That’s a super disrespectful and rude thing to say tbh.
Spoilers Coda Trilogy Discussion Thread
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I don't find this cliché reasoning clever. If CBS the corporation collapsed tomorrow and every Trek staff member suddenly died, then would you get any enjoyment out of this site that would conclude its decline from the height of the BBS era?
My participation in this site is proof that ongoing additions to a franchise produce more activity with which I can engage. It appears to me the same applies to you getting to thumb your nose at someone else's complaint in this thread.
For all the folks saying that the end of the First Splinter Timeline means you can't enjoy the books set in that timeline as much anymore because it feels like everything that came before is meaningless if the characters all essentially die in 2387...
It makes me think a lot about my mother. She suffered a stroke in 2012 and became disabled. Because Social Security Disability benefits amount to loose pocket change and SNAP benefits amount to bread crumbs, I had to spend the next nine years providing significant financial support to her every month. I was stuck in the service sector because I couldn't save enough money to take the risk of finding a new job if it didn't work out; only after my fiancee and I moved in together did I have the financial cushion to take that risk and find something new. And then my mother died, unexpectedly, this past summer.
I do not think that everything I sacrificed to make sure my mother kept a roof over her head and food on her table was less meaningful, just because my mother did not have as much time on this earth as we would have wanted. The meaning comes from making the choice.
Same thing with these characters. The things they sacrificed to stop the Borg in Destiny, or to thwart fascists in The Fall, or to stop warmongers in Typhon Pact, or to defeat both the Terran Empire and the Klingon/Cardassian Alliance in Mirror Universe, do not matter any less just because the Temporal Apocalypse happened a few years later.
* * *
Besides, Coda is written in such a way that you can basically assume that any aspect of the First Splinter Timeline that isn't explicitly contradicted by future canon still happened in the Prime Timeline. In other words, if the canon doesn't explicitly contradict something from a First Splinter book, you can cherry-pick what you like from the books and keep them in your headcanon.
It makes me think a lot about my mother. She suffered a stroke in 2012 and became disabled. Because Social Security Disability benefits amount to loose pocket change and SNAP benefits amount to bread crumbs, I had to spend the next nine years providing significant financial support to her every month. I was stuck in the service sector because I couldn't save enough money to take the risk of finding a new job if it didn't work out; only after my fiancee and I moved in together did I have the financial cushion to take that risk and find something new. And then my mother died, unexpectedly, this past summer.
I do not think that everything I sacrificed to make sure my mother kept a roof over her head and food on her table was less meaningful, just because my mother did not have as much time on this earth as we would have wanted. The meaning comes from making the choice.
Same thing with these characters. The things they sacrificed to stop the Borg in Destiny, or to thwart fascists in The Fall, or to stop warmongers in Typhon Pact, or to defeat both the Terran Empire and the Klingon/Cardassian Alliance in Mirror Universe, do not matter any less just because the Temporal Apocalypse happened a few years later.
* * *
Besides, Coda is written in such a way that you can basically assume that any aspect of the First Splinter Timeline that isn't explicitly contradicted by future canon still happened in the Prime Timeline. In other words, if the canon doesn't explicitly contradict something from a First Splinter book, you can cherry-pick what you like from the books and keep them in your headcanon.
I’m going to just have to keep my own little head canon which acknowledges neither Coda nor Picard. I know it’s not much, but there isn’t much else for me to do.
I used to think that way. I don't anymore.
I mean, I think most of us would love more stories set on, say, the Enterprise-C. Does it matter that THEY all die? No? Then this doesn't either.
Nor does the thing about all the main characters in Rogue One being killed off. Doesn't change the fact that it's my favorite SW movie of all time. They all died for a purpose. Same with the Ent-C, and same with the first splinter group.
That said, I admit I'm curious as to what all these temporal shenanigans mean in regards to @Christopher's DTI novels. Do THEY still happen? I mean, it's clear that the 32nd century as seen in Discovery doesn't have the magical medical technology, for example, that the DTI future has (as I understand it, it's almost impossible to die in the DTI future, but we see people being killed in DSC's future all the time). But still...
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Not entirely related, but I remember stating at one point I wanted a final trilogy to the novel verse-something like say a Hobus Supernova trilogy that would show the remaking of the alpha quadrant and its political situation-and now the characters would handle that. And would end maybe at the turn of the 25th century.
That to me would have been a good endpoint for the novels, as the further you go in the 25th and 26th centuries, the more advanced the tech gets and the more distant the story becomes from the story of the shows(and the novelverse was already a decade distant). A final epilogue showing where the federation and most of the characters are at, heading into the new century, the fate of the romulans and the typhon pact, and a generally optimistic tone of “it’s been a rough century, but there are wonders ahead”.
That is the novelverse swan song I wanted. And more I think than the novelverse being destroyed I am frustrated I didn’t get that trilogy.
That to me would have been a good endpoint for the novels, as the further you go in the 25th and 26th centuries, the more advanced the tech gets and the more distant the story becomes from the story of the shows(and the novelverse was already a decade distant). A final epilogue showing where the federation and most of the characters are at, heading into the new century, the fate of the romulans and the typhon pact, and a generally optimistic tone of “it’s been a rough century, but there are wonders ahead”.
That is the novelverse swan song I wanted. And more I think than the novelverse being destroyed I am frustrated I didn’t get that trilogy.
It can be frustrating when the story you want to see is not the story the artist wants to tell. But it's also important to judge a work for what it's trying to be, not what you wanted it to be. It would not be fair to judge The Godfather for not being a romantic comedy; it would not be fair to judge Love Actually for not being an action thriller; it would not be fair to judge Blade Runner for not being a musical; etc.
How Coda ends doesn't dampen my enjoyment of the other novels. I can still read them and enjoy them because they are well written books with characters I like and plots that are engaging.
That said, I have decided not to accept Coda as the ending to Treklit and I've decided I won't read the books again. I went back and forth on that because I am doing a giant Treklit re-read and I debated about giving Coda another chance. I decided against it.
What made up my mind is that Coda doesn't really wrap things up. That wasn't the intention of this trilogy. This trilogy was created to kill everyone and everything. What did the authors care about resolving any long standing plot threads if everything is about ti be erased from existence? Everything DRGIII did in the DS9 novels was ignored. None of his characters were used. Ro and Quark were together despite breaking up in a previous novel. No mention was made of the Endalla falsework. Rebecca, who displayed time powers, is ignored. Taurik's future knowledge basically amounted to nothing. Admiral Batanides and her grudge against Riker was left unexplored, as was Sarai's position as her spy. Bashir woke up just to suffer more and then die.
Basically, stopping at Collateral Damage leaves me with more or less the same amount of unanswered questions I'd have even if I read the Coda trilogy.
Plus, Collateral Damage works better as a finale, IMO. Picard and the crew are together and heading out into uncharted space. Not only that, but they helped a species that was usually antagonistic towards the Federation find a new home. That's a very Trekkian theme to end on. I also don't feel like it leaves us dangling too much. The adventures continue, even if we don't get to read about them anymore.
Also, I get the themes of Coda and making your life mean something even knowing that death is inevitable and that they saved the Prime timeline but for me it is a dark, depressing ending filled with way too much boring, repetitive action scenes and characters acting incredibly stupid to advance the plot and where it doesn't really matter who dies when because they are all going to die anyways in a matter of days.
If you loved Coda and were satisfied and it moved you emotionally, great. I am honestly thrilled for you. I am not hating on these novels or the authors. This was just not the ending I was hoping for even if it was the one I more or less expected that we would get.
That said, I have decided not to accept Coda as the ending to Treklit and I've decided I won't read the books again. I went back and forth on that because I am doing a giant Treklit re-read and I debated about giving Coda another chance. I decided against it.
What made up my mind is that Coda doesn't really wrap things up. That wasn't the intention of this trilogy. This trilogy was created to kill everyone and everything. What did the authors care about resolving any long standing plot threads if everything is about ti be erased from existence? Everything DRGIII did in the DS9 novels was ignored. None of his characters were used. Ro and Quark were together despite breaking up in a previous novel. No mention was made of the Endalla falsework. Rebecca, who displayed time powers, is ignored. Taurik's future knowledge basically amounted to nothing. Admiral Batanides and her grudge against Riker was left unexplored, as was Sarai's position as her spy. Bashir woke up just to suffer more and then die.
Basically, stopping at Collateral Damage leaves me with more or less the same amount of unanswered questions I'd have even if I read the Coda trilogy.
Plus, Collateral Damage works better as a finale, IMO. Picard and the crew are together and heading out into uncharted space. Not only that, but they helped a species that was usually antagonistic towards the Federation find a new home. That's a very Trekkian theme to end on. I also don't feel like it leaves us dangling too much. The adventures continue, even if we don't get to read about them anymore.
Also, I get the themes of Coda and making your life mean something even knowing that death is inevitable and that they saved the Prime timeline but for me it is a dark, depressing ending filled with way too much boring, repetitive action scenes and characters acting incredibly stupid to advance the plot and where it doesn't really matter who dies when because they are all going to die anyways in a matter of days.
If you loved Coda and were satisfied and it moved you emotionally, great. I am honestly thrilled for you. I am not hating on these novels or the authors. This was just not the ending I was hoping for even if it was the one I more or less expected that we would get.
Hmm? Not sure this follows. The only thing my imaginary ending and Coda have in common is they both serve as a wrap up of the novelverse. Beyond that they’d be two entirely different artistic works. I know what Coda is and what it is trying to do, I wanted something else in its place for its purpose.
Just reading through this thread because I only found out about the end of the novel storyline. I haven't read the novels in a long time as I fell off of Star Trek, but I'm not sure if I should be surprised or not that the DS9 stories got shafted in all of them.
It does feel strange that it's all over though.
It does feel strange that it's all over though.
I recall when we were left with the Ascendant’s cliffhanger for all those years that someone around here wrote a series of fanfic picking up the story and taking it up to Destiny. I never got around to reading it, but thought it was great that it existed when there was nothing else.
Ever since finishing Coda I keep popping into the fanfic forum, hoping to see someone working on a final DS9 novel that fills the gap between The Long Mirage/ Original Sin and Coda. Still hoping it’ll show up one day. Anything will be better than the nothing DS9 was left with.
Or perhaps someone will write a completely different Litverse wrap up story…
Ever since finishing Coda I keep popping into the fanfic forum, hoping to see someone working on a final DS9 novel that fills the gap between The Long Mirage/ Original Sin and Coda. Still hoping it’ll show up one day. Anything will be better than the nothing DS9 was left with.
Or perhaps someone will write a completely different Litverse wrap up story…
I might have to look that fanfic up. I wasn't happy with how the Ascendants plot ended in the books. All this build up and then the Ascendants don't really do anything and are dispatched very easily.
While I think TNG and Titan get decent send-off novels (I haven't read the last few VOY novels but I've read that they serve as a good conclusion to that series) I do wish we had gotten at least one more DS9 novel. DRGIII had mainly been filling in the gaps and setting up new plots in his last few novels and there really wasn't a sense of closure at all. I know the post-Destiny DS9 characters weren't as rich or as fleshed out as the ones introduced in Avatar but I still liked several of them and I was disappointed when they weren't used at all in Coda Book 2.
The Litverse fan community is extremely small. Even by extended universe standards, at least from what I’ve seen, comparing it to SW and 40K.
Personally I wouldn’t even know where to begin in writing some sort of fanfic alternative to Coda. So many characters, so many sub plots. Though I’d happily read such a fanfic if it were ever produced.
"He's not really dead... So long as we remember," as the famous victim of a Vulcan mind meld once said.
It was surprising in one way that Voyager wasn't in any way included in Coda, but on the other hand, they basically got the Collateral Damage ending of sailing off into the sunset. DS9 got a really cruddy deal in the litverse over the past few years, but obviously the book sales or something must not have been up to snuff and the commercial decision made sense to just have them tag along. A shame as DS9 seems to do really well on the "Just got into Trek, really enjoying DS9" pandemic streaming binges, I guess because DS9 is the closest 90's Trek got to a modern TV show re its ongoing story arc(s).
Before I answer this very serious question, I do want to make absolutely sure you're comfortable with equating the end of a book continuity you enjoyed with hundreds upon hundreds of real life people dying.
Also I'm not even familiar with this site's decline or height or whatever. I stopped posting here for like ten years when I stopped reading the novels.
So just so I'm clear, your book collection vanished when you finished reading Coda so you can no longer enjoy the previous books which you once loved and Romeo and Juliet is no longer considered a classic because
both of the title characters died?
(And I do say all of this as a guy who doesn't even particularly like Coda. It had some moments but is "very edgy thirteen year old writing fanfic" in its "Hey the universe is ending" plot. It's not a terrible series, just very bland.)
Revenant gave me a reason to re-read Trill: Unjoined, mainly out of curiosity about contradictions.
Probably because the themes of civil unrest, antigovernment riots, and an unstoppable virus have become somewhat topical lately (thank God no acts of attempted genocide -- yet), I actually found this under-200-page novella more harrowing than the entire Coda trilogy. And found something I sincerely hope only happened in the First Splinter. (Hopefully, the revelation of the relationship between the parasites of "Conspiracy" and Trill symbionts [is that by any chance canonical?], and of the Kurlan massacre, happened without bloodshed in the Prime timeline.)
Probably because the themes of civil unrest, antigovernment riots, and an unstoppable virus have become somewhat topical lately (thank God no acts of attempted genocide -- yet), I actually found this under-200-page novella more harrowing than the entire Coda trilogy. And found something I sincerely hope only happened in the First Splinter. (Hopefully, the revelation of the relationship between the parasites of "Conspiracy" and Trill symbionts [is that by any chance canonical?], and of the Kurlan massacre, happened without bloodshed in the Prime timeline.)
Nope. Canon has never followed up on the events of "Conspiracy."
I didn't think so. For all we know by canon alone, then, they could just as easily be second-cousins to the B. portolanii of "Operation: Annihilate" as to Trill symbionts.
I don't see any resemblance beyond general parasitism. There are plenty of unrelated parasitical life forms on Earth, so there are bound to be countless unrelated parasites in the galaxy, simply converging on a similar survival strategy because it works, rather than because of a shared origin. And those two parasites don't resemble each other physically or in their specific effects on their hosts.
