The Excelsior Bridge Looks So Much Cooler in III Than VI

[Paradise City]

TSFS Bridge looks more sci-fi, more TOS even. .

TUC looks a little more.....plausible, realistic. There's more visible detail in the monitors for example. It's a more convincing control room but the other one has a little more soul.

I'm not opposed to either mind you though.

 

[Kor]

Why do the transwarp factor readings keep jumping so much? It looks like a display on an '80s boombox!

Kor

 

[Doug Otte]

Nitpick: Captain Sulu drinks tea.

This thread reminds me (slightly off-topic): When VI was released, I found an Excelsior teacup and saucer at Macy's. As with any glassware or porcelain I've owned, I long ago broke both pieces...

 

[alensatemybuick1]

The fine china seen in Star Trek VI was based on a Pfaltzgraff design called "Hampton"; they made different versions of cups, saucers and dinner plates circa 1991-1993, including but not limited to the Enterprise-A and Excelsior from that movie. There's even a guy on Ebay who makes replicas of Sulu's cup and saucer using decals, presumably much as was done for the actual movie (the commercial versions were silkscreened I think). No comment on his pricing. Years ago, I put together a service for 4, including each of the Pfaltzgraff 3 piece sets for for the TOS Enterprise, the Enterprise-A, the Enterprise-D and the Excelsior, fleshed out with salad plates and soup bowls from the Hampton line. It helped that there was a Pfaltzgraff outlet in Flemington, NJ not from me back in the day.

Back to topic, the Excelsior Bridge in TSFS may have looked cool when I was 18, but I find it laughable today.

 

[Khan 2.0]

an in-universe explanation could be SFS Excelsior was an ultra advanced experimental ship so had an 'out there' futuristic looking bridge. but Sulus Excelsior mustve had a 'standard' make over making it look like other ships (maybe due to the 'great experiment' having failed maybe partly due to Scotties 'work')

 

[Richard Baker]

The STIII bridge was just built for that one scene and had to look much more advanced that the Enterprise's bridge. Being only a partial set I think the controls were also just a bunch of blinkies since they would be out of focus for the short time they were on the screen.
I do like the design however. it does harken back to the clean sweeping consoles of the TOS-E. If they had made it bi-level and finished up the details I would have loved to have seen it instead of the bridges that followed it.

To save money the next time we saw the Excelsior bridge it was just a redress of the Enterprise one. I suppose the in-universe explanation would be the original had a bunch of specialized equipment for the Trans-warp system and they just yanked out the bridge module and used a standard one when that experiment was declared a lost cause.

 

[Timo]

Or then the Excelsior was an older vessel, recently converted to a propulsion testbed but retaining a TOS-style bridge that basically dated from the 2240s...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Kor]

It's interesting that some viewers see the TSFS version as more advanced and futuristic, but others think it looks cheesy and cheap. Design is in the eye of the beholder.

Kor

 

[Galileo7]

Or then the Excelsior was an older vessel, recently converted to a propulsion testbed but retaining a TOS-style bridge that basically dated from the 2240s...

Timo Saloniemi

Yes, the single turbolift and black console panel surfaces reflect TOS era.
They just needed to add the red trim to all stations.

 

[Kor]

I thought something was off. Now I realize what's wrong with the TSFS version... no railing!

Kor

 

[FormerLurker]

If it had a railing, it would have been along the edges of the command platform (not seen in that illustration), and would have made those stations really cramped.

 

[tharpdevenport]

Don't worry, they have some kind of arm-rest buckles to protect themselves. LOL.

 

[MacLeod]

Don't worry, they have some kind of arm-rest buckles to protect themselves. LOL.

Yep, I'm guessing seat belts was one of those techs lost in either WWIII or the Eugenics war. Along with fuses, unless of course explodium is an element used in console manufactor.

 

[JonnyQuest037]

Put me down as another one who think the TSFS Excelsior bridge looks cheesy. The TUC bridge was used much more extensively in STVI, and consequently they put a lot more time into its design. But then, the TUC design aesthetic is one of my favorites in Trek anyway.

 

[captainkirk]

The TUC bridge looks better, bu there's nothing special about it as it's just a redressed Enterprise bridge. The TSFS one looks cheaper, but it's unique, and that's what's needed for the Excelsior.

 

[Smellmet]

The TUC bridge looks better, bu there's nothing special about it as it's just a redressed Enterprise bridge. The TSFS one looks cheaper, but it's unique, and that's what's needed for the Excelsior.

Yeah I think this sums it up. It needed to look different, more advanced. It's just that time hasn't been kind to it.

 

[tharpdevenport]

It looked different, I'll sort of give you that, but advanced? What was advanced about it?

The glowing lights under the chairs?

The large displays panels for red alert and so forth? Large panels are advanced? In that case, my local Wal-Mart and Publix are really really advanced.

The black terminals with push buttons and what looks like touch buttons? I see those on the Enterprise, too.

Arm rests that act as safety buckled for transwarp? I won't even get into how stupid that was. Even K.I.T.T. had an invisible laser restraint system for Michael. These people get manual arm rests.


I guess I don't see the advances. It's missing the railing, but that's advanced -- missing railing?
It's lit up better. Is that advanced?
It has one turbolift door instead of two. I guess that's advanced -- unless the one lift goes down.

Black leather chairs -- that must be the advanced part.

 

[Mark_Nguyen]

Hey, I *liked* the TSFS chairs..!

But while it served its purpose in TSFS, it's very dated and almost laughable now. Still, seeing it all shiny in the theatres at the time made me want to run home and immediately build the bridge set in Lego. Which I did.

At the time, they DID have the TMP bridge set kicking around, and it was already pressed into dual service as the Grissom's bridge (and also pulled double duty as the Reliant's bridge in the previous movie). Still, they wanted to show that the Excelsior was really the next step forward, so they went all out with the all-touchscreen interface, using CRT tech as they really only could. I like what they did, and if they'd had twice as much budget I'm sure the bridge (and for that matter all the OTHER TSFS sets) would have looked a whole lot better, and would have been lit better as well. Chalk it up to a rookie feature film director playing it safe with lighting and budget choices.

As for the TUC Excelsior, it was also a budget decision to re-use the set, but they made choices to set it apart from the E-A in the same film, aside from ripping out the rear wall and putting a big MSD there. There were no physical controls as the E-A had (even though THOSE were anachronistic as the E-A was all-touchscreen in TFF), and of course they cribbed those forward consoles from TNG storage.

I do think that if they tried to make Excelsior all super-futuristic in TUC compared to our heroes' ship, it could have become too different a visual rather than having her there as "just another ship in the fleet" whose special nature would be lost on the casual viewer. And also, in the following film the E-B evolved this bridge design even further, so that precedent was set as well (and even further, considering how it eventually showed up as the Prometheus and Equinox bridges.

Mark

 

[FormerLurker]

Everyone keeps saying the Excelsior bridge is the redress, but wasn't it the other way around? After all, the Enterprise crew are shown looking at Sulu and company on their viewscreen in what to my knowledge is not an insert, but a projected image, and Excelsior doesn't get the same from their end. That would mean that the Excelsior footage was shot first.

 

[David cgc]

Everyone keeps saying the Excelsior bridge is the redress, but wasn't it the other way around? After all, the Enterprise crew are shown looking at Sulu and company on their viewscreen in what to my knowledge is not an insert, but a projected image, and Excelsior doesn't get the same from their end. That would mean that the Excelsior footage was shot first.

Fair point, though if you want to get in the weeds with it, the set was originally built as the Enterprise bridge in the prior movie.