The Hard Six

The new Star Trek trailer is out. I’ve been a Star Trek fan since before I could walk. I could give you a summary of any TNG episode if you gave me nothing but the episode name. Anyone who calls me out on this gets my Skype name and ten minutes of my time to prove me wrong. Go ahead, I dare you. I could do the same with most TOS, DS9, and VOY episodes. My ENT knowledge, while extensive, isn’t up to par with the other four. This isn’t something I lose sleep over.

I know Trek. I’m pretty confident I could take just about anyone in a Trek knowledge competition, with the exception of Bernd Schneider. (Yes, that includes Trek writers. No, that doesn’t include books.)

I brag about my Trek knowledge (is that something even worth bragging about to begin with?) so you can fully comprehend the weight of what I am about to say:

I’ve yet to see anything about Star Trek that leads me to believe it is anything other than Star Trek. This is the real McCoy, people.

Trekkies are split, as they always are when a new Trek project is announced. Some argue that Abrams is raping canon and therefore isn’t actually making a Star Trek movie. I argue that the assumption Abrams cares about sticking with canon is fundamentally flawed.

I know, J.J. has stated that this isn’t a reboot and he will be sticking to what’s canon.

Does it look like he is sticking with canon? He lies. This is absolutely a reboot, J.J. only said it isn’t a reboot to avoid rabid trekkies. People were up in arms over Enterprise because it looked too modern. What they really meant was “I’m going to bitch about the fact that we have a more accurate picture of 2150 in 2001 than we did in 1965.”

Trekkies complaining that NX-01 looked like it was newer than NCC-1701 are very out of touch with reality. News flash: there is no possible way that Brannon and Braga could have come up with a ship that looks both older than NCC-1701 and newer than something designed in 1965.

This is a reboot. It will not be marketed or explained as such, or accepted as such, until after the movie is out.

What do I think this means? I think it’s easy to sum that up as, what will stay, and what will go.

What will stay?

• The major themes and events from Starfleet History. (Federation Day, World War III, Zefram Cochrane, First Contact, etc…)
• The strong moral compass that most Starfleet officers exhibit. Expect the Prime Directive to be mentioned at least once, and hopefully more.
• The basic structure and organization of Starfleet (ranks, uniforms, fleet size, ship size, Starfleet Adademy, etc…)
• Names and functionality of most Treknology. Warp Drive, Phasers, Shields, Transporters, etc…
• Kingons and Romulans as enemies. This is a good place to mention this, too: I am very happy with the choice of the Romulans over the Kingons as the primary villains. Klingons are fun but Romulans are a lot more interesting, and throughout 700+ episodes, I felt like we didn’t see nearly enough Romulans.

What will go?

• The old look. The old Enterprise is what people predicted spaceships would look like by 2260 in 1965. Some of the technological predictions have already come true. I’m pretty sure a MacBook is more powerful than NCC-1701s main computer. The crew uses those goofy yellow ZIP disks for data storage. Those electronic clipboards are truly ginormous when compared to a standard-issue Toshiba tablet PC. There’s no way that these technological predictions will ever come true, because we’ve already developed superior technology. As fun as it would be to see a design closer to the original NCC-1701, it wouldn’t have very wide appeal. Lets face it: the original Enterprise is very, very obviously a product of the sixties.
• Excessive treknobabble. A splash of treknobabble is always fun, but the ridiculous sentences that Geordi and B’Elanna would sometimes string together would make my head explode. Get rid of it.
• Contradictory canon. Since it’s a clean slate, only the major events and history will be incorporated. I’m pretty sure the rest will be filled in. This is my favorite reason. I know the entirety of Star Trek history, and the sheer number of contradictions is astounding. Wipe it all away. Post-TNG it always felt like the fans had chained a large black iron ball to the franchises ankles, and they always got PMS every time a writer attempted to break the chain. Of course, Enterprise was basically Brannon & Braga yanking that ball loose from the chain and throwing it at trekkies collective faces.
• Excessive deus ex machina/escape button. I doubt that this Enterprise will ever be saved by Geordi simply reversing the polarity of the warp field. This Enterprise will never be saved by Janeway flying through some unholy rift which causes Voyager to revert to how it was last episode. You remember what happened to Voyager in Year of Hell? When Voyager got the shit kicked out of it? Yeah, that should of been happening the entire series. When Voyager got home, it should have been limping, as if it was being held together with the 24th century equivalent of duct tape.

This is the right thing to do. Here’s why. I think it’s pretty obvious that there’s no room for this movie in any of the existing timelines or eras in the Star Trek universe. They needed a modern look, because I really don’t think retro would fly. News flash: people don’t like TOS. Even a lot of trekkies. It’s old, it’s stale, it didn’t hold up well as time marched on. The NCC-1701 looked outdated after ten years. On the other hand, I think that the Enterprise-D is more plausible as a starship despite the fact that it was designed more than 20 years ago. In fact, even the Enterprise refit holds up pretty well from thirty years ago. Bottom line: the look and feel of TOS didn’t hold up well. It’s way too ridiculous at times. It always feels old and stale. There are definitely some classic episodes, but for the most part, it’s either boring, or way to ridiculous to be taken seriously. The new NCC-1701 is what we, in 2008, will think a ship in 2265 will look like, and that was realistically the only way to do this. The modern look was necessary and I knew it was coming. But according to trek nerds, the rules are clear. Modern ship? After 2400. Period, end of story. I don’t want 2400+. At all. More importantly, Starfleet is out of enemies. Klingons? Allies. Romulans? Peace talks. Dominion? Licking their wounds/somehow achieving enlightenment now that Odo is squirming around in that freaky ocean. Borg? Crippled. So either they ruin next gen cannon, go way the fuck out into the future (like 2600 or something) or come up with a new race of villains. No thanks.

Let’s be serious: do you realize how limited Abrams’ options are if he sticks to cannon? Especially if they stick to TOS cannon? Let me spell them out for you:

Pre-ENT: 2100 - 2150: Woo hoo! Let’s galavant around the solar system at Warp 2!

ENT: 2150 - 2200: Still too early. Era already established from Enterprise which many trekkies hated. Again, we’d need a new ship and crew. Archer is either Starfleet Chief of Staff, Andorian ambassador, or UFP President. Trip is just straight up dead, and god knows where the rest of the crew went.

It’s actually too bad that we will probably never revisit this era as part of the old canon, because the Earth-Romulan war must’ve been epic. Remember, it’s the Earth-Romulan war, not the Federation-Romulan war. Starfleet was in it’s infancy. They had, at best, maybe a hundred ships, and only 9 or 10 NX class ships. I’d love to know how the humans pulled that one off, because it was certainly an uphill battle the whole time. It must’ve looked really grim for Earth in the beginning. Babylon 5 fans, think Earth-Minbari war. That’s why I was really hoping for Enterprise to make it the whole seven seasons, because then we would’ve caught the first 3 years of the war, leaving the end of the war open for a possible ENT movie. The movie, of course, would depict the Battle of Cheron, where Earth’s decisive victory ended the war. In fact, Enterprise only needed to make it one more season than it did to see the beginning of the war, and a number of 4th season episodes made it very clear that the Earth-Romulan war was the direction Coto was planning to take the series in. The 4th season of Enterprise is significantly better than any other season, I think Coto did a great job making it feel Star Trek again. I also think that ENT season 4 first made it clear to me how it’s okay to be flexible with canon as long as you maintain the essence of Star Trek, which is really what the entire series was trying to prove to begin with. I remember when it was cancelled, and just thought “not now! not when it’s actually getting good again!” It’s a real shame they cancelled it when they did.

Pre-TOS: 2200 - 2250: This was the best time period to do it, which is exactly why the movie starts in the late 2240s. But without rebooting, there’s a major problem with this era, since it would have to reconcile the change in ship design to be halfway between NX-01 and NCC-1701, which would be really tough, given that NCC-1701 looks like a step back from NX-01. Another problem: the crew is too young. April is in command of the Enterprise, Kirk was a lieutenant J.G. serving on either the Republic or the Farragut. So, really, canon was broken the second we heard anything about Kirk being on the Enterprise before 2264.

TOS/Movies: 2250- 2300: Well, here we have 2250-2260, which I when I believe that the movie is mostly set. Again, canon has already been egregiously violated, because Kirk was a lieutenant commander and later a commander, and still serving on the Farragut. 2260-2270 is out, it’s the original five year mission.

If Abrams’ had truly intended to stick with canon, then the only viable option was here: sometime between 2271 and 2276, during Kirk’s second five year mission. We know nothing about what happened during this time, but we do know that Kirk was in command of the refit NCC-1701 with the entirety of the original crew intact. He could’ve done adventures with Admiral Kirk aboard the (theoretically) original Enterprise. Like I said earlier, the refit-Enterprise has stood the test of time pretty well, and an updated CGI refit-NCC-1701 would have needed very minor modifications to be believable.

But he didn’t. We know that Star Trek starts with pre-Captain Kirk and starts with Pike in command during the 2240’s. Given the options, I like the rebooted 2240s better than the canon 2270s.

2280s and 90s? Nope, too much going on. This is one of the most well-defined and fan-favorite eras. Messing with it would’ve been a bad choice, plus, everyone is really old. We’re talking Admiral/demoted-Captain Kirk, Captain Spock, Commander McCoy, Captain Scott, Captain Sulu, Commander Chekov, and Commander Uhura.

Late 2290s? Kirk’s “dead.” No good.

Pre-TNG: 2300 - 2350: Almost nothing is known about this time period. Here is what we do know: almost all of the TNG main characters (not Vulcans, of course) were born in this time period, the first being Picard, in 2305. Relations with the Kingons evolved from truce, to trade agreements, to alliance. An incident in the Tomed system resulted in a revised neutral zone and a Federation ban on cloaking devices. The USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-C) was built, launched, served for 12 years, before it was lost in the Narendra system in a skirmish with 3 Romulan warbirds. It was the first Enterprise to be destroyed with all hands lost. It would make a good era, but you would definitely need a new ship and crew. (Interestingly enough, Abrams’ Enterprise shares more similarities with the Enterprise C than any other Enterprise.) Deep Space 9 was built by the Cardassian Union in orbit occupied Bajor for use as an ore processing station. Oh yeah, and Picard got laid a lot.

TNG/DS9/VOY/Movies: 2350 - 2400: Now we’re in next gen territory. New Picard adventure? No thanks, Nemesis was enough. Janeway or Sisko? Not big on them, either. Again, you encounter the problem with the era being so well defined - you’re practically guaranteed to violate canon at some point in time.

Post-VOY: 2400+: No thanks. No enemies, technology too advanced, would need a new crew.

This is a reboot, plain and simple, masquerading around as a movie that will stick to established canon. It won’t. I don’t even want it to. Even if J.J. continues to insist that it’s not a reboot, I am going to treat it like one anyways. It’s a fucking reboot. Anyone who hasn’t accepted this should do so now.