How much time between ST:V and ST:VI?

[MarsWeeps]

In Star Trek:V (painful to admit it existed) we see a brand new Enterprise still getting the bugs worked out but by the time of Star Trek:VI, the ship is about to be decommissioned. I always felt a bit "cheated" out of all the adventures in between.

Has it been determined how much on screen time elapsed between the 2 movies? Obviously the Enterprise-A didn't see the same lifespan as the original.

 

[JarodRussell]

I think it's a maximum of 5 years.

Star Trek 2 - 5 are supposed to take place within a single year. And there has always been this side plot of Sulu being supposed to command the Excelsior (more in the novelizations, less in the movies). I guess he finally got his command shortly after The Final Frontier.

 

[gottacook]

I don't recall anything about the ship being decommissioned in TUC, only about its present crew standing down. In TSFS there's dialogue about decommissioning the Enterprise, and I don't think such dialogue was heard in more than one of the movies.

 

[MarsWeeps]

I don't recall anything about the ship being decommissioned in TUC, only about its present crew standing down. In TSFS there's dialogue about decommissioning the Enterprise, and I don't think such dialogue was heard in more than one of the movies.

Right at the end of the movie:

Uhura: Captain, I have orders from Starfleet Command. We're to put back to Spacedock immediately...to be decommissioned. [long pause as Kirk contemplates the order]
Spock: If I were human, I believe my response would be...go to Hell. [Kirk looks at Spock] If I were human.
Chekov: Course heading, Captain?
Kirk: Second star to the right...and straight on till morning.

 

[gottacook]

Right - sorry I didn't rewatch TUC today to make sure before replying.

 

[SeerSGB]

As to the ship being decommissioned: To be fair in the 1st half, they were talking about the crew standing down: Valeris was going to replace Spock. Maybe she was getting busted to a training ship? I guess after Chang shot the poor girl full of holes Starfleet said screw it and decommissioned ship and crew.

As for the time span: I don't recall the "official" length, but I usually say 9 years (7 years between STII and STV + 2 years between STV and STVI)

 

[Sandoval]

Right - sorry I didn't rewatch TUC today to make sure before replying.

Apology accepted.

 

[Sandoval]

Has it been determined how much on screen time elapsed between the 2 movies? Obviously the Enterprise-A didn't see the same lifespan as the original.

There is at least some consensus that the Enterprise A wasn't a newly-built ship when Kirk and co took delivery, but rather an older ship that had been refitted and thus accounting for the short time between launch and decommissioning.

I'm prepared to buy that.

 

[JarodRussell]

As to the ship being decommissioned: To be fair in the 1st half, they were talking about the crew standing down: Valeris was going to replace Spock. Maybe she was getting busted to a training ship? I guess after Chang shot the poor girl full of holes Starfleet said screw it and decommissioned ship and crew.

As for the time span: I don't recall the "official" length, but I usually say 9 years (7 years between STII and STV + 2 years between STV and STVI)

7 Years? Did they spend 6 years on Vulcan?

 

[F. King Daniel]

In Star Trek:V (painful to admit it existed) we see a brand new Enterprise still getting the bugs worked out but by the time of Star Trek:VI, the ship is about to be decommissioned. I always felt a bit "cheated" out of all the adventures in between.

Has it been determined how much on screen time elapsed between the 2 movies? Obviously the Enterprise-A didn't see the same lifespan as the original.

Sulu's just finishing a 3-year mission on the Excelsor at the start of STVI. So, a minimum of 3 years. But since McCoy didn't even know Sulu was Excelsior's captain, the crew seem to have split up even earlier. Unless Enterprise-A had another crew in the interim, it didn't do very much.

 

[EliyahuQeoni]

But since McCoy didn't even know Sulu was Excelsior's captain, the crew seem to have split up even earlier. Unless Enterprise-A had another crew in the interim, it didn't do very much.

I never took that as McCoy not knowing Sulu was Captain of Excelsior, but rather McCoy wonder why--if all the other old Enterprise command crew members had been reassembled for this "top brass" meeting, why wasn't Sulu there as well.

 

[EliyahuQeoni]

In ST VI McCoy says he's been Enterprises CMO for 27 years (Which is inaccurate, since he wasn't continuously assigned to the Enterprise--he resigned between TOS and TMP AND he served on two Enterprises in that time). ST II takes place 15 years after Space Seed, a season one episode. Assuming McCoy started as CMO during that same year, ST VI takes place 12 years after ST II. Since II-III-IV take place within maybe 4-5 months and V might take place 6 months after IV (I'd say it takes place weeks later personally, but Bennet apparently intended for a 6 month shakedown of 1701-A) there is a 10-11 year gap between ST V and ST VI.

I'm a little curious how the "27 years" was arrived at by the writers, it seems to be an odd number...

 

[Sandoval]

I'm a little curious how the "27 years" was arrived at by the writers, it seems to be an odd number...

It is unquestionably an odd number. It isn't divisible by two without a remainder.

 

[EliyahuQeoni]

I'm a little curious how the "27 years" was arrived at by the writers, it seems to be an odd number...

It is unquestionably an odd number. It isn't divisible by two without a remainder.

And somehow I just KNEW that someone would say that as soon as I posted LOL!

 

[SeerSGB]

As to the ship being decommissioned: To be fair in the 1st half, they were talking about the crew standing down: Valeris was going to replace Spock. Maybe she was getting busted to a training ship? I guess after Chang shot the poor girl full of holes Starfleet said screw it and decommissioned ship and crew.

As for the time span: I don't recall the "official" length, but I usually say 9 years (7 years between STII and STV + 2 years between STV and STVI)

7 Years? Did they spend 6 years on Vulcan?

Realize now I didn't complete the original thought: No sleep in 3 days.

I'm taking up the slack by putting the real world time passage between releases between ST V and STVI.

My "In Universe" Timeline:

ST II, STIII, STIV, STV: All within 12 to 18 months
STV to ST VI: 9 years.

 

[Christopher]

The "official" timeline puts TFF in 2287 (since Nimbus III has been around for 20 years but there was no Federation-Romulan contact until 2266) and TUC in 2293, so that would be six years. However, the TFF timing doesn't work; there's at most a few weeks between TWOK and TSFS, explicitly three months between TSFS and the start of TVH, maybe a couple of months at most between the climax of TVH and the trial/finale, and (according to Harve Bennett) a 6-month shakedown period between the end of TVH and TFF, so that's at most a year, and TWOK is "officially" in 2285. So the interval between TFF and TUC is more likely to be seven years. (The problem with the Okuda Chronology is that it took every stated interval literally instead of as roundings -- if the characters said 20 years, they assumed it was 20 exactly instead of 19 or 18. Although with TWOK they put it 18 years after "Space Seed" instead of the stated 15 years. It's weird.)

 

[Uhura's Panties]

There is a 6 year gap between TFF and the TUC.

Basic classic movie time line

ST: TMP - 2271 or 2273

ST: TWOK - 2285

ST: TSFS - 2288

ST: TVH - 2286 (and 1986)

ST: TFF - 2287

ST: TUC -2293

ST: Gen (first 15 minutes) - 2293

In my own "canon" I believe Kirk and crew did a 3rd five year mission between 2287 and 2292.

 

[EliyahuQeoni]

(The problem with the Okuda Chronology is that it took every stated interval literally instead of as roundings -- if the characters said 20 years, they assumed it was 20 exactly instead of 19 or 18. Although with TWOK they put it 18 years after "Space Seed" instead of the stated 15 years. It's weird.)

I think that's because they wanted TWOK to be set after 2283 (the date on the Romulan Ale) AND insisted on TOS taking placed exactly 300 years after the episodes airdates. The result was that they needed to extend the time gap between Space Seed and TWOK to 18 years rather than 15. The best solution would have been to a) Come up with another explanation for the date on the bottle, or b) give up the idea that TOS is exactly 300 years after the original airdates. Either option would have preserved the explicitly stated 15 year time gap (Which can't be Ceti Alpha V years, since Kirk indipendantly came up with the same time frame).

 

[Christopher]

^But then TWOK could've been in 2283 or '84 - and either 16 or 17 years could be plausibly rounded down to 15 in casual conversation, while 18 is more likely to be rounded to 20. They didn't have to push it all the way to '85 if that was their standard. Like I said, I figure their movie dating was probably grounded in the need to put TFF at least 20 years after "Balance of Terror," otherwise it wouldn't make sense for the Romulans to have been participants in founding Nimbus III. (Though by the same token, they could've put TFF in '85 or '86 if they'd been willing to accept that the characters were rounding off.)

 

[Herbert1]

There is also the Star Trek Fandom Chronology by James Dixon at http://phoenixinn.iwarp.com/startrek/files.html that builds on the fandom timeline created by Chuck Graham and Geoffrey Mandel.

ST: TOS "Space Seed" -- 2260

ST: TOS "Miri" 1960+300 years = 2260

ST: TMP -- 2267

ST II: TWOK -- 2287

TMP refit + 20 years = 2287

ST III: TSFS -- 2287

ST IV: TVH -- 2288

ST V: TFF -- 2288

ST: TUC -- 2292

ST: Gen -- 2293

Though this timeline doesn't work with dialogue in VOY "Q2" that established the end of Kirk's five year mission in 2270.

Interesting how both the Okuda Timeline and the Graham/Mandel/Dixon Timeline ignore the 15 year figure between "Space Seed" and TWOK.