I was recently lucky enough to get an interview with J.K. Woodward and Scott Tipton regarding their involvement in Harlan Ellison's Star Trek: The City on the Edge of Forever and it's been published over at Flickering Myth. I've dropped part of the interview below and added the link to the rest of the article below that. I hope you enjoy the read.
Vil
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Earlier this month, IDW – using the writing talents of Scott and David Tipton and also the artistic talents of J.K. Woodward – released Harlan Ellison’s original teleplay of Star Trek: The City On The Edge of Forever in a comic book format you can read our review here). We managed to catch up with both J.K. Woodward and Scott Tipton and asked them a handful of questions about this comic book adaption, and now being involved in such a memorable piece of Star Trek history.
Villordsutch: With Harlan Ellison’s story being such a classic amongst fans was there are trepidation in accepting this torch and bringing it to comic format? I for one was excited in wanting to see it arrive yet in the back of my head I had this protective feeling towards the story being used.
J.K. Woodward: I was too excited to feel any trepidation, I think. This story was just so visually inspiring that I couldn’t wait to start painting the planet, the guardians, the red sun, the vortex, etc. It was just such a thrill. I did however, have what I’d call a healthy fear of meeting Harlan, but I quickly learned that he can be just as outspoken with things he likes as he is with things that aggravate him and he expressed happiness with the work I was doing so that went well.
Scott Tipton: There was a little trepidation, to be sure. The episode is a favorite, and Harlan has been a literary hero of mine since I was 12 years old. But it’s also the kind of assignment you can’t turn down.
V: How did you come together to get the story and art bonded and published? Did the IDW bosses call in the Tiptons and you said, “We want Woodward or we’re out!”?
JK: I think this was all Chris’ [Ryall] idea. I heard about it through him in an email. He told me I’d be working with the Tipton’s again and I was thrilled. I later got an email from Scott saying, “We’re getting the band back together!” and we haven’t stopped talking about it since
ST: Luckily, our editor, Chris Ryall, pretty much brought this to the table with the notion of reuniting the ASSIMILATION SQUARED team, thinking that JK’s realistic, epic arts would be the perfect fit, and there was no argument from us.
V: How much breathing room where you given in the aspects of your collective skills with Harlan’s original teleplay? Were you allowed to expand certain parts of the story and if yes did you?
JK: My feeling as far as the art goes is to make it look as much like Harlan’s vision as possible. I want this to feel like the episode Harlan wrote if it aired. There are of course some things you can do with paint that a TV budget in 66 might not allow (grand sets, vast helicopter shots , etc.) but with few exceptions, I tried to make it feel like we just found a lost reel.
ST: We didn’t add anything to the story, nor did we have any desire to. Our role he...
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