Star Trek-RM: The Ultimate Computer… Grading/Discussion

[Basill]

Babaganoosh said:

ancient said:
The viewscreen on the other ship is a different shape & bigger. Wesley's goin' all out and pimpin' his Connie.

You mean the main bridge viewscreen? I don't remember seeing that on the Lexington's bridge. The only shots of the inside of that ship were centered on Wesley in his command chair.

Yeah, the Lexington's bridge viewer has rounded corners. It is seen when Wesley is sizing up the situation looking at the Enterprise floating apparently dead in space. I don't recall if that shot was ever in the original however or just added for effect in the RM.

Edit: Went back and watched the old VHS episode and sure enough, that shot was in there, except now the Enterprise actually looks dead. They had already given Wesley's command chair a different backing, left over from the Mirror, Mirror ep. So, I think it's a nice touch that TOS-RM changed the viewscreen a tad.

 

[Rico]

Really cool and well done episode. Very exciting to see again. Loved the new effects.

 

[IrritatingGameOfChess]

I really enjoyed it! This has always been one of my favorite episodes, and the new battle sequences were very fast paced and exciting. The only new fx shot that disappointed me was, worryingly, the opening shot of the Enterprise approaching the space station. It looked a little too cartoon-like and didn't bode well, but the rest of the shots were excellent.

 

[Nomad]

The new fx were excellent, brief as they were (commercial cuts again were brutal). I wish we had gotten a closer look at the Woden, however.

 

[shornak]

Re: Star Trek-RM: The Ultimate Computer… Grading/Discussion

I totally enjoyed this episode just as I did in 1976 when I first saw it.

 

[WHF]

Re: Star Trek-R1: The Ultimate Computer

This has nothing to do with the new effects but I never noticed this one scene before. Scotty is in the Jefferies tube with Spock beneath him. Doohan moves his arm and casts a shadow overs Nimoy's face. Nimoy then makes this awkward move to regain the light. Since Scotty was the focus of the scene Nimoy probably shouldn't have moved. It's a scene that needed another take.

 

[Masao]

Malleus said:
It's unfortunate that the copyright permission couldn't be obtained to make the Vanguard space station bigger than Mack's design...

In fact, the TV version is smaller than the original book version. I was asked to design the station to be large enough to hold 4 starships in the internal dock. The TV design was shrunk so that Lexington had to park outside.

 

[22 Stars]

Masao great work on the station.

I do have a big gripe with the great people doing the remastered effects this time around. After watching the show, from an artistic point of view, the new shots don't show much 'vision' in interpreting the events. I think Mike, Denise and Dave are wonderful people and have met them a few times but please hear me out.

Why when the Enterprise is shooting at the Lexington and Exeter, did they choose to show us this from behind the Enterprise every single time? Why not a shot near the Lexington, where the damage was being done? In ST II when the Reliant shoots the Enterprise, we see both the Reliant shooting and more importantly I feel, the IMPACT of that shot on the Enterprise's secondary hull.

I know the length of each effects sequence is very short, but they have a few chances, perhaps one of them could have been showing us the actual damage caused by the phasers, at the point of impact. The dialogue even tells us where the ship was hit, c'mon guys show it to us! If the Exeter sustained damage to kill their Captain and First Officer, we could have seen maybe a quick phaser bolt hitting the bridge area of their saucer?

I think technically the remastering is done very well, but perhaps more of an artistic eye was needed to create more compelling and dynamic compositions.

 

[The Castellan]

They said very subtle differences ( and I am sure they did not mean names and numbers ) were made to the other 4 ships, and that some fans might be able to pick them out...

.....so, what WERE those subtle differences? o_o

 

[Trekwatcher]

Overall, this was a mixed bag for me, and this was one I was really looking forward to. The space station and the TAS-esque freighter were nicely done, but the battle to me seemed cartoony, and the old version was better in this respect, IMHO.

 

[siskokid888]

I was really looking forward to this one, and was a bit disappointed. If you are going to remaster, go all the way. The syndication cuts are horrendus, so many effects shots were probably edited out. But I would have liked to see a little more of the battle, something like in "The Doomsday Machine", when you see the rubble bouncing off the Constellation's hull. Maybe a view from behind the Excalibur, showing the E's phasers ripping through her hull, or something like that. I thought they could have done more with it.

 

[Jarok]

Malleus said:
It's unfortunate that the copyright permission couldn't be obtained to make the Vanguard space station bigger than Mack's design, and more unfortunate that some Star Fleet Battles ship designs couldn't be used (the dreadnought design, in particular) but the remastering was good nevertheless.

Yeah. As I watching this I thought it would have been cool to see TOS version of a Miranda class or the dreadnought in that battlegroup.

 

[Basill]

The Castellan said:
They said very subtle differences ( and I am sure they did not mean names and numbers ) were made to the other 4 ships, and that some fans might be able to pick them out...

.....so, what WERE those subtle differences? o_o

I do know that the Lexington had 4 of those big round glowing circles on her forward saucer unlike the Enterprise's 3. It's hard to see on screen in such a quick passing moment, but its easy to notice in the screen caps on the Trekmovie.com website.

 

[Stag]

^Lexington's viewscreen was different, Enterprise's lights were out in eterior shots after M5 shut down power to those decks.

 

[Noname Given]

cooleddie74 said:
Just saw it about an hour or so ago.


(*Spoilers ahead*)







The new starship wargame effects are very nice and interesting, but unfortunately the original opticals they replace were never on screen long enough to allow for any lengthy or intricate maneuvers and battle exchanges. Since the new f/x just slip into the exact same space and time duration of the old ones, we get great new digital ships that simply aren't allowed to spend much time on screen and have an impact. I like the Remastering job done on this one, but if I said I wasn't somewhat disappointed by the brevity of the new f/x sequences and anticlimactic feel of many of them I'd be lying.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

That sums up my feelings for the most part with the following additions:

1) I did enjoy the attention to detail and the accuragy displayed in the phaser shots - the Lexington getting hit on the secondary hill; and the Potemkin getting blasted along the side of her Primary hull section.

2) The syndication cuts REALLY hurt this one as they DID cut SFX shots from the first wargame sequence. I have also NEVER seen important to the story dialogue more mangled by syndication cuts then what they did here. (If this is someone's first intro to TOS; it makes a VERY WELL written episode seen disjointed in spots.

3) I was seriously underwhelmed by what they did with regard to the 100% dead (M5 scans it and reoports 'no life') and 'damaged/destroyed' U.S.S. Excalibur. They just showed the ship just drifting through space at an off orientation; but the ship itself didn't look damaged at all - no scaring or explosions; and considering what they did for the Klingon D-7 in the RM version of Day of the Dove; I was expecting more here. In the original 1968 verson they used a longshot of the U.S.S. Constelation from The Doomsday Machine and hell (imo) that conveyed it better then a non-scared ship just drifting off at a wierd angle.

 

[Professor Moriarty]

An "A" for the episode, but "Below average" for the new CGI work. Part of that low grade may have been influenced by the butchery this episode suffered for syndication, but I was very, very disappointed by what I did see. Where's the destruction of the Excalibur? Where's the severe damage to the Lexington that left 53 people dead?

I've been eagerly awaiting "The Ultimate Computer" ever since it was slotted onto the schedule, but I actually shouted "That's ALL?!" at my TV yesterday as I was watching this episode.

 

[Shatmandu]

Pretty underwhelming.

I understand they had to stick with the alloted times, but I expected much more. I always imagined someone's nacelle getting phasered loose and spinning away.

Joe, graphic

 

[The Castellan]

Shatmandu said:
Pretty underwhelming.

I understand they had to stick with the alloted times, but I expected much more. I always imagined someone's nacelle getting phasered loose and spinning away.

Joe, graphic

Someone, several years ago, made a model of the Excaliber after the battle, and one part I liked was that the left nacelle looked like it exploded from within.....the front and rear ends were spread open and the edges twisting back....sorta like popcorn after going boom.

 

[Professor Moriarty]

The Castellan said:

Shatmandu said:
Pretty underwhelming.

I understand they had to stick with the alloted times, but I expected much more. I always imagined someone's nacelle getting phasered loose and spinning away.

Joe, graphic

Someone, several years ago, made a model of the Excaliber after the battle, and one part I liked was that the left nacelle looked like it exploded from within.....the front and rear ends were spread open and the edges twisting back....sorta like popcorn after going boom.

I remember that model. It was quite well done and chilling in its execution. Damage like what you've described would have provided a visual--although perhaps gruesome--clue as to how the entire crew of the Excalibur was killed with only a couple of phaser hits.

A warp nacelle with such catastrophic damage could have showered the entire crew of the Excalibur (which, remember, was unshielded) with some exotic form of warp radiation (Delta rays, perhaps?) that instantly crispy-fried everyone aboard.

 

[cooleddie74]

The Remastered "Doomsday" machine's f/x worked in part because there were long sequences in the original episode where either the Enterprise or Constellation were on-screen and the center of action. In "Computer" there are nice wargame sequences but little in the way of lengthy f/x shots to show off the new CGI. You see the snazzy new Lexington and Potemkin in brief snippets but that's about it. The Woden freighter got more screen time than most of the new starships.