The fall... I don't get it...

[OpenMaw]

It would not have been that hard to fix this, honestly. Just a tweak or two to the dialogue and a slightly different VFX shot.


Enterprise was shown to be at full stop and then suddenly plunges towards the Earth which would be about four days away at the distance they're at. The Enterprise had such severe damage that gravity is failing, the very last thing to go when the ship is being blown to pieces. She clearly didn't have any thrust behind her one moment, and then the next a lot of force was pulling on her...

So, here's how I would have fixed the issue. It's a very simple tweak. Enterprise would still have a little impulse power left. Not enough to escape Vegeance's firepower. When Spock said they can't flee i'd just have him say instead "We have no weapons and only minimal impulse power, not enough to escape." When Spock does his trickery on Khan, he has Sulu engage impulse engines to get away from the blast zone. The ship just isn't fast enough and the explosion ends up pushing on the ships stern, plunging it into the atmosphere. We'd see the shock wave literally smack the Enterprise into it's descent.

Simple.

 

[Pauln6]

It would not have been that hard to fix this, honestly. Just a tweak or two to the dialogue and a slightly different VFX shot.

So, here's how I would have fixed the issue. It's a very simple tweak. Enterprise would still have a little impulse power left. Not enough to escape Vegeance's firepower. When Spock said they can't flee i'd just have him say instead "We have no weapons and only minimal impulse power, not enough to escape." When Spock does his trickery on Khan, he has Sulu engage impulse engines to get away from the blast zone. The ship just isn't fast enough and the explosion ends up pushing on the ships stern, plunging it into the atmosphere. We'd see the shock wave literally smack the Enterprise into it's descent.

Simple.

Yes I understand the writers wanting to make the movie exciting and avoiding technobabble but I also think they should put some effort into making any real world science they include to be accurate. I don't view elementary physics as technobabble! There are thousands of scientists who are fans of the franchise any one of whom might kill to consult on these films. Take a leaf out of Stargate's book and spend some of your budget on people to make what's on screen scientifically credible instead of just, 'Whoa dude, that was freakin' awesome!"

 

[Belz...]

Even when they are aware of basic laws of physics they'll often ignore it to do the cool thing instead.

Which is not necessarily a bad thing: given the choice, would you prefer a boring movie that's scientifically accurate, or one that's tons of fun to watch and ignores most of that ?

 

[MacLeod]

It would not have been that hard to fix this, honestly. Just a tweak or two to the dialogue and a slightly different VFX shot.


Enterprise was shown to be at full stop and then suddenly plunges towards the Earth which would be about four days away at the distance they're at. The Enterprise had such severe damage that gravity is failing, the very last thing to go when the ship is being blown to pieces. She clearly didn't have any thrust behind her one moment, and then the next a lot of force was pulling on her...

So, here's how I would have fixed the issue. It's a very simple tweak. Enterprise would still have a little impulse power left. Not enough to escape Vegeance's firepower. When Spock said they can't flee i'd just have him say instead "We have no weapons and only minimal impulse power, not enough to escape." When Spock does his trickery on Khan, he has Sulu engage impulse engines to get away from the blast zone. The ship just isn't fast enough and the explosion ends up pushing on the ships stern, plunging it into the atmosphere. We'd see the shock wave literally smack the Enterprise into it's descent.

Simple.

Did we actually have dialouge, stating they were at a full stop?

Just because something is shown to be apperantly stationary, doesn't mean in fact it is stationary. If the point of view and all objects within view are moving at the same realtive speed, they would appear to be stationary.

 

[Maurice]

...We'd see the shock wave literally smack the Enterprise into it's descent.

Simple.

Only if you ignore the fact that there'd be no shock wave in those circumstances. That's replacing bad science with more bad science.

 

[OpenMaw]

Just because something is shown to be apperantly stationary, doesn't mean in fact it is stationary. If the point of view and all objects within view are moving at the same realtive speed, they would appear to be stationary.

That's rather silly, considering film is a visual medium.

The vengeance is shown to maneuver right up until her weapons go off line, at which point she's a sitting duck. The Enterprise does not move at all from the initial position it came to a stop at. Except expressly where Sulu uses thrusters to maneuver the ship slightly.


Not to mention we're not talking about a small bit of KPH here to make all the difference. It won't. The trip would still take a long time to get to Earth. She was right there at the moon, the explosion happens, power fails, they plummet to Earth really fast. We see where Enterprise is when the power goes down. Right where she was before. Near the moon.

Only if you ignore the fact that there'd be no shock wave in those circumstances. That's replacing bad science with more bad science.

I'm not ignoring anything. I'm being consistant with what we've seen in the fictional realms of Star Trek. If it's science that's understood, you at least try to play ball, even loosely. If it's a fantastical element, there is room to maneuver. We've seen what M/AM detonations look like in Star Trek pretty consistently, and they always produce some kind of intense shock wave that can be felt by nearby objects. "Contagion" and "Generations" are two immediate examples of what happens when a ship is near a matter/antimatter explosion. If you don't have shields, you get thrown around. Even if you have shields, you feel the effect of the blast.

 

[Commishsleer]

It would not have been that hard to fix this, honestly. Just a tweak or two to the dialogue and a slightly different VFX shot.


Enterprise was shown to be at full stop and then suddenly plunges towards the Earth which would be about four days away at the distance they're at. The Enterprise had such severe damage that gravity is failing, the very last thing to go when the ship is being blown to pieces. She clearly didn't have any thrust behind her one moment, and then the next a lot of force was pulling on her...

So, here's how I would have fixed the issue. It's a very simple tweak. Enterprise would still have a little impulse power left. Not enough to escape Vegeance's firepower. When Spock said they can't flee i'd just have him say instead "We have no weapons and only minimal impulse power, not enough to escape." When Spock does his trickery on Khan, he has Sulu engage impulse engines to get away from the blast zone. The ship just isn't fast enough and the explosion ends up pushing on the ships stern, plunging it into the atmosphere. We'd see the shock wave literally smack the Enterprise into it's descent.

Simple.

Did we actually have dialouge, stating they were at a full stop?

Just because something is shown to be apperantly stationary, doesn't mean in fact it is stationary. If the point of view and all objects within view are moving at the same realtive speed, they would appear to be stationary.

I had no problem with the fall.
The Vengeance explosions/attack could have imparted motion to The Enterprise whether she was stopped or already had motion.
OK they did say the ship was caught in the Earth's gravity well. Maybe they meant we are caught in Earth's gravity well because we are moving closer to the Earth and the helm isn't responding so I can't put on the brakes. Exactly how close was the Enterprise to the moon anyway. I think it was an optical illusion. We saw clouds around the Enterprise. The Enterprise could have been closer to the Earth, the Enterprise could have misfunctioned with all the explosions and headed towards the Earth herself or just the shockwave could have sent her into Earth's atmosphere fast. There is no need for blah blah explanation.

I don't think Spock needs to explain every little detail. He knows what the Helmsman means. No power - not enough power effectively means the same thing.

One thing though (and this demonstrates why I'm not a 'true' fan) why does impulse go offline/online when the Warp core goes offline/online?
That happened in 'Naked Time' too.

 

[OpenMaw]

One thing though (and this demonstrates why I'm not a 'true' fan) why does impulse go offline/online when the Warp core goes offline/online?
That happened in 'Naked Time' too.

There was quite a bit of damage done to the ship, it's entirely possible that the primary source of power for the impulse engine was damaged, so it would need to rely on the warp reactor for power.

 

[Belz...]

Yeah, after the second attack, at least, the impulse decks seemed destroyed.

 

[The Wormhole]

Yes I understand the writers wanting to make the movie exciting and avoiding technobabble but I also think they should put some effort into making any real world science they include to be accurate. I don't view elementary physics as technobabble! There are thousands of scientists who are fans of the franchise any one of whom might kill to consult on these films. Take a leaf out of Stargate's book and spend some of your budget on people to make what's on screen scientifically credible instead of just, 'Whoa dude, that was freakin' awesome!"

So the story goes, the writers do try to be scientifically accurate, it's Abrams who overrules them and decides to stick with "It's awesome, that's all that matters."

 

[Belz...]

He must be doing something right, then.

 

[JarodRussell]

Yes I understand the writers wanting to make the movie exciting and avoiding technobabble but I also think they should put some effort into making any real world science they include to be accurate. I don't view elementary physics as technobabble! There are thousands of scientists who are fans of the franchise any one of whom might kill to consult on these films. Take a leaf out of Stargate's book and spend some of your budget on people to make what's on screen scientifically credible instead of just, 'Whoa dude, that was freakin' awesome!"

So the story goes, the writers do try to be scientifically accurate, it's Abrams who overrules them and decides to stick with "It's awesome, that's all that matters."

The writers already do all that by themselves.

 

[Kruezerman]

Welcome to storytelling.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

It would not have been that hard to fix this, honestly. Just a tweak or two to the dialogue and a slightly different VFX shot.

So, here's how I would have fixed the issue. It's a very simple tweak. Enterprise would still have a little impulse power left. Not enough to escape Vegeance's firepower. When Spock said they can't flee i'd just have him say instead "We have no weapons and only minimal impulse power, not enough to escape." When Spock does his trickery on Khan, he has Sulu engage impulse engines to get away from the blast zone. The ship just isn't fast enough and the explosion ends up pushing on the ships stern, plunging it into the atmosphere. We'd see the shock wave literally smack the Enterprise into it's descent.

Simple.

Yes I understand the writers wanting to make the movie exciting and avoiding technobabble but I also think they should put some effort into making any real world science they include to be accurate. I don't view elementary physics as technobabble! There are thousands of scientists who are fans of the franchise any one of whom might kill to consult on these films. Take a leaf out of Stargate's book...

Right up until that sentence, you almost had a point.

 

[Mr. B]

$200 million doesn't buy continuity.

 

[BillJ]

$200 million doesn't buy continuity.

Personally, I wouldn't spend a single dollar on continuity.

 

[Locutus of Bored]

Even when they are aware of basic laws of physics they'll often ignore it to do the cool thing instead.

I know I would much prefer to have my Star Trek space battles without sound effects, without visible energy beams, without expanding shockwaves, without dramatic fires erupting externally, fought between ships that are well beyond visible range of each other, and with only Newtonian physics and no banking and listing ships. Sounds exciting.

You can do some of that if its been part of the universe from the start: 2001 and in some episodes nuBSG filled the silence with dramatic musical scores, and nuBSG and Babylon 5 relied on Newtonian physics for maneuvering, but in Star Trek and Star Wars for the two biggest examples, starships behaving like airplanes and boats is so ingrained into our consciousness that it would be weird to not have them do that at this point.

I suppose you could do it if there was a long gap between the last incarnation of the franchise and a full reboot, but the Abramsverse came too soon and was trying to both appeal to an entirely new audience and also to appease some of the existing fans who in some cases might not want such a drastic change from the way things have been done before, hence the similar soft-scifi physics defying trappings and the alternate universe setting instead of just going their own way and completely rebooting the characters and universe. I know some people would have preferred a full reboot, but no matter what you do, there are always going to be dissatisfied fans who don't like the choices you made. It's a Catch-22.

 

[MacLeod]

Just because something is shown to be apperantly stationary, doesn't mean in fact it is stationary. If the point of view and all objects within view are moving at the same realtive speed, they would appear to be stationary.

That's rather silly, considering film is a visual medium.

The vengeance is shown to maneuver right up until her weapons go off line, at which point she's a sitting duck. The Enterprise does not move at all from the initial position it came to a stop at. Except expressly where Sulu uses thrusters to maneuver the ship slightly.


Not to mention we're not talking about a small bit of KPH here to make all the difference. It won't. The trip would still take a long time to get to Earth. She was right there at the moon, the explosion happens, power fails, they plummet to Earth really fast. We see where Enterprise is when the power goes down. Right where she was before. Near the moon.

Only if you ignore the fact that there'd be no shock wave in those circumstances. That's replacing bad science with more bad science.

I'm not ignoring anything. I'm being consistant with what we've seen in the fictional realms of Star Trek. If it's science that's understood, you at least try to play ball, even loosely. If it's a fantastical element, there is room to maneuver. We've seen what M/AM detonations look like in Star Trek pretty consistently, and they always produce some kind of intense shock wave that can be felt by nearby objects. "Contagion" and "Generations" are two immediate examples of what happens when a ship is near a matter/antimatter explosion. If you don't have shields, you get thrown around. Even if you have shields, you feel the effect of the blast.

Remember the speeds we are dealing with. Full Impulse is around 0.25c or to put it another way around 75 000km/second. Even if thrusters are only 1000km/second. a trip from the Earth to the Moon would be measured in minutes, if they are 10 000km/second we are talking less than a minute.

 

[WarpFactorZ]

I had no problem with the fall.
The Vengeance explosions/attack could have imparted motion to The Enterprise whether she was stopped or already had motion.

And how exactly would the explosions have imparted motion on the Enterprise?

 

[Belz...]

Physics, actually.