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A Memo to J.J. Abrams

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Picking science fiction movies apart for their scientific gaffes – both major and minor – has a long and venerable tradition. When I first saw J.J. Abrams' Star Trek "reboot" in the theater (twice) I enjoyed it immensely. However, the weaknesses of the whole idea of a "supernova" taking out a single habitable planet, the home-world of the movie's villain, was not lost on me at the time (I will not address the "red matter" MacGuffin in detail here). While watching it again the other day on DVD, I thought of a minor tweak that would make the plot element of the destruction of a planet more scientifically plausible and still retain the following storyline benefits: the plot would still involve a black hole (cue ominous music) the word “supernova” (hereafter: “SN”) would still be used on-screen the word “hypernova” (i.e. a really bad-ass big brother to a mere supernova) could be used as well an opportunity would be created for some re