My very brief glimpses back to Western reruns left me thinking Daniel Boon and Davy Crockett were the same guy
No surprise. Same actor (Fess Parker) and Daniel Boon series was largely created due to the intense interest in Davy Crockett.
Why Do We Demand Internal Consistency & Continuity in Star Trek?
- Thread starter Samuel
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No surprise. Same actor (Fess Parker) and Daniel Boon series was largely created due to the intense interest in Davy Crockett.
I didn't mention how people are behaving in this thread though, I was speaking about fifty years of a fandom characterised by association with a vocal minority who do exactly that, get very angry over very meaningless things. You mentioned the scale of Memory Alpha, but that just reinforces my point, it isn't an official publication demonstrating the links and interplay in a complex and interwoven universe, it is a fan site which lists thousands upon thousands of often contradictory details. That it is so huge is simply a statement of volume, not coherence. If it is evidence of anything, it is that my point holds, the fandom contains people who value details over substance and are extremely obsessive about those details.
No they aren't mutually exclusive in principle, you are completely right, but one of those things is definitively there, it is written into the show and very much pat of it's defining purpose. It's the reason so many forward thinking politicians and activists cite trek as their inspiration, why Nichelle Nichols was invited to the White House, why so many prominent feminist and race equality activists are also Star Trrek fans. It's an incredibly positive thing which only a fool would deny has had real world impact. Yes Trek is in many ways a simple action show and should in the first instance be seen as exactly that, but at it's best it is also so much more.
The other is externally imposed despite all evidence to the contrary, with people determinedly insisting it must be there because they believe it should be, becoming angry where things don't match their expectations to the point where cast and crew members have been known to receive verbal abuse, threats and even had to go into hiding. It fuels little more than toxic obsessions whose irony is that those obsessions are based on something that only really exists in their heads. That's why it's a bad thing, much as any passionately held belief is when it is shown to be delusional.
Appreciating consistency is fine, provided it's actually there to be appreciated. Where it isn't it just leads to exactly the sort of frustration we see expressed here dozens of times every single day.
I'm not saying Trek is an exception, I'm saying those "basic reasonable expectations of logical consistency are going to result in some pretty serious disappointment because it doesn't adhere to them. Whether it should is an entirely different question.
Lots of franchises show little or no consistency beyond the broad strokes and Trek is one of them. That there is room for consistency doesn't mean said consistency is actually there. Trek has a political entity represented in every iteration known as the Klingon Empire, which on the surface is a point of common ground, however even the most cursory analysis shows that the actual portrayals of that entity tie them together in name only, they are utterly different from one showing to the next.
Much the same applies to much of the technology, the topography and politics of the setting. There are deliberate areas of common ground, but they are superficial at best, with even the most fundamental aspects of the portrayals varying widely according to the needs of the plot.
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Most worthwhile part of the post.
But the key words are "in principle".
Many things are compatible in principle, in this case practise is a different matter
Maybe and just consider this... some people (I believe most of us) are capable of an appreciation of a work at more than one level of priority. There's that organic reception I mentioned earlier. That gut reaction, where your senses just let it happen. It's childlike and raw and honest. You look to entertainment and you feel it. Then there's the processing 'you'. The one that is adult trained to register messages. Then there's the critic. The one that may have dabbled in school or university exams where you feel the need to be clever. For some there IS the technical expert. I have learned from this site how absolutely amazing some of you guys are when it comes to detailing of ships and detail. I don't see anger at all but a rather delightful expertise. Much like Memory Alpha you mentioned. It is one of the best sources for Trek on the Net.
Trek for me IS science fiction. Its messages are often so heavy handed and clumsy but that's okay. It's depiction of representation is more subtle and natural and I kind of like that. It's internal continuity as relevant to the OP does make a difference to me personally. I may be an ordinary person but I love story and literature and appreciate the writing. If the writing is not good or there is inconsistency I personally critique it.
I actually agree with pretty much all of this post (although I'm yet to hear a convincing argument that trek really is sci fi) and as far as criticising the media goes, I'm just the proverbial guy on the street too.
The problem though is that for all the amazing things Trek does, surely it should be clear that consistency not only isn't one of them, it was never meant to be.
You judge a thing on whether it achieves it's objectives, whether an athlete can run fast or score goals, whether a house keeps you dry and warm and looks pretty, whether a food feeds you and tastes good.
Yet look through these upper forums and tell me honestly, is trek really being judged or assessed here on the things that matter? The things that mark it out from the run of the mill, the things that make it iconic?
Proportionately how many of these threads are actually about the impact Trek has had, what message, themes or questions were being raised in any given episode? There are some, sure, but they are vastly outnumbered by threads about deck numbers, uniform designs, klingon make up, fleet numbers and warp core specifications. Stuff that was never really meant to matter any more than "The Story of the Good Samaritan" is meant to be about the materials and design of the road, or "Oliver Twist" was about the technical capabilities of the workhouse.
I recall today being in a thread about Seven from Voyager and how she would have developed if her father had not been assimilated or had been rescued. It made me personally reflect that when it came to parental figures it was Janeway not Magnus or the Borg Queen, who fought like Mother Bear to retrieve Seven from danger. There really are a lot of threads where we delve into the human story. Then I think about a thread in the Discovery forum where there are these amazing pictures of the Enterprise and versions of them and frankly, I'm pretty impressed by the detail. Yet frankly I can most certainly lay claim to being very critical to construct in story telling and in part production. It is what features in aspects of debate that also interest me as a fan.
Consistency in the Original Series only had itself to source. The mere fact Spock in The Cage and Spock thereafter is kind of different is something the audience adjusted to. However I still have sympathy for those that see jarring mess ups between one iteration to the next.
To be brutally honest the iconic symbols of Trek are mixed. Thankfully some are messages and not just the ones that are in story. They are ones of simply casting your eye over the crew compliment and accepting who is in it. Sometimes the messages are iconic, like the mess with Tuvix. You know what though? And I seriously don't mean to distract from the importance of mission statement... but some of what really makes Trek iconic is basic. It's the friendship. It's Kirk and Spock and McCoy. It's seeing these flawed people try and do what is right and sometimes be totally awkward and even fail. It is also superficial elements. Catchphrases - Beam me up Scotty. Uniforms (admit it
) even the theme music. The appeal is both superficial and more.
Not really, more to take pot shots at the way people miss the point of trek. It is an iconic and beautiful piece of TV which has had an inordinate cultural impact in the real world, but not remotely by building a consistent, coherently built world a la Middle Earth. Anyone who believes it ever achieved that, or even made a serious attempt, hasn't been watching very closely.
The fandom has a subset of people angrily obsessing how fast warp is, or how many decks the Enterprise has, or how far Qo'nos is from Earth, or "canon" (whatever that horrible word is being misused as today), completely missing the value of this thing we have been given which is about examining the human beings who watch the show and the world they created
Star Trek matters in the same way Aesops Fables matter, or parables, or zen poetry, or the novels of Charles Dickens. It is about stories which pose questions and make the viewer think, not about creating an immersive universe, which is precisely why it falls apart with even the slightest attempt to analyse the setting.
People have spent fifty years making that mistake and getting ridiculously angry when they can't make it all add up, treating the inconsistencies like failings and mistakes rather than simply part of the nature of the thing they are examining. You could argue there's room for both, but that misses the point that only one of the two was ever really meant to be there at all, the other is something people have mistakenly imposed after the fact and failed to realise the error lies in their perceptions, not the show itself.
It's strength lies in it's impact on the real world, what it has to tell us about what is happening around us, how it makes us think about our own actions and beliefs, not whether Klingons have been done right, or the visuals match, or whether they have the right uniforms, or whether the technology doesn't quite fit.
Are people really,really getting angry over this stuff? Their is internet anger or nerd anger and then their is real world, someone has just screwed you over in a big way that effects your life kind of anger. While we might complain and even rant I think most people still keep everything in perspective. At least with things like canon and continuity. The only time REAL anger shows up is when you start getting into political aspects of shows.
Jason
Why thank you sir
Could part of the reason for lack of those posts be down to the simple fact those themes, messages etc.. are already known to the audience. We shouldn't have to be told imposing our beliefs onto others is wrong, ostracising one group of people because of gender, ethnicity etc.. is wrong, talking care of the environment is the responsible thing to do. We largely agree upon those foundations so there is little to debate unless it's more of a grey area such as the episode "Tuvix". So that leaves us with the miniature for areas of debate
It's not that I deny the possibility in principle of a show that's all about the allegorical storytelling, and doesn't give a hoot about worldbuilding. An example even springs to mind: nuBSG. That show wasn't remotely concerned with depicting a futuristic (or past) interstellar culture. Everything from the tech levels to the fashions to the politics to the music were basically 21st-century American, except with FTL added and a new polytheistic religion grafted on. The entire show was constructed to facilitate allegories about contemporary issues, and it did that very well (at least, until the fourth season). Conversely, when it came to worldbuilding and backstory, the show just made things up on the fly, and casually contradicted itself time and again.
Trek is not like that, on either count. Allegory is certainly an aspect of what it does (despite those who argue otherwise). But so is worldbuilding. When you say the continuity "is externally imposed despite all evidence to the contrary," that's not a caveat you can just wave away, because there really is a heckuva lot of evidence to the contrary.
Trek is not like that, on either count. Allegory is certainly an aspect of what it does (despite those who argue otherwise). But so is worldbuilding. When you say the continuity "is externally imposed despite all evidence to the contrary," that's not a caveat you can just wave away, because there really is a heckuva lot of evidence to the contrary.
IMHO the worst part of the lazy worldbuilding by far was the whole "press room" thing. I mean, it's plausible that some journalists would be onboard the fleet, but with a population of 50,000, they only really have the manpower/audience for - at most - maybe two competing small-time newspapers. Every time an episode brought in the whole media aspect it just totally broke my immersion.
In general, it seems like worldbuilding in Trek is closely related to character building. For example, giving Worf a character arc on TNG resulted in a large amount of lore and worldbuilding related to the Klingon Empire. And DS9 in general was chock full of both worldbuilding and character growth. This makes sense, because options for worldbuilding without character growth are limited, as there are only so many "infodumps" you can insert before something becomes watchable to all but the geekiest fans. Also, if you're developing the character in a particular direction, it's much more likely you'll use the lore from earlier episodes to deepen the character. For example, they didn't do this well with Seven and Borg lore on VOY - basically every time they did a Seven story, it was a new thing, which necessitated they come up with some new, random-ass element of Borg physiology, psychology, etc. If they gave her a real Worf-like arc, the Borg-related lore may have been more cohesive as a whole.
Can you seriously look around this board and claim people keep it all in perspective?
I don't think so. Trek came into being in the 1960s, a time of massive political upheaval and social change, with race wars, gender inequality and mounting international tensions, much like the world we are currently living in. Agreed Trek shouldn't "preach", allegory works best when it asks questions rather than pushes answers, but absolutely the role of that allegory, that visible representation, that challenging of preconceptions is relevant in the modern world.
To be frank we need not even look outside of these forums to see those toxic, bigoted, anachronistic attitudes being expressed by star trek fans. If there were ever a time we needed the show to return to it's roots, this is it.
Well, yeah.....can't fault you there, lol.
Personally I don't care all that much... however some peeps might care because they perceive the creators caring about such stuff. TPTB have on occasion, and not uncommonly, made connections between episodes and different series, so maybe it's a precedent that is set from above somehow.
I mean it is kind of cool that, for example, we get to see in VOY what became of the two Ferengi that got vaulted into the DQ in TNG...
I mean it is kind of cool that, for example, we get to see in VOY what became of the two Ferengi that got vaulted into the DQ in TNG...
With some of the toxix and racist stuff you see on the internet about any show I don't always assume they are fans. You got trolls who want to just make problems for their personal enjoyment and others who will gloom onto a issue that they feel they can use to help them promote any personal pollitical agenda. I mean you will have some fans who aren't good people as well but i'm not sure if they are the majority.. I think we might be more eccentric than your average tv fan but that's not the same. Not to mention more diverse. You have fans from all over the world and of different races and sexes and countries. That's why someone like me who lives in Oklahoma can enjoy it just like someone across the globe in some city I can't even pronounce. That's the good thing about Trek but I also think people might not always be looking for the same things out of Trek. Trek has inspired people to be scientist and artist or just helped them deal with their own personal lives. For others it's just a fun action adventure show. Some might only like it because of specific actors. I'm not sure we can say the show is just one specific thing or if even needs to always be the same thing with each show and movies. I enjoyed the Kelvin Universe movies even though they don't really feel like old TREK and mostly feel like just cool action movies. Tarantino's movie might be the first R-rated movie and that can also be fun. I do think Trek does need s to come back from time ti it's roots which is being smart and about social commentary but it doesn't have to always be that all the time.
As for what Trek is suppose to be I kind of think that means many different things. It started out as a :Wagon Train to the Stars" and then fans saw more into it and it became more about deeper social issues and then it became about a Utopia. Which I think happens a great deal in tv and movies. How often do you hear about fans who saw more into something than even the writers. My take is that dealing with social issues and human condition stuff is usually the most important thing but i'm also not into science or really tech all that much. Maybe if I was a scientist or worked at NASA I might be more inspired by the gadgets. I'm mixed on how positive the show should be. I mean I became a fan because I was depressed and found TNG but at the same time I now think I prefer "DS9" which was more edgy, by Trek standards and I also enjoy stuff like "Breaking Bad" and "Sopranos" etc that go against the Trek spirit but I would kind of like to see a Trek show like that from time to time.
Jason
The cynic in me suspect they'll always be those attitudes held by some, and I doubt any TV show is going to get them to change their beliefs. And sure it doesn't help when some politicians stoke those fires instead of say trying to appeal to hope.
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