Jack_Bauer

Starfleet Command
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Content Count

    2,815

  • Joined

  • Last visited

Posts posted by Jack_Bauer

  1. Posted

    the wire

     

    vancouver, BC (canada)

    I'm guessing one of jPod , Da Vinci's Inquest, or Da Vinci's City Hall. None of which I watch and had to double check the settings. Hopefully I'm not wrong.

     

    Toronto, Ontario

     

    (the show I'm thinking of has never actually stated the city but it's generally assumed it's Toronto. Also, it is currently on and is aired in the United States).

  2. Posted

    I was totally blown away until the revel of what exactly was happening.

     

    That

    Click for Spoiler:

    the wind
    was making people kill themselves is the craziest thing Night has yet done. Someone needs to take away his writing/directing licensee and burn it, imo.

    I think it would have been better to do that after Signs.

     

    I mean c'mon:

    Click for Spoiler:

    Aliens, who are allergic to water, attempting to conquer a planet whose surface is two-thirds water?

     

    He's pretty much been a train wreck (at least critically, financial results are mixed) ever since Signs (The Village, Lady in the Water, The Happening). All of which have scored progressively worse on Rotten Tomatoes (43%, 24%, 19%, respectively).

     

    I've never actually seen any of his movies because I generally don't care for horror movies and the trailers for his movies creep me out, so I'll give him that.

  3. Posted

    I dont' get it

     

    first they say it's not a reboot, then they say it is

     

    then they say it's not meant for fans, and now they say they hope fans will be happy with it

     

    MAKE UP YOUR FRAKKING MIND ALREADY!

    In terms of being a reboot, it sort of is and it sort of isn't. They're not rebuilding the universe from the ground up like Batman Begins or Casino Royale, but they're not adhering to all of the canon set forth by the previous series (and the method they've chosen to do so allows them that freedom).

     

    Click for Spoiler:

    Based on everything I've heard, this movie will result in the creation of an alternate timeline. Nero travels back from the late 24th century (at least sometime after 2384, based on Countdown #1) and destroys the U.S.S. Kelvin, this ship on which Kirk's father serves.

    The theory of time travel they've decided on for this movie is the quantum theory (or something like that), which simply states that in order to avoid paradoxes, when you travel back in time, you are never in the past of your original timeline. Your very presence in the past means you are in a different timeline and events need not necessarily take place as you remember them. To use Back to the Future as an example as soon as Marty prevents his parents meeting they are no longer his parents. He would still exist (and the photo wouldn't fade) because his parents met in his original timeline and he is not in the past of his original timeline. It would also be impossible for him to travel back to his original timeline, per my understanding. He could only travel to the future of the new timeline (and even then it may not necessarily be the same future because he's there again). Confused yet?

     

    So applying that logic to Star Trek, Nero leaves his native timeline and travels into the past of the second timeline (the timeline in which the movie takes place). It is already different from his timeline because of his presence in the past. However, not much would change over time unless he interacts with something, which he does by destroying the Kelvin. This one event allows for a complete reinvention of the look of the universe. The destruction of a Starfleet vessel by Romulans at this point in history could alter numerous facets of the Star Trek universe (including where the Enterprise is built, how it looks, when it launches, the technology onboard, who serves aboard it, anything really). But despite all of this, the original Star Trek timeline would still exist and continue on beyond Nero's travels and would not be erased by anything he does in the past because he has jumped timelines. However, also note that anything proceeding the destruction of the Kelvin would be unchanged.

    I doubt such an explanation will be given in the movie but this is what the producers (specifically Orci) have stated to be the case, more or less, with some extrapolation by yours truly.

     

    Personally, I like this explanation, it allows Star Trek to refresh itself and bring in new fans, while still creating something that old fans can enjoy. It's not really a traditional reboot but its not a straight prequel either because anything could happen that didn't necessarily happen before. If its anything its more of an in-universe reboot as opposed to an external reboot (nuBSG, Batman Begins, Casino Royale).

     

    As for whether or not it's for fans or not. I think that it's something that existing fans will enjoy and it has been made for the fans, but it wasn't made only for fans of Star Trek. We are a target market, but not the only target market. Star Trek needs new fans, the same way businesses need new customers. The challenge is to not alienate the existing loyal customer base and that's the line Abrams and his team have to walk. I think they've done a pretty good job with this explanation but only time will really tell for sure.

    However, should this movie fail, Star Trek is dead for the foreseeable future.

  4. Posted

    Although Abrams has a bad reputation among Trek fans (Enterprise) and is only interested in cash, he may surprise us. I also resent the fact that some people consider others as not true fans if they liked Enterprise. I thought it was good until the Zindy angle.

    What? Abrams has had no involvement with Trek prior to the development of this movie.

  5. Posted

    The Communicator and ear-thingy are ok but the Tricorder looks odd.

    I think Tricorder is a mislabel. I believe its intended to be like the 'salt shaker' medical scanner McCoy was always using.

     

    And I concur about the other two props. It would have been cooler to see the communicator open though.

  7. Posted

    You should leave both lid and seat down - to prevent the inevitable plunge of valuables into where no one wants to put their hand.

     

    Jewelry, toothbrushes, hair brushes, the roll of tp that no one ever put on the holder.

     

    On a more serious note - homes with toddlers should always leave the lid down to prevent accidental drowning.

     

    And not just women but children can fall into the abyss when the seat left up.

     

    And one more note - if you have small boys - don't get heavy designer toilet seats - and if you do - make sure they stay locked in the up position - there have been some toilet training accidents with the heavier seats falling on the boys

    All very good points. Also, the lid of the toilet should be down when you flush. Flushing expels a misty vapour of toilet water (I can't think of any better way to describe it) in the air which then lands of anything within a few feet of the toilet (i.e. potentially everything TUH mentions in that second line). So really, it is better to put both the seat and the lid down when you flush and you might as well leave them down.

  8. Posted

    I can't remember that name of the episode, and I don't think it was the worst, but it's one where the doctor is found after so many years and the rase that has him thought of Voyager as an enemy and a warship... I just kind of thought that that particular episode was kind of a filler...

    Living Witness

  9. Posted

    I think Robert Carlyle, new to the Stargate franchise, could do it - he portrayed Hitler - I think he can do villain.

    Not a bad choice, and he does kind of have the UK connection these movies had thus far (Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Gary Oldman, Cillian Murphy, and of course Chris Nolan etc). Of course, there could potentially be a lot to work out. Batman 3 is far from a certainty and even if it does move forward there's no telling when that will be. On top of that, Carlyle would likely be committed to SGU for sometime, should the show be successful, and so he would have to shoot during a hiatus.

     

    Another UK actor I've heard mentioned as a potential Riddler (to the point where he is lobbying for the role, or at least will be if the project moves forward with the Riddler as the villian) is David Tennant. That would be another excellent choice IMO.

  12. Posted

    It would be nice to hear what JJ meant by "not a Trek Fan" from his own mouth but I accept Orci's explanation.

     

    Loved his comment about needing to "check with the rest of the Supreme Court" (meaning fans) on whether the comic prequel Countdown is canon or not. Now he is starting to understand what they got them selves into. :)

    The Supreme Court actually refers to Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman, J.J. Abrams, Damon Lindelof, and Bryan Burk. Those five (who range from strong Trekkies Orci and Lindelof to complete novice Burk) who made decisions regarding the content of the new movie in terms of how strictly to follow canon in various situations.

  13. Posted

    The theory I've seen as to why Nimoy was omitted from the original version of the trailer was to make the new film seem less connected to the franchise as a whole. That's the challenge the new movie faces. It has to draw in some new fans and that could be difficult if it seems like it's just another Star Trek movie (hence why the title is not Star Trek XI). This has to be a movie that can be enjoyed by someone who has seen all of Star Trek, but at the same time, by someone who has never seen a minute of Star Trek. That is not going to be easy. If it seems like you have to know about Star Trek to see this movie, that's going to turn people off.

     

    The Nimoy trailer is only being released online (exclusively to AICN, I think), so it will most likely only be seen by Star Trek fans and other genre fans.

  15. Posted

    I bet its Garth of Izar!..That would be cool!

    That would have required someone to actually know Trek's history. Possible, if the writers did research but if Abrams wrote the script then I doubt that would happen. I have no idea who wrote it though.

    Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci (M:I:III, Transformers, Fringe) wrote the script through most of its iterations. Orci is a hard-core Trekkie and Kurtzman is a Trekkie but not quite to Orci's level. However, both have read Trek novels, so you get some idea of how into Star Trek they are. Abrams and Damon Lindelof (Lost) did the final polish on the script, IIRC. Lindelof is a pretty hard-core Trekkie as well, and Abrams is more of a lapsed casual Trekkie, I believe. All four are executive producers on the film and Bryan Burk (Lost) (who is a complete Trek novice) is as well.

  16. Posted

    Like I said though, if it's all a timeline plot that is out of skew and gets corrected in the end then I can live with that and if that is the case then I'll begin looking forward to the movie again.

    Click for Spoiler:

    I think an alternate timeline is what we're dealing with. Based on spoilers, Nero travels back to kill Kirk before he was born by destroying the ship that Kirks parents are aboard (the U.S.S. Kelvin). He fails but Kirk's childhood is somewhat altered by the loss of his father. However, he does still inevitably joins Starfleet. Therefore, we have a second timeline that would deviate from what we know about the time immediately preceding TOS, mostly in regard to Kirk. However, in the long run, not much would change, especially in Nero's time (the late 24th century, presumably).

    Therefore, Nero travels back again in an attempt to destroy Vulcan and more radically alter the timeline. This attack on Vulcan was never supposed to occur and brings the TOS crew together differently than in the original timeline. Now, Spock from Nero's timeframe travels back to prevent Nero from succeeding in destroying Vulcan (but presumably cannot prevent the earlier attack on the Kelvin). He'll be more or less attempting to perform damage control.

     

    So I don't think the original timeline will be entirely restored but we'll get a new, fairly similar timeline that in the long run (i.e. by the 24th century) but the events surrounding the timeframe of TOS will be marginally different and give the writers of this movie and the possible sequels some leeway to tell new stories involving the TOS crew. Presuming of course there isn't some sort of predestination paradox in the works (I do highly doubt that possibility). The original timeline is also preserved in a sense because everything that happened before has to have happened if Nero wants to change it. It's very existence is his motivation for wanting to change it.

     

    This isn't really my first choice either, but in the long run, I think its the best option. Star Trek needs to be re-launched with the characters that are strongest in the minds of the general public, the TOS crew, and the story needs to be accessible to someone who has never seen Star Trek before.

    The fact of the matter is we need new Star Trek fans. The existing hardcore fans are now too small a market to be worth targeting (which is a big reason why Enterprise was cancelled, although not all Trek fans were watching Enterprise by the end). If this movie isn't a success, it's game over. Paramount is going to stop producing Star Trek movies or TV shows for the time being because it's not going to be financially viable. The best we'll be able to hope for is some direct-to-DVD movies and the novels. It could very well represent the end of the franchise and I think we can all agree that the message of Star Trek, a hopeful future for humanity, is too important to let die.

     

    So while this may not be your first choice for a Star Trek movie you want to see, it may be your only choice if you ever want to see what you loved about Star Trek again (not to say this film won't have what you loved about Star Trek, it's kind of hard to know that without seeing it). I'm not saying that you absolutely have to see it, but there's a lot of time between now and May and it would be best to keep an open mind. Also, I'd just like to say that I'm not targeting VaBeachGuy specifically, even though I realize it may sound that way. I really mean this more as a commentary to the fandom in general.

     

    As for the trailer itself, I like it. It looks big, and epic and exactly the kind of movie we need to reclaim Star Trek's spot on the pop culture landscape. It may not be exactly what the hardcore fanbase wants but catering to our whims is no longer an option. It may not be perfect but it's what we're getting and like I said, if it doesn't do well it could be the last thing we get for a very long time.

  20. Posted

    I've seen some people at another board say that they thing that the PTB named Voyager (the ship) after the VOyager 6 probe from TMP. I personally think that they did it because of the nature of the show. After all, they were taking a huge voyage home.

     

    What do you all think?

    The In Universe explanation (i.e. why STARFLEET named it Voyager) for Voyager's name is that it was probably named after the Voyager probes (the real world 1 and 2 and the fictious 6). Starfleet could not have possibly been aware of the fact that Voyager would have such a long voyage home when they named the ship.

     

    In reality, (i.e. why the PRODUCERS named it Voyager) was probably a combination of the Voyager probe homage and the fact that they are voyaging home. It also wouldn't surprise me that there was a connection made between the U.S.S. Voyager being the farthest human-made object from Earth and as of right now, Voyager I is the farthest human-made object from Earth.

  21. Posted

    I don't think the Chakotay-Seven thing was totally out of the blue, she was interested in him as far back as Human Error (which was seven episodes before the finale, not a long time but not really a short time) and then the events of Natural Law sort of showed the beginnings of a potential relationship (4 episodes before the finale).

     

    As for showing events after Voyager returned home, I think it would have been anti-climactic. The story of the series really ends when they get home because that's been the driving force of the series. The story's over.

  22. Posted

    Very cool to start seeing stuff and I liked the move of giving each image to a different website (Trekmovie, MTV, IGN, JoBlo, AICN, and UGO) in addition to the cover story in Entertainment Weekly (which is now available online at http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20233502,00.html). Be forewarned, it contains spoilers.

     

    It terms of the images themselves, I have no problem with most of them and I think the cast looks good. I need to see more of the bridge, though. Right now its looking like too much a departure visually. I knew there was no way we were going to see an exact replica of the 1960s bridge, because that would have led to Star Trek getting laughed out of the theatres and it would have been the final nail in the coffin for the franchise. I was just hoping for something a little closer. But like I've said, I need to see more. Other than that, I think it looks good, the Kelvin's registry number is odd (NCC-0514) because the first zero seems unnecessary but then again its not really necessary in NX-01 is it?

     

    Regarding the article:

    Click for Spoiler:

    I am a little disappointed that there's talk of reinventing some of the mythos of Star Trek. It's not entirely unexpected or really, unnecessary, I just have some reservations about it. But really, the message of Star Trek is too important to lose and if that means moving a few facts around and a more realistic and functional look, I suppose I can learn to love it as long as I try to keep an open mind.

  24. Posted

    I just hope they don't change the base story.

    Doesn't look like they will, it's looking more and more like a straight prequel albeit with a more modern look from all accounts (i.e. the uniforms have been described as looking close to that of the original series but are not exact replicas).

     

    Of course, with the acknowledged presence of time travel there could be the creation of an alternate timeline in which part of this movie and possible sequels take place. It's pure conjecture but it would explain why the creators refuse to use one of sequel, prequel and reboot/re-imagining to describe the movie. However, they acknowledged that it will adhere to canon and anything that doesn't seem to be in canon will have a canon explanation.

  25. Posted

    I've been watching and enjoying it. This is one of only two new shows that I've had any interest in this season (the other being Life on Mars (US) which I think may suck compared to the brilliant UK original). I was especially interested in Fringe because its being helmed (or more accurately was created by) the team behind Star Trek (2009) as well as Transformers, and Lost (Abrams, Burk, Orci and Kurtzman). Jeff Pinkner(formerly of Lost) is the actual showrunner.

     

    Last night's episode was easily the best so far (well, at least since the pilot) as it expanded the mythology and dealt with some of the perceived character flaws (i.e. Walter becoming a parody and not really having a reason for Peter to be there). However, I don't understand why the regular cast is as large as it is. They really only need Torv (Olivia), Noble (Walter), Jackson (Peter) and Reddick (Broyles). Everyone else (Mark Valley, Blair Brown, Jasika Nicole and Kirk Acevedo) really should all be recurring characters (especially Valley) with potential to become regulars. Of course, it may be an effort to hold onto those actors as long as possible.

     

    UPDATE: Fringe has been given a full season order from FOX.