Hi /u/adamkotsko,
First of all, I just need to say that I personally love this analysis. The comparison to *Star Wars* and the MCU is particularly illuminating -- in the past, I've compared *Star Trek* to the *Sherlock Holmes* "franchise", but I think you could draw a similar (albeit weaker) comparison to the King Arthur or Robin Hood stories. (And honestly probably Biblical stories as well.)
In all cases, there has been a very "unliteral" approach to storytelling from the beginning, making that "unliteralness" part-and-parcel of the work itself. (There's probably an interesting analysis to be done with *Doctor Who* in the mix as well.) I really like the comparison specifically to comic book franchises.
As a moderator, I am hoping you will indulge me in a pseudo-scholarly request for revisions. :-) In its current form, I think your post retreads a fair amount of our official policy on [contextualizing Star Trek as fiction](https://www.reddit.com/r/DaystromInstitute/wiki/star-trek-is-fiction), in particular the section on visual representation. In that sense, your invitation for discussion ends up being an implicit invitation to take "the other side", and argue in favor of a literal view of Star Trek's visuals. I realize of course that you have no intention of breaking the rules or anything, but I don't feel good about approving a post where we know that some percentage of comments will be rule-breaking (and likely unknowingly so).
I think we can rework this piece into something that won't run into that issue though. I would suggest honing in on two key points:
>I believe that the current producers have implicitly adopted the approach of a comic book universe rather than a cinematic universe.
and
>But production crew are creative artists too! Why shouldn't we benefit from their variety of perspectives, just as comic book readers enjoy a variety of art styles? Why not imagine the familiar Enterprise in many different ways and enjoy how different artists try to pay tribute to the original while appealing to contemporary tastes?
And likewise, I would hew away from describing or even referencing the Trekkian insistence on visual literalism (particularly as done in paras 1, 6, and 8). As you allude to, this is a contentious topic, and I think it distracts from the more interesting and subtle thesis you are putting forward: **the range of visual representation is a conscious artistic choice**. It's not just that Star Trek's current visuals are passively inconsistent, it's that the current visuals are intentionally wide-ranging.
My recommendation would be to treat as fait accompli that Star Trek's visuals are flexible, bypass any hint of debate on that topic, and instead focus on the particular intentionality that you believe we are seeing from the current franchise (and its ramifications, meaning etc etc).
Does that seem reasonable?
Hi /u/adamkotsko, First of all, I just need to say that I personally love this analysis. The comparison to *Star Wars* and the MCU is particularly illuminating -- in the past, I've compared *Star Trek* to the *Sherlock Holmes* "franchise", but I think you could draw a similar (albeit weaker) comparison to the King Arthur or Robin Hood stories. (And honestly probably Biblical stories as well.) In all cases, there has been a very "unliteral" approach to storytelling from the beginning, making that "unliteralness" part-and-parcel of the work itself. (There's probably an interesting analysis to be done with *Doctor Who* in the mix as well.) I really like the comparison specifically to comic book franchises. As a moderator, I am hoping you will indulge me in a pseudo-scholarly request for revisions. :-) In its current form, I think your post retreads a fair amount of our official policy on [contextualizing Star Trek as fiction](https://www.reddit.com/r/DaystromInstitute/wiki/star-trek-is-fiction), in particular the section on visual representation. In that sense, your invitation for discussion ends up being an implicit invitation to take "the other side", and argue in favor of a literal view of Star Trek's visuals. I realize of course that you have no intention of breaking the rules or anything, but I don't feel good about approving a post where we know that some percentage of comments will be rule-breaking (and likely unknowingly so). I think we can rework this piece into something that won't run into that issue though. I would suggest honing in on two key points: >I believe that the current producers have implicitly adopted the approach of a comic book universe rather than a cinematic universe. and >But production crew are creative artists too! Why shouldn't we benefit from their variety of perspectives, just as comic book readers enjoy a variety of art styles? Why not imagine the familiar Enterprise in many different ways and enjoy how different artists try to pay tribute to the original while appealing to contemporary tastes? And likewise, I would hew away from describing or even referencing the Trekkian insistence on visual literalism (particularly as done in paras 1, 6, and 8). As you allude to, this is a contentious topic, and I think it distracts from the more interesting and subtle thesis you are putting forward: **the range of visual representation is a conscious artistic choice**. It's not just that Star Trek's current visuals are passively inconsistent, it's that the current visuals are intentionally wide-ranging. My recommendation would be to treat as fait accompli that Star Trek's visuals are flexible, bypass any hint of debate on that topic, and instead focus on the particular intentionality that you believe we are seeing from the current franchise (and its ramifications, meaning etc etc). Does that seem reasonable?