• Welcome! The TrekBBS is the number one place to chat about Star Trek with like-minded fans.
    If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Should Discovery hire acclaimed hard SF authors like Alastair Reynolds, Greg Egan, Andy Weir, etc?

INACTIVERedDwarf

INACTIVERedDwarf

Commander
Red Shirt
C1dipjcv_OKS._SL250_FMpng.png
the-expanse-series.jpg


I remember a while back when someone pitched a Star Trek revival, one of the things they argued for was that Star Trek should hire prominent authors from literary science fiction to pitch stories.

The way this was justified, was that Star Trek: The Original Series hired authors of it's day, and was applauded at science fiction gatherings, because by comparison to the competition (i.e. Lost in Space), it was downright literary. Why not grab Vernor Vinge, Greg Egan, Richard Morgan, Alastair Reynolds, Andy Weir, Ann Leckie, John Scalzi, Kim Stanley Robinson, or whoever else?

What would be the barrier to doing this? Hollywood politics? Rights?

Coming out of the thread on Discovery/Universe, it's clear that even a lot of people who currently watch he show feel it could do with better plotting. Is this one potential solution? Get a short story, dealing with high concept ideas from physics, space-age society, or information technology, and adapt it into a stand alone episode, or two parter?
 
If Discovery was episodic yes, they absolutely should have. Since Discovery is Serialised though.. ehh?
Black Mirror would be a better fit for hard-sci fi authors I think.
 
RedDwarf said:
Get a short story, dealing with high concept ideas from physics, space-age society, or information technology, and adapt it into a stand alone episode, or two parter?
Click to expand...
Except, Star Trek isn't high concept science fiction, it's a action adventure show set in a fantasy future. It's inter-personal drama, people running around with ray guns, and magic dressed up as science.

Any actual science is pushed into the background/back story, and is allowed to peek out only rarely.

A professional author of adventure novels would likely be a much better choice, Ahh if only Tom Clancy were still with us.
 
Last edited:
Seems like a restrictive definition Tenacity, for a very expansive setting that potentially encompasses both high concepts and action adventure.

Star Trek dealt with hard science concepts before, i.e. two dimensional life forms, space phenomena, nanotechnology, bioengineering, terraforming, dyson spheres, eugenics, big history, etc.
 
RedDwarf said:
Seems like a restrictive definition Tenacity, for a very expansive setting that potentially encompasses both high concepts and action adventure.

Star Trek dealt with hard science concepts before, i.e. two dimensional life forms, space phenomena, nanotechnology, bioengineering, terraforming, dyson spheres, eugenics, big history, etc.
Click to expand...

Yeah there's a fairly big part of me that wants (much) more "hard" sci-fi...but as others have said (and I recognise in myself from also liking most iterations of the show), it can't really change course so radically now, and particularly now it is serialised. (At the very least it'll lead to civil war on here :devil:) I can get harder sci-fi elsewhere and ST provides me with something else, which I also value.
 
Star Trek has never been 'hard' sci-fi really. The TOS episodes written by sci-fi authors generally needed extensive rewrites to make them into TV shows. So while I'm all for sci-fi authors contributing story ideas, it would still need feeding through a layer of TV writers to make it to screen in a format that will work. I would certainly appreciate an arc for season 2 which focused on a sci-fi concept instead of a war.
 
cultcross said:
Star Trek has never been 'hard' sci-fi really. The TOS episodes written by sci-fi authors generally needed extensive rewrites to make them into TV shows. So while I'm all for sci-fi authors contributing story ideas, it would still need feeding through a layer of TV writers to make it to screen in a format that will work. I would certainly appreciate an arc for season 2 which focused on a sci-fi concept instead of a war.
Click to expand...

Yeah, that's what I imagined; the short stories could be fed past the TV writing team. It would be nice to see even a couple of episodes in the next season, as you say, just to break up the show a bit.
 
Hells to the yes. Let's get some professionals involved here.

Tenacity said:
...it's a action adventure show set in a fantasy future. It's inter-personal drama, people running around with ray guns, and magic dressed up as science.
Click to expand...
That sounds more like Star Wars you're describing there (except for the "future" part).

No, Star Trek has never been about "hard" SF, as noted. (Nor are most of the authors mentioned in the OP.) But at its best it has always been serious, thoughtful SF. Certainly not fantasy. DSC could definitely use a bit more of that.
 
Yeah, I really detest describing Star Trek as fantasy.

No istari, hand drawn maps leading to Erebor, or ash nazg thrimbatul booming from the heavens = not fantasy.
 
RedDwarf said:
Star Trek dealt with hard science concepts before, i.e. two dimensional life forms, space phenomena, nanotechnology, bioengineering, terraforming, dyson spheres, eugenics, big history, etc.
Click to expand...
and how EXCITING it was. I only fell asleep twice during each of those episodes
 
RedDwarf said:
Yeah, I really detest describing Star Trek as fantasy.

No istari, hand drawn maps leading to Erebor, or ash nazg thrimbatul booming from the heavens = not fantasy.
Click to expand...

Let's be fair though, you can have fantasy with all of the swords and wizards taken out, and sci-fi elements added in. That's what Star Wars is.

Star Trek, though, is pretty clearly a sci-fi series. Sure, it's not particularly rigorous in terms of the science, but there are few examples of TV/movie sci-fi that are. It's a cut above the action-adventure shows generally however, because it (usually, or at least often) tries to use the setting as an allegory to discuss some socio-political issue, rather than just providing us with an excuse to munch popcorn for the week.
 
Tenacity said:
A professional author of adventure novels would likely be a much better choice, Ahh if only Tom Clancy were still with us.
Click to expand...

I disagree. A great example of why was the idiocy in the 12th episode about how, if the mycelial network was killed by the ISS Charon, all life everywhere in all universes would die. Any decent science fiction writer would be able to tell you the line made no sense, because if the mycelial network linked together all universes, and it was possible to destroy it, it would have been destroyed by some random alien shitheel billions of years in the past, and Stamets wouldn't be around to have this conversation. But you really need to have someone who is familiar with how the Many Worlds Theorem works - at least as a layman.

Another example would be if you want to design an alien race. Sci-fi authors construct alien races all the time as part of worldbuilding, and can create a race which seems...well...alien (at least to the modern educated westerner). Random thriller writers, not so much.

In the end, you could tell an action-adventure story in any setting. Why have it be sci-fi if you're not going to use the setting to the fullest? Just to pander to an audience who likes rayguns?
 
Half those authors aren't even hard SF writers, which is good, because most people who write hard SF have no idea what characterization even is. Or social science, for that matter.
 
RedDwarf said:
Seems like a restrictive definition Tenacity, for a very expansive setting that potentially encompasses both high concepts and action adventure.
Click to expand...
Even though it was primarily pitched as action/adventure with the science more limited?
 
It's perhaps worth noting that the prominent SF authors who wrote for TOS were not exactly "hard SF" writers: Harlan Ellison, Theodore Sturgeon, Richard Matheson, Norman Spinrad, Robert Bloch . . . . all great writers, but none of whom were known for their rigorous scientific accuracy. (Indeed, Bloch was mostly a horror guy.)
 
If they have written for TV. I seem to recall TOS regularly had problems with deadlines and rewrites with established scifi authors who had not written for TV.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Sign up / Register


Back
Top