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Talk:Star Trek: First Contact: Difference between revisions

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:One point of interest in this movie from a gun perspective is the new phaser rifles, which were developed because of a problem with the original prop.
One point of interest in this movie from a gun perspective is the new phaser rifles, which were developed because of a problem with the original prop.


See, Roddenberry didn't want the Enterprise's crew carrying anything that looked like a gun, so when he got more creative control over ''Next Generation'' he replaced the handgun-like Phasers with a thing that appears to be the offspring of a TV remote and a dustbuster. The Phaser Rifle was the same, with an awkward 2-point grip with no stock, and a fakey reflex sight with no second aim point.  
See, Roddenberry didn't want the Enterprise's crew carrying anything that looked like a gun, so when he got more creative control over ''Next Generation'' he replaced the handgun-like Phasers with a thing that appears to be the offspring of a TV remote and a dustbuster. The Phaser Rifle was the same, with an awkward 2-point grip with no stock, and a fakey reflex sight with no second aim point.  


The trouble wasn't apparent until the more conflict-heavy DS9; the Phasers were completely impossible to aim consistently, and when it came time for the SFX guys to draw in the beams, as often as not they didn't actually match the barrel axis. This becomes a problem when an actor is trying to make it look like they're lining up a difficult shot only for the gun to seemingly aim all by itself in the final cut. Hence the new rifle p
The trouble wasn't apparent until the more conflict-heavy DS9; the Phasers were completely impossible to aim consistently, and when it came time for the SFX guys to draw in the beams, as often as not they didn't actually match the barrel axis. This becomes a problem when an actor is trying to make it look like they're lining up a difficult shot only for the gun to seemingly aim all by itself in the final cut. Hence the new rifle prop.


Moral of the story: guns look like guns for a reason. [[User:Evil Tim|Evil Tim]] ([[User talk:Evil Tim|talk]]) 01:37, 10 September 2012 (EDT)
Moral of the story: guns look like guns for a reason. [[User:Evil Tim|Evil Tim]] ([[User talk:Evil Tim|talk]]) 01:37, 10 September 2012 (EDT)
:I thought the aiming issue only affected the Type I and Type II phasers. The Type I was pretty much phased out since it was too small to be seen in an actor's hand to start with, and the Type II had a redesigned grip. The Type III rifle seen in TNG and DS9 actually had real pistol grips and even real sights.  --[[User:Funkychinaman|Funkychinaman]] ([[User talk:Funkychinaman|talk]]) 02:03, 10 September 2012 (EDT)
:I thought the aiming issue only affected the Type I and Type II phasers. The Type I was pretty much phased out since it was too small to be seen in an actor's hand to start with, and the Type II had a redesigned grip. The Type III rifle seen in TNG and DS9 actually had real pistol grips and even real sights.  --[[User:Funkychinaman|Funkychinaman]] ([[User talk:Funkychinaman|talk]]) 02:03, 10 September 2012 (EDT)
::From what I heard it was the performance of the rifle props as the Dominion War plot arc kicked off in DS9 that caused the creation of the new rifle seen in First Contact. It wasn't really such a problem with the handgun phasers, but at longer ranges and with the rifle having a much clearer axis it was more apparent they weren't shooting straight and that it was the design of the prop that was at fault for it. [[User:Evil Tim|Evil Tim]] ([[User talk:Evil Tim|talk]]) 02:16, 10 September 2012 (EDT)
::From what I heard it was the performance of the rifle props as the Dominion War plot arc kicked off in DS9 that caused the creation of the new rifle seen in First Contact. It wasn't really such a problem with the handgun phasers, but at longer ranges and with the rifle having a much clearer axis it was more apparent they weren't shooting straight and that it was the design of the prop that was at fault for it. The best 'aim' you could manage with them would be the equivalent of a shotgun with a front vert grip and no stock. [[User:Evil Tim|Evil Tim]] ([[User talk:Evil Tim|talk]]) 02:16, 10 September 2012 (EDT)


== Plot hole ==
== Plot hole ==

Revision as of 06:26, 10 September 2012

One point of interest in this movie from a gun perspective is the new phaser rifles, which were developed because of a problem with the original prop.

See, Roddenberry didn't want the Enterprise's crew carrying anything that looked like a gun, so when he got more creative control over Next Generation he replaced the handgun-like Phasers with a thing that appears to be the offspring of a TV remote and a dustbuster. The Phaser Rifle was the same, with an awkward 2-point grip with no stock, and a fakey reflex sight with no second aim point.

The trouble wasn't apparent until the more conflict-heavy DS9; the Phasers were completely impossible to aim consistently, and when it came time for the SFX guys to draw in the beams, as often as not they didn't actually match the barrel axis. This becomes a problem when an actor is trying to make it look like they're lining up a difficult shot only for the gun to seemingly aim all by itself in the final cut. Hence the new rifle prop.

Moral of the story: guns look like guns for a reason. Evil Tim (talk) 01:37, 10 September 2012 (EDT)

I thought the aiming issue only affected the Type I and Type II phasers. The Type I was pretty much phased out since it was too small to be seen in an actor's hand to start with, and the Type II had a redesigned grip. The Type III rifle seen in TNG and DS9 actually had real pistol grips and even real sights. --Funkychinaman (talk) 02:03, 10 September 2012 (EDT)
From what I heard it was the performance of the rifle props as the Dominion War plot arc kicked off in DS9 that caused the creation of the new rifle seen in First Contact. It wasn't really such a problem with the handgun phasers, but at longer ranges and with the rifle having a much clearer axis it was more apparent they weren't shooting straight and that it was the design of the prop that was at fault for it. The best 'aim' you could manage with them would be the equivalent of a shotgun with a front vert grip and no stock. Evil Tim (talk) 02:16, 10 September 2012 (EDT)

Plot hole

This has bugged me ever since I saw this movie: if Picard knew that projectile weapons worked well on the Borg, why didn't he immediately start replicating hundreds of old guns to use against them? --Funkychinaman (talk) 02:11, 10 September 2012 (EDT)

The Trekkie answer is that the Borg would adapt, but they can't adapt to knives and adapt to phasers by changing shield frequencies, so it's not at all clear how they could. You can't say the ship doesn't have the patterns because it can make a mechanically sound Tommy gun (and as I recall anything you can pick up in a holodeck is a temporary replicated object, not a hologram). I'm guessing it's because using a sensible solution to a problem wouldn't make up the technobabble quota. Evil Tim (talk) 02:16, 10 September 2012 (EDT)