My Grievances of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

[BigJake]

Re: My Greivences of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

Two examples in The Hunt for Red October come to my mind. The most significant is probably that, with a range of 5,000 miles, the missiles of the Red October don't need to be launched close to the American coast at all, to hit American targets.

Actually the scenario the movie is built around, and which everyone is racing to prevent, is a decapitation strike, short-range firing of SLBM's to take out centers with little to no warning before impact (so that the Americans wouldn't even know where to evacuate short of the impossible task of evacuating the entire eastern coast). We are told this in the film, and it is in fact an actual tactical use of SLBM's.

But, my favorite, that took me right out of the movie on first viewing, is that in the middle of its cat-and-mouse game with the Red October, when the two subs are shown running silently side by side, the Dallas surfaces to pick up Ryan from the helicopter, and yet we are supposed to believe that the Red October can't detect any of that.

This one, maybe, except I always had the impression that Dallas hung back and pulled away to pick up Ryan. (Hence Captain Scott Glenn's annoyance, which wouldn't have made sense if the Dallas had just surfaced right behind their target and dived again.)

Neither of these examples is at any rate relevant to my point, since neither of them is a problem that remotely affects the geographic framing of the action or constitutes "speed of drama" nonsense, which is what I was talking about. Moreover I don't require "fidelity to reality" so much as internal consistency: what I'm talking about is a film choosing a set of rules, indicating what they are and then playing by them. Red October delivers the drama that it does by doing this. "Speed of drama" conventions rob a film of the opportunity to do this, and squander story possibilities in so doing.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Re: My Greivences of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

what I'm talking about is a film choosing a set of rules and then playing by them.

Wonderful! Both STXI and STID did this, so what's the problem again?

 

[BigJake]

Re: My Greivences of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

Both STXI and STID did this

Pull the other one, it's got bells on.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Re: My Greivences of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

Both STXI and STID did this

Pull the other one, it's got bells on.

On the contrary.

In this thread, and in many others, it's been convincingly pointed out over and over again many reasons why there is no need for the nu-timeline to depict the same warp physics as was shown in the TOS era. Several convincing cases have been put forth in this thread in the past few pages, so I won't bother linking to them. I will add to them, though (or rather, bring up one point that I find particularly significant, which, no doubt, has been brought up before in this context).

In The Menagerie, in the flashback footage of The Cage, we have the dialog:

SURVIVOR: Is Earth all right?
PIKE: The same old Earth, and you'll see it very soon.
TYLER: And you won't believe how fast you can get back. Well the time barrier's been broken. Our new ships can

That suggests quite plainly that advancements in warp physics occurred in the old-Trek TOS timeline, between the years 2236 and 2254. But the Kelvin was destroyed in STXI, in 2233, before this suggested revision in warp physics occurred. So, in TOS's own terms, wouldn't it be more far-fetched to assume that warp physics would the same after the temporal incursion of 2233 as it was in the TOS timeline?

 

[Kemaiku]

Re: My Greivences of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

We've never even seen Klingons *use* warp drive in this reality. Nevermind how slow or inferior it is compared to the new militarised Starfleets faster drive systems.

 

[BigJake]

Re: My Greivences of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

it's been convincingly pointed out over and over again many reasons why there is no need for the nu-timeline to depict the same warp physics as was shown in the TOS era.

No, you're changing subjects, this is not what we were talking about. I'm talking about "speed of drama," that nuTrek ships and setting -- and many occasions in the old shows and movies, for that matter, the moreso as time progressed, this is something I specifically said was a problem from the early days -- do not perceptibly set or play by any rules of speed or distance at all. Period. Indeed if they had clearly done so, "speed of plot" would never have come up as an excuse on behalf of nuTrek's writing team in this thread, and we would not now be having this conversation.

 

[Sindatur]

Re: My Greivences of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

it's been convincingly pointed out over and over again many reasons why there is no need for the nu-timeline to depict the same warp physics as was shown in the TOS era.

No, you're changing subjects, this is not what we were talking about. I'm talking about "speed of drama," that nuTrek ships and setting -- and many occasions in the old shows and movies, for that matter, the moreso as time progressed, this is something I specifically said was a problem from the early days -- do not perceptibly set or play by any rules of speed or distance at all. Period. Indeed if they had clearly done so, "speed of plot" would never have come up as an excuse on behalf of nuTrek's writing team in this thread, and we would not now be having this conversation.

Can you name a conflict, within ST'09 ad STiD, where at one point, something was declared a certain time distance away and another such situation where it was a different time Distance away? Where has it been shown in the two movies that you can't get somewhere within 2 weeks, yet in another instance it was shown you can get there in 2 minutes?

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Re: My Greivences of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

^ Quite so, Sindatur. That is exactly the right question.

I certainly can't find any such internal inconsistency, as I already said. But, to that, BigJake said, "Pull the other one."

No one else has been able to find any such internal inconsistency, either, which is why the complaints about internal inconsistency represent attempts to compare nuTrek with TOS or some such.

 

[BigJake]

Re: My Greivences of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

]Can you name a conflict, within ST'09 ad STiD, where at one point, something was declared a certain time distance away

No. We never even get this far. Neither film sets or plays by any perceptible rules at all. Nothing is ever stated or shown to be any particularly set time or distance from anything else, period. In fact I don't believe I can even recollect the use of devices like the "warp factor."

 

[Sindatur]

Re: My Greivences of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

]Can you name a conflict, within ST'09 ad STiD, where at one point, something was declared a certain time distance away

No. Neither film sets or plays by any perceptible rules at all. Nothing is ever stated or shown to be any particularly set time or distance from anything else, period. In fact I don't believe I can even recollect the use of devices like the "warp factor."

So, then there is no lack of Internal Consistency, so that complaint is illegitimate. They don't waste screen time saying it takes "X" time to get there, they don't waste screen time showing how long it takes, they just cut right to there, and leave it to your imagination how long it took, nor do they take up screen time with Technobabbling how long it takes to get there.

But, as has been pointed out, it seems they have access to Transwarp, according to Admiral Marcus' office

 

[BigJake]

Re: My Greivences of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

So, then there is no lack of Internal Consistency

No, if you set no rules you cannot have internal consistency. Internal consistency requires rules to exist in the first place.

(Basically, as with so much else in nuTrek, this is just an amping-up of what was already a habit of the original franchise. In the old movies "warp factor" was rubbery and inconsistent, in the Abramsverse any gesture in that direction is simply dispensed with. The person who mentioned "speed of plot" was doing so quite justifiably, Abramsverse Trek is a very, very pure instance of it.)

 

[Opus]

Re: My Greivences of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

All I can say is THANK GOD they didn't waste time with spelling out every little tech detail and bludgeon it to death with a dead horse. I enjoy my space action movies to be fun and exciting and not so much like watching a corporate HR Policies and Procedures training film.

"Delta Vega and The Warp Factors That Will Absolutely Necessarily Get You There Overnight!"

 

[Sindatur]

Re: My Greivences of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

So, then there is no lack of Internal Consistency

No, if you set no rules you cannot have internal consistency. Internal consistency requires rules to exist in the first place.

(Basically, as with so much else in nuTrek, this is just an amping-up of what was already a habit of the original franchise. In the old movies "warp factor" was rubbery and inconsistent, in the Abramsverse any gesture in that direction is simply dispensed with. The person who mentioned "speed of plot" was doing so quite justifiably, Abramsverse Trek is a very, very pure instance of it.)

How do you know they don't have rules? Are you privvy to the writer's notes? How you been in the writer's room and seen the Chalk board? There has been no inconsistency, so, they must be basing it upon something. You can't spend 2 weeks in a 2 hour movie to get to someplace, so, they simply bypass mentioning it? I don't see why it's a problem that screentime wasn't wasted on it. How many people have complained about "Earth again"? Well, if they actually showed a real passage of time (according to the scale you expect travel time to be), getting to other places would be impossible without eating up lots of screen time.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Re: My Greivences of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

All I can say is THANK GOD they didn't waste time with spelling out every little tech detail and bludgeon it to death with a dead horse. I enjoy my space action movies to be fun and exciting and not so much like watching a corporate HR Policies and Procedures training film.

"Delta Vega and The Warp Factors That Will Absolutely Necessarily Get You There Overnight!"

Word.

]Can you name a conflict, within ST'09 ad STiD, where at one point, something was declared a certain time distance away

No. We never even get this far. Neither film sets or plays by any perceptible rules at all. Nothing is ever stated or shown to be any particularly set time or distance from anything else, period. In fact I don't believe I can even recollect the use of devices like the "warp factor."

I can.

How do you know they don't have rules?

He doesn't.

Are you privvy to the writer's notes?

He isn't.

How you been in the writer's room and seen the Chalk board?

He hasn't.

 

[BigJake]

Re: My Greivences of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

All I can say is THANK GOD they didn't waste time with spelling out every little tech detail

Pretending that any objection to a trope that happens to be found in nuTrek writing must be some form of crazy Poindexterism really doesn't work either. I know you're a smart guy, Opus, and that in all probability you know perfectly well that there's a difference between simply rejecting "speed of drama" and "wasting time with spelling out every little tech detail." So I don't really understand this kind of dodging.

How do you know they don't have rules?

You should know something is wrong when you have to resort to stuff like "sure, we don't see any rules, but they must have some, how do you know they don't?" If the writers did lots of hypothetical super-secret awesome stuff in the background which would totally blow my objections out of space but just somehow never wound up manifesting on the screen in any way, I don't care. I care about and am talking about what's on the screen.

I would also point out, incidentally, that my original comment was not directed at nuTrek, but at Trek in general. It was Closed Caption who insisted on dragging the discussion around to the pros and cons of nuTrek and whether or not it uses the "speed of drama" convention I was criticizing. If you're feeling aggrieved about being unable to convince me that it doesn't, take it up with him.

 

[M'Sharak]

Re: My Greivences of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

Indeed if they had clearly done so, "speed of plot" would never have come up as an excuse on behalf of nuTrek's writing team in this thread, and we would not now be having this conversation.

I see what you're doing there.

]Can you name a conflict, within ST'09 ad STiD, where at one point, something was declared a certain time distance away

No. We never even get this far. Neither film sets or plays by any perceptible rules at all. Nothing is ever stated or shown to be any particularly set time or distance from anything else, period. In fact I don't believe I can even recollect the use of devices like the "warp factor."

They were present nonetheless.

 

[BigJake]

Re: My Greivences of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

If I'm misremembering the films, and all these things were present without my noticing them, that would of course be very different.

 

[BillJ]

Re: My Greivences of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

If I'm misremembering the films, and all these things were present without my noticing them, that would of course be very different.

Warp factors were used...

Chekov: If Mr. Scott can get us to warp factor 4...

 

[MakeshiftPython]

Re: My Greivences of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

^ Quite so, Sindatur. That is exactly the right question.

I certainly can't find any such internal inconsistency, as I already said. But, to that, BigJake said, "Pull the other one."

No one else has been able to find any such internal inconsistency, either, which is why the complaints about internal inconsistency represent attempts to compare nuTrek with TOS or some such.

It seemed to take longer to reach Klingon space than it did to head back for Earth. When the Vengeance threw the Enterprise out of warp, they were close to Earth's moon, which is actually perfect timing. So, they were gonna keep going if it weren't for the Vengeance stopping them?

 

[Sindatur]

Re: My Greivences of Nutrek. What makes me a hater...

So, BigJake, let me ask in all seriousness, which scale would you want to see? The one in Where No man Has Gone Before, where they went beyond the Galactic Rim in a single episode, or the one in Voyager where it was estimated it would take 35 years to traverse the length of one Quadrant of the Galaxy? Or maybe DS9, where it was a 2 week trip to Earth from DS9? But, since, Admiral Marcus' office shows us they have Transwarp capabilities, which is almost instantaneous (certainly compared to 35 years to traverse the length of a single Quadrant) we really don't need any explanation.

So, which scale should they use? And how much screen time should be spent explaining that scale and showing the passage of time? 10 minutes is about 1/10th of the available screen time in a 2 hour movie, and an awful happens in a JJTrek in 10 minutes, so, a lot will have to be cut out to explain something that doesn't pertain to the plot. The movies aren't about what happens between point A and Point B, they are about what happens at point A and point B. The only time the travel time is really important, is if you are rescuing someone who doesn't have enough food or water or air for a prolonged wait, or if someone is being victimized daily, etc.

If they used any kind of "realistic" scale, we would never leave Earth