Trek XI to be alternate timeline, according to AICN
- Thread starter Ghostface1701
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Abrams may not share, or even be interested, in what some fans think "killed 'Enterprise.'"
A premise is a premise is a premise. It's not a story, a series or a movie.
Okay, in BTTF Marty McFly goes back in time just after his friend Doc Brown is apparently shot dead. Marty accidentally interferes with the courtship between his long-suffering and rather limited parents, and will cease to exist unless he straightens that out.
Or something like that. And, oh yeah, SPOILERS for a twenty-odd year old movie, above.
Anyway, all of that is little more than set-up in BTTF; it's the first act of the movie.
Moriarity's description of the putative events of the Trek movie sounds similar in that it's apparently set-up. The assassination of Kirk's father and Spock's putting that right all have to occur decades before (within the story) Quinto's Spock and his contemporaries appear.
By the time Young Spock makes his appearence, all the time-screwing-up stuff appears to be done with. Old Spock is apparently continuing through the decades to try to guide events in directions that will produce an outcome something like the history he remembers.
Marty spends most of BTTF trying to get his parents back together and also get home to his own time. When he does, the world is different - his parents are much happier, and he's saved Doc Brown's life (among other things).
Well, what happened to the "original timeline?" While it might hypothetically be said to continue to exist in some "other dimension" the practical answer is that it's been replaced. It don't matter no more.
A premise is a premise is a premise. It's not a story, a series or a movie.
Okay, in BTTF Marty McFly goes back in time just after his friend Doc Brown is apparently shot dead. Marty accidentally interferes with the courtship between his long-suffering and rather limited parents, and will cease to exist unless he straightens that out.
Or something like that. And, oh yeah, SPOILERS for a twenty-odd year old movie, above.
Anyway, all of that is little more than set-up in BTTF; it's the first act of the movie.
Moriarity's description of the putative events of the Trek movie sounds similar in that it's apparently set-up. The assassination of Kirk's father and Spock's putting that right all have to occur decades before (within the story) Quinto's Spock and his contemporaries appear.
By the time Young Spock makes his appearence, all the time-screwing-up stuff appears to be done with. Old Spock is apparently continuing through the decades to try to guide events in directions that will produce an outcome something like the history he remembers.
Marty spends most of BTTF trying to get his parents back together and also get home to his own time. When he does, the world is different - his parents are much happier, and he's saved Doc Brown's life (among other things).
Well, what happened to the "original timeline?" While it might hypothetically be said to continue to exist in some "other dimension" the practical answer is that it's been replaced. It don't matter no more.
Hey UWC only a few weeks ago people were worried that Nimoy was gonna be sitting back "Telling a story", with this he does seem to be intragal to the events, Spock becomes a "Prime Mover" behind all known Trek history.
It was a notion lacking in the "Temporal Cold War" as we weren't given anything to care about with those involved since the producers never really established "Future Guys" stake in all that.
But here it comes across as *important*!
Sharr
It was a notion lacking in the "Temporal Cold War" as we weren't given anything to care about with those involved since the producers never really established "Future Guys" stake in all that.
But here it comes across as *important*!
Sharr
Something about it just doesn't pass the smell test.
-- How would old Spock know the time line has been screwed up?
-- If Kirk never existed in this "new" timeline, then how would Spock know there's even supposed to be a James T. Kirk?
-- How would old Spock know how things "should" be in order to put them right?
-- OK, the Romulans may have prevented Kirk's birth, and all that entails, but what gives Spock the right to play God and try to hit the reset button? What if things actually are BETTER without Kirk around (though I suspect, of course, they wouldn't be).
-- Why does old Spock need to work through young Spock?
-- If Kirk was not born, there may be no Earth. V-ger could've destroyed it. Or if someone else found a way out of that predicament, then the Space probe in TVH destoyed it.
Don't know. Just some ramblings. Make sense? Any other thoughts?
-- How would old Spock know the time line has been screwed up?
-- If Kirk never existed in this "new" timeline, then how would Spock know there's even supposed to be a James T. Kirk?
-- How would old Spock know how things "should" be in order to put them right?
-- OK, the Romulans may have prevented Kirk's birth, and all that entails, but what gives Spock the right to play God and try to hit the reset button? What if things actually are BETTER without Kirk around (though I suspect, of course, they wouldn't be).
-- Why does old Spock need to work through young Spock?
-- If Kirk was not born, there may be no Earth. V-ger could've destroyed it. Or if someone else found a way out of that predicament, then the Space probe in TVH destoyed it.
Don't know. Just some ramblings. Make sense? Any other thoughts?
I was with the others that thought this idea wasn't the greatest, but in the way you've put it, it actually does sound quite fascinating, and pretty reasonable.
But then again, I may not be the best source, because as I think back now, I'm a big sucker for the stories (usually that start in a possible or alternate future) that feature slightly altered (or merely older) versions of our heroes mucking about with the timeline, or hitting the big reset button to set things right. Examples of episodes like these that I really loved are Stargate SG-1's "2010," VOY's "Year of Hell" and "Endgame," and ENT's "Twilight." So yeah, thinking back on my track record, I've got a clear history of liking this general concept.
Of course, this alleged concept for the movie isn't exactly the same; if UWC Defiance is right, the "fixing the past" thing is just the prologue (which will probably in itself be fun, for me at least), then we proceed onto a more traditional TOS-flavored story with Old Spock doing a little chessmaster from the sidelines, just to make sure things turn out right.
Okay, you can throw rocks at me if you wish, but honestly, if it turns out like that, I think I'll have a lot of fun on Christmas '08.
But then, crap! If it does turn out like that, it is officially the most spoiled I've ever been about a movie yet to be released (I'm not one that hunts down these kinds of detailed plot rumors). Oh well, it's part of the Trekkie experience.
I might have to swallow my pride and actually wear a costume to the premiere. (But then I'd never be able to convince my family to come with me, much less my friends!)
Oh, one other thing, as tight-lipped as all are being about plot points and even the general plot and theme, who the hell would be stupid enough to leak information to Moriarity from AICN? Over dinner?
Are we to believe that, "This is just between you and me," was said somewhere along the line?
If I were Abrams and there was even a kernel of truth to the AICN story and how it was obtained, I'd go after the leaker like the Nixon White House used to.
Are we to believe that, "This is just between you and me," was said somewhere along the line?
If I were Abrams and there was even a kernel of truth to the AICN story and how it was obtained, I'd go after the leaker like the Nixon White House used to.
I call BS as well. Star Trek is not Quantum Leap. :thumbsup:
A premise is not a plot, and a plot is not a movie.
Whoever Moriarity spoke with may have given him an overview of the approach and the premise, but this isn't anything like having read the script. There's no way of telling from the premise what the story is like - scary, funny, moving...uh, dull, or whatever.
Whoever Moriarity spoke with may have given him an overview of the approach and the premise, but this isn't anything like having read the script. There's no way of telling from the premise what the story is like - scary, funny, moving...uh, dull, or whatever.
The dichotomy you've created between alternate timelines and altered timelines has some support in Star Trek history.
Though I'm sure some will bristle at the mere mention of the TNG movies and Enterprise, it seems that the events of First Contact altered the same timeline that the rest of Trek occurs in, if we're to assume that "Regeneration" occurred in the same universe as the rest of Star Trek.
Similarly, "Trials and Tribble-ations" probably didn't create an alternate timeline launching from "The Trouble With Tribbles" — it just altered the events, or perhaps were always a part of the events, much like people have said about First Contact and the first warp flight. Those sorts of causality paradoxes are a lot more interesting than any alternate timeline nonsense.
Who's to stay time travel creates alternate realities, anyway? Those few examples above from various episodes don't support it, nor do the two movies that employ time travel, TVH and FC. Some episodes seem to directly oppose it — "Regenaration," "Trials and Tribble-ations," "Past Tense," "Time's Arrow," "Assignment: Earth," "Tomorrow is Yesterday" (all of which impacted and preserved the original timeline without creating alternate timelines) — while others, mostly from Voyager — "Year of Hell" being the most notable and technical — rely pretty heavily on the "alternate timeline" notion. "Yesterday's Enterprise" is an episode that would seem to fall in both categories, but I'll put it in the altered timeline category simply because the alternate timeline was shortlived and the events of the episode clearly impacted "real" Trek. (And I'm not even going to attempt to produce a coherent statement on the topic from Enterprise's Temporal Cold War.)
All in all, Star Trek originally and primarily favoured your interpretation of time travel — and TOS pretty conclusively rejected alternate timelines.
That said, the premise sounds silly to me, but you've done a good job of showing how that might not mean much. Still, I won't believe it until I see it from a source I trust.
I really hope this isn't true not only for the movie's sake, but for the franchise's future as well. You could make something like this work, but I don't know what you could do after it.
Well, if this movie doesn't succeed "the Franchise" has no future.
So, if this is true (IF), then in an odd way, Spock does save Kirk's life, or brings him back to life, so to speak. At least he gives him 62 years or so that he otherwise wouldn't have had.
Without Spock, there never would've been a Jim Kirk. Who would of course later save Spock on Genesis, and -- . OK, now I've confused myself.
Still, what I'd need to know (and excuse me, outside of Trek my sci-fi skills for how this could be are not good) is if the timeline was corrupted back before Kirk was even born, how would Spock know there ever was (or should be, or can be) a Kirk?
Without Spock, there never would've been a Jim Kirk. Who would of course later save Spock on Genesis, and -- . OK, now I've confused myself.
Still, what I'd need to know (and excuse me, outside of Trek my sci-fi skills for how this could be are not good) is if the timeline was corrupted back before Kirk was even born, how would Spock know there ever was (or should be, or can be) a Kirk?
Well that's the question isn't it? Perhaps he has a Guinen like perspective of time? Perhaps there is a third agent at work (Gary Mitchell maybe? he was becoming a "god") who informs him of this? Maybe it ties back into a previous adventure? Maybe the Guardian of Forever plucks Spock away and tells him time is not right?
I don't have an answer - which doesn't mean that there isn't a good one we just don't know it yet.
As I've mused this idea growing to like it. The Spock Paradox, Kirk saved Spock, so someday Spock could save him and the whole of the Federation and history itself.
Sharr
Yes, you phrase it well. Except if Spock has any special intuition, is there anything in his past that could explain it? In a way, to say that he has a Guinen-like ability we never knew of before would be a cheat to me (something very new and also so coincidentally important to the story). The Guardian of Forever or Gary Mitchell may be a bit too inside baseball for a new audience.
OK, let's run with this. Most folks, whether they saw the movies or not, know that Spock died and was brought back to life. Maybe Spock saw some things when he was dead? (Spock did say to McCoy in TVH that he couldn't talk about it with him without a common frame of reference. That's different than saying he had nothing at all to talk about -- as in nonexistence. So, Spock had an afterlife? He saw things?)
I have to say that the whole idea that Spock has to save Kirk so that he can save history is a rather intriguing premise on the face of it. It's just that as it's reported in AICN I hope that's a draft or two away from what we may really see.
I lean toward the Gary Mitchell/Guardian of Forever/and or X-Factor we do not yet know as the answer.
If it is either Mitchell or the GoF its not a hoop to the new viewer and can be a treat for the "hardcores", an actual valentine to the fans. Two seconds of exposition can explain either one.
"Mitchell, you were dead?" Spock gasps after Mitchell has pulled him out of time.
"Oh Mr Spock its been so long... do you think a god could die? I've seen things the likes of which you could never comprehend" Mithcell lords over the slightly confused Spock. "Or maybe so? you've been dead before. Kirk needs you."
"Kirk?"
"Oh yes excuse me." Mithcell waves his hand.
The GoF is course an even better exposition device since its visual and could make use of previous footage.
Either one though need not be known by noobs to catch on the notions.
Sharr
If this is a way to reboot the franchise it's the worst way to do it. Either just do a Time travel movie or either just do a reboot movie or just a normal prequel movie. Making it all 3 is going to confuse the piss out of people.
And did anyone else get the impression that the Bones Character might be female? Or was I reading too much into that article?
And did anyone else get the impression that the Bones Character might be female? Or was I reading too much into that article?
Apparently, somebody was fully that stupid/crafty. Jeremy Smith of CHUD.com-who was one of the first to go out on a limb on the casting of Quinto-claims the broad strokes of the story are legitimate:
Which, if anything, is simply more confusing (the garbled, third-hand-at-best account from Moriarty is actually dead-on?), but there it is.
No - it could infact be a kind of mad ballsy genius of a sort few have seen before. It gets in the craw of a few die hards even better.
If presented in an orderly fashion no confusion should ensue...
*It should be noted when asked if Nimoy and Quito had a "scene together" both actors became rather tight lipped... One can take that however.
Sharr
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