Ok, me and my wife are doing a re watch. I loved TNG and other Star Trek growing up, future is made great through tech, utopia is possible, go humanity, etc.
Wife’s watching the series. I dip in from time to time, I know some spoilers and how some characters are, but can’t remember a single plot all the way through. We watched the Pegasus (S7E12).
Like, it completely ruined Star Trek. Humanity and the federations before that point are going into all interactions with aliens, and we always assume they’re the good guys, always acting on good faith, the frustrations they have with other species is because the other species don’t believe how nice they can be, earth has no problems of racism or hunger or fucking whatever.
And then, no, we have clandestine , backstabbing stuff, fully known by the federation, covered up, everyone hushed, the research discontinued, but searched for so it can be dug up again. That research, which was done in direct, knowing violation of a peace treaty they cobbled together with the Romulans, which have been the semi bad guys in various episodes.
Well, if the fucking federation are known, lying backstabbing, black ops using, pride and wrath addled assholes, I also would look at them with distrust. No wonder the Ferengi don’t want to join the Federation, of course the Cardassians are attacking on the borders.
Every time they go to a space bar and dig around for information, all the other aliens are wearing some personable clothing with their own customs and history woven into the fabric, when these squares rock up wearing a space potato sack, talking about the greater good. Fuck off you Maoist assholes.
I love the series and the morals, but the worldbuilding is fucking destroyed with this episode. I assume this is what gives way to the section 31 film and all that.
I’d love to hear some counterarguments. I loved seeing Star Trek as a utopia, and with humanity being their best with great leadership. I want to go back to that point of view.
PS : Also, Picard says to decloak right in front of the romulan warbird, then they never show that conversation. I want to know how he talked his way out of that one, and the rammifications. We’re about to watch sub rosa, and I am looking forward to the source of all the beverly ghost fucker memes.
If that was too much skullduggery for your taste then you really shouldn’t watch Deep Space Nine.
Computer, delete that entire personal log.
Oh, you know that’s right.
(I love DS9 so much though…)
Please, do some sort of text based let’s watch of Sub Rosa. Don’t take time to recover, just post it, stream of consciousness
He didn’t have to talk his way out, the romulans got what they love: proof their enemy are actually all cheating liars.
That commander got some serious awards for that, it was a massive romulan victory, they’ll be using it to show the federation are all worse cheats than everyone for centuries.
Also, you need to never watch in the pale moonlight.
Because you can’t live with it…
The less said about the s31 film, the better.
DS9-era s31 plot lines were legit because it was pointedly asking the question, and doing it well. The movie was just… I mean, as far as I can tell, it was an infantile cash grab.
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I’m knee deep into a TOS run, and let me tell you, the number of corrupted captains meddling with pre-warp cultures is astounding.
It’s one thing to say that humanity largely got its collective shit together. It’s another to expect that mentality to be wholly shared and maintained, especially once presented with the notion of an entire galaxy to explore or exploit. That there are still those trying to uphold greater moral and ethical standards while being open to new ideas is what makes Trek… fascinating.
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But there was backstabby, clandestine stuff authorized by the federation before, in Chain of Command (S6E10&11) for example.
I have never understood the Federation and especially not Starfleet as perfect, and utopian only in comparison to our society. And neither could have ever been perfect, because Star Trek isn’t about the far future and how it may be but about our society. It is social commentary and you cannot spin episodes about standing up to an imperfect government or society in a show with a perfect government and society.
(Also, I personally have always found it weird that both Klingons and Romulans had cloaking tech but Starfleet hadn’t. I get it for storytelling, it is hard to write some stuff when you got cloaking and the obvious solution would be to get invisible and get out, but lorewise it’s just stupid to go without such an impactful tech when the other two major powers in your quadrant have it.)
Cloaking-wise, humanity was behind. The workaround of the Treaty of Algeron just adds a narrative twist, holding back the greater principles of the Federation. Of course certain parties still tried to develop the tech (I assume through reverse engineering captured wessels from either faction).
Still doesn’t make sense to concede such tech, even or especially when you’re behind others. It’s just that much of a game changer.
Also, it’s not really the point of my comment but a side note.Plenty of countries sign on to nuclear non proliferation.
Besides, the Federation did well enough without it.
I see this as an episode about humans being… human. That despite significant advances in human civilization towards a socialist utopia, there is still greed and a lust for power in humanity, and that strong steps still need to be taken to blunt those evils.
Picard decloaking in front of the Romulans may not have translated well to Romulan mores, but it’s an attempt to re-establish trust, a way of saying, “we don’t tolerate shit like this, and here is us exposing this malfeasance to prove our dedication to being honest.”
I mean, the Romulans will most certainly assume the worst, because they will project onto humans that which they are most likely to do themselves. But at least Picard is holding true to what the Federation stands for, which means airing dirty laundry such that the Federation can learn from it.
You… Should watch Star Trek more throughly.
There have been plenty of episodes like Pegasus well before Pegasus. An easy one that comes to mind is a pretty famous one: The Drumhead.
In Star Trek the United Federation of Planets have built themselves a utopia. And yet they still have enemies, they still have wars. Star Trek doesn’t just show Humans being in this utopia, but also the vigilance towards keeping it that way.
The Pegasus is a great example of some part of Starfleet sliding back, but then the crew of the Enterprise D taking the high road and upholding the morals they believe in. The morals that makes the UFP a utopia.
