I have mixed opinions on the three movies, but the best thing about them is that they have for the moment purged the Star Trek universe of technobabble. At least the resolution to none of the movies was "re-calibrating the deflector dish the release phased protons that will disable Nero's ship once they're absorbed by the ship and enter their warp engines".
shareOh, yeah, it's so great the way Abrams dumbed everything down, and ditch anything resembling an attempt at internal logic or rational thought....
There has certainly never been a piece of technobabble, or comparable fictional device in Star Trek that has inspired any kind of interest in science by any viewer, nor the development of real world technologies derived from elements of those concepts.
"I'm in it for the power and the free robes." - Harry Stone
Oh, yeah, it's so great the way Abrams dumbed everything down
funny i think that's what's wrong with these movies. The effects and acting are all good, but the storyline is so fking stupid i just can't enjoy it.
it may not have 'technobabble' solutions, but it does have 'science fartion' (sounds 'sciencey' but is *beep*
"He's dusted, busted and disgusted, but he's ok"
You got that I was being sarcastic, yeah?
"I'm in it for the power and the free robes." - Harry Stone
The best thing about Jar Jar Abrams universe is how he's managed to turn Star Trek into something like Transformers. Why bother with well thought out, intelligent sci-fi, which contextualizes and explores relevant issues by weaving them throughout the narrative. We can just stare at fast moving shinny objects and watch crap blow up, while we eat some popcorn.
The second best thing is that there's only 6 hours of it. With each movie costing more and making less, hopefully they won't make many more.
No Sitcoms! No Sports! No Reality!
In response to both the people here defending technobabble, there was nothing "intelligent" about technobabble. It was called babble because it was incoherent and was pretty much there to trick the majority of the audience that didn't know anything about science/technology into thinking something important was happening. The writers themselves even admitted that it became a crutch and they just used it as a cheap way to resolve stories. On the original teleplays they would just write *technobabble* in the midst of lines of dialogue, because what was being said had no real significance. If you get Geordi rambling on about dilithium crystals confused for real hard sci-fi you are badly mistaken.
TOS was pretty much technobabble free as well. TNG had it and gets a lot of flak for it, but it wasn't nearly as bad there as on the later shows, particularly Voyager and the early episodes of Enterprise, where entire episodes would be resolved through people talking nonsense about fake science.
Technobabble isn't the part of Star Trek that has inspired real scientists. The broader technological concepts that Star Trek introduced did, but not the made-up minutia that has no basis on anything real. A little bit of that is fine if it's necessary to tell a story, but you shouldn't be building entire episodes/movies around it, as got to be the case later in the Berman/Braga era.
Here is what Ronald D. Moore had to say about technobabble in Star Trek-
"How many space anomalies of the week can you really stomach? How many time paradoxes can you do? When I was studying the show, getting ready to work on it, I was watching the episodes, and the technobabble was just enervating; it was just soul sapping. Vast chunks of scenes would go by, and I had no idea what was going on. I write this stuff; I live this stuff. I do know the difference between the shields and the deflectors, and the ODN conduits and plasma tubes. If I can’t tell what’s going on, I know the audience has no idea what’s going on. Everyone will say the same thing. From the top down, you bring up this point, and everybody will say, ‘I am the biggest opponent of techno-babble. I hate technobabble. I am the one who is always saying, less technobabble.’ They all say that. None of them do it. I’ve always felt that you never impress the audience. The audience doesn’t sit there and go, ‘God damn, they know science. That is really cool. Look how they figured that out. Hey Edna! Come here. You want to see how Chakotay is going to figure this out. He’s onto this thing with the quantum tech particles; it’s really interesting. I don’t know how he is going to do it, but he is going to reroute something. Oh my God, he found the anti-protons!’ Who cares? Nobody watches STAR TREK for those scenes. The actors hate those scenes; the directors hate those scenes; and the writers hate those scenes. But it’s the easiest card to go to. It’s a lot easier to tech your way out of a situation than to really think your way out of a situation, or make it dramatic, or make the characters go through some kind of decision or crisis. It’s a lot easier if you can just plant one of them at a console and start banging on the thing, and flash some Okudagrams, and then come up with the magic solution that is going to make all this week’s problems go away."
While I did not specifically defend technobabble I do think it has it's place and is a part of Star Trek. Every term for some science or device that does not exist is technobabble. I rarely felt overburdened or annoyed by the tech speak. They all had technobabble. Having been alive long enough to see each show air, I've seen the quality of that babble increase as we began to get a better grip on what and how much we did not know. Having a better grasp on technology gave a better direction on where things might end up. Each series increase the foundation on which to build that technobabble just like creating a language.
Ronald Moore is full of crap. He was one of the major players in DS9 which was full of technobabbling. Just as much as Voyager had. Then to make matters worse he filled it with spiritual and religious mumbo-jumbo. That's something I could use a whole lot less of. Not to say I didn't like DS9, I did. I liked them all and could argue why any of the series were the best of Star Trek.
In the end Mr. Moore's opinions are no more relevant than mine or a 14 year old kid watching for the first time. Having worked on the show sort of encapsulates a person and generally makes their opinions less not more important.
No Sitcoms! No Sports! No Reality!
Oh, yeah, it's so great the way Abrams dumbed everything down, and ditch anything resembling an attempt at internal logic or rational thought....
There has certainly never been a piece of technobabble, or comparable fictional device in Star Trek that has inspired any kind of interest in science by any viewer, nor the development of real world technologies derived from elements of those concepts
Nice one, stargazer.
If you see exactly what to do don't tell ME! I'm just a singer in a rock&roll band!
In the end Mr. Moore's opinions are no more relevant than mine or a 14 year old kid watching for the first time. Having worked on the show sort of encapsulates a person and generally makes their opinions less not more important.
If you see exactly what to do don't tell ME! I'm just a singer in a rock&roll band!