"...and another thing..."...besides what?

[Timo]

Oh... What happened to the post I thought I was responding to?

Yes, "Level 5" seems pretty clear, and the orangish walls would fit SJ's (AP's) model. At this point of the story, Kirk probably has had time to get to know the ship a bit better (it's been hours since he left Earth), so he isn't blindly headed towards the deck where he left his quarters 2.5 years ago, he's headed towards the den he has claimed for himself earlier that day. Whether it's his or Decker's, and whether that means it's the official Admiral's or Captain's Quarters or Office or something less permanent, is left open.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[J.T.B.]

FWIW, on the old David Kimble cutatway Enterprise poster which decorated my bedroom wall in my teens, the space labeled captain's quarters looks like the room where Kirk, Decker and McCoy meet.

 

[drt]

I put more stock in the Kimble drawing, as I think Probert had more input into that than the Johnson book.

The Kimble drawing had the two decks above the saucer main deck with the padded brownish/orange walls (which seemed to make those decks a little more comfortable looking), with the rest of the decks being more of a silvery white. I think the corridors outside of engineering were the same color, but just bathed in blue light. This only applied to TMP, for TWOK/SFS the padding seem to have been lost and the silvery white replaced with a metallic red for every deck.

 

[Timo]

It would be interesting to know whether the original plan was to have a large number of different color-panels for distinguishing the "different decks" represented by the corridor set; just the one panel and then set lighting to create the differences, in true 1960s television style; or whether the color coding thing is complete bunk and the intent always was to just go for padded vs. bare... (In-universe, I'd assume Starfleet would have wanted the latter.)

We know that the Kirk/Spock/McCoy chat was originally supposed to be filmed against the visually impressive background of the big "Officers' Lounge" windows, but the effects proved prohibitively expensive for the time. Hence the action was moved to a more confining set, nevertheless situated somewhere "aft" for the starstreak view. It would make plenty of sense for this place to be Captain's Quarters, since neither Kirk nor McCoy would see the point of going to a Lounge that isn't even fitted with a regulation bartender yet, and Spock would be disgusted at the idea of recreational comfort!

But the set still contains table-and-chairs clusters that would seem out of place either in a personal cabin or in the public reception section thereof. And if the heroes had one resource, it was time. They could wander the corridors of the nearly empty and unfinished ship in an attempt to quell their anxiety, as the "few minutes of sheer terror" were still ahead. Checking out the facility that one day would be Officers' Lounge might be an idea suggested by McCoy, despite the drawbacks. Or then our heroes went all the way to the Rec Deck, where windows like that would be found.

(Or, really, the Officers' Lounge could be where we think the Rec Deck is, at the back of the saucer, because the Rec Deck cannot be there - it's too high for the saucer rim. But if the Rec Deck windows are mere viewscreens, then the ones at the Officers' Lounge could be, too, and any arbitrary location would do.)

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Now correct me if I'm wrong, but modern day aircraft carriers contain thousands of crew, don't they? Much more than a Constitution-class ship would, at any rate. And yet a carrier's entire complement of officers can fit in one room quite easily. There's a dozen, maybe two.

Oh God no. The carrier has around 200 officers, the air wing maybe 250, and the flag staff another couple dozen. They have to have three wardrooms to serve them all.

Oh.

This is what I get for using The Final Countdown as a reference...

Well that's a steel-toed boot to the ego, then.

 

[J.T.B.]

^ Well, no big deal. IIRC in that movie Kirk Douglas had a meeting of departments heads, about a dozen or so officers. But each of them would have a couple dozen officers in their departments.

 

[Timo]

Would you happen to have any insight into the command issued at the Enterprise first sighting Gorkon's ship, "All officers to the bridge"? Is it something more appropriate for the sailing ship era (before bridges were invented, yeah, but anyway)? Something one would expect in a WWII setting? Something we would encounter even later on?

Why does Kirk want his officers to the bridge anyway?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

^ IIRC, it wasn't Kirk who summoned the officers to the bridge. It was a female voice, perhaps an automated computer command triggered to go off in certain emergencies.

 

[Timo]

Yup, but Kirk would supposedly be issuing the command for that PA to be sent.

And I trust it wasn't automated, as Kirk didn't even have his shields set on auto-raise; they'd tiptoe around this Klingon encounter, avoiding hasty or stereotypical reactions in every respect. Until booze entered the picture, of course.

(Why would even an emergency call for officers to leave their duties and instead have a bridge get-together, though?)

Timo Saloniemi

 

[J.T.B.]

Would you happen to have any insight into the command issued at the Enterprise first sighting Gorkon's ship, "All officers to the bridge"? Is it something more appropriate for the sailing ship era (before bridges were invented, yeah, but anyway)? Something one would expect in a WWII setting? Something we would encounter even later on?

The thing is, even on a big ship the bridge is pretty small and confined, and everyone there is working, so it's not a good place to confer with more than a couple of people. On a carrier there is a room in the island with a conference table, and I believe another one for the admiral. I imagine battleships had something similar, maybe cruisers, and smaller ships would probably just use the wardroom. But Star Trek has always used the bridge as a combination bridge and combat information center, so there's more room and more reason for various officers to be there. But wanting "all officers" to come to the bridge seems far fetched. I think maybe what they meant was "all officers who should be on the bridge, you know who you are..."

 

[Captain Clark Terrell]

My main question: after Decker left Kirk's quarters and conveniently ran into Ilia who just happened to make herself available in the vicinity of Kirk's quarters (unless she was on break, I suppose), the scene returns to Kirk's quarters.

There's a brief cut to Ilia watching them leave the bridge, as she obviously sensed the change in Kirk's mood and knew what was coming. Although I can't imagine she left the bridge solely for the purpose of finding out what happened in Kirk's quarters, it's not surprising that she ran into Decker as the latter was on his way back to the bridge.

McCoy says "And another thing...", Kirk obviously annoyed like McCoy were a fly in the room.

McCoy's last line of dialogue before the scene change was, "He may be right, Jim." It's likely he spent the intervening moments rehashing Kirk's mistakes before moving onto to the larger issue of Kirk being obsessed with the Enterprise to the point that he was competing against the officer on whom he should have been relying more than any other person on his senior staff.

Kirk admitted as much when he cited Decker's familiarity with the ship as the reason he was staying aboard, but that didn't stop him from demanding the impossible the moment the Enterprise left drydock, nor did it prevent him from taking offense when Decker dismissed his phaser order--until the latter pointed out that using the phasers would likely have resulted in the ship's destruction, as they would have not fired properly, and Enterprise would have collided with the asteroid.

I think you're right on the money there. That fits perfectly, and spares us the viewer of having to hear essentially the same information twice. So, cut ti Decker and Ilia standing in front of the orange door, then switch to McCoy and Kirk talking in front of a giant Chekov.

Indeed. It reminds me of Scooter Computer and Mr. Chips, which aired almost three decades ago. There's an episode that features an enormous depiction of Mr. Chip's face. I remember laughing hysterically as a child when I saw it.

--Sran

 

[trevanian]

It would be interesting to know whether the original plan was to have a large number of different color-panels for distinguishing the "different decks" represented by the corridor set; just the one panel and then set lighting to create the differences, in true 1960s television style; or whether the color coding thing is complete bunk and the intent always was to just go for padded vs. bare... (In-universe, I'd assume Starfleet would have wanted the latter.)

The TMP corridors were done for the film, not p2, so distinguishing between the decks was done when the director wanted it. TMOSTTMP and/or Sackett's STARLOG column mentioned that set decorator Linda DeScenna brought in colored fabric to differentiate the corridor for the Decker/Ilia scene, so it sounds like that was a fairly late call, probably well into shooting.

Doesn't really fit into any 'grand plan' type thinking at all, and kind of flies in the face of the production designer's stated approach to differentiate things or futurize them through lighting. So, in addition to providing some much needed visual snap, the fabric also warms up the scene between the pair, which is probably a big part of the choice, since it is on paper a pretty conventional personal/emotional exchange.

I do wonder about how & why they dulled down the roddenberium metal walls after TMP. Only thought is that like the pearlescent exterior of the miniature, it was just too difficult for ordinary gaffers and cinematographers to light for. As much as I dislike most of the art direction calls for TMP, those metal-like walls are pretty damn impressive.

 

[Timo]

Ditto - but in-universe, we can rather nicely argue that the ship left dock before proper paint had been applied on the interior or the exterior.

Timo Saloniemi