I tend to think of the 'protein resequencers' and 'synthesizers' as incredibly archaic replicator technology used only when necessary. And still, in the 24th century, we know plenty of people who don't like/refuse to use replicated food, so I don't see why farming would be outdated.

I really had to think this over before risking an explanation worth anyone's imagination, ScoutDog.

How big is the Red Matter container?

It's a surgical mining hole of about 15kms down of solid rock (density plays a role on the continental shelf) until it reaches magma. Besides, find me another director who would resist toppling the bridge with GDI effects.

Instantly recognizable, funnel of flames backdropped upon evacuation of Starfleet HQ. Cinematic.

I just finished reading the book and found it considerably more satisfying than the movie as it dealt with a lot of my pet peeves.

Here are just a few it resolveD:

1. The kid hitchiking when young Kirk is driving the car is Kirk's big brother who is running away from home because their step father was just such a jerk to them.

2. Kirk drove the car into a quarry and it is explicitly called that in the book.

3. The star that exploded exploded 130 years prior to it hitting Romulus. It was a super giant and the shock wave wasn't detected until it was nearly too late.

4. The shockwave's progression increased in velocity over time which wasn't expected which is why Romulus was destroyed.

5. When Spock Prime meets Kirk in the cave, Spock explicitly says that the odds of them meeting at that time in that place are so astronomically tiny that "Dr. McCoy would argue that it is proof that there's a higher power at work." When they happen to run into Scotty, another big coincidence Spock starts hypothesizing that the timeline is trying to repair itself as these coincidences seem absurdly unlikely.

6. Earth-based defenses had specifically attacked the drill but had been unable to damage it do to the Romulan ship intercepting shots and surface fighters that had attempted to destroy the drill.

7. The Romulan ship had to be destroyed at the end to prevent it from time shifting again. The Romulan ship could not operate warp drive and have its shields up at once. It needed warp drive to perform the time shift. The Enterprise was able to destroy the ship because it had its shields down.

8. Kirk was sleeping with the Orion chick because she was one of the technicians on the test and through her was able to learn how to break in and install his subroutine.

9. There are numerous very excellent scenes not in the movie that were in the book including:

a. More discussion about Admiral Archer's prize beagle.

b. The very last scene in the book is Admiral Archer's beagle materializing on the transporter of the Enterprise.

c. Uhura talking to the Orion chick in Orion-Prime about how Kirk had bedded half the females at the academy - not all of whom were humanoid only to discover that Kirk also speaks Orion-Prime and that she's exaggerating and that all of them were humanoid -- he thinks.

d. The debate between Kirk and Spock at the hearing is much more interesting and makes it clear that Kirk would likely have won the debate. 

e. Some great lines about how "Kirk never loses - the man doesn't know how to lose."

f. The super nova was not going to "destroy the galaxy" but because it was a super giant, it would definitely have wiped out a lot of habitable planets in the alpha quadrant.

g. The Romulans had every intention of taking their ship back to Romulus after they were done. They didn't before our of fear of losing control of their ship. The crew debated with Nero over whether they should destroy any Federation planets other than Vulcan and were anxious to destroy the star that destroyed Romulus and then return to Romulus.

h. The ship was an "exploratory mining" ship that was heavily armed because it was left to fend for itself in very remote areas and often had very valuable ore on board that it needed to be able to protect.

Yay for more backstory in the book - and the contradiction with the comics doesn't really matter because it sounds like the book hangs together a bit better.

Phaedyme = her

I'm not fighting, I'm confused about Zyx's response.

I'm also not going to hold back my frustration when someone says something frustratingly obtuse. I don't think the tone of my response has any bearing on the message, which is that Zyx totally missed the point of what I said, got defensive as if I were attacking him, and told me to stop talking that way about my reaction to the film.

...

The tone of my response is fine. The words I used are fine. When someone says something as mind-boggling as Zyx did in response to my comment, I think "what the fuck are you talking about?" is a reasonable response. It's not a matter of maturity. Removing those words won't change the content of my response, and I don't think I should be required to respond with a level tone when I'm told I'm talking about something wrong - or more specifically, told to shut up.

Also, look up - I edited my response.

I didn't say you were telling me to shut up, but that was the vibe I got from Zyxspilon's response, and what I was talking about.

Arrrrgggghhh, if i came across as defensive - it must be my fault. After all, we move verbs before structural phrasing in Québec, twice i might add. We speak in riddles, and peek at adjectives with keen eyes. Etc.

But, i would highly recommend this site (mid '80s versions of some of his books, here on a shelf somewhere) before delving any deeper into specific 'Character' plotting devices used by professionals.

I'm just a typo freak. And got blamed too often for it.

Want the "...Panic" episode so that i can prove it to you?

I also wonder, if (most) everyone on Earth uses hovering vehicles, why are there still roads. My dad is in charge of logistics at a large universtiy, and he tells me that roads take a LOAD of money to maintain.

Usually I don't read the movie books when they come out. I read the one for Nemesis and that's about it.

But Frogboy's summary of the book sounds like it fixes a lot of issues. Are these books considered canon?

TNG wasn't a reboot, it was an expansion pack.

The movie had many well done scenes, but I found it pretty lazy/weak on the overall storyline.  I like the new actors and I think they all did great jobs.  I can understand that no new movie is going to be 100% faithful to canon.  The thing I disliked most was how they bent the rules of the Star Trek universe...a lot...to fit their storyline, and even then it didn't always make sense.

Some of these points have been mentioned, and some have been clarified a bit with Frogboy filling in info from the novel, but here were my issues:

1.  No Supernova explosion is going to sneak up on a FTL race like the Romulans.  It would certainly be dangerous to habitable worlds, but they have time to detect it and prepare for it.

2.  You can't use a black hole to suck up the leading edge "shockwave" from a supernova.  Too big.  A black hole big enough to do this is more dangerous than the supernova itself.

3.  Why is Ambassador Spock carrying 20 gallons of red matter when only a drop is necessary.

4.  You don't have to drill into a planet to destroy it with a black hole.

5.  The future Spock assisted transport across light years was conveniently far fetched even for the Star Trek universe.

6.  Why did Nero and Spock get sucked back in time when they fell into the black hole?  It would have taken very little explanation to say they were stuck in the event horizon and engaged their warp drives to go back in time rather than be destroyed.

7.  Why was Spock's mother hanging out in the Vulcan elder sacred area?  OK, I will give them a pass on this one to forward the plot, but seriously, she wouldn't be in there.

8.  Why didn't Kirk and Sulu take phasers with them to attack the driling platform?  Maybe Nero's ship would have detected the energy reading from phasers?  So they had to take hand to hand weapons?  (See, I'm trying to help them here!)

9.  Ejecting the warp core would not have saved the enterprise from the black hole, it would have destroyed the Enterprise.  They needed the warp core to maintain their speed, and the resulting proximity to the antimatter explosion would have destroyed the ship, not thrown it clear.

10.  Delta Vega was not so close to Vulcan for Spock to watch his world get destroyed.

Finally the movie didn't feel that satisfying in that Nero was a villain who got very little screen time.  The whole "save the Federation" plot felt incidental to Kirk being able to trick Spock out of his command.  As someone pointed out, I also noticed Kirk got the crap pounded out of him in every fight he was in, though I suppose they weren't quite fair all being against superior numbers or stronger aliens.  The old Kirk has always outwitted those he couldn't outfight, but he was a bit more of a weasel in this movie.

I would have liked to have seen Kirk be more of a hero so I felt like he earned that Captain's chair.

That said, it was an enjoyable special effects action movie with many funny, well acted scenes.

Yeah, good point, I suppose it could be a catalyst and need some dense matter there to get going.  Using red matter on a neutron star remnant wouldn't be an issue, but maybe you need the core of a planet to get a proper sized black hole.  Of course, then they would have a problem with the black hole they created with all the red matter at the end of the movie.  Even assuming all of it got dumped, it should have only created a tiny singularity, nothing with an event horizon big enough to trap a ship...it would have just punched through the ship leaving a rather largh hole.  Of course, that is really splitting hairs.  Star Trek was never much for hard science fiction, it is just disappointing to see how far out they went with science fantasy in this movie.