Question about the trilogy continuity.

[sariel2005]

Hi everyone,
this is something that has kinda confused me for ages and I wondered what other peoples take on this was.

according the the Chronology/ Official website etc we get the following dates.
ST II /ST III- 2285
STIV - 2286
STV - 2287

Now official sources also place Kirk's Birthday as being in March ( thematically I personally think his fiftieth birthday would make more sense but there you go.) so clearly STII happens in March 2285 and STIII follows on more or less straight after ( lets say April.)
At the end of STIII Kirk and co arrive on Vulcan and IV follows on from
that,so far so good. But Kirks opening log entry says that they are in their third month of Vulcan exile which by my reconning would mean it was
July 2285. the crew then return to Earth in the Bounty and after saving the planet once again Kirk has his hearing and is awarded his new ship.
there doesn't seem to be a gap here so I'm still seeing 2285 ( in any event the guides say the Probe crisis occured in 2286 and that doesn't fit.)
then we get STV. Internal dialogue suggests the film takes place around six weeks after the end of STIV ( Scotty recalls Kirk's "lets see what she's got " line and Kirk mentions giving Scotty six weeks to fix the ship.)

does anyone know why they were spaced so far apart, or does this bug anyone else ?

 

[Christopher]

The dates you refer to come from the Okudas' Star Trek Chronology and are their own conjectures for that book. I and many others consider their dating choices for those films to be rather bizarre. 2285 is eighteen years after "Space Seed," not the stated fifteen, which is odd when the Okudachron usually treats onscreen references to time intervals as exact. I think TWOK was placed in '85 instead of '82 because of the 2283 date on the Romulan ale and McCoy's line about it taking a while to ferment.

I figure TFF was placed in 2287 because of the references to Nimbus III being twenty years old; since the Romulans had had no contact with the Federation for over a century prior to "Balance of Terror" in 2266, I guess they figured that the talks that led to Nimbus III couldn't have happened any earlier than 2267. Maybe they put TVH in 2286 to split the difference between TWOK/TSFS in '85 and TFF in '87, though you're right that it contradicts the reference to three months on Vulcan.

I think if they were going to round the "Space Seed"-TWOK interval up from 15 to 18 years, they should've rounded the "20 years" reference to Nimbus III down a year or so and put TFF in late '85 or early '86.

As for the interval between TVH and TFF, Harve Bennett has said there was a six-month shakedown cruise between them. The six weeks referenced by Kirk would've thus presumably been the time Kirk gave Scotty to fix the ship after the end of that shakedown cruise, although you'd never know it from the film proper.

 

[sariel2005]

Hi Christopher,
thanks for your reply. Makes sense what you say about TFF, I guess the the theory is that Romulans don't round down. I didn't know there was
a six month shakedown cruse between TVH and TFF but that does
make perfect sense.

now you mention the 2283 label on the Romulan ale I wonder wether that was when the story was supposed to be set and the lines were supposed to be delivered with more irony?

 

[Christopher]

Hi Christopher,
thanks for your reply. Makes sense what you say about TFF, I guess the the theory is that Romulans don't round down.

But why would they use Earth years, though? Why couldn't exactly 20 Romulan years correspond to, say, 18.357 Earth years?

 

[sariel2005]

I'm not sure the line makes sense either way if it doesn't refer to an Earth date. the stuff seems pretty easy to get hold of and seems common though, maybe someones labelling them in for export to the federation ?

 

[UssGlenn]

I've always favored the theory that 2283 is a Stardate. That really is plenty of time to ferment.

 

[Green Shirt]

At the end of STIII Kirk and co arrive on Vulcan and IV follows on from
that,so far so good. But Kirks opening log entry says that they are in their third month of Vulcan exile which by my reconning would mean it was
July 2285

Anyone know how long is a Vulcan month?

 

[UssGlenn]

At the end of STIII Kirk and co arrive on Vulcan and IV follows on from
that,so far so good. But Kirks opening log entry says that they are in their third month of Vulcan exile which by my reconning would mean it was
July 2285

Anyone know how long is a Vulcan month?

Well considering that they don't have a moon, they probably don't have months at all; just days, seasons, and years. I think we can assume he's referring to Earth (Federation standard) months.

 

[FormerLurker]

I always thought "This stuff takes a while to ferment" was meant to be taken ironically, ie; this stuff(Romulan Ale) ferments virtually overnight.

 

[Christopher]

^Me too, but apparently the Okudas decided to take a different tack.

Given that Mike Okuda is a member of the TrekBBS, it might be nice if he could drop in here and enlighten us on the thought process behind the movie dates in the Chronology.

 

[Bones2]

I didn't know Mike Okuda was a member on here. What's his username? I'd love to read his posts.

 

[Christopher]

I didn't know Mike Okuda was a member on here. What's his username?

Mike Okuda.

Similarly, Rick Sternbach posts here under the username of... (Go on, guess.)

 

[Campe]

I didn't know Mike Okuda was a member on here. What's his username?

Mike Okuda.

Similarly, Rick Sternbach posts here under the username of... (Go on, guess.)

Wah Chang?

 

[FormerLurker]

Papa Smurf?

 

[Bertie]

As for the interval between TVH and TFF, Harve Bennett has said there was a six-month shakedown cruise between them. The six weeks referenced by Kirk would've thus presumably been the time Kirk gave Scotty to fix the ship after the end of that shakedown cruise, although you'd never know it from the film proper.

I remember, back in the day, when I first started reading the Trek technical/production type manuals and such, being quite surprised at how much of a time gap the powers that be put between TVH and TFF, the most natural and obvious interpretation of the first few TFF scenes being that the movies were practically back to back, and that the bridge officers were enjoying a brief mini-vacation on Earth while the engineers fixed up the newly received ship. For that reason, I never understood the "trilogy", since there was to my mind no more of a gap between TVH and TFF than between TSFS and TVH. Oh, well, no biggie

 

[Therin of Andor]

I never understood the "trilogy", since there was to my mind no more of a gap between TVH and TFF than between TSFS and TVH. Oh, well, no biggie

It's a trilogy of theme, not time.

The Death/Resurrection/Restoration of Spock, or, as the omnibus of ST II/III/IV novelizations is called: "Duty, Honor, Redemption" - for Kirk?

 

[Green Shirt]

At the end of STIII Kirk and co arrive on Vulcan and IV follows on from
that,so far so good. But Kirks opening log entry says that they are in their third month of Vulcan exile which by my reconning would mean it was
July 2285

Anyone know how long is a Vulcan month?

Well considering that they don't have a moon, they probably don't have months at all; just days, seasons, and years. I think we can assume he's referring to Earth (Federation standard) months.

Well, they could divide the Vulcan year into 12 units and call it a month. Or, be metric and divvy it up into 10 parts. Then they can switch back and forth using both systems to confuse the audience.

 

[Christopher]

If anyone's curious, a planet in the middle of 40 Eridani A's habitable zone would have a year length of about 202.5 days. Since it's a hot world, it might be a bit closer, so maybe something a bit under 200 days per Vulcan year. Of course, that's Earth days; the length of a Vulcan day is impossible to predict.

Of course, this clashes with "Yesteryear" putting Spock's seventh year "thirty Vulcan years past," since that would be only about 16.4 Earth years, making him a prepubescent kid only a year before "The Cage." That'd be one hell of a growth spurt.

 

[Candlelight]

I didn't know Mike Okuda was a member on here. What's his username?

Mike Okuda.

Similarly, Rick Sternbach posts here under the username of... (Go on, guess.)

Wah Chang?

Jayson?

 

[Timo]

Maybe they put TVH in 2286 to split the difference between TWOK/TSFS in '85 and TFF in '87, though you're right that it contradicts the reference to three months on Vulcan.

How does it contradict anything? I'm no fan of the Chronology dates, but it should be perfectly possible for ST2/3 to occur in late 2285, ST4 in early 2286 for the most part, and the end of ST4 (where they go find out "what she's got") to occur in late 2286 or early 2287, so ST5 could be in 2287.

Timo Saloniemi