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Straczynski Offers To Re-Boot Star Trek [updated]
EvilMagnus writes "I just came across this thread over on usenet where J. Michael Straczynski, creator of Babylon 5 and Jeremiah, talks about the cancellation of Enterprise. It seems he and a collaborator have already written a series bible and treatment for a new version of Star Trek - but it's not been pitched to Paramount out of 'political considerations' (Berman refusing to give up his dead horse?). JMS calls for everyone who thinks a JMS-run Star Trek series would be a good idea to write Paramount and let them know." Along similar lines, yonnage writes "Last week there was an article posted here about Enterprise fans atempting to pay for the next season of Enterprise. It seems that all the efforts have been pulled together and a new website has been created and has started collecting contributions for Enterprise's next season." Update: 02/16 19:47 GMT by T : Read the rest of the thread to see JMS's followup; he's decided to at least postpone this endeavor.
The nice thing about JMS's work is how he weaves complex themes into the story arc, rather then exploring and discarding them in single episode blips. That was great for the original Star Trek and early science fiction on tv (time tunnel, that sub show, quantum leap, etc) but the work of series like Bab5 has raise sci fi on tv to a higher level - where they take advantage of the serial esque nature of weekly broadcasts.
I'm in.
The rock, the vulture, and the chain
How about bringing back a show that was interesting and original, like Firefly?
That would be worth the money. Not watching YATS (Yet Another Trek Show).
Cue all the "Let it die already!" and "Trek needs a rest" comments...
These people have nothing to lose by pitching another series to Paramount. Enterprise is dead, and I'm sure Paramount would eagerly pick up anything with the slightest chance of turning a profit.
Since the article mentions they're taking their idea "to the public" I think they'd get a better reaction by releasing a preview of some type. Kind of hard for an audience to approve and support a project without knowing what it is! (Because we all know counting on the Trek name alone doesn't always work)
..Voyager, and then Enterprise proved that the producers have completely lost their marbles, and totally lost touch with the core audience.
As soon as I heard the Enterprise opening theme, I knew it was dead.
I think trek needs to die, and stay dead for another 15 years or so. Only then will it be ready for another revival.
Such wasted effort on tripe like Enterprise, when stuff like Firefly is far more deserving.
And more Walter Koenig :)
:P
One of Trek's nicest guys played the B5 villain that everyone loved to hate! But I loved how JMS actually gave him a bit of a human side when you understood what made him the way he was...
Even villain need motives and factors that drive them - very few people are just inherently nasty for the sake of being mean
"Nothing strengthens authority so much as silence." - Charles de Gaulle
Actually, Ira Steven Behr and Michael Piller were also executive producers. However, I don't think that it's a coincidence that Deep Space 9 picked up steam around the time when Voyager was launched. Personally I suspect Ira Steven Behr had far more to do with the success of Deep Space 9 than Berman ; he likely got more control of the show as Berman turned his attention to Voyager.
That's not to say that I think Berman is solely, nor even mostly responsible for the downfall of the franchise : Check Brannon Braga's credits : He had his fingers in a great deal of the two worst Star Trek shows. And notably absent from my favorite trek, DS9.
While I will beg to differ that the well has dried up for the Star Trek universe, I would have to agree that putting the series into hiatus would be a good idea.
When I hear director commentaries of Star Trek movies, or listen to actors make comments regarding their involvement with Star Trek, they seemingly have a universal theme: "I never saw Star Trek before I was hired by Paramount."
It makes me wonder about the writers as well. It is one thing to try and bring in some people from outside the Trekkies fan base to add some new and fresh ideas, but the near universality of the people producing and creating both the movies and the series doing it just as another job speaks volumes about how committed Paramount is to maintaining quality in the series.
Basically none.
One of the reasons why the Lord of the Rings was so absolutely fantastic was that the people involved with making those movies were some major fans of the work. Sure, a couple of actors may not have been as familiar with the story as die-hard fanatics, but with the rest of the production team really pulling to make it something special, those actors "caught the vision" and even added more to the passion to get it done.
I could even use the "Passion of the Christ" produced by Mel Gibson as an example of how somebody with in this case a deep religious conviction bringing something extra to the production that turned what could have been an ordinary movie into something extra ordinary.
I just don't see that kind of fire coming from Paramount these days. The attitude of William Shatner comments of "Get a Life" to fans is more typical. Star Trek has simply become a cash cow for studio executives, and they really don't care at all about the fan base other than trying to figure out how to get more money from what they percieve as a bunch of suckers. The Trek-based fan web pages legal mess is more proof of how stupid Paramount doesn't really know what they are doing other than trying to make a quick buck.
Star Trek has suffered from poor writing since after TNG. Even Deep Space Nine still had some good plots that made you interested. Another problem with Enterprise is that they have bores like Trip and Malcom. I loved B5. Loved it. I am sure JMS would make sure that the writing wasn't lame. How? Because with little money to work with he concentrated on the storylines. I think they should stop spending so much money on the props, sets, makeup, etc., and start spending it on the writing. I also loved the original Trek which became classic because of the writing again, certainly not the props.
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I do not believe there is any need to "rest" Star Trek, I think what it needs is creative talent that can improve the quality of the episodes, and it needs a series that is set after the DS9 and Voyager. I think Enterprise was a bad idea, creating a series which is set long before the other star trek series, it allows for a lot of trouble with messing up the timelines, and takes away some of the value of moving the star trek timeline forward into the future, new territory, and instead must dwell within an already defined past timeline.
In a sci-fi series like Star Trek, accuracy in timelines, events, facts and detials is very important and errors in the timelines, which they seem to have a hard time avoiding in Enterprise since it occurs previous to the other series', can shake ones confidence in the series and introduce paradoxes which weaken the entire structure of the franchise.
A new series I believe as well should incorporate the exploration and discovery aspects of Star Trek, finding strange new worlds, new civilisations, strange distant reaches of the galaxy filled with odd pecularities and phenomena. Integrating a sort of mystery-genre aspect into many episodes where the crew encounter odd mysterious and wierd phenomena and discovering what they are can be quite fascinating. There are so many creative possibilities for plots that don't involve pure action and violence but offer a deep and involving plot line, with mysteries, strangeness, and oddities, that there is no reason Star Trek cannot be revived. Furthermore we do have today far more resources avialable than in the original series in creating compelling renderings of these strange worlds and different races and beings that werent avialable in the original star trek. While the series should be based on a ship, there should also be episodes allowing the viewer to see other parts of the federation, such as the crew visiting space docks, and federation planets. In addition to exploration and discovery of distant corners of the galaxy, it would also be nice to see in several episodes the ship visit several core federation planets which we seem to see little of, like Vulcan and Earth.
I mean, I know that SF on TV is pretty much a kind of stage-play allegory, but it all feels so grounded in a '60s kind of shiny smarmy middle-class american morality (yes, I know all about demographics, I'm a director/producer). JMS's B5 brought a touch of biological diversity into the vidiotic galaxy.
What I would really like is a SF series that takes nanotech and extreme body customization into human -- not just evil borg -- society. One that has Samuel Delaney's sense of cultural development, Ridley Scott's visual and human grittiness, and KS Robinson's sense of the march of history. B5 had some of all that, but some truly cheesy interludes and unconvincing dialogue, and in the end fell back frequently to rely on the hollywood galactic tropes, so he should be able to cope in the ST version of 'future.' Here's hoping he can move the franchise into something more... contemporary.
Damn those pesky terrorists