posted
Yeah, I swear that Newton type has registry of NCC-071/B, even though its probably 0718, but that 1 looks funny.
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As someone at SSM pointed out, the ship was designed by Abrams.
Sorry, but that can't be right. Abrams is a film director, not a starship designer. Undoubtedly this is just more hearsay from Abrams-haters.
This ship has John Eaves written all over it, from the holes in the saucer to the clearly 24th century design. While Eaves himself is a very nice guy, his ship designs all tend to look the same no matter what time period they are supposed to be from.
Do I like this ship? Well, no, not really. I didn't like the nuEnterprise either. Am I going to let it detract from my enjoyment of the movie? Not at all.
No, the SSM guy wrote on how the director is ultimately the one that says what a ship should and will look like- artists take direction from him and make changes at his say so. Even great designs get rejected in favor of stuff like a silver akira with the nacelles up or nacelles or a ship that transforms into a giant deathray whatthehellever other silly notion. Check out Sternbach's lovely first Voyager design for example...and we got that football with the tiny flapping nacelles instead!
And we know it was Abrams himself that decided the Cloverprise would be larger than the Soverign just to make "his" ship the biggest...but that's a rant that Bernd does better than I ever could, so go to EAS for that!
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
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No, the SSM guy wrote on how the director is ultimately the one that says what a ship should and will look like- artists take direction from him and make changes at his say so.
Still, I'm sure Abrams's total involvement consisted of nothing more than him going to his art department and saying, "I need you guys (or guy, in this instance, since it's quite obvious the ship was designed by John Eaves) to create a big, mean-looking ship."
quote:Even great designs get rejected in favor of stuff like a silver akira with the nacelles up
Actually, UPN wanted to use the actual Akira class for the NX-01. How stupid would that have been? But really, comparing the UPN suits to JJ Abrams is like apples and oranges.
quote:Check out Sternbach's lovely first Voyager design for example...and we got that football with the tiny flapping nacelles instead!
The only "real" difference between what Sternbach drew up and what we eventually got were the nacelles. If Voyager's nacelles were larger and longer, it would have looked fine.
quote:And we know it was Abrams himself that decided the Cloverprise would be larger than the Soverign just to make "his" ship the biggest.
I don't remember it that way. I remember the ship starting out as just a slight bit bigger than the original E, but halfway through, the visual artists realized that a lot of the VFX shots ended up reinforcing the idea of a much larger ship. I don't think Abrams really cared how big the ship was, or if he did say something to that effect, he was probably just joking after the fact.
-------------------- "A film made in 2008 isn't going to look like a TV series from 1966 if it wants to make any money. As long as the characters act the same way, and the spirit of the story remains the same then it's "real" Star Trek. Everything else is window dressing." -StCoop
Registered: Jun 2000
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As to director involvmen, it varies on the director- Nicholas Meyer did exactly as you say regarding the Reliant- just signed off on it , but with nacelles down instead of up, while Abrams, for example, was VERY hands-on with the look of the Cloverfield monster: I doubt he'd let such a big visual element of a movie just be whatever his art crew came up with...not that we have any idea who really designed that thing.
As to Sternach's Voyaher design, you're mistaken- his elegant design was much much different than the final version- he went so far as to make a model of the design, complete with tiny figures to show scale...
You can see where Sternbach would take some elements of this design and bring them into his Prometheus design. Really nothing like Voyager- and the first design sketches had this cool sail like part rising from the back of the ship, which was an energy absorber to suck in weapons fire, IIRC.
As to the size of the Cloverprise, I can see the VFX guys saying "we need a bigger ship to match the shuttlebay scene", but if taht's the case, they raelly did a halfass job scaling the ship up- windows and docking ports made for a 300 meter long ship just span like two and a half decks at the larger size and remain in the same Probert Refit configuration as the 300 meter ship has. docking ports also make zero sense, unless they're made for giant Zentradi crewmen.
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
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I'm not saying that the upscaling made any sense...I actually hate the nuEnterprise design, but I hate even more that they upscaled it so much that now it's bigger than the Galaxy class. All I was saying was that I doubt that the size of the ship really mattered to Abrams.
And as for Sternbach's Voyager design: yes, I've already seen his study model, and while there are minor differences in the design (except for the nacelles and the oversized runabout pylons), to me it looks sufficiently similar in structure to the final design. However, I will say that I prefer his version to what we ended up with.
And as for the new dreadnought...I really just wish they weren't using John Eaves as a starship designer, alternate 23rd century or not. He's a nice guy, but I hate his ship designs.
-------------------- "A film made in 2008 isn't going to look like a TV series from 1966 if it wants to make any money. As long as the characters act the same way, and the spirit of the story remains the same then it's "real" Star Trek. Everything else is window dressing." -StCoop
Registered: Jun 2000
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quote:Originally posted by Mars Needs Women: Yeah, I swear that Newton type has registry of NCC-071/B, even though its probably 0718, but that 1 looks funny.
I watched the movie yesterday and the number was not better to read as in the trailer. I don't think that there is a '/' in it. It is pretty clear even in the picture of the trailer that the line is more or less in parallel to the last digit (more like '|'. So I assume that it is NCC-0718. But the name of that ship is not readable.
Registered: Oct 2002
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Admiral Marcus had some starship models in his office: Dreadnought, Kelvin-type, NX-class, Phoenix and some rockets and airplanes.
I was disappointed that we didn't get one good shot of the dreadnought.
-------------------- "Never give up. And never, under any circumstances, no matter what - never face the facts." - Ruth Gordon
Registered: Mar 2000
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I noticed the ships on the desk as well. I wondered why the top secrete dreadnought ship was displayed on the desk in the open for everybody to see. And I wondered why the Kelvin class was on display and not the flagship of the fleet, the Enterprise. Did anybody noticed the regristry on the hull of Kelvin-class? Cool was the NX-01-Class (The Enterprise?).
Registered: Oct 2002
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Right, so, let me say now, this will be a bit spoilerey. I wrote this on Saturday after seeing in Friday, but didn’t post it. In the end I figured why not. It’s ramblings about what I saw basically, with a few questions, comments and bits I liked and didn’t. Skip it if you haven’t seen it yet I guess, because it’s worth watching spoiler free. Although, why would you be here if that was your plan?
Background then: Lucy and I went to see it On Friday night. I was a bit worried about it but excited. I’ve tried to inflict Star Trek onto her and while she likes it, I wouldn’t call her a fan, if you see what I mean.
We liked the opening scene – good mix of action and humour. The natives were far more interesting than Spock in the volcano – after all they wouldn’t kill him off that early in the film, would they?
Enterprise worship? Nothing new here, fans have been doing that for years.
A super Alka Seltza ring? Really? Oh, apparently yes. Fine.
Nice to see Bruce Greenwood back. Pike seemed to be rocking the Elvis look, with the fat greying sideburns, the body suit and the big rings - all he needed was the glasses.
I really enjoyed the fanboy nods, such as using Section 31. Then, the attack on SFHQ happened and Pike, which was a little unexpected, but what was with Spock mind melding with him - bit intrusive? I dunno.
Admiral Marcus’ nice open plan office, with a weird policy of displaying models of classified dreadnaughts alongside older (presumably less classified) star ships. Maybe it’s a clever double bluff.
72 torpedoes, eh? (might be remembering this a bit early). Scotty quits! But why replace him with the lowest ranked officer Kirk can think of? Just asking.
At this point I will recant my reactions to the film at certain points. Despite having strived to remain spoiler free, it has been impossible to ignore all the rantings and ravings online, vis a vis John Harrison. So I get to the cinema thinking “Pease don’t be remake”. I watch the Spock scene in the volcano thinking “Uh oh, he’s talking about sacrifices and Kirk is cheating death”. The admiral is named Marcus (wincing uncomfortably). There are 72 torpedoes (Aww shit). I turn to Lucy and explain that I won’t be enjoying the film anymore. She gives me an elbow in the ribs. Fair enough.
Anyway, back to the film. The flying hamburger they are going to use is from “The Mudd Incident” – nice. They go to Qu’nos and are chased by D4s. Ok, that sorta works. Then they meet the Blingons! Was that make up or did the Klingon Captain have gold bits on his (less than pronounced) ridges? Also, don’t Klingons have phones? Why did they not call their mates to say “were getting the shit kicked out of us – come quick and bring really big guns”. Might be an honour thing, I dunno.
Right, so we get the big reveal – it’s halfway through the film, but ok. Now, to me this was left a little limp. What do I mean? Well, those with no prior will go “so what”. Those wh know a little will go “oh, ok”. Those who know a modest amount will go “oh, yeah, him”. Fans will go “NOOOOOOOOO! WHY? WHYYYYYY? GAH!” Perhaps I’m overeacting, but that was kind of how I felt. If it was a present to the fans, I’ll be swapping it at the store at the nearest opportunity.
Lucy also noted that in this context, the vengeance thing was just a bit stupid. It was personal because of who got killed, so it was a personal revenge. It was all about rash decisions and being in the wrong place. There was no build up, no wait and no “w-word”.
I also thought, despite being a good actor, Cumberbatch was wrong in this role. He was too lithe, too pale, too sneering. Or, as Lucy said “he’s no where near as buff as he should be”.
Hurumph.
All right, braced for the rest of it, the hollow feeling in my gut gradually dissipated and I just sat back and watched.
The sets were as stupid and big as before – though I did like the torpedoes and the launchers, which fitted a lot better that the six shooters from the old films. Except for where they looked like they were supposed to shoot from. Never mind.
I did enjoy watching the Enterprise getting beat up – lots of homage-ery there. A blown up warp nacelle, a huge scar cut into the side of the neck etc.
The Dreadnaught was a heroic mess of a ship. Liked the Section 31 vibe, but yet another uniform? Really? That makes how many? There’s the ship board uniform, the scuba suit, the red cadet uniform, the blue wool cadet uniform, the admirals uniform, the teachers uniform, the grey “barracks” uniform, the smart grey uniform with matching hat, the last one but in green, the grey jacket with coloured triangles, the Section 31 uniforms. 11 uniforms (just off the top of my head)? Can you really call them uniforms at this point if everyone is wearing something different?
And then came That Scene.
What can I say? Erm. Well, I thought it was awful. It was a ham fisted rehash but it also lacked any of the emotional resonance, especially since it wasn’t permanent, or even at the end of the film – that confused me. Also, Quinto, you ain’t no Shatner. It was a good try by switching things around, but it just didn’t do it for me. Lucy noticed and did say to me “I know, he didn’t even steal Scotty’s glove and try to mind meld with him”. She was there in my hour of need.
Oh, a note on the sets. I liked them a bit more this time. The brewery engineering was still there, but we saw the warp core. Well actually, we saw a high powered laser experiment, but it sort of fitted, I guess. The inside was bit Star Wars-y though – I was kind of expecting the millennium falcon to fly through and shoot it.
I, as a scientist, also enjoyed the “kick it to make it work” approach to dealing with broken delicate and highly sensitive equipment. To be fair, we do that all the time.
Oh, and why did the warp core need to be online for the rockets to work? Are those warp rockets? If I was building the Enterprise I'd have rockets that don’t need the warp core on just in case.
Um. The ending wrapped everything up nicely I suppose. I was confused as to why Uhura beamed down on her own, but I suppose they couldn’t find a red shirt who wanted to umpire that spat. The baddie can come back but everything is hunky dory. Alice Eve is on the bridge, so that does not necessarily eliminate certain future persons happening. They can make more films, leave it there, do a series or whatever. It’s a good place to be.
Lets see, the cast. Well Chris Pine is ok, but a bit wooden in places, B- maybe for him. Pegg was, well, Simon Pegg. Not old Scotty, but good with what he was given and I liked party Scotty, sneaky Scotty and naughty Scotty. I liked Spock in this actually, Quinto was really good. . Urban was probably the unsung casting hero here, although his accent did slip a bit at one point into something odd. His McCoy just about nails it, but really has been side-lined in these films. Yelchin was good in a red shirt, but didn’t really do much. Sulu did even less. Zoe Saldana is still not Uhura for me. She’s too whiney and lacks sassyness. Again, might be writing not casting, but she is my least favourite transition from old to new.
BC, as I said I think he was misplaced here, but did well with what they gave him. Alice Eve was ok but didn't have all that much to do - did JJ admit she was there simply to have a nice pair of boobs?
Overall, the film was a good flick. But, and it’s a big one, for a film that is trying hard to please it’s fans, most of whom it’s piggybacking from a 45 year old franchise, it kind of undoes itself. It harks back to the 2009 film and the older shows, sometimes very nicely (Section 31, Mudd etc – all small, brief references). It’s got action, big set pieces, dynamic characters, but ultimately it’s a bit untidy around the edges and it is ultimately predicated on ripping off what was (to most Star Trek fans) the best Star Trek film ever. It’s a big let down, it’s not as good as it was the first time around, and it makes me think that maybe it would be better to kill Star Trek here and now.
But at least no matter how bad it gets, we still can have our mantra: “It wasn’t as bad as Nemesis.”
-------------------- I have plenty of experience in biology. I bought a Tamagotchi in 1998... And... it's still alive.
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tribbles are back and they are bigger and juicier than ever. Bet you could make five steaks out of one of them. No little tennisball here.
Starfleet low-rank officers now wear Imperial Snub-Caps for dress occasions, very foreboding. At the Starfleet hearing I almost did a double-take. To me, the costumes and uniforms were all gorgeous and well-chosen throughout the movie (especially Peter Weller's "TMP" uniform), except for the dark grey Starship Troopers dress uniforms and the Death Star caps. I really liked the Zero-G outfits and sensible helmets, best in Trek so far, especially compared to the spacewalk stuff in Voyager.
The Dreadnought Class "Vengeance" had three things going for her:
1:, the two spherical weapons clusters under the deflector were boss as fuck, used to great advantage. Exactly the right width and length of the phaser-volleys too (maybe a bit knifier), and red, like in TWOK.
2:, the reason for the hole in the saucer was explained, it held a massive, downwards-expanding gun platform. Made me think of three-nacelled 1701-D.
3:, The Vengeance made the Enterprise look like a small and nimble pearly-white frigate. She finally looked the part, like the bobbing and weaving thing seen in The Undiscovered Country. I kinda wish they would've thrown a nebula in there too. And they should've made the Vengeance slick gunmetal grey, would've made her look like a DeLorean battleship, completing the 80's lovefest circle in a stylish way.
I'm not crazy about Zoe Zaldana, but my opinion of her style is opposite from Ginger's, I think she had way too much frowny, scolding attitude in the first movie, while Nichelle Nichols was a glittering little happy flower most of the time (until TWOK, where she got cooler). In this movie she did get a bit passive-aggressive, but at least not as insubordinate as the last movie. I never saw her do this in any of the Klingon scenes, though, was this in the movie? If so, I never caught it.
I liked that Spock got subtly bothered by Alice Eve's presence, implying (more or less) that the ship was too small for "two" bridge science officers. Using only perfectly logical tone, of course.
I enjoyed seeing the new alien crew members. The cartographer or whatever he was seemed to be a Bynar, for lack of a better guess. Their first showing in TNG wasn't a "first contact" meeting, was it? They'd already established diplomatic connections by then?
Those torpedoes looked appropriately 1982-ish, I thought. I liked the exhaust nozzles.
I don't think Michael Giacchino has enough balls to be Trek music composer. Not that Jerry Goldsmith ever bit the heads off of bats or anything, but James Horner's pomp was sorely missed here, I thought. Sure, he uses the same Horn-blasts in Avatar, Aliens and TWOK, but damnit it works for me. I wonder if he says "You just got Hornered" when submitting his final drafts.
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Nim - Bynars were members of the Federation by the time of 1100101, but important to remember that the Abrams timeline apparently has a lot of information on the world of the "prime" timeline up to the mid-to-late 24th century, so maybe they were actively sought out?
posted
True. He did seem tall for a Bynar, though, and he spoke with english syntax, so maybe an alternative Bynar or just a very augmented humanoid of some other species. He had a neat shunt in the back of his head.
I don't think it was ever made clear if the Bynars had naturally evolved binary thought processes or if they had voluntarily gone to stage 5 of 10 on the way to Borgness, through the use of implants.
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I saw the film yesterday. I'm all over the place. There were bits I liked, and there were bits I despised. I thought the movie demonstrated some lazy writing, and I thought there was a chance to do something completely different with Khan: make him a hero. I think that would've made STID both a compelling film and one that will not be compared to Star Trek II -- and then, always, always, only in a negative light.
One thing I really enjoyed was that atrium corridor set. It really had the feel of some of Probert's ideas for the interior of the -D.
Registered: Sep 2000
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I saw the movie this afternoon. I liked it more than the first film, maybe because it didn't need a tie-in comic to make plot more sense. In fact, I think the tie-in comic had very little to do with this movie. But I digress:
Nibiru scene - Meh. The natives draw an image of the Big E's top side, even though the only got a good look at its front and bottom. If Spock didn't like Kirk's violation of the Prime Directive, why did he go along with mission and even volunteer for the most dangerous part?
So in the event of an attack all high-level Starfleet Officers are to meet in the poorly guarded Starfleet HQ. They're at the same level of intelligence as the Jedi Council.
So Praxis has already exploded? The "D4 class" Bird of Prey - its the Klingon equivalent of a VTOL Osprey. I wanted to hate this design, but considering its purpose as a patrol vessel its one of the more sensible ship designs in the reboot universe.
Lots of civilian vehicles on Earth, and shuttles seen throughout the film. I think they reused the Kelvin shuttle design. The troop transport from the last film appears to have been redesigned, its fold out wings are longer in length, and folds out at a much steeper angle than before. There's also a variant for hauling cargo, seen at the Vengeance's drydock. Aside from the Vengeance, no new Starfleet designs, but the Newton-type and Armstrong-type do make brief appearances.
So yeah, Kahn. He was ultimately the d-bag we know and love. But were those crocodile tears he shed in the brig? Magic blood- I don't know. I mean if Kahn had rapid regenerative abilities, it would come in handy in The Wrath of Kahn, where he's all effed up after the Enterprise severely damages the Reliant. Also his jump from the crashed Vengeance seemed implausible.
He doesn't die, which leaves open the possibility he could come back. If they don't bring him back, whoever is the next villain has tough act to follow. It would have been nice to see the Botany Bay.
The reverse Kirk and Spock TWOK scene; my initiate reaction was, "Oh no, please don't do this". Then it changed to, "Well at least he didn't die from falling of a bridge, and then the bridge falling on him." But then I remembered Lazarus tribble and Kahn's blood, and another reset button was born.
I apologize for the stream-of-conscience writing, there's a lot to digest here, and its not nearly as a non-nonsensical as the last film.
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So a covert ship design is the largest ship ever? That's a bit like painting an Iowa class battleship black and assigning it for stealth missions... As to the fanboy nods...I wonder if that's in reaction to the negative views many of the hardcore Trek fans had regarding the 2009 movie?
Praxis is already gone...um...taht seals the whole "completely alternate universe" theory for me- i's one thing to rationalize stuff like early bynar contact due to Spock breaking Temporal Prime Directive, but the Klingons would not have been so impacted by that as to exhaust their...ozone...layer... Fuck it- nothing of what spock says in SYVI made shit for sense anyway.
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