What I Don't Like About the USS Kelvin

I'm pretty sure you missed the entire point of the opening scene.

 

I for one rather like the fact that, for once, a Federation starship doesn't look like it's all immaculately clean and fresh from spacedock. I like seeing a ship that looks like it's got some actual history to it.

 

But after the Kelvin was destroyed, why didn't the Narada then destroy all the shuttles?

I mean the Kelvin's gone... the shuttles can't outrun the futuristic Narada...

 

Because George Kirk drove a starship into the Narada's gut, crippling it.

I'm sure this will lead to an extended discussion about the potential energy of an early 23rd Century matter/anti-matter explosion dispersed in a vacuum environment over the external structure of a 24th-Century triple-reinforced duranium hull squared times pi, with footnotes derived from the honored Matt Jeffries through a Ouija board, but were you watching the opening scene? At all?

 

Yeah, that sucker's engine lights were fading in and out and it was sloughing off quite a bit of debris while listing. Narada seemed pretty well done-in at that point.

 

No kidding. All of this was pretty straight forward in the movie.

 

<wipes water off moniter> I have got to stop reading online while I'm drinking something. And really glad I gave up Pepsi a long time ago.

 

Modern cruise ships cram 5000+ people in less than 40 lifeboats. And you'd be supprised how small those things look from the outside.

 

That is a very good point, Vicki.

Objection retracted.

 

I've always loved the fan who's Suspension of Disbelief includes:
Alien races that are all very humanoid, and nearly-equally developed
Faster than light travel
Sound in space (which in the beginning, this movie seemed to point out that there's no sound in space, but then it sorta gave up on the idea)
etc. etc.

But change the ship design, or bending the rules of the made up physics in the Trek Universe? That's crazy.

Seriously, it's fiction. Just watch it for the story telling, and discuss it on that level (yeah... this movie lacked in that regard, admittedly. But hey. Shit blow'd up, woooo-wheee!)

 

It's not really suspension of disbelief that's often the problem among Trekkies (myself included). It's when Trek violates its own established rules, its own "framework," that the suspension of disbelief is pushed past the breaking point.

Do I think that happened in XI, or with the Kelvin? Nah, not really.

 

Robau.

 

A Kelvin saucer separation, that's a funny thought. That would basically be exploding.

 

Still, with the firepower the Narada had, I'm amazed the Kelvin wasn't just blown apart in one salvo

 

It was in the script.

 

I thought it was pretty obvious that it didn't separate because it couldn't in that senario.

It was to damaged to waste that much time or, its before it gets shot at - which is a bad time to split your shields in 2.

 

The Kelvin was BEAUTIFUL! It has risen to a very high place on my overall favorite list of ship designs.

 

You need to stop thinking like in real life terms this is called Science Fiction after all. The script needed the Kelvin to survive or no Kirk and it made a great openeing scene besides you can easily say Nero after that fight was more powerful due to the 25 years to upgrade

 

Plus, it wouldn't have allowed for Robau to have his badass can-opener demise if his ship had been blown away within the first 90 seconds of the movie.

 

The Narada's purpose in the beginning vs. the Kelvin was to cripple her and interrogate her captain to find out where Spock was.

If you just blow up the ship, how do you know where or when you are, much less where or when Spock is or will be?