The Prime Universe....no more.

[theFirebottle]

Translation: I can't negate a thing you said so I will try and get off topic with the hopes of not showing my lack of content.

Sigh!

I'm not any more obligated to be able to refute your moronic, baseless, insupportable knee-jerk reaction as an "argument" than I am obligated to disprove the existence of invisible pink flying unicorns that weigh sixteen billion tons and shit cotton candy.

 

[Jackson_Roykirk]

I have seen on several fan sites the idea that the "prime universe" is not gone and that this is an alternate universe etc. I am sorry but I am not buying that. Spock clearly tells Kirk in the mind meld that he is from the future. On the bridge Spock says that Nero changed the time line after he came from the future and destroyed the Kelvin. Uhara even says "an alternate reality" not "universe". This is considered the new time line and all that happened before is now lost. If someone went back in time and killed Hilter the future that they know is now lost. You could clearly see old Spock developing new memories when Kirk is made Captain.

The writers said the story does not wipe out the prime timeline, but rather creates an alternate branching timeline (google "many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics") -- and since they wrote the story, I have no reason to believe otherwise.

You can argue that some other Star Trek time travel stories established that when you go back in time, you go back to your own timeline, not an alternate one -- but this is a new Star Trek with new rules, and I'm OK with Star Trek having new scientific "rules" -- just like I was OK with all of the conflicting scientific rules of past Star Treks. TNG changed the science of TOS, and this film further changes that science.

The many-worlds theory of quantum mechanics was not as widely-known in TOS's days, but I suspect if it was, we would have had stories regarding alternate/branching timelines. The many-worlds theory was around during TNG's time, hence the inclusion of this real-world scientific theory into the TNG episode Parallels.

The people who care about the prime universe carrying on can use this "many-worlds theory" explanation to ease their mind, and the people who don't care...errr...don't care.

You guys honestly think that if they thought it would make a good movie or whatever, TPTB wouldn't resurrect the old timeline just :: snap :: like that? Or parts of the old timeline? No matter what anybody else has said or not said to the contrary? That they wouldn't come up with some kind of Trekkish explanation that allows them to do anything they want?

The plain fact is that TPTB will use as many or as few of the elements of older Trek as they want to - and that includes alternate universes and parallel universes, those that resemble the old timeline and those that don't.

Just as they've always done with Trek. Always. Well, since 1966, anyway.

So anybody who thinks he has the definitive answer is just kidding himself.

Exactly...

Even if the prime timeline is no more in Abrams Universe -- then so what? What difference does that really make? If someday someone thinks they can make a marketable post-Nemesis film with some of the TNG crew (or even some of the TNG cast) set in the "prime universe", there is nothing stopping them from doing so...or a film taking place in the prime universe's 25th century with a whole new crew.

...although I can't help but wonder why it would be so important that it take place in the prime universe, except for perhaps needing the planets Vulcan and Romulus to tell the story they want to tell.

 

[Cyrus]

If the writers/producers say Prime Universe exists in parallel to the new one then that's good enough for me. That claim could have been dismissed if Trek had always been consistent about time travel stuff. But that's clearly not the case, time travel has always worked to match the writers intentions instead of being consistent with previous movies/episodes.

 

[Timelord79 (he/him)]

I understand this theory and I could actually get on board with it, but what about episodes like "City on the Edge of Forever"? The timeline shouldn't have changed around them if this theory held true. They simply would have witnessed McCoy disappear but nothing would have changed.

Something to do with the Guardian of Forever I would imagine. Had special abilities, we couldn't possibly fathom it's capabiltities with our puny human minds.

I think I see what you're saying... In this particular instance the device itself erased history in the prime universe instead of creating a new universe and so the same could be said in other various episodes that the way the crew traveled back in time would determine whether or not it created an alternate reality. Interesting. I may need to think about rewriting my signature... I have a migraine now.

My interpretation of that situation is this: For history to play out the way it was supposed to, it was necessary for Kirk and Spock to perceive a universe that would motivate them to go after McCoy. Nothing was overwritten. They just had to witness an alternate history. So the quantum nature of the universe ensured it's current state. It fraks your mind up pretty well but works if you can bend your mind around this concept.

You clearly are among the few here that are missing the point going on with that line hoping it means something. Paramount and Abrams have taken all that is known about Trek and thrown it out the window. As a fan of TNG, DS9 etc you will never see anything added to it. They have taken Trek down the road of "Star Wars". Let me guess STXII will be the "Empire Strikes Back" theme? As fans of Trek, following all the series with regards to stories has been ruined by the "time travel" reset movie that Abrams put out.

I'm not missing the point, I'm taking a giant steaming dump on it because I think it's asinine in the extreme.

You are in denial. You have provided nothing from the movie to suggest anything. I have on the other hand have quoted the movie (Nero talking to Pike) that this is the "now" and not some alternate universe. Thus erasing the prime universe. Did you miss Spocks comment when Kirk is made Captain? New memories are forming. Another viewing of the movie might help you.

What new memories? If you are referring to Spock saying "Full thrusters." as something that just newly formed in his mind parallel to young Spock experiencing it, than I believe you just misinterpreted. The whole scene just triggered a memory he always had and he just thought it out loud for US. Although I think they should have chosen a better phrase that was recognizably something Prime Kirk used to say.

Taking Trek backwards was not the way to go.

Worldwide Gross: $283,994,301

No. The timeline is different. There will be no Cage and therefore no Menagerie. There will be no Balance of Terror. No Amok Time. There will also be no Spock's Brain. Not because of the timeline, but because of the suck.

You can haz it?

You can now take your Trek DVDs and box them in the attic seeing how there will be no more stories to add to it.

There will be no more to add to Citizen Kane and Friends either...might as well box that up too. I wasn't aware that one could only watch something and enjoy it only if it's continuity was on going.

Your big red "X" is unnecessary. Please calm down. Trek has been an on going adventure from the first movie. It became a franchise. This movie clearly goes back in time before TOS (Archer is referenced so ENT is still there as part of the Trek background.) and erases everything. So your on going "Trek" story/universe that you have enjoyed from day one has been erased. It is pretty clear concept that your just can't seem to grasp.

They finally marketed the movie well and yes it grossed $283. Of course if you minus the budget of $150 and and promo of another $150. It hasn't made any money yet via ticket sales. It still needs to bring in another $27 million to break even.

Also you fail to realize (another Trek history lesson) that Berman movies were BORING. Especially the last 2. With the help of George Lucas ILM and the transfomer twits they put together a movie to attract all the transformers type audience.

So what episode is now going to be redone as STXII? They have 79 choices.

That is silly. So when they write an entirely new story, will this board be in turmoil once again, because that mission was obviously NOT part of the original 5 year mission and therefore can't be canon? Oh my... you won't be using THAT situation as proof canon has been erased because those 79 adventures were in fact ALL adventures Kirk and co EVER experienced, will you?

 

[ITL]

Funny how an attempt (a gloriously successful one, IMO) by the writers to preserve the prime universe as well as open up a new one for new adventures has been turned against them by some in an effort to prove how they destroyed it....

Prime still exists. All is good.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Dude your [sic] a total troll...sit down and the[sic] let the grown up talks[sic].

Rather a remarkable accusation, given that you joined this board a week ago and evidently for no reason other than to harp incessantly and opaquely on this single assertion about the "Prime Universe."

BTW, fan since 1966 here who does not care whether someone else declares TOS "dead." I still watch it.

 

[JustKate]

Funny how an attempt (a gloriously successful one, IMO) by the writers to preserve the prime universe as well as open up a new one for new adventures has been turned against them by some in an effort to prove how they destroyed it....

Prime still exists. All is good.

That is a really good point. They went out of their way to say, in essence, "We're going to find a way to rewrite stuff to make Trek fresh, but that in no way should inhibit fans from continuing to enjoy the older versions. We just hope new fans and old fans will enjoy this fresh Trek."

And yet, as is so often the case with diplomacy, some people can still find ways to get really ticked off. There's some kind of lesson here...

 

[dahj]

Can someone more photoshop savvy than me, and with DS9 season 7 DVDs nearby post a screen of Odo umpiring in Take me out to the holosuite with the caption: Prime Universe.... SAFE!!!

 

[thumbtack]

Prime universe is dead.

And the 94% of viewership (98% if you remove trekkies from the poll) who are perfectly okay with this are just a bunch of morons, no doubt.

Your opinion is so deeply entrenched in such a tiny minority as to be irrelevant. And typing the same thing over and over again does not make us think there are a lot of you.

 

[Jayson]

And if you don't believe in parallel universes then you have been ignoring Star Trek since at least season 2 of TOS. Every series has episodes on parallel timelines. Mirror Mirror, Yesterday's Enterprise, Parallels, All Good Things, the annual Mirror Universe episodes in DS9(I think there were 6, but I could be wrong), Voyager had Year of Hell, and did the same thing Star Trek did in their final episode(have someone come back in time to change history), I'm sorry but you're unablity to believe in parallel universes doesn't make them not exist in Star Trek. They absolutely do.

Last but not least the canon argument. TOS couldn't even follow it's own canon. There are many things in TOS that you can't explain through canon. They destroy a cloaked ship in BoT then comes season 3 and they find out that the Romulan's recently discovered how to cloak their ships like they never knew about it. Not to mention the multiple times they messed up what year it was(anywhere from the 21st to 29th centuries off the top of my head) And it's not like the writers in the TNG era discounted canon whenever they felt like it. They did, atleast they made sure the century was right. That's about the only thing they kept canon most of the time.

Did some of you fall a sleep during the movie? They made it PERFECTLY clear that this was "THE NOW". People from the future (Nero) went back in time and changed everything. It is not a new universe etc. It is the now. When Pike is questioned by Nero he says "I am preventing Genocide, I am saving Romulus etc". Pike says "you are blaming the Federation for things that have not happened." They clearly had have this movie on the same time line as the Trek of before.

You can forgot about all the other episodes etc about time travel, mirror universe etc. None of that applies to this Trek. It is a simple "go back in time and change the known future".

The Prime Universe is dead. It has been erased.

Funny how an attempt (a gloriously successful one, IMO) by the writers to preserve the prime universe as well as open up a new one for new adventures has been turned against them by some in an effort to prove how they destroyed it....

Prime still exists. All is good.

I agree! I don't see why people just don't roll with the idea that both trekverses exsit. The explanation could have have been explained better in the movie but it's ovious what the writers intent was, because they have stated their intent. Why would anyone go with the theory that erases Prime Trek. This two seperate unvierse idea is the best of both worlds.

Jason

 

[xman]

Perhaps Uncle Spock feels that monkeying with time travel has consequences well beyond those anticipated and is more likely to have a positive impact in his current role. Still, with the destruction of Vulcan you'd think he'd try something. The problem is it just makes your brain hurt, all the inconsistencies in Trek especially with the ease of time travel.

Here's the prologue for the next movie. Kirk Spock and some redshirts are sneaking in to an ultra secret facility only to discover Uncle Spock has been trying to find a way back to change things. Spock wants to stop the destruction of Vulcan so he wants to go there. Kirk wants to save his father so he wants to go there. McCoy wants to go back to the night of his bachelor party and tell himself to run. Anyhow, it turns out that Uncle Spock has been looking for a way back, but all the ways are blocked and it can't be done now.
Kirk:

 

[ITL]

Can someone more photoshop savvy than me, and with DS9 season 7 DVDs nearby post a screen of Odo umpiring in Take me out to the holosuite with the caption: Prime Universe.... SAFE!!!

I hope I used the correct gesture...please kick me if I didn't.

 

[Butters]

If the prime universe no longer exists, then why didn't prime spock fade out of existence BTTF style?

Silly question for a silly topic. The way I see it is, the prime timeline still exists but is timelocked, Time War style. The original characters and shows are still out there, but we'll never see them again because that iteration trek was creatively bankrupt, but that backrupcy would sound naff on screen, hence the inworld explanation.

If only they'd taken a moment to break the 4th wall and labour the point to the audience...

 

[Timelord79 (he/him)]

http://community.livejournal.com/ihasatardis/1864752.html

Now who (pun intended!) has the right connections to get David Tennant to actually read that out loud so we can dub it over the original sequence in Blink?

 

[dahj]

Can someone more photoshop savvy than me, and with DS9 season 7 DVDs nearby post a screen of Odo umpiring in Take me out to the holosuite with the caption: Prime Universe.... SAFE!!!

I hope I used the correct gesture...please kick me if I didn't.

That is awesome!

I'm gonna go ahead and assimilate it for my avatar if you don't mind

 

[ITL]

^ Groovy.

 

[Peter the Younger]

Funny how an attempt (a gloriously successful one, IMO) by the writers to preserve the prime universe as well as open up a new one for new adventures has been turned against them by some in an effort to prove how they destroyed it....

Funny, but not at all surprising.

 

[Trekker4747]

It's really not that damn hard, folks.

And, know what? SO WHAT if all that we know is erased and gone?

Hard to swallow, sure. But we were never revisiting any of that again. So either we start over or we "erase" it all.

Would it have been nice if the movie adhered better to canon? Sure. It could've been done and still maintained excitement and all, but they didn't do that route.

So.

What?

I'm watching TOS-R on DVD right now and loving it. Don't care a wit that it was "erased" by ST09 because it's still a damn good series.

 

[OneBuckFilms]

Logically, the events in this movie are created Stardate 2233.04 by Nero arriving back in time.

If all that existed was erased, so would Spock, and paradoxically, the Narada, meaning it would be impossible. Grandfather Paradox.

Therefore, logically, a new quantum reality must have been created from the Prime reality where events play out differently.

 

[Foxy]

These arguments are getting crazy now ... unless you are Stephen Hawking then you are not anywhere close to being able to say what happens and what the effects of time travel are, other than speculation.


Even Hawking etc can only theorise …. So anything goes … its Sci-fi.

If you don’t think the Prime time line is there then fair enough… I don’t agree with you, there are so many arguments each way with no way to prove anything.