COUNTDOWN TO DARKNESS 5-page preview

[The Stig]

serenitytrek1 wrote:

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does anbody feel that JJ Abrams is not reading the comics?

I'm quite certain he isn't.

[serenitytrek1]

The Stig wrote:

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I'm quite certain he isn't.

My thoughts exactly....

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Why would he?

[SalvorHardin]

What does it matter if Abrams is reading the comics?
Orci is a writer for the movie and oversees the comics, so they've got that angle covered anyway, if it matters at all.

[The Stig]

My Name Is Legion wrote:

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Why would he?

I can't think of any reason why he would, or should.

[Christopher]

serenitytrek1 wrote:

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does anbody feel that JJ Abrams is not reading the comics?

I'd be surprised if he did. The producers of prior Trek series and films didn't read the tie-ins; that was the studio licensing department's job. TV and film producers are busy producing TV and films, and don't have a lot of time to pay attention to side projects, especially not with the sheer mass of tie-ins that Star Trek generates.

Abrams in particular is a very busy man. He's not only directing Into Darkness but is producing or executive-producing four other films currently in pre-production (including Star Wars Episode VII) and five more that have been announced (including the third Trek movie and the fifth Mission: Impossible), and is executive-producing Person of Interest and Revolution for TV. He's probably not very hands-on with the EP gigs, but they're part of the business of the production company he runs, which is very much in demand. Tie-ins are such a teensy-weensy part of that creative empire that it's natural he'd delegate their oversight to someone else.

This is why tie-ins are rarely canonical, and why canonical tie-ins directly overseen by the creators generally only happen after the series has ended (as with the B5 novels, Buffyverse and other Whedon comics, and the like): because creators rarely have the time to devote to the tie-ins while they're busy with the show itself. There are some exceptions to that rule -- the comics based on the Young Justice animated series have been canonical and written/overseen by the show's creators, and I gather there are tie-in comics to Arrow that are considered canonical. But they are exceptions, and they're the work of people who don't have vast filmmaking empires to manage like Abrams does.

[ChristopherPike]

Somebody over at Trekmovie.com (post#344) has put forward a theory that surprisingly might work...

In Star Trek (2009) Kirk watches what we all assume is the Enterprise being built on the ground. What if, instead, it was actually Robert April's being dismantled and broken up?

That allows a starship to remain constructed in space at a dry or space dock facility. But establishes they are brought down to a planet surface to scrap down for their component parts.

The NCC-1701 registry number being carried over from one ship to another, still presents a problem however. Especially if you consider starship numbers to progressively get larger as time goes by and the Constitution as 17 (or 18) models away from the NX class. The commissioning of April's Enterprise wouldn't be long after the destruction of USS Kelvin NCC-0514. However that class of ship could always have been a few decades old in 2233.

Perhaps if an earlier starship has merit, the name and registry number can be inherited by a later class. So you get the USS Constellation NCC-1017, a Constitution class with an earlier number... because there once was a 10th generation starship that did something historic that special dispensation granted the name and number came together.

[Hartzilla2007]

ChristopherPike wrote:

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Somebody over at Trekmovie.com has put forward a theory that surprisingly might work...

In Star Trek (2009) Kirk watches what we all assume is the Enterprise being built on the ground. What if, instead, it was actually Robert April's being dismantled and broken up?

That allows a starship to remain constructed in space at a dry or space dock facility. But establishes they are brought down to a planet surface to scrap down for their component parts.

The NCC-1701 registry number being carried over from one ship to another, still presents a problem however. Especially if you consider starship numbers to progressively get larger as time goes by and the Constitution as 17 (or 18) models away from the NX class. The commissioning of April's Enterprise wouldn't be long after the destruction of USS Kelvin NCC-0514. However that class of ship could always have been a few decades old in 2233.

1) Except April's Enterprise was decommissioned 2 years prior to Countdown to darkness which would probably make that the year before The NuEnterprise's launch and 2 years after Kirk went to the academy. So seeing as the ship would have still been in service it was probably the JJprise being constructed.

2) Who seriously gives a crap if they built the ship on the ground.

[EyalM]

ChristopherPike wrote:

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Somebody over at Trekmovie.com has put forward a theory that surprisingly might work...

In Star Trek (2009) Kirk watches what we all assume is the Enterprise being built on the ground. What if, instead, it was actually Robert April's being dismantled and broken up?

That allows a starship to remain constructed in space at a dry or space dock facility. But establishes they are brought down to a planet surface to scrap down for their component parts.

The NCC-1701 registry number being carried over from one ship to another, still presents a problem however. Especially if you consider starship numbers to progressively get larger as time goes by and the Constitution as 17 (or 18) models away from the NX class. The commissioning of April's Enterprise wouldn't be long after the destruction of USS Kelvin NCC-0514. However that class of ship could always have been a few decades old in 2233.

You can solve the registry issue by having the ship refitted on Earth. So it was always the same ship, so no need to change the number.
Kirk's line in the comic about getting the new Enterprise can still work, if the refit was extensive enough. Decker claimed the Enterprise to be new in TMP, so why not here?

This will also explain how the Enterprise was (allegedly) built so much later in the new timeline, yet still ended up with the same registry number, instead of a much higher figure.

[The Wormhole]

ChristopherPike wrote:

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Somebody over at Trekmovie.com has put forward a theory that surprisingly might work...

In Star Trek (2009) Kirk watches what we all assume is the Enterprise being built on the ground. What if, instead, it was actually Robert April's being dismantled and broken up?

That allows a starship to remain constructed in space at a dry or space dock facility. But establishes they are brought down to a planet surface to scrap down for their component parts.

No, that very clearly was the Enterprise being built. The registry number was NCC-1701, the nacelles were the same size, everything's a match.

Besides, why bring a ship down to a planet's surface to scrap it? That just isn't practical in any way. Far easier to tear it apart in space where the components can be transported to wherever you want them from there.

The commissioning of April's Enterprise wouldn't be long after the destruction of USS Kelvin NCC-0514. However that class of ship could always have been a few decades old in 2233.

Huh? As of 2338 April was already commanding the Enterprise for ten years, according to the comic. And besides, since it was decommissioned in 2256, the ship itself was probably launched around 2206 or so, to give it 50 years of service which is common for navy ships of today, like Enterprise CVN-65.

[The Wormhole]

EyalM wrote:

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Kirk's line in the comic about getting the new Enterprise can still work, if the refit was extensive enough. Decker claimed the Enterprise to be new in TMP, so why not here?

Decker's actual line was "this is an almost entirely new Enterprise." He was being metaphorical, not literal.

[ChristopherPike]

Perhaps somebody will correct me, but Robert April states he'd been a Captain for a decade sometime around 2239. That doesn't necessarily mean he'd been the Enterprise skipper throughout that time.

He could have disappeared, early on into his tenure as the Captain of that ship.

In fact, applying such a backwards date would cross the 2233 dividing line and place an additional starship Enterprise in service before the NCC-1701, in the Prime Universe too.

[Christopher]

ChristopherPike wrote:

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Perhaps somebody will correct me, but Robert April states he'd been a Captain for a decade sometime around 2239. That doesn't necessarily mean he'd been the Enterprise skipper throughout that time.

You're not wrong. From the scans I've seen posted, he only says he was a captain for ten years, not the Enterprise's captain for ten years. Star Trek conditions us to expect a captain to command the same ship indefinitely, but in real life, naval captains typically command many different ships over the course of a career, with command tours that can be as short as a few months.

Even in Trek, Kirk Prime, Picard, and Janeway are all known to have commanded other ships before the ones we knew, though in Kirk's case that's only from behind-the-scenes material. (The Making of Star Trek said he commanded a destroyer-equivalent ship before the Enterprise, and it's possible he only held commander's rank at the time, though he would still have held the title/job description of captain.)

[The Wormhole]

ChristopherPike wrote:

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Perhaps somebody will correct me, but Robert April states he'd been a Captain for a decade sometime around 2239. That doesn't necessarily mean he'd been the Enterprise skipper throughout that time.

He could have disappeared, early on into his tenure as the Captain of that ship.

In fact, applying such a backwards date would cross the 2233 dividing line and place an additional starship Enterprise in service before the NCC-1701, in the Prime Universe too.

Okay, but even if we assume April's Enterprise was launched after the Kelvin's destruction, that would mean Starfleet decommissioned a starship that was only twenty years old. Despite what Admiral Morrow thought, that's pretty early to retire a starship. If we assume April had been commanding his Enterpirse for all ten years, that's nearly forty years of service, and then we can insert another captain(s) for its first ten years to give it fifty years. If anything, that would be a pretty realistic way of looking at a starship's service life, for Trek, anyway. Yeah, this is before the 2233 timeline divide, but perhaps it's time we consider there was another Enterprise between NX-01 and hte 1701, even in the Prime Timeline, canon be damned.

And besides, nothing wrong with commanding the same ship for ten years. If we assume his Enterprise was on a five year mission rotation, then April stayed in command for two five year missions, which both Pike and Kirk did in the Prime Timeline.

[King Daniel Into Darkness]

It's worth pointing out that the 2245 launch date for the Primeverse Enterprise is conjecture originally from the TNG Technical Manual. AFAIK, it's never been said on-screen. So despite how it was drawn in the comic (and IMO these ship designs can be recast as easily as actors), April's Enterprise and the ship we see in TOS may be one and the same.