Novels as films?

[Warped9]

Let's do a little retrospective time traveling back to the 1980s just for a little fun thought experiment.

Are there any Trek novels (or even non Trek) that you think could have been an interesting Trek feature film? Something you would rather have seen than what we did get?

I've always loved Spock Must Die! and it remains my favourite of Trek novels. Part of the reason is because it reads as a good SF story as well as a good Star Trek story. Although it's long past ever happening I think it could have made for a great episode or even a cool feature film, assuming the right sensibilities were brought to it. No way in hell do I think that it could be done well now in the NuTrek style. But I also remember thinking it could have been a great followup to TMP and something I would have preferred to TWOK.

I think it was a cool setup. The Enterprise is caught behind enemy lines when the Klingons launch a broad scale war against the Federation after somehow neutralizing the Organians. Kirk's immediate orders are to rejoin the fleet while endeavoring to wreak as much havoc as possible upon Klingon forces along the way. Yet upon Spock's suggestion Kirk decides to head for Organia to learn how the Organians could have let this happen in the first place.

I admit the ending would likely had to have been tweaked, but I still think it would have been cool.

Another potentially good story---yet one never seen---might have been the "Kitumba" storyline initially planned for the aborted Phase 2 series.

Anyone else?

 

[Roboturner913]

Always thought Dark Mirror would've made a great movie.

 

[Therin of Andor]

I always used to say that "The Wounded Sky" by Diane Duane" had a great, cinematic feel - and it was eventually adapted and pitched by her for TNG: "Where No One Has Gone Before".

 

[Warped9]

I always used to say that "The Wounded Sky" by Diane Duane" had a great, cinematic feel - and it was eventually adapted by her for TNG: "Where No One Has Gone Before".

That would have fit in well after TMP and it was one of the earlier books, too. When I first read it I saw the TMP era and how the familiar characters looked like in the film.

 

[Kaziarl]

I always thought the Q-Squared books would be good. But probably more of a miniseries. Same with DS9's Millennium books.

 

[nightwind1]

The Final Reflection

How Much For Just The Planet- the Star Trek Musical

 

[nightwind1]

Another potentially good story---yet one never seen---might have been the "Kitumba" storyline initially planned for the aborted Phase 2 series.

Anyone else?

Kitumba is in post-production as we speak. It is an episode of "Star Trek: Phase 2", formerly "Star Trek: The New Voyages".

 

[Therin of Andor]

When I first read it I saw the TMP era and how the familiar characters looked like in the film.

"Ex Machina" does TMP era even better!

 

[Warped9]

^^ Read it. Didn't care for it.

 

[bullethead]

Dark Mirror and the TNG novel Crossover.

 

[Kelso]

I agree that "Ex Machina" wasn't very good.

 

[Nick086]

I always used to say that "The Wounded Sky" by Diane Duane" had a great, cinematic feel - and it was eventually adapted and pitched by her for TNG: "Where No One Has Gone Before".

Really? that episode was based on one of her books?

 

[Christopher]

I always used to say that "The Wounded Sky" by Diane Duane" had a great, cinematic feel - and it was eventually adapted and pitched by her for TNG: "Where No One Has Gone Before".

Really? that episode was based on one of her books?

Barely. She and Michael Reaves pitched and sold it as a variant of The Wounded Sky, but it got drastically rewritten by the production staff.


Speaking as a novelist, I don't really think of novels in terms of fodder for film adaptation. I think a novel works best as a novel. A film is a very different medium with different demands, and has much, much less content than a novel. In terms of length and amount of story, a typical movie is closer to a novelette, maybe a short novella.

 

[Warped9]

Diane Carey's Final Frontier. In terms of continuity there are what I believe inconsistencies in terms of detail, but I liked her sense of setting and her take on the characters. I could do without her Jim Kirk's emotional crisis framework scenes because I don't think it's in Kirk's character and the rest of the story works well without it. And it had (at the time) what I felt was a fresh way of doing an "unofficial" first voyage for the E under Captain April.

I certainly like this a lot better than what they did in ST09.

 

[sonak]

In the "awesome if they could do it, but basically unfilmable" category I'd put "Vendetta" by Peter David.

 

[od0_ital]

... Speaking as a novelist, I don't really think of novels in terms of fodder for film adaptation. I think a novel works best as a novel.

Tell that to Dan Brown and John Grisham!

 

[Salad Shooter]

In the "awesome if they could do it, but basically unfilmable" category I'd put "Vendetta" by Peter David.

Why?

The FX are do-able with CGI, no problem there. Here is how I would re-write the story:


You'd have a flashback to the Academy, then the Borg attack that planet... then we fade to the E-D arriving on scene and dealing with the aftermath... then you rescue Not Seven Of Nine. Then we have a short interlude with the Repulse, then back to the Enterprise dealing with Not Seven.
From there we have a scene where a Frenigi ship is captured by the Borg... and we introduce Captain Korsmo (spelling) and Commander Shelby dealing with that situation.

Back to the Enterprise, dealing with the information about a new planet-killer on the loose... We gradually build up to confrontation over the Tholian home-worlds and from there build up to a confrontation between three Three Borg cubes, the planet killer, and the Enterprise and the Chekov. The Repulse appears and opens a can of Whup-Ass while Picard is dealing with the "operator" of the Planet Killer.

The final climax of the movie is rescuing Picard from the out-of-it's-mind planet-killer as it accelerates past Ludicrous Speed uh I mean Warp 10.

add about 15 min to wrap up the Not Seven Of Nine plot, let Picard emote about the operator of the PK and wrap up the lose ends.

 

[Pauln6]

I really enjoyed Traitor Winds.

 

[sonak]

In the "awesome if they could do it, but basically unfilmable" category I'd put "Vendetta" by Peter David.

Why?

The FX are do-able with CGI, no problem there. Here is how I would re-write the story:


You'd have a flashback to the Academy, then the Borg attack that planet... then we fade to the E-D arriving on scene and dealing with the aftermath... then you rescue Not Seven Of Nine. Then we have a short interlude with the Repulse, then back to the Enterprise dealing with Not Seven.
From there we have a scene where a Frenigi ship is captured by the Borg... and we introduce Captain Korsmo (spelling) and Commander Shelby dealing with that situation.

Back to the Enterprise, dealing with the information about a new planet-killer on the loose... We gradually build up to confrontation over the Tholian home-worlds and from there build up to a confrontation between three Three Borg cubes, the planet killer, and the Enterprise and the Chekov. The Repulse appears and opens a can of Whup-Ass while Picard is dealing with the "operator" of the Planet Killer.

The final climax of the movie is rescuing Picard from the out-of-it's-mind planet-killer as it accelerates past Ludicrous Speed uh I mean Warp 10.

add about 15 min to wrap up the Not Seven Of Nine plot, let Picard emote about the operator of the PK and wrap up the lose ends.

yeah, I guess you're right, with advancements in CGI and stuff, they could pull it off.

 

[Christopher]

... Speaking as a novelist, I don't really think of novels in terms of fodder for film adaptation. I think a novel works best as a novel.

Tell that to Dan Brown and John Grisham!

Well, of course, if I should sell an original novel and someone should want to pay me for a film option, I wouldn't say no. But it would be with the understanding that whatever film they made would be their own distinct work that was only based on mine to some extent. The novel would still be the novel.