Weird or "no shit" moments in Star Trek

[X24actor]

Now that it's brought up, every time someone needs a disguise, they always use "surgical alteration". It's just not a big deal to the future.

I always found it creepy. It's never explained how it's done. Do they get their faces mangled up, with the actual bits and pieces rearranged and scrunched up? Or is it a less creepy procedure, in which realistic prosthetics are stitched and mended to the existing face?

 

[Discofan]

Now that it's brought up, every time someone needs a disguise, they always use "surgical alteration". It's just not a big deal to the future.

I always found it creepy. It's never explained how it's done. Do they get their faces mangled up, with the actual bits and pieces rearranged and scrunched up? Or is it a less creepy procedure, in which realistic prosthetics are stitched and mended to the existing face?

Try as they may they'll never beat "Mission Impossible" from the sixties where a thin guy puts on a latex mask and looks exactly like a much heavier guy and can even move his mouth and every part of his "latex" face will move like the real one.

They did that again in a movie this time in "face/off" where John Travolta is notably fatter than Nicolas Cage, yet one turns into the other after the "face switch"? I mean one face is visibly wider than the other... yet there are no adjustment problems...

Am I the only one who found that movie hilarious?

 

[The Old Mixer]

A couple weeks back I watched a Mission: Impossible in which Cinnamon had to quick-change disguise herself as Lee Meriwether's guest character while in a cell, so she was wearing a mask of her own face over a mask of Lee Meriwether's face!

 

[Discofan]

A couple weeks back I watched a Mission: Impossible in which Cinnamon had to quick-change disguise herself as Lee Meriwether's guest character while in a cell, so she was wearing a mask of her own face over a mask of Lee Meriwether's face!

In the sixties there made a French movie in which Fantomas an evil mastermind would wear several masks of his victims and under those a blue mask where only the lips would barely move.

 

[X24actor]

The one and only time "surgical alteration" wasn't used was in the extended version of Star Trek VI. They did it Scooby Doo style

 

[Discofan]

The one and only time "surgical alteration" wasn't used was in the extended version of Star Trek VI. They did it Scooby Doo style

Yes and the extended version was the reason they gave the Klingons pink blood because when the "Klingon" would be assassin falls on the ground, his red blood gives him away as a human being. But we don't see that in the theater version and that makes the "pink blood" detail unnecessarily ridiculous.

Note also that this movie is the only time we see the Klingons bleed pink.

 

[somebuddyX]

Why does Captain Robau need to tell the crew to polarise the viewscreen? Shouldn't either the computer do it automatically or some crew person do it?

 

[Tenacity]

and that makes the "pink blood" detail unnecessarily ridiculous.

I believe the primary reason they went with the pink blood in the first place was to make the scenes with blood less graphic and avoid a R rating.

 

[CommanderRaytas]

Try as they may they'll never beat "Mission Impossible" from the sixties where a thin guy puts on a latex mask and looks exactly like a much heavier guy and can even move his mouth and every part of his "latex" face will move like the real one.

They did that again in a movie this time in "face/off" where John Travolta is notably fatter than Nicolas Cage, yet one turns into the other after the "face switch"? I mean one face is visibly wider than the other... yet there are no adjustment problems...

Am I the only one who found that movie hilarious?

No. It cracks me up every time. The movie is awesome!

 

[Tim Thomason]

At least in Star Trek, they never showed the surgical alterations (prior to Discovery's first season), and you can imagine them being as horrific as plausible.

Their faces are all carved open, new bone structures added, dermal regeneration to eliminate scars and grow more skin. Maybe Bashir keeps some of the original tissue and noses and stuff in jars, for ease of the reversal surgery, but more likely there's a medical replicator that can produce cloned body parts with matching DNA.

It's also helpful that the Klingon/alien variations are played by the same actors, so no real difference in body mass required. M:I did that occassionally when the bad guy would be played by one of the regulars whose character would end up conveniently impersonating him or her.

 

[The Wormhole]

Their faces are all carved open, new bone structures added, dermal regeneration to eliminate scars and grow more skin. Maybe Bashir keeps some of the original tissue and noses and stuff in jars, for ease of the reversal surgery, but more likely there's a medical replicator that can produce cloned body parts with matching DNA.

And then Voyager forgot all that in Workforce when Chakotay, surgically altered to look like a forehead alien simply points a dermal regenerator at his head and reverts back to human. It even restored his tattoo.

 

[Tim Thomason]

And then Voyager forgot all that in Workforce when Chakotay, surgically altered to look like a forehead alien simply points a dermal regenerator at his head and reverts back to human. It even restored his tattoo.

Those dermal regenerators do alot of work!

 

[X24actor]

And then Voyager forgot all that in Workforce when Chakotay, surgically altered to look like a forehead alien simply points a dermal regenerator at his head and reverts back to human. It even restored his tattoo.

That makes me feel better.

 

[Discofan]

The doctor's portable emitter is a piece of technology from the 29th century (if memory serves). It's major pollution of the timeline (the doctor even talks about using it for RESEARCH!!!) (it's even a major paradox: using something before it's invented!!!) Yet its presence (in the present) doesn't seem to worry the "future guys". I guess things are only a bother when the plot demands it...

 

[johnnybear]

Kirk into a Romulan and Chakotay into a Vidian by surgery are the only two times I can remember seeing in Star Trek! I know that Sisko became a Klingon but I've never seen that episode so can't really comment!
They show the surgery as an every day type of operation and easily done and reversed which I find odd! That or people of the far future have a much more elasticated skin than most people living today!
JB

 

[Discofan]

Kirk into a Romulan and Chakotay into a Vidian by surgery are the only two times I can remember seeing in Star Trek! I know that Sisko became a Klingon but I've never seen that episode so can't really comment!
They show the surgery as an every day type of operation and easily done and reversed which I find odd! That or people of the far future have a much more elasticated skin than most people living today!
JB

They have no problems with sex-change operations either which are easily done (on an outpatient basis) and easily undone.

 

[The Wormhole]

Kirk into a Romulan and Chakotay into a Vidian by surgery are the only two times I can remember seeing in Star Trek! I know that Sisko became a Klingon but I've never seen that episode so can't really comment!

Sisko, O'Brien and Odo. Picard and Data were turned into Romulans, and Dukat was turned into a Bajoran, as was Seska. Kira was turned into a Cardassian.

 

[Underfunded]

Insurrection: If they asked the immortal aristocrats if they were willing to share the benefits of the whatever particles with billions of people from the federation and they said: "No!" then they would look like egotistic assholes and it would be hard for Picard to defend them... If they answered "Yes" then there wouldn't be any conflict and the movie would be pointless. So the "brilliant' solution found by the writers is that no one ever asks them the question... Sure! That's plausible! Also, no one among the immortals ever says anything about the problem of either keeping everything to themselves or sharing with others... They just act like that question doesn't exist, even though it's central to the movie!
Congratulations: You've just concocted the most implausible plot point EVER!!!

This point was made by Roger Ebert when he wrote his review of the movie.
Another point of the film that is intellectually vacuous is the fact that the Bak'u proudly declare that they have thrown away their guns and starships because they are so morally superior. So the Sona show up with guns and starships to rob them of their land. Then the Enterprise defend the Bak'u with their guns and their starship. The NRA would love to make this point.

 

[FormerLurker]

Sisko, O'Brien and Odo. Picard and Data were turned into Romulans, and Dukat was turned into a Bajoran, as was Seska. Kira was turned into a Cardassian.

Troi was turned into a Romulan.

 

[tharpdevenport]

And Beverly was turned into a dog.






;-)