Logline
A distress call from Lt. Noonien-Singh compels Spock to disobey orders and take the USS Enterprise and its crew into disputed space, risking renewed hostilities with the Klingons in a bid to aid their shipmate.
Written by Henry Alonso Myers & Akiva Goldsman
Directed by Chris Fisher
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I kind of wished they had made more of an effort to wrap their faces and hands first, just to drive home the peril they were in.
I guess I just have to accept that in this version of Star Trek, science is magic, and so they didn’t worry about the possibility they might survive but be horribly disfigured by frostbite. I have to remind myself that this is a franchise where people can change their appearance into a completely different species and then revert back without any apparent scarring.
To be fair, despite what sci-fi will tell you frostbite is not a concern if you’re jumping into space without a suit, so the fact that they were frozen at all is artistic license. You’ll die from hypoxia long before you even begin to get chilly.
Normally I’d agree with you wholeheartedly, but didn’t the episode explicitly state and show that the ships were amidst a gargantuan field of interstellar ice?
The problem is mainly that there’s no atmosphere to actually conduct heat away from your body. There being an ice field doesn’t change that much.
Having not seen the episode, do some people get spaced?
If so, and assuming there isn’t any other shenanigans, you don’t need to worry about the cold. Space tends to be cold, but its also just barely even there. No air means no convection, and that means you’ll only get cold very slowly. Much too slowly for it to matter in this situation.
Your biggest concerns are going to be preparation (don’t hold your breath!) and getting back to an atmosphere as soon as possible.
The problem here is its kinda a meme. PIC S3 also did this, with Vadic, though she was a changeling.
Science is magic in every version of Star Trek. TOS has Mind Melds and Greek Gods. Throughout the TNG era is the implication that evolution has a will of its own that can’t (or mustn’t) be subverted. DS9’s main character eventually learns he’s a demigod.
There’s a version of it that at least pretends to use scientific principles as a basis. I’m not going to say it’s lazy writing when characters just assume that their wobbly wobbly future science will protect them, but I do wish there was more lip service given to it.