Canon: Fate of Trip and T'Pol unknown

[Cogito]

the episode made it abundantly clear that Troi, and Riker, accepted the program as fact. Because of that, according to Paramount it is fact.

You're ignoring the difference between fact and inference.

What the episode made abundantly clear was that Troi and Riker watched a holoprogram. They may or may not have believed it was historically accurate and they may or may not have been correct in that belief.

To assume that everything they seemed to believe they actually believed, and everything they believed true was actually true, is daft.

For example, let's imagine an episode where Data tells Wesley that all his friends decided he was such as great guy that they were throwing a party for him in the cargo bay. So Wesley says "WooHoo!" and rushes off to score some free cake and pop. Is it a matter of fact that there is a party waiting for him? You can't know, until the scene cuts to the cargo bay and we see the bucket off goop balanced over the doorway. And now suppose that as Wesley was listening to Data he was thinking back to yesterday when Data pulled this exact same trick. "Hmmm," he thinks, "I'll let him think he's tricked me again, but we'll see who has the last laugh when he sits on that whoopie cushion ..."

Just because Data acted as if he believed it, and Wesley acted as if he believed it, does not mean either of them believe it or that it was true.

What's true is that Data said it, and Wesley seemed to believe him.

[WarpGirl]

The only issue here is whether someone can alter a wiki that specifically states that they're only publishing "canon according to Paramount" to say that Trip didn't die. Unfortunately you can't because according to Paramount Trip is dead.

What we want to believe, infer, rationalize, whatever you want to call it is irrelevent. Trip is dead, he and T'Pol broke up, Archer is a legend that started The United Federation of planets. It sucks, but Paramount owns it so they get to do whatever it is they want. I still say they're a lot nicer than George Lucas and LucasArts.

Not to mention, canonically speaking, they're correct. By its definition in Trek, canon is defined as only the things seen on screen in a live action format, which thus excludes books, comics and cartoons. So according to canon, Tucker died in 2161 and his relationship with T'Pol ended shortly after "Terra Prime." Unless the next reboot movie happens to introduce ADM Lorian and reveal otherwise (which is, IMO, pretty unlikely), this will remain the "canon fate" of Trip and his relationship with T'Pol.

Live action includes the holodeck.

[Cogito]

according to Paramount Trip is dead.

That's the crux of the matter though.

Have Paramount explicitly said that Trip is dead?

Or have they said "whatever we showed on the screen is canon" and we are inferring that Trip is dead?

Which is it?

[lfvoy]

StarTrek.com's official recap of The Abomination

I'll quote the relevant bits here to save everyone the need of going all the way through it. Emphases are mine.

Trip leads the aliens into what appears to be a harmless utility closet — he tells them it's simply a com station and he's going to get Shran to come to them. Trip tells them he just needs to connect a couple of things, but when he brings a pair of conduits together, a massive explosion erupts, taking out both Trip and the aliens. Trip is critically wounded — despite Phlox's best efforts, he dies.

...Archer notes that when he took command 10 years ago, he saw himself as an explorer, excited about new discoveries and convinced that the risks of space travel were worth it. Now, his friend is dead and he has to write a speech about how worthwhile their mission has been.

Since this is the official site sanctioned by TPTB (look at the site footer), it's going to be awfully hard to make a case to the Memory Alpha folks that its written documentation is incorrect.

And now I'm going to go hide in the bunker with putaro.

[WarpGirl]

Like I said, it sucks. Paramount owns ST.com, and they authorize it's content. But I do agree it sucks.

[Cogito]

StarTrek.com's official recap of The Abomination
Since this is the official site sanctioned by TPTB (look at the site footer), it's going to be awfully hard to make a case to the Memory Alpha folks that its written documentation is incorrect.

You're missing an important point. All that should be preceded with:

Riker watches a holoprogram, where ...

The fact that all this happens in a holoprogram fundamentally changes its significance.

[WarpGirl]

That is because the fact that it was a holoprogram has no effect on the fact that it is canon!!!!! I'm sorry but that is what Paramount has decreed. Why is this so difficult? We the fans, DO NOT OWN Star Trek. We have no say in what they declare to be canon.

Holodeck stuff is considered canon, what they experience on the holodeck actually happened. If Janeway ran a program where she was a Victorian governess she got to be a Victorian governess. Fairheaven actually became a self-aware program. DATA was Sherlock Holmes, and Picard and Riker did fall for Minuette.

[Alelou]

Are you confusing Memory Alpha with Paramount? Just because someone who writes in a wiki about what happened in a holodeck scene within an episode as if it matches reality outside the holodeck, doesn't make that canon. What's canon is simply that it happened on the show in a holodeck. Trip was never REALLY on Ah'Len's home planet. He saw it on a holodeck. The canon is that he experienced a holodeck recreation of Ah'Len's planet, and got pregnant during a game he played with Ah'Len during it. So yes, that he got pregnant is canon -- because he continued to be pregnant outside the holodeck. That he was on the planet with her -- no. Obviously, that's not canon.

What's canon is that 200 or so years after the events of Enterprise, two characters from TNG believe that Trip died in 2161, and participate in a holodeck program that purports to dramatize those events. That's the full extent of what I'm buying as canon.

Edited to add that confusing even StarTrek.com with the Official Canon-Governing Voice of Paramount is crazy (yes, I'd missed some interim posts). Just because some marketing flunky has summarized the episode that way doesn't wipe out the fact that all these things happened in a holodeck program. I agree that Trip's death APPEARS to be believed outside the holodeck program, but even that doesn't make it impossible that it is not true, since we do not see it happen in real time in the original show's time, and neither did Troi or Riker.

[Asso]

Please listen to what Transwarp said. He speaks with the voice of wisdom.
You see, a little (a little, mind you,) I have dedicated myself to history. History is based on documents and testimonies that must be validated by evidence. Consequence: the fate of Trip and T'Pol is historically unknown.
The Canon is what has been seen on the screen? Okay. What has been seen on the screen is a reconstruction of historical facts which, in themselves, according to what Transwarp said (and that has the sound of truth), can not be known.
Ergo: we are talking of "historical" facts that cannot be demonstrated as really - historically - happened; that, at the most, can be said imaginatively invented or alleged.
And what we saw on the screen (ie the Canon) is exactly that.

[Silverbullet]

I think the alelous example is exactly right. Trip saw Ah'Len's planet in a holodeck program. He was never on it. So it is not fact just a hooprogram.

By extension then What riker and Troi saw was a holoprogram and NOT fact. It could have been made and remade over the years. How old was the holoprogram. that has never been established. Certainly at least 100 or more years. Many hands might have brought changes to it.

What we know that is Canon is the end of Terra Prime. In that Trip and T'Pol are together and T'Pol is holding trips hand as if in agreement that they could have a child. since she never said it then that is implication but the fact she is holding his hand is canon.

The Holoprogram is worthless. riker and Troik can believe what they want. We can believe what WE wantt.

SB

[WarpGirl]

:vulcan: Are you confusing Memory Alpha with Paramount?

No actually, I am not. Wiki's can be edited by any old Joe who wants to slant the information any old way they choose, even if it is accurate. So on the NCIS LA wiki if someone doesn't like a relationship, they'll site all the episodes where there were negative interaction, and minimize the episodes with positive interaction.

ST.com is a completely different beast. Information posted on the site must be authorized by the people who control the franchize. Whoever wrote the summery was told what to write and how to write it. Trip is dead.

[Asso]

Information posted on the site must be authorized by the people who control the franchize. Whoever wrote the summery was told what to write and how to write it. Trip is dead.

Who controls the controllers?

[Alelou]

I think you vastly overestimate the interest whoever was left at Paramount in charge of dead TV shows would take in the matter of writing one blurb out of a whole series' or season's worth on a web site that's there to serve the entire (mostly dead) Trek franchise. For one thing, if they'd been THAT fanatical about Trip being dead, they never would have authorized the Pocketbooks relaunch plot.

In any case, the blurb is still simply accurately describing what happened in the holo-deck portrayal. Which takes us back to the old argument.

[Cogito]

What was shown in that holodeck program cannot be historically accurate.

It was an interactive hologram. Unless you believe that Riker truly served as Enterprise's chef on that final voyage and actually had those conversations with the crew, it is not possible for the holoprogram to be showing a recording of what actually happened. That simply won't wash.

As you know, the holodeck was used extensively in TNG and I can't recall a single occasion where it was used to play back an actual recording. In every case that I can think of, the holodeck had been programmed with what the viewer wanted to see. In some cases this was a deliberate plot point, with different people presenting very different holodeck representations of the same event to show what they thought happened. To say that something shown on the holodeck is historically accurate by virtue of having been shown on the holodeck is just plain daft.

As soon as you step away from the idea that the holodeck is showing what actually happened and accept that it's showing what somebody programmed it to show, any relationship to what actually happened is speculation.

[Silverbullet]

I still stay the program is old and the possibility of many changes is very real.who is to say that others may not have changed the holodeck program to reflect Trip's death when the orginal Holodeck program did not and did not show Trip and t'Pol parting.

It is too open in inaccuradcies put in by others t o suit themselves.

Riker and troi sw what may the last change made by someone in the past.

The whole abominaton can't be taken as canon because of the Holodeckprogram .

It is junk

SB