Stillborn Sulu Show

[Boo-khat!]

Yep. See starting at 4:47 in this video (link) of the video Space: Science Fiction Films Special Effects, narrated by Christopher Reeve. A very young Bill George appears in the video.

EDIT: I just asked Tom Hudson if the Excelsior seen in these animatics is the small model in question.

Did Tom ever get back to you?

I was hoping that Series 5 was going to be set aboard the Enterprise-B a few years after GEN. Harriman is gone, Demora is the XO, and there's a new captain. The series would have filled in the "Lost Years" between TUC and TNG.

I really don't see the Demora actress who played a bit part for about 5 minutes as a main character. Mainly because there'd be no logical reason to have her there, since she was just an ensign in 2293 and by the time she would have been an XO, she would have no longer been serving on the same ship. But sure, a Lost Era show set on the Ent-B would have been preferable to what we got, at least in my opinion.

 

[Maurice]

Did Tom ever get back to you?

He seemed unsure. He said they made that model before the movie was made, and did not really offer an opinion as to if it was used in those animatics. My instinct is it was, because the model in those looks too small to be the hero, and there were no official kits yet.

 

[Quinton]

I can't vote in the poll because my thoughts are somewhere in the middle. :P

One of the very first internet things I ever encountered was that fansite for a Captain Sulu show. At the time, I was so young (single digits) that I thought it was just an authentic thing that was actually en route. When Voyager ended later that year, and Enterprise had that very first UPN promo that said, like, "Before Kirk and Janeway... Before Sisko and Picard... There was... ENTERPRISE," I got real confused. What happened to Sulu?

I probably would have been cool with it. I mean, at the time, I'd have been cool with anything. But I grew up with regular access to most of the TOS movies on VHS, and no access to TOS itself. So, for kid me, that was the 23rd century. That, and only that. With the vaguest understanding that there was a show beforehand.

 

[Maurice]

Sorry to bump this thread, but there's an update!

As mentioned upthread, I made an Excelsior mesh on an Atari Mega ST around the time Star Trek VI was a thing. It was based on the plans for a small ≈3' miniature built by Ed Miarecki & Tom Hudson, which apparently appeared on the Bird of Prey's targeting scope in the film. The OG file was lost, but the mesh had been converted to a short-lived format, and Tom shared it with someone who was able to convert it into a .3DS file.

So, voilà! here's that ≈35-year-old mesh recovered! Aim your Klingon weapons at it, if you dare.

 

[Mudd]

He seemed unsure. He said they made that model before the movie was made, and did not really offer an opinion as to if it was used in those animatics. My instinct is it was, because the model in those looks too small to be the hero, and there were no official kits yet.

I may have an idea about this. Remind me Thursday?

 

[FredH]

I would happily have watched a Sulu show, but it was never going to happen.

 

[Returnee BBS]

We should’ve had a Star Trek: Excelsior series alongside Star Trek: Voyager. It is a sin that can never be rectified.

I'm more skeptical on this idea.

Scenario 1

Once upon a time, had TNG been cancelled early, like after four seasons, then an Excelsior TV series would have made sense.

If TNG had stuck to the same writing style of Seasons 1 and 2 for its remaining seasons, based much more closely on TOS, then an Excelsior TV show could have used what we now know is the TNG Writing Style (S3 - S7).

Scenario 2

In production hindsight, a station-based sci-fi series was inevitable after TUC performed well at the box office. There's no way Star Trek: Excelsior would have replaced DS9.

However, that doesn't mean it couldn't have replaced VOY. That would present its own set of problems. In my opinion, Star Trek: Voyager recycled the plots of just under 20 TNG episodes and at least 10 TOS episodes. I don't think this problem would have been avoided by an Excelsior TV show.

Scenario 3

If ENT went into first run syndication in 1999 instead of being on UPN, it could have had more seasons. Meanwhile, Star Trek: Excelsior taking up IRL ENT's UPN slot would mean that show would have difficulty with not copying episode plots from VOY, TNG, and TOS.

Scenario 4

A Kelvin Excelsior TV show might work.

Scenario 5

Pike's alternate future uniform in SNW had a mixed fan reception, not being exactly identical to the Monster Maroon uniforms of the TOS movies.

People would be less forgiving of the differences between a similarly different Monster Maroon style and the originals, than they have been of differences between the SNW uniforms and the old TOS uniforms.

 

[FredH]

How does TUC make a station-based show inevitable? (TUC isn’t a station-based story, so I’m not following your reasoning here — not that I think there was a demand for a TUC-like series anyway (however defined?), and we never got one.)

 

[Returnee BBS]

How does TUC make a station-based show inevitable? (TUC isn’t a station-based story, so I’m not following your reasoning here — not that I think there was a demand for a TUC-like series anyway (however defined?), and we never got one.)

Paramount exec Brandon Tartikoff wanted to launch a third Star Trek series while TOS and TNG were popular. This would capitalize financially on that popularity. However, he was inspired by the fixed frontier town setting of certain western shows.

That's different from going to a new western town each week.

None of the powers that be wanted the format of new western town each week, translated to two starship shows on at the same time.

 

[Maurice]

Still makes no sense.

 

[PCz911]

Paramount exec Brandon Tartikoff wanted to launch a third Star Trek series while TOS and TNG were popular. This would capitalize financially on that popularity. However, he was inspired by the fixed frontier town setting of certain western shows.

That's different from going to a new western town each week.

None of the powers that be wanted the format of new western town each week, translated to two starship shows on at the same time.

Did Babylon 5 play into any of their calculations?

 

[Mudd]

Did Babylon 5 play into any of their calculations?

No.

 

[Tomalak]

Much debated over the years. Sounds like the reality is that it was a coincidence and that development was underway before JMS pitched his idea.

It wasn't a leap of the imagination that a second spin-off would not be ship-based, which quickly leads you to a space station or planet.

 

[Boo-khat!]

Sorry to bump this thread, but there's an update!

As mentioned upthread, I made an Excelsior mesh on an Atari Mega ST around the time Star Trek VI was a thing. It was based on the plans for a small ≈3' miniature built by Ed Miarecki & Tom Hudson, which apparently appeared on the Bird of Prey's targeting scope in the film. The OG file was lost, but the mesh had been converted to a short-lived format, and Tom shared it with someone who was able to convert it into a .3DS file.

So, voilà! here's that ≈35-year-old mesh recovered! Aim your Klingon weapons at it, if you dare.

So I have a photo presumably taken during DS9's second season in 1994, showing an Excelsior model above a set top model used in a DS9 episode that year. Since no other model of the Excelsior would have existed in 1994 other than Bill George's (which this model clearly is not), and the debut of the AMT Excelsior model kit (which this also is not, as it's too large for a 1:1000 model kit), I'm wondering what model this is. Could it be Miarecki's model?

 

[Mudd]

There were resin garage kits of the Excelsior available during the late 1980s and 1990s. I was given to understand, he said vaguely, that one of these was assembled for use in effects photography that would simulate a three-dimensional display graphic of the ship for shots in ST:TUC.

 

[MLJames1961]

There was one Excelsior garage kit (with both vacuform and resin parts) that I remember seeing ads for in catalogs in the early 90s. It was way beyond my price range, and way above my model-building skill level, so I never even thought of buying one. The kit was 41 inches long when assembled, which looks to be about the right size range for the ship in the Drex Files image.

 

[Mudd]

There was one Excelsior garage kit (with both vacuform and resin parts) that I remember seeing ads for in catalogs in the early 90s. It was way beyond my price range, and way above my model-building skill level, so I never even thought of buying one. The kit was 41 inches long when assembled, which looks to be about the right size range for the ship in the Drex Files image.

IIRC, what i was told specifically was that they needed to shoot a model that would not require detailing, as the intention was to put black tape lines on it and use the negative image to represent a wireframe somewhere. And they bought this kit and sent it out to contracted model builders (may have said ILM) and were shocked to get it back in a meticulously assembled and painted form.

 

[Boo-khat!]

IIRC, what i was told specifically was that they needed to shoot a model that would not require detailing, as the intention was to put black tape lines on it and use the negative image to represent a wireframe somewhere. And they bought this kit and sent it out to contracted model builders (may have said ILM) and were shocked to get it back in a meticulously assembled and painted form.

That jibes with what Maurice mentioned upthread about Ed Miarecki building a 3-foot Excelsior model for the computer display for TUC.