Star Trek: Starships Model/Magazine Subscription

[mswood]

The NX01 refit was never, ever, ever something the producers of Enterprise (Berman, Braga, or Coto) requested anyone from the art department to create. And Doug was not a part of Enterprise's art department. He worked for a contractor, Eden's FX.

Doug Drexler always thought the Enterprise should feature two nacelles, and saucer and a secondary hull, Braga and Berman didn't. And after the over all rough design was given to the FX house (where at this time Drexler worked) Doug got to create and put in all the fine detail for when he took the design and created the working in detail CGI file.

Like any other primary Hero ship the NX-01 went through hundreds of various designs before it got approval, hell even the final design to turn into a CGI file, then had to have the CGI file get final approval. And both the original designer and Drexler thought that the ship could be updated, specifically the aft mid section between the nacelles, just as Sternbach designed the Vor'cha to have it's front piece be modular (just to use another example).

Now flash forward several years after the show has ended and Doug is making posts on drexfiles and working for several years with Pocket books, he decided to turn the NX-01, more towards the NCC-1701. He does this and finalizes it without any of approval process that happens with the TV shows (Hero ships). and thus we get the NX-01 Refit. It's pushed through calendars and websites and when a proposal is made unofficially to netflix to give Enterprise (this is like ten years after the show was cancelled) a 5th season, the Refit is the poster child and Doug gets Coto to give his verbal blessing on the design.

Of course, this literally has zero chance of occurring as its a pitch to netflix not by CBS, but from former staff. Now lets assume Netflix says your right we not only want a Star Trek (something that was heavily rumored), but we want to continue Enterprise (very unlikely but lets role with it). And Netflix is able to convince CBS that this is what should be done, and Netflix says lets hire the people who helped make the push, like Coto. Then lets hire Drexler not as a CGI artist (what he did on Enterprise), but as the art director. And then you have to assume that all the producers who would have a say (On Enterprise even through the 4th year final say would have been Rick's not Manny). Even with Manny running the writing staff, Berman had final say on literally everything. So you would have to have someone favorable to this design at that level of the production. The literal top dog. All extremely, extremely unlikely at every single level.

Now back to the real world, if Enterprise had managed to continue, and at some point, most likely the very last episode, it was decided to show the NX-01 in an upgraded exterior form, it most likely wouldn't have been Drexler to design, it would go to the on staff illustrator John Eaves. The only aspect Drexler would have done is tweaking any design in turning it into the CGI file, and that's if it landed on his desk at Eden's FX (there were others who did his same job, typically alternating through the weeks). And of course why do I say that it most likely would be for the last episode, why its very, very obvious as a change in the design would mean that you would loose their vast library of shots already create through all other episodes, a rather expensive story point for anything but a couple of shots.

Doug has managed to sell so well and to so many people that "his" design of the refit was destined to be a part of the show, it absolutely never was. And I have gotten so very tired of reading people's comments who think that was what would have occurred eternally within the production if Enterprise had continued.

Of course I also really dislike the idea that the design needs to bridge even closer to NCC-1701. As I think the original design is a very good bridge between the 1st warp ship and NCC-1701. The show was nearly half way between First Contact and TOS, and the design is roughly half the way between. So pushing it even more towards the design in TOS made zero sense to me.

 

[Griffeytrek]

Fascinating details on the backstory that most of us don't know or only know bits and pieces or rumors.

Although it really doesn't settle the arguments about what is or is not cannon in CBS/Paramounts eyes. Because this one is just so freakin weird and outside the box. Yes it's a fan design, by a guy who worked on the show. But there are literally thousands of fan designs out there. Including dozens from actual art and design people associated with the shows. Heck that's what the Ships of the Line calendars are or were. CBS/Paramount has always enjoyed and at times even encouraged fan designs and art. But they have never before actually embraced any examples as an in house commercial product. That's what makes this one so strange, and what leads many to suspect that this design has been more or less penciled into cannon retroactively by the powers that be.

See regardless of its origin, or how or why or when Drexxlers doodled it up and sold people on it, the official licensing and merchandising division has seemingly bought into it. The one that really raises my eyebrows is the Polar Lights kit of the design. That's not a deeply niche product like a gaming miniature or a direct to consumer collectible. That is a mass market retail product that shows up worldwide in places such as Hobby Lobby and Walmart. All under the official Star Trek and Enterprise branding. CBS has absolute veto over each product offering by the licensee, as is normal for these sorts of things. It does not get made or put on the shelf without their explicit review and approval, and without conforming to their carefully planned marketing message and schedule. (The licensee has some freedoms to pick and choose within the boundaries of the license holders needs and desires.)

This thing got approved and made before a large number of popular on screen designs ever hit retail shelves. And that's interesting. That's unusual. We often argue about what is and is not cannon. While many will legitimately point out that cannon is what appears on screen. I think this is only mostly true. Ultimately cannon is what the Powers that be, Those that control the IP say and believe is cannon. And I think the safe assumption is somebody with power over those decisions really really likes this particular ship design. I can't fault them. The design certainly seems to resonate with enough fans for it to be a decent retail product.

 

[Richard Baker]

I have one of those 1/1000 scale Polar Lights NX-Refit kits and I really like the design. JUst as the official NX was a flipped Akira and shoe horned into the retro tech style, the NX-Refit demonstrates an evolutionary step towards the classic Connie. The logic of adding a larger warp core in an additional engineering hull and splicing it into the existing structure is brilliant, no matter who's idea it was. It upgrades the power systems and the deflector dish without loosing the originals which can be used as backups. It does look a bit awkward from certain angles, but then again the NX looked a bit too swoopy and modern for it's role in history IMO.

 

[mswood]

The whole point isn't whether people like or dislike the design, the point is that I keep hearing how this design was going to be part of season 5 if the show wasn't cancelled, and that its an absolute falsehood.

I am actually not that surprised that the design took hold. people need to remember with the show done the ships of the line calendars were really the only place to see new designs from several eras of Trek. Unlike back in the day of the 70's or even the FASA designs we have solid CGI artwork each year, some that gets used with novels that can engage the audience in way that wasn't possible decades earlier.

 

[BillJ]

Although it really doesn't settle the arguments about what is or is not cannon in CBS/Paramounts eyes.

Actually, it does. The refit never appeared on screen, which is what CBS/Paramount has always considered "canon". The refit is fanwank.

Though count me as another person who thinks the refit was unnecessary and ruined the look of the NX-01.

 

[Kor]

As I don't keep up much on anything related to ENT, I was unaware of the NX-01 refit until now.

Yuck.

Kor

 

[mswood]

Now in fairness as much as i think the refit destroy's the lines of the NX-01. The model is really well detailed with only a few shortcomings, one of the very best specials. And makes me want several Hero or often seen ships get done in that scale, especially the ones that were so small to begin with.

 

[jaime]

It's used in the books...
And there's a possibility we may get things like the Titan and the Aventine this way...Maybe even the Oddysey class from Star Trek Online, which are all 'official' continuations until a TV series declares them otherwise.

I am glad they do decent ships like this, though I would really like it if they can send me the blooming defiant I paid for while it was in stock and have not received to this day. Sigh.

 

[Tomalak]

It feels a bit like barrel-scraping when there are ships that appeared on screen which haven't yet been made. That said, I don't have any real problem with it, no one is forced to buy it.

I think the design is quite smart, and it makes sense to me that the new warp 6 engine might be larger than the current one, and therefore need a larger housing. When I first saw the NX-01 I thought it was quite obvious such an upgrade could be made. It looks so flat in profile.

Count me a moderate fan of the NX refit. It makes more sense than the All Good Things Enterprise-D, and is more obviously a refit of the original than the TMP refit was! I don't really have a problem with the "unofficially official" status either. No different from the Daedalus class or the Titan.

 

[137th Gebirg]

I guess I must be one of the few who think the refit NX is a step up. I never liked the blatant rip-off of the Akira to begin with. Thought it was a cop-out. IMO, building on the secondary hull to the NX was an effort to bring it more into the visible lineage and pedigree of the Connies that came after it. I get the impression that that was more of what Doug's intention was for it, and not so much to sell model kits and artwork for book covers and Ships of the Line calendars.

To each, his/her own, I guess.

 

[BillJ]

I never liked the blatant rip-off of the Akira to begin with. Thought it was a cop-out. IMO, building on the secondary hull to the NX was an effort to bring it more into the visible lineage and pedigree of the Connies that came after it.

So the way to fix a blatant ripoff is with another blatant ripoff?

 

[137th Gebirg]

The first rip-off seemed like unimaginative laziness, forcibly pulling a design over 200 years from the future into the past. Even some of the model's greebles and detailing seemed copied and pasted from the Akira's original mesh and texture map. The second rip-off, while, yes, technically a rip-off, employs a module for a ship that is more chronologically associated with the "Enterprise" lineage and makes more sense from a design aesthetic. It doesn't look like as much of a leap.

In the interest of full disclosure, I also admit in-universe bias, as the Akira is one of my all-time favorite designs, and for the producers of Enterprise to create a "new" design obviously based on Akira's lines, directly infers that Akira herself is derived from a 200+-year-old design, when it was originally intended to be a state-of-the-art breakthrough fleet workhorse with the specific mission of defeating the Borg (like the Defiant and Akira's other "classmates" of the 24th century). The Enterprise's design, IMO, cheapened that backstory, and putting the secondary hull on it placed it more in-line as an experiment (hence the proper use of the "NX" moniker) for its immediate 23rd century descendants.

 

[Tomalak]

In the interest of full disclosure, I also admit in-universe bias, as the Akira is one of my all-time favorite designs, and for the producers of Enterprise to create a "new" design obviously based on Akira's lines, directly infers that Akira herself is derived from a 200+-year-old design, when it was originally intended to be a state-of-the-art breakthrough fleet workhorse with the specific mission of defeating the Borg (like the Defiant and Akira's other "classmates" of the 24th century). The Enterprise's design, IMO, cheapened that backstory, and putting the secondary hull on it placed it more in-line as an experiment (hence the proper use of the "NX" moniker) for its immediate 23rd century descendants.

Hang on, don't Akira-class ships have registry numbers making them contemporaries of the Nebula-class, therefore pre-dating the J-25 Borg encounter quite significantly?

Whilst there are certain details which seemed to be slavishly copied from the Akira, there are almost as many in-universe examples of the saucer + two underslung nacelles as there are saucer + two nacelles + engineering hull.

 

[Griffeytrek]

Hang on, don't Akira-class ships have registry numbers making them contemporaries of the Nebula-class, therefore pre-dating the J-25 Borg encounter quite significantly?

It's clear from a number of conflicts and off pattern examples that Registry numbers are not simply chronologically issued, and more likely reflect a pattern of information referring to a ships role, function, class, categorization, etc. Granted we have no idea what this pattern is. The writers have no idea what it is. They just make up numbers as they go.

Here is a real world example of what I am talking about. The world famous Fire Trucks of FDNY (New York City Fire Department). Each truck proudly carries a number, not unlike our Starfleet Registries. But there is a bit more nuance to the numbers than the casual observer would see. To us the trucks are numbered from 1 to 999 (they may actually be past that now). What we don't realize is how those numbers are actually looked at. Numbers 1-9, single digits are reserved for Rescue Trucks and Companies. Double Digits from 10-99 are specific to Ladder Trucks. 3 digits are Pumpers/engines. Digging deeper each truck is assigned to one of the 5 boroughs and will rarely if ever move from that command subdivision. So the first digit will indicate borough. So just by glancing at the number you can tell what the trucks role is supposed to be, where it roughly comes from and which specific truck it is. Starfleet Registries most likely work something like that. Also do not look for absolute patterns. Even in the real world this sort of thing will get tweaked evolved and changed every couple of decades. Where groups sit in the blocks of numbers may move. Ships may change numbers. Ships may be grandfathered in but be doing a role other than there number implies. Whole blocks may be retired or reassigned. etc. I may be wrong, but don't Airplane Tail numbers work similarly?

One of the biggest early on screw ups was locking everything to that "NCC" designation. That was clearly supposed to be a reflection on the US Navy's ship markings and classifications al CVN etc. But they screwed up and never really wandered from the NCC code accept for experimental. The Reliant and Grissom both should have carried different letter codes as well as Registry numbers.

 

[t_smitts]

The first rip-off seemed like unimaginative laziness, forcibly pulling a design over 200 years from the future into the past. Even some of the model's greebles and detailing seemed copied and pasted from the Akira's original mesh and texture map. The second rip-off, while, yes, technically a rip-off, employs a module for a ship that is more chronologically associated with the "Enterprise" lineage and makes more sense from a design aesthetic. It doesn't look like as much of a leap.

In the interest of full disclosure, I also admit in-universe bias, as the Akira is one of my all-time favorite designs, and for the producers of Enterprise to create a "new" design obviously based on Akira's lines, directly infers that Akira herself is derived from a 200+-year-old design, when it was originally intended to be a state-of-the-art breakthrough fleet workhorse with the specific mission of defeating the Borg (like the Defiant and Akira's other "classmates" of the 24th century). The Enterprise's design, IMO, cheapened that backstory, and putting the secondary hull on it placed it more in-line as an experiment (hence the proper use of the "NX" moniker) for its immediate 23rd century descendants.

I don't think you can say the NX-01 "ripped off" the Akira, simply because they had a similar basic shape. Every Enterprise from the 1701 to the "D" had a similar shape, after all, despite being up to a century apart: A saucer, a "neck", a secondary hull, and two nacelles. But each of those individual parts LOOKS different, as is the case with the NX and the Akira (or the Pasteur and the Daedalus class, for that matter).

 

[137th Gebirg]

Heh...there is SO much more than just a passing resemblance between the two. I'm talking about this, and many of the surface details and structural components look patently identical. When you take all of this into account, it's really quite shocking how bad a theft job it really was. Seriously, it's like they used pieces of the Akira mesh to make the NX. It was bloody embarrassing, IMO.

 

[DimesDan]

I like both.

 

[jaime]

One of my problems with enterprise was with the pride the behind the scenes footage at launch had about the Engineering panel being an actual car part. (dashboard or sound system or something) As opposed to the behind the scenes launch footage for Voyager where the pride wasn't in budget saving but in trying to do new things like the new beam in effect etc.

That was my first warning that enterprise was going to be a step back for Trek in bad way. I was sad to be essentially right, based on others reactions at the time too. The akiraprise is just another facet of this lazy approach that seemed to pervade enterprise from its inception.

 

[137th Gebirg]

I like both.

Ironically, as much as I rail against Enterprise and dislike it for being too much like the Akira, I also happen to like it...because it's a lot like the Akira. It is a contradiction, admittedly so, and I'm in constant conflict over it. By itself, it's a very cool design, and if it actually came first, before the introduction of the Akira in First Contact, I would have thought the NX was absolutely superb in its aesthetics, with the Akira being more of an obvious "homage" to the NX. I know it may sound totally hypocritical at a certain level, but there it is.

 

[DimesDan]

I like how they both look, I can't say I've spent much thought on it beyond that.