# Dr. Pulaski **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 11, 2012, 5:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659 "2012-11-11T05:35:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Lobohan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobohan/32/79_2.png) [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2012, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659/21 "2012-11-11T20:13:20Z")
I thought she was cool. I liked that someone wasn’t as good-natured as the rest of the crew. In real life some people are curmudgeonly too. Also, she was hot in her TOS appearances, if Dr. Pulaski was frumpy. [![](https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Diana_Muldaur?file=Henoch_thallassa.jpg) ](https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Diana_Muldaur?file=Henoch_thallassa.jpg) [![](https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Diana_Muldaur?file=Miranda_Jones.jpg) ](https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Diana_Muldaur?file=Miranda_Jones.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2012, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659/22 "2012-11-11T20:29:41Z")
> [@LurkerInNJ](#): > > How dare a 39 year old woman look hot! The nerve! And to stay fit and attractive into her 40’s 50’s and 60’s! Unthinkable! There’s a difference between being fit and attractive, and acting (and trying to look like) a 25-year-old. Real women don’t flip their hair around as an attempted sexual signal. Full disclosure: I’m not attracted to women anyway, so perhaps I’m not the best judge of this sort of thing. She seemed to me to be desperately hanging onto her youth. Roddy ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2012, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659/23 "2012-11-11T20:31:49Z")
> [@Grumman](#): > > Sure, just like constantly questioning why the black guy was ever made an officer would be a sign you’re taking his work seriously and not just you being a bigot. You may recal there was previous another medical officer - quite well-beloved, BTW, who had a habit of repeatedly needling the emotionless scientific genius of the crew. I suspect they were going for the same idea. The problem was that Pulaski wasn’t part of the original crew, and therefore her poking offended people. Had she been there from day one she probably would have come off much smoother and been better written. As it was, the show hadn’t gotten over Season One CrapFest time, and things were still a bit unstable. That said, I wanted to like Crusher but always found her bland and rather uneccessary. Same with Troi for the most part. They had the odd moments to shine, but simply didn’t have many hooks as characters - their job was to appear and do whatever the plot required. ---
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2012, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659/24 "2012-11-11T20:33:37Z")
I’ve watched 8 episodes of S3 so far and I haven’t noticed any hair flipping. So far, though, Bevs is striking me as supremely bland and inoffensive. Which is fine but it’s like eating plain rice after a season of spicy curry with Pulaski. Maybe some people prefer that but I like characters who don’t seem like walking ads for sominex. ---
**Author:** ![Ethilrist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ethilrist/32/4604_2.png) [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2012, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659/25 "2012-11-11T20:45:25Z")
My general experience has been that the most outspoken of Star Trek fans are curiously resistant to change… they weren’t complaining that anything they changed was poorly done, they were complaining that they changed it at all, even if for the better. ---
**Author:** ![Balance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ccd318/32.png) [@Balance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balance)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2012, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659/26 "2012-11-11T20:58:29Z")
> [@Grumman](#): > > Sure, just like constantly questioning why the black guy was ever made an officer would be a sign you’re taking his work seriously and not just you being a bigot. Not remotely the same thing. Remember that Data was, so far as the Federation knew, _unique_. They had never encountered a genuinely sentient artificial life form, at least not in a way that allowed for enough long-term interaction to verify that it was not just a really convincing simulation. Whether Data was really sentient or not was a valid question; his striving to appear more human could easily be interpreted as the activity of an expert system designed to improve its simulation of sentience. Most of the crew quickly came to take Data pretty much for granted, ignoring the profound implications of his existence. Pulaski didn’t. Now, I’m not privy to the inner thoughts of the writers who established her character. I could be reading her wrong. Had I been writing her, however, she would actually have been intensely excited about Data, and carefully hiding that excitement behind a facade until she could be absolutely sure he was the real deal. ---
**Author:** ![levdrakon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@levdrakon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/levdrakon)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2012, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659/27 "2012-11-11T21:07:26Z")
Yeah, I thought Pulaski and Data could make a good McCoy & Spock. Bones didn’t trust logic, and Pulaski didn’t trust wires and chips. ---
**Author:** ![BorgHunter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@BorgHunter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BorgHunter)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2012, 10:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659/28 "2012-11-11T22:07:22Z")
> [@smiling\_bandit](#): > > You may recal there was previous another medical officer - quite well-beloved, BTW, who had a habit of repeatedly needling the emotionless scientific genius of the crew. I suspect they were going for the same idea. That’s really why, I suspect, a lot of people never really liked Pulaski. She seemed, at times, to be a cheap McCoy wannabe, down to the distrust of transporters. Not that Beverly was ever a supremely compelling character or anything, but the writers weren’t obviously trying to make her a clone of a previous _Trek_ character, at least. What I found far odder is that the **show itself** never treated her as a true member of the cast. It was always “With Special Guest Star Diana Muldaur as Dr. Katherine Pulaski”; she never got main billing with the rest of the senior-staff-plus-Wesley. ---
**Author:** ![Ethilrist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ethilrist/32/4604_2.png) [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2012, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659/29 "2012-11-11T22:12:13Z")
> [@BorgHunter](#): > > What I found far odder is that the **show itself** never treated her as a true member of the cast. It was always “With Special Guest Star Diana Muldaur as Dr. Katherine Pulaski”; she never got main billing with the rest of the senior-staff-plus-Wesley. That’s actually usually done as a sign of respect, to show that the actor has done greater things and they are glad to have her on the cast. Similar to Jonathan Harris in _Lost in Space._ ---
**Author:** ![bouv](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bc8723/32.png) [@bouv](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bouv)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2012, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659/30 "2012-11-11T22:32:15Z")
> [@pancakes3](#): > > Tangent, shouldn’t Data be called Datum? No. His father/creator decided to call him Data, so that’s what it is. It’s a proper noun. ---
**Author:** ![bibliophage](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bibliophage/32/7615_2.png) [@bibliophage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bibliophage)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2012, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659/31 "2012-11-11T23:58:24Z")
> [@pancakes3](#): > > Tangent, shouldn’t Data be called Datum? Shouldn’t Bones be called Bone? ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2012, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659/32 "2012-11-12T00:18:29Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > I loathe Pulaski and was quite happy when she fell down the turbolift shaft. _snerk_ ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2012, 12:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659/33 "2012-11-12T00:28:31Z")
My primary memory of her is a scene where she is incredulous of something, don’t even remember what it was, but it was horrible, terrible awful acting and from that moment, I wanted her gone. ---
**Author:** ![DSYoungEsq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c6cbf5/32.png) [@DSYoungEsq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSYoungEsq)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2012, 12:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659/34 "2012-11-12T00:40:22Z")
> [@Ethilrist](#): > > That’s actually usually done as a sign of respect, to show that the actor has done greater things and they are glad to have her on the cast. > > Similar to Jonathan Harris in _Lost in Space._ However, in her case, it was done because she specifically asked not to be identified as part of the regular cast, as she wasn’t sure how long she wanted to do the part. She had just retired, moved to the Sierra with her husband, and did the season only as a favor to Gene Roddenberry. Gates McFadden had left the show after season one after “difficulties” with Maurice Hurley, who was part of the production team. Several people have claimed that those difficulties essentially were attempts by Hurley to get McFadden in bed with him, and when she refused, he campaigned to have her part de-emphasized. Hurley left after the end of Season Two, so McFadden could come back. Co-incidentally, it may be the case that Muldaur had asked for a four or five episode break at the start of the season to do “The Return of McCloud”. As a result, Beverly Crusher returned, and Dr. Pulaski was never mentioned again. I, personally, thought that they never fully utilized the talent of Diana Muldaur. _LA Law_ did a much better job of making her a thoroughly unlikeable character, simply because she got on with it much like a man would, and didn’t act at all female. I don’t think _ST:TNG_’s writers ever quite totally knew what to do with her character. It didn’t help that, as pointed out before, Season Two was still filled with some pretty poor writing, certainly at the beginning of the season. As far as Dr. Crusher goes, I think that the part for the first half of the show ended up being, in essence, Wesley Crusher’s mom, former flame of the Captain. It wasn’t until the second half of the show that they started actually trying to find out who Dr. Crusher was, and, sadly, I don’t think they ever really figured it out. Even in the run of excellent episodes from Season Five to Season Six, she was more or less a non-entity. The episode where Wesley is involved in the cover-up over the accident at the Academy could have seen her shine, but instead the writers more-or-less whiff on the chance. But one does have to admit she was relatively pretty. \ ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2012, 2:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659/35 "2012-11-12T02:49:16Z")
> [@BorgHunter](#): > > She seemed, at times, to be a cheap McCoy wannabe, down to the distrust of transporters. My problem with the entire first season of ST:TNG was that it felt like a rehash of TOS. Then along comes season two and they inserted a character who felt too much like McCoy, and whose relationship with Data was too much like McCoy’s with Spock. And nothing against Diana Muldaur, whom I love (and I even loved her as Rosalind Shays.) But the character of Pulaski didn’t have the opportunity to be as funny as McCoy, or to have the confidence of the Captain, like McCoy. Pulaski was just a placeholder to be an annoyance to Data, and it just never felt right to me. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_A.Robrin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sam_a.robrin/32/14497_2.png) [@Sam\_A.Robrin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_A.Robrin)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2012, 2:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659/36 "2012-11-12T02:49:28Z")
A little too obviously based on McCoy, but I liked her as needed counterpoint to the more dimply _Trek_kian cast. But hey, I never fell in with the general hatred of Wesley Sue, either. ---
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2012, 3:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659/37 "2012-11-12T03:42:09Z")
> [@kunilou](#): > > Pulaski was just a placeholder to be an annoyance to Data, and it just never felt right to me. I think if you go back and watch some of the episodes, you’ll be surprised at how little their relationship is given focus. With the exception of “Elementary, Dear Data” and a few vignettes in other episodes, it’s not brought up at all. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2012, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659/38 "2012-11-12T04:04:52Z")
I always liked Pulaski, who was far more interesting than the bland Beverly Crusher. She had bite and personality and was the best thing about the second season. ---
**Author:** ![montag01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/51bf81/32.png) [@montag01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/montag01)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2012, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659/39 "2012-11-12T04:17:46Z")
I didn’t like Pulaski at first, but came to really like her character. She had more dynamic to her, and genuinely responded to other characters in different ways. For instance, there was a scene where Warf wants to thank her for something by having her participate in some drink ceremony, but the drink is poisonous to humans. Pulaski has herself injected with an antidote and then goes through with the ceremony, despite the discomfort it will cause. Pulaski tended to dominate most of her scenes because she was often the strongest character in the room. ---
**Author:** ![Hail\_Ants](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/dc4da7/32.png) [@Hail\_Ants](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hail_Ants)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2012, 4:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659/40 "2012-11-12T04:31:41Z")
I’m of the ‘hated her’ camp. But I’ll admit for a lot of unfair, superficial reasons. As a huge fan of TOS it was depressing & jarring to see Diana Muldar having gone from superhot to not just older, but frumpy, shrewish and unpleasant. Her personality was unbecoming of a (fictional) medical doctor, a healer. Namely she was unfriendly, confrontational, bitchy, overly practical and unsympathetic. Gates McFadden’s doctor on the other hand was warm, comforting, very empathetic and pleasant. Plus, her age be damned, she was very attractive. And not in an unbelievable, eye-candy, bimbo kind of way (I could never accept Deep Space Nine’s Terry Farrell as a scientist because of her ‘model pretty’ good looks). McFadden was attractive in a realistic, intelligent, professional kind of way. And because she’s what we today would have absolutely called a _ **MILF!** _ 😃 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dr-pulaski/640659.md?page=3)