Summer nuTrek novels pulled-TrekMovie.Com

[Saul]

My understanding was the toys would be put back in the box at the end of each novel so the story would be left just as things were before. Maybe they'll be released next year once the script gets banged out.

Can we fill the gaps with some Romulan War books? Cos we aint got no Enterprise Books this year.

 

[Christopher]

but was this a big concern before???

i am pretty sure there were novels coming out between the other movies that had contradictions with the movies that came afterward.

Yes, but policies can change when new people are in charge. Although of course it's pure speculation that this decision has anything to do with canon or continuity.

as much as i liked the new movie i feel like by this orci, kurtzman , abrams and pocket have just screwed the fans and especially the authors
whose books got torpedoed.

You're blaming the wrong people. Roberto Orci has said on TrekMovie that the suspension of the novels was a decision that he and his fellow writers had nothing to do with. And as others have pointed out, Pocket would have no reason to cost themselves money and prestige by shelving these books. The decision had to come from higher up.

My understanding was the toys would be put back in the box at the end of each novel so the story would be left just as things were before.

That's the idea, but then, it's the way tie-ins have almost always been done in the past (the post-series books of recent years being an exception to the conventional rule), and yet many of those "toys back in the box" tie-ins of past years ended up being contradicted anyway. Because it's always just a best guess, and you never know what details might end up getting contradicted later. (For instance, in Strike Zone, Peter David asserted that Worf had never met a Klingon-Human hybrid before, and then "The Emissary" came along a few months later and established he'd had a relationship with a Klingon-Human woman six years before.)

Maybe they'll be released next year once the script gets banged out.

We can but hope.

Can we fill the gaps with some Romulan War books? Cos we aint got no Enterprise Books this year.

Not enough time by far. It typically takes close to a year to outline, approve, write, reapprove, edit, reapprove, typset, manufacture, promote, and distribute a book. The process can be accelerated to get a book out in as little as a couple of months (as with ADF's novelization of the film), but it takes enormous added effort and expense to do so. So the gap is probably going to be filled only with reprints. Although early indications are that they're going to be reprints of e-book content that hasn't been physically published before, so it's still new material for most book buyers.

 

[Lonemagpie]

Can we fill the gaps with some Romulan War books? Cos we aint got no Enterprise Books this year.

Not enough time by far. It typically takes close to a year to outline, approve, write, reapprove, edit, reapprove, typset, manufacture, promote, and distribute a book.

And in any case, Enterprise's 10th anniversary is in 2011, so it'll make some logical sense to have Enterprise books next year rather than this year- that's what I'd do if I was the scheduler.

 

[Turbo]

(I assume that the Series II changes was the forced removal of the new characters they'd introduced in the first run?)

Peter David already understood that he wouldn't be able to use Konom, Bryce, Bearclaw, Bernie and Sherwood in Series II, but the artwork for Issue #1 featured M'Ress (and he had plans to switch Arex over to Security Chief), but M'Ress had to be redrawn as M'yra.

Okay, I know I've seen this answered before but I just can't remember - why were the studio and/or Arnold so against using M'Ress and Arex?

And even with the Star Wars novels' continuity, the books still tend to run into characterization problems. Remember when Jaina's love interest changed depending on who was writing this month's novel?

not to mention Leia's wildly fluctuating level of training and skill with the Force/Lightsabres

Oh, and I forgot the total personality and competence shift of the NJO Daala versus the Bantam Daala.

Can we fill the gaps with some Romulan War books? Cos we aint got no Enterprise Books this year.

Not enough time by far. It typically takes close to a year to outline, approve, write, reapprove, edit, reapprove, typset, manufacture, promote, and distribute a book.

And in any case, Enterprise's 10th anniversary is in 2011, so it'll make some logical sense to have Enterprise books next year rather than this year- that's what I'd do if I was the scheduler.

Do we know if the Year 2 book is in the pipeline yet or is it still too far out for that?

 

[Christopher]

Okay, I know I've seen this answered before but I just can't remember - why were the studio and/or Arnold so against using M'Ress and Arex?

Roddenberry considered the animated series apocryphal, because it wasn't something he'd made himself (he was more of a consultant, with D.C. Fontana running the show), and because he had a low opinion of its production values. And Arnold believed his job was to strictly enforce Roddenberry's vision of Trek canon.

 

[Allyn Gibson]

Peter David already understood that he wouldn't be able to use Konom, Bryce, Bearclaw, Bernie and Sherwood in Series II, but the artwork for Issue #1 featured M'Ress (and he had plans to switch Arex over to Security Chief), but M'Ress had to be redrawn as M'yra.

Okay, I know I've seen this answered before but I just can't remember - why were the studio and/or Arnold so against using M'Ress and Arex?

In addition to the points that Christopher noted, Filmation was also in bankruptcy proceedings in the late-80s, which puts the ownership of a lot of things into flux. It's confusing; even though Paramount owned the animated series, it was also an asset of Filmation, and this put it in a kind of legal limbo until the bankruptcy was finished. It was easier to put the animated series and its concepts on the shelf than to risk legal entanglements by using them elsewhere.

 

[Allyn Gibson]

RA said the disclaimer wasn't intended to be a "home free" card to get around Star Trek Office approval memos. So, although a similar disclaimer did appear on novels, such as "Home is the Hunter" and "Vendetta" (IIRC), the authors were supposed to still be tweaking to satisfy the STO and Viacom/Paramount Licensing.

Yes, but in the case of Vendetta there were no Star Trek Office memos on the finished book, as Arnold couldn't be arsed to look at PAD's manuscript. (The story is that the manuscript sat in a briefcase in Arnold's office, Paramount Licensing finally got tired of waiting for his approvals, and they told Pocket they could go ahead and publish the book with the Roddenberry disclaimer.)

Objectively looked at, Richard Arnold was a douchebag, especially when it came to Peter David's work for some unknown reason. Q-in-Law was published because PAD bypassed Arnold entirely and gave a copy of the book to Majel Barrett. His "Once a Hero" comic story for Star Trek was approved because it was submitted under a pseudonym. The man was a menace, and he was actively destructive to Star Trek during his reign of terror.

 

[DaveGalanter]

One thing that comes to mind is a discussion about "Troublesome Minds"...a while back. Wasn't there some discussion during the creative process about that novel being the first nutrek book? I know that is not the case, and that "Troublesome Minds" firmly is locked into the prime universe, but I seem to remember talk that it could have been the first nutrek novel if a couple changes had been made.

Really have to wonder what changed between then...and now...

No one ever asked me to make TM a movie universe book. I'd merely said (somewhere here, I think) that had I been asked, I could have done so relatively easy--a few changes here and there, and probably a week or two of tweaking. But there was never any discussion with ME about doing it. I just thought about it just in case, because that's a smart thing to do. Other proposals I've made to Pocket have always said "and if you want to do it this way, we can."

 

[Defcon]

^No clue if you talked about it here, but you commented about it in our interview:

“A good story is a good story, and if you hope to write one and can write one, it's the same process no matter the ‘universe’ or timeline. Had Pocket asked me to change Troublesome Minds into a Trek '09 novel, it would have taken me seeing the film and maybe two weeks or so of tweaking the story and characterisations, but because the characters are basically the same, it shouldn't be difficult to do. It's not the universe that so much matters, it's the people. The people are more or less the same, but have been brought to familiar places in different ways. My guess would be Trek '09 fans want to read a book like the movie they saw and old fans and new can be entertained by focusing on a compelling story and an interesting journey for the crew, and not on changes in the timeline.”

 

[Therin of Andor]

Roddenberry considered the animated series apocryphal, because it wasn't something he'd made himself (he was more of a consultant, with D.C. Fontana running the show), and because he had a low opinion of its production values.

But we should note that Roddenberry hadn't always considered it to be apocryphal. In 1989, the following crucial things were also happening:

* Filmation was being wound down, sold off (partly to Hallmark?) and its back catalogue of shows went into limbo until the red tape was sorted as to who-owned-what.

* TNG merchandising was indicating that it was time to overhaul the ST licenses and renew them with tighter contracts. The Star Trek Office requested that the tie-ins concentrate on "the big seven" characters of TOS and the then-current "big eight" of TNG.

* Larry Niven was arranging for his "Ringworld" novels (with kzinti in them) to become a licensed RPG. Pocket had announced a novel that was to feature TAS kzinti, but they had to become the M'dok at the last minute ("The Captains' Honor").

* DC Fontana and David Gerrold were suing Roddenberry for co-creatorship of TNG, and both had been major players in TAS. Leonard Maizlish, GR's lawyer, was perhaps looking for ways to distance both of them from ST and TNG to make GR's case strong (totally my supposition here.)

And Arnold believed his job was to strictly enforce Roddenberry's vision of Trek canon.

Most definitely. Had RA been a huge TAS fan, something else may have happened, but certainly was more efficient to deny the licensees access to TAS in 1989 than to have Paramount's copyright lawyers do all the red tape. (RA's ongoing feud with Peter David is documented with numerous hilarious asides in David's "But I Digress..." omnibus.)

especially when it came to Peter David's work for some unknown reason.

Yeah, bizarre!

It's confusing; even though Paramount owned the animated series, it was also an asset of Filmation, and this put it in a kind of legal limbo until the bankruptcy was finished. It was easier to put the animated series and its concepts on the shelf than to risk legal entanglements by using them elsewhere.

Yep. It was a joint production of Filmation, NBC (Children's TV arm) and Norway Productions (which was GR's company). I understand that although Paramount eventually received the rights to TAS, it was only ever been a distributor of TAS in syndication. Most of the rest of the material that has come out on DVD has been through Warners. TOS and TAS are now with CBS.

 

[Christopher]

No, TAS was a co-production of Filmation Associates, Paramount Television, and Norway Productions. (Making it the only post-Desilu Trek production to be co-produced with anyone other than Paramount until the recent movie.) NBC was just the distributor.

 

[Therin of Andor]

No, TAS was a co-production of Filmation Associates, Paramount Television, and Norway Productions. (Making it the only post-Desilu Trek production to be co-produced with anyone other than Paramount until the recent movie.) NBC was just the distributor.

Umm, I thought that it was NBC that was noted in the end credits, with Paramount not involved till after the first run of episodes.

 

[Christopher]

I'm going by what IMDb says, which admittedly could be in error about Paramount's role. But Filmation, whose name you omitted in your original post, was definitely the principal production company, the one whose staff actually made the show.

 

[Therin of Andor]

I'm going by what IMDb says, which admittedly could be in error about Paramount's role. But Filmation, whose name you omitted in your original post, was definitely the principal production company, the one whose staff actually made the show.

Yeah, I didn't originally list Filmation only because I was discussing Filmation throughout the post. I'm sure I read an interview with Fred Bronson (aka John Culver) where he said that Paramount's only participation was distribution - beyond the initial run on NBC. He was publicist for NBC Children's TV, which is why he had to have a pseudonym for writing a TAS episode.

 

[Christopher]

^Okay, that sounds like a plausible source. Hmm, so that makes TAS the only post-Desilu Trek production that Paramount didn't produce at all.

 

[bbailey861]

Well, I am fucking stunned . I have been away for the past week with no computer access. To come home and read this really pisses me off. I was looking forward to these books next summer. The plan was to buy them and take them with me when I deploy to Afghanistan in Sep. To the four authors, I am really bummed for you guys. I hope these get published and I get to see them when I come home. I haven't read all the posts yet, and frankly, right now I'm not going to. I'm going to have to wait until tomorrow when I calm down a bit.

Byron

 

[Thrawn]

Interesting.

It appears SCE: Out Of The Cocoon is listed on Amazon, for July 20th, and is not a MMPB (at least, I would assume not, based on the price). http://www.amazon.com/Star-Trek-SCE...=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1263802021&sr=1-6

So I guess they're releasing the SCE omnibus(es?) because of the publishing hole, but not worrying too much about making them fit the one-mmpb-per-month paradigm? Makes sense to me...

 

[Tino]

So, back to the track:
Any reasons given yet for pulling the novels?

I always thought that the novels come out rather late for the movie.

It would've made more sense to spread them between theatre release
and home video release - the franchise gets the most attention in this
half-year-period. Would've been great to get the DVDs with coupons
for the novels, wouldn't it?

Maybe Abrams wants Pocket Books to wait for the next movie?
Let's tweak the novels a little to fit the next movie's story and throw
them out between theatre release and home video release.

 

[F. King Daniel]

This is bullshit of the highest order.

 

[Saul]

That's the idea, but then, it's the way tie-ins have almost always been done in the past (the post-series books of recent years being an exception to the conventional rule), and yet many of those "toys back in the box" tie-ins of past years ended up being contradicted anyway. Because it's always just a best guess, and you never know what details might end up getting contradicted later. (For instance, in Strike Zone, Peter David asserted that Worf had never met a Klingon-Human hybrid before, and then "The Emissary" came along a few months later and established he'd had a relationship with a Klingon-Human woman six years before.)

Then there's no point holding back the books. They can be contradicted in any number of ways.

Can we fill the gaps with some Romulan War books? Cos we aint got no Enterprise Books this year.

Not enough time by far. It typically takes close to a year to outline, approve, write, reapprove, edit, reapprove, typset, manufacture, promote, and distribute a book.

Ah, I was sorta hoping work might have already begun on those.

The process can be accelerated to get a book out in as little as a couple of months (as with ADF's novelization of the film), but it takes enormous added effort and expense to do so. So the gap is probably going to be filled only with reprints.

"Star Trek Deep Space Nine: A Stitch in Time" please

Although early indications are that they're going to be reprints of e-book content that hasn't been physically published before, so it's still new material for most book buyers.