Star Trek XI Plot Holes
Xanto
posted on March 8th, 2010, 4:00 pm
The Old Man wrote:That's quite funny. You all are trying to prove that starships were not and cannot be built on planets to support your opinion that the scenes showing the Enterprise being built on Earth are stupid or whatever.
What the funny thing is you might ask...
Well, Star Trek itself and whatever you might consider as canon Star Trek has nothing to do with ST XI and that's why ST XI simply doesn't care!
You can come up with whatever ship / episode / book / website you like. It simply doesn't matter and doesn't prove anything.
The only thing ST XI shares with Star Trek is its name.
Is this so hard to understand?
But they give me a great laugh trying...
posted on March 8th, 2010, 7:25 pm
posted on March 8th, 2010, 7:26 pm
Quatre wrote:Today's standarts? Today's standarts are to save space and build functional. Not a Hangar with 90% air for the powerplant.
The look of the Voyager was modern, the look of the Sovy was modern. Even by today's standarts. The look of the new enterprise was just strange. "The engineering section was an immense maze of pipes and tanks. Often the only sign of futuristic technology was the intercom. Metal catwalks crisscrossed upper levels in some areas, such as Water Turbine Section 3. ""while the more industrial looking parts of the ship were filmed at a Budweiser brewery"
USS Enterprise (alternate reality) - Memory Alpha, the Star Trek Wiki
Tell me how this fitt into modern shipconstruktion.
And in the movie you see the enterprise build at the ground. Don't know how to start such a big and fragile struckture. The original enterprise was build in space .
Movie:
"Old" Enterprise buiddock.
Ok, there is the refit, but it has been build there too.
But yes, it is not a real plot hole. Just a logichole in the movie. In my eyes.
You assume the picture being shown is the Enterprise. Do they ever state that it was? In TOS they never made mention of where the ship was constructed, did they?
posted on March 9th, 2010, 1:19 am
posted on March 9th, 2010, 1:24 am
posted on March 9th, 2010, 1:47 am
Last edited by Atlantisbase on March 9th, 2010, 5:08 am, edited 1 time in total.
Borg101 wrote:
You assume the picture being shown is the Enterprise. Do they ever state that it was? In TOS they never made mention of where the ship was constructed, did they?
Look at the hull! It says 1701 quite clearly. But I agree with you that there were almost no on screen references to the location of the ship's construction. (Granted I have not seen every TOS episode, but regardless.)
As far as building ships in space versus on land goes, to build large ships on land would be difficult, but not impossible, if they were smaller ships. At some point however gravity would sink in and without a Structural Integrity Field, the space frame would collapse under its own weight. It would certainly be more efficient to build parts on land and assemble them in space. On land you obviously also encounter the problem of moving large sub-assemblies. I doubt you could move an entire nacelle without the help of anti-grav units of some kind. To build the entire ship on the ground would pretty much dictate that the ship is built from the ventral up. It would be most efficient to build the ship completely in space.
As to Utopia Planitia. There are definitely facilities and colonies on Mars but I don't think it was ever terraformed. As such it would have negligible atmosphere and it's natural gravity is only .376 of Earth's which means it would be much easier to construct large ship parts on the surface and move them to orbit later.
As to ships landing. The only full starships which have been shown to land are the Intrepid class and Defiant class. It is doubtful that ships much larger than the Intrepid could actually land and return to orbit in one piece. There are several obvious problems involved in landing, first of which is re-entry. Atmospheric re-entry would put an enormous amount of strain on the ship some of which could be compensated for by the Structural Integrity Field (SIF). However as the design of the ship becomes larger and broader the space frame will incur more and more stress as air resistance pushes the ship up like a sheet of paper while the crew tries to compensate and keep the proper descent angle. You also encounter the problem of actually maneuvering the ship in atmosphere. Again, the larger the ship, the harder this becomes, although a static warp field could be used to compensate, but most of the power is needed to run the SIF so that would become another strain on the ship. The heat generated by friction from the air itself is easily handled by the shields. Once on the ground you have to deal with that unfortunate reality: gravity. The larger the ship the greater the force on the SIF will be and the more power you required to maintain it. There is also the matter of weight distribution to consider. While the Intrepid appear to have fairly even weight distribution, a ship the the Galaxy is clearly front heavy which would make it harder to land without something supporting its saucer section. There is also the issue of finding a spot large enough to actually land the ship. An Intrepid class ship is about 350m long, to put that into perspective for us Americans that's three football fields (for those who don't know an American Football field is 100 yds. or 300 ft. long) plus three-fourths of another; to land a Galaxy you'd need about seven football fields. So the actual landing any Starfleet vessel save the Intrepid, which was designed with the intention of landing and was equipped special for it, would be rather bothersome but it could be done if need be.
Now, as to the latest addition to the Star Trek saga: F(*K the reboot. Star Trek did not need a "reboot". It was just fine as it was and having been done, this little reboot of theirs created something which was nothing more than the common, everyday action film. The ship design(s) was(were) simply hideous and simply destroyed the sharp, crisp, down-to-business look of the original. This new design was completely out of balance. They contracted the design from front to back while appearing to add more mass to the dorsal aft which is completely against the established Federation design aesthetic which places most of the mass far to the dorsal fore while keeping the dorsal aft open and light. And then they had to go and make the nacelle pylons sweep. All I can say to that is WTF. When, When WHEN, have we ever seen a Starfleet vessel with pylons that sweep; curve yes, but not sweep. I highly disapproved of the hull design.
Engineering was crap and definitely didn't even come close to the original. This design was just one huge space filled with pipes, catwalks, and missile launch tubes. It looked like part of a modern aircraft carrier, not a Starfleet vessel. Starfleet vessels don't make much use of large open spaces and tend to be compartmentalized. A compartmentalized design affords the ability to contain and secure more effectively. The new bridge wasn't half bad, I think that had touch screens even been envisioned in 1968, Roddenberry would have used them (although switches and buttons would have been better). However, I have objection to the extra free-standing consoles and those suspended-pane consoles both of which clutter up the bridge and just create blocks in the line of sight.
Oh, and it has been clearly established that the view screen is not a "window". That is a fact which has been established since day one. That's why it's called a viewscreen.
I really don't care what time line you're in, these are things which would have been established long before a temporal incursion could have any effect. This is just a bunch of outsiders impressing their views onto the established universe. Frankly the whole movie was a bit like Adams seeing one of his childhood Trek fantasies played out. Any of us who grew up with some form of Star Trek have had them, where none of the rules apply, and we can do anything with the characters. I have issue with the notion that Kirk and Spock met at the Academy; Kirk and Spock were never at the Academy concurrently that we know of. Given that we know Spock was given his commission around 2250 and that Kirk entered the Academy around the same time, it is unlikely that they had anything other than a passing meeting while at the Academy. It is unlikely that Spock was the one who created the Kobayashi Maru scenario because it is implied that the test was notorious even in Kirk's day which means it must have existed long prior to Kirk's taking it.
I think the biggest issue with the whole movie was "Red Matter" (what ever the hell it is
). It was just some miracle substance concocted to make the story work. It is by far the worst thing that any Trek writer has pulled out of their ass. I know there have been some bad ones, but "Red Matter"; and, they don't even bother giving more than a cursory explanation of it so there are no plot holes to create.I vote that we find the nearest black hole and throw any and all material relating to this latest movie into it. Ok, that's my rant for the day.
EDIT: P.S. The lens flare, my god. Enough said. And about the transporters, since when can they not easily transport moving objects. Hell, they were doing it back in Archer's day like it was nothing so why all of a sudden is it so hard?
posted on March 9th, 2010, 1:52 am
As such it would have negligible atmosphere and it's natural gravity is only .376 of Earth's which means it would be much easier to construct large ship parts on the surface and move them to orbit later.
hah! Tell that to the Mars Climate Orbiter!
posted on March 9th, 2010, 2:05 am
Dominus_Noctis wrote:hah! Tell that to the Mars Climate Orbiter!
Am I missing a reference?
posted on March 9th, 2010, 3:37 am
posted on March 9th, 2010, 3:49 am
Yeah, I loved the film. Saw it 3 times, once in Imax. You also have to remember that Paramount was in financial troubles, and really needed a win from the new movie. Paramount has Berman and Braga to thank for the success of the last few canon "epics".
http://www.the-numbers.com/movies/series/StarTrek.php
Oh, and remember that these numbers are not adjusted for inflation.
http://www.the-numbers.com/movies/series/StarTrek.php
Oh, and remember that these numbers are not adjusted for inflation.
posted on March 9th, 2010, 4:49 am
posted on March 9th, 2010, 5:05 am
Last edited by Atlantisbase on March 9th, 2010, 5:13 am, edited 1 time in total.
kllthdyrctr wrote:As much as I love "canon" Star Trek, it shouldn't be followed at the expense of, well, common sense.
You can credit Star Trek (the franchise) for having such a massive fan-base and cult-following. However, as much as it is loved, it is hated in equal measure.
The film might have plot holes and things which "hardcore fans" would consider blasphemous but it takes a stale, overly serious, and niche franchise and gives it a new coat of paint that it sorely needed.
The Original Series was always light-hearted, a little bit camp, and something that didn't take itself too seriously. The relationship between Kirk and Spock was central to the series in '66 and, importantly, took center-stage in the newest film.
There are some things I don't like about ST-XI. I don't like the way that George Lucas seems to have got hold of the script and doodled all over it. I don't like the Eric Bana character, not villainous enough for me, and I don't like the small details like the way Engineering has been done.
However, I love the film, but I also loved the series which took themselves too seriously.
Ultimately Gene Roddenberry wasn't a man who believed in doing things "canon" (a bi-word for "previously established"), if he did then he wouldn't have cast Nichelle Nichols, or George Takei. He believed that everything could and should be accepted. He had a vision that all people were equal and equally deserving. That people could be.. better, and that Star Trek would unite people from every country and every background. His "United Federation of Planets" was how he wished the World was.
That would make it ironic that such a fantastic film which bridges the gap, between the cult following and those who didn't "get it" before, should be hated so much. It promotes virtually all of the values and qualities Roddenberry himself tried to convey in the Original Series.
I think anyone pouring scorn over the latest film should open their eyes and realise that the new film is more in keeping with the Original Star Trek than all of the series that followed.
Star Trek started as light-hearted, bright, colourful and corny. If you don't like that then maybe you don't love Star Trek, but the bastard-child that was born from the ignorance of people who thought they could do a better job, and obviously couldn't.
Most sci-fi is like this, there is a group that follow it religiously and a group that doesn't. Frankly I don't think that Star Trek needed a redo, or at least not one as radical as this. While yes, the original was light hearted and had quite a bit of humor Roddenberry was also making a bit of a socio-political commentary which is in no way light hearted. Yes, the original series focused on Kirk and Spock, if only because it had nothing else to focus on. Like all the other early sci-fi shows 80-90% of all the technology and ideas were pure imagination, and Roddenberry didn't necessarily envision in his mind how every little detail worked. Thus you can't really focus on the tech or the events in the story and end up looking at character interactions. The problem as we come to the present is that, guess what, we have science which now either supports or refutes some or all of the weak babble from the show. Half the technologies from Star Trek have come to pass in one form or another. It now matters what we say to some extent and with the advent of VHSs and DVDs and DVRs, etc. viewers (fans) can now go and scrutinize every little detail, because they are now telling us how this works or that works to some extent and we want to know so maybe, just maybe, we can make it reality.
To say that Roddenberry didn't believe in "canon" is a stretch. When he created the original show, of course there was nothing previously established but once it was created he didn't necessarily go and contradict himself, the show didn't I mean. But again, given that they didn't worry too much about the "how it worked" bit (nor did viewers), there was little to contradict. Also don't confuse in-show continuity and establishment of universe canon or breaking with it with breaking with social customs (or stigmas) by casting Nicholes and Takei and Koenig. It was the height of the American Civil Rights movement and the Cold War, a period of immense instability and conflict, and Roddenberry is presenting an image of a unified, unbiased Earth.
I'm afraid that I really don't see how this film, "bridges the gap", as you say. Nor do I see how it conveys the values of the original show. The original show was not about blowing things up or revenge killing or reckless fly-boy stunts. It was about exploration and interaction with what is out "there", and "there" becomes a metaphor for Earth, and finding the peaceful solution first, and failing that, the solution which involves as little force as necessary. Now, did the original include plenty of fist fights (and the losing of shirts), yes and that influence is coming from the very popular "Western" genre which seems to have a gun fight or a punch thrown every episode. But notice how in Star Trek, the fist fights were almost always forced and they were not the most common solution.
This new film comes under such criticism from die-hards because it takes the canon we all know and love, turns it on its head, spins it around, and beats it until it does what its tormentors want. It destroys the characters that we know to be Kirk and Spock and completely ignores the majority of what was established and has been established for the last forty years. It is also criticized because unlike the most recent Treks sacrifices the logic and sensibility of technology and science for the sake of creating a "interesting" and "attractive" film. Trekkies of the TNG-DS9-VOY-ENT era want their Trek to make sense and be plausible. Red Matter is the farthest you can get from plausible. Yes, the original Star Trek was light hearted and colorful and funny at times because it was conveying a utopian ideal and utopian image (the 60s were also just like that
). Subsequent series were aimed at filling out that idea and showing that this society we thought was perfect, maybe isn't so much. This was especially true of DS9. The subsequent series were never really meant to continue to project that utopian image, not even TNG which was initially pretty close to the original in design. To suggest that all Star Trek should be like the original show is silly and to suggest that if you don't like the timbre of the original show that you don't love Star Trek is just plain stupid.I would say that this latest movie is as close to the original show in all aspects as a Marxs Brothers (if you don't know who they are shame on you, go look them up you'll laugh your balls, if you have them, off eventually) film is to Avatar (the blue alien one not the Air Bender thing). These writers took their shot at it and in the eyes of most Trekkies failed horribly on most fronts. Therefore we should just sweep this one under the carpet and forget it happened.
posted on March 9th, 2010, 3:15 pm
posted on March 9th, 2010, 10:32 pm
Atlantisbase wrote:
Yup: Martian atmosphere
posted on March 9th, 2010, 10:56 pm
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