Speaking of transporter chiefs, I was rewatching the TNG episode The Wounded and in it we see Transporter Chief O'Brien's former captain, Captain Maxwell, and Maxwell says that O'Brien was his tactical officer on the Rutledge. The best he ever had. So O'Brien had a job equivalent to Worf's as tactical officer and then he goes from a role of importance to being the dummy that spends 8 hours a day standing in a tiny room with no windows doing almost nothing unless someone is getting beamed over and he is not even given a chair to sit in. It isn't even the only transporter bay on the Enterprise. What a sucky job for someone so talented. We then see in DS9 he is chief engineer of the whole station and that his engineering skills are second to none. But we never saw him helping Lt. Commander LaForge in engineering even when the whole ship was severely damaged and time was critical. The Enterprise clearly did not utilize the chief well at all which likely is the blame of Riker as he assigns duty shifts. So the question is, why did Riker hate Chief O'Brien? Did Riker secretely love Keiko and was mad that she ended up with O'Brien? Did O'Brien once sit in Riker's chair or hit on Troi before he was with Keiko? Can O'Brien secretely play the trombone song Night Bird perfectly which just rubs Riker the wrong way?
Now that you mention it, the chief’s career path IS kinda bonkers. For that matter, how do you go from transporter chief to the equivalent of Chief Engineer on an entire space station? And wasn’t he initially a helmsman on the Enterprise? So many questions.
Speaking of transporter chiefs, I was rewatching the TNG episode The Wounded and in it we see Transporter Chief O'Brien's former captain, Captain Maxwell, and Maxwell says that O'Brien was his tactical officer on the Rutledge. The best he ever had. So O'Brien had a job equivalent to Worf's as tactical officer and then he goes from a role of importance to being the dummy that spends 8 hours a day standing in a tiny room with no windows doing almost nothing unless someone is getting beamed over and he is not even give a chair to sit in. It isn't even the only transporter bay on the Enterprise. What a sucky job for someone so talented. We then see in DS9 he is chief engineer of the whole station and that his engineering skills are second to none. But we never saw him helping Lt. Commander LaForge in engineering even when the whole ship was severely damaged and time was critical. The Enterprise clearly did not utilize the chief well at all which likely is the blame of Riker as he assigns duty shifts. So the question is, why did Riker hate Chief O'Brien? Did Riker secretely love Keiko and was mad that she ended up with O'Brien? Did O'Brien once sit in Riker's chair or hit on Troi before he was with Keiko? Can O'Brien secretely play the trombone song Night Bird perfectly which just rubs Riker the wrong way?
If you like this line of thinking, you will love this online comic about Chief O'Brien: https://chiefobrienatwork.com/
It explores all the issues you mentioned, and more.
I don’t ever remember Rand being hideous. This must be from a movie. Never got into the movies
TMP, To be honest it's a difficult watch for me even as a lifelong ST fan. But you need to see it at least once.
I’ve tried the original movies and TNG movies. They just are very sub par Star Trek to me. I can’t watch one all the way through
Not even ST:IV???
Death to the blasphemer!
The one with the whales? That was god awful!!
Are you kidding? That movie was a blast!
I will identify myself as a dweeb forever, but I *still* quote that movie:
“Well, double-dumba$& to you!”
[When someone does something dumb]: “I think he took a little too much LDS in the 70s.”
[Whenever someone mentions Alameda]: “Alameda? Where they keep the nuclear
wessels?”
[Whenever someone proposes doing something the hard way] “What is this? The dark ages?”
And I will also occasionally talk to my computer with a Scottish accent: “Hello, computer!”
There’s more, but I won’t go through them all...Needless to say, I’m a riot at parties...😆
I will say I can see why you would hate ST:IV if you wanted a pure, serious, sci-fi Star Trek. But I happen to like my Sci-fi with a healthy dose of humor. The overarching whale story was a bit stupid, but all the little moments were awesome. The movie never took itself too seriously, so we didn’t have to take it too seriously, and could just enjoy it for what it was: a great comedic romp.
I mean, just watch the extended shot of William Shatner’s facial expressions when he sees Spock has jumped into the whale tank. It’s hilarious.
Now that you mention it, the chief’s career path IS kinda bonkers. For that matter, how do you go from transporter chief to the equivalent of Chief Engineer on an entire space station? And wasn’t he initially a helmsman on the Enterprise? So many questions.
The root of the problem is that he is one of only a handful of non-commissioned officers we ever see in all of Trek and the only one who ends up being a main character. We just don’t have a good handle on how enlisted ranks are handled in Starfleet. It could be that enlisted crew have a shortened time at the Academy with a narrower focus of their studies, that they have limited terms of service (four years, for example) that they are not obligated to renew (though Starfleet’s allowances for retirement/sabbaticals seem quite generous anyway given what happened with McCoy, Spock, and Sisko), and/or that they are simply regular officers who intend to never go onto any sort of command track.
Arguments could be made that his singular talents with transporter tech meant that he got slotted into the transporter chief role (perhaps in combination with a lack of billets elsewhere in engineering) or that he only temporarily took over as the backup flight controller during Encounter at Farpoint because they were short-staffed, that he was always the transporter chief and was moved to the bridge due to his (field?) promotion to tactical officer on the Rutledge.
And when it came to being declared the Chief Engineer of DS9, they probably looked at his whole body of work and felt that even as an NCO that he would be the best person for the job, over engineering officers with less jury-rigging talent or exposure to Cardassian systems.
Speaking of transporter chiefs, I was rewatching the TNG episode The Wounded and in it we see Transporter Chief O'Brien's former captain, Captain Maxwell, and Maxwell says that O'Brien was his tactical officer on the Rutledge. The best he ever had. So O'Brien had a job equivalent to Worf's as tactical officer and then he goes from a role of importance to being the dummy that spends 8 hours a day standing in a tiny room with no windows doing almost nothing unless someone is getting beamed over and he is not even give a chair to sit in. It isn't even the only transporter bay on the Enterprise. What a sucky job for someone so talented. We then see in DS9 he is chief engineer of the whole station and that his engineering skills are second to none. But we never saw him helping Lt. Commander LaForge in engineering even when the whole ship was severely damaged and time was critical. The Enterprise clearly did not utilize the chief well at all which likely is the blame of Riker as he assigns duty shifts. So the question is, why did Riker hate Chief O'Brien? Did Riker secretely love Keiko and was mad that she ended up with O'Brien? Did O'Brien once sit in Riker's chair or hit on Troi before he was with Keiko? Can O'Brien secretely play the trombone song Night Bird perfectly which just rubs Riker the wrong way?
If you like this line of thinking, you will love this online comic about Chief O'Brien: https://chiefobrienatwork.com/
It explores all the issues you mentioned, and more.
Haha, that is very good and funny. Thx for the suggestion.
I don’t ever remember Rand being hideous. This must be from a movie. Never got into the movies
TMP, To be honest it's a difficult watch for me even as a lifelong ST fan. But you need to see it at least once.
I’ve tried the original movies and TNG movies. They just are very sub par Star Trek to me. I can’t watch one all the way through
Funny how different tastes can be. I'd say that the original cast TOS movies are probably my favorite Star Trek thing (tied with TOS and DS9), meanwhile Enterprise has always been my least favorite series.
I don’t ever remember Rand being hideous. This must be from a movie. Never got into the movies
TMP, To be honest it's a difficult watch for me even as a lifelong ST fan. But you need to see it at least once.
I’ve tried the original movies and TNG movies. They just are very sub par Star Trek to me. I can’t watch one all the way through
Funny how different tastes can be. I'd say that the original cast TOS movies are probably my favorite Star Trek thing (tied with TOS and DS9), meanwhile Enterprise has always been my least favorite series.
Funny too that we do seem to have totally opposite tastes yet we both agree that overall Star Trek is awesome!!
robownage
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Comments
It wasn't her fault. There was nothing she could do.
If you like this line of thinking, you will love this online comic about Chief O'Brien:
https://chiefobrienatwork.com/
It explores all the issues you mentioned, and more.
TMP, To be honest it's a difficult watch for me even as a lifelong ST fan. But you need to see it at least once.
I’ve tried the original movies and TNG movies. They just are very sub par Star Trek to me. I can’t watch one all the way through
Not even ST:IV???
Death to the blasphemer!
The one with the whales? That was god awful!!
Are you kidding? That movie was a blast!
I will identify myself as a dweeb forever, but I *still* quote that movie:
“Well, double-dumba$& to you!”
[When someone does something dumb]: “I think he took a little too much LDS in the 70s.”
[Whenever someone mentions Alameda]: “Alameda? Where they keep the nuclear
wessels?”
[Whenever someone proposes doing something the hard way] “What is this? The dark ages?”
And I will also occasionally talk to my computer with a Scottish accent: “Hello, computer!”
There’s more, but I won’t go through them all...Needless to say, I’m a riot at parties...😆
I will say I can see why you would hate ST:IV if you wanted a pure, serious, sci-fi Star Trek. But I happen to like my Sci-fi with a healthy dose of humor. The overarching whale story was a bit stupid, but all the little moments were awesome. The movie never took itself too seriously, so we didn’t have to take it too seriously, and could just enjoy it for what it was: a great comedic romp.
I mean, just watch the extended shot of William Shatner’s facial expressions when he sees Spock has jumped into the whale tank. It’s hilarious.
I will fight you and anyone who "awesomes" your post.
What's next? Are you going to insufficiently praise STII?!?!?!
Not at all. They were all bad
The root of the problem is that he is one of only a handful of non-commissioned officers we ever see in all of Trek and the only one who ends up being a main character. We just don’t have a good handle on how enlisted ranks are handled in Starfleet. It could be that enlisted crew have a shortened time at the Academy with a narrower focus of their studies, that they have limited terms of service (four years, for example) that they are not obligated to renew (though Starfleet’s allowances for retirement/sabbaticals seem quite generous anyway given what happened with McCoy, Spock, and Sisko), and/or that they are simply regular officers who intend to never go onto any sort of command track.
Arguments could be made that his singular talents with transporter tech meant that he got slotted into the transporter chief role (perhaps in combination with a lack of billets elsewhere in engineering) or that he only temporarily took over as the backup flight controller during Encounter at Farpoint because they were short-staffed, that he was always the transporter chief and was moved to the bridge due to his (field?) promotion to tactical officer on the Rutledge.
And when it came to being declared the Chief Engineer of DS9, they probably looked at his whole body of work and felt that even as an NCO that he would be the best person for the job, over engineering officers with less jury-rigging talent or exposure to Cardassian systems.
maybe you're saving Badmiral Kirk and Jury Rigger Spock and Real Ilia for a TMP 40th anniversary Mega in December??
Mirror Randy
Shouldn’t her profile quote be “Pull Them Back” instead of “Yank Them Back”?
Haha, that is very good and funny. Thx for the suggestion.
Funny how different tastes can be. I'd say that the original cast TOS movies are probably my favorite Star Trek thing (tied with TOS and DS9), meanwhile Enterprise has always been my least favorite series.
Funny too that we do seem to have totally opposite tastes yet we both agree that overall Star Trek is awesome!!