you know how the 1701-A had three captains (kirk, spock, scotty)...

Re: you know how the 1701-A had three captains (kirk, spock, scotty)..

Weren't the command-ranking officers of Starfleet during that period wearing white shirts? Which is why Spock is wearing white and not purple? If Scotty were Captain, he would be wearing white instead of gold, no?

 

Re: you know how the 1701-A had three captains (kirk, spock, scotty)..

Scott is a Captain by rank. The rank of Captain and the title of Captain are two different things. Spock continues to hold a Captain's rank even though he is no longer the Captain of the Enterprise.

 

Re: you know how the 1701-A had three captains (kirk, spock, scotty)..

I know that.

What I am trying to say is that according to the uniform guide, an officer who is within a command rank is designated by white. If Spock is not "Captain" of the Enterprise, why is he still wearing white and not purple, as designated by his division as Chief Science Officer? So if Scotty is Captain, why is he not wearing white as well despite the fact that he's still Chief Engineering Officer?

Costuming error? Continuity?

 

Re: you know how the 1701-A had three captains (kirk, spock, scotty)..

Perhaps Spock is no longer heads the science division aboard the Enterprise and is merely the Executive Officer?

 

Re: you know how the 1701-A had three captains (kirk, spock, scotty)..

If he was simply the XO, he would be chilling on Kirk's right ala Riker. Spock was CSO on Enterprise-A from IV - VI according to Memory Alpha.

Maybe its just a costuming error. Idk :/

 

Re: you know how the 1701-A had three captains (kirk, spock, scotty)..

Nope.

The costumes as designed by Robert Fletcher allowed for some personal preferance on the part of the officer in question. It was an option for the division chief of a ship to wear either the color of his or her division or rather the color white as part of the command structure (in this case the senior staff of a starship). There for, any of the division chief officers could wear either their own division color or white. If Bones wanted to as Chief Medical Officer he could have worn white as well.

Check out... http://www.st-spike.org/pages/uniforms/2278-2350/2278-2350.htm for more info than you ever wanted to know on all Starfleet uniforms.

Wow...I feel old. Back in the time of the original series and movies, a First Officer (Decker excepted), was also expected to hold a vital bridge position not simply hang out next to the captian. As such Spock was both first officer and science officer and as I pointed out above ws then free to wear either the sciences division color, or the command color as first officer of the ship.

John

 

Re: you know how the 1701-A had three captains (kirk, spock, scotty)..

Thank you!

 

Re: you know how the 1701-A had three captains (kirk, spock, scotty)..

No problem. I'm a big uniforms geek.

John

 

Re: you know how the 1701-A had three captains (kirk, spock, scotty)..

Nowhere in films four through six is he identified as the Enterprise science officer. As a matter of fact, in Star Trek VI, it seems he has been detached from the Enterprise for quite some time and was only back for the Gorkon peace initiative.

 

Re: you know how the 1701-A had three captains (kirk, spock, scotty)..

Was he sitting at his Sciences station? He was the chief sciences officer. STAR TREK has never started a movie or episode with a recall roster of officers, and the production never wavered from the idea that when Spock was aboard the Enterprise (except when she was his ship) that he was anything other than both Kirk's first officer, and the ENTERPRISE'S chief science officer. That's why in TWOK he reverted to 1st officer and science officer when Kirk assumed command, and why Chekov became Acting science officer after Spock's death.

John

 

Re: you know how the 1701-A had three captains (kirk, spock, scotty)..

So when Uhura sits at navigation, she's the chief navigator?

 

Re: you know how the 1701-A had three captains (kirk, spock, scotty)..

Come on. Be reasonable. She sat at that station only when needed in an odd situation. The official position of Spock was always traditionally that of both Kirk's first and Science officer. You know I'd call James, or Doug, or Mike to help support this idea but they'd laugh at me for bothering them over a message board discussion.

Cheers,

John

 

Re: you know how the 1701-A had three captains (kirk, spock, scotty)..

Exactly. We all went into each movie already knowing that Spock was science, Uhura was comm, Chekov was tact, Sulu was nav, etc etc etc. Spock was always at his science station except in STIII for obvious reasons. Even in IV, in some way, he was the science officer. If he wasn't the CSO, they would have explicitly stated it and replaced him, like in TMP.

 

Re: you know how the 1701-A had three captains (kirk, spock, scotty)..

"Command" is used to refer to one of the ship's divisions, the same as engineering, security &c. It can also refer to the people who are actually in line of command, which creates some confusion. But all the evidence in TOS and the movies is that the colors indicate current division assignment and nothing more. Scotty is part of the engineering division, of course, but is fully qualified to take command and is identified as "an officer of the line." That part of an officer's qualification is apparently not visible on the uniform.

--Justin

 

Re: you know how the 1701-A had three captains (kirk, spock, scotty)..

Most notable Troi in TNG suggests that the "officer of the line" part is implied in anyone above the rank of first year cadet.

dJE

 

Re: you know how the 1701-A had three captains (kirk, spock, scotty)..

Maybe, but in TOS it's clearly not everyone: McCoy specifically states in "A Taste of Armageddon" that he's not authorized for command.

--Justin

 

Re: you know how the 1701-A had three captains (kirk, spock, scotty)..

I know how the command works in TOS. It's Kirk -> Spock -> Scotty -> Uhura (apparently, never happens though) -> Sulu(?). I just thought that once you rank Captain or higher, you're now in the Command division and your uniform color changes like Spock. Perhaps Spock changed to white as a personal preference once he obtained Captain...

... Maybe Scotty decided to stick with his division's colors also considering how he's proud of being an engineer he decided to keep it?

It just got confusing when you look back on the movies and see that only Spock is walking around in the command designated white but everyone else kept their division colors but its still said that in, some way, they're all in the line of command. But AshGL1914 explained it for me

 

Re: you know how the 1701-A had three captains (kirk, spock, scotty)..

In "Where No Man Has Gone Before" Spock wears the same gold tunic as Kirk, indicating he is the First Officer. However, in the series proper he adopts the sciences blue rather than the gold command uniform. Spock could have donned the purple as he did the blue in the series but he may not be chief science officer in the movie period, simply the executive officer as others have speculated. Scotty interchanged between the mustard scheme of Engineering and the command white of his rank in IV, V, VI.

 

Re: you know how the 1701-A had three captains (kirk, spock, scotty)..

Perhaps, but wasn't Uhura in gold as well in The Corbamite Maneuver? I think it could then imply that anyone on the senior crew would then be considered command-level officers(?). But then that would simply be taking a costuming error/fix/continuity error and turning it into something beyond what it initially was.


I do stand by the belief that Spock was CSO on board the Enterprise except for TWOK in which he was an Starfleet instructor, but then later on in the movie he relinquishes command. I'm just going to go with the idea that in the movie verse once command rank was obtained the officer in question had a choice between division colors or command white.