ST Into Darkness - first nine minutes

[Anuadela]

In the 9 minute opening you find out that the planet is about to rip itself apart..causing issues with the magnetic field.  It plays havic with beaming..(See First  NuTrek movie)

If that's the reason for the ship being underwater, it's still weak.  They have shuttles, lots of them.  We saw them in the first "NuTrek" movie.  (Don't tell me, they're all broken at the same time, right?  )

Whatever!  Perhaps they said...."You know...we could take shuttles down there...but instead lets just take the whole ship down incase the worst happens and we need to save these people."  "Jim, taking the ship down there is a bit much, why?"  Kirk's eyes glinted wickedly.  "Spock, why do we climb mountains?"  "Because we can."

[evil_genius_180]

In the 9 minute opening you find out that the planet is about to rip itself apart..causing issues with the magnetic field.  It plays havic with beaming..(See First  NuTrek movie)

If that's the reason for the ship being underwater, it's still weak.  They have shuttles, lots of them.  We saw them in the first "NuTrek" movie.  (Don't tell me, they're all broken at the same time, right?  )

Whatever!  Perhaps they said...."You know...we could take shuttles down there...but instead lets just take the whole ship down incase the worst happens and we need to save these people."  "Jim, taking the ship down there is a bit much, why?"  Kirk's eyes glinted wickedly.  "Spock, why do we climb mountains?"  "Because we can."

True, the latest trailer does have a monologue by Pike where it sounds like he's lecturing Kirk on the recklessness of his actions and on how he's going to get someone or everyone killed.  Maybe taking the entire ship down and putting it underwater just seemed like a good idea to Kirk due to his reckless nature.  In fact, the monologue by Pike could even be him reprimanding Kirk for his actions in that instance.  After all, we know Kirk in TOS seemed to be hit or miss as far as following the Prime Directive.  I'll accept that explanation more than one about how the ship had to be down there. 

[mattalki]

I think the thing other than the ship being underwater that I couldn't understand was why did they have to lower Spock into the volcano?  Couldn't they fire a probe from orbit to deploy whatever device he had to plant?  Why are they sending THE FIRST OFFICER of the ship into a very hazardous situation like this? 

None of the 9 minutes made any sense. I just sat there shaking my head in bewilderment that the writers think we are all that stupid.

I really want to like JJTrek, but at this point it looks like they don't really know what they are doing.

[HalOfBorg]

In the 9 minute opening you find out that the planet is about to rip itself apart..causing issues with the magnetic field.  It plays havic with beaming..(See First  NuTrek movie)

OK - at least it's a valid, time-honored Star Trek style reason. So WHY are they interfering with the local population? Something happened in this new timeline to remove the Prime Directive?

[evil_genius_180]

OK - at least it's a valid, time-honored Star Trek style reason. So WHY are they interfering with the local population? Something happened in this new timeline to remove the Prime Directive?

JJ Abrams and crappy writing happened.    Kurtzman and Orci claim to be Trekkies (or, at least, one of them supposedly is) but I have my doubts.  Despite being a pretty good flick, they had enough inconsistencies in the first film to make you question that (Delta Vega being within viewing distance of Vulcan, for example.)  However, they could also be writing what JJ is telling them to write.  Though, in TOS, they did play it a bit fast and loose when it came to the Prime Directive.  But, they were also making stuff up as they went back then.  The more current Trek writers have more than 46 years of Trek history to take stuff from and you wonder how much of it they're actually using.

[HalOfBorg]

The Delta Vega bit bugged me in the theater, then I thought "OK, someone in the Startfleet Naming Office died (or didn't) on the Kelvin. VULCAN still calls that planet the same I imagine. Or now they used to.....

[evil_genius_180]

There are too many things wrong with that planet, besides the name.  With as clearly and largely as Spock could see Vulcan from that planet, the planets would have to be close, so close that their gravitational forces would cause issues.  (earthquakes, etc.)  Not to mention the fact that Delta Vega likely would have been pulled into the artificial black hole as well.  Plus, it's awfully convenient that Nero would destroy Vulcan at a time where their orbits were that close, as we know that planets with close orbits (Neptune and Jupiter) aren't usually that close together.  Of course, it could be a moon, but Vulcan has no moon.  That was established on TOS.  (unless you count the planets/moons you can supposedly see from Vulcan in the theatrical cut of TMP, but those contradict TOS and cause the same proximity issues as the Vulcan/Detla Vega proximity does and that was corrected for the DVD release anyway, where Vulcan was made to look more like it did in STIII and STIV)

[S'kai]

Um, Delta Vega, in that scenario, would not get "pulled into the black hole." Assuming the black hole was created entirely from the mass of Vulcan, it would still have the same gravitational pull as Vulcan did at its uncompressed size. A common misunderstanding, the belief that black holes suck everything into them.

Back to the topic.

[evil_genius_180]

Nobody said it was made entirely by the mass or Vulcan or had the same gravitational pull as Vulcan.  After all, they seemed to think the Enterprise would be pulled in, despite at no time thinking it would be pulled down to Vulcan's surface.  However, I'm willing to admit that Delta Vega may not have been pulled in.  After all, the black hole did just destroy Vulcan and then disappear.  It was probably very unstable and had a very short life anyway.

But, yes, getting back to the topic at hand is a good idea.

[Saladin_CO]

I imagined that Spock saw 'vulcan' die, the same way that he saw the Intrepid die in "The Immunity Syndrome" which was the inspiration for Obi Wan seeing Alderaan die by using the force.  So the funny thing to me is, JJ Abrams is going, "I can make Spock use the Force like Obi Wan" and we all know that Spock did it first and Obi Wan was a copy of him. 

Seriously, I think it was in his mind's eye at the terror of Vulcan's being defeated, not that he literally was able to see Vulcan destroyed in the visual sense.  At least, rationalizing it that way works better than it being a 'moon' of Vulcan.

Ken

[Admiral Barnett]

So wait...you buy into a starship diving down into a canyon to use a large time portal....you buy into a starship slinging itself around a star to time travel...yet one under water confuses you?...you guys just trolling?  Prime Directive is mentioned.  Haters are bad...lazy ones are worse.

Trolling?  Haters?  Uh, it's called logic.  It has nothing to do with the physics of putting a ship underwater, it has to do with the absurdity of hiding a ship underwater.

Before calling people lazy trolling haters, go watch some Star Trek episodes.  Like the ones where the Enterprise (a space ship) hides behind a moon or asteroid or other celestial body to avoid Prime Directive issues.  There are plenty of episodes where they do that.  If the culture in the movie is at a fairly primitive level of intelligence, they're not even going to see ship in orbit.  There's no logical reason to hide a space ship underwater when they could just as easily hide it in space.  Besides, according to the Blu-Ray special features on the first movie, this ship is between 700 and 800 meters long.  How do you get a ship that large into an ocean from space without being seen by the natives from which you're trying to hide?  You don't.  Again, go watch Star Trek.  Specifically, Star Trek IV.  They landed a cloaked Klingon Bird of Prey on Earth and they were still noticed.  Also, Tomorrow is Yesterday.  The Enterprise was in the upper atmosphere for just a few seconds and it was noticed.  Granted, that was with radar, but it was still noticed.  The B'Rel class Bird of Prey is around 100 meters long, the Enterprise is 289 meters long.  If those ships can't go unnoticed in an atmosphere, a 700+ meter one is going to have a harder time.  Go watch any of the Voyager episodes where they landed the ship.  It was noticed in more than one occasion due to its size and the nose it made coming down and it's a lot smaller then the new Enterprise.  Plus, the ship went underwater, which was bound to make a really big splash that would be noticed.  Also, water is clear.  All one of the natives had to do was dive in to see the ship.  Only once in all of Star Trek is a ship hidden in water, and that was in Star Trek: Insurrection.  However, it was cloaked and hidden there as part of an illegal plot.  (though, it was a weak plot device even then)

A. If the ship can do it...and there is nothing to say that they did not submerge further out to sea...then why the fuss?  No see the issue is that you and others have already decided to hate the movie.  The phase 2 Enterprise was delayed because some here hated the new movie design.  So what do we have...Kitumba with TOS Enterprise...even though the script made a point to illustrate that the refit was so much faster, she could get past the Klingon fleets.  That was cutting one's nose off to spite one's face...and your disaproval of a submerged Star Ship...is not logic...it is more about complaining.

THIS.

[Admiral Barnett]

There are too many things wrong with that planet, besides the name.  With as clearly and largely as Spock could see Vulcan from that planet, the planets would have to be close, so close that their gravitational forces would cause issues.  (earthquakes, etc.)  Not to mention the fact that Delta Vega likely would have been pulled into the artificial black hole as well.  Plus, it's awfully convenient that Nero would destroy Vulcan at a time where their orbits were that close, as we know that planets with close orbits (Neptune and Jupiter) aren't usually that close together.  Of course, it could be a moon, but Vulcan has no moon.  That was established on TOS.  (unless you count the planets/moons you can supposedly see from Vulcan in the theatrical cut of TMP, but those contradict TOS and cause the same proximity issues as the Vulcan/Detla Vega proximity does and that was corrected for the DVD release anyway, where Vulcan was made to look more like it did in STIII and STIV)

Okay, here's what REALLY happened with Spock and Kirk on Delta Vega: Spock saw the destruction of Vulcan from Delta Vega, but in his mind's eye! What we saw on screen was just that. If none of you here can grasp that, then it's YOU who's got the problems with the script, not anybody else. I figured this out quite a while ago, and I'm surprised that most of you Star Trek fundamentalists here haven't (at least Anudela has sense.)