Really? I must remember it from rereading the DC Comics adaptation so many times, then. He definitely says it in there.
What happens between TMP and WOK?
- Thread starter Commander Kielbasa
- Start date
Maybe she was just so excited for the project she decided, subconsciously, not to notice it.
When David first brought up the use of proto-matter in a weekly staff meeting, the senior researchers discussed the idea, and as head of the project Carol agreed to it's use and told David to go ahead with incorporating the proto-matter into the genesis device.
Got to keep that grant money coming in.
Got to keep that grant money coming in.
I tend to think of the interim period this way:
2273-2278 Second 5-year mission
2278-2280 New Earth
2281-2284 Kirk retired
2284 Kirk rejoins Starfleet
2285 TWOK
As much as I like Christopher Bennett and Dayton Ward's work, I really don't like the notion that Kirk & crew go out on missions just before TWOK. In that film, Kirk is languishing, rusty and morose. This wouldn't be the case if he had just been adventuring with the old gang. Plus it just seems logistically implausible, and smacks too much of a fan impulse to cram adventures into every single minute of the characters' lives. It makes more sense to me that Kirk had just recently come back to Starfleet; the inspection trip to the Enterprise seems something special, not something he'd done before. And the idea that he had been retired for three years, then comes back to Starfleet for some action only to end up babysitting, helps underscore his feelings of malaise in TWOK.
Along the same lines, Goodman's idea that Spock takes the ship out for a third 5-year mission while Kirk is promoted/retired also doesn't ring true to me. First of all, I can't see Kirk retiring when Spock and co. are "hoppin' galaxies." I also like the idea that Spock isn't particularly interested in command, even if he's a competent commander. In TWOK, the second things get remotely interesting, he immediately relinquishes command to Kirk. I feel like that conversation would have been a bit different if Spock had just returned from five years in command. But I suppose you could read it as Spock simply deferring to Kirk out of friendship.
Finally, I don't think that there needs to be some kind of explanation for Kirk retiring a second time. If Michael Jordan and Brett Favre can retire three times, so can James T. Kirk. When he retires/accepts promotion before TWOK, Kirk is ten years older than at the end of the original five-year-mission. It's not hard to believe his feelings changed over nearly a decade of active duty. Of course, he ends up stuck in the same rut, but that seems believable to me.
2273-2278 Second 5-year mission
2278-2280 New Earth
2281-2284 Kirk retired
2284 Kirk rejoins Starfleet
2285 TWOK
As much as I like Christopher Bennett and Dayton Ward's work, I really don't like the notion that Kirk & crew go out on missions just before TWOK. In that film, Kirk is languishing, rusty and morose. This wouldn't be the case if he had just been adventuring with the old gang. Plus it just seems logistically implausible, and smacks too much of a fan impulse to cram adventures into every single minute of the characters' lives. It makes more sense to me that Kirk had just recently come back to Starfleet; the inspection trip to the Enterprise seems something special, not something he'd done before. And the idea that he had been retired for three years, then comes back to Starfleet for some action only to end up babysitting, helps underscore his feelings of malaise in TWOK.
Along the same lines, Goodman's idea that Spock takes the ship out for a third 5-year mission while Kirk is promoted/retired also doesn't ring true to me. First of all, I can't see Kirk retiring when Spock and co. are "hoppin' galaxies." I also like the idea that Spock isn't particularly interested in command, even if he's a competent commander. In TWOK, the second things get remotely interesting, he immediately relinquishes command to Kirk. I feel like that conversation would have been a bit different if Spock had just returned from five years in command. But I suppose you could read it as Spock simply deferring to Kirk out of friendship.
Finally, I don't think that there needs to be some kind of explanation for Kirk retiring a second time. If Michael Jordan and Brett Favre can retire three times, so can James T. Kirk. When he retires/accepts promotion before TWOK, Kirk is ten years older than at the end of the original five-year-mission. It's not hard to believe his feelings changed over nearly a decade of active duty. Of course, he ends up stuck in the same rut, but that seems believable to me.
I like to think this too, especially since the movies really show Kirk in an unflattering light, as a captain, imho. He spends more time being a guy who wants to be a captain than he does actually being a captain. TMP: Wants the chair back. TWoK: Wants the chair back & has to be told so. TSFS: Litarally has to steal the chair. TVH: No chair. TFF: New chair! New very bad chair. TUC: Ready to retire. GEN: Retired & back seat driving, or trapped in the Nexus pining... literally... chopping down pines. Is it any surprise that Kirk's Nexus happy place isn't actually captaining a starship, but rather hanging around lamenting about captaining a starship?
If we don't assume another 5 year mission between TMP & TWoK, then the only real time he was a long term sitting captain was the original one. I like to think there might've been a 3rd 5 year mission on the ENT-A, between TFF & TUC as well, which is kind of neat, because then he did a long term mission on what was essentially all 3 different ships (Even though the 2nd was a refit of the original ship)
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Man, how awesome would it have been if Kirk's Nexus place was the Enterprise, and the entire original cast got to cameo there, with Kirk thinking he's in the middle of a traditional TOS episode with Picard as the intruder, until he is talked out of his fantasy. Bonus points if it was full TOS cheese as opposed to the movie era.
I always assume a 3rd mission as well; There is no point in celebrating the end of IV/V (with V being the most TOS like of them all) if it is just a hollow ship with few missions until retirement. I always figured that since II-V take place in the span of ~2 years max, that there is another gap between V and VI (much like I and II) to reset the in story ages to match the actors.
I always assume a 3rd mission as well; There is no point in celebrating the end of IV/V (with V being the most TOS like of them all) if it is just a hollow ship with few missions until retirement. I always figured that since II-V take place in the span of ~2 years max, that there is another gap between V and VI (much like I and II) to reset the in story ages to match the actors.
Generations would have been much more interesting with this.
Nexus-Spock would have to be the one to convince him; Captain, it is LOGICAL....
It's actually a travesty, imho, that it wasn't some form of commanding the Enterprise. They spent a decade on cinema screens painting the man as someone who's unwavering calling is to be in that chair, including a line in the very movie we're talking about, that has him advise Picard to not give up the seat, & here he is in his own personal nirvana & it's NOT captaining a ship. That was harder for me to swallow than him dying
But to get back on topic, I also like this idea of Kirk having had 3 different periods, in his life, being on a long term exploration mission. As thrilling as the TOS period of his life was, I can only imagine how cool it would've been to see him & his crew in similar missions in what accounts to be two other different decades of their lives. They were already old looking once they took over the ENT-A. That's what I'm talking about. Geriatric dudes still out there finding new life & civilizations, because that's the only thing they were ever meant to do
I can settle for Kirk's Nexus fantasy being the woman he almost married, but why did it have to be a complete unknown like Antonia? There may have been likeness issues at play that prevented either character from being reused in the film but Carol Marcus or Edith Keeler would have made infinitely more sense as his dream woman he almost wed other than a person we'd never even heard of before this film. Even Janet Wallace, since the two seemed to have a lingering affection for one another when they were reunited aboard the Enterprise in "The Deadly Years(TOS)."
Agreed that that would have been the perfect fantasy for Kirk. Maybe a youthful Kirk aboard the original Enterprise with his main crew and all the people who had died during TOS. Gary Mitchell, Commodore Decker, that girl who was turned into the hexagon thing, etc.Generations would have been much more interesting with this.
This also would have been better but the movie was written by people who didn't care for TOS so why would they bother. They had Shatner to appease so they put horses in it instead of relating it to TOS.
I sort of see him in a Nexus half-way house in the 60s with Nexus- fantasy Edith being visited by various crew members from TOS - Anyway thats my fan-fiction take on the whole thing.
It would have even been better if they'd given Antonia 5 minutes screen time - someone who we could relate to. Instead Kirk sounded like he was a bit hen-pecked by Antonia in GEN.
The J.M. Dillard novelization for the film actually has Kirk's Nexus reality feature friends, loved ones and crewmembers he'd lost over the decades, including Gary Mitchell, David and others who'd died under or during his command. The scene that Dillard weaves for the reader is a lot more impressive than what the actual movie gave us.
With Rogue One-Leia-style original character image editing. Antonia et al. could be his rec deck fantasy, adding another layer of fantasy within fantasy.
That's not entirely fair. Ron Moore is on record as being a huge fan of TOS. Brannon Braga, not so much, but he learned a lot about it on the job. Moore has said that when he first came up with the notion of Kirk dying in the film, he sank into a chair and said, "I just killed my childhood hero."
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He can be on record as saying he's a huge fan of TOS but that doesn't mean he wrote its characters well. Its not just that Kirk dies but its the way it happens. Substituting Scotty and Chekov for Spock and McCoy without bothering to change their lines...
I understand its supposed to be all about Picard but just say "No" to Kirk being in the movie if you are to lazy to do it properly.
OTOH, it's true to pattern that Kirk would have a new flame here, especially if it's a new old flame (new to us, old to Kirk). Pining for lost love would be atypical for our hero. And it's not as if the interchangeable woman here actually means much to Kirk, who clearly prefers horseplay.
That's what rings true of the Nexus thing - that it doesn't ring true. Kirk can have everything, and tries out everything, instead of getting stuck with something approximating reality. Standing on the bridge of his familiar starship would be the last thing in his mind when it's all about exploring the truly unknown. And finding out that the unknown is no fun after all is a revelation worth out attention and time.
I always thought the Kirk stuff in ST:GEN was fine. Having him die saving even less than he actually did would have been even better (not to mention more heroic), but the sort of not-for-the-history-books end we got was good already. Picard's arc was enjoyable, too; what I didn't care so much for was Data's.
In any case, Kirk being lost should be part and parcel of any reproduction of his movie era years. This is where Nexus does well!
Timo Saloniemi
That's what rings true of the Nexus thing - that it doesn't ring true. Kirk can have everything, and tries out everything, instead of getting stuck with something approximating reality. Standing on the bridge of his familiar starship would be the last thing in his mind when it's all about exploring the truly unknown. And finding out that the unknown is no fun after all is a revelation worth out attention and time.
I always thought the Kirk stuff in ST:GEN was fine. Having him die saving even less than he actually did would have been even better (not to mention more heroic), but the sort of not-for-the-history-books end we got was good already. Picard's arc was enjoyable, too; what I didn't care so much for was Data's.
In any case, Kirk being lost should be part and parcel of any reproduction of his movie era years. This is where Nexus does well!
Timo Saloniemi
What?
Kirk said he lived the same day over again. The movie said nothing about him trying out all his fantasies . That might have made the Nexus a bit more like Gunian described - fulfilling your greatest fantasies so that you'd never want to leave.
Kirk's only fantasy shown was cooking breakfast and chopping wood. Does that make the Nexus seem desirable?
Umm, no. He never said anything like that.
What may be confusing is the fact that he had only spent a few minutes in the Nexus by the time Picard got there, decades later. But Kirk never experienced any recurring days, not to our knowledge. He just experienced the wood-chopping, the cooking, and the going to Antonia (one moment of his past), and the horseplay (another moment).
Perhaps eventually Kirk would have tried out a day at the office (starship bridge). But apparently he wanted to try out other things first.
Timo Saloniemi
The problem with the movie is that they showed us tedious fantasies for Kirk.
Picard's was fairly humdrum as well though understandable considering his recent loss.
They did it a lot better in the Cage where they showed us an array of Pike's and Vina's fantasies. You can guess that Kirk may have had more interesting things to do but we never saw him do them and the Nexus was made out to be so wonderful that you would never leave voluntarily. Kirk and Picard had very little trouble leaving the Nexus and I could see why.
And I concede that some people's ultimate fantasy might be riding horses all day especially when they feed and look after themselves. However as a movie audience member I just don't think the Nexus was as good as it was a made out to be. It was as exciting as watching Kirk reading a book or going fishing.
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