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The Final Countdown ... counting down

John Birmingham's excellent "Axis of Time" trilogy takes some cues from Final Countdown and expands upon them. I really enjoyed these books and how he weaves the whole "fish out of waster" nature of taking modern people and technology and going into the past.
 
As a child I loved this movie. As an adult, I discovered there is no plot. The Nimitz goes back in time and does nothing. Then it returns to the present. Yes, there is the closed loop paradox, but there really isn't much substance, meat to the story.
 
I enjoyed the movie, but it was more a U.S. Navy recruitment piece.
I think that was kinda part of the agreement to have access to the aircraft carrier and fighters.

The US military generally only agrees to participate in stuff that is going to be scripted and present it in a positive light. It's why the Air Force rejected working with Iron Eagle when given the script. They didn't think teenagers being able to fool the United States Air Force and steal an f-16 and fly it in a mission against a middle-eastern country was good PR for the military.
 
As a child I loved this movie. As an adult, I discovered there is no plot. The Nimitz goes back in time and does nothing. Then it returns to the present. Yes, there is the closed loop paradox, but there really isn't much substance, meat to the story.
Sure there’s a plot: Given this bizarro situation we’ve found ourselves in, what do we do about it? And ultimately they make the choice to change history, come hell or high water — but whatever’s creating the storm won’t let them.

(Admittedly, I like to headcanon that this is a stealth Star Trek prequel, the storm is Q testing humanity, and by making the choice to just fight the war again humanity fails*so Q rolls his eyes in disgust, sends the Nimitz back where it belongs, and is deeply prejudiced against humanity when he starts mucking around with Picard a cosmic eyeblink later.)

(* Mind you, this would be Q’s opinion. Something I like about the film is that absolutely everyone in it absolutely does the right thing, from their own perspective — even the pushy Senator we’re apparently not supposed to like.)
 
I remember watching this back in '80 and liked watching the latest, greatest aircraft and military machinery in action. But you can't stop the inexorable march of time. All of those aircraft are now retired, except for the venerable Hawkeye. And the Nimitz herself, now the grande dame of the carrier force, will be stricken within just a few years. A depressing reminder of the passage of time and our own mortality rearing up to face us. Most of the cast is gone now – Kirk Douglas, James Farentino, Ron O'Neill, Charles Durning, Soon-Tek Oh, Alvin Ing. Only Katherine Ross and Martin Sheen remain.


I remember that movie. It was a good story, but I can recall a few lines that I found a bit problematic.
 
I believe the Japanese did a variation on this theme with an anime/manga called Zipang. About a Japanese Self-Defense Force destroyer that ends up at Midway in 1942, and can't get home. They at first try to maintain the timeline, but things get out of hand.
Hated it. Japanese weren't better than Nazi in occupied territories and even worse then them with POWs.

But the whole comic reeks of nationalism and justification for the actions of the Empire during the war. Pretty much the only thing the author admits is that going to war was a mistake because then the Japanese lost.

I can't remotely imagine a popular German or Italian comic with the same premises (if there is any clandestine neo-Nazi fanzine with this story on it, well, I don't know).
 
I love the film, its in my top ten greatest films of all time. Ironically the Nimitz has been in service longer than the period of time between the attack on Pearl Harbor and when the film was made. 1941-1980 - 39 years, 1975-2023 - 48 years. Here's some interesting background information about the film.
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I was coming here to say something similar. Hard to believe the passage of time
 
This is one of my favorite movies of all-time. I have a deep love and affection for all things "naval aviation" and it all stemmed from this movie (for most, it was the original Top Gun, but I saw this 5-6 years before the Tom Cruise classic). It has a cool Twilight Zone sci-fi vibe, and it showcases virtually the entire carrier air wing...both rotary and fixed wing aircraft feature prominently.

And, every sequence with an F-14 in it is pure joy. The areal photography and choreography is amazing. The opening scene (filmed in Key West subbing for Hawaii) where the Tomcat takes off from the runway ("Have a nice day!") is still awesome, and the 4K disk totally rocked my home theater set up.

The image of the time storm vortex, while simple by today's standards, is something that has been burned into my phyche for a long time.

I love this film and revisit it as often as possible. I have shared it with both of my sons (11 and 9 years old) and they really enjoyed it too.
 
This is one of my favorite movies of all-time. I have a deep love and affection for all things "naval aviation" and it all stemmed from this movie (for most, it was the original Top Gun, but I saw this 5-6 years before the Tom Cruise classic). It has a cool Twilight Zone sci-fi vibe, and it showcases virtually the entire carrier air wing...both rotary and fixed wing aircraft feature prominently.

And, every sequence with an F-14 in it is pure joy. The areal photography and choreography is amazing. The opening scene (filmed in Key West subbing for Hawaii) where the Tomcat takes off from the runway ("Have a nice day!") is still awesome, and the 4K disk totally rocked my home theater set up.

The image of the time storm vortex, while simple by today's standards, is something that has been burned into my phyche for a long time.

I love this film and revisit it as often as possible. I have shared it with both of my sons (11 and 9 years old) and they really enjoyed it too.
My only problem with the recent restoration was there is a bridge scene when they're supposed to be out at sea and I could swear I could see buildings in the background as they were in port at the time the scene was shot.
 
I was an Electrician's Mate in RE division on the USS Nimitz during the filming. When the film crew was aboard, I spent most of my time in work areas and on watch 4th deck and below in #2 Reactor Auxilliary Room. When they finished filming, I had been aboard for a year, and transferred from Reactor Department to Engineering Department, where I spent my last 3 years aboard in Boat Repair Division, that was later combined with A division.

I can spot a lot of shipmates I knew in some of the background scenes. I got to meet Katherine Ross and Charles Durning when they were between scenes in sickbay. They were outside sickbay at the second deck aft weapons assembly area near the aft mess decks scullery and wearing blue bathrobes.

As a side note, when underway replenishment (UNREP) occurs, it is customary for the ship receiving supplies to have emergency breakaway music that is piped over the 1MC and heard by all the ships. After this film came out The USS Nimitz used the movie theme song as its emergency breakaway music that lets all the ships along side to know that the UNREP is completed.
 
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You know the scene where a Tomcat does a screaming dive recovery that looks like its about to slam into the ocean There's a story the wife of the pilot who flew that stunt, who know it was him in the film, screamed in terror when she saw the scene for the first time, and gave him a reaming out for doing something so dangerous. In reality, IIRC, it was just a fairly normal and safe maneuver that the camera and sound effects exaggerated.
 
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