Here is why canon is important to Trek.

[Jayson1]

Like an anchor around the neck, so is the canon of Star Trek.

The old can be respected while creating the new, without slavish adherence and endless random references and stunt casting.

I'd like all new Trek, and it looks like that's what we're getting.

The question though is without canon how do you build the world in which you want to tell your stories? How do you really dig deep into a story arc or character arc if you don't feel any need to respect what you establish.
"TOS" was I think we can all agree the most loose when it comes to canon and continuity. While this worked it also did it with the idea the character's would never grow and the reset button would always be pushed and you had to relay on alien of the weeks to tell the stories.
I think most fans want more from modern Trek or any modern tv show. They want stories with individual stories with a mix of mytholgy in the background or they want all mythology and one big arc. You can't do any of those things if you don't create a bigger world outside of that week's episode.
Granted each tv show has to basically create a mythology just for itself but at the same time if your something like Trek you got to also find ways to still connect to the bigger universe.
To me it's all a balance. You want your show to stand on it's own and have it's own arc and mytholgy but you also want to feel like it's part of the bigger Trek universe we have been following.
I think everything from Berman Trek,Stargate,Arrowverse and the Marvel movies have basically worked like this. It doesn't matter if Iron Man has almost nothing in common with Guardians of the Galaxy but it's still fun to think they are all happening in the same universe.

Jason

 

[Nerys Myk]

Canon and continuity are just tools.

 

[Ithekro]

I've always found them to be useful tools.

 

[Nerys Myk]

I've always found them to be useful tools.

In moderation.

 

[Jayson1]

In moderation.

I think everyone agree's with that. I mean out of hand you can get into some real fan fiction mistakes like having The Enterprise battle Voyager in Klingon space, which is interupted by a Romulan attack being led by Sela and Tomalock.
I don't think any of the shows have ever went to far IMO except maybe the series final of "Enterprise."
Jason

 

[Nerys Myk]

I don't think any of the shows have ever went to far IMO except maybe the series final of "Enterprise."

It was just a horrible episode,not a canon violation.

 

[Jayson1]

It was just a horrible episode,not a canon violation.

I didn't mean to say it was a canon violation only that it was a bad way to use canon. It felt more like bad fan fiction instead of just a cool episode that involves canon stuff. What is intresting it that followed a 2 parter that did use canon in a good way in that we saw a bad guy inspired by Cornell Green and some of the human racism was an ovious leftover from the Xindi attack and we got to see many of the familiar older aliens come together and form a alliance which we can see as something leading towards the Federation. PLus it focused plenty on a established character arc and that was Trip and T'Pol's romance.
My impression I get from people who don't like canon they would have just as been as happy if the villian was just some bad guy who hates aliens for some undefined reason and none of the established aliens working together would be needed. Earth in danger would be enough for the drama. You could tell that story and it might work but I think the canon stuff made the episodes even better.

Jason

 

[uniderth]

In moderation.

That's like saying you need to use a hammer in moderation. Well clearly. But when you need to use a hammer, you use one...EVERYTIME.

I don't understand why canon and continuity fell like baggage to so many people. What stories are just begging to be told that couldn't be by adhering to canon/continuity? JJTrek? I can think of many ways those stories would be improved by adhering to canon/continuity(not that it would take much).

I think the biggest problem is that fans equate canon/continuity with continuity porn and small universe syndrome, which should be avoided in general, because they do limit story telling. When you have to link ever story to Kirk's long lost son from that slave girl on the Roman planet, or Khan's fifth great granddaughter; then it's limited. But we have only seen a small portion of the Star Trek universe and there is no reason to throw that small portion away just because you can't think of a better way to get to Qo'nos, than transwarp beaming.

I think fans have created an imaginary canon that is really just traditions built upon small universe syndrome. But canon/continuity are fairly loose and leave room for millions more stories to be told within its framework.

 

[mos6507]

Part of the problem with canon/continuity in a long-running franchise is people's level of emotional attachment varies depending on their age. There is a perception that a franchise must adapt and conform to today's cultural sensibilities and fashion-trends in order for it to be healthy, otherwise the fanbase will age into oblivion. That this hasn't proven to be the case with the new Star Wars Trilogy and Rogue-one being firmly rooted in a mid-70s aesthetic would call that assumption into question, but there are those who are adamant about this, and apparently that includes movers and shakers at CBS.

Younger fans simply do not hold TOS and the TOS aesthetic with the same reverence as long-time fans. So they simply do not care whether tinkering is done. There's just no seeing eye-to-eye with them. To them, older fans are out-of-step codgers. To old fans, the younger fans are endorsing a vandalization of something that took decades to stack into a Jenga puzzle.

The best you can hope for is a mutual acknowledgment of these differences, and the level of passion behind them, but of course instead you get an ongoing tug-of-war where the other side is continually told they are "wrong" for preferring things this way or that, usually buttressed by economic theories about what is or isn't viable for CBS to do (not to mention the fact that so many here predicted CBS could never justify bringing Trek back to TV in the first place!)

 

[suarezguy]

Part of the problem with canon/continuity in a long-running franchise is people's level of emotional attachment varies depending on their age. There is a perception that a franchise must adapt and conform to today's cultural sensibilities and fashion-trends in order for it to be healthy, otherwise the fanbase will age into oblivion. That this hasn't proven to be the case with the new Star Wars Trilogy and Rogue-one being firmly rooted in a mid-70s aesthetic would call that assumption into question, but there are those who are adamant about this, and apparently that includes movers and shakers at CBS.

Younger fans simply do not hold TOS and the TOS aesthetic with the same reverence as long-time fans. So they simply do not care whether tinkering is done. There's just no seeing eye-to-eye with them. To them, older fans are out-of-step codgers. To old fans, the younger fans are endorsing a vandalization of something that took decades to stack into a Jenga puzzle.

I think more significant than the visuals and designs is maybe the how the characters are treated-I imagine younger fans in general like and consider it more natural that Kirk became a captain very quickly, from one big mission, and that Spock was more open about his feelings earlier on, having a girlfriend from the beginning of the voyage and pretty quickly growing more comfortable with other major emotions and becoming more humanlike early on-although part of that is probably also just the difference between film and television (where in the latter you accept there is more unseen backstory and also for character changes to occur more gradually).

BTW for Discovery to be not on television but Internet subscription-streaming suggests the studio again wants it to be for the masses but also again accepts that it will mostly be for niches.

 

[J.T.B.]

I think more significant than the visuals and designs is maybe the how the characters are treated-I imagine younger fans in general like and consider it more natural that Kirk became a captain very quickly, from one big mission[...]

Just wondering, why would that be considered more natural?

 

[Nyotarules]

I think both are important and I would add a few other things such as Finnegan,friendship with Gary Mitchell, Carol Marcus and David and Edith Keeler because I think she has become KIrks "soulmate" for many fans. You proably also have to make sure he still has a brother and nephews though that is intresting because in one ep he mentions several I think but then in "Operation Annaliate" we only see one. Granted this is a example were the change can be explained by head canon by simply saying the other nephews were off planet and I know the comic books did that because I read that issue.
Jason

Edith Keeler depends on Kirk finding the Guardian of forever, if its never found in the new universe since the five year mission, starts five years early then some other ship might find it and not Kirk.

David Marcus - since Kirk is not obligated to fall in love with the same woman in all universes i.e Carol Marcus, then chances are he won't exist in the Kelvin one

Carol Marcus - see above

Gary Mitchell - PineKirk joins Starfleet years later then ShatnerKirk, Mitchell probably graduated by the time PineKirk came along.

 

[Tenacity]

David Marcus - since Kirk is not obligated to fall in love with the same woman in all universes i.e Carol Marcus then chances are he it won't exist in the Kelvin one

Romance and true love are matters of destiny, fate, kismit.

 

[Nyotarules]

Yes it is important, I agree with the OP. To say it's not is taking for granted the great attention to detail writers have been able to pull off over the years even if it's not perfect.

You mean like flatheaded Klingons in TOS to ridges in TMP?

 

[stardream]

Edith Keeler depends on Kirk finding the Guardian of forever, if its never found in the new universe since the five year mission, starts five years early then some other ship might find it and not Kirk.

David Marcus - since Kirk is not obligated to fall in love with the same woman in all universes i.e Carol Marcus then chances are he it won't exist in the Kelvin one

.

Holding out hope for McMarcus. ")

 

[Nyotarules]

Romance and true love are matters of destiny, fate, kismit.

Spock and Uhura in TOS managed to avoid 'romance and true love' until Nero turns up somewhere else.

 

[Nyotarules]

Holding out hope for McMarcus. ")

The actors had better chemistry, lol

 

[F. King Daniel]

Romance and true love are matters of destiny, fate, kismit.

In fiction, yes.

In real life, no.

 

[fireproof78]

That's like saying you need to use a hammer in moderation. Well clearly. But when you need to use a hammer, you use one...EVERYTIME.

I don't understand why canon and continuity fell like baggage to so many people. What stories are just begging to be told that couldn't be by adhering to canon/continuity? JJTrek? I can think of many ways those stories would be improved by adhering to canon/continuity(not that it would take much).

I think the biggest problem is that fans equate canon/continuity with continuity porn and small universe syndrome, which should be avoided in general, because they do limit story telling. When you have to link ever story to Kirk's long lost son from that slave girl on the Roman planet, or Khan's fifth great granddaughter; then it's limited. But we have only seen a small portion of the Star Trek universe and there is no reason to throw that small portion away just because you can't think of a better way to get to Qo'nos, than transwarp beaming.

I think fans have created an imaginary canon that is really just traditions built upon small universe syndrome. But canon/continuity are fairly loose and leave room for millions more stories to be told within its framework.

I think it's more the expectation that production values remain static, regardless of changing demographics/audiences. The idea that the look, appearance, and technology must remain the same due to fictional history is one that is difficult to reconcile in changes with contemporary technology.

I think that DSC is on the right track with telling the story about a ship unaffiliated with any known quantities (April, Pike, George Kirk, Robau, etc). The characters are wholly new, as is the ship. I think moving to more a more unknown ship, even if the time period is "supposedly" known is a choice that makes sense from a production values point of view.

 

[suarezguy]

Just wondering, why would that be considered more natural?

I think younger people especially today tend to value more individual stars rather than organizations or gradual advancement or other change and thus agree with the 09's film view that if someone is suited for a role and demonstrates that he can do it well he should get it quickly rather than go through incremental steps.
He's the protagonist and hero of the film so he should quickly get control of the ship, him being unusually really young and inexperienced as captain (since he was always fairly young) makes a better story.