They DID NOT just destroy... [SPOILERS]

[DigificWriter]

DS9 and its characters represent my absolute favorite iteration of Gene Roddenberry's franchise, and while I can certainly feel sadness over the destruction of the existing station, that sadness is mitigated for me by knowing that things will continue on even without the iconic former Terok Nor.

 

[StarFleetVeteran]

DS9 and its characters represent my absolute favorite iteration of Gene Roddenberry's franchise, and while I can certainly feel sadness over the destruction of the existing station, that sadness is mitigated for me by knowing that things will continue on even without the iconic former Terok Nor.

I can definitely agree with you there. If TrekBBS had a "Like" button, I'd push it!

 

[Ryan Thomas Riddle]

"Deep Space Nine was the last of the Deep Space stations, there would never be another one ... until the next novel."

 

[DigificWriter]

StarFleetVeteran: Just out of curiosity, how far along in Plagues of Night are you?

 

[StarFleetVeteran]

I'm a little over halfway through, just after Prynn decides to make some changes after going to Quark's. (Don't want to spoil it further for those who haven't read it)

 

[Sci]

"Deep Space Nine was the last of the Deep Space stations, there would never be another one ... until the next novel."

Yeah, that's one thing about the destruction of DS9 at the start of Raise the Dawn... it's so sudden and unexpected, it feels like it's interrupting a story that's still in process, and it's part of a larger, quadrant-wide political crisis -- in contrast to the destruction of Babylon 5 in the B5 series finale, which was very dramatically built up to and given a long, slow "goodbye" destruction scene.

DS9's destruction is like the middle-aged man who dies in a firefight on patrol; B5's destruction is like an old man who dies in bed after he decides to stop taking his heart meds. Both very sad, but in very different ways. It was kind of fascinating.

 

[RoJoHen]

From a strictly nostalgic point of view, I have to side with the OP. I tend to get very attached to objects, landmarks, etc., especially those that have endured for a very long time. I never got sad when the Enterprises were destroyed. Those ships were never very old to begin with, and I never really got attached to them. I was shocked by their destruction, but to me it was more like totaling your car and having to buy a new one. Destroying DS9 would be more like watching my childhood home be bulldozed to the ground.

Now, I admit I haven't been reading the relaunch books. I attempted the first few DS9 books back when the relaunch began, but I found them boring, and the new characters bugged me (I never got the love for Elias Vaughn). The only Trek novels I read anymore are the New Frontier books, and even with those I'm two books behind.

I pop in here from time to time to see what's going on in the relaunch novels, and every time the information I learn makes me want to stay as far away from them as I can. I have no doubt that many of the books are well-written and entertaining, and I am certainly not opposed to occasionally shaking things up in the Trek universe, but there are just some things that I wish would remain untouched.

 

[Elias Vaughn]

I never got the love for Elias Vaughn

But... But I've always loved you...

 

[StarFleetVeteran]

From a strictly nostalgic point of view, I have to side with the OP. I tend to get very attached to objects, landmarks, etc., especially those that have endured for a very long time. I never got sad when the Enterprises were destroyed. Those ships were never very old to begin with, and I never really got attached to them. I was shocked by their destruction, but to me it was more like totaling your car and having to buy a new one. Destroying DS9 would be more like watching my childhood home be bulldozed to the ground.

Now, I admit I haven't been reading the relaunch books. I attempted the first few DS9 books back when the relaunch began, but I found them boring, and the new characters bugged me (I never got the love for Elias Vaughn). The only Trek novels I read anymore are the New Frontier books, and even with those I'm two books behind.

I pop in here from time to time to see what's going on in the relaunch novels, and every time the information I learn makes me want to stay as far away from them as I can. I have no doubt that many of the books are well-written and entertaining, and I am certainly not opposed to occasionally shaking things up in the Trek universe, but there are just some things that I wish would remain untouched.

Very well said! It's like seeing my childhood home bulldozed. I was pretty attached to the Enterprise-D as well however, and though I've accepted the E-E, it's still not the same.

 

[StarFleetVeteran]

I never got the love for Elias Vaughn

But... But I've always loved you...

Lol!

 

[Sci]

From a strictly nostalgic point of view, I have to side with the OP. I tend to get very attached to objects, landmarks, etc., especially those that have endured for a very long time. I never got sad when the Enterprises were destroyed. Those ships were never very old to begin with, and I never really got attached to them.

Interestingly, construction on Deep Space 9/Terok Nor began in 2346 and was completed in 2351, and it was destroyed in mid-2383. So when it was destroyed, Deep Space 9 was 37 years old.

The original U.S.S. Enterprise, by comparison, was launched in 2245 and destroyed in 2285. So at the time of her destruction, she was 40 years old.

So, Deep Space 9 and the starship Enterprise had roughly similar lifespans; they were both launched in the mid-40s of their respective centuries, and both destroyed in the mid-80s. They both lasted about 40 years. So the idea that Deep Space 9 was substantially older than Kirk's Enterprise, or that Kirk's Enterprise wasn't all that old, seems fallacious to me.

ETA:

Very well said! It's like seeing my childhood home bulldozed. I was pretty attached to the Enterprise-D as well however, and though I've accepted the E-E, it's still not the same.

You do know that it's been almost twice as long since the Enterprise-E premiered in Star Trek: First Contact (16 years) as it had been since the Enterprise-D premiered in "Encounter at Farpoint" (9 years) when First Contact was released in 1996, right? And that, in-universe, Picard has been commanding the Enterprise-E for 11 years -- four years longer than he had commanded the Enterprise-D?

 

[Bry_Sinclair]

I fell out with TrekLit a while back, trying to enjoy reading a book that referenced something from another book which referenced something from yet another book, and so on. So I stopped reading them a while back.

Now they've gone and destroyed DS9 (but then what would you expect with a traitor like Ro in command, if Kira was still there the station would have endured whatever was thrown at it), I doubt I'll ever want to read how and why.

 

[StarFleetVeteran]

From a strictly nostalgic point of view, I have to side with the OP. I tend to get very attached to objects, landmarks, etc., especially those that have endured for a very long time. I never got sad when the Enterprises were destroyed. Those ships were never very old to begin with, and I never really got attached to them.

Interestingly, construction on Deep Space 9/Terok Nor began in 2346 and was completed in 2351, and it was destroyed in mid-2383. So when it was destroyed, Deep Space 9 was 37 years old.

The original U.S.S. Enterprise, by comparison, was launched in 2245 and destroyed in 2285. So at the time of her destruction, she was 40 years old.

So, Deep Space 9 and the starship Enterprise had roughly similar lifespans; they were both launched in the mid-40s of their respective centuries, and both destroyed in the mid-80s. They both lasted about 40 years. So the idea that Deep Space 9 was substantially older than Kirk's Enterprise, or that Kirk's Enterprise wasn't all that old, seems fallacious to me.

ETA:

Very well said! It's like seeing my childhood home bulldozed. I was pretty attached to the Enterprise-D as well however, and though I've accepted the E-E, it's still not the same.

You do know that it's been almost twice as long since the Enterprise-E premiered in Star Trek: First Contact (16 years) as it had been since the Enterprise-D premiered in "Encounter at Farpoint" (9 years) when First Contact was released in 1996, right? And that, in-universe, Picard has been commanding the Enterprise-E for 11 years -- four years longer than he had commanded the Enterprise-D?

It's not so much about in-universe time as it is that I watched the Enterprise-D in roughly 178 hours of The Next Generation and Generations, and watched the Enterprise-E in roughly 6 hours (two of those which I sometimes try to forget). In all that time in TNG, I grew to love not only the characters and the family feeling I got from them, but the ship itself and the sets they constantly used - the bridge, Captain Picard's ready room, Ten Forward, engineering, sickbay... In the three movies featuring the E-E, I saw more of the ship exterior and bridge than anything (the bridge I never really got attached to) and only a handful of other interior sets for no more than a few minutes. And I also felt that by Nemesis, that family feeling was mostly lost, because it revolved so much around Picard, Shinzon and Data. Yeah the others were there, and they had their moments, but Nemesis to me was more about those particular three, and less about all of them.

It's partly the same for DS9 and the original Enterprise. I wasn't even a month old when STIII came out, so when I first saw the Ent destroyed, I didn't have as much of an attachment at that point. Not to mention that by that point, the ship had changed outside and in, so it didn't feel like the same Ent that I had watched in TOS when I was really little. But I did grow up watching DS9 when it was on, so I had a lot more time to get attached to it than the Ent. I'd probably feel the same way if they destroyed Voyager.

 

[Sci]

Now they've gone and destroyed DS9 (but then what would you expect with a traitor like Ro in command, if Kira was still there the station would have endured whatever was thrown at it), I doubt I'll ever want to read how and why.

Deep Space 9 was destroyed because bombs were detonated in the reactor cores at the same time that it came under attack from three cloaked Typhon Pact ships that had been trying to sneak through Federation space. Kira was actually aboard at the time, but the outcome would not have changed had she been in command.

Further, Ro -- who, let's remember, defected from Starfleet to protect colonists from illegal Cardassian aggression in the DMZ when Starfleet refused, just a few years before the Federation ended up fighting a war against those same people -- saved thousands of lives in the course of her command, and was willing to lay down her life to ensure that others would live. Her actions in Plagues of Night/Raise the Dawn were very heroic.

ETA:

From a strictly nostalgic point of view, I have to side with the OP. I tend to get very attached to objects, landmarks, etc., especially those that have endured for a very long time. I never got sad when the Enterprises were destroyed. Those ships were never very old to begin with, and I never really got attached to them.

Interestingly, construction on Deep Space 9/Terok Nor began in 2346 and was completed in 2351, and it was destroyed in mid-2383. So when it was destroyed, Deep Space 9 was 37 years old.

The original U.S.S. Enterprise, by comparison, was launched in 2245 and destroyed in 2285. So at the time of her destruction, she was 40 years old.

So, Deep Space 9 and the starship Enterprise had roughly similar lifespans; they were both launched in the mid-40s of their respective centuries, and both destroyed in the mid-80s. They both lasted about 40 years. So the idea that Deep Space 9 was substantially older than Kirk's Enterprise, or that Kirk's Enterprise wasn't all that old, seems fallacious to me.

ETA:

Very well said! It's like seeing my childhood home bulldozed. I was pretty attached to the Enterprise-D as well however, and though I've accepted the E-E, it's still not the same.

You do know that it's been almost twice as long since the Enterprise-E premiered in Star Trek: First Contact (16 years) as it had been since the Enterprise-D premiered in "Encounter at Farpoint" (9 years) when First Contact was released in 1996, right? And that, in-universe, Picard has been commanding the Enterprise-E for 11 years -- four years longer than he had commanded the Enterprise-D?

It's not so much about in-universe time as it is that I watched the Enterprise-D in roughly 178 hours of The Next Generation and Generations, and watched the Enterprise-E in roughly 6 hours (two of those which I sometimes try to forget). In all that time in TNG, I grew to love not only the characters and the family feeling I got from them, but the ship itself and the sets they constantly used - the bridge, Captain Picard's ready room, Ten Forward, engineering, sickbay... In the three movies featuring the E-E, I saw more of the ship exterior and bridge than anything (the bridge I never really got attached to) and only a handful of other interior sets for no more than a few minutes. And I also felt that by Nemesis, that family feeling was mostly lost, because it revolved so much around Picard, Shinzon and Data. Yeah the others were there, and they had their moments, but Nemesis to me was more about those particular three, and less about all of them.

It's partly the same for DS9 and the original Enterprise. I wasn't even a month old when STIII came out, so when I first saw the Ent destroyed, I didn't have as much of an attachment at that point. Not to mention that by that point, the ship had changed outside and in, so it didn't feel like the same Ent that I had watched in TOS when I was really little. But I did grow up watching DS9 when it was on, so I had a lot more time to get attached to it than the Ent. I'd probably feel the same way if they destroyed Voyager.

Fair enough. I suppose at least part of the issue there for me is that Star Trek is, to me, just as much -- if not more -- of a literary thing than a TV/film thing. So I'm just as attached to the Enterprise-E as to the -D, since I've been reading books set aboard her for 16 years now (and since First Contact was one of my absolute favorite movies growing up).

Similarly, I first got into Trek as a kid by being introduced to the TOS movies and TOS simultaneously, so my attachments to the refit Constitution class and to the TOS version are pretty much coequal.

Bottom line: We've lost starships before. Destroying DS9 doesn't feel any different to me. I was more attached to DS9 in certain ways, because DSN was my favorite Trek series, but DSN was never afraid to shake things up and take risks and piss the audience off. (Hell, they blew up the Defiant!) So as long as it's well written, I'll keep reading.

 

[StarFleetVeteran]

Yeah, even though I'm upset over it now, I'm sure I'll keep reading. Hell, it's my main and best source of "real" Trek entertainment (don't get me started on JJ-Trek >_< )!

 

[Toefur]

The reason I am not particularly happy with the destruction of DS9 is because it is a well traversed route that Star Trek has worn both on screen, and in book form. Yeah, sure, Deep Space Nine has been destroyed... but there is no emotional fallout or significance... they are going to replace it immediately with a brand new station. Therefor rendering the destruction of DS9 essentially meaningless.

Okay, I like that so far it looks as though this book is a good set up for the contiuing stories of the DS9 Universe. But seriously.

 

[Sci]

Yeah, sure, Deep Space Nine has been destroyed... but there is no emotional fallout or significance... they are going to replace it immediately with a brand new station. Therefor rendering the destruction of DS9 essentially meaningless.

If construction on One World Trade Center had commenced in 2001, would that have rendered the destruction of the Twin Towers essentially meaningless? They lost almost as many in the destruction of DS9 as we lost in real life on 9/11.

 

[Thestral]

I love DS9 more than any other Trek, maybe more than all other Trek combined, but... well, she had a good run.

Speaking of "had a good run," Mr. Vaughn...

 

[StarFleetVeteran]

I love DS9 more than any other Trek, maybe more than all other Trek combined, but... well, she had a good run.

Speaking of "had a good run," Mr. Vaughn...

NO! No more about Vaughn, I haven't read Raise the Dawn yet and don't know what happens to him for sure! =D

 

[trash80]

Like the OP i loved the old station especially as its so different to most Federation sets in the ST universe and fairly unique unlike the Enterprises that were destroyed. But its gone its a shame but its war.

I only just started reading the new book, my Kindle battery conked out just after i downloaded it. Tal'Shiar hacking perhaps?