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TAS stories as TOS revival basis?

Wingsley

Commodore
Commodore
If there was a story from STAR TREK: THE ANIMATED SERIES that you wish you could order to be produced as a bona fide ep of TOS, or that you wish you could see made as a TOS-derived fan film, which one would it be, and why?

Would any TAS eps work better than others in the conversion to TOS' hour-long adult-drama format?
 
What would you do about the newer non-human characters in TAS, such as M'Ress and Arex?
 
If there was a story from STAR TREK: THE ANIMATED SERIES that you wish you could order to be produced as a bona fide ep of TOS, or that you wish you could see made as a TOS-derived fan film, which one would it be, and why?

Would any TAS eps work better than others in the conversion to TOS' hour-long adult-drama format?

"Yesteryear"

"Beyond the Farthest Star"

"The Pirates of Orion"

"Albatross"

"The Jihad"

"The Slaver Weapon"


All were mature episodes which captured the sensibilities (to varying degrees) of TOS: from the large concepts TOS excelled at, and/or touching on the emotional connections between the 1701 crew. There are additional episodes that would work on TOS, but I posted the best candidates.

What would you do about the newer non-human characters in TAS, such as M'Ress and Arex?

Depends on the budget and creative approach to problem solving--much like The Outer Limits. They developed the Gorn captain, Salt vampire, and Horta, so perhaps they would have have enough ingenuity to create another believable, reusable alien creation. Arex would need to be modified to a degree, but it would be interesting to see how they would have managed him without going into the slapped together look of so many Lost in Space aliens.
 
I thought virtually all TAS storylines were worth of TOS as I recall, but I think you'll find Yesteryear to be an automatic answer from most, if not all, of us. So I might preface the post by saying, "Aside from Yesteryear..."

Beyond the Farthest Star For Me.
 
I've had this very idea in the past.

One issue is what you want to see. There were all sorts of things referenced in TOS that we never actually saw mostly because they couldn't afford and/or didn't have the resources to show them. A fan production might pull off a live-action TAS episode reasonably close to what was seen animated. Or they could adapt a TAS story, but done more closely to what could have been done on TOS. That would be tricky because it would necessitate changing certain things.

If we hew more closely to what was possible in TOS then some changes are no big deal. It's easy enough enough to swap out Arex and M'ress and put Chekov and whomever else back into their place. The animated shuttlecraft are easily replaced (except the aquashuttle) with the familiar TOS Class F design. Some of the more exotic aliens could be changed to something TOS could have done (given time and money). So we can cheat a little with today's resources and do some things TOS could coceivably have done but didn't. TOS managed Horta, Gorn, Talosians, Excalbians, Vians and such so we could extrapolate from that. That means Phylosians, Vendorians, Dramians, Kzinti, Vedala and the like would look different as live-action. "The Jihad" would be fun, but the Skorr would have to be totally rethought.

"Beyond The Farthest Star," "Yesteryear," "Pirates Of Orion," "The Infinite Vulcan," "Albatross," and "Slaver Weapon" shouldn't be too difficult to adapt as live-action.
 
"The Time Trap".

Considering the infrequent authorizing of new miniatures for TOS, I imagine the sea of background ships would be one or two matte paintings. The ships were largely "hanging" in place, so as rich a variety of vessel could have been achieved, with the 1701 & Klingon miniatures being the only needing a physical presence / new shots.
 
Doable:
"Beyond The Farthest Star" - Depicting an alien as green light wouldn’t have been much of a challenge for TOS. The greater challenge would be in depicting the distinctly alien interiors of the giant alien ship—not impossible given time and money, but challenging. Depicting a non-humanoid being on a viewscreen would have been similar to depicting a Melkot or a Tholian so no big problem there. More time and money to create a model of the massive alien ship, but if you can do a Fesarius or a Doomsday Machine then it’s doable. Life-supoort belts become space suits or drop them altogether.

"Yesteryear" – The biggest rethink here is the depiction of a sehlat and a llematya. The avian historian could be dropped or reimagined into something less exotic.

"One Of Our Planets Is Missing" – This would be pretty straightforward considering how similar it is conceptually to “The Immunity Syndrome.”

"The Lorelei Signal" – No great challenge here.

"The Survivor" – Rethink the Vendorian (and his bit about becoming a deflector shield) and it’s a done deal.

"The Infinite Vulcan" – Drop the 50ft. clones and rethink the Phylosians into something less exotic and it’s done.

"The Magicks Of Megas-Tu" – Lucius could be reconceived into something remotely resembling Satan without being half man/half goat.

"The Time Trap" – The graveyard of ships could be a matte painting.

"Slaver Weapon" – Rethink the Kzinti, swap in the Class F shuttlecraft and set the story on an icy (or at least cold) world yet maybe not even needing environmental suits.

"Pirates Of Orion" – All you need is a model of the freighter Huron.

"Albatross" – Some matte paintings and reimagine the Dramians. A good story giving us some neat McCoy background.

Problematic:
"Mudd's Passion" – While I have little interest in seeing Harry Mudd again the main sticking point are the dinosaur sized creatures. Reimagine those and it you might make this work.

"The Ambergris Element" – I don’t see how TOS could have done this. The appearance of the Argoans isn’t the big problem, but so much of the action takes place underwater and then there’s also a giant sea snake.

"Eye Of The Beholder" - This isn’t much different from “The Cage” except it has non-humanoid aliens as the zoo keepers. Curiously the Talosians in "The Cage" were initially supposed to be non-humanoid. In this case remaking the aliens into something more humanoid undermines a lot of this story.

"The Jihad" – A fun story, but all the aliens would have to be reconsidered. The ever changing landscapes would also be challenging unless completely rethought.

"How Sharper Than A Serpent's Tooth" – Basically a retelling of “Who Mourns For Adonais?” but with a very different alien god creature.

"BEM" – The essentials of the story are okay (they did essentially this in TNG’s “Justice”), but depicting multiples of lizard beings as well as a colony being (Bem) would have been impossible. It would have to be totally rethough such as TNG did.

Wouldn't bother:
"More Tribbles, More Troubles" – Cyrano Jones and tribbles again? What’s the point?

"Once Upon A Planet" – Not a bad story, but we already have “Shore Leave” so what’s the point?”

"The Practical Joker" – Not a reall challenge to do, but I always found this episode stupid. The holographic rec room would also be a challenge if not rethought.

"The Terratin Incident" – Shrinking the entire crew visually would have been very challengin if at all possible.

"The Counter-Clock Incident" - Neat to see Robert and Sarah April, but aging the crew backwards? Forget it.
 
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RE: "Time Trap": Couldn't the starship boneyard be pulled off in CGI? Would it be that difficult?

As an aside, I have ideas on what Scotty meant when he exclaimed about the Earth ship Bonaventure being "the first with warp drive installed"; we never heard the term "warp drive" ever used in ENT. During "These Are the Voyages", Archer and Trip toast "to warp seven". The NX-01 Enterprise was well known to be equipped with Earth's then-new Warp Five Engine. I assume that, due to the brouhaha throughout ENT about superior alien starships such as the Vulcans achieving Warp 7 as if it were some kind of milestone, that Warp 7 did represent a new plateau for technological achievement that spacefaring races shoot for. Thus, the unseen "Warp Seven" engine would be termed true "warp drive" to mark this plateau of accomplishment. I assume that Bonaventure was the first prototype to be equipped with a new Warp Seven Engine, aka warp drive.
 
Doable:
"Beyond The Farthest Star" - Depicting an alien as green light wouldn’t have been much of a challenge for TOS. The greater challenge would be in depicting the distinctly alien interiors of the giant alien ship—not impossible given time and money, but challenging. Depicting a non-humanoid being on a viewscreen would have been similar to depicting a Melkot or a Tholian so no big problem there. More time and money to create a model of the massive alien ship, but if you can do a Fesarius or a Doomsday Machine then it’s doable. Life-supoort belts become space suits or drop them altogether.

"Yesteryear" – The biggest rethink here is the depiction of a sehlat and a llematya. The avian historian could be dropped or reimagined into something less exotic.

"One Of Our Planets Is Missing" – This would be pretty straightforward considering how similar it is conceptually to “The Immunity Syndrome.”

"The Lorelei Signal" – No great challenge here.

"The Survivor" – Rethink the Vendorian (and his bit about becoming a deflector shield) and it’s a done deal.

"The Infinite Vulcan" – Drop the 50ft. clones and rethink the Phylosians into something less exotic and it’s done.

"The Magicks Of Megas-Tu" – Lucius could be reconceived into something remotely resembling Satan without being half man/half goat.

"The Time Trap" – The graveyard of ships could be a matte painting.

"Slaver Weapon" – Rethink the Kzinti, swap in the Class F shuttlecraft and set the story on an icy (or at least cold) world yet maybe not even needing environmental suits.

"Pirates Of Orion" – All you need is a model of the freighter Huron.

"Albatross" – Some matte paintings and reimagine the Dramians. A good story giving us some neat McCoy background.

Problematic:
"Mudd's Passion" – While I have little interest in seeing Harry Mudd again the main sticking point are the dinosaur sized creatures. Reimagine those and it you might make this work.

"The Ambergris Element" – I don’t see how TOS could have done this. The appearance of the Argoans isn’t the big problem, but so much of the action takes place underwater and then there’s also a giant sea snake.

"Eye Of The Beholder" - This isn’t much different from “The Cage” except it has non-humanoid aliens as the zoo keepers. Curiously the Talosians in "The Cage" were initially supposed to be non-humanoid. In this case remaking the aliens into something more humanoid undermines a lot of this story.

"The Jihad" – A fun story, but all the aliens would have to be reconsidered. The ever changing landscapes would also be challenging unless completely rethought.

"How Sharper Than A Serpent's Tooth" – Basically a retelling of “Who Mourns For Adonais?” but with a very different alien god creature.

"BEM" – The essentials of the story are okay (they did essentially this in TNG’s “Justice”), but depicting multiples of lizard beings as well as a colony being (Bem) would have been impossible. It would have to be totally rethough such as TNG did.

Wouldn't bother:
"More Tribbles, More Troubles" – Cyrano Jones and tribbles again? What’s the point?

"Once Upon A Planet" – Not a bad story, but we already have “Shore Leave” so what’s the point?”

"The Practical Joker" – Not a reall challenge to do, but I always found this episode stupid. The holographic rec room would also be a challenge if not rethought.

"The Terratin Incident" – Shrinking the entire crew visually would have been very challengin if at all possible.

"The Counter-Clock Incident" - Neat to see Robert and Sarah April, but aging the crew backwards? Forget it.

Nicely done, Warped.

I must say that when I recently saw TAS for the first time, I was particularly disappointed in the "sequel" episodes to TOS episodes, like Tribbles, the Shore Leave planet, Mudd. They were ok, and there were no bad episodes, IMO, but I guess YEARS and YEARS of knowing about those episodes without seeing them kinda subconsciously built it up in my head.
 
Yesteryear would be an obvious one! Spock as a youngster and the deserts of Vulcan plus Sarek! Great stuff1 The Time Trap would be my second choice for the fantastic visuals we would have got, different alien spaceships, klingons and our second look at a Gorn captain!
JB
 
What about TAS-desrived stories? (In other words, stories not directly tied to a specific TAS ep, but borrowing from the TAS series as a whole)
 
Let's turn our attention to ships; assume you're making a fan film that uses a TAS-derived starship other than the Constitution-class. Do you pay homage to TAS by using a design concept (like the Huron), or do you use CGI to come up with a new design? Do you consider yourself bound by the TAS ship designs, or free to consider each on a case-by-case basis?
 
If produced in the 60s, the production could build a shuttle of another style, then get the same shot as in your composite.

How much did the Galileo miniature cost?

I don't know what the TOS shuttlecraft cost, but they didn't pay for it as AMT offered to be build the mockup in exchange for rights to the Star Trek model kits.

But if you want something different...



Thing is we're looking at this in retrospect with knowing what was done on TAS. If TAS' stories had been done as a fourth season for TOS none of those ideas would have existed so we'd have had those kinds of ideas filtered through the perspective of the production crew's late 1960's perspective. So I very much doubt they would have invested in designing and building other Starfleet shuttlecraft designs when they had a perfectly suitable one already on hand.


Let's turn our attention to ships; assume you're making a fan film that uses a TAS-derived starship other than the Constitution-class. Do you pay homage to TAS by using a design concept (like the Huron), or do you use CGI to come up with a new design? Do you consider yourself bound by the TAS ship designs, or free to consider each on a case-by-case basis?
Although I would tweak them I see no probelm with the Huron design or that of the robot freighters for use as Starfleet transports. If I needed a Starfleet starship other than the Enterprise type there are a number of designs adapted from FJ or fan originals that could look authentic and fit right in. Some of the non Starfleet and non Federation ships seen in TAS could be adapted into something worthy.
 
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As an aside, I have ideas on what Scotty meant when he exclaimed about the Earth ship Bonaventure being "the first with warp drive installed"
The NX-01 wasn't the first Human starship, and Cochrane's testbed from FC might not be considered a "ship" by the TOS crew.

The animated shuttlecraft are easily replaced
(except the aquashuttle)
Use the example from the late movie and just take the whole ship into the water.

:lol:
 
I don't know what the TOS shuttlecraft cost, but they didn't pay for it as AMT offered to be build the mockup in exchange for rights to the Star Trek model kits.

I'm aware of the AMT deal, but i'm wondering what the labor and materials cost, since we it might be safe to guess that one licensing deal for a then un-produced Galileo would not extend to another miniature (particularly if at the time, AMT did not know if it would be worth it). If Norway/Desilu had to generate another on its own, would it break the season budget--or would they jump in, and spend it on something they can use as much as desired?
 
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