Will the Enterprise get a grand entrance?

[Balrog]

I've always loved the Enterprise. Star Trek has always been about the story and the characters. But if it were not for the ship, there would be no story.

TMP really showed how important a character the Enterprise is. She was truly given a lot of screentime, and I still love watching those scenes.

I always felt gipped by FC. Firstly, I never felt the E-D got it's due like Enterprise did in TOS and the TOS movies. Then there was no fanfare introduction of the new E-E!!!! I'm sorry, but no matter what excuse the writers made, they simply didn't understand the importance of Enterprise. The E-D is dead. Hop on a new ship! Plenty of letters left in the alphabet. Blah, blah, blah....

With this new teaser trailer, it seems JJ and co. really want to bring back the grandeur of the Enterprise. Do you think they will give her a the same or even greater introduction than TMP did for the Ent-refit?

 

[EliyahuQeoni]

I hope so. To me the Enterprise was as much a character as Kirk or Spock in the original series.

 

[cbspock]

I am sure they will give Enterprise an introduction. They have to since this is basically the beginning of the story.

In each Classic Trek movie she was spotlighted. The introduction in 1, the attack in 2, her destruction in 3, her ressurection in 4, the shuttle flight in 5 with Kirk quoting "all I ask", and her farewell in 6.

Picard's line in First Contact, "there are more letters in the alphabet" kind of pissed me off.

-Chris

 

[DeafPoet]

Actually, I thought the E-E was introduced very nicely in FC. Cool flyby to open it up, a scene on the hull and lots of nice space shots within the context of the narrative. That's really all you need, IMO. The Enterprise is important and we should always be aware of it, but not to the point where there are extended periods where the filmmakers are going 'Look! Look at this! It's the friggen Enterprise, man!'

If you ask me, the TMP intro is a little bit excessive for this reason. The ship is cool because of the relationships our characters have with it and the events that take place on it. Trek's had it's excessive ship porn. I'm cool with leaving that the way it is.

 

[Sharr Khan]

If you ask me, the TMP intro is a little bit excessive for this reason. The ship is cool because of the relationships our characters have with it and the events that take place on it. Trek's had it's excessive ship porn. I'm cool with leaving that the way it is.

I was waiting for someone other them me to say this. We don't need a half-hour flyby in a drydock - show me the Enterprise *doing something*, let me get to know her by seeing her in action.

Sharr

 

[Holytomato]

We have the teaser.

The 1st trailer: inside the warp bubble. Stars are streaking past. Kirk speaks, "Space..." Spock: "The final...frontier" McCoy: "These are the voyages" Uhura: "of the starship enterprise." Sulu: "Her mission, to explore" Chekov: "strange new worlds."

We can see a shape at the back of the corridor.

Scott: "To seek out new life and new civilizations."

The shape gets closer.

Kirk: "To boldly go...where no one...has gone...before!"

The Enterprise zooms by.

The title card reads: "Star Trek Christmas 2008"

Trailer 2: shots of our characters in action.

Kirk judo kick "Risk is our business!"
Spock raises eyebrow "That is not logical"
McCoy: "I'm a doctor not a space jockey!"
Uhura: "I wanted adventure, so I joined Starfleet."
Sulu: "You don't want a pilot. You want me."
Chekov: "Wessals. Eels. There is nothing I can't handle."
Scott: "Engineering is in m' blood, captain."

A starscape fades in. A star shines brightly. A shape blots out some of the starshine. It goes full stop right infront of us. It goes to warp a'la TNG's "Datalore" rushing headlong towards us.

The Movie: We see the scene from the trailer.

Then the saucer section zooms past us. Then the secondary hull. Then the nacelles.

a Star Trek XI Starfleet shuttlecraft zooms past the moon, and comes up under the spacedock. It parks inside the shuttlebay.

The main dorsal attaches to the saucer, and secondary hull.

We saw interior shots of the ship. Carpet being laid, equipment being stalled. People rushing around. Think TMP, and Star Trek V.

Interior shot of Deck 1: The Bridge. Overhead lights turn on. The turbolifts' doors open. People rush in. They sit at the consoles. Display monitors, and keyboards switch on.

From behind his shoulder we see someone in gold sit at the conn- the center seat. Another person in gold stands behind him. We examine his cuffs rank braids. We see his chin clenched in worry. We see his nose, his narrowed eyes. Its George Kirk Sr. Commander.

Kirk: "Warp core activate!"

Interior shot of Main Engineering. The warp core pulses with light, and sound.

Kirk: "Inertial dampeners on!"

A console monitor shows that they are turned on.

Kirk: "Floodlights on!"

Exterior shot: The floodlights turn on. We see "CC-17" on the bottom of the saucer. We see the bottom points of the delta behind the main nav dish. We see "Federation of Planets" on the port nacelle.

Kirk: "Navigational lights!"

Exterior shot of the navigational lights start blinking on and off.

Kirk: "Bussard ramscoops!"

Exterior shot of the bussard ramscoops lighting up, and start spinning.

Kirk: "Warp coil grills!"

Exterior shot of the warp coil grills lighting up.

Kirk: "Main Nav deflector!"

Exterior shot of the inside of the main nav deflector lighting up.

Interior shot of Deck 1: The Bridge.

Kirk: "Quard thrusters. Half power. Forward!"

Exterior shot of the Quad thrusters fire. We see from behind that the ship is moving forward. The ship fully exists spacedock.

Someone says, "We have existed spacedock. We are cleared for travel."

Kirk: "Impulse power. Half. To Luna."

Exterior shot of the impulse engines flaring up. The ship moves past Luna. We see Tycho City. The ship warps away.

Title Card: "10 years later..."

:thumbsup:

 

[Superman]

Hey Lloyd,

I just want to point out that the reason the E-D was never spotlighted on the big screen in GEN was because the design wasn't intended for film. Though he's a completely useless person creatively, Berman managed to realize this and didn't put the E-D under any intense scrutiny.

And they didn't focus too much on the E-E because they realized just how hideous and unappealing a ship it was.

The refit, on the other hand, was made for the big screen and has majesty, grace, power, and scope.

Here's hoping the "new" Enterprise manages to have the same.

\S/

 

[Dale]

I hope she's a beauty and gets at least a few beauty shots. We don't need an orgy of ship ogling like TMP featured (although it was quite appropriate in that case), but I do want a chance to drool over her. I love starship porn.

 

[The Squire of Gothos]

I'm hoping for at least one scene like the star base lounge scene in TSFS. Not necessarily a battle scarred Enterprise but the ship close up, with a few people around as awed as we are to see it up close.

 

[Franklin]

Dale Hoppert said:
I hope she's a beauty and gets at least a few beauty shots. We don't need an orgy of ship ogling like TMP featured (although it was quite appropriate in that case), but I do want a chance to drool over her. I love starship porn.

By the time TMP was released, there were plenty of pictures out of what the refit Enterprise would look like (unless I'm not remembering the chronology of my "Starlog" magazines correctly). So its unveiling on the screen was the first time the real size and details of the ship were revealed after 79 episodes of seeing the ship on grainy film on a 19" or 25" screen, maybe even in black and white.

A similar treatment of the Enterprise this time is unneeded. I'd certainly bet they'll be beauty shots interspersed throughout the movie, and probably some kind of dramatic reintroduction also meant to reveal the scale of the ship in some way. But no grand unveiling like in TMP.

Starship porn. Let's all just keep our hands in sight when the Enterprise appears on screen for the first time.

 

[trevanian]

Sharr Khan said:

If you ask me, the TMP intro is a little bit excessive for this reason. The ship is cool because of the relationships our characters have with it and the events that take place on it. Trek's had it's excessive ship porn. I'm cool with leaving that the way it is.

I was waiting for someone other them me to say this. We don't need a half-hour flyby in a drydock - show me the Enterprise *doing something*, let me get to know her by seeing her in action.

Sharr

Well, I can agree with you on SOMEthing anyway, the 'let me get to know her by seeing her in action' part of your post (though I LOVE the drydock sequence as is for selfish reasons.)

Wise violated his own SAND PEBBLES dictum here. The ship isn't special till later on, after it has done something. That's when he let Goldsmith make the theme go big in SAND PEBBLES, and he wouldn't let him till that point.

Difference is that TREK's ship had an in-head history with the audience (hence my selfish reasons), but ideally you'd want the 'moments' after it means something in the actual story.

Wise's thing about showing how big the ship is before showing how big vger is doesn't really hold up for me either. You get the size differential on the two with a single shot late in the overflight, when you see the tiny E cruising over a vger detail. Couple just THAT shot with audience memory of the travel pod in front of the engineering hull and you've given the audience what it needs to appreciate the scale issue. You could drop out or speedup most of the overflight and not hurt the storytelling at all (in a lot of ways, I've considered Ed Harris' journey over the NTE ship in ABYSS to be TMP-on-speed, and think that by colorcorrecting and stepprinting the TMP cloud stuff, you could have had a better TFF center of galaxy too, for no money.)

 

[scotthm]

Lloyd_Dobler said:
Do you think they will give her a the same or even greater introduction than TMP did for the Ent-refit?

I hope not. We've already had one movie make a big deal out of introducing the Enterprise, we don't need another (IMO).

---------------

 

[Sharr Khan]

Well, I can agree with you on SOMEthing anyway, the 'let me get to know her by seeing her in action' part of your post (though I LOVE the drydock sequence as is for selfish reasons.)

There is something to consider as well. An extended "ship porn" scene will really turn off the broader audience. Could be wrong but I'm pretty sure the whole extended drydock scene wasn't a critic favorite regarding TMP.

Nice space going beauty shots I'm ok with, but much like pausing the movie and pointing fingers at a cameo this focusing on the setting (and to normal none Trekkies the ship is a setting) rather then the story will make people groan.

I'm almost sure we'll meet this Enterprise mid-action, just a gut feeling on my part.

Sharr

 

[martin]

A 15 minute scene showing the launch of this ship, and its dedication ceremony should show up on the DVD for the fans, but not in the actual movie...

 

[Franklin]

Sharr Khan said:
I'm almost sure we'll meet this Enterprise mid-action, just a gut feeling on my part.
Sharr

As I think about it, you may be right. Throughout most of the movie, it's probably Pike's ship. Pike's been its captain for years. He may love the ship, but I doubt he lingers over it.

So, maybe the ship porn makes sense if it's at the end or nearly the end of the movie, when Kirk becomes its captain. We see Kirk introduced to what will become his home and love for many years to come. The old ship is his, seen through new eyes.
By then (waiting longer into the movie, and especially if the movie has been entertaining to begin with), the indulgence of a little bit of ship porn would probably illicit the same forgiving attitude from the larger audience that the sentimental introduction of the Enterprise-A received in TVH.

Captain Kirk and the Enterprise meet. I mean, it is a moment.

 

[egonbeeblebrox]

I'm sure it'll have a BIG moment when it first shows up. The very fact that she's the only 'character' that pops up in the trailer seems to prove Abrams knows how much fans love the ship.

 

[CaptJimboJones]

Some beauty shots would be nice, but I can't imagine they'll repeat the TMP-style flyby. As much as the fan in me loves that sequence, I realize that to the general audience basically fell asleep after the first 10 seconds.

 

[PKTrekGirl]

Of course it will.

They have already done one dry run of that grand entrance with the teaser trailer.

 

[God Magnus]

A grand entrance does not require 15 minutes. If you shoot the angles right and give us one or two beauty shots it can be done (with proper music accompanying it of course) in under five minutes easily. I do agree the key is that there needs to be context in the scene other than "Look! It's a ship!"

In that sense I think Archer and Trip's "intro" to the NX-01 was handled very well in "Enterprise". We got a good look at the ship overall, then close up all while dialogue explained things about it and a tiny snippet about its Captain. Something like that would suit me fine.

 

[steveman]

For the Big E, is there any other kind?

I agree with those who think that our first shot of her will be while she's in action. Probably Pike et al taking care of business. Makes sense.