Definitely! Peter David breathed new life into the series even in the handful of issues he was in charge of -- it makes sense that they would bring it back with him at the helm.
This reminds me of perhaps the nerdiest thing I remain angry about: the way that George Lucas managed to screw up the continuity of his own story at the end of Revenge of the Sith, where the following happens:
(1) Luke and Leia are born;
(2) Luke's identity as Anakin Skywalker's son is "hidden" by taking him back to Anakin's home planet; giving him to Anakin's step-brother to be raised; and giving him the last name "Skywalker," even though Owen's last name is Lars; and
(3) We see the Death Star seemingly more than half-way finished. Since we know that the Death Star wasn't completed until shortly before the events of A New Hope, this means that it took some 18 years (or however old you think Luke is in that movie) for the Empire to complete the damn thing. The Empire must have the least efficient military contracting apparatus in the galaxy!
OK, sorry for the Star Wars posting on a Star Trek board!
Sorry for multiple comments, but this one is at least more germane: they had a similar issues, and a more interesting solution, with all of the TNG novelizations. The novels developed a LOT of post-TNG continuity that was flatly inconsistent with the premise of the Picard streaming series (most notably, novel-Picard was married to Crusher, they had a young son named Renee who lived with them on the Enterprise, and novel-Picard had been involved in some treason-adjacent behavior that meant he'd never be promoted beyond Captain). Once Picard was in production and its story beats were set, the powers that be brought together several of the more prolific TNG authors and had them do a three-part novelization that aligned the novel-verse with Picard as best they could.
I'm not saying you shouldn't participate. I'm just wondering who is in the Venn diagram of "fine grained knowledge of Stat Trek comics in the 80s" and "has no idea what has been going on in the novels for the last twenty years."
Peter David wrote a fair amount about a guy at the studio who more or less appointed himself the continuity-chief who messed with the comics and David in particular frequently and not to try and enforce conformity to the movies, but to his vision of what "Gene would have wanted". So he did not want David to use the animated series characters, he did not want other alien crew members David wanted to add, he did not want Bearclaw, he did not want Konom, etc.
Yes, what a weird thing! It seems like David at least got the better of him much of the time -- or maybe he had a special polemic against David, since Bearclaw, Konom, et al., already existed by the time he started.
The way David described it, I think it was a special animus towards David. But also what sometimes happens to franchises--someone in the corporation exercises a kind of petty dominion over the creatives just for the hell of it.
This now makes me want to dig into the 1989 run where David starts off as the writer. I poked at the end of it to see what it was like and it looks like someone else eventually takes over -- so I won't be signing myself up for 80 straight issues, necessarily (though we all know I will eventually read all of them because I have a sickness).
You've got to admit, though, the whole "Who Killed Captain Kirk" story by Peter David was first rate.
Definitely! Peter David breathed new life into the series even in the handful of issues he was in charge of -- it makes sense that they would bring it back with him at the helm.
Great article!
This reminds me of perhaps the nerdiest thing I remain angry about: the way that George Lucas managed to screw up the continuity of his own story at the end of Revenge of the Sith, where the following happens:
(1) Luke and Leia are born;
(2) Luke's identity as Anakin Skywalker's son is "hidden" by taking him back to Anakin's home planet; giving him to Anakin's step-brother to be raised; and giving him the last name "Skywalker," even though Owen's last name is Lars; and
(3) We see the Death Star seemingly more than half-way finished. Since we know that the Death Star wasn't completed until shortly before the events of A New Hope, this means that it took some 18 years (or however old you think Luke is in that movie) for the Empire to complete the damn thing. The Empire must have the least efficient military contracting apparatus in the galaxy!
OK, sorry for the Star Wars posting on a Star Trek board!
Sorry for multiple comments, but this one is at least more germane: they had a similar issues, and a more interesting solution, with all of the TNG novelizations. The novels developed a LOT of post-TNG continuity that was flatly inconsistent with the premise of the Picard streaming series (most notably, novel-Picard was married to Crusher, they had a young son named Renee who lived with them on the Enterprise, and novel-Picard had been involved in some treason-adjacent behavior that meant he'd never be promoted beyond Captain). Once Picard was in production and its story beats were set, the powers that be brought together several of the more prolific TNG authors and had them do a three-part novelization that aligned the novel-verse with Picard as best they could.
I wouldn't say they aligned them -- the explicitly blow up the novel timeline from within!
Well, I was trying to be positive, but you’re of course correct.
Also, in the future, you may want to avoid Trek-splaining to someone who started a Star Trek substack to promote their book about Star Trek.
I… didn’t think I was? And it certainly wasn’t my intent; I just like talking about this stuff. But, message received; good luck with the Substack.
I'm not saying you shouldn't participate. I'm just wondering who is in the Venn diagram of "fine grained knowledge of Stat Trek comics in the 80s" and "has no idea what has been going on in the novels for the last twenty years."
Peter David wrote a fair amount about a guy at the studio who more or less appointed himself the continuity-chief who messed with the comics and David in particular frequently and not to try and enforce conformity to the movies, but to his vision of what "Gene would have wanted". So he did not want David to use the animated series characters, he did not want other alien crew members David wanted to add, he did not want Bearclaw, he did not want Konom, etc.
Yes, what a weird thing! It seems like David at least got the better of him much of the time -- or maybe he had a special polemic against David, since Bearclaw, Konom, et al., already existed by the time he started.
The way David described it, I think it was a special animus towards David. But also what sometimes happens to franchises--someone in the corporation exercises a kind of petty dominion over the creatives just for the hell of it.
This now makes me want to dig into the 1989 run where David starts off as the writer. I poked at the end of it to see what it was like and it looks like someone else eventually takes over -- so I won't be signing myself up for 80 straight issues, necessarily (though we all know I will eventually read all of them because I have a sickness).