posted
Bleh. This episode ended up being a near-total ripoff of DS9's "Shadowplay" setup. And I'm willing to bet that the writers didn't even know it.
I watched this one at a friend's place, and thus couldn't make a more detailed tech review. I'll add more points tomorrow when I re-watch it. This episode is fairly tech-light, so it won't be much longer anyway.
-The first point is also the oddest. The alien ship this week is a CGI render of one of the more common ships in the TNG era: one of the ships called the "Antares" class! That's right, it's that triangular ship seen as a Pakled ship, a Bajoran transport, and a multitude of other Alpha quadrant vessels. It's been "redressed" as far as CGI would allow, but it's 95% there. Why, God? Why?!
-The ship comes with an optronic data system that can and has created sentient holograms capable of just about everything our trusty EMH can do. Of course, the Pre-E gang does nothing to acquire this technology by show's end; however, they drop a continuity-based hint when they mention that the Xyrillian ship had a similar technology.
-Hey! Mayweather *is* still on the show!
-The bad guy weapons are new again this week, which only increases my wonder that the Suliban hand weapons are pure TNG stock. Maybe they'll change 'em the next time we see 'em.
-I can't remember xactly what the Pre-E's protein resequencer can actually resequence. Can it do meat? There's mention made of a probable coffee stock aboard ship... One wonders when they're going to head home, or rather when they're going to *have* to head home for crew rotation or resupply or something. We're closing out their first year in space - how long before our intrepid crew gets homesick, and how long will it take to get back?
posted
Umm, what's so odd about having an Antares here? It's not as if the ENT heroes would have seen one before, so they would have no special reason to comment on it. And later shows establish that the type is available to just about anybody in the Alpha Quadrant, so why would these folks not have access to it?
And if a warship or exploration vessel can remain in service for a century, I don't see why a freighter wouldn't be in use for a millennium or more. Perhaps not an individual spaceframe, but certainly a design could be perpetuated for millions of years if it meets the basic criteria of getting your unobtainium ore, tastybeest reefers or Toxinian ale from star A to star B.
posted
I hereby do solemnly swear that if ever the gods decide to smile upon me and elevate me with the cherubin and carry me to LA to write for Trek that I will incorporate the term "tastybeest reefer" into a script.
-------------------- "I was surprised by the matter-of-factness of Kafka's narration, and the subtle humor present as a result." (Sizer 2005)
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As an rationalization for the similarity of the Klingon ships in the 2150s to those two centuries later, Doug Drexler cited the example of B-52s serving for 50+ years. Fine. I can accept the possibility. But just because ships CAN serve with few changes for a long time doesn't mean you SHOULD continue to use designs from the 24 century in the 22nd century. I agree that it's possible, but to continue doing so is creative laziness. Don't you want more from a SF show? Is this yet another gift for the fans?
Look at how ships are designed in the Star Wars universe. Ships appearing in the Phantom Menance are clearly precursors of those in episodes 4 through 6 but are not carbon copies. I've heard no one complain that the ship designs in Star Wars are uncreative. Trek could do this as well. If Trek didn't have enough time to do good design work, they shouldn't taken a year off.
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Oh, now that is unfair. Not only is it a specious analogy, I'd dispute your statement that:
quote:"Ships appearing in the Phantom Menance are clearly precursors of those in episodes 4 through 6 but are not carbon copies."
According to the Schneider Institute of Starship Knowingitall (SISK) "smoothness" is the foolproof test of design age. The Naboo fighters are way curvier than X-Wings. And for the life of me, I can't see much by way of "clear precursors" either. Oh, sure, Maul's ship has TIE Interceptor-like wings. But aside from that, what common features am I supposed to see carrying over from ships to ships? Aside from being "evil gunmetal grey shade #333C33" there's nothing connecting the Trade Federation ships to the Empire's. Naboo's fighters are completely new in the SW universe, etc. etc. In fact, I remember reading some (but not too many) complaints after TPM came out that Lucas should have dusted off the Z-95 and other fandomy designs. I think most SW fans had more pressing complaints on their minds, though.
The Star Wars Universe has never really had the (primarily Probert-driven) obsession with form following function that Trek is seen in the eyes of some as having/needing. Ships are designed to look cool, and the SW fanbase cares not one iota if the engines line up with the center of mass or not.
Finally there's the age old 100:1 hour ratio thing. There are only so many ways to make a ship that instantly says "our heroes" and only so many ways to make one that says "Klingons." In 700 hours, Trek has used, relatively speaking, bazillions of different ways to connect a saucer to two nacelles in a way that instantly tells our audience "TEH G00D GUYZ." In the first seven hours, Lucas never even had to come up with a starship that says "Jedi." Trek designers work within a very crowded slate. Wars designers have a comparatively blank one.
quote:But just because ships CAN serve with few changes for a long time doesn't mean you SHOULD continue to use designs from the 24 century in the 22nd century.
Ships from-scratch in the 19 hourlong produced-on-a-tight-schedule episodes after the pilot: Axanari, bloodsucker alien, Xyrillian, Conestoga, Vulcan ringship, Malurian, Fortunate, Nausicaan raider, AOTW Transport from "CF", silent enemy ship, Klingon scoutship, Vulcan transport, Ferengi ship. That's what, four times the number of new designs in all of TOS? New ships are coming at a fast-and-furious rate never before seen, even on DS9 or Voyager. We've been spoilt rotten.
-------------------- "I was surprised by the matter-of-factness of Kafka's narration, and the subtle humor present as a result." (Sizer 2005)
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You should see the latest Star Wars 2 trailer. It has very clear predecessors to Star Destroyers, AT-ATs and even the Death Star (check out the weapon of the globes on the side of the attack gunships).
I don't count the Naboo ships. They were never mentioned in episodes 4, 5 or 6. And them having a 'rounder' style of ships has no effect on rebel star fighter designs.
I do however count the droid attack fighters and the Sith Infiltrator. To me both are very clear predecessors to TIE Fighters.
Another thing to keep in mind is that in a war people generally do not care for their ships looking good. They're only interested in makeing them work properly and making a lot of them fast. I always found that to be an exceptable explination for the exposed machinery design.
Anyway, back to Enterprise: I found it very lame that they re-used this model for this series, but only for the reason that we've seen more than enough aliens use this. I have no problems with seeing far more advanced ship design. It's not like every race started using warp-drive in the same small time-frame (although it certainly looks that way in many Star Trek episodes, of any of the series).
-------------------- "And they had other stuff (...) like pictures of the Vulcan woman on Enterprise." "OOOOhhh! Uhm, I mean: Nerds!"
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posted
Why can't you just be happy with the ships? I find it possible that they could have ships over 200 years old.
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posted
well, i think the individual ships themselves would probably expire from old age after a much smalelr period of time than that (on the order 0f 20-60 years, maybe up to 100 for the most advanced spaceframe like the Galaxy) .. but our culture seems to support the idea of constantly changing the look of things ... our cars get unneeded upgrades every year like clockwork (for consumer recgnizability reasons.. if a new car doesnt look different from last years model, how are people going to know that it is new?).. our ships (naval vessels) dont suffer from that as much, but they change because new designs are constantly tried.. but i think that if the Klingon empire found that configuration to be advantageous, they might continue to use it.. build a run of the ships, stop, then build another run this time with new impulse engines,etc, next run they incorporate cloaking, a few runs later maybe they add some new gobbledy gook.. its really just a proven spaceframe being constantly improved upon, rather than the 'ground-up' approach the humans take (retire all the constitutions! build new excelsiors! retire all the ambassadors, weve got galaxies! junk all the 99 models.. weve got the 2000 cars in!)
besides, i liek to imagine that the unexpected ship was blurry enough that it could have been a lot different than the voyager/TMP D7.. we didnt see enough detail to make that judgment
now the antares class... that one we should just forget about..
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posted
I don' t think we should cut the poor overworked producers some slack on the re-use of Klingon designs. The Klingons are the major adversary race of the Star Trek franchise: If their ships don't deserve a bit of extra design work, why bother to come up with any new ships for any race? Just slap some paint on an old model and spin it around. The fans won't care (or maybe they will appreciate it!) And again, just because it's POSSIBLE that a design is used for 200 years doesn't mean that the producers should use this as an excuse for reusing an old design.
-------------------- When you're in the Sol system, come visit the Starfleet Museum
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posted
Well, I think the more Drexler says, the more I'm puzzled. I'm pretty sure that the ship from "Unexpected" is the same CGI that's been kicking around for a while. The fact that Eaves' design never saw the light of day makes me wonder if in fact there was some kind of problem that prevented its use there.
-------------------- "I was surprised by the matter-of-factness of Kafka's narration, and the subtle humor present as a result." (Sizer 2005)
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In order to say that the basic Klingon hulls weren't/cannot have been in use for at least 225 years, we would need proof. Unfortunately, there is nothing in the show that says that the K't'ingas cannot have lasted that long. We only know that the BoP lasted at least 93 years (2282 to 2375).
The kind of ship-scrapping stasis can also be seen in the Federation with its 93+ year old Excelsior-hull, 100+ year old Miranda-hull, 89+ year old Oberth-hull etc. The idea that these designs might be even older is reinforced in the similarities between NX-class and the TMP-era ships, which brings us to exactly the same age range as that of the Klingon vessels.
I think that it is possible to derive reasonable explanations for the new data if we reaffirm the notion that onscreen evidence has the highest priority, regardless of what other sources we choose to include.
[ April 03, 2002, 17:36: Message edited by: Boris ]
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posted
But there is no problem when you assume that the age of a design has nothing to do with its usefulness.. perhaps the D7s built/used in the TNG years were built in new spaceframes of the old design, but outfitted with state of the art equipment. Lots of designs for thing stabilize and remain unchanged, visually, because its the most efficient use of parts.
The hammer has gone through changes in the past few hundred years, but still looks very much the same, because even though the ergonomics of it have improved, a hammer is still a hammer. Theres no reason to go experimenting with the design because it satisfies all its requirements, and therefore has reached its pinnacle.
The Klingons know the D7 spaceframe is effective, therefore they keeping building new, improved ships of the old, original design.
I have no problem with rationalizing their laziness in using the model since i dont think it detracts from the show any. It an explainable use that helped them make the show run smoothly.
And going by their registries, the Mirandas, Oberths and Excelsiors were not 100+ year old hulls.. many of them were built in later series so they were 10, 20, 30 year old hulls. Just because the design is old, doesnt mean the individual ship is old. (Going by registries, the only ships that were quite so aged were the Lantree and the Repulse.. the rest of those classes' ship seen were of new builds of the same ship design, or meant to be really old, like the Jenol*n and the Hathaway).
Clearly the Klingon ships might not even be lasting long lifetimes, but building new D7s twenty, thiry, forty years later is the means of replacing them. In fact, with the exception of the sleeper ship T'Ong' ,no Klingon ship has ever appeared over the span of more than a few years, or even had its age revealed (barring the 'older cruiser' reference in "Rules of Engagement").
[ April 03, 2002, 18:09: Message edited by: CaptainMike ]
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Ok, hull designs, not actual hulls to be specific. On the other hand, the Grissom with its registry of NCC-638 supports the theory that Oberths were being built in the late 22nd/early 23rd century, and that a starship hull can last quite a while. Just because some designs, notably the refit Constitutions, were retired early doesn't mean that others can't last longer.
The thing is that if basic onboard technology hasn't changed in centuries (as proven in ENT with its transporters, phasers, warp engines, impulse engines), why should the basic hull design change? Form follows function.
Furthermore, this is not a B5 situation where every race has a different tech level. Every Alpha Quadrant race has basically the same technology, so there is no need for radical changes to match what the other Alpha Quadrant players are doing.
[ April 03, 2002, 19:06: Message edited by: Boris ]
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I've seen that ship being called one thing to another from TNG and DS9. It's the high level of holographic technology that bothers me. Oh, the episode does have elements of Shadowplay and some TNG episodes.
-------------------- "It speaks to some basic human needs: that there is a tomorrow, it's not all going to be over with a big splash and a bomb, that the human race is improving, that we have things to be proud of as humans." -Gene Roddenberry about Star Trek
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