Text 16398, 121 rader
Skriven 2007-07-31 21:48:57 av Josh Hill (2871.babylon5)
     Kommentar till en text av rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated
Ärende: Re: [OT] Nimoy at SDCC: "It was logical!"
=================================================
On Tue, 31 Jul 2007 19:56:57 -0500, "Carl" <cengman7@hotmail.com>
wrote:

>
>"Josh Hill" <usereplyto@gmail.com> wrote in message 
>news:41tua3pdv6ktmig3m0mkcbkra99tgvgj6r@4ax.com...

>> I liked it too. It was a reboot, but in a sense, it was closer to the
>> spirit of the books and From Russia With Love. Which in a way is what
>> I'd like to see happen to Trek -- recapture the spirit of the
>> original.
>
>I would too.  I just don't think you can do it as a continuation of the
>framework established by the whole TOS/TNG/DS9/VOY universe.
>I think they've locked themselves in and you have to go back and
>hit a reset.

Agree 100%. The basics are OK, even necessary, but over time they sank
in the mires of over-elaboration.

>> They've already chosen a Spock, it seems -- the guy who played Sylar
>> on Heroes. And Nemoy will be in it playing his older self.
>
>No idea who that is.

Really creepy guy who decapitates other mutants and absorbs their
powers. Not exactly Spock-like, eh? But I can (if memory serves) see
it working: he has a certain deadpan quality and a somewhat Nemoyish
look.

>>>> I tend to think that how well they do it is more important than how
>>>> faithful they are to every last detail, and that the constraints of
>>>> reasonable fidelity to the premises of the show aren't a problem if
>>>> they remember three things that the later shows and the lesser of the
>>>> movies forgot: the galaxy is immense, varied, and almost undiscovered;
>>>> most of the action has to take place on a human scale; the stories and
>>>> characters must be, within the constraints of heroic fiction,
>>>> plausible.
>>>
>>>I originally wrote a fairly lengthy list of things that I don't think you
>>>could
>>>change if you continue in the current Trek Universe.  Thinking better of 
>>>it,
>>>I'm curious what you think you *could* significantly change and still keep
>>>fan acceptance?
>>
>> I think you'd be safe with an Enterprise that looked like the original
>> done on a higher budget and with modern effects.
>
>Only if you hit the reset, although you'd have to update it a little.

Just went back and reread what you said, and I somehow managed to
misread it the first time around -- I was talking about continuing the
original show, when you were talking about a continuation of the
existing universe.

>If you continued after Voyager, you'd have to introduce new
>weapons and technology.  Do you stick with the old warp engines
>or do you let Starfleet reverse engineer slipstream drives?
>Do you let them invent the personal shields that the Borg had
>(once you plant the idea) and then make landing parties/away teams
>almost invulnerable or admit that Starfleet is too stupid to
>learn from the alien technology they've come across over several
>hundred years.

I've no doubt that you'd want to drop the likes of slipstream drives.
But you'd drop the silly (and non-canonical) TNG warp 10 limitation.
Let the new Enterprise do Warp 16 or something. Makes no difference --
they're traveling in drama time, not clock time, and that means that
there are times you're going to want them to be five days away from
something and times you're going to want them 30.

>We have phones that are the size of earpieces now.  Do you let communicators
>become too small to see?  I can imagine how the audience
>and the characters not seeing communicators would cause a problem
>in some stories.

The communicators are such a handy plot device that I think you'd need
/something/ that could be taken away. IIRC, Rodenberry rejected the
ability to locate and beam people up for just that reason. Also, you
want something that requires the characters to speak so you can hear
them -- no tuning into brainwaves and the like. But lots of things you
could do. Forex, the communicators could have AI's in them.

>Either we've learned a lot more by then, in which case the villians
>have to be much worse than the Borg, Founders, etc., or there's
>no risk and therefore no drama.  (Hmmm... a Start Trek comedy?)

Part of the challenge, I think, is to keep the limitations, even when
they aren't particularly realistic -- just as you want to create some
capabilities that aren't realistic either. I mean, IRL, a ship like
the Enterprise would likely be smart enough to drive itself, and its
reaction time would be a fraction of that of a human helmsman. But
where's the fun in that?

>The alternative is a complete collapse of Start Fleet and a much
>darker and more militaristic series, which could work but I don't think
>they'd let it go there.

What Andromeda was supposed to be, I think. But they screwed it up.

><snip>
>
>You could make the changes you mentioned, but only on a reboot, not a
>continuation (which was my original point).
>
>Instead, they've decided to do a "Star Trek, the Lost Tales" instead.
>I doubt it will live up to another set of Lost Tales that came out. :)

Though Lost Tales has the same cast. I've never envied the people who
set out to do remakes, at least remakes of classics. The creative
staff will have to be damned good.

-- 
Josh

"Your manuscript is both good and original. But the part that is
good is not original, and the part that is original is not good."
	-- Samuel Johnson
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