DOOMSDAY: A Star Trek Fan Production

[blssdwlf]

From what was said in and implied by the episode, life support was down to low power. The crew couldn't survive aboard the ship.
It very well could have been a no-win scenario.

We get this line early on in the episode while exploring the Constellation:

KIRK: But where are they? I can't imagine a man like Matt Decker abandoning ship while his life support systems were still operative.

What I gathered from the dialogue was:
Communications blocked
Can't run (Enterprise with Warp Drive could outrun the DDM so that's probably because the Constellation's antimatter was inactivated by the DDM and the warp engines were destroyed)
Fought at a distance with phasers and were ineffective
Impulse controls were fused solid. No impulse control. Also another reason they couldn't run. (There was still enough for 1/3 impulse power when controls were swapped with the warp controls.)
Life support still operative and Kirk didn't see that as a reason to abandon ship.
Transporters worked until the Constellation was hit one last time.

So to me the reason to get off the Constellation had to override any reason to stay on the Constellation.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

We get this line early on in the episode while exploring the Constellation:

KIRK: But where are they? I can't imagine a man like Matt Decker abandoning ship while his life support systems were still operative.

Spock's initial scans show that life support is "operative at a low power level."

Granted, Kirk's line that you quote seems to imply that he expects the crew to still be present, but he doesn't know what attacked the ship yet.

I think we're suppose to believe that one more hit from the machine would risk the total loss of life support, since it's already in bad shape.

 

[Ssosmcin]

Kirk: "No survivors...no bodies, either."

Considering the average mortality rate on the Enterprise, it's shocking a ship in as bad a shape as the Constellation didn't have some bodies strewn around. Were there no fatalities during the attack? Or did Decker jettison them before he went catatonic? Perhaps dragging all of the bodies to the airlock was the final straw that snapped him.

He stated his crew was 400 strong, but either he had 30 fewer people than Kirk, rounded down or lost a few in the conflict.

It's amazing the details I gloss over in this episode because I love it so hard.

 

[blssdwlf]

Kirk: "No survivors...no bodies, either."

Considering the average mortality rate on the Enterprise, it's shocking a ship in as bad a shape as the Constellation didn't have some bodies strewn around. Were there no fatalities during the attack? Or did Decker jettison them before he went catatonic? Perhaps dragging all of the bodies to the airlock was the final straw that snapped him.

He stated his crew was 400 strong, but either he had 30 fewer people than Kirk, rounded down or lost a few in the conflict.

It's amazing the details I gloss over in this episode because I love it so hard.

My guess is that the long-range firefight with the DDM didn't incur any fatalities but probably had lots of wounded. When they beamed down they were pretty thorough in grabbing everyone. Kirk's Enterprise fluctuated between 400 and 430 so it didn't seem out of place for only a crew of 400 for the Constellation.

DECKER: We tried to contact Starfleet. No one heard. No one! We couldn't run.
KIRK: What happened to your crew?
DECKER: Oh, I had to beam them down. We were dead. No power, our phasers useless.

Decker's line about "no power" is vague since the transporter had clearly had power to beam ~429 people down to a planet (that's 72 beam downs if you assume six people at a time). The ship clearly had life support and transporter power. How did they even get close enough to planet three to beam down?

The whole scenario doesn't wash as written. You have to assume Decker's either leaving out details or engaging in hyperbole.

SPOCK: All power plants dead, reserve energy banks operative at a very low power level.

Most likely they drained the reserve energy banks to beam everyone down. More than likely they lost propulsion within the 3rd planet's gravity well. Why were they there? Maybe they were trying to hide from the DDM. Or maybe like in "The Doomsday Machine" the Constellation was hit and it veered off towards the 3rd planet (like how the Enterprise was hit and veered away out of the system.)

Spock's initial scans show that life support is "operative at a low power level."

Granted, Kirk's line that you quote seems to imply that he expects the crew to still be present, but he doesn't know what attacked the ship yet.

I think we're suppose to believe that one more hit from the machine would risk the total loss of life support, since it's already in bad shape.

With the Constellation unable to move on her own power but with still working life support it leaves very few scenarios to abandon ship to the 3rd planet.

 

[Ssosmcin]

My guess is that the long-range firefight with the DDM didn't incur any fatalities but probably had lots of wounded. When they beamed down they were pretty thorough in grabbing everyone. Kirk's Enterprise fluctuated between 400 and 430 so it didn't seem out of place for only a crew of 400 for the Constellation.

428 was the lowest exact number Kirk stated for the Enterprise (I think) and he rounded down when in a crunch, which is what I suspect Decker did. For example, Kirk rounded down in "The Ultimate Computer" because he was calculating 400 per starship the M5 was gonna kill and "4 starships, 1600 men and women!" is easier than doing the math and saying "4 starships, 1,712 men and women!"

Although, Spock would have jumped in to correct him if it wasn't such an inappropriate time.

 

[blssdwlf]

428 was the lowest exact number Kirk stated for the Enterprise (I think) and he rounded down when in a crunch, which is what I suspect Decker did. For example, Kirk rounded down in "The Ultimate Computer" because he was calculating 400 per starship the M5 was gonna kill and "4 starships, 1600 men and women!" is easier than doing the math and saying "4 starships, 1,712 men and women!"

Although, Spock would have jumped in to correct him if it wasn't such an inappropriate time.

From "Squire of Gothos",
KIRK: There are four hundred men and women aboard that ship (the Enterprise)

 

[Ssosmcin]

From "Squire of Gothos",
KIRK: There are four hundred men and women aboard that ship (the Enterprise)

Apparently, that was crunch time.

 

[blssdwlf]

Apparently, that was crunch time.

Kirk had no problem dropping 30 medical personnel onto Cestus 3 in "Arena" so it is also possible that each time he mentions 400 crew ("Squire of Gothos" and "Requiem for Methuselah") he had dropped off a contingent somewhere earlier

 

[publiusr]

You could say that ground operations of some kind were interrupted. A fair number of people had already taken their time to ease on down…so it would not take much even for a disabled ship to beam down the rest. Easier to beam a handful the rest of the way down and try to draw it off?

Say Stardate 4198.9 Constellation and some long range TAS type long range shuttles fan out across several systems intending to meet up at X:
https://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/schematics/tas-copernicus.jpg

Being a Commodore he has a small task force spread out….his crew assigned several of these craft from a starbase. Some picked off, etc.

Cosmic event? Log it…place a marker buoy.

Spread a bit thin. Some even hope for the opportunity for shore leave.

L-374 is where they were going to rendezvous anyway.

Constellation comes in as the Planet killer does.

Options are limited.

Decker’s assignment was to learn the fates of disrupted star systems. I think quite a few of his crew might have been dead before he even went in-system.

I can even imagine how the assignment was handed down:

“Matt, we’ve had a couple of systems go dark. This is too big for Kirk—-I’d just as soon he’d stay between the rest of civilized space and the Klingons so I know where all my problems are.

No, we need an older man. Now, I have about seven of these new long range shuttles and I want your crew to fan them out between here…and here….ending, say…L-374.”

 

[Joshua Irwin56]

Hi Everyone! Thank you for watching the film. I took over Directing the film during production. What I can tell you is, it was HOT two days of shooting. There was no AC in the studio. I too, would have done things differently from a script standpoint. But it was someone else's script, and I decided to be as respectful of that as I could. I wasn't sure how it would turn out. But despite everything, it's got around 100K views and most people do seem to like it. Which I'm grateful for. For me the most fun part was trying to make it look and feel like TOS. A silly little film for sure. But I'm glad that many have enjoyed it for what it is.