Who was the best ‘person from the 20th century frozen and come back to life on a Federation starship,’ Amelia Earhart, Khan or that country singer dude from the TOS episode where they also unfroze the asshole businessman that found out he was in a post-scarcity society?
I’d say the country singer dude. He was pretty chill.
It does raise a ton of questions, though. If 24th-century medical science can easily revive a person who’d been frozen with primitive 20th-century cryonics, why did they ever “give up” on people dying of things in sickbay? Stick them in the freezer and ship them to a better facility on a starbase. Have emergency freezers in shuttles or escape pods would also make sense.
I always thought of the Culture as the Federation, but super-hardcore. In the Culture, individuals can just upload their mind to a new, undamaged body if they’re sufficiently injured that repair isn’t an option. Even just popping the head off is enough to revive someone if they don’t have a backup and can catch it in time. If the repairs will take a while, they can drop into a simulated reality to do something else while they wait. Some individuals get tired of living and decide to just end it – no backup. Others get tired of living and have themselves warehoused until something interesting happens somewhere down the line.
But if they made Trek like that, I don’t think 80’s television audiences could have handled it. I’m not certain 21st century TV audiences are ready for that.
That’s nothing. It’s established that the transporter can keep you alive indefinitely in the pattern buffer, make an exact copy of you and turn you back into a child.
The transporter is a death machine. They established that in the episode with the two Rikers created by some interaction between the transporter and the field around the planet, leaving one stranded. Normally it kills you and creates a duplicate. You’re actually dead while your doppelganger takes your place.
Scotty jury-rigged it that way with him and another guy, and the other guy didn’t make it. Dr M’Benga also did it for his daughter, and he had to refresh the system periodically and make sure nothing else messed with it while she was in there.
It can work, but it’s unreliable and/or has heavy maintenance requirements.
It was also being used in the flashback episode where M’Benga and Chapel were medics on the front lines of the Klingon war, they were using an evacuation transporter to store critically wounded soldiers who couldn’t be patched up with the equipment they had on hand. Led to a difficult moral dilemma where they needed to clear the buffer to accept more incoming wounded in need of treatment.
The more routine it gets in the show, the harder it is to explain its absence.
Not enough people recognize the transporter is an immortality engine. Thank you for being this important point to light. It would actually solve the Lower Decks question if how do the officers come back to life instead of the black mountain and screaming koala.
This is almost canon thanks to Lower Decks where Lt. Shaxs died heroically in one episode and then a few episodes later was back at his post, with one lower-ranking crewman explaining it to the other with a simple “he’s bridge crew” and a shrug.
Every time I re-watch that episode all I wanna do is hang out with the country dude. Like, imagine a farmer from the 1820s who’s somehow still alive and all they wanna do is play guitar and sing folk songs. I’d be that person’s best damn friend.
I don’t even like country music much and I still would want to hang out with the guy. He just seemed like a cool guy to get to know. And the fact that he took waking up hundreds of years after he was born in stride just made him cooler. Imagine finding out you died, got frozen and ended up in the 24th century and were just like, “well, that’ll happen…”
I was holding out hope for the Delta quadrant.
Funny I just watched that episode not too long ago. I always liked it when Trek did weird little historical episodes like that.
This sounds more like the Boeing quadrant.
Who was the best ‘person from the 20th century frozen and come back to life on a Federation starship,’ Amelia Earhart, Khan or that country singer dude from the TOS episode where they also unfroze the asshole businessman that found out he was in a post-scarcity society?
I’d say the country singer dude. He was pretty chill.
There was Kahn and company on TOS, the '37s on Voyager, and geetarist, businessman with boneitis and random sad housewife on TNG.
It does raise a ton of questions, though. If 24th-century medical science can easily revive a person who’d been frozen with primitive 20th-century cryonics, why did they ever “give up” on people dying of things in sickbay? Stick them in the freezer and ship them to a better facility on a starbase. Have emergency freezers in shuttles or escape pods would also make sense.
I always thought of the Culture as the Federation, but super-hardcore. In the Culture, individuals can just upload their mind to a new, undamaged body if they’re sufficiently injured that repair isn’t an option. Even just popping the head off is enough to revive someone if they don’t have a backup and can catch it in time. If the repairs will take a while, they can drop into a simulated reality to do something else while they wait. Some individuals get tired of living and decide to just end it – no backup. Others get tired of living and have themselves warehoused until something interesting happens somewhere down the line.
But if they made Trek like that, I don’t think 80’s television audiences could have handled it. I’m not certain 21st century TV audiences are ready for that.
That’s nothing. It’s established that the transporter can keep you alive indefinitely in the pattern buffer, make an exact copy of you and turn you back into a child.
The transporter is a death machine. They established that in the episode with the two Rikers created by some interaction between the transporter and the field around the planet, leaving one stranded. Normally it kills you and creates a duplicate. You’re actually dead while your doppelganger takes your place.
It’s also established on Voyager that it’s severely time-limited and can’t be used for lengthy periods! Also, wormholes obey the laws of music.
Scotty did it for 75 years with more primitive equipment.
Poor Franklin!
Scotty jury-rigged it that way with him and another guy, and the other guy didn’t make it. Dr M’Benga also did it for his daughter, and he had to refresh the system periodically and make sure nothing else messed with it while she was in there.
It can work, but it’s unreliable and/or has heavy maintenance requirements.
It was also being used in the flashback episode where M’Benga and Chapel were medics on the front lines of the Klingon war, they were using an evacuation transporter to store critically wounded soldiers who couldn’t be patched up with the equipment they had on hand. Led to a difficult moral dilemma where they needed to clear the buffer to accept more incoming wounded in need of treatment.
The more routine it gets in the show, the harder it is to explain its absence.
Not enough people recognize the transporter is an immortality engine. Thank you for being this important point to light. It would actually solve the Lower Decks question if how do the officers come back to life instead of the black mountain and screaming koala.
Only the bridge crew gets immortality.
This is almost canon thanks to Lower Decks where Lt. Shaxs died heroically in one episode and then a few episodes later was back at his post, with one lower-ranking crewman explaining it to the other with a simple “he’s bridge crew” and a shrug.
That’s why I said it. :)
Don’t know about TOS, but TNG did country singer, asshole businessman, and woman. It was still the wacky seasons so it had that feel.
The costumes from that episode were straight out of the TOS leftovers closet, though. Probably the script, too.
Whoops. Meant TNG.
Every time I re-watch that episode all I wanna do is hang out with the country dude. Like, imagine a farmer from the 1820s who’s somehow still alive and all they wanna do is play guitar and sing folk songs. I’d be that person’s best damn friend.
I don’t even like country music much and I still would want to hang out with the guy. He just seemed like a cool guy to get to know. And the fact that he took waking up hundreds of years after he was born in stride just made him cooler. Imagine finding out you died, got frozen and ended up in the 24th century and were just like, “well, that’ll happen…”
The two guys signed up for it. The woman’s husband signed her up so she had no idea. Wake up and it’s suddenly 400 years later? Yeah I’d be wtf too.