Over the past couple weeks we have been examining the temporal anomalies in the 2009 Star Trek movie. There have been several issues of concern which we have considered in that time. Ultimately, though, the important question is whether in one hundred twenty-nine years time someone sufficiently like the Ambassador Spock and someone sufficiently like the Captain Nero who were sucked into the past through the black hole will be so again, so as to perform their parts in the new history.
Captain Nero's part seems probable. As long as Romulus is not significantly impacted by the changes in the Federation, he will be born, become captain of his mining ship, father a child, and be in position if Romulus is not saved. Thus it is mostly about Spock, and about the Federation.
It is clear that this will be a very different Spock. He is already very different. Yet he is still very Vulcan, and has the benefit of the wisdom of his older self to prepare him. He will do the logical thing. The history of the universe has changed drastically, and we cannot assume plot immunity for anyone, but Spock might manage to live long enough to play his part, and this history may yet stabilize despite the impact his own trip has had on his own past. History might be undone by this, but it is likely that this will not be a fatal problem.
It is also clear that in giving the transwarp equation to Mr. Scott, Spock has probably given a boost to the science and technology of the time. That, though, is a very unpredictable factor. Perhaps it will lead to more discoveries sooner, and the development of better ships and better ways to save Romulus. This could be a serious problem, since if Romulus is saved, history is lost.
On the other hand the loss of the planet Vulcan with its people is a setback to the Federation on many levels, technology not the least of these. Without the brilliant graduates of the Vulcan Science Academy, the Federation will be struggling to keep pace with the Klingons, Romulans, and Cardassians. Without the strength of Vulcan in its membership, the Federation will be a considerably weaker entity. Suddenly there are many questions concerning whether Spock will have a ship equipped to create black holes able to reach the supernova threatening Romulus moments too late to save the planet but at the right time to save history.
Thus it all hinges on Spock. If he fails to make the right trip at the right moment, whether he saves Romulus or makes no attempt to save Romulus, then neither Nero nor Spock will appear in the past, and history will revert to the original version--which we know ends with Spock and Nero being thrown to the past. Thus an infinity loop looms as a very likely danger. Yet Spock knows, or should know, what he must do. It may be that his older self can give him the very timing and trajectories of the events, so that he can play the part quite intentionally, traveling back to the beginning of his own life to put himself on the right course to save the universe. If he follows the pattern precisely, there will be a sawtooth snap caused by his interaction with his own temporal duplicate, but there is reason to hope that it will resolve to an N-jump ultimately. Star Trek has created a time travel event that could happen and could resolve to a benign preservation of an altered history of the universe.
Comments
The logic is simple. Spock must kill Nero's parents before they meet at The Enchantment Under the Sea Dance at their high school on Romulus.
Again I thank you for all your comments, BillHoo; it's good to know someone is reading the Star Trek articles.
And your logic is in some history of the universe unimpeachable.
(Insert appropriate emoticon here.)
--M. J. Young
Your missing something very important.
Your applying your own personal rules of time travel to the situation, which is fine, but as you've said before every movie has it's own rules of time travel. 2009 Star Trek in this case as well, and the star trek franchise has clearly indicated that this did not create a c-d loop which effected the A-b one. It in fact created a separate universe and both universes exist, Time travel is in fact irrelevant in this case, Spock and Nero simply moved to Boston (to use your terms) and the actions they had there will have lasting effect in Boston. But not have any effect on their home, and nothing needs to happen in the future as it has already happened in their home.
Thank you, Daropedia. It is certainly true that Star Trek 2009 can be explained under a divergent or parallel dimension theory; it is also true (as you must know from reading my other articles) that I do not consider that to be time travel. More to the point, there is nothing within the movie itself that demands that this be another dimension and not the replacement history.
You say that the Star Trek Franchise calls it another dimension. I would exclude that as parole evidence, information not found in the film. More significantly, that interpretation is inconsistent with Star Trek IV, where we have every hope that they have visited their own history, and Star Trek First Contact, where they must have done. This film, like those, works under replacement theory, and contains nothing to demand it be considered otherwise.
Thanks again for your note.
--M. J. Young
The only thing that I have seen that hints that this is an alternate dimension is in the prequel comic.
memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Star_Trek:_Countdown
The very last page of the final issue shows the Enterprise-E arriving shortly **AFTER** the Narada and the Jellyfish have departed for the past. "May his soul live long and prosper," says Picard, in reference to Ambassador Spock, in a touching scene. This is interesting in that, somehow, their own timeline escaped being instantly erased at the moment that Spock and Nero left, as one would have expected. Could just be creative license though, and that universe really did die when Spock went back in time.
Well, I'm not sure how canonical this comic is considered to be, but that one bit does seem to indicate that the creators intended the new movie as an alternate universe, rather than a replacement of the old timeline (since, if nothing else, it allows them to continue to do stories in the "old" timeline if they want, as
Also, there are already examples of alternate, but semi-parallel dimensions in Star Trek as well. The Mirror Universe with goatee Spock, for example. The interference of the original series crew in the Mirror Universe certainly had ramifications, as seen later in DS9. Who knows how that universe would have turned out had the original transporter accident not occurred?
The 2009 Star Trek may simply have been another of these alternate dimensions, just one that more closely resembled what we think of as the original than the Mirror Universe did. But, of course, that's not time travel at all. Spock and Nero didn't shoot themselves around the sun or go through the Guardian of Forever this time, after all, so who can say whether what they did was actual time travel or "merely" dimension hopping that only *seemed* like time travel?
By the way, I ran out of space in the first comment, but I just wanted to say that I am a huge fan of your analyses of time travel movies, in general.
Thank you, Kane Magus; I'm pleased you've enjoyed the articles.
I noted in the first article on this film that the Star Trek editors are not terribly concerned with continuity between versions or episodes; there universe need not be internally self-consistent. There use of parallel dimensions is also noteworthy. I'm approaching this from the assumption that it can be treated as a time travel movie, and concluding that it can; if it couldn't, it would be considerably less interesting. After all, I wouldn't mind if Spock traveled to Narnia through a wardrobe, but I wouldn't be asking whether in doing so he altered the history of either universe.
Thanks again.
--M. J. Young
This movie had more holes than brick of Swiss Cheese. Based on the deleted Klingon prison planet scenes - Why, after putting Nero and his crew in prison for 23 years, not only leave his super advance ships with its super advanced weapons on board in orbit, but apparently repaired it to the point where it could wipe out an entire fleet of Klingon ships. Why would they not take it back to Kronos and reverse engineer it? Or at least remove its weapons and install them on Klingon ships. Plus how would they know that Spock was going arrive back in the lightning cloud zone when he did? Who told them that? And why didnt they escape years earlier? Why sit around in Klingon prison for 23 years?
Its been almost 2 years since this was written but I only saw the movie recently because I hated the idea of creating yet another universe. Why not use the Evil Earth Empire Universe led by Emporer Spock somehow. Or take Trek farther into the Future?
Thank you for your comment, and I certainly understand the reluctance to become involved in yet another iteration of Star Trek. I abandoned <em>Voyager</em> because in the first season there were at least three disastrous time travel-based episodes, and although when <em>Enterprise</em> started I was otherwise occupied, when I heard about their time travel involvements I decided not to attempt to catch up.
As for deleted footage, I never watch it and was unaware of its existence until you mentioned it. From the theatrical version, there's no reason to think that Nero did anything other than await Spock's arrival between destroying Kirk's father's ship and starting his real plan. And as far as knowing when Spock would arrive, Nero knows where, and has no reason to be elsewhere until it happens.
As to why Nero's ship was not reverse engineered by the Klingons, that's not a problem if we omit the part about the Klingons capturing him (how anyway could they have accomplished that?).
It's a fine example of what I often say, that there are more reasons than just time for footage to land on the cutting room floor. Whoever removed the material about Nero in a Klingon prison may have seen that it was completely incongruous and unnecessary.
Not to defend the film unduly, but I think that the holes you cite are not really part of the original.
Thanks again for your comment.
--M. J. Young
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