Why is ST09's altered timeline a problem?

[JarodRussell]

The writers and/or producers had no confidence in the story, so they felt it was necessary to make Kirk Captain by the end of the movie. And it was another case where the characters were not developed naturally but only according to the franchise. "Everyone knows him as Captain Kirk! So no matter what he needs to be Captain by the end of this movie."

But I think the general audience couldn't care less about that. Would have made no difference had Kirk been promoted to Lieutenant only. Would that have changed anything else in that movie? No. Does the promotion in the last 5 minutes of the movie decide between 400 millions and box office bomb? No.

This movie is full of things that upset the hardcore fans but are irrelevant to the general audience. So I'm always asking myself why they felt the need to do these things.

 

[I-Am-Zim]

Really, STXI was pretty bad. But worse than "Battlefield Earth"? I think not. Sorry but there are worse movies out there than STXI.

 

[Shazam!]

He could have pointed out Spock's irrationality (and I suppose stupidity) by simply calmly pointing out that a. wherever they were going they should be doing it at warp already instead of limping bout at sublight speeds, and thus that Spock isn't thinking straight, and then b. that now the Narada is gone they should be able to contact the fleet by subspace radio, as opposed flying all the way to it, before telling them what's going on.

I thought it was weird how they didn't actually use McCoy here, and have him relieve Spock of command instead of having everyone idly standing by whilst two dudes have a fight in the middle of a crisis situation.

 

[Set Harth]

You must have missed where the transwarp beaming only comes after they've marooned Kirk down to the planet from which you can see Vulcan.

That doesn't mean they set out for the Laurentian system at sublight, a journey that would be expected to take many years. There was no indication of any kind that their warp drive was inoperative.

It's still faster than flying there all the way yourself.

How much faster? And how do we know messages weren't sent out?

Remember the Best of Both Worlds?

Remember what happened to the "Mars Defense Perimeter"?

The torpedos that were sent at the Borg cube as one part of the solar system defense systems, were the size of the Defiant.

Yet the Borg ship was not destroyed by Earth's defenses.

 

[Hartzilla2007]

It's still faster than flying there all the way yourself.

How much faster? And how do we know messages weren't sent out?

I don't know for sure but I think they said that their communications were damaged.

Remember the Best of Both Worlds?

Remember what happened to the "Mars Defense Perimeter"?

The torpedos that were sent at the Borg cube as one part of the solar system defense systems, were the size of the Defiant.

Yet the Borg ship was not destroyed by Earth's defenses.

Also Best of Both Worlds was in 2367, Nero's attack on earth was in 2258 so there is over 100 years between those events so Earth's defenses wouldn't have been as powerful as they were in the 24th century.

 

[Set Harth]

I don't know for sure but I think they said that their communications were damaged.

In that case Spock could presumably have stopped at any Federation outpost along the way and used their communication equipment.

 

[I-Am-Zim]

I don't know for sure but I think they said that their communications were damaged.

In that case Spock could presumably have stopped at any Federation outpost along the way and used their communication equipment.

Duh!!! Why didn't Spock just go to the outpost on NuDelta Hoth and use their communications to contact Starfleet? That would have worked just fine. But then they couldn't have used that rediculous transwarp beaming nonsense to get Scotty into the water pipes at the Wonka factory next to the brewery.

 

[3D Master]

You must have missed where the transwarp beaming only comes after they've marooned Kirk down to the planet from which you can see Vulcan.

That doesn't mean they set out for the Laurentian system at sublight, a journey that would be expected to take many years. There was no indication of any kind that their warp drive was inoperative.

A planet from which you can see Vulcan, and can see it clearly, is essentially in the same orbit as Vulcan. It'd be a moon, or a sister planet. Even going MERELY the speed of light, you reach our moon in 1.1 seconds, and it wouldn't take much longer to reach this planetary body from which you can see Vulcan. If they were at Warp a few mere seconds at FTL speeds they have left it far behind. It was minutes between starting to move and Kirk being sent down. At Warp, they would have already left the solar system, and thus, could NOT have put them on a planetary body, from which you see Vulcan, clearly and with the naked eye.

It's still faster than flying there all the way yourself.

How much faster? And how do we know messages weren't sent out?

Because nowhere is it stated that they went to do it. In fact, Kirk before he gets thrown off the ship, IIRC, demands that they contact Starfleet command to readdress their orders to rendez-vous with the fleet. Which more than heavily implies they haven't sent out any communication to anywhere. Or Starfleet Command or the fleet would have contacted them.

Remember the Best of Both Worlds?

Remember what happened to the "Mars Defense Perimeter"?

The torpedos that were sent at the Borg cube as one part of the solar system defense systems, were the size of the Defiant.

Yet the Borg ship was not destroyed by Earth's defenses.

Yeah, the BORG with their defenses and defense fields FULLY UP. Not a simple mining ship with its shields DOWN.

The torpedos that were sent at the Borg cube as one part of the solar system defense systems, were the size of the Defiant.

Yet the Borg ship was not destroyed by Earth's defenses.

See above.

Also Best of Both Worlds was in 2367, Nero's attack on earth was in 2258 so there is over 100 years between those events so Earth's defenses wouldn't have been as powerful as they were in the 24th century.

Relatively speaking, yes they would be.

 

[Hartzilla2007]

Also Best of Both Worlds was in 2367, Nero's attack on earth was in 2258 so there is over 100 years between those events so Earth's defenses wouldn't have been as powerful as they were in the 24th century.

Relatively speaking, yes they would be.

No they would not have been, that would be like saying the U.S. could intercept an attack from a Tanker modified for combat with missles in 1910.

 

[I-Am-Zim]

It did seem somewhat odd to me that there were no land-based defenses that could have at least fired something at the Narada. It seems unlikely to me that the defense codes that Nero got from Pike could completely disable every single defense system on planet Earth and all the other manned defenses in the entire system.

 

[3D Master]

Also Best of Both Worlds was in 2367, Nero's attack on earth was in 2258 so there is over 100 years between those events so Earth's defenses wouldn't have been as powerful as they were in the 24th century.

Relatively speaking, yes they would be.

No they would not have been, that would be like saying the U.S. could intercept an attack from a Tanker modified for combat with missles in 1910.

No, that would be like saying if a planetary defense grid in the 24th century is enough to take down two fleets of the local rival's forces, then in the 23rd century it can do the same. THAT is what it means when you say, relatively speaking they are at the same power.

 

[Set Harth]

At Warp, they would have already left the solar system, and thus, could NOT have put them on a planetary body, from which you see Vulcan, clearly and with the naked eye.

The appearance of Vulcan in the mind meld is not necessarily to be taken as a literal representation of its actual distance from Delta Vega, according to the writers. ( For example, this is a mind-meld which features images of events from 2233 that Spock Prime wasn't even around to see. ) Furthermore, it stands to reason that the Enterprise would not have departed for the Laurentian system at a sublight speed.

It'd be a moon, or a sister planet.

We can see quite clearly in the planet's death scene that it has neither.

Not a simple mining ship with its shields DOWN.

There's no reason to assume the Narada would have failed to activate its shields in response to an imminent attack by Earth defenses. We know from film dialogue that they had working shields which were only compromised when the ship was being destroyed by the singularity.

 

[Hartzilla2007]

Relatively speaking, yes they would be.

No they would not have been, that would be like saying the U.S. could intercept an attack from a Tanker modified for combat with missles in 1910.

No, that would be like saying if a planetary defense grid in the 24th century is enough to take down two fleets of the local rival's forces, then in the 23rd century it can do the same. THAT is what it means when you say, relatively speaking they are at the same power.

Except the Narada had the firepower to destroy at least that many ships and better sheilds then were in the era.

 

[3D Master]

At Warp, they would have already left the solar system, and thus, could NOT have put them on a planetary body, from which you see Vulcan, clearly and with the naked eye.

The appearance of Vulcan in the mind meld is not necessarily to be taken as a literal representation of its actual distance from Delta Vega, according to the writers. ( For example, this is a mind-meld which features images of events from 2233 that Spock Prime wasn't even around to see. ) Furthermore, it stands to reason that the Enterprise would not have departed for the Laurentian system at a sublight speed.

Ah, right. So when Nero said he wanted Spock to watch the destruction of his world, he was just talking out of his ass?

It'd be a moon, or a sister planet.

We can see quite clearly in the planet's death scene that it has neither.

One more bad thing, because where is that planet from which Spock could see the destruction of his world so Nero would have his revenge?

Not a simple mining ship with its shields DOWN.

There's no reason to assume the Narada would have failed to activate its shields in response to an imminent attack by Earth defenses. We know from film dialogue that they had working shields which were only compromised when the ship was being destroyed by the singularity.

It failed to activate its shields when it faced the Enterprise and Spock's ship, or Kirk and Spock couldn't have been beamed on, and Kirk and Pike couldn't have been beamed off.

No they would not have been, that would be like saying the U.S. could intercept an attack from a Tanker modified for combat with missles in 1910.

No, that would be like saying if a planetary defense grid in the 24th century is enough to take down two fleets of the local rival's forces, then in the 23rd century it can do the same. THAT is what it means when you say, relatively speaking they are at the same power.

Except the Narada had the firepower to destroy at least that many ships and better sheilds then were in the era.

Yeah, that's the point isn't it; they didn't bother raising their shields.

 

[Set Harth]

One more bad thing, because where is that planet from which Spock could see the destruction of his world so Nero would have his revenge?

Not where you think it is.

It failed to activate its shields when it faced the Enterprise and Spock's ship, or Kirk and Spock couldn't have been beamed on

Once again you're ignoring the whole transwarp beaming thing. Kirk and Spock were beamed on well before the Narada faced the Enterprise. The point is that the Narada would have had the use of its shields if seriously threatened by Earth defenses.

 

[M'Sharak]

Remember when this thread used to be about why the alternate timeline was a problem?

Up to here, at least...

What's bad about the alternate timeline:

Because I have absolutely no interest in following an alternative time line, especially one where Kirk is a dick.

I want to see the main, true timeline, and no others. For a quick one time visit, especially with the characters of the main timeline, sure, but to play entire stories in it with the main true timeline being essentially tossed aside as no longer important:

Nope, no interest, not even a little bit.

...it still was.

From this post onward...

Hah! Seriously, I don't think anyone is really suggesting that the hardcore continuity fans actually think this stuff is real, but there does seem to be a segment of fandom that is emotionally invested in the idea that there is a "real" and a "true" STAR TREK canon that trumps all others. As opposed to those us who attach less importance to canon and see it just as raw material to work with--and revise as necessary.

(I, of course, may be biased here, having spent my entire career writing books that were never considered canon. So I stopped worrying about canon decades ago)

So, yeah, some of us get baffled and scratch our heads when people start complaining that this isn't the "real" Kirk. It's not that we think those other posters are delusional; it's just that we know in our hearts that none of it is real. So arguing about which imaginary fictional constructs are more real than others seem kind of puzzling . . . .

It's rather simple really. The "real" Kirk is a fantastic guy you would be willing to follow into hell itself, and follow all his adventures.

The fake Kirk is an asshole you want to phaser into oblivion.

...we've been getting farther and farther off track until the original topic is no longer recognizable and the thread is completely off the rails.

Closing for review.