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How would you retcon Strange New Worlds?

I mean, TAS is only barely in continuity anyway. I would suggest the best way to handle this is to disregard parts of TAS that contradict the rest of the canon, not to adjust SNW to adhere to an obscure TAS character's design.
It was my understanding that the TAS wasn't cannon at all so there is no contradictions with SNW version of Admiral April.
 
Could the Gorn not have different breeds that look very different from one another?
QE8jEWM.jpeg

All 4 of these pictures are Dogs. Yet, they look extremely dissimilar. You get the idea.

All dogs walk on all four legs (not counting injuries). Newly "hatched" Gorn walk on 4 legs and have no arms. Adult Gorn walk on 2 legs and have 2 arms.

Does this imply a cocoon stage/metamorphosis? Is there a choice - can a Gorn choose to become a warrior race, or a brainiac race, etc?
 
Its 100 % canon like all Paramount Trek.
No it isn't.
At the end of the first season of Star Trek: The Next Generation, all licenses for Star Trek spin-off fiction were renegotiated, and the animated series was essentially "decanonized" by Gene Roddenberry's office. Writers of the novels, comics and role-playing games were prohibited from using concepts from the animated series in their works. Among the facts established within the animated series that were called into question by the "official canon" issue was its identification of Robert April as the first captain of the USS Enterprise in the episode "The Counter-Clock Incident".

The Star Trek Chronology by production staffers Michael Okuda and Denise Okuda does not include the animated series, but does include certain events from "Yesteryear" and acknowledges Robert April as first captain of the Enterprise.The timeline in Voyages of the Imagination dates the events of the series to 2269–2270, assuming the events of the show represented the final part of Kirk's five-year mission, and using revised Alan Dean Foster stardates. In the updated October 1999 edition of their book: The Star Trek Encyclopedia: A Reference Guide to the Future, Michael and Denise Okuda state that:

In a related vein, this work (i.e. book) adheres to Paramount studio policy that regards the animated Star Trek series as not being part of the "official" Star Trek universe, even though we count ourselves among that series' fans. Of course, the final decision as to the "authenticity" of the animated episodes, as with all elements of the show, must clearly be the choice of each individual reader.'

It's on par with the novels. While certain events or characters can be used, the series itself is not canon.
 
No it isn't.


It's on par with the novels. While certain events or characters can be used, the series itself is not canon.
Also from the Wiki
On June 27, 2007, Star Trek's official site incorporated information from The Animated Series into its library section,[28] with many pointing to this as evidence that the animated series is canon, though this has not been officially confirmed. Both David Gerrold and D. C. Fontana have stated that the animated series is essentially the fourth season that fans wanted originally.[29]
 
It was my understanding that the TAS wasn't cannon at all so there is no contradictions with SNW version of Admiral April.

It used to be that Paramount did not consider TAS canon.

These days, it's considered canon, but clearly a lot of things from it are not in continuity. Like, Robert April is clearly black instead of white as in TAS. And the Bonaventure 10281NCC is clearly not the first starship in history to have warp drive installed, as Scotty claimed in TAS "The Time Trap." And Koloth never faced Kirk in battle (as Jadzia says he told Curzon in DS9 "Trials and Tribble-ations") rather than having a battle with Kirk as in TAS "More Troubles, More Tribbles." And the idea that there was a major war between Humans and the Kzinti in 2069 (TAS "The Slaver Weapon"), just six years after First Contact, is just not plausible. And the idea that starship-mounted transporter technology could be 200 years old in the 2260s (TAS "The Terratin Incident") contradicts ENT. And obviously, Michael and Sybok were both part of the Sarek family household even though we didn't see them in TAS "Yesteryear."

Bottom line: TAS has a lot of little contradictions with the rest of canon. It's best to take a "broad strokes" approach and just let go of certain TAS details. Edited to add: Arguably, that's also true of parts of TOS -- especially elements of TOS that reflected widespread 1960s cultural values that we now reject, like the casually-accepted idea that women can't be starship commanders in "Turnabout Intruder."
 
All dogs walk on all four legs (not counting injuries). Newly "hatched" Gorn walk on 4 legs and have no arms. Adult Gorn walk on 2 legs and have 2 arms.

Does this imply a cocoon stage/metamorphosis?

It's important to remember that we still know next to nothing about Gorn biology or culture. We do not, for instance, know if Gorn is a species name or a cultural or political identity common to several different species. For all we know, the juvenile Gorn encountered aboard the wreck of the USS Peregrine might have been an entirely separate species from the Gorn captain that Kirk encountered on Cestus III almost a decade later, and they both might be separate species from the Gorn who tried to sabotage the USS Defiant in the Mirror Universe. Or, as you posit, they could all be the same species, and their juvenile forms undergo a metamorphosis before their mature forms develop.

Is there a choice - can a Gorn choose to become a warrior race, or a brainiac race, etc?

I would gently suggest that the idea that there's a such thing as a "warrior race" or a "brainiac race" is generally not going to be good biology. Gorn culture might hypothetically genetically engineer certain castes to be optimized for certain functions, but that's pure speculation with no evidence to support it. It's just as likely not the case, and also it's important not to fall into the trap of thinking in biological essentialist terms, since those terms of thinking tend to in real life lead to racial and sexual bigotry.

Anyway, the Gorn are a total blank slate. We don't even know if the Gorn La'an encountered as a child are from the same political faction the Enterprise encountered in 2259, or if either of them represent or were otherwise agents of the Gorn state that the Enterprise encountered in 2267. We don't know jack about their culture or their biology and a lot of different, mutually-contradictory hypotheses could all explain for the limited canonical information we have.
 
TBH the only thing in terms of retconing or keeping with canon is that somehow Kirk doesn't actually spend a ton of time with Pike since Kirk says he only met Chris briefly after his promotion to Fleet Captain.

If they bypass that, it's okay, but it's the only thing per say that is sticking out in my mind
 
It's important to remember that we still know next to nothing about Gorn biology or culture. We do not, for instance, know if Gorn is a species name or a cultural or political identity common to several different species. For all we know, the juvenile Gorn encountered aboard the wreck of the USS Peregrine might have been an entirely separate species from the Gorn captain that Kirk encountered on Cestus III almost a decade later, and they both might be separate species from the Gorn who tried to sabotage the USS Defiant in the Mirror Universe. Or, as you posit, they could all be the same species, and their juvenile forms undergo a metamorphosis before their mature forms develop

We don't know jack about their culture or their biology and a lot of different, mutually-contradictory hypotheses could all explain for the limited canonical information we have.

I want Trek to embrace more stories where other races and species aren't cultural or philosophical monoliths. Or that many planets could have several intelligent, biologically different species that evolved concurrently like the Xindi.
 
Yeah the Star Wars issue is a good example. When Disney took over they just did a blanket wipe of everything except the six Lucas movies and the Clone Wars CGI show. Everything else became legends and they've been selectively bringing what they want into canon again
 
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