Contemporary Future Earth

Trek has always shied away from showing us too much of future Earth. We've seen a few quiet pedestrianized streets in DS9, Picard's family vineyard and a restaurant in Paris in TNG, some military stuff like Starfleet HQ, the academy grounds etc, but this will be the first time we see a major civillian population centre. And I can't wait. As soon as I saw the built-up megalopolis of San Fransisco in STXI, I wanted to explore it. And we're going to in the next film!

They have cars in the future! Some of them fly! It's very much more contemporary than Gene Rodenberry's talked-about-but-never-seen TNG-era "nudist paradise utopia" concepts.

Big pic of San Fransisco (with cars, busses, trucks, flying cars, skyscrapers and falling Spock, HERE.

 

It is difficult to make films in futuristic environments because our world is changing very fast. Everything can be different 20 years from now, imagine in 100 years. But I always had this curiosity to know how the future Earth would be in star trek. Nobody can criticize Abrams at that point, trying to make a reality of the Gene Rodenberry's universe. I'm very curious to see how they imagined it.

 

I love science fiction movies about the future and it was always a bit frustrating that they could never show the Earth of the future. I am sure it was mainly due to budget reasons.

I too am really excited to see more of the Earth in the 23rd century.

 

It takes some guts to project what a future Earth may look like a couple of hundred years out. I'm not sure I one hundred percent like J.J.'s "uber-urban" vision of S.F. and London, but I suppose George Washington would be rather shocked to see New York City, today.

 

I like it much better than Gene Roddenberry's "underground" version.

Say what you like about this version of San Francisco - at least it's above ground.

 

"Now we'll never be canon!" [/mole people]

 

I was a little surprised to see how many buildings there were in SF in Trek09. I thought JJ would have more futuristic buildings in SF just not as many as he did.

 

I like how it looks different but the same. There's nothing real whacky about Trek's future.

 

I like futuristic images of cities as well. However, unless the entire city is rebuilt from the ground up as a result of some horrific catastrophe, wouldn't there be older buildings still standing? Hell. Pittsburgh (where I live) has a gigantic
218 year old building smack dab in the middle of downtown. Just a thought.

 

^ The topic is contemporary future Earth. What is 'spamming' about contrasting different views of what that Earth would look like? (i.e. Gene's version vs. JJ Abrams' version)

 

Yes. I think that many buildings of that size (even though that size is feasible) would be an urban planner's nightmare. Imagine the quality of life walking down those urban canyons. There might be areas where the sun seldom shines. Still, it may be a fairly accurate representation if we grow in population and still want to maintain countrysides like the English ones seen in the teaser.

In the shot of Spock standing on a platform (ship?) above the buildings in downtown S.F., you can see what looks like some old-style buildings. In other urban shots, there are recognizeable landmark buildings from S.F. (the TransAmerica building) and London (the gherkin). St. Pauls is also seen from Clarke's character's bedroom window in London.

 

[/QUOTE]

In the shot of Spock standing on a platform (ship?) above the buildings in downtown S.F., you can see what looks like some old-style buildings. In other urban shots, there are recognizeable landmark buildings from S.F. (the TransAmerica building) and London (the gherkin). St. Pauls is also seen from Clarke's character's bedroom window in London.[/QUOTE]

Missed that. Thanks.

 

I'm absolutely THRILLED to be seeing future earth that isn't just Starfleet Academy's manicured grounds. So far it looks like a more realistic version of the more highly developed Firefly planets, great tech but also older stuff that developed and wasn't replaced. I think it looks great. Coruscant was always my favorite city but it's definitely in another world, a fantasy world. What we've seen so far looks very firmly set in our world, with the jumble of past and future bits.

 

Faaaaaaaaaaaack my spelling.

San

Fran

cis

co.

San Francisco.

(Also: Yes, it's actually even more like present-day than I thought. Fascinating.)

 

Don't forget this is an Earth that has lived through the Eugenics Wars and/or World War III. A lot of cities may have been rebuilt from the ground up

 

We don't which American cities, if any, were nuked in World War III. It was stated that American was attacked by the Eastern Coalition, but in which way is unknown. It could have been nuclear strikes on military bases and ICBM sites and not direct attacks on cities. And considering that the New York Stock Exchange, Carnegie Hall, and the fact that the three cryo-humans in TNG episode The Neutral Zone were born in 2007, 2051, and 2072 in New York City it seems all the more unlikely that American cities were hit.

The Eugenics Wars didn't even touch North America.

 

Just because we recognize some buildings in cities doesn't mean they weren't nuked. People tend to rebuild to remember, I could see those London landmarks being replica buildings.

 

The thing I liked about Star Trek 09 was that the way they depicted 23rd Century Iowa was always how I always imagined my area (a rural area in Western Michigan) would look like in that time, even those large buildings in the distance.