His age had always been estimated based on his appearance in the original tv show episode. It's been speculated that he well may have been in his 50s at the time of First Contact, and the Companion later restored his youthfulness and extended his lifespan - which partly explains why Kirk & co don't instantly recognise him (given that he's such prominent figure in their history).

That's what I mean though - the writers can always just add in a bit of sci-fi to explain away any discontinuity.

And yet, with a whole new universe to explore (re the reboot) they could actually make something unique with the Klingon culture.


In my mind, the better Klingon culture wasn't truly developed until TNG, so it's understandable that they'd be more ... sassy before hand. All the Klingon's we've met since have maintained a different approach.

Maybe I just want to see space battles between Constitution & Miranda ships against D7's and B'rels; something similar to that opening Star Wars scene above Coruscant.


I disagree here. I think the language used was (is?) much more fluid.

There is that potential, but the new films still share the same timeline with the prime timeline up to the point of divergence. So Enterprise still happened in the new films timeline also, so there has to be an element of respect to what has gone before; i.e. Klingons in Enterprise. From a design perspective it's always refreshing to see new takes on Klingons (and other aspects such as other races, spaceship interiors, etc), but they can't deviate too much, certainly not to the point where where their uniqueness starts to make them different from the standard blueprint.


Klingon culture didn't really start to take shape until Ron Moore joined TNG. Even from that point onwards there have been wilder klingons and there have been calmer ones. It's shown us that a Klingon's behaviour depends on individuality, the situation, their background, their rank, etc.


It's calmer later on when they're talking in English. But at the start of the scene when they're talking in Klingon, it's is very much the standard Klingon sound. Again it's whatever suited the situation. When they've got the alien on the ground they wanted to sound intimidating so they had that traditional rough sound, then in the next scene they wanted to sound menacing so they used a calmer voice. In themselves these deleted scenes aren't an indication that these klingons were all that diffent from the ones we had known from the prime timeline.

You say that, but they've already changed; their appearance for one thing has been altered (for the better), as has the appearance of the Caitian.

I think we'll need to overlook some inconsistencies (else there's no explanation for the Kelvin being the ship and size that it ultimately was; all before the temporal incursion. Regardless, I wouldn't want them to rewrite the Klingons as a whole, just give more depth to their species. They can still have honour, but they became a bit too friendly toward the end of DS9, when they should have remained the Viking like space tribe that they are.


I wonder if said scenes would have been different had they made it into the final product.

I know, thats what I'm saying, design-wise the look of the Klingons often changes, tweaks here and there. Of course, that's all fine, design tweaks can be explained away by Enterprise. It's not just a case of there being two type of Klingons - we know the mutation affected Klingons differently, and there were different stages of the mutation. So that allows re-designs without contradicting established narrative. We just don't know that much about the Caitians, could be straight forward species-wide artistic licence changes, or it might just be a case that we've just been seeing different sub-species of Caitlins.


Depends how Klingon centric you wanted the series to be I guess.

The TNG era does kind of gloss over the fact that Klingons are still effectively Nazis in space. They view other species as inferior, advocate death for anyone who is 'useless' and pride themselves on having an empire that encompasses slave worlds that support their huge military. Yet the Federation is happy to have them as close allies and fight along side them.

I guess it all depends on how much needs to be consistent. I would have been quite happy if they just rebooted Trek clean; no element of time travel, just a fresh take on an existing story; think BSG.


I think it was more an ends justify the means.

It's possible a poor example, but if you compared America to the Federation (wanting to liberate everyone) and the Klingons to Russia. Even though America doesn't necessarily like the way Russia conducts business, they work with them when they need too, and would likely become allies if a bigger threat emerged. That's pretty much what happened in Trek.

The Khitomer Accords were signed as an uneasy peace (I guess), but the Federation could hardly go and invade the Klingon Empire. When it came to the Dominion War, the Federation, Klingons, and eventually Romulans (even though their arrival was the result of Sicko and Garak) banded together for the greater cause.

Well, TNG in particular is very much Star Trek through the lense of the Federation at its most holier-than-thou. It wasn't just the Klingons, it was other races also such as the Cardassians and their treatment of Bajor. Whilst it could be called glossing over, another way of looking at it is that it was exposing the Ferdartion's hypocrisy for what it was. Something wich DS9 wasn't afraid to explore, or even TNG itself later on in the series once the Maquis came on the scene.

^^ I think the mere fact Section 31 exists and intervenes as much as it does, in the way that it does goes to show that the Federation isn't as innocent as one would imply. What the Federation stands for, and what it desires is great, but realistically it's a lost cause. Some species are never going to bow to that ideology.

I know in the future (25th century was it?) Daniels said that the Klingons had joined the Federation. Sorry, but they have a completely different way of life. The odd Klingon joining the Federation, or the odd Romulan, Cardassian, Ferengi (etc) you can accept, but their entire species? Nah.

I see it a bit differently - it's one thing have different cultural norms and views of morality, but the Klingons are (presumably) brutal oppressors of multiple different worlds. How many 'Bajors' must have existed in the Klingon empire?

Obviously i'm not suggesting that the Federation would refuse peaceful coexistence or even temporary alliances against mutual enemies - but the kind of friendship that's shown doesn't sit right with me. It's one thing having secret organizations going round killing people and manipulating events, it's another to have an open policy of military conquest and subjugation.

I'm always a little torn about the Roddenberry idealism. One one hand the optimism and dream of aspiring to something better than what we are is the heart of the show, but on the other it does place a limit on realistic drama. DS9 tried to straddle the two and created great TV but very much stepped away from that earlier goal.

Many. Wasn't there an episode of ST: Enterprise where this was happening? I thought it was stated then that it's what they do (the Klingons), though you are right, why did the Federation intervene with the Cardassians and Bajorans, but didn't any other time.

It's possible that the Federation only intervene when asked by the locals (in this case, Bajorans) and that the subjects of the Klingon (or Romulan) Empire aren't in a position to do that. Regardless, you don't put Empire in your faction name if you haven't enslaved others on your conquest. We certainly know how the Romulan treated the Reman.

I've always wondered about them too, ever since their inclusion. Were the Reman in that system before the Romulan people got their (following their leave of Vulcan) and enslaved, or were the Reman formerly Romulan/Vulcan?

Lol, I was checking this to see if it actually does start in January. But having briefly read some of the posts, I now wanna throw in my two cents worth

Roddenberry's idealism is directly at odds with later Star Trek pragmatism. But, for us now as a species, that pragmatism rings more true than the idealism which feels unrealistic and kind of hollow. We aspire towards idealism, but are forced to deal in the pragmatic. The question is, should Star Trek (fiction) be constrained by our current reality? Granted, it provides more drama, but in another way it feels like a lazy betrayal of Roddenberry's vision.

Anyways, I'm guessing this doesn't start in January?

I'm curious to see if they really can update Star Trek in the way that the Next Generation successfully did (eventually ), but yeah, feel like it hasn't been handled well thus far.

The Federation didn't intervene when the Cardassians occupied Bajor which is why a lot of Bajorans (and Kira) hated the Federation early on in DS9.

I don't think Humanity will ever become remotely like the Federation; we'll always be fighting each other, whether that's for resources, religion, or a mere disagreement. Even if/when we do get up there and colonise other worlds, those worlds will eventually be likely to want to disassociate themselves with Earth, and we'll end up with planetary conflicts with giant space battles and stuff.

In all seriousness, I don't think we'll ever unite as a species, there will always be a faction of us trying to undermine the greater leadership. Roddenberry's vision was a utopian one, but not a realistic one.


I'd be amazed if they'd even started filming it yet!


I'm skeptical. For a true update, I think they'd have been better off with a complete reboot (without the use of time travel), or continuing on some time after ST: Voyager and the TNG feature films.


My mistake.