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I am technically out of time this morning already (lost power sometime during the night and the alarm didn't go off!) so this is going to go quick! First, some comments from previous columns . . .
Scott Vogt: I agree with whoever said a show set in the past wouldn't be the same since we knew how things would turn out. It would also have to look cheesy. Look at the realism they used in DS9's tribble episode, you really wanna see another show with that look? But that kind of show would be a nitpicker's dream, knowing how the creator's like to rewrite history. :)
But I thought along the lines of something set in the Federation's present, only having one or two regulars. I'd like to see someone's climb through Starfleet. Start someone out as an ensign, and let's watch him work. Maybe show two friends, or brothers, and their different lives in the Fleet. Not even have them serve together necessarily, just give each guy half the show, they like "A" and "B" stories anyway. We could watch them learn and grow, see how their experiences change them. Every season wouldn't have to equal a year either, show them as they get promoted through the years. That way, they would only need 2 regulars, and the others might just be around for a season, until they get transferred or promoted or whatever.
Or maybe, pick a ship. Follow the ship, not the crew. I mean, if the stroy demands it, kill off someone, don't hire anyone for the long haul. Have people leave regularly, that way it'll stay fresh, the audience wont know the heck is gonna happen, that would catch my interest, like when Picard became Locutus, the rumors flew, would Shelby stay as Riker's #1? Would Locutus become a recurring character? With this premise, they could always surprise you.
Omer Belsky, Haifa, Israel: Personally I think that`s a great Idea, to see the NG people again. It will also be more *similar* to what trek *should* be, so I guess it won`t be rejected by people who don`t like B5. I also tink that the key to doing another really succesful TV-show is by getting some new writing - how about getting some Sci-Fi writers to the shows? remember 'City at the edge of Forever'?
Phil, what did you mean when you said that TREK fandom is changing? Can you explain that a bit? I`m not living in the US so I don`t know how things *used* to be.
Phil: I'm not sure yet but I think the Internet is modifying how people approach discussions about their shows. In the past, groups of people actually got together and talked about the show and did things. It seems now that people spend that same time at their computer. I'm not sure yet how that all works out but I think it's a shift.
T. J. Radwell, III: They could do a Sulu series in the 23rd century, if they set it in the time after Kirk "dies." I mean, gee, they have a 78 year gap to fulfill. They could have a series without the "Big Three," set it aboard the Excelsior, and maybe have Uhura, Chekov & Scotty decide to come out of retirement to serve with Sulu.
Phil: My plan here is to have you all list all the possible new series and then if and when Paramount does decide to do one we can say we thought of it first! ;-)
Ron Saarna of Toronto, Ontario: Not to nitpick the Chief Nitpicker, but if every letter equals 1000 viewers, aren't you just 9,000 away from doing a Bond Guide? And if this counts as a vote too, we are only 8,000 away! C'mon folks...8 more of you respond and Phil can begin writing!
Phil: To quote the warden from Cool Hand Luke, "What we have he-yah is a fail-yah to communicate." ;-) I didn't say I thought that one letter was the equivalent of 1000 people, I said Paramount used to think that! (They still might. Haven't heard. Wouldn't know.)
Scott McClenny: Well a Bond Guide would be interesting to read I think that a general Spy Guide would even be better. That way you could get nits for not only Bond movies but for all of the great spy shows such as The Avengers,The Man From U.N.C.L.E,Get Smart The Wild,Wild West,I Spy, Mr.And Mrs.Smith and Spy Game. I realize that it would have to be one large book or you would have to do it in at least two volumes to get everything in. I also realize that not everyone would agree with the inclusion of Mr.And Mrs.Smith or Spy Game (but hey,I liked them when they were on). Also if Gene Roddenberry's Earth:Final Conflict gets mega popular can we expect a Nitpicker's Guide for it one day soon. Still waiting for the Xena Guide.:) Scott
Phil: Let's see. I think we're somewhere around 13 down and 19,987 to go!
Ronan Mitchell: I'd buy the Bond guide as well!
Phil: Fourteen down . . .
Omer Belsky, Haifa, Israel: And about a Bond guide... I`m not really exited about it, but I guess that I`ll buy it. So, for the record, that`s another one down and 19,900-something to go.
Phil: Fifteen down . . .
Joshua "Licensed to Nitpick" Truax: In the e-mail in which I initially suggested a 007 Nitpicker's Guide, I said that there were 18 James Bond movies. I believe a clarification is in order on this count. As far as United Artists and the Ian Fleming estate are concerned, there are 18 canonical James Bond movies. In chronological order, they are:
Dr. No (1963, stars Sean Connery as Bond)
From Russia with Love (1963, Connery)
Goldfinger (1965, Connery)
Thunderball (1965, Connery)
You Only Live Twice (1967, Connery)
On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1970, George Lazenby)
Diamonds Are Forever (1971, Connery)
Live and Let Die (1973, Roger Moore)
The Man with the Golden Gun (1974, Moore)
The Spy Who Loved Me (1977, Moore)
Moonraker (1979, Moore)
For Your Eyes Only (1981, Moore)
Octopussy (1983, Moore)
A View to a Kill (1985, Moore)
The Living Daylights (1987, Timothy Dalton)
Licence to Kill (1989, Dalton)
Goldeneye (1995, Pierce Brosnan)
Tomorrow Never Dies (1997, Brosnan)
There are also two other movies made by other studios that feature the James Bond character that are not considered canonical. One is Casino Royale (1967), which is actually a parody of the 007 series. It stars the late Peter Sellers as Bond. The other is Never Say Never Again (1983), which marked Sean Connery's one-time return to the role that launched him into super-stardom, and was made by Warner Bros. instead of United Artists. I don't know the entire story behind this movie, but apparently it was a sort of renegade project, made without the blessing of the Fleming estate! So, if you do end up writing a 007 Guide, I'll leave it up to you as to whether you want to include either of these movies. If it were my decision, I'd include Never Say Never Again but not Casino Royale, because Never was at least a serious Bond movie, whereas Casino was a parody...
Glenn St-German: Make that 11. I'd buy one!
Phil: Sixteen down, 19984 to go.
Dave Craig from Waterloo, Ontario: Stweart isn't the first Star Trek actor to forget the details of an episode. In that old Star Trek special that was mentioned further down in the column, Nimoy talked about how the "Vulcan Death Grip" was often mistaken for the Vulcan Neck Pinch. Specifically, he said that there was no Vulcan Death grip, it was just invented by Spock in order could fake McCoy's death. As I recall, the Vulcan Death grip is only used in "The Enterprise Incident", and it was used to fake Kirk's death, not McCoy's. It is possible that Nimoy was just reading from a script, but I'm still amazed that noone caught that error.
Shane Tourtellotte: The "very thin, small, and rectangular pieces of wood" Joseph Lin mentions as having borne invisible labels on Classic Trek: could he mean the computer disks? I recall several instances where characters knew more about what was on those disks than their blank faces, or pretty colors, would seem to impart. I'm pretty sure they're not reading colors, just nonexistent labels.
Shane Tourtellotte: On battles at warp speed, in "Flashback" (ST-VOY) Sulu's Excelsior comes under photon torpedo fire at warp speed, with keen effects and everything.
Douglas Bruzzone: Phasers do work at warp, not very well at all though, and they are the main weapon.
Derek Moffitt: While I'm almost sure that we've done this subject to death in the past, here's a brief explanation: A causality paradox happens when an effect precedes its cause. A perfect example is the Voyager episode "Parallax", when the Voyager answers a distress call, gets caught in a black hole and dragged backward in time, and then sends out a distress call...the same one that they were originally answering. But if the Voyager didn't send the distress call until *after* they were caught in the black hole, where'd the distress call that they answered come from in the first place? That's a causality paradox. They're fairly common in Trek (especially the first season of Voyager); Janeway explains them to Paris in either "Parallax" or one of the other episodes that involves one. The causality paradox should not be confused with the "irrational time" interpretation of time travel used by Trek; the same paradox can occur even when time behaves in a fixed, logical fashion. A good example here is the Babylon 5 universe, where it's been established that altering the past is impossible.While I can't think of a B5 episode built around a causality paradox, a few of them can be found lurking in the background. For one, where did that plexiglass contraption that turned Delenn into a part-human come from? The Minbari had had it around ever since Valen's time; Delenn used it; it went back into the past on B4, where Sinclair used it to become Valen; the loop repeats. The device was never created, yet it exists.That's another version of the causality paradox. (Hmmm...I said this was going to be a *brief* explanation, didn't I?Oops....)
One final comment, tangentially related to all of the fifth-series discussion: I was just observing the other day that, with all of the time-travel episodes and movies we've had, we've never been within eighty years of one of the most important events in galactic history: the founding of the Federation. I don't think there are any other gaps this large anywhere between the "present" (2374 or whatever) and the 1700s. Seems like a ready-made opportunity here. Plus, it'd give TPTB a chance to use that Daedalus-class model that they've had around since who-knows-when.Failing that, though, I like the Sulu/Chekov idea, though I'm a bit leery that they'd rather overdo it with guest apperances by Uhura, Rand, Spock, McCoy, etc.I mean, if they'll put Riker into a Voyager episode, one wonders what level of improbability they'd balk at. (Note to Paramount: if Kirk gets resurrected, I'm going to be so disillusioned that I'll seriously consider boycotting the viewing of Trek series for a lengthy period of time, perhaps exceeding 0.68 seconds....)
Scott Vogt: Someone asked who and what episode someone said a discouraging word about Earl Grey tea. It was made by Garak, as he travelled with Worf to look for Enabrain Tain in the episode "In Purgatory's Shadow."
Phil: Thanks to Corey Hines, Murray Leeder, Mike Ash, Ronan Mitchell, Matthew Patterson, John Myers, Darren Bennett, Alex Otis, Marty Hecla, Eddie Marshall and Rene Charbonneau for sending this information along as well.
Eddie Marshall of Hampshire, UK: [Concerning Holodoc demonstration of his changing permeability,] Just to expand it was the season one episode where Torres prepared to transfer the holodoc to the holodeck to search for the missing Ensign Kim she made a comment along the lines of "Ive given you control over your magnetic confinement so you can be solid or allow things to pass through you.".
Scott Vogt: Someone wanted know a song which mentioned Picard. I don't know the group, but the chorus went "Everybody knows that the world is full of stupid people." The reference to Picard was along the lines of, "you might as well say you are Capt. Jean-luc Picard from the United Federation of Planets, because they don't speak English anyway."
Corey Hines, Hamilton, ON: It is a song by the group The Refreshments
Matt Cotnoir: The song in question is called "Banditos," performed by the Refreshments (I think. I know the song title is right, but I'm not exactly sure that is the name of the band)
Phil: I looked it up. Both are right!
Marty Hecla: Amber Heinzel asks about a song that mentions Jean-Luc Picard from about 2 years ago... It was by The Refreshments and I think it was called "Banditos." Oddly enough, earlier this morning I heard it on the radio for the first time in about a year! [Insert Twilight Zone theme here]
Ken Cullison of Baltimore, MD: In the 1/9/98 column of "ask the chief" you mentioned that a classic trek episode had a turbolift scene which showed double doors. It was "The Corbomite Manuever", and I believe the double doors were shown twice. The inner doors are blue, and during one bridge scene the stage hand closed the blue doors faster than the red ones - they show quite prominently.
Patrick Sweeney: I just wanted to comment on the Cochrane Statue thing, in the Decipher First Contact CCG, there is a Visit Cochrane Memorial card, and it shows a better statue picture than the encyclopedia does. It is huge, with Cochrane in the pose shown by LaForge in the movie. It is actually pretty cool and high quality.
Dave Craig from Waterloo, Ontario: Also, regarding blooper tapes, Roddenberry made Blooper Reels of all three seasons of TOS, and showed them at the season-end Wrap Parties. Once Trek conventions started up he started showing them there as well. However, some people managed to get a hold of these tapes, and started selling bootleg copies. When TNG started up, Roddenberry made a blooper reel for the first season, but when bootleg copies of it started to appear Gene decided enough was enough, and stopped making blooper reels. To the best of my knowledge, the only other blooper tape was for the TNG 2nd season wrap party, but it was destroyed after it was viewed.
John Bibb: OK, if those are canonical, what about the Star Trek: Klingon and Star Trek: Borg CD ROMS, which come from the same company as the Omipedia and Encyclopedia? Both have a fuinction where you can stop the interactive movie and click on background objects for an "encyclopedia" like entry. Is that info canonical? And if it is, what about the interactive movies themselves? (BTW: The "Klingon" one is the only other occurance of Klingon Pepto-Bismal Blood) I know the answer to these questions is probably "no," but if certain CD-ROMS are canonical, the PTB should make it clear which ones.
Phil: The only rule that I've been able to deduce from all of this is that the TV shows and the Movies are canoncial. Period. Now, if you've got a book that is basically a rehash of the information in the TV shows or Movies that would be canoncial by default (Like the Encyclopedia or the Chronology). And then there are documents that Paramount simply stamps canonical like Tech Manual for the Enterprise-D or the blueprints . . . or the novel that Jeri Taylor wrote and decided that that really was what Janeway's childhood was like! As for the rest of it . . . who knows? ;-)
Patrick Sweeney: On the "are cd-roms cannon material" question, well, the new encyclopedia is written by the Okuda's as a companion for the book, and supposed to be considered on in the same.
John Myers: The E-Es master systems display has NOMAD on it (I saw this when using the Captains Chair CD) just as the E-D has all the other jokes.
On to the questions . . .
John Burke of Hyannis, MA: I recently bought the Next Generation Volume II Guide, and it led me to a sudden insight about Trek's dating system.In the review of "Lower Decks," you refer to the "obscuring qualities of the star dates."This is true.Star dates are very confusing.They make an effort to have 1000 of them conform to a year but eeven the creators do not always hold themselves to that. Star dates are a pain in the neck sometimes, and I finally figured out the reason why. Consider:
Starfleet officers use stardates in their logs, but whenever they speak about time, they talk the way we do today (There are countless examples.People on Trek are always mentioning how many years ago something was, O'Brien once said his birthday was in September, etc...) They almost never talk about something happening 50.4 stardates ago, or meeting so-and-so at 2100 hours on stardate 40998.2. They still use the concepts of days, weeks, months, years quite a bit. Am I the only one who thinks this doesn't make much sense? It's like they use two completely different dating systems, depending on whether the writer wants to go by easily understandable terms, or utilize the futuristic and "obscuring" stardate system. I realize that Starfleet probably developed the Stardate in response to the different times on different planets in different parts of the galaxy--a sort of unified system--but if this were the case, don't you think the whole Federation would have "converted" (like switching to the metric system)? I wouldn't be surprised if even Starfleet officers sometimes get confused, trying to remember both systems ("Captain's Log, Stardate 457...Ummm, let's see, April was 45601...Lieutenant, how many fifths of a Stardate in a month?") One would almost think the creators don't want us to know exactly when certain events are taking place (Imagine that...)
Phil: The stardates have always been confusing to me. That's one of the things I like about Babylon 5. It seems like the creators actually know when stuff occurs.
Murray Leeder: In "Nisei", you refer to Penny Northern. In "Momento Mori", you refer to Peggy Northern. Which is it?
Phil: Just a little brain glitch, should be "Penny."
Chris Piepers of Leiden, The Neitherlands: What Ever Happened To The Prime Directive?
Did the Talaxians have warp power when feds met them?
...did Kes's people?
...did the Kazon?
...did any of the other species they mingeld with, fought, or influenced, had or would have
had, warp power before or after they met our 'space heroes'?
Or did Janeway just think:"This is a new quadrant, we make our one prime directive."?
Phil: Well . . . the Kazon did and the Talaxians must have because of the distances that they seem to be able to travel but the prime directive does tend to get a bit hazy (and maybe for good reason!).
Vicki Strzembosz: I'm having one of those brain blank moments and I bet there are fellow nitpickers that can help me out. This scene may have occured on Earth 2 as a flashback to one of the space stations, or it may have been on Space Above and beyond. Two people are speaking to each other in the foreground of the scene. One or both of them are main characters in whichever series it was. In the background there are people standing in a food service line. One of the people is studying the list of selections posted above the head of the server. He says to the server, "I'll have the Soylent Green. "If any one can tell me where I saw this scene I would be very grateful.
Phil: It has that faint, familiar ring to it but I have no idea where I've heard it! Anybody?
Shirley Kolb, who has just moved to Sterling, Kansas: I can't find Voyager at all yet. Maybe you could ask on "Ask the Chief" if anyone from near Wichita knows if it is on at all. Also, do you happen to know if DS9 is still in reruns? The last new one I have is "Statistical Probabilities".This Sun. night the ABC station showed a preview at 10:20 PM for one where Sisko & Gul Dukat were stranded on a planet together, but when they showed the episode at 10:35 PM, they repeated"Rocks & Shoals" instead of showing the new one. I'm very confused.......
Phil: Dear confused (sorry, old joke), I believe "Waltz" was the first new DS9 episode after "Statistical Probabilities". "Rocks and Shoals" rerun just after "Waltz" so . . . you probably missed "Waltz". Sorry.
Robert J. Woolley: I stopped at my local Barnes and Noble for a couple of things on my way home tonight. I checked to see if they had the X-Files nitpickers guide. (They didn't.) But I noticed that there are not only, of course, the obviously non-canonical X-Files novels, but there are novelizations of broadcast episodes, which say "Based on the teleplay by...."
So, O Wise One, shall these be considered canonical? I didn't look closely enough to see if they contain further details or contradictions when compared to the episodes, but it seems inevitable that they would.
Phil: Didn't have the X-phile Guide?!? Well, hopefully, they are sold out and have ordered more. Have not heard anything about the canonicity of the X-File novels!
Mike Deeds of Philadelphia, PA: Have you noticed how Millennium is copying The X-Files?In the last episode, they had Frank Black teamed with a female partner.They even included a scene where they walk around in the dark with flashlights!
Phil: Wouldn't know! Millennium is not on my list of show that I watch!
Mike Cheyne: Say, what do you think is going to be the next Star Trek movie? Have you heard anything? I believe I've heard they're starting, but I don't know the details. SOME IDEAS: Q (natch), the return of such characters as Barclay, possibly Lwaxana, maybe Scotty or Spock (I know--"Leonard Nimoy is not interested), a fun time travel episode (whatever happened to "goofy situations involving our fun cast--who wants to see Data in the 20th century), something to do with DS9 or (somehow) Voyager. Also, will Michael Dorn appear? Do you know?
Finally, I have a question about your Next Generation 2 Guide. (hope it's not been brought up before) One nit for "Yesterday's Enterprise" is about how Guinan doesn't get drink for Castillo and Yar because she knows they won't pay. Yet for "Allegiance" you remark that all drinks in Ten-Forward are free. Then, what's up with the nit for "Yesterday's Enterprise"?
Phil: I try to stay away from movie rumors. There are so many and most are so wildly inaccurate. And, the comment in "Yesterday's Enterprise" was just a little joke as I'm sure yours was as well!
Eddie Marshall of Hampshire, UK: I''m having dreadfull trouble finding a copy of the nitpickers guide for X Philes here in Southampton UK. Is it available over here yet ?
Phil: I have heard from at least one nitpicker who found the American version in some bookstore in London. Titan Books was interested in publishing it but there was a small problem which I am not a liberty to discuss.
Ross A. Fillmore, Columbus, OH: I'm going to help you with your Star Trek/B5 crossovers.I found another one.I've been watching the re-released reruns of B5 on TNT (get your VCRs ready), and tonight's episode had a character listed as Knight One who was the technician that operated the device that dug into Sinclair's subconscious to find out what had happened to him when he was captured by the Minbari during the war.I recognized this guy and it bugged me all night until it finally came to me where else I had seen him.He played Sobi in TNG:Symbiosis.He was the male Brekkian who supplied the drug felicium.Further research in my Star Trek Encyclopedia also shows that Judson Scott played the character of Joachim who was Khan's protege in "The Wrath of Khan."(I remember that now too).
On a disheartening note, I found out tonight that the new season of B5 starts next week... OPPOSITE VOYAGER!IS THERE NO MERCY?
Phil: Them's the way the scheduling crumbles. Wonder if that was intensional. Hmmmm.
Joe McLaughlin Jr. of Medway, MA: I was watching many episodes of Star Trek this week and a lot of these points came to my mind, can anybody else verify them?
1.) I was looking through my technical manual this week and came across the warp factor chart on page 55. This shows (If you follow the black line curve for warp speed) that when you get to the end, it is about 3,000 times the speed of light. At this speed, wouldn't Voyager return to the Alpha Quadrant in about 25 years instead of 75? Did they redraw the warp curve for Voyager? I don't think so because in the TNG episode "The Price" Picard says that the Ferengi Ship can reach it's shuttle in 80 years.
2.) Also, I just watched my First Contact movie that I got for Christmas, but did anyone else notice that the sun was a bright white-blue? I tend to think in space that it still looks yellow-orange.
3.) Furthermore, Does anyone remember the first season Voyager episode, "The Eye of the Needle" (The one with the microscopic wormhole that led to the Alpha Quadrant 20 years earlier), when everyone wants to leave and Kes asks why the doctor can't come. He says that his program is fully integrated into sickbay and cannot be downloaded. But in many episodes since, he's been downloaded into the little portable holographic device (and the crew has said "downloaded" many times when referring to making the Doctor work on the portable).
4.) Also there is some scrutiny about Data. Is there some way that he recharges himself? Or does he have a power supply that runs indefinitely or for a few hundred years? Does he recharge himself during his off hours on the Enterprise? He can't possibly run for hundreds of years on the same supply, not with all the processing he does. He thinks about more than one thing at the same time. With all this going on and him moving around all over the place and dancing, wouldn't his power supply run out sooner than he thinks?
Phil: Let me take quick stab at these. 1.) No reason that I can see unless everyone on Voyager is factoring in stops at planets, nebula, gaseous anomolies and anything other possible source of problems for the ship. 2.) Haven't bought the movie yet. Couldn't say! 3.) Evidently, Torres has been working away. 4.) Come to think of it, I can't remember any dialogue about Data's power source either! Anybody?
Dan Wiese, El Cajon: In First Contact, Data puched a hole in the coolent tank to kill the Borg, was it or was it not a coolent leak that caused a warp core breach that destroyed the Enterprise-D.
Do you know what deck the Brig is on? (Enterprise-D)
Phil: Didn't Data punch a hole in the high-energy plasma conduit? Don't know. Haven't seen the movie in a while. As for the Brig on the Enterprise-D, I would guess it's on the blueprint but I haven't bought them yet either! (I've been busy with other things lately!)
Have a great weekend, everybody!
If you would like to submit a question or comment, send it to: chief@nitcentral.com with "Question" in the Subject line. (Remember the legalese: Everything you submit becomes mine and you grant me the right to use your name in any future publication by me.)
Copyright 1998 by Phil Farrand. All rights reserved.