To sum up my feelings on this, I present this desktop wallpaper;
http://img8.imageshack.us/img8/1303/10099enterprised.jpg
The Galaxy class is such a perfect balance between majestic and menacing.
D or E?
- Thread starter Infern0
- Start date
To sum up my feelings on this, I present this desktop wallpaper;
http://img8.imageshack.us/img8/1303/10099enterprised.jpg
The Galaxy class is such a perfect balance between majestic and menacing.
I agree almost wholeheartedly. The D was as much a part of TNG as the 1701 was TOS. TMP onward still had a different 'feel' for me because the 1701 and everything else was redesigned. Those were TOS movies, but didn't feel like it and were perhaps only as strong as they were because of the scripts. They were also afforded the intervening decade between the end of TOS and the start of the movies.
I don't see the E-E as dainty as much as over-greebled and stretched. The 'arrow' detailing on the saucer was always tacky to me. I also feel that that CGI E was vastly inferior to the model, if only because of the crappy quality of the CGI models that were used.
I cannot subscribe to the idea that the D was 'unsuitable' for films when you take into account that the techniques used to build the model in 1987 were on par with those used in films. (The video used to edit the show, however? Ick.) The only major change between 1987 film-quality techniques and 1994 was the advent of CGI. 'Generations' also proved that the model could translate well into CGI. I can therefore only chalk up dislike of the D to personal preference, which is something I can't fault anyone for but will still disagree with.
The only thing I can determine is that (presumably) Berman either disliked the D himself or was aware that many fans had always disliked it, and this, combined with a desire to create new merchandise and 'give the fans something they couldn't get on television' (
) and as a part of that establish a 'new' visual identity for the TNG films, wanted the D gone. The resulting films (post 'Generations,' which still felt like TNG to me despite being subpar) did not feel like TNG to me, and, when coupled with the subpar scripts of the latter two, were supremely disappointing.
Yes, it does.
(At least the first one of the E has the virtue of being the physical model, rather than the inferior quality 'Insurrection' CGI model, even if that model benefits from the lighting in that particular scene.)
It's personal preference, admit it!
Of course but neither of them beats this:
http://movies.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/tmp/themotionpicture0394.jpg
^^
Give me the following one with the six footer instead any day:
http://tng.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/s6/6x18/starshipmine002.jpg
Give me the following one with the six footer instead any day:
http://tng.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/s6/6x18/starshipmine002.jpg
The -D was a far superior ship in almost every concievable way.
But more than that it was their ship it was another character of a show, it was the ship the fans had watched for seven year. It was the Enterprise!
Then they destroyed it in a blaze of suck where everyone on the ship's compentence and IQ levels dropped 100 points. (10,000 for Data) Worf gets a chair (Apparently his reaction times in bridge-boardings weren't slow enough?) and thus it never occurs to him to unload all of the Enterprise's 5 or 6 phaser banks with a forward firing arc and a slavo of 10 torpedoes at that BoP. I mean, seriously, to quote both Be'tor and Picard himself the Enterprise was a Galaxy-class Federation flagship up against a 20 year old Bird of Prey. Shields or no shields it shouldn't have even been a match. The Enterprise could've made short, short, work of that BoP but instead it fires a couple phasers and one piddly torpedo.
The movie Generations itself shows and proves how much the ship could work on the big screen and, know what? Maybe her limitations would've forced the future movie makers to work more on stories and story-built action instead of SFX to make the movies engaging.
The -D was THEIR ship and the fan's ship. Did anyone care about the -E in First Contact? Did we care that it might get blown up or that it was being borgified? I sure as hell didn't. I had no attachment to it.
In INS we could've seen Calypso, the E-D's Captain's Yacht, used. and then finally in the Blase of Glory we could've destroyed the -D defending the Federation from Shinzon and building a "unity" between the Romulans and the Federation.
But the -E never worked for me. It screamed trying to just look cool for the sake of looking cool and it also looked like the chromosonally enhanced bastard demon child of the Excelsior and Constitution classes.
It's "nice enough", I suppose but it never struck me as a ship that called out "We're a peaceful race of explorers," but "Like us or we'll kick your ass." It's far to agressive looking a design.
It wasn't the Enterprise, that's for damn sure.
And what sings the most about it is that WHY the -D was destroyed. Not out of any dramatic necessity. Not for an emotional punch. Not for any reason close to that.
It was destroyed becasue a)TPTB thought it would be neat to land the saucer -and I'll concede that it would've been and the scene was well done- and b) pretty much because they 'didn't like it."
Why was the Enterprise destroyed in TSFS? Because Kirk had to sacrafice something for the sake of saving himself and his friend and it was a strong, big, emotional punch.
The -D's crash? Not so much.
The -D, all of the way. It was THE ship of TNG. The -E, never got to know her.
But more than that it was their ship it was another character of a show, it was the ship the fans had watched for seven year. It was the Enterprise!
Then they destroyed it in a blaze of suck where everyone on the ship's compentence and IQ levels dropped 100 points. (10,000 for Data) Worf gets a chair (Apparently his reaction times in bridge-boardings weren't slow enough?) and thus it never occurs to him to unload all of the Enterprise's 5 or 6 phaser banks with a forward firing arc and a slavo of 10 torpedoes at that BoP. I mean, seriously, to quote both Be'tor and Picard himself the Enterprise was a Galaxy-class Federation flagship up against a 20 year old Bird of Prey. Shields or no shields it shouldn't have even been a match. The Enterprise could've made short, short, work of that BoP but instead it fires a couple phasers and one piddly torpedo.
The movie Generations itself shows and proves how much the ship could work on the big screen and, know what? Maybe her limitations would've forced the future movie makers to work more on stories and story-built action instead of SFX to make the movies engaging.
The -D was THEIR ship and the fan's ship. Did anyone care about the -E in First Contact? Did we care that it might get blown up or that it was being borgified? I sure as hell didn't. I had no attachment to it.
In INS we could've seen Calypso, the E-D's Captain's Yacht, used. and then finally in the Blase of Glory we could've destroyed the -D defending the Federation from Shinzon and building a "unity" between the Romulans and the Federation.
But the -E never worked for me. It screamed trying to just look cool for the sake of looking cool and it also looked like the chromosonally enhanced bastard demon child of the Excelsior and Constitution classes.
It's "nice enough", I suppose but it never struck me as a ship that called out "We're a peaceful race of explorers," but "Like us or we'll kick your ass." It's far to agressive looking a design.
It wasn't the Enterprise, that's for damn sure.
And what sings the most about it is that WHY the -D was destroyed. Not out of any dramatic necessity. Not for an emotional punch. Not for any reason close to that.
It was destroyed becasue a)TPTB thought it would be neat to land the saucer -and I'll concede that it would've been and the scene was well done- and b) pretty much because they 'didn't like it."
Why was the Enterprise destroyed in TSFS? Because Kirk had to sacrafice something for the sake of saving himself and his friend and it was a strong, big, emotional punch.
The -D's crash? Not so much.
The -D, all of the way. It was THE ship of TNG. The -E, never got to know her.
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Here's another thing that amazes me about the Galaxy class; The design holds up amazingly well. It is almost timeless.
The design probably dates back to late 1986 or early 1987, meaning it is around 23 years old. Now, consider how dated the Constitution class, both original and refit, looked by 1990. Hell, you'd be hard pressed to find any starship design from any scifi series that would be extremely well regarded more than 20 years after its initial design.
If a new Trek series were to debut now and a Galaxy class were to serve as the crew's ship, I don't think any Trek newcomer would look at it and even begin to suspect that it had been designed in the mid 80's.
The design probably dates back to late 1986 or early 1987, meaning it is around 23 years old. Now, consider how dated the Constitution class, both original and refit, looked by 1990. Hell, you'd be hard pressed to find any starship design from any scifi series that would be extremely well regarded more than 20 years after its initial design.
If a new Trek series were to debut now and a Galaxy class were to serve as the crew's ship, I don't think any Trek newcomer would look at it and even begin to suspect that it had been designed in the mid 80's.
Ah, the Odyssey. Good captain, good name. I wouldn't have minded seeing more of her, maybe a spinoff.
(They guy that played her Captain also voiced Skeletor and Man at Arms and a bunch of others on the old 'He-Man' cartoon if anyone watched that.)And I agree Lateralus; it's a pretty timeless design. I don't know how it will feel at 44, but at 22, she's doing good.
I think the fact that pretty much every federation ship uses that same configuration speaks well of the sixties design.
I dunno, I'd argue that the TOS Enterprise is fairly "timeless." But only because it's a classy, elegant, design. It only "looks dated" because we know when it was made. In TOS "Refit", DS9 and Enteprise when the TOS design was brought to a modern setting with modern techniques she looked petty darn good.
But I would also agree that the -D/Galaxy has quite a bit -if not moreso- timelessness to her.
But I would also agree that the -D/Galaxy has quite a bit -if not moreso- timelessness to her.
Ditto that. The TOS ship may just be a tad too 'rockety' to our modern eyes. I confess as a kid (I'm 24) I thought that the warp engines did expel something out the rear and were types of rockets. Then, after deciding that made no sense, I thought the rear parts were backup impulse engines.
I've always thought the original Enterprise model would have held up so much better if it had just been shorter; shorter neck and shorter thruster pylons. They just seem needlessly long and give the impression that the ship is very fragile. That's pretty much the extent of my critiques of it though.
I know picking apart a nearly 45 year old design is kind of cowardly, but... *Shrugs*
I know picking apart a nearly 45 year old design is kind of cowardly, but... *Shrugs*
Well, I tend to interpret that the longer neck and pylons on the TOS/TMP Enterprise (and et al) were non-issues for them, for whatever technological reason, be it the shields, structural fields, building materials, whatever. A retcon, I know, but one that helps separate it as technologically advanced from our own time.
Jefferies consciously decided to separate the engines from the rest of the ship because he believed the space warp field would be dangerous, or at least emmit dangerous radiation, hence the long pylons. One might infer that he separated the secondary hull from the saucer because he imagined the secondary hull as storage and thought there might be some volatile stuff in there too. Where he placed the reactors is a whole other kettle of fish.
For what it's worth, IIRC we've never actually seen a ship 'decapitated' in battle, or with its engines shot off via pylon targeting. The closest we've come is the Reliant in TWoK, and even there the warp engine itself was the target, not the pylon.
Jefferies consciously decided to separate the engines from the rest of the ship because he believed the space warp field would be dangerous, or at least emmit dangerous radiation, hence the long pylons. One might infer that he separated the secondary hull from the saucer because he imagined the secondary hull as storage and thought there might be some volatile stuff in there too. Where he placed the reactors is a whole other kettle of fish.
For what it's worth, IIRC we've never actually seen a ship 'decapitated' in battle, or with its engines shot off via pylon targeting. The closest we've come is the Reliant in TWoK, and even there the warp engine itself was the target, not the pylon.
The D went down like a Worf melee in S1. With a "WTF!? Noooooo!"
She went before her time.
Excellent points on the emotional impact of, for instance, seeing the D get Borgified in FC. Seeing Riker get in a TWOK-style battle in the Big Chair of the D in INS. (With. No. Joystick.) Sacrificing her in NEM against a ship that, for once, vastly outclassed her.
I do like the E, and it would have been great to see the Sov class introduced in the TNG films alongside the Galaxy, kind of like how the Excelsior class emerged while Kirk's ship was being mothballed.
All that said, I watched GEN last week, and still give it a thumbs up. One thing that occured to me is, Kirk's second death really does nothing to detract from his more dramatically heroic death on the Ent-B. The event still occured, and history would probably tend to remember that tale as how he died.
She went before her time.
Excellent points on the emotional impact of, for instance, seeing the D get Borgified in FC. Seeing Riker get in a TWOK-style battle in the Big Chair of the D in INS. (With. No. Joystick.) Sacrificing her in NEM against a ship that, for once, vastly outclassed her.
I do like the E, and it would have been great to see the Sov class introduced in the TNG films alongside the Galaxy, kind of like how the Excelsior class emerged while Kirk's ship was being mothballed.
All that said, I watched GEN last week, and still give it a thumbs up. One thing that occured to me is, Kirk's second death really does nothing to detract from his more dramatically heroic death on the Ent-B. The event still occured, and history would probably tend to remember that tale as how he died.
QFT, mi amigo.
U.S.S. Titan, anyone?
That's a valid point. Blaze of glory and all that.
I believe both ships are excellent representations for there times.
D- the federation was tired of war and the focus was on exploration. = big comfy looking roadkill swan thing.
E- klingons, romulans, cardassians etc etc etc etc. the federation needed a aggressive stance = compact built to necessity thing.
no doubt the throws of time would see the F going back to a more peaceful looking route and so on.
personally i much prefer the E its a much more sleek and elegant design to my eyes the D looked way out of proportion, too squashed up with a laughably oversized saucer. plus the idea of keeping families on board really really irked me.
so in the end i will go for the ship without the bad 1970's biege interior.
hopefully if there is a new tv series following on from that point (which i doubt) then the sovereign will stay in use but with a few more lights to take off some of the 'edge'.
D- the federation was tired of war and the focus was on exploration. = big comfy looking roadkill swan thing.
E- klingons, romulans, cardassians etc etc etc etc. the federation needed a aggressive stance = compact built to necessity thing.
no doubt the throws of time would see the F going back to a more peaceful looking route and so on.
personally i much prefer the E its a much more sleek and elegant design to my eyes the D looked way out of proportion, too squashed up with a laughably oversized saucer. plus the idea of keeping families on board really really irked me.
so in the end i will go for the ship without the bad 1970's biege interior.
hopefully if there is a new tv series following on from that point (which i doubt) then the sovereign will stay in use but with a few more lights to take off some of the 'edge'.
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