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25 Things That Don’t Make Sense in Star Trek December 11, 2009

[cross-posted @ Vogue Republic]

I really enjoyed the latest Star Trek film, I saw it in theatres who knows how many times and once during the 2-week IMAX Experience re-release. I saw it last about a week and a half ago. It’s fun, enjoyable, and oh so pretty. The theme, characters, and excitement of the movie, I’ve long thought, make up for some rather shockingly nonsensical elements.

Given the months and months of planning that go into films, I’m always shocked by the level of carelessness or arrogance (Michael Bay) that go into script/plot continuity. So without further ado nonsensical things in J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek

1. The Kelvin disables the Narada long enough (presumably weapons and propulsion) for a smattering of shuttles to escape, yet the same vessel is somehow impervious to an entire Klingon armada and a smaller Federation fleet.
2. As convenient as it is, we’re supposed to believe that the automated firing controls and fly-by-wire navigation controls of the Kelvin work just fine but somehow the autopilot system is rendered inoperable.
3. Why were the Vulcan kids taunting Spock, illogical.
4. How was Uhura going to carry all of those drinks over to her friends? You’ll notice the barkeep took his sweet time.
5. Kirk, “I’ll graduate early, cuz I’m a bad ass.” Reality: “This is a service academy, not a UC.”
6. Nobody should’ve been baffled by what happened during the rigged Kobayashi Maru.
7. The Federation’s flagship has a minor on the alpha shift running ops, or as I like to call it the console of miscellaneous responsibilities. Also, the 17 year old is like 4th in command.
8. Everything in this military analysis.
9. Cadet Uhura translates a message detailing the destruction of nearly 50 Klingon vessels and Captain Pike is unaware of this. Is there no galactic CNN? Or for that matter does Pike not get intelligence briefings?
10. The drill disables subspace communications, but clearly the drill also causes seismic disturbances. So how could Vulcan have issued the distress signal in the first place?
11. Hmm…there is absolutely no civilian air/space traffic around Vulcan. Was it a holiday? Were they all ruthlessly shot down by the Narada? Does the Federation live under permanent martial law?
12. I like how instead of beaming up random Vulcans from the planet’s surface, the Enterprise crew does absolutely nothing while Spock locates the elders.
13. From Earth to Vulcan is like five minutes max, when the Enterprise “warps into a trap,” but somehow the Narada‘s trip from Vulcan to Earth takes like half the movie. Headwinds? Space Headwinds?
14. It’s nice to know that the artificial black hole which swallowed Vulcan whole in like 20 seconds and had no accretion disk or time dilation effect, also had zero gravitational effects on the ice planet within visual distance from hot, dusty Vulcan.
15. I’m really surprised Acting Captain/First Officer Spock never bothered to name a replacement second in command during the entire time Kirk was on Delta Vega. It seems like pointing out that rather egregious mistake would’ve been easier than baiting him with taunts about his mother.
16. Why is Nero torturing Captain Pike, except to give us unnecessary exposition? So far the fleet guarding Earth is gone…to Vulcan where it was destroyed. Even if it hadn’t been, the body ship count so far is 52 to zip. Even Sulu notes they left the Enterprise alone because they aren’t a match.
17. The big navigational plan is for Scotty to boost the engines, for the Enterprise to hide itself near Saturn so as not to alert the Narada to its presence, and beam aboard. Except the Narada is clearly at Earth by the time they beam aboard and that whole rings of Saturn sequence, while cool, just seems entirely extraneous. Not to mention they know the Narada is like super-advanced, yet don’t assume her sensors are better than theirs.
18. Drilling into the planet’s core seems entirely superfluous when your mega-awesome, planet-killing, red matter fueled black hole bomb could just as surely destroy a planet by impacting on the surface. If you have the know how to use/build the device, surely you must know this.
19. I’m pretty sure they transported moving things on Enterprise. And did so while at warp. As much as Abrams’ new continuity machine gets out of some hairy continuity pickles from TNG era shows, chronologically it doesn’t explain the lack of continuity with Enterprise.
20. Kirk who is the only person who knows that Spock and Nero came back in time by being pulled into a singularity the kind of that may or may not have just strewn the guts of Vulcan across space in the past, then plans to destroy the Narada by creating, yet another singularity. Seems risky. He’d have no way of knowing if he was destroying the Narada or sending it to 1865.
21. Chronological continuity means Spock shouldn’t have known that Romulan and Vulcan were similar languages.
22. Like hundreds if not thousands of cadets were killed yesterday along with the complete genocide of Vulcan and Federation flags aren’t even at half mast, in fact the medal ceremony for Kirk (but no one else on the crew) seems to happen as though nothing had occurred besides a fine act of daring.
23. Starfleet promotes Jim Kirk from cadet to captain in a week, gives him a crew of similarly green cadets, gives them the flagship, and calls this good management. Maybe they don’t have money in the 23rd century but I’m pretty sure they haven’t eliminated jealousy or meritocratic job assignments.
24. Kirk: “Going back in time, that’s cheating.” Spock: “It wasn’t on purpose, you idiot.”
25. Considering how Vulcan was kind of like the Virginia of the Federation, people are taking this protective failure and genocide in the capital’s backyard very, very well.