Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the same

[beamMe]

Re: Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the sam

For Data's head to be there, TNG has to be akin to what we saw. But is that possible with what we are seeing in the reboot? The history of that series includes elements from the prime universe TOS ("Relics", "Journey to Babel", "The Naked Time", etc). This TOS has been irrevocably altered.

Sorry, this is the trap of time travel. You're suggesting that Nero's incursion altered the eventual "path" of TOS (and by proxy TNG), so Data will never travel back in time. BUT, if Nero altered TOS, then Spock may never become an Ambassador, and will never work with the Romulans to save Romulus, and the black hole will never be created, and Nero will never travel back in time, and .... ERROR. ERROR. DOES NOT COMPUTE. [Smoke billowing from ears]

So, you have to go with the "timeline divergence" theory. Everything before that point is as it is -- INCLUDING Kirk "killing" Edith Keeler, Gary Seven, Riker and Geordi helping Cochrane, Data's head in 1800s San Francisco, etc...

Both Nero and Spock were already caught in the black hole and thus protected from the changes that occurred when the Narada went back first.
If you don't accept that, then First Contact too wouldn't have worked; there the Enterprise was caught in that time vortex/hole and protected from what the Borg did, while the whole universe they knew was replaced with that Borg-ified one.
City on the Edge of Forever too wouldn't have worked if Kirk and Co hadn't been protected from the changes McCoy caused.

So, my idea may be convoluted and complicated, but it makes some (Doctor Who-style of) sense and could give an explanation for the already apparent differences before the Narada destroys the Kelvin.

God, why couldn't they have made a straight reboot. This would have spared us all this convoluted shit.

 

[DonIago]

Re: Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the sam

The Data's Head resolution really depends on whether you believe that the '09 timeline "branched" off the existing one, or whether you believe that that timeline was always running in parallel to the Prime timeline and Nero and Spock just jumped tracks.

If the former, then the head should be there (but that raises some physics questions involving one head becoming two (or more)), if the latter, then it shouldn't be there...unless a TNG crew also jumped tracks to this timeline at some point...

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Re: Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the sam

As I said, the past of "Time's Arrow" is common to both the prime and Abrams timelines. Therefore, anything and anyone from either timeline can travel to it. Data's head comes from the prime future, and (up until 2233) that prime future can still arise from it. Therefore the head must logically still be there.

For Data's head to vanish from the cave would mean that there is a version of the 19th century that can ONLY lead to the Abrams timeline, which is of course not the case.

 

[DonIago]

Re: Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the sam

What you've just said is exactly what I covered under the theory that the '09 timeline "branched" instead of always existing in parallel to the Prime timeline and being identical up to the point of Nero's incursion.

There could be an infinitude of timelines that are all essentially identical to both the Prime timeline and the '09 timeline of course.

Data's head wouldn't "vanish" from the cave; it would never have been there to begin with. And AFAIK we can't know whether in the '09 timeline we saw it ever was there because we have no clear evidence of temporal divergence that could be traced to those events.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Re: Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the sam

There's also alt-Tasha Yar (from Yesterday's Enterprise) to consider. She didn't vanish from the Enterprise-C when the alternate timeline featuring her was erased from existence, did she?

 

[beamMe]

Re: Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the sam

As I said, the past of "Time's Arrow" is common to both the prime and Abrams timelines. Therefore, anything and anyone from either timeline can travel to it. Data's head comes from the prime future, and (up until 2233) that prime future can still arise from it. Therefore the head must logically still be there.

For Data's head to vanish from the cave would mean that there is a version of the 19th century that can ONLY lead to the Abrams timeline, which is of course not the case.

But that is exactly the case, if my idea of the changes the Narada causes is correct.
And since this is all fiction, and unless my idea is contradicted by a future film, I think I'll stick with it for now.

 

[beamMe]

Re: Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the sam

There's also alt-Tasha Yar (from Yesterday's Enterprise) to consider. She didn't vanish from the Enterprise-C when the alternate timeline featuring her was erased from existence, did she?

No, like Spock, she travelled into a different timeline/universe.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Re: Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the sam

^ Incorrect. Tasha and the Ent-C travelled into the past of the *same* timeline. But since the Ent-C's sacrifice was already a part of history, they didn't create an alternate timeline; merely fulfilled the existing one. (Nero and Spock Prime, on the other hand, created a branching timeline, since their actions were not a part of history.)

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Re: Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the sam

^ Incorrect. Tasha and the Ent-C travelled into the past of the *same* timeline. But since the Ent-C's sacrifice was already a part of history, they didn't create an alternate timeline; merely fulfilled the existing one.

That's not quite right, either. A better description is that Tasha traveled into her own past and then influenced events to become the normal TNG timeline.

But all that's moot. Just because time travel worked one way in one episode, or even in many episodes, it doesn't follow that it must work the same way in every episode.

Consider The City on the Edge of Forever versus Yesteryear. Both use the same Guardian of Forever. In City, time is restored to its proper shape. But in Yy, everything is the same, except a pet dies, so apparently it's not quite the same timeline in the end. One could argue that different parameters in effect caused the differences in how time was fixed, and I'd agree in principle that that notion is fine.

Then there's the red-headed stepchild of TOS time travel: All Our Yesterdays. I've seen fans dismiss the regression that Spock begins to undergo as absurd. I, on the other hand, consider it a breath of fresh air, because of its originality. Again "different parameters", in this case in the however the Atavachron works, versus other methods of time travel, suffice to "explain things".

(Nero and Spock Prime, on the other hand, created a branching timeline, since their actions were not a part of history.)

How do you know that "different parameters" don't exist in the case under discussion? You don't. You all are trying to tie the hands of hypothetical authors to conform to the limitations that you consider to have force. The actual authors of future episodes might not consider themselves constrained by such limitations; perhaps they have something to say that in their view requires the introduction of "different parameters". Maybe Red Matter has weird properties.

Who knows? Perhaps all the differences in the JJverse are due to an interconnected web of temporal-mechanical influences crisscrossing back and forth throughout the Prime universe that becomes unraveled when Nero's lightening storm opens up.

 

[beamMe]

Re: Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the sam

^ Incorrect. Tasha and the Ent-C travelled into the past of the *same* timeline. But since the Ent-C's sacrifice was already a part of history, they didn't create an alternate timeline; merely fulfilled the existing one. (Nero and Spock Prime, on the other hand, created a branching timeline, since their actions were not a part of history.)

No. When the Enterprise-C fell trough that time-rift a new timeline/universe was created. One in which Armus never killed Tasha (and Data's head never ends up in a San Francisco cave).
We get a short glimpse into that universe, since we basically follow the course of the Enterprise-C from the view-point of the Enterprise-D.
When the E-C returns to her own timeline/universe through that rift this war-with-the-Klingons-tl/u doesn't get wiped out. It continues on.
But we follow the E-C back to her own tl/u to the time we left it at the beginning of the episode. There all this has indeed already happened.
This means that when we first see Tasha in Encounter at Farpoint her alternate-timeline-ego has already died on Romulus.

 

[Set Harth]

Re: Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the sam

It's a total reboot.

It's not. Spock Prime is the same Spock we followed through TOS, the first six movies, and Unification. You may allege that this was done to placate some people. It doesn't matter. In-universe it is true regardless of any out-of-universe reason for doing it.

Both Nero and Spock were already caught in the black hole and thus protected from the changes that occurred when the Narada went back first.

We know Nero went into the black hole before Spock. To explain why Spock went into the alternate timeline created by Nero as opposed to a completely separate one, I think we could call it a property of red matter black holes if we so desired. ( Nero, on the other hand, does not need to be protected from the changes caused by himself, just as the Borg ship did not need to be. ) But how is Spock, as someone momentarily not yet in the black hole when Nero enters, "protected" from changes to the timeline? The same way everyone else in the Prime universe, including Picard and LaForge, is "protected" at that point: it's not single-timeline travel. The universe doesn't change as soon as the time traveler departs, to reflect the results of the time travel; rather, the time traveler disappears, never to be seen again, and the rest of the universe remains as it was.

But this is all ancillary to the point: Data's head being in the cave does not depend on how events play out in the future of the Abramsverse continuity, because it was already there when the timelines diverged. The Narada went back to a point in the Prime timeline in the middle of a period during which we know it was there.

 

[DonIago]

Re: Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the sam

Your last paragraph is, again, predicated on the theory that the timeline "branched" as opposed to having existed the whole...well, time.

 

[Hober Mallow]

Re: Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the sam

The idea that this is an alternate universe split off because of Nero is a fig leaf. Even if the writers were paying real careful attention to make sure that all events line up - and they clearly aren't - the visual artists, director and so on are willing to play fast and loose with so many things that nuTrek is pretty obviously a reboot.

Exactly. It's a reboot which refuses to be honest about it.

But then again -- let's be honest -- so were the TOS movies. And TNG along with the other Berman-era spinoffs.

 

[Therin of Andor]

Re: Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the sam

IRL it's a reboot, but it ties into the old at least as well as any of the other series' and movies (which is to say, a LOT of willing suspension of disbelief is required)

Assuming that transporters, warp drive, recast actors, replicators and a money-less society require no suspension of disbelief.

It's a reboot which refuses to be honest about it.

It was the perfect way to reboot it. A reboot we can choose to embrace or reject.

Exactly, this has happened before, and nobody complained, and yet the new guy walks in with a new direction and all of a sudden it's INSANITY.

Of course people complained. Check out the fan rants (and accolades) about the many changes in ST:TMP in early volumes of "The Best of Trek".

"Who are these... Munchkins?"

 

[bryce]

Re: Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the sam

The Data's Head resolution really depends on whether you believe that the '09 timeline "branched" off the existing one, or whether you believe that that timeline was always running in parallel to the Prime timeline and Nero and Spock just jumped tracks.

No there is a *third* option: the timeline(s) branched off, not like a "Y" shape, (or existed in parallel, like an "H" shape, with the cross line being the wormhole) - but the timeline branched in an "X" shape, when Nero appeared.

In the Star Trek...multiverse...time travel is a reality, so Star Trek's past is constantly influencing and affecting and shaping it's future...and vise verse - Trek's future shapes it's past. So when Nero changed the local present, he changed the future...and that reshaped the past. The mechanism for this change is there - it's time travel. in a universe where the laws of physics allows time travel, the laws of cause and effect are very different ... from one where time travel is forbidden: cause and effect can run two ways.

So when Nero changed the future, he changed the past...there isn't necessarily a Data in this new future to leave his head in the past. Or maybe a Data exists, but didn't experence those events. Or there is a Data head in the past...but it's the new timeline's version of Data and his head in the new past. (Just like this new timeline has a version of Archer in it's past...and Spock Prime indicated that this new universe has...a version of fate and destiny...or maybe it's just time's way of trying to "repair" the "damage"...so we still have an Archer and Kirk and probably a version of Picard and Sisko and Janeway too...but their lives won't be quite the same.)

And it *has* to be that way...because if Data's head *is* in a cave in the new timeline...then all the other visits to the past from the future of the Prime timeline also exist in the new timeline's past! So effectively, the new timeline has *two* seperate futures! And nuKirk could travel back to when Data's head was left in the cave, and join with the Prime version of Picard, and travel with him "back" into the *Prime future*! And Prime Picard could likewise travel with nuKirk into the new timeline! Which is nonsense.

So no, the new timeline didn't "always" exist (if we think in terms of "meta-time")...it didn't exist until Nero created it...but Nero's actions creatd a new future, in a metaverse where the future can and does effecf the past, so Nero also created a new past too! Since cause and effect are complicated and multidimensional in the Star Trek...over-reality.

Of course, there is a...contradiction here...in a universe where the past and future effect each other dynamically...well, then creating a parallel or alternate timeline shouldn't be possible...but perhaps there is something special or different about time travel involving Red Matter created wormholes. And anyway, the rules - and effects - of time travel in the Trekverse have never been consistent...we have seem time travel in Trek have all soets of different effects...changing the future...erasing it...creating alternate timelines...creating branching timelines which eventually self-correct or self-repair or self-delete, depending on how you look at it. So probably, like the books about the Department of Temporal Investigations imply, there do indees seem to be multiple kinds of time travel in the Trekverse...all with different effects on the timeline, depending.

 

[beamMe]

Re: Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the sam

... So when Nero changed the local present, he changed the future...and that reshaped the past...

Yes, that's exactly how I see it.

Love your post; you explained it so much better than I did.

 

[BillJ]

Re: Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the sam

For me, Data's head is there. We'll probably get a Trek Lit book featuring it somewhere down the road when they're allowed to start playing in the Abramsverse.

 

[abaldwin360]

Re: Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the sam

The Data's Head resolution really depends on whether you believe that the '09 timeline "branched" off the existing one, or whether you believe that that timeline was always running in parallel to the Prime timeline and Nero and Spock just jumped tracks.

No there is a *third* option: the timeline(s) branched off, not like a "Y" shape, (or existed in parallel, like an "H" shape, with the cross line being the wormhole) - but the timeline branched in an "X" shape, when Nero appeared.

In the Star Trek...multiverse...time travel is a reality, so Star Trek's past is constantly influencing and affecting and shaping it's future...and vise verse - Trek's future shapes it's past. So when Nero changed the local present, he changed the future...and that reshaped the past. The mechanism for this change is there - it's time travel. in a universe where the laws of physics allows time travel, the laws of cause and effect are very different ... from one where time travel is forbidden: cause and effect can run two ways.

So when Nero changed the future, he changed the past...there isn't necessarily a Data in this new future to leave his head in the past. Or maybe a Data exists, but didn't experence those events. Or there is a Data head in the past...but it's the new timeline's version of Data and his head in the new past. (Just like this new timeline has a version of Archer in it's past...and Spock Prime indicated that this new universe has...a version of fate and destiny...or maybe it's just time's way of trying to "repair" the "damage"...so we still have an Archer and Kirk and probably a version of Picard and Sisko and Janeway too...but their lives won't be quite the same.)

And it *has* to be that way...because if Data's head *is* in a cave in the new timeline...then all the other visits to the past from the future of the Prime timeline also exist in the new timeline's past! So effectively, the new timeline has *two* seperate futures! And nuKirk could travel back to when Data's head was left in the cave, and join with the Prime version of Picard, and travel with him "back" into the *Prime future*! And Prime Picard could likewise travel with nuKirk into the new timeline! Which is nonsense.

So no, the new timeline didn't "always" exist (if we think in terms of "meta-time")...it didn't exist until Nero created it...but Nero's actions creatd a new future, in a metaverse where the future can and does effecf the past, so Nero also created a new past too! Since cause and effect are complicated and multidimensional in the Star Trek...over-reality.

Of course, there is a...contradiction here...in a universe where the past and future effect each other dynamically...well, then creating a parallel or alternate timeline shouldn't be possible...but perhaps there is something special or different about time travel involving Red Matter created wormholes. And anyway, the rules - and effects - of time travel in the Trekverse have never been consistent...we have seem time travel in Trek have all soets of different effects...changing the future...erasing it...creating alternate timelines...creating branching timelines which eventually self-correct or self-repair or self-delete, depending on how you look at it. So probably, like the books about the Department of Temporal Investigations imply, there do indees seem to be multiple kinds of time travel in the Trekverse...all with different effects on the timeline, depending.

Wibbly wobbly timey wimey

 

[Kruezerman]

Re: Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the sam

THIS THREAD IS GIVING ME A HEADACHE. STAHP.

 

[Set Harth]

Re: Is everything before the destruction of the kelvin exactly the sam

So when Nero changed the future, he changed the past...there isn't necessarily a Data in this new future to leave his head in the past. Or maybe a Data exists, but didn't experence those events. Or there is a Data head in the past...but it's the new timeline's version of Data and his head in the new past.

It really doesn't matter what happens with "nuData". It's Prime Data's head. We don't need a hypothetical future Abramsverse Data to leave his head in the past, because the Prime Data head is already there.

Just like this new timeline has a version of Archer in it's past...

That "version of Archer" is the same version seen on Enterprise. It's Prime Archer.

So effectively, the new timeline has *two* seperate futures!

Not really. For one thing, as a character in another franchise once said, always in motion is the future. Just because the past of the Prime timeline featured travelers from the TNG future doesn't mean that the TNG future becomes a future of the Abramsverse.