Ladies and gentlemen I present to you, The Shrike.
Menacing indeed and made more-so by those dangerous looking spikes nearly swallowing up Crusher's ship.
So, why do all the recent "Ships of Evil" and their "terrible tentacles" appear so often?
Well, there is this inspiration.
And this from our collective unconscious.
Get it? Tentacles, tendrils, spikes. Bad.
I suppose I should include this too.
Fangs bad too.
I think I've made my point.
There is something uber creepy about pointy things that threaten our existence. Maybe because they seek to embrace us. To keep us in their clutches. To never let go. To poison and infect.
There is also this bit of mythology.
Horns and fangs. Greeaaat.
Of course, there are other great uses of the Spikey Ship in sci-fi annals. Check out this beauty from Babylon 5.
The Shadows battle ship. What a beauty.
What kind of subconscious dread does this unearth for you?
I always loved this one. So simple. So elegant. The perfect blend of terror and menace. You have to swallow hard when this appears on the view screen.
But we're not done. Star Trek has employed other Spikey Ships.
Here is the Narada over Vulcan from the Kelvan universe movie "Star Trek: The Future Begins". A peaceful Romulan mining ship turned for evil purposes by the vengeful Nero. Much like the Core displacement weapon seen in the past episode of Picard! Hmph!
You want spikes? I've got your spikes. The Borg version Agnes Jurati had this ship enter stage left.
Massive in scale this bad boy, um girl, vastly out sized the Starfleet ships. I heard the intonations of, "There's a New Kid in Town" by The Eagles when I saw this monster. Good thing the captain was a friend.
If you include Star Trek Online we also get these dazzlers.
Here's a one from the Star Trek online development blog. Spikes ahoy!
Here's the Tal Shiar Borg adapted Llaihr class destroyer.
My "Spikey Sense" went into overload when I detected this Kraken. It looks like it's going to pick you up and stab you. It's spikes have spikes!
Above is a Romulan Khnial class ship also developed from Borg tech. Not sure if this baby is canon but it sure is impressive. Find more about it here from Memory Beta .
Last but not least is this Romulan drone ship next to the NX-01 Enterprise for scale. Purportedly, navigated by telepathy by a Aenar pilot and two Romulan officers oversaw it's operation.
It kind looks like it has a bit of an armadillo in it or horseshoe crab. Still, the spikes are there.
So what did I forget? Do you have a favorite "Spikey Ship?" Please leave in the comment below. I'd love to hear from you and due credit will be given and perhaps included in a revised post!
(Should we include V'Ger? The spike are a little lame.)
Comments
Post a Comment