Yeah, I don't know why one should consider it a primary source for what is canon.
Star Trek Canon Problems
- Thread starter Jmal234
- Start date
If I remember right, TNG was intentionally set 80 years after "the time of Kirk and Spock" (I'm too lazy to look up the specific fictional calendar dates, but I remember that line being used in the promotional material). But if you walked on a US Navy ship in the 1940s, the uniforms, equipment, and tone of the culture would have elements of what you would see in the 2020s, but it would be different while also being familiar. I think from TOS to VOY, you can trace a similar through-line where it all feels connected in the same way.
And, admittedly, people can point to places where there's story discrepancies, there's character moments that don't exactly fit with everything else, and nitpicky shit where the phasers fire out of the photon torpedo tube, but Star Trek from 1966 to 2005 is united in accepting that everything that happened in a TV show or movie happened the way it was shown. Yes, the Klingons look different, but DS9 and ENT acknowledge it while playing around with it. Neither the TOS movies or the Berman Era try to disown TOS or any of the things that came before them and say "well, actually..." this is how the Constitution Class Enterprise really looked because it's too goofy looking for a 1990s-2000s audience.
All of those works build on what came before instead of trying to reinterpret it.
That's where my canon problems with DSC and SNW comes in. There is absolutely NOTHING WRONG with an approach that reinterprets that era of Star Trek if you have a good story to tell, good actors, and great artists doing amazing work. It's still Star Trek. Where my issue comes in with canon is fundamentally this: If you openly admit in interviews that you want to reinterpret Star Trek and that's what this is, where things are changed to explore certain story aspects using legacy elements then there's nothing wrong with saying it exist as its own thing. If we can agree that there's nothing wrong with being open to changes, then we should be able to agree that there's nothing wrong with acknowledging there are changes and it exists in a changed setting where things are different.
Speaking only for me, when those conflicts occur in episodes, especially with the series that are designed to be prequels wedged between certain eras, it takes me out of the story. I'm like "hey, wait a minute, how does this fit with..." and if it was divorced from the other shows and existed as its own thing that wouldn't be there.
If they want to explore a new iteration of Klingon culture in DSC season 1, Spore Drive technology that's forgotten about and never pursued by any other species in the galaxy (not even the Borg), a more-xenomorph version of the Gorn that was in conflict with Starfleet before TOS, the emotional legacy of descendants of Khan (that Spock never mentions during "Space Seed"), or a more emotional version of Spock that has feelings for Nurse Chapel (that's never even hinted at in TOS), just own it. Because if you continue to argue "NO, NO, NO, it's still all the same and it's still a prequel to TOS," then that invites a comparison to TOS and how well all of these changes will fit with TOS and everything that comes after it.
When I was a teen, I remember the canonicity of TAS was debated and generally not accepted to be part of Trek canon. That changed after Paramount got the rights to TAS in the 2000s and declared it to be canon, and writers in the Berman Era made references to elements of it, but even still TAS has story aspects that are REALLY hard to reconcile with Trek's timeline.
For example, how exactly did humanity fight FOUR wars against the Kzinti (TAS: "The Slaver Weapon") in the 21st century before making first contact with the Vulcans?
Back then? We still didn't really have an onscreen reference to work from regarding when Star Trek took place.
I've been aware of that site for over twenty years now and I've yet to see a good article over there, let alone a great one.
Most definitely. Even in my younger days when I was a nut about continuity and canon, I thought Bernd was way too OTT. I mean, the guy actually believes starship windows always must be the same size. That's right, he believes that every alien race in every part of the galaxy in every time period all have a uniform size they must make the windows on their starships and that this is apparently a law of engineering or something.
The guy was high strung about continuity and starship design back when Enterprise was airing. He's become positively unhinged with the Abrams movies and the current shows.
Yes but that doesn't matter so long as the ships look exactly right.
Of course, because for some folks the technology is the thing they love about Trek.
There isn't if that's your interpretation.
Or uniforms. Trek fans could give historical reenactors a run for their money.
Star Trek doesn't have continuity, it has vibes.
Groovy, man.
I guess the Kzinti War can now be retconned to be the third interstellar conflict fought by humanity after the Xindi attack and crisis and then the Earth-Romulan War, just pushed towards the end of the 22nd century. That's my head canon, anyways.
In the multiverse, it all happened the way we see it happen. From "The Cage" to whatever the current episode is.
Whatever floats your particular boat. IDIC and all that.
Every different scene. That would explain why the Defiant keep changing size and shape in DS9.
Every single take.
The Great Multiversal Easter Egg Hunt. Where ever egg is in the exact same spot, but in different realities.
Hell, there are plenty of times history books contradict one another.
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