What happens between V and VI?

[Agent Richard07]

I realized that there are only four consecutive lines in the film that even mention the center of the galaxy as their destination, and it's easy enough to just ignore those few seconds and pretend the Great Barrier is somewhere much closer.

Someone here suggested that the Enterprise and the Klingon ship travelled through some sort of conduit or area of space that allowed them to get to the center quickly. Of course that explanation does raise other questions, such as why such a conduit wasn't used regularly in the 24th century. Maybe it was set up temporarily by the being at the center and collapsed at some point. Who knows.

Or maybe "the Center of the Galaxy" is a poetic Vulcan name for some cosmic formation that's relatively nearby.

That works too.

 

[Therin of Andor]

The Captain Sulu Adventures audiobooks Cacophony by a pseudonymous Peter David

Didn't Peter David deny being "JJ Molloy"?

 

[LibraryComputer]

Someone wrote a better script.

 

[Whofan]

The STV novel, from what I recall, says they used modified shields to get through the barrier-don't think that made the trip faster though...

 

[Shon T'Hara]

I used to do that, but I've changed my mind. I realized that there are only four consecutive lines in the film that even mention the center of the galaxy as their destination, and it's easy enough to just ignore those few seconds and pretend the Great Barrier is somewhere much closer. Or maybe "the Center of the Galaxy" is a poetic Vulcan name for some cosmic formation that's relatively nearby.

There's still the issue of "Sarek" (TNG episode, not the novel) which states that Perrin is Sarek's second wife. I've always assumed that's an official decanonization of TFF since the alternative is that Sybok's a bastard.

[quoteMy other dealbreaker issue with TFF was the scene of a photon torpedo hitting just meters away from Our Heroes and doing them no harm, even though it's supposed to be a more powerful weapon than a nuclear warhead. But if I'm glossing over details for the sake of accepting the whole, I can just pretend the torpedo burrowed deep underground before going off, or that most of the energy was absorbed or neutralized by the "God" entity somehow.
[/QUOTE]

Well, we know the ship's phaser battery can be set for stun, so maybe the torpedoes have variable yields.

 

[Christopher]

There's still the issue of "Sarek" (TNG episode, not the novel) which states that Perrin is Sarek's second wife. I've always assumed that's an official decanonization of TFF since the alternative is that Sybok's a bastard.

All we have is Picard's log entry referring to Sarek's "first wife" as being from Earth. All that proves is that Picard believed at the time of that log entry that Amanda was Sarek's first wife. Picard's belief could easily have been in error. Given that Sarek had disowned Sybok and that hardly anyone, not even Spock's closest friends, knew that Sybok even existed, it's likely that the general public is unaware that Sarek had a mate before Amanda.

For that matter, we know nothing about Sybok's mother except that she was "a Vulcan princess." It was never stated that she and Sarek were actually married, just that they bore a child together. Even among Vulcans, it is no doubt possible to bear children out of wedlock. Or perhaps their marriage was dissolved in a manner analogous to annulment, in which case it would officially have never existed.

Well, we know the ship's phaser battery can be set for stun, so maybe the torpedoes have variable yields.

Yeah, but what's even the point of reducing the yield of an antimatter warhead to that of an old-style artillery shell? Why would Kirk think such a low yield would be effective at all against such a powerful entity?

 

[Xerxes1979]

The Enterprise-A probably was the defacto academy training ship. This would explain three captain ranked officers on board for one.

Its appearence is what the original would have been had Starfleet Commander Morrow signed off on another refit in ST:III.

The Connies were on their way out in any case. We have to assume the Excelsior was in series production by the lanuch of the Enterprise-B.

 

[Therin of Andor]

since the alternative is that Sybok's a bastard.

And many people would agree. What a bastard!

 

[James Cole]

There's still the issue of "Sarek" (TNG episode, not the novel) which states that Perrin is Sarek's second wife. I've always assumed that's an official decanonization of TFF since the alternative is that Sybok's a bastard.

All we have is Picard's log entry referring to Sarek's "first wife" as being from Earth. All that proves is that Picard believed at the time of that log entry that Amanda was Sarek's first wife. Picard's belief could easily have been in error. Given that Sarek had disowned Sybok and that hardly anyone, not even Spock's closest friends, knew that Sybok even existed, it's likely that the general public is unaware that Sarek had a mate before Amanda.

For that matter, we know nothing about Sybok's mother except that she was "a Vulcan princess." It was never stated that she and Sarek were actually married, just that they bore a child together. Even among Vulcans, it is no doubt possible to bear children out of wedlock. Or perhaps their marriage was dissolved in a manner analogous to annulment, in which case it would officially have never existed.

Exactly, plus Sarek would most likely have been betrothed as a child to another Vulcan.

 

[ClayinCA]

Which may have been chronicled in "Fearful Summons" by Denny Martin Flynn, IIRC.

Dear god, no! That book was dreadful - full of contradictions and complete mischaracterizations. Not only one of the worst Star Trek books I've ever read, but one of the worst books, period.

 

[Christopher]

^Basically the whole reason The Fearful Summons was written was so that Denny Martin Flinn could use the "Kirk reassembling the scattered crew" sequence that was cut from the opening of TUC. However, that was just a small part of the book, naturally.

 

[Timo]

On those two dealbreaker things in ST5:TFF... The references to the center of the galaxy in the movie are, happily enough, mainly on travel towards said center. Nothing in the plot really requires the heroes to go all the way and actually reach the center; all they have to achieve is get through the Great Barrier in that direction, and voilá.

That is, first Sybok says that Sha-Ka-Ree lies "beyond the Great Barrier at the center of the galaxy", and then our heroes argue that such a destination is ruled out because of the obstacle in the path. We can simply choose to interpret this as Sybok saying that the GB is a huge thing centered on the center (= "at the center") but extending to the immediate vicinity of our heroes. And Sha-Ka-Ree doesn't lie at the center, but merely beyond the GB. It's another case of the swallowed comma, to accompany "You are, Number Six"...

On the issue of the photon torpedo, a variable yield (carefully specified by Kirk in his lengthy off-camera dialogue with Sulu for the desired effect of knocking out God while not killing the heroes) in combination with precision aiming ought to help. On the latter issue, God's pillars emerged from underground; perhaps He Himself did, too, and the torpedo dove down a deep, deep hole?

Overall, the gap between 5 and 6 is an interesting one where much can happen; the gap between TMP and 2 ought to be much less interesting, as the point in 2 is that nothing much is happening and Kirk is bored out of his skull!

Timo Saloniemi

 

[T'Girl]

Exactly, plus Sarek would most likely have been betrothed as a child to another Vulcan.

And the girl child that young Sarek was bonded to could have been the Princess, people in the Roddenberry-verse conveniently fall into crevasses all the time. Or there could have been a different form of separation, freeing Sarek to wed Amanda.

Or Sarek had multiple spouses.

 

[Timo]

Not necessarily at the same time. If Picard is correct in that Sarek's first wife was a human, then perhaps Amanda was his third wife?

Sarek is about a hundred years old when standing next to his thirty-something son, after all. And this thirty-something son muses that his own first pon farr should have come and gone already. So what was Sarek doing between his first pon farr and the time he turned sixty-something and had Spock? (Or sixty'ish and had Sybok?) There's a gap of two decades at least (and more probably three) for him to be fertile and fill Vulcan, and no obviously logical reason for him not to do so.

Of course, Spock in ST5 only admits to having one step-brother. But he doesn't dwell on the issue of step-sisters, or possible childless marriages of his father's.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[T'Girl]

Prior to his first pon farr, Sarek could have married God knows how many females, had various affairs and even committed ritual sex with a princess of the planet Vulcan's royal family.

Plenty of time for pon farr later.

 

[Mr Silver]

Hey, who said anything about Vulcan's having to be on a Pon Farr cycle to have sex? It stand to reason that Vulcan's have a similar repoductive system to Human's and if that is really the case, then not all sexual encounters will result in pregnancy.

I've always seen Pon Farr as a 'must have sex' condition, which may or may not be the result of Vulcans supressing their emotions (perhaps a condition that their hormones create in order to balance things out?). I'm sure Vulcan's have non Pon Farr sex, especially if they are married to members of emotional species' (do you really think Amanda, as a Human female, could deal with only having sex at 7 year intervals?). And if Vulcan's decide they want to have children, then i'm sure they go ahead with the act, unless they are too prude for that and do it artificially.

I'm sure Vulcan's aren't strangers to birth control either. As we've seen in DS9, its protocol for Starfleet officers to recieve periodical birth control injections, unless they plan to start a family. Still, Vulcan women may not use birth control, Tuvok did mention that his family started as a result of him entering Pon Farr. Who knows how Vulcan's express affection to each other? We only know it from a Human and select other species' points of view (they have sex or 'make love')

 

[plynch]

Would it not be illogical to have sex other than to procreate? My assumption is that doing it for pleasure is too close to emotion for Vulcans.

Maybe it could serve a bonding function. That would bring NPFS (nonPonFarrsex) into the realm of logicalness.

 

[Christopher]

As we've seen in DS9, its protocol for Starfleet officers to recieve periodical birth control injections, unless they plan to start a family.

Uhh, well, DS9 did establish that Ben Sisko missed a monthly contraceptive injection and that Bashir, as his doctor, had reminded him of it. But there's no reason to extrapolate from those facts that it was some kind of Starfleet protocol rather than just something that sexually active 24th-century people in general would tend to do. I don't see Starfleet as the kind of organization that invades its officers' personal lives to that degree.

 

[JonnyQuest037]

When I first saw TUC in the theaters, I assumed that it took place about 10 years since the last movie. I think the 9000 Stardate and Kirk's little tuft of grey in front were what led me to that conclusion. In the Star Trek chronology I put together, I have it taking place about 10 years after TWOK.

 

[Epsilon-9]

What happened between? They had space warp factor 8 sex is what they did! That’s why they look so knackered in STAR TREK VI