I wouldn't be surprised if the Enterprise were destroyed. Memorable scenes from the TOS movies are being lifted and Abramsified. XI copied TMP's Enterprise fly by (duration cut by 90%), STID copied Spock's death scene from TWOK (switching Kirk and Spock). It stands to reason that with the Enterprise's destruction being the most memorable scene from TSFS it'll be copied and Abramsified in XIII, particularly since the plan was to do a trilogy. The scene will be Abramsified by having a Klingon ship tear the Enterprise apart with a shit load of torpedoes and phaser railguns. With lens flare.
And as the ship is being torn apart, Kirk puts Enterprise on a collision course with the Klingon ship and then orders his crew to get into thruster suits. As the Klingons blow Enterprise to pieces, the crew flies through the debris and boards the Klingon ship, fight their way to the command pod and take it over. But not before the Klingon commander manages to take pregnant Carol Marcus hostage, forcing Kirk to have a dramatic face off on the Klingon bridge which is finally resolved by Kirk shooting out the airlock with his phaser and then kicking the Klingon out of it in an oddly satisfying fusion of "Aliens" and TSFS "I... have had... enough... of you!" We have our climax, ladies and gentlemen! All we have to do is hack the rest of this together and it's in the can!
I think Nero may have accelerated the accident with an attack. The new Klongons almost seem Babylonian to me. Less unified, more like Aridas concept of the Golden Horde culture... I think the costumes are better--less of the Gwar/Ogron look.
Yet the Klingons aren't in a bad shape or Section 31 wouldn't be worried about them. I guess they conquered worlds with energy resources as result of Nero's appearence.
Or it could be that Klingons are no threat at all to the Federation, but rather a perpetual nuisance, and Section 31 would prefer for the Federation to conquer/reeducate/civilize them than continue to put up with border raids, kidnappings and murders year after year. Basically, the Taliban with starships: they keep showing up in random bursts of spectacular violence that cause a lot more dismay than actual damage. Marcus' idea is that the best way to deal with the Klingons is to roll in there, kick their asses and force them to behave themselves. It's basically what Cartwright was saying in TUC. "The opportunity here is to bring them to their knees." The key word here is opportunity: it's something that some in Starfleet always wanted to do if they could just think of a good enough excuse.
Of course, such gutted planets are pretty but unrealistic. The body's own gravity pull would quickly crunch the remaining hulk back into a sphere.
In which case it still wound't be the shattered eggshell looking thing seen in as the moon and all over the end titles.
I noticed the moon but did not give much thought to the planet surface. I am wondering if we are seeing a precursor to a future film with this scene. I remember from all of earlier speculation that this was to be a Klingon film and that they were marauding nomads. This could explain a lot.
Perhaps Praxis exploded earlier because the Klingons stepped up their mining efforts after their fleet was laid waste by the Narada. There could be any number of explanations.
If Praxis indeed blew up much earlier in this timeline, it would spell disaster for the Federation considering the Praxis explosion and the humanitarian aid the Federation sent were the final bricks that eventually culminated in the Khitomer accord and brought peace between Klingon Empire and the United Federation of Planets.