Where was the Enterprise during the Dominion War?

[arch101]

One of the biggest missed opportunities in the history of the franchise. The 3rd TNG film, which took place during the war, SHOULD have been a war film. Heck, they could have tied DS9 into it to help the TV show's ratings. The first X-Files film did exactly this- brought the continuing TV story to a bigger, more lavish venue in order to get more viewers the following season.

 

[Cap'n Spots]

Wasn't their ship being repaired after the first or second movie? I just assumed they were busy with that or didn't want to risk such a valuable ship.

 

[Bossplaya]

Farting around a low budget movie (Insurrection) that did not do the Dominion War justice because those who ran Star Trek at the time didn't want to validate anything happening on DS9. No problem validating Voyager with Janeway as an admiral. They even did a Federation values challenged under a desperate war thing in the most nondescript way imaginable so I can only think that they just didn't want to show a story with the necessary scope to actually pull it off. That would have meant spending actual money.

 

[Damian]

One of the biggest missed opportunities in the history of the franchise. The 3rd TNG film, which took place during the war, SHOULD have been a war film. Heck, they could have tied DS9 into it to help the TV show's ratings. The first X-Files film did exactly this- brought the continuing TV story to a bigger, more lavish venue in order to get more viewers the following season.

There should have been more than a single line that the Federation diplomats are "tied up with Dominion negotiations".

The only other line that might refer to the war in Insurrection was at the end when Picard tells Anij that he cannot abandon the Federation to those that would destroy it (or something to that effect). On the one hand he might be referring to his earlier line about slowing down the Federation Council. But you could also reasonable infer he might be referring to the ongoing war and the Dominion wanting to destroy the Federation.

But Hell, Nemesis had more lines about the Dominion War and the war was over about 3 years by that point.

I think the fear was that they didn't want to make a movie that required viewers to be familiar with Deep Space Nine. Movies try to appeal to a larger audience. And according to what I read about Insurrection, they intentionally wanted to make a more 'light-hearted' film after First Contact (a la TVH after TWOK and TSFS).

Now I can understand them not wanting to make a movie that required the viewers to have to be familiar with another show to make sense and enjoy the movie. BUT, that being said, there are ways to write and make a movie that straddles both sides. A story where knowledge of what is going on within Deep Space Nine is not necessary, but is still part of that larger universe.

As far as the latter, the wanting a more 'light-hearted' film after FC, I don't totally oppose that idea in general. It did work well for TVH and I always thought that film was a needed breather film after the heady TWOK and TSFS--and it happened to be well made I thought. The huge problem is that THERE IS A MAJOR WAR GOING ON AT THE TIME. The Enterprise is still the flagship of Starfleet I believe. Now the Enterprise was technically not supposed to be in the Briar Patch---but I find it completely ridiculous that during a major war, where the Federation's future is in mortal danger (I think we can infer the Dominion War dwarfs the previous Cardassian conflict) that the flagship of Starfleet was going on an archaeological dig. It seems utterly ridiculous to me.

At the very least, it would have been nice to see a teaser battle between the Enterprise and a Jem-Hadar warship. And it would have been nice is the story of Insurrection was somewhere tied to the war in some fashion. Maybe there would still be a way to make it more 'light-hearted' and still be tied to the conflict.

Insurrection---I'll watch it from time to time, usually during a movie series rewatch. Made during the TV series, it'd probably be fine. But that's part of the problem. It doesn't feel like a movie.

 

[Damian]

It's implied that Insurrection takes place after the surrender of the Dominion

Insurrection takes place in 2375, within the 7th season of Deep Space Nine. If I read the timeline correctly it takes place before the Breen enter the war.

 

[Timo]

The movie itself offers no hints whatsoever on when it might be taking place, except for things like "after the previous one" or "after the Federation first learned of there being a thing called Dominion" or "after they learned about Ketracel White". There's no year, no stardate, no reference to passage of time since event X, and no direct mention of a "war" of any sort.

The two concurrent Trek shows, DS9 and VOY, offer no hints, either. "In Purgatory's Shadow" has Sisko mentioning the recent Borg activity, which sorta kinda perhaps fits ST:FC and suggests ST:INS would be later. Otherwise, there's no particular slot that would be more amenable to Worf taking a brief leave (or outsystem assignment) than another - although the longest stretch of absence would probably be around "Paper Moon", it's actually needlessly long for the needs of ST:INS.

So it's pure conjecture: are all our TNG heroes cowards and traitors for practicing archaeology in the middle of the war, and does Worf join them in the betrayal by abandoning his at least slighty warlike task (which we never really learn of since his explaining it is humorously hidden behind other lines) - or does Starfleet really think that keeping the E-E from fighting at all is the patriotic thing to do (perhaps exactly because Picard is a known traitor to all mankind)? Or might it be that the time for alliance-building diplomacy (and archaeology) comes after the war is won?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Prax]

No problem validating Voyager with Janeway as an admiral.

Well that was a different movie. Also, not including The Motion Picture, all of the movies were smaller budget films prior ST09, which was like the first Trek big budget blockbuster.

Insurrection takes place in 2375, within the 7th season of Deep Space Nine. If I read the timeline correctly it takes place before the Breen enter the war.

They mention the Dominion several times as if the war was over. Perhaps it takes place right around the very end of DS9, after the surrender but before the official closure.

In Purgatory's Shadow" has Sisko mentioning the recent Borg activity, which sorta kinda perhaps fits ST:FC

FC offers a stardate, so it's known exactly when those events take place. Plus FC was written by a DS9 and a Voyager writer, and the events of the film are mentioned in both shows.

 

[Timo]

...How much time passes during "What You Leave Behind" is indeed quite a question. Perhaps the movie fits in there somehow?

- After Cardassia falls and Garak concludes that "we live in uncertain times", the action jumps to the formal surrender. But in the meantime, Dukat and Winn are in the Firecaves, Dukat being dead and Winn being possessed and immortal. Perhaps neither would notice if a few months passed?
- A further jump might take place between the surrender ceremony and the following scene where Worf agrees to become Ambassador. Dukat is still dead and Winn is still possessed.
- The same night, Dukat gets resurrected and The Sisko feels compelled to intervene. The action then peaks and ceases, and we jump again to concluding ceremonies in which the heroes, including Worf, pack up and leave. How much time between The Sisko ascending to the Plain Plane, and Worf leaving? Well, Nog has been recently promoted to Lieutenant, on the recommendation of the late Sisko - but did that happen overnight, or after three weeks of paperwork plus four more weeks of leave while Nog sorts out affairs back home?

Any and all of the slots could be long enough to allow Worf to have his ST:INS adventure. The early slots, with Winn just sitting in that cave for the whole time, aren't all that appealing, though. The third jump is fine if we do want to insist that Worf ultimately becomes Ambassador after all. But the next movie makes no reference to Worf having been one! Perhaps he just grew a spine and told Martok "No can do"?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Damian]

They mention the Dominion several times as if the war was over. Perhaps it takes place right around the very end of DS9, after the surrender but before the official closure.

How much time passes during "What You Leave Behind" is indeed quite a question. Perhaps the movie fits in there somehow?

There's one major problem with assuming Insurrection takes place sometime after DS9. The film was released 12/1998 and the episode "What You Leave Behind" did not air until 06/1999. The film was obviously written several months before 12/1998 as films go through months of filming and editing before they are released.

The writers of Insurrection would have no way of knowing how the Dominion War would conclude at the point the film was written, esp. since how DS9 would end had not likely not even been conceived yet. TV episodes don't have to be written as far in advance as a film would. I mean, for that theory to work, Piller and Berman would have had to have known how DS9 and the Dominion War ends at least a year prior to the last episode airing. I find that highly unlikely.

When Insurrection was released, on DS9 the war was still raging heavily.

 

[Trekkie27]

I take the position that the Enterprise was involved, but, aside from a few non-canon novels and some insinuations, the story has not been told, and, for the sake of completeness, it should be.

 

[Timo]

There's one major problem with assuming Insurrection takes place sometime after DS9. The film was released 12/1998 and the episode "What You Leave Behind" did not air until 06/1999. The film was obviously written several months before 12/1998 as films go through months of filming and editing before they are released.

Why should this be a problem? DSC was written half a century after TOS. The failure of DSC to, say, "conclude Spock's story" did not much impact the writing of TOS. OTOH, the writing of TOS was source material for DSC, despite the newer show's events taking place earlier in the fictional universe. Fiction is flexible that way.

Piller and Berman would have had to have known how DS9 and the Dominion War ends at least a year prior to the last episode airing.

...Why?

How the war ended had zero impact on ST:INS. The movie was not obligated to tell any specifics, and never did. The two things we can infer from the movie, and the writers could assume, would have been that the UFP and Worf would not have died yet. Only the latter involved any sort of real betting, and

a) I doubt Dorn would have gotten himself kicked out of the show by shouting "I was in the movie, Worf is immortal, you can't refuse my raise!" or by meekly agreeing to die at the writers' whim (I mean, Worf is immortal, explicitly appearing in most of the futures shown in Star Trek), and
b) the writers betting wrong would not depend on whether the war was over or not anyway: if Worf could die, he could die in any DS9 episode, in the middle of the war, after the war, in a time travel adventure before the war...

When Insurrection was released, on DS9 the war was still raging heavily.

And conversely, when the Borg invaded Earth in ST:FC, on DS9 nobody noticed much. This is neither a contradiction nor a problem.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Damian]

Why should this be a problem? DSC was written half a century after TOS. The failure of DSC to, say, "conclude Spock's story" did not much impact the writing of TOS. OTOH, the writing of TOS was source material for DSC, despite the newer show's events taking place earlier in the fictional universe. Fiction is flexible that way.



...Why?

How the war ended had zero impact on ST:INS. The movie was not obligated to tell any specifics, and never did. The two things we can infer from the movie, and the writers could assume, would have been that the UFP and Worf would not have died yet. Only the latter involved any sort of real betting, and

a) I doubt Dorn would have gotten himself kicked out of the show by shouting "I was in the movie, Worf is immortal, you can't refuse my raise!" or by meekly agreeing to die at the writers' whim (I mean, Worf is immortal, explicitly appearing in most of the futures shown in Star Trek), and
b) the writers betting wrong would not depend on whether the war was over or not anyway: if Worf could die, he could die in any DS9 episode, in the middle of the war, after the war, in a time travel adventure before the war...



And conversely, when the Borg invaded Earth in ST:FC, on DS9 nobody noticed much. This is neither a contradiction nor a problem.

Timo Saloniemi

I was simply responding to a comment about why I don't believe the war was over before Insurrection. I happen to believe the movie took place within the early to mid part of the 7th season of DS9 (when the film was released). I don't believe the writers intended to place the movie in the 'future' of the then existing Star Trek universe. The Berman Star Trek films usually took place whenever the then existing Star Trek universe was. For instance, Generations took place within what would have been the 8th season of TNG, after DS9 "The Search" and during the first season of Voyager, FC took place 2 years later during the 5th season of DS9 and 3rd season of Voyager and Nemesis took place 4 years after Insurrection and 2 years after the conclusion of Voyager. And those are the number of years between the various films.

Insurrection doesn't give us a stardate to work with, but as the other 3 TNG films all take place the number of years between films (FC is 2 years post Generations and Nemesis is 6 years post FC--based on the Stardates and what is going on in the other shows at the same time) it's reasonable to assume Insurrection is 2 years post FC since it was released 2 years later and 4 years pre-Nemesis based on that being released 4 years later.

Memory-Alpha goes with that idea and places Insurrection in 2375.

And the Rick Berman era shows and movies didn't do tricky things with time...making episodes or shows in the future of where they were and going back (outside you're obvious time travel stories). For example, during the Berman era, an episode or movie that is made a year after a previous episode or movie takes place a year after that. Or put another way a year in real time basically equals a year of in story time. So since Insurrection was released during the early to mid part of the 7th season of DS9, it's reasonable to assume that's the timeframe the movie takes place in 'in-universe'. That's the way the Berman era generally worked.

 

[Timo]

Fair enough, if this causes no in-universe problems. However, in this case, it would seem to do exactly that, making deserters of our heroes who refuse to have anything to do with the war.

Writer intent that is not explicit on screen is often a complication we're better off without. Here I feel ST:INS is one of those cases, a problem that is no problem unless we make it one. After all, we are under no obligation to think that airdate would be relevant to in-universe passage of time - the time for that came and went when ST:TMP was written under the fan assumption that airdate plus three centuries gives the date of the fictional event (something that did not yet affect TOS writing, even if it tainted later assumptions about TOS, and failed to affect any later writing, too).

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Damian]

Fair enough, if this causes no in-universe problems. However, in this case, it would seem to do exactly that, making deserters of our heroes who refuse to have anything to do with the war.

Well, not really. They weren't headed for an archaeological dig because they refused to fight in the war. Those were their orders from Starfleet. So if it's anyone that's at fault it's whatever idiot admiral that gave them orders to go on a dig during warfare.

The only other thing I could think of is maybe the archaeological expedition they were going on had something to do with the war effort. We really know nothing about what that was--it was just mentioned as where they were supposed to be instead of the Briar Patch. It's possible they were headed there to look for something that may have aided the war effort in some way. To be honest I never gave that angle much thought.

I always blamed the writers for writing in that the Enterprise was going on an archaeological expedition in the middle of a war.

 

[Timo]

And I don't, because there veibg no war is so much more convenient.

Picard and Riker really are deserting in spirit if they not only don't fight their orders to stay out of the fight (they did that very thibg in the previous movie already!) but further explain that instead of diplo acy or archaeology, they would prefer being sent to explore. So if that dig has strategic value, the heroes again act unheroic about that.

Of course, sendi g Picard should be separate from sending the E-E. If the ship is best used for supporting archaeological digs, then her absence from DS9 adventures is explained then and there already...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Damian]

But then why were there any negotiations going on with the Dominion if the war was over. You don't negotiate to end a war if the war is already over. We know from DS9 that there were negotiations going back to at least the 6th season.

Plus I just have a hard time buying that in every other Berman era production the time period of a particular show or movie takes place in is during whatever is going on in the rest of the Star Trek universe in general....except this one time with Insurrection. That Insurrection takes place almost a year later from what was then occurring in the Star Trek universe in DS9 and Voyager. That's not the way Berman era Trek worked. It was all one single continuity proceeding a pace of one another at the same time.

For me it was just a poorly timed story. They probably could have kept the general outline even if they wanted to keep the general parameters and just changed some of the specifics. They could have tied it even in general terms to what was going on in the war.

And I always took Picard's line about not abandoning the Federation to people that would destroy it to just more than 'slowing things down on the Council'. A bit of a hidden reference to the ongoing war. It makes sense in context of the war. This was a war like none the Federation had faced before. Second only to the Borg, the Dominion seemed the gravest threat the Federation had ever faced up to that point. The Federation was fighting for it's very survival. Taken in that context Picard's line makes a lot of sense.

 

[Prax]

The villain's line about the Federation being "old and dying makes sense only as maybe a metaphor for himself. He mentions various attempted conquests of the Borg, the Cardassians, and the Dominion, and says that they tried to do this because the sense the Federation to be weak and ripe for a new order. The Borg attempted to assimilate the Federation for exactly the opposite reason. The Dominion tried because it's their purpose to conquer all solids. They also planned to conquer everyone else. The Cardassians joined the Dominion because they themselves were weak. And of course, we know the Federation exists for at least a millennium. Someone needs to educate the Sona.

 

[thribs]

Saving Ro and destroying a artificial wormhole.

 

[F. King Daniel]

Insurrection takes place in 2375, within the 7th season of Deep Space Nine. If I read the timeline correctly it takes place before the Breen enter the war.

There's mention of someone being tied up with "Dominion negotiations" which surely means after the war?

What would you negotiate during open warfare?

 

[Tenacity]

What would you negotiate during open warfare?

A end to open warfare?