Which episode most breaks your suspension of disbelief?

[CorporalCaptain]

Also, perhaps the change in Vulcans was more radical than any experienced by humans in this time frame, and therefore more pronounced under the Atavachron. This was always my interpretation, and it would directly imply something about the intensity of ancient Vulcans' emotions relative to humans' [i.e. Vulcans=a lot more].

By the way, Mister Atoz, the librarian, is "Mister A-to-Z" .

I actually kinda like this episode, warts and all. It's sad. The unremastered winking out effect at the end fits perfectly.

 

[number6]

Agreed^.

There a loads of ways that can be explained.. It's part of the story. I don't have a problem with it. Japan is sliding into the ocean and we're all going to be radioactive mutants. How traveling back in time affects a Vulcan doesn't give me that much agita.

 

[Merky]

Maybe, but the Atavachron didn't change them - they jumped through before Atoz had the chance to process their bodies for the change. It did nothing to their bodies, they simply landed 5000 years in the past.

But also, its a Vulcan discipline, so its not like they're born emotionless. They are raised to be emotionless... If that was the case McCoy should have been more barbaric as well. I just... can't buy it.

ETA: I wasn't literally bashing my head into my computer. It was a figure of speech - this episode was just the only episode that I found too ridiculous for Spock's character. I'm a person who watches television for characterization... I really don't care about space time continuum and all that other jazz. I just watch for the characters and this episode, I felt, was flawed character wise for the sake of giving Spock a gf.

 

[number6]

Maybe, but the Atavachron didn't change them - they jumped through before Atoz had the chance to process their bodies for the change. It did nothing to their bodies, they simply landed 5000 years in the past.

But also, its a Vulcan discipline, so its not like they're born emotionless. They are raised to be emotionless... If that was the case McCoy should have been more barbaric as well. I just... can't buy it.

Perhaps it didn't, but we don't really know how the Atavachron works and what it changes and how. We also don't know what happens by simply passing through the gateway. Spock's behaviour is completely plausible when you factor that in.

 

[Merky]

Maybe, but the Atavachron didn't change them - they jumped through before Atoz had the chance to process their bodies for the change. It did nothing to their bodies, they simply landed 5000 years in the past.

But also, its a Vulcan discipline, so its not like they're born emotionless. They are raised to be emotionless... If that was the case McCoy should have been more barbaric as well. I just... can't buy it.

Perhaps it didn't, but we don't really know how the Atavachron works and what it changes and how. We also don't know what happens by simply passing through the gateway. Spock's behaviour is completely plausible when you factor that in.

They state in the episode how the machine works when Kirk realizes the Judge was from that planet:

JUDGE: I will do everything I can to prove you innocent. I will disprove all the charges of witchcraft. But you must never again speak to the comrades you left behind.
KIRK: Help me return to the library. I've lost my way. I must get back there.
JUDGE: You cannot get back.
KIRK: I tell you I must! I had two friends with me, who are lost in another time period. I must find them. You'll come back with us.
JUDGE: We can never go back. We must live out our lives here in the past. The atavachron has prepared our cell structure and our brain patterns to make life natural here. To return to the future would mean instant death.
KIRK: Prepared? I was not prepared. Your Mister Atoz did not prepare me in any way.
JUDGE: Then you must get back at once! If you were not transformed, you can only survive for a few hours here in the past. Come. Hurry. Hurry.

Not to metion the many times it's brought up that they must be prepared in order for it to work:

SPOCK: Interesting nomenclature. How does it work? May I
ATOZ: Oh, no, sir, no. I must ask you not to touch the controlling mechanism. Return and make your selection. When you have chosen, I will prepare you through the atavachron.
SPOCK: Thank you, Mister Atoz.
(Kirk hears a woman scream from behind a doorway)
KIRK: Spock. Bones.
ATOZ: Wait! I haven't prepared you.
(Spock and McCoy go through the doorway)

ATOZ: May I help you? It’s you. You're lucky you found your way back here. Now let me process you through the atava
KIRK: No. Mister Atoz, my friends and I are from another planet. We don't belong in your history. We don't belong on your planet at all.
ATOZ: Just let me take care of you and get you back where you belong.

They were never proceeded so nothing would change their bodies. Spock "changing" isn't consistent to how the Atavachron works. Him simply changing just because he was thrown 5000 years into the past is just some BS to build tension between McCoy and himself and to justify why he fell for the hot cavewoman.

 

[number6]

Maybe, but the Atavachron didn't change them - they jumped through before Atoz had the chance to process their bodies for the change. It did nothing to their bodies, they simply landed 5000 years in the past.

But also, its a Vulcan discipline, so its not like they're born emotionless. They are raised to be emotionless... If that was the case McCoy should have been more barbaric as well. I just... can't buy it.

Perhaps it didn't, but we don't really know how the Atavachron works and what it changes and how. We also don't know what happens by simply passing through the gateway. Spock's behaviour is completely plausible when you factor that in.

They state in the episode how the machine works when Kirk realizes the Judge was from that planet:

Not to metion the many times it's brought up that they must be prepared in order for it to work:

SPOCK: Interesting nomenclature. How does it work? May I
ATOZ: Oh, no, sir, no. I must ask you not to touch the controlling mechanism. Return and make your selection. When you have chosen, I will prepare you through the atavachron.
SPOCK: Thank you, Mister Atoz.
(Kirk hears a woman scream from behind a doorway)
KIRK: Spock. Bones.
ATOZ: Wait! I haven't prepared you.
(Spock and McCoy go through the doorway)

ATOZ: May I help you? It’s you. You're lucky you found your way back here. Now let me process you through the atava
KIRK: No. Mister Atoz, my friends and I are from another planet. We don't belong in your history. We don't belong on your planet at all.
ATOZ: Just let me take care of you and get you back where you belong.

They were never proceeded so nothing would change their bodies. Spock "changing" isn't consistent to how the Atavachron works. Him simply changing just because he was thrown 5000 years into the past is just some BS to build tension between McCoy and himself and to justify why he fell for the hot cavewoman.

What exactly have you proven, now? OK, fine..Other than those quotes from the tv show, we don't know what an Atavachron does to humans and vulcans and how their physiology is affected versus the way it works for the people indigenous to the planet.
We also don't know that McCoy wasn't affected?? The people 5000 years in earth's past weren't exactly cavemen, either. They were the ones who built Stonehenge.

I also think you're taking this way too literally. When this show originally aired, people had better imaginations and didn't need everything meticulously explained.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Maybe, but the Atavachron didn't change them - they jumped through before Atoz had the chance to process their bodies for the change. It did nothing to their bodies, they simply landed 5000 years in the past.

That's not exactly they way they say it happens in the story. The way the atavachron/time portal evidently works, the reversion is automatic and fatal unless the traveler is prepared. It's not fully explained, but preparation either makes the reversion safe, or not as severe, or both. In this story, both matter and life patterns from the present are at least slightly unstable when transfered to the past. Phasers don't work and cells revert to their nature of the era. It's a relatively novel take on the idea of time travel. Only a prepared traveler is viable in the past.

There are many possible interpretations of the author's intent, if any, but one I've thought of is that she might intend certain physical laws to change subtly over time. Preparation by the atavachron either compensates for this, or prevents the transition from being fatal, but apparently it cannot be undone. Otherwise, what is now can't exist then, and what is then can't exist now, so to speak.

You don't have to agree, I'm just stating what I've thought of about the episode. There is a level of fantasy in effect here. But, to me, the deliberately daring and original aspects of the fantasy about the nature of time travel were refreshing, especially when compared with many other episodes produced in the third season, and a lot in the second too. In my opinion, this episode is superior to certain episodes from every season.

for the sake of giving Spock a gf.

Spock needed a qf. And Zarabeth was totally hot.

 

[Merky]

Perhaps - and even if that was how the machine worked - I just viewed Spock's characterization in that episode extreme. The excuse used in Star Trek 365 in regards to why McCoy never reverted was " Humans are naturally barbaric " or something along the lines of that. I have to get the book to read it. It just seems like a weak conflict to give the characters something to deal with for the episode.

I don't like the episode and it really stretched my disbelief watching it. There was no struggle for him to regain control of his emotions... nothing. He simply was Spock the emotional possessive Vulcan. Yeah, he started questioning why he was eating meat and saying emotional things but had Nimoy not brought it up it probably would not have been included in the story (according to I am Spock). Spock has always fought to control his emotions and hold on to his logic and considering how logic is a way of life and not natural, I would have preferred to have seen that inner struggle of him steadily loosing control, if that had to be the case, then him loosing touch of reality, the severity of their situation, and falling in love.

Also, to act so selfishly... Spock gave up. That was something I did not enjoy to watch. It wasn't satisfying to watch as a Spock fan. /shrug

 

[number6]

Perhaps - and even if that was how the machine worked - I just viewed Spock's characterization in that episode extreme. The excuse used in Star Trek 365 in regards to why McCoy never reverted was " Humans are naturally barbaric " or something along the lines of that. I have to get the book to read it. It just seems like a weak conflict to give the characters something to deal with for the episode.

I don't like the episode and it really stretched my disbelief watching it. There was no struggle for him to regain control of his emotions... nothing. He simply was Spock the emotional possessive Vulcan.

Why should there be? He returned to his own time, he was fine, roll credits. It's not exactly rocket science.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

" Humans are naturally barbaric "

Nice. This totally fits too.

 

[Merky]

Perhaps - and even if that was how the machine worked - I just viewed Spock's characterization in that episode extreme. The excuse used in Star Trek 365 in regards to why McCoy never reverted was " Humans are naturally barbaric " or something along the lines of that. I have to get the book to read it. It just seems like a weak conflict to give the characters something to deal with for the episode.

I don't like the episode and it really stretched my disbelief watching it. There was no struggle for him to regain control of his emotions... nothing. He simply was Spock the emotional possessive Vulcan.

Why should there be? He returned to his own time, he was fine, roll credits. It's not exactly rocket science.

I'm not saying it is rocket science. I did not say I did not understand the episode. I did not enjoy his characterization nor how the story was developed that put his character in that situation.

I'll just say this: You guys like the episode, I don't. Nothing is going to change that fact. Everyone has their favorite and non-favorite episodes. I found fault with it, you didn't.

That's that. Everyone can agree to disagree.

 

[Captrek]

If V’ger can touch Spock’s mind across space, so can a planetful of raging Vulcans.

 

[Merky]

Touche.

I'll just add this to the list of ridiculous things science fiction manages to get away with.

 

[Rom's Sehlat]

"Spock's Brain." The body can only live so long without the brain? I thought with their technology, they could do all this cool medical stuff and keep him alive. OH, and this sounds like the work of the Viidians from VOY. Just break onto a ship and steal a body part. Creepy indeed...

 

[Unicron]

Interesting that no one has mentioned the computerized system for war in "A Taste of Armageddon." It never made much sense to me, and it makes both the cultures involved look dumb.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Interesting that no one has mentioned the computerized system for war in "A Taste of Armageddon." It never made much sense to me, and it makes both the cultures involved look dumb.

I always interpreted the virtual bombs as a metaphor for the Cold War. Additionally, the suicide booths were a perfect metaphor for "just following orders", and the acceptance of the insane. Sorry, when the first virtual bomb goes off, Babcock brilliantly sells the scene as one of the more chilling in TOS. At least to me .

Under the threat of real devastation, I don't think it's too far-fetched to see the lure of a virtual war.

Besides, without the suicide booths we would be deprived of:

SPOCK: Sir, there's a multi-legged creature crawling on your shoulder.

 

[Unicron]

You have a good point about the acceptance of the insane. But I have to admit I doubt so many citizens on both worlds would prefer a more "civilized" virtual war that still kills people. As opposed to peace.

 

[UssGlenn]

If V’ger can touch Spock’s mind across space, so can a planetful of raging Vulcans.

I could have sworn they actually stated that in the episode. Spock reverts because Vulcans are telepathic and he's being influenced by all the pre-Surak Vulcans. Humans aren't telepathic so nothing happens to McCoy.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

You have a good point about the acceptance of the insane.

Thanks.

But I have to admit I doubt so many citizens on both worlds would prefer a more "civilized" virtual war that still kills people. As opposed to peace.

But this is precisely the point. And it's why I think of it as a metaphor of the Cold War, due to the doctrine of limited war used in the prosecution of the Korean and Vietnam Wars, and which I really should have said in the first place. My apologies: I probably should have expressed it as a metaphor for limited war, because that is really more accurate.

So, while you are free to disagree, I interpret it as a direct indictment of the real life policy of limited war that was employed during the Cold War.

 

[Captrek]

If V’ger can touch Spock’s mind across space, so can a planetful of raging Vulcans.

I could have sworn they actually stated that in the episode.

Eh... sort of.

MCCOY: Are you trying to kill me, Spock? Is that what you really want? Think. What are you feeling? Rage? Jealousy? Have you ever had those feelings before?
SPOCK: This is impossible. Impossible. I am a Vulcan.
MCCOY: The Vulcan you knew won't exist for another five thousand years. Think, man. What's happening on your planet right now, this very moment?
SPOCK: My ancestors are barbarians. Warlike barbarians.
MCCOY: Who nearly killed themselves off with their own passions. Spock, you're reverting into your ancestors five thousand years before you were born!
SPOCK: I've lost myself. I do not know who I am. Can we go back?

I take it to mean Spock is being influenced by what is happening on his planet right now this very moment and telepathy is the only obvious mechanism, but that isn’t the only possible interpretation of this conversation.