Roddenberry kind of went off the deep end in regards to his creation. I don’t know if the signs were there with TMP, it’s a good Trek story even if the execution was rather boring. But in the lead up to the Next Generation he started insisting Star Fleet wasn’t a military organization, didn’t want any conflicts between the characters, and wanted them to be evolved beyond the petty concerns of contemporary people. I read that he didn’t want the main characters to mourn Tasha Yar because he felt humans would be evolved to the point where they just accepted death as part of life. And I find this odd because he didn’t shy away from flaws humans in the original series. The Federation as presented in TOS wasn’t perfect. It was better than what we had in the 1960s but they still had problems.
It is apparent in the story treatments for the aborted Phase II series (several of which were actually recycled for The Next Generation). I guess it is ‘nice’ that he wanted to portray an advanced version of humanity bereft of uncomfortable emotions or adverse interactions, but that doesn’t really make for entertaining storytelling. I’m sure this was a reflection of how he viewed himself but in reality Roddenberry had some problematic attitudes that would have doubtless gotten him in trouble had he lived into the #MeToo era.
The Federation in the The Next Generation/Deep Space Nine/Voyager era was basically full of conspiracies, corruption, incompetence, et cetera, as well as multiple potentially civilization-ending threats regularly showing up within the span of just a few years. It is basically existential cosmic horror crossed with House of Cards; any time a Starfleet Admiral shows up, watch your back because they are probably either on some secret agenda or have been taken over by an alien life form.
Stranger
For years, I always heard sexism was to blame for recasting the role of Number 1 from Majel Barrett in the pilot to Mr. Spock as the first officer because executives just couldn’t accept a woman in that position. But others argue that part of the reason was that executives didn’t want the series to be a vehicle for Roddenberry’s mistress. I especially loved that he wanted to have an open relationship with both Nichelle Nichols and Barrett that they’d all keep secret from his wife but Nichols didn’t want to be the other other woman. Roddenberry must have had the magic touch or something. But last I heard he was still remembered fondly by Nichols and of course Barrett married the guy.
What’s odd about this is that in early TNG seasons the crew was so sanctimonious about how much more evolved they were. But, yeah, if you’re an admiral in Star Fleet you’re either incompetent or involved in some sort of nefarious conspiracy.
That’s OK - the Federation has the ultimate attack weapon to defeat the Borg, anyone, but somehow they forgot about it.
I am referring to the Genesis Bomb. Which has no defense.
Or am I referring to unlimited telekenetic powers, achievable by an injection?
Or an infinite clone army if you have an analog cassette tape.
Or they’ve gone rogue. And it’s not just admirals. Any officer who shows up from some base/ship we’ve never heard of on the show before, they’re trouble! Nobody in Star Fleet ever just drops by to say “Hello!”
Happened all the time, but it isn’t entertaining so why tell the story.
They did when it was Luxwana dropping by, or Riker’s father. Of course, those two were also trouble. With a capital T and that rhymes with P and that stands for Picard!
It was so slow-moving that they called it The Motionless Picture. And the sets were so dark it looked like they lit them with candles.
Hm, has anyone ever seen James Doohan and Jerry Garcia in the same room together?
Star Trek XII: So Very Tired.
I read some of Doohan’s autobiography at the library a while back, where he mentions he lost it in WWII. He had the choice of keeping it, but losing the ability to move it, or having it removed. He went with the latter, but he was tempted to for the former, as a permanent “fuck you” to Hitler.
Given that the ship itself was a modified rocket, I’ve always assumed he was primarily modifying existing parts that had been made pre-WWIII but had been damaged in the war. So he was more putting together parts that were already really advanced, repairing them as necessary.
We also were explicitly told that the Vulcans only noticed the Phoenix when it went faster than light. Perhaps then Cochrane had some preliminary work on the warp drive before the destruction, but not enough to get to superliminal speeds.
The actor who voiced that “didn’t live very long” line did a horrible job. Totally an unbelievable piece of dialog as delivered.
Or he’d done a few warp experiments before but there just wasn’t anyone around to detect it. It’s stated in the movie that it just happened that the Vulcan ship was close enough to detect the warp signature.
“And it exploded” was left out entirely.
This. The Federation that was depicted in the TOS era was an optimistic vision of the future, which is part of what draws people to Trek, especially in troubled times like the 1960s and the present day. But it was an optimism with its feet on the ground. It was an optimism that allowed for personal flaws and interpersonal conflicts. It was an optimism that allowed for Kirk saying, “Maybe humans ARE killers. But maybe all that it takes is saying ‘we are not going to kill today.’”
But by the making of TMP and the early days of TNG, Roddenberry started overdoing it, not wanting ANY negative emotions or traits in Federation citizens. He didn’t even like TWOK, the best Trek movie, because he thought it was “too militaristic.” (And rumor has it that he was the one who leaked Spock’s death out of spite for being overruled. So much for being above pettiness.)
Yes, I remember enjoying the novelization very much. Had some good background on the characters and some interesting asides about Federation society at the time.
Definitely. I was a total Trekker and loved every moment of of it.
Speaking of Roddenberry being booted out of making Star Trek movies --if I remember correctly one of the issues was he kept pitching the idea of the crew going back in time to the Kennedy assassination and the studios kept rejecting it.
Mentioned here: https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/John_F._Kennedy
Yes, I remember hearing about that. One of the scripts even had JFK and JTK meeting.
As it happens, Andrew Robinson, who played Garak on DS9, played JFK in a time-travel episode of The Twilight Zone (1986).