Cross-post: Enterprise vs Trek 2009... (SPOILERS)

[commodore64]

Re: Cross-post: Enterprise vs Trek 2009...

Which is a problem with the film. I don't read nor should I have to comics or other supplemental materials. If it is relevant it should be in the film--not on the cuttin room floor or someplace else.

I agree. I enjoyed the movie, but I felt the villain (Nero) was one of the weakest elements. I don't care for him, I'm not interested in him, he tells me nothing. He is just a device to keep good guys busy. I don't like to be forced to read some background stories to be able to know who he is and I shouldn't be forced to do it.
I found Enterprise's villains far more exciting: not only Xindi, but also Augments, for example.

Agreed. I found the plot also to be a weak link as well.

 

[Hopeful Romantic]

Re: Cross-post: Enterprise vs Trek 2009...

Not getting into the quality of the script, but...

If the script was well written before shooting started (as it should have been), the writer's strike wouldn't have been an issue.

Script changes are usually made on set, in response to whatever surprise restrictions or difficulties arise during production, or ideas that the director or actors come up with in the moment. Sometimes screenwriters are called in to rewrite, or they may actually be on set... although typically screenwriters have little or no clout once their work is done. In the case of films in production during the writers strike, no changes could be written by the writers themselves.

I just can't imagine that a pair of "professional" screenwriters would take 2+ years to write a script, have dozens of meetings about the story with all kinds of stakeholders, only to come to the set and suddenly realize that it was riddled with plot holes, then say "oh, well, there's a writer's strike."

That's probably not the way it went down. The screenwriters I've met are devoted to their craft, and work HARD to do the best job they can. Between leaving the writer's word processor and hitting the screen, a story can go through many changes (i.e., those meetings you mentioned). It's possible that other people (producers, director, executives, actors) had suggestions which were incorporated. Scenes get filmed, but discarded, for purposes of pacing or length, or because they just didn't work for some reason. There may be a ton of extra scenes on the cutting room floor that turn up on the eventual DVD.

When you see a film and you think the story is crap...well, no writer sets out to write crap. Films cost too damn much to go into production with a script that is acknowledged to be in need of a rewrite. Sometimes the story gets screwed up (too many cooks), but the writer has no control and no way to stop it. Everyone with power has their own (subjective) opinion of what will make the script work better. Sometimes they're wrong.

 

[Middle Earther]

Re: Cross-post: Enterprise vs Trek 2009...

Well, my two bits: I loved season 4 - it was finally coming into it's own. I would love to see a season 5 - I know it would sell. Just say you're gonna develop the Vulcan storyline more and delve into Andorian culture even more.

 

[Nebusj]

Re: Cross-post: Enterprise vs Trek 2009...

That would be like never learning in any real depth why the Xindi or the Sphere Builders wanted to destroy Earth. It would make enjoying the rest of the story that these events rest on less interesting because the motivation isn't believable.

Er ... the Xindi motive to destroy Earth had depth? I thought it was, ``Extradimensional invaders told us Earth's going to destroy our homeworld in the future so we're going to blow them up first'', as opposed to Nero's thoughtfully considered and radically different motivation.

 

[startrekwatcher]

Re: Cross-post: Enterprise vs Trek 2009...

That would be like never learning in any real depth why the Xindi or the Sphere Builders wanted to destroy Earth. It would make enjoying the rest of the story that these events rest on less interesting because the motivation isn't believable.

Er ... the Xindi motive to destroy Earth had depth? I thought it was, ``Extradimensional invaders told us Earth's going to destroy our homeworld in the future so we're going to blow them up first'', as opposed to Nero's thoughtfully considered and radically different motivation.

I thought it did. The writers carefully went out of their way to give the Xindi’s actions of trying to destroy Earth plausibility as we learn that the Sphere Builders didn’t just appear out of the blue one day telling the Xindi to annihilate humanity. The Guardians earned their trust for over a century by guiding them to habitable worlds and helping them locate resources as well as being the ones who brought forth the idea of reconciliation via the council before finally providing visual evidence of humanity destroying their new homeworld a century late. I mean what else should they do. The Xindi believed humans were brutal conquerors. They had no reason to not trust their benefactors who had been there for them for over a 100 years.

I certainly will take that over the anemic motivation just ever so slightly scratched in the film.

 

[Squiggy]

Re: Cross-post: Enterprise vs Trek 2009...

Good Lord. Another "Enterprise is better than Star Trek" thread?

 

[Count Zero]

Re: Cross-post: Enterprise vs Trek 2009...

I forgot to say that earlier, but after I had seen the movie for the first time, I remember sitting in the dark cinema thinking that they just sunk ENT. I really like the series but it was never that much fun and its attempts at humour were juvenile and often cringeworthy. In two hours the makers of this movie got more things right than ENT did over its entire run in that regard.

 

[Middleman]

Re: Cross-post: Enterprise vs Trek 2009...

I forgot to say that earlier, but after I had seen the movie for the first time, I remember sitting in the dark cinema thinking that they just sunk ENT. I really like the series but it was never that much fun and its attempts at humour were juvenile and often cringeworthy. In two hours the makers of this movie got more things right than ENT did over its entire run in that regard.

Not taking anything away from the movie, which I enjoyed, but having three years and $150 million to produce 2 hours of material certainly helped them get it right. Also, being allowed to flush 40 years of canon down the toilet helped as well. I will disagree with you on your comment on Enterprise humor. I though season one, in particular, had some very humorous moments. Unfortunately, ENT was sunk before the movie came out.

 

[bluedana]

Re: Cross-post: Enterprise vs Trek 2009...

I just saw Trek XI for the second time, and it occurred to me that in at least three instances, the movie borrowed from/gave a nod to Enterprise. At the very least, they used some elements from specific episodes that were very recognizable.

1. The teaser: we watch as George Kirk is KIA. We're sitting there going that cannot/didn't happen in "our" universe . . . and then the "Star Trek" title comes up, black on grey (a very subtle hint that this is an alternate universe).

Just like the opening to ENT:IAMD part one, where Cochrane takes out the Vulcan and the sinister credits appear, leading us into an alternate universe.

2. The captain is told to go to the enemy's ship (this happens twice in Trek XI). He pauses, then calmly stands and transfers the comm to his First - knowing that he probably isn't coming back - and leaves the ship.

Just like ENT:Shockwave, part one, when Archer leaves the bridge to go to the Suliban, calmly transferring the comm to T'Pol's. (There's even the you can't do this, this is crazy, Captain parallel.)

3. We watch as a planet we know and love is disintegrated by a powerful weapon, leaving a race of only ten thousand where there were once millions, looking for a place to establish a colony.

Just like ENT:Twilight, where Earth is destroyed despite heroic best efforts, leaving 6,000 humans searching for a suitable planet to colonize.

Maybe they're purely coincidental, but they jumped out at me as an ENT fan. Along with the ton of echoes from TOS (like Dr. McCoy and his hypospray of deviousness), these ENT "nods" were fun to spot this time around.

 

[pookha]

Re: Cross-post: Enterprise vs Trek 2009...

That would be like never learning in any real depth why the Xindi or the Sphere Builders wanted to destroy Earth. It would make enjoying the rest of the story that these events rest on less interesting because the motivation isn't believable.

Er ... the Xindi motive to destroy Earth had depth? I thought it was, ``Extradimensional invaders told us Earth's going to destroy our homeworld in the future so we're going to blow them up first'', as opposed to Nero's thoughtfully considered and radically different motivation.

I thought it did. The writers carefully went out of their way to give the Xindi’s actions of trying to destroy Earth plausibility as we learn that the Sphere Builders didn’t just appear out of the blue one day telling the Xindi to annihilate humanity. The Guardians earned their trust for over a century by guiding them to habitable worlds and helping them locate resources as well as being the ones who brought forth the idea of reconciliation via the council before finally providing visual evidence of humanity destroying their new homeworld a century late. I mean what else should they do. The Xindi believed humans were brutal conquerors. They had no reason to not trust their benefactors who had been there for them for over a 100 years.

I certainly will take that over the anemic motivation just ever so slightly scratched in the film.

and it took how many episodes to get to that revelation???

really we find out more about nero then say the probe from trek four.

part of it is that for most of the movie we only know what the characters know.
and prime spock knew he only had a limited amount of time to get across what he knew to young kirk.

 

[Middleman]

Re: Cross-post: Enterprise vs Trek 2009...

Bluedana: Awesome analysis, I didn't pick up on those similarities.
​

 

[startrekwatcher]

Re: Cross-post: Enterprise vs Trek 2009...

and it took how many episodes to get to that revelation???

I wasn't expecting that level of detail but I certainly expected more than what was presented.

really we find out more about nero then say the probe from trek four.

That's fine. In TVH case it didn't bother me. It was a mystery. In XI case the writers chose to reveal too much to maintain a mystery but didn't go far enough to flesh it out. Instead, they made it an unsatisfying muddle.

part of it is that for most of the movie we only know what the characters know.

And most well-done stories start out with the characters in the dark only to eventually have all the answers revealed to them. Of course that is slightly different in some series where some never found out or learn of certain things but the audience finds out eventually and that is what really matters.

and prime spock knew he only had a limited amount of time to get across what he knew to young kirk.

That is just a rationalization made to excuse the sloppy handling of those expository scenes revolving around Spock/Nero history and the backstory of events in 2387.