I’m just going to leave this here.
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Apparently the kind of insurance that allows 15-year-old “acting ensigns” (who have not yet graduated the academy) pilot the thing?
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”Sure, why not let the precocious child pilot the thing?” was one of the many silly bits they carried over into Galaxy Quest.
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So, size DOES matter, yes? Only grown-ups allowed at the helm, yes?
Don’t ruin my childhood dreams, dear. I implore you.
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Wil Wheaton’s head canon on that is pretty poignant.
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I love Wil Wheaton but the logic is still a little suspect.
“Remember that a being of extraordinary power and ability pulled Picard aside and said, “this kid is special. I can’t tell you exactly why, but it’s really important that you nurture and encourage him to the best of your ability.” And Picard listened. He heard that this being, who had literally just taken them where no one has gone before, and he followed his advice.
“And that eventually leads Wesley to become one of the Travelers.
“I’m sure that there are plenty of officers on the Enterprise who share your opinion. They’re pissed that this kid was promoted. They’re pissed that he’s a nepo baby.
“But they don’t know everything that Picard knows. And Picard is the captain of the ship, so he gets to make that call. And he doesn’t have to explain himself to anyone.”
Starfleet Inquiry Board: Captain, can you please explain why you put an inexperienced, untrained 15-year-old at the helm of the Federation’s flagship?
Captain Picard: A space hobo told me the kid needed some encouragement.
Starfleet Inquiry Board: Sounds legit. Hearing adjourned.
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Well, that’s why it’s his head canon and not canon, canon.
The canon reason is that Wesley is an avatar for Roddenberry.
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It’s no sillier than much of what is real canon. But that’s OK, Star Trek is supposed to be an idealistic fantasy rather than a realistic depiction of a future society.
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I think I disagree here a bit… it’s a possible utopian future (especially up to when Roddenberry died) based on humanities finally putting our squabbles behind us and working to build a better future. It’s meant to be aspirational to encourage people to work for that better future (even if it does not look exactly like ST). By the time TNG came around, Roddenberry was definitely buying into his own hype about what he had created, and believed we could have a future that good.
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His depiction of humanity certainly had a “this is what we can become if we work hard to be our best selves” theme to it, but I still think of Star Trek as more “fantasy” than hard sci-fi because Roddenberry was never overly concerned about creating a universe that seemed scientifically likely (for example, a galaxy filled with alien life forms who look just like humans and speak unaccented American English).
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I guess I’ve never understood the appeal of hard sci-fi, personally, but it generally gets floated around as a “superior” form of sci-fi… But “predicting” the future is always fraught and problematic. No one is going to get it “right” and then most likely, it’s not predicting things anyways, it’s influencing people in particular directions. Think of the iPad form factor and the PADDs from ST, for example.
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I don’t think either variety of sci-fi is inherently superior, it’s just a different kind of storytelling. If you like swords and sorcery in space then watch Star Wars, if you like to geek out over the real-life physics of space travel then watch The Expanse.
Star Trek is, first and foremost, a sandbox for telling stories about humanity.
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I don’t think fantasy and soft sci-fi are the same thing. Soft sci-fi doesn’t sweat the details, but it still looks at the present to tell of the future. (Or other possibilities.) “Fantasy sci-fi” has technological trappings, but has little to say about where we’re going.
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Oh I get that you don’t… it’s just a trend I’ve noticed, often to dismiss shows like Star Trek as a lesser than form of sci-fi…
I think that’s where it’s value really comes from, honestly. That is at the heart of all story-telling, whether its literature, mythology, religion, non-fiction, whatever… I definitely buy Terry Pratchett’s argument about storytelling being a key marker of humanity.
I would argue that fantasy, as a genre, very much has things to say about humanity, it just tells it from the opposite side - it’s where we came from, as opposed to where we are going. But both are about trying to better understand us, who we are, our complexity, etc. Star Wars, for example, was built on a traditional mythologies of the heroes journey… that matters too.
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Yep, I went in the wrong direction with fantasy, but it was already posted when I thought better of it.
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That might be an overgeneralization… did you catch Andor? It was set in a “Fantasy sci-fi” universe but it felt very much like it had some things to say about human society.
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Also… always a good time to post this…
I really miss Sir Terry… I wish he were still here with us, cranking out Discworld novels and working on season 2 of Good Omens with Gaiman… 
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Well…
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Cetacean navigation from 1984, courtesy of Alan Moore’s ‘Halo Jones’:
One of the best stories ever, IMO.
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I would give something for him to be around some more - e.g., I’d accept that anthropomorphic personifications of cultural concepts exist for him, and pray to some of them.
The closest someone would get me to become religious, I think.
I wonder what @Death would have to say about this…
BTW, while I really enjoy watching and especially listening to Michelle Dockery, I think the dialogue is even better in writing than acted out.
ETA:
I wonder, since there are blueprints (non-canon, as he states) - hasn’t anyone done a CAD/GIS/Unreal engine model of the Enterprise D?
I mean, AFAIR someone even building a D in Minecraft!
Hm. Got to work a bit, but I add looking for it to my bucket list. And if I don’t find one - could someone point me into the right direction? Or at least in the direction of the blueprints, as highres as possible?
I shall see, making vector graphics out of this… Hmmm… And then importing into QGIS… Should be possible…
ETA2: 💫 A Tour of the Enterprise D (TNG) in Unreal Engine 4 - YouTube
…and: killed by copyright. Damn.
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