The Unauthorized Trekkers’ Guide to the Next Generation and Deep Space Nine. James Hise van

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СКАЧАТЬ only clues to Data’s true origin are his peculiar yellow eyes, pale skin, and encyclopedic memory comparable to that of a Vulcan, but actually more extensive. It takes a skilled biologist to detect that Data is composed of artificial tissues instead of real flesh and blood. Although he only uses it in extreme circumstances, Data also possesses superhuman strength.

      Data was discovered by a Starfleet Away Team investigating the disappearance of an Earth colony. The colony was completely destroyed, but the android was near the site, deactivated, and programmed with all the knowledge and memories of the lost colonists—except for the memory of what eradicated them so utterly. All this was rediscovered later, when Lore was reassembled.

      At the time of his discovery, Data had no memories of his own, and was impressed by the humans who rescued him. He chose to emulate them, hoping to become more human in the process. His remarkable abilities do not give him a superiority complex. In fact, he seems to feel a bit less than human, as he cannot feel emotions, but he seems somehow to overlook the truth that his loyalty and actions toward others would actually qualify him as an exemplary human being.

      He excelled in the Starfleet Academy entry tests and has never received a mark against his performance. Data benefited from the Starfleet regulation that prevents the rejection of a candidate so long as it tests out to be a sentient life form. This was later put to the test by Commander Bruce Maddox, whose efforts to classify the android as a possession of Starfleet were thwarted by Jean-Luc Picard. Picard’s spirited defense of his colleague also served to strengthen Data’s rights and liberties.

      DATA CAN DO IT ALL

      Data was created in the male gender, is fully functional (see “The Naked Now”!), and seems incapable of falsehood. While he speaks a more formal brand of English and does not use contractions, he tends to ramble on a bit because of his vast knowledge. He does learn and adapt, however, and discontinued calculating times to the exact second because he learned that this often annoyed humans.

      He has difficulty understanding humor and idiomatic language, although he can learn vast glossaries of slang, such as that of the 1940s (“The Big Goodbye”), when he deems it relevant to the situation at hand. He also involves himself in amateur acting. Picard has shared his interest in Shakespeare with him, and Data’s researches in theatrical history have led him to become an adherent of Stanislavsky’s Method approach to acting, although his reasons are peculiar. The Method is rooted in drawing on deep emotions to bring characters to life; Data hopes to reach emotional depths through creating characters onstage, in essence reversing the original Method concept.

      While Data appears to be an adult in his late twenties, he has probably existed a much shorter time than that. Because Data was never a child, he seems particularly interested in children such as Wesley Crusher, as they mark an aspect of existence he has never experienced and represent another example of his goal of being human.

      In fact, his older “brother” Lore was given basic emotions, but Dr. Soong had overreached himself in this attempt and did not try to give emotions to Data after they went seriously awry in Lore. Years later, Soong developed circuitry to remedy this, but was fooled by the jealous Lore, who obtained the implant himself. Soong died soon afterward, leaving Data much the same as before. Data, despite his misgivings, continues to learn and grow as a sentient, and certainly very human, being.

      BRENT SPINER

      “I’m one of those people who believes that mankind will find all the answers out in space,” says Spiner, “but the first step is to get off this planet. The sun is going to burn out eventually and we better be somewhere else as a race of people by the time that happens. I think that’s why everybody digs Star Trek, because they know it’s a part of all of our futures and represents a vision of home.”

      “As the series opens, we don’t know much about Data, only that he was constructed by beings on a planet which no longer exists. He’s the only thing left. His creators programmed him with a world of knowledge—he’s virtually an encyclopedia—but only in terms of information, not behavior. He’s totally innocent. However, he does possess a sense of question and wonder that allows him to evolve. His objective is to be as human as possible.”

      Brent Spiner was born and raised in Houston, Texas, where he saw an average of three movies a day between the ages of eleven and fifteen. “At fifteen I was already a major film buff. I could quote lines from movies, tell you who was in it and in what year it was made. I always fantasized about being an actor. I was also lucky enough to have a brilliant teacher in high school named Cecil Pickett, who was capable of seeing potential, nurturing it, and making me aware of it.”

      SPINER’S EARLY DAYS

      Spiner did a lot of “gritty, ugly plays” off-Broadway after college. “The one that finally pushed me over into the serious-actor category was a Public Theater production of The Seagull for Joseph Papp.” The actor went on to roles in the Broadway musical productions of Sunday in the Park with George, The Three Musketeers, and Big River, based on Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn.

      Since moving to Los Angeles in 1984, he’s appeared in such plays as Little Shop of Horrors at the Westwood Playhouse. His feature-film credits include the Woody Allen film Stardust Memories. On television he has appeared on such series as The Twilight Zone, Hill Street Blues, Cheers, and Night Court.

      One could say that he was very well prepared for his role as Data by his belief in extraterrestrials. “Obviously I’m from another planet.” He laughs, but adds that he seriously does believe in beings from other planets and will continue to do so until such things are disproven.

LIEUTENANT WORF

      The prediction made by the Organians nearly a century before has come to pass. The Klingon Empire and the Federation are at peace. Even so, Worf is unique as the only Klingon officer on a Starfleet ship. When his family was destroyed in a treacherous Romulan attack on a Klingon outpost, Worf was rescued and raised by humans of Slavic extraction, who did their best to keep their adopted son in touch with his Klingon roots. He joined Starfleet and is treated with the same courtesy and respect shown any other bridge officer—possibly even more, since the Klingons still have a remarkable reputation for violence.

      Although Worf is still very aggressive by nature, he is able to control his anger even when he feels he has been provoked. As a bridge officer, and the third in the line of command after Picard and Riker, Worf takes his duties very seriously. In combat situations, when the Enterprise or its crew is threatened, Worf instinctively wants to respond in kind and confront the menace head-on. The Klingon Empire does not stress cool deliberation as the preferred method for problem solving.

      Worf rarely talks about himself and his culture, but in “Justice” Riker inadvertently gets Worf to talk about Klingon sexual attitudes. When Riker wonders why Worf is not enjoying the pleasures offered by the sybaritic Edo, Worf explains, quite casually, that only Klingon women could survive sex with a Klingon male. When Riker wonders if this is simply bragging, Worf is confused. He was merely stating a simple fact of Klingon life.

      Eventually, Worf did renew a long-unconsummated relationship with the half-human K’Ehleyr, who came back into his life as a Federation emissary. Their encounter in “The Emissary” produced a son, but unfortunately K’Ehleyr was murdered in “Reunion,” a crime that provoked Worf to a bloody and time-honored Klingon revenge. His son now lives with his Earth grandparents, since Worf’s status in the Klingon Empire had at one point become a precarious one.

      UNFAIR BLAME

      Years after Worf’s СКАЧАТЬ