Topic: A Good Old Fashioned Star Trek XI Starship discussion! ($$$SPOILERS$$$)
Amasov Prime
lensfare-induced epileptic shock
Member # 742
posted
IF there was such an exceptional story, if we had the next big thing in SF storytelling at our hands, and the thing that would keep it from happening was our reverence towards canon. Keep in mind that there has never been such a story that could not be told within the framework of canon. Authors got used to it, and Star Trek is quite open when it comes to possible restrictions for writers. IF Ron Moore had respected the canon and continued BSG, it wouldn't have become the great show it is. *That* is the kind of exception I'm talking about. XI on the other hand is just an excuse to wipe the slate of clean with regard to hard canon while at the same time being able to refer to the tentpoles of Trek (did someone mention Khan for XII?). It quite intelligent, but at the same time incredibly cheap.
Registered: Nov 2001
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A supernova is a natural phenomenon; it cannot travel faster than light. The idea that Spock could have been en route in Vulcan's fastest ship and been beaten to Romulus by the supernova is ludicrous.
As for the so-called "black holes," they behave absolutely nothing like what we know of real black holes. The time travel thing is the least of it, I don't even mind that. There's just no conception in anyone's mind in the film that after swallowing Vulcan, or Nero's ship, or whatever, a black hole would only grow and continue to suck in more matter until it ate everything. It's not just something that can be shrugged off or magically disappear once the drama is over.
The only semblance of believability technologies like warp drive and transporters have are their self-imposed limitations. If those limitations can be circumvented willy nilly at anyone's convenience through whatever plot device, they become totally unbelievable.
On the larger issue of continuity, I do not believe it stifles creativity at all. Most of the time, the only reason to violate it is laziness, both on the part of the writer and the audience. You can talk all you want about canon getting in the way of good storytelling, but in my considered opinion, if your story violates the principal internal order (physical or historical) of the fictional universe in which it takes place, IT IS NOT A GOOD STORY. If you have to use contrivances that are disruptive to suspension of disbelief, IT IS NOT A GOOD STORY. PERIOD.
If you don't want to be bothered with actually knowing what has or hasn't been done and said, if you want a clean slate, to start from scratch, then do just that. Make up your own damn fictional universe instead of running amuck in one that's already been established. Invent something new and unique instead of constantly trying to reinvent, rework, reimagine, reboot, remake, repackage, rebrand, retread everything. Pop culture is becoming unhealthily derivative and people are eating it up with a spoon.
The new film was fun and exciting to watch for two hours after years with no Star Trek. The actors, for the most part, played their roles endearingly. The SFX were on the high side of average. The story was a bloody mess, though. Leaving wholly aside any contradictions that could be justified by the premise, even excusing the gaping plot holes as par for the course, it served no purpose other than to present a parade of (somewhat) familiar characters. If that was a good science (or even social science) fiction story then I'm very sad to be living in this very sorry era of science fiction.
-MMoM
-------------------- The flaws we find most objectionable in others are often those we recognize in ourselves.
Registered: Jun 2001
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posted
I think it boils down to the nature of the medium in which you choose to tell your stories. If you want to write stories for a series, people expect it to fit together into a believable, consistent faux-reality. That's part of the fun. Identifying with characters you care about and getting to eventually fit together the pieces of their lives.
If you want to tell good, one-shot stories, write a novel.
WizArtist II
"How can you have a yellow alert in Spacedock? "
Member # 1425
posted
The reason why we get all these retreads is that Hollywood is not going to take the time or gamble money on something that could be a risk. Taking the familiar and tweaking it has an automatic built in audience. People are familiar with the story/characters/backgrounds and it then allows for a bunch of "Oooh-ahhhs" from SFX to make it a "Blockbuster".
If you have something that is totally different, the returns are nowhere near as immediate. The audience has to grow through word of mouth and much more hype. A following has to grow. Then there is always the chance that it does not become the next Star Wars or Terminator. That is NOT instant monetary gratification that the Ho'-wood leeches demand. Hence we get retreads of the familiar or movies based off of fond memories of childhood toys/heroes.
The trouble is, that Familiarity breeds contempt.
-------------------- There are 10 types of people in the world...those that understand Binary and those that don't.
Registered: Nov 2004
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quote:Originally posted by The Mighty Monkey of Mim: [QB] A supernova is a natural phenomenon; it cannot travel faster than light. The idea that Spock could have been en route in Vulcan's fastest ship and been beaten to Romulus by the supernova is ludicrous.
You're making the (possibly flawed) assumption that Spock departed from Romulus. The "fastest ship" was built by the Vulcan Science Institute, so he could concievably have gone back to Vulcan to get the red matter, and tried to fly back to Romulus in Vulcan's fastest ship, but didn't make it in time before the Supernova got there.
quote:As for the so-called "black holes," they behave absolutely nothing like what we know of real black holes. The time travel thing is the least of it, I don't even mind that. There's just no conception in anyone's mind in the film that after swallowing Vulcan, or Nero's ship, or whatever, a black hole would only grow and continue to suck in more matter until it ate everything. It's not just something that can be shrugged off or magically disappear once the drama is over.
Spock was the one that called it a "Black Hole". If the singularity didn't actually behave like a black hole (about which very little is known, incidentally), then perhaps it wasn't an actual black hole, and Spock was generalising. Perhaps it was a micro-singularity, like the ones that were theoretically going to blink in and out of existance every few fractions of a second in the LHC at CERN? You're assuming that nothing new about science could possibly be discovered in the next couple of centuries; think about how many times scientific assumptions have been proven wrong in the past.
As for the rest... I hope you enjoyed getting the rant out of your system. I happen to agree with very little of it... but then I see stuff like the Star Trek franchise as just being "a story". In the same way that the classic novels get retold in slightly different ways from time to time, I don't see why such a damn good story can't be retold in such a way that it *doesn't* exclude a whole new audience.
I mean, come on: how many new viewers do you honestly think would have gone to see the movie, if it had just slotted in with the continuity? Either it would have needed to spend ages re-introducing the characters (which would be boring for fans), or it would have not bothered, and thus confused and alienated the new viewers. This way, they came up with a compromise that allowed them to describe familiar characters and situations, but in such a way that was new for everyone.
Its fun. It was enjoyable. You said so yourself. At the end of the day, why the hell does anything beyond that matter? Its a movie, for Kirk's sake!
Registered: May 2009
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quote:Originally posted by Captain Untouchable: You're making the (possibly flawed) assumption that Spock departed from Romulus. The "fastest ship" was built by the Vulcan Science Institute, so he could concievably have gone back to Vulcan to get the red matter, and tried to fly back to Romulus in Vulcan's fastest ship, but didn't make it in time before the Supernova got there.
I was actually assuming he left from Vulcan. The point is that a supernova in even a nearby system wouldn't pose a direct threat to Romulus for years. It's not an instantaneous event. It's not going to sneak up on you.
quote:Spock was the one that called it a "Black Hole". If the singularity didn't actually behave like a black hole (about which very little is known, incidentally), then perhaps it wasn't an actual black hole, and Spock was generalising. Perhaps it was a micro-singularity, like the ones that were theoretically going to blink in and out of existance every few fractions of a second in the LHC at CERN? You're assuming that nothing new about science could possibly be discovered in the next couple of centuries; think about how many times scientific assumptions have been proven wrong in the past.
Even granting all that as potentially true, you're giving the filmmakers far too much credit and missing the point. There's a difference between the rationale behind a film and the rationalizations the audience comes up with to smooth things over when the former is lacking. I am criticizing one, not the other. I fully support any rationalizations we may need to posit to make sense of the nonsense displayed in the movie. I do not support a creative policy that considers these matters of scientific plausibility to be immaterial in devising the story to be told.
quote:As for the rest... I hope you enjoyed getting the rant out of your system. I happen to agree with very little of it...
You are, of course, free to disagree with it. It would be a pretty boring and static world if we all agreed about everything. We all have our own points of view, and it's nice to have a place like this to talk about them with people who share some of the same interests.
quote:I don't see why such a damn good story can't be retold in such a way that it *doesn't* exclude a whole new audience.
You keep using the phrase "good story" without defining what you mean by it. What is so good about the story presented in the film? Grieving villain on killing spree stopped by gifted teenagers.
The problem with action movies is that their stories are not created around unified controlling ideas, but rather around the desired action sequences. The story is incidental, merely a way of getting from one fight or explosion to another. The plot serves no purpose other than to showcase action and scenery-chewing.
That is not what Star Trek should be, IMO. It should be about presenting scientific, social, moral, and philosophical dilemmas and exploring their possible outcomes through a combination of logic (reasoned discourse and experimentation) and human ingenuity (creativity and adaptability). These issues should be ones that are--or may, in the future, be--directly relevent to our lives. There should be some kind of actual intellectual content that we can learn from or that can at least get us to think about something other than how cool those explosions were or what a badass Kirk is. The action should be the incidental component of the plot instead of the other way around.
quote:I mean, come on: how many new viewers do you honestly think would have gone to see the movie, if it had just slotted in with the continuity?
I have no idea, but I think you are conflating at least three distinct things: a good film that stands on its own storytelling merits, a film that will draw large audiences and make a lot of money, and a film that ties in with extant material. While these certainly can be inclusive of each other, they often aren't.
I'll let the producers worry about their turnaround; as a consumer my concern is the quality of the product I receive. I am not satisfied in this case, and I may be a demanding customer but don't believe I am an unsatisfiable one.
quote:Either it would have needed to spend ages re-introducing the characters (which would be boring for fans), or it would have not bothered, and thus confused and alienated the new viewers.
I do not see your logic, here. Why would staying in line with continuity require extensive re-introduction of the characters? Why spend time on elaborate and contrived introductions of characters at all? Just tell an interesting and believable story that has relevence and meaning and let the character's words and actions speak for themselves. That's exactly what TOS did. The first episode was not about how the main characters met each other. No such story was necessary then and it wasn't necessary now either. It's nothing but a gimmick.
quote:This way, they came up with a compromise that allowed them to describe familiar characters and situations, but in such a way that was new for everyone.
And what they ended up with was the most self-referential film the franchise has yet seen, which paradoxically seeks to distinguish itself by presenting stereotypical distillations of its source material while leaving out the complexities that made it interesting and believable in the first place. A prequel with no point. A film that at once holds no resonating siginificance outside of itself and is insignificant outside of the context of TOS's resonance within popular culture.
quote:Its fun. It was enjoyable. You said so yourself.
After years with no ST and if you didn't think about it, I said. After years with no sex, even a one-night stand with a one-eyed hooker would probably feel good, until the next morning.
quote:At the end of the day, why the hell does anything beyond that matter? Its a movie, for Kirk's sake!
To me, the motion picture is a valid and valued art form that is failing to live up to its potential and being increasingly drained of its validity and value due to commercial conceits. I suppose I feel that the movie did just what Kirk did: it cheated instead of doing its homework and delivering well-thought-out work.
Maybe in the future I'll be able to enjoy the film as a somber allegory to the era and industry of its making!
-MMoM
-------------------- The flaws we find most objectionable in others are often those we recognize in ourselves.
Registered: Jun 2001
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Amasov Prime
lensfare-induced epileptic shock
Member # 742
posted
Just a thought on the 'good story'. The story itself was crap. "Villain accidentially travels through time to destroy Vulcan for some confuse reasons and the tries to destroy the universe for no reason at all". What made the movie work was the chraracters, more than anything else. The whole thing was character-driven, not story-driven. Which is a good thing, usually. It's just that *we* are used to 40+ years of mostly story-driven narratives in Trek (in the shows, I will exclude some of the movies and a few episodes here), which makes it feel strange to us. The story construct of this movie felt like an afterthought, as if someone sat in the writer's room and said "You know, we have all these wonderful characters and dialogue and interactions, but we actually need some story we can tell". It probably took about 5 minutes to come up with it. Seriously, I even dare to say that it definitely was not one of the first things Orci and Kurtzman developed.
Registered: Nov 2001
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quote:Originally posted by Jason Abbadon: You lost me with the "attention to detail" part. Yes, it's a fun movie but it's got far more than the usual amount of plot holes and VERY bad science for a Trek movie.
Very bad science? I have to say, a lot of the science featured in the movie was actually more logical than we're used to in Trek. I'd be intregued to hear which science in particular you thought was bad. Or do you just mean it "was bad Trek science"... meaning actually realistic?
Regarding attention to detail, I'm talking about little things; the lens flipping around on the phasers when the settings change; the PDF weapons; the fact that there were no SFX in space when the guy got blasted out during the Kelvin scene; that sort of stuff.
They're completely unnecessary. They aren't a nod to existing stuff for the fans, since they're all new. They aren't the kind of things that casual viewers would remember from the show when they watched it either, so that isn't the reason. Someone has sat down and thought "Right, so how is this going to work?" and has put a hell of a lot of effort into the fine details that most viewers probably wouldn't notice. The only "reason" is attention to detail, in the truest sense of the term.
Not the SuperNovas or the Black holes so much as spock seeing Vulcan be destroyed from the ice-planet's surface, Earth to Vulcan in six minutes, no communications with the fleet despite the "jamming" having been eliminated and YES, Transwarp beaming- I mean really, why bother with a fucking ship at all after that's proven?!? Then there's the idiot notion that Kirk will run into Spock on the ice planet and they both with run into Scotty (now sadly reduced to a comedic catchphrase character) and all the other plot holes. Yeah, it's a "reboot" but throwing out all your established psydo-science is a huge waste and clearly the result of writer that could not be bothered to get it right with the franchise.
Bad science, big plot holes, stuff that stains the plausability of even a Star Trek movie and the tossing of established rules for treknology are all indicators of a lack of attention to detail and/or respect for the source material. You decide which.
Incidently, I found the hand "phasers" really poorly designed- a big glowing indicator on your gun in a darkened environment is like having a "kill me" sign in neon over your position.
Registered: Aug 2002
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posted
EXACTLY the joke my friends all made after watching this- just like the 200th episode of SG1. "Dude, she was a G'Auld." "So? I was gonna tap dat!"
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
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bX: I already saw your deck structure a couple of days ago and I totally agree with it. There is hardly any other vessel with so much consistency in recognizable decks. If we are not allowed to use this method here, where else?
Sure. They can always divide up each deck into two, but it is just too obvious that the original Church design either borrows heavily from the 300m Enterprise for no good reason or was meant to be 300m itself.
Thanks for permission to use the images!
-------------------- Bernd Schneider
Registered: Mar 1999
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Wasn't the Hobus star supposed to be some crazy supernova that threatened the entire galaxy? Something that many of the Alpha Quadrant races have never seen before?
We can toss all scientific knowledge out the window at this point, since this is supposed to be some crazy mega explosion that probably exists in subspace too.
Registered: Aug 1999
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quote:Originally posted by Wes: Wasn't the Hobus star supposed to be some crazy supernova that threatened the entire galaxy? Something that many of the Alpha Quadrant races have never seen before?
We can toss all scientific knowledge out the window at this point, since this is supposed to be some crazy mega explosion that probably exists in subspace too.
That's really lame, though. It's like writing a story about a plane crashing after colliding with a flock of ostriches. (But ostriches don't fly! These ones do! They are unlike any ostriches known to science! Because I am the storyteller and I say so! It's fiction, what do you care??)
Yes, there probably are as yet unknown phenomena that would seem unbelievable to us and yet exist nonetheless. This is not a catch-all excuse to invent nonsensical plot devices because you're too lazy to do some research and come up with something logical that doesn't violate basic universal physical laws. Science fiction is at least supposed to have some fundamental footing in, you know, actual science. And all good fiction should be at least somewhat believable.
Besides, not even that flimsy non-explanation you cite was in the film. It's from a non-canon comic.
-------------------- The flaws we find most objectionable in others are often those we recognize in ourselves.
Registered: Jun 2001
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Amasov Prime
lensfare-induced epileptic shock
Member # 742
posted
This is the main problem with the entire film: We're not looking at it from the perspective we're used to. It's like watching First Contact from Cochrane's perspective or TVH from Gillians. You have all this stuff going on around you, but you don't get any insight. It's none of our business this time. We don't get Spocks perspective here. We're left in the dark about all of that. So maybe there is a good explanation as to what is going on in the 24th century. But we weren't actually 'there' with the movie, we just kinda read about it in the newspaper this time. We're not backstage, just part of the crowd. You know what I mean?
Registered: Nov 2001
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