Why not use the Stargazer?

Discussion in 'Star Trek: Picard' started by Lordcommanderdarkwolf, Apr 28, 2023.

  1. Saul

    Saul Vice Admiral Admiral

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    I don't know if it will be or not but I wouldn't mind catching up with those races in the 25th century. Their situations would be new at least. I wouldn't mind seeing DS9 characters return or TNG villains such as Sela.
     
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  2. fireproof78

    fireproof78 Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    Mileage will vary as to interest.
     
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  3. Skywalker

    Skywalker Admiral Admiral

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    Only problem with that is by that point it was no longer just "the novel ship" as it had shown up on-screen in Lower Decks with the proper design.
     
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  4. drt

    drt Commodore Commodore

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    Plus, the Luna class was in the Titan-A's display case.
     
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  5. Dukhat

    Dukhat Admiral Admiral

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    But the only thing it had in common with the novels was the design of the ship and the fact that Riker was captain and his wife was a crewmember (the latter we already knew from Nemesis.) None of Riker's crew from the novels were serving on the ship in LDS.
     
  6. Mr. Laser Beam

    Mr. Laser Beam Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    ^ There seems to be some wiggle room on that last point.

    I mean, Riker's XO in Lower Decks was never named, so it is entirely possible it's Christine Vale.
     
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  7. The Wormhole

    The Wormhole Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    Christine Vale is human. The Titan's XO is season 2 of Lower Decks is not. Hell, she doesn't even resemble Christine Vale in the slightest.
     
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  8. Mr. Laser Beam

    Mr. Laser Beam Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    We don't know that.

    Riker's LD executive officer did appear to have some kind of face paint, but there's no proof she isn't human.

    Since there's no canon information as to Christine's physical appearance...we don't know that either.
     
  9. The Wormhole

    The Wormhole Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    You're doing a lot of tapdancing to make a square peg fit in a round hole. Especially since Vale was never said to have face paint in the novels anyway, and aside from being female and XO of the Titan, there are no similarities between Vale and the character seen in season 2 of Lower Decks.
     
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  10. Sci

    Sci Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    I mean, what it boils down to is that the impulse to make the hero ship of PIC S3 a ship that Riker had previously commanded is in conflict with the impulse to make it a ship that the audience wasn't already emotionally invested in so as to make rechristening it as the Enterprise an emotionally satisfying ending. Matalas tried to circle that square by making it the Titan-A rather than the Titan and by rationalizing the link to Riker by implying either that Riker had commanded the Titan-A or that components from Riker's Titan were used in the construction of the Titan-A, but either way it's just weird and awkward. Making it the Titan-A is especially awkward because it comes across like saying, "Well, the Titan legacy was amazing enough that it gets a letter suffix just like the Enterprise, but not amazing to keep its letter suffix."

    It would have been better to either have the hero ship be a different ship Riker had commanded after the Titan, or to make it an entirely new ship with no connection to Riker. Personally, I think the ship that eventually became the new Enterprise in "The Last Generation" should have been the same ship that Picard and company encountered the Jurati Borg on in S2 -- and that that ship should not have been named Stargazer and should not have been designed to look like a modern version of the Constellation class. Make Rios's ship from S2 a Constitution III-class, and give it a name that registers as vaguely annoying or at least unmemorable -- the USS Edward Jellico for instance, or the USS Jaresh-Inyo, or the USS William Ross. That way, rechristening it as the Enterprise would feel like an upgrade rather than an insult to prior name. You still get the benefit of a sense of the vessel having a history with Picard when he and Riker board it at the start of S3, because Picard will have already commanded it in S2. Also it would have brought the budget of S3 down a bit by assigning the cost of designing the ship and building the model to the S2 budget.

    Also, side note: Get rid of the goddamn Odyssey-class. There was no reason to make the Enterprise that Shelby commands the F. The Enterprise that Shelby commands and which the Borg commandeer in "Vox" should have been the Enterprise-E, and the hero ship of S3 should have become the Enterprise-F. There was no reason to introduce an entirely new Enterprise and then have it last for two-point-four seconds before introducing yet another new Enterprise. And making it the 1701-E -- and explicitly establishing that Sol Station destroyed the Enterprise-E in defense of Earth -- would have just added a tad more of a feeling of tension for the audience, since it's a ship that people who don't play Star Trek Online would actually recognize from the three motion pictures it featured in.

    Yeah, but the fact that Lower Decks used the Luna-class design is the big thing here.
     
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  11. Dukhat

    Dukhat Admiral Admiral

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    Oh, I agree. McMahon made the conscious decision to use the novel design for the Titan when he could have easily had a new design made, since the shows are not beholden to the novelverse. But he used it anyway as a tribute to Sean Torangeau, not to the novelverse in general. But clearly Matalas was under no such compunction.
     
    Last edited: May 24, 2023
  12. fireproof78

    fireproof78 Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    Matalas and McMahon did what fans do-use ship designs they like.
     
  13. Dukhat

    Dukhat Admiral Admiral

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    I wouldn’t go so far as to say that McMahon liked Torangeau’s Titan. He just used it as a tribute. For all we know he could care less what the Titan looked like.

    Matalas on the other hand liked Krause’s Shangri-La design so much that he copied 90% of it for his new Titan.

    Yep. I’m a big fan of Occam’s Razor. And saying that character is Vale with face paint is not remotely the simplest answer. The simplest answer is that that character is an alien, and the artist who drew her had no idea who Vale was.
     
    Last edited: May 24, 2023
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  14. Tiberius Jim

    Tiberius Jim Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Here's my solution:

    Ditch the Titan, keep the Stargazer. Turns out Shaw was given command over Seven who is relegated to be his first officer. It's Picard and not RIker who uses his history with the ship and relationship with Seven to come aboard.

    Enterprise-E is the ship being ceremoniously decommissioned on Frontier Day. Ties in with the TNG movies, much more emotional for the fans to see a ship we knew for 4 films be honored. And that much more dramatic to see it commandeered by the Borg.

    Stargazer gets heavily damaged in the final fight against the fleet and gets a refit with Seven put in command, allowing the design to be adjusted.

    Jack is stationed on the Stargazer. How cool, Picard's son serving aboard a ship with the same name as his dad's first command? A future show could take place on the Stargazer, avoiding having two shows both set aboard an Enterprise.

    On their way to the Stargazer, Jack reveals to Picard that Starfleet's newest, best and baddest cruiser, the Odyssey class, has been commissioned as the next Enterprise.
     
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  15. USS Firefly

    USS Firefly Commodore Commodore

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    That would have been better than what we have got
     
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  16. fireproof78

    fireproof78 Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    Agree on this part, yes. Connecting to Picard's history makes far more sense.
    Less inclined this way. Jack is nepotism on steroids as it is. This is even worse.
    Please no.
     
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  17. Tiberius Jim

    Tiberius Jim Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    How is Jack serving on the Stargazer worse than him serving on the Enterprise?

    And the new Enterprise being the Odyssey class would not only make more sense in-universe but would line up with what was established in STO. I'm not a huge fan of the design myself but it's a much more logical progression to go from Sovereign to Odyssey than the step down from Odyssey to the Neo-Constitution.
     
  18. fireproof78

    fireproof78 Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    They're both bad but this feels like small universe taken to 11.

    I'm sure someone could argue for STO but I have no interest in it, nor am I familiar with. So, going from a different perspective, how is this a logical progression?
     
  19. Tiberius Jim

    Tiberius Jim Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Eh, they could have easily shown him to be serving on some random science or medical freighter but where's the fun in that? I feel like the Stargazer is more realistic as it would only take a small bit of pull from his two flag officer parents to be assigned there. It would have also tied nicely to the story about Jack's namesake. Feels like enough of a cool connection without being so on the nose as him serving on the Enterprise does.

    Each generation of Enterprise has been larger and more advanced than the previous one. Since the Odyssey looks like a larger, more advanced progression of the Sovereign class, it seems like a more logical evolution. It was already established the ship as the Enterprise-F, I'm simply suggesting they should have kept her around to be the next generation of the ship rather than show her being decommissioned and replaced by a smaller, seemingly less advanced class.
     
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  20. fireproof78

    fireproof78 Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    None of it is realistic. And the fun? What I want from Trek is something new.

    I don't completely agree but that's just me. I hate the idea of the ENTERPRISE as the biggest and best. But you do make a decent point.