The Movie Era of the Okuda Chronology is pretty barren, as are "The Distant Past," "The Twentieth Century," "The Twenty-first Century," "The Twenty-second Century," and "The Far Future"--but this timeline is working with so many restrictions, it's to be expected. More of a straightforward research work than an actual Treknical reference book like the TNG Technical Manual. The first Appendix covers "Undatable Events And Other Uncertainties" and is another sad example--because a large portion of the material speculated upon here is Here: found in the animated series, the novels, the novelizations, and the Treknical publications spanning two decades. First contact with Vulcan: "Strangers From The Sky." The invention of the transporter: "The Terratin Incident." The Vulcan Reformation: "Spock's World" and "The Romulan Way" also covering the Romulan War.
Okuda uses the First Romulan War and a statement made by Troi in "The Outcast" to prove that the Federation was founded in 2161. There are numerous problems with this. Fandom has always placed the U.F.P.'s formation closer to 2100 (right after Cochrane's last voyage) and the year 2127 eventually evolved. FASA/SFC places it much earlier, 2087, which obviously contradicts with "Metamorphosis." 2161 was supposedly chosen for the U.F.P. date, if I read the book correctly, because it was right after the Romulan War and in "Balance of Terror" Spock referred to it as the "Earth-Romulan Conflict" not mentioning the U.F.P. (as if not founded yet). The notes later point out, however, that this was entirely due to the U.F.P. and Star Fleet not having been established so early on in Trek's 1st season. Throughout much of the first season, starbases are referred to as "Earth Bases" and the "Enterprise" is reporting to UESPA (United Earth Space Probe Agency, a division of Star Fleet later phased out according to the Officers Manual). But the U.F.P.'s headquarters and Star Fleet Command are, after all, based on Earth. In "The Corbomite Manuever" Captain Kirk announces, "This is the United Earth Ship 'Enterprise.'" Uh, maybe the United Federation of Planets wasn't in existence by this episode either and there's the proof! Okuda later states that a tiny "MMCLXI" appearing on the Star Fleet Academy emblem in "The First Duty" is further proof--Roman numerals for 2161. Okuda's going against one of his "Dating Conventions" in that exact relative dates would be used: the Romulan War was a century prior to "Balance of Terror" and therefore should be around 2166 by his date calculations and his U.F.P. founding date no earlier. The novels (including "The Romulan Way" establishing the first ship to contact the Romulans was a Human-manned ship from Earth and the U.F.P.), and Fandom, and in frankly every source I know of outside of Okuda's Chronology, the United Federation of Planets was in existence during the First Romulan War. Basing When the U.F.P. was founded around the "Earth-Romulan Conflict" statement is very weak. The classic Star Fleet Technical Manual (which some fans regard as being more of an authentic Star Fleet Academy text than the TNG Technical Manual) on TO:00:01:60 shows the Treaty Of Peace "Between the Romulan Star Empire and the United Federation of Planets" mentioning the "Governor of the Federation Council of the United Federation of Planets." So what of Troi's statement in the TNG episode? All she mentions is the founding date of A federation and never explicitly claims it to be The United Federation of Planets. For all we know, Deanna might have been referring to the Federation of Card Players (she was engaged in a card game at the time) or any other federation. And what of the Academy logo's number? More confusion. We take it that Okuda assumes the U.F.P. and Star Fleet were created simultaneously as he appears to view them as being one and the same. The Line Officers Requirements, Starfleet Dynamics manual, and even Star Fleet Battles claim that Star Fleet was put together many years later (the two former sources giving the year 2183) and in ST II Carol Marcus says "Star Fleet has kept the peace for a hundred years" (2287 - 100 = circa 2187). The 2161 on the Academy logo--and we must stress Star Fleet Academy, Sol sector as there are no doubt other Star Fleet Academies throughout U.F.P. space--may have been when the building was erected, when Star Fleet was first drawn up on Earth or might even be a stardate. Other fans theorize that the U.F.P. was established in 2127 but not founded until 2161 because of the Romulan War and numerous Earth-bound problems. We do know that the homeport of the U.S.S. "Essex" in 2167 was Starbase 12 commanded by Admiral Narsu as established in "Power Play." It seems unlikely that the U.F.P. and/or Star Fleet could establish a minimum of 12 command bases within 5 or 6 years. The construction of all starbases are authorized under the Articles of Federation.
There are quite a few other disagreements... I'll nitpick, starting with the ordering of the TNG episodes by Production Order. As already discussed, Aired Order for The Next Generation episodes makes more sense as they are clearly intended to be seen in that order, unlike the thrown together aired sequence of classic episodes. Throughout the Okuda Chronology in this section, they make exceptions to this episode and that: "Unification Part II" was filmed before Part I but should be swapped obviously, "Symbiosis" was produced after "Skin of Evil" but should be swapped because Tasha was killed in the latter etc. Aired order makes more sense and recently the stardates have been perfectly in sync with the aired order.
Alexander Rozhenko, the Chronology states, was conceived in the holodeck in "The Emissary." If this were true, the child would be less than 2 years old in "Reunion" when he first appears! It's been speculated that Klingon kids mature faster than Humans, but Really! In "The Emissary" Worf had a relationship with K'Ehleyr 6 years previous and this is when I believe Alexander was conceived. She kept their son from Worf until "Reunion"--no wonder Worf was shouting "Why didn't you tell me!" Yet in a "New Ground," Alexander gives the stardate of his birth which seems to prove Okuda's Chronology correct. Yet this episode establishes him to be a compulsive liar and in a later scene Worf tells his son "When I was a child younger than you...I lost my parents..."that he was orphaned at an even. Worf was 6 years old when his parents were killed at the Khitomer Massacre, therefore Alexander at the time of this episode is over 6 years old. What we saw on the holodeck in "The Emissary" was nothing more than a Klingon bonding ceremony. But then along comes the more recent episode "Firstborn." All's well at the start, Worf telling Alexander that he's approaching the Age of Ascension and that he must participate in the Right before the age of 13 if he wants to become a warrior. That's consistent with this since Worf would be about 10 years old at the time of "Firstborn." All's not well, however, towards the end when old Alexander tells Worf that he was a mere 3 years of age when K'Ehlyer was killed. If Alexander was conceived on the holodeck in "The Emissary," a mid-second season episode, he would have been born no sooner than the third season (going by Okuda's assumptions). K'Ehlyer died in the early fourth season episode "Reunion" so (going by Okuda's assumptions) Alexander would have been about 1 year old. So I guess we now have three conflicts regarding Alexander's date of birth. Considering the above info, I'll stick with the 2360 date and assume Alexander was speaking of Klingon years in "Firstborn" as a couple sources indicate that Klingon years are longer than Standard/Terran years. Although in "The Final Reflection" it's a mere fraction of a solar year longer, we again don't know if the homeworld in TNG's time is the same homeworld a century earlier (if the Klingons relocated would they possibly change their own timekeeping system to match that of their new adapted homeworld?). Yes, this is Very confusing and messy, and I regret having brought this up as an example...
Blind assumptions is another problem... Simply because Worf is a Klingon apparently born within the Klingon Empire doesn't necessarily mean he was born on the Klingon homeworld and that homeworld isn't necessarily named Kronos, spelled "Qo'noS" in the Okuda Chronology. The same goes for Riker being born in Valdez, Alaska on Earth, Deanna on Betazed etc. "Conundrum" confirms that Dr. Crusher was born on Earth's moon, as an example. Greg Jein's original photos of never-before-seen ship models causes additional trouble. An ancient Romulan warship and the "Botany Bay" departing Earth are one thing, but photos of a DY-750, the S.S. "Valiant" and the "Essex"--models invented strictly for this book--are inappropriate for a chronology claiming to be based entirely upon episodes and movies. Are they Researching Trek history or Inventing it?
The Okuda Chronology's "eyeballing" of certain events is rather crude. Due to lack of material for specific dates, a "window" in which the event could have occurred was created, and the specific event dropped within. The given example for this is Spock's promotion to Captain. They say it was some time between ST-TMP (2271) and ST II (2285) so they arbitrarily chose 2284. Why 2284? Beats me. I chose not to eyeball dates at all whenever possible. In a case like this I would merely acknowledge the fact that Spock would later be promoted to Captain of the "Enterprise" in an earlier entry regarding Spock. If future novels would provide more concrete information for a specific year I would use it. Chekov's year of assignment to the "Reliant," McCoy's medical career, Saavik's entry into the Academy etc. are all blind guesses. Saavik's year of entry, for instance, is based strictly on Star Fleet Academy being a 4-year institution--but Merik was said to have dropped out of the Academy after his 5th year ("Bread And Circuses"), and there are text references to other Star Fleet officers remaining on at the Academy as instructors or for post-graduate work. The Okuda Chronology also seems to assume that 17 being the average age of Academy entry is a good start to map-out specific characters careers. Saavik was certainly not in her teens in ST II. The Okuda Chronology automatically assumes that episodes span an average of 2 weeks, so if an event is described as happening 2 months before a given episode it's slotted in 4 episodes earlier. I find this to be unacceptable since episode lengths vary as do season lengths. The last season of the classic series, in particular, is com- pacted down by the addition of the animated episodes, the upgrade time of the "Enterprise," and the 2 months expended in "The Paradise Syndrome."
The spellings of planet and character names for specific TNG episodes I don't pretend to have memorized and the chronology was at least helpful in this respect. Yet after decades it's a surprise to find the chronicles of the classic episodes to be full of mispelled names in Okuda's book. Bjo Trimble's Concordance, James Blish's novelizations, and the myriad fan-produced works almost invariably match up letter for letter. Yet here we find "Khan NooniEn Singh" and Dr. "NooniEn Soong" spelled incorrectly in every reference. Likewise for the planet "SaHndara," Spock's home city "ShiRkahr," Dr. "SevErin," "hyronalYn," and "Rigelians" just to name a few after spot checking. No big deal--until the book is used as a writer's guide by Trek authors... And why's the development of the drug "hyronalyn" listed as being one of the six "Scientific And Exploratory Milestones" of Trek in Appendix A?
Speaking of authors, Pocket Books advertises it as: "At last! Here is the official illustrated timeline for Star Trek... Exhaustively researched by Star Trek production staff members..." Even on the back cover. While the inside Introduction ends with "We do not, however, want this to intimidate our writer friends or inhibit the imaginations of fans who may have differing interpretations of the Star Trek timeline. As such, we encourage both fans and writers to take this material with a grain of salt and to enjoy it with the spirit intended, as a fun way to explore the Star Trek universe." This alone should provide our more conservative Trek fans with hours of manic confusion... It's already screwed up the novel "Sarek" Big Time (in which case I've tried my best to preserve as many specific months and days as possible, and default to relative dating schemes) and a key date in "Shadows on the Sun" (which I have interpreted as a transpositional error). "Traitor Winds" was also influenced by the Okuda Chronology, though dates within are 1 year off. The dates in the more recent "The Better Man" fit rather well assuming that the novel is set 4 years after ST-TMP, not 2 as indicated in the 'Historians Note,' or about 2 years into the new 5-year mission. The big screwup lies with McCoy's age since, counting back from the TNG pilot episode, McCoy is only a few years older than Kirk which contradicts the original Writers Guide and most first generation fans' reckoning. The hardcover novel "Federation" is perhaps the biggest nightmare in this category, owing its soul to Okuda's book in every respect, and the Reeves-Stevens later joked about wearing out Okuda's chronology when ghost writing "The Ashes of Eden"...
Another Okuda book is The Star Trek Encyclopedia. It is essentially the Okuda Chronology reformatted into alphabetical entries and expanded to include the classic series and the first season of Deep Space Nine. Nothing beyond this is included such as the Animated series since that's "unofficial." It reads like a watered-down and plagiarized Star Trek Concordance except that it's highly biased and fully backs the Okuda Chronology book and the TNG Technical Manual--and little else! The NCCs of "Constitution" class starships (among other classes) Badly conflict with the past 20 years' worth of Technical Fandom publications, going back to the Franz Joseph Star Fleet Technical Manual and U.S.S. "Enterprise" Blueprints. NCCs are even unjustifiably provided for such vessels as the U.S.S. "Horizon" and "Archon" with the same forged photos ported over from the Okuda Chronology rep- resenting these ships--with additional forged photos of "Constitution" class starships with altered NCCs. Quite frankly, I don't think the casual fan will be able to tell a "genuine" photo from a "forged" photo. Another section of this encyclopedia summarizing the decks of the old "Enterprise" relocates Main Engineering from the aft primary hull to the secondary hull and even adds antimatter containment bottles to Deck 23! Studying the book, I get the distinct impression that the Okudas are emphasizing that 24th Century (NCC-1701-D) treknology (from ship construction to phaser settings to engineering concepts) applies also to 23rd Century treknology! Does the Star Fleet Technical Manual hold Any sort of merit any longer? Certainly not according to this new book! Many of the same gripes with the Okuda Chronology are multiplied with the Okuda Encyclopedia as endless entries cite the Okuda-derived years for referencing events. The book is therefore highly questionable at times. Totally disregarding the founders, they go too far and not only bite the hand that fed them but also apparently spit on Fandom. Certainly nobody expects these people to attempt a project of this magnitude, studying the many novels and manuals out there, but there is much "common ground" accepted by the fans for over two decades, general concepts shared by everyone from Franz Joseph to Shane Johnson--basics rejected by Okuda. The Okudas only acknowledge their own work: anything else to them is "not official." The Okuda Chronology and Encyclopedia were both recently released on CD ROM disk for computer gurus as "The Star Trek Omnipedia" with very few corrections made, and several additional boo-boos. Despite being hailed as "A voice-activated guide to the future" featuring the voices of Majel Barrett and Mark Lenard, shovelware is still shovelware.