From: thogek@cco.caltech.edu (Thomas G. Kiefer)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.startrek.current
Subject: Re: Chain Of Command Part II -- review
Date: 3 Jan 1993 20:40:29 GMT
Organization: Nope, just me.
NNTP-Posting-Host: yvonne.caltech.edu

In article <rawdon.725753074@cs.wisc.edu> rawdon@colby.cs.wisc.edu writes:
>In <1992Dec28.212729.5734@bnlux1.bnl.gov> schroede@bnlux1.bnl.gov (gary l. schroeder) writes:
>>In article <1992Dec28.114848.538@rivers> ph9991_manfr@rivers.acc.uwrf.edu writes:
>>>But this was the problem with the episode, there were no science fiction
>>>plot devices at all in this story, and there should have been.  Big ones.  
>>>I have no objection to parallels to today's Earth, and in fact I like them,
>>>but they have be drawn with the pencils of science fiction.  This was
>>>drawn with a twentieth century ballpoint pen.
>
>>Okay, Steve, what kind of SF plot devices would you suggest?  Picard was
>>tortured by aliens, there was a show down in a nebula with spaceships,
>>electronic torture devices were used, shuttlecraft were flown...what
>>would have made this "sci-fi" enough for you?
>
>Not that I'm defending Steven's opinion that more SF was needed in "Chain Of
>Command" (since I don't agree), but I think you miss his point.  The only one
>of those elements you mention which strikes me as truly being SF is the
>torture gizmo implanted in Picard, and even that isn't really a necessary
>innovation; knives or burning steel would have worked as well.
>
>All of these elements could have been easily transported into, say, a 20th
>century naval scene, with minimal changes.
>
[...]
>
>However, while I disagree with Gary that "a story stripped of the gizmos is
>about the human condition" (in that some stories CAN'T be stripped of their
>gizmos without becoming a different story), I disagree with Steven that a good
>science fiction story needs to have good (or necessary) science fiction.  A
>story can be a good story with only a nominal science fiction backdrop.
>That's what "Chain of Command" was.

If it helps at all, ANALOG magazine's editors describe science fiction (at
least the kind of SF they look for) as fiction in which the science fiction
is *necessary* to the story -- remove the fictional science and you have no
story.  The example they give is that of the original FRANKENSTEIN --
take away the "science fiction" elements, and... no story.

If this is what Steve was looking for, then he's right: TNG is a little
short on this type of necessary science fiction much of the time.  Much of
"Chain of Command" could have been replaced with 20th-century elements and
not been changed much.

Personally, I didn't have this problem at all.  Yes, the basic methods of
torture are similar to those of 20th-century and earlier, but that's
because they are commonly-used and effective methods of torture -- from
Picard's stripping and humiliation, to the wracking pains every time he
insisted upon claiming his reality over that which his Cardassian torturer
wanted him to believe.  The application of these was updated to include
24th-century gizmos, but otherwise didn't change much.  People have cited
the brainwashing tactics of Orwell's 1984 (5-not-4 lights = 2+2=5) as very
similar.  Very true.

I would have liked to see a little more variation on this, if for no other
reason than that I'm sure the Cardassians have developed their own
approaches to torture independant of human history.  Also, a few more
details sprinkled over the whole story, over the Picard/Madred conflict
but more so over Jellico/Cardassians, Jellico/Riker, and more on how they
figured out and executed the ship-tracing, mine-laying, etc.  As usual,
there were too many little gaps (it wouldn't surprise me if some of them
were due to editing down for air time).
-- 
======================================================
====> Thomas Kiefer <===> thogek@cco.caltech.edu <====
======================================================
Newsgroups: rec.arts.startrek.current