Which was more of a rape the dog moment?
The ending of Battlestar galactica, or the conversion of the Borg into a feudal monarchy?
Every time I see the Borg now, I can only think of the Borg discussing what's the proper fashion this season.
The Borg Queen, because it ruined something good. The new Battlestar Galactica was always shit.
Borg Queen. ruined one of the coolest scifi villians out there.
The movie she was in wasn't bad, but it really wacked the Borg, who were a frightening villain.
Agree with consensus.
Meh. Borg queen didn't kill the Borg, so much as bad writing did. Alice Krige had a good spin on the character. At the end of First Contact, the Borg would be back; the "queen" just fulfilled a function like the rest. Brannon and Braga should never have been allowed to touch writing for the Borg, though. From "Unimatrix Zero" on, they just shit on the Borg, until they were as laughable as the Kazon were in season one.
I only made it through season one of BSG, so I can't comment on the ending for that.
The Borg Queen was great. She's was totally tacky and unnecessary. :wub:
Besides, we've already gone over this. The only way to keep the Borg frightening would have been to never explain anything about them. The unveiling of the Borg Queen is very much like the unmasking of the Shadows in Babylon 5.
I liked the Borg as long as they were a force of nature kind of thing. The more demystified and throroughly detailed and "individualized" (esp. in Voyager) the less interesting/menacing they became. The queen was a move in the direction but a tolerable one.
Quote from: Syt on May 08, 2009, 11:24:24 PM
I liked the Borg as long as they were a force of nature kind of thing. The more demystified and throroughly detailed and "individualized" (esp. in Voyager) the less interesting/menacing they became. The queen was a move in the direction but a tolerable one.
You put that a hell of a lot better than I did.
Quote from: DontSayBanana on May 08, 2009, 10:31:34 PMBrannon and Braga should never have been allowed to touch writing for the Borg, though. From "Unimatrix Zero" on, they just shit on the Borg, until they were as laughable as the Kazon were in season one.
And? :huh:
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0103804/
Quite literally no moment I can recall in an entertainment product compares to the level of unadulterated suck that was the end of BSG for me. The Borg Queen is horrible, and destroyed one of the best villains on TNG, but there are two reasons it doesn't remotely compare to the end of BSG:
1) It doesn't retroactively make all of TNG suck.
2) It happened after the run of the show was complete, so it's particularly easy to ignore.
It had a very adverse effect on Voyager, but given how crappy Voyager was who would notice?
Can't answer. I normally stopped watching an episode of Voyager shortly after the first scene with 7 of 9.
Quote from: Delirium on May 09, 2009, 01:18:06 AM
Quote from: DontSayBanana on May 08, 2009, 10:31:34 PMBrannon and Braga should never have been allowed to touch writing for the Borg, though. From "Unimatrix Zero" on, they just shit on the Borg, until they were as laughable as the Kazon were in season one.
And? :huh:
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0103804/
:blush: Post proofreading epic fail. Busted. Should have read "Berman and Braga."
There was a lot of low-level controversy surrounding accusations that Berman and Braga took a little too much of a "hands-on role" (re: monopolized) in writing sessions for Voyager, to an effect not unlike George Lucas deciding to go it alone for the prequel Star Wars Trilogy. Look down that list and you'll see story credit for both Endgame and Unimatrix Zero.
Quote from: DisturbedPervert on May 09, 2009, 01:41:19 AM
Can't answer. I normally stopped watching an episode of Voyager shortly after the first scene with 7 of 9.
^_^
I always fanwanked that the whole Hugh deal had more of an effect on the Borg than anyone realized, and led to a partial collapse of Borg society to the point that their abstract gestalt consciousness had to be reified in the form of a single drone.
There's also a line in FC to the effect that the Queen was aboard the (destroyed) Best of Both Worlds cube, which suggests that she's less of an individual and more a manifestation of the collective consciousness.
:nerd: :nerd: :nerd: :nerd:
Anyway, the BSG finale was much worse, since it rendered everything after the first mention of the 'Final Five' nonsensical.
Quote from: Faeelin on May 08, 2009, 08:22:24 PM
Which was more of a rape the dog moment?
The ending of Battlestar galactica, or the conversion of the Borg into a feudal monarchy?
Every time I see the Borg now, I can only think of the Borg discussing what's the proper fashion this season.
How does the presence of the Borg Queen turn the Borg into a "feudal monarchy"? Unless you also believe ants and bees are a "feudal monarchy". :huh:
BSG all the way. First Contact was good.
They're not talking about First Contact, they're talking about later developments in Voyager.
What was so terrible about the end of BSG. I only saw first few episodes (and I thought it sucked big time). It was like Melrose Place vs the Space Robots.
7 of 9 is the best addition to the star trek universe evar! :w00t: she singlehandedly (in a fashion :perv: ) makes up for all the away team and phaser stun bullshit that threatens to turn every ep into campy suckh.
Quote from: Delirium on May 09, 2009, 02:09:44 AM
They're not talking about First Contact, they're talking about later developments in Voyager.
I'm talking about First Contact.
Your problem is watching the newer version of old shows.
Stick with TOS and the old Galactica, warts and all.
Quote from: Ed Anger on May 09, 2009, 08:25:36 AM
Stick with TOS and the old Galactica, warts and all.
And then one will want to scoop one's eyes out.
Quote from: Ed Anger on May 09, 2009, 08:25:36 AM
Your problem is watching the newer version of old shows.
Stick with TOS and the old Galactica, warts and all.
TNG and TOS are two different beasts, so there's simply no contradiction between the two.
Old BSG and new BSG, as it turns out, are both complete dreck.
How did BSG end?
In fire. :vorlon:
Quote from: Grey Fox on May 09, 2009, 02:25:48 PM
How did BSG end?
*spoiler*
Most died of horrible diseases after landing on earth, the surviving females were traded to the natives for food, and Hera was gang raped by a pack of semi intelligent non speaking apes, that eventually evolved in to us.
Nicely summarized DP.
Quote from: Delirium on May 09, 2009, 02:09:44 AM
They're not talking about First Contact, they're talking about later developments in Voyager.
The thread title is "The Borg Queen v. The Battlestar Ending", so the events in
First Contact should certainly be part of the discussion.
Quote from: dps on May 09, 2009, 06:28:17 PM
The thread title is "The Borg Queen v. The Battlestar Ending", so the events in First Contact should certainly be part of the discussion.
What some of us are trying to point out is that the "queen" in First Contact was somewhat of a misnomer, and should really be disentangled from the shitty "queen" that plagued later seasons of Voyager.
I have never watched the Star Trek TV shows.
Quote from: DontSayBanana on May 09, 2009, 11:36:28 PM
Quote from: dps on May 09, 2009, 06:28:17 PM
The thread title is "The Borg Queen v. The Battlestar Ending", so the events in First Contact should certainly be part of the discussion.
What some of us are trying to point out is that the "queen" in First Contact was somewhat of a misnomer, and should really be disentangled from the shitty "queen" that plagued later seasons of Voyager.
But aren't both equally shitty?
Quote from: Neil on May 10, 2009, 09:23:52 AM
But aren't both equally shitty?
Believe it or not, a lot of us
liked First Contact, Neil. ;)
Quote from: DontSayBanana on May 10, 2009, 09:27:32 AM
Quote from: Neil on May 10, 2009, 09:23:52 AM
But aren't both equally shitty?
Believe it or not, a lot of us liked First Contact, Neil. ;)
It's possible to like first contact but still feel that the concept of a Borg queen is retarded.
Quote from: Neil on May 10, 2009, 09:36:26 AM
It's possible to like first contact but still feel that the concept of a Borg queen is retarded.
Every ship needs a helmsman. My point is that the "queen" in First Contact just fulfilled that purpose. There was some room for individuality in the Borg, or else they would have sucked the second time we saw them, when Picard was given a Borg name. I, Borg was unnecessarily cute, but Hugh didn't destroy the Borg as an enemy, either.
Nerd moment: Aspiration to perfection is an intellectual pursuit. Logically, perfection would be superiority. Until Voyager crapped on us with Species 8472, the Borg were as indomitable a force as the Q Continuum, and they technically don't exist in the normal Trek universe. Drones fulfill functions, so I always assumed the "queen's" function was to house the drive that motivated the Borg.
The First Contact queen actually creeped me out once I thought about what lengths the Borg would go to in order to use the will of their drones as just another tool; I didn't see it as feudal at all. The feudal component didn't come into play until the Voyager episode Scorpion. Dark Frontier is the episode that established the Borg Queen as a feudal monarch and made the crap from Scorpion worse than just a one-shot screwup.
Quote from: HVC on May 08, 2009, 09:21:31 PM
Borg Queen. ruined one of the coolest scifi villians out there.
:yes:
First Contact was overall a good movie, but they sacrificed the Borg to make it so, which is an unacceptable sacrifice.
Quote from: DontSayBanana on May 10, 2009, 10:40:34 AM
Every ship needs a helmsman. My point is that the "queen" in First Contact just fulfilled that purpose. There was some room for individuality in the Borg, or else they would have sucked the second time we saw them, when Picard was given a Borg name. I, Borg was unnecessarily cute, but Hugh didn't destroy the Borg as an enemy, either.
The Borg are the helmsman. That's the whole point of the collective.
Picard as a named Borg did suck, but it was a small thing that was easily overlooked. Still, by overlooking it, we allowed them to ruin the Borg, as Locutus was the beginning of a path that led to the Borg Queen.
QuoteNerd moment: Aspiration to perfection is an intellectual pursuit. Logically, perfection would be superiority. Until Voyager crapped on us with Species 8472, the Borg were as indomitable a force as the Q Continuum, and they technically don't exist in the normal Trek universe. Drones fulfill functions, so I always assumed the "queen's" function was to house the drive that motivated the Borg.
That's exactly the kind of short-sighted biological thinking that the Star Trek writers had when they ruined the Borg. The thing that was cool about the Borg is that they had no leadership caste, no individuals. Their drive was supplied by all of them.
Just rewatched Best of Both Worlds. :thumbsup:
The whole point of the Borg was that there was no ego or personality. Just a chorus of dead eyed drones working in unison for goals that were foggy at best. Kind of like the Post Office
Quote from: DontSayBanana on May 10, 2009, 10:40:34 AM
...Drones fulfill functions, so I always assumed the "queen's" function was to house the drive that motivated the Borg.
The First Contact queen actually creeped me out once I thought about what lengths the Borg would go to in order to use the will of their drones as just another tool...
The Borg were much scarier when their "drive" was a collective one, without a queen whose death would remove their "drive." Drones are scarier when they throw themselves into certain death than when they are thrown by some superiors who are the "real " Borg.
The Borg were always sort of the undead of Star Trek.
Pre-First Contact they were more like Zombies, a homogenous horde devouring what stands in their way, turning you into one of them on their way, driven only by the goal to assimilate all there is.
Post-First Contact they were turned into more like space vampires - hierarchically organized individuals that had a past, no matter how buried, that could be saved and reasoned with. Assimilation was still a major goal, but politics played an increasing role.
Quote from: Syt on May 11, 2009, 07:24:16 AM
The Borg were always sort of the undead of Star Trek.
Pre-First Contact they were more like Zombies, a homogenous horde devouring what stands in their way, turning you into one of them on their way, driven only by the goal to assimilate all there is.
Post-First Contact they were turned into more like space vampires - hierarchically organized individuals that had a past, no matter how buried, that could be saved and reasoned with. Assimilation was still a major goal, but politics played an increasing role.
An excellent analogy, methinks.
Yeah I have to agree. While the Borg with a queen are still a formidable and interesting opponent, the original Borg is much more alien and thus scary. If there never was the original Borg, I think most people wouldn't see the queen as a bad thing - but then the Borg would probably be much less memorable.
In a world of Star Trek, where being an "alien" simply meant you are like a human with some skin disease, the original Borg were a refreshing change by being truly "alien". The queen made them like any other Star Trek universe race.
Quote from: Syt on May 11, 2009, 07:24:16 AM
The Borg were always sort of the undead of Star Trek.
Pre-First Contact they were more like Zombies, a homogenous horde devouring what stands in their way, turning you into one of them on their way, driven only by the goal to assimilate all there is.
Post-First Contact they were turned into more like space vampires - hierarchically organized individuals that had a past, no matter how buried, that could be saved and reasoned with. Assimilation was still a major goal, but politics played an increasing role.
Very good.
I'd agree with yes, the borg went to hell, they were reduced from big scary villains to run of the mill baddies. But then this is quite normal development in TV. The Go'Auld in SG1 started as big scary, invincible villains who could wipe out earth at any moment and then were reduced to a joke over time.
The borg queen though was not at all to blame for the borg's weakening. This was more than done in TNG with all its silly plot developments around the borg. The Borg queen came as part of a reinvention of the borg which once more restored their coolness (until voyager started running rings around them every episode of course)
Janeway :wub: