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posted
Kind of like the 1305-E issue.. Do we believe the writer's intent, or the art department's intent? The guy telling the story or the guys hanging up the signs?
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Registered: Sep 2001
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posted
Neither if I ran Trek as of this moment. But unfortunately I don't... so what should we do? Ignore it? Perhaps... Try to explain it? It may take a while...
I personally would do all of the above.
-------------------- "It speaks to some basic human needs: that there is a tomorrow, it's not all going to be over with a big splash and a bomb, that the human race is improving, that we have things to be proud of as humans." -Gene Roddenberry about Star Trek
quote:Originally posted by CaptainMike: Kind of like the 1305-E issue.. Do we believe the writer's intent, or the art department's intent? The guy telling the story or the guys hanging up the signs?
In this case, we look at the "staff" intent, not that one any one person. Episodes are often rewritten, sometimes by a dozen people. That doesn't mean that we should accept what the first writer of the first draft wanted over the final episode. In the case of the Yamato, we have a well-documented timeline.
Writer, not knowing the registry system, writes 1305-E.
Okuda, acting in his assigned role as advisor, notes the mistake.
Line is dropped.
Line is re-added at last minute, without Okuda's awareness.
"Contagion" allows Okuda to correct the mistake.
So we know that the writer's use of 1305-E was a mistake, we know that the mistake was initially corrected, we know that it was another mistake that allowed the line to get filmed. If this mistake had been caught, the line would have never been filmed. The intent of the production staff was that only the Enterprises get suffixes.
In other words: mistakes are forgivable, and there's no sense in bending over backwards to accommodate them.
Do we know for certain whether the pulse-plasma pistols we see early in the episode are more or less effective than the phase-pistols? Is one more powerful than the other? When Reed is breaking out the new guns he made it seem as though the idea of a variable setting weapon (Stun/Kill) was a novel idea to which the Captain and Tucker wouldn't be accustomed.
-------------------- "Nah. The 9th chevron is for changing the ringtone from "grindy-grindy chonk-chonk" to the theme tune to dallas." -Reverend42
posted
Well, put it this way: B5's PPGs didn't have 'stun' and 'kill' settings. It's kinda hard to configure a burst of superheated plasma to not injure anyone. Again, I haven't seen the ep, so I don't know how the blasters fare in combat, or if any reason is given for replacing them other than "ooh, newer guns."