I'm hoping Very Short Treks started with their weakest showing. Who okayed this? I'm imagining someone who when asked what their favorite part of Star Trek is, responds, "the lightsabers and the Wookies." How else would the not at all representative of Star Trek whinge, "omg, I can't say anything without offending someone!," get put on repeat for nearly the entirety of the short. Except by someone who is clueless about Star Trek. And then ending with the Captain getting his imaginary girlfriend wish fulfilled. What the hell did I just write. What the hell did I just watch.
this post was submitted on 08 Sep 2023
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The message, I think, is "When Spock tells you you're being an asshole, stop doubling down on being an asshole, or you lose it all".
Or more generally, "This is an example of being an asshole. Don't be like this."
So I think there's the kernel of an entertaining idea here, regarding how idioms translate, but I have such an immediate, visceral reaction to how unfunny Pete Holmes is that I'm not really feeling charitable here. I think as soon as the woman whose head was underpants showed up, we crossed the line past anything that could be salvaged.
I'm not familiar with Pete Holmes but it would have been nice to have Paul Wesley voice Kirk to provide some aural continuity.
I watched "Too Many Cooks" in preparation for Very Short Treks and so thought "Skin a Cat" was tame in comparison. I enjoyed it. 'Twas silly.
I don't think that was supposed to be Kirk, it was credit as just "Captain".
Soooo....the message was that you can't say anything anymore because people are offended by everything?
I somewhat agree with that but it's weird that Star Trek sends such a message.
No, the message is that if you continue being an asshole, you don't actually get what you want, and everyone dies in the end.
I'd argue that there wasn't really any sort of message to be found here.
I'm taking it at face value that old earth figures of speech and idioms would be problematic on a TAS bridge with the nomaly going on, they addressed that by the cat person responding that "there is more than one way to disembowel a human", we wouldn't like people casually throwing that around. It's also tongue in cheek as illustrated by the knickerstonians and the ship blowing up. It's meant to be silly.
The tapestry of star trek (and science fiction) has always included silly and over the top alongside the serious, thought provoking and intelligent.
Cornering the star trek parody and comedy market with their own product is genius btw. Like how Elvis's manager sold "I hate Elvis" shirts.
Jokes can usually include a message, and often are more effective at delivering that message than a serious monologue with full citations.
Therefore, saying something is meant to be silly or a joke does not do anything to address whether the message behind that joke is a good one or not.
One could argue that "Skin a Cat" makes a more profound point amidst the silliness. Which is that (as Azetbur has pointed out) "the Federation is nothing more than a homo sapiens only club".
Obviously there are real world reasons why human (and primarily American) cultural references abound in Star Trek, but it's always irked me that, for instance, there would be an entire class of Starfleet vessels named after cities in one United States state - ie, the California class. Why not have all the ships in this class named after towns in, say, the ShiKahr district of Vulcan instead? I think that would do a better job of world building, representing the Federation as a body that's more than just a bunch of humans with a handful of token aliens. Or, better yet, have all the ships ships named after smaller cities in a range of UFP member planets?
edit: typo
The US centricity is actually an interesting topic in-universe. Especially because the federation should try and work hard to make member worlds feel equal. Having so much Americentrism would alienate the aliens. The federation has done a bad job of this 😆
Of course the real answer is that the people that make it are American and it's probably largely for American audiences and therefore producers and writers feel like they need to show people things they are comfortable with. And when they do show other cultures they are seen through an American lens. Which is why the Irish were so cliche that O'Brien even teleported the straw around their feet when they beamed into Picard's enterprise. 👨🌾
Which Lemmy am I in? Which way to the daystrom institute?
Ships named after Vulcan cities wouldn't make much sense, since Vulcan still has their own fleet of starships. I'd be interested to know if other Federation worlds are the same. I bet at least Andoria is, because they wouldn't have wanted to mothball their fleet while their most contentious neighbors maintain theirs.
One of the concerns also brought up by characters in the past is that joining the federation would lead to them losing their cultural identity. It's very possible this is part of the problem. Even Captain Vendome, with his entirely Bolian bridge crew, is still captain of a ship named after a city in California.
Hopefully this will be explored as T'Lyn integrates into the Cerritos crew.
It also doesn't really surprise me. With admirals like Buenamigo naming new ship classes, this is what you get. Star Fleet needs to work on diversity among their flag officers