Forum:Alternate timelines and Star Trek (2009)

Forums → Reference Desk → Alternate timelines and Star Trek (2009) (reply • watch)

Thanks to the Star Trek (2009) film, I don’t understand anything. In the past, things used to be much easier: there was a timeline, and the timeline could be changed by time travel. That means, if someone traveled back in time and changed something, the Federation traveled back as well and preserved/restored the timeline. In some of the series, there are even temporal agents from the distant future whose only task is to prevent anyone from changing the timeline. The latest film, however, changes this concept completely. And that’s not bad at all because it uses a new concept that is more logic and actually supported by real scientists. But it has a huge impact on the Star Trek franchise.

I just want to talk about a movie, let’s say Star Trek VIII. What does the new concept mean for the movie? It means: when the Borg traveled back in time and the Enterprise followed them, the timeline was split into two branches. In one of the branches, the Borg and the Enterprise disappeared and nothing happened. In the other branch, both ships landed in the past. There, the events as we know them from the movie occurred. Finally, the Enterprise traveled back to the future. But to what future did they travel back?

Or let's talk about the series. Kirk and Spock, f.ex., prevent Bones from helping Edith Keeler. But why? The time branch where he saves her which leads to Hitler’s victory actually still exists and is not eradicated according to the new concept. What is the task of the temporal agents from the 29th and 31st century if they actually can’t prevent anything as every change of the past necessarily leads to an alternate timeline that will exist forever. And the prevention of the event would even cause another timeline instead of fixing it, like the Keeler example (one timeline where nothing happened, another timeline where Bones saves Keeler and Hitler wins the war, and a third timeline where Spock and Kirk prevent Bones from saving Keeler). Everything gets quite meaningless, doesn’t it?

Why am I writing this comment? I’d like to know whether there already are good explanations concerning the impact of this new assumption on the Star Trek series? -- AniWX 15:15, June 4, 2012 (UTC)

In a non-canon aspect, the Department of Temporal Investigations series of novels covers this quite well. In a canon sense? See Alternate timeline, alternate reality. -- sulfur 15:48, June 4, 2012 (UTC)

If it would depend on me, I'd delete both the Abrams movie and Star Trek: Enterprise from canon completely. -- Ltarex 18:43, June 4, 2012 (CET)