As part of my glorying in the latest iteration of Star Trek (Picard), I have indulged myself in a couple of cross-over episodes from earlier ST series: the remarkable Deep Space 9 episode, "Trials and Tribble-ations", that brings Sisko and his crew back to Kirk's Enterprise and Space Station K7; and the almost equally remarkable episode of Voyager, "Flashback", in which Tuvok and Janeway visit Tuvok's memories of his time on the Excelsior under Captain Sulu.
These are both excellent episodes, though I prefer the DS9 show for a variety of reasons, but an odd contradiction struck me as I watched them all over again.
The crew on DS9 not only knows all about Captain Kirk and his crew, they absolutely revere the Captain from TOS. He is a legend in their minds and is also well known to the folks from Temporal Investigations, though they see him as a menace for having made so many temporal incursions. Sisko respects and admires Kirk so strongly that he actually risks significant censure to create an opportunity to meet the great man before Sisko and his crew return to their own time.
This is in direct contrast to the way Kirk and his crew are [not] remembered in the Voyager episode. Tuvok takes Janeway on a flashback to his experience on the Excelsior during the very time that the events of the final TOS feature film, "The Undiscovered Country", take place. In fact, the Voyager episode recreates several scenes from the original film and then follows Excelsior's crew as Sulu leads them on an ill-fated attempt to rescue Kirk and McCoy from Kronos, where they are on trial for the murder of the Klingon Chancellor.
When they first enter Tuvok's memory, Janeway asks Tuvok where they are. He explains that they are on Excelsior, under Captain Sulu, and that the destruction of a Klingon moon had led to heightened tensions and the assassination of the Klingon Chancellor. Janeway appears to have absolutely no knowledge of these events, even though they represent a massive turning point in the affairs of the Federation. By the end, of the film, one of the Federation's greatest enemies, the Klingon Empire, has finally begun the process of creating lasting peace and what would become a very beneficial friendship.
How is possible that Janeway has never heard of these events? They are pivotal in Federation history. They would be taught in every history course imaginable.
And then Tuvok feels the need to explain to Janeway that Sulu is planning to take Excelsior to the Klingon homeworld, at great risk to ship and crew, to save two of his former shipmates. Janeway, again, doesn't appear to know about these events nor does she have any clue who Sulu's former shipmates are.
Even when Tuvok mentions their names -- KIRK and MCCOY -- Janeway shows no signs of recognition.
Where Sisko and his crew clearly knew who Kirk and his crew were and held them in almost god-like esteem, Janeway doesn't even recognize who they are.
Does that make any sense? I know, I know, two sets of writers, two different times, two approaches to the same question. But Star Trek always prides itself on its canon, on consistency and inter-referentiality.
How was it that the Voyager writers were permitted to approach the important issue of Kirk's legendary status in such a different way than DS9's writers had taken not so many years before?
No comments:
Post a Comment