Talk:The City on the Edge of Forever

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Star Trek Portal
This article is part of WikiProject Star Trek, an attempt to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to all Star Trek-related topics on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, you can edit the article attached to this page, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and/or contribute to the discussion.
??? This article has not yet received a rating on the quality scale.
??? This article has not yet received a rating on the importance scale.

Contents

[edit] Guardian of Forever in Star Trek: New Voyages

It makes a prominent appearance in the fan-film along with the Planet Killer. It should be mentioned.DrWho42 05:06, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Also makes a cameo in the "Fallout" adventure game, as a random encounter, if I recall correctly. - 219.165.164.126 04:44, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Jumping to conclusions

This episode is notable in that it doesn't have a humorous ending, like most others. If I recall correctly. (That's a big if, by the way.) As I remember it, Kirk says, "Let's get the Hell out of here." That's the last line. Seems like this should be included in the article.

Well, if you read the page you'd see at the bottom that very line is quoted. Cyberia23 21:57, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

Okay. You're right; I didn't see that. I'm just getting my feet wet with this site and it's ways. I'm sure I'll make a few newbie style mistakes here and there. Sorry.

Along with not signing your posts. Odd, I didn't think that making assumptions about material before reading it was particularly a "newbie-style mistake". ;) Actually, most of the first and second season episodes had fairly serious endings. The campy humor wrapups were a plague of the Fred Freiberger-produced third season. Canonblack 23:39, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Verification of Ellison's original and one of the show credits

Can we get a source for the "Trivia" bullet point about the differences between Ellison's original and Fontana's shooting script? As described, Ellison's original sounds sadistic and not at all Star Trek material (they stalked Edith in the criminal sense, the Guardians' punishment for one murder seems excessively cruel, the idea that a Starfleet officer would sideline as a drug dealer — or drug addict, as the Memory Alpha article has it — goes against the depiction of the Federation as a practical utopia), and I have a hard time believing that that was the version that won the WGA. Also, the Memory Alpha article has stuntman Cary Loftin and not Eddie Paskey driving the truck. This is confirmed by the IMDB entry for the episode, in which Paskey is given credit for the role of "Lt. Leslie". Neither was apparently credited in the actual show credits. Canonblack 23:59, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

I don't remember all those details, but the 'Jewels of Sound' drug thing was in Ellison's script. The "not at all Star Trek" of it is why it had to be substantially rewritten.
—wwoods 00:20, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
Yes, but what's your source? We need some kind of verification. It doesn't sound likely that a "name" writer would be hired to work for the show and then have his work completely rewritten. Canonblack 00:27, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
That's the nature of television--"name" writers are rewritten all the time--Chris Carter rewrote Stephen King's script for "The X Files." As for the veracity of the trivia points... I can verify them (hell, I wrote, rewrote, or edited some of them). I own a copy of Ellison's script, as well as a copy of D. C. Fontana's "Shooting Script." Ellison's version did indeed win the WGA award for best dramatic script, one hour, continuing series. It's grittier and more likely the type of script that other writers admire and give awards to than the aired version. Also, I would imagine that writers like to give awards to original work, not work rewritten by producers. Sir Rhosis 05:35, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
Also, the trivia doesn't say anything about "stalking Edith in a criminal sense," it just says they spy on her. They do indeed spy on her, learn where she lives, watch her movements, in Ellison's script, simply to learn more about her, to perhaps gain a clue about what she will do to set time wrong, or even if she is indeed the focal points the Guardians mentioned. Sir Rhosis 05:38, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
Sorry for the tripe posting, but one final thing that may help others appreciate the differences between Ellison's original and Fontana's final shooting script. I write reviews of TOS scripts, and a review of both versions of the "City" script can be found at this site:
http://www.fastcopyinc.com/orionpress/articles/unseen.htm
Anyone may click on my hperlinked real name there and email me questions so as not to clutter up this talk page. Sir Rhosis 05:51, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Problems with this article

Kirk informs Scotty that if they do not return, the landing party will have to jump through the portal to an era of their choosing to survive.

That's not wholly incorrect, and what I'm about to write is a bit speculative but it appears to be valid given the context. Kirk says, "Scotty, when you think you've waited long enough.... Each of you will have to try it. Even if you fail, you'll be alive in some past world somewhere." Kirk is apparently telling Scotty, Uhura, and the two security men that if Kirk and Spock fail to complete the mission, they should try to do so -- to go back in time and fix whatever McCoy screwed up. "Even if [they] fail" to stop McCoy, "at least [they'll] be alive."

Meanwhile Edith nurses McCoy, who is slowly coming to his senses but still thinks everything is an illusionary side effect of the cordrazine overdose. He tells her who he is and where he is from.

He says, "I am Leonard McCoy, senior medical officer aboard the U.S.S. Enterprise." He doesn't explicitly tell her he's from the future, which the article sort of implies.

Kirk takes a step or two in her direction instinctively, and freezes when Spock says, "Jim, NO!"

Spock calls out, "No, Jim!"

[edit] Temporal Inconsistency

[edit] Bum dying

While this episode wraps up pretty well elsewhere, there is a bit of a problem in that McCoy's phaser has disintegrated a random person in 1930's New York. Logically, this will change the future (however slightly), and 200 years later, somebody important may suddenly be missing a part of their family tree (for all we know, he's Kirk's great-great-grandfather).129.237.90.24 05:16, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

  • The concept of backwards time travel is scientifically bogus, so looking for inconsistencies in episodes and films that use that as a theme is redundant. Also, the guy who disintegrated himself might well have died 5 minutes later anyway, from the effects of whatever hootch he was drinking. Wahkeenah 12:35, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
First of all, backwards time-travel is not necessarily impossible. Proving a negative is "scientifically bogus", so your statement is also scientifically bogus. Backward time travel is currently theorized, at the quantum level. But quantum teleportation was limited to a single atom a few years ago, now it has been done on an object a few hundred thousand atoms in size.
Also, even if the bum died five minutes later, it may have become a significant five minutes. Or he may live another thirty years and have nothing of significant effect happen. But the three (Bones, Kirk and Spock) may have interacted with someone else that could have become significant. That the Guardian stated that "all is at it was" (or significantly similar) means that the other changes made were not significant. There is a theory of time that it is like a river and its course can only be changed at certain critical points. Edith was critical, but the other people they interacted with weren't (or weren't pushed enough). But since it is fiction, the better explanation is that this is how the writers wanted it to happen. (We probably agree on this paragraph.) Val42 04:04, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
Stephen Hawking has explained why backwards time travel doesn't make sense. Time is a vector. Obviously, anything can be theorized. But backwards time travel, at least for organic beings, is inherently illogical. It creates the potential for paradoxes that require even more and wilder theories to cover... just like they had to invent spheres-within-spheres to explain the retrograde motion of the planets in a "geocentric universe". As one of my old math professors once said, "If you start with invalid assumptions, you are liable to get interesting results." They are missing the most obvious temporal paradox, which is that if there is no Enterprise up in the sky, then there is no way for Kirk and Spock to be there, either. Time travel stories are entertaining, for sure, but are about as logical as Superman's capability of flight. Wahkeenah 04:20, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
I like time travel stories; they're like intellectual candy. I'm not saying that backwards time travel is possible, but I'm also not dismissing it outright.
Tell me, if we had an example of a human with flight powers like Superman, but without further complicating it with his other powers. Would science say that said person, who all could observe, didn't exist because they couldn't explain how he flies? Val42 04:37, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

The "fan speculation" is reversed from what I remember, an article in one of the Star Trek fan essays books (one which came out after Star Trek IV). The idea was that the bum's son, distraught about the disappearance of his father, eventually causes the death of Roddenberry, then a young LAPD officer; thus, the bum's death constitutes the separation point between our universe, where Star Trek is a TV show, and the one where Trek actually happens. (The article envisions some interesting scenes, such as Kirk and company time-traveling to 1986 San Francisco as in Star Trek IV, only to be immediately recognized by hordes of Star Trek fans.) I will try to locate the particular book sometime to verify my memory, and update the page to match (unless someone else beats me to it). John Darrow 05:14, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Okay, found it, it's an article entitled "The Disappearing Bum -- A Fun Look at Time Travels in Star Trek" by Jeff Mason, published in The Best of Trek 16: From the Magazine for Star Trek Fans (1991) and again in The Best of The Best of Trek II (1992). John Darrow 08:07, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

I just watch it because it's a TV show and I leave it at that :P Cyberia23 05:26, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Thinking about time travel from the human perspective is fairly silly. From a physics point of view, paradox occurs the moment a single thing in history is changed, from the smallest particle on up. At the end of the day, either the Universe will put up with that sort of nonsense, or it won't. Humans don't really work much into it.  :) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.148.147.15 (talk) 03:00, August 30, 2007 (UTC)

[edit] McCoy's phaser

In the article, it states somthing like McCoy was disarmed so he didn't have a phaser. But I remember that when he jumped the redshirts on the planet, he grabbed a phaser from one of them. Would someone who has the episode go and check to see which way it is. Val42 04:04, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

  • I don't have the episode, and haven't seen it for awhile, but Bones certainly had a phaser when he got to earth in the 1930s, because that's how the street guy was able to vaporize himself, right? And don't take my apparent criticisms the wrong way... it's a great episode, one of the very best from the classic Trek era. Wahkeenah 04:20, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Controversy

Ok. I turned this into a prose section. It says things about the dispute which are uncontroversial, it doesn't go deep into the Harlan-said, Gene-said stuff as I think it would be very easy to make a very badly written section about this. Morwen - Talk 20:18, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

  • I once read the book Harlan wrote, incorporating the original script along with his many pithy comments about what was done with it. And, I'm sorry Harlan, but the finished product was a much better "Trek" episode than the original script was. It was like a "Star Trek" from a(nother) parallel universe. Wahkeenah 01:02, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] scene with bum dying cut everywhere?

so, was this removed from all versions of the remastered version, or just the short version of the remastered version? the way the article has it now it has it removed from all versions, which would be remarkable as i wasn't aware they were making any edits for the long version (which, to be fair, stations aren't airing much) which will end up on DVDs. Morwen - Talk 23:44, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

  • The article says that the bum's accidentally dying from McCoy's phaser would alter history, hence it's removal. But the Guardian said that if they were successful in their mission, history would be restored and "it would be as though none of you had ever gone.". There was no reason to remove the bum's death in that case.Mr. ATOZ 18:50, 27 February 2007 (UTC)
  • Found at www.cbs.com, every episode of Star Trek the original series is available to see at the cbs website. In the "City on the Edge of Forever" episode is shown with the bum vaporizing himself with McCoys phaser. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jmartin5 (talk • contribs) 16:01, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirk's final words

Very emotional line, Let's get the hell out of here by Kirk (when about to beam back up to the Enterprise). This parting line, should be added to the episode. GoodDay 00:45, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

I should have read the whole article, that 'line' is there. GoodDay 00:47, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Regarding the claim that Roddenberry "repeatedly said" that the script had "Scotty dealing drugs"

The only source that I have ever seen that claimed the Gene Roddenberry went around stating that the original script had "Scotty dealing drugs" was writings and lectures from Harlan Ellison himself. In fact, in a lecture by Gene Roddenberry that I attended in 1982, Roddenberry addressed this subject directly. According to Roddenberry, he NEVER EVER SAID that the original script had "Scotty" dealing drugs. The original script did, however, have a guest-star crewmember dealing drugs, and Roddenberry, in the lecture I attended, confirmed that he strenuously objected to ANY ENTERPRISE CREWMEMBER dealing drugs, and again, he vehimently denied that he had ever claimed that he thought that crewmember was "Scotty". Indeed, the original script published in Ellison's own book has a random crewmember named "Beckwith", if I recall correctly, dealing illegal drugs on the Enterprise.

So, I modified the line in the "controversy" section in which the claim was made that Roddenberry "repeatedly said" that the script had Scotty dealing drugs. The paragraph in question correctly cited Ellison's book as the source, but to make it absolutely clear, I added the phrase "according to Ellison", before the claim that Roddenberry said that "Scotty" was dealing drugs in the script. Ellison himself is hardly an unbiased source on this and this is clearly a "he said / he said" dispute.

If someone can find a reference of someone OTHER THAN ELLISON confirming that Roddenberry repeatedly went around saying that the script had "Scotty dealing drugs" (as opposed to a random crewmember), then I'd be all for removing the phrase "according to Ellison" and putting the approporate citation.Fish Man 17:02, 5 October 2007 (UTC)