Into Darkness and the novelverse [SPOILERS]

Discussion in 'Trek Literature' started by F. King Daniel, May 16, 2013.

  1. F. King Daniel

    F. King Daniel Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    "My name is Khan."

    It's not a title, it's his name. He says it in "Space Seed" and Star Trek Into Darkness.
     
  2. newtontomato539

    newtontomato539 Commander Red Shirt

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    "Jeepers."

    Khan is Khan. Carol Marcus has a British accent.

    Back to your daily lives.

    Oooh waaaiiitt. This is a Star Trek bbs. :Smacks forehead:
     
  3. Charles Phipps

    Charles Phipps Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    I'd like to see Admiral Marcus' history with Section 31 revealed. In the mainstream universe it might be he never actually was discovered for his actions. However, it could explain why Carol and her son are apart from Starfleet if she found out he was involved in SOMETHING shady.
     
  4. Christopher

    Christopher Writer Admiral

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    Or that he never got involved with them at all.

    That's possible, true. It would explain why David was so suspicious of Starfleet's motives -- although I think the events of Vanguard were meant in part to explain that.
     
  5. Charles Phipps

    Charles Phipps Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    True, Admiral Marcus might never have been involved in S13 but I was just going with 'ease of storytelling.' The timeline from the Abrams-verse seems to be manipulated by something (Organians, God, Q, fate, destiny, Time Police) to being similar to the mainstream universe as much as possible.

    Just in "broad strokes."

    That's just my view on why TOS crew is together, at least. In-universe.
     
  6. Christopher

    Christopher Writer Admiral

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    Try telling that to 99% of the Vulcan population. Oh, wait, you can't, they're dead. ;)

    While some things are lining up with Prime, others are radically different. Even the stuff that's similar is happening years or decades earlier. The technology has gotten considerably more advanced -- ships are bigger, warp drive is far faster, etc.

    As for the factor that's pushing some events to happen similarly, Orci's explanation is that it's quantum probability -- the majority of timelines tend toward the most probable events. To put it another way, there are many causative factors shaping events, and even if you change one factor, the others will still be in play and thus events may still turn out much the same, even if the details differ.

    Although I don't think that can explain events happening years too early. The best hypothesis I've heard is that it's some effect of the Red Matter event that caused the timeline to branch off. Maybe it's created some kind of probabilistic bleedthrough from the Prime timeline that not only promotes similar events but accelerates them.
     
  7. Charles Phipps

    Charles Phipps Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Good explanation.

    I know it'll never happen but landing in the Abramsverse would be hilarious for the DTI.

    "This is all wrong!"

    :)
     
  8. ryan123450

    ryan123450 Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Perfect way to complete the trilogy, Christpher!
     
  9. Therin of Andor

    Therin of Andor Admiral Moderator

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    I see that others have already suggested that "This is a case for... DTI."
     
  10. Charles Phipps

    Charles Phipps Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    It's why I can't wait for all the novel characters to react to the Hobus event.
     
  11. F. King Daniel

    F. King Daniel Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    Although we haven't seen them, a lot of incredibly convoluted events must have taken place for the Mirror Universe characters to continually be in the same places as their Primeverse counterparts.

    When all of humanity was enslaved by the Klingons and Cardassians a century ago yet the DS9 crew's counterparts are all interacting on and around the MU version of DS9 is at least as fishy as Kirk bumping into Scotty bumping into Old Spock who just happens to have a way to get them both back to the Enterprise.

    I go with what Spock said in "City on the Edge of Forever"...

    SPOCK: First, I believe we have about a week before McCoy arrives, but we can't be certain.

    KIRK: Arrives where? Honolulu, Boise, San Diego? Why not Outer Mongolia, for that matter?

    SPOCK: There is a theory. There could be some logic to the belief that time is fluid, like a river, with currents, eddies, backwash.

    KIRK: And the same currents that swept McCoy to a certain time and place might sweep us there, too.

    SPOCK: Unless that is true, Captain, we have no hope.
     
  12. rahullak

    rahullak Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    There's a simpler answer: fiction.
     
  13. Paper Moon

    Paper Moon Commander Red Shirt

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    Regarding the probably two biggest "game-changers" of STID, the transwarp transporter and Khan's Blood:

    Remember, we have seen exactly two instances of transwarp beaming happening successfully and exactly three instances of Khan's Blood working. From any perspective, science, medicine, engineering, that's not enough examples to come to any conclusions.

    Transwarp transporter:

    Given the lines in BoBW about matching velocities (as well as what longmagpie has said about Scotty's last depicted moments in Indistinguishable From Magic, in terms of TrekLit), it's pretty clear that the equation for transwarp beaming was developed after 2367, and probably after 2379 (since we never see anything from Starfleet like transwarp beaming in canon Trek before ST09) but before 2387. So we're already dealing with technology that's 120 years ahead of its time. And it's worth reiterating, as others have, that technology that can beam you from Earth ultimately to Kronos is not unheard of, in concept anyway, in Trekdom, just outside of Starfleet. Reverse-engineering?

    Anyway, it's pretty easy to imagine how transwarp beaming across 100+ lightyears has an exponential energy cost curve; beaming one person takes a lot of energy, but beaming even ten people takes a LOT of energy, such that it becomes unfeasible. This would mean that transwarp beaming would be pretty useless for exploration: you just can't explore strange new worlds with a single landing party. (And what about needing a sickbay, for one?) Unless the writers want to radically change the way our characters get around the galaxy (and maybe they'll have good reasons to do so!), a thus far unique instance of this incredible technology isn't going to be a major game-changer for Star Trek.

    (As for what happened in the movie, it seems pretty clear to me that it was TPTB's intention that Harrison beamed pretty much directly from Earth to Kronos, so I tend to go with that over ADF's interpretation in the novelization. I might mitigate my interpretation slightly by supposing the he routed himself through some installation's massive power source [like, maybe, S31's Jupiter station].)

    Khan's Blood:

    First, one of many gripes I've had with people nitpicking the film: McCoy didn't unfreeze one of the other Augments and just use their blood because he had zero evidence that their genetic enhancements would lead to their blood having similar regenerative properties. Khan was alive at the time and he knew Khan's blood worked in at least one case (I don't think he knew about Lucille Harewood), so that was the route he took. Any good scientist or doctor would've come to the same conclusion.

    In any case, I don't think Khan's Blood is necessarily the miracle drug we might think it is. We know it could repair Kirk's radiation injuries, we know it could revive an apparently dead Tribble (I don't know how it died, since I haven't read the comics) and that it could heal a decidedly not-dead young girl. We can put aside the Harewood case, since she wasn't dead.

    So we're left with a dead Tribble and a dead human who died hours earlier of radiation injuries. If you think about it, that's actually a pretty specific medical use. Khan's Blood can apparently be used to repair cellular damage, even after death if it's done relatively quickly in humans. (I assume Tribbles are much simpler biologically, given them a longer "shelf-life".) Very easy to believe that it wouldn't work after, say, 48 hours, or wouldn't cure gross-level injuries like a broken neck or spine.

    In short, I don't think any story teller needs to worry about either of these things making it impossible to have drama in their narratives.
     
  14. Christopher

    Christopher Writer Admiral

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    But Starfleet did understand the principle of the subspace transporter in "Bloodlines"; Geordi was able to use the technique to beam Picard to DaiMon Bok's ship. They simply chose not to use it because it was dangerous and impractical. It's the sort of thing you'd use only for emergencies or if you were desperate/determined enough to take the risk -- which is how we've seen "transwarp" beaming used so far in the movies.

    So I still say Starfleet was probably aware of the principle well before 2370.

    Not to mention that it makes no sense to beam someplace you haven't been able to get a detailed scan of; it would be far too dangerous and impractical. Although it could perhaps be used to send robot probes out first.


    Absolutely right. It's a plausible assumption that the other Augments could've had the same power, but it's still speculation until it's proven.

    I agree. Also, I'm not sure that something which regenerates the body's own cells would have the ability to kill an infection; indeed, what if it has the same growth-enhancing effect on the disease microbes or cancer cells that it does on the normal cells of the body? What if it creates a cancer risk when used on normal, non-Augmented humanoids? After all, cancer is just the body's normal cell-growth process running out of control.

    Bottom line, there's no such thing as a wonder drug that cures every kind of life-threatening condition, since there are so many different ways for the body to fail. A treatment that's a miracle cure for some conditions might be useless or dangerous when used for other conditions or injuries.
     
  15. Paper Moon

    Paper Moon Commander Red Shirt

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    My memory of "Bloodlines" is a little rusty, but from what I can recall and gather from MA, the subspace transporter would solve the distance problem posed by STID but not the relative motion problem posed by ST09 (and described in BoBW). So that leads me to think that the "transwarp equation" might have incorporated aspects of the subspace transporter, but be fundamentally based on a post-2379 discovery.

    I agree that transwarp beaming does seem to be dangerous and somewhat impractical from how it's been used thus far, but I'm not sure it is so to the degree that you're implying. In STID, no one seems to react to Harrison's use of the transwarp transporter as if it were incredibly dangerous to do so. No one says anything like, "Wow, he must be nuts." So I'm not sure it was the writers' intention for the technology's use in these circumstances to be quite so extraordinary.

    It's interesting, though, that you mention being "aware of the principle." The way Spock Prime's interaction with nuScotty in ST09 goes, we know that nuScotty came up with the idea of transwarp beaming sometime prior to 2258, possibly when he was still a cadet. From the way Spock Prime approached the question, we can infer that Scotty Prime also theorized transwarp beaming, probably at a similar time to his alternative counterpart. So Starfleet was most likely aware of the principle for over a century before someone, possibly Scotty Prime himself, developed it in the 24th century prior to 2387.

    Definitely agree with all that you've said. I hope someone, somewhere, runs with that cancer analogy. I think there's a great story in there. (Regarding the infection question, Khan's Blood might be useful for strengthening antibodies or the immune system in general. But your points remain.)

    The writers could decide to run in the other direction and make Khan's Blood very versatile. That could be interesting, if done right. But they don't have to do so, and a lot of reviews I've seen of the movie seem to be arriving at the erroneous conclusion that Khan's Blood must be a universal panacea, and therefore something that detracts from the film.
     
  16. Christopher

    Christopher Writer Admiral

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    Maybe. What a lot of people overlook is that the '09 movie used "transwarp" differently than it had been used before -- instead of using "trans-" in the sense of "beyond," as in a velocity faster than warp drive, it was using it in the sense of "across," as in across the warp barrier -- beaming from a (relatively) stationary location to a ship in warp drive. However, Into Darkness apparently forgot this, since it showed "transwarp" beaming being used to get from Earth to Kronos.


    Given how many different writers with different assumptions have written Trek over the decades, you can't possibly reconcile all the inconsistencies unless you're willing to interpret things differently from how the writers intended, or to squint a little at some of the script details. Heck, there are countless detail-level contradictions throughout the canon, so the only way to be able to buy into the pretense that it's a single coherent universe is if you're willing to be flexible about details and gloss over the occasional inconsistency.

    Besides, it's simple enough to rationalize just by the fact that they had more important things preoccupying them at that moment, like the murder of several members of the admiralty. And given that Harrison had just committed a couple of extremely violent acts, it kind of went without saying that he was fanatical, determined, and possibly insane. Heck, he was taking a huge risk by attacking a Starfleet facility so brazenly in the first place. So the fact that he'd take the added risk of using an experimental transporter wouldn't really have warranted surprise at that point.
     
  17. Hartzilla2007

    Hartzilla2007 Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Plus you can't take a transporter with you so if there isn't one where ever it is you are going, you're pretty much stuck there.
     
  18. Paper Moon

    Paper Moon Commander Red Shirt

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    Yeah, your explanation of the name makes sense, but I never really cared for this new transporter tech being called "transwarp". The term's been used so many times in Trek, it just feels a bit uncreative at this point.

    I just figured that transwarp beaming was the next generation of transporter technology, with multiple new capabilities, one of which was the "transwarp" capability you described.

    True. Very fair points.

    Going back to the Khan's Blood discussion momentarily... having just seen the film again for the umpteeth time... I'm gonna be a strict constructionist here and say that we never actually had it confirmed that Kirk died. Whatever his state was, he was viable enough for McCoy to believe it possible to preserve his brain functions by putting him in cryostasis. And all McCoy says was that Kirk was "barely dead." That's actually a pretty low bar as Trek goes (Yareena, Bareil…). 23rd century medicine may have a stricter medical definition of death than 23rd century generalized definitions of death. So Kirk may have been dead in laymen's terms, but not medically.

    Or maybe that's overthinking it. :p
     
  19. F. King Daniel

    F. King Daniel Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    About the Transwarp beaming, I have no doubt that Starfleet would have detailed scans of Kronos' surface by 2259. Beyond that, all they'd need to know it's orbit and can beam away. The risk being if someone was standing where you plan to materialize or if they'd done some contstruction work since the last scans were made (no doubt partly why Harrison chose an uninhabited area as his destination)

    And about Khan's blood and the technology of the 1970's, I am reminded of DTI: Watching the Clock's speculation that the Chrysalis Project may have had some assistance from the future.
     
  20. Lee Son of Pete

    Lee Son of Pete Lieutenant Junior Grade Red Shirt

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    For what it's worth, I have a good friend who is white, of Welsh-celtic extraction, and is a practising Sikh. It could be considered offensive to assume that all Sikhs are Asian.