History Headscratchers / StarTrekVItheUndiscoveredCountry

** Look at the scene where they point to each other. The one on the right (Iman) doesn't actually point to Kirk, but slightly above, and the guard seems confused. Kirk instead points right next to him, and the guard immediately realizes what's going on. Most likely, [[ShapeshifterDefaultForm Iman's true form]] was smaller than a human. Though it's not clear why they would make such a mistake when they seemed able to fight Kirk perfectly well just earlier (maybe due to the stress of having a gun pointed at you?).

** Look at the scene where they accuse each other. The one on the right (the shapeshifter) doesn't actually point to Kirk, but above him, and the guard seems confused. Kirk instead points right next to him, and the guard immediately realizes what's going on. Most likely, [[ShapeshifterDefaultForm Iman's true form]] was smaller than a human, though it's not clear why they would make such a mistake when they seemed able to fight Kirk perfectly well just earlier (maybe due to the stress of having a gun pointed at you?).

** It is TheHorseShoeEffect at work, or maybe NotSoDifferent since they are not really so ideologically opposed. They are just afraid of things being different to how they have always been, they cannot handle change, and everything else is just them trying to rationalise away the lengths they are prepared to go to to prevent it.

** It's also a bit of a running joke for ''Franchise/StarTrek'' in general, and this film in particular--it's the TropeNamer for InTheOriginalKlingon, after all. Later in the film, Spock claims to be a descendant of Literature/SherlockHolmes (and this is speculation, but I've always assumed that he referring to his ''father's'' side of the family). Chang and Spock, incidentally, were [[BorrowedCatchphrase borrowing this joke]] from Chekov, who was known to claim that Russians were responsible for almost every technological or cultural advancement in human history[[note]]Which, itself, was a parody of a real-world stereotype about soviets[[/note]]. Interestingly, Chekov's claim that Cinderella is a Russian story--his only instance of using this gag in all of ''The Undiscovered Country''--it's actually a subtle subversion. Russians ''do'' kind of have their own unique version of Cinderella: "Vasilisa The Beautiful".

** It's also a bit of a running joke for ''Franchise/StarTrek'' in general, and this film in particular--it's the TropeNamer for InTheOriginalKlingon, after all. Later in the film, Spock claims to be a descendant of Literature/SherlockHolmes (and this is speculation, but I've always assumed that he referring to his ''father's'' side of the family). Chang and Spock, incidentally, were [[BorrowedCatchphrase borrowing this joke]] from Chekov, who was known to claim that Russians were responsible for almost every technological or cultural advancement in human history[[note]]Which, itself, was a parody of a real-world stereotype about soviets[[/note]]. Interestingly, Chekov's claim that Cinderella is a Russian story--his only instance of using this gag in all of ''The Undiscovered Country''--it's actually a subtle subversion. Russians ''do'' kind of have their own unique version of Cinderella: "Vasilisa The Beautiful.

** IIRC, there's a brief shot of a computer graphic showing Kirk's signal when they leave the magnetic field that sort of suggests that the field also disrupted sensors to some degree -- ''Enterprise'' didn't seem to actually get a fix on Kirk's signal until he had physically left the security parameter. The Klingons might have wanted to let Starfleet long-range sensors (and ''Enterprise'', herself) to get a good, clean recording of the "escape attempt." Something they could point to and say, "See? Kirk and Bones weren't assassinated! They were just gunned down by guards while trying to escape their slightly slower death in our forced labor camp!" Come to think of it, that would also explain why they let Kirk keep the tracking device: To give Federation surveillance networks a signal to focus on.

*** On that note, I always though the point of this running joke was to remind you that it's 300 years in the future and some things have been lost to history a little bit. The Vulcans learned about Nixon going to China and liked the idea so much that the phrase got rebranded as a "Vulcan proverb". Most people in the 23rd century have no idea who Nixon was, any more than you or I could recognize the name of most political figures from the 17th century. Likewise the Klingons got their hands on Shakespeare, translated it, and then played the telephone game for awhile until eventually lots of Klingons believed that Shakespeare himself was a Klingon. (There might have even been a deliberate lie at some point; maybe some particular Klingon loved Shakespeare and wanted his friends to read the plays, but knew they wouldn't respect anything made by non-Klingons. So he just told his friends that Shakespeare was a Klingon, and most people couldn't be bothered to double-check the history.)

** It's also a bit of a running joke for ''Franchise/StarTrek'' in general, and this film in particular--it's the TropeNamer for InTheOriginalKlingon, after all. Later in the film, Spock claims to be a descendant of Literature/SherlockHolmes (and this is speculation, but I've always assumed that he referring to his ''father's'' side of the family). Chang and Spock, incidentally, were [[BorrowedCatchphrase borrowing this joke]] from Chekov, who was known to claim that Russians were responsible for almost every technological or cultural advancement in human history[[note]]Which, itself, was a parody of a real-world stereotype about soviets[[/note]]. Interestingly, Chekov's claim that Cinderella is a Russian story--his only instance of using this gag in all of ''The Undiscovered Country''--it's actually a subtle subversion. Russians ''do'' kind of have their own unique version of Cinderella: "Vasilisa The Beautiful."

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** The battle takes place just outside of Khitomer orbit. Kirk may not have wanted to fire blind so close to the planet as any hits on the surface would cause catastrophic damage. Hence why Chang ambushed them there rather than in open space where they were less likely to be noticed.

*** Mentioned on TNG, DS9, and Discovery - Klingon society is feudal in nature with cracks in its stability always lying just below the surface. Better to preserve what's already there than instigate a civil war.
** For what it worths, the EU does mentions that the Klingons release all of their subject races after that and they just kept somewhat of a mild political and cultural influence something in the lines of the British Commonwealth of Nations. Although non-canonical this is confirm in DS9 when the Klingon invade Cardassia and everyone, but specially the Federation, reacts with surprise (if the Klingon still had subject species or continue the tradition of conquering worlds that would not be a surprise), in one episode Worf himself says that "if my people return to their old ways, they will name an Imperial Supervisor and killed all officers [in Cardassia]" (I'm paraphrasing). So, again, it seems confirm canonically that they did had an Empire in the literal sense but it was a thing of the past.

* The issue here is conceptualizing these empires as if space ships were the equivalent of planes and not... well, ships. As in the Titanic. It takes weeks or months to travel from one star to another, space travel in the Star Trek Universe is less like taking a plane from New York to Tokyo in the 2000s and more like taking a cruise from Britain to Australia in the 1700s/1800s. Of course that if in 2021 Washington DC or New York are detroyed they can be easily replaced and the President can move from DC to some other place. Now imagine what would have happened to the British Empire in 1700s if the British Isles are granted inhabitable for some natural catastrophe?

** For what it worths, the EU does mentions that the Klingons realease all of their subject races after that and they just kept somewhat of a mild political and cultural influence something in the lines of the British Commonwealth of Nations. Although non-canonical this is confirm in DS9 when the Klingon invade Cardassia and everyone, but specially the Federation, reacts with surprise (if the Klingon still had subject species or continue the tradition of conquering worlds that would not be a surprise), in one episode Worf himself says that "if my people return to their old ways, they will name an Imperial Supervisor and killed all officers [in Cardassia]" (I'm paraphrasing). So, again, it seems confirm canonically that they did had an Empire in the literal sense but it was a thing of the past.

*** The problem with that is of course that ''Enterprise'' was getting an intensive beat down, and Spock was keeping him from doing his damn job. That Bones was up on the bridge in the first place is irritating--especially to the people burned and/or hemorrhaging in sickbay. If Spock needed help, why not call one of the botanists? Space Seed establishes that ''Enterprise'' has an historian on staff (at least at the time of that episode); why not get him or an equally useless crewman to meet Spock in the torpedo bay?

*** Even if they did keep the Bird of Prey it had all it's power drained then crashed and sank to the bottom of the San Franciso Bay. While they probably salvaged it, I doubt they'd find much info in half destroyed water logged computers.

** Regarding Chekov, I assumed they were just spitballing ideas; Valaris suggested the assassins might have taken off their magnetic boots in zero gravity before beaming back to the Enterprise. The ones who reprogrammed the computer to show they had fired two torpedoes might have disabled the security sensor temporarily so the alarm didn't go off. Plus, as Spock said: "When you eliminate the impossible whatever is left, no matter how improbable, must be the truth." A phaser that can vaporize a target without setting off an alarm is as novel an idea as a ship firing while cloaked.
** Speaking of which, doesn't it also seem weird that there's an unlocked cabinet full of loaded pistols in the galley, and that nobody--even the frickin' chief of security--seems all that irritated that Voleris fired one off in a room full of people?

*** Except in the context of that scene, security was reacting to the power setting, not the fact that she fired a phaser (which the movie makes clear is potentially lethal even on the stun setting) in a crowded room. In the real world, reckless discharge of a firearm is a ''very'' serious crime that could easily cost a junior officer his or her career (and some brig time). Voleris doesn't even get a stern talking-to.

*** Or on another note, it's entirely possible they also considered Kirk would just straight up press the attack once the "accident" happened rather than surrender and be arrested, with the Cloaked BoP on standby to beam Chang out. Taking the chance to get his vengence, or simply just defending himself after Chang threatened to return fire returning to Earth and claiming there was a malfuction. The goal was just to ruin the peace conference, so if Kirk destroyed the ship himself so be it, he was retiring soon anyway and they didn't specifically need a scapegoat or Kirk in jail in the first place. And given that the special ops guy drew up a plan to attack the Klingons and rescue Kirk "with minimal losses" it's also possible that a plan c would be for the Federation to attack to rescue their hero James Kirk, which would also end the peace talks which is what they want. This could have been a very complex conspiracy and sending Kirk was likely to cause several potential outcomes that would achieve their endgoal.

*** This is the approach the newer Trek Novels have taken. In the Star Trek Titan Novel Orions Hounds, you had a vulcan character say the vulcan version, "Only Soval could go to Andoria", and a human character mentally remark they were more used to the 'translation' version using different human history references. The Vulcan version serves as something of a double reference as well, as the Character of Soval is one of the Vulcan ambassadors from the Star Trek Enterprise series, which was set in a time when Vulcan and Andoria were engaged in a cold war type situation of their own. I believe the Soval saying appears in a few other novels as well, as the different writers tried to stay in continuity with each other.

*** But wouldn't Klingon technology improve to work against attempted countermeasures as well? I get the impression roughly 99% of Klingon science is dedicated to combat. So I'm sure they would work on finding ways to keep the ship better hidden. It just seems silly to use it once and then totally abandon it when it was in its prototype stage. Even if it doesn't make a ship invincible, you just gotta figure it would always be better to have the ability to fire while cloaked then to not have that ability. It's not like having that ability give you any disadvantages.

** To be fair, the Federation and the Klingon Empire are not really at war. They are in a truse since the Organian Peace Treaty. The Cold War allegory is in full here. What the radicals of both sizes want is to ''keep'' it that way and not going into outright hot war (and what the Romulans understandably want is to avoid their two major enemies to became allies). Keeping the status quo is by no mean strange in politics and passing from a Cold War to become allies is not an easy thing to do (heck, in real life the US-Russia alliance did not last more than a couple of decades). As we have seen in Discovery, lots of Klingon truly fear the Federation because they see it as assimilating, as mild version of the Borg who would impose their rules, valures and principles on them, whilst many federals fear the Klingon as they see them as violent and brutish. Mixing both cultures and having them both interact might be seen undertandably as a big no no for people in both sizes. We have similar situation in the real world like the mutual distrust that some civilizations (like Western and Islamic) have to each other.

* The issue here is conceptualizing this empires as if space ships were the equivalent of planes and not... well, ships. As in the Titanic. It takes weeks or months to travel from one star to another, space travel in the Star Trek Universe is less like taking a plane from New York to Tokyo in the 2000s and more like taking a cruise from Britain to Australia in the 1700s/1800s. Of course that if in 2021 Washington DC or New York are detroyed they can be easily replaced and the President can move from DC to some other place. Now imagine what would have happened to the British Empire in 1700s if the British Isles are granted inhabitable for some natural catastrophe?

* The issue here is conceptualizing this empires as if space ships were the equivalent of planes and not... well, ships. As is the Titanic. It takes weeks or months to travel from one star to another, space travel in the Star Trek Universe is less like taking a plane from New York to Tokyo in the 2000s and more like taking a cruise from Britain to Australia in the 1700s/1800s. Of course that if in 2021 Washington DC or New York are detroyed they can be easily replaced and the President can move from DC to some other place. Now imagine what would have happened to the British Empire in 1700s if the British Isles are granted inhabitable for some natural catastrophe?