TNG Characters in the JJ-Verse

The MU stories after TOS really stretched any kind of believability. You could maybe say that the universes were linked together by some unknown force, but at that point things get too far into hyper fantasy.

The same rules don't apply to time travel, which is often shown to be more deterministic (or at least it was before JJ got to it). If JJ cared, he could make the TNG cast be alive here much in the same contrived way that the OS cast came together, but I doubt that he wants that. And as much as I love TNG, I'm glad that he wouldn't do that. It just seems unlikely that after such changes in the timeline that the same people could come together to create the same kids that would have even remotely the same lives. They should not be.

 

I see what you mean, yeah. I'd argue (though not very fervently) that the JJverse at it currently stands hasn't diverged quite enough to totally rule-out the TNG characters even being born in the first place, but the more this universe develops with more movies (and comics, assuming those are canonical), the farther out the chances get.

By the time the trilogy is done, I figure it'll be a completely different 24th century coming up in the queue. The outsiders will probably still exist: Worf, maybe Data, the Delta Quadrant characters who don't matter, Odo... but that's about it. No real reason to do anything with them, either. Just fun to speculate.

 

Picard's parents could easily still create Picard, and so forth.
( EDIT: this reminds me of the joke/rumor that the drill falling on SF crushed a Picard ancestor. ) Abrams' time travel is no less deterministic than what we've seen before. The thing is, there's no way to know exactly how the changes in the timeline will influence things, so the writers have a somewhat free hand. Though I agree it would seem highly unlikely if all the significant TNG era characters turned out almost exactly the same.

 

I couldn't see Jim Parsons as Data, but Alan Tudyk? That would be AWESOME!

Ignoring the fact, of course, that I hope they don't try to shoehorn anyone from TNG into the Abramsverse.

 

Worf, probably not. For all we know, some of his ancestors were on one of the many Klingon ships destroyed by Nero. The Klingon Empire should be facing some pretty big changes.

Data (or a similar android) has a decent chance though. Soong was possibly already born before Nero made too many waves.

That is assuming Picard's parents are even born yet.

Yes, the mother has a set amount of eggs, but a man's sperm varies so greatly. The chances of anyone from TNG being born is like winning the lottery two or three times.

Time travel ideas usually weren't too consistent throughout Trek. But the best stories ("The City on the Edge of Forever", "Yesterday's Enterprise", Star Trek: First Contact, "All Good Things", "Year of Hell", "The Visitor", etc) usually involved a more deterministic point of view.

These stories didn't involve putting characters in for any fated reasons against odds. At least not as drastically.

 

I wasn't assuming that.

The time travel in STXI is not less deterministic simply by virtue of not being single-timeline.

 

I never said that's why it's less deterministic.

 

It's not less deterministic.

 

The ideal way to get TNG characters in the JJ-verse would have been, during Spock Prime's flashback in the first film, to have Picard, Geordi, Data and possibly even Worf, in the background as they outfitted the Jellyfish before Spock launched it. No lines, no big change from the scene as it was already done, just have some or all the characters from Countdown there in the background in place of the nondescript Vulcans we got. A simple nod to TNG fans.

Apart from that, why would we bring any TNG characters into the JJ-verse? More time travel, more alternate universe BS... no. It flies in the face of what the first film set out to do - reboot the universe.

 

If said TNG character is immortal by human standards and thus should presumably have been around in the Abrams filmverse timeframe, then it would be appropriate.

 

Only if there is a compelling story to tell with such a character. The current producers should certainly not feel any obligation to include such a character.

 

Maybe it's just me, but I kind of get the feeling that the current Trek writers and producers have very little interest in TNG Trek saga. I just hate to see TNG seem almost buried to some degree. I know, I know...the TNG era doesn't fit in this era. I love what they're doing with Trek now, but I'm also loyal to TNG....like I was to TOS....for me...it'll all blend together in time. Just thought it would be neat to see a TNG presence in one of the movies one day......to see TNG thru JJ's eyes.

 

I'm waiting for Janeway to crash through a space time thingie and wow NuKirk.

 

I can just imagine her facepalming in front of a confused Enterprise bridge crew and saying "this is why I hate this space-time crap".

 

Guinan! And she would probably know that there is something wrong with this timeline.

 

Dax exists in the JJ Abrams Universe, a character simply has to be old enough to live in both centuries, they could bring Dax into a movie and have another actor play him or her very easily.

Guinan could also make an appearance since she also lived in the 19th century.

Q could certainly make a show, they might get a different actor to play him, but no matter.

 

It is.

The fact that the same crew got together on the same ship with the same command structure despite all the changes in the timeline shows the Bad Robot method of time travel. They believe that certain things are fated to happen, regardless of if it makes sense. They even said that time tries to repair itself, which is basically mumbo jumbo for fate, not determinism.

 

Considering that Kirk and co. save the galaxy a few times, the universe can perhaps be forgiven for nudging them together after things went wonky in 2233.

 

Since it's a parallel timeline that exists beside the "original" one, probably not. Especially if her "time sense" is related to the Nexus, which she hasn't encountered yet in the ST09 timeline.

 

Who is to say that the alternate timeline from Yesterday's Enterprise is not a parallel timeline as well?

About her "time sense" ... it has never been explained how she got it. Could be related to the Nexus, or could be some El Aurian thing.