Star Trek Vanguard: The Finale Thread (SPOILERS)

[David Mack]

Hi, folks!

With the Star Trek Vanguard saga's finale coming any day now, I thought it might be good to have a thread for discussion of the series as a whole, and in which all of you could ask questions relating to the content I'll be posting to my website over the next few weeks here:

Vanguard — The Finale Page
​

From my recent blog post introducing the page:

To kick off the beginning of the end for the saga I helped nurture into existence seven years ago, I’m sharing a little bit of behind-the-scenes content from the series’ development:

• An early design schematic that shows a much larger footprint for the station;
• Masao Okazaki‘s exterior and interior designs for the U.S.S. Sagittarius;
• My internal memos about the plucky scout ship’s crew and capabilities;
• and links to past interviews, blog posts, and podcasts about the saga.

Another fun treat: a special desktop wallpaper image composed of the eight original cover art images from the series, rendered by Doug Drexler.

Need more? When fellow Vanguard author Dayton Ward moved his website a while back, his annotations for the series’ second book, Summon the Thunder, got lost in the shuffle. Now those annotations make their triumphant return via my website (with his permission, of course). Also, I’d never gotten around to annotating the third book, Reap the Whirlwind … until now. That’s right, Vanguard fans — brand-new annotations for the series’ pivotal volume.

In the weeks to come, I plan to add more content to the page, including Vanguard‘s original series bible, the post-Harbinger addendum to the series bible, and new audio interviews and podcasts with myself, Dayton Ward, Kevin Dilmore, and Marco Palmieri.

Also, just a reminder, you have until next Tuesday, March 13, at 11:59PM EDT to submit your questions — here, on either of my blogs, my Facebook author page or personal page, or as a reply to my Twitter feed — for the Vanguard Farewell Podcast.

From all eligible entries I'll choose two winners to receive complete autographed sets of the Vanguard saga — that's all eight print-original books, signed by the authors.

So stick around, folks — the party’s just getting started!

 

[Christopher]

I like how the Sagittarius apparently has a couple of TRON lightcycles in its cargo bay...

 

[CaptainDonovin]

it took me a bit to get into this series but once I did I was hooked. Sad to see it end but All Good Things...

Thanks for a great series, though sad I'm excited to see how it finishes up.

 

[JD]

Vanguard quickly became a favorite of mine, so I'm sad to see it go. But at the same time I'm kinda happy that it's ending while the story is still going strong, and still short enough that I can reread the whole series in a fairly short amount of time. I'm definitely going to be rereading it, probably several more times over the next few years.

 

[CommodoreNero]

What really drew me to this series was how truly real, it felt. There's always been a bit of an antiseptic unreality attached to Star Trek and how it really never feels like it could grow out of our world. The Vanguard characters really seem like real people. How they speak, what they do, how they interact... It all seems perfectly realized.

And, I would love to see a movie version, if only to see Ms. Karume cast.

 

[Yevetha]

Nice to see some more annotations. I love those.

 

[fleetcaptain]

Nice, going to take a look at it now myself. Glad you came up with this Mack.

 

[flandry84]

Just to add to the sentiments expressed above.Vanguard has become absolutely my favourite iteration of the Star Trek universe,and I am very sad to see it go.
People are probably sick of me saying this but Vanguard is Star Trek as it would be done by HBO.
Hopefully the Vanguard project will lead to more mini-series and if not at least a grittier more realistic approach to Treklit.

 

[Patrick O'Brien]

Thanks for the links David We are all looking forward to the podcast. It's sad Vanguard is wraping up but i'm very excited to see how the series ends.

 

[Ronald Held]

Thanks for the pages and links, David. it is a shame that this series is ended, for it is one of the best in a long time.

 

[Relayer1]

Thanks for the pages and links, David. it is a shame that this series is ended, for it is one of the best in a long time.

Two words -

'Spin' and 'off'.

 

[Sxottlan]

I'm realizing that I haven't commented at all about the fact that Vanguard is ending.

I've long advocated that the series not go on forever, but now that it's really ending it does feel surreal. To actually have a series finale in the books is so unique. But I'm glad for it, especially since New Frontier has become such a cautionary tale about the dangers of being never-ending.

Looking back, I remember reading the post on this board announcing the series. I can't believe 7 years have already gone by. That's about the normal running time of some Trek series, so the timing is apt. It's amazing how much the Treklit community has really latched onto this series. While I'm sure it's because of a great many reasons, I can't help but think one important reason is because a fan ended up helping create the look of the Vanguard universe. Now the Archer-class appears to have become a fan favorite (with another appearing in That Which Divides) and best of all, a Watchtower-class (or variant) space station has been retconned into on camera TOS. Incredible!

 

[Avro Arrow]

David Mack, thanks for posting your Vanguard Finale page... cool stuff! It's like getting DVD bonus features for the books. I'll certainly be checking back to see the new additions.

Although it's sad to see such an excellent series come to an end, I'm really looking forward to Storming Heaven to see how it all goes down!

 

[Mage]

In a way, I'm glad that Vanguard will end, meaning that it can actually have an ending. I love Vanguard, I've only started reading it in 2011, and I'm already re-reading it so I'm fully charged for the last novel. Vanguard changed TOS for me, showing there was far more to the 23rd century then just Kirk and co. Great writing, good drama, fantastic characters, witty humor, terror and angst, action, heroics, romance, even some courtroom drama and some glimpses into colonial life in Star Trek.

And what I feared the most, was that it was going to get dragged along, stretching it out over to many novels, putting to much in there. Ever since Open Secrets, there has been this unnerving feeling of things building up to something terrible and dangerous, building suspence. If that was dragged along to long, it would have become tidious. What direction will you go with the characters to keep them interesting? What sort of plots twists are you forced to put in there to keep the story going?

No, better to end it on a high, with an ending that will leave us both wanting for more but also satisfied. I, for one, can't wait to read this final installment, even though it means it will be the end of one of the finest moments in Star Trek, called Vanguard.

 

[Relayer1]

Yes, it's right and proper that it has an ending - it is a finite story, not an open ended saga. However, it has served to open out the TOS era in a way approximating (on a smaller scale) the way that TNG, DS9, Destiny, The Typhon Pact etc. give a bigger picture of the TNG era and after.

I surmise that not everyone will die at the end of Vanguard (?). It would be good to see an ongoing companion series to the TOS novels. It need not always be the same cast, but could feature amongst others, the Vanguard survivors, the TOS crew and supporting characters, one or two Enterprise survivors (T'Pol and...), earlier versions of the movie era characters etc. etc.

I'd like to feel the TOS era was as richly developed as the later Trek universe has become...

 

[T'Bonz]

I am just catching up on it now, and have book 8 on order. I've been reading a book a day and am HOOKED.

Really loving this series, which has interesting characters who make it worthwhile to stay up way too late at night reading the books in which they're contained.

I'm a big fan of T'Prynne and Fisher, and Quinn makes me laugh.

 

[Ian Keldon]

What really drew me to this series was how truly real, it felt. There's always been a bit of an antiseptic unreality attached to Star Trek and how it really never feels like it could grow out of our world. The Vanguard characters really seem like real people. How they speak, what they do, how they interact... It all seems perfectly realized.

And, I would love to see a movie version, if only to see Ms. Karume cast.

Agreed.

I think OCs feel more "real" because novel OCs aren't subject to "keeping it canon". They don't have to conform to characters built according to the needs and rules of television or movies, which have unspoken (and often spoken) limitations placed upon them by the studios.

 

[shanejayell]

And of course OCs can die. Unlike Kirk etc etc....

 

[Christopher]

And of course OCs can die. Unlike Kirk etc etc....

Yeah, because the books would never be allowed to kill off a canonical character like Janeway or Shakaar or Mr. Homn or... hey, wait a minute...

 

[Ian Keldon]

And of course OCs can die. Unlike Kirk etc etc....

Yeah, because the books would never be allowed to kill off a canonical character like Janeway or Shakaar or Mr. Homn or... hey, wait a minute...

Shakaar and Mr Homn are walk-ons at best.

Janeway is one I'll give you, but she's the exception to the rule. Characters from "dead" franchises are not as immune as "active" ones

If you're writing Kirk, or Spock, or McCoy and so on you know you can't kill, cripple or otherwise hurt them nor can you permanently marry them off, retire or otherwise make changes in their status quo.