Star Trek 2 (XII) (Now with spoilers)

[trackercowe]

Originally Posted by jammies

How does hitting the ship move the warp cores out of alignment? That sounds like a really crap design issue to me, especially when the "fix" is having someone kill themselves kicking it back into place. "Oh man, someone shot at us again! Who is on warp core duty today - Ensign Whirly? Haha, sucks to be you, dude!"

Not only that, but the Federation can make a suit which protects the wearer from being right inside a volcano, but a simple radiation suit is apparently completely beyond them.

Many, many, many movies do the same thing. Sure kicking the core back into the place might not seem logical, but it's a common method used in many movies. Maybe there was only a 1% chance kicking it was going to work, but hey it did! That's not really a big deal at all; it was out of alignment (not necessarily broken), but Kirk moved it back. He also probably didn't have time to put on a radiation suit, as wasting any time may have caused the destruction of the Enterprise. That and the ship was in pieces, so who knows if such suits could have been located, or if they were even near the hatch. You're really looking for issues that don't need explaining there.

Aimed it how? I didn't hear him command that, but if the starship had working drives, why is it falling (in violation of the laws of physics, mind you - if it's just beside the Moon, it's going to fall there, not on the Earth, and the Moon is practically covering the sky in some of the battle shots) at all? It's not a plane, it doesn't have control surfaces to maneuver in atmosphere. And why would you engineer a starship to be able to survive atmospheric re-entry unpowered, even if you could?

That whole sequence is really, really dumb. They are tens of thousands of kilometres from Earth (they say exactly how far, but I misremember), yet in a few minutes the dreadnought hits the Earth, meaning it must be travelling at hundreds of thousands of km/h to get there that fast. But wait! We see it fall and hit, and it's going maybe a few km/h. Then it smashes the city, and there is mass destruction... But wait! A few blocks away, it's normality, with traffic merrily chugging along and people ambling along, oblivious.

He most definitely did command it to hit Star Fleet HQ in San Francisco; you can hear it plain as day when his ship is falling apart. It had just enough power to control where it was going to hit, but not enough to stop it from falling towards the Earth, probably because certain parts were still working, while others weren't. And why wouldn't you engineer a starship to survive re-entry if you can? Just for the sake of extra safety if the ship is destroyed.

I don't think that scene in particular was dumb at all. Maybe the Bayish slowdown was, but the crash was one of the bigger effects in the movie, so they had to sell the crash. Any the citizens of the city were only reacting normally before the ship hitting the city. Are they supposed to expect falling starships or something? Is that a normal event that happens in San Francisco on a daily basis?

That makes it even worse - so, presumably, this was a private project of Marcus'? That ship was, what, 8 times as big as Enterprise (2X as long, high, and wide) and he just used his expense account to build it and crew it? Where did he get the money, the materials, the construction crews? Or did Khan build the whole thing himself out of Lego blocks?

Really you wanted an explanation of how he was able to fund the building of the ship? Do you they need to detail it specifically? Maybe he lied to Starfleet of its true intentions, and they aided him in building it, while only mercenaries were used in powering the ship (they said he only needed a few). Maybe he got the funds to build it from private sources who believe in his cause? Does that really need an explanation? Do you really want a detailed financial record of how the ship was built, what is this Space Balls?

150 years from now they won't have IFF on their starships? Or the ability to count? "Hmm, we ordered 9 shuttles of supplies, but we got 10. Well, I dunno, it's probably ok. Just park it over there by the crates marked "Munitions" and hope it's not a trojan horse here to blow up this multi-trillion credit starship."

Further, how did he even get close to the starship yard in the first place - they don't have pickets out defending it at all? What if the Klingons start a war before it's ready - I guess they just come in all lah-de-dah, dancing and singing and pirouetting, then blow up the secret weapon, after which Admiral Marcus look like a clown running a circus?

And before you say "Well it's hidden and secret!", the Federation could find ONE GUY'S specific location on the Klingon homeworld (which was also stupid, because why didn't they use that ability when he was on the run after the bombing and still on Earth), the Klingons should be able to find a huge starship. One would presume they have spies, drones, really big telescopes, tracking dogs, access to Wikipedia, and other sources of intel sufficient to the task.

As I said they probably didn't have enough time to check all of the transports to find out who/what was in them. They were forced to go after Kirk in a matter of minutes, which did not give them time to look around the ship or check for credentials. Also how was Marcus to know Khan had given Kirk the coordinates for the ship, and that one of Kirk's officers was on Earth and was able to sneak aboard the ship? You really want them to explain every specific point in detail don't you? Hundreds of transports (not nine or ten) boarded the ship, and Scotty was able to hide out on the ship (which had a small crew aboard), and wasn't found by any of the Mercs.

Any why would the Klingon's go to Jupiter in search of the ship? Maybe it was, or wasn't hidden from Starfleet, but I am sure it was hidden from the Klingon's out of anyone. Also there was no evidence that the Klingon's wanted to attack Earth. Marcus was the one who said the war was coming; you didn't hear the same from anyone else. Maybe they were going to attack Earth eventually, maybe not; that could be further explored in later movies. But for now they seemed quite happy in taking over other planets instead.

Spock was able to detect where he went on Kronos because of the transport device he used. He did not use the same transport device while on Earth, so how could they track him then? They didn't know his exact location on Kronos, which is why they had to search a bit for him, but fortunately he wanted to find them, and he did.

It's incredibly dumb because another 15 seconds of exposition would have (sort of) fixed it. "Hmm, Jim, in studying this blood sample I took of Khan's, I noticed that it seems to have miraculous properties of regeneration and cell regrowth. I'm thinking of injecting this tribble I caught Crewman Morty sodomizing to death - it's possible it might even be able to return the dead to life!" "Good idea, Bones! And I hope you gave Morty a stern lecture!"

The movie was already pushing two and a half hours, do you really need more exposition on the purpose of the experiment? The minute I saw him injecting the blood I knew it was going to be used (and I am sure most people thought the same way). They knew Khan's blood had superhuman elements to it, so why not inject it in a dead animal? Maybe he did tests prior to it, and saw what capabilities it had, and decided to try it out. If anything I wonder why they didn't blood let Khan and the rest of his crew at the end of the movie to store their superhuman blood for future purposes. You would figure having the ability to resurrect humans would be important for Starfleet, but maybe not if they just stored the bodies in cryogenics.

[jammies]

Originally Posted by trackercowe

He also probably didn't have time to put on a radiation suit, as wasting any time may have caused the destruction of the Enterprise. That and the ship was in pieces, so who knows if such suits could have been located, or if they were even near the hatch. You're really looking for issues that don't need explaining there.

I dunno, if I had radiation suits available, I think I'd keep them somewhere near where they might be useful, like, say, at the access hatch to the radioactive warp drives. I don't think it's really stretching to wonder how they don't have something in the future that we have versions of now.

Originally Posted by trackercowe

And why wouldn't you engineer a starship to survive re-entry if you can? Just for the sake of extra safety if the ship is destroyed.

Because a starship falling onto a planet is extremely unlikely, and if it did fall, not burning up in the atmosphere isn't going to help you when the ship hits the planet. Further, even if you come up with some reason, like wanting to be able to take the starship into atmosphere when the shields are down (why?), there are big chunks of hull missing from the dreadnought so that still doesn't fly.

Originally Posted by trackercowe

I don't think that scene in particular was dumb at all. Maybe the Bayish slowdown was, but the crash was one of the bigger effects in the movie, so they had to sell the crash. Any the citizens of the city were only reacting normally before the ship hitting the city. Are they supposed to expect falling starships or something? Is that a normal event that happens in San Francisco on a daily basis?

Spock chases Khan thru the city for a while, and nobody seems too chuffed about the giant spaceship crash once they get past the impact area.

Originally Posted by trackercowe

Really you wanted an explanation of how he was able to fund the building of the ship? Do you they need to detail it specifically? Maybe he lied to Starfleet of its true intentions, and they aided him in building it, while only mercenaries were used in powering the ship (they said he only needed a few). Maybe he got the funds to build it from private sources who believe in his cause? Does that really need an explanation? Do you really want a detailed financial record of how the ship was built, what is this Space Balls?

Do you think some admiral in the current US Navy could get a giant supercarrier built, then staff it with his own guys and take it off on a cruise to nuke the Chinese? If that type of scenario is not credible now, what makes it credible in the Star Trek universe?

Originally Posted by trackercowe

As I said they probably didn't have enough time to check all of the transports to find out who/what was in them. They were forced to go after Kirk in a matter of minutes, which did not give them time to look around the ship or check for credentials.

That's just not how military security works. The idea is laughable, they do similar things in movies all the time, but that doesn't make it any more likely to actually happen. This is some kind of top-secret base, not the back of the movie theatre with your buddy Jimmy holding the fire door open. You don't get onto the ship - hurried departure or not - without your credentials being checked, and, as I said, there would be defences set up to challenge and destroy unauthorized vessels even trying to get close, which wouldn't rely on "well it kinda LOOKS like one of our shuttles."

Originally Posted by trackercowe

Any why would the Klingon's go to Jupiter in search of the ship?

A competent military assumes the worst case at all times - the point is not that the Klingons might attack, but that it's stupid to think that Starfleet, or whoever was building that ship, would not assume it might be attacked and wouldn't take measures to defend it if that did happen. Especially when Admiral Marcus, already shown to be paranoid about Klingons, is the one who set up the base.

Originally Posted by trackercowe

Spock was able to detect where he went on Kronos because of the transport device he used. He did not use the same transport device while on Earth, so how could they track him then? They didn't know his exact location on Kronos, which is why they had to search a bit for him, but fortunately he wanted to find them, and he did.

Well that's almost credible, although why they don't use these magic transporters to go everywhere instantly instead of using a ship is another open question. I didn't remember Spock specifically saying that he found Khan by tracing his transporter at all, I think I was busy being amazed that somehow they could track one guy on a far distant planet light-years away as if it was as easy as spotting a guy on a unicycle across the street.

Originally Posted by trackercowe

The movie was already pushing two and a half hours, do you really need more exposition on the purpose of the experiment?

If it made sense, I wouldn't, no. Random things happening to advance the plot is the very essence of poor writing, though.

[OutOfTheCube]

Originally Posted by jammies

It's incredibly dumb because another 15 seconds of exposition would have (sort of) fixed it. "Hmm, Jim, in studying this blood sample I took of Khan's, I noticed that it seems to have miraculous properties of regeneration and cell regrowth. I'm thinking of injecting this tribble

That's almost exactly what he actually says in the movie. Try watching it more than once and actually paying attention before bitching about every tiny detail.

[MrMastodonFarm]

I thought the Klingons looked pretty good and were generally pretty awesome. I loved there outfits.

They'd be very good villains for the third movie... it's just a shame they cut them off at the knees already by making the current bad guy mop the floor with them.

[jammies]

Originally Posted by OutOfTheCube

That's almost exactly what he actually says in the movie. Try watching it more than once and actually paying attention before bitching about every tiny detail.

Are you saying you've already seen this movie twice or more? I hope not just so you could closely rewatch the scene with the tribble.

What did McCoy say? I remember him saying something along the lines of "I'm going to inject this dead tribble with Khan's blood to test its properties" to which I thought "Oh, so someone's going to die and get resurrected by Khan's blood - well isn't that convenient!", but I suppose it's possible dead tribbles are standard Starfleet resurrection testing subjects and it wasn't just a throw-in homage awkwardly worked into the film.

[GreenLantern2814]

Originally Posted by jammies

Are you saying you've already seen this movie twice or more? I hope not just so you could closely rewatch the scene with the tribble.

What did McCoy say? I remember him saying something along the lines of "I'm going to inject this dead tribble with Khan's blood to test its properties" to which I thought "Oh, so someone's going to die and get resurrected by Khan's blood - well isn't that convenient!", but I suppose it's possible dead tribbles are standard Starfleet resurrection testing subjects and it wasn't just a throw-in homage awkwardly worked into the film.

When that scene happens, I thought it was a clever little way to explain why tribbles reproduce so rapidly; a super tribble with Khan blood. But as soon as Kirk goes into the reactor, you know that's how they're bringing him back. Thus rendering any potential emotional impact of the scene inert.

[sureLoss]

Originally Posted by MrMastodonFarm

I thought the Klingons looked pretty good and were generally pretty awesome. I loved there outfits.

They'd be very good villains for the third movie... it's just a shame they cut them off at the knees already by making the current bad guy mop the floor with them.

Speaking of the Klingons, I noticed Kronos' moon was already blown up... wasn't that the disaster that brought the Klingons to negotiate a peace treaty with the Federation in one of the earlier Star Trek movies?

[GreenLantern2814]

Originally Posted by sureLoss

Speaking of the Klingons, I noticed Kronos' moon was already blown up... wasn't that the disaster that brought the Klingons to negotiate a peace treaty with the Federation in one of the earlier Star Trek movies?

Yep, its the Chernobyl disaster that kicks off the events of star trek six. It felt like something that was thrown in for the hardcore audience, except there was no discussion about why the thing was broken in the first place.

I dunno, maybe the destruction of Vulcan caused the klingons to ramp up their defense spending and Praxis became unstable sooner. I still think someone said 'The moon explodes right?'

'Yeah'

'Great, put it in the establishing shot, it'll look awesome'

'it's not supposed to explode for 30 years'

'#### it, new timeline'

'if its a new time line, must we shoplift so much from the previous films? This crew has its own destiny, is it really gonna be past adventures with more commercially viable aesthetics?'

'You're fired'

[Yeah_Baby]

They spelt Qo'noS wrong too.

[CaptainCrunch]

Stupid thing, I didn't like the Klingon look, they got to enamored with it.

to me the current Star Trek stories happened before the events of the 5 year voyage in the original series.

So the Klingon's should have been



If I recall my Star Trek, the bumpy headed Klingon look didn't really have wide spread occurance until the time between the series and tmp

[Rhettzky]

But then how would you be able to differentiate between Klingons and guys with goatee's? Seems hilariously confusing.

[Puppet Guy]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

Stupid thing, I didn't like the Klingon look, they got to enamored with it.

to me the current Star Trek stories happened before the events of the 5 year voyage in the original series.

So the Klingon's should have been



If I recall my Star Trek, the bumpy headed Klingon look didn't really have wide spread occurance until the time between the series and tmp

I read an interview with Gene Roddenberry back around 1990 where he had the best line about the different look between TOS Klingons and movie/TNG Klingons: "they always looked the way they do now (bumpy-headed)- we just didn't have the budget in 1966!"

[MrMastodonFarm]

Originally Posted by sureLoss

Speaking of the Klingons, I noticed Kronos' moon was already blown up... wasn't that the disaster that brought the Klingons to negotiate a peace treaty with the Federation in one of the earlier Star Trek movies?

I have no idea, if I ever know the answer to this puzzle I may just shoot myself.

[GreenLantern2814]

Originally Posted by MrMastodonFarm

I have no idea, if I ever know the answer to this puzzle I may just shoot myself.

Don't look up...

[GreenLantern2814]

Courtesy of red letter media, an in depth review of Into Darkness that everyone who has seen the film should watch.

http://redlettermedia.com/half-in-th...into-darkness/

[gottabekd]

Originally Posted by GreenLantern2814

Courtesy of red letter media, an in depth review of Into Darkness that everyone who has seen the film should watch.

http://redlettermedia.com/half-in-th...into-darkness/

So on the one hand, they aren't off base with most of their points. On the other hand, I'm not sure if anything would have satisfied them.

[GreenLantern2814]

Originally Posted by gottabekd

So on the one hand, they aren't off base with most of their points. On the other hand, I'm not sure if anything would have satisfied them.

A more thoughtful movie would've done it.

[Yeah_Baby]

Originally Posted by GreenLantern2814

A more thoughtful movie would've done it.

Exactly. As the review said, they crafted the plot to jump from action scene, to shocking reveal moment to another action scene, to shallow homage. Write a good story first, then go from there.

[Yamer]

"Use the shuttle-craft obtained during the 'Mudd' incident."

Hehe, awesome.

[3 Justin 3]

A better movie than Iron Man 3 that's for sure.