Starship design history in light of Discovery

...Then again, there only ever was one "classic TOS" starship design in evidence. Quite possibly no others survived outside the background logistics side of things, having been refitted with bits and pieces that gave them the DSC appearance (box nacelles etc). And this would include those "classic TOS" ships glimpsed on TOS movie computer screens, as we already learned such screens show outdated, pre-refit views of such ships (or at least they did that exact thing with Kirk's ship).

Having the "classic TOS" style actually be a 2220s-30s thing (such as in fan assumptions before the 2245 launch date for NCC-1701 started getting pushed), its representatives all gone by the 2270s and most either lost or converted by the 2250s already, would be perfectly consistent with everything we know.

Now, mixing DSC and TOS (and ENT) Klingon designs... We at least got the cleave ship alongside the D7 shape of things to come, although I'd argue it to be the one Klingon design without a right to survive, it being the equivalent of the ram monitor in the early days of steam, and actually a poor use of the new cloaking capability.

Timo Saloniemi

 

But what would be the point of speculating about TOS style if this Enterprise is the original ship in Discovery's vision? It's been revised from that point of view, which means that every other Enterprise must also be revised (made longer at least, to make sure the lineup looks right), perhaps with fixes such as a) the TMP version being an actual refit with continuity, as opposed to the original redesign-the-universe approach b) the Enterprise-A exhibiting further minor updates c) the Enterprise-C being more streamlined...

 

If you really expect ship exterior dimensions to line up with reality, you're never going to be happy. It's a kind of threatcounting that leads nowhere.

And there is no reason to think this version of Enterprise was the same one that left space dock as a new ship under April. It's over 10 years old and subjected to a lot of changes over the years. Everything so far points to Connies being pretty damn modular, maybe they undergo serious changes per mission role.

 

Wait, but you cannot seriously visualize the fictional reality of "The Cage" followed by DSC, then "Where No Man Has Gone Before" (which looks similar to "The Cage") followed by TOS. The timeline of events is Prime: all the events and years line up, but the physical aspects are entirely different, and that includes everything from ship design and measurements to uniforms. We'll just have to see if the Star Trek Encyclopedia or a similar resource gives it a special moniker such as "Discovery universe", "Discovery vision", even as they reaffirm the Prime Timeline label.

 

That ship has sailed. Producers have made it such a big deal that Discovery takes place in Prime Universe (no ifs ands or buts) that they spend whole of Season 2 "syncing" it up with canon. Furthermore they abandoned 23rd century completely so as not to pollute "canon" any further.

 

Yes, but that's only on story level. A hypothetical Encyclopedia update shouldn't stop depicting Matt Jefferies' design or resort to something like "U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701 (2258)" for the Discovery version, as if Starfleet made a redesign there-and-back-again, uniforms included. The idea should be that in the Prime Timeline of events, Crewman A walked from one end of the bridge to another on January 4, 2258, but the arrangement of obstacles or the exact number of meters would differ between the original and Discovery's vision.

 

And anxiety producing.

 

Is that some kind of koan? Seriously, reread that. And then again.

 

What do you mean? Live action strives to look like it would in the real world. If you need to recreate the Millennium Falcon for Galaxy's Edge, it should look like it does in the films (well, bigger from the outside to fit the interior, but little else). The same would apply to the original Enterprise: visitors would expect a recreation of what they remember from the shows, and now they would expect two such versions, with the clear understanding that there is no physical continuity there, hence the need for two universes on the same Timeline.

You seem to be adopting a philosophy where Star Trek is not a franchise that needs to make sense on a physical level, that all the detail work created by designers, technical consultants and modellers can be squinted away into "maybe it looks like this, maybe not, maybe somewhere in-between". This is not like different animation styles depicting what we know of the real world: the intent is that designs would like that if only they were real, and now there can be different versions of the same in different realities.

 

I wouldn't call it a philosophy. I don't take it that seriously. I would counter that some seem to take it as religion. Debating dates and minutiae like ancient monks arguing monophysite controversy, or exactly the right way to tonsure one's hair.

Enterprise from the Cage vs TOS enterprise vs TMP enterprise alone have so many inconsistencies you could have a headache if you really tried to make it all work in your head. I get it. I was THAT KID with the technical manual too. It's just extra bits to dive a bit deeper and enjoy the show a bit more. But its never meant to be some labyrinth of credulity that takes you away from enjoying the stories and the characters.

I am saying this as a fan that loves star trek ship design so much he has created a highly detailed virtual reality annular drive pre-NX earth starship you can log in walk around and enjoy any time of day. I can tell you every dimension of it, and where to click things to make them go beep boop. The advantage for me is if i decide, and i probably will one day, "hell with that" and change the floor textures or swap out the rings for clunky nacelles, I don't have people needing a fainting couch and talking about teh cannon. I'm not creative, I'm just a copier making lovenotes to a franchise I enjoy. The really creative people should certainly try to fit their creations in with continuity but they shouldnt be slaves to them. In my opinion what Fuller tried to do with the Klingons was pointless and very few people enjoyed it. What was done with the Enterprise this year was fucking brilliant.

To answer that first question: the Falcon can look like a Buck Rogers Rocket for all I care, at this point. They mangled Han's character into a sad bitter man who lost his wife, was abandoned by one of his closest friends who almost murdered his son he had entrusted his care to and helped turn him into the murderous villain who then killed him in a rather pointless death. Fuck what the Falcon looks like or how many windows it has, they already mangled the main occupant. Disney fell into that trap of the look vs the feel and the story. They went all in on the look and kind of forgot about the characters. Many will disagree. I'm fine with that.

 

I thought Roddenberry said Star Trek is a future teleplay of past actual events, or something to that effect. So, there is one prime timeline (past actual events), and several different teleplays on the same timeline. Ship models, actors, interior sets, etc. are just teleplay components representing reality, including the latest Discovery series (i.e. teleplay).

It's the events that need continuity, not the teleplay components of ship models, etc.

 

Because TOS was not completely consistent is no excuse to make it worse in DSC.

 

It's also no reason to expect perfection now, when none was present before.

 

This will hold up exactly as long until the next production decides it doesn't anymore.
One thing is absolutely for certain: Should any other Trek production, more than 5 years from now, make a reference to "Cpt. Pike" or "The Enterprise" - they gonna' either create a completely new version again, or show the original 60s model. If that Pike-show doesn't materialize fast, this current rendition of the 1701 is already as dead as the Kelvin-movies.

 

Nature of the beast.

 

One of the recent Eaglemoss books depicted the DSC and TOS Enterprises side-by-side (at their correct, totally different scales) and handwaved something about refits, ignoring "The Cage" and implying a DSC-TOS-TMP evolution. It was painful to see.

 

Well, yes and no. But mostly no, not really.

The USS Discovery herself - no matter how clunky and bare the CG-model of that ship might have been - will forever be "The" Discovery. The same way even my non-Trekkie fans can identify the Voyager and the Enterprise-D as "Janeways" and "Picards" ship.

This rendition of the 1701 - despite it being a far more intricate and detailed design than the Discovery herself - will forever only be "just another tv-version" of that famous ship. One that outside a few Memory-Alpha article most people will probably forget ever even existed.

 

Again: The "correct" size of the TOS Enterprise is neither correct (it's from an early Jeffries draft before the ship size was doubled for the show), nor was it EVER official. It's as non-canon as "Spock being the first Vulcan in Starfleet" (clearly made obsolete by T'pol). It's only been used in non-canon books for so long, people seem to mistake it for being in any way official. But it really isn't.

 

Except the reference book treats it as official, and the new number too.

Plus, the proportions are different enough that even if they were the same size, it would not be a plausible refit.

 

Which are - you guessed it - non-canon. Eaglemoss can tell me the Runabout exists in a 200m battle-version. That won't make it true either.

The "common" given size for the Connie is simply a mistake (again - taken from an earlier draft where the ship had half the deck-count), that simply was never corrected, because no one cared enough, and it wasn't official anyway.