Moore: Star Trek Had Too Much Continuity March 24, 2008
by Anthony Pascale , Filed under: DS9, Star Trek (2009 film), TNG , trackback
Last week Ron Moore talked about his visit to the new Star Trek set and today there is more at Sci-Fi Wire. The TNG/DS9 vet writer/producer says after seeing Trek at Paramount again, “all that kind of really hardcore, Trekkie geek stuff came flying back.” Moore (who has not read the Trek script, but has experience rebooting the Battlestar franchise) opined on Abrams’ plan to bring Trek back.
From the Sci-Fi Wire interview:
I just think that Star Trek had gone on for so long and had developed such a complicated backstory and so much continuity that it really wasn’t possible for any one writer or any one group of writers, really, to keep it all straight anymore….
And that meant there was a whole legion of people out there that weren’t even going to make the effort because it was just too much work. This really gives it a chance to start over and bring everybody back to what made it so great to begin with.
More Moore at Sci-Fi Wire
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I’d love to use that line of logic on a history test!
So true.
I agree, the franchise got to bloated with it’s self. thats what killed enterprise
well I agree with Moore… lets get back to good stories and good movies/TV and let the nazis worry about ret-coning history so that their the only ones that can enjoy Trek.
I got off Trek for a while during DS9 days after catching an obscure treaty reference and finding myself startled at how much I knew about this nonworld. Maybe if the show had been better that wouldn’t have bothered me, but, anyway, I think Moore’s right. I’m entirely looking forward to the movie, but the structure can bear only so much weight.
Uhm, no. Moore’s talking out of his ass. Just because there’s a lot of backstory and continuity, doesn’t mean the scripts for each episode had to be loaded down with that crap. There was no reason at all for all the technobabble, there was no reason at all that the characters were often scared of their own shadow geeks, instead of cut from the hero mold like Kirk. In short, it was the freaking writing that killed TV Trek, of which Moore plays a big a part as anyone else.
I totally disagree. It’s not really that complicated when you get right down to it. I’m not a trek writer, but I can’t imagine that any writer has ever hit a dead end because of a continuity issue.
Well I don’t know how complicated the backstory was, but there were published Encyclopedias and Chronologies, so having someone check them would’ve helped. Hell, there are prolly many Trek fans who’d have done it for free….
That said, I do agree that there were several aspects that made the universe just a bloated mess. Like creating new races when an older, already established, but not used as much race might’ve worked. In Ent, there was an ep where a freighter was supposed to be attacked by an alien race. Originally it was Orions, but IRCC it was changed to a newer species.
Also, I remember going through the Trek Encyclopedia around the temporal and spatial anomoly section and several were just the same thing, with new names. Now giving them new names spared the writers from charges of just rehashing “X” plot device….but really, it was the same with just a different name.
Also, reusing established anomolies would’ve helped strengthen continuity, not made it so damn confusing and prolly made them think twice about doing that type of story again and again.
Having said that…..I’m ready for a new Trek with a far, far simpler backstory. These days I just don’t have the time, effort or inclination to look into a bloated, largely lacklustre backstory, nor do I think it’s going to hurt Trek much by jettisoning it.
Vulcans use logic, Klingons and Romulans are the enemy and I dont care if the Cardassians, Bajorans, Breen, Ferengi, Dominion and Borg even exist in the new Trek or it’s future. There’s a combined total of 21 years worth of seasons for those that do and they’re all out on DVD.
#3
I’m going to have to respectively disagree.
I believe that the reason Enterprise failed was exactly the opposite. Enterprise made it very clear from the get-go that they were going to throw away all the bloatedness. So many interviews stated that they would favor good storytelling over consistency with minutea.
The big push with Enterprise was to reach out to new audiences even if it pissed off some of the hardcore fans. That’s the reason behind the music video opening and dropping “Star Trek” from the title. And it worked, they pissed off the hardcore fans who felt betrayed. Complaints poured in every week about how Enterprise was so seperated from the show and didn’t respect that which came before it.
In my opinion, it made Enterprise a really good show that was able to make bold choices without tiptoeing around the details like the final awful seasons of Voyager (my opinions only)
The problem with the plan was that for all the talk about reaching a new audience, Paramount never ever made any attempt to reach out to a new audience. The general public never heard of Enterprise, or assumed it was just “one of those Trek shows”.
I have a few friends who aren’t into Trek at all and they started to catch a little Enterprise and got really into it. Enough to ask to borrow older Treks. They didn’t like Voyager and Deep Space Nine because of the bloated factor. But loved Enterprise.
It’s a shame the show was designed for a certain audience and then never introduced to that audience.
“In short, it was the freaking [poor, medioce, hackneyed] writing that killed TV Trek, of which Moore plays a big a part as anyone else.”
EXACTLY, r6. EXACTLY.
I agree with Moore. The longer the shows and movies ran the deeper the continuity got. That can intimidate alot of casual viewers/fans and simply doesn’t make the material as accessible as it should be.
It’s great to have all that depth; but after awhile you can get shackled down by it.
This isn’t the first time Moore has said something to this effect. He and Braga both stated they felt that Trek was gonna need a reboot eventually during an audio commentary for either Generations or First Contact, I can’t remember which.
There’s nothing wrong with hitting the refresh button with Trek.
I think what Moore’s referring to is not just keeping the canon straight, for storytelling’s sake, but the intimidating nature of it all. Unlike soap operas, this is a world that tries much harder to be free of loose ends. It has to try because it’s already a strange heady concept of a show. It needs consistency to make that concept to fascilitate suspension of disbelief.
On top of all that, it’s intimidating because a writer has to meet the *sometimes* unreasonable expectations of its fans. That’s partly the show’s own doing. Once TNG premiered, or perhaps as early as the plans for Phase II and TMP, or TAS, the decision was made to make all incarnations of the show tie into each other, and therefore, fact-check it down to the nitty-gritty details.
Even discounting TAS, after 40 years of stories spanning 28 television seasons and 10 movies, it would be intimidating for all but the most hard-core students of this world to break into. It’s hard enough for an apiring TV writer to fathom breaking a spec script for a show that’s only been around for a season or two.
The feeling of a world being visited will still be there with this new movie, but with much less baggage. We can always do as John Lennon said and put the old ones on if we want to reminisce. We can discount this new film as part of the canon we’re more familiar with or include it with everything else. Hopefully we’ll be able to reconsile the two into one, but if not, then it would be a clean slate and it might not be such a bad thing.
#9
The biggest problem with Ent is that they straddled the fence. They kept saying it wasn’t a re-boot, so people expected them to honor what came before. But they didn’t honor what came before so it pissed people off.
And the writing was just god awful. Great concept (prequel that is, not the Temporal Cold War…..an idiotic term anyway), great crew, horrible writing and an inability to have the balls to just say “we’re rebooting it” created a big confusing mess that seemed to piss off more people than not.
Later, they tried to say that Ent *was* in an altered timeline, but too many people were pissed or dis-interested to care, the writing was still crap and the show just lacked any kind of direction. Both in the show and in the real world. Both crew and writing team were “just flyin around”.
Then they bring in Manny Coto who tries to firmly establish it in the Trek universe proper, and while he does a pretty good job that I and many others would’ve liked to see continue, it’s too late. Shows dead.
Oh boy, Ron Moore opened up a can of worms on this one.
I wonder if Moore will complain about continuity if the BSG franchise continues to make spinoff series and TV movies and such.
I’m all for a fresh start, but what was so complicated about the ‘Star Trek’ universe?
“Battlestar:Galactica” only remotely resembled it’s origins, and, while it was, arguably, an improvement, it never actually needed to be named ‘Battlestar: Galactica” to begin with. And talk about complicated. That program was far more of a saga than the original Trek ever was.
If ‘Star Trek’ is “reimagined” to the point that it’s just another space opera, I don’t see the point, except to trade in on a brand to make an easier buck than gambling on an all new idea.
I would like to see the philosophy of a non interference directive and an optimistic future survive the transition to the new product. I’d be thrilled if we actually saw some new worlds and civilizations. I’m afraid though that what we’re being prepared for is a young adult soap opera in space.
#6, you are RIGHT on the money. I really couldn’t have said it better myself!!
I can’t figure out why we’re even listening to what Ron Moore says, as if his words have any relevance to what Abrams and Co are doing. They’re going out of their way to make us purists (who are a small minority in the first place, as far as I know) happy with the new project, even bringing in people who are NOT involved with the project who they hope has some credibility with us fans, and getting them to wax poetic about the film. They don’t seem to realize that they wouldn’t even HAVE to “convince/win the purist population” if they hadn’t made so many asinine changes in the first place.
Trek began it’s slide after DS9….same writers, same composers, same production designers, cinematographers, etc. all led to a blandness and “sameness” to each show, no matter what timeline they were set in. Enterpise should’ve been done by a whole new production group from the gitgo.
#12 When did they say that Ent was in an altered timeline? Or are you referring to the Borg discovery in Antarctica?
When did they ever, ever say it was an altered timeline? Never. Enterpise never ever tried to be a reboot. They may have failed to be in a place people were comfortable with it being, but it never claimed to be a reboot or alternate timeline.
Also, I don’t want to get into an argument over the quality of Enterprise. I just want to point out that it did not pussy-foot around the details. That’s all.
And for all the talk. Enterprise didn’t really trample on that many things. Little details like the date of some mission, or some Vulcan biology. The things Enterprise conflicted with were what people thought it should be.
That’s not a good thing or a bad thing. I’m just saying if you damn it, damn it for what it was.
Personally, I preferred good storytelling to nitpicking details. That’s just me. Some people prefer consistency of the little details. That’s valid too. I don’t see why people who like the ideas of Star Trek can’t accept each others thought there. I respect that you didn’t like Enterprise, and wouldn’t care to try to change your mind.
IDIC
I’m going to hold star trek Hostage in my mind until they make good use
of all of today’s powerful computers, made ready & available & write good stories that totally stay within “Cannon!” Don’t ever tell me that you “Can’t do it!!!” AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!
“In short, it was the freaking [poor, medioce, hackneyed] writing that killed TV Trek, of which Moore plays a big a part as anyone else.”
I would say that for Bermann, but Moore wrote some of the best stories (”All good things”, expanding the Klingon culture in DS9) and produced DS9 (not only one of the best Trek series, but also one of the best scifi series). I think Voyager and ENT would have become better if not Bermann but Moore had made them.
That’s one of the good things about TOS: you could watch about any episode in any order, or even independant of the others, and still get it without a compendium. Each one stood alone.
#17 Agreed
Perfectly stated. The process ceased to be a labor of caring and became a preprocessed product with an unending sameness.
Ron Moore is Absolutely Right(TM). And this dude knows whereof he speaks - anyone who could take crap like the 1978 “Battlestar Galactica” into the brilliant current version, as Moore has, should be heeded.
How can you ever have continuity issues when time travel is possible?
# 20 would that be phaser cannon or what? ;-)
Bloatedness is what kept me away from Babylon 5. I didn’t want a frakkin’ soap opera. I wanted episodes. It’s not that I have a short attention span (I’ve been watching Trek for 4 decades now) but I just don’t like being forced to watch a series week after week or be lost in ambiguity.
Moore is riding high on the hog right now… he apparently has forgotten how quickly an audience can turn on a show. I don’t wish that to happen with BSG, but now that they’re doing Caprica, who knows?
I’m all about good story telling. Let’s see if it happens again.
#18
“#12 When did they say that Ent was in an altered timeline? Or are you referring to the Borg discovery in Antarctica?”
Yep.
#19
“When did they ever, ever say it was an altered timeline? Never.”
It was never stated within the show, but Braga made comments about it later.
From “The Trek Nation” May 19th 2003.
“Following the screening there was a short Q&A. Braga teased, “No direct threatening questions”. When asked about continuity discrepancies in “Regeneration”, Braga replied the “timeline has been altered”. A temporal paradox? Along the same theme, he added that next season would be edgier.”
Here’s the link: http://www.treknation.com/articles/brannon_braga_ucsc_event.shtml
As for the quality of the show….well as I said above, it had some cool things…..they just weren’t executed well. On other boards around that time, I stated that a prequel idea was awesome, but that B&B, just weren’t the people to execute it. Mainly because I didn’t think people who had spent so much time writing in a certain time and mind frame could readjust their thinking to a much more primitive time.
#22: “That’s one of the good things about TOS: you could watch about any episode in any order, or even independant of the others, and still get it without a compendium. Each one stood alone.”
Exactly so.
There’s this tired old (by Internet standards) chestnut that goes “Saying continuity is a problem is an excuse of lazy writers.”
Nope. Falling back on audience familiarity, affection or need to find out what happens in a continuing storyline, while certainly not a failing when done well, is simply a marvelous safety net when writers *can’t *write*compelling*short*screenplays* that make people want to tune in next week to see another new story.
Rod Serling could do that brilliantly. The producers of TOS managed to find writers who could do it more often than not for a couple of years, and it’s those damned fine little stand-alone fifty-minute science fiction “movies” that remain the foundation of “Star Trek’s” success.
OMG, Michael Moore just said everything I’ve wanted to say re: the new film. That’s exactly it: move the hell away from this massive saga of 5 series all interconnected, and just get back to the beginning… when Trek was new and pure, and start fresh. That said, it’ll never, ever be possible to escape star trek’s backstory. Too many rabid fans (like myself) keeping tabs on everything. But at least with a prequel they aren’t as beholden to the Trek canon. They can and should take some creative liberties. Trek got too bogged down and that’s why we all suffered Trek fatigue, in a sense. The last two films were major disappointments and the canon just felt tired and regurgitated. This new film could capture the sense of adventure and new-ness to Trek that we haven’t felt since the last 10 minutes of “First Contact.”
Jordan, that’s RON Moore, not Michael Moore. :)
Moore is right, the Abrams and company should just start from scratch, make the film and ignore all these ridiculous chronology book limitations that some fans are trying to impose upon trek. Back story is only useful to a point then it becomes a veritable white Elephant which will in the end kill vitality of the franchise. Its alright to homage the past but its not alright to be stuck in it.
Jeez. What did Gunsmoke do? Give me a break.
Moore, did it with Galactica and it can be done with Star Trek, just start over and keep the best from the original series. Perhaps this is something of what we’ll get with the new movie. I think, in this case, they are keeping much of what worked and are using the older Spock angle to explain the new changes.
Works for me, now if they can just omit the screaming opera singer from the 2nd & 3rd season remastered titles… too overpowering!
#6:
Both parties have a point here. The canon gives us races, a history, a universe to play around in. It truly does add to stories. It also spawns new stories that are wonderful in their own right, and are even better when seen in the full context of the work. (I think the best-ever example of that was Enterprise Season Four.) From the broad strokes of the races and the universe to the subtle little references that so delight the fandom, Trek is its own legendarium, and I would never want to see that thrown away as RDM seems to be advocating here. A Galactica-style reboot for Trek would, as another poster said, only turn Star Trek into just another space opera.
And yet… it is -hard- to write new Trek within that huge conflicting mass of data that is canon. Even knowing as much as I do (which, at last count, is roughly everything ever, give or take an episode of Voyager), I simply could not write Trek fanfic anymore if not for the huge crutch of Memory-Alpha. I can’t keep the years of the Dominion War straight, I rely heavily on a javascript stardate converter I found on Google and on the warp tables from Ex Astris, and trying to map out locations so as not to piss off the alarming number of fans who think the Star Charts are canon (or ought to be) is hellish when you want a face-off between the Klingons and the Tzehnkethi. In this respect, RDM is exactly right. Moreover, when he was writing DS9, the canon was a lot smaller than it is today–and hardcore fans didn’t expect you to keep consistent with the novels, the production materials, the fanon… I once even had the executive producer of Hidden Frontier complain to me that my own fan production (Star Trek: Excelsior) wasn’t fully respectful to HF because my show’s backstory contradicted -his- show’s canon! (A fan film!)
Suffice to say it’s fracking hard. There are too many details for any one man (or men) to keep track of, and simply doing one’s best to avoid a myriad of technical contradictions consumes enormous amounts of energy. Trying to write a good story within the context of canon is a tremendous undertaking, and I am always impressed with those who attempt it and succeed; they are not recognized enough. (Except for NV/P2’s Hugo nomination! Go Cawley! Represent!) In this regard, like RDM (who, incidentally, did a wonderful job on DS9 and also deserves recognition), I hate the canon and want it to die painfully.
What I think Trek needs to find–and, from what I see of BALOK’s “Supreme Court”, what Trek has found–is a balance. Characters, conflicts, the central ideas of the races we know and love, from Klingons to the Dominion to even the Xindi–these things matter, and should always be protected within the canon. These are the things, along with Gene’s bold vision of the future, that make Star Trek something special. Minutiae–dates, registries, locations, technological capabilities, even actors–should be entirely ignored, altered to serve the purposes or themes of the story. The fans who disowned Enterprise because the NX-01 looked like an Akira–and it did–are the same fans who railed against the new movie for apparently having the Enterprise being built on Earth. These fans are the greatest threat to good storytelling and to Gene’s vision, and, therefore, they are a grave threat to the franchise as a whole.
Let’s have a new vision of canon, where we, as a fandom, have clearly marked the differences between “that which is important” and “that which is not.” *That* would put Star Trek on the fast track to a renaissance.
My two cents.
Wow… that was longer than I thought it was. Sorry.
Ron, Ron, Ron…..
Staying within continuity for a Star Trek show shouldn’t be any more complicated than staying within continuity for a CSI or Law & Order show.
Just don’t contradict what came before, or put forward something that really doesn’t fit without a really freakin’ good reason.
Besides, hasn’t it been said over and over again that limitations makes for better writing?
18, 19, 27 RE: altered timeline…
All of Season Three could’ve been an altered timeline. Daniels explained that the Xindi attack on Earth in the Season Two finale and the following year’s-worth of stories were “not supposed to have happened” and were a consequence of the Temporal Cold War.
Of course the whole series could’ve been an altered timeline for similar reasons (the Temporal Cold War starting with the pilot episode). I always wonder if in the “new” timeline a model of the NX-01 is also included in the 1701-D conference room alongside the other Starfleet Enterprises. Ow. My head hurts.
Ron Moore is Absolutely Wrong. Totally. Completely. Utterly. Profoundly.
There’s nothing really that complicated about Trek’s continuity, if one cares even a little bit about it. It’s a huge universe, with plenty of room for new directions, all along its fictional timeline. With any sort of luck, Messrs. Abrams, Orci, and Kurtzman understand this. As Jeff (#6) said, the fact that there is continuity doesn’t mean that every script has to loaded down with it, and the fact of continuity gives dozens of launching-points for new stories, too.
(Having written more than half a million words of storyteling in the Trekverse {or at least a very close analogue to it ;) }, I’ll certainly argue from experience that continuity has far more benefits than drawbacks.)
I think it ironic that, for all the whining about continuity, the Trek film widely considered the best is the most continuity-laden of the bunch. Its entire story owes its existence to an Original Series episode. Why does it work? Because the filmmakers knew to provide just enough hooks to the original story so that new viewers could “get it”, and then got on with the job of the storytelling. That’s good use of continuity.
Moore’s Galactica could have benefitted from a whole lot more respect and caring for the original. I’m still saddened that he opted to demonstrate so little of either. And I think if what he did to BSG was ever done to Trek, it would be a profound loss.
#34 very well said, It would be a chance for trek to maybe go down a different time line. If I could change one or two things in trek. One would be Captain Pike, Let him have a different fate then He did in the original, I always hated how he ended up in the original. I know I am going to hear a lot of criticism on this statement, so be it.
I find it supremely ironic that Ron Moore is complaining about “too much continuity,” when he single-handedly created much of the Klingon backstory for the 24th century period. But, setting that aside…
The problem with Star Trek isn’t continuity, it’s a dire lack of any sense of adventure and exploration.
Say all the negative things you want about the first two seasons of TNG, but at least the Enterprise was actually attempting to go out and explore “new worlds and new civilizations.” That was the whole reason for families being on the new Enterprise, a decision that was highly controversial among Trek fans when the show first debuted.
Then, somewhere around Season Six, TNG forgot about exploration entirely, and the Enterprise served merely as a heavily-armed Ramada Inn designed to ferry around diplomats, mediate the occasional Klingon or Cardassian skirmish or serve simply as a backdrop for a crew member’s emotional crisis or holodeck experience.
Plots became predictable, and always revolved around fixing The Crew Member or Technological Gadget That Has Gone Wrong This Week™.
So, continuity isn’t the issue. Case in point: Doctor Who, the longest-running sci-fi series in history (with more episodes than the entire Trek franchise put together) has *oodles* of continuity, but it doesn’t get in the way of telling a fun adventure each week. And if something needs to be retconned in order for the story to make sense, then fine. The point is to tell a story that is fun and adventurous. And if some commentary on modern society can be woven in to give it depth, so much the better.
Remember when Star Trek was actually fun and adventurous? You know, like watching “Doomsday Machine” or “Trouble with Tribbles” or “City on the Edge of Forever”? You know, those feelings you get, even though you’ve seen the episode thousands of times?
Does anyone get those feelings when watching “The Quality of Life,” “Aquiel,” or “Bloodlines”? Does anyone even remember what the hell those episodes were even about without having to consult Wikipedia? I doubt it.
I’m sorry, Mr. Moore. You’re supremely talented and your new Galactica series kicks ass. But Star Trek wasn’t run into the ground because of “the weight of continuity.” It was run into the ground by many writer/producers who clearly got bored with the 24th century universe they helped create, and we as the audience eventually got bored watching episodes which took place in it.
Star Trek is near death because it desperately needs a new infusion of genuine adventure… and fun! I’m hoping the new film will re-ignite that.
I don’t know if Moore is as perplexed by all the back-story and continuity there is to get straight as he is simply worried he’ll piss off a purist with the wrong colored laser button. If he reads these posts like Robert Orci does, he understands how some people here can be so militant about their make-believe. I’m as sure there’s a part of him that is quite capable of going through all the shows with his team and making a time-line and figuring it all out, as I’m also as sure there’s a part of him that doesn’t give a f**k about it either.
As for Trek, I’m a 60’s veteran, loved the original show, loved Next Generation, preferred DS9 to Babylon 5, loved Voyager and loved Enterprise. Basically I love Star Trek!
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I try to analyze why some people put one up against another, why series are put down in comparison to each other. However, the intricate “canon” back history that run’s through all series tying them together souldn’t take precedence over a good story. I think good stories are the key.
It’s fascinating that given enough time and episodes that all will eventually be explained. When I watch Worf’s reaction to questions about the Klingon’s “human” appearance in “TRIALS AND TRIBBLE-ATIONS” (which of course is DS9’s visit back to TOS) and later the reason for their appearance is explained in ENT: AFFLICTION I just love it! Eventually all canon discrepancies will be explained. It’s a pity some people have such closed minds about TOS versus everything after that they miss out on the joy of these magic moments.
So to the new movie, make it a good story, TRY to maintain canon. If you have to deviate, leave it for some future Trek TV episode to explain. I’m going along to see ST:The JJ version with an open mind and huge excitement. I don’t care that a few deviations in cannon may have to be to get from A to B. Any blinding contradictions I know will be explained later. As Spock say’s “There are always possibilities”
Why are people evenc aring what he says?If people seriously want what was done with battlestar Galactica with Star Trek then Star Trek IS dead.
He showed how little regarded he had with the original.It should never have had the name battlestar Galactica.What many of the cheerleaders of the reimaged forget the original was a hit and was cancled over It’s budget and ABC not getting much over Merchandise.It had a strong fanbase going on for years with only one season,and It’s DVD set sold very well.Now we all know J.J. Abrams and his crew are not going In this direction.Leonard Nimoy’s Inclusion proves this.This will be a film for both new and Old fans.How many times have they said William Shatner Isn’t In this film because of Generations.Merchandise reports suggest a strong resemblanse to the original show.Forget Moore and his Galactica In name only I will take J.J. Abrams,Damion Lindelloff,Alex Kurtman,and Bob Orci over him and his projects.
jeff - March 24, 2008
“In short, it was the freaking writing that killed TV Trek, of which Moore plays a big a part as anyone else. ”
I agree. “Shaka, when the WALLS FELL!” And way too many holodeck malfunctions.
But I also agree with Moore in that there was just too much backstory and frontstory. Nowhere left to go. Enterprise was an attempt to get away from the massive fact-psychosis (and holodeck-driven drama) of most of the other Trek series.
But it also slammed the door on post-Picard era shows by introducing TimeCop Daniels. A few hundred years after Picard it seems that Star Fleet spends all its energy and technology on just barely managing to de-subvert the timeline to avoid defeat in the Temporal Cold War. Zzzzzzzzz….
So I think it was a combination of uninspired writing plus an impenetrably complex back story that ran the Trek franchise into the ground. Enterprise just wasn’t able to attract a new audience.
J.J. knows how to attract new audiences, and if that means that not every single little piece of the 40+ year old Star Trek puzzle will still fit, then that’s fine. Two generations of viewers have been born since TOS first aired. That’s a lot of potential new fans.
No. He’s wrong, the back story is what makes trek special, When the quandrant is in danger we know the places that could be efected, Earth Vulcan, Cardassia, Bajor, Betazed, Romulus, Fereginar, Risa, Andoria, Kronos, etc… These places have developed over time some more than others but if writers can’t do alittle research on the back ground of the characters they are writting about then they are just lazy and shouldn’t of been offered the job in the first place
i agree with Moore 100%. Trek I growing under its own weight and needs this new, fresh start. Comic books retcon and reboot all the time and it works wonders for the Characters and stories and for new readers. it is waht Trek needs and hopefuly what it is getting.
sigh…no the nx-01 dosent appear in the conference room in 1701-D…and yes all the bridge plaques from the enterprise ships are all wrong… # ship to bear the name enterprise..well no one will notice say paramount execs..why dont you introduce the borg on enterprise? says another suit.
In star trek you can do anything you want and invent anything you want as long as its set AFTER voyager, why anyone would want to invent a prequel wish to be constrained by 40 years of canon is beyond me. and as a hardcore trek purist, I have alot of clout as far as getting people to check out star trek, if i hate it..good chance other not so hardcore fans will listen to me.
Ron Moore got his start because of Trek. Now, he treats it like it is substandard sci-fi. That irks me. He would be no where without his experience from Trek
Nuff said!
#40 - agreed!
I like continuity! I like to know what planets have been visited prior to said ship, i like to know what aliens are members of the federation and what class starships are, when a certain contact or war was first initiated, it’s all part of trek history, which is very rich. Maybe to rich for some to follow, but i think if you are any average fan then you should be interested in the history as much as the character developement, that’s what adds to star trek. Anyways, i welcome a reboot of star trek even if it’s a major reboot from scratch, i’ll still be interested and watch it nonetheless.
#40- I couldn’t have said it better. Newer Star Trek seemed to be doing nothing but trying to save their asses every week fighting this group or that. They were always fighting with someone. I agree- get back to the adventure side of it and EXPLORE! Surely there must be someone with an imagination to come up with something NEW!
I’m just glad that folks like Ron Moore rather than continuity-obsessed viewers are the ones producing TV shows. That’s not accidental, by any stretch.
Other than the work of John Dykstra’s folks and Dorléac there’s little worth respecting in the 1978 version of BSG.
I completely disagree… It’s the epic story and incredible history that has made Trek able to live on for so many years. I find it funny that people believe that Trek is unable to gain new fans if they were to start watching during the later shows like Voy/Ent, because I have known so many people that have become fans JUST because of those shows.
Although I am embracing the new film with open arms, I still feel it’s a damn shame what’s happening to all that history.
Anyone know of a new T.V series?
Moore and Dennis Bailey hit the nail on the head.
Give me compelling stories about real problems, not wierd, make-believe technobabble-certification-exam-questions about stuff that doesn’t make sense to begin with!
Then, set it in 50 minutes or so with a BEGINING and MIDDLE and an END (as in, THREE ACTS) and write it like it’s worth writing. Act it like it’s worth acting.
(You know, like “Law & Order” for example - a program that could EASILY get bogged down by Police and Lawyer Geeks who could - but don’t - argue over every little point, reference, precedent… they just tell great stories about LIFE IN NEW YORK. Come to think of it, didn’t Roddenberry once say, “Joe Friday does not lecture us on the chemistry of gun powder or the mechanics of ballistic trajectory. He just shoots his gun.”????)
Keep the ADHD/Ritalin Addition slop for soap operas and SciFi Channel.
I THINK that all the DS9,VOY and ENT era stuff has died which Ron Moore was apart of.
I THINK that the Rick Berman, Brannon Braga and also Ron Moore’s version of star trek has died.
I THINK Rick Berman, Brannon Braga and also Ron Moore’s version of star trek was to must war and battle stuff.
I FEEL that Ron Moore should shut up because he also had a hand in the bad version of star trek.
I FEEL that TOS and the first six movies Star Trek canon is Alive and well.
I FEEL that TOS and the first six movies Star Trek continuity is fine the way it is.
#55: I remember that Manny Coto was trying to start one, but I’m not sure if his idea was taken into consideration (it was around a year after “Enterprise” ended). Besides, at the moment, he’s too busy with “24″.
He’s totally right… it is hard to stay creative in a universe with so much established history… if you’re a tired and/or poor writer.
The original Star Trek boasted some of the top Sci-Fi writers in the business. Some of the best episodes and movies even came from people who hadn’t done Star Trek before. The problem wasn’t and isn’t the canon… the problem was they started to have the same few people write all the episodes, and these people either went creatively bankrupt, or just weren’t that talented to begin with.
DS9 tried to push the envelope, but you just knew things would end up alright… just because of who was writing it. More ambitious writers would have had Federation member-worlds choosing to ally with the Dominion, or choosing to bolt from a sinking ship (Vulcan and Romulus reunifying), or better yet, having Federation victory being completely due to Section 31 and their questionable acts… opening up a completely new can of worms for the Federation. How would our heroes respond knowing that they were going to lose if S31didn’t wipe out the founders, how would the other Alpha Quadrant powers react, how would Federation member worlds react? Mankind reverting to brutality when pushed far enough… that’s interesting, and would add an interesting nuance to Roddenberry’s idea of the future. Sure, his vision was optimistic and open-minded, but lets not forget how that Federation had a General Order 24, and a willingness to defend itself without hesitation. With that, I don’t think the Federation losing (and essentially becoming nuBSG) would have been good though.
Personally, I don’t think nuBSG is any screaming hell, and I’ll be impressed if it has a fraction of the staying power of Star Trek. Its easy to reboot something like BSG, which was nothing but a B-level space opera designed to ride the wave that Star Wars (and Star Trek) were riding. Starbuck and Apollo just weren’t iconic characters, and they still aren’t. Most people probably didn’t know Starbuck was originally played by one of the guys from the A-Team.
Moore pretty much pissed on canon. The Next Generation movies sucked becaused they became Star Wars wannabes. Forgetting its Star Trek roots in the process. JJ might fall in the same trap. Bigger isn’t always better. Today, the masses got to the movies to see action, sex, special effects and big explosions. Where will the big compromise fall? Remember this is a business first and foremost. My bet is, the masses will get what they want at the expense of what we all grew up with.
-60. CANON
Right on!
When Manny Coto came on board for Enterprise during the 4th season, that is when i believed the show would pick up, it needed vitality, something fresh and exciting, and i am pleased with the 4th season of Enterprise, it gave us the Augments, the Orions, Vulcan homeworld, Klingon forehead solving, Babel, section 31 and the first treaty between earth and alien worlds, something which uses all of Star Trek lore and history and also something which solves previous continuity problems. I felt Enterprise started to feel something worth watching because it felt more in touch with other Star Trek series and not just oh it’s Tuesday, Enterprise is on i’ll watch it because it Trek, no because during it’s 4th season i wanted to watch it because it was actually good. I would have no problem with a reboot and i would have no problem with another TV series prequel, as long as they keep in touch with trek as a sense of human issues, exploration, aliens and the occasional battle (not just battle because they are aliens) but because there is a reason behind it (DS9 season 4 war with Klingons comes to mind).
I can just see this goin on for ages!
Anyways, I kinda have to agree with the Moore man on this one! For 18 years there was always a new series of Trek, after a while there was only so much you could do! Voyager, in my opinion, extended the franchise; new races, new rules etc. From a writing point of view, there was so much of a back-story that it was next to impossible to go into new terratories. I will agree though that with the last seasons, the borg lost their scare factor!
I can see why Moore thinks this, Firefly short but sweet; BSG ending on a high. Everything that came after Next Gen, was essentially trying to capitalise on that show’s success! Suddenly there were quadrants to the galaxy. DS9 only kicked off with the introduction of the Dominion and even there they brought in Worf to continue that link with the franchise’s most succesful show. It is possible to have too much of a good thing!
When Roddenberry created TNG, he wisely set it far enough (78 years?) in the future so much of TOS continuity stayed out of reach. He (with help from many) created a whole new universe of ST.By contrast, the creators of the following spinoffs not only set two shows in the same continuity, they kept reusing elements of TNG (Borg, Ferengi , Q, Worf/Klingons ) to easily hook TNG viewers in with easy familiarity. Enterprise wangled in Borg, Ferengi and Romulans with psuedohistorical contortions worthy of an Olympic event. Paramount’s continuity straitjacket is parcially the result of using tried and true TNG elements to promote DS9, Voyager and Enterprise. New stuff is hard to create, yes. But they should try.
#62: “When Manny Coto came on board for Enterprise during the 4th season …”
Actually, he came on board during the 3rd season (he “mapped out” the second half of the Xindi story arc). He was made showrunner for the 4th.
Personally, I balme the death of TV Trek on the the hardcore fans. So obsessed with everything being bloated that when Enterprise did not satisfy this core group, they abandoned the very franchise that they claimed to love so much. So much for loyalty. Same thing happened to Nemesis too. Fans abandoned it and thus killed off the franchise themselves. It took a casual fan like Abrams to bring trek back and I for one hope that he makes one hell of a movie that follows canon and manages to piss off hardcore fans all the same.
The continuity issue really isn’t as bad as some people make it out to be. Yes, blatant, in-excusable, change the whole world upside down continuity violation should be avoided, but for the most part, with the exception of a few die hards, I think a lot of the fans can handle minor inconsistancies when done for the reason of making a good story.
The problem as I see it, is that with the arrival of the internet, suddendly those few die hards got very loud, far louder than the majority of fans were willing to put the effort out to shout down. While Joe Sixpack may like Star Trek and and watch it whenever it comes on, he may not ever go to a convention, or a Star Trek website. So his opinion is not necessarily recorded.
I love Moore. He’s only about a million times smarter than most of the social anorexics that post their little rants on here everyday, and I completely agree with him.
>>8. The Lensman - March 24, 2008
. . . Also, I remember going through the Trek Encyclopedia around the temporal and spatial anomoly section and several were just the same thing, with new names. Now giving them new names spared the writers from charges of just rehashing “X” plot device….but really, it was the same with just a different name.
Also, reusing established anomolies would’ve helped strengthen continuity, not made it so damn confusing and prolly made them think twice about doing that type of story again and again.<<
I think I’m going out on a limb, but I’ll see if this floats, there may be a reason as to why “New” names appear in identical situations. . . . Because just like the idea of “The Guardian” or “Tribbles” some references may require a paycheck to be issued to a previous writer, and keeping that to a minimum is obviously needed AND causing a mess at the same time.
ALTHOUGH I RESPECT MOORE AND HIS OPINION…
…can I just say that ALL the writers of all the novels and comic books of the last 25-or-so years have successfully straddled the “too-much-continuity” question on an almost regular MONTHLY basis.
I think I understand what Moore was trying to say, but it’s not impossible to deal with all that continuity. They simply fell back one too many times on the same writers.
Moore is just a Cry - Baby! How about a new tv show called: Star Trek Historian. It’s placed about 250 years after the next generation. Something has way gone wrong with the earth. Poverty, corruption, etc. We come to findout (for example of one eposode) that Garth really went insane because of some kind of outside power souce yet detected by anyone. At least until our Historian team learns of the truth. They discover that Garths desendants & the villian desendants some 500 years later need a reconning. Now justice, fairness and help for the present time period is in jepardy until our crew of 5 people find a way to make peace and amends with those who have become bitter or have slanted things unfairly for others. Justice will not come as easy as before with a flip of a switch. It will only come with real action. And hopefully soon before the
many victoms suffer beyond repair. It’s Law & Order SVU - Meets Star Trek Voyager. …. You like? Anyway it all takes place on earth & is full of Possibilities as 3 of the 5 members are female!! This is all free of charge. I am beamer. And I am out.
Ok, speaking as a writer (and as one who submitted stories to STRANGE NEW WORLDS), I welcome an established continuity to work with. When you’re talking about TREK or STAR WARS, having a backstory to draw from enhances the story-telling possibilities. I like figuring out how to put them together like a puzzle to come up with something new and interesting.
Having said that, I don’t think a writer should use established TREK elements simply as a gimmick. It has to serve the story.
One of the things I always disliked about TNG is the fact that it was so vanilla. White-bread, everyone gets along. And there were too many “bottle” stories - guest star on the ship, yadda yadda yadda. The great thing about TOS (and it’s been stated already) was the exploration aspects of it. ENT tried to do this, but there was too much “gee, whiz” winking at the audience for my taste.
ENT always offended me as a TREK fan because it completely ignored established continuity. Not a canon issue, but from a story-telling standpoint, ignoring continuity complicates the job for other writers. I’ll admit the stories in ENT were OK, and I’ll even go so far as to say that ENT was pretty decent sci-fi, but it was lousy TREK.
I think Moore is mistaken, but he’s entitled to his opinion. I have to disagree with his notion of a bloated backstory, though. You’re only talking about the TV shows and movies. “Canon” completely ignores the novels and comic books - and even straddles the fence on the animated series. If all of those stories were lumped in there…
Oh, Beamer has more!!! The Truth gets detected by some super, & I mean super computer. This new super computer, placed on earth can rewind or fastforward to any events that have been recorded ever. Information is compiled and the computer is about to make connection with video or written info, ether personal notes, or as big a star fleet official records. The connect of names, place, etc. causes this super computer to say: Hey somethings not right about this. The team consists of an emotional your teen who’s been trying to find out what has happend to her family. Also a Romulan who pretends to be a half human - half Vulcan all because of a dark past. The other guy is the great, great grandson of Mr. Obrian. The next guy is a male andorian slave who broke free. But the group does not turn him in because the have rationalized his usefullness being needed. Finally another female who noone knows is really a shapeshifter. Please consider the possibilities !!!!!!!!!!!1
I looooooove “Canon Nazis”. The whining is akin to the sound of Jack-boots on the pavement… marching in time.
Lets face facts…. The new movie is doomed to fail in their minds because there is bound to be an error…. somewhere… You better believe they’ll find it if there is. Then we can all read about it here.
lets the artists do there job ….and direct and act and design and photograph and write a NEW chapter in the “idea” Gene created over 40 years ago.
How do you avoid the bloat of the established history? Stay the hell out of it and go forward in the timeline. Then you don’t have to worry about possibly overlooking some small detail mentioned someplace else and completely “changing the past”. Personally, I think that was Trek’s problem.
I liked Enterprise towards the end, but honestly, if you’re gonna do a prequel series, you need to have people who aren’t just off the shelf writers, but also knowledgeable fans of the series. Otherwise, you get exactly what he said- people who don’t care/don’t want to go back and look at things.
It’s too bad, too, because they could’ve done almost anything if they had gone forward or, alternately, had the Trek fandom humping their legs if they had just gone the extra mile to follow the canon.
Fine, but use the original series all you can as retro special effects as this will really draw the croud. I’d tune into anything like the ‘More trouble with tribbles show from DS9. That was so cool. Just make it a weekly series. I’d never get tired of it!!
71. Beamer - March 24, 2008
“Moore is just a Cry - Baby! How about a new tv show called: Star Trek Historian.”
How about… no.
Sounds far too much of Time Tunnel meets Time Cops meets a Trek series far worse than Voyager.
And Moore didn’t cry.. he offered his opinion.
I’m talking about something we all can do! Change things today - in light of the past. You know, LEARN from the past! That’s our biggest problem. But in Star Trek historian, we’ve learned that lesson. We’re ready to make things right in the big things, & not just in the small personal things. Although the small things will help develope the charactors. The Fab Five will have no ship. only a secret dark warehouse of safety. Away from those who have only dispare. They need the hope that things really are alright. We as a human race are one big family. So let’s try to get along.
Read my first Beamer. Past shows should be preserved & re-visited. NEVER changed or ignored. Shatner & the rest will always live on. We can’t snuff them out. I support the new movie. But to really enjoy it, I have to pretend that Rodenberry is making Trek right now for the first time.
I want to embrase the new completely. Yet I think I’m going to have to lie to myself to do it.
What Ron Moore is saying here is nothing new, it’s been stated by him before, and by he and Brannon Braga on the commentary track for Star Trek: First Contact. As for Moore “opening a can of worms” with his comments (as one poster put it), that’s hardly the case.
I love Star Trek, almost everything I’ve seen from it, and can pick and choose the bad episodes from the good ones, the good movies from the poor ones, without hesitation and to know what makes them great, mediocre, or downright awful. Moore is totally correct in his assessment; now, I’m not sure what exactly the premise of the new film is, so I’ll reserve judgment until I see it, but a “reboot” or “re-imagining” is totally fine with me, it’s what Trek needs at this point.
I have sooo tried to watch Galactica. But when I’m clicking up the channels, I just keep going. I don’t see the explosions I saw in the old show. The new one is too people oriented. Give me some Sci-Fi Baby!
Make me wonder more with my imagination!
beamer
warning for spamming
and you and some other people should just calm down. I dont want to see any more attacks/flames on Ron Moore. You can disagree with his opinion but find a civilized way to do so.
What 41 said.
The problem with reimagining or rebooting Trek is that Trek was just one example of a pre-existing story structure – go to place, see things there, stuff happens. Unlike the Galacticas, which have a clearly-stated universal premise in the first episode (colonies! cylons! war! galactica!), Trek started with only the bare bones of a backstory (there’s a ship in the future with a captain, an alien and a hard-drinkin’ doctor) and slowly accrued things we now associate with it. What’s an ‘essential part’ of Trek? Are the Vulcans and Vulcan society–our understanding of which is pieced together from dozens and dozens of episodes–essential, or is it simply the character of the Other in the main cast? Is the Federation as a multi-species governmental entity an essential part, or is only the implication of a utopic future Earth needed for it to be still Trek? Is the look of the Enterprise key? How much can it change before it’s different?
The truth is, Trek already had a reboot. It was called TNG.
“I looooooove “Canon Nazis”. The whining is akin to the sound of Jack-boots on the pavement… marching in time. ”
How is referring to people as “nazis” not flaming?
Moore is absolutely right. It’s not that every story had to reference a complicated backstory, it’s that hundreds of episodes had presented solutions to what seemed like every problem they could encounter. If a crewman’s disease had been cured by a saved pattern in the transporter buffer in an early episode of TNG, why couldn’t the crew of Voyager use that solution when one of their people got sick? Inevitably, there would be an explanation – a tachyon field around the planet prevented it or something. (Before anybody attacks this, I am making up this entire example. But many things like this occurred.) Eventually, the technology became magic (was there anything Voyager’s computers couldn’t do?), robbing the stories of any tension. Some combination of solutions to previous plots should have rendered any threat moot. Also, the writers were bound to obey tossed-off lines of dialogue made up by writers decades ago who could never have dreamed these words would handcuff producers beyond the year 2000! (When, incidentally, the devastating Eugenics Wars had miraculously been avoided.)
Not just that, but while fans demanded devotion to the show’s history, this was meaningless to casual viewers, who found the barrier to entry into the series too steep. Which is why, as the show went on, the audience got older. They simply couldn’t create new Trekkies.
Moore has a very, very valid point.
Ever since TREKs demise, there has been this constant need for some to explain why. Everything from over-saturation to crappy writing to competition from other sci-fi franchises and series have come up and I guess since no one has done a quantifying study or statistical analyses, any theory is as good as another.
However, Moore’s theory seems to me to be a little silly and the least valid I’ve heard in awhile. All the reasons I listed above, make a lot more sense.
I slightly see his point, but only in regards to the fact that a serialized show might be complicated and therefore followed by a limited audience and that audience will probably be smaller. Hence, DS9, rating decline might fit his theory. But neither VOYAGER nor ENTERPRISE (it early episodes), were serials and their ratings steadily declined. As a matter of fact, complicated, serialized writing of ENTERPRISE season 3 and 4, didn’t help or hurt the show that much. It still didn’t make a big difference. Might we therefore look in areas other than complicated back-story and continuity to explain why it under performed?
I don’t agree that viewing TNG required me to have seen TOS. I don’t agree that watching DS9 required me to have seen TOS or TNG. I don’t agree that watching VOYAGER required me to have seen TOS, TNG or DS9… and so on. Therefore, Moore’s point doesn’t work in regards to viewing these show and the question of canon, complex back-story and continuity don’t seem to apply. They are non-issues. Sure, the writers might have had to work harder, but following the details of any show comes with the territory. That’s why shows have bibles to follow. TREKs show bible was thicker than most, but not thicker than a lot of others series, past and present.
TV soap operas, many that have continued longer than STAR TREK and developed much more complicated back-stories and continuity–and have a ton more episodes–have not been crushed by the weight of these things. There are many, many TV series that have produced a mammoth amount of episodes, way more than TREK, and that is simply a non issue. Moore is entitled to his opinion, but I see very little truth to his claim.
It’s all well and good to try and come up with a legitimate reason why TREK declined and the best way to bring it back. A limited reboot may be the way to go, but to say that starting over is the answer to all TREK problems and people are going to flock to the theaters is sheer guess work.
TREK declined because that is the nature of all TV shows and popular trends. Shows and trends ten times more popular than TREK are now gone from the airways, indeed gone from popular discussion and memory. Surely, no TREK fan could or should have thought STAR TREK would last forever at the popularity level it was? Add to this, the fact that TREK is viewed as a cult, and was never really as popular worldwide as say, STAR WARS, 007, LOTR, and you see this need to explain its disappearance is greatly exaggerated. It was and is a niche product, so it’s decline was truly foreseeable.
The biggest mistake this movie is possibly making is thinking TREK is popular enough to justify a 200 million dollar plus movie (I’m adding advertising cost).
Could be wrong, but just don’t see it. The thing that is really telling about TREK is the fact that it has never even come close to breaching non-english speaking countries. The film makers, in my opinion, haven’t dealt with this suffiently enough and this will be the breaking point of whether it succeeds. A great story helps, but plenty of movies have great stories and never find an audience. Indeed, movies with crappy stories make a lot of money too. I suspect the makers are banking on the films reported epic production design and size, as well as CGI to bring the audiences to the theaters. May work, may not. I would have put in as many bankable stars as possible to hedge my bet, since it is quite obvious that the STAR TREK name itself hasn’t worked for past films.
I do wish the production all the luck in the world.
#69
“I think I’m going out on a limb, but I’ll see if this floats, there may be a reason as to why “New” names appear in identical situations. . . . Because just like the idea of “The Guardian” or “Tribbles” some references may require a paycheck to be issued to a previous writer, and keeping that to a minimum is obviously needed AND causing a mess at the same time.”
I hadn’t thought of that. Seems to me the producers, during the height of TNG popularity, would’ve made sure that such a situation wouldn’t arise. I can see them not caring during the 60’s, because sci-fi just wasn’t big, nor did these guys think a sci-fi show, let alone theirs would ever be popular or profitable enough to warrant some kind of air tight copyright or whatever.
However once the property became the most popular sci-fi, pretty much ever, on t.v., I would’ve thought Paramount would’ve been in the mindset of “anything created NOW on this property is OURS.” and taken whatever legal steps to secure such. I could be wrong tho…..wonder if anyone here could clarify?
Those of you are what I term Cannon fanatics and purist s what is the point of having trek if cannon takes precidents over good story telling? If you weigh down trek with all this flotsam and jetsum of back story mumbo jumbo of trek history chronology you will end killing trek , In fact trek right now is on critical life support Paramount is not going to commit money or resourses to produce a trek film soley for a limited segment of the trek audience, that would be bad business for them and in the long run would not serve the greater good of the trek franchise. Paramount is in the business to make money by producting films for the widest possible audiences. In the case of trek they are doing the film with the fan in mind but soley for the fans benifit. If this movie is in the spirtit of the original then its good enough it is by definition a trek film with as much right to legitimacy as the original, you might want to get used to that because its the shape of trek to come and it will be be a big hit in spite of you, It will probably spawn a series films and they will be embraced by the younger generation and by a large portion of trek fan in the older generation.
I love Trek and I want it to survive and the only way it can survive is it must change and at the same same time remain true to itself, thats what Abrams is trying to do, please give him a chance, give the film a chance
I agree with Ron Moore and Dennis Bailey. And Arthur Conan Doyle and Isaac Asimov. Did the fact that Watson’s jezail bullet wound moved from his shoulder to his leg impair the Sherlockian canon? Or because the Galactic Empire of Foundation and its timeline had to be adjusted to fit the Robot stories, now the entire Foundation and Robot arc is ruined?
Of course not.
The continuity of any series has to, within certain limits, take second place to the needs of the story. Eitherwise, a piece will become so-much fanfic: heavy on Kirk’s safe combination but light on tension, conflict, resolution and true character development.
Alright. In a civil way I’d like to say I luv TOS over all. Perhapes what could be cool is to find a few TOS extras who by now are in their 70 who we might struggle a little to remember because they were in only one episode. But their cameo would be huge when people discover their small, tiny role in the film. Maybe just a guy sreaming as a Romulan is shooting to some civilians. Consider that chick from the Pilot to be the new computer voice on the Enterprise. Her voice rocks. It sounds familar, though many can’t place her. Plus she could be the prequal voice to majel Barrett. You like?
Garovorkin you are so right. I never knew I was that old til now. My sixteen year old daughter read your #89. Please know I embrace Abams. In fact I now look forward to seeing Kirk’s new hair-do. Give me some advice so I know how to handle all of that mentally. Yes, I’m a geek. Just know, Trek has become almost reality to me. If my reality changes, then was my past just a lie?
I think the shows were boring, continuity didn’t have much to do with it.
OR DID IT?!
I agree with Moore. I think it all went bad with DS9, and vanished up it’s own backside, and the spinoffs that followed too. They completely shut out any casual viewers.
# 92 Beamer Sarcasm is very poor subsitiute for alot of things, look the problem I have that more then a few trek fan are against this film before it even has a chance. i understand loving the original nothing else but to dictate what is proper trek and what is not that i have a problem with. Yeah i sound a bit preachy but im not trying to be. I just can’t believe some of these comments im reading.
Trying to find new and fascinating tales to tell in the richly established history of Trek lore makes writing a challenge. And this is bad, why?
I can understand the point he’s trying to get at, but it still seems like a lazy approach to creativity to me. And creativity is what’s kept the franchise alive for me over all the years and throughout it’s many incarnations.
Either way, I’ll still be chompin’ at the bit when the movie gets here, just throwin’ my two cents in. :?)
I know a couple of Trek fans in Singapore who pooh-pooh any talk of TV/movie canon because they like the way this writer extrapolates post-DS9 and yadda yadda yadda.
I think Ron Moore is absolutely right. When it comes to a point where no writer or group of writers can seriously produce anything new without angering some small faction of fans… the continuity has become too complicated. Heck, the fact that there are over 90 responses to a simple statement alone with no clear agreement…. proves that beyond any doubt.
Sorry Ron but I disagree.
It was not the burden of 40 years continuity that killed Star Trek on TV. Manny Coto’s fourth year of Enterprise clearly showed you could leverage continuity to create new situation and stories. Getting the little details and reusing place names is easy at least with today’s desktop databases.
What killed Enterprise in the first 3 years was the utter disregard for canon, poorly written dialog, poor direction leading to supposedly competent characters doing criminally stupid things, and overall poor production characterized by the regurgitation of copycat plots old DS9 and (arg!) Voyager episodes. Not an overload of continuity.
probably a good 90% of the preceding comments explain the descent, decline and death of ST.
canon only gets in the way of fanboys and in-charge storytellers who UTTERLY FAIL to GET THE FACT that the series was founded on compelling character drama, as in the excellent FICTION in science fiction.
anybody bitching and moaning about the shackles of canon are, trust me, full of sh*t. totally, utterly full of sh*t.
the greatness of TOS (take the top 25 episodes here) lies in its complicated relationships found among a handful of well-developed characters thrown into genuine social-commentary conflicts and pure adventure.
always amazing to me how anal you fanboys are.
#86 Agreed. Well explained too. How many times would you watch something and wonder “why don’t they just do that thing they did in “some other” episode?” That’s how cannon damages storytelling, by creating arbitrary conventions that get in the way of crafting a new compelling story.
Y’know, Arthur C. Clark also realized the problem with creating new stories built on older ones, namely that something from the previous chapters would often conflict with new chapter in a way that was never intended. He solved the problem by retconning the backstory with each new book. This becomes more and more necessary as a story continues, in order to maintain continuity without sacrificing story.
The quote reads fairly innocent to me. I don’t see it as a complaint. RDM believes that the largess of the canon proved too intimidating or burdensome to other writers who might come in with a fresh approach. Whether or not this is true, I can certainly imagine a scenario where talented people with only a passing or superficial understanding of Star Trek would turn away when they learned that x and y can’t happen because of z. Add to all of that, I (personally) don’t think this is a right and wrong situation. RDM’s not saying canon is bad, he’s not saying that it’s wrong for people to be slavishly devoted to canon; he’s just saying that there’s a lot of it, and sometimes, for some writers, getting back to the basics of the story works best. If a writer can’t make something her/his own, then it’s just not as fulfilling. That might be, too, where he’s coming from by making this pretty innocuous statement. He went to the set and Star Trek was fun to him again. Cool!
Everyone remember Star Trek Historian is a T.V. Show. Which brings the question. Don’t you think that there could be some extras, or even 1 or 2 main charactors from the new movie that would ultimately be interested in a spinoff T.V show? Perhapes a Starfleet Headquarters Trek that prequals JJ’s film. I’m talking about a contraversal show that shows how the U.S. and other countries have moved towards a common peace during the first five years of “First Contact.” How about the guy that invents the transporter or the communicator?
I think Ron Moore’s viewpoint is valid, however, he did spend 10 years working on Star Trek, so obviously he was heavily steeped in the canon. That said, he has acknowledged that when you spend that long in one universe and writing stories with one large continuity, you begin to struggle against it. Ron did so in his later years at Star Trek, and it was one of the reasons he stated for leaving the franchise.
The way I’ve always felt about Star Trek and its continuity is that it can both confine a writer and liberate them. Time and again it has been demonstrated that Star Trek could produce original, fresh and relevant stories while also using its pre-existing continuity to spin off stories that other series would never be able to tackle.
I remember an interview Ron gave where he spoke about how he once came up for with a storyline that he liked which he couldn’t write it because it conflicted with pre-established rules in Star Trek. I always wonder how many stories are possible because of the already existing Star Trek universe in comparison to those that it excludes.
Besides, Star Trek has been able to utilise its continuity to great effect over the years, more so than any other show on TV. Some shows have lasted a fraction of Star Trek’s length and devoured itself in its own continuity.
Just look at the number of fan productions that have spun off from throwaway lines and small pieces of continuity.
Frankly, if a writer has problems writing a story because of continuity, I have to wonder what sort of writer they are. Surely whether or not the Enterprise can do this or that is irrelevant if the core of the story is about its characters.
I mean the Phazer.
#1 I’d love to use that line of logic on a history test! -
History is real, but even history is only as accurate as the recollections of those who witnessed it. Star Trek is Fiction…and I see no reason why we should not open our minds to a retelling of the tale for a new generation. I’ve had the pleasure of growing up on TOS, TNG, DS9, VOY and ENT. It became so damned convoluted that it got away from what Trek started off as…exploration The later series and later movies just became too damned political.
99. Decius is Stonn, Stonn is Decius - March 24, 2008
“…anybody bitching and moaning about the shackles of canon are, trust me, full of sh*t. totally, utterly full of sh*t.”
“…always amazing to me how anal you fanboys are.”
While you make some points… you are not compelling me to “trust” you when you attempt to tell me how full of “_____” anyone else is… especially a writer who HAS written Trek. I haven’t written any Trek episodes or movie scripts…. which did you scribe?
Or is this just more “___”?
I don’t have a problem with his statement - I think he’s largely correct. I might not have liked most of his work, but mostly that comes down to personal taste IMHO.
There is *way* too much fact-checking that can and IS done. I would imagine it *is* quite daunting to write a script for a series where you know there are thousands of people just looking for errors and who can spot them so quickly. It’s like working for an overly-critical boss. Nothing is ever right. You might come close, but its never *right*. Some people say “screw it!” to those situations and try anyway, others say “I can’t do it” and don’t bother putting in their full effort.
I *hated* all the techbabble crap. I really hated it. I might be in the minority here, but I really just need a few technical terms for the sake of realism when it directly relates to what is going on. I don’t need a “I’m going to blah blah blah the blahity-blah so when I blah the blah it doesn’t blah blah blahity blah blah.” (Hey, its how it sounded to me! =p) I could deal with maybe 1.5 times the amount of techbabble there was in TOS. Anything more than that and the majority of the audience just zones out until the person talking is finished (Yeah, talking to you there Geordi/Wesley/Data!).
The need to self-reference in later series and explain everything before it was done really annoyed and bored me into not watching the later episodes. I don’t need to know how it was done unless you can explain it in less than 3 sentences on a 5th grade reading level. Seriously!
Beamer , it’s not my call, but you may get more feedback on your TV show on the “chat” line.
What’s the point of this “discussion” board anyway? So that people can write little essays about how they’re right? I know that nobody ever really listens to people they disagree with, but why give this “conversation” a podium? What does it accomplish? Nothing, as far as I can tell.
Imagine being a writer trying to write anything for trek. First off you have deal with a cannon and chronology that contradicts itself anyway.Wedding a trek movie to this cumbersome cannon and backstory is very unrealistic.
I love Continuity so I don’t really agree with Moore’s statement. Where would Star Trek be if it was to out right abandon continuity? Khan wouldn’t have happened and it all probably would have stopped with the Motion Picture.
I think for Moore to say that it’s too much work is like saying you don’t want to do historical research when you’re writing about Napoleon. I myself would like to see more continuity rather then less of it. It gives a solid sense of continuation and that these events “did” happen rather then be a forgettable monster of the week episodic format.
#40 I like the way you think. And sure, that is something of what we could see if somehow the slate is wiped clean of some known details. Captain Pike could certainly have a much more heroic adventure, with say, Jim Kirk and live to pass on the Enterprise.
I’m an original fan and I’m certainly not worried about some changes. As I’ve said before, “I’m a fan of the original 79 episodes and 6 movies.” That’s it. And certainly, if they can make me believe that what’s going to be in the movie is connected to the original show, then cool! If not, the original cast and “the body of work” as Leonard Nimoy has called, it, will still be there.
I’m very much hoping the premise of the movie will cover all the bases!
It’s a win, win, all around!
I agree with Ron Moore, BUT in a narrow sense… The problem for me is not that Star Trek ended up with too much continuity, but that it wasn’t written with continuity in mind from the very beginning. I like TOS just fine, but I do feel that too often, the writers were allowed to just make stuff up as they went along.
Some time ago, a video of continuity errors was posted on this site. I remember that there were several clips of Spock saying, “This is ___, the hardest substance known to science” juxtaposed, one right after the other. I mean, this is the kind of stuff that should be set out from the beginning in some kind of manual for Star Trek writers. If Roddenberry had set out such details of continuity across the board — which he did do for certain things, like the nature of Warp travel, subspace, etc. — then there wouldn’t have been as much struggling later on.
One of the things I like the most about BSG Reimagined and Lost, and to a lesser extent Star Wars (but, midichlorians - hrmph!), is that they largely seem to have been written as one piece, before the first episode was filmed. Star Trek, with its episodic nature, gave certain writers the impression, it would seem, that they could get away with more. But that’s just a sloppy attitude.
not to take off topic, but what Sackhoff said scares me about the ending of BSG Season 4 the final one. If you followed the link to the complete interview, she said who thought that we would ever see a sex in the city movie, but the way BSG ended left the door open ( or somthing like that) is she saying BSG is going to have an ending like Sopranos? ( which Moore said was brillant!)
I hated the end of the sopranos, I really had hoped BSG had a closing, but eventually not, THAT SUCKS.
#112 Tom I just don’t see how trek can continue to be viable if it limited to the conditions that some fans would love impose on it.
I think it’s much easier to get lost watching Battlestar Galactica than Star Trek. Most episodes of Star Trek (of all series) can be watched without knowing everything that happened before. In Battlestar Galactica, if you don’t know what’s happened before (in almost every episode) you are completely lost!!! So, in this case, it seems that Ronald D. Moore doesn’t know what he’s talking about or he’s just trying to come up with a reason why he left Star Trek. Most stories of Star Trek were easy to follow without knowing everything and if you wanted information on any backstory it can easily be found on the internet. Some of my friends starting liking Star Trek after watching episodes like “In the Pale Moonlight,” an episode that’s helped if you understand the backstroy of Romulan/Federation relations but it’s not necessary to understand (Garak is a spy/Romulans don’t like humans/the Federation is involved in a bitter war with the Dominion) which are all the facts you need to know to understand the episode, and “The Way of the Warrior,” “Unification,” etc. Each of these episodes can be better understood if you understand canon but it’s not necessary to understand and enjoy the episode. After watching these episodes my friends began watching other Star Trek episodes and each one of them, without fail, thinks DS9 is the best Trek series. When asked why they site the fact that there’s more action, more drama, more political intrigue, more spy stories, more criminal investigations, etc. One of my friends calls DS9 “the most realistic Trek,” citing that crime, no matter technologically advanced, will ever be completely eliminated and neither can all of our problems be solved with technology. They also have watched DS9 out of order and still understood every episode they saw. So much for canon holding Trek back. Each series could be watched without watching any of the others and it could still be followed. The idea that continuity is holding back Star Trek seems to be an excuse for “I just got burned out and couldn’t come up with anymore good ideas.” While I hate to compare Star Trek to Star Wars, continuity is extremely important in Star Wars and every other sci-fi show I can think of. Babylon 5 was heavily dependant on continuity, almost as much as Battlestar Galactica. In fact, Battlestar Galactica seems to rely on continuity more than any other sci-fi show I’ve ever seen. BSG relies on it more than B5, Stargate, Star Wars, and Star Trek. In short, Ronald Moore’s argument makes no sense whatsoever. And that makes him completely wrong. Nothing compares to Star Trek and never will. Nothing is better, more entertaining, or more exciting than Star Trek.
By the way, BSG is OK but it’s NOT great! Star Trek, B5, and Stargate all beat it hands down.
Good stories can be made that can both respect canon and not require knowledge of canon to enjoy it. Which is exactly what the writers and producers promise they are doing!!
Moore = right. Everybody who disagrees = wrong.
Have they said who’s gonna play Deanna Troi?
I’m kidding.
#56:”Then, set it in 50 minutes or so with a BEGINING and MIDDLE and an END (as in, THREE ACTS) and write it like it’s worth writing.”
This requires discipline.
#116 the original trek didn’t have that kind of continuity to begin with which you have pointed The Abrams movie is reboot of the franchise .why should it it have be handcuffed by that? why cant it go in a new direction and still call itself trek, What about all the trek books they are not considered cannon yet they are still considered trek. Yes you are correct about ds9,b5 and Galactica being dependant on continuity but I believe that they were written with that in mind. Not so the original Trek Roddenberry did not create the cannon, people who came after created it.
Y’know boys… there’s nothing less attractive, even to girl who likes nerds, than a guy who can’t let go of his action figures. Except, possibly, a guy who can’t stop complaining about how they’re detailed wrong.
I have to chuckle at some of the people who post on this board- not the regulars, but the ones who come in from out of the blue saying “The Original Series sucked,” etc. WHY ARE YOU HERE??? Go watch YouTube or something that might bring you entertainment!
g’night folks. I’ve read enough for the night.
Someone claimed that the TNG films sucked: not true. Someone said that the TNG wanted to be Star Wars films: nonsense.
ST: Insurrection was purely Star Trek and dealt with a story of an small group of people being forcibly located by a larger group and the fact that they were small was the excuse used by the larger group to relocate them. The claim that their relocation could help a larger group of people was also used as rational for the Federation’s actions. Captain Picard’s line “It’s too easy to turn a blind eye to a people you don’t know” is one of the greatest lines of the film and the entire movie was a moral and ethical story. In other words, social commentary. And that is exactly what Star Trek is and has always been! Star Wars has never been that. Nemesis was about family, which would have been more clear had the scene between Picard and Data in Picard’s quarters talking about Riker’s promotion and the marriage of Riker and Troi had not been cut from the film (this scene can be viewed in the “Delected Scenes” in the Nemisis SE DVD). First Contact dealt with Picards inner demons and the topic of revenge. In case you didn’t know canon First Contact opened with a look back at TNG “Best of Both Worlds” and, in case you still didn’t undrstand, Picard explained to both Lily and the viewers what happened all those years ago. To make a long story short (I know, too late) is that the TNG films were excellent and didn’t “suck” and didn’t want to be “Star Wars films.” Star Trek doesn’t have “too much continuity” and stories can be made that are entertaining, respectful of canon, and, at the same time, not requiring knowledge of canon to understand what’s going on. All of this (stories that are entertaining, respect canon but the viewer doesn’t need to understand canon to understand the story) is impossible in Star Wars, B5, and especially BSG.
It’s not impossible in Star Wars - I saw the clone wars by itself without seeing or knowing much other than Darth Vader is Luke’s father. I didn’t watch all the movies until last year. (I admit, knowing what’s come and gone is helpful, but its not a necessity.)
Captain April- are you serious?
Police procedurals don’t have much canon- and even ones like NYPD Blue which did focused on one unit of one precint over an 8 year period. Not two quadrants of the galaxy over a 400 year period. They could not be more different.
Worse still, Trek chronology and canon is so incredibly inconstant and inbred. It would be a nightmare- as some in this thread who actually write fan fic have pointed out.
I respect you for wanting to keep canon, but if you think it would be easy, you are frankly not being realistic.
Personally, I think Moore is dead on. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t want JJ to change Trek as dramatically as Moore changed BSG- not by a long shot! But I do think a relaxed and open-minded attitude toward canon is the best bet.
#123 other then star trek first contact the rest of the next gen movies were just t palin god awful .Generations explain to me how human flesh could enter the nexus when metal ships could not, for the first movie that was best they could come u[p with?
Star Trek insurrection, the whole mystical shagra la planet was a waist of story af time.
Nemesis where we have Picard vs mini me Picard, oh and they kill off data but not really. that put the kabosh on the next gen films. If they wereas good as you believe, then why isn’t the studio doing another next gen movie? The next generation movies stopped being critically and financially viable for the studio.
#109 Michael (regarding the “point” of this little forum):
I read everybody. Of the half of the comments that are grammatically correct and therefore taken seriously, about half again have some insight that I had not considered. #84, although I disagree with quite a bit of what he said, just gave me a whole new perspective on TNG that had never occurred to me before. The same is true of others. I also find this a valuable tool for taking the temperature of the fandom (although TrekMovie.com, like all sites, has its own unique community biases which I must take into account).
If you don’t personally take anything away from this, then, with all due respect, get out of the kitchen.
This particular thread is fascinating, because opinions are varied and, it seems to me, almost evenly divided. I’m jumping straight from reading “Moore is exactly right” to “Moore is full of it” so quickly so often that I’m getting a bit disoriented here. I think RDM may have just touched a very raw nerve for Trekdom.
Exploring it further is imperative.
120, if it takes place prior to TOS, TNG, DS9, VOY then it takes place prior to all that was established in those series so they could go in their own direction so long as they respect certain things. TOS did establish canon, the Eugenics Wars, the Earth-Romulan War, etc.
Also, I said that DS9 could be watched WITHOUT knowing canon and I pointed out the fact that my friends watched DS9 FIRST, were hooked, watched DS9 out of order, AND understood what was going on. Certain events could be HELPED if you understood canon but it wasn’t NECESSARY!
A total reboot is UNACCEPTABLE! Period. I don’t want another “Casino Royal” where 40 years of history are wiped out because people are too lasy to come up with a good plot. Star Trek stories never end and, as I’ve said above, you can make a good one without making it necessary to understand canon WITHOUT violating it.
The Producers/Writers/some of the Actors have said repeatily that the new film respects the old while trying to bring in the new. They have also said that fans will like it and hopefully it’ll bring in a new generation of fans. Hopefully they’ll go back and start watching what has come before.
By the way, as I type this I’m watching Enterprise on Sci-Fi and just saw yet another episode in which you didn’t need to know canon to understand, like most Trek episodes.
You people talk as if you need the Star Trek Chronology of Memory Alpha in front of you when you watch Star Trek. Simply not true. Minor errors are ok, after all it gives us something to talk about, but a complete reboot is unacceptable, as I said before.
120, B5 and BSG were written with this in mind, NOT DS9.
By the way, Star Trek has been very successful in bringing in new audiences for years, TNG premered 21 years after TOS, ENT aired 14 years after TNG. Bringing Star Trek back from the brink of destruction has been done before and it will be done again because Star Trek is a continuing story that has canon as a guide, not a necessary component, of the story unlike every other sci-fi franchise in existance.
I cant stand comments like these from Moore. Translation is……he got lazy, unmotivated and wanted to do his own thing.
#128 well might i point out one rather obvious thing the Eugenics was I believe happened in 1997 which i believe is contradicted by the next genteration which moved World war 3 up to the year 2053 i believe, also Ds9 contradicts the old timeline of Tos if im not mistaken so what continuity are you talking about? the problem is that the original trek was written in the 60’s and history has kinda passed it by.
124, I stand corrected on Star Wars. What you just said about Star Wars, “knowing what’s come and gone is helpful, but its not a necessity” is exactly the point I’m making with Star Trek. When it comes to Star Trek truer words have never been spoken.
125, you’re right minor changes are okay but major ones (i.e. ignoring WWIII, the Eugenics Wars, First Contact, saying ENT or any other Trek series didn’t happen (prequels naturally taking place prior to TOS, TNG, DS9, VOY), etc.) is unacceptable. I’ve always understood minor errors (there were several in ENT, i.e. Phase Pistols, and understandable error and one made for a good reason) and I’ve always embrased them but major errors, like the one’s listed above, are unacceptable and unnesasary. Staying within the confins of major continuity issues is easy to do (and I have written fan fiction stories) while still making an interesting and entertaining story which everyone can enjoy.
OK, I know I’ve made the same point multiple time but I felt that it needed to be repeated and, hopefully, made more clear.
130. You’re right that the date of the Eugenics Wars has been contradicted multiple times but noone ever denied that it HAPPENED sometime in the past. That’s what I mean by minor problems vs. major problems. Minor problem: exact date of Eugenics Wars, Major Problem: Claiming that the Eugenics Wars NEVER happened. World War III happened AROUND 2053 according to TNG but there was no evidence that WWIII was the same as the Eugenics Wars, and no evidence that it wasn’t. Again, Minor Problem: Exact date, Major Problem: Claiming WWIII and the Eugenics Wars NEVER happened. I’m not saying that continuity doesn’t need to be “updated” but to completely ignore major events in Star Trek history, like First Contact (a whole movie was made on the subject), WWIII, Eugenics Wars, etc. would be a mistake. Again getting dates wrong, or updating it as history moves past it is one thing, but claiming these events never happened would be a critical error.
I hope I have clarified things for you.
#131 LoyalstarTrekfan ive probably read some of those stories you’ve written. I don’t think you and i are going to agree on a lot of things and thats simply the way it is. for example City on the Edge of Forever, I love the screenplay that Ellison wrote but not so much the episode that emerged rom it. With Abrams film I just can’t seem to make myself care about what is cannon and what isn’t. I can accept it as trek, and if not the original ill think of it as an alternate universe trek. I am convinced that Ron Moore is right in what he believes, that trek cannot continue in the old vain and survive
By the way, ENT Producer Manny Coto decided to leave the date of the Eugenics Wars vague and simply make it clear that it happened in the past. Again updating continuity is one thing, ignoring it completely is quite another.
However, by the look of this new film they won’t be dealing with WWIII, Eugenics Wars or any of that so we won’t have to worry about them ignoring it.
133, well I think we can agree on one thing: Trek is in trouble and needs to bring in new fans. I believe they also need to keep the old. It’s a balancing act. One I’m confident JJ Abrams can do.
#135 the proof will be in the film, you know your trek no question about that.
The Quickening - “I don’t agree that viewing TNG required me to have seen TOS. ” you are 100 percent right there. Gene wanted it that way I believe.
He’s totally right about continuity. Too much of it, and it limits the writers’ options for the stories they can tell.
More importantly it means a writer would have to pay attention to stuff that maybe they think is stupid.
Let’s face it…OVER half of all the episodes of all the Star Trek series’ were pretty awful in terms of the stories they were telling. If you want to stick with continuity (ie “canon” for those who take this stuff waaaaaaaay to seriously) then you have to pay attention to and possibly incorporate lame elements into the story you want to tell. No writer wants to do that.
Well. Don’t know what I can say that hasn’t been said but my goodness, I cannot believe the gentleman said that. Wow.
Start over?
First of all, why did everyone think that they could only do stories that related to stuff that we already knew?
That being said, what I think was so hard to do was KEEPING THE DEADLINES forced upon them by TPTB. IMO, making sure things were kept “true” was more time-consuming than it was difficult. It seems to me that with the time constraints of doing a weekly television series, they felt they didn’t have the time to make sure they weren’t violating canon hence saying the complicated back-story complicated things. Granted, I am not a writer and I wasn’t there at the time so I don’t actually have a leg to stand on. It’s just an opinion. I actually can see both sides of the argument. However, it sounded kind of lame to me. Looks like they didn’t have enough stories to choose from that didn’t have to be canon-checked.
Don’t get me wrong - - I really do appreciate the effort they made to keep things straight. It makes it so much more realistic and fun.
When they did the episode in TNG where Worf’s brother Nicolai Rozhenko, his adoptive parents’ human son, suddenly appeared (in Season 7, Ep. 13) they didn’t have to worry about the history because nothing had been said yet. So they were able to create something to add to the Star Trek Bible.
Second of all, didn’t he just contradict himself? When Ron Moore said
“This really gives it a chance to start over and bring everybody back to what made it so great to begin with”,
did he forget that they’re starting TOS over? And how can they start over? How can they ignore what’s already happened? Did he mean that they’re throwing the book out and rewriting history? They’re not doing “Starfleet: The Beginning”, where they can add whatever they want that hasn’t been covered yet; they’re doing a ‘prequel’ which still has rules because we know the characters and most of their history. And they still have to consult the basics. For example: they still have to call Kirk’s brother by his correct name BUT…….. here’s where they could add a new branch and say that Aurelan was George Samuel’s SECOND wife and create a whole new piece of history that wouldn’t violate any rules because nowhere did it say that he only had one wife/family, etc. As I stated somewhere before in another thread, we didn’t know that Spock’s parents were Sarek and Amanda until a third of the way through Season 2, so what else don’t we know?
Am I making sense? Anyway, I think what he said was a bit of a copout but I WASN’T THERE so my opinion could be ‘an obtuse piece of flotsam’. (I’ve always wanted to say that!!)
:-)
kg
I’ve only sampled the 100+ comments above, so forgive me if I’m repeating someone else, but comment #98 is right on the money. I think Ron Moore is a great contributor to Trekdom as well as brilliant with BSG, but unless we’re misconstruing his meaning here, I think he’s wrong in this case. ENTERPRISE did poorly because it was written poorly for three years. Manny Coto made it good in the fourth season by embracing continuity and making it fit with the Trek canon, not by junking it and ignoring all that came before. The best efforts on ENTERPRISE came from Coto and the Reeves-Stevenses, writers with great regard for canon and continuity. There were some good stories here and there with ENTERPRISE, and I thought the cast and characters were plenty worthy, but on the whole, seasons 1-3 suffered greatly from DISinterest in continuity and Star Trek canon.
And to the early comment (#6, I think), I’m with you up until lumping Moore in with the rest. Moore didn’t play as big a part as anyone else in bringing Trek’s quality down; his efforts were, for the most part, welcome and solid. The real offenders were Berman and Braga. I know Braga has popped in here from time to time, and I mean nothing personal by this, but his approach to Star Trek was less respectful of the overall context of the Trek universe and more like, well, “regular” television. It’s probably the biggest reason VOYAGER was the lesser entity it was, and most assuredly why ENTERPRISE never got consistently good until year 4.
Continuity is good, so long as it’s respected.
#127 - Ironically, yours was one of the posts I liked, not that there weren’t others. I guess I’m just tired of the argument, though I have participated in it before. It just seems increasingly pointless since, they are going to do whatever they want to do, not one of us will agree with everything they decide upon and it’s all a fantasy anyways.
If I recall, you actually write this stuff. That gives you some credibility. I like reading a lot of the comments for the same reasons as you do, and I’m sorry to offend, but I as much as I like talking nerd philosophy (i really do) I don’t see any meeting of the minds here.
The reason I say that is because over and over again on this board I see the same argument