Latecomer To This: JANEWAY DIED?!?

[Thrawn]

Edit. I had another post here, but I changed my mind. We've had this argument, Lynx, and I'm not going down this road again. You have your opinions; I have mine.

All I'll say is this - we still haven't seen the reasons they had for killing Janeway off. The book isn't out yet, the story hasn't been told. It's extremely pointless to argue about whether or not killing her off was a good idea until we see why they did it. I don't even know if I'll like it yet! I might hate the damn thing, and not read Voyager at all going forward. But I'm at least waiting to read it, or at least read what people say about it. Until then, all we're arguing is one hypothetical - what they might've done if she'd lived - versus another - what they might've done now that she's dead. Arguments over actual preferences are subjective enough; arguments over theoretical preferences get stupid very quickly.

I'd love to revisit this after I've read the book (and that's not a lie, I genuinely would). But until then, I really don't think we have any new ground to cover.

 

[Therin of Andor]

The TOS movies without Kirk (or Spock, McCoy, Scotty and the others)wouldn't have been neither real TOS movies nor the success they actually was. The same can be said about "Voyager books" without the main characters.

DC Comics' post-ST II issues were Spock-less until his eventual return in ST III, and those issues sold very well. I think DC Comics writers were a little disappointed to have to shift the limelight back from Saavik. Furthermore, Spock commanded his own vessel between ST II and III. While a few issues focused on his new team on the USS Surak, he was absent from many Excelsior-focused issues.

Similarly, Spock is missing from the main thrust of the four "The Lost Years" saga instalments. Again, those books sold well.

 

[Capt_Piett]

See, I'm against Janeway being killed, not only because she's one of my favorite Voyager characters, but because it was pointless to kill her. Quesada's argument (one of them) was that they'd run out of "exciting" Spider-Man stores to tell with a married Peter Parker; never mind they'd done quite well with a slew of very well written married stories, as they had had a slew of them BEFORE they were married. Thus he wanted the marriage gone. However, Marvel could have easily had Peter and Mary Jane get a divorce or seperated in some other manner; but no, he had them LITERALLY make a deal with the devil to get the marriage undone.

As has been mentioned, Janeway being an Admiral would have effectively removed her for the most part from the day to day events in a novel, but she still could have appeared every so often. They could have sidelined her WITHOUT killing her. As I said, it does sound like Paramount wasn't thrilled with the idea, thus the inclusion of that bit at the end people have mentioned with Lady Q. I can only hope at some point she returns, and it either takes place immedaitely after she "died" or takes place after "Full Circle".

It would be somewhat amusing for her to walk in to her own wake and see the reactions on the crew's faces. Does anyone know if they've explained why it was Lady Q and Not Q who was speaking with her? Given their history, he would be a far more likely choice.

 

[Marcus Porcius Cato]

I would believe all of that if it was not Peter David who wrote the awful bloody mess.

Peter David was contracted by Margaret Clark to write the book, and was told he was to kill off Janeway in it. He had literally nothing to do with that decision whatsoever, and has expressed many times his surprise at being asked to write it.

And yes, it's certainly debatable whether or not he wrote her sendoff well; I personally thought Janeway was one of the highlights of the novel, but I can see how you'd think otherwise. If it helps any, Full Circle, the novel that will be exploring her death from Voyager's perspective, was edited by Marco Palmieri and not Margaret Clark. He's responsible for Vanguard, Titan, and the Deep Space Nine relaunch, all of which have gone off with hardly a hitch so far, and it was a collaborative decision between Palmieri and Clark to kill Janeway off. In many ways, Full Circle is the motivation for that choice, not Before Dishonor.

Was it a poor editorial choice to have Peter David be the one to kill her? Possibly. Maybe even probably. But we still haven't seen the book that was designed to tell the Voyager crew's story yet, and that to me will be the real judge.

Again, you're free to disagree, but I'd encourage you to at least wait for reviews from similarly minded fans before you jump on the train of bitterness and anger.

Perhaps in my hurry I did not clarify enough. I think PAD's writing in "Before Dishonor" was subpar all around. I am aware that such decisions are made by editors not by authors. His unique handling, of unique writing style just did not work. That is my view.

It is my view he botched his assignment, that is, wrote a poor book. Perhaps, some other author, such as Mack, DeCandido or Bennett could have done better.

All this is my opinion. I am not against Characters dying, but PAD botched it in my view.

 

[Therin of Andor]

They could have sidelined her WITHOUT killing her.

What would Janeway fans say about that? "You sidelined the headline character for no good reason!"?

They also could have married her off to a Bolian, or turned her gay, or made her a Borg, or severed her arms, or reverted her to childhood, or sent her back to the Delta Quadrant to visit Neelix. There would be people objecting to each of those fates, too.

Janeway died doing what she always thought was best: ignoring Q, facing off against the Borg, saving her colleagues, helping Seven... I'm sure Janeway would rather die in battle than be "sidelined".

 

[Therin of Andor]

It is my view he botched his assignment, that is, wrote a poor book.

You may think it's poor but, according to Amazon sales figures, it's still in their top ten best sellers for ST. #7, IIRC, over two years on.

So plenty of ST fans have made it a success.

 

[JAG]

See, I'm against Janeway being killed, not only because she's one of my favorite Voyager characters, but because it was pointless to kill her.

You don't know that because you have not read the book. Her death may have been quite good, and furthered the story. You won't know the answer till you read the story and the ones that came after it.

 

[Brit]

Well I see the same old argument is going on.

 

[JD]

I can only hope at some point she returns, and it either takes place immedaitely after she "died" or takes place after "Full Circle".

I'm sorry to tell you this, but, as has already been stated on this very thread numerous times, both Kirsten Beyer, the author of Full Circle and Unworthy (the next Voyager book after FC) and Margaret Clark, the editor of the Trek book line have said that she will not be coming back in either of those stories or any others in the next few years.

 

[Lynx]

They could have sidelined her WITHOUT killing her.

What would Janeway fans say about that? "You sidelined the headline character for no good reason!"?

They also could have married her off to a Bolian, or turned her gay, or made her a Borg, or severed her arms, or reverted her to childhood, or sent her back to the Delta Quadrant to visit Neelix. There would be people objecting to each of those fates, too.

Janeway died doing what she always thought was best: ignoring Q, facing off against the Borg, saving her colleagues, helping Seven... I'm sure Janeway would rather die in battle than be "sidelined".

I'm pretty sure that most of the Janeway fans could accept that she's sidelined because in that case there would at least be a chance for a comeback.

Killing her off is so definite.

And as I've written before, making Janeway an admiral was a horrible mistake (Berman's gang did a lot of "mistakes" in the later seasons of the show) but it could have been changed in the books. Janeway is an explorer, she could have resigned from being an admiral and demanded to have a post on a ship instead, they could have sent her on amission to seek out and explore parts of the galaxy where no one has gone before. The possibilities are endless.

But they just have to get rid of her, the main character of Voyager.

JD wrote:

I'm sorry to tell you this, but, as has already been stated on this very thread numerous times, both Kirsten Beyer, the author of Full Circle and Unworthy (the next Voyager book after FC) and Margaret Clark, the editor of the Trek book line have said that she will not be coming back in either of those stories or any others in the next few years.

Do I miss Christie Golden!

She may have written some flawed stories in the last years but she did at least care for the Voyager characters (I get that impression after a nice exchange of views that I had with her shortly after the "Dark Matters" trilogy was published).

Besides that, books like "The Murdered Sun" and "Marooned" are masterpieces!

I miss Marco Palmieri too. He did at least communicate with the fans.

 

[PaulSimpson]

I miss Marco Palmieri too. He did at least communicate with the fans.

Margaret Clark is part of a panel discussing the future of Star Trek next weekend at New York Comic Con...

 

[kimc]

They could have sidelined her WITHOUT killing her.

What would Janeway fans say about that? "You sidelined the headline character for no good reason!"?

I can't say I cared for it much and was watching the Pocket Book schedule in hopes that a novel where she wasn't sidelined was eventually coming out. Unfortunately, instead of using her they killed her. I guess I don't need to be watching that stupid schedule anymore.

 

[Kirk1980]

Voyager wasn't good enough (in the eyes of many, not to be mean about it) for the series and it's characters to get 'protection' from anyone involved in marketing the series.

 

[kimc]

Voyager wasn't good enough (in the eyes of many, not to be mean about it) for the series and it's characters to get 'protection' from anyone involved in marketing the series.

You're stating opinion as fact.

 

[Kirk1980]

Voyager just isn't well-regarded, it doesn't have the clout TOS or TNG does economically.

Therefore, these characters are likely treated as more 'up for grabs' than either TOS or TNG.

Let's be honest, there are absolutely zero plans in Paramount's future for doing anything more with the Voyager property as evidenced by their decision to instead reinvent TOS.

Again, I'm not trying to be mean but that's just cold economic fact. If you can prove otherwise, please let me know. Show me a reliable source where Paramount has shown any indication of furthering Voyager and I will gladly eat crow.

 

[Marie1]

I was planning on finishing my copy of Death in Winter so I could get caught up with the other Next Generation relaunch books.....not even going to bother now. I'll stick to the DS9 Relaunch series (though they seem abysmally slow to come out now) and Voyager books set before they return home.

Why won't you finish the TNG relaunch, if you're going to keep going with the DS9PF (Which I agree with you, you should: because its great, and has 2 novels coming out this year! ) because you don't like what happened in the VOY books?

Though I guess, if you want, read up to that book, or before they return home, then just read up about upcoming books and see if VOY books come out that are too good to be passed up.

But DS9PF is good, and what I've read of TNGPF is good too, so you may like to keep going with it...

 

[kimc]

Voyager just isn't well-regarded, it doesn't have the clout TOS or TNG does economically.

Therefore, these characters are likely treated as more 'up for grabs' than either TOS or TNG.

Let's be honest, there are absolutely zero plans in Paramount's future for doing anything more with the Voyager property as evidenced by their decision to instead reinvent TOS.

Again, I'm not trying to be mean but that's just cold economic fact. If you can prove otherwise, please let me know. Show me a reliable source where Paramount has shown any indication of furthering Voyager and I will gladly eat crow.

I'm not saying you're trying to be mean. Paramount may or may not decide to do anything further with Voyager or for that matter DS9 or TNG. Or they may. While I'm certainly not holding my breath I will say nothing at this point would surprise me.

 

[Kirk1980]

Well, isn't it safe to say that with basically TOS coming back again in the form of the movie.... that about does it for all the spinoffs thereafter?

TNG is relatively safe as far as killing off characters go given it's broad market in comparison to DS9/VOY/ENT but even TNG's being changed. The whole crew is broken up. No Riker/Troi, no Worf, no Data. That's 4/7, leaving Picard, Crusher and LaForge.

If even Trek's next biggest moneymaker isn't safe from change, Voyager certainly won't be.

 

[kimc]

Well, isn't it safe to say that with basically TOS coming back again in the form of the movie.... that about does it for all the spinoffs thereafter?

Maybe, maybe not. I guess it depends on how well this movie does. If it's a huge moneymaker then Paramount will understandably want to milk what they can out of it. Otherwise, they may do something else.

 

[William Leisner]

I miss Marco Palmieri too. He did at least communicate with the fans.

It should also be pointed out that Margaret is now doing her job and Marco's job; reading through fifteen threads discussing Janeway's death would amount to another part-time job on top of that.

And, y'know... Marco was one of the people who had to okay Janeway's demise. He could have said, back in 2006, "No, we can't lose Janeway! She has too many fans; my books would lose thousands of sales if she died!" He didn't. He embraced it, and he had Kirsten use it in her upcoming books. So, let's not make Margaret the Wicked Witch in this story.