Ravings - How My Brain (Sometimes) Works, The Star Trek Edition

These are the ramblings of a man who didn’t really sleep last night, originally published as Tweets that came with GIFs that I’ve tried to replicate here, but are not my content. I wanted a record, dammit; a crazy linear list of the ravings of my brain and the way in which is works.

And yeah, there are typos. My brain likes typos.

Umm…enjoy?

I didn't really sleep last night, but nonetheless woke up this morning with very weird thoughts. Those thoughts? About all things #StarTrek and I'm thinking that Twitter and tweets might be the most appropriate way of addressing how and why my brain has worked in this fashion.

So yeah...I haven't actually done my homework on this. I'm sure there's blog posts or books about this narrative, but this is just a series of tweets about my own take on story-telling, narratives and the like.

I don't think of #STTNG very often. I haven't watched it in years, prefer #STDS9. But this morning, my brain decided it wanted to address the "evil twin" narrative in the #StarTrek franchise. Because ST:TNG had a mountain of evil twin stories...but no mirror universe.

Time-wise...I know that ]#STTOS only had the one #MirrorUniverse episode and it was only DS9 that went heavy into the narrative. Logic (hah) tells me that TNG didn't actively avoid the Mirror Universe so much as that Mirror Mirror, like most TOS episodes, was a stand-alone.

But my brain went "ah, it doesn't really matter though. TNG still explored the evil twin narrative." And so, I remembered Data and Lore, and evil Riker. I'm 37 years of age, and leaving TNG alone for a very long time, I have only now twigged how Data (and Lore) are a battle...

of fact and fiction (ie Data and...Lore.) Fact and fiction. Look, I was 3 years old when Datalore aired, dammit. I never actually GOT the meaning of the episode title, cos I just could not make sense of the word "Datalore."

So my brain then decided that it wanted to review similar things in TNG, and obviously it went to Evil Riker, more of a clone/split (also addressed in TOS) than the classic Evil Twin narrative.

Can you really count "Evil Riker" as an evil twin, since his appearance explains his origins and being? Like...he isn't really a (full) evil twin until he turns up in DS9.

We're talking about how MY brain works here, so obviously there was a split second in which I acknowledged how Riker (or at least his beard) certainly turned me gay and/or established a "type" for me.

At this point, my brain wondered why TNG did this "evil twin" narrative (especially with so many appearances of Lore) while the other shows didn't go so heavy. When I think of DS9's usage of the Mirror Universe, I think of order and chaos and, perhaps more importantly...

a sense of rigid propriety versus open sexuality. Not to say DS9 didn't address these issues throughout various episodes and characters, but it went so heavy with sexy Kira and the like.

Note: I would've been 9 when Crossover aired and I never twigged. Looking back on that as an adult, I can see queer representation all over DS9, especially in Kira coming out of any closet (regardless of universe.)

Which, of course, Kira can't come out of any closet. Cos her people have been so repressed. So...at this stage, my brain goes back to TNG wondering why it never used the Mirror Universe but used other "evil twin" narratives instead (as I posted already, it was was episodic.)

Then my brain went "WAIT...hang on a second... TNG DID have MORE evil twins. My brain actually triggered two fairly quickly, but in a specific order.

The first, and worst, was Tom Hardy's evil Picard in #StarTrekNemesis. The film is a mess and coming out in 2002, I was...17 years of age, and I knew how stories worked. Introducing a hidden species of Romulans and a mental rape scene was...uncomfortable (to say the least.)

I actually cannot bring myself to watch that film again if just because of that; it's unnecessary for the overall narrative. When my brain was having this though, my brain specifically went "oh, it's such a pity they never made any more Trek movies after First Contact."

My brain spirals. There is another movie in there. I can't remember the name. It was also...not great. It goes back to the Data/Lore narrative, and I can't remember which movie Data dies in, only to be "resurrected." But Data "getting" emotions also undoes the Data/Lore narrative

Which undoes the evil twin narrative. Two thoughts occur to me at the same time (see, I told you this is how my brain fucking works.) The first is that "wait, there's another Evil Twin character in there." Tasha Yar, coming back to life in Yesterday's Enterprise.

The actress/character then returns as her daughter Sela in a weird crossover. Thanks to time-fuckery. In retrospect (and I know this has been discussed) there was definitely some queer part to Yar's character, in the representation and...y'know, the fact that she shags Data.

In doing so, Yar is a tiny bit of the sexuality that DS9 has, and maybe (just maybe) it's too early in life (and too many viewers) to be able to get away with. Yep, my brain puts the TV viewership hat back on for a second, wondering if DS9 was allowed to get away with more

of that queer stuff because its viewings were that TINY bit lower, allowing it to get away with more. While the timing, and the rigid elements (and viewership) of TNG meant that Tasha (and none of the characters) were allowed to be in any way sexual, let alone queer.

Except stupid sexy Riker(s)

Yar brings me to her "reappearance" in the show, the actress returning as her daughter Sela, being a somewhat evil Romulan. Which triggers another thought process of consent, evil clones and the like.

Like...can you really count it as an evil twin narrative if it's legitimately the daughter of the character, as played by the same actress, born in a fashion that...let's be honest, she's a Romulan. Given my comments on Nemesis, looking back now, there's a consent question there.

If you're still reading this...wow, you're cool. Cos...yeah, there's more to come... (not much.) So my brain now realises that the evil twin narrative in TNG has doubled from Lore/evil Riker to include evil daughter and MOVIE universe child-type-clone-type thing.

There is a thread that started below. I then ran out of tweets (didn't know this was possible.)

So...I was talking (ad nauseum) about evil twins and such in Star Trek, because my brain went down a fucking stupid spiral of thoughts within about five seconds this morning (yeah, all those tweets are about five fucking seconds of thoughts.)

That's how my fucking head works sometimes, and for all I fucking hate my stupid brain tumour, epileptic head, I fucking love it too.

So my brain returns to Nemesis and Tom Hardy (woof) and I think of queer things again. Because, come on, his character in Nemesis is somewhat queer. Or at least camp. TERRIBLY so. Like...it's one of Hardy's few roles in which I am not the least bit attracted. In the slightest.

If I remember correctly, the role somewhat put his career on hold, and...let's be honest, kinda killed the Trek movie franchise. Until Star Trek came back. My brain decides "it's such a pity they never made another Trek movie after First Contact...except Trek. Trek was good."

But...the two Trek sequels were not good. And as I'm writing this, I realise why. The new, updated Trek movies are too heavy on the action, missing some (a lot) of the character driven stuff that draws me to the franchise. Like, I'll go see them in the cinema. But...

I wouldn't re-watch the previous to remind me what was going on before watching the next one. So my brain then wonders about the universes, back to...y'know, the Mirror Universe stuff that was...several (million) tweets ago. Like...

Is it truly a Mirror Universe (ie, just the one) if there's another fucking universe created by a series of movies (that undo some shit in the main universe, also known as the Kelvin Universe.)

And then I think of Tasha Yar's return (after dying in Season One) in the EPIC Yesterday's Enterprise. Being the origin of Sela. So my brain wonders for a split second if Yesterday's Enterprise takes place in the Mirror Universe and maybe I'm wrong about it not appearing in TNG

While writing that tweet, I just searched the internet. Somebody else on Reddit has had similar thoughts, and now I have to find them and be friends with them.

But...then my brain wonders if this means there are FOUR fucking separate universes in the Star Trek universe.

And then my brain wonders... What if Yesterday's Enterprise is actually...a consideration of the Kelvin Universe. And...that's...sort of it. Yeah, it's a somewhat flat ending to a shitload of tweets (that, let's be honest, nobody's going to read.)

But I thought it was fun and funny to note how my brain works because (aside from those two seconds of searching "Yesterday's Enterprise Mirror Universe" this is entirely shit from my head that took place within about ten seconds.

Imagine how my fucking head would work if I actually slept?