^ Those are great!
Star Trek created in 1866 instead of 1966
- Thread starter Lord Garth
- Start date
Yes, because it become fantasy like LOTR and GOT. There is no real world analog for these things, so suspension of disbelief is a whole easier to maintain, vs. a production that states "we're in the future."
Those were good. Of course I would prefer Kirk had been made a Royal Navy captain rather than a cavalry officer, but oh well.
I did some looking up. Even though they had drafting in the Civil War, only 2% of Union Soldiers were draftees. The vast majority of the military was volunteer. I also have Gene Roddenberry in his 40s. So he probably wouldn't be out there fighting. (link)
Gene Roddenberry's experiences during the Civil War would be those of a Civilian and whatever would influence his work would be from that perspective. Which would be as interesting as if he'd actually fought in the war, even though it wouldn't be quite the same.
On the other hand: he would've been the prime age for serving during the Mexican-American War (1846-1848). Land that was acquired through James K. Polk's wanting to carry out both Andrew Jackson's legacy and the concept of Manifest Destiny. The Whigs were opposed to the War and the fight for this land but then thought it wasn't such a bad idea after the fact once they had the land, even nominating General Zachary Taylor, who fought in the war, in 1848 as their candidate. I mention the Election of 1848 because I see Gene as being more of a Whig (and later a Republican) than a Democrat and wanted to put it into perspective. Or he might have been a Free-Soiler who turned Republican.
What would Mexican-American War Veteran Gene Roddenberry bring to the table?
* And I know Gene Roddenberry was born in Texas. But if his family immigrated to the United States from Ireland, they would've immigrated here pre-Texas joining the Union (in order for him to take up arms in the Mexican-American War), so he almost definitely would've lived in another state and might have even been born in wherever that state was. I'm putting him in the North only because I prefer Star Trek to not be a Confederate Vision of the Future.
Gene Roddenberry's experiences during the Civil War would be those of a Civilian and whatever would influence his work would be from that perspective. Which would be as interesting as if he'd actually fought in the war, even though it wouldn't be quite the same.
On the other hand: he would've been the prime age for serving during the Mexican-American War (1846-1848). Land that was acquired through James K. Polk's wanting to carry out both Andrew Jackson's legacy and the concept of Manifest Destiny. The Whigs were opposed to the War and the fight for this land but then thought it wasn't such a bad idea after the fact once they had the land, even nominating General Zachary Taylor, who fought in the war, in 1848 as their candidate. I mention the Election of 1848 because I see Gene as being more of a Whig (and later a Republican) than a Democrat and wanted to put it into perspective. Or he might have been a Free-Soiler who turned Republican.
What would Mexican-American War Veteran Gene Roddenberry bring to the table?
* And I know Gene Roddenberry was born in Texas. But if his family immigrated to the United States from Ireland, they would've immigrated here pre-Texas joining the Union (in order for him to take up arms in the Mexican-American War), so he almost definitely would've lived in another state and might have even been born in wherever that state was. I'm putting him in the North only because I prefer Star Trek to not be a Confederate Vision of the Future.
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I'm not sure I follow the reasoning here. Something completely foreign to everyday experience is easier to suspend disbelief in?
And if so... there's no real-world analogue for experiencing "the future," either, so I'm not sure where the difference lies.
Plus, historical epics are pretty popular too, even though one might think they'd be hard for contemporary audiences to "relate to"... and even though the films, no matter how much they (may) try for authenticity, are inevitably chock-full of anachronisms...
Basically, what I was saying is just that audiences have more open-minded tastes than a lot of producers are willing to give them credit for, and hypothetical "audience expectations" are often used as a figleaf for creative shortcomings.
Yes if the characters are done well.
Because there is a point of reference, i.e how technology works.
Perhaps? But in terms of narrative plausibility, there's really not a ton of difference between "magic" in a fantasy setting, and "futuristic technology" in a SF setting. (What with Clarke's Third Law and all that.) The important thing that wins over the audience in either case is just setting up a set of internal ground rules about how whatever-it-is works in universe, and being consistent about it.
In my scenario, Star Trek doesn't have to be a huge franchise, it just has to last from 1866 up to now.
If he's from Texas or Western (say, California, maybe even a 49er who failed to find gold but got into book publishing instead), then he most likely spent much of his youth fighting the Indians. Spock could be based on the idea of the "noble savage" (i.e. Tonto) but as an alien instead (possibly literally a half-Martian, as described in his original pitch).
If he's a Californian by the time of the Civil War, then he would likely be away from the front lines, still Union (but conflicted because of his roots), and be spurred into writing his ideas down in the lens of fantasy future fiction.
You could even have him stealing ideas from other authors and releasing them in dime (penny?) novels, when those become popular.
^ That solves the problem right there! And reflects real life. He moves to Texas after Annexation, so he's Texan and it keeps his Irish roots. Then, in 1849, he heads out to California. So he's a '49er who takes up writing. Before his writing career fully takes off, he also works for the local Sheriff. So he also still has the cop background.
I like the idea of Gene feeling conflicted. That makes him a lot more likely to want to show both sides of a conflict or at least not have the antagonists be outright total unsympathetic villains. And the inner conflict, feeling like he's between two worlds, feeds into the idea of Spock being of two worlds if Gene channels that into the character.
Now we've got 19th Century Star Trek.
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I'm not going to do this right now. But soon-ish (I don't know exactly when), just for fun, I'll have a fleshed-out concept for this version of Star Trek. I'll be describing the characters, the setting, and possible episodes.
TOS will be the basic template, and the Captain's name will be Kirk, but I'm working backwards from a cross between "The Cage", TOS Itself, and some things unique to the 19th Century. Spock will be there. McCoy will be there. I can't guarantee the rest of the characters but I'll try where I can. I might have ideas for some new ones that fit this type of series better.
Gulliver's Travels and Greek mythology will influence this too.
TOS will be the basic template, and the Captain's name will be Kirk, but I'm working backwards from a cross between "The Cage", TOS Itself, and some things unique to the 19th Century. Spock will be there. McCoy will be there. I can't guarantee the rest of the characters but I'll try where I can. I might have ideas for some new ones that fit this type of series better.
Gulliver's Travels and Greek mythology will influence this too.
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At what point did people start seriously imagining intelligent life on other planets? And when did it become friendly intelligent life as opposed to monstrous enemies? Somewhere around the turn of the century?
I agree 1866 would focus on Civil War and Restoration issues, but I think it'd focus less on aliens, have more religion, and involve man going out and colonizing space. They'd take Manifest Destiny and extend it outward, and glorify expansionism.
And the Enterprise might look more like a submarine.
I agree 1866 would focus on Civil War and Restoration issues, but I think it'd focus less on aliens, have more religion, and involve man going out and colonizing space. They'd take Manifest Destiny and extend it outward, and glorify expansionism.
And the Enterprise might look more like a submarine.
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Yeah. The Prime Directive would not exist in this.
^ THIS IS GREAT!!!!
I'm sharing this with my friends. I love the musical notes. I can't believe they're still burning the coal at the end. During one point I kept thinking in my head, "Sometimes you just can't get rid of a bomb!"
I'm sharing this with my friends. I love the musical notes. I can't believe they're still burning the coal at the end. During one point I kept thinking in my head, "Sometimes you just can't get rid of a bomb!"
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All male-crewed ships, brilliant uniforms, more overt military culture. I think it would be just as triumphalist as 60s trek -- very self-assured. Admittedly I'm thinking more of the age of imperialism, which for the US wouldn't start until McKlinley and Roosevelt, but I could see plots with an Earth-man's-burden component, of the Star Fleet spreading the virtues of civilization to the heathen Klingons and such. We still get that in the TNG era, but it's less honest and more unctious.
I know Mormonism has had the idea since about the mid-1830's. Of course that was commonly understood to mean children of God, just like humans, or exalted humans. There is a story attributed to Joseph Smith, Jr., the founder of Mormonism, about six feet tall people who lived to a thousand years old, dressed similar to Quakers, who lived on the moon. Though it's highly doubtful this story is accurate considering it was told many decades later. But it shows that people were at least thinking of the concept that early on.
I'd be willing to bet the idea of intelligent life on other planets was around long before then. Though they were probably always envisioned to be just like humans.
There are so many variables here. Did GR invent "space opera" fiction in the 1860s or does Star Trek form more naturally out of the fiction of the day? Space travel in fiction didn't really look anything like we'd think of it now until the late 1800s, and anything very Star Trek-like probably around the 1920s. If it's more a product of its time, like Verne's From Earth to the Moon and Around the Moon, I suspect it would involve much smaller space crews, probably limited to the solar system, and be more like explorer adventure stories on Earth.
Like most of Joseph Smith's output, there are contemporary sources that would seem very likely to have influenced him. Most famous is probably the "Moon hoax" of 1835, a series of articles in the New York Sun that gave details of telescopically-observed life on the Moon, including winged "man-bats." But ever since it became widely accepted (1600s) that the Earth was a planet orbiting a sun which was a star like countless other stars, people speculated that other planets had life on them just like Earth did.
Like most of Joseph Smith's output, there are contemporary sources that would seem very likely to have influenced him. Most famous is probably the "Moon hoax" of 1835, a series of articles in the New York Sun that gave details of telescopically-observed life on the Moon, including winged "man-bats." But ever since it became widely accepted (1600s) that the Earth was a planet orbiting a sun which was a star like countless other stars, people speculated that other planets had life on them just like Earth did.
