Questions regarding the ST XI continuity in novels

[Maltz]

Are there any plans for characters like Captain Robeau, or the USS Kelvin to make any guest appearances in books set in the mainstream continuity?

And are there any plans afoot to flesh out Nero, the Narada, and the supernova destroying Romulus in the post-TP novels? (I'm aware that the comic book Countdown has already done this, but seeing as that takes place in the continuity of Star Trek Online, I assume you authors will have your own take on the situation.)

[King Daniel Into Darkness]

I've been wanting a USS Kelvin novel series (which would be common to both continuites) since the film was released.

But, with the nuTrek novels having been cancelled, I have a feeling Pocket might not want to risk featuring nuTrek concepts (by which I mean anything from the film, including the prime-verse flashback/forward or USS Kelvin) too heavily, and risk further books being pulled. I wonder if, rather than featuring the supernova and destruction of Romulus, the novels may skip over those events.

It would be a(nother) huge missed oppertunity.

[Christopher]

As I said in the Myriad Universes thread, there probably aren't any firm plans for anything beyond what's already been announced to this point, since the pitching/development season for 2013 is still a couple of months away. But my understanding is that the folks at Bad Robot prefer to generate their film tie-in projects in-house and keep close creative control over them. If Pocket were to do anything along those lines, the plans would probably originate with Bad Robot. So this is really not the ideal place or time to ask that question.

[Shatinator]

Christopher wrote:

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As I said in the Myriad Universes thread, there probably aren't any firm plans for anything beyond what's already been announced to this point, since the pitching/development season for 2013 is still a couple of months away. But my understanding is that the folks at Bad Robot prefer to generate their film tie-in projects in-house and keep close creative control over them. If Pocket were to do anything along those lines, the plans would probably originate with Bad Robot. So this is really not the ideal place or time to ask that question.

I have watch this speculation / debate for a while now and this is what I am seeing:

• All Nu Trek Novels pulled at the insistence of JJ / Bad Robot.
• Desire by JJ / Bad Robot to control any materials on the novel front related to Nu Trek, in favor of their own "in house" projects.
• Currently JJ / Bad Robot has proposed no new Novels for Nu Trek (excluding the young cadet stories geared for teens). That I am aware of.

All of this needless heavy-handed approach is completely unnecessary. All that is required is a partnership between say Pocket books and Bad Robot on focusing / steering away from certain story / character elements. In the same manner Enterprise was asked by the studio to steer away from a direct Earth - Romulan War arch, because at the time a proposed Earth-Romulan war feature film was being considered.


Such absolute approach to things, reminds me of the stance made by the previous show runners of this franchise, where the bottom line became control, control, control....




The
S H A T I N A T O R

[Therin of Andor]

Shatinator wrote:

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Such absolute approach to things, reminds me of the stance made by the previous show runners of this franchise, where the bottom line became control, control, control....

For example? Are you referring to Rick Berman here, or Richard Arnold, or Gene Roddenberry?

Licensed tie-ins should always created under strict guidelines. I figure that Orci and friends didn't think they'd have the spare time to read four novel manuscripts, write memos, then read the revisions; they are busy making the next movie. There are examples of what happens when licensing plans go awry: way back when, Franz Joseph had an unusual licensing agreement which enabled him to sub-license his own interpretation of ST in the "ST USS Enterprise Blueprints" and "ST Star Fleet Tech Manual" to the original "ST war game", "Star Fleet Battles" - and Roddenberry and Paramount were helpless to change it.

People still complain that DC Comics did their own post-Spock death comics after ST II, then had to create a convoluted solution to get their comic storyline ready for ST III, and all over again for ST IV.

And, you know for fact, if Bad Robot had allowed the four tie-in Pocket novels to be released, and they were then overruled/ignored by the canonical events of the next two films, there'd be wailing and gnashing of teeth, and cries of: "Why didn't Bad Robot make Pocket wait for all three films to be out before they were allowed to play in the new sandbox!"

[Christopher]

Shatinator wrote:

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I have watch this speculation / debate for a while now and this is what I am seeing:

• All Nu Trek Novels pulled at the insistence of JJ / Bad Robot.

That's conjectural. We don't know whether BR "insisted" or whether they and Pocket came to an amicable understanding, or what. Heck, I wrote one of the books and even I don't know the specifics.

All of this needless heavy-handed approach is completely unnecessary. All that is required is a partnership between say Pocket books and Bad Robot on focusing / steering away from certain story / character elements. In the same manner Enterprise was asked by the studio to steer away from a direct Earth - Romulan War arch, because at the time a proposed Earth-Romulan war feature film was being considered.

That's your opinion, but different people have different approaches. Abrams & co. like to maintain a tight continuity among their tie-ins, and that's their prerogative. Just because they do it differently from their predecessors doesn't mean they're doing it wrong. Heck, a lot of Trek fans over the years have been unhappy with the way the books and comics could be suddenly negated by some new episode or movie. There have been threads in the past on this very forum advocating a tighter rein on tie-in continuity more akin to the Lucasfilm approach or something.

And you're wrong that a "steer clear" agreement is all that's necessary. That often was the case in the past; for instance, DC's Trek comics set between the TOS movies had to steer clear of various things and that shaped their storylines and led them to focus more on their own original characters -- until Richard Arnold came along and told them to steer clear of original characters and focus on the main cast. The catch is, those "steer clear" arrangements go one-way. The tie-in creators are limited in what they can do, but the filmmakers or TV producers aren't obliged to avoid contradicting the books or comics -- and if the tie-ins are not generated in-house, the filmmakers/producers don't have time to keep track of them all. So it's really not practical to maintain mutual consistency between the canonical series and its tie-ins unless they're both generated by the same creators.

Such absolute approach to things, reminds me of the stance made by the previous show runners of this franchise, where the bottom line became control, control, control....

Umm, except that being in control is the showrunner's job. That's the whole point of the position -- to provide a single guiding voice that keeps everything unified and consistent.

And aren't you kind of contradicting yourself? You're complaining that Bad Robot's approach is different from what their predecessors did, but you're also complaining that they're the same?

Or maybe that's not a contradiction. They are the same in that they have the same right to control the fate of the franchise that's been placed in their hands -- and the same right to make their own independent choices about how to handle it rather than just copying what their predecessors did.

[JD]

Yeah, as I think about it more. I think this is pretty much one of those scenarios where no matter what you do someone is going to be pissed. Right now people are pissed there's no Abramsverse novles, but if they did publish novels, which then didn't line up with the movies people would be pissed about that. And as much as I'd love to read the Abramsverse novels that were already written, I can see where holding off on them would alleviate the possibilities of a lot of headaches for the Abramsverse Supreme Court. But that doesn't mean I won't pick up the books the second they are published.

[Greg Cox]

Christopher wrote:

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That's conjectural. We don't know whether BR "insisted" or whether they and Pocket came to an amicable understanding, or what. Heck, I wrote one of the books and even I don't know the specifics.

Exactly. People may not believe this, but I've never actually discussed the matter with anybody at Pocket or Paramount. Jamie Costas was nice enough to alert us a few hours before the announcement was made, just so we weren't blindsided, and she took pains to assure us that we would all be paid in full, but, beyond that, all I know is what I read in the same press release everybody else saw. I've never heard the inside story . . . and never asked about it.

Basically, I sulked for a weekend, shrugged, then got back to work on my next book . . . . .

[King Daniel Into Darkness]

Whatever got those nuTrek novels pulled, it wasn't continuity concerns. Or if it is, it's the worst and most misguided application of it that I've ever seen. Look at the YA Starfleet Academy books - the first one alone is packed with discontinuities and inconsistancies vs. the Trek movie and greater Trek universe. The Countdown comic had a Vulcan Praetor and Senate in post-TNG 2387. The Narada had a cloaking device and various anti-infiltration countermeasures (also seen in the Nero comic) that would have made short work of Kirk and Spock in the movie, had they been in it. The events surrounding the supernova don't mesh up with what we saw in the movie. In short, their tie-in continuity sucks.

I am pretty easy going. I spot these things, but they don't ruin it for me. But I know that none of the nuTrek novels would have contained gaffs anywhere near as bad as those described above. The authors are incapable of it.

[Therin of Andor]

KingDaniel wrote:

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Whatever got those nuTrek novels pulled, it wasn't continuity concerns.

I was surprised when the four sequel novels were announced. It seemed to be way too early for a whole new unexplored timeline that was only one movie old.

Orci and his colleagues want to be the first to explore their new sandbox. Very understandable. The three prequel "Starfleet Academy" YAs and the post-movie comic retellings of TOS episodes are more containable. Knowing that the comics may contain Easter eggs for the next movie is cool. I'm intrigued that there's a post-movie original comic mini-series coming, and assume that JJ's writers have had input into this.

Pocket invested a lot of money into four novels they were then asked to shelve. I still think they'll eventually get resurrected some day, with a little tweaking(?), but my ever-growing "To Read" pile continues to overwhelm me so... I can (quite happily) wait.

[Dantheman]

I would say on the whole, Lucasfilm is pretty good on maintaining continuity with Star Wars tie-in books and comics.

Funny story: When Marvel was publishing the monthly Star Wars comic during the time of the original trilogy, the creators pitched a "return of the Death Star" storyline to Lucasfilm, which they rejected (Keep in mind, this was after The Empire Strikes Back came out). They asked if they could still do a storyline where the Empire built a planet-destroying laser on a large spaceship, and they said yes, as long as it wasn't spherical.

When Return of the Jedi came out, those creators realized why Lucasfilm nixed their storyline.

[Christopher]

^Except that episodes of Star Wars: The Clone Wars have contradicted a lot of things from the books, most notably their portrayal of Mandalore and its culture. Like I said, even if tie-ins are required to avoid conflicting with canon, the reverse is not the case.

[Therin of Andor]

Dantheman wrote:

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I would say on the whole, Lucasfilm is pretty good on maintaining continuity with Star Wars tie-in books and comics.

I seem to recall they used humanoid Jabba the Hutt in a comic, from before he was canonically shown as a giant slug creature.

[Christopher]

Therin of Andor wrote:

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I seem to recall they used humanoid Jabba the Hutt in a comic, from before he was canonically shown as a giant slug creature.

Yeah, a tall, slender green creature as I recall, somewhat Seussian in appearance. My own personal retcon for that was that it was an alien that Jabba was somehow speaking through via some sort of telepathic or cybernetic link, or maybe just a translator speaking on Jabba's behalf like C3PO did in ROTJ.

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Therin of Andor wrote:

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Orci and his colleagues want to be the first to explore their new sandbox. Very understandable.

Of course, but why should this preclude appearances by the prime versions of characters like Captain Robau? That has nothing to do with Orci's "sandbox", since it's an entirely different timeline.