Starfleet Jedi

"Another thing that makes canon a little confusing. Gene R. himself had a habit of decanonizing things. He didn't like the way the animated series turned out, so he proclaimed that it was not canon. He also didn't like a lot of the movies. So he didn't much consider them canon either. And – okay, I'm really going to scare you with this one – after he got TNG going, he... well... he sort of decided that some of The Original Series wasn't canon either. I had a discussion with him once, where I cited a couple things that were very clearly canon in The Original Series, and he told me he didn't think that way anymore, and that he now thought of TNG as canon wherever there was conflict between the two. He admitted it was revisionist thinking, but so be it.[4]— Paula Block, 2005"

This quote I pulled off from Wikipedia seems to suggest that TNG is more canon than TOS. Any more info?

What Paula block said is not only vague and does not list the episodes/movies she claims he disliked but is also hearsay at best.

Viacom own paramount and they say officially that what is on screen is canon without retcon or preferences for newer material over old mentioned. So it all depends on if you think that the inheritors of rodders vision have the right to say what is what.

If i inherit some ones stuff i get to do what i like with it unless there is a provision in the will right?.

I got impression that Gene said that TNG in general overrules TOS.

It doesn't matter what Gene said, since he no longer owned the rights to ST, and the canon policy makers, Paramount, say that only movies and series are canon... ALL of them...

While I'm glad I was able to get that statement from her, it is rather vague. Some might want to say that it's in regards to how the ships fight or in regards to Federation organization/law/history or anything. But that's wishful thinking, I imagine.

It is probably simply in regards to things we already knew about, like the suggestion from "Turnabout Intruder" that there were no female starship captains which Roddenberry supposedly acknowledged as (and dismissed as) pure sexism, best forgotten. And of course, by the third season of TOS his involvement in the show was more limited anyway, which of course is part of why he wouldn't feel constricted by third season things.

At best, we can say that in the case of absolute contradiction between the two about history then TNG should win, but then again there's seldom an absolute contradiction.

Praeothmin wrote:It doesn't matter what Gene said, since he no longer owned the rights to ST, and the canon policy makers, Paramount, say that only movies and series are canon... ALL of them...

They are all canon, but if there is some contradiction one can't warp their way out of, one series should have precendance over another.
I would put them this way:
TNG
TOS
DS9
VOY
ENT
movies

I would put them in the chronological periods they represent...
ENT
TOS
TNG
DS9
VOY

And the movies go with the period in ST history they represent as well...

I was talking about direct contradictions, not chronological order...

Picard wrote:I was talking about direct contradictions, not chronological order...

Take the direct contradictions, see how many examples there are for the "white side" and how many for the "black side", and do an average...

Well, later series is, more contradictions it creates (from what I remember). So, older series is, it should be given higher standing, with exception of TNG and TOS, due to TNG being explicitly stated to be higher canon than TOS.

Picard wrote:Well, later series is, more contradictions it creates (from what I remember). So, older series is, it should be given higher standing, with exception of TNG and TOS, due to TNG being explicitly stated to be higher canon than TOS.

You haven't produced a quote that show TNG is higher canon the TOS.

I'd just go with a case by case basis, but could you give a clear example of these contradictions you are talking about?

1) It's wikipedia article. Where they got that info from, I have no idea.

2) I can't exactly remember, and I'm in no mood to search for them - althought, I think there is one with Enterprise and Borg. Enterprise encountered highly dangerous opponent, yet no-one mentions it 200 years later, nor do they display any knowledge of Borg at all, despite the fact that data on Enterprise NX1-borg encounter must have been avaliable.

Picard wrote:1) It's wikipedia article. Where they got that info from, I have no idea.

The problem with wikis is they are not always correct, or they may not correctly

Picard wrote:2) I can't exactly remember, and I'm in no mood to search for them - althought, I think there is one with Enterprise and Borg. Enterprise encountered highly dangerous opponent, yet no-one mentions it 200 years later, nor do they display any knowledge of Borg at all, despite the fact that data on Enterprise NX1-borg encounter must have been avaliable.

There is such a thing as the Temporal Prime Directive.

7 of 9's parents went Borg hunting before the E-D met the Borg.

It stands to reason the information could be classified.

Wikipedia got that quote from me, hence my earlier statement that I was glad to have gotten that quote out of her. A guy a few edits ago strongly based the Star Trek canon Wikipedia article on the CanonWars site article. Here's the conversation the quote came from:

http://www.canonwars.com/STCanonquotes-trekbbs1.html

I bookmarked page an'I'll look at it later.

Thanks.