Worldbuilding in Season 1

[Ryan Thomas Riddle]

eleborations please?

Harlan Ellison had only watched the two pilots when he began writing COTEF. Thus, the characterizations of Kirk and Spock are very much in line with the second pilot. A bit contentious, not the partnership of later episodes.

But in terms of Vulcan... Kirk chides Spock that Vulcans didn't achieve space travel until two centuries after humans. The only human food that Spock can keep down is cabbage and asparagus. Then says he needs Youbash and Keva as nourishment. Keva being a purple juice.

Oh and one interesting detail, the Tricorder has a vocal interface and speaks back when Kirk uses it.

 

[Maurice]

Speaking of City and early worldbuilding, his original teleplay very much reads like it would've fit better in the first few episodes.

Yeah. When Ellison outlined the story the only references available would have been the two pilots and maybe he coulda seen the unused second pilot versions of "Mudd's Women" and "The Omega Glory". By the time he was on the lot in June working on the script they were a few weeks into filming and there were a few more scripts he might've seen, but so much was still undefined at the point it's unsurprising his first draft was "off". So were a lot of first drafts they got.

 

[fireproof78]

But in terms of Vulcan... Kirk chides Spock that Vulcans didn't achieve space travel until two centuries after humans. The only human food that Spock can keep down is cabbage and asparagus. Then says he needs Youbash and Keva as nourishment. Keva being a purple juice.

I hope Kirk called him a cabbage head.

 

[publiusr]

Or that phrase about conquering Vulcan. Must have been a bad set-back post ENTERPRISE

 

[Phoenix219]

The pre-Enterprise, pre-First Contact, pre-timeline contamination version of TOS is very very different than the world we are left with afterward..... thats how I rationalize it, anyways.

 

[Henoch]

The pre-Enterprise, pre-First Contact, pre-timeline contamination version of TOS is very very different than the world we are left with afterward..... thats how I rationalize it, anyways.

I'm not even sure whether the TOS Enterprise returned to its own timeline(s) after The Naked Time, Tomorrow is Yesterday and Assignment: Earth...for example, after Tomorrow is Yesterday, Starfleet morphs from being under United Earth Space Probe Agency to being under the United Federation of Planets and United Earth is never mentioned again?

 

[Henoch]

As discussed in a parallel thread https://www.trekbbs.com/threads/sta...ce-time-and-speed.312178/page-2#post-14271288, about 100 years before TOS, subspace radio must have been just discovered by United Earth. Later in season two, we learn that the SS Horizon disappeared 100 years before and they didn't have subspace communication back in those days. Also, there was no Non-Interference Directive back then, either. The Romulan War occurred about 100 years ago, and the peace treaty with Romulans was negotiated via subspace radio.

(Maybe subspace communications did exist prior to that time, but the equipment size or power requirements wouldn't allow it to fit on a spaceship back then. It was planet or space station size equipment.)

 

[Christopher]

(Maybe subspace communications did exist prior to that time, but the equipment size or power requirements wouldn't allow it to fit on a spaceship back then. It was planet or space station size equipment.)

Enterprise established that they did have subspace radio back then, though you needed relay beacons to boost the speed and range of the signal. The novel Kobayashi Maru by Michael A. Martin & Andy Mangels explained the discrepancy by saying that the Horizon's subspace transmitter malfunctioned and sent the report on Sigma Iotia by conventional radio. We can assume that Kirk just got a little confused about when subspace radio was introduced.

 

[Warped9]

We can assume that Kirk just got a little confused about when subspace radio was introduced.

Simpler explanation—like so many other things ENT got it wrong and ignored what had already been established. Simpler to accept ENT is a totally different continuity.

 

[Christopher]

Simpler explanation—like so many other things ENT got it wrong and ignored what had already been established. Simpler to accept ENT is a totally different continuity.

We don't pretend "James R. Kirk" and "lithium crystals" are in a different continuity from the rest, or that the emotional, contraction-using Data of early TNG is in a different continuity from the rest, or that the peacetime Starfleet of TNG seasons 1-2 (where the very concept of war games is seen as a pointless atavism) is in a different continuity from season 4 where the Federation had been at war with Cardassia until a year before. Or that "Space Seed," where Khan's followers were mostly dark-haired, theoretically multiethnic adults in their 30s, is in a different continuity from TWOK, where 15 years later they're a bunch of blond twenty-something models.

Glaring continuity discrepancies have always, always been part of Trek, but we have always used our imaginations to gloss over the inconsistencies and choose to accept the intended pretense that it all fits together even when it obviously doesn't. The only difference with the newer stuff is that it's newer. We've gotten so used to rationalizing away the contradictions in the older stuff that we forgot they were there, so the newer inconsistencies stand out in our minds more. But there's no reason we can't reconcile them exactly the same way, by remembering that it's all just make-believe. They're doing the best they can to create a convincing illusion of consistency, but it's not perfect, and we can choose to help them out by suspending disbelief about the imperfections. That's what we TOS fans always did when I was young, and I'm bewildered at how many fans today are unwilling to make the same minor effort.

 

[TREK_GOD_1]

Simpler explanation—like so many other things ENT got it wrong and ignored what had already been established. Simpler to accept ENT is a totally different continuity.

Closer to details were ignored, as most of ENT was run like more of a reboot / revisionist project than a prequel. It was a miracle that the two-parter "In a Mirror, Darkly" was produced at all. Then again, what many consider ENT's finest hour(s) proved a TOS revisit was more appealing to viewers than the rest of the series. Go figure.

 

[Warped9]

...most of ENT was run like more of a reboot/revisionist project than a prequel.

Definitely.

 

[Phoenix219]

Simpler explanation—like so many other things ENT got it wrong and ignored what had already been established. Simpler to accept ENT is a totally different continuity.

Yup. It leads to the current 23rd, and s a result of First Contact butterflies.

I am ok with the previous suggestion that other small changes (the early S1 weirdness) is a result of one of the TOS time travel episodes

As an aside I have always liked the concept that the end of Naked Time threw the ship back in time for Tomorrow is yesterday. With a little tweaking you could probably even combine the transporter use at the end of the episode with the transporter interception at the beginning of assignment earth.

 

[Commishsleer]

Harlan Ellison had only watched the two pilots when he began writing COTEF. Thus, the characterizations of Kirk and Spock are very much in line with the second pilot. A bit contentious, not the partnership of later episodes.

But in terms of Vulcan... Kirk chides Spock that Vulcans didn't achieve space travel until two centuries after humans. The only human food that Spock can keep down is cabbage and asparagus. Then says he needs Youbash and Keva as nourishment. Keva being a purple juice.

Oh and one interesting detail, the Tricorder has a vocal interface and speaks back when Kirk uses it.

Wow if this had gone to air much of Star Trek lore would be changed - all ENT, much of DISC.

 

[Phaser Two]

I'm not even sure whether the TOS Enterprise returned to its own timeline(s) after The Naked Time, Tomorrow is Yesterday and Assignment: Earth...for example, after Tomorrow is Yesterday, Starfleet morphs from being under United Earth Space Probe Agency to being under the United Federation of Planets and United Earth is never mentioned again?

Hey, now there's an interesting theory that would explain much! I imagine that it has been advanced before (probably quite a bit just on these boards), but for some reason it appeals to me at the moment. The already - shall we say - intriguing ending to Tomorrow is Yesterday makes the most sense to me as a divergence point.

Then again, what many consider ENT's finest hour(s) proved a TOS revisit was more appealing to viewers than the rest of the series. Go figure.

Probably no need to go do so. But as someone who thinks ENT has a ton of great moments AND who loved, loved, loved In a Mirror, Darkly - yeah, I do understand the allure of the "alternate reality" approach to that franchise entry. I rewatched about five to seven ENT eps a few months ago, two or three of which I had never seen before, and with that theory in the back of my mind I found that many of my quibbles melted away. (For example, I was able to enjoy Carbon Creek far more.) Schrödinger/Everett/Deutsch and the many worlds interpretation as entertainment-enabling comfort!

 

[Kor]

Harlan Ellison had only watched the two pilots when he began writing COTEF. Thus, the characterizations of Kirk and Spock are very much in line with the second pilot. A bit contentious, not the partnership of later episodes.

But in terms of Vulcan... Kirk chides Spock that Vulcans didn't achieve space travel until two centuries after humans. The only human food that Spock can keep down is cabbage and asparagus. Then says he needs Youbash and Keva as nourishment. Keva being a purple juice.

Oh and one interesting detail, the Tricorder has a vocal interface and speaks back when Kirk uses it.

So in his 'persona' as a Vulcanian merchant in Errand of Mercy, Spock was possibly selling varieties of this purple juice. The similar word is probably pure coincidence, but I think I'll go with that explanation for "kevas" in my head 'cannnnnnnnon' from now on. Now to figure out what exactly "trillium" is.

Kor

 

[Christopher]

Now to figure out what exactly "trillium" is.

It's a kind of lily: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trillium

It has some medicinal value, having traditionally been used to assist labor and control uterine bleeding. Though whether that's what Gene Coon had in mind when he wrote the line "kevas and trillium" is unknown.

 

[scotpens]

It's a kind of lily: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trillium

It has some medicinal value, having traditionally been used to assist labor and control uterine bleeding. Though whether that's what Gene Coon had in mind when he wrote the line "kevas and trillium" is unknown.

Probably just something Coon half-remembered that sounded exotic. Maybe an instance of cryptomnesia?

 

[Maurice]

Probably just something Coon half-remembered that sounded exotic. Maybe an instance of cryptomnesia?

Coon started on the show the same month that Ellison's "final draft" of "City" came in, but he didn't start "Errand of Mercy" until December, around the time Ellison submitted his gratis revised final draft, so while there's no evidence Coon took "Keva" from it, so little about Spock and Vulcans had been settled at that point it's not impossible a variation of the word got repurposed. Mind you, not impossible doesn't "make it so."

 

[Neopeius]

As opposed to the alien species names "Horta" and "Borg" which both appeared in Tom Purdom's 1964 book, I Want the Stars.

Coincidence?!?

Well... probably. Maybe.