Star Trek The Motion Picture 45th Anniversary Book Club

[Christopher]

Ale: It always read like we were kind of missing the joke. Part of that is that we don't have the context of knowing when it is "now." I get the impression that 2283 sounds surprisingly recent (if not current) and then McCoy makes it sound like this is the good stuff so it takes even longer (than bathtub gin?). By a couple of hours? Kirk's response of "oh?" is "Sure, Bones, why not?"

Ah, okay, that's sort of the impression I always had, but as a kid (and a lifelong teetotaler since) I was never clear enough on how alcoholic beverages work to be sure. Nice to get support for my impression at last.

If the last two digits had been below 60, I might've thought it was hours and minutes in military time. Although I've seen the occasional science fiction future where they count time decimally, by 100s instead of 60s.

As a fan of the Star Trek Maps and the fan works that followed that dating scheme, that was a GREAT day!

STM was actually a few years off from the now-accepted dating, putting TOS in 2261-63. There's also the strange case of David John Nielsen's U.S.S. Enterprise Heavy Cruiser Evolution Blueprints and Todd Guenther & aridas sofia's Ships of the Star Fleet Volume One, which both put ST:TMP in 2267 (more or less consistent with the STM dates) yet put The Search for Spock in 2287, as strange as that is. How can they be 20 years apart when TWOK was only 15 years after "Space Seed?"

But yes, most of the books at the time and the FASA role-playing game (chicken and egg) followed the Spaceflight Chronology dating. Which drove me nuts. If I follow up this project with a "The Final Reflection" book club I'm sure we'll get into that at length since that's a book that not only relies on that date scheme but the SFC specifically.

The main issue with the SFC dating is that "Metamorphosis" established that Cochrane was lost 150 years earlier at the age of 87, so if the episode had taken place in 2208 per the SFC, Cochrane would've had to be born in 1971. Which, okay, is not incompatible with "Space Seed" saying that sleeper ships were supplanted by faster drives in 2018, but it still seems unlikely that Gene Coon in 1967 intended him to be so close in time.

Also, "Where No Man" put the Valiant expedition 200 years before TOS, so that would've been absurdly early in the timeline, something like 2005 by the SFC scheme.

GR manages to analogize seeing the Enterprise to a nude scene. The man was a wizard.

There's a similar bit in the opening paragraphs of David Gerrold's "Encounter at Farpoint" novelization, describing Picard's reaction to seeing the Enterprise-D the first few times. It says that on his third viewing of the ship, "he saw it from a different angle" and recognized "the designer's private joke" that made the ship look "more feminine than most." I spent years wondering what Gerrold meant by that; my best guess is that he was saying that if you rotate the Galaxy-class deflector dish 90 degrees, it looks a bit like a vagina. If that's what he meant, it makes Roddenberry's classical allusion to Aphrodite tame by comparison. (My initial, tamer interpretation was that the dish looks a bit like a pair of feminine lips, but the "different angle" bit doesn't make sense that way.)

I have to wonder what was the tremendous advantage of launching eight hours early? What were they going to do that they were now not able to do?

They didn't know what they'd find, but the further it was from Earth when they intercepted it, the more time they'd have to figure something out.

How much time was lost after launch that might have been prevented in those eight hours? Or would everything that would go wrong after launch also have gone wrong if they had launched as scheduled so moving the launch up actually was critical?

Still, you're right about this part -- haste made waste, and they probably lost more time by rushing the launch and not getting everything sorted out. Still, the ship wasn't meant to launch for weeks yet, probably, so it could be that the systems would still have been unstable if they'd launched a few hours later.

The bigger improbability is that there's only one unready starship available to defend the heartworld of the entire Federation. True, the movie established that Earth had a defense grid that V'Ger was only able to bring down by stealing the access codes from the Enterprise computer, but there should've been an entire fleet of capital ships defending Sol System and the other heartworlds. The trope of the Enterprise being the only ship available to address a threat makes sense when it's out on the frontier, far removed from the Federation, but it's complete nonsense when the threat is to Earth itself.

 

[Airin]

Ale: It always read like we were kind of missing the joke. Part of that is that we don't have the context of knowing when it is "now." I get the impression that 2283 sounds surprisingly recent (if not current) and then McCoy makes it sound like this is the good stuff so it takes even longer (than bathtub gin?). By a couple of hours? Kirk's response of "oh?" is "Sure, Bones, why not?"

The thing is, why would you put a year label in a bottle if aging isn't relevant for the liquor? That's why wine has it, while beer doesn't. Romulan ale, therefore, works more like wine than beer. It also matches TNG's production info that put STIV in 2286 (then STII would be around 2285, and "Space Seed" would be in 2270). Memory Alpha even has an article about "2283" and that's the explanation they give for the ale; it's just the simplest explanation.
The discrepancies in chronology came when they moved the FYM back during Voyager. Then, the 15 years since Kirk met Khan don't make sense anymore, unless you consider that "Space Seed" happened at the very end of the mission, which is plain weird.

 

[Christopher]

The thing is, why would you put a year label in a bottle if aging isn't relevant for the liquor? That's why wine has it, while beer doesn't. Romulan ale, therefore, works more like wine than beer.

Yeah, but then what would the writers have intended McCoy's line to mean? It makes more sense in the context Bill proposed, as a joke about its recentness as a low class of hooch. Maybe Bennett, Sowards, or whoever wrote that line cared more about the joke than the technical accuracy of how spirits are labeled.

It also matches TNG's production info that put STIV in 2286 (then STII would be around 2285, and "Space Seed" would be in 2270).

But none of that would've been known in 1982 when TWOK was made. Maybe it was part of what "The Neutral Zone"'s writers were influenced by when they chose the 2364 date for the episode (contradicting "Farpoint"'s reference to Data being "Class of '78" and proving that TNG's own creators did not plan it that way, since "The Neutral Zone" was shot from an unrevised first-draft script during a writers' strike), but at the time TWOK was written, the time frame hadn't been narrowed down any more specifically than somewhere between Kirk's "about 200 years" in "Space Seed" and Will Decker's "over 300 years" in TMP. So saying it "matches" something that didn't exist yet is getting the cause and effect backward. TNG matched it, intentionally or accidentally.

Memory Alpha even has an article about "2283" and that's the explanation they give for the ale; it's just the simplest explanation.

Which is a separate question from what the creators may have intended at the time, or how we fans tried to interpret its meaning at the time. As I already said, the more popular fan chronology scheme at the time would've put TWOK in the 2210s, which was irreconcilable with 2283 being a Gregorian date, so we came up with other possible explanations.

Also, no Trek production prior to TWOK had ever shown the characters using a Gregorian date in reference to their own present day; they used stardates instead. These days it's become a routine practice in Trek shows and movies for Gregorian dates to be used in the future, but at the time it was unprecedented, and if anything it seemed unimaginative to assume that people in the future would still use our present-day Western calendar. So we didn't take it for granted the way today's audiences do.

The discrepancies in chronology came when they moved the FYM back during Voyager.

No, they moved it forward. The Star Trek Chronology claimed the 5YM ended in 2269, immediately after TOS season 3, because the Okudas were trying to respect the "no TAS" policy that Roddenberry had reputedly favored (although I suspect it was actually just Richard Arnold claiming to be doing Roddenberry's will). VGR: "Q2" bumped it forward to 2270, allowing TAS to occur after all (though that was probably by accident rather than design).

As I mentioned, the leading fan chronologies prior to the STC put TOS either in 2207-10 (Spaceflight Chronology), 2261-3 (ST Maps), or the 2266-9 dates that the STC adopted. I can't think of any TOS dating scheme setting it later than that, so I don't see how "Q2"'s 2270 end date would constitute moving it back from anything.

Then, the 15 years since Kirk met Khan don't make sense anymore, unless you consider that "Space Seed" happened at the very end of the mission, which is plain weird.

I once asked Mike Okuda why he put TWOK 18 years after "Space Seed" in the STC instead of 15, but he couldn't remember his reasoning. My best guess is that he wanted TFF to be over 20 years after "Balance of Terror" to reconcile Nimbus III's age with the lack of Romulan contact prior to BoT, but it seems it would've been simpler to interpret that "20 years" as rounding up, or a measurement in a different planet's years that are shorter than Earth's. (He also put TWOK/TSFS in 2285, TVH in '86, and TFF in '87, even though there are explicitly only 3 months between TSFS & TVH, and it's hard to justify a year between TVH & TFF; even Harve Bennett's asserted 6-month interval seems too long.)

 

[Tallguy]

The thing is, why would you put a year label in a bottle if aging isn't relevant for the liquor?

Because you care about this more than Nicholas Meyer did.

There's also the strange case of David John Nielsen's U.S.S. Enterprise Heavy Cruiser Evolution Blueprints and Todd Guenther & aridas sofia's Ships of the Star Fleet Volume One, which both put ST:TMP in 2267 (more or less consistent with the STM dates) yet put The Search for Spock in 2287, as strange as that is. How can they be 20 years apart when TWOK was only 15 years after "Space Seed?"

I'm not saying post TNG that they exactly adapted the fan dates either.

David and aridas are the same fine fellow. Not to speak for aridas and Todd, but given their love/hate reaction to any movies post TMP (only without the love part) I'm pretty sure they took the 15 year gap between Space Seed and TWOK to be just as binding as "The Enterprise is 20 years old" from TSFS. So aridas gave Kirk two more five-year missions after TMP and also threw in a captaincy from The God Thing's Gregory Westlake (if I remember the name) before transferring the Enterprise to training command.

EDIT: Christopher posted while I was writing so-- All fine points!

 

[Avro Arrow]

The bigger improbability is that there's only one unready starship available to defend the heartworld of the entire Federation. True, the movie established that Earth had a defense grid that V'Ger was only able to bring down by stealing the access codes from the Enterprise computer, but there should've been an entire fleet of capital ships defending Sol System and the other heartworlds. The trope of the Enterprise being the only ship available to address a threat makes sense when it's out on the frontier, far removed from the Federation, but it's complete nonsense when the threat is to Earth itself.

Kirk: “Most of the fleet is in the Laurentian system right now.”
McCoy: “What do we keep doing over there, anyway?!”

A thought occurs to me, that hadn’t before. I don’t know exactly what “Chief of Starfleet Operations” does, but it sounds like it could be a position that’s responsible for fleet deployment. Is the lack of other ships in a position to defend Earth Kirk’s fault? The next time we see him, he no longer seems to be in a position of the same amount of authority (I’ve read somewhere that he’s commandant of the Academy, although I don’t think that’s confirmed in the movie itself), and the next time there’s a threat against Earth in TVH, there are ships at Earth, they’re just ineffective.

(Even more insidious is if Kirk deliberately ordered the other ships away after learning of the threat to create a situation where he could take command of Enterprise, but that’s getting into villain territory and would be wildly out of character for Kirk.)

@Scrooge McTall , does the novel give any clarification as to what the role of Chief of Starfleet Operations entails?

 

[Christopher]

A thought occurs to me, that hadn’t before. I don’t know exactly what “Chief of Starfleet Operations” does, but it sounds like it could be a position that’s responsible for fleet deployment.

I asked some knowledgeable people about that back when I was researching Ex Machina. They suggested that if it was like the Chief of Naval Operations in the US, he would be answerable to the Secretary of the Navy (or in this case probably to the Starfleet Commander, like Nogura or Morrow) for command & control, allocation of assets, and efficient operations. He probably would be responsible for fleet deployment, assigning crews and resources, overseeing refits, etc. (which makes it odd that he seemed so unfamiliar with the Enterprise refit). Dayton Ward suggested that he would be one of several parallel department chiefs, such as Operations, Personnel, Intelligence, etc., each overseeing the duties under their particular purviews and coordinating with each other to get things done.

 

[Airin]

Yeah, but then what would the writers have intended McCoy's line to mean? It makes more sense in the context Bill proposed, as a joke about its recentness as a low class of hooch.

What the writers intended is a mystery to all save them. But all this about it being a joke sounds very convoluted. It's not implied in any way. Kirk is being sarcastic because he's in a bad mood and generally annoying (his sarcastic comment about McCoy bringing him "Klingon aphrodisiac", and McCoy's comment that he's taking his birthday as a funeral). Besides, McCoy doesn't strike me as someone who would drink low class hooch, precisely...

So saying it "matches" something that didn't exist yet is getting the cause and effect backward. TNG matched it, intentionally or accidentally.

I already said in a previous post that TNG matching it was possibly accidental. And I'm very aware that TNG came after TWOK. But if it matches, it matches.

Also, no Trek production prior to TWOK had ever shown the characters using a Gregorian date in reference to their own present day; they used stardates instead.

TWOK changed a lot of things, from aesthetics to concept. First of all, because the producing/writing team was different and Roddenberry was barely involved (and unhappy about many changes). But Meyer mentioned again the late 23rd century in STIV, so he was certainly not opposed to pinning down the story with Gregorian dates.

As I mentioned, the leading fan chronologies prior to the STC put TOS either in 2207-10 (Spaceflight Chronology), 2261-3 (ST Maps), or the 2266-9 dates that the STC adopted. I can't think of any TOS dating scheme setting it later than that, so I don't see how "Q2"'s 2270 end date would constitute moving it back from anything.

Voyager moved it backwards in relation to the movies and TNG. I'm not talking about fan chronologies. As per the movies and TNG, TWOK happened around 2285, and Space Seed around 2270. Voyager moved it backwards as it established 2270 as the end of the mission.
As for the chronology in TOS the series, you could turn crazy trying to make sense out of it. Just in season one, you have episodes setting it 200 years in the future (since the 60's), and then "The Squire of Gothos", where the Napoleonic stuff of Trelane is said to be from Earth 900 years in the past.

 

[Christopher]

But Meyer mentioned again the late 23rd century in STIV, so he was certainly not opposed to pinning down the story with Gregorian dates.

But that was Kirk telling Gillian Taylor where he was from, and he explicitly said "I am from what, on your calendar, would be the late twenty-third century." Which is overt confirmation that Kirk's own calendar was supposed to be different. TNG: "The Neutral Zone" did the same thing -- Data told Ralph Offenhouse it was 2364 "by your calendar." It was only in later years that writers started getting lazy and assuming that the Trek characters used the Gregorian calendar for their own purposes.

Voyager moved it backwards in relation to the movies and TNG.

No, it did not. As I said, the Star Trek Chronology, originally published in 1993, had already put TOS in 2266-69 while also inexplicably putting TWOK in 2285. VGR: "Q2," released 8 years later, was just following that precedent while allowing a bit more room between season 3 and the end of the 5YM.

 

[David cgc]

I just wanted to say that I'm not sure where it is (or if it's even in my edition), but I'm pretty sure there was an article in a Best of Trek collection talking about dating Star Trek from the 1980s where they also couldn't figure out if "2283" was supposed to be a very long time ago, a very short time ago, or possibly some time in the future due to a mistranslated Romulan calendar. So it's certainly never been clear what the intent of that line was beyond banter for banter's sake.

Oh, and, um, TMP. Uh... Kirk muttering about Aphrodite and Scotty overhearing him.

 

[Tallguy]

Oh, and, um, TMP. Uh... Kirk muttering about Aphrodite and Scotty overhearing him.

Hey! What do you mean talking about TMP in a TMP thread?

 

[Christopher]

I just wanted to say that I'm not sure where it is (or if it's even in my edition), but I'm pretty sure there was an article in a Best of Trek collection talking about dating Star Trek from the 1980s where they also couldn't figure out if "2283" was supposed to be a very long time ago, a very short time ago, or possibly some time in the future due to a mistranslated Romulan calendar. So it's certainly never been clear what the intent of that line was beyond banter for banter's sake.

I remember a Best of Trek chronology article that was my main source for the SFC dating scheme (since I confess, to this day I've never owned a copy of the SFC). I doubt it was the same article, though, since I think it was from a pre-TWOK edition.

 

[Tallguy]

Chapter Seven - Oops.

Our first "deleted scene" that was restored for both the Special Longer Version and ultimately the Director's Edition.

Uhura thinks Kirk looks ready to TAKE the Enterprise, in the biblical sense. Ahhh, Gene. (Also she's "not unacquainted with that look". Not from Kirk, just men in general.)

You do wonder about the lone crewman who thinks maybe Decker is getting a raw deal. We don't know who has been on board during the refit, who is staying, what kind of crew Decker was building professional relationships with while he was captain. It's clearer in the book (from the scene with Ciani) that Kirk's crew is being put back in place. Who are they replacing? (I know in @Christopher's book Ex Machina that there is more pushback about McCoy.)

Heh. Did anyone other than Nogura think that Kirk being promoted was a good idea?

Gene has a different idea of where the intermix chamber goes than Probert did. (Only a few decks up, rather than all the way to the impulse engine.) As we know from Star Trek V, counting decks is hard. He also describes it like something that has always been there. Unless when Scott thinks that he "had long ago learned how to ignore" the chamber's "unearthly appearance" he means in the last three years. Not a big deal, certainly, but another indication that GR doesn't necessarily expect that the Enterprise on TV looked like it did "in real life".

45 years later and I just now started to wonder: Why is Decker working on the transporter? I know, hands on, can do fellow. He can actually solve a problem faster than Scott. (Kinda.) He can work alongside the greatest engineer in the Federation and hold his own. But really, this is the management equivalent of a symphony and conductor is off playing the oboe. Who is managing this now even more insane time table?

Then we have the transporter accident. Funny that the book manages to both be explicit that Kirk makes a mistake - a control has been moved - and yet Kirk seems more comforting when he tells Rand "it wasn't your fault". In the film Kirk explicitly says "Give it to me" and takes over. In the book both Rand and the assistant move over when Kirk and Scott appear. Scott even defers to Kirk. Also, Rand is blaming herself.

Of course the book also doesn't have the look of total scorn that Grace Lee Whitney gave Shatner when he said it.

The book also makes the scene mostly about Lori Ciani. This is the character we know, the one who Kirk has a relationship and a conflict with. Kirk says he will contact her parents when time permits. Sonak is mentioned, of course. But in the film we don't know who either of these people are until Kirk says "Commander Sonak's can be reached through the Vulcan embassy" to explicitly tell the audience "Hey, that Vulcan science officer you met a few minutes ago isn't around anymore!"

I have conflicting feelings about this scene. I know it's meant to tell us that the Enterprise herself may be unreliable. That Scott and Decker's concerns for moving too fast are reasonable if not justified. But it also tries to do double duty in giving us the same doubts about Kirk. It Kirk the problem or the ship?

Again, I've lived with this book for as long as I have the film. I wonder if the film gives any indication that Kirk isn't up to task? So maybe it's only here that it does double duty. Maybe the film only makes us wonder about the ship?

 

[TheUsualSuspect]

Just a quick comment about dates and calendars . . .

I know some of this has been mentioned, but it might be useful to pay more attention to the fact that there are multiple dating systems and calendars in use across the Federation. I think Americans (and possibly westerners in general) tend to forget that there's more than one calendar, and that some people are likely pretty used to moving from one to another. I'm thinking of Chinese folks who live in or have strong connections to western societies as an example. Probably Muslims and Jews as well, both of whom have calendars based on their religions.

The easiest one here is the Romulan ale date. Despite the fact that it's close to the western Earth calendar date, perhaps its a date from a Romulan calendar. If Kirk and McCoy are familiar with that calendar, perhaps because of their fondness for Romulan alcohol, they might each recognize the date. That allows for either interpretation - the brew is old and therefore meant for a special occasion, or it's cheap hooch and McCoy is pulling a fast one on Kirk. We just have no way of knowing which it is.

Going back to the TMP novelization, there's some internal evidence in support of this. As was already noted, Kirk (and, later, Decker) suggests it's been two and a half years since the five-year mission ended while Spock gives a more precise date of 2.8 years that he's been working towards Kohlinar. Perhaps that date is a Vulcan one, not from an Earth calendar. That would make sense because it is from Spock's own recollection of the event, and he had been living on Vulcan, immersed in Vulcan disciplines, for the period in question. Christopher's scientific look at the likely length of a Vulcan year makes that seem unlikely, but perhaps the Vulcan year being referenced is based on something other than a solar year. I'm not sure what that might be, but here on Earth people have created calendars based on the lunar cycle, and possibly other measures of time as well. (ETA: I just saw that in Chapter 7 Uhura's thoughts refer to Kirk as having been in his job for three years, so maybe the time period is closer to three years [and therefore Spock might be referring to the Earth calendar] after all.)

I do think it might have been interesting if the writers had not eventually pegged the stardate system so closely to the Gregorian calendar. In a Federation of hundreds of worlds, why should the standard military/exploratory calendar be based on the calendar of a specific planet in the first place? Obviously, it has to ultimately be based on some standard measurement of time, but does that have to be a measurement tied to a specific planet?

 

[Tallguy]

Perhaps that date is a Vulcan one, not from an Earth calendar.

All good points, but the footnote specifically states that "the past nine Vulcan seasons" is "
In Earth time, 2.8 years".

While there is certainly a way to enrich an environment with non-Terran calendars and measurements of time there are also times when it doesn't make any sense to offer a time scale that the audience is not intimately familiar with. Going back to Yesteryear, Fontana threw in a specific Vulcan date and year while still using what the audience would (and arguably should) interpret as conventional Earth years.

The date on the Romulan Ale bottle? Of all of the dates that I may or may not attach significance to that will never be one of them.

I did give this some thought this morning when I was thinking of what years I'm used to thinking of TOS in now vs. what dates I would have used in the 80's when I was reading the Federation Reference Series, Starship Design, Ships of the Star Fleet, etc. I don't care so much about the dates themselves (outside of a very broad "this is late 23rd century") as much as I care about the differences. So if I take TWOK as a valid statement that it is "15 years" between Space Seed and TWOK or ignore it and try to figure out what "The Enterprise is 20 years old" means in The Search for Spock. (20 years since it became a "totally new Enterprise"?) Whether TOS is in 2266 or 2258 doesn't make THAT much difference to me.

As long as we all understand that it was ~2.8 Earth Years between the end of the Five Year Mission and Star Trek: The Motion Picture, as The Great Bird hath writ. (And obviously this includes TAS. )

 

[Christopher]

I know some of this has been mentioned, but it might be useful to pay more attention to the fact that there are multiple dating systems and calendars in use across the Federation. I think Americans (and possibly westerners in general) tend to forget that there's more than one calendar, and that some people are likely pretty used to moving from one to another. I'm thinking of Chinese folks who live in or have strong connections to western societies as an example. Probably Muslims and Jews as well, both of whom have calendars based on their religions.

Exactly. The Gregorian calendar isn't even universal on Earth, so it wouldn't necessarily be the default calendar in a future interspecies federation. That was part of why stardates were invented, because the makers of TOS knew that different planets would have different year lengths and an interstellar civilization would probably invent a calendar that wasn't dependent on any one planet. Which is why it bugged me when later creators just assumed they would. (Although the worst example is the Kelvin "stardates" just being Gregorian dates written in a weird way -- where does the "star" part come in, exactly?)

Going back to the TMP novelization, there's some internal evidence in support of this. As was already noted, Kirk (and, later, Decker) suggests it's been two and a half years since the five-year mission ended while Spock gives a more precise date of 2.8 years that he's been working towards Kohlinar. Perhaps that date is a Vulcan one, not from an Earth calendar.

Or the imprecise humans might just be giving a rough estimate of the interval.

By the way, the "2.8 years" thing is one of the numerous things that I always assumed was a canonical part of the film because I read the novelization first and often.

Christopher's scientific look at the likely length of a Vulcan year makes that seem unlikely, but perhaps the Vulcan year being referenced is based on something other than a solar year. I'm not sure what that might be, but here on Earth people have created calendars based on the lunar cycle, and possibly other measures of time as well.

As I mentioned in my DTI Calendar Notes on my blog, the fan-made Vulcan calendar I and other novelists used as a reference gives a year length that's 1.5 times what the year length would actually be at the indicated orbital distance from 40 Eridani A. Which raises an interesting question of why a calendar would base its "years" on one and a half revolutions instead of one.

While there is certainly a way to enrich an environment with non-Terran calendars and measurements of time there are also times when it doesn't make any sense to offer a time scale that the audience is not intimately familiar with. Going back to Yesteryear, Fontana threw in a specific Vulcan date and year while still using what the audience would (and arguably should) interpret as conventional Earth years.

I dunno -- all we needed to know in "Yesteryear" was that Spock went back to when he was seven years old. We didn't need to know how long ago that was.

The date on the Romulan Ale bottle? Of all of the dates that I may or may not attach significance to that will never be one of them.

Sure, it's trivial, but back when many of us believed the movie took place in the 2210s, a 2283 date was a mystery we were curious about, so we came up with possible explanations. Something doesn't have to be a big deal to be a subject of curiosity.

As long as we all understand that it was ~2.8 Earth Years between the end of the Five Year Mission and Star Trek: The Motion Picture, as The Great Bird hath writ. (And obviously this includes TAS. )

It's interesting to note that Alan Dean Foster's outline for "In Thy Image," the Phase II pilot script that evolved into TMP, was dated July 31, 1977, which happens to be exactly 2.8 years after the debut of "The Counter-Clock Incident," the final episode of TAS. Probably a coincidence, though.

 

[drt]

The thing is, why would you put a year label in a bottle if aging isn't relevant for the liquor? That's why wine has it, while beer doesn't. Romulan ale, therefore, works more like wine than beer.

Not necessarily, craft beer is often dated because it spoils (macrobrews are pasteurized, which is why they usually aren't dated).

On that note, presumably Romulan ale contains some other intoxicant, since Spock says Vulcans are "spared the dubious benefits of alcohol", so how the dating compares with how human alcoholic beverages are brewed and fermented is probably moot.

My two cents, when I first saw TWOK in 1982, not knowing really if the date was supposed to be a stardate or a calendar (human, Romulan, whatever...) date, I thought from the way the scene was acted that Kirk was skeptical that it was good, the way someone would if you brought a bottle of cheap stuff.

 

[Christopher]

On that note, presumably Romulan ale contains some other intoxicant, since Spock says Vulcans are "spared the dubious benefits of alcohol", so how the dating compares with how human alcoholic beverages are brewed and fermented is probably moot.

Spock claimed as much in "The Conscience of the King," but DS9 established the existence of Vulcan port and VGR established Vulcan brandy. Also, Romulans separated from Vulcans 1900 years before TOS, plenty of time to develop new customs.

Really, I find it hard to believe that there would have been no alcohol on Vulcan, since the fermentation of sugars is a natural process, and alcohol was important to early civilization because its germ-killing properties made it safer to drink (in some ways) than water. Perhaps what Spock meant is that Vulcans aren't affected by alcohol the same way humans are. There are some animals that are less susceptible to intoxication due to genetic mutations, or because they're fruit eaters who'd need to evolve resistance to alcohol in fermented fruit. So perhaps Vulcans do have alcohol but don't get drunk. (Have we ever seen a drunk Vulcan or Romulan?)

 

[drt]

Perhaps what Spock meant is that Vulcans aren't affected by alcohol the same way humans are. There are some animals that are less susceptible to intoxication due to genetic mutations, or because they're fruit eaters who'd need to evolve resistance to alcohol in fermented fruit. So perhaps Vulcans do have alcohol but don't get drunk. (Have we ever seen a drunk Vulcan or Romulan?)

That's what I was getting at, they undoubtedly have alcoholic beverages, but it isn't intoxicating to them. From what i remember Romulan ale seemed like it was intoxicating, so maybe as part of its fermentation process some other compound is added or produced that does have "dubious effects" on Vulcanoids.

 

[Airin]

Or maybe Spock's just being Spock when he says that, and he's exaggerating the truth (because Vulcans don't lie, ever). Just as when he claims to be in perfect control of his emotions, and then... not so much.

 

[Tallguy]

Chapter Eight - Aftermath and Briefing
"Kirk was aware that he needed McCoy." So when does he put things in motion to coerce McCoy on board?

Kirk is grieving over Lori. We get a tiny indication that Kirk is still thinking of Spock.

Sonak was the critical loss. He was the second best science officer in the Fleet. No, the best on active duty.

Now that the transporters are working (hopefully) Kirk gives the order:

“I need a working transporter, Engineer! Total checkout and fail-safe back-up of any questionable part. Full safety trials before each beam-up. Kirk, out.”

Honestly, who decided to start using the transporters mere seconds after Decker had them on line? Why were no tests run at that point? I get it: the transporters were going to break and kill people to show us that the ship is new and space is still scary. But the sequence of events is kind of compressed.

Kirk is setting up a meeting with the entire crew.

He could not recall that any starship captain had ever assembled a full crew as he planned to do. There would not have been adequate space for it in earlier design vessels, anyway. And there was usually no need for it—a starship’s “nerve system” of computer-regulated scanners and viewers permitted instant contact with anyone at any time.

Wouldn't the shuttle deck have been large enough? But otherwise, GR predicts teleconferencing! (Yes, I'm sure someone else wrote about the same thing before this.)

Thirty-two hours until the planned intercept with the Intruder. The film also says that the Intruder is fifty-two hours away from Earth at this point.

Kirk emphasizes the importance of the social areas of the ship to the daily function of the mission, something that the various writer's guides may have mentioned but the closest we have gotten (until SNW) was Ten Forward. He also notes that other people not familiar with space exploration might consider it a trivial extravagance.

Kirk is even getting tired of watching the Klingons.

While watching the Intruder take out Epsilon Nine:

It was no recording they were seeing—this was happening now and it was frighteningly real.

Do we ever have time delayed communications in Star Trek ever again? This kind of instantaneous comms from Earth to the Federation border would have been handy in Balance of Terror.

EDIT: As with the film I now wonder: Why is the First Officer of the ship not at this briefing?