Alternate Star Trek II Main Titles

Yeh but it also makes no sense - the Enterprise isn't in space. It's a bridge simulator with a viewscreen.

 

But you don't know that! The scene is presented to look like part of the training cruise. Again, showing Starfleet Academy ruins the illusion; showing the Enterprise in space maintains it.

 

You do know that about 5 minutes later!
I'm not advocating showing the academy, but showing the Enterprise ruins the logic and makes Kirk walking onto the bridge from the academy grounds less 'ohhh I get it' and more 'what. the. hell?'
Yes, it would cement the illusion of the scenario, but it also makes no sense in the context. It'd be like having establishing shots of Kirk's Enterprise inserted into Scotty's bridge holoprogram in Relics.

 

That'd work well, yes.

 

It's nothing like that. We know Scotty's on the holodeck because we see him go to the door, tell the computer to punch up the bridge of his old ship, and walk in. "Relics" makes no effort to pretend it's the real bridge of the old Enterprise.

Even panning down to Earth would ruin the illusion that the Kobayashi Maru simulation is a real mission. I know we're trying to somehow fit this into the Star Wars model of panning down to a planet or ship, but Nick Meyer really did it best by just putting us right on the bridge. And it's easy to forget 25 years later, but the whole point of the scene was to be a red herring to all those fans who were pissed over the rumors that Spock would die. It's not a red herring if people don't start the scene thinking these guys are really on the Enterprise, on a real mission somewhere in space.

 

God, what is with all the thread necromancy tonight?