One of the exciting elements of last week’s season 2 premiere of Star Trek: Picard was the appearance of a number of new and familiar Starfleet ships. Now production designer Dave Blass is breaking down all the space ships from the episode.
Dave Blass breaks down the fleet
The following copy and images are based on an extended Twitter thread from Dave Blass, reformatted here for the web with his permission, along with illustrations and details on the designers and artists. The graphics on all charts are by Geoffrey Mandel.
The first ship we see having issues with the anomaly is the lone U.S.S. Avalon NCC-63887, an Akira-class Starship, one of the few that is called out by name.
The original Akira design is by Alex Jaeger with modeling done by Thomas Marrone.
When Admiral Whitley sends Picard to deal with a new anomaly in space, she makes sure she sends plenty of backup. We get a look at 34 Starfleet vessels in “The Star Gazer,” some old friends and some new.
Jörg Hillebrand already made a chart so I am going to steal his. [UPDATED with ship names]
Our new Hero ship U.S.S. Stargazer NCC-82893 drops in.
It is soon joined by the (new, not refit) U.S.S. Excelsior NCC-42037.
The Sutherland Class U.S.S. Almagest NCC-91870.
The U.S.S. Gagarin NCC-97930.
The Ross Class U.S.S. Vanguard NCC-75148.
The Inquiry Class U.S.S. Rustazh NCC-86503.
It brings us joy to bring back the Sovereign Class and the U.S.S Gilgamesh NCC-74669 and another Sovereign U.S.S Valkyrie NCC-74877.
Making Sean P. Torangeau’s Luna Class a [live-action] canon ship was a great honor as his passion for design inspires us all with the U.S.S. Europa NCC-80104.
The Reliant Class U.S.S. Uhura NCC-90214 is a salute to Nichelle Nichols.
A wider annotated shot shows more ships (also annotated by Jörg Hillebrand).
This includes a classic Akira U.S.S Thunderchild NCC-63549.
USS Huygens NCC-91814, another Sutherland class.
Another Reliant Class U.S.S Clark NCC-90206,
Next are a pair of Sutherland Class ships U.S.S. ibn Al-Haytham NCC-91965 and the U.S.S Sutherland NCC-91800.
Another Akira Class, the U.S.S. Helios NCC-63284.
Next up are two Inquiry Class ships, U.S.S. Magellan NCC-86509 and USS Shackleton NCC-86517
The Reliant Class U.S.S. Reliant NCC-90200. Hopefully, [Star Trek Online designer] Thomas Marrone can chime in on the design.
The Luna Class U.S.S. Oberon NCC-80103.
A different shot as the fleet heads to the Borg ship reveals more ships (also annotated by Jörg Hillebrand).
This includes three more Sovereign Class, U.S.S. Venture NCC-75306, U.S.S. Arsinoe NCC-75307, and U.S.S. Hutchinson NCC-74975. The John Eaves design of the Sovereign is one of my favorites.
And the Ross Class U.S.S. Yi Sun-Sin NCC-76545.
A second Excelsior II Class, the U.S.S Eureka NCC-42023, is next to the U.S.S. Hrothgar NCC-74975, and (another canon addition) U.S.S. Okuda NCC-74107, both Sovereign Class ships.
The Akira Class USS Rabin NCC-63293.
And the Sovereign U.S.S. Pachacuti NCC-74181.
The Inquiry Class USS Nathan Hale NCC-86501.
And the biggest baddest ship in the fleet even shows up to tangle with the Borg. The U.S.S. Zheng He NCC-86505 rounds out the list.
How does Picard get to the U.S.S. Stargazer? In the brand-new Type 14 Long Range Shuttle Craft the U.S.S. Jemison, named for astronaut Mae Jemison and designed by John Eaves and Harald Belker.
Finally, the Borg “Singularity” Ship was designed by John Eaves and Dave Blass, with modeling by James Chung.
UPDATE: Stargazer dedication
Dave Blass followed up with more on Twitter…
The Starship Registration plaques have become an excellent place to give credit where credit is due. In past years the plaques have combined creatives and executives into the world of Starfleet Brass. The Admiralty Board was at my suggestion. We stand on their shoulders.
Video on new Stargazer
Paramount has also released a video feature with Dave Blass and others talking about the new USS Stargazer.
Video on Star Trek Online ships
The fleet included some designs from the game Star Trek Online. The following video, which includes Blass again, goes behind the scenes on how the ship went from the game to the show.
New episodes of Star Trek: Picard premiere on Thursdays on Paramount+ in the U.S. and on Fridays where Paramount+ is available around the world. In Canada, it airs on CTV Sci-Fi Channel on streams on Crave on Thursdays. Picard is also available on Fridays on Amazon Prime Video around the world.
Find more stories on the Star Trek Universe.
Interesting. I thought the Excelsior would be Obena Class.
Very similar thought, though I hadn’t really enjoyed that class name in the first place (and the explanation for it was, in my opinion, stupid).
That being said, I’m wondering why the artwork here appears to show the USS Excelsior with acutely-angled nacelle pylons, while the Eureka appears to have the more ‘classic’ 90-degree angles from the foreword view.
Note: By stupid, I mean that the guy hasn’t yet earned the right to have a ship or ship class named after him.
Before they will release tng on paramount+ I hope they will take the opportunity to fix the stretched/squeezed enterprise shots and the heaviest of the many season 2 mistakes!!!
Not sure if they feel any financial incentive to do that.
The SD copies of DS9 and Voyager on P+ often have black and white overscan lines on them and the picture has not been deinterlaced.
I keep saying we should watch the hell out of the new TMP to make it evident we appreciate investment in the legacy shows and films. Fall asleep to it every night, if you like. Some would argue that’s what it’s made to do .
‘Fall asleep to it every night.’
That definitely won’t be an issue for me. 😂
lol, I have literally put that movie on to fall asleep and it works!
They fixed episodes of tng exclusively for netflix after the mistakes where spotted on blu ray. And because of the viacom/cbs/paramount merger I think the financial aspect of the studio is stronger then ever.
Huh? Which episodes? I had no idea about this and I’d really like to see because I only watch on the blu rays
Oh did they? Well, that’s good, then. Paramount+ screams of having a backlog of things that need fixing, no doubt that is somewhere on the list.
The financial aspect I could see going either way though. They could invest more in the legacy shows and films to keep those fans happy, or they could rest on their laurels knowing Paramount+ is the only place to stream them now, so why bother upgrading anything? Paramount Global is a big company that wastes plenty of money, but it’s no Netflix/Apple/Amazon/Disney. It has a long history of pinching pennies with only a few exceptions.
LOL
Like Lukas,I would like to know as well.
THE RELIANT! THE EXCELSIOR! OH MY!
What about USS Gigamesh. A fictional character? Is there a USS Sherlock Holmes? There probably is…..
Sure, why not a Gilgamesh? The US Navy has had several ships named Hercules.
There’s already ships named after fiction… Potemkin, Thunderchild, et.al.
Potemkin is a fictional ship?
No. It was a battleship back in the day.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grigory_Potemkin
Not the right one. The question was about the ship.
It was a rhetorical question!
How dramatic,lol!
Some cool boats, some clunkers. Weird how the “Miranda” class is renamed “Reliant” class – that would be like renaming all Constitution or Galaxy class ships “Enterprise” class
It’s because of the refit. Some fanon documents do list the Constitution Refit as Enterprise Class.
Not just fanon. The original STAR TREK CHRONOLOGY from just after TMP’s release also has the refit listed as Enterprise-class, as per its principal designer Andy Probert. Circumstantial evidence also indicates Enterprise-class on-screen in TWOK based on signage by TMP/TWOK graphics designer Lee Cole, though that has been (mis?) interpretted as meaning the class of students assigned to the refit at the start of the film.
Miranda is a moon, so the 24th Century USS Miranda is probably Luna-class.
Miranda class is named for the rights, as we already had a constitution class. I’d imagine there’s a magna-carta class somewhere.
We had Oberth, Excelsior, Galaxy, Constellation and Intrepid classes too, though. That doesn’t mean Miranda is named for the 1960s guy the rights are named for.
Very nice!
It’s just great to see the TNG era back and fully alive these days. And it’s obvious all the people running these new shows are long time fans themselves and trying to honor this era as best they can. Also helps when you bring back others who were responsible for the look and feel of it from the beginning.
As someone who has been skeptical about the new stuff as others at times, the last year has been some of my favorite Trek in 20 years and hope it continues.
So many ugly ship designs that look like are supposed to evoke the feelings of “sharp” and “fast”. The design language of this supposed utopia and its peaceful science and exploration arm is very aggressive and warlike. Hmmm. Its almost as if these ships were designed by people from a more war-like primitive culture. Oh, wait. Makes sense thinking that these designs are from MEN born in the 20th century with all its hot rods, war carnage and pollution. Design is supposed to assist in telling a story and setting a tone. These ship designs fail in setting the tone that this is a better future. The shift away from the deliberate roundness of the Enterprise-D and details like the defensive hand phasers NOT looking like guns, to the obvious guns with barrels (why?!) and these sharp “knife” vibe ships is a major design oversight and flaw. Anyone can design spaceships… it would seem that not everyone is capable of using a design language to help tell a story and create a setting. #BelowAverageTalent
You’re a toxic little cookie, aren’t you?
The only ship out of all of those which have a very hard-edged, overtly aggressive look is the Gagarin Class. All the others look mechanical, hell one is even a variation of the Galaxy class.
You may think they’re below average talent, but you’ve not demonstrated you’re any authority to claim better either
Trek fans:
End of season one, some are raising holy hell that Riker shows up with a fleet of similar vessels.
Season two, holy hell for different ships.
Movies are boring, bring on the epic starship battles.
Why does does Starfleet look like its itching for a fight? Where’s the E-D flying hotel?
Come on now, none of this s**t works, it’s all artistic interpretation. Okay, maybe not to your liking, which actually is allowed, but unless you’re out there doing something better, you’re in no position to be judging talent. There’s nothing wrong with the talent. All you have is an opinion…and not everyone is going to agree with it.
We were upset that they did a cut and paste for the entire fleet in season one. Then there was an elaborate explanation about how it makes sense to have a fleet with interchangeable ships/parts. Then we have this years vastly superior fleet, which we all love, but it undoes the new, albeit ridiculous, cannon that they established only a year ago.
All of that to complain about a bunch of ships ready to go to war.
You…need better priorities.
You can barely see any of it onscreen.
The two things I dislike in the general direction of the designs where John Eaves has been involved, from say around Star Trek: First Contact forward, he tends to flatten Federation starships (they lose the necks connecting the drive and saucer sections), and he doesn’t seem to like having an actual honest to god saucer section.
A lot of his designs have moved more and more towards the saucer section being an arrowhead, and I think the hero ships look less distinctive with the sleekness.
If you look at the original Matt Jefferies design of the TOS Enterprise, there’s a coherent visual design of contrasting shapes (cylinders, domes, etc.) with sharp angles. When you sleek all of that out, I think it loses something.
I agree that the neck and saucer is an elegant and iconic look. I believe the argument for reducing that has been the increased amount of combat Starfleet has come up against. In a battle, ships with a slim profile and fewer weak points tend to be able to avoid/absorb more shots and last longer.
It does seem in canon/universe that the Borg made them change their designs. Less weak points like the neck in between the saucer and secondary hull.
Since Reliant was est. to have 1864-M in Star Trek discovery shouldn’t it have an A or B?
This is about as perfect a textbook example of the ancient adage “there’s always one” as I’ve ever seen. Well done, Luke.
Can’t lie, I do love starship p*rn. Very nice to see John Eaves still working for the franchise, and it was delightful to see the Okudas feted in the other article today. Herman Zimmerman tearing up got me me!
USS Hrothgar > someone behind the scenes plays Skyrim.
Horthgar doesn’t get any higher than that.
Or likes Beowulf…
Was so awesome to see so many different ships here after the single design fleet at the end of S1.
Looks pretty good for the most part. I hear that ironically the Thunderchild is crewed entirely by Martians. ;-)
No one would have believed, in the first year of the 25th century…
Ha, nice!
Thunderchild = Donnager? Gosh, I love that name…
Very happy to see the effort to assemble a “real” fleet instead of the same ship copy/pasted a few dozen times in the finale of Season One 🥳 Looking forward to rest of Season Two.
+1
I still have no idea what they were thinking with that? At least have one or two classic ships show up when some of us have been waiting to see these ships again for 20 years and on a show that didn’t bother to even show a starship until the finale.
They obviously learned their lesson in a big way and didn’t keep us waiting for 10 episodes. 😏
Seriously how hard is to understand. The show was slowed by Covid, both production offices and venders. They don’t have High Definition CGI files of the legacy ships. What they had would need to be heavily reworked. And since they no longer have physical models to scan, they can’t even get that head start. So to use a legacy ship means that either heavily rework on older file (and I have no idea if they are still compatible with the programs they currently use, or even what ones CBS actually had) or recreate a legacy ship from scratch. Meaning they are needing to match geometry. It can be easier and faster to create something new. Its not like the designers or the producers of the show wouldn’t have liked to do more.
It’s the same reason the only fleet in TOS featured constitution class. Why they reused the filming models of the Bird of Prey, K’Tinga, Excelsior, reliant and Grissom so heavily in TNG. Why so many ships both from models or CGI renders have been reused or modified to be a new ship. Why in Enterprise they had to reuse an old ship instead of a create a new design. Why DS9 had to use AMT models and hallmark ornaments for ships.
Shows have limits on what they can and can’t accomplish with the time, money, artists they have available for them.
Now the real option they had, but one that’s not their decision. Would be once they new they were falling behind schedule, is to split the season (I Don’t know when they found out they were getting swamped). And this can absolutely happen. But its a studios not the producers decision. Now one thing to also remember is that when CoVid was hitting, the idea wasn’t lets take more time to get something done. It was how do we cross the finish line as fast as possible so that our workforce isn’t decimated.
This is something that no other previous generation of Trek ever had to deal with. If it wasn’t for that its quite possible that the studio would have had more designers working, more modelers working and possible pony up the money to engage addition CGI artists to get things done. But that absolutely wasn’t going to happen with covid at that time. Now that production has learned to deal and manage their production during times of covid (they’ve had to), But at that time. It was get it done, close it down and get everyone home.
it’s really very easy to understand what they were thinking.
Sorry not buying it!
First off, what is your source they originally planned to use various models in the first place? Because I have never seen an interview, anywhere, that cited this. Of course maybe I just never saw it for myself, but then source please? AFAIK, no one every said that was the plan. They could’ve just come out and said that and if they did it would’ve been sourced over and over again. This is how the internet works. People would’ve still hated it, but OK, at least they had some excuse for it.
And Covid shut everything down a week before the the final episode aired. So you’re trying to tell me they were THAT behind?? Still adding visual effects days before it was to air? I’m sorry I don’t buy it at all. I’m not anywhere close to an FX professional and I know when it comes to big effect films shots can be rendered until the last days before a premiere. But you’re talking about just completing the overall effects, ie, creating them DAYS before the episode ran, which sound insane to me. Or am I interpreting that wrong?
But just to prove I try to be fair about this (because I’m not here to be proven ‘right’, simply accurate) I went and tried to find anything you said to back up your claim. The only thing I found discussing the finale’s production and FX was on wikipedia. And here it is:
“The season finale was the largest episode for visual effects that Zimmerman had worked on across both Picard and Discovery,[75] requiring 60 to 70 visual effects shots.[89] The visual effects team had eight to ten weeks to complete the episode. They began by mapping out the battle between the Romulan fleet, the giant space orchids used by the synthetics, and the Federation fleet, figuring out where the factions would be in relation to the planet Coppelius. Once Goldsman approved the plan, a previsualization of the sequence was created and then the animation was refined from there.[75] For the orchids, Chabon was loosely inspired by the works of Jean Giraud, and mentioned orchids throughout the season as part of Soji’s backstory to set-up their later appearance. The final orchid models were scaled down from the original designs,[35] and their colors were adjusted to be photo-real and to better contrast with the Borg Cube since they appear onscreen together. The bridges of the Federation and Romulan ships in the finale were also created digitally.[89]”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek:_Picard_(season_1)#Production
Funny how nothing you said was mentioned in the article. Nothing about Covid or the shut down causing them major delays or the idea that the Federation fleet was anything more than what was originally shown. The part I highlighted made it as clear as day, Goldsman APPROVED the original plan, so they created the previsualization for the scene and they created it as we saw it. So what else am I missing please?
But this is just one article. Maybe there are other sources out there that gives a bigger picture, but according to this at least it sounded like everything went according to plan, right? So if you have a link, then provide it please? I’m not saying there couldn’t be other factors, but there is nothing I could find that stated anything you said. And I at least have some proof my claim isn’t far off and this is simply what they came up with. I did remember reading somewhere the team didn’t have a lot of time to finish the episode, but it had nothing to do with Covid, it was just a rushed production all around….and it showed all through the finale, not that scene alone.
I can corroborate that they didn’t have much time to do the VFX. A friend worked on season one’s CGI, showed me some usused shots after the show had aired. He didn’t work on the fleet shots, but said they were still finessing shots a week before broadcast at times, and it wouldn’t surprise him if they didn’t have time to find/refine and incorporate other ship models. Hence the copy + paste Federation and Romulan fleets with only 1 brand new model (and some variant in there for the Feds, apparently).
Judging from Blass’ explanation of how much work still went into the fleet we did see and why they reached out to Star Trek Online for help, it makes sense they were rushed. It easily could have been unrelated to COVID.
And that’s completely acceptable. That I can buy and I even said that in my post. I heard the same thing, the production was far behind and it was clear just by watching the finale on it’s own, that stuff was not completed in an appropriate manner.
And I’ll go one step farther and say yes, it IS possible that the delay changed their plans with the ships. So I trust what you and your friend are saying.
I’m only saying we can’t say that’s what happened either because no one has simply come out and said it. And I don’t buy it had anything to do with the pandemic because it was never even reported the production became delayed due to it like Discovery and Lower Decks was reported at the time. And even if that was true, they had nearly 2 years to just say that by now, righ?.
In fact, I was thinking about when Michael Chabon was doing damage control after the finale aired and was using his instagram page to answer fan questions about everything that was missed or unexplained. Trekmovie posted it here too. To his credit he tried to answer every question given to him but never at any time did he try to excuse the cut and paste ships. I just went to look at his answers for those. Here they are:
“Why only one class of Federation ship?
I believe but am working to confirm that there are actually four distinct classes.
Why do Starfleet have so many of the same incredible ship? Do they have any others?
It would be odd and unprecedented if they didn’t.”
https://trekmovie.com/2020/03/28/michael-chabon-answers-fan-questions-about-star-trek-picard-finale-loose-ends-season-two-and-more/
So yeah! Those were his answers. Maybe he is just trying to answer some of the questions ‘in universe’ but the guy was asked point blank and this was all he provided. But in that same exchange, he admitted in other cases things were changed or omitted due to time or editing. Not once did he suggest that here though.
And literally why I asked the question I did in my post because two years on this is the ONLY thing I found talking directly about the ships and this guy was the show runner. If there was a time to use Covid as a reason for your lackluster finale, here was your chance and yet the pandemic or shut down was never brought up to excuse any of it. It just sounds like they bit off more than they could chew and just got behind. It happens.
And I’m not trying to gang up on Mark Wood. But I think he at least understands now why so many of us are still confused years later over it. ;)
No, I agree with you, not much more we can say without more corroborating anecdotes.
I know you did….I just keep babbling lol.
Oh I’ve definitely been there too!
Picard season 1 wasn’t impacted by the pandemic. The industry didn’t start shutting down until the middle of March, 2020 and the Picard finale debuted on 3/26/2020. Post production had wrapped long before that date.
The season finale had been rewritten and those revised pages called for a new ship with RIker in command to save the day. John Eaves was asked to submit a design and he provided one.
In a nutshell: they had a tight post-production schedule. It had nothing to do with the pandemic.
Thanks Denny C!
As to this ‘covid affected it’ – I guess the thing that stops me buying it is looking at some of the STUNNING fan made cgi on YouTube. These people are solo and they come up with astonishing work. One of them is Tobias – something. Can’t recall the full name. There are others just doing it for sheer fandom and as a hobby. If they can come up with stuff that looks as good as it does, then studios really have no excuse. They did the right think hooking up with Star Trek online so I forgive it now, of course, forgive and move on. But it doesn’t change the fact that they could have done that before, or poached a few fans off YouTube like Lucas film did with the deep fake guy for Luke Skywalker.
So agreed! I seen one of them at least a year ago and it was pretty impressive how well it looked and just did a much better job using classic ships compared to what we got in Picard. It is just amazing what fans can do on Youtube these days and for free. Your example of people getting actual jobs in LucasFilm because of how well they crafted an image of Luke Skywalker really does show that is real talent being displayed in these videos and showing up with professional FX artists are doing who are given tons of money and resources to do the same work.
I do feel they have redeemed themselves with this episode and all the great work and passion they brought with these new ships. And the Picard cut and paste wasn’t the worst shot ever or anything, as I said in my OP, fans were waiting not just ten episodes but really 20 years to see those ships again on a brand new show that supposedly had tons more money and technology to do anything they wanted and it really fell flat. When you build something up like that, then it better wow people by the time you get there.
Ok, so what am I supposed to do with all these new desktop images????
Decisions, decisions…
Great article. Hopefully the Stargazer dedication plaque will show up at Eaglemoss soon.
Yay! Attached nacelles! What more can you ask for? Seriously, these are all cool. I like them much better than the 32nd century designs. It would be interesting to see the Enterprise E, F or G someday.
I am not a huge fan of many of them, but I really dislike almost all of the 32nd century ships, so glass half full.
The Disco ships all just look like concept cars.
Some people will find any excuse to hate on Discovery, huh? Even in other threads talking about another Trek show.
To dislike something ist not hate….
It would be interesting to know if this design team reached out to the Sagan estate and ran this Sagan class design by them. Maybe they did, and I just missed it.
USS Rustazh…
That name is familiar to readers of a certain Final Reflection…
YES! I love the acknowledgement of Karen, and still one of the best Klingon stories ever written.
*Krenn. Khest’n autocorrect.
Cranston, your correction wins the day.
I love seeing that name in canon.
That’s the (largely) standalone TREK story I’d most like to see tackled as a standalone feature, even more than PRIME DIRECTIVE or MY ENEMY MY ALLY or THE WOUNDED SKY (lots of element on those last two found their way into THE TRAITOR and WHERE NO ONE HAS GONE BEFORE.)
I don’t dig the Eaves aesthetic for starships, going back to the E’s hull plating seeming like a TMP-era K’tinga, but I understand their reluctance to use TOS-like bold different shapes, out of fear of being rejected by a younger audience. Joe Jennings fought hard to keep the refit and RELIANT smooth-skinned as the ‘chris-craft’ of starships, and in the end all it seemed this integrity got him and Mike Minor were pats on the back and shoves out the door.
Some of these are pretty awful, but mostly they’re great; and, most important, none have those stupid detachable nacelles.
Wow, I didn’t notice the USS Uhura until now! Nice touch! :)
This is great, although I can’t say I’m a huge fan of some of these STO designs, especially the Ross and Sutherland class with their enormous deflectors. The new Excelsior looks phenomenal, hopefully we get a good look at it on the show.
We know we’ll eventually see the Steamrunner and Nova class ships. I’m surprised they didn’t use them in the fleet shots since they needed so many.
I’m actually a bit shocked we didn’t get an Intrepid class either. I think many fans would’ve loved to seen a Voyager model there as well.
I’m just happy that there are starships that don’t have windows for viewscreens.
I actually really like the windows, though at first I was a bit hesitate. But clearly thinking of the D, that ship was covered by huge windows all over the places and they never seemed to be the weak point for the ship. So clearly the material used is close to the strength of the utter hull. And having a way to physically see when systems go down is very practical. Or being in a situation where an opponent could scrabble a ships sensors but at least in close range you could still visually acquire them.
If you wanna know something about windows and starships…they actually don’t help with navigation. Seriously, you think you can pilot a starship from just looking out a window? A starship without sensors is useless, no matter what little glimpse you get out of a window. So I think it’s mainly an aesthetic choice, no practical value to it at all.
I don’t think they’re used for navigation, but just to see what is outside. Think of all the times sensors were spoofed to screw up what was being seen on the view screen. With a giant window you wouldn’t be able to get away with such a thing.
If the systems go down, a window isn’t going to help because even if you can see where you are going… the systems are still down.
And living in a world where lip reading is a real thing (Even depicted in science fiction like 2001: A Space Odyssey), having a huge window where anyone can look into the bridge from the outside raises all kinds of concerns. One moment you’re bluffing to the enemy who’s being projected onto the viewscreen and the next you’re telling your crew what the real plan is. Not to mention that so many brightly lit displays on the bridge would also be in plain sight to anyone who’s watching. A huge window where you can see most of the bridge from the outside is a vulnerability.
Plus aesthetically, it’s an eye sore. It removes the ‘uniformity’ look that Starships had. One ship design that I really liked in Star Trek Beyond was the USS Franklin. I thought it did a better job at conveying what a pre-TOS Starfleet ship would look like better than the NX-01. But the one thing that ruins it for me is that stupid window that is carved right out of the saucer section. It would look so much better without it.
Given the velocities at which these ships normally travel, it would make absolutely no sense that they would ever get so close to be in visual range. If your ship moves at tens of thousands of kilometers per second you don’t approach within 5 or 10 km.
Star Trek has always been very unrealistic in that respect. Or let’s say: They went with what would look good on screen, not what would look realistic on screen.
I know we are just fans but this is very sweet.
I always enjoy seeing things from the tie in material brought into the mainstream canon.
Kind of amazing to think the last couple years have brought into official screen canon not only all this Star Trek Online stuff and the Luna-class design but also the Brikar species, the term Ni’Var, and the Space Fun Helmet from licensed print media, fan works, and most especially the bizarre realm of the ‘70s Remco toys.
As a person who never played STO, that is pretty impressive. I didn’t know that about the Brikar for example. I thought they came from a novel first.
It just really speaks to the new makers of all these shows and trying to be inclusive with both canon and beta canon.. It makes everything feels whole. If Discovery did just a third of this kind of stuff first season, people may have had a different view of that show from the outset.
I think the Brikar did come from a novel first. I wasn’t saying all these things came specifically from Star Trek Online, just that they all came from various sources outside official screen canon (whether books, comics, games, toys, even fan works, whatever) and in the last couple years have all become actual screen canon.
Yeah when I read it again I realized you were talking all beta canon in general, which is still cool.
Would’ve been cool to see a California class show up. Not necessarily the Cerritos, but to see a California in live-action would give it… I don’t know… I feel like until we see it in live-action it’s not quite solidified in canon if you get what I mean. I want it to get the live-action legitimacy.
Just sending some love to TrekMovie for this article. I really appreciate the work that went into putting this together. Thank you!
I’m really curious as to what possible criteria Starfleet could be using for giving a starship’s name the (A, B, C, D, etc.) suffix that keeps the original registry number versus a whole new registry number with the same name.
We know from canon that it isn’t something special just to honor the Enterprise (i.e., TNG has a USS Yamato with a registry number that has an “E” designation). And 32nd century Starfleet gave Discovery the “A” designation after it was refit with new tech even though it was the same ship.
But Stargazer, whom Picard’s showrunner has said is supposed to be Picard’s original ship just gutted and refit with new tech, has an “8” added to the registry number. And the new USS Excelsior has a new registry number even though the ship is distinguished enough to have its own plaque at Starfleet Academy honoring its achievements.
Is it one of those things where it’s just up to the whims of whatever admirals are in charge of ship naming at the moment?
There seems to be a disconnect between the showrunner’s intentions and what the production team executed. Happens plenty of times. Matalas says this is the old Stargazer refit to within an inch of its life. The dedication plaque says the old Stargazer is in a museum.
Soo… ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
In a museum makes way more sense than trying to upgrade the old Stargazer.
I like the look of some of these ships. Really confused with the registrations. Excelsior is my fav ship, would like to have seen this be a ‘B, C D’ etc.
I named my Sovereign class the Valkyrie in STO like 8 years ago
So now I’m in Star Trek!
Legit, I’m so proud of STO. When it 1st launched in 2010, calling it a B quality game would be a stretch. Now, while the game engine leaves much to be desired, the ship design team are without a doubt of AAA-caliber quality.
In fact, I can tell most of the screens in this article are pulled from Star Trek Online
I’m a big fan of starship design, and I guess I like the sort of remixes of pre-existing classes, but I still find the new designs trash. Zheng He is an abomination, as is the Yi Sun Sin and Vanguard. Stargazer looks very similar to Disco-era [23rd century] designs. So yeah it’s exciting to see the varied fleet, but if we’re gonna nitpick, then no, that’s not how the Excelsior class looks. Why can’t you just make it how it’s ALWAYS looked? Why you gotta “put your own spin on it”? So you can sell more Eaglemoss models? Sigh…I miss the days of physical models. Not only for the consistency of it, but the fact that they were real, tangible things, that looked physical on screen. Not these weightless CGI kitbashes.
It appears to be the “Excelsior II class,” so no, probably not meant to be the original class but a second generation. A refit perhaps?
I for one am very happy to see the Sovereign class get so much love finally!!!! One thing I am curious about with the Stargazer though. I thought it’s not possible to outfit a ship with four warp nacelles? I could’ve sworn I read somewhere that having four nacelles is not good at all for a starship, like it puts too much pressure on the hull or something?
I absolutely loved seeing all those ships!!! I am very intrigued about the Borg one as well. It’s a radically different design then any we’ve seen before. It looks like a giant spider and the ships looked like flies in its web.
I can’t wait to see how this story turns out! Oh, and kudos to Alex Kurtzman and everyone else for including Walter M. Jefferies and Herman Zimmerman on the Stargazer’s registration plaque. Really nice touch👌👍. What a really great way to honor two men that had such a big impact on designing two different Enterprises.
Live long and prosper, Trekmovie 🖖.
The original Stargazer from TNG had four nacelles. It was basically a Constitution-class kitbash that used a modified saucer section attached to a twinned neck with two impulse engines and four nacelles. https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Constellation_class
Thanks 👍🙂. I didn’t remember the Stargazer having 4 nacelles. And what makes it worse is I have the Stargazer novels (haven’t read them yet though.) and you can clearly see on the covers of two of them that the Stargazer has 4 nacelles. Crazy, huh😄?
All I had to do was look at the books. Thanks again and live long and prosper 🖖.
It’s obvious a lot of work went into these. I guess I’m not feeling the new ships, because they don’t feel harmonious or proportioned correctly, and aren’t as identifiable or iconic as the Enterprise-A or D. A lot of overcomplicated angular shapes, reminiscent of extreme sneaker styling or those weird open-frame gamer PC cases they make these days.
The Zheng He looks odd to me as it feels very chopped-down and blunted, tough but not really elegant to look at. Those weird…shark scales? Windows?…along the edges of the saucer section don’t help. I get that it was designed to be a carrier of some kind (hence the blunt nose and front-opening shuttlebay) but it doesn’t feel Starfleet-ish.
Between all these designs, there’s little consistency in nacelles. Many don’t seem to inherit any design language from the main ship. On many with underslung nacelles, like the Akira and Luna classes, they look like big rabbit feet instead of sleek power pods as on the original Reliant. As a subscriber to Nacelles Monthly I must protest :)
Would have been nicer if the exterior camera panned over all the ships to give us a full view of all the models. e.g. Tracking Rafi transferring by shuttle from her ship within the fleet to the Star Gazer ship
I am a sucker for starship designs, so I am here for this!
I love the naming and the various designs. I still prefer the four-number registries personally. They just look cleaner to my eye, but I digress!
I still have to address the elephant in the room: where’s the Enterprise?
Nice to see some Sovereign class ships…still arguably the most beautiful in Trek
Great models for the most part, hope we get a cheeky look at an Intrepid and Defiant class at some stage.
I hope they bring the Vesta/Rademaker class over to on screen canon, that is one amazing ship design
I really liked the new Stargazer bridge set. I hope they do an in-depth look at that set some day.
I’m pretty sure I read somewhere that one of Mike Okuda’s favorite shows is MASH; I think it’s a missed opportunity that his namesake ship registry isn’t NCC-74077. :-/
Just a couple of comments:
A) The producers justifiably got panned for the fleet of starships that showed up in the premiere of Discovery S1 way back in 2018. They did a better job in S1 of Picard, but even though there were at least two classes ships, it looked like post production did a digital “cut and paste” job on the scene with the Romulans. This time around, they got it right – third times a charm! In fact, I would suggest they went more than a little overboard because they obviously spent a LOT OF MONEY coming up with a scene that only lasted a few seconds. I would imagine, they will be using these images and ship names again sometime in the future.
B) What is ironic? Way back in 1967, the TOS producers laughingly did an analog “cut and paste” to portray the war games starship fleet in the “Ultimate Computer”. NOTE: I am referring to the original version of the episode, not the digitally remastered version. Now of course, there were big budget restrictions and only limited VFX available for a 1960s television show, but as a kid I can still remember thinking the special effects with the four identical starships looked pretty ridiculous and wondering what the show could have done, if money were not an object.
Just out of curiosity: How do people like Jörg Hillebrand assign the names to all these ships in the fleet shots? They are obviously far too small to read off the hulls. I’m having a hard time even matching the ship classes, let alone individual ships when there’s more than one of a specific class. Is it just guess work? Do they have insider information that we don’t?
I love those new and refit ship designs. Inquiry Class ist still there, but not a swarm of them anymore… I especially like the Ross class (named after war hero Admiral Ross???), which seems to be the love child of Galaxy and Ambassador class… I want more series in that time period!
Love to see all these ships.
But does it bother anyone else that none of the registries have letters associated with them to indicate lineage? Is the Enterprise really the only ship to continue with 1701-A, B, etc. You would think even the Stargazer would be NCC-2893-B or something.
People bitched when they use they copy-and-paste fleet. People bitch when they get creative and try some new ships. There is no pleasing Trekkies.
you new here?
Sarcasm aside, YES, Trekkies/Trekkers are a fiercely passionate bunch whom nit-pick, critique and comment ad nauseum. Most want the best for Trek in its many incarnations! IDIC aside, many people want familiar things. And specific things, given the limited views presented onscreen. Keep being passionate, Trekdom!
The nacelle struts on Excelsior are still using those odd-looking right angles. Wish they would have updated that.
I’d like a Season 4 of Season 4 is really Season 1 of Star Trek: Stargazer, I’m all in. If fans could manifest Strange New Worlds, can we please make a new Trek series based in the 25th century – a natural next step. Give us Captain Rios, his cool new ship and an all new crew. Dale!
I can’t express how much I love seeing all these TNG Ships on screen again.
Trek is not Trek without the ENTERPRISE.
What about Deep Space 9 and Voyager?
a) That’s a ridiculous statement.
b) Be patient, there will be more Enterprises. There will always be more Enterprises.
There are plenty of letters left in the alphabet :P
Kind of is, bruh.
This is just fantastic!!!! Finally a proper and worthy fleet. Delighted to see some iconic designs here especially the Sovereign and Akira class. Like all of the new designs. Huge Thanks to everyone involved.
It continues to be dumbfounding to me that even now, and with all those names that can fit on a dedication plaque, Gene L. Coon continues to get no recognition at all. Without him, Star Trek would be a very different franchise, and very well could have ended after TOS.