quote:Yesterday's Enterprise BoP:s /../ remain an embarassment to the franchise
Wow, I think all of 3 viewers cared about that in the original airing. It was another timeline of utter war, so there. If anything, "Yesterday's Enterprise" is the perfect precedent to legitimize scaling up BoP:s again. Not that they necessarily will.
Anyway, I never mentioned BoP sizes in my previous post, that was projection on your part. When it comes to new ships in new Trek-movies, I care about visual style, sound effects and soundscape, warp animation, weapons, interiors, etc. Focusing on how big an arbitrary ship is in comparison to another arbitrary ship from a movie 30 years ago is not on the top of my list. Especially not since about every Trek episode ever has misrepresented "100 000 kilometers" as being "ten ship-lengths away".
"Cloverprise" is cute, but I don't think it's gonna work any better than "Benghazi-Gate". And the Constitution class was not up-scaled without sense, Alex Jaeger explains it clearly: "Once we got the ship built and started putting it in environments, it felt too small. The shuttle bay gave us a clear relative scale — shuttlecraft initially appeared much bigger than we had imagined — so we bumped up the Enterprise scale, which gave her a grander feel and allowed us to include more detail." They're breaking with tradition for the sake of cinematography. Works for me.
On another note, I just rewatched ST:Insurrection, and had forgotten what a piece of crap that movie was. The story was ok on the face of it, if a bit small-fry, but the crew-scenes were interminably awkward, the Briar battles were rubbish and the S'ona were weak third-rate antagonists.
That's when I realized that apart from 2, 3, 6, and 8, the Trek movies are subpar when viewed with the standards used on other movies. First movie was slow and anemic, 4 and 5 felt frivolous and inconsequential, Generations was a jumbled mess hinging on an idiotic macguffin (the Nexus), Insurrection was an expensive two-part episode, and Nemesis was a death rattle. I really like the battles in ST:X, some of the best since TWoK, and Tom Hardy does try his hardest with what he's given (and after his success with Bane and all his other recent movies, some people might want to rewatch it just to see him), but yeah, it didn't have the immediate threat of First Contact, just a potential threat, and the Remans were unnecessary and shallow, where renegade Romulans would've been more logical and less Nosferatuish.
When I thought further I realized that even the good ST-movies are occasionally crappy or camp: TWoK-Scotty carrying his dying crewman to the bridge instead of sickbay for drama-points, Kruge conveniently getting a stone pillar raising under him so he can lunge at Kirk (at no group viewing I've done has that not gotten a laugh), Chang's obsession with the Original Klingon Shakespeare, Kirk's Superman-save of the President followed by standing ovation, Troi having a career-first lapse of judgement and getting shitfaced on whisky.
We tend to accept those things on the whole, take the good with the bad and view the old movies with a very forgiving eye, and that's ok, but let's be realistic, Trek has always been camp entertainment with an underlining of futuristic utopia, even in TOS (Gorn, Mudd), so the new movies have a much lower bar to clear than some make it out to be.
I agree ST:2009 had faults, but it was neither a snooze fest nor over-restrained like ST:1, which in some ways is the movie most similar to ST:2009 in scope and framework.
If nothing else, the trailer for the upcoming sequel makes it clear they're going to keep focusing on action and adventure, something Picard's crew ultimately tried and failed at, and I think the new crew does a better job with it. But I have no idea how the new movie will be and withhold judgement. After all, I liked Casino Royale and disliked Quantum of Solace. Skyfall was ok, except for the parliament scene.
[ February 23, 2013, 10:25 AM: Message edited by: Nim ]
Registered: Aug 1999
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Yeah 2,3,6,8 were the cream of the crop. 10 could have ended TNG (nay the entire prime universe) on a high note, having a decent story that would have brought lasting peace between the Federation and the Romulans. A ST 6 rehash perhaps, but I would have preferred it over the tired, hack story we got.
Also more info on Captain April from the comic. At one point April asks Kirk how his ship is doing, to which Kirk replies that April's Enterprise was decommissioned two years ago, and that Kirk's Enterprise is an entirely different ship. So that means that either the NX-01 had a really long service history, or that there existed another Starfleet Enterprise between the NX-01 and the NCC-1701, at least in this new universe.
Also Harry Mudd is now a blonde Bajoran woman, but let's not think about that.
Registered: Feb 2005
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Nim, "Cloverprise" is the term the modeling community has adopted for this turkey- I assume neither credit nor responsibility. We're hoping that the ship crashes will be rebuilt with something closer to the Refit's proportions, or hell, as long as they are useing a saucer the size of an Ambassador, why not use that general configuration? Whatever they do, those zeppelin nacelles have got to go.
Alex Jaeger's POV aside, no, the ship really makes fuck off for sense- the external windows and docking ports are all for giants or at 1.8 decks tall- Bernd does a good breakdown of these issues at EAS. The ship was loosely based on Gaberial Korener's design, which I rather like, but then someone took that and started changing proportions untill it looks like a ship in a funhouse mirror...fucking hideous.
That being said, I think every other federation design in the movie is fantastic. The less said about that supposed Romulan mining ship the better- the pinacle of clusterfuck, and I thought the Scimitar was as bad as things could get!
As to ST:Insurrection, yeah, dont forget that the Sona command ship is flying backward for the whole movie- in spite of what should have been an obvious design simmularity between the command ship and battleship (pointy parts forward), the VFX boys made the CG model fly around ass-first...
You certainly have apoint about the campy part and how we overlook that stuff in favor of the cool parts- with the "great" movies having a higher ratio of awesome>camp.
Over at Starshipmodeler.net, we have been talking about the things in the Star Wars prequels that we LIKED, and it devolved into a total bashing of the awful camp that was RTOJ...
It's all about perception, I suppose- of all the Trek movies I think First Contact is the only one cheese free...I can forgive the drunken councelor bit as required for understanding Cochrane's world...sorta.
quote:Also Harry Mudd is now a blonde Bajoran woman, but let's not think about that.
If ever there was a sentence to damn the JJverse, that was it.
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
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I hate Harry Mudd, if they can get a drunken, manizing bajoran girl to do his bits, like a Kristen Wiig type, that could be interesting. I was ok with Idris Elba as Heimdall in Thor, I think he's a cool dude.
I hope we get to see as many new designs as possible in ST:ID. I think that "klingon" ship might only be an attack shuttle, not a proper Bird of Prey, since it's chasing what seems to be a Federation shuttle.
Regarding the Prequels, I feel all three of them are weak, but AOTC had the best crowd-pleasing bits with the Obi-Boba fights and the lightsaber stuff in the end, only time in SW-movie history that someone dual-wields, if only for 2.5 seconds. Many people lament the Anakin romance scenes, I tend to ignore them altogether. But lets not get side-tracked here.
Yes, many people dislike the mining ship, I was glad it at least went in a different direction, opting for the Kraken-style of ships, violent and unpredictable. Which reminds me, I'm looking forward to getting Dead Space 3 in a few months. It's available for PC already, but I always wait at least six months until a few patches and bug fixes have come out. The first game was set on the Ishimura, which is now one of my all-time favorite game settings, one hell of a city ship, loved it, especially the bridge atrium, very eerie and panoramic. The third game is said to have some really nice and novel settings, looking forward to it.
I hope they bring in some more alien races into ST:ID, there are so many in the Federation. Still holding out for an official rendition of the Tzenkethi, at some point. ;
Registered: Aug 1999
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quote:So that means that either the NX-01 had a really long service history, or that there existed another Starfleet Enterprise between the NX-01 and the NCC-1701, at least in this new universe.
The latter is true. April's Enterprise is shown a couple pages later.
Registered: Mar 2000
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It's basically just a ship that looks 99% like the Abramsprise (although the bridge interior is a cross between the new bridge and the TOS bridge). It would have been nice if the comic artists had any sense of originality, but apparently they don't.
And you can't see any registry number on the ship either.
-------------------- "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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Yes I finally got a picture of it. How uninspired. Why would you build a ship, decommission it, and then build an almost exact copy of it?
Registered: Feb 2005
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The same reason why they give a recent academy graduate a command of the flagship and a full commission to captain. I'm just shooting in the air here though.
-------------------- "Its coming on. I just saw the wall move..."
Registered: Feb 2008
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quote:Originally posted by shikaru808: The same reason why they give a recent academy graduate a command of the flagship and a full commission to captain. I'm just shooting in the air here though.
The comic writers and artists have nothing to do with the scriptwriters of the movies.
-------------------- "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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-------------------- "Never give up. And never, under any circumstances, no matter what - never face the facts." - Ruth Gordon
Registered: Mar 2000
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quote:Originally posted by Mars Needs Women: Yes I finally got a picture of it. How uninspired. Why would you build a ship, decommission it, and then build an almost exact copy of it?
Maybe it's supposed to actually be the same size as the TOS Enterprise, not the humongous Abramsprise?
Yep, I see it. It's not like they made it easy to find, did they?
-------------------- "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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This is very sloppy work; the pylon attaching to the frontmost part of the nacelle, the saucer rim being 0 degrees incline, the ventral saucer texture is pasted on and doesn't curve with the perspective.
If I were still anally inclined (I left that part of me behind years ago, after retroactively naming all the ships in the docking scene of "Matrix Reloaded", then watching the sequel and having them all be destroyed off-camera in a throwaway-line. "Fuck this", said I), I would call this Aprilprise, since 'prising is the new black.
Registered: Aug 1999
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quote:Originally posted by shikaru808: The same reason why they give a recent academy graduate a command of the flagship and a full commission to captain. I'm just shooting in the air here though.
The comic writers and artists have nothing to do with the scriptwriters of the movies.
Unfortunately not so- back when DC had the liscence, they had srious restrictions on making new Federation designs- possibly there are simmular limits imposed on the current batch of comics...not that DC ever hired an artist that bothered to draw any of the ships better than a third grader. Hell, even as a Trek junkie back in the mid 80's I could not stomach their comics.
quote:Originally posted by Spike:
quote:Originally posted by Dukhat: And you can't see any registry number on the ship either.
On the other hand, looking at that pic, I thin the artist might just suck- his editors too, for letting that get to press. I particularly like how the artist added no aztec pattern and only minimal detail and how the colorist decided to just impose some rectangles over te saucer that in no way match the ship's hull or perspective. Amazing that such shit can be considered professional work while hundreds of fansites turn out incredible caliber work just for the love of Trek. On the plus side, it looks like they put the correct number of windows to match the decks on this ship, unlike thhe Cloverprise...I'm sure that it was unintentional though, as they did not put any other details like docking ports pr RCS or any detail in the deflector or...
Really, the best thing Paramount could do would be to give the comics franchise to Dark Horse- they are losing the Star Wars liscence this year when it's terms expire because Disney now owns SW and Marvel...but damnit, Dark Horse too SW to amazing new heights- they could do as much for Trek by focusing on the so called Lost Era between TOS' movies and TNG.
Nim that large expansive bridge you linked in looks cool...but the central open area is either a wste of space or possibly genius- I can see many people gracefully moving through that area in zero G, each with their own portable (or holographic) command station. On a spaceship, I'd guess clastraphobia would be a real issue after a while, so making the working areas as open as possible would make sense.
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