Bennett’s Academy film

[JonnyQuest037]

But the little snippets of character history we have from TOS on Kirk, Spock, & McCoy never seems to indicate they were at the Academy at the same time, or that they knew each other there (quite the opposite; see "Shore Leave"), and certainly not that they had cadet adventures together.

True. It's pretty obvious that McCoy didn't know Kirk during Kirk's Academy days, and several other episodes indicate that McCoy didn't attend the Academy at all (He's unsure if confinement to quarters is enough punishment for Spock hijacking the Enterprise in "The Menagerie", he can't name a regulation that prevents Decker from taking command in "The Doomsday Machine", and he's unfamiliar with the Academy slang term "Dunsel" in "The Ultimate Computer"). Considering this and McCoy's generally non-military nature, it seems pretty obvious to me that he enlisted in Starfleet and, as a surgeon, was just given a brief training course and a commission.

With Spock, it's a little less cut & dried if he and Kirk knew each other before serving together aboard the Enterprise. They seem relatively unfamiliar with each other in "Where No Man Has Gone Before" and other early first season episodes, but Spock knows that Kirk knew R.M. Merik in "Bread and Circuses." OTOH, Spock says in "Patterns of Force" that he studied Earth's history from the text that John Gill prepared, while Kirk says that Gill was his history teacher at the Academy. So apparently Kirk and Spock didn't attend the Academy at the same time, or at the very least weren't in the same history class.

Of course, none of these continuity bits would've stopped Paramount from making a Starfleet Academy movie if they thought it would be profitable. And if the movie was good enough, it'd certainly be easy enough to discount those stray bits of dialogue.

 

[JonnyQuest037]

Prequels and such always seem to have the right intention, but they don't fit and what's wrong with characters referring to offscreen adventures, which is usually enough or more to begin with?

It's still an ongoing prequel, but I will say that the Breaking Bad prequel Better Call Saul is doing an outstanding job, explaining and foreshadowing BB without outright contradicting it. At this point, I like it better than Breaking Bad. And The Godfather Part II is a partial sequel/partial prequel that won Best Picture of 1974. So prequels can absolutely be done well.

But OTOH, Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories did very well with lots of references to unseen adventures... The Giant Rat of Sumatra, anyone?

 

[Maurice]

[...]TOS deserved better than an academy piece and noting the comedic bent the latter-era Kirk movies had, the last thing the franchise needed was "Star Trek VI: Police Academy". [...]

That mischaracterizes the tone of the piece, which—while not a good script—wasn't a comedy or a trainwreck.

 

[Relayer1]

Back in the day I thought an academy film was a terrible idea.

With passing years, seeing Enterprise and alternative looks for the TOS era in Discovery, plus the academy portions of the Kelvin timeline, I have to admit...it's still a terrible idea.

 

[Khan 2.0]

Back in the day I thought an academy film was a terrible idea.

With passing years, seeing Enterprise and alternative looks for the TOS era in Discovery, plus the academy portions of the Kelvin timeline, I have to admit...it's still a terrible idea.

I remember back in 90/91 the monthly updates on Trek VI in the Official Fan Club magazine and letters page of the DC comics and for a while it was about SFA and then the relief of it being announced it would be another TOS cast film and the excitement of Meyer writing/directing with Nimoy exec producing.. and then thered be little bits of info about it being about the Klingons, Sulu would be a captain, there'd be a ice prison planet, ILM returning, the Klingon battle cruiser would return, and the casting announcements (more impressive than usual)

 

[JonnyQuest037]

and the casting announcements (more impressive than usual)

Yeah, the supporting cast in STVI is really killer. The most impressive cast in any of the ST movies, IMO.

 

[Khan 2.0]

wonder if the notion of doing the Academy movie AND Trek VI back to back was ever considered? (like BTTF2/3 around then). Bennett couldve directed SFA and released in the summer of 91 and Meyer doing TUC for xmas (or vice versa). providing it didn't bomb I guess the SFA movie series (charting the Ents 1st missions) may have taken TNGs film spots and TNG continued on tv (instead of VOY) until the late 90s then maybe taken over the movies from SFA

 

[Khan 2.0]

just had a listen to Treksperts/Movies Never Made podcast on the Academy movie (with guest speaker scriptwriter David Loughery)
https://www.podbean.com/media/share/dir-zw3rn-699355b?
and he offers a few interesting nuggets id not heard before:
-his idea was to do the movie with a retro 50s SciFi vibe sort of Forbidden Planety as TOS was the 60s aesthetic (which I remember reading was sort of the idea with the Kelvin in ST09 according the Art of ST09 book)
-the treksperts talked about getting in touch with IDW to get Lougherys script adapted into a comic!
-original title was 'Star Trek: The First Adventure' (similar to the novel 'Enterprise: The First Adventure') later when Bennett decided he wanted to direct changed title to 'Star Trek: The Academy Years'
-the wraparounds featuring Bones then Kirk/Spock were added at a later date by Bennett
-there were 2 Enterprises in the movie - a battered old version for training. and the 2nd TOS one at the end (that Scotty designed!)
-Kirks dad was killed in this version too.
-in early 00s (just prior to 'Enterprise') there was talk of doing it again with Bennett (Paramount mustve been deciding between doing either a prequel movie with Kirk/Spock or a series with Archer & Co)

 

[Danlav05]

just had a listen to Treksperts/Movies Never Made podcast on the Academy movie (with guest speaker scriptwriter David Loughery)
https://www.podbean.com/media/share/dir-zw3rn-699355b?
and he offers a few interesting nuggets id not heard before:
-his idea was to do the movie with a retro 50s SciFi vibe sort of Forbidden Planety as TOS was the 60s aesthetic (which I remember reading was sort of the idea with the Kelvin in ST09 according the Art of ST09 book)
-the treksperts talked about getting in touch with IDW to get Lougherys script adapted into a comic!
-original title was 'Star Trek: The First Adventure' (similar to the novel 'Enterprise: The First Adventure') later when Bennett decided he wanted to direct changed title to 'Star Trek: The Academy Years'
-the wraparounds featuring Bones then Kirk/Spock were added at a later date by Bennett
-there were 2 Enterprises in the movie - a battered old version for training. and the 2nd TOS one at the end (that Scotty designed!)
-Kirks dad was killed in this version too.
-in early 00s (just prior to 'Enterprise') there was talk of doing it again with Bennett (Paramount mustve been deciding between doing either a prequel movie with Kirk/Spock or a series with Archer & Co)

IDW graphic novels of the unmade scripts would be amazing, we know there are like a dozen!

I’m surprised none have leaked online. Unmade films and episodes are a favourite topic of mine

 

[fireproof78]

That mischaracterizes the tone of the piece, which—while not a good script—wasn't a comedy or a trainwreck.

It amazes me how quickly maligned the idea is without any sort of context.

 

[Maurice]

It amazes me how quickly maligned the idea is without any sort of context.

Well, people hear these "game of telephone" reports on things and fail to apply critical thinking. Everyone misremembers stuff, especially at a remove of decades, and stories get better with retelling, so it's important to keep in mind that what people remember isn't truth even if they intend it to be.

 

[Saul]

Hope no one minds me bringing this one back. I've long wondered what an Academy film would have looked like if it had been made in the 90s. At first I didn't like the concept at all but when I learned more about the film and how it unfolds I was a lot more interested. I think it would have been good.

I got it from one of my many sources. I don't think it's online anywhere unfortunately.

Any chance you still have it and would be able to share?

I would be interested as well.

As would I.

 

[Dukhat]

I think it would have been a flop. And coming off of the flop that was TFF, people would be wondering why they were making a film about young Kirk, Spock & McCoy in college with new actors when there was already a perfectly good cast they could use for a new film...the TNG cast.

Paramount's mistake was that they thought they could still continue having a viable film franchise with the TOS cast after TVH while simultaneously producing TNG for television. They completely failed to take into account the unrealistic aspect of having an aging cast continue on the same type of adventures they had when they were younger, and the growing popularity of TNG. If anything, the next TOS film should have been about Kirk, Spock et. al handing the reigns to the Enterprise-A off to a new crew, but even that would just have been cloning TNG (and worse, because we would only see this new crew every two or three years, where the audience would see the TNG crew every week. There would be too long of a stretch of time for the movie audience to have a vested interest in this new crew, while a TNG film in the early '90's would have worked because the TNG cast could go right back to television afterward.)

 

[Ssosmcin]

Star Trek V failed more because of the film itself. It had a strong opening weekend, but reviews and negative word of mouth - plus heavy summer competition - killed it. If they were able to put it out in 1988 a year earlier, they may have had a bigger slice of the box office pie. TNG was still finding its legs and it wasn't universally embraced by fans yet, so the original cast still had a shot, especially coming off the good will of the previous film.

I do agree that resetting the characters back to their TOS places was a mistake. They stopped getting older. As far as a TNG baton passing, the TOS cast wasn't on board with that. TNG was still the interloper show as far as they were concerned.

 

[captainkirk]

Hope no one minds me bringing this one back. I've long wondered what an Academy film would have looked like if it had been made in the 90s. At first I didn't like the concept at all but when I learned more about the film and how it unfolds I was a lot more interested. I think it would have been good.






As would I.

Check your PMs.

 

[Dukhat]

Star Trek V failed more because of the film itself. It had a strong opening weekend, but reviews and negative word of mouth - plus heavy summer competition - killed it. If they were able to put it out in 1988 a year earlier, they may have had a bigger slice of the box office pie. TNG was still finding its legs and it wasn't universally embraced by fans yet, so the original cast still had a shot, especially coming off the good will of the previous film.

I do agree that resetting the characters back to their TOS places was a mistake. They stopped getting older. As far as a TNG baton passing, the TOS cast wasn't on board with that. TNG was still the interloper show as far as they were concerned.

After TFF, the TOS actors’ feelings about TNG was irrelevant. TNG was steadily gaining in popularity year by year, and the dismal showing of TFF was the nail in the coffin for that crew. The only reason why they made one more film was because they realized their time was over and they didn’t want to go out on the sad note that was Star Trek V.

 

[Ssosmcin]

After TFF, the TOS actors’ feelings about TNG was irrelevant. TNG was steadily gaining in popularity year by year, and the dismal showing of TFF was the nail in the coffin for that crew. The only reason why they made one more film was because they realized their time was over and they didn’t want to go out on the sad note that was Star Trek V.

They made the film because Paramount wanted a classic cast movie for the 25th anniversary. If not for that, Harve Bennett may well have had his Academy film. Roddenberry was avoiding a lot of cross references to the original series, you had to strain to hear them when they dared mention the classic cast. So a crossover film would have to wait until he was dead. But Paramount wouldn't have greenlit Star Trek 6 if they didn't think they could make decent money off the anniversary. The original cast could want a better goodbye all they want, if the suits didn't see the money in it, it wasn't gonna happen.

 

[Dukhat]

You’re vastly overestimating Roddenberry’s control over things. They didn’t need to wait until he was dead to make a TNG film. Even before 1991 he had little to no influence in Star Trek production.

 

[Ssosmcin]

Whether it was Roddenberry or Berman doesn't really make a difference in the end. They were extremely hesitant to cross the streams for a long time.

 

[suarezguy]

*Shrug* I don't think it would have bombed, there would have generally been guarded openness and some excitement (especially with actors like Hawke), but they actually would have been as or more niche than the TNG films and there would at least be a lot of feeling that Paramount went prequel far too early and some rejection of that the new versions were too different, the original characters were being overly-milked and/or the TNG characters were being too overlooked. If it was just a one-off film (end with the beginning) fine, not a big impact, but Paramount would probably not be really excited by that, giving the original cast one more and hint at transitioning to TNG makes a lot more commercial sense.