Star Trek: Voyager: 11:59 Rewatch
February 5, 2018 7:40 AM - Season 5, Episode 23 - Subscribe
Let us go back to the waning days and hours of the twentieth century, when controversy surrounded the construction of the Millennium Gate, a monumental, kilometer-tall building that towered over rural Indiana and--wait, what?
Regardless of when you think the millennium began, Memory Alpha was drunk both times:
- This episode was inspired by an undeveloped Q episode for Star Trek: Voyager, thought up by John de Lancie, and was originally to have included a recurring character from Star Trek: The Next Generation. "For a while [Executive Producer] Brannon [Braga] and I were thinking about doing Janeway's distant ancestor and Q in the year 2000," explained Supervising Producer Joe Menosky. "We also thought about Janeway's distant ancestor and Guinan, and this might have been a Whoopi [Goldberg] episode."
- When it came time to actually write the installment, the writers attempted to involve no hard science fiction in the episode and opted to include no guest stars from previous episodes. Joe Menosky stated, "Our original inspiration for this was to do an episode where we didn't see Voyager at all. All we saw was Kate Mulgrew playing a distant ancestor [of Kathryn Janeway]. The idea was to tell a quintessentially Star Trek story without any science fiction. I wrote a teleplay, and it was a very painful [script] to write, because our premise wasn't working. We realized that we couldn't tell a story just on Earth without having Voyager to ground us in some way. We ended up doing a third of the episode set on Voyager."
- Both David Livingston and Brannon Braga considered this episode to be very different from others in the Star Trek canon. Livingston remarked, "It is the only Star Trek show that I know of that has no science fiction. It is not a Star Trek show." Braga agreed, "Ultimately, it's a very unique off-concept episode."
- When Neelix suggests that the Great Wall of China is visible from space, he takes a popular Earth myth as fact and Janeway, a capable science officer, does not correct him. Under optimal conditons the path of the Great Wall is visible but the wall itself is not. Man-made objects visible from space include the Great Pyramids of Giza, collections of cities, man-made geographical features (like Lake Mead in Nevada, Kennecott Copper Mine [an open pit mine] in Utah, and Flevoland in the Netherlands), and wakes of large ships at sea.
[no quotes because MA doesn't include them, for some reason, and I forgot to write any down last night]
Poster's Log:
Well, they tried. Of course, any episode about the upcoming millennial celebrations would seem unavoidably dated, and the "let's use contemporary settings to save money" episode is just as much a tradition as the bottle show. There's also something to be said about doing a show about how your honored and legendary ancestor was actually living hand-to-mouth for a while, and how you never really looked at the available evidence to the contrary maybe because you didn't want your illusions dispelled. Shannon O'Donnel's crappy car and empty bank account could even be a handy metaphor for Voyager's sometimes-reduced circumstances.
But the premise of the story... geez. When this episode was produced, the actual tallest buildings in the world were the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur, a bustling metropolis, and less than half the height of the Millennium Gate. From a commercial perspective, it's utterly preposterous, and there's no indication given as to why a big Jetsonsesque tower would be a better design for a self-contained Martian colony than, say, a big dome. (Of course, we have a somewhat better idea now of the potential problems with a Martian colony, but still.) There's no real attempt to frame the town (and, in particular, Henry Janeway's neighbors' eagerness to sell out) in any sort of economic reality. There's just this sort of generic message of "the future is coming, with or without you." It's the sort of message that you'd expect from a unit of Viacom, a new network that, as it turns out, would not last long in the new millenium itself. From that perspective, the "OK, let's all look at old family pictures" thing seems kind of forced.
Poster's Log, supplemental: There is actually a good Shannon O'Donnel story... but it's not in canon. She appears (along with many other people who appeared in Trek stories set in and around the current period, notably Gary Seven and Roberta Lincoln) in the Khan prequel books, The Rise and Fall of Khan Noonien Singh. Also, I wish that Seven's Tsunkatse name had been "Buttercup."
Regardless of when you think the millennium began, Memory Alpha was drunk both times:
- This episode was inspired by an undeveloped Q episode for Star Trek: Voyager, thought up by John de Lancie, and was originally to have included a recurring character from Star Trek: The Next Generation. "For a while [Executive Producer] Brannon [Braga] and I were thinking about doing Janeway's distant ancestor and Q in the year 2000," explained Supervising Producer Joe Menosky. "We also thought about Janeway's distant ancestor and Guinan, and this might have been a Whoopi [Goldberg] episode."
- When it came time to actually write the installment, the writers attempted to involve no hard science fiction in the episode and opted to include no guest stars from previous episodes. Joe Menosky stated, "Our original inspiration for this was to do an episode where we didn't see Voyager at all. All we saw was Kate Mulgrew playing a distant ancestor [of Kathryn Janeway]. The idea was to tell a quintessentially Star Trek story without any science fiction. I wrote a teleplay, and it was a very painful [script] to write, because our premise wasn't working. We realized that we couldn't tell a story just on Earth without having Voyager to ground us in some way. We ended up doing a third of the episode set on Voyager."
- Both David Livingston and Brannon Braga considered this episode to be very different from others in the Star Trek canon. Livingston remarked, "It is the only Star Trek show that I know of that has no science fiction. It is not a Star Trek show." Braga agreed, "Ultimately, it's a very unique off-concept episode."
- When Neelix suggests that the Great Wall of China is visible from space, he takes a popular Earth myth as fact and Janeway, a capable science officer, does not correct him. Under optimal conditons the path of the Great Wall is visible but the wall itself is not. Man-made objects visible from space include the Great Pyramids of Giza, collections of cities, man-made geographical features (like Lake Mead in Nevada, Kennecott Copper Mine [an open pit mine] in Utah, and Flevoland in the Netherlands), and wakes of large ships at sea.
[no quotes because MA doesn't include them, for some reason, and I forgot to write any down last night]
Poster's Log:
Well, they tried. Of course, any episode about the upcoming millennial celebrations would seem unavoidably dated, and the "let's use contemporary settings to save money" episode is just as much a tradition as the bottle show. There's also something to be said about doing a show about how your honored and legendary ancestor was actually living hand-to-mouth for a while, and how you never really looked at the available evidence to the contrary maybe because you didn't want your illusions dispelled. Shannon O'Donnel's crappy car and empty bank account could even be a handy metaphor for Voyager's sometimes-reduced circumstances.
But the premise of the story... geez. When this episode was produced, the actual tallest buildings in the world were the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur, a bustling metropolis, and less than half the height of the Millennium Gate. From a commercial perspective, it's utterly preposterous, and there's no indication given as to why a big Jetsonsesque tower would be a better design for a self-contained Martian colony than, say, a big dome. (Of course, we have a somewhat better idea now of the potential problems with a Martian colony, but still.) There's no real attempt to frame the town (and, in particular, Henry Janeway's neighbors' eagerness to sell out) in any sort of economic reality. There's just this sort of generic message of "the future is coming, with or without you." It's the sort of message that you'd expect from a unit of Viacom, a new network that, as it turns out, would not last long in the new millenium itself. From that perspective, the "OK, let's all look at old family pictures" thing seems kind of forced.
Poster's Log, supplemental: There is actually a good Shannon O'Donnel story... but it's not in canon. She appears (along with many other people who appeared in Trek stories set in and around the current period, notably Gary Seven and Roberta Lincoln) in the Khan prequel books, The Rise and Fall of Khan Noonien Singh. Also, I wish that Seven's Tsunkatse name had been "Buttercup."
Particle of the Week: The story is mostly set before the discovery of particles of the week.
Pointless STO Comparison of the Week: There are a fair number of time travel missions in STO, but they mostly drop back to the TOS era.
Ongoing Counts:
* Maximum Possible Photon Torpedoes: -1.
* Crew: 134.
* Credulity Straining Alpha Quadrant Contacts: 10.
* Janeway's Big Red Button: 2 aborted self-destructs, 1 successful, 1 game of chicken, 1 ramming speed.
Notes:
* It's That Guy(s)!
Henry Janeway is Locke's dad from Lost. I now sort of want a fanfic where Shannon O'Donnell is Locke's mom. I'm sure it would make as much sense as anything Voyager offered.
Moss was also a familiar face. I used to watch The Drew Carey show many years ago, and he played Drew's brother.
* I feel charitable toward this one even though it's kinda dumb.
Jack's not wrong about this:
There's no real attempt to frame the town (and, in particular, Henry Janeway's neighbors' eagerness to sell out) in any sort of economic reality. There's just this sort of generic message of "the future is coming, with or without you."
I don't have any sense of why it's necessary to bulldoze Mr. Janeway's shop, why it has to be here, why it's a shopping mall, why... anything that's going on here, really.
Even more amusing: I hate genealogy. My mother's a big proponent of Janeway's perspective here: 'ancestors are so important,' 'oh it's so great we have [whatever] bloodline.' (She is also a fellow Mefite at my instigation because she's great, so hi, mom!)
While I can make a host of arguments about why ancestry matters, (mostly stemming from a cumulative economic perspective, racial issues or medical history), I feel takes like that are extremely reductive and disagree with trying to draw specific lines between living people and high-profile dead ones. Rather than inspiring me, it irritates me in the way only a long-standing but low stakes disagreement with an otherwise reasonable parent can.
Despite all of this... eh. This mostly worked for me. It was nice to see Kate Mulgrew get to stretch a little bit. Shannon O'Donnell's personality is both pretty different from Janeway and internally consistent over the entire episode. I liked her. Henry was... well, he irritated me, but I've known people like him too. The kid was a reasonable person instead of an annoyance, and a science fiction show putting a non-annoying teenager front and center is worth extra points, especially in the 90s.
I also liked that Moss was a reasonable person with a conflicting agenda instead of a villain: while he wanted O'Donnell to apply whatever pressure she could, he did seem to actually care about her and the town instead of falling back on a bunch of Evil Executive tropes. That was a very Trek take on a hackneyed 80s plot.
So I found the A-story to be nonsensical from a plot standpoint, but the emotional core of it worked for me. Indeed, Shannon and Henry getting together was decent, far better than the average Trek love story, (especially on the heels of Someone To Watch Over Me).
* The B-story addresses complaints I had last week.
It amuses me that they didn't want to feature Voyager at all this time, because by putting a bit of this story there, they directly addressed a complaint I had after the last episode about how we see the crew do very few shared social activities. Everybody getting caught up in a little history craze and turning it into a makeshift holiday is exactly the sort of weird, unique custom I'd expect to see in an isolated community, and it even featured Seven being drawn into stuff (and learning a valuable lesson about human nostalgia or whatever) in an organic and non-creepy fashion.
I also thought it was nice that Janeway never learned the whole truth about O'Donnell, even though the audience did.
So... hm. This is a dumb episode with a very obvious moral that nevertheless receives a pass from me for managing to bring some heart to a very cliched movie plotline and offer a little bit of believable socialization to Voyager.
posted by mordax at 9:43 AM on February 5, 2018 [3 favorites]
Pointless STO Comparison of the Week: There are a fair number of time travel missions in STO, but they mostly drop back to the TOS era.
Ongoing Counts:
* Maximum Possible Photon Torpedoes: -1.
* Crew: 134.
* Credulity Straining Alpha Quadrant Contacts: 10.
* Janeway's Big Red Button: 2 aborted self-destructs, 1 successful, 1 game of chicken, 1 ramming speed.
Notes:
* It's That Guy(s)!
Henry Janeway is Locke's dad from Lost. I now sort of want a fanfic where Shannon O'Donnell is Locke's mom. I'm sure it would make as much sense as anything Voyager offered.
Moss was also a familiar face. I used to watch The Drew Carey show many years ago, and he played Drew's brother.
* I feel charitable toward this one even though it's kinda dumb.
Jack's not wrong about this:
There's no real attempt to frame the town (and, in particular, Henry Janeway's neighbors' eagerness to sell out) in any sort of economic reality. There's just this sort of generic message of "the future is coming, with or without you."
I don't have any sense of why it's necessary to bulldoze Mr. Janeway's shop, why it has to be here, why it's a shopping mall, why... anything that's going on here, really.
Even more amusing: I hate genealogy. My mother's a big proponent of Janeway's perspective here: 'ancestors are so important,' 'oh it's so great we have [whatever] bloodline.' (She is also a fellow Mefite at my instigation because she's great, so hi, mom!)
While I can make a host of arguments about why ancestry matters, (mostly stemming from a cumulative economic perspective, racial issues or medical history), I feel takes like that are extremely reductive and disagree with trying to draw specific lines between living people and high-profile dead ones. Rather than inspiring me, it irritates me in the way only a long-standing but low stakes disagreement with an otherwise reasonable parent can.
Despite all of this... eh. This mostly worked for me. It was nice to see Kate Mulgrew get to stretch a little bit. Shannon O'Donnell's personality is both pretty different from Janeway and internally consistent over the entire episode. I liked her. Henry was... well, he irritated me, but I've known people like him too. The kid was a reasonable person instead of an annoyance, and a science fiction show putting a non-annoying teenager front and center is worth extra points, especially in the 90s.
I also liked that Moss was a reasonable person with a conflicting agenda instead of a villain: while he wanted O'Donnell to apply whatever pressure she could, he did seem to actually care about her and the town instead of falling back on a bunch of Evil Executive tropes. That was a very Trek take on a hackneyed 80s plot.
So I found the A-story to be nonsensical from a plot standpoint, but the emotional core of it worked for me. Indeed, Shannon and Henry getting together was decent, far better than the average Trek love story, (especially on the heels of Someone To Watch Over Me).
* The B-story addresses complaints I had last week.
It amuses me that they didn't want to feature Voyager at all this time, because by putting a bit of this story there, they directly addressed a complaint I had after the last episode about how we see the crew do very few shared social activities. Everybody getting caught up in a little history craze and turning it into a makeshift holiday is exactly the sort of weird, unique custom I'd expect to see in an isolated community, and it even featured Seven being drawn into stuff (and learning a valuable lesson about human nostalgia or whatever) in an organic and non-creepy fashion.
I also thought it was nice that Janeway never learned the whole truth about O'Donnell, even though the audience did.
So... hm. This is a dumb episode with a very obvious moral that nevertheless receives a pass from me for managing to bring some heart to a very cliched movie plotline and offer a little bit of believable socialization to Voyager.
posted by mordax at 9:43 AM on February 5, 2018 [3 favorites]
… "Now, Voyager"
Heh. A not inappropriate reference for the show given the most famous line from the movie:
“Don't let's ask for the moon. We have the stars…”
Man, now I want to watch that again more than this episode, but I guess Bette will have to wait until after I watch Kate.
posted by gusottertrout at 10:00 AM on February 5, 2018 [2 favorites]
Heh. A not inappropriate reference for the show given the most famous line from the movie:
“Don't let's ask for the moon. We have the stars…”
Man, now I want to watch that again more than this episode, but I guess Bette will have to wait until after I watch Kate.
posted by gusottertrout at 10:00 AM on February 5, 2018 [2 favorites]
I delayed re-watching this one until today (I'm roughly a third of the way into season 6 right now), mainly because on previous viewings it annoyed the shit outta me. The millennium hype was probably too fresh in my mind, and when combined with the fact that (as Livingston rightly notes) it is not a Star Trek story, it always struck me as pointless.
This time through, I think what saved it for me was the final scene in the mess hall. It's one of the examples of the heart this series has. And a rare example of the writers figuring out a good angle on an apparently troubled concept. (This same overall story as a Q episode? I mean, it COULD've worked, but not likely.)
I also liked that Moss was a reasonable person with a conflicting agenda instead of a villain: while he wanted O'Donnell to apply whatever pressure she could, he did seem to actually care about her and the town instead of falling back on a bunch of Evil Executive tropes.
Yeah, ditto. And even more surprising when you consider how often that dude plays a bad guy.
Also the kid's T-shirt was badass.
posted by CheesesOfBrazil at 11:46 AM on February 5, 2018 [1 favorite]
This time through, I think what saved it for me was the final scene in the mess hall. It's one of the examples of the heart this series has. And a rare example of the writers figuring out a good angle on an apparently troubled concept. (This same overall story as a Q episode? I mean, it COULD've worked, but not likely.)
I also liked that Moss was a reasonable person with a conflicting agenda instead of a villain: while he wanted O'Donnell to apply whatever pressure she could, he did seem to actually care about her and the town instead of falling back on a bunch of Evil Executive tropes.
Yeah, ditto. And even more surprising when you consider how often that dude plays a bad guy.
Also the kid's T-shirt was badass.
posted by CheesesOfBrazil at 11:46 AM on February 5, 2018 [1 favorite]
I'll confess to possibly having been less charitable than I could have been, due to getting over that nasty virus that's been going around.
posted by Halloween Jack at 12:25 PM on February 5, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by Halloween Jack at 12:25 PM on February 5, 2018 [1 favorite]
I'll confess to possibly having been less charitable than I could have been, due to getting over that nasty virus that's been going around.
I hope you're feeling better!
And seriously, your criticism of this is entirely fair: the plot doesn't actually make a ton of sense. I think we're back at a case of 'we all agree about the basic facts of what we saw, but had slightly different emotional reactions to it because of reasons.'
posted by mordax at 12:47 PM on February 5, 2018 [2 favorites]
I hope you're feeling better!
And seriously, your criticism of this is entirely fair: the plot doesn't actually make a ton of sense. I think we're back at a case of 'we all agree about the basic facts of what we saw, but had slightly different emotional reactions to it because of reasons.'
posted by mordax at 12:47 PM on February 5, 2018 [2 favorites]
Oh man, the further we get into Voyager's run the further we get into "Episodes Mr. E is completely unfamiliar with" and let me tell you, that's a weird feeling and I think the knowledge there are episodes of Voyager I not only haven't watched, but I haven't ever even HEARD of is more important than whatever knowledge I might gain by actually watching them.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 5:36 PM on February 5, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 5:36 PM on February 5, 2018 [1 favorite]
wait WHAT is right! I'll squeeze this in this week simply due to egregious Hoosier content.
T-minus about three weeks until I'm cleared to run. Where's the Doc with that boneknitter?
posted by mwhybark at 8:12 PM on February 5, 2018
T-minus about three weeks until I'm cleared to run. Where's the Doc with that boneknitter?
posted by mwhybark at 8:12 PM on February 5, 2018
Well after some unavoidable delays I finally got a chance to rewatch the episode and was pleasantly impressed by it this time around. I didn't think much of it one way or the other on first viewing, no doubt because it was both unexpected and got lumped with other Trek does nostalgia episodes I didn't much care about.
This episode though is more interesting than that because it avoids overnostilgizing (yeah, that's an ugly coinage, sue me.) it's subject, and smartly manages to both suggest something lost and something gained by the changes occurring in its story. What really caught my attention this time was the episodes emphasis on the shift from the written word, and gaining experience and knowledge through reading to a world where experience is gained first hand through activity. The show used a sort of opposition between travel and reading, the future and the past to point to the conflict and agreements between Henry and Shannon, but echoed it in the activities on Voyager, in sometime subtle ways, to give some balance to the idea rather than say either Henry or Shannon was wrong.
That differs from my first impression of the episode where I was a bit annoyed by feeling that they took a jab at Captain Janeway in her ignorance of her ancestor and in having Henry capitulate as if his values didn't really matter. But that was shortsighted and doesn't fit my current impression of events. The main thing that led me to feel differently about the episode was in how much the crew of Voyager was caught up in the search for written accounts and how fragile they realized the keeping of history was. Captain Janeway mentions on a couple occasions how little information they have and the unexpected ways in which they found that history being collected. Even in Paris and Neelix's game the wonder of the ancient world they both forget is the Ptolemy's library, the Library of Alexandria.
Henry's love of books serves him as substitute for travel, with he and Shannon having dinner "in Paris" for example, while Shannon requires travel and actual experience seeking something new. The Millennium Gate project threatens Henry's vision by offering an exchange from the world of stored knowledge to a promise of new experience, but as Shannon suggests new experience is also necessary for building stored knowledge in a way. There is perhaps something in this the writer's didn't even fully envision now that I'm looking back on that era from one of internet dominance, where there is a feeling of a real shift in how we see and understand events being "in the moment" and putting so much into experiencing versus study. The show now seems a little bit prophetic in suggesting the importance of that shift, placing emphasis as it does on a moment of change.
The show, as I see it, doesn't end by suggesting the loss was greater than the gain so much as the need to continue to expand and explore our horizons is as necessary as maintaining a connection to where we came from. The past isn't, in this sense, less important than the future as it informs it, so both views are necessary for gaining a full understanding of where we are in the moment, seeing where we've been while looking to where we might go next.
Mulgrew and Tighe really sold the idea of there being a balance in their performances which allowed for disagreement but showed the attraction they had for each other. Tighe is a fine actor who's done good work in many secondary roles, (though whenever I see him onscreen I still kind of expect Randy Mantooth to show up as well since I was a big Emergency! fan as a kid.) and here he's in fine form, being just a bit too precious about his resistance and righteousness while still selling its importance and Mulgrew matches him with a good mix of challenge and growing attachment to Janeway and his perspective. There's a resolute gentleness in their disagreement that feels right for the characters and the supporting players too bring a nice range of ideas and emotions to it that feeds the mix without pushing it towards an overdetermined resolution.
No real threat, no real bad guys, and a minimum of conflict is something of a daring choice to make for an episode, even if it is so in a low key kind of way. I'll give this one good marks for both the effort and follow through. It isn't a favorite since it does still feel like it exists outside the usual boundaries of the series a bit and it is, perhaps, a bit too light a conceit to build a stronger emotional concern for the events, but it has grown on me and may still continue to do so on further reflection as we come nearer to the end of the series.
posted by gusottertrout at 7:40 AM on February 7, 2018 [3 favorites]
This episode though is more interesting than that because it avoids overnostilgizing (yeah, that's an ugly coinage, sue me.) it's subject, and smartly manages to both suggest something lost and something gained by the changes occurring in its story. What really caught my attention this time was the episodes emphasis on the shift from the written word, and gaining experience and knowledge through reading to a world where experience is gained first hand through activity. The show used a sort of opposition between travel and reading, the future and the past to point to the conflict and agreements between Henry and Shannon, but echoed it in the activities on Voyager, in sometime subtle ways, to give some balance to the idea rather than say either Henry or Shannon was wrong.
That differs from my first impression of the episode where I was a bit annoyed by feeling that they took a jab at Captain Janeway in her ignorance of her ancestor and in having Henry capitulate as if his values didn't really matter. But that was shortsighted and doesn't fit my current impression of events. The main thing that led me to feel differently about the episode was in how much the crew of Voyager was caught up in the search for written accounts and how fragile they realized the keeping of history was. Captain Janeway mentions on a couple occasions how little information they have and the unexpected ways in which they found that history being collected. Even in Paris and Neelix's game the wonder of the ancient world they both forget is the Ptolemy's library, the Library of Alexandria.
Henry's love of books serves him as substitute for travel, with he and Shannon having dinner "in Paris" for example, while Shannon requires travel and actual experience seeking something new. The Millennium Gate project threatens Henry's vision by offering an exchange from the world of stored knowledge to a promise of new experience, but as Shannon suggests new experience is also necessary for building stored knowledge in a way. There is perhaps something in this the writer's didn't even fully envision now that I'm looking back on that era from one of internet dominance, where there is a feeling of a real shift in how we see and understand events being "in the moment" and putting so much into experiencing versus study. The show now seems a little bit prophetic in suggesting the importance of that shift, placing emphasis as it does on a moment of change.
The show, as I see it, doesn't end by suggesting the loss was greater than the gain so much as the need to continue to expand and explore our horizons is as necessary as maintaining a connection to where we came from. The past isn't, in this sense, less important than the future as it informs it, so both views are necessary for gaining a full understanding of where we are in the moment, seeing where we've been while looking to where we might go next.
Mulgrew and Tighe really sold the idea of there being a balance in their performances which allowed for disagreement but showed the attraction they had for each other. Tighe is a fine actor who's done good work in many secondary roles, (though whenever I see him onscreen I still kind of expect Randy Mantooth to show up as well since I was a big Emergency! fan as a kid.) and here he's in fine form, being just a bit too precious about his resistance and righteousness while still selling its importance and Mulgrew matches him with a good mix of challenge and growing attachment to Janeway and his perspective. There's a resolute gentleness in their disagreement that feels right for the characters and the supporting players too bring a nice range of ideas and emotions to it that feeds the mix without pushing it towards an overdetermined resolution.
No real threat, no real bad guys, and a minimum of conflict is something of a daring choice to make for an episode, even if it is so in a low key kind of way. I'll give this one good marks for both the effort and follow through. It isn't a favorite since it does still feel like it exists outside the usual boundaries of the series a bit and it is, perhaps, a bit too light a conceit to build a stronger emotional concern for the events, but it has grown on me and may still continue to do so on further reflection as we come nearer to the end of the series.
posted by gusottertrout at 7:40 AM on February 7, 2018 [3 favorites]
Oh, and with apologies to mother of mordax, the genealogy hook for the show also left me a bit cold as its something I'm not all that keen on, but I have to admit some possible bias there being an adoptee legally barred from knowledge of my birth parents, so it isn't something I'd be able to indulge in even were it an interest.
posted by gusottertrout at 8:18 AM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by gusottertrout at 8:18 AM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]
What really caught my attention this time was the episodes emphasis on the shift from the written word, and gaining experience and knowledge through reading to a world where experience is gained first hand through activity.
... hm. Intriguing. I don't think the writers were thinking about any of this so deeply, but I also think it doesn't really matter in this case: your post here feels like an accurate assessment of the implicit assumptions behind the way the conflict is constructed, offering some insight into how the people who wrote it view the world.
posted by mordax at 8:19 AM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]
... hm. Intriguing. I don't think the writers were thinking about any of this so deeply, but I also think it doesn't really matter in this case: your post here feels like an accurate assessment of the implicit assumptions behind the way the conflict is constructed, offering some insight into how the people who wrote it view the world.
posted by mordax at 8:19 AM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]
Should've previewed:
Oh, and with apologies to mother of mordax, the genealogy hook for the show also left me a bit cold as its something I'm not all that keen on, but I have to admit some possible bias there being an adoptee legally barred from knowledge of my birth parents, so it isn't something I'd be able to indulge in even were it an interest.
*nods*
That's also interesting. Thank you for sharing. (I'd be curious about your other observations about that if you're comfortable and they come up. I wonder what popular fiction gets wrong about adoptees.)
In my case, this is a combination of being biracial and observing the march of science. As I've discussed in various spots on Mefi in the past, it's my feeling that I don't fully belong to either world that I come from, making any attempt at connections feel forced emotionally.
I also know the idea that memory can be transferred used to be a big thing back in the day, but has slowly been discredited over the years. (Indeed, I had a bitter argument with an ex-gf about Dune many years ago now, because she didn't know people really used to think memory could seriously be hereditary the way that Alia, Leto II and Ghanima experience it in those books.)
posted by mordax at 8:30 AM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]
Oh, and with apologies to mother of mordax, the genealogy hook for the show also left me a bit cold as its something I'm not all that keen on, but I have to admit some possible bias there being an adoptee legally barred from knowledge of my birth parents, so it isn't something I'd be able to indulge in even were it an interest.
*nods*
That's also interesting. Thank you for sharing. (I'd be curious about your other observations about that if you're comfortable and they come up. I wonder what popular fiction gets wrong about adoptees.)
In my case, this is a combination of being biracial and observing the march of science. As I've discussed in various spots on Mefi in the past, it's my feeling that I don't fully belong to either world that I come from, making any attempt at connections feel forced emotionally.
I also know the idea that memory can be transferred used to be a big thing back in the day, but has slowly been discredited over the years. (Indeed, I had a bitter argument with an ex-gf about Dune many years ago now, because she didn't know people really used to think memory could seriously be hereditary the way that Alia, Leto II and Ghanima experience it in those books.)
posted by mordax at 8:30 AM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]
I don't think the writers were thinking about any of this so deeply
Oh, almost certainly not, at least not in the terms I used. I'm sure they had some concept in mind about future/past and dissemination of knowledge given the details of the show, but it may have been in different terms than my take on it.
I'd be curious about your other observations about that if you're comfortable and they come up. I wonder what popular fiction gets wrong about adoptees.
It's a weird area for me in part due to there being so much emphasis on the positive sides of adoption, giving a child a home who may not otherwise have had one, couples unable to have children getting the chance to raise one in a loving environment, and all the associated sacrifices and benefits that are a real part of adoption, at least when it goes well. I see and appreciate that aspect of it and have nothing but good things to say about my parents, who were every bit the model I'd hope other adoptive parents would be, but at the same time there is still some sense of it not being the same sort of relationship as a birth parent one for me, which is further complicated by questions of whether that feeling is something that is often shared by other adoptees or maybe just a more unusual reaction of my own.
Since I was raised as a Catholic and went to a small private grade school, my experience was mostly in seeing big families that had quite a notable set of shared resemblances and traits as well as often having closer shared interests with their parents and siblings than I experienced myself. My parents were great, but I had little in common with them or my sister and that was difficult. It meant that I didn't have a good model for what I could become or might want to as my personality, skills, and interests were so far afield from my parents they didn't have any context from which to guide me in my pursuits even as they were nothing but encouraging about whatever interest I did take up on whim of the moment. It pains me a bit to think about that gulf because I neither learned restraint due to the encouragement coming without being tied to measure, nor found useful application since my interests found no greater connection than what I provided for myself.
I knew I was adopted from earliest memory and assumed that was a natural course of events, that something like 50% of kids must be adopted, when I found out differently, that too sort of reshaped my thinking on things, where the idea I was chosen, like one might choose to buy a car or other product, didn't inspire greater closeness for being selected, but instead spawned the realization that they had they been presented with another child they would have raised him with the same love and affection they showed me, making me feel more a product of circumstance than any deeper connection. Aside from being adopted, there was nothing that would have ever linked my parents to me basically, which seems a cruel thing to say in a sense, but fit the feelings I had growing up even as it didn't at all reflect negatively about my parents care and efforts with me.
I was a pain in the ass as a kid, and perhaps that would have been the case with my birth parents as well, but that I can't know, so the measure of myself and connections to others has always felt incomplete for that lack of knowledge even as the dissatisfaction that came from wanting to share interests and find guidance was met by guilt over not better rewarding what I did receive from my parents that so many children would be blessed to have. It all left some mixed feelings about adoption that I can't resolve since there is no way to see beyond my own experience in it enough to gain more distant perspective.
I often wonder too whether my lack of close familial connection helped shape my deep interest in artistic representation where "reading" relationships has some clearer shape and reward.
posted by gusottertrout at 9:16 AM on February 7, 2018 [4 favorites]
Oh, almost certainly not, at least not in the terms I used. I'm sure they had some concept in mind about future/past and dissemination of knowledge given the details of the show, but it may have been in different terms than my take on it.
I'd be curious about your other observations about that if you're comfortable and they come up. I wonder what popular fiction gets wrong about adoptees.
It's a weird area for me in part due to there being so much emphasis on the positive sides of adoption, giving a child a home who may not otherwise have had one, couples unable to have children getting the chance to raise one in a loving environment, and all the associated sacrifices and benefits that are a real part of adoption, at least when it goes well. I see and appreciate that aspect of it and have nothing but good things to say about my parents, who were every bit the model I'd hope other adoptive parents would be, but at the same time there is still some sense of it not being the same sort of relationship as a birth parent one for me, which is further complicated by questions of whether that feeling is something that is often shared by other adoptees or maybe just a more unusual reaction of my own.
Since I was raised as a Catholic and went to a small private grade school, my experience was mostly in seeing big families that had quite a notable set of shared resemblances and traits as well as often having closer shared interests with their parents and siblings than I experienced myself. My parents were great, but I had little in common with them or my sister and that was difficult. It meant that I didn't have a good model for what I could become or might want to as my personality, skills, and interests were so far afield from my parents they didn't have any context from which to guide me in my pursuits even as they were nothing but encouraging about whatever interest I did take up on whim of the moment. It pains me a bit to think about that gulf because I neither learned restraint due to the encouragement coming without being tied to measure, nor found useful application since my interests found no greater connection than what I provided for myself.
I knew I was adopted from earliest memory and assumed that was a natural course of events, that something like 50% of kids must be adopted, when I found out differently, that too sort of reshaped my thinking on things, where the idea I was chosen, like one might choose to buy a car or other product, didn't inspire greater closeness for being selected, but instead spawned the realization that they had they been presented with another child they would have raised him with the same love and affection they showed me, making me feel more a product of circumstance than any deeper connection. Aside from being adopted, there was nothing that would have ever linked my parents to me basically, which seems a cruel thing to say in a sense, but fit the feelings I had growing up even as it didn't at all reflect negatively about my parents care and efforts with me.
I was a pain in the ass as a kid, and perhaps that would have been the case with my birth parents as well, but that I can't know, so the measure of myself and connections to others has always felt incomplete for that lack of knowledge even as the dissatisfaction that came from wanting to share interests and find guidance was met by guilt over not better rewarding what I did receive from my parents that so many children would be blessed to have. It all left some mixed feelings about adoption that I can't resolve since there is no way to see beyond my own experience in it enough to gain more distant perspective.
I often wonder too whether my lack of close familial connection helped shape my deep interest in artistic representation where "reading" relationships has some clearer shape and reward.
posted by gusottertrout at 9:16 AM on February 7, 2018 [4 favorites]
I'm sure they had some concept in mind about future/past and dissemination of knowledge given the details of the show, but it may have been in different terms than my take on it.
I do think you nailed it. One deeply uncomfortable thing about storytelling is that our own biases come out in it in ways we don't expect. Like... the very first novel-length draft I ever finished turned into a meditation about nature vs. nurture even though I was just trying to write a pulp action genre mashup. There I was just setting up fights and explosions and silly Bond one-liners, and here's all this stuff about what makes us who we are. None of it was intentional, not all of it was comfortable. Seeing my biases all leaked everywhere was unsettling.
So I think you accurately sussed out at least some stuff that was going on with the writers here, whether they meant it that way or not. This opinion is bolstered by you being right about the iconic role of books in modern fiction: books are definitely shorthand for the past, even though that's a weird attitude for a writer to hold. (I think there's some culture shock about computers going on with that.)
It all left some mixed feelings about adoption that I can't resolve since there is no way to see beyond my own experience in it enough to gain more distant perspective.
I appreciate you sharing such personal things. Thank you for the insight. I can't know what that particular experience is like, but I sympathize about feeling unmoored. It also makes sense to hear that the story is a lot more complicated than fiction usually has it. I will have to mull that over awhile.
posted by mordax at 9:43 AM on February 7, 2018
I do think you nailed it. One deeply uncomfortable thing about storytelling is that our own biases come out in it in ways we don't expect. Like... the very first novel-length draft I ever finished turned into a meditation about nature vs. nurture even though I was just trying to write a pulp action genre mashup. There I was just setting up fights and explosions and silly Bond one-liners, and here's all this stuff about what makes us who we are. None of it was intentional, not all of it was comfortable. Seeing my biases all leaked everywhere was unsettling.
So I think you accurately sussed out at least some stuff that was going on with the writers here, whether they meant it that way or not. This opinion is bolstered by you being right about the iconic role of books in modern fiction: books are definitely shorthand for the past, even though that's a weird attitude for a writer to hold. (I think there's some culture shock about computers going on with that.)
It all left some mixed feelings about adoption that I can't resolve since there is no way to see beyond my own experience in it enough to gain more distant perspective.
I appreciate you sharing such personal things. Thank you for the insight. I can't know what that particular experience is like, but I sympathize about feeling unmoored. It also makes sense to hear that the story is a lot more complicated than fiction usually has it. I will have to mull that over awhile.
posted by mordax at 9:43 AM on February 7, 2018
gus, I did not know you were an adoptee. I am too. It rarely comes up in these Trek threads, but I have a long-term interest in and awareness of how adoption and adoptees are depicted and utilized in genre fiction. In the larger universe of genre fiction, adoptees tend to appear as dual-identity changelings, such as Clark Kent, Peter Parker, or Bruce Wayne; this has roots in similar tropes from myth (Moses, Jesus).
In Trek we see relatively little explicit use or examination of adoption (with two important exceptions) although there are implicit references to adoption-like relationships (Jean-Luc and Wesley, Dr. Soongh and Data, Data and Lal). The two primary exceptions are the still-new in-canon and developing relationship on DIS between Michael Burnhan and Sarek, and of course, Worf Rozhenko, who was adopted by human parents after being orphaned in the aftermath of an armed conflict.
Disappointingly, TNG does not really examine Worf's adoption per se as a crux of his bicultural identity conflicts, but then again they don't really have to, since the character has so much material to offer over the course of all of his screen time.
gus, regarding adoptees being blocked from obtaining your OBC: let me be explicit. This is a violation of our human rights, as it severs our access to our birth identity, something that in my opinion is inherent as a condition of being born. This viewpoint is upheld in the UN Charter on Human Rights and forms the legal basis of the right to citizenship in the country of birth for most international adoptees.
Asian-born international adoptees often find it difficult to establish birth identity. This is true even in Korea, which has good access laws, in part because initial recordkeeping was often poor. Bad or nonexistent records in international adoption are sometimes deliberately so, as international adoption has an ongoing direct entanglement with human trafficking.
The United States, in part because of the way that our adoption laws are adjudicated on a state by state basis, is one of the hardest countries in the world for us as adoptees to obtain access to our birth identity.
However, that is changing, slowly, state-by-state, imperfectly, and it is also driven by widespread use of consumer DNA testing. I belong to an adult-adoptee support group in Seattle. I started attending five years ago just after I entered into reunion with my birth mother and her extended family. At that time, the group was predominantly made up of adoptees that were *not*'in reunion. Today, five years later, it has become normal for an adoptee to attend a session without being in reunion or having thought much about it and then a month or two later to find themselves grappling with the overwhelming experience of entering into reunion, which can be extremely fraught and which carries with it the risk of what we in-group term "secondary rejection," when a birth parent refuses contact either immediately or after some degree of communication and contact.
Anyway, feel free to ask me questions, if you like. I have access to a wide range of resources on the topic accumulated over the past five years, including my own personal experience of reunion and would be delighted to be of assistance. If you are in the US and interested in learning more about your options to seek your birth identity whether by initiating contact or seeking your OBC, the first step is checking your birth state's laws regarding adoptiive birth identity access.
mordax, outside of genre fiction, in my online adoptee-support groups, the shows most currently cited as offering a nuanced depiction of adoption are "The Fosters," which concerns fostercare and rehoming but which I have never watched, and "This is Us," which features an African-American adoptee raised in a white family. His birth father enters the show early in season one. The show is a Big Fat Family Drama and not at all to my taste, with big soapy twists and cliffhangers, but Russell's story, much to my surprise, includes some honestly observed aspects of adoption that are structually problematic.
In my knowledge of international and interethnic adoption via friends I grew up with and fellow adoptees in-group, I would say, yes, your sense of being in two worlds yet also distinct from each is directly applicable to the experience of many adoptees of color.
posted by mwhybark at 9:53 AM on February 7, 2018 [5 favorites]
In Trek we see relatively little explicit use or examination of adoption (with two important exceptions) although there are implicit references to adoption-like relationships (Jean-Luc and Wesley, Dr. Soongh and Data, Data and Lal). The two primary exceptions are the still-new in-canon and developing relationship on DIS between Michael Burnhan and Sarek, and of course, Worf Rozhenko, who was adopted by human parents after being orphaned in the aftermath of an armed conflict.
Disappointingly, TNG does not really examine Worf's adoption per se as a crux of his bicultural identity conflicts, but then again they don't really have to, since the character has so much material to offer over the course of all of his screen time.
gus, regarding adoptees being blocked from obtaining your OBC: let me be explicit. This is a violation of our human rights, as it severs our access to our birth identity, something that in my opinion is inherent as a condition of being born. This viewpoint is upheld in the UN Charter on Human Rights and forms the legal basis of the right to citizenship in the country of birth for most international adoptees.
Asian-born international adoptees often find it difficult to establish birth identity. This is true even in Korea, which has good access laws, in part because initial recordkeeping was often poor. Bad or nonexistent records in international adoption are sometimes deliberately so, as international adoption has an ongoing direct entanglement with human trafficking.
The United States, in part because of the way that our adoption laws are adjudicated on a state by state basis, is one of the hardest countries in the world for us as adoptees to obtain access to our birth identity.
However, that is changing, slowly, state-by-state, imperfectly, and it is also driven by widespread use of consumer DNA testing. I belong to an adult-adoptee support group in Seattle. I started attending five years ago just after I entered into reunion with my birth mother and her extended family. At that time, the group was predominantly made up of adoptees that were *not*'in reunion. Today, five years later, it has become normal for an adoptee to attend a session without being in reunion or having thought much about it and then a month or two later to find themselves grappling with the overwhelming experience of entering into reunion, which can be extremely fraught and which carries with it the risk of what we in-group term "secondary rejection," when a birth parent refuses contact either immediately or after some degree of communication and contact.
Anyway, feel free to ask me questions, if you like. I have access to a wide range of resources on the topic accumulated over the past five years, including my own personal experience of reunion and would be delighted to be of assistance. If you are in the US and interested in learning more about your options to seek your birth identity whether by initiating contact or seeking your OBC, the first step is checking your birth state's laws regarding adoptiive birth identity access.
mordax, outside of genre fiction, in my online adoptee-support groups, the shows most currently cited as offering a nuanced depiction of adoption are "The Fosters," which concerns fostercare and rehoming but which I have never watched, and "This is Us," which features an African-American adoptee raised in a white family. His birth father enters the show early in season one. The show is a Big Fat Family Drama and not at all to my taste, with big soapy twists and cliffhangers, but Russell's story, much to my surprise, includes some honestly observed aspects of adoption that are structually problematic.
In my knowledge of international and interethnic adoption via friends I grew up with and fellow adoptees in-group, I would say, yes, your sense of being in two worlds yet also distinct from each is directly applicable to the experience of many adoptees of color.
posted by mwhybark at 9:53 AM on February 7, 2018 [5 favorites]
Disappointingly, TNG does not really examine Worf's adoption per se as a crux of his bicultural identity conflicts, but then again they don't really have to, since the character has so much material to offer over the course of all of his screen time.
This is an interesting point I'd love to discuss more, here or elsewhere - I realize we're into epic derail territory, but I dunno if it bothers anybody. (I am not adopted, but I have never had - nor particularly desire - access to the paternal side of my family, meaning I am a POC who was raised exclusively by white family, and I feel there's some imperfect overlap between these backgrounds.)
mordax, outside of genre fiction, in my online adoptee-support groups, the shows most currently cited as offering a nuanced depiction of adoption are "The Fosters," which concerns fostercare and rehoming but which I have never watched, and "This is Us," which features an African-American adoptee raised in a white family.
Thank you. I'll have to look into those.
posted by mordax at 10:23 AM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]
This is an interesting point I'd love to discuss more, here or elsewhere - I realize we're into epic derail territory, but I dunno if it bothers anybody. (I am not adopted, but I have never had - nor particularly desire - access to the paternal side of my family, meaning I am a POC who was raised exclusively by white family, and I feel there's some imperfect overlap between these backgrounds.)
mordax, outside of genre fiction, in my online adoptee-support groups, the shows most currently cited as offering a nuanced depiction of adoption are "The Fosters," which concerns fostercare and rehoming but which I have never watched, and "This is Us," which features an African-American adoptee raised in a white family.
Thank you. I'll have to look into those.
posted by mordax at 10:23 AM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]
It's funny, I've never really wanted to meet my birth parents exactly, I was definitely curious about them in regards to wondering whether there was any hint of greater likeness in some unknown fashion, but I also really didn't want to get caught up in lives of people I didn't know since I didn't want any more weight from relationships I didn't choose myself. My sister met her birth father since he'd left a letter okaying her contacting him, and she, according to him, was a great deal like her mother in many ways, rather her mother when he knew her since they didn't stay together. I came close to trying to find out if I could sue to have records of my birth parents destroyed since the thing that galled me most about my situation was that the courts/government could have access to information about my own history that was barred to me. I'm sure there would have been no chance of that happening, but it was a strong desire for a while so I would, effectively, have no history beyond my adoption.
The way adoption is handled in shows and movies is interesting. I haven't seen many currentish shows that deal explicitly with the subject, but a lot of shows approach the idea from a more metaphorical stance like the Superman story, orphans being ideal figures for blank slate conditions. Even when not that direct, the use of things like parallel universes also often comment on those ideals of nature vs nurture in ways that inform ideas on adoption, with the nurture side seemingly the more favored at the moment. That I think goes to some of the ways Trek handles characters like Seven, Michael, Worf and whoever else, where they aren't necessarily thinking of them as adopted per se, but more as examples of nurturing or nature, something that does has meaning for adoptees, but isn't the entirety of the issue as much as it is often simplified as being.
posted by gusottertrout at 10:32 AM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]
The way adoption is handled in shows and movies is interesting. I haven't seen many currentish shows that deal explicitly with the subject, but a lot of shows approach the idea from a more metaphorical stance like the Superman story, orphans being ideal figures for blank slate conditions. Even when not that direct, the use of things like parallel universes also often comment on those ideals of nature vs nurture in ways that inform ideas on adoption, with the nurture side seemingly the more favored at the moment. That I think goes to some of the ways Trek handles characters like Seven, Michael, Worf and whoever else, where they aren't necessarily thinking of them as adopted per se, but more as examples of nurturing or nature, something that does has meaning for adoptees, but isn't the entirety of the issue as much as it is often simplified as being.
posted by gusottertrout at 10:32 AM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]
I think it'd be interesting to compare how Trek and other shows handle things like being biracial in contrast to being adopted or orphaned since my feeling is there is something of a contradiction in their views on each at times, where something like Spock's "human nature" carries a different weight than Seven's Borg "nurturing". That's just an offhand guess though, I really do think it's a subject that could stand being looked at more closely to see how aligned the perspectives are.
posted by gusottertrout at 10:37 AM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by gusottertrout at 10:37 AM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]
Worf (and Michael Dorn's performance) is indeed a hugely worthy subject for discussion; there's just so much there to examine, from TNG's hamhanded clumsiness in language regarding race, culture, and species, to the inherent unfolded doubling of Worf's identity as a bicultural Klingon portrayed by a black man, to the unfortunate overall story arc of Worf and Alexander - man, there's just so much to write about, and I have of course wholly neglected all the fantastically admirable things about the character and his portrayal.
Hm... some pondering might reveal a way to construct a post on this, but I'm not 100% sure it's really fit for the Blue. I mean, FF clearly has a cohort of Trek talkers and that's who the post would be best suited to.
Sidebar on Worf and Alexander: In my adoptee support group there's a split between adoptees that have ahd kids and those that haven't, with the parents often emphasizing that the experience of looking into their child's face for the first time is the most overwhelming experience of their lives, specifically because it is often first time they, as adoptees, have ever looked into the face of someone that shares their DNA. This is a story beat that is entirely lacking in Worf's initial encounter with Alexander, and it seems likely to me that it stems from writing that did not include the authentic voice of an adoptee in the creation process.
gus, I hear you about not wanting to put more energy into new familial relationships with people you've never met. This strongly informs my decision to remain childless and also was an element in my reluctance to initiate a contact request with my birth family. They very definitely did not and do not understand that perspective, that desire to minimize familial obligations, but I have to say I fully get where you are coming from. That said, I've come around to accepting my relationship with them as familial, although I more accurately understand the limitations on that than they do, which is fine with me. In a way, because I have acccess to a bigger set of data regarding how adoptee birth-family reunions develop over time, I have greater control over our relationship than they do.
posted by mwhybark at 11:10 AM on February 7, 2018 [3 favorites]
Hm... some pondering might reveal a way to construct a post on this, but I'm not 100% sure it's really fit for the Blue. I mean, FF clearly has a cohort of Trek talkers and that's who the post would be best suited to.
Sidebar on Worf and Alexander: In my adoptee support group there's a split between adoptees that have ahd kids and those that haven't, with the parents often emphasizing that the experience of looking into their child's face for the first time is the most overwhelming experience of their lives, specifically because it is often first time they, as adoptees, have ever looked into the face of someone that shares their DNA. This is a story beat that is entirely lacking in Worf's initial encounter with Alexander, and it seems likely to me that it stems from writing that did not include the authentic voice of an adoptee in the creation process.
gus, I hear you about not wanting to put more energy into new familial relationships with people you've never met. This strongly informs my decision to remain childless and also was an element in my reluctance to initiate a contact request with my birth family. They very definitely did not and do not understand that perspective, that desire to minimize familial obligations, but I have to say I fully get where you are coming from. That said, I've come around to accepting my relationship with them as familial, although I more accurately understand the limitations on that than they do, which is fine with me. In a way, because I have acccess to a bigger set of data regarding how adoptee birth-family reunions develop over time, I have greater control over our relationship than they do.
posted by mwhybark at 11:10 AM on February 7, 2018 [3 favorites]
Hm... some pondering might reveal a way to construct a post on this, but I'm not 100% sure it's really fit for the Blue. I mean, FF clearly has a cohort of Trek talkers and that's who the post would be best suited to.
I was kicking around maybe posting to MetaTalk about this because it seems to me there are discussions that firmly belong in Fanfare, but are difficult to hang off the current posting structure. Not quite sure how to frame the question yet though.
(I just dropped a line to the mods about Altered Carbon, and cortex said it'd be okay to take big questions like this over to the gray if I thought it would be helpful.)
posted by mordax at 11:27 AM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]
I was kicking around maybe posting to MetaTalk about this because it seems to me there are discussions that firmly belong in Fanfare, but are difficult to hang off the current posting structure. Not quite sure how to frame the question yet though.
(I just dropped a line to the mods about Altered Carbon, and cortex said it'd be okay to take big questions like this over to the gray if I thought it would be helpful.)
posted by mordax at 11:27 AM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]
My Duffer's Guide stuff worked OK in FF Talk. Maybe a Worf-oriented set of episodes oriented to get discussion rolling? Still, FF Talk just feels like the right place for the DGs.
The other issue with FF Talk is that it's very low-visibility, the only way to call attention to the DGs was to crosspost into active threads (which was fine, but since both the TNG and DS9 rewatches are wrapped up, it's not clear how well that would work).
A way to make a Worf post for the Blue would be to find some other independent critical writing on him, of which I am sure there must be a fair amount. I do think there were also prior Worf threads over there but it's been some time and they weren't quite the discusson I'm imagining.
posted by mwhybark at 11:34 AM on February 7, 2018
The other issue with FF Talk is that it's very low-visibility, the only way to call attention to the DGs was to crosspost into active threads (which was fine, but since both the TNG and DS9 rewatches are wrapped up, it's not clear how well that would work).
A way to make a Worf post for the Blue would be to find some other independent critical writing on him, of which I am sure there must be a fair amount. I do think there were also prior Worf threads over there but it's been some time and they weren't quite the discusson I'm imagining.
posted by mwhybark at 11:34 AM on February 7, 2018
Here are three prior threads tagged "Worf"
Is There a Reason You Are Trying to Give Yourself More Work, posted February 2012. Fancut of Worf getting denied. This fancut is actually a crucial critical document regarding Worf as a character on the show, despite how amusing it is.
I am Worf Son of Mogh, posted March, 2014. Parody fancut of trailer for "The Wolf of Wall Street," "The Worf of Starfleet".
I am NOT a merry man, also posted March, 2014. A ten-link appreciation, including the fancut cited in the first link given here.
So, hm, maybe no actual post over there encouraging actual brow-furrowing* and thought regarding the character and his complicated semiotics.
*please accept my apologies for this dishonorable attempt at humor
posted by mwhybark at 11:46 AM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]
Is There a Reason You Are Trying to Give Yourself More Work, posted February 2012. Fancut of Worf getting denied. This fancut is actually a crucial critical document regarding Worf as a character on the show, despite how amusing it is.
I am Worf Son of Mogh, posted March, 2014. Parody fancut of trailer for "The Wolf of Wall Street," "The Worf of Starfleet".
I am NOT a merry man, also posted March, 2014. A ten-link appreciation, including the fancut cited in the first link given here.
So, hm, maybe no actual post over there encouraging actual brow-furrowing* and thought regarding the character and his complicated semiotics.
*please accept my apologies for this dishonorable attempt at humor
posted by mwhybark at 11:46 AM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]
That said, I've come around to accepting my relationship with them as familial, although I more accurately understand the limitations on that than they do, which is fine with me. In a way, because I have acccess to a bigger set of data regarding how adoptee birth-family reunions develop over time, I have greater control over our relationship than they do.
Yeah, I totally get that, and it's something that doesn't have one right answer, hell, not even for me to myself since I have no way of knowing how much I'd appreciate an unknown situation like that. I guess the feeling that relationships are "weight" itself sort of shows my bias on this and points to why I've largely withdrawn from all but a small handful of relationships, and those that remain are carefully chosen. That others find a different route is not only reasonable, but wise since I don't intend my choices as models, just what's made me feel most content in many ways, though the prospect of aging without close ties is also daunting.
I was kicking around maybe posting to MetaTalk about this because it seems to me there are discussions that firmly belong in Fanfare, but are difficult to hang off the current posting structure. Not quite sure how to frame the question yet though.
I think that would be a good Metatalk subject, especially since cortex was talking about trying to revamp Fanfare a bit on the recent podcast thingy. Having some way to talk about concepts, connections, or what-have-you that go beyond a single episode to a series, franchise or group of shows would be great if there were a way to do that and keep the site clean and functional. It is a bit more like a post on the blue, where the discussion would be more immediate than something designed to be able to be entered into whenever someone got around to watching a show. But then again that aspect of Fanfare isn't necessarily a strength for it given people seem to find it difficult to add to posts that aren't current anyway.
posted by gusottertrout at 11:52 AM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]
Yeah, I totally get that, and it's something that doesn't have one right answer, hell, not even for me to myself since I have no way of knowing how much I'd appreciate an unknown situation like that. I guess the feeling that relationships are "weight" itself sort of shows my bias on this and points to why I've largely withdrawn from all but a small handful of relationships, and those that remain are carefully chosen. That others find a different route is not only reasonable, but wise since I don't intend my choices as models, just what's made me feel most content in many ways, though the prospect of aging without close ties is also daunting.
I was kicking around maybe posting to MetaTalk about this because it seems to me there are discussions that firmly belong in Fanfare, but are difficult to hang off the current posting structure. Not quite sure how to frame the question yet though.
I think that would be a good Metatalk subject, especially since cortex was talking about trying to revamp Fanfare a bit on the recent podcast thingy. Having some way to talk about concepts, connections, or what-have-you that go beyond a single episode to a series, franchise or group of shows would be great if there were a way to do that and keep the site clean and functional. It is a bit more like a post on the blue, where the discussion would be more immediate than something designed to be able to be entered into whenever someone got around to watching a show. But then again that aspect of Fanfare isn't necessarily a strength for it given people seem to find it difficult to add to posts that aren't current anyway.
posted by gusottertrout at 11:52 AM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]
one other note regarding gus' observations on how his psychology as an adoptee may have informed his interest in critical analyses of storytelling. I'm as logorrheic as you, observably, and have at times worked as a writer and journalist. My adoptive father is an inveterate storyteller who can visualize the actions of a protagonist in an invented setting populated with supporting characters and physical descriptions of the environment instantaneously and apparently without end. I can't visualize a protagonist to save my life. I can command vast chunks of fact in many disparate environments - art, film, computing - and write about them both practically and critically, as I do with you guys here.
But I will never, ever, be able to consistently write fiction, because when I visualize a protagonist, that protagonist is perfectly and solely reactive, never proactive. There's never an arc to the story; there's just a series of events that happen to the protagonist. That describes, with both accuracy and inaccuracy, the arc of my life. I have at times vigorously pursued goals and motivated others to do so as well; yet the actions I was taking were always perfectly invisible to me and my self-image is of a being at rest, moved to activity by forces outside myself. It's not a wholly accurate self-image.
This sense of a missing protagonist is very clearly, in my self-review, directly related to my own experience as an adoptee. I'm rarely motivated to do things for myself, in my self image. That self image is not wholly accurate, of course, but it unfortunately also neutralizes my fiction-creation impulses. Which is kind of a bummer.
posted by mwhybark at 3:04 PM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]
But I will never, ever, be able to consistently write fiction, because when I visualize a protagonist, that protagonist is perfectly and solely reactive, never proactive. There's never an arc to the story; there's just a series of events that happen to the protagonist. That describes, with both accuracy and inaccuracy, the arc of my life. I have at times vigorously pursued goals and motivated others to do so as well; yet the actions I was taking were always perfectly invisible to me and my self-image is of a being at rest, moved to activity by forces outside myself. It's not a wholly accurate self-image.
This sense of a missing protagonist is very clearly, in my self-review, directly related to my own experience as an adoptee. I'm rarely motivated to do things for myself, in my self image. That self image is not wholly accurate, of course, but it unfortunately also neutralizes my fiction-creation impulses. Which is kind of a bummer.
posted by mwhybark at 3:04 PM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]
That's really fascinating mwhybark as that is exactly how I am as well, but would never have thought to connect that to adoption or the feelings that came from it. It's something I'm going to have to give more thought to since it is such a strong element of my make up as well.
posted by gusottertrout at 10:45 PM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by gusottertrout at 10:45 PM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]
finally watching the catalyst episode on Amazon, two things:
the LEM Shannon has hanging from her rearview mirror in the opening flashback shot is a same-era Hallmark Christmas ornament. Why do I recognize it? I have one!
Amazon numbers the episode as 05 22, which confused me for a moment.
---
She can email every computer within a hundred miles!
posted by mwhybark at 10:58 PM on February 7, 2018
the LEM Shannon has hanging from her rearview mirror in the opening flashback shot is a same-era Hallmark Christmas ornament. Why do I recognize it? I have one!
Amazon numbers the episode as 05 22, which confused me for a moment.
---
She can email every computer within a hundred miles!
posted by mwhybark at 10:58 PM on February 7, 2018
gus, happy to connect at whatever your speed or need. I'll drop an IRL 411 via MeMail and you can follow up as you wish. There are a number of adoptees on MeFi that interact with an awareness of our familial experiences. It's not, you know, the cabal or anything, but without question, the conversation I had with my a-mom that led to my search was prompted by an exchange over a decade ago here with Astro Zombie, now known as Max Sparber.
Personally, developing both an IRL and online social network that includes explicit subsets of adoptees has been hugely beneficial and rewarding for me. I know myself better, and I think I interact with those I choose as my intimates with greater self-awareness and compassion, and consequently (I fucking hope) with greater kindness.
posted by mwhybark at 11:09 PM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]
Personally, developing both an IRL and online social network that includes explicit subsets of adoptees has been hugely beneficial and rewarding for me. I know myself better, and I think I interact with those I choose as my intimates with greater self-awareness and compassion, and consequently (I fucking hope) with greater kindness.
posted by mwhybark at 11:09 PM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]
Ha ha, at the story break around 20m, the bookstore owner guy Janeway is supposed to be getting supplies in "Bloomington," I think. Which is my hometown and nowhere near northern Indiana, the only plausible location for this improbable megastructure.
posted by mwhybark at 11:21 PM on February 7, 2018
posted by mwhybark at 11:21 PM on February 7, 2018
The likeliest northern Indiana location I can think of with a name similar to Portage Creek is La Porte, Indiana - my first wife's hometown. Although there is also a place just east of Gary called Portage, in Porter County. soooo...
posted by mwhybark at 11:33 PM on February 7, 2018
posted by mwhybark at 11:33 PM on February 7, 2018
La Porte is 40 miles east of Portage. Six of one, half a dozen of the other.
posted by mwhybark at 11:37 PM on February 7, 2018
posted by mwhybark at 11:37 PM on February 7, 2018
the LEM Shannon has hanging from her rearview mirror in the opening flashback shot is a same-era Hallmark Christmas ornament. Why do I recognize it? I have one!
I was reasonably impressed by their art direction this episode, I mean, sure, setting the show in "our" time makes things a little easier, but they did a fine job of adding little touches that seemed right in the town, vehicles, and shops.
The likeliest northern Indiana location I can think of with a name similar to Portage Creek is La Porte, Indiana - my first wife's hometown. Although there is also a place just east of Gary called Portage, in Porter County. soooo...
That's a lot of "ports" for Indiana!
posted by gusottertrout at 11:40 PM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]
I was reasonably impressed by their art direction this episode, I mean, sure, setting the show in "our" time makes things a little easier, but they did a fine job of adding little touches that seemed right in the town, vehicles, and shops.
The likeliest northern Indiana location I can think of with a name similar to Portage Creek is La Porte, Indiana - my first wife's hometown. Although there is also a place just east of Gary called Portage, in Porter County. soooo...
That's a lot of "ports" for Indiana!
posted by gusottertrout at 11:40 PM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]
Porter County, Portage, and La Porte are all near the southern shore of Lake Michigan. The first European economic presence in Indiana were French fur traders, who established Fort Ouiatenon on the Wabash maybe 100 miles south of the lake, at what is now Lafayette, and downstream on the same river Vincennes and Terre Haute.
The fur traders were out there on their own for more than a century and intermarried with the locals, the indigienous population of the Northwest Territories, which led to the development of a hybrid Native American - European culture.
This should, of course, ring a bell for viewers of this show. After all, the traders were known as Voyageurs, and the hybrid culture was known as Métis.
posted by mwhybark at 11:57 PM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]
The fur traders were out there on their own for more than a century and intermarried with the locals, the indigienous population of the Northwest Territories, which led to the development of a hybrid Native American - European culture.
This should, of course, ring a bell for viewers of this show. After all, the traders were known as Voyageurs, and the hybrid culture was known as Métis.
posted by mwhybark at 11:57 PM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]
This should, of course, ring a bell for viewers of this show. After all, the traders were known as Voyageurs, and the hybrid culture was known as Métis.
Excellent! I knew that, but never connected it with Indiana since, for me Voyageurs were an upper Minnesota/Canada thing that I'd never otherwise linked with the show.
posted by gusottertrout at 12:20 AM on February 8, 2018
Excellent! I knew that, but never connected it with Indiana since, for me Voyageurs were an upper Minnesota/Canada thing that I'd never otherwise linked with the show.
posted by gusottertrout at 12:20 AM on February 8, 2018
IMO, the proposed Worf analysis post sounds just fine for the Blue. It looks to me like those other threads are sufficiently dissimilar from it, and it's not as though Worf is too minor a character to merit such attention.
posted by CheesesOfBrazil at 2:39 AM on February 8, 2018
posted by CheesesOfBrazil at 2:39 AM on February 8, 2018
I disagree, because I don't just want to talk about Worf - I'd like to discuss Michael Burnham and some other characters too, and it's not the first time I've really wanted to talk about more than one show in the same thread without accidentally spoiling people or taking it to the Blue. (FPPs have a different bar, and while I do not object to reading someone else's critical analysis of this, that wouldn't cover some related discussions I would like to be able to have on this subsite.)
I'm dropping the mods a line right after I hit post here, and seeing if they have any opinions about this. (Would've yesterday, but things got pretty busy after I stopped posting here.)
posted by mordax at 10:11 AM on February 8, 2018 [1 favorite]
I'm dropping the mods a line right after I hit post here, and seeing if they have any opinions about this. (Would've yesterday, but things got pretty busy after I stopped posting here.)
posted by mordax at 10:11 AM on February 8, 2018 [1 favorite]
I'm going to quote cortex here:
I can share the laundry list of ideas I ran by him too, if anybody's curious. I will also be posting about this to Fanfare Talk later so non-Trek fans know the score, but I need to get back to work right now. (I haven't even seen Relativity yet, argh!)
posted by mordax at 11:16 AM on February 8, 2018 [2 favorites]
Heya! Interesting question. I think the two best answers from among those proposals (and I don't have an alternate better suggestion) are:So basically, it's okay for us to post a thread either here in Fanfare, or in Fanfare Talk - like the Duffer's Guides, as mwhybark compared this to. The Blue isn't ideal for this except rarely.
3. FanFare Talk. There's a visibility issue there, but if you have folks already interested in a topic and/or looking at FanFare a lot, there'll be some takers. Mentioning it in a comment in a couple relevant existing threads would also help there.
4. In a show-specific thread, with clear description of what the threads about. This is okay to do; we designed in the possibility for intentional duplication on things like episodes, seasons, etc so folks can choose when it makes sense to spin up another thread on the same nominal categorical scope.
Obviously its okay if it happens on the blue by chance, but that's chance.
I don't see a "cross-show" flag thing happening because that's adding systemic complexity for a pretty niche issue; hacking around it manually through description seems like a better fit over all.
I can share the laundry list of ideas I ran by him too, if anybody's curious. I will also be posting about this to Fanfare Talk later so non-Trek fans know the score, but I need to get back to work right now. (I haven't even seen Relativity yet, argh!)
posted by mordax at 11:16 AM on February 8, 2018 [2 favorites]
Just to make sure I don't misunderstand the idea. The question/answer was over being able to use Fanfare talk to have a discussion that covers multiple shows, not just a discussion about having that discussion, heh, yes?
Cuz that'd be a cool option for the talk page which isn't getting used much otherwise and help keep people from having to dig up quasi-relevant articles that touch on a desired subject to sort of force the conversation to the blue. (That's already a not uncommon strategy for certain events.)
posted by gusottertrout at 11:35 AM on February 8, 2018 [3 favorites]
Cuz that'd be a cool option for the talk page which isn't getting used much otherwise and help keep people from having to dig up quasi-relevant articles that touch on a desired subject to sort of force the conversation to the blue. (That's already a not uncommon strategy for certain events.)
posted by gusottertrout at 11:35 AM on February 8, 2018 [3 favorites]
Yep, you have read me correctly, gus. I specifically asked:
Then I listed a bunch of options I'd brainstormed for threads that concern more than one show simultaneously without causing huge spoiler problems, and cortex said 3 & 4 were the best ones from a mod standpoint, as quoted above.
Cuz that'd be a cool option for the talk page which isn't getting used much otherwise and help keep people from having to dig up quasi-relevant articles that touch on a desired subject to sort of force the conversation to the blue. (That's already a not uncommon strategy for certain events.)
Right, exactly.
posted by mordax at 11:58 AM on February 8, 2018 [1 favorite]
I would like to know the best practice for discussing multiple shows on Fanfare in the same thread. For example: 'compare DS9 to VOY' or 'Stargate SG-1 to TNG as they relate to TOS' or something.I also talked about our specific issue in this thread: 'talk about Worf and Michael Burnham in the same show thread.'
Then I listed a bunch of options I'd brainstormed for threads that concern more than one show simultaneously without causing huge spoiler problems, and cortex said 3 & 4 were the best ones from a mod standpoint, as quoted above.
Cuz that'd be a cool option for the talk page which isn't getting used much otherwise and help keep people from having to dig up quasi-relevant articles that touch on a desired subject to sort of force the conversation to the blue. (That's already a not uncommon strategy for certain events.)
Right, exactly.
posted by mordax at 11:58 AM on February 8, 2018 [1 favorite]
Mordax, I was beginning to look for critical work on Worf and came across this essay, Crossing the Racial Frontier: Star Trek and Mixed Heritage Identities, by an academic called Wei Ming Dariotis.
I think it's an interesting concidence that the author's name combines Chinese and Greek ethnic identity, as does Michelle Yeoh's Giorgiou.
posted by mwhybark at 11:16 AM on February 9, 2018
I think it's an interesting concidence that the author's name combines Chinese and Greek ethnic identity, as does Michelle Yeoh's Giorgiou.
posted by mwhybark at 11:16 AM on February 9, 2018
The author focuses on Spock, Seven, and Odo, with a particular awareness of and attention to Orientalizing as an element of Trek characterization and plotting, logically enough, as this reflects their academic orientation. The piece was initially published in 2007.
The piece also explicitly identifies both Seven and Odo with transracial and international adoptees, which is clearly a legitimate viewpoint. Odo has a human "father", and at one point obtains a Founder child. Seven, of course, was assimilated as a child. The author focuses on and identifies Janeway as Seven's would-be adoptive mother with special attention to the involuntary nature of Seven's reintegration into human society. The author does not mention American frontier narratives of reintegration such as The Searchers, nor does the piece examine Seven's initial experience of assimilation.
It's interesting to me that while Seven and Odo are clearly limnal characters with dual-bore identities, as an adoptee, I can't say their arcs relate or resonate with mine, probably because their formative experiences - Odo the experimental subject; Seven the war orphan in assimilation - are so different from mine. I suppose if I had experienced an abusive childhood that might alter my degree of resonance with the characters.
I suppose another factor is that both the Founders and the Borg are characterized by Trek as collective societies with different and poorly-described concepts of individual and collective identity than our own. In my opinion this is a weak spot in much of Trek's characterization of antagonists, from early Klingon depictions in which Ghengis Khan and Ming the Merciless are deliberately invoked with a dash of red-baiting right on up through the cubes and the sea of silly-putty. Since the non-human social identity and experiences of Odo and Seven (and Locutus and Hugh) are so poorly expressed over the course of the show, I cannot identify with the characters' experience.
I suppose also Odo's struggle with his identity as a Founder has a great deal of applicability to the experiences of adoptees coming to reunion, though. I watched DS9 right as my own reunion was developing, though, and I don't think I ever noticed that Odo's experience was in some ways paralell to mine. Maybe because it's not? My birth family are not buckets of goo, for example.
posted by mwhybark at 11:52 AM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]
The piece also explicitly identifies both Seven and Odo with transracial and international adoptees, which is clearly a legitimate viewpoint. Odo has a human "father", and at one point obtains a Founder child. Seven, of course, was assimilated as a child. The author focuses on and identifies Janeway as Seven's would-be adoptive mother with special attention to the involuntary nature of Seven's reintegration into human society. The author does not mention American frontier narratives of reintegration such as The Searchers, nor does the piece examine Seven's initial experience of assimilation.
It's interesting to me that while Seven and Odo are clearly limnal characters with dual-bore identities, as an adoptee, I can't say their arcs relate or resonate with mine, probably because their formative experiences - Odo the experimental subject; Seven the war orphan in assimilation - are so different from mine. I suppose if I had experienced an abusive childhood that might alter my degree of resonance with the characters.
I suppose another factor is that both the Founders and the Borg are characterized by Trek as collective societies with different and poorly-described concepts of individual and collective identity than our own. In my opinion this is a weak spot in much of Trek's characterization of antagonists, from early Klingon depictions in which Ghengis Khan and Ming the Merciless are deliberately invoked with a dash of red-baiting right on up through the cubes and the sea of silly-putty. Since the non-human social identity and experiences of Odo and Seven (and Locutus and Hugh) are so poorly expressed over the course of the show, I cannot identify with the characters' experience.
I suppose also Odo's struggle with his identity as a Founder has a great deal of applicability to the experiences of adoptees coming to reunion, though. I watched DS9 right as my own reunion was developing, though, and I don't think I ever noticed that Odo's experience was in some ways paralell to mine. Maybe because it's not? My birth family are not buckets of goo, for example.
posted by mwhybark at 11:52 AM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]
Among my current reading is Andrew Robinson's Garak novel, "A Stitch in Time," which of course inevitably reminds me that Garak (in the book, I am uncertain if this was a fact that made it to the screen) is also what is known as a late-discovery adoptee, someone who learns of their biological parentage after childhood.
posted by mwhybark at 4:38 AM on February 20, 2018
posted by mwhybark at 4:38 AM on February 20, 2018
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( •_•)>⌐■-■ / (⌐■_■)
… "Now, Voyager"
YYYYYEEEEAAAAHHHHH
posted by CheesesOfBrazil at 7:54 AM on February 5, 2018 [3 favorites]