See? Even in the Trek universe, the writers can't keep the canon straight.
Continuity
- Thread starter PrimeDirective
- Start date
Those "in-universe" writers and historians would have to be pretty useless to mess up: the when and how of World War 3, when the transporter was first invented and that Remus is a floating lump of dark rock full of vaguely vampiric monsters rather than a lush, green Romulan world. Don't they have Wikipedia in the future?
...I'm not helping my case, am I?
...I'm not helping my case, am I?
no, but you made me LOL.
Two words: Inglourious Basterds.
One word: And?
I dunno. Klingons may not have short lifespans as I believe TFR implied or stated, but they sure as hell age to maturity quickly. (See also: Alexander Rozhenko.
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I may have waivered a bit in my belief that consistency in Star Trek movies, series, and novels doesn't really matter, but I've realized that it's the most important thing to me. I will never waiver. Consistency makes a story believeable, which in turn allows me to enjoy it more
At the risk of being a "Herbert" I'll say I appreciate these comments -- I'm not a continuity fascist, and I can enjoy 'playing along' with inconsistencies relative to other iterations of Trek (Federation is still one of my favorite Trek novels, and I only read it last year after greatly enjoying ST: Enterprise)but I have to say I was drawn to the world of Trek Fiction exactly because the books were launched from and constantly referred to episodes and films that I was already familiar with.
Thus, "consistency" and the ability to pretend that this is a living, breathing, universe is amongst the qualities I enjoy in a Star Trek book/etc. So complete hermetic consistency is not number one (see: My love of Federation, and many other early Trek books that both do and do not jibe with other Trek) a good story, good ideas, and solid writing are more important, but the ability to play in a world who's fictional boundaries have already been established is one of the great joys of Trek lit to me. When something clicks, or get expounded upon from the shows/films its so satisfying to me, even if its minor like "Captain Dunsel" in the latest Enterprise book - not crucial to the story per se, but a simple pleasure nonetheless.
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It's nice to know that there is someone out there who knows why consistency is one of the most important qualities to any story
Basically, that Tarantino's latest piece of cinematic history isn't remotely close to historical accuracy, yet it's written in a world where the events of World War II are very well known and quite well documented. For that matter, just about all of Oliver Stone's historical dramas have issues with being true to the historical record of the events that are being portrayed (which he readily acknowledges when pushed on the subject, and he attributes to having to take dramatic license from time to time to keep the story entertaining and interesting.)
Why should the writers within the Star Trek universe be constrained from taking the occasional dramatic license with their creative works?
I never said they shouldn't. Then again, I'm okay with writers outside the Trek universe doing the very same thing on occasion, particularly if it serves the story being told. I'm not the one looking to burn directors and writers at the stake for veering off the rails of the Holy Trek Canon Express, remember?
Are we now taking the approach that ST09 is just a holonovel gone horribly wrong?
There's a little bit of a difference between a story being told within the confines of the Star Trek universe as a creative work of a character within the Star Trek universe, say, a dramatic presentation of "Photons Be Free", and a Star Trek story being presented as an event in the Star Trek universe. Reginald Barclay didn't give us ST09, JJ and his merry band did. Different measuring sticks.
Besides, burning at the stake is so passe'. Firing squad is the way to go.
Captain Robert April said:
Depends on your point of view. I tend to view it all as...well...fiction, so I don't get hung up about it like some folks. I'm actually intrigued by the possibilities of different takes on the material....a "reinterpretation of the mythology," if you will.
Not that it matters, as I actually was addressing this point:
I guess I'm having trouble reconciling the notion that a filmmaker in the real world can create a story set against the backdrop of real-world events and even take extraordinary liberties with the facts as presented, but someone can't do the same thing while working with characters and settings which are all made up from the get-go. People who write King Arthur, Robin Hood, Sherlock Holmes, Batman, Superman, James Bond, even Star Wars (just to name some prime examples off the top of my head) stories must be crushed to hear stuff like this.
Wait, that's right. They do that all the time, too. It's been done, and done successfully, for...well...about as long as people have been telling stories. Some "versions" work better for folks than others, depending on your point of view, but by and large, such reinterpretations seem to do okay, even going so far as to (gasp!) co-exist right alongside one another!
But not Trek. Oh, no. Everything has to fit within the same box, or else the world just stops spinning. QT or Oliver Stone (or whoever you care to name) can take historical accuracy and wipe their ass with it in the name of trying to tell a good story, but JJ's a dick for daring to challenge some assumptions or even just offer a different take on the subject matter for Trek?
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^You do know you're never gonna convince him, right?
Futile.
Futile.
If I may say, I personally do not at all object to the fact THAT JJ/et al (or anybody) would have a different take on Trek - I was excited for a reboot and you'd never hear me complain about a nacelle, I just wasn't that in love with the sum total of their particular take. Parts of it I liked, and it was a thrill to see ST in the theaters again, but as a whole it left me a little cold.
Regardless of how much I do enjoy seeing 'everything connect' from the various shows/canon, I'm all for trying new things in the abstract. ST09 was just the first iteration of Trek that left me feeling less than totally enthusiastic (I loved Enterprise), though I did think there was a terrific action movie in there.
Though wouldn't you have to grant that even in those examples you gave, certain things are inviolable? Holmes is a mastermind detective, Robin Hood robs from the rich, Batman wears a costume and fights crime, etc etc - so the real question is WHICH details are open to change without violating the spirit or 'world' of these characters, and which things are open to addition/subtraction - to me a nacelle or an engine room isn't a big deal, but for instance destroying Vulcan, making Kirk a troubled kid, and then become captain so quickly - these weren't the strongest Trek choices to me. But I personally would never say 'don't try it', or call anybody a dick for doing so!
All told, the major faults I found with ST09 had little to do with continuity per se, and much more with what I perceived to be a lack of fidelity to the general spirit that has made Trek great, in favor of a more breezy action/adventure-with-callbacks-to-the-show thing which did work on that level as intended. But I saw no reason why it couldn't have had more sci-fi ideas (beyond simply an outer-space star fleet vs. future bad guy thing) and also been more exciting action-adventure wise. Maybe the sequel!
My estimation of JJ as a dick is for other reasons, but the way he handled Star Trek certainly doesn't help his case.
Back to the topic, like I said upthread somewhere, from where I sit, it'd better be a freakin' incredible story before you even think of screwing with the backstory, and the story JJ presented was just flat out lame. He took the barebones plot of Star Wars, minus the mysticism that made the whole thing work, slapped on the surface trappings of Star Trek and the standard stereotypes, sprinkled in some inside references, most of them incorrectly used, and jazzed it up with a bunch of shaky camera shots, lens flares, and explosions.
In other words, he trashed the place and really didn't produce anything that justified the carnage.
If you enjoyed the lightshow, fine, great, more power to ya, but when things keep coming up *WRONG!*, it takes me out of the movie and gets me started on plotting an MST3K riff on the thing.
Back to the topic, like I said upthread somewhere, from where I sit, it'd better be a freakin' incredible story before you even think of screwing with the backstory, and the story JJ presented was just flat out lame. He took the barebones plot of Star Wars, minus the mysticism that made the whole thing work, slapped on the surface trappings of Star Trek and the standard stereotypes, sprinkled in some inside references, most of them incorrectly used, and jazzed it up with a bunch of shaky camera shots, lens flares, and explosions.
In other words, he trashed the place and really didn't produce anything that justified the carnage.
If you enjoyed the lightshow, fine, great, more power to ya, but when things keep coming up *WRONG!*, it takes me out of the movie and gets me started on plotting an MST3K riff on the thing.
Fair enough. Different strokes for different strokes.
Whereas I had a blast at the theater, and am left rather uninspired by most of Enterprise. I see a lot of potential behind the concept of a 22nd century-era Trek show "when it all began," and I think they largely squandered that potential.
Yes, they destroyed Vulcan. In one swoop, they demonstrated that this isn't the same timeline/reality/whatever as the original versions of these characters, and told audiences that "All bets are off. Nobody and nothing is safe. Buckle up." As for Kirk the troubled kid....is there anything in the canon to refute this? No. Indeed, there's nothing at all, which is why Diane Carey was able to fashion a backstory for Kirk as just such a troubled young man for her novels. (Yes, I know they're not canon, which only reinforces my point...there's more than one way to do this). In the "real" universe, we're to believe that Kirk was one of the youngest people ever to attain command of a starship....29, if we're to believe conjecture put forth in various sources. I'll give you that the circumstances of Kirk's rapid promotion in the film are unbelievable, but it's not worth having a stroke over. Weirder things have happened in fiction and...besides...we don't know the "real" circumstances under which he got to command the Enterprise. There are no less than three versions of that story, none of them canon.
I'd like to see a weightier story for the second film, too, but I'm not going to begrudge this first outing for amping up the action-adventure quotient. There's plenty of Trek that falls into that category, though admittedly not to the level of this film. Still, if the crews on previous productions had possessed the kind of budget and studio support this film enjoyed, I have no doubt we'd have seen this kind of thing a lot sooner. Paramount's wanted Trek to go toe-to-toe with Star Wars for 30+ years.
Yes, I enjoyed the lightshow. I was able to have a fun time, more so than with anything with the Trek lable that's been put on a movie or TV screen in more than a decade. I was able to do even while acknowledging its flaws, which I've done here more than once, so I'll thank you to quit using your little codespeak to call me and anyone who disagrees with you fucking morons because we like a movie that you didn't.
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Dayton, if I thought you were a fucking moron, I'd say flat out that you're a fucking moron, right after I made sure my life insurance was paid up. No need to draw inferences.
The fact is, I don't think enjoying the movie qualifies anyone as a moron, especially if they're honest about the flaws. By that criteria, I only question their taste in movies, but then I'm quite fond of "Tank Girl", so I can't throw many stones from that standpoint.
Frankly, what irritates the living hell out of me is the implication that I'M the fucking moron because I didn't think this was the greatest Star Trek event ever. Well, sorry, kids, but the movie was flawed in areas that I cannot, and will not, simply overlook for the sake of getting along and on the stance that "bad Trek is better than no Trek," because that way only leads to more bad Trek.
A version of Picard's "The line must be drawn HERE!" speech comes to mind, but I think the humor would be lost on some folks.
The fact is, I don't think enjoying the movie qualifies anyone as a moron, especially if they're honest about the flaws. By that criteria, I only question their taste in movies, but then I'm quite fond of "Tank Girl", so I can't throw many stones from that standpoint.
Frankly, what irritates the living hell out of me is the implication that I'M the fucking moron because I didn't think this was the greatest Star Trek event ever. Well, sorry, kids, but the movie was flawed in areas that I cannot, and will not, simply overlook for the sake of getting along and on the stance that "bad Trek is better than no Trek," because that way only leads to more bad Trek.
A version of Picard's "The line must be drawn HERE!" speech comes to mind, but I think the humor would be lost on some folks.
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