capped
I WAS IN THE FUTURE, IT WAS TOO LATE TO RSVP
Member # 709
posted
I think the E-A was new, and just was decommissioned to make room for a newer type ship.. just because other Connies were milked to the end of their operational lifetimes doesnt mean that Starfleet would still try to give it a long run.. obviously it would still be useful, but as a stripped ship sold to a different government for the rest of its lifetime..
-------------------- "Are you worried that your thoughts are not quite.. clear?"
Registered: Sep 2001
| IP: Logged
posted
It's been years, and I'm still amazed at the assumptions made by so many people about the end of Star Trek IV... Why is it so hard to think that the Yorktown and Saratoga revived when the Probe left the same way Spacedock and Earth did? Why does it seem everyone thinks that the sentencing of Kirk and his command crew took place immediately after they were plucked from the waters of San Francisco Bay?
I see nothing wrong with the notion that the disabled ships powered back up after the Probe left, that the Yorktown returned to Spacedock for decommissioning, that her crew was already slated to move on to a new Excelsior-class Yorktown (whatever class it was, this was the ship Tuvok's parents served on later on toward the turn of the century), that Kirk and Company were thoroughly debriefed and the Klingon BoP was salvaged -- taking a few days, and that the Federation Council's deliberations took several days more before the sentencing scene we saw.
--Jonah
-------------------- "That's what I like about these high school girls, I keep getting older, they stay the same age."
--David "Woody" Wooderson, Dazed and Confused
Registered: Feb 2001
| IP: Logged
posted
I have no problem with most of those things, but I do think the Yorktown was offed for good. Spacedock got power restored immediately after the Probe left; "Captain Vijay" reported his ship dead in space several hours after the Probe had passed. And I saw no reason to think that the Probe would actively assist the humans it had harmed - at most, it would cease to actively jam Spacedock.
It's unclear whether the Probe ever paid a thought to humans at any point. Had it done so, it would probably have killed every last human after having had that short chat with George and Gracie... Ignoring us was probably the most humane thing the Probe could do. And thus the Yorktown would only regain power when Starfleet engineers restored it for her.
Also, I see no problem with half the crew of a ship being told "move on to a garbage scow" and the other half "haul your butts to Starbase 123", without this being an insult or a commendation to the crew. Theirs is not to ask why. If Starfleet wants to give Kirk an empty ship, it gives Kirk that ship and sends the former crew away, and that's that. It's pretty silly that a single crew would cling on to a certain ship for any length of time anyway.
Not that I think Starfleet gave Kirk an empty ship, anyway. Probably he got an existing crew, with just his famous top officers transferred along with him. Or half a crew, as ST5 makes it look like.
And the time interval between the courtroom and the E-A test drive could have been *years* for all we know. The looks and ranks of the heroes did not change much during the later movies, so there's no way to really tell if years had passed.
posted
Good points, as always, Timo... I always interpreted the Probe's effect to be an active jamming -- that is, once it encountered an object under power, it automatically damped it, and kept it dampened until it relented. Short of the Probe being somehow able to alter the composition of those ships' Deuterium and/or antimatter, there's no reason why they wouldn't be able to generate power once the Probe had passed -- unless something were actively supressing onboard power transfer systems.
To invert your argument, why should the Probe continue the damping effect on those ships if it had lifted it on Spacedock, the ships in it, and the Earth herself?
--Jonah
-------------------- "That's what I like about these high school girls, I keep getting older, they stay the same age."
--David "Woody" Wooderson, Dazed and Confused
Registered: Feb 2001
| IP: Logged
posted
Good question. As the Yorktown (and supposedly at least the Shepard as well) remained powerless long after the Probe had passed, we have three explanations:
1) The Probe kept on jamming the specific ships across apparently interstellar distances.
2) The Probe delivered powerful blasts that momentarily disrupted the power nets of the targets. A spacedock had the resources to repair the damage, so the Probe had to keep on delivering the blasts. A mere starship did not, so a single blast knocked the ship out of action for good (or at least for the duration of the adventure).
3) The Probe used two different jamming systems to begin with. The ships were simply hit by the "bow shock" of the traveling vehicle, while Spacedock was actively jammed from afar.
Alternatives 1 and 2 allow for the Yorktown to recover as soon as the Probe departs. Alternatives 2 and 3 allow for a prolonged effect on the ships. All seem acceptable, although none is explicitly supported.
But only 1 requires that the Probe be actively "fighting" the ships and stations. In both 2 and 3, the deactivation of the ships could be a minor side effect of the Probe's normal operations. In 2, a brief pass by the Probe would hit the ships once, but a steady orbit would subject the Spacedock to constant bombardment. In 3, the ships could have been disabled by the Probe's equivalent of a navigational deflector, while the station (and the Excelsior and the Bounty) would have been jammed by the Whale Phone & Ocean Boiler device instead of or in addition to the nav deflector.
I think I'm a sucker for the "superior indifference" interpretation. The Probe just wouldn't stoop to actively fighting Starfleet...
posted
Incidently, it occurs to me that, for all the talk of TMP being the only Trek film to really grab a high concept SF idea, The Voyage Home has that beat with the Probe. A fantastically powerfully but totally alien entity, with none of this "It's just looking for God" nonsense. Motives totally nonunderstandable, as I fear any real alien's motives would be.
Registered: Mar 1999
| IP: Logged
posted
OK, maybe this is a stupid question (I just thought of this, btw): if those ships lost all internal power, then how did Yorktown even have power for the subspace radio? Further, if all power went off line, then wouldn't the magnetic containment fields on the antimatter pods go down and...POOF?
Registered: Mar 2002
| IP: Logged
capped
I WAS IN THE FUTURE, IT WAS TOO LATE TO RSVP
Member # 709
posted
quote:if those ships lost all internal power, then how did Yorktown even have power for the subspace radio?
Um.. the engineer rigged a makeshift solar collector.. its what the dude was talking about on the screen.. were ya listenin'?.
And I'm sure there are some non-power failsafes on the antimatter in case the captain doesnt pay the electric bill. Possibly magnetic containment is achieved from non-powered means (i.e. the bottles are made of magneticly endowed material that doesnt require a constant charge) or possibly they could have been jettisoned..
thanks for playing
-------------------- "Are you worried that your thoughts are not quite.. clear?"
Registered: Sep 2001
| IP: Logged
posted
I thought the Probes motives were to find out what happened to the whales it had been in contact with, and that in it's efforts to communicate with them, it was damaging humanoid technology, most certainly because it didn't care rather than through any act of malice.
There were far too many sentences in that sentence.
And if there's so long between the court scene and Kirk getting the Ent-A, you'd think he would have had time to buy a proper Captain's jacket, rather than just changing the rank on his admiral one.
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
Registered: Mar 1999
| IP: Logged
posted
Surely that was more good story telling than anything inherantly "Sci-fi" about it? Or are you saying that sci-fi villians (such as it was) don't need to have their motives explained out as much as regular villians?
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
Registered: Mar 1999
| IP: Logged
posted
Well, I'm suggesting that it is somehow better for a film to only hint at things and allow viewers to draw their own conclusions than to drag them through long explanations.
Which isn't to say that's what I think TMP did. Or that I think this is hard and fast rule. It's just something interesting I was thinking about due to the thread.
Registered: Mar 1999
| IP: Logged
posted
I saw ST4 as the ultimate expression of Gene's insistence that conflict results from miscommunication.
Usually, that would make for dull stories, as much of early TNG stands witness: a personified enemy turns out to be a reasonable fellow who actually teaches our heroes a thing or two. But ST4 sort of turns that around. The heroes *cannot* communicate with the villain, not even at the conclusion of the movie. They have to do all their learning by themselves, fighting the enemy known as "the human race" in order to complete their mission. Not only do they triumph over the barbarism of the 20th century mankind, they also humbly accept their own incomprehension and limitations. I agree, you don't necessarily need a sci-fi vehicle to have all this - but this sci-fi vehicle certainly works well with the story.
In ST4, the heroes are minor side players in the story of their lives. These guys save the world, and what do they get out of it? Kirk ends up with a demotion, an over-the-shoulder LJBF and a sorry little rust bucket pretending to be his old ship. And seems quite content with that for a change. His adventures may still be on the juvenile side, but he's certainly matured as a person.
And of course, ST4 is cool for showing us more of Starfleet than all of TOS did...
posted
I see no reason why the E-A couldn't have been the Yorktown.
Why replace an old ship set for decommissioning with another ship around the same age, you ask? Well many people like to believe that the E-nil was the first Constitution to undergo the refit. A few less years on all the new components would have made the Yorktown newer in one sense. But really, they could have been the same age and slated for decommissioning at the same time.
Let's say that the Constitution class is nearing the end of its operational lifetime. The design may just not have been compatible with the latest and greatest innovations. Maybe it had become too expensive to refit these old ships again. Better to invest in a shiny new Miranda that is easier to upgrade. So SF Command decides to decommission each old Constitution when it becomes due for a refit. During ST II-IV, both the Enterprise and Yorktown could have not been due for a refit for another 10-15 years. However, the Enterprise is severely damaged in battle with the Reliant, making it necessary to either conduct expensive repairs or decommission the ship. Starfleet does the latter. By this same reasoning, the E-A's damage in ST VI could've accelerated its decommissioning too. Though the crew is set to retire, nothing is said about the ship being decommissioned until the end after it took heavy damage.
-------------------- "Existence is random. Has no pattern save what we imagine after staring at it too long. No meaning save what we choose to impose. This rudderless world is not shaped by vague metaphysical forces. It is not God who kills the children. Not fate that butchers them or destiny that feeds them to the dogs. It?s us. Only us." Rorschach
Registered: Mar 1999
| IP: Logged
posted
I was always slightly amazed that Starfleet managed to accuratly summerise the condition of the ship roughly 7 minutes after it arrived at Kitomer.
Okay, it might have been in orbit for a while, but still, doesn't ordering a decommisioning sound like the sort of thing that would require a more thorough inspection at a Starbase?
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
Registered: Mar 1999
| IP: Logged
Printer-friendly view of this topic
