Which version of TOS is canon??
- Thread starter Lt. Tyler
- Start date
Yes.
Does it matter?
I think the intent of the remastered in some cases was to overcome the budget restraints of the original. So, for me, it makes more sense "in canon" that the Woden did not look like the Botany Bay or that the Aurora from "Way to Eden" didn't look like a Tholian ship with added nacelles.
I think the intent of the remastered in some cases was to overcome the budget restraints of the original. So, for me, it makes more sense "in canon" that the Woden did not look like the Botany Bay or that the Aurora from "Way to Eden" didn't look like a Tholian ship with added nacelles.
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The one I watched on-screen
Both versions are "canon," because "canon" refers to the body of work.
Now, within any particular canon (literary, musical, religious, whatever), not everything necessarily lines up perfectly, and there are often multiple versions of the same work, and thus it falls upon the scholars to explain any apparent discrepancies.
Kor
Now, within any particular canon (literary, musical, religious, whatever), not everything necessarily lines up perfectly, and there are often multiple versions of the same work, and thus it falls upon the scholars to explain any apparent discrepancies.
Kor
Both are canon until someone in charge of Trek decides to un-make it so and has one of them wiped out. As for which one people choose to accept as HEADcanon, that’s a whole different matter. 
Yes canon is What's currently making TPTB money.
What the #$#$@ is canon for X-Men though?
What the #$#$@ is canon for X-Men though?
Luckily, while I’m no fan of the remaster, the changes are minor enough to be mostly easy to ignore.
"Canon" is about the whole, not the parts. The word refers to an entire body of works considered comprehensive or definitive -- for instance, the Shakespeare canon is every work credibly attributed to Shakespeare's authorship, and the canon of Russian literature (say) is all the most essential works you need to read if you want a comprehensive knowledge of the field.
In fiction, canon refers to the complete set of stories that are treated as a continuous narrative, regardless of their internal inconsistencies and contradictions -- such as the way all Marvel Comics stories going back to the 1960s are considered to be a single inclusive continuity even though the timescale is constantly being rewritten and characters who once fought in the Vietnam War have now been retconned as fighting in Afghanistan or some imaginary early-21st century conflict. The canon is the entirety, the pretense of an overall shared reality. It's the whole that all the different stories add up to create. So it doesn't matter if one version of a given story is told slightly differently -- it's still the same story, the same event within the larger whole.
Still, if you're asking which version should be considered more accurate, I'd generally go with the remastered version. As a rule in fiction, ideas are refined as you go, and later refinements are generally considered more "true" than the early rough drafts (which is why we don't follow the adventures of Captain James R. Kirk of the UESPA starship Enterprise and his half-Vulcanian science officer). The makers of TOS's effects were only approximating things to the best degree that they could with available time, money, and technology, and would have gladly made more elaborate effects given the chance, or created new matte paintings or miniatures instead of using stock footage. So the remastered FX shots can generally be assumed to come closer to the original intent and thus to be "truer" than the original, rougher version. For instance, I much prefer Max Gabl's amazing digital painting of Flint's mansion to the reuse of the Rigel fortress painting. It doesn't make sense that Flint's house would look exactly like a fortress on another planet, right down to the shape of the coastline and the astronomical bodies in the sky. So obviously the recycled stock painting from the original is less "real" than the unique painting in the remastered version.
One way of looking at it, then, is that both versions tell the same story, but one tells it more accurately. That's the approach I'm taking with my novel Arachne's Crime which just came out. The first half is greatly expanded and revised from my first published story, and a couple of scenes and a number of technical details are different between the two versions. But they both tell the same event within the continuity of my original universe, just differing in the details of how they tell it. So I consider the novel a "corrected" account of the same events, fixing what the original telling got wrong.
In fiction, canon refers to the complete set of stories that are treated as a continuous narrative, regardless of their internal inconsistencies and contradictions -- such as the way all Marvel Comics stories going back to the 1960s are considered to be a single inclusive continuity even though the timescale is constantly being rewritten and characters who once fought in the Vietnam War have now been retconned as fighting in Afghanistan or some imaginary early-21st century conflict. The canon is the entirety, the pretense of an overall shared reality. It's the whole that all the different stories add up to create. So it doesn't matter if one version of a given story is told slightly differently -- it's still the same story, the same event within the larger whole.
Still, if you're asking which version should be considered more accurate, I'd generally go with the remastered version. As a rule in fiction, ideas are refined as you go, and later refinements are generally considered more "true" than the early rough drafts (which is why we don't follow the adventures of Captain James R. Kirk of the UESPA starship Enterprise and his half-Vulcanian science officer). The makers of TOS's effects were only approximating things to the best degree that they could with available time, money, and technology, and would have gladly made more elaborate effects given the chance, or created new matte paintings or miniatures instead of using stock footage. So the remastered FX shots can generally be assumed to come closer to the original intent and thus to be "truer" than the original, rougher version. For instance, I much prefer Max Gabl's amazing digital painting of Flint's mansion to the reuse of the Rigel fortress painting. It doesn't make sense that Flint's house would look exactly like a fortress on another planet, right down to the shape of the coastline and the astronomical bodies in the sky. So obviously the recycled stock painting from the original is less "real" than the unique painting in the remastered version.
One way of looking at it, then, is that both versions tell the same story, but one tells it more accurately. That's the approach I'm taking with my novel Arachne's Crime which just came out. The first half is greatly expanded and revised from my first published story, and a couple of scenes and a number of technical details are different between the two versions. But they both tell the same event within the continuity of my original universe, just differing in the details of how they tell it. So I consider the novel a "corrected" account of the same events, fixing what the original telling got wrong.
As people above have said, it's all canon. And as @Christopher pointed out, it's usually what comes later that takes precedence over what came before (since there are always going to be inconsistencies...see James R. Kirk for reference.)
However, since Star Trek is all just fiction anyway, there's no hard-and-fast rule about what someone personally thinks should take precedence. If someone decides that they prefer the original version of TOS over TOS Remastered, that's fine. Speaking for myself, I was originally excited when I heard that CBS was going to replace the VFX with updated effects, but now in retrospect I feel of two minds about it. On one hand, I feel like there were some changes made that made things better, and then there were other changes that I think made things worse. I also didn't like the fact that a lot of the work was rushed and only sub-par. In the end, I decided that I still like the original VFX and prefer them over the new stuff, outdated warts and all.
However, since Star Trek is all just fiction anyway, there's no hard-and-fast rule about what someone personally thinks should take precedence. If someone decides that they prefer the original version of TOS over TOS Remastered, that's fine. Speaking for myself, I was originally excited when I heard that CBS was going to replace the VFX with updated effects, but now in retrospect I feel of two minds about it. On one hand, I feel like there were some changes made that made things better, and then there were other changes that I think made things worse. I also didn't like the fact that a lot of the work was rushed and only sub-par. In the end, I decided that I still like the original VFX and prefer them over the new stuff, outdated warts and all.
i loved Star Trek continues’ explanation: Gary Mitchell was so self-absorbed he couldn’t be bothered to get Kirk’s middle name right!
Sure. All human creations are imperfect. And that's why it's best not to be too literal-minded about fiction. This mentality that every last tiny detail has to be treated as absolute fact is misunderstanding how fiction and art work, how imagination works. Stories just represent ideas. Their "reality" is something we create in our own minds through our interpretation of a story, whether it's conveyed to us through a storyteller's voice, words printed on a page, actors on a stage, drawings in a comic book, or whatever. Some media come closer to simulating reality than others, but they're still just exercises in pretending, and it's okay if they don't convey the reality perfectly, because it's up to us to use our own imaginations to fill in the holes and smooth the inconsistencies.
If there are a dozen students in an art class, they'll depict the subject a dozen different ways, each with its own imperfections and variations of detail. But they all represent the same reality. The difference between the reality and its representation is where the art comes in.
Indeed. We have visual changes, but none actually affect or alter the stories, so really canon isn't an issue here. Even the replacement shots of the satellite distribution in Operation: Annihilate, for instance, is simply done to advance the original story. These effects are done faithfully to add to, not take away from, the original.
I agree with what you said. That answers my question. Thanks very much!
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