Iām not talking about stuff like OāBrienās hollow rank pip, Iām talking about stuff like āWhy make Chakotay a lt. commander rather than a full commander?ā
It seems like there was at least some forethought put into who has what rank, but itās not clear to me how much thought, nor how much meaning was supposed to be baked in to those decisions.
For example, Dr Crusher was a full commander from Day 1, matched only by Riker on the main cast. Was that supposed to signify the authority afforded to the CMO? Was it supposed to be blatant enough for the audience to āgetā it?
One of the most prominent examples is Sisko starting his series as a commander. Again ā was that supposed to signify that he was more junior, a younger officer?
Behind the scenes, I wonder if we can trace a waxing and waning military influence in the writers room over the years. I know Roddenberry served, and I think some of the early TNG writers did as well. But I feel like that became less common in later series? (But I donāt know for sure.)
I think itās striking that rank is significantly downplayed on DSC, except for Burnham and potentially Saru.
A couple of quibbles that no one else seems to have brought up. Ensign Tilly was not promoted to XO - she was assigned to the position of acting XO while remaining an Ensign. The designation of āactingā makes it clear sheās just holding down the slot temporarily until Saru makes a more permanent selection, and makes it much more tolerable for those sheās now in charge of despite the lower rank. It probably wouldnāt have been tolerated (by the Admirals at Command) even in the lax standards of Starfleet, but even ADM Vance realized Saru had to pick from the tiny crew he brought to the future with him, so he let it go.
As for Ezri, again, remember that rank and position are only loosely connected, while rank and specialty (Counselor, science officer, engineer, navigator) are COMPLETELY unconnected. Ezri is a counselor because they wanted to make her distinct from Jadzia, and is an Ensign to highlight her inexperience both as a person and in dealing with a symbiote.
But yes, it does seem like the writersā familiarity comes and goes. I swear there are at least a few episodes (and I canāt remember which series, because Iām alternating between three right now) where people refer to a Lt. Cdr. as āLieutenantā instead of the proper term of address, āCommander.ā
Tuvok is such an example as he is almost always referred to as Lieutenant and later heās promoted to Lt. Cdr properly, but he wore Lt. Cdr. rank insignia for like maybe the first season without anyone really correcting it.
Itās true that Tilly was not āpromotedā to any rank and kept her rank simply being assigned a position, however, I think itās weird for her to be the XO except that she was part of the principle cast and they needed to give her a reason to be part of the overarching narrative for each season.
Oh, absolutely, story/cast reasons were the real reason - but while assigning an Ensign to a Commander slot is extreme, assigning people above their rank and above higher ranks in the process is not completely unheard of, even in todayās military. Given their utterly unique situation as an in-universe excuse, I donāt have any real problem suspending disbelief on Tillyās assignment there.
I thought it was a clever way to handle it, but it wasā¦ strange because it telegraphed itās narrative purpose rather than keeping it as part of the narrative. But I mean - to be fair I canāt think of a better way to make it work than exactly what they did and I thought it kind of worked out well all things considered.