it really is funny how confident everyone in Star Trek acts about the transporter despite it constantly causing bizarre incidents they can't explain

@SeanAloysiusOBrien

ZOMG, I think this all the time. I read once the transporter was a plot device invented to remove what would have been a constant series of scenes shuttling people around in small craft.

Then, fast forward a few years, and becomes the MacGuffin that gives us such goofy plotlines as #Tuvix and Rascals. I mean, whiny tween Picard is funny but 🙄

It is cannon tho that Doctor McCoy felt transporters were completely foolish for organic beings due to safety risks.

Cc: @Taweret

@bkuhn @SeanAloysiusOBrien @Taweret yeah the quote (might have been Roddenberry, might have been Justman maybe) was something like "we needed the transporter because we couldn't figure out a way that damn ship could land." And you don't even have to go to the second generation to find the transporter malfunction plots, it was responsible for splitting Kirk into good and evil halves, and then in a separate but suspiciously similar incident swapping the away team into the mirror universe

@funkula @SeanAloysiusOBrien @Taweret

As much as I find later mirror universe stuff despicable (especially the #DS9 plotlines that “duplicitous people are pansexual because you never know what team they're on”), the OG “Mirror, Mirror” was for its time a window into how close we could fall into a dangerous fascist society if just a few facts fell the wrong way.

I mean, I have been wondering for like the last 6 years if I am in the Mirror, Mirror universe myself.

@funkula @SeanAloysiusOBrien @Taweret
Also, my whole life , I've never even considered growing a goatee or a Van Dyke because I always assumed those were Evil facial hair styles after seeing that episode at 10 years old. So the positive impact on better facial hair styles alone is a reason to be glad for the OG “Mirror, Mirror” #StarTrek episode!
@SeanAloysiusOBrien this is how i feel about politics