Flare Sci-Fi Forums: Now the Borg look like even bigger idiots... ("Endgame" spoilers)

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Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :

I really DID like "Endgame" as a story, but as usual the Voyager writers can't resist beating the dead horse just a few more times.

Now, if the Borg had this magical "transwarp hub" that could send ships pretty much anywhere in the galaxy, then why haven't they spread throughout the galaxy like a plague, and assimilate every civilization in the entire Milky Way? Why have they sent only two cubes towards Earth in the past ten years, when it's obvious that they could send an entire fleet any time they chose?

And a related question -- is this the actual end of the Borg? There are some pros and cons to that POV:

The End: Admiral Janeway managed to destroy the Borg Queen and Unimatrix One itself. Her attack clearly disrupted the collective far beyond that little room. The Queen was unable to contact some of the Borg ships (she was pleased when ONE sphere could "hear" her). Furthermore, the destruction of the Unimatrix was very similar to the destruction of all the Borg at the end of "First Contact" -- the controlling entity (the Queen) was destroyed/removed, and thus all the other Borg ceased to function. (In the Collective, anyway.) And on top of that, the Queen was not seperated from the Collective this time, like she was in "First Contact" and "Dark Frontier." She was still in the heart of the Collective, the central processor so to speak.

Not the End: On the other hand, maybe the Borg are a bit more adaptable than that. The Collective, by its very nature, is decentralized. The destruction of one Unimatrix and (one/the) Queen is certainly a big problem, but it's not a problem that can take out the entire Collective. As always, they will adapt. There is most likely more than one Queen, or at least more than one manifestation of the Queen, as the entity that "controls" the Collective.

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Jeez, this is turning into a deeper discussion on the Borg than I thought. I suppose it depends on just how "decentralized" you think the Borg are. I could use my computer as an analogy -- the Queen could be the equivalent of the processor chip, that which "brings order to chaos." Without that chip, the entire computer will not work. But on the other hand, the Queen could be the equivalent of some other little component that regulates the flow of data and the functions that the computer performs, and something that the computer can manage without by bypassing its operations.

The thing is, way back in "First Contact," the Queen commented, "You imply a disparity where none exist. I am the Collective." But the Queen has already been killed at least once, maybe twice (depending on your interpretation of the ending of "Dark Frontier"). Maybe it's as simple as the computer monitor-- when one blows out, you get another one. But at the same time, the Queen has shown the ability to control the Collective, as if directing its actions. So, is the Queen a manifestation of the Collective, its "face," or is the Queen merely its primary "node"?

Sheesh, now we're talking about philosophy...

I'll stop now and let some other people cash in on this subject.

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You know, you really should keep a personal log. Why bore others needlessly?
The Gigantic Collection of Star Trek Minutiae

Posted by Omega (Member # 91) on :

My personal theory is that the Queen manifests when the collective deems it necessary. She has the advantages of individuality. However, the idea that all drones under her jurisdiction are DEPENDENT upon her, even to the point of the destruction of such a major facility, is NOT Borg. They would not be that centralized. Voyager's totally screwed up the Borg.

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"How do you define fool?"
"I don't attempt it. I wait for demonstrations. They inevitably surpass my imagination."
- CJ Cherryh, Invader

Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :

My personal theory is that the Queen was a very very stupid idea...

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"Even the colors are pompous!"
-a friend of mine, looking at a Lexus brochure

Posted by TheF0rce (Member # 533) on :

it was said that the hub and the destruction of the unicomplex was a result of the death of the queen becuase as 7 said the queen is directly linked to these structures.....this means that the borg everywhere else is fine---the very fact that the sphere didn't just blow up, prooves that borg everywhere may not hear that particular queen no more but other then that they are just fine and dandy.

as for the HUB thingy---there were 6 of them!!!!
so the borg are now 5/6th the power they use to be--not dead or trapped in the delta qaudrent.

[This message has been edited by TheF0rce (edited May 25, 2001).]

Posted by BlueElectron (Member # 281) on :

I haven't seen the ep. yet.

But personally, Starfleet advance from a organization that get their collective asses kicked to a small fleet of ships that destroyed the "headquarter" of Borg in a period of few decedes sounded very corny to me.

I mean, come on, using a reference from the beginning of TNG to the end of DS9, just how far has the Fed advanced? And they're trying to sell the idea that all of a sudden, Feds are able to do "one on one" with Borg?

Not to mention that they assume the Borg has no tech. advances during this period of time.

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What is the difference between a terriorist and your girlfriend?
- With terrorist, there is a chance of negotiation.

[This message has been edited by BlueElectron (edited May 25, 2001).]

Posted by TheF0rce (Member # 533) on :

we don't know how useful the fed new weapon tech is against borg of the same time period which i imagine would resemble the borgs in "drone"

you can't really compare the two and said the feds are way too powerful---its like sending a musket back in time to bow and arrow day....one guy probably can use the mucket to lay hell to alexander's army given the fact that he had a fast hand-good aim-and alot of ammunition.

but a musket in its original time period would not be as deadly

Posted by BlueElectron (Member # 281) on :

oh sorry, my mistake....

are you saying that in the ep. Janeway went back in time to destroy the Borg in the past?

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What is the difference between a terriorist and your girlfriend?
- With terrorist, there is a chance of negotiation.

Posted by BlueElectron (Member # 281) on :

I would see how "travel back in time" would make a little more sense.

But still, we were led to believe that the Borg is at least couple century more advance then Feds, so even if Voyager do travel couple decades back in time, wouldn't the Borg still have the "home-field" advantages technology wise?

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What is the difference between a terriorist and your girlfriend?
- With terrorist, there is a chance of negotiation.

Posted by TheF0rce (Member # 533) on :

the borg of the past did adapt to the armor tech that took the feds 26 years to develope

so give them some crdit--voyager was about to be destroyed by that sphere now enhanced with armor piercing modifications.

Posted by Matrix (Member # 376) on :

Also now the Federation is now invincible with Voyager's armor upgrades. For those of you who saw the episode a shuttle took mulitple hits from 2 Negh'Var class ships without damage, so 26 years earlier Starfleet has the power to destroy ships without much damage.

The destruction of the Queen is just like First Contact. The Borg probably have a backup "Queen" or memory just in case something like that happens. The Borg aren't completely destroyed only UNimatrix One and the Queen.

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The whole concept of Survivor is get your average Joe and put him/her on the show and see how they react. Afterwards even though they did not win they make money by appearing on shows. There is no point in having to win a million dollars! They will make that amount in 2 months after appearing on 100 different shows!

Posted by TheF0rce (Member # 533) on :

yeah thats my exact problem with this episode
how the federation now can wipe the floor with other alphaquadrent species[not borg]

i mean its so wrong---like us giving the atom bomb to our colonial ancesters in the thirteen colonies to fight england!

it alters everything!

and most of all the tech should have vanished when history was altered---how the tech still remained, almost can not be explained.

[This message has been edited by TheF0rce (edited May 25, 2001).]

Posted by Peregrinus (Member # 504) on :

As soon as Voyager made it out the end of the transwarp conduit, Future Janeway will have never existed to go back and give that tech to Voyager, tell them to go back to the nebula, get assimilated, and kill the Queen with the virus.

So as soon as Voyager made it out the end of the transwarp conduit, it should have "popped back" to where they were just before Future Janeway's temporal rift formed, with no memory of events that had never occurred in the first place. It's a self-terminating time loop.

This is why time travel gives me nosebleeds.

And one of the reasons I wish Trek writers would quit diddling with it -- they've never gotten it right.

--Jonah

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"It's obvious I'm dealing with a moron..."

--Col. Edwards, ROBOTECH

Posted by TheF0rce (Member # 533) on :

yeah what was that old janeway thinking!!!

at least in timeless it made sense and harry kim knows he's gonna be erased from this timeline after saving voyager.

Posted by monkeyboy on :

ahh but she took a serum to counter the effects of tachyon particles right?? maybe that is the explanaiton why things future janeway did would still exsist in the new timeline.

And we still do not know what that chip in her head did. Maybe it does control the ship emotley but what if it also helped her toexsist in the past to effect its outcome without disaperaing?

Does this all make any sense?

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I did'nt do it.

Posted by Omega (Member # 91) on :

You can not go to the past in order to prevent events that have already occured and succeed. If you DID prevent the events, you would never have had any reason to have gone back in the first place. Time travel has to be used very carefully as a plot device, and this wasn't an example of that.

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"How do you define fool?"
"I don't attempt it. I wait for demonstrations. They inevitably surpass my imagination."
- CJ Cherryh, Invader

Posted by TheF0rce (Member # 533) on :

that pretty much also debunks "timeless"

btw---in another board someone remembers harry and tom in a shuttle and one of them said that voyager was built for combat--any idea what episode this is?
or is it this guy who makes this claim have a faulty memory?

Posted by Michael Dracon (Member # 4) on :

It was said in the episode where Harry played the clarinet and his neighbor banged on the wall.

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"I don't poke my head into business world too much. All I care about is making the show. And naked stuff."

- Joss Whedon, creator of Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Posted by Prakesh (Member # 265) on :

The Borg WILL adapt. I don't think the 'death' of the Queen is a real problem for the Collective. She has been killed several times, and no harm was done to the Collective, apart from the drones very close to the Queen. But the "irst Contact" drones were alone, without any contact with the rest of the 24th century *or* 21st century Collective.

As for the destruction of Unamatrix One, I don't think it will stop the Borg. Just rename Unamatrix Two and your finished .

Posted by infinity11 (Member # 531) on :

Well the borg can't be GONE because of this, but I do think they'll need to go thorough some big change like when Lore took over, they will need to be put back together because they were obviously torn apart and separated from the queen and each other.

Posted by BlueElectron (Member # 281) on :

I watched "Endgame" yesterday...

I think they taked out Traswarp Hub and the surrounding structures instead of Unimatrix One

Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Blue Electron:
"Endgame" yesterday...
I think they taked out Traswarp Hub and the surrounding structures instead of Unimatrix One

No, Admiral Janeway took her shuttle into the transwarp network itself, remember? She was going to Unimatrix One. They even re-used the establisher CGI shots from "Dark Frontier" and "Unimatrix Zero" to set the scene.

Besides, why would the Queen be at the Transwarp Hub? Wouldn't it make more sense for her to be in Unimatrix One?

Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :

Regarding the apparent time travel problems, here's how I think it works...

There are two timelines here; we'll call them 'A' and 'B'. They diverge at the moment Vice Admiral Janeway's temporal rift opens in the "past".

Timeline A:
No rift opens in 2378; Voyager takes until 2394 to get home; Janeway turns übersarcastic; she ceases to exist after 2404 when she leaves the timeline to go back to the past.

Timeline B:
Rift opens; Vice Admiral Janeway, who lived most of her life in Timeline A, comes into existence in Timeline B in 2378; Vice Admiral Janeway dies; Voyager gets home right away.

So, in the Trek timeline, which follows Timeline B, Janeway never goes back in time. But Vice Admiral Janeway still exists in 2378, because she came into Timeline B from Timeline A. Every timeline is like a separate universe. So, the Vice Admiral Janeway who existed in 2378 actually came from 2404 in a separate universe.

Posted by Jack Hammerfist (Member # 614) on :

HELLO? ANYONE is invincible when you use TIME-TRAVEL- you just find out what happens, go back and use it against them, since you know what they're going to do-- and what's more you can use advanced technology from God-knows-when in the future, even using the enemy's own advances against them. It's impossible to beat someone who has that advantage of playing the time-game-- even morons like Bill & Ted saved the universe when they could do that.

Likewise, the Borg Queen stated that if she "killed Captain Janeway, then Admiral Janeway would never exist--" is the Borg Queen so temporally ignorant that she doesn't know an alternate timeline when she sees one? Admiral Janeway had ALREADY escaped from the Borg decades earlier; killing CAPTAIN Janeway would make no difference in the current timeline, since it was already altered-- Captain Janeway didn't need now need to wait 23 years and go back to do what she did all over again in an endless loop.

Posted by Jack Hammerfist (Member # 614) on :

This also reminds me of the episode with the general who destroyed enemies by erasing them from time-- and ended up so badly mucking up the space-time universe that he had to finally erase himself to put his life back to normal. But even compared to this, "Endgame" is so screwed up that Father Time is going to to need to send "temporal anomalies" experts of Dr. Who, Mr. Peabody, Rufus, and Back to the Future's "Doc" to fix THIS mess.

Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :

It's quite possible the Borg know something interesting about temporal mechanics that we don't. Considering their apparent distaste for merely three-dimensional thinking, I wouldn't be surprised to learn they share the same distaste for fourth-dimensional thinking too.

Posted by Timo (Member # 245) on :

Isn't this more of an argument FOR the success of time-tampering? If you want to change your personal past, and you have a time machine to do it (a time machine that allows you to go to the past and return from there to an altered future, that is), there are a couple of possible outcomes:

-You fail, and return to your time. You are then likely to try again, unless your failure altered a single timeline and made your future life difficult. If you'd rather believe in branching infinite timelines, then the whole exercise is moot, since your machine can take you to your personal Xanadu regardless of what you do in the past - ONE of the infinite branches is going to be perfect in any case.

-You fail and perish. If you live in a single timeline, no prob: your past self will soon reach your timeframe and repeat the attempt. Depending on how much you believe in free will and random nutations, he may succeed where you failed. If he fails, again a successor is climbing up the timeline.

-You succeed. You can return to your timeframe now, using your time machine that allows this. You will not disappear in a Q-like flash or a puff of air. The trick here is in constructing this type of time machine - otherwise, every time you disembarked your timecraft within your lifetime, you would have to face youself, and if you wanted to enjoy the benefits of the trip alone, you would have to commit murder. Unless your time machine has the duplicate-avoidance feature, you are in deep trouble. Unless, of course, you enjoy the prospect of having yourself as a roommate.

Timo Saloniemi

Posted by Obi Juan (Member # 90) on :

I think that if there was a post Voyager trek and they even addressed the issue of the future tech, they would just write it off by saying that Starfleet didn't want to mess with the timeline by using it--of course the doctor would still be wearing his holoemitter.

Posted by Balaam Xumucane (Member # 419) on :

Just for my own indulgence. An oversimplified time line would be like this? (Thanks to TSN)

Where the show we've been watching would now follow timeline 'B', and timeline 'A' would be world unto itself without Janeway (after 2404) and without 7of9 (a bleak timeline indeed).