I actually really like that idea, even better than the joke they did. As soon as the Defiant travels back in time, Worf suddenly looks like a TOS Klingon and when they return home he's back to his normal appearance, and no one ever acknowledges it at all. I think that would have been fantastic!
The Great Bird on Klingon Forehead Ridges
- Thread starter Gratty
- Start date
I like to whip out that quote from Best of Trek 3 anytime anyone complains about a Klingon redesign.
Yep, all understood. I get the forces at work when stuff like this is licensed. I can remember SW letters pages with readers asking "will this or that happen in the comics?" and the editor would explain that certain stuff was off limits. Especially when they wanted a team-up with Spider-Man.
I completely agree that nothing "happened" to the "in-between" stories - in SW or Trek for that matter. I only meant it as a general comment about how storylines would have to be reset when new films were released.
A friend of mine was really upset when the Disney declared the old SW EU stuff as "Legends." My reaction consists of two basic points:
Numero Uno: There have always been varying levels of "canon." I understood that before I ever knew the word when I was reading comic and novel spinoffs & adaptations when I was a kid.
Numero Two-o: Regardless of anyone's definition of "canon," we can all still enjoy the stories. Nothing happened to them. The same is true for remakes or a new production of a Broadway play - it doesn't "ruin the original."
And, yes, I totally miffed the timeline of the Excelsior relative to TWOK / TSFS / TVH. I was and am mortified.
A lot of the details you cite have me yearning to revisit some of the materials.
You mentioned Gray Morrow - I gotta say that I knew him first for his work on the Space: 1999 comics and mags, another favorite.
OK enough for now. Thanks again for all the detail.
cheers
i too was miffed at disney for that. mostly because they said it was so they could have a clean slate, and then immediately started ripping it off.
Nah.
That would've been too confusing to the DS9 viewers who weren't familiar with TOS, who may well have been the majority of the audience. The episode was all about referencing TOS, sure, but even a story built around references should be accessible to that portion of the audience that doesn't know the thing being referenced.
I mean, that's the whole reason for the scene where Worf had to explain to Odo and Bashir that the smooth-headed tavern patrons were Klingons. In-universe, it doesn't make a lot of sense that a brilliant doctor like Bashir would've been unaware of the existence of variant Klingon phenotypes. But Odo and Bashir were the stand-ins for the non-TOS viewers who wouldn't have recognized TOS-style Klingons and needed it explained to them.
The problem is in having a Klingon (Worf) on K7 but not part of the Klothos crew at a time when the only Klingons on the station were from the Klothos. In the episode Worf wears a hat to cover his ridges and, as we are discussing, looks different than the Klingons.
Of course you would think a Klingon would recognize another Klingon regardless of any disguise. Worf recognizes the TOS Klingons after all.
I disagree. The situation is no different than what actually happened. There are smooth headed Klingons that the audience is told/supposed to know are Klingons. A simple line of dialog (Worf, you look different, using a new shampoo?) similar to what actually was written would suffice. Jadzia makes a similar comment regarding the TOS design aesthetic.
No, it would've been too big an ask for the audience. A lead character suddenly changing his gross anatomy for no reason? That's far more inexplicable and absurd than just going to a different time and finding that the designs looked different (as one would expect) or that an alien race had more than one phenotype (which isn't that implausible, except for the part about nobody remembering that they had existed). There's a profound difference between a subtle wink to the audience that makes reasonable sense in-story and a huge, massive unexplained change that breaks the reality and drags people out of the story for the sake of a dumb joke.
What would've been nice is if, at some point in TNG and DS9's runs, they'd established that the various different Klingon makeup designs seen over the course of the series and movies coexisted as different Klingon subspecies, with smooth-headed Klingons as a minority but still around. (There were some Trek comics that did this, for instance, a DC time-travel released before ENT came out that showed smooth and ridged Klingons coexisting on the Klingon homeworld in the past.) Then there would've been no need for a belated handwave. Heck, I often think the best solution would have been to establish that "Klingon" wasn't the name of a single species, but a multispecies society united by following Kahless's teachings.
No, my judgment as someone who actually writes fiction for a living and has the experience to know why story choices are made.
CLIFF: It's true. 23rd Century, no ridges. Just ask the next Klingon you see.
That would've been hilarious, if for no other reason than all the fanboy heads exploding.
Some fans are upset that the franchise does not line up with the fanon in their head or whatever Trekverse they love.
Am I the only one that thinks the foreheads on the two in the middle are similar enough they should be related? Along with General Korrd?Time to whip out some old Photoshops
House of Sh'uK.
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