Media Musings

Media Musings
        - By Commander Noah Masterson

In keeping with last month's Musings, I'm going for another theme. But this one will improve upon and fix some of the glaring errors of the previous iteration. This time, nobody's gonna interfere with my vision…well…at least not till the third season.

Ahem….I'll call this "Media Musings: The Subsequent Iteration!" People will love it more than the original version!

::insert evil laugh here::

Sorry, but I couldn't resist! This month's Musings is all about Star Trek: The Next Generation and although Gene Roddenberry wasn't a mad genius, part of his motivation for making TNG was to fix all the things that had gone wrong with TOS, thanks to the various studio execs that thought it "too cerebral."

The same cannot be fairly applied to the Musings, but…on with the show!

Something To Read

This month, I read the Pocket Books "Star Trek: The Next Generation Technical Manual." I know what you're thinking.

"Masterson," you're saying, "how can one read a technical manual?", right?

Well, for those who've never cracked its cover: this thing is packed with information. Whereas the Franz Joseph Tech Manual was packed with information in the form of deck plans and technical illustrations, the TNG Tech Manual is packed with information about the technical illustrations and plans. Although the book serves to explain the tech (and stands in as a writer's bible in this sense), it also provides "real world" explanations, from a production point of view, about why certain things worked the way they did in TNG.

In today's day and age of Memory Alpha and Memory Beta, that may seem antiquated. But, as I can personally testify to, there was a time when the Internet wasn't chocked full of tech diagrams…or discussions about how LCARS worked (seriously, this far in the future and they still have to type in code strings?)…or where Ten Forward was. I mean, sure /on the show/, it was on Deck 10. But what did that look like?

This book answered those questions.

From a USF simmer's perspective, this book is invaluable! Ever wondered about your position on your ship and what you're supposed to be doing? The TNG Tech Manual covers each of the positions as well as giving you a visual of what your station's LCARS terminal looks like.

Something to Watch

In keeping with this month's theme, I watched the TNG episodes "The Best of Both Worlds, Parts One and Two" and "Family."

A word before I go further:

I chose this episodic arc because it represents a turning point in a TNG. Up till this point in TNG, the stories hadn't been much different than TOS. In fact, quite a few had been remakes of TOS episodes that Gene Roddenberry felt hadn't been done right by NBC. But by this point, Mr. Roddenberry wasn't writing as many episodes as before; he was acting as more of an executive producer/ creative consultant. The end of Season Three and the beginning of Season Four represent a shift in the telling of the stories. Instead of focusing on creatures or situations, the episodes began to focus on the people of the Enterprise and how they dealt with situations.

"The Best of Both Worlds" and "Family" are crucial to the TNG mythos because we see a strong leader, Jean Luc, forced to face his own frailty and his inability to stop an opponent from using his considerable knowledge against the Enterprise.

In "TBoBW," we see the dedication the crew has for their captain as well as their desire to fight the insidious Borg. From a real world perspective, we (the audience) are denied that thing that Star Trek, specifically and TV generally, has conditioned us to expect: closure. It was groundbreaking for a show to conclude a season on a cliffhanger and then wait until the next season to conclude the story. That may not sound that innovative to us today; that's the streaming-bingable-service of your choice talking! This was in the day before any of those technologies existed…in fact, this show probably influenced people to make that tech possible.

What put the proverbial cherry on top of this sundae (as it were) was the second episode in Season Four: "Family." After his encounter with the Borg, Jean Luc decides to spend his recuperative leave at his family estate in France. On top of dealing with what we today would recognize as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, Jean Luc is forced to deal with the old argument from his brother about how Jean Luc never should have left. Although it could be dismissed as just another episode, I feel that "Family" is crucial to the "TBoBW" story arc as it serves as an epilogue of sorts. In the arguments of Jean Luc and his brother, we the audience find a sort of catharsis following the Borg intrusion.

This three episode arc is my absolute favorite in TNG, easily beating out the later Sons of Mogh stories (which if you know me is on my "must watch" list). Find some time and watch all three consecutively; it's well worth the time and I think you'll gain a new understanding of this story.

A closing note: some of this information was gleaned from an excellent documentary I watched previously titled "Chaos on the Bridge." I watched it on Netflix when it first hit the service and I was enthralled. If you like TNG at all, do yourself a favor and watch this film. I have reviewed it during my run on the Fortnightly Media Review but I plan to return to it at some point.

Something to Listen To

If you can't find time to watch "The Best of Both Worlds," do yourself a sonic treat: listen to the score. I found it on Spotify as an album. A quick search for Star Trek: The Next Generation should net you the correct result (look for Data and Worf on the cover).

I listen to this album when I write because all the necessary elements are there: ambient world building, tension and release, heroic themes in major keys and villainous ones in minor keys. Before finding this, I would have to settle for watching the episodes and catching snatches of the music. But not anymore!

Something to Play

Although I've covered it before (during my FMR days), I feel that coverage of Star Trek: Attack Wing from WhizKidz is entirely appropriate. Mainly because I've got both the Enterprise D and a Borg Cube…but hey, who's counting?

For those unfamiliar with the game, it's a 2D combat simulator that's designed to get you into a skirmish with friends as quickly as possible. There are rules, but unless you're the type that has to know the rules intimately before playing, I recommend jumping in with both feet.

After picking your ship models and mounting them on clear, acrylic stands, you have the option of picking crew upgrades and ship upgrades. Crew upgrades allow you to pick specific crew members (such as Worf) who perform special abilities during combat to give you an upper hand. Ship upgrades allow you to use the generic ship (in our example, this would be a no-name Galaxy class) or a specific ship (the Enterprise D) which each net their own rewards.

Once "fleets" are readied, you fight! Each side uses a movement dial to determine and set their ship's course and speed. To accommodate this, the game is supplied with several course rulers. The appropriate one is selected and then laid out in front of the maneuvering ship and said ship is moved according to the course set on the maneuver dial. Forces then jockey to get into the best firing solution in order to score damage and win.

All in all, this is a dogfight, not a fleet battle. The system was actually leased from Fantasy Flight Games, which applied the system to their dogfight system that uses ships from that galaxy, far, far away with the space wizards…

But I digress…

I don't think the system lends itself well to capital ship combat (which Star Trek is known for) but is a fun game nonetheless. I own both universes version of the game; it works best for starfighters, not capital ships. However, I still play it…frequently. Although it's not scaled for Fleet sized combat, the game is fun and interesting enough that I think you can suspend the spec nerd in you long enough to "stab at thee from Hell's heart."

That's it for this month's Media Musings. Next month, Deep Space Nine!

If you have any suggestions for the Media Musings, please keep them to yourselves. I've got enough on my plate without you yahoos giving me more stuff to do…

However, if you feel you must contact me: email me at noah.masterson.opx@gmail.com or drop me a PM on Discord!

Until next month, GLORY TO YOUR HOUSE!!!