How Important or Not is Canon to you?

[RikerChick 5]

Ok let's be blunt. In Star Trek Canon Will married Deanna, therefore Star Trek canon is out the window in my book

[VaBeachGuy 12]

Ok let's be blunt. In Star Trek Canon Will married Deanna, therefore Star Trek canon is out the window in my book

lol Well just say this... "Canon Shmanon" and throw it out the window...

[Kor37 9]

To me, canon is important but not absolutely essential. If a good story can be told by bending the rules of canon a bit, I wouldn't mind.

[BakulaBabe 2]

Canon is everything. Inconsistencies annoy me. When I find an apparent canon violation I think "don't the writers do any research before writing a story?" It can be bent a little, but not too much

Edited September 6, 2008 by BakulaBabe

[youbroughtheryouRiker 2]

Canon's important just because Star Trek is a franchise that has committed itself to having one. Though it does also help a franchise to last longer when you have continuity.

[Stephen of Borg 2]

Canon is nothing. This is just a TV show which entertains and not based on any facts so it can change as much as it wants and I'll still like it.

[VaBeachGuy 12]

But the franchise has prided itself on basing it's shows and movies on the facts as they have written in years gone by. How would it be if they all of the sudden changed the name of the Captain of the USS Enterprise NCC-1701 from James T. Kirk to John P. Kirkpatrick for the upcoming movie? It would totally fly in the face of what is Canon.

 

Yes, that's a bit extreme but why write a "history" for the show if it's just going to be disregarded for a story down the road? That history exists so just write stories that stay within that framework. When something is open and not referenced at all in the history and you can explore other areas then that's fine. But at least stick to the "history" that is already established.

[Stephen of Borg 2]

good point, but I'm not expecting anything extremely drastic to happen. I'm sure it would bother me if a really major thing was changed, so I was wrong in saying I'd like any change, but a major changed has never happened. On the other hand, if the change made logical sense story-wise, I might be more accepting. Canon has been played with on and off since at least DS9. The earlier episodes act as if Sisko dad is dead, but we later find out he isn't.

[Takara_Soong 4]

Canon has been played with on and off since at least DS9. The earlier episodes act as if Sisko dad is dead, but we later find out he isn't.

Canon has been breached in one way or another from the beginning. TOS breached some of its own canon at times. With later series, it will continue to be difficult to not breach canon as more and more canon is established. One of the biggest problems though is with people convincing themselves that canon has been breached by a series when in reality there was no canon set in the past.

 

You mention the thing with Sisko's dad which is technically not a canon breach if they didn't say specifically in an earlier episode that he was dead. A more blatent canon breach from DS9 would be the whole genetic engineering storyline surrounding Bashir. In that storyline they claimed that genetic engineering was illegal in the Federation for centuries and that Bashir could lose everything if it was discovered he was altered. However that flies in the face of the season 2 TNG episode Unnatural Selection where the Federation is involved with a science facility called Darwin Station (run by humans) where human children have been "engineered to become super-specimens through genetic research".

[VaBeachGuy 12]

good point, but I'm not expecting anything extremely drastic to happen. I'm sure it would bother me if a really major thing was changed, so I was wrong in saying I'd like any change, but a major changed has never happened. On the other hand, if the change made logical sense story-wise, I might be more accepting. Canon has been played with on and off since at least DS9. The earlier episodes act as if Sisko dad is dead, but we later find out he isn't.

 

Which episode did they hint at him being dead? I don't remember that.

 

You mention the thing with Sisko's dad which is technically not a canon breach if they didn't say specifically in an earlier episode that he was dead. A more blatent canon breach from DS9 would be the whole genetic engineering storyline surrounding Bashir. In that storyline they claimed that genetic engineering was illegal in the Federation for centuries and that Bashir could lose everything if it was discovered he was altered. However that flies in the face of the season 2 TNG episode Unnatural Selection where the Federation is involved with a science facility called Darwin Station (run by humans) where human children have been "engineered to become super-specimens through genetic research".

 

Which one is the breach of canon? Genetic engering had been outlawed (at least on Earth or for humans) since the time of Khan (going back to TOS). I'll have to watch "Space Seed" and "Doctor Bashir I Presume" again to see how they word it all.

[Takara_Soong 4]

You mention the thing with Sisko's dad which is technically not a canon breach if they didn't say specifically in an earlier episode that he was dead. A more blatent canon breach from DS9 would be the whole genetic engineering storyline surrounding Bashir. In that storyline they claimed that genetic engineering was illegal in the Federation for centuries and that Bashir could lose everything if it was discovered he was altered. However that flies in the face of the season 2 TNG episode Unnatural Selection where the Federation is involved with a science facility called Darwin Station (run by humans) where human children have been "engineered to become super-specimens through genetic research".

 

Which one is the breach of canon? Genetic engering had been outlawed (at least on Earth or for humans) since the time of Khan (going back to TOS). I'll have to watch "Space Seed" and "Doctor Bashir I Presume" again to see how they word it all.

I don't believe it was said in Space Seed or ST:WoK that genetic engineering was banned on Earth or in the Federation. Even if it was, that could change between TOS and TNG without it being a canon breach (laws change or are rescinded all the time around the world) but having genetic engineering illegal in DS9 does breach canon established by TNG that it was at least no longer illegal by the 24th century.

 

There were other episodes of TNG that had genetic engineering in the plot however most were with non-Federation member worlds. On TNG it was never said that it was or had ever been banned on Earth or in the Federation even in the season 5 episode The Masterpiece Society when Troi and Picard actually discuss genetic engineering because he doesn't approve of it. Picard said "it was a bad idea whose time passed long ago", not that it was banned.

 

I think the first mention that it was banned on Earth was during the Augment arc of ENT however that doesn't mean it was banned in the Federation. It was also said that the Denobulans had not had the problems humans had with genetic engineering. I find it difficult to believe that they (or other Federation members) would agree to ban it because Earth had a problem with it.

[Enoch 0]

Canon is everything, thats what makes it Star trek.