Orci/Kurtzman Q&A - Lots of Interesting Bits

[Graham Kennedy]

The mind meld makes all the difference to the Delta Vega thing. What we see is little more or less than a dream Spock is having about what he saw!

Incidentally... I rather doubt they thought all these things out in advance, really. More than likely they've just looked around at what fans have said and picked out the explanations they like best.

[Sionnach Glic]

Yeah, that's the safe bet.

I still don't like it.

We don't see him using anything, for one.

That's a real stretch to label something that incorrect "cinematic license."

PLEASE use some kind of display device next time.

We don't see him observing the event at all. All we see is his mind's representation of it happening.

[thelordharry]

...Admiral Archer is indeed Captain Archer from ENT (so poor Porthos indeed)

I immediately thought that but then did a bit of maths, taking approx 2150 as Porthos's DOB, taking the stardate of ST:XI and taking Scotty's age and thought, hmmmmmm, that would be one old dog Still, who's to say that the life expectancy of a dog in a 150 years isn't increased in line with the longevity of a human?

[Nickswitz]

Or maybe it's just a different dog, you know, like parents do when gerbils die, they buy a new one and give it the same name as the one before.

[Sionnach Glic]

Actualy, the dog's name is never said. All Scotty says is that it was "Admiral Archer's pet beagle" or something. Archer could simply have gotten another beagle when Porthos died.

[Nickswitz]

Oh, that works too, I thought the name was mentioned.

[Captain Picard's Hair]

Not only did we see merely a representation of what Spock Prime saw, but you'd expect that given Nero's motivations for leaving him there he'd be left close to Vulcan and with means of seeing it clearly.

Indeed, BoT shouldn't be relevant, as the whole point of the opening scene was George Kirk saving 800 lives (and freeing them to alert Starfleet).

OT: I've a friend who has an 18-year old cat.

[Graham Kennedy]

I am more and more convinced that the Federation's reaction to the Narada was "christ, the Romulans have something NASTY. We've better start building ships that are a hell of a lot bigger, badder, and faster!"

that + more interest in threats generally and the Romulans in particular = much earlier contact with many races.

[thelordharry]

Or maybe it's just a different dog, you know, like parents do when gerbils die, they buy a new one and give it the same name as the one before.

That's terrible! How could anyone do that!

Off on a slight tangent though, I've had the same goldfish for 34 years! My parents have looked after it since I left home and it seems to have, I don't know, changed appearance a bit but I put it down to age

[RK_Striker_JK_5]

I am more and more convinced that the Federation's reaction to the Narada was "christ, the Romulans have something NASTY. We've better start building ships that are a hell of a lot bigger, badder, and faster!"

that + more interest in threats generally and the Romulans in particular = much earlier contact with many races.

That's what I figured, too. A crash course in building to counter the 'new' threat.

[Tsukiyumi]

My theory is along those same lines: The Narada is what, five miles long, if we believe the guy in charge of the FX? It certainly looks that big.

The Federation thinks the Romulans can field a massive super-ship, so they start designing their ships considerably larger than they would have normally. Since the Connie design is a sensible one, they still arrived at a similar (though much larger) design.

It makes sense to me, anyways.

[Graham Kennedy]

Well it's not like a 700+ metre long ship is especially uber for the Federation. Hell, we build 450 m long ships right now and the only thing that stops us going larger is that they have to physically fit through things like the Panama canal. A 700 m starship is a big jump over a Connie... but 20 year to ramp up from 350 m to 700+ metres is easily within credibility.

[LaughingCheese]

Yeah, that's the safe bet.

I still don't like it.

We don't see him using anything, for one.

That's a real stretch to label something that incorrect "cinematic license."

PLEASE use some kind of display device next time.

We don't see him observing the event at all. All we see is his mind's representation of it happening.

Perhaps, but he did say Nero had marooned him there to watch it.

It was implied in real life. There was nothing to imply that this was a obfuscation because of the dream sequence.

Also, what's with the warp core being multiple segments, and shot out the back instead of downward vertically?

[Lazar]

Also, what's with the warp core being multiple segments, and shot out the back instead of downward vertically?

That's one of the reasons why I'm desperate to see some cutaways or cross sections.

[Graham Kennedy]

There was a big argument about whether to show the Sovereign warp core ejection in Insurrection. Apparently they say that whilst ejecting the core downward makes great engineering sense, it tends to come across on screen rather as if the ship is dropping a giant turd. I guess they decided to try doing it upwards!

I like having multiple cores - always wanted to see that in a starship, I even did drawings of a Defiant engine room with twin horizontal cores once. It makes perfect sense - redundancy, ability to weather battle damage, all that good stuff.