What's with the Uniforms?
- Thread starter Bry_Sinclair
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It's the difference between Starfleet and today's navies in which officers are frequently assigned grunt work too. The majority of enlisted personnel serve mainly as technicians, IMO.
We've seen mercifully little of soldiers and marines in canon Star Trek.
^^^ "Mercifully" little? That's a curious phrase. Surely you would see the need for such a branch of the service, despite Roddenberry's anti-military leanings. There might even be some very interesting stories to tell there. The Klingons, Romulans, Cardassians and other factions excel at ground-based troop movements to board other ships and take over planets. Without a similar force to repel them, Starfleet would be woefully out-classed and need to resort to planetary bombardment. And that's not very Starfleet - even though they do have General Order 24. Hmmm...maybe that's why...
Yes, but are we sure that this was Kirk-Prime. Remember this guys was named James R. Kirk. Kirk-Prime was James T. Kirk
It's not a real time and place, so any such "need" is hypothetical unless required by a story. Since I have no interest in watching that kind of thing - I much prefer Star Trek as it is - "mercifully" is entirely appropriate.
O'Brien continued to wear Lieutenant's pips until TNG's sixth season, when he began wearing a single hollow rank pip, which he continued to wear on DS9 up until the fourth season when he began wearing a new rank pin with three chevrons on it.
Voyager's Maquis crew wear rank pins which contain stripes that work on the same principle as the Starfleet pips. They are very different than the rank insignia used by Starfleet cadets.
We know that Starfleet does indeed have ground troops. DS9 mentioned that phrase in several episodes. And we've seen them in others. We just don't know what they are actually called.
Re O'Brien, he was originally an extra. When he became a regular they decided to make him a chief petty officer so assigned him a single hollow pip.
In DS9 they finally designed a proper petty officer insignia, his had three stripes and two dots of a senior chief petty officer.
They then had a chief petty officer wear this same rank, messing up as usual.
In DS9 they finally designed a proper petty officer insignia, his had three stripes and two dots of a senior chief petty officer.
They then had a chief petty officer wear this same rank, messing up as usual.
O'Brien was never an "extra." Extras are people in the background who never have dialogue. O'Brien always had dialogue.
O'Brien wore an Ensign's rank pip in Encounter at Farpoint and Lonely Among Us. Starting in season 2 of TNG, he begins wearing a full Lieutenant's rank pips, and is even referred to as "Lieutenant O'Brien" by Riker in Where Silence Has Lease. Despite being established as a Chief Petty Officer in Family, O'Brien continues wearing Lieutenant's pips until season 6 when he switches to the single hollow pip.
There are no-dialogue extras, "two-line extras" and "day-players". IIRC, once an extra gets to deliver more than two lines in a scene, they get a major jump in pay.
Don't like soldiers much?
Is that the only possible reading which that post could have been given?
I think not.
Consider that, particularly during the 1966-69 period of Star Trek's original run, but also at many times between then and today, there were many TV shows and movies in which the focus was on soldiers of one sort or another and on the business of soldiering. In the Star Trek shows, even though Starfleet was depicted as having a military (or quasi-military) structure, the emphasis was much less on soldiers or soldiering and more on seeking out new life and new civilizations, boldly going to planets with red skies and strange background sounds, etc., ... and we liked that they did that, right?
How, then, is preferring to continue to see less emphasis on soldiers, marines, etc. equivalent to "not liking soldiers much"? Soldiers are fine, but if one wants to see soldiers, one chooses to watch shows or movies which are about soldiers. Star Trek doesn't categorically exclude soldiers, but Trek stories are far more often about other things.
I could as easily ask whether you "Don't like those other things much?" But that would be kinda silly, wouldn't it?
The MACOs had their place in the Xindi arc, which was primarily concerned with an attack upon Earth and a threat to Earth's continued existence. I enjoyed that for what it was: a war saga. But do we really want to see MACOs/marines/soldiers in every Trek story?
Do you?
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You missed M'Sharak's point completely.
M'Sharak missed my point.
Did I?
Go back, then, to the question with which I began my earlier post. Was there no way to read My Name Is Legion's post without perceiving it as "when [soldiers] are referred to with distaste"? I don't believe that he intended to convey any distaste for soldiers (even strictly fictional Star Trek ones) and I was a bit surprised to see his remark challenged in that manner.
'Marines' = combat roles. I'm tired of 'Battle Trek'. DS9 did the interstellar war thing so well that I feel it never needs to be revisited. I want to go back to Trek being about intrepid explorers that occasionally get into scuffles, not MACO/Section 31 tripe.
We don't have to see the 'marines' in every episode or film, I'll settle for the occasional mention of them. Just to know that they're there at all.
IIRC, My Name Is Legion real life job is/was at the Pentagon. I've a feeling he likes soldiers just fine.
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