How is your headcanon hierarchy structured?

mneme0

We all have different headcanon independent of our knowledge of actual canon. If you were to list off the "more real" versus "less real" sources of Star Trek material as you see it, how would that look? For example, mine is:

Most real
* Star Trek novels relaunch by Pocket. They have made a concerted and very successful effort to be internally consistent.
* Star Trek movies, as solid data points.
* Enterprise, Voyager, Deep Space Nice, Next Generation, Original Series, and Animated in that order.
* Star Trek reference and omnibus books, such as The Lives of Dax, The Klingon Art of War, Captain's Table, etc. in reverse order of age (older = less real).
* Star Trek novels in series, such as Rihannsu, Vulcan's Soul trilogy, Invasion, Rise and Fall of Khan, etc.
* Single Star Trek novels, in reverse order of age.
* JJ Trek.
* Any comics.
* Star Trek Online and any other Star Trek games, in reverse order of age.
Less real

redeyedraven

Canonical continuity is already broken since Voyager and Generations... and so is the chain of good shows and movies.

My headcanon is TOS, TMP-era-movies, TNG/DS9. In that order and everything beyond is a mess IMO, but that's just me.

I believe this kinda talk belongs more into the ten-forward-section of the Forums

psycoticvulcan

The shows and movies always come first, of course. I tend to place the most recent information at the top; for example, I think we can safely assume there was no Earth/Kzinti war in the 2060s.

salazarraze

I always view the individual crews as being independent from one another. Books don't count. Games don't count. Just shows and movies.

starswordc

The canon hierarchy I have set up for my fan fiction series goes something like STO through "Delta Flight" > DS9, TNG, TOS movies, TNG movies > TOS > some of the novels > VOY.

ENT is a speshul case. Most of the televised series is a bad in-universe holonovel series that resulted in a ton of libel lawsuits; the historical Archer was actually played by Mike Colter and was an ambassador attached to an NX-01 commanded by a Taiwanese fellow. The Temporal Cold War aspects happened in an alternate timeline that was started by the Borg shenanigans in First Contact, then cut off before it could start by Alt!Archer (Scott Bakula) killing Drooling Hammy Badguy #6 (a.k.a. the Na'Kuhl leader who I don't give enough of a TRIBBLE about to remember his name) before he could get assimilated, which was how the Borg acquired the time travel technology they used in First Contact. Bakula!Archer and his crew ended that timeline at the cost of being wholly erased from history themselves, which explains why nobody in the later series ever mentioned them. It was also the actual reason for the Temporal Accords: everybody sez "Let's all agree never to try to use time travel as a weapon of war again because I think I had an aneurysm trying to figure out what the flying frell just happened."

My Temporal Agents work in the shadows using cover identities and absolutely never allow anybody in the past or future to actually know they're not from around here, because that further contaminates the timeline.

artan42

Same as CBS, the films and TV shows. The only main head canon I have is that the AR films and ENT share a seperate quantum reality to the main series of films and shows.

I don't really care enough about the books, games, or comics to bother with trying to fit them into canon. I just read or play the ones that interest me and ignore the rest.

puckerbrush

Expected a discussion of the Hierarchy. Disappointed.

anazonda

If it was on screen, and officially produced as such (licences) it's canon...

If it wasn't, it's not.

khan5000

Movies and TV shows
Books and games

rllaillieu

I put it all on the same level. That being said, I do distinguish between universes and I'm selective about what parts of ENT and TAS I consider legit. For example, "These are the Voyages..." doesn't exist.

Most of the games don't exist for me, but only because I haven't played them. Other than that, I accept most of it on a relatively equal level, with some wiggle room.

duncanidaho11

1. Show, Movies
2. STO, Path to 2409
3. My foundry missions
4. Other people's foundry missions (inevitably because I don't know them as well as 3, and I may also have other ideas :P)
5. Books

I generally don't try to reconcile other video games with STO.

farmallm

1 - Movies and shows
2 - official books for star trek. Like the Star Trek Encyclopedia, Star Trek The Magazine, or others that is considered under this.

I consider these most "factual", as it comes from the Developers who brings us Star Trek.

Novels, Games, JJ Trek, the cartoon series. I don't call this being factual. As its loose ideas based off the actual stuff.

rattler2

Seen on screen = Canon
In regards to Star Trek in particular, I do count one game as canon as well, the reboot game that takes place between the '09 movie and Into Darkness as it was stated to be canon. Also, McCoy mentions dealing with a pregnant Gorn in ID and in the game he deals with said Pregnant Gorn.

Only one other game I know of has Canon status. Aliens: Colonial Marines. It is considered a Direct sequel to Aliens, and does reference both Aliens and Alien 3. Other than that, games aren't canon, and neither are books unless otherwise specified.

Never believed in the old Star Wars novelverse convoluted canon scale. I viewed all of them the same way I view any other novel.

Now... the '98 Godzilla... THAT, as Zilla was accepted as a seperate kaiju into the Toho pantheon, I headcanon as a misidentification of the Kaiju. The fisherman who identified the kaiju only saw the dorsal plates, and he knows of only one monster that has dorsal plates. Godzilla. So... the whole movie is based on a misidentification of a new Kaiju.

artan42

rattler2 wrote: »

Seen on screen = Canon
In regards to Star Trek in particular, I do count one game as canon as well, the reboot game that takes place between the '09 movie and Into Darkness as it was stated to be canon. Also, McCoy mentions dealing with a pregnant Gorn in ID and in the game he deals with said Pregnant Gorn.

But not by CBS so it doesn't count

puckerbrush wrote: »

Expected a discussion of the Hierarchy. Disappointed.

Ah, the poor man's Sontarans.

​​

angrytarg

Star Trek canon isn't complicated. As stated in 2007 by the person in charge of CBS licensing, everything belonging to the Star Trek continuity seen on the small or big screen is canon (TAS is canon!). Nothing else. No book, no game, nothing.

This is what you need to know when you want to discuss show canon. Everything more than this and we enter "headcanon" territory and that is a bit more interesting.

I personally construct my headcanon of course from original canon, but I like to ignore/dismiss most of what happened after DS9 (most of the TNG movies, VOY and ENT). When I think Borg I think "Q, Who" and "Best of Both Worlds" - there is no queen. When I think early space exploration I think Daedalus - there is no NX. And there is no Archer. I have adopted @artan42 approach of putting ENT in the AR and the audience got pulled there through the FC Borg shenenigans. In the AR we have a Borg Queen, red pulse weapons, flat screens and all that.

I consider the Technical Manuals by Okuda et al (those that served as writer's guidelines before the actual shows were shot) to be as good as canon and I supplement info on ship classes and technology from them. And I like some elements from a select number of games enough to integrate them into my headcanon, for example the Garidians from "A final Unity" (my KDF Rom character in STO is Garidian, complete with crew, ship and backstory how the Garidian Republic funded D'Tan's splinter group until the straying Borg decimated Garid and the Romulan Republic became so powerful it annexed the Garidian Republic again).

artan42 wrote: »

Ah, the poor man's Sontarans.

Don't worry, my girl, they will soon recognize the Sontaran Empire's glory! ​​

sle1989

Star Trek has established on screen that there are multiple realities, so I borrow concept from comics and say that everything is canon. For example, there is the prime universe, the mirror, the JJ verse, various book and comic book universes, and the game universes. I would consider each of these to be no less canon than the others in the same way that Marvel or DC comics universes are no less canon than one or the other. While I would prefer to see the prime universe make new stories, I don't devalue others simply because they come from a video game or a book.

angrytarg

sle1989 wrote: »

(...) I don't devalue others simply because they come from a video game or a book.

This here is a key problem shared by people struggling with the "canon" term - "canon" and "non-canon" are not synonyms for "good" and "not good". It is not a statement of quality or even personal preference.​​

mustrumridcully0

1. Real Life Action TV Shows + Movies
2. Everything else.

Maybe I should give TAS a separate place above everything else, but since I never really saw it, it doesn't matter. Novels used to be mostly stand-alones or tiny series, and what I read about the attempts at creating a more consistent novelverse just sounds meh. I don't think anyone going into making a new Trek show would incorporate those.

angrytarg wrote: »

sle1989 wrote: »

(...) I don't devalue others simply because they come from a video game or a book.

This here is a key problem shared by people struggling with the "canon" term - "canon" and "non-canon" are not synonyms for "good" and "not good". It is not a statement of quality or even personal preference.​​

Indeed. Especially among novels I know plenty of awesome ones that are just good reads, from a Science Fiction perspective or a Trek perspective or just general literature. Arguably one of the best Trek books, Final Reflections, is pretty much entirely contradicted nowadays by TNG and DS9. Still amazing.

And there is plenty of TRIBBLE in the official canon material.

If I were given the franchise and had no other job but to make me happy, I'd certainly "reimagine" it to my liking and throw out TRIBBLE and inconsistencies and steal good ideas liberally from novels. (Bat'Leth + Klingons killing their gods + H'urq + Thought Masters + Black Fleet + Klin Zha sounds like something with great potential.)

staq16

artan42 wrote: »

Ah, the poor man's Sontarans.
​​

I'm sure I'm not the only one to have named his Hierarchy BOff "Strax"....

artan42

staq16 wrote: »

artan42 wrote: »

Ah, the poor man's Sontarans.

I'm sure I'm not the only one to have named his Hierarchy BOff "Strax"....

I named mine Linx.​​

rattler2

staq16 wrote: »

artan42 wrote: »

Ah, the poor man's Sontarans.
​​

I'm sure I'm not the only one to have named his Hierarchy BOff "Strax"....

I might have done that myself... and since I got mine when they were still customizable... he's wearing blue Delta armor.

starswordc

artan42 wrote: »

puckerbrush wrote: »

Expected a discussion of the Hierarchy. Disappointed.

Ah, the poor man's Sontarans.

​​

"Hierarchy HA!" just doesn't have the same ring to it.