A comment in another thread got me wondering - have any of Trek's TV producers and showrunners gone on record with their opinions of the direction the post-series novels have taken? A lot has happened and a lot has changed in the 24th century.
TV Trek producers' opinions of the post-series novels?
- Thread starter F. King Daniel
- Start date
I would venture to guess that only a couple have kept up with developments in the novel-verse. I think many have moved on with their careers, are too busy, or just don't care. That has been my impression from conversations and interviews with any involved with the shows.
It's probably hard for us to remember, but for the vast majority of people involved in making it, Trek's just a job...studio suits, technicians, actors, writers all give their input then move on.
If anyone still retains an interest in the novels, it's probably the series writers, but I doubt it.
If anyone still retains an interest in the novels, it's probably the series writers, but I doubt it.
TV producers are busy people. They probably don't have time to stay current with the novels.
And a few of them have written novels, so we know at least some of them must be happy with the directions they've taken.
That's kind of sad. A soulless production line of television. Anything that I'd spent years on, shaping the characters and stories and world I'd keep at least the vaguest interest in what others did with them afterwards.
Reading books is time-consuming, but still.... George Lucas doesn't read Star Wars novels, but he knows enough about them to at least say it's definitely not what he would have done with the characters after Episode VI.
^There are many people who worked on ST shows that still love the IP. Doug Drexler, Mike Okuda, Steve Neil, etc... They are not all soulless, some still have a real passion for Trek
Having worked in the theatre industry, I can tell you that that's probably not what it means when they say they see Trek as another job.
For most creative types, it's not that they're out to make a soulless production line of television (or film, or theatre, or what-have-you). What it means is that they are in love with the art of storytelling, but that this doesn't mean that a particular story has greater purchase on their hearts than others. So you might have a person who became a successful television writer on numerous television shows, but for whom Trek was "another job" -- not in the sense of, she didn't try to imbue it with love and passion, but, rather, in the sense of, Trek was not more important to her as a job than other shows she worked on. Yet that same writer might find that her time on, say, House, M.D. was more moving and important to her than her time on any other show -- for her, then, Trek was just another job that was not more important to her than other shows, but House was something special.
When I was active in theatre, it was the same way. Every show was important in its own way, but certain productions were much more beloved to me than most for very specific reasons. Every show is someone's favorite show, but when you make your living doing show after show after show, it's just not possible to love them all as much as your favorites -- even if you always find something about each show to love it when you're working on it.
That doesn't follow. They may have written their own novels without having read any of the others. After all, members of the cast and crew of the shows would be in a class of their own, given the freedom to do whatever they wanted. Nobody was going to tell them "You have to read these 20 other books and conform to what their authors who are far less famous and lower-paid than you have done." So they didn't need any familiarity with the other books to do their own.
The others are right -- you're completely misreading this. It's not like these producers are lounging around at home with endless free time on their hands and simply choosing not to pay attention to Trek. They're busy with their new projects. Television production is a very intensive process that leaves very little room for outside interests beyond your current show. And when creators do find free time for recreation, they often prefer to devote it to things that don't remind them of work, so reading tie-ins to a TV franchise they used to work on might not be their first choice.
And there's nothing "soulless" about it. On the contrary -- as a creator myself, it often mystifies me the way fans expect creators to be satisfied with doing only one thing for the rest of their lives. That's soulless if you ask me. Creators yearn to try new things, to broaden their horizons, to challenge themselves. You can be very happy with the work you did on an earlier project, you can love it and be fulfilled by it, yet still want to create something new and different and challenge yourself in a new way. It's no more "soulless" than deciding to have a new child after your first child has grown up and gone off to college.
Lucas has a bunch of employees whose job it is to read the books and summarize them for him. That's because he's still in charge and is still producing Star Wars as an active franchise. His awareness of Star Wars tie-ins is a professional responsibility, not a recreational undertaking, so it's a completely invalid analogy here. The people who used to produce Star Trek are not doing so anymore. They're working on other shows. They no longer have any responsibility for ST, so there's no professional reason why they should be kept up to date. Some of them might still check out the occasional novel if they have the time -- but would you rather they were devoting their time to reading Trek novels or devoting it to creating great new SFTV?
I'm not putting Trek on a pedestal over everything else, but most TV shows don't spawn ongoing novels continuing their stories years after the show itself ended. I'd expect (or rather hope) that the producers etc would approach all their work with the same enthusiasm - and if after ten years there were novels carrying on the story of any other TV show, that those in charge of the original would have an opinion on what the novelists were doing with their creations. Even if it wasn't their personal favourite.
Well... yes, you were. You assumed that if someone doesn't love Star Trek with the kind of fire and passion you feel is appropriate, that it must therefore be a matter of "soulless production."
But why should they? To their minds, maybe those novels just aren't the TV show they worked on. I can easily see someone thinking, "Listen, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine aired from 1993 to 1999, and it finished. That was my show, and my show is finished and over. Those novels may be good, they may be bad; I don't know. But they're not my show, and I have no interest in reading them." It's the same way someone who worked on a film may not be interested in watching a remake of that film years later -- or the way most TOS and TNG actors have indicated that they never watched the other Trek spinoffs.
And that's fine. It may be sad that they're not interested in these great novels, but that doesn't mean they lack for love for their old show just because they don't feel like reading the tie-in novels. If anything, it may stem from having professional pride in their work, and viewing that work as complete and not wanting to see that story continued after what they may view as a natural end point. Mind you, that's only one hypothetical reaction a producer may have.
For what it's worth, we do know that former DS9 staff writer David Weddle co-wrote Section 31: Abyss with Jeffrey Lang; that former DS9 staffer Bradley Thompson was originally going to write a DS9 Relaunch novel called Walking Wounded before that project was cancelled; that former VOY and ENT staff writer and producer Mike Sussman co-wrote Age of the Empress: The Reign of Sato I in the Mirror Universe: Glass Empires anthology with Dayton Ward and Kevin Dillmore; that former DS9 and TNG producer Ronald D. Moore was a fan of several early TOS novels (including The Final Reflection) and noted in 2005 after ENT went off the air that the ongoing novels are perfectly valid forms of continuing Star Trek; and that ST09 writers Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman are fans of the novels, and have even listed their favorites -- among which is Christopher's own Ex Machina.
You're not hearing me. They are approaching their work with enthusiasm -- their current work, their new projects. Why should they dwell on a part of their creative life that ended many years ago when they have active, living projects in the here and now to devote their enthusiasm to? It's different for a fan like you, since for you it's just recreation, something that runs alongside whatever it is you do for a living. You've got to think of it more like a career, a devoted and all-consuming one that leaves little room for hobbies. Once you get caught up in a new stage of your career, your focus is on that. You don't constantly live in the past and dwell on your former career. You devote your passion, time, and energy to what you're creating now. It doesn't mean you don't care about what you did in the past -- it just means that's in the past, and your immediate responsibility in the here and now is what dominates your attention, as it should.
Besides, most of the people you're talking about didn't create Star Trek; they were hired to work on a show created by other people. They may have enjoyed and valued their job and put their hearts into it, but it was still a job, and it was something that wasn't really theirs. If they've since moved on to shows that they created themselves, I can hardly blame them for caring more about those. Because you're always going to have more passion for something that comes from you personally.
That's an excellent point. I suppose in some ways, the attitudes that a writer on a Star Trek series might have towards her Star Trek work could be similar to the attitudes an actor typically has on any project; the actor (generally speaking) did not create the project and does not own it, and is in essence working to bring someone else's vision to life. In a way, that's true of Star Trek as well (though the extent to which Gene Roddenberry can be said to have a single consistent "vision" of Star Trek is often exaggerated, and the contributions of other early Trek writing pioneers like Gene L. Coon and D.C. Fontana are often ignored).
Nicely put. Just for example, I slaved over my first novel (a young-adult pirate novel) which is now proudly gathering dust on my brag shelf. But, honestly, I haven't looked at that book in years.
Doesn't mean that I churned it out "soullessly" back in the eighties. I just means that I'm obsessed with my next book right now . . . .
^ Might be painful to look at that earlier work: "I could do that sooo much better now!"
I'm sure!
It's funny. Several years ago, when I compiling some Poul Anderson collections for Tor, there was a bunch of very early stories that Poul didn't wanted included. At the time, being young and naive, I was a bit puzzled by this attitude. Why would any author not want to show off a past publication?
I think I understand a little more now . . . .
That was my initial reaction to Relayer1's comment, although I see I took it the wrong way.
And I wasn't saying my views about wanting to keep up-to-date with characters I'd created or helped shape was the only correct one. Merely that it's how I would feel about it.
I understand why others would feel otherwise. Each to their own.
No, that's how you think you would feel about it without ever actually having been in that situation. You can't know if you actually would feel that way, you can only speculate. I find that fans rarely appreciate or understand just how different the professional experience is from the fan experience.
For one thing, no matter how much you cared about your past characters, I think you're consistently ignoring the fact that having current characters who demanded your immediate and daily attention would leave you little time to devote to nostalgia. For another thing, if you really cared about those characters as your own, it might be too painful for you to see what other creators were doing with them beyond your control. (Think about how Alan Moore reacted to Before Watchmen. That's an extreme case, but it's the same principle.)
Fine, how I THINK I would feel about it. Happy?
As I said, each to their own.
As I said, each to their own.
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