Trek cliches that annoy you

[Balthier the Great]

All the aliens are the same -- one world one culture. C'mon there are several cultures in New York City by itself, let alone on the entire fucking planet.

For that matter, even in the Federation, all members of species X has Xian culture. All Vulcans revere Sarek, all Klingons dream of war and worship Kahless, All humans are decidedly atheistic or agnostic and westernized.

Holodeck malfunctions. Just stop. If they're that dangerous, close them and lose the key.

For that matter, why can't we ever have an episode about something in the actual universe? Strange matter might be an interesting thing to play with, pulsars, black holes, gamma ray bursts. Sometimes I think the whole franchise could be helped by subcribing the writers to Scientific American. There are tons of strange things in space, and a good number of them would be great storywise. Just reading through some of these (http://www.exitmundi.nl/exitmundi.htm ) ought to give them a few decent ideas.

 

[Xelo]

Also, they killed off baseball! That's something you just don't do.

Ya! WTF?

 

[Anwar]

All the aliens are the same -- one world one culture. C'mon there are several cultures in New York City by itself, let alone on the entire fucking planet.

For that matter, even in the Federation, all members of species X has Xian culture. All Vulcans revere Sarek, all Klingons dream of war and worship Kahless, All humans are decidedly atheistic or agnostic and westernized.

Well come on now, the obvious answer to this is that there'd be little chance of fully fleshing out a one-shot race in 40 minutes and the writers aren't going to put in that insane amount of effort to try so if said aliens aren't going to be seen ever again.

That's why the recurring aliens are deeper than the one-shots.

 

[number6]

Fans who do nothing but nitpick and complain.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Also, they killed off baseball! That's something you just don't do.

Ya! WTF?

Not only that, but they did it for typical PC bullshit namby-pamby liberal cushy peacenik reasons. Supposedly people were changing, that nobody was interested in competitive sports anymore! Bullshit.

Oh well, at least Cestus III is bringing it back. If I lived in the Trekverse, that's where I'd go!

 

[Gojirob]

Sending out a power's entire fleet of heavily-armed warships to retrieve one person.

 

[Jonas Grumby]

Oh well, at least Cestus III is bringing it back. If I lived in the Trekverse, that's where I'd go!

I dunno...it's just not the same anymore without Commodore Travers' dinner parties.

 

[Solarbaby]

There are 161 planets in the federation because thats the same as countries in the United Nations. WTF? Space is vast.

Starfleet officers hardly ever change out of uniform when off duty.

Illegal Romulan ale is freely available under the counter at any federation bar.

All Klingons are honourable by human values. But then when it suits the writers, the honour can be changed to cover non honourable things. Like Worf saying in Battle nothing is more honourable than victory to justify the Klingons attacking defenseless worlds. Thats not honourable and wouldnt stand up in a military tribrunal.

Crew-particularly extras- can press controls whilst looking in the opposite direction.

Data couldn't change his programming to say "can't" instead of cannot- even though he did a couple of times that the producers missed.

Nearly all admirals are human

My favourite cliche is that you can be saved from the borg or return from an undercover mission surgically enhanced as a romulan, and the doctor can miraculously make your hair grow 30 inches in a few hours. But Picard is still bald

 

[Anwar]

Picard's baldness is because in the Trek future no one cares if you have hair or not. It's a personal choice.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

^ Bald is badass, didn't you know that?

 

[Red Ranger]

The one cliche that doesn't bug me that much, but seems silly, is most prevalent in TOS: Kirk knows all the starship commanders and Starfleet commodores he meets (Stone, Mendez, Wesley, Decker, Tracy.) It's a big galaxy out there, people! They tended to avoid that cliche with Picard -- he didn't know Captains Maxwell or Jellico, just by reputation. Sure, there were some he knew, like Walker Keel. But they didn't overdo it. -- RR

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

^ The fleet was smaller in TOS' time. Maybe that was the reason.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

And yet how to do you explain the apparently endless number of Starfleet officers who went to Starfleet Academy with Sisko?

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

And yet how to do you explain the apparently endless number of Starfleet officers who went to Starfleet Academy with Sisko?

And how many was that? Really?

 

[Nerys Myk]

Redshirts. It never was good writing to begin with, and the cult really annoys me.

Meaning what exactly?

 

[Anwar]

^ The fleet was smaller in TOS' time. Maybe that was the reason.

Was it really? We know there were 12 Constitution class ships but nothing else is said about the fleet.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

And yet how to do you explain the apparently endless number of Starfleet officers who went to Starfleet Academy with Sisko?

And how many was that? Really?

Primarily I'm thinking of "In the Pale Moonlight" where Sisko makes reference to this at least twice. Then there's "Apocalypse Rising" where some Klingons are bragging about having decapitated a benzite who went to the Academy with Sisko. At least two other references come to mind, but I can't recall the episodes.

It seems to be at least as often as Kirk, although the addition of already being an old friend of Admiral Leyton puts him on equal terms with Kirk as Starfleet's MySpace Champion.

 

[Myasishchev]

Holodeckery. This is really a judgment call, but, Worf excepted, these nerds generally use the holodeck for the most boring things.

It was once implied that Riker used the holodeck to work off some sexual frustration. In The Perfect Mate after having a run-in with Kamala, Riker simply says "I'll be in the holodeck."

Also, it was often implied that Quark's holosuites doubled as a holographic brothel.

Yeah, sex would be the funnest thing to do in the holodeck, but many of the scenarios they showed, particularly on VOY, were quite dullish.

Why in the world do you need a holodeck to recreate a bar? Go drink in a real room and quit wasting power! And of course Janeway's Victorian England RPG was irredeemable. Like I said, that's kind of a matter of taste, though--surely people have fun with things that I find insanely dull, e.g. World of Warcraft.

But I'd have liked to have seen more holodeck FPSes. I will point out that Bashir's programs usually seemed pretty fun (Bond-esque RPGs, air combat simulators, and so forth).

 

[DGCatAniSiri]

The bridge sitting there on the top of the saucer section where one good shot is all it takes to wipe out the ENTIRE COMMAND STAFF. Seriously, if I were a Captain of a Starfleet ship, I'd be running the place from the battle bridge or something.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

^ Actually, the bridge placement makes sense to me. If it's separated by the hull, you have to hit it DEAD ON in order to do any damage. Otherwise, if it's in the center of the saucer, you could miss the bridge by three compartments and still take out the entire command crew once the explosion and the fire blows through the bulkheads.

Or picture yourself on a 747 when somebody shoots a missile at you. Where would you rather be, in the baggage compartment or standing on the wingtip?