Bennett had no involvement whatsoever with The Undiscovered Country. He spent a year developing his Starfleet Academy project with David Loughery, and when it got torpedoed by Martin Davis, he walked away from the franchise.
TUC - not aged well
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Bennett had no involvement whatsoever with The Undiscovered Country. He spent a year developing his Starfleet Academy project with David Loughery, and when it got torpedoed by Martin Davis, he walked away from the franchise.
I've always found the way Scotty finds the uniforms with the blood on them, gathers them up, and kind of looks around suspiciously and walks away in a weird gait kind of off.
In plot terms, he should realize that finding those uniforms is not a good thing for the heroes...
...After all, they have been found in a part of the ship only the officers should have access to, implicating them. It's a setup, and Scotty should be worried about somebody observing him finding the uniforms and thus completing the framing.
Similarly, the bodies of the assassins are found in a corridor likely to be in officer-only territory - where else would Kirk have been walking to at that point but his own cabin, and why else would nobody else have stumbled onto the corpses yet? It's clumsy, perhaps, but it's also just the sort of evidence that, if made public, would look very, very suspicious to the ignorant audiences. And this is all about the public opinion: nobody cares whether Kirk lives or dies, as long as a war gets going!
Timo Saloniemi
...After all, they have been found in a part of the ship only the officers should have access to, implicating them. It's a setup, and Scotty should be worried about somebody observing him finding the uniforms and thus completing the framing.
Similarly, the bodies of the assassins are found in a corridor likely to be in officer-only territory - where else would Kirk have been walking to at that point but his own cabin, and why else would nobody else have stumbled onto the corpses yet? It's clumsy, perhaps, but it's also just the sort of evidence that, if made public, would look very, very suspicious to the ignorant audiences. And this is all about the public opinion: nobody cares whether Kirk lives or dies, as long as a war gets going!
Timo Saloniemi
Scotty was clearly the mastermind behind the Khitomer Conspiracy. He was still mad at the Klingons over that "garbage scow" incident.
Valeris further debunks the fan idea that bad Vulcans were original to Enterprise.
Valeris, willingly took part in a conspiracy that could have started an all out war between the Federation and the Klingon Empire. Where's the logic in that?
Valeris, willingly took part in a conspiracy that could have started an all out war between the Federation and the Klingon Empire. Where's the logic in that?
It seems that the Klingon philosophy is the precise opposite to the Vulcan philosophy in particular and the Federation philosophy generally. Klingon's are uniquely passionate and quick to anger than any other major power. And the Klingon's appear to be the Federations one major and active rival in the movie era.
Maybe the Fed conspirators thought this was their chance to make the Klingons a third rate power with a quick war. It was clearly Cartwright's thinking.
If war is inevitable, then it is best fought when your opponent is abnormally weak. The destruction of Praxis would leave the Klingon Empire at an awesome strategic disadvantage. There's the immediate loss of materials, facilities, people, and industrial capacity owing to the destruction of Praxis and immediate fallout on the Klingon home world. Furthermore, the home world will require a massive investment of resources, to either rebalance its ecosystem or to evacuate it. That investment would challenge an Empire at peace. It could demolish any Klingon ability to make war. The Klingons should be entering a period of resource weakness and societal chaos before the first shot is fired.
So if the war is inevitable, then this is clearly the best moment in a generation to have it. The logic is inescapable. It's the same logic that justified atom-bombing the Soviet Union into submission in 1947.
Also the start, middle and end of Klingon life is war, war and war. It's very counter intuitive to have a sustainable peace process with a species that is so consumed by war. It takes real vision from Spock to go and defy conventional logic as well as good luck that Gorkon and then his daughter were game for it.
By this thinking, Valeris was at least smarter than Admiral Marcus, who seemed to place his victory hopes on one powerful ship.
(BTW, I haven't been able to find a transcript of STID online. Does anyone know of one?)
What if.....? The Klingons were war like, but the Kinshaya were berserkers?
What if the lmajority of Klingon forces were tasked to fend off the Kinshaya....long term? And after their alliance disolved, the next largest portion of Klingon forces were set to guard against the Romulans?
While maintaining a reserve for internal repression.
Or then he had dozens, but commandeered only one of them for the clandestine mission to get the war started. Just because Kirk is ignorant of the ship class doesn't mean it isn't in series production already (and proudly presented in the desktop lineup of the Admiral).
http://www.springfieldspringfield.co.uk/movie_script.php?movie=star-trek-into-darkness
One of those raw feed things, so you have to guess on the attributions and parsing.
So shouldn't Starfleet wait it out, hoping that the Klingons actually make that crippling investment and cannot turn back?
At the time of the movie, no investment has been made yet; all the economic resources of the empire are still available for fighting. And the Klingons certainly would see the wisdom of striking first and, through conquest, securing the extra resources needed for simultaneous campaigning and homeworld restoration.
Timo Saloniemi
Well, we only see one ship, which was apparently still under construction near Jupiter. Nothing in the script suggests there's more than one.
True enough, but nothing requires there to only be one, either. And plot logic walks us towards the other conclusion already...
Marcus is very over the counter about wanting Starfleet to be ready for the Klingons. No doubt he could get hundreds of warships built simply on his say-so - but it wouldn't follow that Kirk would know about that, because Marcus wouldn't want to tip off the Klingons with a public program.
Also, things appear to proceed according to Marcus' plan: it's on his initiative that Kirk is sent to ignite the war. It just isn't required of us to think that Marcus jumped the gun, when he otherwise appears to be the epitome of preparedness (madman slaughters half of Starfleet -> I have this plan prepared, with the special hardware waiting in the storehouses, please proceed).
To consider this a "plot hole" (by its broadest definition) is an option available to the audience, but not much more.
Timo Saloniemi
Marcus is very over the counter about wanting Starfleet to be ready for the Klingons. No doubt he could get hundreds of warships built simply on his say-so - but it wouldn't follow that Kirk would know about that, because Marcus wouldn't want to tip off the Klingons with a public program.
Also, things appear to proceed according to Marcus' plan: it's on his initiative that Kirk is sent to ignite the war. It just isn't required of us to think that Marcus jumped the gun, when he otherwise appears to be the epitome of preparedness (madman slaughters half of Starfleet -> I have this plan prepared, with the special hardware waiting in the storehouses, please proceed).
To consider this a "plot hole" (by its broadest definition) is an option available to the audience, but not much more.
Timo Saloniemi
But why wouldn't Marcus mention it while monologuing to Kirk? It seems an obvious thing to say - "We have a fleet of these monsters waiting in the wings. Time to strike while we have the advantage." It would seem logical, as you point out, but there's no hint, which I guess is a failing of the writers.
I just thought of it as a harsh interrogation. Go away, feminists.
Just going back to my comment about why it was necessary to force information out of Valeris.... a lot of the woman protests about Spock forcibly probing Valeris's mind also strangely overlook the fact that Valeris is a traitor and a murderer.
An acquaintance recently pointed out that this sort of things happens a lot - "Malaysia has the death penalty for not believing in religion... but that doesn't matter 'cause we can't get a beer on Sundays in most of the U.S.!"
An acquaintance recently pointed out that this sort of things happens a lot - "Malaysia has the death penalty for not believing in religion... but that doesn't matter 'cause we can't get a beer on Sundays in most of the U.S.!"
I'd argue we already got the hint with the tabletop display...
But Marcus would want to lie to Kirk. His Plan A is to get Kirk killed with that reactor sabotage that allows the Klingons to catch him, but he's likely to have a Plan B, too, and the Vengeance would be it. Ruining that surprise would be a bad idea. And Kirk would probably wonder why his exploration ship or flagship or whatever has to go do the assassination when there are proper war monsters available as well...
Then again, I also want to believe in an even deeper level of planning here, of Marcus contracting the penthouse massacre from Khan, so that a young lobster would be motivated to do the dirty deed while sensible veterans would be conveniently swept out of the way by Khan's superb marksmanship that would pose no risk to Marcus himself. I mean, if that attack (and the bombing of S31 that did no harm to the supply of supertorps) wasn't part of Marcus' plan, then there are too many coincidences there; if it's "cooperation" where Marcus' blackmailed-to-loyalty henchman Khan helps ignite the war as per Marcus' commands while secretly using this for his own escape plan, then the two villains would get much further in their plans before splitting and backstabbing. As far as the Klingon homeworld at least.
In ST:ID, it's two people who are superclever and thinking even more highly of their cleverness, working within very tight confines to achieve secret goals. In ST6:TUC, it's a much simpler scam where two people who would want nothing more than to backstab each other can still achieve their mutual goal of a destructive war by very simple means - by sowing chaos. The two plots are very different beasts, with Khan requiring lots of byzantine finesse to get himself and his crew out of Marcus' hands, but Cartwright or Chang needing to do very little besides shooting around.
Timo Saloniemi
Whether by accident or design, both films imagine a particular conspiracy theory.
VI is a retelling of the idea that JFK was slain by a cabal of rightists with Kirk as a Lee Harvey Oswald figure with the idea that the Federation has gone dangerously soft on a mortal enemy. JFK was regarded as having gone soft on Cuba by rightists of that time.
ID has Marcus, who is a kind of Dick Cheney type who conspires to and has no difficulty in massacring his own citizens to kick start his grand imperial plans, which shares many features with 9/11 conspiracy theories.
In defence of the VI conspirators, I do think that, while their actions and methods are of course reprehensible, they have a strong argument.
In the initial scenes, the peace overtures seem very radical. "Dismantling Starbases along the border" against a race that upholds war as a virtue to a crazed degree, is a hair raising proposition. Cartwright's suggestion of putting this warlike race permanently on the back foot with a quick war at a moment of vulnerability seems the more reasoned suggestion.
I'm glad Spock's vision prevailed in the end but the 'conventional logic' is with the conspirators.
Marcus depiction is as some kind of savage homicidalist who is thrilled by war. He hasn't the slightest compunction in torturing the Enterprise and does so with absolute relish. It's impossible to mount a defence for him in anyway. Even JJ's Kahn has some defence.
VI is a retelling of the idea that JFK was slain by a cabal of rightists with Kirk as a Lee Harvey Oswald figure with the idea that the Federation has gone dangerously soft on a mortal enemy. JFK was regarded as having gone soft on Cuba by rightists of that time.
ID has Marcus, who is a kind of Dick Cheney type who conspires to and has no difficulty in massacring his own citizens to kick start his grand imperial plans, which shares many features with 9/11 conspiracy theories.
In defence of the VI conspirators, I do think that, while their actions and methods are of course reprehensible, they have a strong argument.
In the initial scenes, the peace overtures seem very radical. "Dismantling Starbases along the border" against a race that upholds war as a virtue to a crazed degree, is a hair raising proposition. Cartwright's suggestion of putting this warlike race permanently on the back foot with a quick war at a moment of vulnerability seems the more reasoned suggestion.
I'm glad Spock's vision prevailed in the end but the 'conventional logic' is with the conspirators.
Marcus depiction is as some kind of savage homicidalist who is thrilled by war. He hasn't the slightest compunction in torturing the Enterprise and does so with absolute relish. It's impossible to mount a defence for him in anyway. Even JJ's Kahn has some defence.
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