A USS Kelvin Complaint Nobody's Made Yet...

[M'Sharak]

It makes us Cling-ons

[link removed]

No politics, please. Do not want.

Interestingly, the link is back...

Or maybe I didn't do it right the first time. Fixed now.

 

[CorboMight]

The USS Kelvin comes under attack and is laid waste early in Star Trek.

A common assumption is that Nero's ship commits this horrid, destructive attack.

But it's not quite the case.

A rogue team, led by Starfleet's Lead Designer, borrows the keys to Nero's gargantuan Warship. (NERO: Bring it back in one piece, okay? I've gotta be at Vulcan by 11:30.)

The last thing the crew of the Kelvin hears, over subspace, is the Lead Designer, screaming: "One nacelle my ass!"

The consequence?

STARFLEET COMMAND
Okay. Okay!
From now on, only pairs of engines.
(To Lead Designer)
Happy?

 

[Shatterhand]

Oh, how I wish J.J. and his boys had never, EVER suggested that their Star Trek movie was going to be respectful to canon. Sweet sh*t, what a stupid thing to do. He should've called a press conference or something, stood in front of reporters, webcasters, studio execs, and whoever else needed to know, grew some brass ones, and said:

"While my Star Trek movie has characters, settings, and thematic elements that very closely parallel established Trek lore, my movie is NOT set what fans would consider the current "canon". It is an independent, unique vision of the Star Trek universe, one that I hope attracts and inspires a whole new legion of fans and wins over some of the old ones. I wanted to create something fresh, exciting, and new and breathe life into a property that I feel has stagnated in recent years. I knew going into this that I was going to have detractors that were too loyal to the Star Trek they love to accept my changes. Pardon my brutal honesty, but if it fails to bring the old-school, die-hard Trek fans into the fold, I don't anticipate losing much sleep over it. This movie isn't just for them. I'd love for them to appreciate it in the spirit with which it's being made, but if they can't, there's not much I can do about it. What's done is done."

Arrogant-sounding? Yeah, probably. But it sure would've made it crystal clear that whatever minor details people are willing to shred the movie to pieces over are there for a reason.

Yeah, and I'll give you the reason: he was too lazy and uncreative to bother to put in the effort to make it fit.

There was no reason to try to make it fit. It shouldn't HAVE to fit in order to be relevant to those open-minded enough to give it its fair shake. Star Trek is in line for an evolution. The franchise has become stagnant. The same people have been running things for a decade plus, and they've managed to take a highly lucrative property and drive it into the ground. Sure, they did some good things with it, but it's time for a change, or else Star Trek as a franchise will stay dead, save for the occasional paperback book or comic book.

If you're fine with that, and you can't bring yourself to open up your mind enough to give the movie a chance, don't launch some asinine protest movement, don't boycott Paramount Studios or write nasty letters; those tactics never, ever work. In fact, they usually end up having the opposite effect. Skip the movie and watch your TOS DVD sets or whatever gives you pleasure. Save yourself the anguish and frustration.

Too many people are taking these scattered details and over-interpreting them to death, allowing those interpretations to further inspire predetermined judgments. It's ridiculous. It's disturbingly ironic that a fandom devoted to concepts like "infinite diversity in infinite combinations" has become so rigid and inflexible.

 

[3D Master]

Yeah, and I'll give you the reason: he was too lazy and uncreative to bother to put in the effort to make it fit.

There was no reason to try to make it fit.

Yes, there is. It's called contributing to a whole.

It shouldn't HAVE to fit in order to be relevant to those open-minded enough to give it its fair shake. Star Trek is in line for an evolution. The franchise has become stagnant. The same people have been running things for a decade plus, and they've managed to take a highly lucrative property and drive it into the ground. Sure, they did some good things with it, but it's time for a change, or else Star Trek as a franchise will stay dead, save for the occasional paperback book or comic book.

Which has absolutely nothing to do with continuity, let alone the continuity of the ORIGINAL series, which was NEVER stagnant. Star Trek only became stale during Voyager and especially Enterprise, because they FORCED it to fit with their idea of "how Star Trek episodes should be". The exact same story structure, music, "sweet humans", same lift scenes, same battles, same terns, same weapons, etc. etc. This obviously, has got nothing to do with continuity.

In fact: HAD they STUCK to continuity, Enterprise would have blown this mold clear off the face of the Earth, and produced a FAR different show. You would have recognized only "warp drive", "impulse" and the occasional alien. It would have brought the evolution to Star Trek earlier, and nobody here would be going about how it "got stale". Well maybe with Voyager, but everyone would be saying they nicely avoided another lame duck for a series.

In FACT, had they kept Voyager to their own "continuity", their premise, it would have produced a show more along the lines of Farscape instead of TNG redux.

So again, continuity has got NOTHING to do with the stagnation of Star Trek. And thus they can do their evolution, hell, REVOLUTION, and kept it within continuity without problem. They just couldn't be bothered. Aka; lazy, uncreative writing.

And when you have lazy uncreative writing; it does not bode well for the quality.

If you're fine with that, and you can't bring yourself to open up your mind enough to give the movie a chance, don't launch some asinine protest movement, don't boycott Paramount Studios or write nasty letters; those tactics never, ever work. In fact, they usually end up having the opposite effect. Skip the movie and watch your TOS DVD sets or whatever gives you pleasure. Save yourself the anguish and frustration.

I probably will skip this movie, because lazy, uncreative writing will almost certainly produce a bad movie.

Too many people are taking these scattered details and over-interpreting them to death, allowing those interpretations to further inspire predetermined judgments. It's ridiculous. It's disturbingly ironic that a fandom devoted to concepts like "infinite diversity in infinite combinations" has become so rigid and inflexible.

And again, with that ridiculous concept, that one is supposed to take "infinite diversity in infinite combinations" to the literal extreme. Somebody murdered a person for a quick buck. "Hey, good for him, infinite diversity in infinite combinations. If he thought murdering someone was the best way to go ." One can be critical and say something is bad, when it is bad. You do not have keep your mouth shut, because you're critical of something. Now demanding THAT, would indeed be a violation of IDIC.

 

[Candlelight]

I'm not too fond of one-nacelle designs. But I don't think it's really a gross violation. As for the registry having a leading 0, it's not unprecedented.

First there was the Dauntless NX-01-A or whatever it was, then there was Enterprise NX-01. So I accept the leading 0 as well.

People may argue that the leading zero is irrelevant; the Grisson was like NCC-625 or something.

 

[Kemaiku]

I'm not too fond of one-nacelle designs. But I don't think it's really a gross violation. As for the registry having a leading 0, it's not unprecedented.

First there was the Dauntless NX-01-A or whatever it was, then there was Enterprise NX-01. So I accept the leading 0 as well.

People may argue that the leading zero is irrelevant; the Grisson was like NCC-625 or something.

638

 

[cooleddie74]

But then the earliest Starfleet starships like Archer's Enterprise had a "0" before the digit in their hull number. Sure, their numbers were so low(practically zero)that it helped fill out space on the hulls and looked more even and congruent with a two-letter prefix like "NX", but this won't be the first time we've seen a Starfleet vessel with a "0" preceding the other numbers in its registry.

 

[Cary L. Brown]

But then the earliest Starfleet starships like Archer's Enterprise had a "0" before the digit in their hull number. Sure, their numbers were so low(practically zero)that it helped fill out space on the hulls and looked more even and congruent with a two-letter prefix like "NX", but this won't be the first time we've seen a Starfleet vessel with a "0" preceding the other numbers in its registry.

You know, I have absolutely NO problem with the presence, or absence, of the zero. But that's because I see these numbers as being something a bit different than many folks do.

To me, the "N.C.C." doesn't stand for "naval construction contract." And it also doesn't stand for "nothing except random numbers and letters," either.

"N.C.C" stands for "Navigational Contact Code."

It's the transponder ID code that each ship broadcasts to identify itself to other ships in the fleet.

Some ships broadcast a four-digit code. Others broadcast a three-digit code. Others, eventually, broadcast a five-digit code. But what makes up that code is largely irrelevant.

A ship could very easily have a navigational contact code of "zero-zero-zero-zero" and that would still be perfectly valid, because that would be a unique identification signal... which is really the purpose of this code.

This is ONLY an issue if you think that the NCC code is just a "sequential numbering scheme." If that's not what it is... then there's no issue, is there?

 

[3D Master]

But then the earliest Starfleet starships like Archer's Enterprise had a "0" before the digit in their hull number. Sure, their numbers were so low(practically zero)that it helped fill out space on the hulls and looked more even and congruent with a two-letter prefix like "NX", but this won't be the first time we've seen a Starfleet vessel with a "0" preceding the other numbers in its registry.

Since Archer's Enterprise is one giant continuity violation, that instance can be tossed out the window with the rest of the garbage.

 

[cooleddie74]

I always consider NCC to mean Naval Construction Contract and have ever since, I think, the novel BEST DESTINY came out years and years ago. It seems to make the most sense logically even if its never been made official canon.

 

[Cary L. Brown]

I always consider NCC to mean Naval Construction Contract and have ever since, I think, the novel BEST DESTINY came out years and years ago. It seems to make the most sense logically even if its never been made official canon.

"Naval Construction Contract" was how it was described by Franz Joseph back in 1974... "Best Destiny" didn't come along til, what, 1990?

 

[Kanenas]

Or at least, not that I'm aware of. The ship only has one warp nacelle. This is in blatant defiance of Roddenberry's Rules of Starship Design, which says warp nacelles have to be in even numbers. A rule which has been followed faithfully with the exception of the redesigned Enterprise D in AGT, but that can be written off as an alternate future that never happens. So what gives with the Kelvin and its odd-numbered nacelle?

In the OLD OLD OLD Starfleet Technical manual there was a version of a ship which was the old enterprise saucer section and ONE warp nacelle. I believe this was printed before even the first movie came out.

 

[Cary L. Brown]

Or at least, not that I'm aware of. The ship only has one warp nacelle. This is in blatant defiance of Roddenberry's Rules of Starship Design, which says warp nacelles have to be in even numbers. A rule which has been followed faithfully with the exception of the redesigned Enterprise D in AGT, but that can be written off as an alternate future that never happens. So what gives with the Kelvin and its odd-numbered nacelle?

In the OLD OLD OLD Starfleet Technical manual there was a version of a ship which was the old enterprise saucer section and ONE warp nacelle. I believe this was printed before even the first movie came out.

"Roddenberry's rules" came along after many, many years... during a time that Roddenberry's mental deterioration was well-underway as well (the disease which eventually killed him). So I tend not to treat them TOO seriously.

Roddenberry came up with Star Trek. He conceived it... in effect, he's its mother. But he's not the only person who ever contributed to it, and eventually he turned into a "Mommy Dearest" type figure, sadly.

"Roddenberry's rules of Starship design" were never based upon any logic or reason. They were mainly created to discredit the work of Franz Joseph (see the classic Star Trek Technical Manual). Many other things were done during this time with the same intent, it seems... to discredit anything not specifically claimed as "Roddenberry's idea."

So I've always... without exception... rejected this rule.

****************

HOWEVER, if you want to think about how it might work, I've got a solution for you.

Picture, in your mind, the TNG Enterprise (1701-D). Notice the two nacelles... and notice that each nacelle has two sets of "coils" (an upper set and a lower set) inside.

Now, think basic physics... and pretend that these things are providing "thrust" in the conventional sense, just for the moment. Imagine that each "row of coils" is creating thrust like a jet engine or a rocket motor. It's NOT... I'm just using an analogy. But stick with me.

Now... if those were thrust-based engines, the 1701-D would be able to steer upwards or downwards, but not very significantly, by altering the relative thrust levels between the upper and lower coil sets.

On the other hand, with the wide spacing LATERALLY, you'd be able to steer left and right quite dramatically by altering the relative thrust levels of the coil sets in the left and right nacelles, relative to each other.

And that's pretty much what we see in the show, isn't it?

SO... to steer left, right, up, down (pitch and yaw, in other words) at warp, you need some way to get that "differential thrust" effect. You do it in TNG, not with TWO NACELLES, but with FOUR SETS OF COILS.

For a "single nacelle" solution... perhaps that single nacelle has four sets of coils inside of one housing. It may be less maneuverable, but may be faster in a "straight-line sprint" due to the coil's resultant fields being more closely coupled. It might be more efficient, in other words, at the expense of being less maneuverable.

If you need an explanation... think of it that way. "Nacelles," after all, aren't items of technology. They are simply housings for the technology they carry inside of them.

 

[Kanenas]

Or at least, not that I'm aware of. The ship only has one warp nacelle. This is in blatant defiance of Roddenberry's Rules of Starship Design, which says warp nacelles have to be in even numbers. A rule which has been followed faithfully with the exception of the redesigned Enterprise D in AGT, but that can be written off as an alternate future that never happens. So what gives with the Kelvin and its odd-numbered nacelle?

In the OLD OLD OLD Starfleet Technical manual there was a version of a ship which was the old enterprise saucer section and ONE warp nacelle. I believe this was printed before even the first movie came out.

"Roddenberry's rules" came along after many, many years... during a time that Roddenberry's mental deterioration was well-underway as well (the disease which eventually killed him). So I tend not to treat them TOO seriously.

Roddenberry came up with Star Trek. He conceived it... in effect, he's its mother. But he's not the only person who ever contributed to it, and eventually he turned into a "Mommy Dearest" type figure, sadly.

"Roddenberry's rules of Starship design" were never based upon any logic or reason. They were mainly created to discredit the work of Franz Joseph (see the classic Star Trek Technical Manual). Many other things were done during this time with the same intent, it seems... to discredit anything not specifically claimed as "Roddenberry's idea."

So I've always... without exception... rejected this rule.

****************

HOWEVER, if you want to think about how it might work, I've got a solution for you.

Picture, in your mind, the TNG Enterprise (1701-D). Notice the two nacelles... and notice that each nacelle has two sets of "coils" (an upper set and a lower set) inside.

Now, think basic physics... and pretend that these things are providing "thrust" in the conventional sense, just for the moment. Imagine that each "row of coils" is creating thrust like a jet engine or a rocket motor. It's NOT... I'm just using an analogy. But stick with me.

Now... if those were thrust-based engines, the 1701-D would be able to steer upwards or downwards, but not very significantly, by altering the relative thrust levels between the upper and lower coil sets.

On the other hand, with the wide spacing LATERALLY, you'd be able to steer left and right quite dramatically by altering the relative thrust levels of the coil sets in the left and right nacelles, relative to each other.

And that's pretty much what we see in the show, isn't it?

SO... to steer left, right, up, down (pitch and yaw, in other words) at warp, you need some way to get that "differential thrust" effect. You do it in TNG, not with TWO NACELLES, but with FOUR SETS OF COILS.

For a "single nacelle" solution... perhaps that single nacelle has four sets of coils inside of one housing. It may be less maneuverable, but may be faster in a "straight-line sprint" due to the coil's resultant fields being more closely coupled. It might be more efficient, in other words, at the expense of being less maneuverable.

If you need an explanation... think of it that way. "Nacelles," after all, aren't items of technology. They are simply housings for the technology they carry inside of them.

hmm what you say about Roddenberry being so "anti-not-my-idea" makes sense given his comming up with lyrics for the original theme song.

I always saw the two nacelles as simply two propulsion systems in much the same way as a ship has two props.

I don't see a single nacelle as a violation of any rules. It just means the ship designers want to make sure the crew gets home.

 

[Captain Robert April]

Well it is the 'Trek fandom way, after all. Get a 100 fans in a bar, and get a 100 definitions of what is and isn't canon.

Probably more.

A grand unified continuity for all the past series is just a cute little story, nothing more.

Well, it is a tantalizing goal, if one is up for such a quest...

As for slash fiction: no matter how much you wish it, their not going to canonize you Trip/Spock/Riker/Paris crossover time travel orgy fic.

AND THANK THE GODS FOR THAT MUCH, AT LEAST!!

 

[Captain Robert April]

Didn't Gene R. also say that he didn't really consider Trek V canon, what with Spock's laughing Vulcan half-brother?

I wouldn't mind striking Trek V from canon, personally. :-/

Just chalk it all up to a drunken attempt at a ghost story around the campfire by Kirk and McCoy, and it all falls into place.

 

[Captain Robert April]

I always consider NCC to mean Naval Construction Contract and have ever since, I think, the novel BEST DESTINY came out years and years ago. It seems to make the most sense logically even if its never been made official canon.

"Naval Construction Contract" was how it was described by Franz Joseph back in 1974... "Best Destiny" didn't come along til, what, 1990?

 

[Cary L. Brown]

I always consider NCC to mean Naval Construction Contract and have ever since, I think, the novel BEST DESTINY came out years and years ago. It seems to make the most sense logically even if its never been made official canon.

"Naval Construction Contract" was how it was described by Franz Joseph back in 1974... "Best Destiny" didn't come along til, what, 1990?

HUH???

 

[Captain Robert April]

Explain, then, the registries with prefixes like NX, NAR, NSP, etc.

 

[Cary L. Brown]

Explain, then, the registries with prefixes like NX, NAR, NSP, etc.

CRA, I know better than to "discuss" things with you where you've made up your mind... the "deck-2-bridge" thing taught me that one. FYI, the "nub" is the lift shaft... so there!

Seriously, though... I don't have to "explain" it to you. I'm stating what I, personally, choose to believe, and it's every bit as consistent with on-screen canon as what you do. With the additional advantage of fitting in with the topic we're discussing.

However... let's just say for the moment, that NSP doesn't mean "navigational contact code" but instead means "Navigational signal protocol" for instance... and "NX" stands for "Navigation exchange" or "NAR" stands for "Navigational associated response."

I'm just tossing those out off the cuff, not claiming any of them are "legit." The point is, it's entirely possible that there are different IFF-systems out there for different types of ships. Maybe one for ships which are not yet on operational status (NX) and another for "merchant marine" ships, and another for civilian vessels, just for a few examples.

Why is that inherently "impossible?" It sure makes a lot more sense than lowering the bridge a full deck just so the viewscreen can face forwards.