Talk:The Drumhead (episode)

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Contents 1 Episode talk page 1.1 Maintenance links 2 Removed Background Notes 3 Similarity to BSG - Litmus

[edit] Removed Background Notes

While rewriting background, I removed the following:

• Jean Simmons is an actress with a very long history. One of her most famous appearances is the role of Varinia at the side of Kirk Douglas in Stanley Kubrick´s Spartacus.

Is not relevant to the episode herself; that's what her page is for ;-)

• Picard's line "The first time any man's freedom is trodden on we’re all damaged," sounds a lot like Martin Luther King, Jr.'s Letter From Birmingham Jail, in which King says "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."

"Sounds a lot like" isn't sufficient citation. We need some proof it was an intentional reference, not an assertion. There is no reference to such a homage/borrowing in either of the sources I consulted, Captains' Logs: The Unauthorized Complete Trek Voyages and Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion, which both note the allusions to the McCarthy trials and Salem witch-hunts. But if a citation can be found for the King reference it could be re-added. – Cleanse 07:56, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Similarity to BSG - Litmus

I've always felt that this episode bore an astounding similarity to the Battlestar Galactica episode "Litmus" (season 1 episode 6):

• An explosion and fear of a traitor prompts an investigation that quickly becomes McCarthy-esque
• One of the crew members is persecuted for asserting their right not to incriminate themselves
• The trial is finally ended when Commander Adama/Captain Picard give a speech about civil liberties and walk out. The prosecutor attempts to stop them, but they have lost the support of the court.
• Both are based on an idea by Ronald D. Moore

This probably isn't enough to place the similarities on the main page, but I think it might be appropriate to dig a little deeper. Hopefully someone will see Moore at a convention and have a chance to ask on the record. Or if there is already a statement that I'm missing, someone should point it out to me.