plot items so bad they destroy the series in hindsight

[Admiral X]

Honestly it seems like several of the writers on both VOY and ENT don't seem to understand how reproduction works. Unless maybe Braga was responsible for both Kes and Trip being pregnant through a sack hanging off a random part of their body.

[CharlesPhipps]

Halo 4 which have ruined Halo's lore.

The premise of Halo is that humanity is not actually the big kid on the block or special like the Federation or the Earth Alliance. No, humanity is the Bajorans. We're a backwater, technologically inferior planet with a lot of awesome qualities that still gets its ass kicked repeatedly by aliens who have no respect for it. At the end of Halo 3, we've "won" but that's after losing much of North Africa and almost all of our colonies.

Halo 4 acts like humanity is now a superpower with the huge INFINITY warship with Forerunner technology (which humanity doesn't understand). That it can now deal with any of the Covenant successor states as minor nusiances and terrorists despite the fact even one small group of them could wipe out humanity's remnants. We also get Karen Traviss writing about plans to destroy the Elites and start civil wars with them despite humanity's vulnerability.

Then there's the fact the Spartans are a rare and elite force which were created through a punishing and horrific series of circumstances. Only, now, they've been mass produced so the Spartan-IVs are an endless eries of super-soldiers. They're also annoyingly smug and acting like they've earned the right to be called Spartans just for being appointed them and doing...nothing.

Then there's the fact Forerunners aren't human anymore....which then makes it nonsensical for them to be able to use the Halos to begin with. It also gives the Forerunners an army of robots that are immortal and indestructible....then says the Flood can't be beaten.

[LittleRaven]

It seems to me that realistically Ocampan women would be rape magnets. If they can only reproduce once in their lives, then they are going to REALLY picky in what man they choose to settle with. There are going to be a lot of Ocampan Incels.

Well...maybe? I mean, "sex" with Kes doesn't actually seem that fun...for either party.

"Hey baby...wanna hold hands for 6 days?!?"

Being an Incel kind of sucks for a human, because sex is a lot of fun if you do it right and you can have a fair amount of it. But it seems like being an Ocampan Incel would be kind of a relief.

"Yeah....uh....not really. I mean, I've only got like 5 years to live, and I don't really feel like spending a whole week doing...that."

Even putting aside all the biological problems this ridiculous method of reproduction has, the social effects of this kind of system could fill a decent book.

[TheLibrarian]

If TNG was a series that was really strict about continuity, instead of conveniently forgetting series-breaking fixes, then the straw that would have broken the camel's back would have been "Unnatural Selection" S2E7. Pulaski's dying of rapid aging caused by some genetically engineered test-tube children, but they're able to cure her by taking a weeks-old sample of her DNA and using the transporter to reset her physiology to before she was infected, but she keeps all the memories of the intervening period. How could you ever have drama surrounding illness or aging if you can just constantly reset yourself to an earlier state? People complained about Khan's magic blood in Star Trek Into Darkness, but this was worse. (I know there are other SF works where this kind of instant backup is common, but it would drastically alter the setting of Star Trek.) Luckily, this technique is never brought up again.

[LittleRaven]

Wow, I had forgotten about that one. (I think I mentally purged all Pulaski episodes from my head at one point.)

You're spot on, though. That. Breaks. Everything.

[clearspira]

If TNG was a series that was really strict about continuity, instead of conveniently forgetting series-breaking fixes, then the straw that would have broken the camel's back would have been "Unnatural Selection" S2E7. Pulaski's dying of rapid aging caused by some genetically engineered test-tube children, but they're able to cure her by taking a weeks-old sample of her DNA and using the transporter to reset her physiology to before she was infected, but she keeps all the memories of the intervening period. How could you ever have drama surrounding illness or aging if you can just constantly reset yourself to an earlier state? People complained about Khan's magic blood in <i>Star Trek Into Darkness</i>, but this was worse. (I know there are other SF works where this kind of instant backup is common, but it would drastically alter the setting of Star Trek.) Luckily, this technique is never brought up again.

You say they forgot about it, but what about ''Rascals?'' Did they ever explain why they could not do that again?

It is interesting that you mention Khan, because the second continuity break in ''Unnatural Selection'' is the fact that these children are essentially augments - which are illegal to the point of making you a second class citizen as we see with Julian.

[CharlesPhipps]

Remember Roddenberry said that the Federation no longer fears death so they don't bother with trying to lengthen life extensively.

[Beastro]

Remember Roddenberry said that the Federation no longer fears death so they don't bother with trying to lengthen life extensively.

Which says more about a subset culture in the Federation than the Federation as a whole. Something akin to the quintessential Brit saying all Brits are stiff upper lipped, take death nonplussed and none have ever, ever been cowards.

It might be true of his family, the circles he walked in, or even his entire generation, but it isn't true to apply to all Brits.

IMO in-world it's a mindset that arose around the time of, or after, the TOS generation and was one that effected a good 2-3 generations from Picard's most of all, to the younger crew members to lesser extents until it began to die off with Wesley's generation that openly began to doubt it.

In a similar fashion I like to think of the original Feringi met on TNG as a faction that has embraced an old culture from the Feringi past that is much at odds with modern Feringi society and mostly made up of disenchanted youth led by ideologues akin to today's Islamists (and are look upon in much the same light).

[Nealithi]

The transporter fix episodes were limited because the writers were told not to do it often to avoid the very issues mentioned. "Worf had his spine broken? Run him through the transporter. Do I have to remind you we have this thing?" It would kill drama.

No my plot item is when they don't follow something from an episode.
The Enterprise had a child. And you never went to find out what or where it went? Just left a junior biological starship to go wandering. . . .

[MyUserName]

I'm gonna post something from star wars, but will avoid the low hanging fruit from the current Disney era and go for something I've always hated from the novels.

Callista Ming and Cray Mingla. Way to be creative with your names Barbera Hambly.

I'm about to spoil some of the books pretty hard, so last chance to back out.

So for me, the book Children of the Jedi is a massive dumpster fire with a train wreck piled on top in the midst of a garbage heap. It starts off pretty early with Cray.. Cray is a Jedi knight and leading expert in droid technology, but Han just refers to her as "the blonde with the legs." directly to Leia, whom at this point he is married to, and isn't sentenced to sleep on the falcon forever. Anyway Cray's chief backstory, as it is exposited to us, is that at some point in her Jedi training under Luke, her lover died and she constructed a droid replica body and programmed it with her memories. Noone in the book has any problem with this insanity whatsoever, and act as though this is perfectly normal behavior, despite the idea of Jedi becoming one with the force being a very prevelant thing at this point in the books.

So anyway, about Callista. we meet her as a force ghost who tried to destroy a automated imerial super-weapon called the Eye of Palpatine, and died in the attempt and whose force ghost becomes one with the machine. She is an old republic Jedi, who knew and served with Anakin. which would place her age around 50-60. But of course having existed as a force ghost, she still looks physically in her prime. Her and Luke fall in love, and even have a type of force spirit sex. I'm dead serious.

So Callista and Cray's stories intersect when Cray figures out how insane the idea of artificially preserving her lover was when her boyfriend can't come to her rescue after he's stuck with a droid restraining bolt. She then, rather than dealing with her grief and idiocy, becomes suicidal and goes on the same suicide mission Callista did years back but has more success. At some point, off page, Cray gives up her force spirit to become one with the force, at least someone does, and Callista goes full on body snatcher, takes over Cray's body, somehow, and escapes to be with Luke. Who has absolutely no issues whatsoever at how disturbing this hookup is.

The worst part of all this is that what was originally a one shot novel became a trilogy focusing on this character and her romance with Luke, meanwhile former imperial assassin and borderline grey Jedi Mara Jade is being shipped with galactic playboy Lando.

I've not met a single person who laments that both these ships got sunk, hard, by future writers. Prior to the writers behind the Calista trilogy, it was strongly implied and Mara and Luke would have their own romance at some point in the future, but neither was quite there yet. The Callista character, and resulting tilogy, strongly sunk this plotline for years, until it was ultimately brought up again when Zahn returned to write his Hand of Thrawn books.