It wouldn't have de-canonized TOS if they hadn't explained it. TNG never gave an in-universe explanation for why WW3 was moved to the mid-21st Century.
Spoilers Star Trek: Strange New Worlds 2x03 - "Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow"
- Thread starter Commander Richard
- Start date
If the showrunners had just said, behind the scenes, that the Eugenics Wars had been moved, then, yeah, that would have written TOS off. It'd be like it didn't matter. But moving them in-universe keeps it alive. The wars may not be 1992-96 *now*, but they once *were*.
And yet TNG moved WW3 to the early 21st century with zero explanation and TOS is still canon, because that isn't how canon works. Everything is canon, even the contridictions.
Moving the EW without explanation would not have changed anything except the specific dates Spock and Khan give in Space Seed and Wrath of Khan.
Last edited:
Which can now be ADR looped into later edits of the one TV episode and the one movie in which they appear out of a grand total of nearly 1,000 combined.
People should be expecting more of these timeline shifts in the future. I suspect that the events of First Contact and the entire Trek timeline will be shifted due to time traveling Romulans, or other temporal war combatants etc.
The Eugenics Wars move will be rendered obsolete in just another decade as it is. Trek's showrunners have, with this episode, doubled down on Trek being "our" future and not just a parallel universe like say, the Marvel Cinematic Universe is (I don't know about you, but I'd think I'd remember half of the population disappearing and reappearing these past 5 years).
So unless the planned US Congress hearings on UFOs this month comes complete with a public appearance by aliens, expect EVERYTHING in Trek to be moved down the timeline to keep it "our" future. Am I happy about it specifically? No, I'm one of the biggest continuity nitpickers there is and anyone who reads my posts here knows that. But after thinking about it I realize it's probably necessary to keep the franchise relevant.
Trek is going to go full "floating timeline" like the Simpsons and specific dates can no longer be relied on.
The Eugenics Wars move will be rendered obsolete in just another decade as it is. Trek's showrunners have, with this episode, doubled down on Trek being "our" future and not just a parallel universe like say, the Marvel Cinematic Universe is (I don't know about you, but I'd think I'd remember half of the population disappearing and reappearing these past 5 years).
So unless the planned US Congress hearings on UFOs this month comes complete with a public appearance by aliens, expect EVERYTHING in Trek to be moved down the timeline to keep it "our" future. Am I happy about it specifically? No, I'm one of the biggest continuity nitpickers there is and anyone who reads my posts here knows that. But after thinking about it I realize it's probably necessary to keep the franchise relevant.
Trek is going to go full "floating timeline" like the Simpsons and specific dates can no longer be relied on.
No, but it did (for awhile, anyway) retcon it so that WW3 and the Eugenics Wars were different conflicts.
Even that kept TOS relevant.
Consider this: Perhaps there was some debate over whether to call them the same war. It's not without precedent. There are some who referred to the real-life Cold War as World War III! Could be the same story here.
And I'm still wondering why it's so damned important that Trek's future be "our" future. Far as I'm concerned, that ship sailed a LONG time ago.
You should ask the showrunners then, because this episode showed that it's important to them.
Changing the date of the war doesn't make TOS irrelevant.
Oh please - by that logic you can claim TOS is decanonized due to Scotty's line of: "Their power is simple Impulse." From Balance Of Terror, or the fact that (Per Squire Of Gothos) TOS takes place in the 28th century (not the 23rd)...
OR
You can just realize that ALL OF STAR TREK takes place in the same continuity/timeline; BUT, that timeline/continuity has PLENTY of inconsistences - and that goes for ALL Star Trek films and series from 1966 to the present day in 2023. (There is NO inconsistency that's somehow 'worse' than any other. They are all part and parcel the Star Trek Franchise.)
They hope that someone other than old Trekkies will watch Star Trek, sometime.
That ship sailed a long time ago too, because Roddenberry hooked it to the idea of Trek as an inspiration and so a part of "our humanity's future." And the public consciousness bought in to it, since cell phones are still looked at as "that thing that came out of Star Trek" and efforts to build a "real Starship Enterprise." Star Trek tries way too hard in having it's cake and eating it too.
Last edited:
It wasn't that long ago this would have annoyed me to NO end. If I'm now cool with it then other fans can adjust, too.
So cooleddie wasn't always so cool?
Thank you! My thoughts exactly.
The ironic thing is in reality we may end up having a war over AI (not necessarily waged by AI, that's more a Terminator thing) long before we will about genetically engineered people. The ongoing strike by WGA and SAG is already the tensions of AI boiling over.
We can't even cure genetic conditions (I know, I have a genetic hearing loss), forget about creating genetically engineered superbeings.
We can't even cure genetic conditions (I know, I have a genetic hearing loss), forget about creating genetically engineered superbeings.
Oh look at that, a drive-by insult about lawyers. How original of you.Oh, for fuck's sake. It's ACTING! Everybody knows what that means. Playing the ROLE of a cop is not impersonating a cop.
Ah well. It's what I've always said: Lawyers are the enemy of common sense.
This has nothing to do with lawyers or legalities and everything to do with public appearances. The matter of non-police wearing authentic police uniforms is a very sensitive issue in Canada, especially in light of a mass shooting a few years back in which the shooter was a civilian wearing an actual police uniform, an RCMP uniform specifically. Well, I don't know if it was an authentic uniform or just resembled one, he did also paint his car to resemble an RCMP car. The point is, in light of this incident police organizations and other law enforcement agencies in Canada have become very understandably protective about their uniforms and gear and it is a factor in why they won't let anyone, even actors in a TV show have access to authentic police uniforms, cars or whatever.
I remember hearing about an incident on May 4 one year in which a comic book store had one of their employees standing outside dressed in Stormtrooper cosplay, complete with replica blaster. Someone then called the police to report a "masked and armed individual" in the area. Police arrived with their guns drawn screaming at the employee to drop the weapon and lay on the ground. The employee immediately dropped the blaster and tried to lay on the ground, though Stormtrooper armor is rather restrictive and they had trouble doing so. The police apparently unsatisfied with how long this was taking slammed the employee to the ground and broke their nose in the process.
Perhaps we will go back to eugenics then and selective breeding.
Hey, if it’s good enough for Shakespeare it’s good enough for the rest of us.
Similar threads
- Poll
- Poll
- Poll
