posted
Hannibal Lecter took 'em, along with the skin to the shuttlecraft.
[Mark tries in vain to imitate Lecter's slurping-hissing thing]
Anyway, I think it looks spiffy, though I question the actual need of it. What's wrong with using a shuttle for low-level searching? Or a hover-anything, for that matter? Perhaps antigrav technology can't work on this planet because of some wierd property of its isodiametricpseudomagnetic whatsit?
-------------------- Picard: Mr. Crusher, what's our maximum speed this week? Wesley: [checking manual] Uh, 9.4, sir. Picard: Very good. Take us to Warp 9.8 then. Wesley: Aye, sir. Warp 9.2 it is.
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
Viewing the trailer, the Argo is both the name of the Jeep and the Shuttlecraft. The shuttle design is...neat. It has nacelles built directly into the bulk of the ship, with 4 little winglets that come out (big ones sloping downward on the bottom and little ones sloping upward on the top. They appear to compactly fit into the side of the shuttlecraft, kid of like how modern naval aircraft have foldable wings for use on aircraft carriers to save space.
-------------------- "Lotta people go through life doing things badly. Racing's important to men who do it well. When you're racing, it's life. Anything that happens before or after is just waiting."
-Steve McQueen as Michael Delaney, LeMans
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
Wings could presumably still be vaguely useful for maneuvering even on a craft with antigrav.
-------------------- "I was surprised by the matter-of-factness of Kafka's narration, and the subtle humor present as a result." (Sizer 2005)
Registered: Mar 1999
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Siwiak
Ex-Member
posted
I dunno... I bet my Saturn could beat the little dune buggy, what with my plastic sides and all making me light-weight. We'll have to wait for close-ups to see if its equipped with a CD-player, or just an AM radio.
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posted
So, has anyone nicknamed this new shuttle a hopper yet? 'Cause, you know, it seems vaguely like something that might be called that. I guess.
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
Personally, I find the design of the "Jeep" very bad. It's too contemporary and sticking Starfleet like plating on it doesn't cut it.
Also, if the script I read was accurate, I really dislike the way it's used.
As to the shuttle, I wish one of these designers would do some research into actual aerodynamics instead of sticking fins and wings on things. And, just once, I'd like to see a wing with a wing's cross-section and not just a flat plywood panel. I can't really tell with this shuttle, but past experience doesn't give me much hope that this would be the case.
-------------------- "Well, I mean, it's generally understood that, of all of the people in the world, Mike Nelson is the best." -- ULTRA MAGNUS, steadfast in curmudgeon
Registered: Feb 2001
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posted
Well, I may get used to the shuttle, but why did they make it Batmobile-black instead of green? Only because it looks more fashionable, I suppose.
My god, that jeep is awful! Looks like it was ripped off from Mad Max or something like that. In addition, if it's really Federation, we have another inconsistency, considering that in the 23rd and 24th century no one seems to be familiar with cars or anything with wheels any longer (Harry didn't even recognize a car when he was standing in front of one). If you can have a hovercar (for 300 years) and all the nifty antigrav technology (for 200 years), why still build something with wheels?
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
Well, yeah. I was just talking randomly, it seems.
At the same time, we've heard the term "hopper" attached to a couple of really different-sounding vehicles. A civilian space-coupe and a military transport, among others, if I recall correctly. Perhaps it's 24th century slang for any dedicated surface-to-orbit vehicle? (The Space Shuttle would be a hopper, Apollo would not, even though both can go from the ground to orbit and back (albeit in rather different ways)). Or perhaps hoppers are more like proposed hypersonic ramjet flights from New York to Tokyo, with brief-exoatmospheric excursions along the top of their flights. In other words, vehicles primarily devoted to getting things from planet-point A to planet-point B, with escape velocity capabilities (since, really, what can't reach escape velocity in Star Trek, considering how compact some of those engines are) but not dedicated to a more general purpose mission profile like your average John Q. Shuttlecraft.
I suspect I've gotten a little far afield with this. Anyway, in my definition a hopper wouldn't have warp drive, which this shuttle appears to have. Or do my eyes decieve me?
Registered: Mar 1999
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![[Roll Eyes]](rolleyes.gif)
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