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Ulysses and Okuda
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[QUOTE]Originally posted by Boris: [QB] According to Ron D. Moore, John Ordover, and the startrek.com website, the canon is: The shows and the movies except for TAS. That's it. We've seen this in practice. Although some have argued that certain movies or parts of TOS aren't canon, that was just Roddenberry's view (call it Roddenberry canon if you will). However, Roddenberry is no longer controlling the Star Trek universe, and Braga and others have never said that TOS or the other shows/movies aren't canon, or that TOS has been reimagined for Enterprise. They've tried (with moderate success) to rationalize the apparent inconsistencies between the various shows. However, they haven't bothered rationalizing any of the books. That's because none of the books, including the Encyclopedia, the TMs, Starship Spotter, etc -- none of this is canon. However, as Ryan McReynolds has pointed out so many times, the general misunderstanding is that the writers are prohibited from using these works, except for maybe the Encyclopedia and the manuals. As far as I could tell, this is not 100% true. Some books have fallen out of favor (Franz Joseph's manual), as has TAS, but a lot of others are included or even written by these same writers that decide on how the show should look. Does it make sense to reject Jeri Taylor's novels, or Legends of the Ferengi, Andrew Robinson's Garak novel or the Klingon CD-ROM which first featured the Klingon anthem? The writers have no problem including parts of these books onscreen, and we shouldn't either. However, the difference is that parts of these books can be rejected if they truly conflict with the canon. The real problem is whether or not other books such as miscellaneous novels, or games, should be included. Well, going by what John Ordover says, the only reason these books aren't taken into account onscreen is that the writers don't have the time to follow this continuity. After all, this is not Star Wars, where Lucas has endless time to control official materials, or B5, where Straczynski doesn't have endless time and compensates by allowing only a few official (and even canon!) materials to go out. Since Star Trek is a huge franchise, the writers neither have time to control the books nor the desire to limit the franchise to a managable level. Still, there are good reasons to include other official sources: 1) If Star Trek writers are merely limited by their inability to follow the continuity, why not help? Perhaps Pocket Books could compile an Encyclopedia that includes the novels likewise, which could serve as a reference for the show's writers. Furthermore, we know that the writers frequent online forums, so including these works in our discussions could make them aware of good points within these novels that could then end up in the show. The only trouble is, Mike Okuda couldn't tell me if there are any legal considerations that prevent the writers from using the novels. He suspects there are no general rules, though. 2) Mojo and Alex Rosenzweig have informed us about the reality of writing non-fiction books -- you gotta stay consistent with the DS9TM and other important books, yet we don't really bother with them. Let's say someone else gets to write a book in the future -- wouldn't it be better for that person to have a huge reference of well-discussed theories that rationalize mistakes in the books? On the other hand, unlicensed sources are out (Alex told me they were merely allowed to use some equipment designations from Ships of Star Fleet, no actual names!), as is anything not published by Pocket Books. I've yet to figure out where the Star Fleet Technical Manual is standing at the moment, along with other licensed sources such as games, etc, but I suspect these should be more open to inclusion than unlicensed sources. But Pocket Books stuff -- definitely. In the end, you get a more consistent Star Trek universe that the fans will like and purchase, as opposed to the current situation where a lot of the materials are not even considered by fans because they're not consistent with the show. Still gotta talk to Ordover, but expect a reply soon. (Oh...I know who ELSE could help....) Boris [/QB][/QUOTE]
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