http://io9.gizmodo.com/everything-the-discovery-can-tell-us-about-the-new-star-1784257704
Supposedly, according to a denial by Fuller, my above post is completely off base in terms of time frame.
If you take into account ST:ENT, my nacelle argument amounts to next to nothing and ST:DSC could just as easily be set post ST:ENT and pre TOS.
Dammit.
The blue-sided nacelle configuration you describe was (if we ignore Star Trek: Enterprise) first seen in ST:TMP, so it’s after The Original Series (and The Animated Series) but not after the TOS era (which includes the first six movies). But anyway, within the fictional Trek universe, there would actually be two different possibilities regarding the blue-side nacelles.
The first possibility is that the blue-sided nacelles were indeed a technological innovation that appeared around the time of TMP; new ships would have been incorporated the new nacelles straight off, while older ships (as in the case of the original Enterprise, as we saw in TMP) would have been refitted with the new design during their next major overhaul. So by that hypothesis, the ship in Discovery would be an older design that’s been uprated with new nacelles, which would place the series either around the time of TMP, or a bit before, or anytime afterwards.
The second possibility, however, is that Star Trek: Enterprise does not represent a continuity gaffe, and that instead Starfleet has used two types of nacelles at the same time: one type on some ships and another type on other ships, depending on requirements, in the same way that steam, turbo-electric, diesel and nuclear ship propulsion systems existed simultaneously in the 20th century. This possibility would not rule out for the series the TOS/TNG gap timeframe you mentioned, but it would add the possibility that the new series is set between Enterprise and TOS (in a period which itself constitutes another interesting gap in the Trek timeline).
@CWO:
The blue-sided nacelle configuration you describe was (if we ignore Star Trek: Enterprise) first seen in ST:TMP, so it’s after The Original Series (and The Animated Series) but not after the TOS era (which includes the first six movies). But anyway, within the fictional Trek universe, there would actually be two different possibilities regarding the blue-side nacelles.
This is true, however, my premise was based on having both blue sided nacelles and red/orange bussard ramscoop collectors at the front end of the nacelle.
But… my point below may just nullify the whole argument.
@CWO:
The first possibility is that the blue-sided nacelles were indeed a technological innovation that appeared around the time of TMP; new ships would have been incorporated the new nacelles straight off, while older ships (as in the case of the original Enterprise, as we saw in TMP) would have been refitted with the new design during their next major overhaul. So by that hypothesis, the ship in Discovery would be an older design that’s been uprated with new nacelles, which would place the series either around the time of TMP, or a bit before, or anytime afterwards.
The second possibility, however, is that Star Trek: Enterprise does not represent a continuity gaffe, and that instead Starfleet has used two types of nacelles at the same time: one type on some ships and another type on other ships, depending on requirements, in the same way that steam, turbo-electric, diesel and nuclear ship propulsion systems existed simultaneously in the 20th century. This possibility would not rule out for the series the TOS/TNG gap timeframe you mentioned, but it would add the possibility that the new series is set between Enterprise and TOS (in a period which itself constitutes another interesting gap in the Trek timeline).
These are reasonable theories. Your propulsion-type postulation is interesting and could account for such a difference. However, Federation starships have never had anything other than matter-antimatter warp engines for their main interstellar propulsion. Therefore, there was never really a difference in the propulsion systems in the vein of diesel vs steam vs nuclear.
From a vessel design perspective, I do personally consider the NX-class a continuity gaffe. However, now that we are talking about it, ST:ENT was not the first to make this aesthetic choice when going back in time. TNG did so in First Contact. Zefram Cochrane’s Phoenix had the red collectors and blue lined nacelles also… before ST:ENT was even a thought.
Perhaps it is simply personal preference, but I have never liked the idea of prequels that do not or can not visually match the original aesthetic.
The real-world explanation for all this is, of course, that TOS was produced on a small budget and with 1960s modelmaking and effects technology. With the exception of the (literally) “star” ship of the series, the USS Enterprise, the producers couldn’t afford to put nifty glowing parts on the nacelles of their ship models. The Romulan Bird of Prey ships of the series had solid nacelles and the Klingon battlecruiser ships of the series had solid nacelles. When the Enterprise series came along, they retroactively gave glowing nacelles not only to the old NX-class starships, they did likewise for the old Klingons as well: the episode Sleeping Dogs shows a Raptor-class Klingon ship with red glowing parts on the nacelle sides. In TMP, conversely, the new Klingon K’t’inga-class battlecruisers had solid nacelles; in The Undiscovered Country, the same ship class was updated to have glowing nacelles. The Romulan ships likewise were given glowing nacelles in TNG. So I don’t think that the presence or absence or configuration details of glowing parts on engine nacelles is necessarily a reliable indicator of the evolutionary stages of a fictional technology; it’s more an indicator of how motion picture and television technology (and budgets) have evolved from the 1960s to today.
It’s a fair point to say that this results in apparent aesthetic inconsistencies across Trek’s eras, but the flip side of the argument is that maintaining rigid aesthetic consistency across several hundred years of fictional history would not only be visually boring, it would also be unrealistic from the point of view of technological evolution. To give just one example, the US Navy’s current aircraft carriers and submarines have absolutely no resemblance to the USN’s three-masted sailing frigate USS Consititution, but the USN still uses them anyway even though they’re aesthetically inconsistent with eighteenth-century sailing ships. I’d even argue that, at least as far as Trek’s Earth / Starfleet ship classes are concerned, the series and films have actually been pretty good about using a recognizable and broadly consistent design architecture for many (though not all) of the important ship types we’ve seen: two elongated nacelles connected by two struts to a hull, which has consisted of either a cylinder (Phoenix) or a saucer (NX-01) or in most cases both (several Enterprises and Voyager). Discovery basically just replaces the cylinder with a wedge. (This triangular shape can be seen as an indirect connection to Star Wars: the original design sketches on which Discovery is based were made, as previously noted, in the 1970s by Ralph McQuarrie, who also designed the Imperial Stardestroyers around the same time.) Some of the McQuarrie sketches show the same bronze colour tone used for Discovery; this tone is actually quite novel for Earth / Starfleet ship classes, and in a sense is a nice follow-up to the NX-01 Enterprise, which was a similarly novel metallic silver.
Good post Marc. You sum it up well.
The production inconsistencies or developments over time are what they are. The nerds among us, of which I am one, will usually go through significant theoretical gymnastics in seeking to justify these differences. Ultimately, it is a pointless endeavor. Though a pleasant distraction from real life on occasion.
Your analogy to the evolution of our own naval ships is well taken. However, there is an apparent (perhaps self-evident) physical and technological improvement over time. You would expect something similar to occur in Star Trek, were it an actual time in history. However, with the Phoenix in First Contact and the entire Enterprise show, we have been presented with a fairly consistent image for human (and even alien) spacecraft design over the course of 300 years (from 2063 to 2379). And TOS/films I-VI are really now the aberration, at least when it comes to some of the aesthetics. This lack of evolution is what nags me more than anything else.
But it must also be expected given how many people have been involved in a creative capacity for the Star Trek brand for 50 years now. Similar things could be said of Star Wars. Though one figure is primarily associated as the father of a franchise (Roddenberry and Lucas), rarely are they able to keep total creative and artistic control. I think it may be impossible this day in age. Tolkien did it. But he was a world builder on a scale different from almost everyone. Can George RR Martin claim to have this? I cannot say since I haven’t read or watched his work.
Speculating about fictional technology is, as you said, a pretty abstract (though fun) exercise because one’s conclusions can’t be proved objectively one way or the other. Since, however, you’re disappointed by the fact that in the TOS TV series the Enterprise has glowy red nacelle caps but no glowy blue nacelle sides, and that in the first six Trek movies the Enterprise has glowy blue nacelle sides but no glowy red nacelle caps, here’s a speculative argument that might make you feel better.
If I understand correctly, you’re saying that the presence or absence of glowy parts on nacelles should be logically (to coin a phrase) provide as an index of technological progress: no-glow nacelles ought to represent the most primitive stage of nacelle evolution, two-glow blue-and-red nacelles ought to represent the most advanced stage of nacelle evolution, and one-glow (blue but not red, or red but not blue) nacelles ought to represent an intermediate stage of nacelle evolution. If we accept that premise, then yes the depiction of nacelles over several centuries of fictional Trek history makes no sense. But here are two reasons why the premise might not actually be correct.
First, the presence of a design feature on real machine A and its absence on real machine B does not necessarily mean that A is more advanced than B (or vice-versa). It might instead simply be because A and B are designed along different principles, in the same way (for example) that helicopters have rotors and airplanes don’t because they’re different types of flying machines. The presence/absence difference might also be due to specialized design/mission requirements that have nothing to do with technological sophistication in an overt sense. Take the MiG-25 Foxbat interceptor, which the West go to study up close when a Soviet pilot defected with one back in the 1970s. Publicly, Western analysts mocked the plane for having vacuum tube electronics. Privately, they weren’t laughing: vacuum tubes are more resistant than transistors to electromagnetic pulses from nuclear explosions and are more temperature-tolerant in extreme conditions.
Second, the lack of visible red glowy nacelle caps or visible blue glowy nacelle sides doesn’t necessarily mean that both glowy parts aren’t actually built into the nacelles; it may simply mean that, for some sort of engineering reason, they’re plated-over or shielded from view in that particular model. Take modern jet aircraft as an example. For the past several decades, we’ve seen some aircraft whose jet engines are mounted externally on the wings (like the KC-135 Stratotanker) and some aircraft whose engines are buried inside the airframe (like the F-15 fighter). An even better example would be the B-58 Hustler and the prototype XB-70 Valkyrie: both were American 1960s-era jet-powered supersonic strategic bombers, yet they look radically different because (among other things) the Hustler had huge external engine pods while the Valkyrie had recessed engines. Somebody who knows nothing about aircraft design might glance at the Valkyrie and think that it has no engines at all, or might look at the twin square intakes below the plane and think that it has two engines, and therefore conclude that the Hustler (with four highly visible engines) is more powerful. In fact, the Valkyrie had six engines buried in its fuselage, each of which could produce 28,000 lbf of thrust with afterburner, or 168,000 lbf in total. The Hustler’s four highly-visible engines could each deliver 15,600 lbf with afterburner, or 62,500 in total, which is two-and-a-half times less than the Valkyrie (which could fly at over Mach 3, in contrast with the Hustler which was a comparative slowpoke at Mach 2).
I hate the new ship design. It looks like a low life transport rather than a Heavy Cruiser. I saw that the design was taken from those old art concepts, but id rather they go back to original 1966 design. Aren’t they copying the characters… Kirk , Spock anyway? On you tube they got some group that’s making terrific original episodes true to the original. One such episode was based on hypothetical extension of Mirror, Mirror
@CWO:
Speculating about fictional technology is, as you said, a pretty abstract (though fun) exercise because one’s conclusions can’t be proved objectively one way or the other. Since, however, you’re disappointed by the fact that in the TOS TV series the Enterprise has glowy red nacelle caps but no glowy blue nacelle sides, and that in the first six Trek movies the Enterprise has glowy blue nacelle sides but no glowy red nacelle caps, here’s a speculative argument that might make you feel better.
It is less that I am disappointed and more that I would have rather seen the design aspects of the TOS era applied in a logical retroactive progression when delving into the pre-TOS time period. Star Trek has always prided itself on being based in scientific plausibility or, at the very least, rationale. That includes how its ships are designed. Form fits the function, primarily. This aberration, as I see it, of the nacelles is just an indication that some writers/artists/designers found the need reverse that and make form more important. It was more important to utilize the now-accepted-as-standard blue/red configuration because that is what people thought a Federation starship looked like. As though it would be confusing if this was not adhered to.
As you rightly pointed out, there were probably production/budgetary and technological limitations during the filming of TOS that precluded the use of a more ‘flashy’ ship design. No argument there. However, I do believe that the period from TOS -> Films I-VI -> TNG era saw a design evolution of its own that embodied the natural progression I am alluding to. Designs became more advanced and visually more sleek. Going back in time (pre-TOS) to make a new show while simultaneously having advanced in our time will naturally lead to a more modern aesthetic; it cannot really be helped. The more we discuss, the more pointless I realize my opinions are. Since these things cannot be changed.
Your aviation analogies are well put however.
http://trekcore.com/blog/2016/08/bryan-fuller-reveals-long-awaited-star-trek-discovery-details/
Whoa ho ho… This is pretty big considering how non-specific past reveals have been. A few questions answered.
Interesting. The part which says that the new show is “set approximately ten years before James T. Kirk takes command of the Enterprise, in the Prime timeline” (which he did in about 2265), places the Discovery series around the same time as the events of the original pilot episode The Cage, which is set around 2254.
IL - wasn’t the Enterprise B from ST:TNG a heavy cruiser? The 1701 and 1701-A were Constitution Classes. (haven’t looked at the images for the show yet, I want to be surprised.)
@CWO:
Interesting.� The part which says that the new show is “set approximately ten years before James T. Kirk takes command of the Enterprise, in the Prime timeline” (which he did in about 2265), places the Discovery series around the same time as the events of the original pilot episode The Cage, which is set around 2254.
Yeah, I was interested by Fuller’s statement: “We�re much closer to Kirk�s universe [than that of Archer�s], so we get to play with all of that [TOS-era] iconography of those ships and those uniforms.”
Sounds good to me, though I hope they don’t riff too hard on the established look.
Also, the perspective being from a non-command officer should be interesting and different. The impression I get is of the TNG episode “Lower Decks” which switches the viewpoint of events from the standard bridge crew to a group of junior officers. It was a pretty compelling shift in perspective. However, Star Trek has never approached a show from the perspective of just one person before. There has always been a general focus on the ‘bridge crew’ with episodes devoted to the entire group and individuals from time to time. This will be quite a change if it follows this woman’s perspective almost exclusively.
@Cmdr:
IL - wasn’t the Enterprise B from ST:TNG a heavy cruiser? The 1701 and 1701-A were Constitution Classes. (haven’t looked at the images for the show yet, I want to be surprised.)
Both the Constitution-refit and the Excelsior class (Enterprise-B) were rated as heavy cruisers in their heyday. By the TNG era they would have been less than that. The way they rate ships in Star Trek is inconsistent and undefined.
Fuller stated that “The lead character will be female Lt. Commander in Starfleet – and human – not the captain of a starship. The rank comes with caveats.” So it’s clear that the lead character won’t be the ship’s Captain, but it also seems clear that she’s one of the senior officers aboard, not a junior officer or an enlisted crewmember. Major surface-combat warships in real navies today typically have a commanding officer / captain who actually does hold the naval rank of Captain and an executive officer who holds the naval rank of Commander. Star Trek has tended to follow that practice, though not consistently; I think that in TOS Spock had the rank of Lieutenant-Commander for a while, even though his shipboard position was that of First Officer (as well as Science Officer).
The role described – from what little we know about it – may have partially been inspired by the Will Riker one on TNG, meaning that TNG adopted the sensible position that a ship’s C/O ought to remain aboard the ship (which is his primary responsibility) and that the more expendable X/O is the one who should handle the potentially risky (and more fun) job of leading missions off the ship. It may also have been partially inspired (based on the cryptic “with caveats” remark) by T’Pol on Enterprise, who as I recall was initially assigned to the ship with a special status (given that she wasn’t Starfleet personnel).
The way they rate ships in Star Trek is inconsistent and undefined.
Yes – and to further complicate the picture, the Klingons in Star Trek III charmingly referred to the Enterprise as a “Federation battlecruiser,” if I remember correctly. In fairness, the Klingons tend to view things from a military perspective, and also may be working from garbled intelligence reports about Starfleet. In the militarized alternate universe shown in Yesterday’s Enterprise, Picard refers to the Enterprise-D as a “battleship”.
@CWO:
Fuller stated that "The lead character will be female Lt. Commander in Starfleet – and human – not the captain of a starship. The rank comes with caveats."� So it’s clear that the lead character won’t be the ship’s Captain, but it also seems clear that she’s one of the senior officers aboard, not a junior officer or an enlisted crewmember.� Major surface-combat warships in real navies today typically have a commanding officer / captain who actually does hold the naval rank of Captain and an executive officer who holds the naval rank of Commander.� Star Trek has tended to follow that practice, though not consistently; I think that in TOS Spock had the rank of Lieutenant-Commander for a while, even though his shipboard position was that of First Officer (as well as Science Officer).�
The role described – from what little we know about it – may have partially been inspired by the Will Riker one on TNG, meaning that TNG adopted the sensible position that a ship’s C/O ought to remain aboard the ship (which is his primary responsibility) and that the more expendable X/O is the one who should handle the potentially risky (and more fun) job of leading missions off the ship.� It may also have been partially inspired (based on the cryptic “with caveats” remark) by T’Pol on Enterprise, who as I recall was initially assigned to the ship with a special status (given that she wasn’t Starfleet personnel).
Possibly. The stated role made me think of “Lower Decks”, however as you pointed out she is not a junior officer. That’s why I said non-command, as in not the Captain. However, Riker certainly was command level. I guess it just depends what her responsibilities aboard the ship are.
@CWO:
The way they rate ships in Star Trek is inconsistent and undefined.
Yes – and to further complicate the picture, the Klingons in Star Trek III charmingly referred to the Enterprise as a “Federation battlecruiser,” if I remember correctly. In fairness, the Klingons tend to view things from a military perspective, and also may be working from garbled intelligence reports about Starfleet. In the militarized alternate universe shown in Yesterday’s Enterprise, Picard refers to the Enterprise-D as a “battleship”.
Exactly. The proper and consistent classification of ships in Star Trek has always irked me. The writers just never seemed to think it that important. It is somewhat tricky to define Federation ships in particularly, since their primary mission exploratory and peaceful in nature. Though the most excitement in the show occurs when they use their weapons.
Playing the various Trek computer games over the years provides a better perspective on the relative classification of ships, but it as all pretty unofficial.
I guess it just depends what her responsibilities aboard the ship are.
Yes, there’s a distinction between line officers (whose jobs involve commanding subordinates) and staff officers (whose jobs don’t necessarily do so). Though it would be pretty boring to build an action-adventure series around the activities of a staff officer. :-)
@CWO:
I guess it just depends what her responsibilities aboard the ship are.
Yes, there’s a distinction between line officers (whose jobs involve commanding subordinates) and staff officers (whose jobs don’t necessarily do so). Though it would be pretty boring to build an action-adventure series around the activities of a staff officer. :-)
Haha, yes. If past Star Trek is any indication we would see a lot of ship tours and communicating with field captains via a computer screen.
http://www.ign.com/articles/2016/08/12/star-trek-discoverys-ship-design-still-evolving
Not much new in the way of info, but interesting.
Here is the study model of the McQuarrie design from the 70s. I am not sure how much they plan to retain, but I hope it is more rather than less. I actually like the aesthetic of the model quite a bit. Fits with the 10 years pre-TOS/TOS feel.
While watching the Olympics last night I saw the new trailer for Star Wars: Rogue One. Looks cool for a change, but I noted how much of the aesthetic of the original trilogy they are maintaining. Particularly in ship design, weapons and control panel layouts. It is all very grounded and realistic. Fortunately, they realize that this is what people expect to see from a Star Wars film that is set in the A New Hope era. I can only hope that Star Trek does the same. Tone down the modern flashiness and bring back the simpler, darker look of the 60s and 70s.
