Xindi insectoid spotted in TAS?

[SpHeRe31459]

Not sure if this has been pointed out before. I was just re-watching The Animated Series episode "The Time Trap" for fun since it's the 40th anniversary of TAS this week, and noticed among the council of aliens stuck in the space version of the Bermuda triangle something that liked a lot like a Xindi insectoid.

http://tas.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/1x12/thetimetrap_062.JPG

Now of course TAS predates ENT by decades, so I wonder if the ENT people decided to use this TAS insectoid for inspiration or if it's entirely serendipitous. Since it's kind of a standard design for something that's an upright humanoidish insect alien species. The TAS version has two sets of arms, while the ENT Xindi does not.

 

[Christopher]

Beyond both being based on Earth insects, there's no particular resemblance between the two at all, so it's highly unlikely that one inspired the other. Give two different artists the assignment "design an alien that looks like an insect but is kind of humanoid," and odds are that their designs are going to have similarities, because of course they're both based on the same thing. Just as any two "cat aliens" or "reptile aliens" are likely to look similar. Really, there's nothing here.

 

[SpHeRe31459]

Beyond both being based on Earth insects, there's no particular resemblance between the two at all, so it's highly unlikely that one inspired the other. Give two different artists the assignment "design an alien that looks like an insect but is kind of humanoid," and odds are that their designs are going to have similarities, because of course they're both based on the same thing. Just as any two "cat aliens" or "reptile aliens" are likely to look similar. Really, there's nothing here.

^^yep I qualified my post with that very notion, it's just kind of fun thing to notice.

Various TAS elements had been slowly brought into subsequent shows, so it's somewhat plausible, though not likely.

 

[Christopher]

^Personally I like to think the "Time Trap" insectoid is a Kaferian, since they've been described as insectoid in various tie-ins.

 

[R. Star]

That's one perk of an animated series. Aliens can be actually alien instead of humans with funny coloring and foreheads.

 

[DS9Continuing]

It could also be a Kaferian or a Jarada.

.

 

[F. King Daniel]

I've always thought of it as a Kaferian Insectoid, as it was identified in Shane Johnson's Worlds of the Federation. But I guess it could be a Xindi Insectoid just the same.

 

[Christopher]

But it doesn't look anything like a Xindi Insectoid. It's red-orange instead of green. It doesn't have antennae. It has a different number of arms and a differently shaped head with more elliptical eyes. They have about as much in common as an Andorian and a Vulcan.

 

[R. Star]

Why can't they be different subraces of the Xindi insectoids? I mean look at humanity. You have people with different skin colors, eye shapes, and overall features across the board. A stretch, to be sure, but hardly the biggest one in the Trek universe.

 

[Christopher]

Why can't they be different subraces of the Xindi insectoids?

With a different number of limbs? You might as well ask why spiders can't be a subspecies of ants. The differences are pretty darn enormous. Frankly it's rather mammal-centric to assume that two species have to be related when the only thing they have in common is looking like arthropods. Imagine a Kaferian looking at humans and asking why we couldn't be a subspecies of Caitians.

By your own admission, it's a stretch. It's unlikely they're related, and the burden of proof is on the unlikely interpretation, not the likely one. I don't have to justify the assumption that they're not, because that's the more probable interpretation on the face of it.

 

[R. Star]

When humans "evolve" into salamanders or into spiders or cavemen, it's not the worst stretch out there by any means. I'd agree they're probably not, just if it was to be validated as a subrace of the Xindi insectoids that would hardly be the strangest thing in Trek.

 

[Christopher]

But why would you want it to be? There's enough small-universe syndrome in Trek already.

 

[R. Star]

I never said I did. I just mentioned it the argument they were wasn't entirely impossible. Heck, look at bugs on this planet, like say... locusts. When they start swarming their entire appearance, color and behavior change. Not unreasonable that sentient insects could undergo similar a metamorphosis.

 

[Christopher]

Very few things are "entirely impossible," which is why it's such a useless standard. A better standard is what's probable. Something that has an 80% chance of being true and something that has a 0.000000002% chance of being true are both "not entirely impossible," but that doesn't mean that they're equally worth taking seriously.

 

[R. Star]

It's a science fiction show. If you're into completely taking things seriously, it's probably not the genre for you. Especially the goofy things Star Trek has done to science over the years.

That 0.00002% is pretty close to the odds of everything going right for sentiment life to develop in a given place with the right circumstances anyways. Nevermind the five races of the Xindi on the same planet.

But hey, I'm just an open minded fan. You're the published author, so you stand a better chance of making the TAS bug race into something different if you want.