Smoothing the edges...

MjavTheGray

Spaceman
Such a question:
How are we supposed to explain "glad to meet ya" said by Maniac in WC1, while in all the later WC's we are told the were classmates?
Throw away WC1?
Or ignore this mismatch with later WC's ?
 
Well, he's just glad he's meeting you...
It's not like he's saying "Glad to finally be introduced to you for the first time ever, person whom I've never ever met before in my 23 years of life".
 
Yeah, that's true.
But he says 'Glad to meet ya, I am Maniac".
And Shotglas is teaching you about Maniac as if Todd's here for some months...
Stupid Shotglas? ;)
 
Well, Maniac has a knack for making bad jokes.
And Shotglass didn't know you knew Maniac already.

I know, when WC1 was made, you're supposedly meeting everyone for the first time, but even in the WC1 Official guide, they say that you were in flight school with maniac. That is pretty solid in all background stories we have, including the cartoon and several official guides. And it's just cooler that way.
 
Well, Maniac has a knack for making bad jokes.
And Shotglass didn't know you knew Maniac already.

I know, when WC1 was made, you're supposedly meeting everyone for the first time, but even in the WC1 Official guide, they say that you were in flight school with maniac. That is pretty solid in all background stories we have, including the cartoon and several official guides. And it's just cooler that way.

Fair enough... how about Bossman being dead.

Paladin being French.

Angel being... well not French.

Knight being killed.

Rapiers being old and "beat to hell."

Broadswords being on the Tiger's Claw.

Iceman being nowhere to be found even though he says hes been on the TC for years.

Paladin transfering to Combat pilot status on the TC, then going BACK to Covert Opps.

I mean I've heard many solutions, but one never covered any of these...
 
Actually there's a thread from not too long ago that started out with the exact same question as this one and it wouldn't hurt to read it over. Have a look here: http://www.crius.net/zone/showthread.php?t=19760&highlight=pilgrim

Fair enough... how about Bossman being dead.
He's not. He's MIA

Paladin being French.
His accent was put on for his covert operations
Angel being... well not French.
She's not french, she's Belgian.
Knight being killed.
I certainly looked that way, though they never actually adress afterwards that he's dead.
Rapiers being old and "beat to hell."
these are not the rapiers in the games, per the handbook and novel the Movie rapiers are an old model and different make and designation than the game ones. I'm too lazy to look up the actual numbers right now.
Broadswords being on the Tiger's Claw.
Why not? Just because WC2 was the first game to have broadswords doesn't mean they don't exist before that. And the 4 fighters we see in WC1 certainly doesn't mean that they're the only ones. Broadswords show up on the Claw in Academy (TV) too.
Iceman being nowhere to be found even though he says hes been on the TC for years.
Just like the fighters just because we don't see it in the movie doesn't mean it isn't there. There are a ton of pilots and crew we don't see in the movie or game either. We see only a fraction of the pilots in either. Presumably he's on the claw, just not center in any of the movie's scenes.
 
Why not? Just because WC2 was the first game to have broadswords doesn't mean they don't exist before that. And the 4 fighters we see in WC1 certainly doesn't mean that they're the only ones. Broadswords show up on the Claw in Academy (TV) too.

Yes I do know that the broadsword has been around since pre-war times. I just didn't think there were any present aboard the Tiger's Claw. I would have thought that such a tough bomber would have made an appearance when there were several oppertunities that it could have been used.

Sorry, but i just hate having loose ends.
 
Yes I do know that the broadsword has been around since pre-war times. I just didn't think there were any present aboard the Tiger's Claw. I would have thought that such a tough bomber would have made an appearance when there were several oppertunities that it could have been used.

Sorry, but i just hate having loose ends.

How is this a critism of the movie though? They hadn't been invented when they made wc1.
 
Perhaps another point as well... in WC1, weapon technology was good enough that torpedoes were not required to destroy capital ships. It would make sense then, that Broadswords were transferred off in favor of more agile craft. When phase shield technology progressed to the point where torpedoes were needed again, the Broadswords find themselves back on the frontlines.
 
And the movie Broadswords are probably an older model. Or something.

The Tiger's Claw should have around 100 pilots. We see very few of them in the game, or the movie.
 
Fair enough... how about Bossman being dead.

I thought he never existed. :) In all honesty, it's the single thing that still bugs me about the movie... but many people, myself included, have outlined stories through which he could have survived.

Paladin being French.

Paladin's scottish accent was a put on, too, according to the Wing Commander IV novelization - part of his covert operative role.

Angel being... well not French.

Angel was never French, for one thing... she's Belgian. The problem here is that the *actress* who played her wasn't French. The actress who played Flint wasn't from Locanda, either...:)

Seriously, though, legitimate theater has had British people playing Frenchmen forever - look at Captain Picard, a French character played with an English accent by an Englishman.

Also, consider that when French people become fluent in English they generally do speak with a British accent - because they learn the language in that part of the world.

Knight being killed.

I know we've freeze-framed this one - it's not clear whether he was killed or not.

Rapiers being old and "beat to hell."

Different fighters - CF-117 Rapiers versus the later F-44 Rapier IIs. Completely unrelated, like the P-47 Thunderbolt and the A-10 Thunderbolt II.

Broadswords being on the Tiger's Claw.

The Broadsword entered service in 2634-5; they first appeared on the Tiger's Claw in the Wing Commander Academy series (2654).

Iceman being nowhere to be found even though he says hes been on the TC for years.

That's sort of weak - there's a *lot* of pilots we don't see in the movie.

Paladin transfering to Combat pilot status on the TC, then going BACK to Covert Opps.

Later stories (including Freedom Flight) already introduced the idea that Taggart was involved with Covert Ops (well, Naval Intelligence) before SM2.

Yes I do know that the broadsword has been around since pre-war times. I just didn't think there were any present aboard the Tiger's Claw. I would have thought that such a tough bomber would have made an appearance when there were several oppertunities that it could have been used.

Actually, we rarely attacked anything large in the original Wing Commander - we didn't even see an enemy carrier until Secret Missions 2.

Broadswords seem to have existed in limited numbers - in both Wing Commander Academy and the Wing Commander movie ordinary fighter squadrons seem to have included sone specific class (Rapiers in the movie, Scimitars in the show) and then a pair of Broadswords.

Such a question:
How are we supposed to explain "glad to meet ya" said by Maniac in WC1, while in all the later WC's we are told the were classmates?
Throw away WC1?
Or ignore this mismatch with later WC's ?

Maybe he's making fun of Blair's having changed his callsign thrice in the immediately preceding Wing Commander movie novel trilogy. :)

Seriously, though, this has always been a mistake - Claw Marks itself tells you that Maniac graduated in the same class as Blair, and every single later story has continued that plot point.
 
Knight being killed.

This has always bothered me, so I popped in the Wing Commander DVD just now and did a frame-by-frame of the scene with Paladin and "Mr. Knight."

Every other pilot's helmet has their last name on it. Blair, Deveraux, Forbes, Marshall.

Knight's has "KNIGHT" written on it. It's really hard to tell because of how small it is and how much he is moving around, but there is one frame in 0:55:19 (you'll need to scan there and then skip one frame at a time to see it) where it is very clear.

If this was the Knight from WC1 it should say "KHUMALO" instead.

Unless for some reason he decided to have his callsign instead of his last name on his helmet, this is an entirely different pilot than the Knight from WC1 and his death is irrelevant.
 
This has always bothered me, so I popped in the Wing Commander DVD just now and did a frame-by-frame of the scene with Paladin and "Mr. Knight."

Every other pilot's helmet has their last name on it. Blair, Deveraux, Forbes, Marshall.

Knight's has "KNIGHT" written on it. It's really hard to tell because of how small it is and how much he is moving around, but there is one frame in 0:55:19 (you'll need to scan there and then skip one frame at a time to see it) where it is very clear.

If this was the Knight from WC1 it should say "KHUMALO" instead.

Unless for some reason he decided to have his callsign instead of his last name on his helmet, this is an entirely different pilot than the Knight from WC1 and his death is irrelevant.

That's not the only instance... Hunter is apparently Mr. Hunter in the movie too...
 
Perhaps another point as well... in WC1, weapon technology was good enough that torpedoes were not required to destroy capital ships. It would make sense then, that Broadswords were transferred off in favor of more agile craft. When phase shield technology progressed to the point where torpedoes were needed again, the Broadswords find themselves back on the frontlines.

Good point. After all, when a flight of Raptors can take down a heavy cruiser/light carrier (Fralthi), there is less call for dedicated bombers.
 
I really don't understand why we can't all just agree that this is an instance of retroactive continuity, rather than pretending that, "hey, playername. I’m Maniac. Glad to meetcha," means anything other than the obvious. There certainly wasn't an overarching vision for Wing Commander as a franchise when the original game's dialogue was written, much less the possibility of a major motion picture and animated series.
 
I really don't understand why we can't all just agree that this is an instance of retroactive continuity, rather than pretending that, "hey, playername. I’m Maniac. Glad to meetcha," means anything other than the obvious. There certainly wasn't an overarching vision for Wing Commander as a franchise when the original game's dialogue was written, much less the possibility of a major motion picture and animated series.

Except, as LOAF stated, the manual that came with WC1 (claw marks) says that maniac was in Blair's class at the academy.
 
AD said:
Except, as LOAF stated, the manual that came with WC1 (claw marks) says that maniac was in Blair's class at the academy.
Says specifically, now? Let's delve a little deeper.
Claw Marks said:
Fresh from the Academy is 2nd Lt. Todd Marshall, known as Maniac by his graduating class.
Marshall, 23, tries hard to live up to his moniker. "Plodding along with your joystick in one hand and a copy of the naval regs in the other is not going to impress the Kilrathi," he says. "They know our regs. They know the Book, they know how we do things. If we're going to put them on the ropes, we have to adapt our rules, tactics, and flying styles. We have to outfly them, outfight them... we've got to want it more. And I want it.
"I'm a Proxie - homeworld Leto, Proxima Centauri IV. When the colonization started, anyone with any brains or skills high tailed it off Earth, and most of them ended up on Leto. That's why Proxies kick homeborn Terrans around in the ratings."
Despite his creative interpretation of colonial history and comparative Naval Academy standings, Marshall was one of the highest-rated Acadamy graduates in the '54 class and promises to be a worthy addition to the Tiger's Clas pilot roster.
I'd be reluctant to say that sharing a graduating year is proof positive that the two characters knew each other during their academy years until such time as there was actual backstory developed about it. Sure, it's easy to look back with the clarity of hindsight and say that it must be so, but Blair, the character, didn't even exist until Wing Commander III. He was a cardboard cutout with no history or personality of his own. Up to that point, he was the blue-haired protagonist with no greater purpose than to represent the player.

That's the beauty of retroactive continuity, isn't it? Turning blue-hair into Blair and creating a fully defined character with a history of accomplishments and relationships to call their own, and meshing it into an existing story where none had existed before.
 
Ref: Bossman and Knight

When watched the movie I wondered if it was at all possible they were different people, since Paladin talks to a Mr. Knight...

Anyway, it's quite obvious that if Bossman and Knight are considered dead but turn up alive later one, it's because they somehow survived.
 
Still, the Academy years aren't THAT important.
For the future relations between Chris and Todd their time on the 'Claw wouldn't be more than enough?
IMHO - it would sure be.
So it's a pity that Origin decided to cripple the story that way (Not mentioning the hated colouring of ships in WC-II ;), impossibility of torpedo salvo for Broadsword, which can't be explained in any way, and maaaaaaaany other things).

But my quiestion was - how do we deal with 'Glad to meet ya' now, when it is officially declared that those two WERE classmates?
And I have the answer. We do call it an idiotic joke of Maniac. Okay. So be it :)

Anyway, uncle Lu's killing Amidala when we do know that Leia remembers her mother - is incomparable example of idiocy. :)

So a little stupid joke of Todd is okay :)
 
When watched the movie I wondered if it was at all possible they were different people, since Paladin talks to a Mr. Knight...


In the movie, Blair refers to Bossman by name. "Lt. Commander Chen? 'Bossman'?"


Anyway I don't recall Hunter ever being called "Mr. Hunter" in the movie at all. Maniac calls him "Mr.... Lt. Hunter" after reading his dogtag. So he referred to him by his callsign there. I don't recall ever seeing his helmet.

I still stand by the fact that "Mr. Knight"'s helmet has KNIGHT displayed on it, so as far as I'm concerned this is another pilot whose last name is Knight.
 
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