Truth and Nontruth in Star Trek: Not All of It's Real, But All the Good Bits I Can Remember Are

Periodically, threads turn up on the kind of websites I frequent that ask, "What Star Trek books / Doctor Who audio dramas / Star Wars comics do you consider part of your personal canon?" Or, worse, "head-canon," a word which is just ugly.

Head-cannon: D'harhan from Star Wars.

I don't usually participate in these discussions, because I don't think I think of canon that way. Now, I'm not saying I'm one of those holier-than-thou pedants who turns up to canon discussions to say, "Well, actually, the term 'personal canon' is an oxymoron because the word 'canon' implies an authority making the decision blah blah blah."* No, I just think that the question describes something more rigid than the way I actually think about these things. I don't go, "Well, Prime Directive, that's in the personal canon, but Enterprise: The First Adventure is right out. And because Prime Directive is referenced by Traitor Winds, then Traitor Winds must also be in, but Enterprise: The First Adventure is a semi-prequel to The Entropy Effect, and so by the transitive property of canon, that's disqualified. Destiny is in, but only scenes beginning on odd-numbered stardates. And so on."

No, I think that the way we decide what's "real" and what's not "real" in the context of a fictional universe is much more flexible than that.† Let's move from these weird hypotheticals I've been using and get specific.

Star Trek is the universe I've probably spent the most time in (though it's not quite my First Fandom). I don't know exactly when I read my first Star Trek book, but I think it must have been around the fifth grade or so. As a result there are a number of things I accept as "true" for the Star Trek universe because I read them as books when I was a kid, and thus they were absorbed into my conception of the universe itself. Never mind that the books aren't "canon," that didn't cross my mind, and it still doesn't most of the time.

Rather, there are just "facts" that I know to be true in the context of Star Trek. Take Greg Bear's 1984 novel Corona. I actually don't really remember much about it, but what I do remember is that-- in an aside-- it's mentioned that the Klingons, the Romulans, and an alien race original to the novel, the Kshatriyans, share a common ancestor. Well, given Romulans are an offshoot of the Vulcans, that means the Vulcans must be part of that equation too. For me, this is just a basic assumption of the Star Trek universe, it comes up without me consciously deciding, "Aha, Corona is designated 'HEAD CANON, PART OF'."

Jeri Taylor, executive producer of Voyager, wrote an excellent novel called Mosaic, about how Kathryn Janeway came up the ranks of Starfleet, from a young cadet to a tyro science officer to a commander. It would be impossible for me to think of the character of Captain Janeway and not imagine that book's events as her history. It always has been. Why pretend she has no history when she has this one?

Back in the day, Kate Mulgrew would read you the story herself-- on two whole cassettes!

Do you know there's a book (actually a whole series of 'em) co-written by William Shatner where the Borg and the Romulans team up to bring Captain Kirk back to life? Now, Captain Kirk is still dead in my head canon, but the first one, The Return, has some of the coolest stuff that has ever been written about the Borg. In my Star Trek, the Borg totally combine eight cubes to make one even bigger cube, assimilate dogs to turn them into guard drones, and pause to run a diagnostic if you ask, "Are you defective?"

This is kind of like the supercube described in The Return, except I don't think there's the clear delineation between constituent cubes. The Return posits that all Borg cubes are made up of smaller cubes, hence why they all have so many redundant systems. This image is from a videogame, I think.

Or, even before I got to Time's Enemy in my Deep Space Nine rewatch/reread, I had it in the back of my head that Jem'Hadar always spoke the languages of their enemies in front of their enemies so that no one could learn their codes. This is actually superseded by on-screen dialogue in a later episode, but I don't care, because the idea given in Time's Enemy is too good to discard.

For me, these stories aren't canon, and they aren't not canon, either. They're just part and parcel of the large, weird tapestry we call Star Trek, and they inform how I think it works on a fundamental level. Even if the canon goes on to contradict them (as it already has in some cases), I will likely always believe these facts to be true. Inasmuch as any aspect of Star Trek is true.

Which is to say completely true.

* Or, if you want to be even more obnoxious, you can point out that properly "canon" is a noun: books aren't canon, they're canonical.
† Unless you're hired by a rights-holder to write some fiction set in that universe, but as that hasn't happened to me in five years, I don't really worry about it.

Review: Star Wars: The Clone Wars: Wild Space by Karen Miller

Have I been forgetting to mention all my Unreality SF reviews here? If so, here are the last few, all Doctor Who tales: Tenth Doctor Adventures, Volume 1, The Early Adventures: The Black Hole, and Criss-Cross, Planet of the Rani, and Shield of the Jötunn.

Mass market paperback, 342 pages
Published 2009 (originally 2008)

Acquired August 2014
Read September 2014

Star Wars: The Clone Wars: Wild Space
by Karen Miller

This is the second of the two Clone Wars books I read in parallel to watching the television series before my viewing of the series sputtered out. Flipping back through it, I find that I remember nothing of it, save that Obi-Wan seemed out of character, and that it felt like the book went on blasted forever with nothing happening. This is Star Wars, people, throw me some action.

Faster than a DC Bullet: Project Gotham, Part XXXII: DC Comics Classics Library: Batman: A Death in the Family

Comic hardcover, 271 pages
Published 2009 (contents: 1988-89)
Borrowed from the library
Read January 2016

DC Comics Classics Library: Batman: A Death in the Family

Writers: Jim Starlin, Marv Wolfman
Layouts and Co-Plotter: George Pérez
Pencillers: Jim Aparo, Tom Grummett
Inkers: Mike DeCarlo, Bob McLeod

Year Twelve, November - Year Thirteen, June
One of the results of the continuity-driven nature of superhero comics is that there are a number of comics known better for what happened in them than how it happened. A Death in the Family is one of those stories. Chronicling the death of the second Robin, Jason Todd (who's only been in the role for two years, poor fellow), A Death in the Family is just not a good story. It lurches along weirdly and depends on coincidence way too much, and even for a superhero comic, it's contrived: the idea that Iran would appoint the Joker its UN ambassador is untenable, a completely bizarre merging of comic goofiness with real-world politics that is tonally misjudged.

But let's start at the beginning with this one. A Death in the Family seems to have been originally designed as a six-issue story but released as a four-part one, as its first and second issues both consist of two 22-page chapters. The first has Jason acting particularly like a jerk, and Batman benching him as a result. Their relationship hasn't particularly been consistent in the Jason stories I've read: Jason is very bloodthirsty in the the beginning of Second Chances, pretty chummy with Batman later on in the same book (except for learning that Batman hid who killed his father from him), and they got along perfectly in Ten Nights of the Beast and The Cult. But now Jason is a jerk again, and Batman doesn't handle it well at all.

Your hero, ladies and gentlemen!; or, Don't you think kids who are little bit snotty deserve to be brutally murdered?
from Batman vol. 1 #426 (script by Jim Starlin, art by Jim Aparo & Mike DeCarlo)

I really don't get why this approach was taken. A character's last story should show them at their best, to make you really regret it when they're gone; for all their flaws, later DC shock killings like Identity Crisis and Countdown to Infinite Crisis got this exactly right, sending Sue Dibny and Blue Beetle out on career highs. This story should show Jason Todd as his heroic best as Robin. But A Death in the Family, bizarrely, wants to make you glad he's dead.

Batman discovers that the Joker is trying to sell a cruise missile to terrorists in Lebanon at the exact same time Jason realizes that the woman he thought was his mother actually isn't, and that a woman who might be his birth mother is-- completely coincidentally-- also in Lebanon. So while Batman shuns his runaway sidekick to chase the Joker (apparently there's no one Batman can ask for help; if only he wasn't always such a jerk to Nightwing), the two end up in the same place anyway and team up.

Return of the New Jedi Order, Episode XXXII: The Joiner King by Troy Denning

Mass market paperback, 526 pages
Published 2005
Acquired August 2005
Previously read October 2005
Reread October 2015

Star Wars: Dark Nest I: The Joiner King
by Troy Denning

Six Years after the Invasion
Having finished The New Jedi Order after an awful long time reading, I thought it would be nice to read the Dark Nest trilogy, a follow-up to its events five years on of which I had fond memories. The first book is decent: parts of it are fun, while parts of it meander a bit too much. Denning always does a good job with Han and Leia; the interactions and adventures of the two of them are always fun to read in his hands. I'd really like to see him tackle more books like Tatooine Ghost, that allow them to go on an adventure without all the baggage of telling some galactic threat story. The Killik nests and the joiners are also some pretty interesting concepts, a little more sci-fi than Star Wars usually gets, but Denning pulls it off here, I think. On the other hand, I don't think he really gets the version of the Force that was advanced in Traitor, and I really dislike what he begins to do with Jacen here (which will culminate in Jacen's fall to the Dark Side in the tremendously misjudged Legacy of the Force). On the whole, this volume is fun, but the seeds of what will make the later Dark Nest books not as fun are present, as well.

Next Week: One year later, the Killiks are back in The Unseen Queen!

Revolutionary Reading: An Examination of the Legion of Super-Heroes Threeboot, Part IV: Adult Education

Comic trade paperback, 190 pages
Published 2007 (contents: 2005-07) 
Acquired February 2016
Read May 2016

Supergirl and the Legion of Super-Heroes: Adult Education

​

Writer: Mark Waid with Tony Bedard and Stuart Moore

Pencils/Layouts: Barry Kitson
Additional Pencils: Adam DeKraker, Ken Lashley, Pat Olliffe, Dale Eaglesham
Inks: Mick Gray, Rob Stull, Rodney Ramos, Greg Parkin, Livesay, Art Thibert
Letters: Nick J. Napolitano, Jared K. Fletcher, Travis Lanham, Phil Balsman
Colors: Nathan Eyring, Richard & Tanya Horie

This collection includes two stories that directly pick up on and work with the idea we've seen throughout the series, that this version of the Legion of Super-Heroes was inspired by the DC Comics publications of the 20th and 21st centuries. Here, the series creators model what we might call the "revolutionary" reading practices they want the readers of their comic to employ.

One is a set of stories within a story, about various versions of the Legion of Super-Heroes that are incompatible with the current one's history. If, like me, you are a little perplexed by how DC Comics characters can be reading DC Comics (including some that they themselves appear in; in Teenage Revolution, we saw the cover of Legion of Super-Heroes vol. 4 #0), an anonymous stranger delivers a helpful piece of advice:

from Legion of Super-Heroes vol. 5 #15 (script by Stuart Moore, art by Patrick Olliffe & Livesay)

Well, that's me told. Recall, after all, that even though the Legion members memorize what issues DC characters first appeared in, what they really care about are the ideals the superheroes stand for.

This is reiterated in the book's final story, which takes place in the aftermath of Terror Firma's destruction of Legion headquarters (as seen in Death of a Dream). Rescue operations for the Legion followers caught in the blast are underway, and the story features a series of juxtapositions between damaged comic books in the rubble and the rescue operations being carried out in the present. For example, here's the cover of an issue of Batman with Commissioner Gordon and Batman looking at a body paralleled with a Science Police officer and a Legion follower covering up a body:

from Legion of Super-Heroes vol. 5 #11 (script by Mark Waid, art by Dale Eaglesham & Art Thibert)

There are six or seven of these, providing a visual reminder of how the comics of the past serve as inspiration for the heroes of the future.

But one of the Legion followers fixates on the comic books, embodying what we might call "nostalgic" reading practices. He goes around scooping up and saving the remnants of the comic books. A group of Legion followers notices him and attack him, thinking he's a speculator looking to pick up some rare back issues. He explains his motives as being purer, however:

from Legion of Super-Heroes vol. 5 #11 (script by Mark Waid, art by Dale Eaglesham & Art Thibert)

The other Legion followers set him straight, however. If what makes the comics important was that they were the Legion's inspiration, then what matters isn't the comics as physical objects, but that members of the Legion carry out the ideals they represent. You don't need the actual, physical comics for them to be important. Chastised, the comic-collecting Legionnaire drops his comic books to the ground and joins in the rescue operations, giving us one last parallelism:

from Legion of Super-Heroes vol. 5 #11 (script by Mark Waid, art by Dale Eaglesham & Art Thibert)

In this story, Mark Waid models the reading practices that underpinned the "threeboot" as conceived of by him and Barry Kitson. Inspired by the comics of the past, but beholden to their spirit, not their literal details. Continuity and nostalgia doesn't matter, idealism and revolution do. As much as Waid and Kitsons take on the Legion was about a revolution, it was itself revolutionary-- taking an old idea and reworking it for a contemporary context.

Unfortunately, the lessons of this story would go unheard by the readers of DC Comics. But that's something I'll cover when I get to the final volume of Waid and Kitson's run.

Star Trek Beyond: First Reactions

One of my favorite Star Trek novels is Prime Directive, by Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens. I haven't read it for ten years or more, but it opens with the five-year mission of the Enterprise cancelled under ignominious circumstances, and the crew divided up across the galaxy. But, across the course of the adventure, the crew reunites, showing that they are better off together than apart. I like it for its understanding of the characters, both as individuals and as a group. The Reeves-Stevenses give all the characters their moments to shine in their own separate adventures, before uniting them for a finale where they come together to solve the problem in true Star Trek fashion. I also like Prime Directive for its unbridled Star Trek optimism, showing that all people are better off together than apart: the reunification of the crew showing this in microcosm, I suppose.

Maybe Simon Pegg and Doug Jung read Prime Directive back in the day, but probably not. More likely, they worked out a good formula for a Star Trek story based on the strengths of the premise. I hope I haven't spoiled too much by establishing this parallel, but though Star Trek Beyond does not open with the five-year mission suspended, the crew does pretty quickly (almost too quickly; my biggest critique of this film would be that the first 30 minutes or so feel a bit rushed) disperse into smaller groups or individuals: Kirk and Chekov, Sulu and Uhura, Scotty, and (of course) Spock and McCoy. Each character faces their own challenges, and gets their own chance to shine. I have always thought that the reboot films were pretty well cast (my favorites are Karl Urban as McCoy, Simon Pegg as Scotty, and, alas, Anton Yelchin as Chekov (so all the funny ones)), but this approach lets them shine. Each character usually got a moment in Star Trek and Star Trek Into Darkness, but here they all get a chunk of the story, and the story is better for it. Some of the best Spock/McCoy scenes of the new film series thus far, I think.

Then they all come back together, and are suddenly working together as a group, accomplishing amazing things-- and in doing so, demonstrating the optimism that Star Trek is all about. They even reach out and add new people to the group. It's not a complex message, but it is an enjoyable one. There are hair-pin escapes and crazy plans, and I dare you not to have a smile on your face when the music starts blasting in the final act. Plus, there's a real nice audio signifier of their unity at the end of the film. I can't believe that's never been done, and it works really nicely.

Lots of jokes (the giant green hand!), and though it's as action-heavy as all these recent Star Trek films have been, the action is more fun and more beautiful than in the other two installments. Starbase Yorktown is an amazing environment, and director Justin Lin makes the Enterprise look the most beautiful she's looked in all three films-- the scenes of her at warp at the beginning, and her launching from Yorktown were my favorites, but there were a lot of great angles throughout. So yeah, I enjoyed it. I've enjoyed all these reboot films in their different ways, and I'm not sure if this one is the best one, but it is the most quintessentially Star Trekky in all the best ways.

Actually, there's a big flaw I didn't mention. The title of the movie is wrong. It shouldn't have been Star Trek Beyond, but, quite obviously I would have thought, Star Trek Beyond! Never pass up a chance to throw an exclamation point in there.

Review: Star Wars: The Clone Wars by Karen Traviss

Mass market paperback, 256 pages
Published 2009 (originally 2008)

Acquired and read August 2014

Star Wars: The Clone Wars
by Karen Traviss

A couple years ago, I decided to watch the Clone Wars cartoon from beginning to end, and read the tie-in novels and comics alongside it. I didn't get very far, but that wasn't really the show's fault. I did get far enough to read two of the novels, the first of which, simply titled The Clone Wars, novelizes the events of the film that kicked off the series. Quite frankly, Karen Traviss's talents are wasted on the pile of shit that was the film's script-- things like Jabba's gay cousin do not need any fleshing out, and like Diane Carey, she delights a little too much in having characters inwardly snark about how the events/dialogue of the story are implausible or bad. That doesn't rectify the problems, it just makes you think you should be reading a different book, given the book's own author doesn't even like it. Traviss's Star Wars books are distinguished for her depth of characterization, but there's nothing to pin that to here, and her dislike of significant components of the Star Wars concept becomes a little too obvious in places. Traviss writing clone characters is always appreciated, though.

Faster than a DC Bullet: Project Gotham, Part XXXI: Batman: The Cult

Comic trade paperback, n.pag.
Published 1991 (contents: 1988)
Borrowed from the library
Read January 2016

Batman: The Cult

Writer: Jim Starlin
Illustrator: Bernie Wrightson
Color Artist: Bill Wray
Letterer: John Costanza

Year Twelve, September
This is my last Jason Todd story prior to his death. The Cult concerns the rise of a charismatic speaker in Gotham City, who organizes the underclass and seals the city off from the outside world; large parts of this plot were adapted for the film The Dark Knight Rises, though instead of Batman being gone while this happens, Batman is being broken. Not physically, but emotionally. The book opens with Batman already captured by Deacon Blackfire and his cult, and the brainwashing well underway.

The comics equivalent of rapid crosscutting here is a really interesting technique, and one I don't think I've seen before. It's confusing when you first transition (the Batman on the left is from a dream he's having where he's committed murder; the one on the right is the actual Batman, hanging in Deacon Blackfire's lair), but that's the point.
from Batman: The Cult #1

What makes this book works so well is Bernie Wrightson. I primarily know Wrightson from his contributions to DC horror comics like The House of Mystery, The House of Secrets, and The Witching Hour!, and The Cult puts him to good use depicting the existential horror that is Batman's mental breakdown, as well as the collapse of all Gotham society. His Batman is a devastated man, and despite the fact that a cowl covers half his face, his Batman communicates the anguish he is experiencing quite well. Panel transitions are used quite well, too, to show how Batman is flickering back and forth between different mental states: we'll jump between the world-as-it-is and the world-as-Batman-sees-it quite rapidly, showing his struggle. Wrightson's art (especially aided by colorist Bill Wray) is grotesque when it needs to be. I hate to complain about someone with the skills of Jim Aparo, but Wrightson is clearly a much better match for Jim Starlin's Batman sensibilities, and it's a shame there's not much more Batman work from him.

Review: Doctor Who: Lights Out by Holly Black

Mass market paperback, 62 pages
Published 2014
Acquired December 2014
Read December 2015

Doctor Who: The Twelfth Doctor: Lights Out
by Holly Black

When 12 Doctors, 12 Stories was released electronically, it was 11 Doctors, 11 Stories because that was all the Doctors there were: this final volume was added in 2014, taking place between the episodes "Deep Breath" and "Into the Dalek," during the Doctor's mission to get coffee for Clara. Like most of the books in this series, it's a solid, enjoyable tale. It's told in the first person from the perspective of an alien the Doctor meets, which is always a nice way to do a Doctor Who story, and Black does a good job capturing the voice of Peter Capaldi (who is my favorite Doctor since Christopher Eccleston).

Next Week: A quick swing back into Star Wars territory for a coda to The New Jedi Order, with Dark Nest!

Revolutionary Reading: An Examination of the Legion of Super-Heroes Threeboot, Part III: Strange Visitor From Another Century

Comic trade paperback, 137 pages
Published 2006 (contents: 2005-06) 
Acquired February 2016
Read May 2016

Supergirl and the Legion of Super-Heroes: Strange Visitor From Another Century

​

Writer: Mark Waid

Pencillers: Barry Kitson, Adam DeKraker, Ken Lashley, Art Thibert, Amanda Conner
Inkers: Mick Gray, Drew Geraci, Barry Kitson, Rodney Ramos
Colorist: Nathan Eyring
Letterers: Phil Balsman, Travis Lanham

One of the clearest explanations of the Mark Waid/Barry Kitson Legion of Super-Heroes is found in the back of this book, where the Legionnaires answer mail from readers of the comic in character. This approach to the old tradition of the lettercol is a delight, and it allows the characters to sort of step outside themselves and describe the premise of the book directly to the reader:

from Legion of Super-Heroes vol. 5 #6 (art by Barry Kitson)

The Legion stands for color, against sterility, as embodied in the virtues of the heroes of the past.

Their virtues are put to the test in this volume, though, which depicts one of the few direct conflicts between the Legion and the society they seek to change. When a group of Legionnaires takes down a terrorist disguised as a Science Police officer outside the home of a guy called Klar who embodies the society they're trying to reform. Klar's wife considers him not "fully clothed" when he's wearing shirt and pants but not hood and goggles, and Klar communicates with his neighbors via screen. He complains the Legionnaires lack "decorum" and "traipse out of doors like savages"!

Here we see something of the dark side of the Legion, as they bully him, stealing his goggles, and mocking his age. This riles up Klar, who comes back with his neighbors to argue with the Legion, who only mock him further:

from Supergirl and the Legion of Super-Heroes #16 (art by Barry Kitson & Mick Gray)

There's some irony here, of course: the Legion has inspired Klar and other social conservatives to interact face-to-face for apparently the first time ever, and Klar's declaration that there is strength in numbers is exactly how the Legion took down Terror Firma in the previous volume. Their revolution has inspired another social movement, yet Klar doesn't recognize that he's abandoning his principles to ostensibly fight for them. Is he becoming a superhero himself? (That's what Matthew from Legion Abstract posits in this nice reading of the scene.)

This is probably the most direct conflict we see between the Legion and society, and on one level, it's pretty harmless-- the Legion shouts out some ageist insults and goes on its way. No real violence is required for them to change society.

That said, it's important to know there's been a major status quo change by this point. The events of the previous volume have shown the United Planets 1) that the Legion of Super-Heroes isn't going anywhere and 2) that the Legion has been successful whereas they have not. So the U.P. changes tactics, and gives the Legion official standing. What happens when they revolutionaries become the establishment? Well, this conflict shows that it actually makes them bullies to a certain extent. The Legionnaires flaunt their newfound authority to intimidate Klar (like I said, they steal his goggles).

It's one thing to punch up, but it's another to punch down, and the Legion is only starting to come to grips with what it means to go from underdogs to establishment, and how you much reorient your attitude appropriately. They're not exactly living up to the virtues of their role models in this sequence, even if they are making the world more colorful, and I'm glad that Kitson and Waid explore that here.