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Yeah, I haven't read a Trek book since, like, 8th grade.
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Nov 3, 2018 06:04
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I remember one time when I was a kid seeing a paperback with Captain Kirk and a velociraptor on the cover, there's no way the novel could deliver on that cover's promise, right?
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Nov 3, 2018 06:06
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Powered Descent posted:Granted, these impressions are from when I was in junior high school, so don't put too much stock in them. (The premise of Uhura's Song in particular makes me worry that it might actually suck and I just had terrible taste.) Ain't nothin' wrong with cat people.
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Nov 3, 2018 06:06
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The Return (one of the Shatnerverse books) is also brought up as being pretty batshit crazy, and rightly so. It's the one where the Romulans and the Borg?? (don't ask) resurrect Kirk after taking his remains from Veridian III and the Enterprise crew gets a new all-black Defiant class ship which is renamed Enterprise. The book ends with Kirk literally pulling the plug or flipping the off switch on the Borg homeworld.
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Nov 3, 2018 06:09
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FlamingLiberal posted:The Return (one of the Shatnerverse books) is also brought up as being pretty batshit crazy, and rightly so. It's the one where the Romulans and the Borg?? (don't ask) resurrect Kirk after taking his remains from Veridian III and the Enterprise crew gets a new all-black Defiant class ship which is renamed Enterprise. The book ends with Kirk literally pulling the plug or flipping the off switch on the Borg homeworld. 
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Nov 3, 2018 06:13
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There's the first Star Trek novel ever, "Mission to Horatius", which, well, let's see what Wikipedoa has to say about it.quote:Issues with the novelisation were first raised with the producers of the television show by John Meredyth Lucas, who contacted both Desilu Business Affairs and Gene Roddenberry, warning them that while the novel was "not technically in bad taste, but is extremely dull, and even considering the juvenile market, badly written".He added that it contained several inaccuracies including describing Vulcans as Vulcanians and an issue with Spock quoting poetry. There were concerns that Sulu had been described as a "bland faced, small oriental" and that Uhura was called a "negress" and sings a spiritual.
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Nov 3, 2018 06:16
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Angry Salami posted:Along similar lines: Sisko would just zap away from his kid with a vague promise to come back sometime
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Nov 3, 2018 06:18
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McSpanky posted:I remember one time when I was a kid seeing a paperback with Captain Kirk and a velociraptor on the cover, there's no way the novel could deliver on that cover's promise, right? This exists and it’s apparently one of the few TOS Pocket novels I never got because I don’t remember a thing about it. Edit And based on its premise I’m betting at least 3 redshirts die to dinosaurs. Kibayasu fucked around with this message at 06:25 on Nov 3, 2018 |
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Nov 3, 2018 06:19
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McSpanky posted:I remember one time when I was a kid seeing a paperback with Captain Kirk and a velociraptor on the cover, there's no way the novel could deliver on that cover's promise, right? im sure it's great  - (kessavel-art)
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Nov 3, 2018 06:21
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McSpanky posted:I remember one time when I was a kid seeing a paperback with Captain Kirk and a velociraptor on the cover, there's no way the novel could deliver on that cover's promise, right? That was First Frontier. It's not great, but it's not terrible. Kirk and the gang get stuck on an alternate timeline where the dinosaurs never went extinct, and intelligent velociraptors rule the earth. They try to get back to their timeline and are helped by this velociraptor physicist who is distracted, because she thinks Captain Kirk smells delicious.
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Nov 3, 2018 06:31
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Epicurius posted:That was First Frontier. It's not great, but it's not terrible. Kirk and the gang get stuck on an alternate timeline where the dinosaurs never went extinct, and intelligent velociraptors rule the earth. They try to get back to their timeline and are helped by this velociraptor physicist who is distracted, because she thinks Captain Kirk smells delicious. see above
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Nov 3, 2018 06:40
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Epicurius posted:That was First Frontier. Found the cover.  Hey dummies, it's behind you.
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Nov 3, 2018 06:49
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Oh, I remember one TOS novel that was kind of like Meridian in that it was about a planet or something that only appeared every some years. One of the main characters was some guy that was there for the first time the planet was found and he fell in love with a woman from the planet of course. So he is on the Enterprise when they are there for the next appearance and it turns out that the woman is now married to their brother and they have a kid because that species has perfect genetics so incest is a-okay. It’s one of those times where you’re not sure if the author just made something up or you’re now reading someone’s fetish.
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Nov 3, 2018 06:54
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I feel like pretty much all of Peter David’s New Frontier series might qualify as among the most insane Trek novels. It’s new ship and mostly new cast. The captain is a rugged rebel leader from a backwater planet, that joined Starfleet, became disillusioned after leading a mutiny, was recruited by Starfleet intelligence, and he’s like 35ish. At one point the book has a flashback that explains in great detail how he lost his virginity to a sexy older widow because his species require their leaders to sire children on the wives of deceased soldiers. I loved those books when I was 9 or so, thought the captain was a huge badass.
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Nov 3, 2018 06:56
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Kibayasu posted:Oh, I remember one TOS novel that was kind of like Meridian in that it was about a planet or something that only appeared every some years. One of the main characters was some guy that was there for the first time the planet was found and he fell in love with a woman from the planet of course. So he is on the Enterprise when they are there for the next appearance and it turns out that the woman is now married to their brother and they have a kid because that species has perfect genetics so incest is a-okay. It’s one of those times where you’re not sure if the author just made something up or you’re now reading someone’s fetish. Welcome to my brigadoon incest fan-fiction. spock's here. kirk's here. whole gang.
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Nov 3, 2018 07:00
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Powered Descent posted:While looking over the list of the old Pocket Books TOS novels to find terrible ones, I noticed a few I remembered really liking: I read Dreadnought a few times at around the same age...I don't think it's terrible but it's very close to having the main leads be an entire group of Wesleys.
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Nov 3, 2018 07:47
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Angry_Ed posted:I read Dreadnought a few times at around the same age...I don't think it's terrible but it's very close to having the main leads be an entire group of Wesleys. Valiant was the best take on that.
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Nov 3, 2018 08:03
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Barlow posted:I feel like pretty much all of Peter David’s New Frontier series might qualify as among the most insane Trek novels. It’s new ship and mostly new cast. The captain is a rugged rebel leader from a backwater planet, that joined Starfleet, became disillusioned after leading a mutiny, was recruited by Starfleet intelligence, and he’s like 35ish. At one point the book has a flashback that explains in great detail how he lost his virginity to a sexy older widow because his species require their leaders to sire children on the wives of deceased soldiers. I’m pretty sure any of Peter David’s books could qualify as the worst trek novel. At the very least it’s gotta be something from the 90’s when they were pumping them out faster than the Star Wars EU. I remember the Genesis Wave books being pretty bad and they were perennial shelfwarmers at all the discount/clearance bookstores.
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Nov 3, 2018 09:19
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Pick posted:Awwww Ship of the Line is a HUGE piece of poo poo!
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Nov 3, 2018 09:45
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The DS9 Millennium trilogy is pretty ridiculous. In the first book a bunch of Pah'wraith orbs are found which create a second wormhole, in the second book they're in the future and in the third book they're in hell (iirc). I liked them when I was younger, but I haven't read them in years so I doubt they'd hold up.
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Nov 3, 2018 10:48
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Which Hell, though? I'd read one where Jadzia leads her old pals from Sto'Vo'Kor to break Quark out of the Vault of Eternal Destitution. Probably ending with it all being a story told by a really drunk Worf.
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Nov 3, 2018 10:54
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Dreadnought and Battlestations were the ones with the Mary Sue protagonist and her gang of New Characters who everyone including Kirk grudgingly admitted were super cool. In a world of tons of spinoff with lots of new characters and fan films and people clamoring for alternate protagonists in the same universe it's not so bad, but when TOS was the only game in town it just reeked of Mary Sue. The titular Dreadnought on cover was cool--3 nacelles of a different, sleek design and black trim. Dwellers in the Crucible has to be the absolute worst. It has the most non-Federation concept ever--the only was peace between Federation worlds is possible is because the children of their leaders are held hostage and killed if one world attacks another because that's how the UFP works.  There's an orgy with Deltan children, a Chained Heat atyle cover of sexy imprisoned women, and like Dreadnought, it's another book almost bereft of the actual Enterprise crew.
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Nov 3, 2018 11:26
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There was a bunch of weird stuff being published back before TNG came out when, presumably, nobody was really paying much attention. That means you get some interesting experimental stuff that does original things, but it also means you get stuff like Dwellers in the Crucible, where it seems very likely that the author started with a "Kirk/Spock Women in Prison AU" fanfic and only slightly cleaned it up for publication.
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Nov 3, 2018 11:40
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Are there licensed ENT novels? Has anyone read one?
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Nov 3, 2018 12:42
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skasion posted:Are there licensed ENT novels? Has anyone read one? The closest thing I read were those terrible Destiny novels that had the captain of the Columbia get superpowers and reveal that the origins of the Borg are a result of an alien trying to take over a human body.
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Nov 3, 2018 12:58
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Pick posted:Awwww The Prometheus Design
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Nov 3, 2018 13:00
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It's weird how DS9 is the "best" Star Trek but TNG is the best Star Trek. Know what I mean?
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Nov 3, 2018 13:16
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Angry Salami posted:There was a bunch of weird stuff being published back before TNG came out when, presumably, nobody was really paying much attention. That means you get some interesting experimental stuff that does original things, but it also means you get stuff like Dwellers in the Crucible, where it seems very likely that the author started with a "Kirk/Spock Women in Prison AU" fanfic and only slightly cleaned it up for publication. Definitely. In the 70s and early 80s all of ST was 79 episodes and a movie or two. The timelines, character bios, arcs, the future histories, the sturctures of Fed/Klingon/Romulan society were all unknown and up for wild interpretation by fans. For a long time, nobody even knew what year TOS was set in. There were long debates over the time between TOS and TMP or TMP and TWOK. I haven't read the early stuff from Pocket or Bantam or the fanzines in a long time, but I would imagine there are some very interesting and really bad or really good interpretations of what Star Trek is that would never fly or make no sense today. skasion posted:Are there licensed ENT novels? Has anyone read one? I read a couple. They cover the events leading up to and including the Romulan War and wisely retcon out Trip's stupid death as a Section 31 rewrite of official history. They were pretty good and I'll probably continue with them eventually.
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Nov 3, 2018 13:18
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I think I drunk posted it before but I watched the TNG episode where time stopped with the Enterprise and the Romulan warship (I think it was called "The spaceship that couldn't speed up") but Troi straight up says "holy poo poo you all froze for a few seconds" and it was so refreshing that everyone said "wtf we need to look into this right now" because TV shows nowadays need that drama where everyone doesn't believe you and thinks you're talking poo poo, like you do that now on Discovery and the first act is Saru et al calling Michael a loving LIAR/insane person
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Nov 3, 2018 13:21
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Astroman posted:I read a couple. They cover the events leading up to and including the Romulan War and wisely retcon out Trip's stupid death as a Section 31 rewrite of official history. They were pretty good and I'll probably continue with them eventually. Yeah it's been a while since I read them but I remember the writers specifically getting permission from the former ENT showrunners or something to retcon Trip's death. They were written by a duo, Martin and Mangels, and the quality kind of fell apart when one of them left and the publisher decided to condense the Romulan War series that was being planned into two books, but the stuff before that was pretty decent. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Star_Trek:_Enterprise_novels#Relaunch I guess there's a whole Rise of the Federation series, anyone know if those are any good? hope and vaseline fucked around with this message at 13:30 on Nov 3, 2018 |
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Nov 3, 2018 13:28
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McSpanky posted:I remember one time when I was a kid seeing a paperback with Captain Kirk and a velociraptor on the cover, there's no way the novel could deliver on that cover's promise, right? I was actually thinking of that exact book when the question was raised. IIRC it was called "First Frontier" but I don't remember actually reading it, my brother had a huge pile of old ST paperbacks. edit: also when i was a dumb stupid kid i thought The Return kicked rear end
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Nov 3, 2018 14:14
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Powered Descent posted:Found the cover.
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Nov 3, 2018 14:22
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Alan_Shore posted:I think I drunk posted it before but I watched the TNG episode where time stopped with the Enterprise and the Romulan warship (I think it was called "The spaceship that couldn't speed up") but Troi straight up says "holy poo poo you all froze for a few seconds" and it was so refreshing that everyone said "wtf we need to look into this right now" because TV shows nowadays need that drama where everyone doesn't believe you and thinks you're talking poo poo, like you do that now on Discovery and the first act is Saru et al calling Michael a loving LIAR/insane person Yeah like in TNG "Remember Me," the one where people are disappearing and Beverly is the only one who remembers they ever existed, the crew goes through like three or four levels of investigation before anyone suggests that something might be wrong with Beverly.
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Nov 3, 2018 14:56
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Admiral Bosch posted:edit: also when i was a dumb stupid kid i thought The Return kicked rear end Same. And then I realized how insane the Reeves-Stevenses are.
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Nov 3, 2018 15:09
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Pick posted:Awwww Shadow Lord, an early TOS novel is just shite. Spock'n'Sulu babysit a spoiled prince. The Bantam Phoenix books are also hot garbage.
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Nov 3, 2018 15:12
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Timby posted:Same. And then I realized how insane the Reeves-Stevenses are. It seriously reads like a dorky 8 year old wrote it. "And then and then all the guys from the OLD show come and hang out with all the people from the NEW show and bones is still alive and they're all best friends and theres the defiant but it's BLACK and COOL and there's the BORG and they teamed up with the ROMULANS"
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Nov 3, 2018 15:31
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Admiral Bosch posted:edit: also when i was a dumb stupid kid i thought The Return kicked rear end Oh god me too. I still remember something in that book about a multidimensional borg cube or something and I thought it was the coolest thing ever
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Nov 3, 2018 15:42
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Timby posted:Same. And then I realized how insane the Reeves-Stevenses are. I still like their novel Federation. Complete continuity porn, and rendered totally non Canon by later episodes and movies, but a fun read.
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Nov 3, 2018 15:44
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Admiral Bosch posted:It seriously reads like a dorky 8 year old wrote it. "And then and then all the guys from the OLD show come and hang out with all the people from the NEW show and bones is still alive and they're all best friends and theres the defiant but it's BLACK and COOL and there's the BORG and they teamed up with the ROMULANS" I can't imagine what their writing process is like. Their later Shatnerverse books got pretty bugnuts wild, too.
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Nov 3, 2018 15:47
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skasion posted:Are there licensed ENT novels? Has anyone read one? I think there was a whole series on the Romulan War
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Nov 3, 2018 15:48
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