The other day, “All good things…” was on and I watched it again and it reminded me of something that bothered me the first time I saw it (when it originally aired).
Okay, the temporal distortion or “anti-time” thingy gets bigger in the past. Got it. Now, when he shows up in the future timeline and goes to the part of space where the temporal distortion is supposed to be, it’s not there. But then their actions actually create the distortion. So, wait a minute, shouldn’t it have been there, but been really small and at the point of creation it should have disappeared? Because after they create it, time is still going forward. But if they create it and then it appears, then five minutes earlier when they were looking for it (since it’s going backwards in time itself) they should have seen it right?
Am I not getting something here? Or is that how it should have been?
It is a bone of contention that has often been pointed out by fans for the past 10 years. Since I never liked TNG, I have my theories to why they did something as idiotic as that, but I will let them slide.
I’ve rationalized it in my head by assuming the anomaly grew both forwards AND backwards in time, which is why they saw it by coming back LATER. Right before they formed it, it was probably still too close to its moment of formation to be visible.
That was never my problem with the finale.
My problem was when Q took Picard back to when all life began on Earth. He warned Picard that a disturbance could ruin the whole evolutionary process. And then he stuck his HAND into it!
That scene always bothers the hell out of me too. I was watching it with my wife once and started yelling at the screen during that scene. She of course didn’t see what the big deal was.
Okay, as long as I wasn’t missing something. I enjoyed the episode though. As far as Q sticking his hand in the “goo,” I guess he was an interdimensional being and could choose to not to have his hand interfere with it anyway. But even so, that timeline doesn’t exist right? The temporal distortion never existed regardless. Besides, all Q was sticking his hand into was some Slime™ from the 1970s. (which I know versions of are still available in TMNT action figure packs and the Jabba the Hut figure, but I remember it first coming out in the 70s.)
I don’t see the problem with Q sticking his hand into the slime. He can control matter on a sub-atomic level with his mind. I think he can stick his hand into some primordial goop without killing the dinosaurs. Heck, maybe he needs to stick his hand in it for us to evolve in the first place.
It’s a temporal distortion. There’s no telling how convoluted the “physics” involved may be. Much like temporal paradoxes, I try not to give them much thought or my mind will turn into primordial goo as well.
Well, it is only an hour long show. As long as they don’t insult my intelligence too much by having crewmen devolving into species they didn’t even come from or if intangible crewmen can somehow breathe despite being … well, intangible, I won’t mind too much.
I think the point Q was trying to make is that what he does to the goo is irrelevant, since the anomaly had already/would soon be (?) prevented the chemicals from mixing to form life. Unless Picard fixed it, there is no way to escape oblivion.
At least that’s what I think. My biggest problem is that Picard married Crusher, then divorced her on terms where he could speak to her again.
TOS had real science fiction writers who turned out the best all time scripts. Why did they move away from this? I’ve read Kirk/Spock slash that’s better than some of the episodes they are filming. The studio could pay peanuts for fanfic and they would be deluged with scripts, enough to pick and choose some real gems. Does this idea make too much sense for the studio?
Both my examples were from TNG, actually. The episode where Barclay becomes a spider (Evolution?) and the episode where Ro and Geordi are the victims of a phasing transporter. Both decent episodes but some of the most horrific science ever.
You mean such gems as “The Way to Eden”, “Spock’s Brain”, “The Omega Glory”, “Catspaw”, and “The Savage Curtain”, among others?
The real crime is the time line may have changed, thus depriving us of the cloak enabled, 3 warp nacelled Enterprise, with the bad ass phasers capable of blasting large holes in Klingon Cruisers. Yeah baby!
Also the Geordi and Ro episode was another favorite- who cares about the science? Watching Trek for the science is like watching Star Wars for the plot consistancy. The concept was cool, acting good, and the episode moved right along. Bonus lack of deflector dish routing or exploding EPS consuits made it rate at the classic level.
Although I kind of wondered why the Romulans put an “overload” setting on their disruptors. Maybe so you can use them as a mini hand genade?
I still want to know why Geordi and Ro could walk thru walls, but didn’t fall thru the floor and end up stuck inside the ship’s artificial gravity generator.
“Genesis” and “The Next Phase”, respectively.
You know, while I’m watching a lot of these episodes, I’m constantly nitpicking the science, but right now I can’t think of anything. Generally, though, I hate the time travel episodes where the crew of the Enterprise valiantly prevents someone from the future (“Captain’s Holiday”, for one) from doing something, as though the time travellers cannot simply go back in time (either to a point further back in time or a point further forward) and try again.
De-evolution I can sort of understand considering we still have a lot of old strings in our DNA. I read an article where scientists created a 4 wing fly offspring from a 2 wing parent by activating some of the older dormant codes. Remember the Voyager episode where Paris and Janeway went past warp 15 or something. They hyper-evolved into some sort of pink crocadiles because apparently, that is where our evolution is heading. What?? Evolution is predetermined? It is random, moderated by natural selection.
I liked it too. Notice I said they were decent? The plot was interesting but scientifically, it still stunk.
Most likely. Kirk used his phaser in a similar fashion in one of the TOS episodes. Hell if I can remember the title but it’s the one where the king of some tribal planet is killed and McCoy and Kirk save the queen who is pregnant and eventually gives birth, naming the kid Leonard James Akaar.
It’s also the episode where McCoy says “I’m a doctor, not an elevator!”
Thanks for the episode titles and yes, I agree. It’s sort of like in First Contact. Why the fuck didn’t the Borg just go back to the Paleozoic and fuck up Earth from orbit? Or if they wanted humans in their collective, then go to the Renaissance Era or something.
Barclay was part arachnid! We don’t have spider DNA!
Since the anomaly was there too, it didn’t matter. He could have gather up all the goo and had Deanna Troi douche with it; since the anomaly was there, life wouldn’t have happened anyway.
