This situation regarding Janeway's death and how it was written in Before Dishonor seems rather familiar to me. For those of us who read this forum back in 2005 it should remind us of another controversial death that took place on screen. Does this phrase sound familiar?
Not.Dead
What we have here is a similar situation that we had back then. A beloved character was killed in a way that a lot of fans felt wasn't worthy of said character. Some of the Not.Dead fans were just as hard core about his death and many saw them as just as militant and hardcore as the Bring Back Janeway are becoming. They made their opinions known to anyone who would listen and when they felt their pleas were going unheard the arguments became more heated. And if some one disagreed with them they fought back just as passionately as we're seeing here in regards to Kathryn Janeway.
Before Dishonor has become the These Are They Voygages of Trek lit. Some comments have been made about Mararet Clark and Peter David as were said about Brannon Braga and Rick Berman. And people are defending Clark and David in the exact same way as some defended Berman and Braga years ago. For example were the writers and creators of said series finale and novel lazy in their writing? Was there a conspiracy on their part to write bad stories. Did they sacrifice puppies in order to get their stories written and out there to the public? That last one was a joke but the tone of the comments about them personally have taken that kind of absurd direction. All we know for sure in regards to Janeway is that Clark decided to kill the character and that an author who was known for not liking the character was chosen to write it. Yeah that choice was probably the spark that ignited this fire.
I find that while back in 2006 the powers that be felt the need to "fix" what they considered a bad episode of television would be confused on why there are fans that would want the same thing to happen to what many see as a badly written novel. This what the author of the Enterprise Romulan Wars book said about TATV and the new direction the Enterprise novels took years ago....
So, whose decision was it to keep him alive, and to effectively rewrite much of what These Are the Voyages... established? “I hated the way Enterprise ended its run on television,” says Michael, adding that he “hated the casual way Trip Tucker was killed off. And I particularly hated the fact that the finale was written so that the Enterprise cast members were actually guest stars on their own farewell show - remember, the only ‘real’ characters we encountered in that episode were members of the Enterprise-D crew, more than two centuries after the time of Captain Archer and Enterprise NX-01.”
And he wasn’t the only one seeing things this way. “Andy had very similar feelings, as did our editor, Margaret Clark, who had first let us come aboard Enterprise with Last Full Measure - a book that, incidentally, made the initial ‘reveal’ that Trip was destined to live to a ripe old age, These Are the Voyages... notwithstanding.
“The idea of allowing Trip to survive his apparent death originally came from Margaret,” Michael reveals. “Andy and I loved the idea that we just might get the rare privilege of ‘rehabilitating’ what we considered a flawed episode - usually an unthinkable notion, since canon is generally inalterable - and Paula Block at CBS agreed that this was the way to proceed. We followed up on LFM’s glimpse of ‘old Trip’ in our second Enterprise novel, The Good That Men Do. So we adapted as much of the original episode as possible and inserted the results into the frame of the much larger story we wanted to tell: that of the beginning of Trip’s ‘afterlife’ - his new career as an undercover intelligence operative working behind the lines during the time leading up to the Romulan War.”
The decision wasn’t without its detractors, though, so how would Michael try to convince those people to give the Enterprise post-finale novels a try nonetheless? “The vast majority of this sort of criticism amounts to a slavish devotion to canon without bothering to think through what canon really is,” he believes. “As I said before, canon is ‘generally inalterable’, which means you can’t just rewrite it or dismiss it. But that doesn’t mean you can’t find legitimate loopholes once in a while.
“This story presented us with an extraordinary circumstance that so far as I can tell exists nowhere else in the Star Trek canon: the fact that the events related in These Are the Voyages... were presented at a remove, filtered through the prism of a holodeck program. We used the holodeck as a continuity loophole by questioning the quality of the program that Will Riker was running, which made the holodeck a classic case of what’s known in prose fiction as ‘the unreliable narrator’,” Michael explains, and elaborates that “for all we know, Riker’s NX-01 simulation program could have been written hastily only a month earlier, and might have been the product of shoddy research.
“Also, consider the fact that the American heroes of the Revolutionary period are about as far removed from our time as Captain Archer is from Will Riker’s time. How much of what Americans consider ‘common knowledge’ about the American Revolution is distorted by propaganda, tall-tale telling, and hero worship?” he ponders. “Why should Riker’s image of Jonathan Archer be any more accurate than the ideas most Americans have about their own nation’s Founding Fathers? And you have to add to that the implication we made that Section 31 may have made a deliberate effort to obscure certain historical events.
“Those who have gotten bent out of shape over the supposed ‘violation of canon’ we committed in reversing Trip’s death - and/or our adjustment of the story calendar from the eve of the first Federation Day to the run-up to the Romulan War - usually stop arguing once I’ve brought the preceding stuff to their attention,” Michael tells from experience. He’s also not sure whether Trip’s canon fate was as definitive as we were led to believe. “The finale episode itself contains a scene in which Archer, Phlox, and Trip exchange a strange look right before Trip’s apparent death that made me wonder whether Berman and Braga might not have been planning something not all that different from what Andy and I ended up doing with Trip - that is, faking his death while perhaps allowing history to record it as a fact - had the television series lasted another season.”
And despite the fact that he was involved with this perceived canon violation, Michael is trying to adhere to what was established onscreen as close as possible, but without falling into the trap of writing “continuity porn”.
“In comparison with many other properties, Star Trek has an exceptionally broad and deep continuity canon,” he acknowledges. “With the sole exception of the canon loophole the holodeck gave us for These Are the Voyages…, we approached Enterprise just as we did any of the other Trek franchises. Continuity-wise we didn’t stuff the kitchen sink in there just to do it, but we also didn’t want to overlook any references from the past that seemed particularly relevant to whatever here-and-now we were creating at the time.
This is a quote from Magaret Clark in 2007 from Trek Today:
In March it is full speed ahead with the new direction for Enterprise fiction as developed by Margaret Clark with the release of The Good that Men Do by Andy Mangels and Michael A. Martin. Margaret Clark is the editor at Pocket who oversees the Enterprise fiction, and like many fans she was very dissatisfied with the final episode of Enterprise, "These Are the Voyages...", particularly the death of Charles Tucker III (Trip). Unlike the rest of us, however, Margaret is in a position to do something about it.
"Thinking like a Star Trek editor you go, wait a minute, if we do this, this and this we can write part two and bring Trip back. The Good that Men Do is the second part of that show ("These Are the Voyages...") and where we find out what actually happened to Trip," stated Clark.
"Go back and watch the episode and there's a whole set-up there for why Trip decided that he had to die, and it leads into what Manny Coto wanted to do if there had been another season."
When the idea first struck Clark, she realized that the concept needed to be set up first, so she asked Mangels and Martin to make some last minute changes to their Enterprise novel Last Full Measure (May 2006).
"Last Full Measure had a prologue and afterward that I asked Mike and Andy to write. I told them I was going to ask them to do something that was going to drive the entire Enterprise community crazy. We find out in Last Full Measure that Trip is still alive and that's he's been hiding his identity for over 100 years."
In retrospect it seems that she was a Not.Dead supporter who could do something to right what she saw as a grievous wrong. That's not my opinion it's right there in her own words. I don't see why that decision was supported and a whole line of books retooled towards correcting the flaws of an episode but you have so many people, fans and authors alike, who act like they don't get where the Bring Back Janeway fans are coming from.
I remember when fans of Trip said they woudn't buy the books because he wasn't going to be in it. I remember the passion they had in their arguments. And yet while it seems that a lot of those were taken into account (Trip is alive and well) the Bring Back Janeway people are shunned and insulted and made fun of.
I am a Bring Back Janeway person in a lot of ways. I thought Before Dishnor was terrible. But I continued buying every single novel that's came out since. I think that Kirsten Beyer has become one of my favorite authors and is ranked up there on my list of favorites with Christopher and David Mack. I think that the Janeway she wrote in Full Circle was more true to the the character from the series than we've had since Voyager was relaunched. I think the fact Kirsten made this invitation in the way she did reinforces for me just what a talented and gracious lady she really is.
What would have the Not.Dead Trip Tucker fanatics say to someone who told them that they should appreciate Tucker's influence on Enterprise novels had he stayed dead in that series relaunch? That they should accept that death is a part of life and that not dealing with death in a way everyone else does means that there's something wrong with them? I'd bet real money that they would have eaten those people for breakfast had that suggestion be made to them. Were the Not.Dead people over the top sometimes? You bet ya. Are the Bring Back Janeway people over the top as well sometimes? Damned Straight. But it's very hypocritical to me that the Janeway fans are treated with less understanding than the Not.Dead Trip fans.
In the seventh season episode of Voyager: Shattered, Janeway intends to change her future for the benefit of her crew. But Chakotay shares with her what the crew will accomplish on their mission to get home. And to me is what the driving force of Voyager always was about.
Captain Kathryn Janeway: If the temporal anomaly doesn't kill them, something else will, the Borg, telepathic pitcher plants, macroviruses - the Delta Quadrant is a death trap!
Chakotay: What about the Temporal Prime Directive?
Captain Kathryn Janeway: To hell with it!
Chakotay: With all due respect, it's a little presumptuous to think you have the right to change everyone's future.
Captain Kathryn Janeway: From what I've seen, they'll thank me.
Chakotay: All you've seen are bits and pieces. You're not getting the whole picture.
Captain Kathryn Janeway: Really? Just what am I missing?
Chakotay: It's not 'what', it's 'who'. People like Seven of Nine, a Borg drone, who'll become a member of this crew, after you help her recover her humanity. Or Tom Paris, a former convict, who'll be our pilot, chief medic, and a husband to B'Elanna Torres.
Captain Kathryn Janeway: That angry woman I just met?
Chakotay: She's gonna be your Chief Engineer. Two crews, Maquis and Starfleet, are gonna become one; and they'll make as big a mark on the Delta Quadrant as it'll make on them, by protecting people like the Ocampans, curing diseases, encouraging peace. Children like Naomi and Icheb are gonna grow up on this ship and call it home. And we'll all be following our Captain, who sets a course for Earth and never stops believing that we'll get there.
So while I've loved Full Circle and Unworthy, I realize that after writing this post just what seems missing from the Voyager relaunch as a whole in my opinion. The entire Voyager series itself was as much about Janeway and her drive to get her crew/family home as it was about being stuck in the Delta Quadrant. When Janeway was killed in Before Dishonor it was as if the novel took the driving force behind seven years of the show and snuffed it out in a way that seems ludicrous to many fans.
Using the above quote from Magaret Clark it would be cool if she or someone like her would say something like this in the future about Janeway.
In March it is full speed ahead with the new direction for Voyager fiction as developed by Margaret Clark with the release of Full Circle by Kirsten Beyer. Margaret Clark is the editor at Pocket who oversees the Voyager fiction, and like many fans she was very dissatisfied with the final novel for Kathryn Janeway in "Before Dishonor...", particularly the death of Admiral Janeway. Unlike the rest of us, however, Margaret is in a position to do something about it.
"Thinking like a Star Trek editor you go, wait a minute, if we do this, this and this we can write part two and bring Kathryn back. Full Circle is the second part of that novel ("Before Dishonor ...") and where we find out what actually happened to Kathryn Janeway" stated Clark.
"Go back and read the book and there's a whole set-up there for why Admiral Janeway decided that she had to die, and it leads into what Kirsten Beyer wanted to do if there had been another set of story lines that included the famed Captain."
When the idea first struck Clark, she realized that the concept needed to be set up first, so she asked Kirsten Beyer to make some last minute changes to her Voyager novel Full Circle (2009).
"Full Circle" had a prologue and afterward that I asked Kirsten Beyer to write. I told her I was going to ask them to do something that was going to drive the entire Voyager community crazy. We find out in Unworthy that Janeway is still alive and that's she's been hiding out with the Q, watching and waiting for the right time to return to her Voyager family."
To the writers, even Peter David, thank you for the talent you've shared with us over the years. For better and worse you have given me years of reading enjoyment. I'm sorry that some people take criticism of the work you produce too far sometimes. But isn't an amazing thing to watch as people share their feelings about a series that breathes and lives life after over 45 years. I thank the editors past, present and future for their contributions. I do hope to see Janeway return one day. One of my favorite parts of the DS9 novel Unity is Sisko's return. Hopefully we'll see the same thing for Kathryn one day. But even if we don't, I'll still buy the novels that are produced. The good, bad and the ugly. Because I for one intend to do everything I can to help keep Trek alive. Just like I know you guys are trying to do everytime you get an idea for a new novel.
Live Long and Prosper
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