ends of the political spectrum and those who do not hold to any political beliefs. In short I'm meeting you at both ends you damn hippies)
ST takes place 400 years after the 20th century so using the same tried cliches of late 20th/early 21st Century American political discourse strikes me as very foolish.

2) The technobabble: this is an obvious one that really doesn't need elaborating upon so I'll only remark upon the fact that this has made trek a laughing stock amongst our fellow nerds.(and ordinary people of course).
Which brings me to...

3) The forced humour: this was evident in the first few seasons of TNG, were one character (often Data) would make a awful joke and the whole bridge crew would titter like a studio audience watching Two and A bloody Half men, forchristssake.
Sometimes they just tried too hard.

4) Broca and the Breen: Just where in Gre'thor did they come from exactly? Introduced in only the last 3-4 episodes of DS9 there was no rhyme or reason for their sudden appearance. The Breen are now a powerful race of warriors who have the almighty Klingons shaking in their boots with an energy damping weapon of doom that no-one has seen before, they then attack earth (which no one has done before, with the exception of the Borg) and seem to be a potent threat to the rest of the Alpha Quadrant!
My question is, where the frak have these guys been hiding for the past hundred years or so?
And then there's Broca. I'm not sure why this guy was produced, perhaps the writers wanted us to still have a Cardassian to hate? I don't know. What I do know is that Broca was an awful character, a cringing , cowardly traitor who was too stupid to realise what was really happening. I really felt for the poor sod who had to play him.

5) The Klingons: Some of you might be familiar with my 'Klingons started the Dominion War' rant so I won't go over it again. What I will state is that I found the Klingon's sense of smug superiority and racism to be disgusting to the extreme.

6) The smug self righteousness of the Feds: Imagine the 'USA first' crowd or the 'great in great Britain' morons but even louder.

7) The Shippers: Why, dear God, Why?

8) The Wounded (as in the TNG episode): I have several problems with this, mostly to do with the fact that the Cardassians are made out to be a pathetic joke. Their Warship is easily disabled by the Enterprise, the Uniforms are to be frank, silly looking and the less said about the stupid ruddy headgear the better.
Also Picard's sanctimonious lecture on loyalty to Gul Macet is a picture perfect example of point six, in my not so humble opinion.

9) The Romulans: Why the Erabus did we not see more of these guys? They had some of the best episodes of TNG, the late and great Andreas Katsulas played one and the Romulan Star Empire is one of the most interesting and compelling civilizations in the Trekverse(after the Cardassian Union of course).
We should have seen a lot more of them if you ask me.

10) Star Trek fans who make a list of their pet peeves and rant on and on about them...erm.

A great list, Damar.

 

[Thor Damar]

And then there's Broca. I'm not sure why this guy was produced, perhaps the writers wanted us to still have a Cardassian to hate? I don't know. What I do know is that Broca was an awful character, a cringing , cowardly traitor who was too stupid to realise what was really happening. I really felt for the poor sod who had to play him.

I love Broca because he gave the Female Founder a chance to break lose and just be angry. That's all he was good for.

There you go, the 'Legate' was merely a punching bag for a pissed off dying shapeshifter with massive genocidal tendencies who was upset that the AQ wouldn't lie down and accept the rule of the Master Race. (You can probably tell that the Founders are another group of beings that I have a certain contempt for)
I suppose she couldn't just go and have Weyoun killed again.


Thanks for the kind words preator!

 

[Myasishchev]

Hybrids. I hate the notion of Vulcan-human, Klingon-human, Cardassian-Bajoran, whatever-whatever hybrids. It's just so damned ridiculous. And it's a continuing problem that never goes away. It's not a one-off failure to pass 3d grade science like Threshold was. It's a mistake that compels me to turn off part of my mind for every hour of TOS and for large segments of DS9, shows I otherwise adore. It's really just infuriating.

 

[Thor Damar]

Hybrids. I hate the notion of Vulcan-human, Klingon-human, Cardassian-Bajoran, whatever-whatever hybrids. It's just so damned ridiculous. And it's a continuing problem that never goes away. It's not a one-off failure to pass 3d grade science like Threshold was. It's a mistake that compels me to turn off part of my mind for every hour of TOS and for large segments of DS9, shows I otherwise adore. It's really just infuriating.

Absolutely with you on this one Myasishchev, It's almost as ridiculous as a theory that all bipedal sentient beings in the Galaxy were all seeded by one particular race! Can you imagine THAT ever happening?
Also with every hybrid it's always the human part that has the 'good' qualities and must struggle with the 'alien' side of their heritage. yes it's the Humans are superior fallacy again.

 

[Deckerd]

Since you have to check your credulity in before turning ST on, there's really no point in hating little bits of it for being unrealistic! Hate the bad scripts or the lazy use of fantasy to fill in where a good story should have been but saying that one particular aspect is less realistic than others is just daft, since it's all impossible.

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

Hybrids. I hate the notion of Vulcan-human, Klingon-human, Cardassian-Bajoran, whatever-whatever hybrids. It's just so damned ridiculous. And it's a continuing problem that never goes away. It's not a one-off failure to pass 3d grade science like Threshold was. It's a mistake that compels me to turn off part of my mind for every hour of TOS and for large segments of DS9, shows I otherwise adore. It's really just infuriating.

Absolutely with you on this one Myasishchev, It's almost as ridiculous as a theory that all bipedal sentient beings in the Galaxy were all seeded by one particular race! Can you imagine THAT ever happening?
Also with every hybrid it's always the human part that has the 'good' qualities and must struggle with the 'alien' side of their heritage. yes it's the Humans are superior fallacy again.

I choose to suspend disbelief on the genetic aspects, though in my own work I at least intend to show that there is a lot of medical help required in the case of a most hybrids.

I do think, though, that we saw one reversal of that stereotype, though--Alexander in his adult years. Seems to me that the source of his klutziness and non-warrior-ly-ness (TM) was his human side, and that was portrayed in a not-so-kind light...

 

[perigee]

What I hate about Star Trek is its inability, in the grand scheme, to escape from the time in which it was made.

TOS - Made in the sixties, diplomacy with a big stick, our values are right - we'll fix you whether you like it or not.

TNG - Made in the eighties, when the USSR fell. Techno Arrogance and Corporate Culture - No command decisions without subcommittee, inexhaustible patience with 'lesser beings' (They're firing on us, Captain... Let 'em fire all day - they can't dent our shields. Let's hold a meeting..) Passionless idealism.

DS9 - Nineties. Moldering superpower with no respect. Too much muscle, and no way to flex 'em. Opponents laugh at them, "protected" cultures have no confidence.

NeuTREK - Afghanistan. Iraq. Take no guff; Federation, %#$^ Yeah!

 

[Myasishchev]

Hybrids. I hate the notion of Vulcan-human, Klingon-human, Cardassian-Bajoran, whatever-whatever hybrids. It's just so damned ridiculous. And it's a continuing problem that never goes away. It's not a one-off failure to pass 3d grade science like Threshold was. It's a mistake that compels me to turn off part of my mind for every hour of TOS and for large segments of DS9, shows I otherwise adore. It's really just infuriating.

Absolutely with you on this one Myasishchev, It's almost as ridiculous as a theory that all bipedal sentient beings in the Galaxy were all seeded by one particular race! Can you imagine THAT ever happening?
Also with every hybrid it's always the human part that has the 'good' qualities and must struggle with the 'alien' side of their heritage. yes it's the Humans are superior fallacy again.

Perhaps the biggest problem with it is that the trope is dramatically necessary exactly once. Tora Ziyal's heritage actually had a story impact that could really not have been achieved any other way.

As for all the other examples, they took biology out behind the chemical sheds and shot, but for what?

Spock: does his human "side" make a difference? Does he look like a human? Does he act like a human? Does he have hemoglobin? Would it have made any difference if Amanda had just been his stepmother? The answer to these questions is no.

Alexander: what, Klingons can't be inept on the strength of their own DNA? Evidence suggests this isn't the case.

B'Elanna: RARGH KLINGON SIDE SMASH. Nice racism there, Voyager. And those stories could have been told with no change had she simply been full Klingon.

Troi: you wouldn't even know if you hadn't been told.

Yet, for what it's worth, I recall liking the Chase--even though it was basically ludicrous, it was belief-suspendable. :humanoid:

 

[Praetor]

You know, the more I think about this hybrid thing the more it irks me, too.

Perhaps the biggest problem with it is that the trope is dramatically necessary exactly once. Tora Ziyal's heritage actually had a story impact that could really not have been achieved any other way.

As for all the other examples, they took biology out behind the chemical sheds and shot, but for what?

Spock: does his human "side" make a difference? Does he look like a human? Does he act like a human? Does he have hemoglobin? Would it have made any difference if Amanda had just been his stepmother? The answer to these questions is no.

Agreed. I wonder how many casual fans even realize that despite the fact Spock is half-human and half-Vulcan, he behaves like other Vulcans. We are told that Spock has to keep his human side in check, yet we know that Vulcans are deep down even more emotional than humans. Vulcan and Romulan hybrids (Saavik) is perhaps the one other case where this makes sense.

Alexander: what, Klingons can't be inept on the strength of their own DNA? Evidence suggests this isn't the case.

B'Elanna: RARGH KLINGON SIDE SMASH. Nice racism there, Voyager. And those stories could have been told with no change had she simply been full Klingon.

Troi: you wouldn't even know if you hadn't been told.

I actually think these characters would have been stronger if they were full ______ instead of part human yet written the same way as they were.

Yet, for what it's worth, I recall liking the Chase--even though it was basically ludicrous, it was belief-suspendable. :humanoid:

I remember liking it too. I think the seeds for what this episode did were sown in TOS - displaced human civilizations and ancient humanoids who had visited other planet aeons ago - Sargon's people from 'Return to Tomorrow' for example. I think overall the reason we have hybrids and we have an ancient race giving rise to almost all subsequent races (and in that way making those races in some regard one giant extended family) is another way of extending the metaphor of Trek to the modern world.

Unfortunately, it also seemed to become a crutch for the makeup and writing department in not developing more truly 'alien' races, which is the thing that annoys me.

(I believe it's the only time we saw a female Cardassian captain, also. She had two long braids, IIRC.)

 

[Myasishchev]

On the minus side, since the humanoids are all deep-down the same, does this mean the Founders and the Sheliak and the Tholians have a basis for their fears of humanoids ganging up to destroy the real aliens?

 

[Praetor]

You may be onto something...

Thank God ENT didn't 'reveal' that the Tholian commander, Loskene, in 'The Tholian Web' was only wearing a helmet as many people theorized for years, because if it had, I'm sure the 'real' Tholian would have only had a wrinkly forehead/nose.

Truly alien and freaky aliens like the Horta, the Tholians, the Melkots, and the Sheliak are one of the things I love about Star Trek. We just don't see enough of them!

 

[Myasishchev]

^Yeah, I always wanted to see the Sheliak in particular reappear.

You can put that on my list of hatreds, even if it's a mild one: one-off aliens who are built up as tremendous badasses, never to be seen and rarely to be referenced again. The Sheliak, the Tholians (they count, despite IAMD), the Gorn, the Parasites, the Excalbians, the Melkots (who might as well have been the Excalbians, although I guess it's the other way around ), the Metrons, the Organians (whose disappearance actually rises to the level of continuity error), the Tzenkethi (never even seen)... I'm sure this is only a partial list.

Edit: I wholeheartedly concur that ENT got the (mirror-)Tholians pretty much 100% right.

 

[Thor Damar]

^ At least it's better than a race that has only ever been referred to as a mere nuisance suddenly being elevated to a Major power that can turn the tide of a Quadrant wide war. I am of course talking about the Been (point 4 on my list).
It would have been interesting to see the Tholians make an actual appearance on DS9 during the war, those guys seem quite interesting and they are just aggressive enough to attack either the DA or the FA over a minor boarder dispute.

As for the Parasites(from TNG's conspiracy on of the most creepy episodes that I have ever seen), they do make an appearance in the DS9R.
And we got to see the Organians in a fourth season episode of ENT.

 

[Praetor]

^We can plop a lot of that in the 'I hate the lack of continuity' pile.

 

[Hartzilla2007]

For me

-Everyone EXCEPT the main characters droping dead (Thank you Pocket Books for fixing that)

-Everyone coming back from the dead (again thanks to Pocket for fixing that)

-Any captain who isn't one of the main characters being a total twit (Thank god Abrams is fixing that)

Oh and "the true fans" who think they no what is and isn't Trek

becuase

The Fans don't own Star Trek nor do they don't make it. So the fans really don't have a say in what makes it Star Trek. So stop acting like Eugene Wesley "Gene" Roddenberry himself came back from the grave and appointed you all knowing god figure of what is and what isn't Trek, becuase all you have is an OPINION NOT A FACT HANDED DOWN BY GOD HIMSELF.

 

[Myasishchev]

Ooh, someone doesn't like the reader-response school of literary theory.

 

[Praetor]

Eek. Decaf, Hartzilla?

 

[Thor Damar]

For me

-Everyone EXCEPT the main characters droping dead (Thank you Pocket Books for fixing that)

-Everyone coming back from the dead (again thanks to Pocket for fixing that)

-Any captain who isn't one of the main characters being a total twit (Thank god Abrams is fixing that)

Oh and "the true fans" who think they no what is and isn't Trek

becuase

The Fans don't own Star Trek nor do they don't make it. So the fans really don't have a say in what makes it Star Trek. So stop acting like Eugene Wesley "Gene" Roddenberry himself came back from the grave and appointed you all knowing god figure of what is and what isn't Trek, becuase all you have is an OPINION NOT A FACT HANDED DOWN BY GOD HIMSELF.

You know it doesn't like to be called that!

 

[Michael]

What I hate about Star Trek is its inability, in the grand scheme, to escape from the time in which it was made.

Wow, that's actually something I like about Star Trek! Every incarnation more or less deals with the issues of its respective time period. I hate to bring up Roddenberry (mostly because to me he wasn't that godlike person many make him out to be), but he once compared Star Trek's possibilities of storytelling to Gulliver's Travels, where the impossible incidents surrounding Gulliver were used to comment on contemporary topics and drawbacks. And I think this ability is also one of the great strengths of Star Trek.

And apart from that, how could it not be reflective of its time? Every medial product is necessarily a mirror of the time it was produced in. It's just impossible to create something that does not feature contemporary ideas and mentalities. Everything will date eventually.

Spock: does his human "side" make a difference? Does he look like a human? Does he act like a human? Does he have hemoglobin? Would it have made any difference if Amanda had just been his stepmother? The answer to these questions is no.

I think I can't agree with you on that. I always felt that it was crucial to Spock's character that he was of mixed heritage. Imagine how hard it must have been for him to decide which path he should follow. He really must have been torn inside between the human and Vulcan way. Just being raised by a human wouldn't have the same effect. And of course he doesn't act like a human! I always felt this was the crux of Spock's character: He had to overcompensate to make up for his human half. In a way that's why he was more Vulcan than most Vulcans.

On another note: There's much talk inside this thread about 'cheap' aliens with rubber in their faces etc. That's something that comes up quite often on this board and I'd like to address that. Aliens like the Horta and the Tholians are fine and good and I appreciate the writer's occasional effort to show alien life that's totally different than what we're accustomed to, but in the end I was always of the opinion that the aliens in Trek were merely a device to hold a mirror to our face. Most aliens we saw are a exaggeration of one of our characteristics. It's not really important how they look. It's much more important how they act. For me an alien race in Star Trek feels alien because it behaves in a strange way, not because it looks totally different from us.

It's also of enourmous importance that the viewer can relate to the aliens. It's very hard to get a giant piece of rubber (or a CGI animation) to really show emotions. People will always be emotionally moved by other people.

And last but not least we should also not forget, that Star Trek is a television show. I suppose it's more or less a question of the budget how alien our aliens can be. In the end, casting humans in creative make-up is a necessity. Like Roddenberry once said: "We always wanted to have more aliens, but there are very few of them in the Screen Actor's Guild."

 

[Praetor]

I have to quote the brilliance of this:

Wow, that's actually something I like about Star Trek! Every incarnation more or less deals with the issues of its respective time period. I hate to bring up Roddenberry (mostly because to me he wasn't that godlike person many make him out to be), but he once compared Star Trek's possibilities of storytelling to Gulliver's Travels, where the impossible incidents surrounding Gulliver were used to comment on contemporary topics and drawbacks. And I think this ability is also one of the great strengths of Star Trek.

Most aliens we saw are a exaggeration of one of our characteristics. It's not really important how they look. It's much more important how they act. For me an alien race in Star Trek feels alien because it behaves in a strange way, not because it looks totally different from us.

It's also of enourmous importance that the viewer can relate to the aliens. It's very hard to get a giant piece of rubber (or a CGI animation) to really show emotions. People will always be emotionally moved by other people.