Would killing her off sell more? It's easy to think that was the strategy here, but did it work? I'm not buying it until they get her back, properly
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My own take on Janeway in Before Dishonor (spoilers)
- Thread starter Darth_Pazuzu
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Would killing her off sell more? It's easy to think that was the strategy here, but did it work? I'm not buying it until they get her back, properly
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To be fair, I don't think kimc was insinuating that, said fate even needed to be a main plot point in any given story. Such a thing could have occurred in a one or two line thing where someone was talking about Janeway. And in that line explained why she's never around and won't be any time soon.
For me, even if Janeway doesn't survive, I won't like that. But had it been executed well enough I would have been able to accept it. So sure we can hate that Janeway was killed, but that's not saying it couldn't be done in a manner that would have pleased fans. One of those times where one might say "Well I didn't like the fact that x event happened, but if it had to happen then I'm glad it happened this way." Before Dishonor seems to be getting (on the internet here anyway) this treatment instead: "Well I didn't like the fact that X event happened, but since it had to happen, I'm not particularly happy with the way it did either." And then top it off with the fact that not only did it happen and happen badly, it happened in a most inappropriate place, from Voyager fans' perspective.
****here be spoilers****
What difference would it make? If you're not going to use the character then put it out to pasture. Don't piss off the character's fans with a pointless death.
Would killing her off sell more? It's easy to think that was the strategy here, but did it work? I'm not buying it until they get her back, properly
That's your choice, but a novel that threatens a perhaps-final fate of a main character is going to attract more interest than one where a main character retires to care for an elderly relative. PAD's a popular author, though. I'm sure that the diehard PAD fans didn't boycott his latest work, and lots of VOY-only fans probably picked up a TNG novel that guest starred Seven, Janeway and the Borg.
Did ST II do well when they killed off Spock, despite full page ads in "Variety" from angry fans who announced they were boycotting the movie and all tie-ins?
Did the SW novel that killed off Chewbacca do well?
You are working under the incorrect assumption that no writers wish to use the character of Janeway any more. And it wasn't a pointless death. It's part of the build up to a crossover trilogy: "Destiny".
I recall the same furore when Spock was killed in ST II, and when it appeared Crusher was doomed in "Death in Winter".
****here be spoilers****
What difference would it make? If you're not going to use the character then put it out to pasture. Don't piss off the character's fans with a pointless death.
Why pointless? I know I'm in the minority but I think it would have been a very fitting end for the character (I phrase it that way because the big red reset button at the end makes me think she'll be back in some shape or form sooner or later). Through her own overconfidence (a weakness I felt she showed repeatetly) she first becomes what she always hated, but is then stopped/"saved" by one of her greatest "accomplishments", the rehumanized former Borg drone Seven of Nine. Not that bad a send-off for her, certainly a better opne than Kirk got IMO.
Gosh that event would sell lots of novels!
What event? Events are advertised. This wasn't (and before somebody says 'that would ruin the surprise', she was killed off at the very beginning of the book, nor was it exactly a salient plot point). Events ought to be carefully planned. This was incredibly callous. Events have impact. Janeway's death was further demeaned by being entirely irrelevant, with scant mention of its effects on those close to her.
Only if potential readers know about it. And the only way they'll know about it is from other readers, from whom the reaction so far has been either "Janeway's dead, and I'm glad, 'cause I hated the bitch", which won't attract any Voyager fans, or "They killed Janeway in a terrible, insulting manner", which won't attract any Voyager fans either.
You can't really make such comparisons. STII was a film in a nascent franchise (ask yourself: did Nemesis do better for killing Data?). Vector Prime was a hardcover that launched a major series and drastic changes for the literary universe, and was advertised as such. Also, both characters died heroically--Spock saving the Enterprise, Chewie saving Anakin. Their deaths were wonderfully crafted scenes--Spock's farewell to Kirk, and the subsequent funeral; Chewie memorably howling his final defiance as the moon of Sernpidal came crashing down onto him. The meek, contemptuous death with which Janeway was dispatched would be more aptly compared to Tasha Yar in "Skin of Evil" or Tucker in "These Are the Voyagers", the latter of which has been considered so abhorrent that the fiction line collapsed six years just to be able to resurrect him as soon as possible.
I can't agree with this. Kirk died saving the lives of millions on Veridian IV from a madman. His legacy is the continued existence of an entire species. Janeway's death had no purpose, and her legacy--through the memories assimilated, the body hijacked by the collective--was involuntarily aiding greater slaughter.
Fictitiously yours, Trent Roman
Mhh, maybe better was the wrong choice of words. What I meant was that she got the more "fitting" death. The way Kirk died was kind of anticlimatic to his career, while I always thought that it would be a nice and fitting way to kill Janeway by making her a locutus like character or the Borg Queen (even before Peter David actually did it).
^ But again, the problem lies in execution. The concept of Janeway becoming the villain she's fought against for so long through assimilation could work (and leaves open the possibility of the character being recovered from the Collective at some point), if properly handled, and this simply wasn't the case. Take Admiral Janeway - she got herself assimilated, but did so in a heroic, self-sacrificing way, as a Trojan Horse for the virus. Janeway in Before Dishonor? Just a victim, brutalized and robbed of agency.
Fictitiously yours, Trent Roman
Fictitiously yours, Trent Roman
I think that one of the biggest criticisms of BD is execution. There are others, but the way things are done and presented really bothered me.
I don't see a problem there, since I think this is a fitting way for her to die, since she basically becomes a victim of her own weaknesses. She never can accept warnings like the one by Lady Q , because in my opinion her character was overconfident and smug by nature, and here she pays the price for that. And I thought it was a nice touch that Seven put here out of her misery, one of her few real successes. (ETA: Since the sentence could be a bit confusing: I mean the humanization of Seven is one of Janeway's successes)
But then again, I'm a member of the minority who thinks that Before Dishonor is a good book and I don't understand a lot of the heat it is getting for various reasons.
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kimc said:
This is true. It also leaves the writers with the possibility to bring the character out again if they have a mondo-cool story idea for them without having to have inane resurrection stories. Actually, this goes all the way back to Tasha Yar, doesn't it? Rather than transfer ships or anything she was killed out of the blue by a tar monster. Then they took every opportunity to put her back in -- alternate universes, time travel stories, and even evil a half-Romulan offspring.
Also, I'm thinking that Janeway will come back eventually. I think of Janeway as 'a piece that's out of play' for now.
Would killing her off sell more? It's easy to think that was the strategy here, but did it work? I'm not buying it until they get her back, properly
That's your choice, but a novel that threatens a perhaps-final fate of a main character is going to attract more interest than one where a main character retires to care for an elderly relative. PAD's a popular author, though. I'm sure that the diehard PAD fans didn't boycott his latest work, and lots of VOY-only fans probably picked up a TNG novel that guest starred Seven, Janeway and the Borg.
Well I'm a diehard Voyager/Janeway fan and putting Seven on the cover of a TNG book was not enough to make me buy it. After I heard what happened I didn't change my mind about it. I did flip through it in the bookstore and what I read was atrocious. Janeway was not in character at all.
Which show were you watching.
Janeway was a starship captain so we can assume she was confident as Kirk, Picard et all. Was it that she had too much confidence or just more than you thought was becoming for a woman?
Also, I would not call Seven one of Janeway's greatest accomplishments. Janeway may have mentored her at first and so did the Doctor but for the most part Seven got to where she was at on her own.
Again, which show were you watching?
Well you got to see a character you don't care for suffer so I suppose it was a good read for you.
Well, that's interesting. I'm trying to think of other female regulars and semi-regulars killed or written out. Ziyal, murdered. Kes, still alive but character assassinated pretty thoroughly. Ironically, the only regular female character who managed to make her death count for something seems to be a villain, Kai Winn, betraying Dukat at the last minute. Am I missing anyone?
Fictitiously yours, Trent Roman
No, I would have said the same if it had been a male Janeway. In my opinion she was one of the captains who more or less wanted to do all on their own and most of the time just let her crew ratify her decisions, without really giving them the chance to convince her otherwise. Yes, she had alibi discussions, but in the end you seldom had the feeling that her officers changed anything about her opinion. Granted all Captains did that to a certain degree and in the end it's their job to make the decisions, but she was the worst in my opinion. Maybe she appeared that way because she didn't had a strong enough first officer.
(BTW You have to love the fact that every time a male says something negative about Janeway he automatically becomes a sexist.
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To be fair, Picard never listens to the warnings of the Q, either (the whole book prior to Before Dishonor was predicated on that notion), but it always turns out just fine for him.
I question whether there's really such a distinction between "heroic" and "meaningless" deaths. I don't think any death is something that should be glorified.
I also disagree that Tasha's death was meaningless. Armus's killing of her was meaningless, an act of arbitary cruelty, but the same could be said for the actions of a lot of villains, conquerors, etc. Tasha gave her life trying to save her crewmates, to do her duty. That should NEVER, EVER be dismissed as meaningless. Just because she was outmatched and had no chance of success doesn't make it any less noble that she tried. (And I'm not happy with "Yesterday's Enterprise" for having alt-Tasha see it that way. I think Tasha would consider dying in the attempt to do her duty and protect her fellow officers to be a meaningful death regardless of its results.)
As for Janeway, in the climax of BD,
she rallied her willpower to fight the Collective's resistance to the Endgame virus, breaking down their firewalls and allowing the virus to defeat them. If not for her efforts at the key moment, the Borg would have won.
Yeah, but I see a difference between Lady Q and Q, since in contrast to him she hasn't that long a track record of messing around with humanity.
All the other captains had luxuries that Janeway and the Voyager crew didn't. The other captains could afford to spend more time ferreting out viewpoints. Janeway couldn't, considering the fact that they were 75,000 light years from home and couldn't afford to waste any time. And Sisko didn't let his crew change his mind, and neither did Archer, really, or Kirk. Picard was always more of a diplomat/mediator.
In regards to Chakotay...I don't know. I'll let someone who's watched more Voyager deal with that.
(BTW You have to love the fact that every time a male says something negative about Janeway he automatically becomes a sexist.
Janeway is sort of like Hillary Clinton-she's damned if she does, and damned if she doesn't. If she hadn't been as strong as she was perceived, then people would have been criticizing her for being a "weak woman". Because she's strong and confident (perhaps a *bit* too much) then she's accused of being brash and overconfident and not a "woman".
