Madner Kami wrote: ↑Sun Oct 31, 2021 12:58 pm
So they designed and constructed the Constitution-class and other ships with a huge shuttlebay and then put no shuttles inside?
Sounds like a typical military boondoggle to me. Design it with, then decide the thing it was designed for is no longer needed, but it is already made so decide to keep using it anyway. I live in a country that paid for brand new airborne warning planes to be built, but then decided immediately after they were constructed and paid for, to stop using them and destroyed brand new, fully ready, unused planes instead. And now we've identified gaps in our airborne warning and SAR coverage and are paying for...guess what...some new planes.
Building a big ship with a shuttlebay and then deciding they are no longer using shuttles because the transporter is supposedly so good, wouldn't even move the needle for me. I mean, we've just paid for two huge aircraft carriers, one of which we can't afford to run and have semi-permanently drydocked straight out of construction, and the other we can afford to either run or have aircraft on it, but not both at the same time.
Classic ''how to deal with rape 1960s style'' moment in this one where Rand makes an accusation against Kirk and is greeted to being immediately put face-to-face with her accuser by the XO. The ending too - dear God. Kirk laughs and Spock actually smiles at the idea that Rand enjoyed it.
And given the reason why Grace Lee Witney claims she left Star Trek, it actually kind of makes sense that the production staff decided that his how to treat rape. Seems eerily prescient to the Gates McFadden incident twenty years later.
CrypticMirror wrote: ↑Sun Oct 31, 2021 12:31 pm
I wonder why they couldn't use a shuttle, other than, of course, the production team hadn't thought of having shuttles at that point. In-universe, I headcanon it as Starfleet having had such success with transporter tech they got a bit cocky and declared shuttles an obsolete technology (like lifeboats on the Titanic) and withdrew them from service, only for, after this and other transporter problems, to hurriedly re-issue them to all ships. I used the example of the Titanic lifeboats, but there is no shortage of other such cock ups.
Or we could assume that the shuttles are being used elsewhere with two remaining shuttles being down for maintenance and periodic inspections. That's my head cannon at least.
Another thought about shuttles. Matt Jefferies obviously designed the Enterprise with that clam shell design at the end of the ship. Now I am a bit fuzzy on this, but he had to have an idea what that part of the ship was supposed to be. The question is, was there always a plan to have shuttles or something but couldn't do it due to budget reasons? Or was there something else?
As i understand it, they had originally intended to have some sort of landing craft, but decided that such a large prop would be too expensive. The idea of the transporter was entirely a cost-saving measure, as the effect was comparatively quite cheap. I don't know if that decision was made before or after the Enterprise model was built.
That's a really interesting question, and I'm sure a lot has been written about the general topic over the decades in books and interviews. There's a good chance the answer is out there, but I've got no clue where to start looking.
