"Assignment: Earth" might have been a cool show
- Thread starter Kryton
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^ You should read Greg Cox' Eugenics Wars novels, their stars are Gary, Roberta and Isis, and they show just how fantastic Assignment: Earth - The Show would have been.
This should really be the sixth Star Trek series, if we ever get one. And it doesn't have to be limited to the 20th century either. Think of an agent like Gary Seven interfering/correcting/witnessing historic events in the Trek universe... The possibilities are endless!
This should really be the sixth Star Trek series, if we ever get one. And it doesn't have to be limited to the 20th century either. Think of an agent like Gary Seven interfering/correcting/witnessing historic events in the Trek universe... The possibilities are endless!
I was thinking the same thing..it could have been the US version of Doctor Who.
It had everything you could want...
1-The cool mysterious super-agent trained by good Aliens.
2-The ditsy,but smart hot sidekick.
3-A strange cat..who may not be all She seems.
4-A smart-alec computer.
add some wacky evil Aliens trying to destroy Earth and you would of had a fun little series.
On a side note..I have a theory about Isis..I don't think she really is a shapeshifter..I think that She communicates telepathically and She was just playing mindgames with Roberta Lincoln..that could have been a running gag in the series..the only time you see Isis in human form is when Roberta sees Her that way and Gary Seven acting confused when She points it out because when He looks over all we see is a cat.
It had everything you could want...
1-The cool mysterious super-agent trained by good Aliens.
2-The ditsy,but smart hot sidekick.
3-A strange cat..who may not be all She seems.
4-A smart-alec computer.
add some wacky evil Aliens trying to destroy Earth and you would of had a fun little series.
On a side note..I have a theory about Isis..I don't think she really is a shapeshifter..I think that She communicates telepathically and She was just playing mindgames with Roberta Lincoln..that could have been a running gag in the series..the only time you see Isis in human form is when Roberta sees Her that way and Gary Seven acting confused when She points it out because when He looks over all we see is a cat.
Possible, but doesn't seem like quite the same MO.
Not nearly benevolent enough to give a damn, or subtle enough to do their work through human agents. Besides, Gary explicitly said he was raised on their planet, not in another continuum of existence.
All but three of their civilization died out 600,000 years ago, and the other three were disembodied consciousnesses stuck in crystal balls until 2268. Totally impossible.
Too passive and isolationist. They find the presence of corporeal beings intensely unpleasant even for a few days, so there's no way they would've been raising humans as operatives for 6,000 years straight.
A Howard Weinstein comic-book story for DC defined Seven's employers as the Aegis, an organization that kept history on track and battled other factions that sought to change it. This was presumably based on the original 1967 pitch for "Assignment: Earth" as a standalone series unrelated to ST, in which Gary was from the future and fought shapeshifting, mind-controlling Omegans who sought to change history to their advantage. It also foreshadows the Temporal Cold War idea, which came along a decade after the comic-book story. Greg Cox's Gary Seven novels borrowed the term Aegis.
This month, IDW Comics is debuting an Assignment: Earth miniseries written and illustrated by John Byrne. It's five issues long, starting in 1968 and jumping forward one year per issue. The first issue is due to come out on May 21st.
Could have been. There's no guarantee the show would have gone in the directions as in those novels. It could have ended up really terrible depending on who what showrunner and writers would have worked on it.
So, let's take this discussion a step further.
If someone were to run with this idea today, who would be cast as the leads? Names or find someone new? Would the "base" setting be brought into 2008 but still keep the classic Trek/60's feel, or just move the whole thing forward and make it totally modern, with the past 40 years of their adventures having happened anyway and we just didn't see them?
If someone were to run with this idea today, who would be cast as the leads? Names or find someone new? Would the "base" setting be brought into 2008 but still keep the classic Trek/60's feel, or just move the whole thing forward and make it totally modern, with the past 40 years of their adventures having happened anyway and we just didn't see them?
I'm looking foward to the ASIGNMENT EARTH comic series JOHN BYRNE is putting out at IDW this month...JB is the BEST writher/artist working in the field today.
I think this would be a great idea for a new series. The nice thing about it is it would work for both the casual viewer who knows nothing about Trek history and for the hardcore fans who understand the context behind some of the events that Seven would be involved in. But such an understanding is not required to enjoy the show.
I'd update it to current times and figure out how to deal with some of the potential timeline inconsistencies (such as when the Eugenics Wars actually happened -- easier said than done I suppose, but not impossible).
Casting...I think Jeffrey Donovan from USA Network's "Burn Notice" would be perfect as Gary Seven: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0232998/. Roberta Lincoln's tougher. Maybe an unknown. And I'd love to see the young Khan storyline from Cox's Eugenics Wars novels worked into the show. Really gives a different perspective on Khan, makes him more of a tragic figure.
This is a great idea! Someone get Paramount on the phone!
I think if A:E were revived as a TV series, it would probably be done as a standalone series divorced from its ST origins, just as Roddenberry's original 1967 pitch was unconnected to ST. It would have a lot more freedom without the ST-history baggage to worry about.
That could work too, certainly. They could always throw in the occasional Easter Egg to give us Trekkers the warm fuzzies.
It was X-Files before there was an X-Files! -- RR
Actually, you should avoid those books like they were dusted in Plague and Anthrax.
Seven and Roberta are played for unfunny laughs, and Khan is portrayed sympathetically. Like it's okay he was a mass murdering tyrant because he had some childhood issues.
Idea: Great.
Execution: Garbage.
How is that any different from the original "Space Seed," in which Kirk, McCoy, and Scott went on about how Khan was "the best of the tyrants" who committed no massacres and never launched a war unless attacked? (Which would argue against your "mass murdering" characterization being valid.) As Kirk said, "We can be against him and admire him all at the same time."
Study your history -- you'll find very few "great leaders" who don't have a lot of blood on their hands. Alexander the Great was just as savage and ruthless in his conquests as Genghis Khan was, and Genghis was just as benevolent to those who submitted to him as Alexander was; the only difference is how history spins them (and the spin is different in Asian cultures than in Western ones). Sure, there are plenty of tyrants in history, but not a lot of Hitlers. There are few major historical figures who can be defined as purely, unambiguously evil by an objective observer (as opposed to someone with an ideological axe to grind).
Heh...I'd forgotten about that and the other one. First one (your link) was better because it explained who he was and what the show's basic premise would have been.
Also, it would have been cool if they'd included shots from that night's episode the way both "Mission: Impossible!" and "Space: 1999" did. Hmmm...all three have similarly structured titles as well. Fascinating.
Ahh, but that's the version from the first two seasons. According to the creator of the videos, the second version is the "third season" title, by which point the (putative) show would've been established enough not to require so much exposition.
Just saying. After rewatching the remastered pilot and all. There were a lot of possibilities. And Isis looks just like my kitty-boy.
I like the speculation on this thread, and I agree, I would have watched it! I'm still going to say that the enigmatic race was a later offshoot of the preservers, who still guide races behind the scenes.
RAMA
This was Roddenberry's intent when the original Trek-less pilot was written. He calls for a rapid-fire tease montage of scenes from the episode to play behind the credits and opening narration.
http://www.fastcopyinc.com/orionpress/articles/assignment.htm
Sir Rhosis
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