Where does the time go?

[T'Girl]

UHURA:
The strangest thing. I was in the long-range sensor lab...
I was tracking solar systems and I picked up an emergency transmission.
From a Klingon prison planet.
A Klingon armada was destroyed.
Forty-seven ships.

CHEKOV:
May I have your attention, please.
At twenty-two hundred hours, telemetry detected at an anomaly in the neutral zone.
What appeared to be a lightning storm in space.
Soon after, Starfleet received a distress signal from Vulcan High Command
that their planet was experiencing seismic activity.
Our mission is to assess the condition of Vulcan, and to assist in the evacuations if necessary.
We should be arriving at Vulcan within three minutes. Thank you for your time.

Kirk:
That same anomaly, a lightning storm in space that we saw today, also occurred on the day of my birth.
Before a Romulan ship attacked the USS Kelvin. (to Pike) You know that, sir, I read your dissertation.
That ship which had formidable and advanced weaponry was never seen or heard from again.
The Kelvin attack to place on the edge of Klingon space and at twenty-three hundred hours last night,
there was an attack.
Forty-seven Klingon warbirds destroyed by a Romulan, sir.
It was reported that the Romulans were in one ship, one massive ship.

PIKE:
And you know of this Klingon attack how?

UHURA:
Sir, I intercepted and translated the message myself. Kirk's report is accurate.

------

Kirk didn't say 2300 hrs "San Fransisco" time, just 2300 hrs. Suggesting that the time used on the Enterprise is the same as the time used in the long-range sensor lab cadet Uhura was in. Perhaps the entire fleet uses Headquarters/San Fransisco time.

From 2300 hrs the previous night, Uhura finish in the lab. Returned to her quarters. Kicked Kirk out. Kirk took the KM test. Reported to the Ethics board in his good uniform. Reported to the shuttles. Flew to the Enterprise. Time for all the cadets to report to their duty sections. Leave for Vulcan. Time for McCoy to change his uniform. Run to the bridge. Even if Kirk spoke to Pike on the bridge, just before shipboard midnight, that's less than 25 hours, busy day.

Chekov said the Starfleet received the distress signal from Vulcan High Command shortly after 2200 hrs, which would seem to have been before Kirk's appearance before the Ethic board. from that point it's less that 2 hours until Kirk spoke to Pike.

From Uhura's and Chekov's statements, and what we saw of the Narada's arrival, at 2300 hrs the previous night the Narada destroyed the Klingon armada. At 2200 hrs (23 hours later) Spock arrived from the future, it unknown where he emerged.

From the time Spock arrived at 2200 hrs, it was "soon" after that the Narada captured Spock's ship.
It was "Soon" after 2200 hrs that the Narada traveled from the emergence site to Vulcan.
It was "Soon" after 2200 hrs that Vulcan began to experience seismic activity.
It was "Soon" after 2200 hrs that Vulcan High Command decided to send a distress signal to Starfleet.

Kirk was speaking to Pike before 2400 hrs.

A busy day indeed. When Starfleet command receive the signal from Vulcan it should have taken several minutes to decide on a course of action, available ships and how they were going to crew them.

From the dialog elsewhere in the movie, it wouldn't seem that the Enterprise wouldn't be ready in a few minutes for a rapid deploy, she didn't even have a full crew complement assigned, hadn't been on her maiden voyage yet.

I can't help be wonder why Chekov's crew briefing included anything about the "lightning storm" in the neutral zone. It doesn't seem on the surface to have anything to do with the problem on Vulcan.

 

[F. King Daniel]

Speed of plot? (and Kirk lives life in the fast lane! )

The Neutral Zone is a long way from Vulcan (at least according to non-canon space maps), but I could imagine people perhaps linking a random anomaly on a quiet night (quiet aside from the destruction of a large Klingon fleet ) with a supposed natural disaster on Vulcan reported an hour or two later. It's not the first time in Star Trek that a space anomaly has affected a planet, or communications around a planet or that space phenomena have had effects light-years away (Excelsior, in Federation space being hit by an FTL shockwave from the destruction of a Klingon moon?)

 

[JarodRussell]

Not to mention that Kirk and Uhura went to sleep between her receiving the Klingon fleet signal and Kirk taking the Kobayashi Maru test. And then a couple of hours must have went into the investigation and announcing a public hearing.

 

[T'Girl]

Speed of plot? (and Kirk lives life in the fast lane! )

The Neutral Zone is a long way from Vulcan ... but I could imagine people perhaps linking a random anomaly on a quiet night ... with a supposed natural disaster on Vulcan reported an hour or two later

But it couldn't have been "an hour or two later," from the time Spock arrived until Vulcan realized and reported a problem.

From the terminology Kirk employed, in less than two hour from the time Spock emerged, the Enterprise was arriving in Vulcan orbit.

 

[I-Am-Zim]

Speed of plot? (and Kirk lives life in the fast lane! )

The Neutral Zone is a long way from Vulcan ... but I could imagine people perhaps linking a random anomaly on a quiet night ... with a supposed natural disaster on Vulcan reported an hour or two later

But it couldn't have been "an hour or two later," from the time Spock arrived until Vulcan realized and reported a problem.

From the terminology Kirk employed, in less than two hour from the time Spock emerged, the Enterprise was arriving in Vulcan orbit.

It's easy. The script simply wasn't "proof read" before it was shot. They weren't concerned with whether or not the timeframes made any sense. As long as the movie was action packed and fast paced to keep your attention, nothing else mattered.

 

[Amaris]

Speed of plot? (and Kirk lives life in the fast lane! )

The Neutral Zone is a long way from Vulcan ... but I could imagine people perhaps linking a random anomaly on a quiet night ... with a supposed natural disaster on Vulcan reported an hour or two later

But it couldn't have been "an hour or two later," from the time Spock arrived until Vulcan realized and reported a problem.

From the terminology Kirk employed, in less than two hour from the time Spock emerged, the Enterprise was arriving in Vulcan orbit.

It's easy. The script simply wasn't "proof read" before it was shot. They weren't concerned with whether or not the timeframes made any sense. As long as the movie was action packed and fast paced to keep your attention, nothing else mattered.

Link?

 

[Gaith]

Yeah, lots of the movie makes no sense whatsoever. Shouldn't it take several days to get to Vulcan from Earth? And if the Enterprise is the fastest ship in the fleet, why does it miss the entire Narada/fleet battle? It's like in Sith, when Anakin goes from Coruscant to the presumably rather isolated Mustafar overnight. (By the same token, the gang seems to get from Tatooine to the Alderaan system to Dantooine in the course of a single day in ANH.) The distances are just too big to accommodate most action plots, so they get chucked out at will.

To be fair, though, TOS did lots of the same thing, what with reaching the universal barrier in "WNMHGB" and the galactic core in TFF at the plot's convenience. Ditto with the NX-01 getting to Qo'Nos so quickly in "Broken Bow".

Bottom line is, do you enjoy the movie or not. If not, there's hundreds of more realistic (warp-wise) episodes out there.

 

[F. King Daniel]

There's no such thing as "realistic warp-wise". Those old warp speed formulas from technical manuals have never ever been reflected in TV/film Star Trek. There's far more evidence that warp speed is much faster than "warp factor cubed = multiple of lightspeed" than there is for it. Even if all that evidence is massively inconsistant (likeVoyager vs. STV)

Just sayin'

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

But it couldn't have been "an hour or two later," from the time Spock arrived until Vulcan realized and reported a problem.

From the terminology Kirk employed, in less than two hour from the time Spock emerged, the Enterprise was arriving in Vulcan orbit.

It's easy. The script simply wasn't "proof read" before it was shot. They weren't concerned with whether or not the timeframes made any sense. As long as the movie was action packed and fast paced to keep your attention, nothing else mattered.

Link?

J.J.: "We meant to proof read it but OMG there were lens flares and we got distracted.. man."

 

[Timo]

From Uhura's and Chekov's statements, and what we saw of the Narada's arrival, at 2300 hrs the previous night the Narada destroyed the Klingon armada. At 2200 hrs (23 hours later) Spock arrived from the future, it unknown where he emerged.

Why 23 hours later? Why not 1 hour earlier?

Remember that Uhura intercepted the message during local night, which would seem to coincide with our heroes' "2300 hours". Kirk faced the board in daylight, and ascended from San Francisco to orbit in daylight, and flew to Vulcan in what probably was a couple of hours only. Chekov would be fully within his rights to refer to "2200 hours" when speaking of the previous day's last hours, then, without having to specify "2200 hours yesterday" - the time would still be less than 2200 hours when Chekov spoke.

And really, it makes more sense for Spock to arrive before Nero's fight with the Klingons than after it. From capturing Spock, Nero would gain access to red matter. With red matter, Nero could execute his plan - he would have no incentive to start executing it (or jeopardizing it with fights against Klingon armadas) before that. And with red matter, Nero could wipe the floor with Klingons; without it, he'd probably lose to 47 warbirds, or 7-8 starships for that matter.

And if the Enterprise is the fastest ship in the fleet, why does it miss the entire Narada/fleet battle?

Nobody says she's the fastest ship in the fleet. And even if she were, this is her maiden voyage. The ship in ST:TMP did a pitiful warp 7 on her maiden voyage, because the new engines were untested and dangerous. Pike wouldn't risk overtasking the engines of the new Enterprise on what didn't sound like an urgent mission anyway - seven other ships were already available for handling the trouble at Vulcan.

To be fair, though, TOS did lots of the same thing, what with reaching the universal barrier in "WNMHGB"

Not really - our heroes already were at the galactic barrier when the episode started. They might have spent months or even years reaching that location for all we know.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[I-Am-Zim]

But it couldn't have been "an hour or two later," from the time Spock arrived until Vulcan realized and reported a problem.

From the terminology Kirk employed, in less than two hour from the time Spock emerged, the Enterprise was arriving in Vulcan orbit.

It's easy. The script simply wasn't "proof read" before it was shot. They weren't concerned with whether or not the timeframes made any sense. As long as the movie was action packed and fast paced to keep your attention, nothing else mattered.

Link?

Can't link to an opinion dude. Unless you want a direct link to my brain. And I don't think you wanna go in there. You might not make it out with your sanity intact.

 

[Dukhat]

It's easy. The script simply wasn't "proof read" before it was shot. They weren't concerned with whether or not the timeframes made any sense. As long as the movie was action packed and fast paced to keep your attention, nothing else mattered.

Link?

Can't link to an opinion dude. Unless you want a direct link to my brain. And I don't think you wanna go in there. You might not make it out with your sanity intact.

And since your opinion means nothing, then saying "The script simply wasn't "proof read" before it was shot" means nothing.

 

[Amaris]

It's easy. The script simply wasn't "proof read" before it was shot. They weren't concerned with whether or not the timeframes made any sense. As long as the movie was action packed and fast paced to keep your attention, nothing else mattered.

Link?

Can't link to an opinion dude. Unless you want a direct link to my brain. And I don't think you wanna go in there. You might not make it out with your sanity intact.

Well, since it's your opinion, yeah I wouldn't want to go in there, although I doubt anymore damage could be done to my sanity.

 

[Devon]

Link?

Can't link to an opinion dude. Unless you want a direct link to my brain. And I don't think you wanna go in there. You might not make it out with your sanity intact.

And since your opinion means nothing, then saying "The script simply wasn't "proof read" before it was shot" means nothing.

Exactly.

 

[Set Harth]

It's like in Sith, when Anakin goes from Coruscant to the presumably rather isolated Mustafar overnight. (By the same token, the gang seems to get from Tatooine to the Alderaan system to Dantooine in the course of a single day in ANH.)

Anakin's transit to Mustafar is not really a problem, in light of hyperspace speeds previously established by the other films. The potential problem in Sith is Palpatine's superfast transit to Mustafar, especially the way it's depicted in the novelization. The film itself is ambiguous regarding Palpatine's travel time ( the wipe used in the theatrical release was replaced by a straight cut for DVD, whatever that signifies ), but analysis of the script seems to imply that the trip did in fact take several hours.

The Neutral Zone is a long way from Vulcan (at least according to non-canon space maps)

Some have argued that Unification implies they are closer than we may have otherwise thought.

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

It's like in Sith, when Anakin goes from Coruscant to the presumably rather isolated Mustafar overnight. (By the same token, the gang seems to get from Tatooine to the Alderaan system to Dantooine in the course of a single day in ANH.)

Anakin's transit to Mustafar is not really a problem, in light of hyperspace speeds previously established by the other films. The potential problem in Sith is Palpatine's superfast transit to Mustafar, especially the way it's depicted in the novelization. The film itself is ambiguous regarding Palpatine's travel time ( the wipe used in the theatrical release was replaced by a straight cut for DVD, whatever that signifies ), but analysis of the script seems to imply that the trip did in fact take several hours.

Who wants wipes in Trek? I know I do.

 

[T'Girl]

Remember that Uhura intercepted the message during local night, which would seem to coincide with our heroes' "2300 hours". Kirk faced the board in daylight, and ascended from San Francisco to orbit in daylight, and flew to Vulcan in what probably was a couple of hours only. Chekov would be fully within his rights to refer to "2200 hours" when speaking of the previous day's last hours, then, without having to specify "2200 hours yesterday" - the time would still be less than 2200 hours when Chekov spoke.

The problem with this is, according to Chekov the distress signal from Vulcan High Command came "soon" after the 2200 hrs time, if 2200 hrs was yesterday, then the distress signal was also yesterday. Why would Starfleet sit on the signal? Also Admiral Barnett's anouncement during the hearing would seem to suggest that the signal was resent.

If the Narada was over Vulcan "soon" after 2200 hrs yesterday, then how could the Narada be destroy a Klingon armada at 2300 hrs yesterday?

Anakin's transit to Mustafar is not really a problem, in light of hyperspace speeds previously established by the other films. The potential problem in Sith is Palpatine's superfast transit to Mustafar,

This is fairly simple really.

Anakin travels to Mustafar taking (let's say) twelve hours, kills everyone.
Then
Padme and Kenobi travels to Mustafar (12 hrs) strangulation and lightsabers.
Then
The Emperor travels to Mustafar (12 hrs) collects Anakin.

All this work if Padme, Kenobi and then the Emperor all leave Coruscant before Anakin even arrives on Mustafar.

The narrative in the movie isn't completely linear.

 

[Timo]

The problem with this is, according to Chekov the distress signal from Vulcan High Command came "soon" after the 2200 hrs time

I'd allow for "soon" to mean "five or six hours later", especially if Chekov is
a) unsure of when this classified message actually arrived or
b) covering for the Vulcans who didn't react in a timely manner..

It may be that Starfleet reacted to the alarming Klingon/Romulan battle during the night already, sending the fleet to Laurentius, and put the Vulcan question on hold. When the Vulcan problem refused to go away and the fleet was now unavailable, the desperation measure of drafting the cadets was hesitantly taken during the mid-morning.

Note how the presiding Admiral seems to be immediately on top of the situation after hearing just a very brief whisper and glancing through a document of some sort. Perhaps he was fully aware that Vulcan was in trouble, and that some sort of action might have to be taken - and only received the expected confirmation that the action would be taken at that specific time?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[shapeshifter]

An inconsistency in a Trek story? Oh yeah, that's a totally new thing.

I remember one time Spock giving a speech about yet another "hardest substance in the universe" and going on to say how they will not be able to break it but then, in the next sentence says - "I'll phaser off a piece."

Given Treks track record at making these kinds of mistakes I sometimes wonder why a fanbase exists at all? We should all wonder what we see in this crap and just walk away.

 

[I-Am-Zim]

Link?

Can't link to an opinion dude. Unless you want a direct link to my brain. And I don't think you wanna go in there. You might not make it out with your sanity intact.

And since your opinion means nothing, then saying "The script simply wasn't "proof read" before it was shot" means nothing.

Since we're on the subject, if my opinion means nothing, then neither does yours or anyone else's. So why are you, I, or anyone else even here?