There should be no more TNG

[Jon]

[rant]

Um, probably been discussed before but I have a few things to say and Necromancy is not the way

I've just read the Nemesis Pictorial synopsis on the main site, fantasticly funny stuff btw.

It stirred something in my mind that bugged me last time, well, every time I watched Nemesis. It's true isn't it- the writers are fucking stupid- and even the prized Prime Directive is just disregarded, thrown out of the window when they like.

I mean, what really pisses me off is the car chase. This should never have happened, an indigenous, pre-industrial race- and Data's flying a bloody anti-grav shuttle craft above the surface, worf's firing off a phaser canon like some trigger happy american and picrad, the bloody captain is laughing all the way through it. Then when they get back into the shuttle they just shoot off into the atmopsphere. Nothing is said of it...

Bah! Who wrote this shit... yes, that bugger, John Logan- but Berman the bitch had 'creative input' amongst others it seems, including Brent Spiner- Logan said he was a huge Trek fan and new all the ins and outs... Berman and Spiner should know better, it's bollocks.

I just hope they stop now, before they destroy any *credibility* TNG has left...

[/rant]

[NecronLord]

The prime directive forbids interfering in their development, not going near their planet. See duckblinds.

[Jon]

What I refer to is their interaction with the species on ther planet. Before they fly down in the Argo, Data refers to them as a Pre Industrial race.. yadda yadda.

[NecronLord]

Even so, they didn't go out to contact the 'primatives,' and even then, it's permissable to defend one's self.

I might add, jeeps are not "early industrial" early industrial is steam power.

[Jon]

I'm sure if thery can detect posotronic signatures from lightyears away, the shuttleboard computer might have alerted them that there were vehicles and locals within the direct vicinity- there's no excuse. Oh, 'the ion storm' thing. Yeah, there was much evidence of that from the surface When I say pre-industrial, I refer directly to the film.

[NecronLord]

The film said "An early stage of industrial development" IIRC.

And as for the positronic signatures. That's just one bigass turd they dropped on science.

[Darth Wong]

Actually NCL, the Prime Directive does override self-preservation in many cases, as demonstrated by the numerous situations in which the TNG Enterprise did not use deadly force in order to rescue a crewman who was under trial or trapped or otherwise hindered by a pre-warp society. Numerous TNG episodes revolved almost entirely around the fact that they were unwilling to expose pre-warp civilizations to their technology, even if it meant risking their own lives.

And the defining line is pre-warp, not pre-industrial. The Prime Directive forbids interference in pre-warp civilization. As Picard pointed out repeatedly, it is their highest law, above all others including military tactical considerations.

One can argue that this is stupid, but nevertheless, it is what TNG was, and what Nemesis was not ... despite having the same characters. Including Mr. Prime Directive himself, Captain Picard. This is a guy who once decided to stand idly by and allow an entire civilization to be destroyed simply because he thought that exposing them to knowledge of the existence of spacefarers would violate the Prime Directive and be worse than their total annihilation. This is a guy who said with a perfectly straight face that by exposing the Masterpiece Society to knowledge of what life was like on the outside, they might have damaged it worse than total annihilation.

[Alyeska]

Just a note. When someone else has already exposed someone to the galactic politics (IE contact with a warp civilization), those worlds are no longer under the prime directive. The Nemesis incident could very well be that planet has dealt with other warp groups before. This could explain why Picard landed and was also attacked on contact.

[Darth Wong]

Just a note. When someone else has already exposed someone to the galactic politics (IE contact with a warp civilization), those worlds are no longer under the prime directive. The Nemesis incident could very well be that planet has dealt with other warp groups before. This could explain why Picard landed and was also attacked on contact.

We saw Data's report to Picard, and he said nothing about this planet having foreknowledge of interstellar civilizations. And are you sure about this "once they've been exposed, the floodgates open" policy?

[Robert Walper]

One can argue that this is stupid, but nevertheless, it is what TNG was, and what Nemesis was not ... despite having the same characters. Including Mr. Prime Directive himself, Captain Picard. This is a guy who once decided to stand idly by and allow an entire civilization to be destroyed simply because he thought that exposing them to knowledge of the existence of spacefarers would violate the Prime Directive and be worse than their total annihilation. This is a guy who said with a perfectly straight face that by exposing the Masterpiece Society to knowledge of what life was like on the outside, they might have damaged it worse than total annihilation.

Which episode was this again? Did the civilization actually get destroyed?

[General Zod]

There was one episode, iirc where a researcher was studying a primitive civilization whose planet was on the verge of destruction. Picard was sent to rescue the researchers and they didn't like the idea of letting them all die. So the researchers with geordi's aid, transported them all to the holodeck without Picard's knowledge so they could be transported to another planet that was similar to the one they were on.

Funnily enough Picard wasn't very happy with the thought that they were on board and saw it as a problem to deal with once they were.

[Alyeska]

Just a note. When someone else has already exposed someone to the galactic politics (IE contact with a warp civilization), those worlds are no longer under the prime directive. The Nemesis incident could very well be that planet has dealt with other warp groups before. This could explain why Picard landed and was also attacked on contact.

We saw Data's report to Picard, and he said nothing about this planet having foreknowledge of interstellar civilizations. And are you sure about this "once they've been exposed, the floodgates open" policy?

In a manner of speaking. Those most likely to ignore the idea of the prime directive are those willing to do the most harm. Once someone else has contacted or affected a pre-warp civilization, it would be in the Federations best interest to also contact them. The Federation has little need to hide itself when galactic affairs have been introduced to these civilivizations.

[Jon]

There was one episode, iirc where a researcher was studying a primitive civilization whose planet was on the verge of destruction. Picard was sent to rescue the researchers and they didn't like the idea of letting them all die. So the researchers with geordi's aid, transported them all to the holodeck without Picard's knowledge so they could be transported to another planet that was similar to the one they were on.

So Insurrection was ripped off from an episode, it seems?

[NecronLord]

Actually NCL, the Prime Directive does override self-preservation in many cases,

What The Fuck?

That's just ludicrous. Really now...

[General Zod]

There was one episode, iirc where a researcher was studying a primitive civilization whose planet was on the verge of destruction. Picard was sent to rescue the researchers and they didn't like the idea of letting them all die. So the researchers with geordi's aid, transported them all to the holodeck without Picard's knowledge so they could be transported to another planet that was similar to the one they were on.

So Insurrection was ripped off from an episode, it seems?

found the episode in question. Homeward, 7th season. More detailed summary on the site.

[Uraniun235]

Oh, 'the ion storm' thing. Yeah, there was much evidence of that from the surface

Geordi said: "I wouldn't recommend using the transporter. That ion storm doesn't look very neighborly; it could head in our direction without much warning."

The ion storm wasn't on top of them, it was nearby. Geordi probably advised against the transporter because if the ion storm came upon them, the transporters would likely be inoperative and they'd be stranded down there.

So Insurrection was ripped off from an episode, it seems?

No, because the Baku were never beamed into the holoship. The episode in question deals a lot with Worf and his brother trying to maintain the illusion of never having left the planet for the people they rescued as the holodeck begins to fail, as well as Picard's usual hand-wringing over the Prime Directive.

[Jon]

Oh, 'the ion storm' thing. Yeah, there was much evidence of that from the surface

Geordi said: "I wouldn't recommend using the transporter. That ion storm doesn't look very neighborly; it could head in our direction without much warning."

The ion storm wasn't on top of them, it was nearby. Geordi probably advised against the transporter because if the ion storm came upon them, the transporters would likely be inoperative and they'd be stranded down there.

Ah, so the ion storm wasn't over them and hence transporters could safely be used.. so why not beam the shuttlecraft and the vehicle back to the ship as quickly as the indigenous race were discovered to be heading their way, stop a massive violation of the Prime Directive.

[General Zod]

because of the fact that ion storms do not stay still. There was a possibility it would have reached them and thus made the transporters inoperable.

[Jon]

I believe that's Rubbish; This storm, it could have reached them from being totally not visible even on the horizon, in the couple of seconds it would take to contact the ship and ask for an emergency transport off the surface?

[General Zod]

I believe that's Rubbish; This storm, it could have reached them from being totally not visible even on the horizon, in the couple of seconds it would take to contact the ship and ask for an emergency transport off the surface?

It was obviously enough to make Geordi worry about it. Unless you have another explanation why he would have mentioned it.

[Darth Wong]

Geordi said: "I wouldn't recommend using the transporter. That ion storm doesn't look very neighborly; it could head in our direction without much warning."

The ion storm wasn't on top of them, it was nearby. Geordi probably advised against the transporter because if the ion storm came upon them, the transporters would likely be inoperative and they'd be stranded down there.

Are you serious? Did it ever occur to you that if they can localize these pieces of Data from light-years away, they can probably locate them far more accurately from low orbit and simply beam them up into the ship? And even if they beam down, do you realize that the storm would have to be halfway around the planet not to be visible from where they are? What's it going to do, abruptly accelerate to lightspeed before they can beam up? And again, what happened to the Prime Directive? In TNG, they would have beamed down in native clothes so that they could stay there even if transport was temporarily interdicted by a storm.

So Insurrection was ripped off from an episode, it seems?

No, because the Baku were never beamed into the holoship. The episode in question deals a lot with Worf and his brother trying to maintain the illusion of never having left the planet for the people they rescued as the holodeck begins to fail, as well as Picard's usual hand-wringing over the Prime Directive.

The fact that they did not successfully pull off the operation does not change the fact that it was basically the same operation. They intended to use a holoship to maintain the illusion of never having left the planet.

[Darth Wong]

I believe that's Rubbish; This storm, it could have reached them from being totally not visible even on the horizon, in the couple of seconds it would take to contact the ship and ask for an emergency transport off the surface?

It was obviously enough to make Geordi worry about it. Unless you have another explanation why he would have mentioned it.

Shitty writing.

[Super-Gagme]

Shitty writing.

Suspension of disblief yadda yadda rules this out sadly. Kind of like a Parsec and ANH

[Jon]

Shitty writing.

Suspension of disblief yadda yadda rules this out sadly. Kind of like a Parsec and ANH

I'm all for suspension of disbelief, but how else can you justify this move? There was no Ion storm visible in all directions- it couldn't have reached them within an hour, let alone a few seconds. There was absolutely no need for what happened when the inhabitants arrived, so if we are to dismiss the writers inability to come up with a plausible escape we must only be left with :

The crew are shit, the enterprise wasnt monitoring what was happening and standing by to beam them back should things go awry- neither were Picard, Data nor Worf- they hadn't put any thought into what they might need to do when encountering the inhabitants, whom could be and turned out to be hostile.

[Uraniun235]

Are you serious? Did it ever occur to you that if they can localize these pieces of Data from light-years away, they can probably locate them far more accurately from low orbit and simply beam them up into the ship?

Then why did Picard and Co. have to putz around on the surface stumbling across the pieces, instead of coordinating with the Enterprise and moving directly to their locations?

And even if they beam down, do you realize that the storm would have to be halfway around the planet not to be visible from where they are?

That's what it looked like when Enterprise moved into orbit.

What's it going to do, abruptly accelerate to lightspeed before they can beam up?

Stranger things have happened. Or Geordi's just stupid. Besides, we both know Picard wanted an excuse to play with his new toy. This might have been Geordi giving Picard an excuse he could put in the ship's log so he could go be stupid on the planet.

And again, what happened to the Prime Directive? In TNG, they would have beamed down in native clothes so that they could stay there even if transport was temporarily interdicted by a storm.

The Prime Directive appears to have been shit upon.

No, because the Baku were never beamed into the holoship. The episode in question deals a lot with Worf and his brother trying to maintain the illusion of never having left the planet for the people they rescued as the holodeck begins to fail, as well as Picard's usual hand-wringing over the Prime Directive.

The fact that they did not successfully pull off the operation does not change the fact that it was basically the same operation. They intended to use a holoship to maintain the illusion of never having left the planet.

It was the same operation, but it wasn't the same plot as the episode.

There was no Ion storm visible in all directions- it couldn't have reached them within an hour, let alone a few seconds.

Go back to the visual where Enterprise first approaches the planet. There's a blue cloud in the distance beyond the planet.