Novels that would make great movies

[Damian]

I've never started a thread before, and forgive me if this topic has been covered in the past (I did a search but didn't find anything specific). I'm curious to see what novels people think would make great movies (or episodes--though the length of novels would seem to me to be of movie length). I've enjoyed many novels over the years. But some are best left as novels. There's stories out there that probably wouldn't translate well to the screen, but are excellent stories, while others seem ready made for the big screen.

One novel that comes to mind in particular is "Chain of Attack" by Gene DeWeese. When I initially read it I thought to myself, this would make an incredible movie. The Enterprise is stranded in a faraway galaxy, so it's the ultimate exploration story. It also precludes them being able to get assistance from Starfleet, they are truly on their own. At the beginning there is a bit of creepy foreboding as they encounter dead planet after dead planet (obviously by an ancient war) and eventually the Enterprise encounters the combatants. It depicts Kirk not only as an excellent tactician but a diplomat too, as he gets the two warring factions to actually talk to one another after centuries of warfare. It was one of those novels I had a hard time putting down.

There are others. David Mack's Destiny trilogy comes to mind (which would obviously need to be a trilogy of movies). That would be an epic type of movie involving characters from multiple shows, and it features what ultimately happens to the Borg, along with their beginnings, one of the greatest Star Trek villains, and spans centuries. Michael Martin's Romulan War also comes to mind (but in that case it's a lot to do with the subject matter, as more than any other event the Romulan War seems to one of the most pivotal in Star Trek history after Zefram Cochrane and it is the least covered in canon).

 

[ryan123450]

Obviously Destiny will be the first thing that comes to everyone’s mind. Nothing from the main series immediately came to my mind, but some kind of unique “spin-off” like IKS Gorkon seems like an interesting option.

 

[Nyotarules]

The Vanguard series

 

[Captain Clark Terrell]

Mere Anarchy would be an interesting series of TV movies.

 

[Daddy Todd]

Strangers from the Sky

 

[Damian]

Mere Anarchy would be an interesting series of TV movies.

Believe it or not, this was one series I never read. I have to get a copy sometime to read it because it does sound like an interesting story. This, the Starfleet Corp of Engineers and IKS Gorkon series are the most prominent series I've missed out on. But they're on my list of books/e-books to get.

 

[Leto_II]

Requisite, obligatory Federation mention before anyone else says it...

 

[Damian]

Strangers from the Sky

This one is intriguing. It was more or less nullified by First Contact. Before First Contact I would have been all in, but now it seems as if it's meant to be a book, even referenced as such in a more recent novel.

 

[Thrawn]

The Vanguard series

Quoted for truth.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Prime Directive

 

[Damian]

What about any of the New Frontier books? I always thought there were a couple good stories there that would make decent films--maybe not theater films but even TV movies. Peter David usually injected a bit of humor in his books too that would probably translate well to screen. And the Excalibur had a pretty eclectic crew.

 

[Captain Clark Terrell]

What about any of the New Frontier books? I always thought there were a couple good stories there that would make decent films--maybe not theater films but even TV movies. Peter David usually injected a bit of humor in his books too that would probably translate well to screen. And the Excalibur had a pretty eclectic crew.

Once Burned

 

[JD]

Thirded.

There are others. David Mack's Destiny trilogy comes to mind (which would obviously need to be a trilogy of movies). That would be an epic type of movie involving characters from multiple shows, and it features what ultimately happens to the Borg, along with their beginnings, one of the greatest Star Trek villains, and spans centuries.

If they were going to do Destiny, I'd rather see it as a 9 or 12 episode miniseries. Even the individual books have so much going on I don't know if even 2-3 hours would be enough to cover it all. I tend to prefer TV for book adaptations these days, they just have to cut out too much for movies.
I would also love to see the early DS9 books done as a revived TV series, with 4-5 episodes book.
Avatar Books 1 and 2, Abyss, and Demons of Air and Darkness, would take us to either 18 or 20, so that would be the end of Season 8. I actually think right before Mission Gamma would actually be good place to stop, since it would allow Twilight to be the big season premiere. Season 9 would them be Mission Gamma, Rising Son, and Unity. I'd possibly put Rising Son's story into the Mission Gamma episodes, just so we don't end up with a whole batch of episodes of nothing but Jake and the Even Odds crew. Then Season 10 would cover the WoDS9 books through The Soul Key.

 

[Enterprise is Great]

The Eugenics Wars trilogy

 

[USS Firefly]

Vanguard and Destiny as mini series

 

[DonIago]

I kind of want to say the last three A Time To... books, as I feel they're great fiction and essential reading, but there's so much violence in the first two of those that at minimum you'd be making something that was a serious tonal departure from what the general public (and even many Trek fans) have come to expect from a ST film. Even by the standards of DS9 (traditionally the "dark" Trek), the things that happen in those books are...possibly unfilmable at least under the ST banner.

 

[Desert Kris]

I've thought about this sometimes. Sometimes when I read the novels I think of them as movie length ST stories.

The Wounded Sky is a book that I think would be an extraordinary yet worthwhile challenge to adapt into a movie. I kind of think of it as a spiritual companion to TMP, aspiring to a similar ambition. Imagine if The Wounded Sky was the movie we got, in place of TMP, but with changes to reflect the movie era (at least, this is sometimes what I have imagined).

I agree about Federation. It's like that book is partly the inspiration for the first two TNG movies, with the crews of both Enterprises meeting (kind of) and a look at Zefram Cochran's role in making the ST universe happen. I would have preferred Federation over the ST Generations movie; but I wouldn't trade either First Contact or Federation, I like having both of those (contradictory or not, I don't care).

Vendetta. Oh yeah. That was First Contact, before First Contact arrived. Except, maybe change/get rid of the Borgified Ferengi.

 

[RonG]

Feature Films:

• Federation
• Prime Directive
• Q-Squared
• Spock's World
• Destiny trilogy as either a (very) abridged movie or a movie trilogy
• Millennium trilogy as either a (very) abridged movie or a movie trilogy

Mini Series / arc-heavy TV series:

• Vanguard series
• DS9 Relaunch "season 8" (Avatar -> Unity)
• Mere Anarchy
• A Time to Kill/Heal-> A Time for War, A Time for Peace -> Articles of the Federation
• Lost Era: The Buried Age
• ENT: Rise of the Federation
• VOY ReRelaunch (the Beyer Era)

"weekly" / episodic TV series

• New Frontier (though it's a mix of "single" episodes and arcs
• SCE/CoE
• IKS Gorkon / Klingon Empire
• Seekers
• DTI

 

[Christopher]

Imagine if The Wounded Sky was the movie we got, in place of TMP, but with changes to reflect the movie era (at least, this is sometimes what I have imagined).

Despite being nominally set pre-TMP, The Wounded Sky already feels like a TMP-era book in the way the ship and crew are portrayed. The crew is diverse and multispecies, there's a large and elaborate recreation deck and an observation lounge with big windows, Chapel is pursuing her doctorate, etc. The only things about Duane's '80s books that feel TOS-like are the ranks of Sulu, Uhura, and Chekov. I've always had the sense that Duane imagined her novels occupying some sort of intermediate period between TOS & TMP in which the ship had been refit to be closer to its TMP appearance and layout but wasn't quite there yet. Or maybe she just didn't take such surface details so literally and was trying to suggest some sort of timeless amalgam of the two eras. But her books always felt to me as if they belonged in the post-TMP era, and I'm not the only one, because The Bloodwing Voyages explicitly retconned My Enemy, My Ally and The Romulan Way to be post-TMP (and ME,MA is explicitly set just a month after The Wounded Sky).

 

[Damian]

But her books always felt to me as if they belonged in the post-TMP era

The Wounded Sky is a book that I think would be an extraordinary yet worthwhile challenge to adapt into a movie.

I agree. Actually a number of the 80's books felt a bit like post-TMP books to me. They weren't always clear as to the timing, but a lot of those books had that post-TMP feel. It was especially interesting reading the few books between TMP and TWOK since all they had was TMP (and the original series of course) to feed off of. They couldn't even really include the animated series back then. The Wounded Sky did have that movie feel to it. Nowadays they'd have no problem depicting K's't'lk (yeah, I had to look that one up). I did see on Memory Alpha the year for the book was retroactively adjusted to 2275, so a few years after TMP--which does make more sense than during the original series.

If they were going to do Destiny, I'd rather see it as a 9 or 12 episode miniseries. Even the individual books have so much going on I don't know if even 2-3 hours would be enough to cover it all. I tend to prefer TV for book adaptations these days, they just have to cut out too much for movies.
I would also love to see the early DS9 books done as a revived TV series, with 4-5 episodes book.

You're probably right about Destiny. I was thinking a trilogy would be needed, but those books have so much going on that would probably be too limiting. And some of those early DS9 relaunch books would have been great. I loved the Mission: Gamma books. I even liked Rising Son. At first I didn't think I was going to like it since it was a Jake-only story basically. But it actually turned out to be a really good book.

The Eugenics Wars trilogy

I loved those books, and the 3rd Rise and Fall of Khan Noonian Singh. I couldn't put that book down. Greg Cox sort of reminds me of the fix it guy because he always seems to find inconsistencies in canon and fixes them so they make sense. And he thinks of things I didn't even realize (like why Khan was wearing a glove in TWOK, why all his 'crew' look like a blonde hair band in TWOK) and of course how he knew Chekov (I always figured he was just assigned elsewhere on the ship). I also loved how he incorporated actual events in the 1990's to explain how the Eugenics Wars could have happened.