Well it’s hard to argue with that. 
Spoilers Discovery and the Novelverse - TV show discussion thread
- Thread starter F. King Daniel
- Start date
Don’t ruin it.
Suddenly, I remember why "But they didn't 'really' happen" was such a persuasive argument for not reading the books in the '90s.
"Well," I thought watching the episode, "this is unlikely to be a coincidence, because they'd surely realize that any casual fan trying to figure out if it were a reference to the past or a tease of the future (a question I have to answer five times an episode for my non-Trekkie friend watching with me) will immediately google 'Section 31 CONTROL' after the end of the episode and find there's literally a book named 'Section 31: Control' and assume that's what that's about, so if it was unrelated, they'd have just picked any other word in the entirety of the english language." Seriously, there's someone on the show whose job it is just to research the names they make up to ensure there's no confusion or conflicts, as famous Sci-Fi characters Jackson Archer and Paul Tigh can attest.
Sigh. Is it wrong that I kind of hope people do google "Section 31 Control," fan speculation goes wild, and somebody from the show has to talk it down, a la poor Ron Moore and the late-run BSG theory that the briefly-alluded-to lost Number Seven Cylon model would end up being the key to everything?
"Well," I thought watching the episode, "this is unlikely to be a coincidence, because they'd surely realize that any casual fan trying to figure out if it were a reference to the past or a tease of the future (a question I have to answer five times an episode for my non-Trekkie friend watching with me) will immediately google 'Section 31 CONTROL' after the end of the episode and find there's literally a book named 'Section 31: Control' and assume that's what that's about, so if it was unrelated, they'd have just picked any other word in the entirety of the english language." Seriously, there's someone on the show whose job it is just to research the names they make up to ensure there's no confusion or conflicts, as famous Sci-Fi characters Jackson Archer and Paul Tigh can attest.
Sigh. Is it wrong that I kind of hope people do google "Section 31 Control," fan speculation goes wild, and somebody from the show has to talk it down, a la poor Ron Moore and the late-run BSG theory that the briefly-alluded-to lost Number Seven Cylon model would end up being the key to everything?
Hm.
Well, personally, I’m comfortable with calling them divergent timelines if that’s an irreconcilable difference with the novels - like, this has happened to Star Trek before, back in the eighties. There are still strong, solid Star Trek stories from that period that didn’t just stop existing the moment that TNG established something incompatible with them. Some even later were referenced, decades later, even if in broad strokes format, so the past was still respected. And it may not be mutually exclusive once some more comes out, and, potentially, a handwave established.
I mean, if anything, now that we have one roadmap of a post-Nemesis landscape (two if you count Star Trek Online), another would be kinda interesting to see as well. Like, that’s always been part of the appeal of fanfiction, getting multiple ways to look at the same event, going in diverging paths. Liscenced fiction has to follow a road map much more stringently, of course, but the concept still applies if the novels’ continuity gets upended - characters who met an end in the books can be reintroduced and reexplored, new and interesting directions get opened up for characters who’d been set...
Yeah, it sucks that the ongoing story ends, but that ending opens the door for more stories at the same time. One can mourn what you’re losing and be excited for what may come.
If anything, my problem is just going to come in how I arrange things on my shelf...
Well, personally, I’m comfortable with calling them divergent timelines if that’s an irreconcilable difference with the novels - like, this has happened to Star Trek before, back in the eighties. There are still strong, solid Star Trek stories from that period that didn’t just stop existing the moment that TNG established something incompatible with them. Some even later were referenced, decades later, even if in broad strokes format, so the past was still respected. And it may not be mutually exclusive once some more comes out, and, potentially, a handwave established.
I mean, if anything, now that we have one roadmap of a post-Nemesis landscape (two if you count Star Trek Online), another would be kinda interesting to see as well. Like, that’s always been part of the appeal of fanfiction, getting multiple ways to look at the same event, going in diverging paths. Liscenced fiction has to follow a road map much more stringently, of course, but the concept still applies if the novels’ continuity gets upended - characters who met an end in the books can be reintroduced and reexplored, new and interesting directions get opened up for characters who’d been set...
Yeah, it sucks that the ongoing story ends, but that ending opens the door for more stories at the same time. One can mourn what you’re losing and be excited for what may come.
If anything, my problem is just going to come in how I arrange things on my shelf...
So I'm presuming that Discovery is just referencing Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy in the same way you did?
Do you mean to tell us that the producers of Discovery just so happened to decide that the controlling authority for Section 31 was called Control and they came to this conclusion without reading your excellent novel "Section 31: Control"?
Well, it's not like it's an improbable name for a controlling authority...
Yeah. I stand corrected.Well it’s hard to argue with that.
Are the Spock/Burnham revelations in the latest episode still compatible with Desperate Hours? I haven't finished the novel yet. I'm wondering why the books were so eager to start dealing with Burnham/Spock history if it was going to be covered on the show barely a year later?
So they'd sell more?
Funny way of going about it, as Spock is not featured on the cover of Desperate Hours and the official description of the book on Amazon for the kindle version doesn't mention Spock at all.
After last night's episode, it seems unlikely? But it might be one of those 'We haven't spoken as father and son' or 'from a certain point of view' kind of things, lol. You could argue that, as Starfleet officers on a mission, they just had to do what they had to do and it didn't count, so it could have happened... But there was an emotional arc in that story that really doesn't seem to fit anymore. Next week, if Saru and Number One don't seem to already know each other, I suppose that will be enough to say no?
Because TV producers do not generally plan out the entire multi-season arcs of their shows before the shows even premiere. (Even the ones who do, like J. Michael Straczynski for Babylon 5, end up making major changes to their initial plans in response to real-life exigencies.) Especially when the original showrunner ends up getting fired before the pilot's even finished.
And because the primary purpose of tie-in novels is promotion, not continuity. The best way to promote a new Star Trek series is to tie it in with the older ones. And when you don't want to spoil the serialized arc of your show's first season, it helps to tell a story that draws largely on characters and concepts from an earlier show.
But that line has the wiggle room already built in -- they haven't spoken as father and son, which means they have spoken as Starfleet officer and Vulcan ambassador, without acknowledging a family relationship.
Yes, I meant that as an example of how the story could still fit. Perhaps Michael and Spock have spoken, just not as brother and sister. That 'from a certain point of view' they have not spoken since whatever she did to him that split them apart, allowing for Desperate Hours to still, maybe, fit.
This, I think, is the biggest reason.
I have to confess I got excited for a second when Leland mentioned Control, but then I realized that that has been used as the name for the person/thing in charge of spy agencies before, so it was probably just a coincidence. I came into the thread with a tiny bit of hope left that it wasn't a coincidence, but it sounds like it was.
Although one thing was consistent with the book. Amanda saying she showed more emotion towards Burnham and not Spock, because she couldn't.
Bryan Fuller requested Desperate Hours use the Enterprise and Spock because he had no plans for them on the show. Obviously, his successors had different ideas.