Bring Back Kathryn Janeway to the Voyager books! Online Petition!

[Therin of Andor]

I've seen my share of posts over the past few years saying that Trip should've stayed dead. Maybe they weren't as vocal as the "Not. Dead." camp, but they were there.

Didn't the whole "Not.Dead" meme start with Trip and "These Are The Voyages..."?

 

[MatthiasRussell]

Dude, we're Star Trek fans. There are complaints about everything.

Never have truer words been spoken.

HAHA, yeah I have to back this one myself. I was just saying in a conversation at st.com that we need to know what the next movie will be about that way we can move on from speculating about it to complaining about it.

 

[MatthiasRussell]

If they can bring back Trip, I think anyone is available for return (at the franchise's and writers' discretion). Few deaths in Trek have been as definite as that of Trip. I remember everyone being angry when he was killed in TATV, but were there many complaints when he was "resurrected"?

Actually nothing about that episode was definitive since the whole thing was a holodeck program. That's why CBS allowed the writers to offer an alternative version of events. Its like assuming that the events depicted in a Hollywood war film are exactly what happened in reality.

But there is a difference between historical fiction and a historical reenactment. It was my understanding that TATV would be compared to a reenactment of the Titanic as opposed to the film Titanic. Of course, even by that example there will be errors in the reenactment since we don't have the whole story of what went down that night. However the deaths of key characters are not in dispute.

The concept that Section 31 covered up the facts is believable and a great way to work around the problems with the episode, by the episode alone, we have no reason to believe the program was historical fiction since Riker and Troi speak of those events as if they happened in reality, not just in a story.

 

[Therin of Andor]

... we need to know what the next movie will be about that way we can move on from speculating about it to complaining about it.

I must admit, I am bewildered by those ST fans who decide they are blackbanning a certain new ST production. For some they claim they have no curiosity about new stuff at all.

I know one diehard Aussie TOS fan who still refuses to watch ST:TMP beyond Kirk arriving on the refurbished Enterprise. Even as a guest at the premiere of TMP at the Smithsonian, she went out to wait in the foyer at that point. Not because she hated what she was seeing, but more because she hated the idea that TOS was being remade. She can sit through other TOS movies, then objected totally to TNG, refusing to watch whole episodes.

I, myself, was filled with dread about ST V, but I went to see it anyway, it was hilariously bad, and I've still managed to watch it dozens of times since. ST V and the DS9 premiere were the only ones I made a wallet-sized protest about. Instead of spending $$$$ on the first VHS release, I bought a cheapie ex-rental. Since then, I've treated ST V like all the other films, and have bought each DVD version that's come along. Ditto the boxed set of DS9.

I can't imagine not wanting to at least see a new ST production once. On the first day of release.

 

[Christopher]

Didn't the whole "Not.Dead" meme start with Trip and "These Are The Voyages..."?

It certainly did.

But there is a difference between historical fiction and a historical reenactment. It was my understanding that TATV would be compared to a reenactment of the Titanic as opposed to the film Titanic. Of course, even by that example there will be errors in the reenactment since we don't have the whole story of what went down that night. However the deaths of key characters are not in dispute.

But a reenactment is not a primary source. In the study of history, the more removed a source is from the event you're studying, the less it can be trusted. You can't just assume it's an accurate representation of the truth. Even the most sincere and well-intentioned chronicler or reconstructor of history is still going to have a set of biases or assumptions through which they filter their interpretation of events. Even a primary source -- meaning a firsthand account by a witness or participant in the event being studied -- can't be relied on absolutely because of that inherent bias or selectivity in human experience. Even raw film or video footage is selective by what it chooses to point at and what it excludes from the frame. So historians are trained to be skeptical of every source, and not to treat any source as authoritative by itself. Everything has to be corroborated by other sources.

And the farther a source is removed from the original events, the less you can rely on it to be accurate, because it's going to be filtered through multiple layers of interpretation and distortion and there's no way of telling what kinds of error might have been introduced. Re-enactments can and do get things wrong. Myths and folklore get confused with facts. There are historians today who sincerely believe that Europeans thought the Earth was flat before Columbus "proved" otherwise, even though that was a myth invented by Washington Irving and his contemporaries centuries later. And those are real historians. The errors you find in popular, mass-media programming that purports to re-enact historical events are likely to be even greater.

by the episode alone, we have no reason to believe the program was historical fiction since Riker and Troi speak of those events as if they happened in reality, not just in a story.

Yeah, and a lot of people believe things about the past that are not actually correct, because history is not an exact science and because misinformation and misinterpretations about the past will inevitably arise. Columbus didn't prove the Earth was round, an apple never fell on Isaac Newton's head, and George Washington didn't wear wooden dentures, but millions of people believe that these myths are historical facts. Even trained historians don't necessarily know for a fact what happened in the past -- but they know they don't know for a fact and are thus more careful about verifying their sources than a layperson like Riker or Troi would be.

 

[JD]

Like I said before, for me at least, it's the fact that this comes up constantly and it always turns into the exact same argument, there is never any progress being made, and there never will make any progress. It's just getting really, really, really old and really, really, really the repetitive. It's also rather pointless.

It doesn't though does it, I mean, once every few months isn't constant.

As for pointless discussions, there are a few around here that could be classified as pointless, given that this is a discussion board where things are discussed and it has an ever growing membership, things will be repeated, what do you suggest happen, the board gets shut down so JD won't get annoyed by one thread out of hundreds? As I've said before (and I know you feel you'll miss out which is a very laughable reason to subject yourself to something you're not a fan of) if you don't like what's being said/discussed, keep out and don't post, it's the whole, if you ignore it, it may go away mentality.

Yeah, I realize now that is probably the best way to treat this. I'll admit with the holiday craziness at work, and with my medical problems acting up again, I got a little more annoyed with this whole thing than was really necessary. My sincere apologies.