The Kobayashi Maru Solution.

[RookieBatman]

It isn’t faithful to the original series, but I think it is consistent with the film’s characterization. Chekov is portrayed at being not only exceptionally skilled with the transporter, but also a “Russian whiz kid” who is given the conn (which he never was in the original series, except briefly as an old man in The Final Frontier) and conceived the Saturn tactic (something we would not expect from TV’s Chekov).

I'm sorry, but that sounds like Wesley Crusher to me.

It didn't have to go that way: Chekov could have stayed at the con, the transporter operator could have failed, Sulu and Kirk could have died and Nero would have destroyed Earth.

Better?

I think maybe you should go back and read my post again, because based on your response, it doesn't seem like you understood the point I was making. I was making an argument about what could've been changed in the real world, to improve that situation. In that sense, if Chekov had stayed at the con, then Sulu and Kirk would not have died, because the writers simply wouldn't have written it that way. I say that the writers should've found another way to showcase Chekov that would've been more befitting his character, instead of coming up with something brand new out of left field that didn't make any sense, either to Prime Chekov, or even the character as established in this movie.

 

[F. King Daniel]

But the thing is I didn't have any problem with Chekov operating the transporter. It didn't seem wrong or unusual to me at all. This thread is the first I've heard of anyone having a problem with it . I know TOS Chekov never operated the transporter, but neither did TOS Kirk drive a car over a cliff or did TOS Uhura ever do any translating. Maybe when TOS Chekov picked sciences as a secondary skill, STXI Chekov picked transporters instead. Who knows?

I don't see how it's at all wrong for the character at all, nor did I consider "lazy writing". Chekov's a genius kid (yes, slightly Wesley-like but not a billionth as annoying IMO) who's already assigned as navigator of the Federation flagship. "Genius" usually means you're good at more than one thing.

Dumbing it down to the max, navigating a ship is pretty much aiming it. Locking on to two people in freefall is pretty much aiming the transporter. Maybe there's some vague skill overlap there?

 

[F. King Daniel]

What I'm saying is that there are plenty of other cases as to where someone on the surface of the planet was beamed directly to sick bay without a landing pad. While granted, they were in standard orbit around the planet, but it does give credence to the fact that Scotty took what was broken with transporters and improved upon them like Dyson does with the vacuum cleaner. Fruits of Scotty's labor came as early as 2293 on the Enterprise-B when he beamed 47 survivors from a ship that was caught in the energy ribbon directly to sick bay.

Except they were beaming into other ships, without a recieving pad during Enterprise set 100 years earlier (Archer and a bunch of MACOs beamed to a ship and stole their warp coil in one episode). So that couldn't be Scotty's invention.

I'd imagine having a recieving pad would give an extra safety margin to transports, which Scotty would have wanted when performing such an extra-dangerous teleport in XI, but it's never been a requirement.

 

[RookieBatman]

But the thing is I didn't have any problem with Chekov operating the transporter. It didn't seem wrong or unusual to me at all.

But you did say it sounded cheesy. I think they could have made a situation that didn't.

Maybe when TOS Chekov picked sciences as a secondary skill, STXI Chekov picked transporters instead. Who knows?

But another person that probably picked transporter operation as a skill was the transporter operator. Is it being suggested that this is the first time anyone's ever been beamed up from freefall? In the hundred years that the transporter's been around, that's never happened before? Otherwise, it seems like the kind of thing that transporter operators would be trained in.

I don't see how it's at all wrong for the character at all, nor did I consider "lazy writing". Chekov's a genius kid (yes, slightly Wesley-like but not a billionth as annoying IMO) who's already assigned as navigator of the Federation flagship. "Genius" usually means you're good at more than one thing.

Pike called him "Russian whiz-kid." I don't mean for this to sound pedantic, but I think that's kinda different from "genius." I never got the impression while watching the movie that he was supposed to be a genius.

Dumbing it down to the max, navigating a ship is pretty much aiming it. Locking on to two people in freefall is pretty much aiming the transporter. Maybe there's some vague skill overlap there?

Well, navigation is about plotting courses, like, on a star chart. I would think it's more thoughtful and mathematical. Fiddling with a joystick at high speeds requiring quick reflexes sounds more like what a helmsman does.

 

[F. King Daniel]

^I think it's a fair assumption that it was the first time anyone had been beamed from freefall above an imploding planet collapsing into a black hole. Causing all sorts of gravitational anomolies is only the first of the complications I can imagine stemming from that. Heck, that close to the black hole time probably wasn't running at the quite same rate for Kirk and Sulu as it was on the Enterprise.

And as I said earlier, the on-duty transporter operator may have had the know-how, but they didn't have the lightning-quick reactions of young Chekov, who (due to the havok the black hole was causing) was aiming the transporter manually.

 

[Captrek]

slightly Wesley-like but not a billionth as annoying IMO

I find Yelchin’s accent to be the most annoying thing in the movie. I cringe every time he speaks. I hope they can tone it down for the sequels.

Note to Yelchin: Check out some footage of Koenig. It’s not that difficult to mix up your V’s and W’s without making me want to strangle you.

 

[RookieBatman]

^I think it's a fair assumption that it was the first time anyone had been beamed from freefall above an imploding planet collapsing into a black hole. Causing all sorts of gravitational anomolies is only the first of the complications I can imagine stemming from that. Heck, that close to the black hole time probably wasn't running at the quite same rate for Kirk and Sulu as it was on the Enterprise.

And as I said earlier, the on-duty transporter operator may have had the know-how, but they didn't have the lightning-quick reactions of young Chekov, who (due to the havok the black hole was causing) was aiming the transporter manually.

Well, that's fine. My opinion is that some other situation would've showcased Chekov more credibly, but I accept that it's purely subjective.

I would like to state for the record that I'm arguing purely for the sake of intellectual discourse, and that scene really wasn't a big deal to me, and ultimately has nothing to do with why I didn't like the movie. I enjoy debating plot elements of movies, and I don't mean for it to indicate overall criticism.

 

[F. King Daniel]

slightly Wesley-like but not a billionth as annoying IMO

I find Yelchin’s accent to be the most annoying thing in the movie. I cringe every time he speaks. I hope they can tone it down for the sequels.

Note to Yelchin: Check out some footage of Koenig. It’s not that difficult to mix up your V’s and W’s without making me want to strangle you.

I loved Yelchin's accent. It was (intentionally) somehow worse than Koenig's, but IMO was far more endearing. Maybe it's because you actually see this Chekov struggling with it - when inputting his access code he almost stutters, almost like a speech impediment instead of a goofy accent.

He was given the option of not doing the accent at all, btw.

 

[JarodRussell]

It didn't have to go that way: Chekov could have stayed at the con, the transporter operator could have failed, Sulu and Kirk could have died and Nero would have destroyed Earth.

Better?

The transporter operator could have been competent for a start, too. Nobody in this movie did what they were supposed to do. Uhura had to replace a communications officer that was incompetent, and then she didn't do anything in that function at all. The transporter guy was incompetent so that first Chekov and then Scotty had to do his job. And when Scotty did the job, he beamed them into the wrong place. The navigation officer was sick and his replacement Sulu was better at fencing than taking the helm. And so on.

It didn't look like that anyone on this ship did the job right or was assigned to the correct positions that suited their abilities.



And that the transporter can't lock on to a person falling is pretty ridiculous. When in orbit, a spaceship is mostly in low orbit (as shown in the movie and the various shows), which means it is constantly in motion at several thousand km/h (the ISS for instance orbits Earth every 90 minutes, and moves at an average of 27,000 km/h). In the movie, the Enterprise was still in a low orbit, but station keeping. It should have been no problem at all to beam them up during the fall (terminal velocity of a human on Earth is about 190 km/h). That the black hole deep inside Vulcan's core somehow made things complicated also doesn't make sense. It's a constant gravity source, there are no fluctuations. When the red matter ignites it would create a black hole with a specific mass, and that hole would then "eat" the mass of Vulcan. So in the end you have "mass of red matter black hole" + "mass of Vulcan", and you're done. Nothing dramatically dynamic.

 

[Sanji Himura]

True, but I think that the entire movie demonstrates as to why most of Pike's crew got replaced in favor of Kirk's crew, howbeit with the exception of Chekov, Spock(as first officer) and Sulu.

Let's take a look at how each gets replaced. Uhura replaced the first communications officer when she admitted that the communications that was intercepted was romulan, not a dialect of klingon as was first thought. McCoy replaced the ship's doctor when he died. Scotty became chief engineer because apparently Pike didn't have one.

 

[DonIago]

Not after Olson got vaporized by the drill, no...

 

[JarodRussell]

The chain of command in this movie's Starfleet is... I can't find any words for that. They have only one Chief Engineer and then the position is up for grabs. If Captain and XO are gone, a cadet can take command and then keep it.

McCoy's transition is the only one that makes sense. He was properly assigned to the Enterprise to begin with, and was probably the second chief medical officer.

Uhura got a barely official last minute assignment (and one has to wonder who replaced her position on the Farragut) and was working somewhere deep down inside the ship, far away from the bridge. Kirk was a cadet about to get kicked out of the Academy, Scotty was exiled to an old lonely outpost, and while he expressed interest in the Enterprise, he couldn't possibly have any experience with the ship. It's pretty far fetched that he would become Chief Engineer just because ONE man died. What are the other engineers doing down there? Was there no second in command?

 

[DonIago]

Given the circumstances it's not impossible to believe that the ship may have been somewhat short-handed. It was pretty clear that they were loading the ships up as fast as they could, and then mostly with cadets.

 

[Captrek]

(and one has to wonder who replaced her position on the Farragut)

Someone who died over Vulcan and won’t be around to complain about losing her post at the last moment to Spock’s girlfriend.

 

[Sanji Himura]

The chain of command in this movie's Starfleet is... I can't find any words for that. They have only one Chief Engineer and then the position is up for grabs. If Captain and XO are gone, a cadet can take command and then keep it.

McCoy's transition is the only one that makes sense. He was properly assigned to the Enterprise to begin with, and was probably the second chief medical officer.

Uhura got a barely official last minute assignment (and one has to wonder who replaced her position on the Farragut) and was working somewhere deep down inside the ship, far away from the bridge. Kirk was a cadet about to get kicked out of the Academy, Scotty was exiled to an old lonely outpost, and while he expressed interest in the Enterprise, he couldn't possibly have any experience with the ship. It's pretty far fetched that he would become Chief Engineer just because ONE man died. What are the other engineers doing down there? Was there no second in command?

Probably not. I think that the movie illustrates Picard's career some as it relates to Kirk. Picard took command of the U.S.S. Stargazer while he was a Lieutenant and destroyed a Ferrengi ship. He was later given full command of the ship.

Remember, in naval tradition, anyone can be called "Captain", even if it is not your current rank.

What that means is that while Kirk was indeed a cadet and shouldn't even been on the Enterprise to begin with, he took command of the ship and destroyed Nero. Later, he was given command of the Enterprise by special Starfleet order.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Remember, in naval tradition, anyone can be called "Captain", even if it is not your current rank.

Unfortunately, at the end of the movie, Captain *is* Kirk's actual rank (he wears the stripes on his sleeves).

 

[Sanji Himura]

That's what I said if you read my post carefully. Kirk got commissioned as Captain and given command of the Enterprise by special Starfleet order(s) AFTER he destroyed Nero. Before that, however, he was still a cadet in Starfleet's eyes.

 

[Captain Ice]

Remember, in naval tradition, anyone can be called "Captain", even if it is not your current rank.

Unfortunately, at the end of the movie, Captain *is* Kirk's actual rank (he wears the stripes on his sleeves).

Part of that whole scene at the end in front of the rest of his class was being given command of the Enterprise. One would assume that he had been promoted to Captain as a part of that. Knowing that, is it unreasonable to show up wearing the formal transfer of command actually wearing the uniform of the new rank? I think not. For that matter, even the admiral addresses him as Captain Kirk in that ceremony. It is possible that his promotion went through before that.

 

[Sanji Himura]

Remember, in naval tradition, anyone can be called "Captain", even if it is not your current rank.

Unfortunately, at the end of the movie, Captain *is* Kirk's actual rank (he wears the stripes on his sleeves).

Part of that whole scene at the end in front of the rest of his class was being given command of the Enterprise. One would assume that he had been promoted to Captain as a part of that. Knowing that, is it unreasonable to show up wearing the formal transfer of command actually wearing the uniform of the new rank? I think not. For that matter, even the admiral addresses him as Captain Kirk in that ceremony. It is possible that his promotion went through before that.

That is what I think happened. Kirk must have been promoted by a special order, and then Starfleet turned right around and issued another special order giving him command of the Enterprise.

 

[T'Girl]

Frocking is where someone in selected for promotion, however the promotion hasn't officially taken place yet. You can assume (and wear) the rank and be assigned to the "job" position that goes along with it. but you don't get the pay and benefits.


I think more likely Kirk graduated the academy as a Lieutenant jg (or just a ensign), and then was breveted to Captain. Kirk's perminate rank would have remained ensign, but as a brevet Captain he would receive all the pay and benefits.