There's Another Ship Coming In...It's the (Eaglemoss Subscribers) Enterprise!

For those unfamiliar, All Good Things is a poignant ending to The Next Generation, arguably the perfect beginning to what we call 'Modern Star Trek'. 

The episode introduced the audience to the futuristic Enterprise D, and with it one of many insights across the Star Trek universe, speculating on alternate future scenarios. That would have been of course, if Deanna hadn't slammed it into Veridian III...

Not dissimilar to the original Enterprise D, with a few... erm... additions. Before we begin our model review though, we have a problem. 

This has left +Hayley Atherton and I at loggerheads on opinion of this 'future variant'. Hayley in truth wasn't that impressed, as it showed limited imagination with the scope of the design. Lining the models up side by side, it was a carbon copy of the original. A quote comes to mind when looking at the variant: "Mr Paris, we are not designing a 'hot rod'".

Now whilst I agree with my esteemed colleague, my argument was that it is still the Enterprise D. If they were to completely redesign a ship from scratch, it would no longer be so - hence the Sovereign Class Enterprise E. Since neither of us are willing to back down on this, we'll let you be the judge of that...

So, what about Eaglemoss' latest special edition? Well, this is tough, with it being a subscribers only model, we were hoping for something that would sweep us off our feet in awe. No. Just, NO. In actual fact our feet are staying firmly on the ground with this one.

As a subscriber, we got onto discussing Hayley's first impressions when opening the package... her initial reaction was "I've already got the D". It wasn't until she looked closer did she realise it had a third nacelle. In my opinion, it's a poor show by Eaglemoss, sort of like sticking a few fingers up at all the loyal subscribers and saying "We could have done more, but the original Enterprise D mold was just sitting there, so we couldn't be bothered." 

There's plenty of evidence in the form of the NX-01 Enterprise and the Thunderchild, that Eaglemoss can produce very good model builds. Bear in mind we're talking about two 'stock' ships, not exclusives. Perhaps it would help to demonstrate our bugbear.

The stock Enterprise is mostly built in four parts: the saucer, neck, topside engineering hull (with nacelle pylons) and the underside engineering hull (with deflector). For the future variant, they have used the same saucer section with the phaser cannon stuck over the underside (this is clearly visible if you inspect the gap between the cannon and saucer). The same underside engineering hull has been used.

The other two sections have clearly been constructed using the same specifications as the original, just with additions such as the nacelle pylon 'fins', and the third nacelle mounting pylon.

What makes this that much worse is the build quality of the rear section. Incredibly, somehow, they have made the variant even more delicate on the nacelle pylons, than the original ever was! Oh and finally - what, in all things sane and rational, is Intiaparinu? I think they meant Enterprise (see opposite). This highlights our earlier point being that the saucer is from the same original mold, as the same alien word appears on the original, in the same location.

Okay, we are being brutally critical on what is a good looking 'free' ship. But to be honest, would it have cost that much more to construct it from the same materials as the Thunderchild or the NX-01???

The question that sticks in our mind now we have heard noises from Eaglemoss about forthcoming 'specials' is: "Are we to expect the same, so-called standards?" or: "Will the Enterprise A, just have an A at the end of the registry?". Speaking of such, we've had our gripes about the Constitution Refit from issue 2, the flimsy weak issues of it anyway. So are we again expecting the same structural integrity problems for the forthcoming Enterprise A and B?

... Magazine comments? No. Don't even start. We'd have to have actually been issued a magazine with this edition, in order to try and give this model some of it's dignity back.

Yes, we're being savage about this particular serving from Eaglemoss. That's not to say we hate the collection, or we're fed up with it's 'apparent' officiality with CBS/Paramount, OR we're revolting against the myriad of cons the series has been plagued by. We just expected a good thing, we just don't want 'All Good Things' to become the theme nor demise of this collection...

UPDATE 28/07/15

With the collection now being released in mainland Europe as a subscribers only publication, the USS Enterprise-D future edition has now been slightly updated with the correct wording behind shuttlebay one from Intiaparinu to Enterprise. We've dropped a video up with a mini-review and comparison to the issue one Enterprise-D. Catch it here on our updated YouTube channel.

All photographed model images from SKoST Image Archive courtesy of +Hayley Atherton