TMP: A Reboot?

[dswynne1]

Interesting YT video with the author speculating that GR intended to distance the film series from TOS:

"Star Trek Has More Than One Reboot"

My opinion is that GR's propensity in changing established lore, especially via the first and second seasons in TNG, clouded the issue for us fans. A classic example for me is the changing of the warp scale, and that an in-continuity reason for it had to justify the changes. But if GR had intended to reboot the franchise, starting with TMP, I wouldn't mind, especially due to the novelization of the movie.

 

[locutus101]

I only wish they could have made TMP a little less static. I mean during a large part of the movie, it's just people staring at something off screen. We got a lot of stares...

 

[BillJ]

Interesting YT video with the author speculating that GR intended to distance the film series from TOS:

"Star Trek Has More Than One Reboot"

In the novelization, what we saw of the five-year mission was supposedly a dramatization. According to Roddenberry. So, yeah, I could see TMP as a reboot of sorts. He definitely seemed to spend the latter part of his life trying to distance Trek from TOS.

 

[locutus101]

In the novelization, what we saw of the five-year mission was supposedly a dramatization. According to Roddenberry. So, yeah, I could see TMP as a reboot of sorts. He definitely seemed to spend the latter part of his life trying to distance Trek from TOS.

It looks like he wasn't happy with TOS.

 

[BillJ]

It looks like he wasn't happy with TOS.

I don't really know? It made him a lot of money over the years. But, lots of people were given credit for its success by fans.

 

[Galileo7]

In the novelization, what we saw of the five-year mission was supposedly a dramatization. According to Roddenberry. So, yeah, I could see TMP as a reboot of sorts. He definitely seemed to spend the latter part of his life trying to distance Trek from TOS.

Agree. Just several years after TOS five year mission ended in 2270, how else could all of the look [production design] of Starfleet from TOS have radically been altered{erased}. TMP was Gene's reboot. If he wanted it a direct sequel to TOS we would have saw production design from TOS still partially existing in TMP, i.e., TOS uniforms, TOS phasers, TOS communicators, another TOS Constitution class starship that has not been refit yet, TOS shuttlecraft, etc.

 

[Warped9]

My personal take.

TMP allowed them to really flesh out and detail the Trek universe in a largly credible way. But in doing saw I think they lost sight of a sense of continuity with what had come before: TOS.

In some respects TMP was a stab at depicting the Trek universe in a way that TOS couldn't just as "The Cage" had been a stab at depicting science fiction (at least on television) unlike what had been done before or was expected of the genre.

The uniforms are but one example of a concept that is reasonably thought out (in their own context), but for viewers lacks a recognizable consistency with what came before. Ironically the TOS uniforms' concept work sufficiently well on the big screen as evidenced in the JJtrek films. So TMP "fixed" something that didn't really need to be fixed but only tweaked.

The same can be said for the depiction of Trek hardware.

I would have appreciated at least a nod to what came before in visual terms.

 

[Tosk]

If he wanted it a direct sequel to TOS we would have saw production design from TOS still partially existing

Which Phase II was going to do. Then they hit that sweet, sweet theatrical release money. I'd argue most of the visual changes came out just because they could. Change just for the sake of change.

 

[Galileo7]

Which Phase II was going to do. Then they hit that sweet, sweet theatrical release money. I'd argue most of the visual changes came out just because they could. Change just for the sake of change.

Agree, Phase II would have not been Gene's reboot. It would have been a continuation/sequel of TOS.

 

[In_Correct]

I hate reboots.

But if they are going to reboot it, please provide excellent soundtrack and also the Beautiful TOS Film Warp Drive Effects, especially from the 1979 TMP.

 

[Christopher]

People today are overly focused on continuity, on whether one story "fits" with another. They assume there are only two options, perfect continuity or a wholesale reboot. But that hasn't historically been the case. The creators of ongoing series, or of revivals of older works, have frequently tweaked or altered the continuity as they went along. This was especially common in the past, when we didn't have the Internet and Wikia and home video and it wasn't as easy for fans to stay current on every tiny little detail, which meant there was more flexibility to rewrite continuity as needed. So a lot of things fall in between what modern fans would call a continuation and what they would call a reboot.

For example: In the pilot movie of The Six Million Dollar Man, Steve Austin was a civilian astronaut and the head of the bionics program was a hardnosed, manipulative government man named Oliver Spencer (Darren McGavin) who essentially forced Steve to work for the government because the government owned nearly half his body. But in the subsequent series, Austin was retconned into an Air Force colonel and Spencer was replaced with (the original novel's) Oscar Goldman, who started out as a government meanie like Spencer but evolved into a much nicer character, and Steve became a more willing (if often rebellious) agent. And when a later episode revisited the events of the pilot, they replaced Steve's original love interest from the movie with a different woman altogether -- different character name, different actress, but described in retrospect as having played the equivalent role to Barbara Anderson's character in the initial movie. It wasn't a complete reboot, the broad strokes of the pilot were still assumed to have happened, but the details of how they happened were subject to change as needed.

Then there's something like M*A*S*H, an 11-year series about a 3-year war. They played quite fast and loose with their own continuity and chronology. In the early seasons, it was often claimed to be 1952 and even 1953 eventually, but then later, after several cast changes, they did an episode that spanned "a year in the life" from the start of 1951 to the start of 1952, featuring the current cast only.

Then there's the way Marvel Comics has always approached continuity -- all the past events are assumed to have happened, but when and how they happened is subject to change. Tony Stark now created Iron Man in a cave in Afghanistan instead of Vietnam. Peter Parker's spider bite happened the same way, but now he had a cell phone at the time. The big-picture continuity is kept, the specifics are negotiable.

And this is the way Roddenberry approached TMP and TNG. They were continuations of TOS, but they were continuations of the general universe, not necessarily of every exacting detail. There was a lot about TOS that he was dissatisfied with, compromises he'd been forced to make due to budget or time restraints or network censorship, mistakes that had been made, things that had turned out badly. And so he wanted to keep the ideas that worked without being hamstrung by the stuff that didn't work so well. In his foreword to the novelization of TMP, he presented himself as a 23rd-century writer who'd produced an "inaccurately larger-than-life" dramatization of the Enterprise's real adventures, and who was now undertaking to do a better, more authentic dramatization with Admiral Kirk riding herd on him to make sure he got it right this time. So what we see as Star Trek, in this view, was just an artistic interpretation of the "real" Trek universe, and so any changes or discrepancies between different works were the result of poetic license or adaptational error.

So, in sum: Yes, both TMP and TNG were intended as what we'd now call "soft reboots," continuing the universe in broad strokes but reinterpreting the details and ignoring the bits he didn't like.

 

[JonnyQuest037]

In the novelization, what we saw of the five-year mission was supposedly a dramatization. According to Roddenberry. So, yeah, I could see TMP as a reboot of sorts. He definitely seemed to spend the latter part of his life trying to distance Trek from TOS

Yeah, I think that video makes an excellent case that TMP is at the very least a stealth reboot. No explanation for the new Klingons, or even a reference to it. That's just how they look now. None of the characters comment on their new uniforms, that's just what they wear now. The Enterprise is referred to as new, because that's a bit of a plot point (which as I understand, only emerged in the first place because they were afraid that the new sets wouldn't be completed when the Phase II pilot started shooting ).

BTW, that YouTuber has lots of cool, thoughtful videos about Trek (and Star Wars) that are worth watching. I've subscribed to his channel.

It looks like he wasn't happy with TOS.

I don't really know? It made him a lot of money over the years. But, lots of people were given credit for its success by fans.

Well, deservedly so, I think. Remember that Roddenberry only produced the first 13 episodes of TOS and then turned things over to others. For me personally, I think that Gene Coon made greater contributions to TOS than Roddenberry did, and TMP desperately needed an infusion of the humor and humanity that Coon delivered in spades. I really wish that he'd still been alive to rewrite the TMP script.

And I can totally understand GR having ambivalent feelings towards Trek in general and TOS in specific. In the late 70s, Trek was still the one success that GR had attached to his name, and it only became a success after the fact in syndication. He'd basically walked away from production in the 3rd season to just cash his checks, and he probably saw others doing things with Trek that he'd prefer they didn't. He then found himself pigeonholed as just "a science-fiction writer." Whereas before he'd written cop shows, westerns, and other things, now he was just "a science-fiction writer" in the eyes of Hollywood.

Meanwhile, GR couldn't get any of his other projects going. Pretty Maids All in a Row was not a success, AFAIK. His Tarzan project never went anywhere. The Planet Earth and Genesis II pilots didn't get picked up. GR walked away from The Questor Tapes when he didn't want to make the changes that the network wanted (So now he's a science-fiction writer AND he's hard to work with! The bubble grows smaller...). So after a decade of this, GR desperately wants to prove that he's not a one-trick pony, and that he knows what he's doing. That tendency is even more pronounced in TNG after years of getting sidelined on the movies.

TMP allowed them to really flesh out and detail the Trek universe in a largly credible way. But in doing saw I think they lost sight of a sense of continuity with what had come before: TOS.

I agree. For me, most of my problems with TMP spring from the fact that they were trying to emulate 2001 rather than TOS.

I'd argue most of the visual changes came out just because they could. Change just for the sake of change.

Agreed. Too much of the movie is "Hey, let's show off our new toys!"

 

[RAMA]

I don't really know? It made him a lot of money over the years. But, lots of people were given credit for its success by fans.

He didn't get any money out of it till around the time of STNG. His first "profit" sharing checks from TOS came in around the mid-80s and more than 2/3rds went to his ex-wife. it's pretty amazing, Gene was broke before STNG but when Majel died, the estate was worth over $500 million.

RAMA

 

[locutus101]

He didn't get any money out of it till around the time of STNG. His first "profit" sharing checks from TOS came in around the mid-80s and more than 2/3rds went to his ex-wife. it's pretty amazing, Gene was broke before STNG but when Majel died, the estate was worth over $500 million.

RAMA

Well, usually when they are broke, they are still richer than most middle class people.

 

[Christopher]

He'd basically walked away from production in the 3rd season to just cash his checks...

More like he walked away in order to shift his focus toward developing new series like Tarzan. It's not like he was just resting on his laurels. And the checks he was getting from ST weren't that big, comparatively.

Meanwhile, GR couldn't get any of his other projects going. Pretty Maids All in a Row was not a success, AFAIK.

Was that more GR's project, or more Roger Vadim's project? Maybe it was more MGM's project. Both Roddenberry and Vadim were brought on board after the original producer, writer, and director (and star) were let go. So it wasn't something he initiated.

His Tarzan project never went anywhere.

That sounds like it would've been interesting. A period piece instead of the usual present-day settings, Tarzan as the intelligent Lord Greystoke of the books instead of a monosyllabic savage, a sci-fi weapon from an ancient civilization. It probably would've been truer to the Burroughs books than any Tarzan production until Filmation's '70s animated series. No Jane, apparently, although I'm sure there would've been a scantily clad love interest or three.

GR walked away from The Questor Tapes when he didn't want to make the changes that the network wanted (So now he's a science-fiction writer AND he's hard to work with! The bubble grows smaller...).

To be fair, their changes would've dumbed it down replaced the core concept with a Fugitive imitation, and ditched the second lead whose friendship with Questor was the emotional core of the premise. He wasn't the only one involved with the show who objected to such wholesale changes. It wouldn't have been the same show at all and would've stripped away the most interesting parts.

I agree. For me, most of my problems with TMP spring from the fact that they were trying to emulate 2001 rather than TOS.

Which isn't really surprising, given that the whole idea was to try to make it feel like a big-budget blockbuster sci-fi movie. Even though Star Wars had recently redefined what that meant, before then 2001 was probably the gold standard. (There's also a fair amount of Robert Wise's The Andromeda Strain in there. Although the other Wise film that TMP reminds me of most is West Side Story, since they're both movies that rely heavily on extended set pieces driven by striking visuals and music instead of dialogue.)

 

[JonnyQuest037]

More like he walked away in order to shift his focus toward developing new series like Tarzan. It's not like he was just resting on his laurels. And the checks he was getting from ST weren't that big, comparatively.

I wasn't trying to say that GR wasn't working on anything else at the time, but as far as Star Trek went, he was checked out by the third season. Fred Freiberger practically had to browbeat him to come into a meeting to settle a feud between Shatner and Nimoy about whether or not they were equal co-stars on the series.

That sounds like it would've been interesting. A period piece instead of the usual present-day settings, Tarzan as the intelligent Lord Greystoke of the books instead of a monosyllabic savage, a sci-fi weapon from an ancient civilization. It probably would've been truer to the Burroughs books than any Tarzan production until Filmation's '70s animated series. No Jane, apparently, although I'm sure there would've been a scantily clad love interest or three.

To be fair, their changes would've dumbed it down replaced the core concept with a Fugitive imitation, and ditched the second lead whose friendship with Questor was the emotional core of the premise. He wasn't the only one involved with the show who objected to such wholesale changes. It wouldn't have been the same show at all and would've stripped away the most interesting parts.

I wasn't talking about the quality or the potential quality of either of these projects. I was talking about the fact that neither one ended up happening, and how GR might have been viewed by Hollywood as a result.

 

[JonnyQuest037]

Just skimmed down a little further after the Tarzan stuff on the Roddenberry bio that Christopher linked to. This passage jumped out at me:

In August 1968, around the time he was working on Tarzan, Roddenberry moved out of the family home -- he'd made the announcement he was finally leaving Eileen two weeks earlier, at his daughter Darleen's wedding.

...He announced that he was leaving the girl's mother at his daughter wedding? Wow, dick move, Gene.

 

[locutus101]

Just skimmed down a little further after the Tarzan stuff on the Roddenberry bio that Christopher linked to. This passage jumped out at me:

...He announced that he was leaving the girl's mother at his daughter wedding? Wow, dick move, Gene.

Well, it wasn't his shining hour.

 

[BillJ]

...He announced that he was leaving the girl's mother at his daughter wedding? Wow, dick move, Gene.

I think the one thing we've learned about Gene over the years, is that he wasn't exactly a class act.

 

[Ryan Thomas Riddle]

Yeah, I think that video makes an excellent case that TMP is at the very least a stealth reboot. No explanation for the new Klingons, or even a reference to it. That's just how they look now. None of the characters comment on their new uniforms, that's just what they wear now. The Enterprise is referred to as new, because that's a bit of a plot point (which as I understand, only emerged in the first place because they were afraid that the new sets wouldn't be completed when the Phase II pilot started shooting ).

The idea of the Enterprise being refit goes back farther than Phase II. It was a core concept of every effort to launch a new Trek movie/show in 1970s, going all the way back to Planet of the Titans.