Spoilers Would you consider the things that Matalas wanted to happen as canon?
- Thread starter TheMadCloner
- Start date
Eh, she was shot with a red beam phaser, on this series red beams indicate being set to kill. And she was shot at close range, and we know from TUC that at close range, even a stun setting can kill.
There's no question in my mind.
There's no question in my mind.
I still looking forward to seeing the USS Titan-B if Legacy gets made and they show it being launched.
So for the record, I think she's dead. I prefer she's dead. But Matalas threw in that idea she may not be. I dont think she would be a changeling or anything like that. I just think maybe she got shot and lived. It's happened before in Trek.
He is the writer of the episode and its director, so creative intent must be respected, even if it *may* be a retcon on his part based on how the performance went down.
FWIW, I think Shelby was a massive missed opportunity. It should have been her, not Clancy, in Season 1. It should have been her in Season 2. There would have been an interesting angle to tell in that Shelby was Starfleet CinC (unclear), but really of the Enterprise-D crew... none of them hit it too big as you'd expect for the senior staff of the Federation flag ship. All of them should have been on the freeway to big jobs.
- Picard should have been Starfleet CinC one day. He was already one of it's premier captains in 2364 and by 2372, pretty much the most senior Captain not named Sisko (when he "took Command of the Fleet at Sector 001).
- Riker should be a three pip admiral by now. Granted he had a family crisis that saw him leave Starfleet, but even returned, he was sidelined.
- Troi retired as a commander in the 2380s.
- Worf became captain, did something to the Enterprise-E and stuck at Captain, became an intelligence officer, or whatever he is, for 15 years. But just a Captain. He also, should be a one pipe Admiral by now.
- Geordi should be head of the Starfleet Corps of Engineers by now, but is instead a one pip admiral curating a museum.
This, in retrospect, is actually not that surprising. Starfleet has long been cursed by the shitty/evil/stupid admirals, and while Shelby isn't one of those, those admirals would promote people like them (people promote people like them... gotta play the game). Enterprise-D crew beat to its own drum, even as prestigious as they were. And as a result by 2401, besides Picard who was retired for 15 years, Geordi is the only one who made Admiral, and even then, just Commodore.
Meanwhile there is the ultimate game-player in Shelby, with her five pips.
That would have been an interesting story to go down, especially if the former subordinate was the pain the the ass authority figure for a few seasons. Alas, we got Clancy.
Nah. She's dead. Only question is if she was Shelby or a Changeling.
I mean, I could see that, but I also like the idea that the head of Starfleet is someone Jean-Luc just didn't have a relationship with.
Same with Geordi. Honestly, becoming a commodore and running the Fleet Museum is doing pretty well considering that, again, he deliberately kept his career in stasis for fifteen years.
Troi, I don't think was ever looking to advance beyond her position aboard the Enterprise and Titan.
With Worf, obviously his career has been a bit different. We know he left Starfleet in 2375 to serve as Federation Ambassador to the Klingon Empire, which frankly is a big step up power-wise and status-wise from being a mid-level Starfleet officer. Obviously he returned to Starfleet (which I still don't like) and his career did advance to starship command in spite of Sisko's belief that his actions in "Change of Heart" (DS9) would preclude him from ever getting a ship of his own. And of course now he appears to be working in Starfleet Intelligence. So I think his career has gone fairly well, and I would not be surprised if he's promoted to the admiralty after this.
I mean, I don't think the admirals at Starfleet are evil, shitty, or stupid just because they didn't keep promoting people who deliberately stopped pursuing career advancement opportunities for a decade and a half.
How old was Jimmy Doohan when he last fathered a child?
Q died but no. The Borg died but no. Data died but no. Nobody stays dead in this Trek.
80. His daughter Sarah was born in 2000.
That does drive me crazy. One decision of Matalas's I really firmly disagree with was bringing back Data. I understand wanting to see the old crew back together again, but death is death and resurrecting characters so often undermines verisimilitude, emotional reality, and artistic integrity. Bring Spiner back, sure! But make him a new character, please.
Ooof, hard disagree.
Data never should have been killed in Nemesis. That was Spiner going through a thing with aging.
His second death in Season 1, while a fine story and good scenes overall, legitimized the Nemesis mistake and really squandered the purpose of the character. To be human isn't to experience death. That's crazy and wrong. Dogs die. Death is the end of organic life, but it's not unique to human life. Intelligence and life experiences we have are unique to human life. This show got this, as Data was willing to die on Duty (and thought dead) many times. The movies ignored it.
The much better story, in season 3 isn't just his return and finally attaining his dream of being human (which in retrospect, was always going to require a more advanced body). It's that the answer to being human was in front of Dr. Soong all along. It was the elements of Data, Lore, B-4 and Data's child, together, to make a fully formed human. I really like the story that Data alone nor any of Soong's androids alone, could ever become human, but together, they all are. It hearkens back - and I hoped the show would mention this - to the nested doll gift that Professor Gaelen gave Picard. All those voices would be in the composite, final android that truly attained humanity.
As we discussed before, I think death in fictional stories is generally stupid and reduces a character to a prop to advance other characters. There was a lot more story to tell with Data in 2002. Spiner just didn't want to do it anymore. Data's very last lines in this show - that being human is much more complicated than becoming human - confirm that.
Resurrecting Data, like restoring the Enterprise-D, fixed a decades old mistake. But that was Season 3 as a whole: going down the list and fixing mistake after mistake after mistake that had accumulated over the years.
As for Data, I said this before, but I hope that being an immortal android he lives for basically ever and shows up maybe with a new actor) in some 32nd, 33rd or 52nd century show. He, unlike Picard has "superpowers" as Altan Soong called it, as shown by his finger movements and ability to control the Titan-A. Star Trek has riffed Foundation before (what hasn't?) so doing a modest riff on Daneel Olivaw would be pretty interesting. One of the Strange New World short stories from years ago already did this.
You can do that with no other Enterprise crew member. But you can with Data. So why kill him like anyone else? Bad story and I'm glad it's finally over. Matalas was cunning to approach it with Spiner the way he did.
By the way, just to expand on why killing Data is so bad, there's a fan edit out there of Nemesis, which reorganizes the movie, and it turns it into one of the best Trek movies. What does it do? Many things. No B-4. No chase scene. Picard is kidnapped and then Data rescues him (using the B-4 scenes carefully cut). Troi then uses her Telepathy to find the cloaked scimitar, which is disabled. There's some more there. But the movie ends with the wedding, with Data serenading the bride and groom. That would have been the perfect ending to TNG. The family taking its next step... yes the kids moving out (finally) but still a family.
Instead, they gave us a funeral.
Since I saw that fan cut years ago, I realized how betrayed by the script and editing room was, and the centerpiece of that failure was to kill Data. You can't have a happy ending, when one of your family is blown up. So don't do it.
And this is a good thing.
Q's death scene in Season 2 was nice. I liked the acting. But the story is stupid, and Q being non-linear, it makes no sense. Doctor Who has done a variant of that for decades.
The status of the Borg at the end of Voyager was unclear. It was a mystery since 2001. We got inklings in Season 1 and Lower Decks, but no official word until exactly this season. So it's a gross exaggeration to say they undid the Borg's demise. Moreover I think the Borg slowly decaying over 20 years and the Queen holding on by her finger nails to launch one, final, gambit for survival is a far more interesting story than consigning one of Trek's most iconic villains to the ashheap.
And some people wanted Redjac or the Pah Wraiths... ridiculous. The Pah Wraiths would be a great DS9 story... or any story that actually mentioned the Bajoran religion in any real sense in a season, which this one didn't besides Ro's earring.
Nobody should stay dead in Trek, because Death is the end of storytelling possibilities, and fiction... especially science fiction fantasy... is about endless possibilities.
THis is why I'm really excited with "Project Phoenix" Matalas put in motion a means by which for some future writer to undo Kirk's awful death in Generations. Maybe not with William Shatner of course, but a rejuvenated, younger Kirk, in the 26th century or something, in his second life, renewed... that would be an interesting story.
Why should we not do it? To protect the sanctity of a death everybody has hated since it went into theaters? C'mon. Put another quarter in that man's arcade machine and give him another Continue! Why? Why not! It's fantasy. It's not real. It's fun.
Oh and for the record, with the Borg... let them sleep for a long while. Make the end of them here mean something. Got now.
But maybe a future 32nd or 33rd century show will deal with the return of a new, changed, future Borg (or Borg like concept) that makes them different what we've seen before, but returns one of Trek's greatest creations to life.
Right now? No. Five years? Dive in writers. Tell the coolest story you can.
But maybe a future 32nd or 33rd century show will deal with the return of a new, changed, future Borg (or Borg like concept) that makes them different what we've seen before, but returns one of Trek's greatest creations to life.
Right now? No. Five years? Dive in writers. Tell the coolest story you can.
I fundamentally cannot agree with this idea at all.
Death is a fundamental fact of human existence. Sure, we share it with other lifeforms, but it remains a fact of our lives. Aside from being alive, it is the only thing that literally every human being has in common with every other human being. How we cope with it is a defining aspect of who we are as individuals.
Art should not always provide us with wish fulfillment and happiness. Sometimes we need art to give us sad endings, and bittersweet endings, even when we think we don't want that, because we need art that confronts unpleasant facets of human existence in order to help us cope with those facets of our lives in real life.
Endless resurrections just mean that death and violence and loss in your fictional universe are without meaning or weight. If no one can really die, then there's no real reason to care, and your work of art has nothing real to say to me.
As much as I enjoyed PIC S3, I'm really sad that S1's beautiful exploration of how one continues living through grief and how one finds meaning in spite of mortality has been so negated by Data's resurrection. PIC S1 did a lot to help me process my grandmother's death, and I feel like PIC S3 just pissed all over that art.
Canon is whatever the stories the producers of the show display on the screen. Its about what they actually do and show. And I am not a canonista fan.
No, I wouldn't.
Sure I'd like to see some of it, but if it's not been on screen then future writers aren't beholden to it.
Sure I'd like to see some of it, but if it's not been on screen then future writers aren't beholden to it.
Nothing is going to make Star Trek look weak and exhausted than constant do-overs, especially those that involve death.
I always viewed humans living to 130-140 in the TNG era to be similar to people who make it over a hundred today. Possible, though rare.
No, because future writers aren't going to be limited by Trek real world interviews. And Matalas himself might change his mind later on and decide that Shelby really is dead, Ro really is dead, etc. And if future writers decide to bring them back, it's still up to them to explain how and not rely on Trek viewers to look up something Matalas said at this event etc.
Remember, the Star Trek Countdown comic was supposed to be Kurtzman's headcanon on what happened in the Prime universe leading up to Spock meeting Nero. Until it wasn't when Kurtzman himself contradicted it with Picard.
Remember, the Star Trek Countdown comic was supposed to be Kurtzman's headcanon on what happened in the Prime universe leading up to Spock meeting Nero. Until it wasn't when Kurtzman himself contradicted it with Picard.
Similar threads
