This city's destruction does not make sense

Discussion in 'Star Trek: Strange New Worlds' started by Ottens, May 15, 2022.

  1. Ottens

    Ottens Commander Red Shirt

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    In the pilot, Pike shows New York, Washington DC and Paris were destroyed in atomic blasts in World War III.

    New York and DC make sense. We never saw those cities in the 23rd and 24th centuries. I think it's safe to assume World War III involved America, and major cities on the East Coast were destroyed. The West Coast appears to have been spared, given that San Francisco still exists and nobody in Picard says anything like, "Odd to be in Los Angeles, huh?"

    (We can also theorize that the reason we've never seen Chinese cities, or many Chinese characters, is that it was the other party in the conflict, leading the "ECON", or Eastern Coalition, Lily refers to in First Contact. Indeed, that's what First Contact co-writer Brannon Braga assumed as well.)

    But Paris? From what we saw in TNG and Star Trek 6, old Paris was intact with just a few skyscrapers added.

    Which is plausible. Many of the old buildings in Paris are protected and can't just be torn down. It's also not that hard to imagine the EU, France included, remaining neutral in a China-US war.

    Was this a mistake? Or an attempt to justify the Shanghai-ed version of Paris Discovery gave us?
     
  2. farbeyondthestars

    farbeyondthestars Lieutenant Junior Grade Red Shirt

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    There are 200 years between WW3 and Discovery. Plenty of time to rebuild.
     
  3. CorporalCaptain

    CorporalCaptain Fleet Admiral Admiral

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  4. LisbonPlayer

    LisbonPlayer Commander Red Shirt

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    After seeing the awful cityscape from Discovery I believe the city got hastily rebuild after the war and then, some decades later, they tore down the majority of the skyscrapers and made new buildings following the late 19th century style.
     
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  5. Tuskin38

    Tuskin38 Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    We also see Paris in Picard and it had none of the skyscrapers that were in Discovery.
    Picard:
    [​IMG]

    Discovery:
    [​IMG]
     
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  6. FederationHistorian

    FederationHistorian Commodore Commodore

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    At least NYC and DC; Boston seems to have recovered if it got hit as well, according to PIC. Can probably add Chicago to the list alongside NYC and DC, since its never seen as well and the conflict reached the Midwest, according to DIS.

    San Francisco was spared; in the ENT episode “Demons”, it was mentioned that the surviving governments convened in San Francisco after the war.

    We don’t see LA because it’s supposed to have fallen into the ocean 6 years before the exchange due to a massive earthquake and become a coral reel. It its possible that Earth was compelled to completely rebuild LA after Voyager returned home. It is also possible that only a small part of LA fell into the ocean, but we never see LA anywhere in Trek until PIC, suggesting that the whole city managed to fall into the Pacific. And since Trek is sci-fi, anything could have made such a scenario happen

    In universe, yes that probably the reason. In real life, its to not upset China.

    It also not hard to image that Europe (and possibly Australia and New Zealand too) either supported or were annexed into the Eastern Coalition, considering how Picard had to calm Lily down and reassure her that he wasn’t one of them.

    There are 300 years of history between WW3 and TNG. Buildings come and go all the time and get rebuilt with new materials and the latest architectural designs. And let’s not forget that the Dominion attacked Earth and Paris is the capital of the Federation. Explaining why Paris in PIC looks different from TUC/TNG.

    Or maybe that's how Paris was rebuilt after the Earth-Romulan War?
     
  7. valkyrie013

    valkyrie013 Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Plenty of instances where places were destroyed by natural calamity like an Earthquake or fire, better is after WW2 rebuilding Germany and Japan. All the castles, temples etc are there.

    So by Archers time 2156 everything has long since been rebuilt. Maybe to only get leveled again in the romulan war..

    Only took 2 years to build the Eiffel tower in the first place. Back in 1887
     
  8. Tuskin38

    Tuskin38 Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    The Golden Gate bridge was rebuilt after the Breen destroyed it.
     
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  9. Deks

    Deks Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Yes, but there's 145 odd years between Discovery and Picard series.
    Many of the skyscrappers could have been removed from Paris in that amount of time.
    Many cities we have today have been rebuilt from the ground up in just 100 years.
    Nothing too odd about it.
    The 24th century could have ended up with a more 'minimalist' policy and higher emphasis on efficiency - and more people could have left Earth to colonize other systems or settle in other areas of Earth.
     
  10. Tuskin38

    Tuskin38 Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    I never said it was odd. I was just pointing out the city changed.
     
  11. Jedi Marso

    Jedi Marso Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Different timelines. :evil:
     
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  12. Deks

    Deks Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Well, cities DO change... and 145 years would be more than enough time for this to happen.
     
  13. Gov Kodos

    Gov Kodos Admiral Admiral

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    Paris is like Marineville.
     
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  14. Jedi Marso

    Jedi Marso Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    I used to love that show, along with Captain Scarlett, UFO, and Space 1999 (the first season)

    "Anything can happen in the next half-hour!"

    That Gerry and Sylvia look is totally what I would have gone for on Earth for Enterprise, if I'd been in charge of production design. Updated, of course. With live actors.
     
    Last edited: May 16, 2022
  15. Ottens

    Ottens Commander Red Shirt

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    You okay, mate?
     
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  16. Ottens

    Ottens Commander Red Shirt

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    I guess Paris being historically recreated after an atomic attack is plausible. It's certainly more plausible to me than the Paris Discovery gave us. Notre Dame is a good example. There are also examples from post-WW2, as @valkyrie013 points out, when buildings and even entire towns damaged or destroyed during the war were rebuilt in the old style. The Old Town of Warsaw is probably the best analogy. It was razed to the ground by the Nazis and completely rebuilt after the war.
     
  17. Sci

    Sci Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    Star Trek has always tried to have its cake and eat it too when it comes to World War III and the survival of major cities. The implication seems to be that aliens -- I would assume not the Vulcans; perhaps the Denobulans? -- helped Earth rebuild in the century between First Contact and the launch of the NX-01.

    Picard also visits Los Angeles in 2401 in both "The Star Gazer" and "Farewell." These remain Los Angeles's only "present day" appearances IIRC.

    I absolutely detest this idea. It's completely incompatible with the idea of Star Trek being a bright, optimistic vision of the future. You're not depicting a positive future if you're depicting China as no longer existing or as having been more decimated by World War III than majority-white countries.

    To be clear, we do not know canonically that World War III was between the United States and China. The creators of First Contact said they had originally thought to have China be the foreign enemy of which Picard assumes Lily is afraid, but decided to instead go with the far vaguer "Eastern Coalition" -- which could mean just about anything. And "Strange New Worlds," the pilot for SNW, implies that World War III grew at least in part out of the Second American Civil War; this opens up the door to the interpretation that the "Eastern Coalition" was an American faction of some sort.

    To be clear, Star Trek has never been consistent in its depiction of Paris or of San Francisco. The versions of Paris seen in "We'll Always Have Paris," Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, and "Homefront"/"Paradise Lost" were all radically different from one-another.

    Not exactly. The line was: "Having endured a catastrophic World War, Earth's governments came to this city for the purpose of creating a just and lasting peace among nations. Today, we have assembled here again, representatives of numerous worlds, to forge an unprecedented alliance."

    That could mean a peace conference was held in San Francisco after World War III. However, in real life, the United Nations Conference on International Organization, the founding conference of the U.N., was held in San Francisco in 1945 for exactly that purpose. So I always assumed Samuels was referring to the founding of the U.N. after World War II when he said that line.

    There's a bit in one of the historic preservation signs in PIC "The Star Gazer" that says only part of L.A. fell into the ocean.

    That is wild speculation based on not a whole lot of evidence. Like, sure, many things are possible, but frankly you're holding onto an a priori assumption ("Eastern Coalition"="China") that has no canonical support.

    "The Changing Face of Evil" only established that the Breen attacked Starfleet Headquarters in San Francisco, not Paris.
     
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  18. fireproof78

    fireproof78 Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    That's always been my interpretation. I never even thought "Eastern Coalition" meant "China" though obviously I see the potential connection now. But, the way Lily talked struck me as a more local power rather than a reference to a larger world power.
     
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  19. Mr. Laser Beam

    Mr. Laser Beam Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    In ENT, Trip Tucker says he’s been to New York City, so obviously it was rebuilt along with the rest of them.

    And Phlox attended Mass at St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, so…ditto.

    As for the ECON/China thing: That comes from the DVD commentary for ST:FC. All references to the ECON were supposed to be China, but were changed at the last minute, no doubt to avoid offending Chinese fans (and possibly the Chinese government). But you gotta admit, the postwar courtroom scene in “Farpoint” did look rather Chinese, didn’t it?

    And it ties into the TOS reference (in “Whom Gods Destroy”) to the dictator Lee Kuan. TOS itself never actually said who he was, but the novelverse presents Lee as a Chinese general who was the founder and leader of the ECON.
     
    Last edited: May 16, 2022
  20. Ottens

    Ottens Commander Red Shirt

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    I also hate to think that in the future of Star Trek, China would have been largely wiped out. But if you put together the reference to an "Eastern Coalition" being a faction in WW3 with the almost complete absence of Chinese people from Star Trek (despite it being the most populous country in the world in our time), China, or East Asia more generally, being devastated in a nuclear WW3 does seem the most likely explanation.

    Pike's comments could be broadly interpreted. You might say, for example, that WW2 grew out of WW1, which grew out of the Balkan Wars of 1912-13. To use that analogy, a Second American Civil War could somehow cause or morph into the Eugenics War, which somehow causes of morphs into World War III.

    It must be called World War III for a reason, though. I don't think it's likely it was an America-only war.

    Remember also Riker's reference in FC that "most of the world's major cities" were destroyed. That, to my mind, again argues for the Eastern Coalition being based in the Eastern Hemisphere.