I'm now reading the novelization of TUC by J. M. Dillard again after a long time as sort of preparation for Discovery. Is it actually part of continuity for the novelverse?
Generally, novelizations aren't counted as part of the larger book continuity. Individual elements from them can be drawn on -- e.g. Lori Ciana from the TMP novelization, Saavik's backstory from Vonda McIntyre's TWOK and TSFS novelization, or character names like Ambassador Kamarag and President Ra-ghoratreii -- but other elements tend to be ignored or contradicted in later books, such as the portrayal of Earth culture and technology in the TMP novelization, the explanation of the Genesis process and the portrayal of Deltans in the TWOK novelization, etc.
You might want to re-read that. Right now he's turned down the offer to cameo in the current episodes. Doesn't mean he won't agree to appear in later seasons.
Maybe the T'Kuvma Klingons are just a distinct ethnic group of the Klingons. I liked the old, "Pre-Augment" novel answer that the Klingons of the TOS were half-human hybrids. Maybe these are Klingons who have mated with another humanoid species or are an older offshoot of the Klingon race.
That would be easier to believe if all the Council members in episode 2 hadn't had the same makeup. I wish they'd taken the opportunity to feature all the different Klingon looks we've seen over the decades -- TOS-style, TMP-style with a single central ridge, TSFS/Westmore-style with individual bony plates, TVH-TUC-style with subtler plates and gender dimorphism, Kelvin-style, and now this.
Exactly. A real missed oppurtunity there, and it makes these new Klingons way harder to except. Theres no way all Klingons can look like this and still maintain visual continuity with the other series.
What visual continuity? As I alluded to in my previous post, this is the seventh distinct design the Klingons have had, not counting the early second season where Fred Phillips just forgot what he'd done the first time. There has never been visual continuity between the different types of Klingon in different productions. In TMP, all Klingons uniformly had a single central bony ridge. In TSFS, the males all had broad, individualized forehead plates and smooth noses, and the one female we saw (Valkris) had very faint ridges. The Berman-Trek, Michael Westmore Klingons were basically TSFS-style, but with ridged noses and no sexual dimorphism. The later TOS movies brought back the subtler female ridges and gave all the males rounder, less pronounced forehead plates with finer ridges. And so on with Kelvin Klingons and DSC Klingons. They're all incompatible, because they all give the same makeup design to every Klingon they depict. The only times we've ever seen two different Klingon designs together were in "Trials and Tribble-ations" and "Affliction"/"Divergence."
Eh, I'm okay also with visual retcons. I never felt the Augment virus explanation was needed even if I found the early novel they were human-hybrids to be a cool idea. At the end of the day...it's just a TV show. *is murdered immediately by horde of angry Landru-ites*
I've grown to really like the new Klingons, but one thing that kind of bugs me is that before there was kind of an obvious evolution, from no ridges to one ridge to the TOS movies - ENT ridges, but now this design has been thrown in there at point where they should either have no ridges or TOSM - ENT ridges. It's kind of knocked that whole evolution out of whack.
The Discovery Klingons look like 24th Century Klingons if you put hair on them - they obviously just have a thing about shaving in the Discovery era...
But yes, I hope it's a simple explanation. Like: "They're equatorial Klingons." Not "They're a mutant offshoot of the augmented Klingons or attempts to repair the damage done by the Augment virus different from Doctor Phlox." Because the novels WILL provide an explanation because they always do. There are few mysteries in Star Trek which don't have a novel explanation even if it's eventually contradicted.