Is Entetprise over?

[JD]

I don't think I'd say pointless, I know that a lot of characters are spread around now, but that doesn't mean new characters can't be introduced. And we do have two Typhon Pact novels involving DS9 characters coming out in a couple months, for all we know they could end with all or most of the characters back together on the station.

Well let's take stock(correct me if I'm wrong on any of these, ds9 characters are hell to keep up with)

Sisko - sadly keeping the hell away from the bajor system thanks to rboe

Yeah, but he does appear to be involved in some events that occur in the Bajor system in the new TP books.

Kira - possible but quite a bit of writing required since she's all vedek'd up

But she's still alive, and in the Bajor system, so it wouldn't be that hard for her to end up back on the station. She doesn't have to be in Starfleet to continue to play a role in the story.

Garak - part of the cardassian government and focused on trying to rebuild cardassia so unlikely for anything but a cameo

He didn't play much of a role in the relaunch 1.0, so I don't see why this would be a problem.

Nog - nagus so cameo only

Actually Nog's father Rom is Nagus, and as far as I know that hasn't changed after Destiny. I haven't read Indistinguishable from Magic yet, so I don't know exactly what it established about what he's been up to, but I do know that the Challenger was destroyed in the end of it, so I don't see why he couldn't end up back on the station.

quark - yes
jake sisko - not really relevant since he's not a kid anymore

I don't see why his being an adult would make him less important to the series. He was already an adult by the end of the show, and he still played a big role in it, not to mention his continued presence in the relaunch. Hell, he got a relaunch 1.0 novel focused entirely on him.

odo - lot of writing required

He didn't play much of a role in the relaunch 1.0, so I don't see why this would be a problem.

ezri - no(thank god)

Yeah, but she is in command of a ship of the line, so she could easily still pop up from time to time. You also ignored Bowers, Leishman, and Tarses, who were all fairly prominent DS9 Relaunch 1.0 characters.

bashir - doing all that secret agent stupidity, I would be absurdly happy if that was junked and he went back to ds9, but seems unlikely

He and Sarina did go back to the station at the end, and we saw him continuing to act as the station CMO, so he's still playing a role on the station.

o'brien - possible, we have no idea what he's doing right now since the fun short story on cardassia.

He didn't play much of a role in the relaunch 1.0, so I don't see this being much of a problem.
And you forgot some characters:
Leeta - Married to Rom and still on Ferenginar
Kasidy - Now divorced from Sisko, but I believe she is still living on Bajor. Is friends with other major characters so she could conceivably still play a role, especially if Sisko become a big part of the series after the TP books.
Ro - Still on the station and now it's captain.
Prynn - Still on the station, not entirely sure if she's playing a new role though.
Ch'Thane: Last seen on Andor during Paths of Disharmony. I believe he stayed there when Andor left the Federation.
Vaughn - Still on the station, last seen in a comatose state, but at the end of Zero Sum Game he appeared to be improving.
Mathias - Current status unknown
Richter - Current status unknown
Kol - Current status unknown
Desca - Current status unknown
Naran - Still on the station
Trier - Current status unknown
Hetik - Current status unknown

 

[zarkon]

Well, I couldn't care less what any of the relaunch characters are doing since I didn't connect with any of them. And having tv characters "just show up" in different roles isn't really good enough. So I'm happy to stick with "pointless" on a ds9 redux.

 

[MatthiasRussell]

I don't see why it is hard to believe the NX-01 ould be pulled out of mothballs. If Starfleet wanted a test vehicle, perhaps it makes sense to refit a decommisioned ship than pull an in service ship from duty to participate in an experiment which could permanently remove it from the fleet.

1. Because it's not established to be in "mothballs;" it's established to be a museum ship. That means that it's being preserved because of its historic importance. You wouldn't use a ship you want preserved for future generations as a testbed for new designs.

2. Again, you face the question of why it's not included in the list of Federation starships Enterprise if you have the NX-01 being used as anything other than a decommissioned museum ship.

Who knows when the NX-01 was sent to a museum? We know from the final episode of ENT that it was being decommisioned, not sent to a museum. Safing it for display could have happened many years later. Even if the finale said the NX-01 was being immediately sent to a museum, we know we can't trust a lot of the details from that episode in trek lit.

In fact, there are many modern airplanes and ships which are retired, then refit to another use. Some are even retired, then restored to their production design for display. Cousteau's original Calypso, for example, was not designed to be an exploration ship. Cousteau bought it, refit it, and adapted it for research. The same is true of many bombers which were refit to fight fires.

I don't know why the NX-01 would be adopted into a UFP Starfleet without it upsetting the 1701's place as the original. But when you look at display's of the enterprise history on the walls of Archr's ready room, the TMP rec room, and the TNG conference room there are numerous Enterprises missing. Even those 3 displays don't agree! So saying the NX-01 was used by the UFP isn't that much of a stretch.

 

[Sci]

I don't see why it is hard to believe the NX-01 ould be pulled out of mothballs. If Starfleet wanted a test vehicle, perhaps it makes sense to refit a decommisioned ship than pull an in service ship from duty to participate in an experiment which could permanently remove it from the fleet.

1. Because it's not established to be in "mothballs;" it's established to be a museum ship. That means that it's being preserved because of its historic importance. You wouldn't use a ship you want preserved for future generations as a testbed for new designs.

2. Again, you face the question of why it's not included in the list of Federation starships Enterprise if you have the NX-01 being used as anything other than a decommissioned museum ship.

Who knows when the NX-01 was sent to a museum? We know from the final episode of ENT that it was being decommisioned, not sent to a museum.

No, both were established in the same episode.

Safing it for display could have happened many years later.

Even if that's the case, that again raises the question of why the ship would be decommissioned in the first place, and of how you'd reconcile the NX-01 being in active service for the Federation yet it not being the first Federation starship Enterprise.

Even if the finale said the NX-01 was being immediately sent to a museum, we know we can't trust a lot of the details from that episode in trek lit.

Again, it's a lot easier to fake a single person's death than to fake a starship's retirement. People aren't in the habit of digging up corpses (or tracking down bodies buried in space); they need only look out the window to see if a decommissioned museum ship is in port.

I don't know why the NX-01 would be adopted into a UFP Starfleet without it upsetting the 1701's place as the original.

Because then the 1701 would no longer be the original Federation starship Enterprise.

But when you look at display's of the enterprise history on the walls of Archr's ready room, the TMP rec room, and the TNG conference room there are numerous Enterprises missing.

Yes -- all pre-Federation. Meanwhile, it's been explicitly established in dialogue, by numerous independent characters across numerous series, that it is a matter of historical fact that there have only been, as of the 2380s, six Federation starships Enterprise. That some pre-Federation ships named Enterprise have been left out of ship lineage set decorations is not evidence that there were actually seven Federation starships Enterprise.

So I really don't think there's a plausible way to do ENT novels set after the Founding of the Federation that keep the NX-01 in active service. Its destiny is pretty clearly established, and there's no real wiggle room to keep it plausibly in use under the Federation flag: Enterprise NX-01 was decommissioned in 2161 and turned into a museum ship.

 

[MatthiasRussell]

Perhaps when reused the NX-01 was used as a research role, not a fully commissioned vessel. This happens today. An aircraft is retired as a warplane and relocated to flight test duty where it is no longer listed on the active duty roster.

 

[Sci]

behaps when reused the NX-01 was used as a research role, not a fully commissioned vessel. This happens today. An aircraft is retired as a warplane and relocated to flight test duty where it is no longer listed on the active duty roster.

Maybe, but then we're just splitting hairs to try to justify a needless continuity break. It just ceases to be plausible that Federates of the 23rd and 24th Centuries wouldn't consider the NX-01 to have been a Federation starship Enterprise.

And for what purpose? Frankly, it seems to me that the story of ENT had a logical conclusion in the Founding of the Federation, and that there's really no reason to keep it going afterwards. Sure, I can see a novel about this or that ENT character -- but ENT itself, I think, is just done. The story feels finished. Trying to keep it going now would be like trying to keep doing Babylon 5 after the Interstellar Alliance has moved to Minbar, or Battlestar Galactica after the Colonials have settled on Earth. Or trying to do a sequel to James Cameron's Titanic.

 

[Skywalker]

Archer and the gang taking out a mothballed NX-01 for "one last hurrah" just sounds tacky as all get out, I'm sorry. It reminds me of something the old TOS-era novels would have done back in the old days. I'm fully in favor of continuing the adventures of Archer and his crew in the early days of the Federation, but they don't need to be aboard Enterprise for that to happen.

 

[MatthiasRussell]

Frankly, it seems to me that the story of ENT had a logical conclusion in the Founding of the Federation, and that there's really no reason to keep it going afterwards. Sure, I can see a novel about this or that ENT character -- but ENT itself, I think, is just done. The story feels finished.

As I've said, you could say the same about Voyager and DS9, but the authors are telling great post-series stories. There are a lot of great ideas I could pitch for how to do this and involve the NX-01, but I don't wish to ruin any more projects for the authors.

Trying to keep it going now would be like trying to keep doing Babylon 5 after the Interstellar Alliance has moved to Minbar.

I would have watched this. J. Michael Straczynski is a great story teller. If he attempted to keep going, it probably would have been good. As it is, Babylon 5 had 3 books set after the show that told what happened with the Alliance and on Centari Prime. They were quite good. On a side note, I also enjoyed Crusade and was saddened it only lasted 1 season.

 

[Sci]

Frankly, it seems to me that the story of ENT had a logical conclusion in the Founding of the Federation, and that there's really no reason to keep it going afterwards. Sure, I can see a novel about this or that ENT character -- but ENT itself, I think, is just done. The story feels finished.

As I've said, you could say the same about Voyager and DS9, but the authors are telling great post-series stories.

I don't think you could say the same about DS9. The closest thing it would have had to a natural end-point would have been the admission of Bajor to the Federation, which never happened in the series.

You might argue that Voyager's reaching Earth constituted a natural end-point, and in a way, you'd be right. I think there's a reason the VOY Relaunch fell apart until Marco and Kirsten decided to send them back to the Delta Quadrant; as just another ship in the Alpha Quadrant, Voyager stopped being an interesting setting. Only by doing something completely different from the rest of the 24th Century series, by sending Voyager and a fleet out to the Delta Quadrant, did the VOY Relaunch prove successful.

But there's still a difference between ENT and DS9 & VOY: ENT had an expiration date from Day One. It was already a given when "Broken Bow" aired that the Enterprise NX-01 was either going to be destroyed or retired before the Founding of the Federation, because we already knew that she could never be a Federation starship Enterprise. The U.S.S. Voyager, by contrast, didn't cease to be a viable setting upon reaching Earth (though it did cease to be an interesting setting until it was sent back to the Delta Quadrant); Starbase Deep Space 9 did not cease to be a viable, interesting setting just because the Dominion War ended, as there were numerous story threads left over from the series that needed to be followed up on.

But the NX-01? She was interesting because she established Earth as an important planet, and because she was vital to the Founding of the Federation. But it was always a given that when the Federation came, the ship would cease to play a narrative role, because we always knew the 1701 was the first Federation starship Enterprise. The setting itself had a built-in expiration date in the way Voyager and Deep Space 9 did not.

Trying to keep it going now would be like trying to keep doing Babylon 5 after the Interstellar Alliance has moved to Minbar.

I would have watched this.

I would not. Babylon 5 was specifically designed to be a single, five-season-long "novel for television," with a distinct beginning, middle, and end. A story that keeps going after it's supposed to end is usually just forced and bad.

 

[MatthiasRussell]

I understand the end of B5 was planned from the beginning. However, as I stated, 3 great novels came after the show to wrap up cliffhangers that were woven into the final episodes. You could say B5 itself set the stage for another season.

That said, after THOSE books, the central story was over. In the same way, I can see ENT having a few stories left to it. Not many, but a few. However, The Romulan War killed a lot of enthusiasm for the series in its poor quality.

That said, if a really great writer like David Mack pitched an Ent book, S&S would probably give it a chance as would readers. Who would have thought Beyer could turn Voyager around as well as she did?

We're gonna have to agree to disagree on this, Sci. We'll just keep going in circles on this one. And if you haven't read the 3 B5 "Legions of Fire" books," please do. They really help tie up some loose ends.

 

[ALF]

Enterprise (as a continuation of the series ending at season 4) should be revisited in graphic novel format.

 

[JD]

Well, I couldn't care less what any of the relaunch characters are doing since I didn't connect with any of them. And having tv characters "just show up" in different roles isn't really good enough. So I'm happy to stick with "pointless" on a ds9 redux.

I really had no problem at all connecting to the Relaunch characters, honestly at this point Vaughn, Prynn, Shar, Ro, Taran'atar, and Treir are just as much a part of the DS9 story as Sisko, Kira, Bashir, or Quark. I am very interested to see what becomes of Vaugh, and Prynn, and I can't wait to get some more "screen" time for Captain Ro. Obviously I am not the only one who feels this way who feels this way since there have been 20 Relaunch novels (22 if you want to include the Typhon Pact books), 1 novella, several SCE crossover novellas, and a comic book miniseries that all feature Relaunch characters, (not to mention the three or four non-DS9 novels that feature Vaughn. Then there are the 8 novels, and 1 novella and short story in the Vanguard series, which feature T'Prynn, a characters originally introduced in the DS9R) . So, while you may not be interested in more DS9 Relaunch stories , I wouldn't say they are pointless.

 

[Therin of Andor]

Enterprise (as a continuation of the series ending at season 4) should be revisited in graphic novel format.

Sadly, IDW's number-crunching failed to get a positive result for this one.

 

[zarkon]

I really had no problem at all connecting to the Relaunch characters, honestly at this point Vaughn, Prynn, Shar, Ro, Taran'atar, and Treir are just as much a part of the DS9 story as Sisko, Kira, Bashir, or Quark. I am very interested to see what becomes of Vaugh, and Prynn, and I can't wait to get some more "screen" time for Captain Ro. Obviously I am not the only one who feels this way who feels this way since there have been 20 Relaunch novels (22 if you want to include the Typhon Pact books), 1 novella, several SCE crossover novellas, and a comic book miniseries that all feature Relaunch characters, (not to mention the three or four non-DS9 novels that feature Vaughn. Then there are the 8 novels, and 1 novella and short story in the Vanguard series, which feature T'Prynn, a characters originally introduced in the DS9R) . So, while you may not be interested in more DS9 Relaunch stories , I wouldn't say they are pointless.

Well that's fine, I guess we just have different opinions on what's boring as hell.

 

[Daddy Todd]

Frankly, it seems to me that the story of ENT had a logical conclusion in the Founding of the Federation, and that there's really no reason to keep it going afterwards. Sure, I can see a novel about this or that ENT character -- but ENT itself, I think, is just done. The story feels finished.

As I've said, you could say the same about Voyager and DS9, but the authors are telling great post-series stories. There are a lot of great ideas I could pitch for how to do this and involve the NX-01, but I don't wish to ruin any more projects for the authors.

Trying to keep it going now would be like trying to keep doing Babylon 5 after the Interstellar Alliance has moved to Minbar.

I would have watched this. J. Michael Straczynski is a great story teller. If he attempted to keep going, it probably would have been good. As it is, Babylon 5 had 3 books set after the show that told what happened with the Alliance and on Centari Prime. They were quite good. On a side note, I also enjoyed Crusade and was saddened it only lasted 1 season.

Babylon 5 had NINE novels set after the series - the Centauri trilogy, the Psi Corps/Bester trilogy, and the Techno-Mage trilogy.

 

[Sci]

Frankly, it seems to me that the story of ENT had a logical conclusion in the Founding of the Federation, and that there's really no reason to keep it going afterwards. Sure, I can see a novel about this or that ENT character -- but ENT itself, I think, is just done. The story feels finished.

As I've said, you could say the same about Voyager and DS9, but the authors are telling great post-series stories. There are a lot of great ideas I could pitch for how to do this and involve the NX-01, but I don't wish to ruin any more projects for the authors.

Trying to keep it going now would be like trying to keep doing Babylon 5 after the Interstellar Alliance has moved to Minbar.

I would have watched this. J. Michael Straczynski is a great story teller. If he attempted to keep going, it probably would have been good. As it is, Babylon 5 had 3 books set after the show that told what happened with the Alliance and on Centari Prime. They were quite good. On a side note, I also enjoyed Crusade and was saddened it only lasted 1 season.

Babylon 5 had NINE novels set after the series - the Centauri trilogy, the Psi Corps/Bester trilogy, and the Techno-Mage trilogy.

And none of them "continued" any arcs leftover from the series, because the series finished all of its arcs. The Drakh control of Centauri Prime, for instance? We already knew how it ended: With Londo and G'Kar, killing each other, and the Drakh losing control of the Centauri government. All the Legion of Fire trilogy was explain how things got from Point A to Point B.

 

[MatthiasRussell]

The Drakh/Centari Prime story gave us an ending. TOS gave us an ending to the Romulan War- humans won. That isn't the story of what went down though. The Drakh story gave us the in between which made more sense of the ending. It also told us of what happened when David Sheridan was given the Centari urn.

As for the Psi Corp, the whole series built up than a telepath war was coming and we were all left hoping bester would eventually get what he deserved. With the books, we got our answers. I'd say B5 left a lot open.

 

[Fer]

(Deleted. I realized I misunderstood the previous post so my reply was way off base.)

 

[Idran]

I would not. Babylon 5 was specifically designed to be a single, five-season-long "novel for television," with a distinct beginning, middle, and end. A story that keeps going after it's supposed to end is usually just forced and bad.

And JMS used up his original plan at the end of the fourth season when the show was on the fence and he was expecting a possible cancellation to come down the pipe, and had to stretch what little he hadn't covered to fill the fifth.

Babylon 5 was far less preplanned than people think, because you simply logistically can't plan a long-form television serial that far in advance and with that much detail. You can plot out the major story beats in advance, but things shift around once filming starts as you come up with new ideas, you see plot threads didn't work in practice as well as you thought from the outline, new facets of the characters emerge from the way the actors play their roles and take them in directions you didn't foresee, etc. etc. Beyond that, there's simply too much unpredictability on the procedural end for that to work out, from filming trouble to executive issues to problems with actors to contract negotiations falling through.

Now, B5 is probably the closest any long-form serial on TV has come to being planned out in advance, but it was still nowhere near as set in stone as all that.

 

[Sci]

The Drakh/Centari Prime story gave us an ending.

No, the B5 TV series gave us an ending. The Centauri Prime novels just showed us how they got from the penultimate episode of B5 to that ending.

TOS gave us an ending to the Romulan War- humans won.

Yes, and that's an excellent comparison. We know how the Romulan War ended; all the ENT books needed to do was show us how we got there and then it's time to end them. We know how Londo and G'Kar died; all the books needed to d was show us how they got there, and then it was time for the books to end.

I would not. Babylon 5 was specifically designed to be a single, five-season-long "novel for television," with a distinct beginning, middle, and end. A story that keeps going after it's supposed to end is usually just forced and bad.

And JMS used up his original plan at the end of the fourth season when the show was on the fence and he was expecting a possible cancellation to come down the pipe, and had to stretch what little he hadn't covered to fill the fifth.

Not exactly. He had to accelerate part of his remaining story to try to fit as much as possible into Season Four when he thought Season Four would be the end, and then he had to take other aspects he hadn't accelerated and try to make them fit into Season Five.

But either way, Babylon 5 was still designed to end, not to keep going ad infinitum. The exact details of how it reached that ending are not relevant; that it was designed to end is the point.