From: cstone@husc8.harvard.edu (christopher stone)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.startrek.current
Subject: Re: Chain Of Command Part II -- review
Date: 5 Jan 93 07:38:31 GMT
Article-I.D.: husc3.1993Jan5.023833.19010
Organization: Harvard University Science Center

In article <1i7ivtINN5jv@gap.caltech.edu> thogek@cco.caltech.edu (Thomas G. Kiefer) writes:
>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 <====
>======================================================

The Romulans certainly have their own unique "approaches to torture" --
se "The Mind's Eye."
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