Spoilers Discovery and the Novelverse - TV show discussion thread
- Thread starter F. King Daniel
- Start date
On camera? Damn! 
This is a great story and I love that BB not only read the novel but thought it was very funny. Was this the last time Carey was asked to write a Trek novel? This seems to me to be... against the code of conduct for tie-in authors, or something. I mean I remember Andrew Robinson telling a crowd I was in about how when he turned in his first draft for 'A Stitch in Time' he got it back with a thousand notes says: "No, can't do that, no this contradicts X, no, you can't do this in Trek." and yet they seem to have let this novel through without quite such a rigorous commentary!
And if you get the eBook version this month, it's only 99 cents! (Although I don't really recall it being that good, but if you're going to get it you might as well get it at that price!
)That is actually from the season 1 blu-ray set. There was actually a whole thread on this a few years back where a couple of us pulled out little excepts from the book. My apologies if I'm not linking that thread correctly but you can read all about it here.
Other than Broken Bow, I read some of her TOS stuff and I vaguely remember liking it, but I don't think I've read any of her work in the other series. Broken Bow can be funny at times, but I found it really hard to get through personally. I read my thoughts in that thread from a few years ago and they still hold.
I didn't mean to drag this thread into a Diane Carey bashing fest as it's been hashed over a couple of times, and thankfully Discovery isn't getting that kind of treatment based on what we know so far of the book that's out and the two that are scheduled.
Other than Broken Bow, I read some of her TOS stuff and I vaguely remember liking it, but I don't think I've read any of her work in the other series. Broken Bow can be funny at times, but I found it really hard to get through personally. I read my thoughts in that thread from a few years ago and they still hold.
I didn't mean to drag this thread into a Diane Carey bashing fest as it's been hashed over a couple of times, and thankfully Discovery isn't getting that kind of treatment based on what we know so far of the book that's out and the two that are scheduled.
I was reading the second Typhon Pact novel the other day where a similar event happens to the latest episode of STD and it’s funny to think how Riker has to come up with a solution in order to it so that it wouldn’t alert the other ships and in the episode they just do it without even thinking that what they might be doing might set off some alarms.
Perhaps these authors are thinking too much about some of these things.
Perhaps these authors are thinking too much about some of these things.
More or less, yes. Her last actual contribution to Trek to actually be published was the Challenger short story in the Gateways What Lay Beyond anthology, but IIRC that was in fact written and handed in well before the Broken Bow novelization was released, or indeed before she worked on it, meaning that Broken Bow probably was the last Trek-related project she worked on for Pocket.
I suspect it was a case where they were coming up on a fast-approaching deadline, and since Diane Carey is an accomplished author, they probably gave the project very little if any editorial oversight.
I saw that video on Youtube with Berman and Braga discussing about Reading the Broken bow novel and were displeased about Carey's comments in the manuscript and calling the editor of Pocket books to say they weren't unhappy about it was mentioned in the video..It was very unprofessional for Diane Carey to write that in her manuscript for the novel.
Ohhhhhhhh, DAYTONNNN....we've all got some major QUESTIONS for you now, re: Lorca and Drastic Measures....
My sentiments exactly
Also, not too much in the way of Litverse contradictions this week, except for maybe
"Dominus of Qo'noS"? Now, who knows, this doesn't necessarily signify that the entire Klingon Empire has been conquered, and indeed this notion would seem to run counter to what was established in last week's episode, that the Klingon Great Houses still exist and are competing with one another for dominance, just as in the Prime Universe.
And I dug the vibes in Emperor Georgiou's royal court aboard the ISS Charon, which at least atmospherically seems very reminiscent in many ways of how David Mack depicted Empress Sato's Kyoto-court in The Sorrows of Empire.
And I dug the vibes in Emperor Georgiou's royal court aboard the ISS Charon, which at least atmospherically seems very reminiscent in many ways of how David Mack depicted Empress Sato's Kyoto-court in The Sorrows of Empire.
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Oh, and the whole revelation that
seemingly all Humans from the Mirror Universe physiologically suffer from light-oversensitivity (like Lorca) is probably not any type of huge deal from a continuity-standpoint, since neither TOS, DS9, nor ENT ever established this in canon either, so it's strictly an onscreen-versus-onscreen difference.
Despite the assumptions of TUC, the Empire is more than just Qo'noS. The Houses could survive, at least in exile, even if the throneworld were captive.
Also, Voq actually said that the Houses were no longer competing, that they had needed to unite in order to be open to working peacefully with other races like the Vulcans, Andorians, and Tellarites in the rebellion.
For me, the biggest continuity issue was the thing about Mirror humans being light-sensitive. Whaaaa? That's never been indicated in any prior MU episode. It's also wayyyyy too on-the-nose as a metaphor for "dark" characters. But I suppose we could rationalize it as just some subset of the population, perhaps as a result of some genetic augmentation experiment gone wrong.
Also, Voq actually said that the Houses were no longer competing, that they had needed to unite in order to be open to working peacefully with other races like the Vulcans, Andorians, and Tellarites in the rebellion.
For me, the biggest continuity issue was the thing about Mirror humans being light-sensitive. Whaaaa? That's never been indicated in any prior MU episode. It's also wayyyyy too on-the-nose as a metaphor for "dark" characters. But I suppose we could rationalize it as just some subset of the population, perhaps as a result of some genetic augmentation experiment gone wrong.
Yup. This was exactly my thinking as well.
Qo'noS is occupied, but the rest of the empire lives on. Trying to remember what the Litverse MU stories mention about the status of the empire circa this period (immediately offhand, I only remember Shards and Shadows: "Ill Winds," with the Klingon scientists developing a doomsday weapon during Mirror April's era, and mentions of the empire subjugating a particular planet a few years prior to that story), but this is still probably workable.
Yeah, that could be, too -- surely the Terran Empire wouldn't have had the ethical guardrails against genetic experimentation that the Federation possesses, but Mirror Georgiou kind of made it sound like the problem was species-wide near the end, there. But now that I think about it, on TOS, DS9, and ENT, we do have numerous examples of Mirror Humans walking around in what appear to be mostly nearly-identical lighting conditions to the Prime Universe with absolutely zero issues, so I wonder. Guess we'll see what next week brings.
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The light sensitivity could work with Enterprise, where the Mirror NX-01 was lit darker, and IIRC, no one turned any lights on when they boarded the Defiant. TOS and DS9 can't be explained, the bright lights of the Prime Universe didn't seem to bother Mirror Kirk in the slightest, and for some reason when the Terran Rebels on DS9 built their own Defiant, they included its bright lights.
On a related note, MU humans had better stay out of the Kelvin Timeline.
On a related note, MU humans had better stay out of the Kelvin Timeline.
Burnham did mention in the previous episode that the stars looked different in the mirror universe, a change in the quality of the light. Maybe there's some slight difference in the laws of physics that results in planets being just a touch dimmer. It could be a widespread issue among all species in the MU.
As for why it's never come up before, Lorca hasn't had too many issues with his light sensitivity. It seems to be situations that would cause most people to blink or have to wait a moment for their eyes to adjust are physically painful, and possibly injurious to him. As long as the lighting is steady, it doesn't seem too much of a burden. And even though it seems knowledge about the Mirror Universe as a whole doesn't percolate throughout Starfleet until after Kirk's encounter (and who knows how long after, since we didn't see it come up until DS9), even if the details were need-to-know, photosensitivity might have made it onto the checklist of things to look for when you suspect someone has fallen prey to possession by a telepathic or incorporeal being, or has been replaced by an imposter. It seemed to happen enough even before TOS that it was a plausible excuse in "The Enemy Within."
I am super-curious about how Prime-Lorca compares to Lorca. I'm thinking he probably is fairly similar, and that Lorca's boast to Mudd about destroying his ship to spare his crew Klingon torture was actually accurate, except Prime-Lorca actually went down with his ship. Plus, Drastic Measures won't be as fun if Lorca isn't a swaggering, Calhoun-esque badass.
As for why it's never come up before, Lorca hasn't had too many issues with his light sensitivity. It seems to be situations that would cause most people to blink or have to wait a moment for their eyes to adjust are physically painful, and possibly injurious to him. As long as the lighting is steady, it doesn't seem too much of a burden. And even though it seems knowledge about the Mirror Universe as a whole doesn't percolate throughout Starfleet until after Kirk's encounter (and who knows how long after, since we didn't see it come up until DS9), even if the details were need-to-know, photosensitivity might have made it onto the checklist of things to look for when you suspect someone has fallen prey to possession by a telepathic or incorporeal being, or has been replaced by an imposter. It seemed to happen enough even before TOS that it was a plausible excuse in "The Enemy Within."
I am super-curious about how Prime-Lorca compares to Lorca. I'm thinking he probably is fairly similar, and that Lorca's boast to Mudd about destroying his ship to spare his crew Klingon torture was actually accurate, except Prime-Lorca actually went down with his ship. Plus, Drastic Measures won't be as fun if Lorca isn't a swaggering, Calhoun-esque badass.
Ohhhhhhhh, DAYTONNNN....we've all got some major QUESTIONS for you now, re: Lorca and Drastic Measures....
Eh I don’t think so
while we haven’t been told when the mirror Buran was destroyed, the Prime Buran was destroyed sometime between episode 2 and 3, so Lorca in the new book is probably Prime. Based on Admiral Cornwall’s dialogue saying Lorca had been different since that incident, mirror Lorca probably showed up after it was destroyed. Hell I’d bet he’s the one who destroyed the Buran to get Prime Lorca out of the way
I may have missed the point of your post
Right -- but since Dayton's novel takes place around 2246 (over a decade prior to the show, during the Tarsus IV crisis), it'll be Prime Lorca that we'll be seeing really for the very first time ever, officially-speaking, which is why I made that first post, there. Otherwise, yup, your timeline still fits.
Otherwise, yup, your timeline still fits.
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