What was happening in the Laurentian System?

[M'Sharak]

There are no reasonable explanations for why Iowa becomes like the Sierra Nevada. <snip>

Whoa, slow down a moment - geographic accuracy check. While I'll readily concede that the Sierra Nevada looks nothing like Iowa, it also appears nowhere in the movie and furthermore bears not even the remotest resemblance to the fields in the vicinity of Bakersfield, Kern County, California.

On the other hand: What if... [shatner]What! If![/shatner] ... the quarry really was the size of the Grand Canyon, and it was in the Laurentian System? Not part of any planet or anything, but just this really, really big hole floating in open space? Made of granite or limestone or sandstone or solid neutronium—whatever, really. You could probably fit all of the absent Starfleet vessels in there... and detonate them. Pretty cool, huh?

 

[Nerys Myk]

There are no reasonable explanations for why Iowa becomes like the Sierra Nevada. <snip>

Whoa, slow down a moment - geographic accuracy check. While I'll readily concede that the Sierra Nevada looks nothing like Iowa, it also appears nowhere in the movie and furthermore bears not even the remotest resemblance to the fields in the vicinity of Bakersfield, Kern County, California.

Talk about geography fail.

I posted a link up thread of some lovely Iowa scenery and a screen shot from the film. While not an exact match,close enough for Hollywood.

 

[Ovation]

Geography fail is hardly the only "fail" at work in those posts.

 

[Tarek71]

i'm surprised no one has excused the deep cliffs and "desert" as a remnant from the Xindi weapon attack. (Yes, I know they attacked Florida...but hey -- why not stretch things out?)

Well that's what I mean. If someone is willing to say that Riverside, IA was made to look like Bakersfield CA by a nuke being dropped on it, the Xindi, or the Third World War, then it obviously becomes pointless to argue what a bad stand in it was. From a production point of view, they were trying to make it look like Iowa, not Iowa from a post Apocalyptic Terminator movie. Just Iowa. But nevermind all that, they dropped a nuke on Riverside!

And regarding the Narada -- I don't have a problem with Nero being captured and imprisoned -- it's the ship I have a problem with. Because there ain't no way the ship wouldn't be taken over by Klingons.

I think the idea is that the Narada was sufficiently crippled by being rammed by the Kelvin that it was not in a condition to fight off a Klingon attack.

 

[Tarek71]

Geography fail is hardly the only "fail" at work in those posts.

Except that you couldn't name any. At least not ones that weren't easily shot down.

 

[Tarek71]

Whoa, slow down a moment - geographic accuracy check. While I'll readily concede that the Sierra Nevada looks nothing like Iowa, it also appears nowhere in the movie and furthermore bears not even the remotest resemblance to the fields in the vicinity of Bakersfield, Kern County, California.

Oh contraire! Bakersfield sits by the southern edge of the Sierra Nevada at the Southern tip of the San Joaquin Valley. Yes, when you see shots of the wider vista they did do a good job removing the mountains you would see from there. But otherwise that is where you are. Nothing remotely like Riverside Iowa. They are in a desert, and while the peaks are gone, it still looks like that area, NOT Iowa. They should have added the Iowa countryside, but they didn't.

But nevermind, a nuke was dropped by the Xindi or Khan, or somebody, and now it looks like California. Problem solved!

 

[Ovation]

Geography fail is hardly the only "fail" at work in those posts.

Except that you couldn't name any. At least not ones that weren't easily shot down.

Keep on believing that if it helps you sleep at night.

 

[Franklin]

I think part of it here is that Iowans (even me) can get a little defensive about presentations of the state as flat as a pool table and bleak. But the thing is, some parts are, including the area of southeastern Iowa around Riverside. I thought the Bakersfield area plus the CGI they added was a darn good approximation of that part of the state all things considered.

Heck, to shoot in Washington County (Riverside), they'd have to have flown the actors and an entire secondary film crew to Cedar Rapids or Des Moines. Cedar Rapids is 40 miles away from Riverside. Des Moines is 125 miles away. A decent proxy, the Bakersfield area sits just over 100 miles from LA, for crying out loud. For three minutes of film, which area seems to be the more economical and efficient area to shoot in? Plus, at the time, Iowa offered no tax incentives for studios to shoot in the state, so there's nothing to defray the costs of extreme accuracy.

Now I would've at least face-palmed if I saw that scene and the shipyard was supposed to be located in the Dubuque or Dyersville ("Field of Dreams") area in northeastern Iowa, or anywhere around the Loess Hills running through western Iowa (ancient wind-deposited dirt hills; the only larger ones are in China), or a few other places in the state that are very hilly, because that would've been a lazy and stereotypical presentation of the state. As it is, Kirk just happens to be from a very flat and boring part of the state. Easy to replicate on the cheap.

 

[M'Sharak]

I think part of it here is that Iowans (even me) can get a little defensive about presentations of the state as flat as a pool table and bleak. But the thing is, some parts are, including the area of southeastern Iowa around Riverside. I thought the Bakersfield area plus the CGI they added was a darn good approximation of that part of the state all things considered.

Just for fun, I had Google Maps put me on the ground in a spot which is just over the line into Johnson County, but less than ten miles southeast of Riverside. Without any labels, I wouldn't be able to easily tell it apart from a lot of places in the southern San Joaquin Valley, including the one (standing in for South Dakota) where Cary Grant was busy getting cropdusted in North by Northwest.

 

[Ithekro]

Looks about like any road around Brentwood or Stockton, California.

 

[YellowSubmarine]

On the other hand: What if... [shatner]What! If![/shatner] ... the quarry really was the size of the Grand Canyon, and it was in the Laurentian System? Not part of any planet or anything, but just this really, really big hole floating in open space? Made of granite or limestone or sandstone or solid neutronium—whatever, really. You could probably fit all of the absent Starfleet vessels in there... and detonate them. Pretty cool, huh?

Holy smokes. They accidentally the entire scene in the Laurentian System instead of Iowa? And that is like only two decades after Winona accidentally gave birth at Federation-Klingon border instead of Iowa? Talk about an unprecedented mix up in geography. Epic fail. Perhaps the right amount of epic to consolidate the ever-changing warp speeds. At this point the only possible way to explain how Voyager had to travel whole eight decades at warp 9.975 is if the Delta Quadrant is actually in Iowa.

How can we even be sure Kirk was born on Federation soil? His mum says 75 thousand klicks from Klingon space, but do we take her word for it? A military ship might constitute Federation territory, but you'd have to be Captain Rubau to admit having crossed into the neutral zone with one. For all we know, it took place in the Laurentian system, and George had an affair and it wasn't her child.

Don't you think Kirk was oddly nervous when he told Dr. Taylor that he was born in Iowa after she called him on his space birth? You could tell she wasn't buying his story there at all... Coincidence?

 

[Ithekro]

Well they found the Seaquest in Iowa.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Whoa, slow down a moment - geographic accuracy check. While I'll readily concede that the Sierra Nevada looks nothing like Iowa, it also appears nowhere in the movie and furthermore bears not even the remotest resemblance to the fields in the vicinity of Bakersfield, Kern County, California.

Oh contraire! Bakersfield sits by the southern edge of the Sierra Nevada at the Southern tip of the San Joaquin Valley. Yes, when you see shots of the wider vista they did do a good job removing the mountains you would see from there. But otherwise that is where you are. Nothing remotely like Riverside Iowa. They are in a desert, and while the peaks are gone, it still looks like that area, NOT Iowa. They should have added the Iowa countryside, but they didn't.

But nevermind, a nuke was dropped by the Xindi or Khan, or somebody, and now it looks like California. Problem solved!

Sitting at the southern edge of the Sierra Nevada doesn't making it in the Sierra Nevada. I live in the Sierra Nevada, folks in the San Joaquin Valley are flatlanders

A desert that was transformed into the fourth most productive agricultural region the USA. The road Kirk drives down isn't crossing a desert, it cuts through famland. The landscape gets bleak as he gets gets closer to the quarry. But its not all sand, rock and cacti.

Just for fun, I had Google Maps put me on the ground in a spot which is just over the line into Johnson County, but less than ten miles southeast of Riverside. Without any labels, I wouldn't be able to easily tell it apart from a lot of places in the southern San Joaquin Valley, including the one (standing in for South Dakota) where Cary Grant was busy getting cropdusted in North by Northwest

Guy who directed that was an unprofessional hack.

 

[Nebusj]

I think part of it here is that Iowans (even me) can get a little defensive about presentations of the state as flat as a pool table and bleak. But the thing is, some parts are, including the area of southeastern Iowa around Riverside. I thought the Bakersfield area plus the CGI they added was a darn good approximation of that part of the state all things considered.

Well, I confess that I am not an expert on the geography of Iowa, but I am willing to suspend my disbelief far enough to believe that two and a half centuries into the future, Iowa could possibly have quarries somewhat larger than it has today, as well as roads. I've just got that much confidence in the state's future.