What are your controversial Star Trek opinions?

[drt]

TOS isn't my favourite Star Trek but something about the tone of the first season sticks with me in a way none of the Berman-era stuff does - space feels totally unknowable and unreal, and the ship feels almost like a floating theater stage that's drifting from one mythic morality play to another.

I like some of the Berman-era worldbuilding and more consistent political factions, and the quadrant model that lets writers place stories at certain points in the galaxy, but I think on the whole I prefer TOS' method of deliberately having almost no internal logic so that space just becomes a terrifying nightmare that's swallowed the ship whole, and the crew are less like "real" people and more like symbols of humanity set against a universe that seems almost designed to test them at every turn.

The first two seasons of TNG are also more like this. Might be a reason I also like them more than most.

 

[Commander Troi]

Until he was writing the intro to The Rocketeer. Then Raiders was soulless and dead and running on lifeless nostalgia. He really didn't seem to be able to love something without hating something else.

Huh. I didn't know that. Damn shame.

 

[1001001]

Met Ellison once, when I was in school. Was smitten.

I always just assumed he was your spirit guide…

 

[Cap'n Calhoun]

Was there anything that Harlan did like, besides being an insufferable curmudgeon?

I mean, he seemed to get along with J. Michael Straczynski well enough. He worked on all five seasons of Babylon 5, and he was one of the few to write scripts for the final season other than JMS himself.

And the late Peter David and Harlan seemed to have a really solid friendship. Harlan was even the best man at David's wedding.

But, also, he did also really seem to like being an insufferable curmudgeon.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Is it hard science fiction from a technology standpoint, no. But it's science fiction as anything ever created for TV or cinema. It literally created Space Opera as a sub genre of science fiction.

Space Opera was a thing long before Star Trek was a gleam in Gene Roddenberry's eye,

 

[The Wormhole]

That's the problem, you have to deal with Multiple Layers of Policy as a StarFleet Officer.

No, Starfleet policy is pretty clear cut on the matter of murder, even if it aligns with another culture's beliefs. In Amok Time when Spock believed he killed Kirk, he was going to surrender to Starfleet and accept court martial and prison time for it, even though it was sanctioned on Vulcan as part of a ponn farr ritual. The difference in times like Tacking Into the Wind, individual officers make judgment calls whether to adhere to these policies or not.

the Gowron thing…I mean…Sisko didn’t just turn a blind eye, he basically orders the Code Red himself. So I’m sure Sisko knew he could sell it to Command if they had questions. Like he did with the Romulans.

I doubt Sisko told Admiral Ross or anyone that he nudged Worf into killing Gowron. And in the case of the Romulans, the only thing Command authorized was using a fake holorecording to make the Romulans believe the Dominion were planning an attack. They certainly didn't condone Vreenak's murder, and I'm pretty sure Sisko never admitted his role in that to them.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

It would seem that the worst transgression that Worf committed in "Reunion," as far as Starfleet was concerned, was going AWOL. As far as the Klingon High Council was concerned, Worf committed no offense whatsoever.

 

[JonnyQuest037]

Until he was writing the intro to The Rocketeer. Then Raiders was soulless and dead and running on lifeless nostalgia. He really didn't seem to be able to love something without hating something else.

So while I no longer have my copy of the 1988 Rocketeer collection from Eclipse Comics that Ellison wrote the intro for, I did manage to find a reminiscence of Ellison I co-wrote in 2018 on the occasion of his passing. And as luck would have it, I quoted from his mention of Spielberg in that intro:

“Spielberg and his clone-children […] filling every corner of the frame with little in-jokes and blatant references to the sci-fi crap that impressed them when they were ten years old, so distracting that you aren’t supposed to notice that the movie center-screen is full of holes and has an empty soul.”

To the best of my memory, Ellison never mentioned Raiders of the Lost Ark by name in that intro. He honestly could've just as easily been talking about E.T., Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Temple of Doom, or even 1941. And the mention of Spielberg's "clone children" means he could've been referring to Joe Dante or Robert Zemeckis just as much as Spielberg.

And even if Ellison did like Raiders at first and later changed his mind about it, so what? Is that not allowed? Does his opinion of a movie have to stay the same until the end of time? I know I've certainly changed my mind about stuff over the decades. The movies I thought were profound at 16 seem rather trite to me now.

Yeah, Ellison was upfront and critical about the stuff he disliked. But he was also effusive with praise for the stuff he did like. And personally, I think that means his opinions meant more, not less. His praise was more valuable because he didn't dole it out that freely. I personally don't entirely trust people who like everything.

But, also, he did also really seem to like being an insufferable curmudgeon.

I have a feeling that Ellison was well aware that that was his reputation, and he enjoyed playing the part or exaggerating his dislike for something occasionally.

 

[Kamen Rider Blade]

No, Starfleet policy is pretty clear cut on the matter of murder, even if it aligns with another culture's beliefs. In Amok Time when Spock believed he killed Kirk, he was going to surrender to Starfleet and accept court martial and prison time for it, even though it was sanctioned on Vulcan as part of a ponn farr ritual. The difference in times like Tacking Into the Wind, individual officers make judgment calls whether to adhere to these policies or not.

How about in Worf's case?

He literally killed a candidate (Duras) who challenged Gowron for the High Chancellor Position, granted it was out of revenge for his Mate K'Ehleyr.
He eventually killed Gowron for risking the entire Dominion War due to his personal Politics in seeking Glory and risking unnecessary pointless missions to make Martok look stupid and risk losing the entire Dominion War.

Both cases, he got away w/o punishment from the StarFleet/UFP side, despite what his superiors & upper brass knew what he was going to do.

 

[cooleddie74]

Ellison did have an openly dismissive view of Close Encounters of the Third Kind.

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[B.J.]

I mean, he seemed to get along with J. Michael Straczynski well enough. He worked on all five seasons of Babylon 5, and he was one of the few to write scripts for the final season other than JMS himself.

I did find it surprising that Ellison voiced the very annoying version of the B5 computer in one episode, and was the voice of the Zooty machine. He also appeared in person as a Psi Cop, but that one honestly doesn't surprise me.

 

[korblborp]

it's a weird thing for him to say while praising The Rocketeer, which is itself a loving reference to the things the creator liked in his youth, many of them the SAME things as Spielberg et al.