STAR TREK SNAFUs (last updated 11/12/92) This posting is intended to cut down on the "often asked questions" that seem to pop up every few months in the rec.arts.startrek.misc newsgroup about messed up scenes. This FAQL is basically a list of SNAFUs that have been brought up and discussed to death in rec.arts.startrek.misc, and a lot of people would be happy if they never resurfaced. Please refer to the "LIST OF PERIODIC POSINGS TO r.a.s.* NEWSGROUPS" article for a full list of periodic post- ings, and to the "LIST OF ACRONYMS" article for acronyms used in this and other postings. =========================================================================== 1) TOS SNAFUs 2) MOVIES SNAFUs =========================================================================== 1) TOS SNAFUs: "The Apple": Near the end of the show, when the Big-E fails to break free of the tractor beam, Scotty falls against the captain's chair and one of the floorboards comes up off the floor. "Charlie X": Uhura started singing in the rec room. Kirk (wearing his gold captains shirt with a black collar) is with Charlie when he gets a message to come up to the bridge. Jim and Charlie get into the turbolift. When they arrive on the bridge, Jim is wearing his green open necked captain's shirt. "The Cloud Minders": When Kirk and Spock are first captured by the miners, Kirk says something like "What is the meaning of this attack", but his mouth doesn't move. "Court-Martial": Kirk says "Gentlemen, this computer has an auditory sensor. It can, in effect, hear sounds. By installing a booster we can increase that capability on the order of one to the fourth power" (which the writers seemed to think sounded more impressive than "one") :-) (and we just have to assume that the voices and other ship noises were masked out like the heartbeats were) "The Enemy Within": Bad-Kirk's scratch on his face switches sides. "The Lights of Zetar": Kirk has Romaine put into the pressure chamber and increases the pressure one atmosphere per second. At that rate, she'd have been crushed like a bug in under a minute. "Mudd's Women": When the women are first beamed up to the Enterprise, it flashes back and forth between the women and Scott, Spock, and McCoy. If you watch it carefully, you will see that they spliced in a scene of McCoy standing in sick bay smiling, and he is wearing a different uniform and has the medical scanner behind him. "Operation: Annihilate!": In a well-known ST blooper, the amoeba- creature accidentally hits Spock's rear end instead of his back. "Return of the Archons": When the landing party is hemmed in by Landru's legions at both ends of an alley, Kirk orders them to fire (on stun). McCoy's phaser appears not to fire at all. I suppose animation forgot to do the effect. "Shore Leave": The yeoman gets her uniform torn by Don Juan, and then changes into the 'princess' costume. When she changes back into her uniform again, it has miraculously been repaired. "Shore Leave": In the scene where the caretaker appears for the first time, you can see the shadow of a boom pass across the tree in the middle of the screen. "Space Seed": As Kirk is bashing in Khan's glass coffin, his phaser falls off his belt. McCoy keeps looking down at it, like he's wondering when they're going to yell 'cut' so they can re-shoot the scene. They never did re-shoot because they didn't want to invest in more glass. "The Squire of Gothos": Trelane sees Earth history 900 years late, but since he talks of Alexander Hamilton's death (1804) and of how he admires Napoleon (whose reign started in 1804). This would put the episode sometime just after 2704. This is more than four centuries too late. There were numerous episodes where people's uniforms changed without them leaving a room or turbolift ("Charlie X", "The Enemy Within", and "What Are Little Girls Made of" get mentioned a lot). --------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2) MOVIE SNAFUs: ST:TMP: You can see the cuiling of the stage they were shooting at in at least one of the scenes with the Enterprise (probably when Spock is outside with his jetpack). ST2:TWoK: When Khan comforts his fallen comrade (the guy with the blond hair) you can see that guy closed his eyes even though he is "dead". ST2:TWoK: When Kirk, McCoy, and Savik beam aboard Regula 1, Kirk orders phasers on stun. It appears that Kirk and Savik each have their respective phasers set correctly, as indicated by a single glowing light. McCoy, though, seems to have his set to kill, with all the lights blinking in sequence, through the cycle. I imagine this is the kill setting, as Capt. Terrell's phaser behaves similarly before he kills an unfortunate Genesis project scientist and finally himself. ST5:TFF: When Spock used his ski boots in the turbolift shaft, they went by several decks multiple times, most notable - deck 52 (52 cards in a deck). Also, the highest numbered deck is more than the number of decks the big e has. ST6:TUC: Sulu's coffee cup breaks, but is back on the table (unbroken) in the next scene. ST6:TUC: When the subspace wave starts shaking the Excelsior, Mr. Valtane (Science Officer) is next to Sulu's seat giving a report. When they show the science station, he's sitting down at station. When they go back to the whole bridge shot, you can see him moving from Sulu's seat to station. Looks like a scene got put in out of sequence, eh? :-) ST6:TUC: Uhura's name is spelled "Uhuru" in the closing credits. But then then NN's last name is often spelled incorectly by Paramount and Creation. ST6:TUC: The cloaked bird of prey is defeated by a gas-seeking torpedo - Lt Uhuru having suggested the use of "the equipment we're carrying to chart gaseous planetary anomolies". At the beginning of the film, it is the Excelsior which is carrying this equipment, not the Enterprise. In fact, the Enterprise is in space dock when Kirk et.al. first set off. This was explained by the producers as a mistake that wasn't caught until the movie was nearly released, and it was too late to fix it, so they just left it in, figuring that the nit-pickers could rationalize a way around the problem. ST6:TUC: When Kirk is recording the log entry that will be used against him in court, he says (re Klingons): "I can never forgive them for the death of my boy." Later, at the trial when it is played back it says "I have never been able to forgive them..." --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Again, if you know of any other topics that should be included in this list, feel free to email me at one of the addresses below. --Otto "HACK-MAN" Heuer _____ _________ _ _____ _____ _____ _____ | ___|| _______|| | Otto E. Heuer, CEO ||___|| |_ _| |_ _| ||___|| | |__ | |___ ___| | FSD, Inc. | o | | | | | | o | | __| |___ || _ | "The innovator for |__O__| |_| |_| |__O__| | | _______| || |_| | software solutions." C, Pascal, Fortran, BASIC |_||_________||_____| Assembly Language, Snobol, Ada, APL, Prolog, LISP Unix, MS-DOS, ProDOS . . . .... . . . . . . . Audio/Video ottoh@cfsmo.honeywell.com :..: .:.:. : :.' .. :`.': .:.:. :`. : Star Trek hackman@pnet51.orb.mn.org : : : : :... : `. : : : : : `: Apple IIgs