Straczynski comment on holodecks - request for quote
- Thread starter Sisko_is_my_captain
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Straczynski has clearly forgotten than modern trek is to a large modeled on the navy of Hornblower.
Anyone who has spent ANY time studying the "age of discovery" knows that boredom at sea (and how the men dealt with it) was a central part of the naval experience.
Sure there were fascinating new lands and peoples to discover and contact, but the fact remains that 95% of their time was spent sailing in the open ocean with little to alleviate the monotony of daily routine.
The same would be true of a starship, and a series which failed to address this issue would be sorely lacking in realism. Kinda like B5.
Anyone who has spent ANY time studying the "age of discovery" knows that boredom at sea (and how the men dealt with it) was a central part of the naval experience.
Sure there were fascinating new lands and peoples to discover and contact, but the fact remains that 95% of their time was spent sailing in the open ocean with little to alleviate the monotony of daily routine.
The same would be true of a starship, and a series which failed to address this issue would be sorely lacking in realism. Kinda like B5.
I've been using it as my sig for some time now.
Actually, I'm not a huge fan of JMS's Trek pitch - it has a kind of stale, Trek-meets-B5 feeling to it that's somewhat dated. However, his comments about the Trek holodecks were right on the money, IMO.
Point one: Babylon 5 didn't center on exploration. They were right in the middle of everything.
Point two: They had a bar. And a casino. I think JMS's point is that, while the characters may have dropped by from time to time, they never spent an episode fighting for their lives because the craps table went crazy and tried to kill them while spouting dime-store aphorisms.
Though, admittedly, B5 did once have a holodeck movie, complete with malfunction. And even a bit of porn. So the man isn't totally innocent.
Except that Star Trek doesn't try to realistically portray futuristic space exploration. If it did, 98 percent of every episode would be Data sitting at the helm saying, "situation unchanged, Captain" every 5 minutes.
Trek and similar shows try to portray just the interesting stuff - actually meeting the aliens, encountering new phenomenon, finding space hippies, etc. So I think JMS' point was that there is so much creative potential for storytelling centered on that actual, interesting part of these character's lives, that there really isn't any need to spend much time talking about what they do for fun.
That said, JMS is far from innocent on these matters himself. Others have pointed out that he used holodeck-like devices in various episodes, and certainly spent a lot of time showing the casinos and other "fun stuff" on his space station. So I'd agree that there is a certain amount of hypocrisy in his statements.
But I think he ultimately does make a good point that, particularly late in the runs of DS9 and Voyager, that the holodeck became kind of a crutch for writers when they couldn't come up with something fresh. We saw an awful lot of the holodeck on Voyager, and most of those episodes just weren't very good. And don't get me started on Vic Fontaine ...
I don't think the problem with the holodeck is showing the characters having fun.
It's the creation of manifestly artificial tension by throwing in a malfunction. If they're just in the holodeck having a good time, tehre's no tension - what's at stake? Nothing. But the idea of them in a fantasy setting while at risk is appealing, so some bizarre plot point is inserted to force them to risk their lives by completing the program.
Some good episodes came out of that formula - "Elementary, My Dear Data", "Our Man Bashir". But it was done so many times to the point where it simply became ridiculous.
The best episodes about the Holodeck are ones like "Hollow Pursuits" and "It's Only a Paper Moon", which use it to analyse addictive personalities being sucked into a fantasy world - doubly relevant now in the age of MMORPGs.
Also good were episodes using the holodeck as a device to discuss authorial intent, such as "Author, Author", and the first half of "Worst Case Scenario" (a brilliant episode right up to the point the obligatory malfunction kicks in.)
So Straczynski had a point.
It's the creation of manifestly artificial tension by throwing in a malfunction. If they're just in the holodeck having a good time, tehre's no tension - what's at stake? Nothing. But the idea of them in a fantasy setting while at risk is appealing, so some bizarre plot point is inserted to force them to risk their lives by completing the program.
Some good episodes came out of that formula - "Elementary, My Dear Data", "Our Man Bashir". But it was done so many times to the point where it simply became ridiculous.
The best episodes about the Holodeck are ones like "Hollow Pursuits" and "It's Only a Paper Moon", which use it to analyse addictive personalities being sucked into a fantasy world - doubly relevant now in the age of MMORPGs.
Also good were episodes using the holodeck as a device to discuss authorial intent, such as "Author, Author", and the first half of "Worst Case Scenario" (a brilliant episode right up to the point the obligatory malfunction kicks in.)
So Straczynski had a point.
I don't really think holodecks were the problem. Every show has its own version of the "filler" episodes. Monsters, diseases, holodecks, mystery malfunctions -- you can find 'em all, in pretty much every series.
The problem is the good-stuff to filler ratio. By the time you come to Voyager and Enterprise, you are probably in the range of 70-80% predictable filler. Maybe a third of the filler eps on Voyager were "Help, the holodeck is trying to kill me" episodes, but I think the monsters were just as annoying. The giant disease bugs seemed like an excuse for Janeway to play Laura Croft.
It's not the holodeck so much as the tendency to take the easy road. It's easy to make X of the Week eps. Doing good stories takes effort.
The problem is the good-stuff to filler ratio. By the time you come to Voyager and Enterprise, you are probably in the range of 70-80% predictable filler. Maybe a third of the filler eps on Voyager were "Help, the holodeck is trying to kill me" episodes, but I think the monsters were just as annoying. The giant disease bugs seemed like an excuse for Janeway to play Laura Croft.
It's not the holodeck so much as the tendency to take the easy road. It's easy to make X of the Week eps. Doing good stories takes effort.
CaptJimboJones said:
"If you need a holo-deck to make an interstellar starship on the bleeding edge of the unknown interesting, something is seriously amiss." - J. Michael Straczynski /quote]
EXCELLENT - that's exactly what I was thinking of (although my Deadwood-abused brain substituted f***ing for bleeding.
Thanks!
But what the crewmen did for fun was a FAR more central part of their lives (and the naval experience) than ACTUAL discoveries.
Just because it was their leisure activity DOESN'T mean that it was uninteresting. Case in point: one of the central plot points of "Midshipman Hornblower" concerns the deleterious effects of boredom and the inappropriate means of alleviating it sometimes practiced by the crew.
Specifically, the men were betting on who could kill rats the fastest using only their teeth
Horrifying to be sure, but FAR more interesting than 90% of what went on daily on a warship. To exclude leisure activities from a story of naval exploration is to rob the narrative of central and undeniably INTERSTING aspects of the whole experience. Straczynski would criticize Trek for delving into the mundane, but I would criticize him for ignoring it. Life in space would inevitably be mostly routine and the crew would seek ways to avoid boredom, sometimes to ill effect.
Straczynski would have us believe that space exploration should be all anomolies and Romulans, but that would not (and has not) been the case.
^^ You obviously missed Garibaldi's descent back into alcoholism, Londo's gambling, G'kar's fondness for Earth women, Sheridan's courtship of Delenn, Franklin's addiction to stims, etc etc.
One of the themes in B5 was that the command staff, DIDN'T get the time to rest and relax, and we got to see first hand, the repercussions that had, in terms of both their physical and mental states of health.
Focussing on the mundane in any attempt to claim the moral high ground on realism is a pointless exercise as you'd end up turning off more viewers than you'd gain. Realistically, how many people are going to sit there watching a whitestar flying from B5 to Minbar in realtime?
The point that Straczynski makes is that you don't need to contrive bland holodeck plot-devices to artificially generate story and tension.
One of the themes in B5 was that the command staff, DIDN'T get the time to rest and relax, and we got to see first hand, the repercussions that had, in terms of both their physical and mental states of health.
Focussing on the mundane in any attempt to claim the moral high ground on realism is a pointless exercise as you'd end up turning off more viewers than you'd gain. Realistically, how many people are going to sit there watching a whitestar flying from B5 to Minbar in realtime?
The point that Straczynski makes is that you don't need to contrive bland holodeck plot-devices to artificially generate story and tension.
CaptJimboJones said:
I've been using it as my sig for some time now.
That's the one I was thinking of, I couldn't see anything resembling it in the blog
And those others are wrong. JMS used virtual reality exactly twice.
First, in the episode "And the Sky, Full of Stars" the Commander was strapped in to a virtual reality type machine, which projected images into his brain, making him think he was alone on the station, and that he was running around it, when he was actually sitting there strapped in.
The other time was not in an episode at all, but the movie River of Souls. In this case, there were holograms in a "holo-brothel". It was also pointed out within that movie that holo-brothels are illegal on the station.
Not counting holographic messages, there were zero other uses of holodeck-like devices.
Holographic messages in this case involves communication between Epsilon 3 and the station, and another communications message in early season 2 down on the flight deck. Nowhere even close to being holodeck-like.
Hmmm, remind me of the episode that was specifically focussed on the casino? Sure the odd scene was filmed there, but that was purely to show one of Londo's vices, whilst also playing into his comedic element. I don't ever recall it being pivotal from a plot point of view.
Some posters compared the overuse of the holodeck malfunction as a standalone episode to similar repeated cliches for B5's standalone episodes, which I think is a legitimate criticism - cf: my 'Arthurian Legends' comment above.
The point is, all TV shows have their formulas, and lots of bad or substandard episodes can come from them.
The point is, all TV shows have their formulas, and lots of bad or substandard episodes can come from them.
It's a fair point. The problem with the holodecks are that they're such a blatent 'lazy card' in lieu of any great measure of ingenuity. Arthurian legend was obviously one of Joe's influences when it came to B5, but any such use of literary cliche was generally used as a vehicle for a superior examination in one form or another. A Late Delivery from Avalon would fit into that category. It's more to do with York's character's psychosis bought about by the traumatic guilt he feels over his pivotal part in antagonising the start of the Human-Minbari war. The Arthurian parts were a means to an end, whereas quite often with the holodeck malfunction episodes it seemed to be that the writers had an idea as to how something could go wrong, and then the story was manufactured around that.
B5 had some real stinkers, particularly in the first season, and a few in the last, and Joe had a penchant for terrible dialogue, but for pure storytelling, Trek trails in his wake.
B5 had some real stinkers, particularly in the first season, and a few in the last, and Joe had a penchant for terrible dialogue, but for pure storytelling, Trek trails in his wake.
Colonel Green said:
Just because it was their leisure activity DOESN'T mean that it was uninteresting. Case in point: one of the central plot points of "Midshipman Hornblower" concerns the deleterious effects of boredom and the inappropriate means of alleviating it sometimes practiced by the crew.
Specifically, the men were betting on who could kill rats the fastest using only their teeth
We actually agree overall more than disagree, and your example from the Hornblower novel is a great one. I'm also a fan of Forrester's novels (I've read the entire series twice now) and he certainly does make the daily life of the British warship quite interesting.
And in a few cases, Trek does the same with the holodeck. "Hollow Pursuits" is absolutely brilliant, a real hard-SF type examination of how that type of near-magical technology could impact people on a psychological level. "Elementary, Dear Data" was the first of the "malfunction" episodes and was a riveting, compelling adventure story of technology run amok.
But I think JMSs criticism, which I agree with, is that the holodeck was used poorly most of the time - either in an endless recycling of the "Elementary" episode, or as an attempt to add character depth (episodes showing Riker playing jazz at a holodeck club, Janeway chatting with a holo Da Vinchy, etc. etc. etc.) that typically just fell flat. We also saw endless examples of the "oh wait, it's just a holodeck program" twist after a supposedly "shocking" scene which was generally a surprise to absolutely no one who has seen more than a few episodes of Star Trek.
As a viewer, I want to see Our Heroes engaged in the drama of space exploration (which is what the show is ultimately about). If you're going to show them prancing around on the holodeck, then it damn well better be a compelling story, much the way Forrester was able to do with his portrayal of daily life on Horatio's ship.
And most of the time it simply wasn't.
You are kidding, right?
Incidentally, somewhere in the last couple of years, we finally reached the milestone of more than fifty percent of humanity living in urban areas. This is a very healthy trend corresponding with astronomical increases in the standard of living for the inhabitants, and it bids fair to continue. While the exact implementation may be worrisome, the way to bet, based on the past five hundred years of experience, is that things are going to be on average considerably better three hundred years from now than they are today.
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