Spoilers Canon, Continuity, and Pike's Accident

[Set Harth]

It reminds me of the camp of Star Wars fans who seem to hope that Disney will suddenly embrace their beliefs for what the franchise "should" have done, and erase the sequel trilogy from existence.

Predicting that Disney ( or, if you like, Lucasfilm under Disney ownership ) will erase their own products seems like a bad bet. They still want to sell those things! A few years back there was a guy proclaiming with extreme confidence that the Obi-Wan project ( at that point probably still envisioned as a film ) was going to erase part of Rebels. Speaking of erasure, you can't find that post now, for some reason.

 

[Tallguy]

Giving a flying fuck that April is now played by a black actor is this fandom reaching rock bottom.

Who fucking cares!?

While I can appreciate the argument (and April is terrific and I'm glad they included him and I'd like to see a flashback episode with April as Captain and Pike as Exec) there would certainly be complaints if all the command staff were still all white.

So it has to be important on some level. Somebody cares.

I'm going to get a lot more passionate over the fact April isn't wearing a cardigan while on duty like he did in the novels than I am over the fact he's now black.

Oh good. Not just me. And I'm pretty sure that was just in Diane Carey's two books, right?

 

[The Wormhole]

And I'm pretty sure that was just in Diane Carey's two books, right?

April was also wearing a cardigan in the novel Legacies: Captain to Captain by Greg Cox released in 2016 in celebration of the 50th anniversary. Though, yes, the depiction of April and the Enterprise under his command in that novel was more or less in line with Diane Carey's novels, aside from elements from Carey's which were overridden in canon in the time since they were published.

 

[fireproof78]

Giving a flying fuck that April is now played by a black actor is this fandom reaching rock bottom.

Who fucking cares!?

Someone does, for reasons that are not clear to me and seem to value details over story. Imagine if Star Trek 3 came out today with Saavik.

 

[Yistaan]

The only notable difference between April in SNW vs April in TAS is that for some reason April has a higher rank in SNW than he had in TAS. And I'm more than content to simply ignore TAS and presume April is an Admiral now.

Or in light of this episode just put Adrian Holmes in a Commodore's rank from hereon out with La'an's temporal interference being the explanation for the rank change.

Giving a flying that April is now played by a black actor is this fandom reaching rock bottom.

It has nothing to do with race. I'm Asian, and I wasn't happy with what they did with Kyle either, and if they were more conclusively tied together I'd be trying to explain away the change too. As it is, it's still possible to claim that the Kyles are different people whereas with April this is not the case.

 

[Tallguy]

Or in light of this episode just put Adrian Holmes in a Commodore's rank from hereon out with La'an's temporal interference being the explanation for the rank change.

And this is where time travel shenanigans take us.

Damn it, Barry!

 

[HotRod]

Imagine if Star Trek 3 came out today with Saavik.

I can only imagine....

"She's got slanted eyebrows! It must be an alternate timeline."

It has nothing to do with race.

It doesn't need to have anything to do with race to be fucking stupid.

April was a character seen exactly once on an old seventies kids cartoon. A cartoon that's status in canon is somewhat questionable.

But even if it wasn't, who cares!?

 

[Yistaan]

I've already pointed out how

I cam only imagine....

"She's got slanted eyebrows! It must be an alternate timeline."



It doesn't need to have anything to do with race to be fucking stupid.

April was a character seen exactly once on an old seventies kids cartoon. A cartoon that's status in canon is somewhat questionable.

But even if it wasn't, who cares!?

This thread is called 'Canon, continuity, and Pike's accident'. What kind of discussions did you think you would find on here?

If you think these types of topics are stupid, as far as I'm aware no one's holding a phaser to you and ordering you to take part in the topic.

 

[Noname Given]

I cam only imagine....

"She's got slanted eyebrows! It must be an alternate timeline."

What? It HAS to be an alternate timeline...hell, she looks like a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT PERSON in STIII:TSFS and STIV:TVH after her canonical first appearance in STII:TWoK.

 

[Yistaan]

It is actually possible that Saavik is a genetically different person between Kirstie Alley and Robin Curtis.

Wrath of Khan explicitly takes place in the 1990s Khan timeline, with Khan himself specifically saying in the movie he fled Earth in 1996.

Search for Spock etc. don't mention what year Khan was from, meaning they take place in the new timeline featuring 2022 Khan and a broad strokes version of Space Seed and Wrath of Khan happened. And in this timeline, Saavik now always looked like Robin Curtis.

 

[Mudd]

I've already pointed out how

This thread is called 'Canon, continuity, and Pike's accident'. What kind of discussions did you think you would find on here?

If you think these types of topics are stupid, as far as I'm aware no one's holding a phaser to you and ordering you to take part in the topic.

Please note:

• This conversation about April is a stupid one;
• It has everything to do with race.

 

[HotRod]

Please note:

• This conversation about April is a stupid one;
• It has everything to do with race.

People bitching about April reminds me an awful lot of assholes bitching about the colour of the Little Mermaids skin.

 

[fireproof78]

I was not aware that I should care about skin color this much in a fictional story. Yes, I am aware of exceptions, such as Moana, but that is specifically designed around a culture. April...isn't.

 

[UssGlenn]

"She's got slanted eyebrows! It must be an alternate timeline."

Why didn't Saavik have slanted eyebrows in TWOK anyway? Its not like Alley had any sort of clout to refuse to shave her eyebrows, it was her first movie role.

 

[HotRod]

I was not aware that I should care about skin color this much in a fictional story. Yes, I am aware of exceptions, such as Moana, but that is specifically designed around a culture. April...isn't.

Only thought I had when I first saw April. "Hey, it's Adrian Holmes. Awesome, he's a great Canadian actor."

If you have to do mental gymnastics to explain to yourself why he's a African Canadian actor and not some old white guy, there's something wrong with you

 

[fireproof78]

Why didn't Saavik have slanted eyebrows in TWOK anyway? Its not like Alley had any sort of clout to refuse to shave her eyebrows, it was her first movie role.

It seems Meyer wanted a bit more of an emotionally expressive option, so he didn't alter the eyebrows. Saavik's Romulan/Vulcan mixed heritage was present so that was part of the background of the character. But, with Nimoy at the helm of 3 he wanted more classic Vulcan.

Only thought I had when I first saw April. "Hey, it's Adrian Holmes. Awesome, he's a great Canadian actor."

And I thought, "Hey, never seen him before. He does a good job."

I wasn't aware I should judge him further than that...

 

[HotRod]

Hell, there's something for the canon lovers out there. Robert April has consistently been played by Canadian actors.

 

[Tallguy]

Hell, there's something for the canon lovers out there. Robert April has consistently been played by Canadian actors.

Not even James T. Kirk can make that claim.

 

[Yistaan]

Since apparently some are still trying to make this about race, as an Asian guy I'm just going to say it--they called Andre Kim's character Kyle instead of Sulu so that they could just leave him in the transporter room and not give him the episodes and development that Sulu deserves. It's the literal definition of token. No wonder Andre left, I'd have done the same if I were an actor.

That's why it infuriates me that the canon issues regarding April immediately have the show's defenders say they care about diversity when Trek basically told me as an Asian man with the whole Kyle nonsense that they're not ready to have an Asian man be a strong lead. The last Asian guy featured prominently on Trek is the butt of jokes to this day, on this very forum, regarding being a perpetual ensign.

If Trek's trying to claim improved diversity, as an Asian man myself I am not impressed. It then even gets more irritating when white people tell me as a minority man how I'm supposed to feel about racial issues, or outright say there's "something wrong with" me if as a minority myself I make my own headcanon regarding April (that again, no one is forcing anyone else to accept as their own headcanon).

 

[fireproof78]

care about diversity when Trek basically told me as an Asian man with the whole Kyle nonsense that they're not ready to have an Asian man be a strong lead.

The fuck? Trek is not ready for this?

This makes no sense. I get that the whole Kyle thing is an issue, but I for the life of me can't imagine this as saying "not ready for a strong Asian lead."

If Trek's trying to claim improved diversity, as an Asian man myself I am not impressed. It then even gets more irritating when white people tell me as a minority man how I'm supposed to feel about racial issues, or outright say there's "something wrong with" me if as a minority myself I make my own headcanon regarding April (that again, no one is forcing anyone else to accept as their own headcanon).

Well, no that's not the intent. The question is why is April's race a matter of question? Why does it require head canon workaround when we have recastings all the time.