Joseph Nebus wrote:
> Yes, I'm running late, but I have a good reason: I didn't get
> around to writing or posting this sooner. All right, that's not any
> kind of reason.
>
>
> By Any Other Name
> The Plot:
> - A band of hostile aliens from the Andromeda galaxy uses a
> distress signal to lure the Enterprise into a trap. (Tivo).
>
> If I'm not mistaken, this is the first time the Federation faces
> invasion from creatures sufficiently technologically advanced that they
> could take over the Federation as swiftly as the United States could
> take over a Persian Gulf dictatorship. While they've faced
> nigh-omnipotent beings before they haven't had ones that particularly
> cared about the Federation or whether they had anything to do with them.
>
> That's something the Original Trek did erratically, and Modern
> Trek did less reliably -- admitting that there are just going to be
> other polities with technology far in advance of Our Heroes and that
> this is just part of what makes life in space so exciting. Usually by
> the time of The Next Generation these vastly more advanced aliens would
> just be relics and archeological digs.
In general, popular science fiction has trouble imagining how vastly
advanced aliens would regard humans, or the human-dominated UFP.
The vast majority of such SF stories make the advanced aliens into a
threat: They want to exterminate us. They want our gold. They want
our planet. They want our water. They want our women. Etc.
Then a smaller class of stories concerns indifference. They don't care
about us at all, we'll just leave each other alone: The Organians. The
Metrons.
Then there's curiosity: They just want to learn about us. "Q," in TNG,
for example.
One of the things I liked about "2001: A Space Odyssey" was that those
aliens had motives and plans that didn't fit any of the above standard
categories. Motives so alien we might not even comprehend them at all.
Such stories are rare in popular SF. And the sequels to "2001" took
away some of that magic.
--
Steven L.
Email: sdlitvin@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
the NOSPAM before replying to me.
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