Why did Spiner write himself out of the franchise?

[Rarewolf]

to clarify, because I can't remember: Did Data give B4 just his memories, or his memories AND personality, because if it's just memories, that's just a small part of identity, but memories plus personality is a pretty big chunk of who one is.

The specific reference was to Data's "memory engrams." The intent was to help B-4 develop into his own individual, so it doesn't seem likely that he would've copied his personality too (if that were even doable). And again, the precedent of Lal suggests that downloading memories from one positronic brain to another does not mean that the personality survives.

yeah that makes sense. Just having a bunch of the being's memories doesn't mean the personality would start coming to the surface.

On the otherhand you also have The Schizoid Man, where a human transfers his personality and his memories into Data, attempting to cheat death.

If you think of it as a battle of wills, neither Lal or B4 would be the dominant personality. They don't have much to remember.

Even if just memories (which Geordi was uncomfortable with) was the intention, as far as they knew the idea failed. So it could well of had unforseen side effects.

Ultimately it was get out clause they could have used had they been given the chance.

What they should have done was just dump Data's personality to the Enterprise's computer, so he could voice (inhabit) the ship.

 

[Iamnotspock]

How come Brent Spiner wasn't interested in playing Data? Because he was older? In that case, I wonder why he went on to reprise his role in "These Are the Voyages..."? Well... it was just a voice-over role.

Well, you've answered your own question there.

 

[Therin of Andor]

yeah, it would've been nice for there to be at least an acknowledgement of the crew's past experiences with Lore.

The shooting draft had someone ask, "Could this be Lore?"

But ST movies are made for the general public, not Star Trek fans, so you'd have most of your audience asking, "Who's Lore?" To top it off, the director would have said, "Who's Lore?" After all, he thought Geordi was an alien.

Ironically, there was no one in the audience. No general public and no Trek fans. They were all next door watching J-Lo in "Maid in Manhattan".

 

[JarodRussell]

yeah, it would've been nice for there to be at least an acknowledgement of the crew's past experiences with Lore.

The shooting draft had someone ask, "Could this be Lore?"

But ST movies are made for the general public, not Star Trek fans, so you'd have most of your audience asking, "Who's Lore?" To top it off, the director would have said, "Who's Lore?" After all, he thought Geordi was an alien.

Ironically, there was no one in the audience. No general public and no Trek fans. They were all next door watching J-Lo in "Maid in Manhattan".

To be fair, that movie wasn't too bad.


But in general, I don't think that you can really scare audiences with something like "Could this be Lore?". Especially because you can explain it in one or two lines. And they name-dropped the Borg and the Dominion without explanation as well.

 

[Therin of Andor]

I think not bringing up Lore was just laziness.

No, as I said, there was a line in the draft script referring to Lore, but it was removed before filming.

The general public doesn't need to know the backstory with Lore, but the ST fans in the audience get to wonder, "Could this be Lore?" for themselves. We don't need to hear Worf or Geordi say it, too.

 

[TroiFan4ever]

I was watching "Brothers" the other day, and I don't get why Lore got to have the emotions chip and Data didn't get to have it until in 2371 (Star Trek Generations).

 

[Dream]

I think the REAL question should be WHY did Spiner get so much money and control of the writing in the later TNG movies?

Data was NEVER as important as Picard. Spiner should have been paid as much as the other six actors not named Patrick Stewart.

 

[Therin of Andor]

I was watching "Brothers" the other day, and I don't get why Lore got to have the emotions chip and Data didn't get to have it until in 2371 (Star Trek Generations).

Soong was going to implant it in Data, but Lore tricked him. Then Lore took off with it, only to return with Borg reinforcements in "Descent". They removed the chip when Lore was disassembled, but studied it before implanting it in Data in "Generations".

I think the REAL question should be WHY did Spiner get so much money and control of the writing in the later TNG movies?

His agent held out for more money. Until Spiner's salary (and ranking in the opening credits) and script-approval improved, he let the producers know that he might be unavailable. Spiner's participation in the movies was deemed essential; Frakes' not so much.

 

[ChristopherPike]

Question already answered.

 

[CoveTom]

Spiner's participation in the movies was deemed essential; Frakes' not so much.

I don't know that it's that Frakes' participation was deemed non-essential. Just that his participation was never in doubt. Frakes loved doing the movies and playing the character of Riker, and he'd have come back as many times as they wanted him to. There was no reason for the studio to go through a tug-of-war with him over salary or billing. Besides, even when Spiner's billing improved, he still only got bumped to third. Frakes always came second in the credits after Patrick Stewart.

 

[Therin of Andor]

Frakes always came second in the credits after Patrick Stewart.

In-built from his previous contracts.

 

[CoveTom]

In-built from his previous contracts.

Well, that's probably true, but the TNG cast was originally under a six season contract, if I recall correctly. Contracts were renegotiated for the seventh season, and then presumably for each feature film.

At the beginning of TNG, there certainly wouldn't have been a "if we ever do a feature film, here's who will get top billing" clause, because if there had been one way back then, then all the actors would get the same billing in the films that they do in the series, and Spiner wouldn't be in the third position.

When contracts were renegotiated for the last season, and it was already known they'd be doing a feature, they certainly could have included a "if we do a feature, I automatically get this billing" clause, but at that point, why wouldn't they bump Spiner to the second spot if they really thought he was that important? They accepted leaving Frakes in the second position and his negotiating position was apparently strong enough to support that.

 

[Noname Given]

When I learned that Brent Spiner co-wrote Star Trek: NEMESIS and saw the enemy ship blow up with Data still on it, it dawned on me that he came up with that himself because I read somewheres else that he felt he outgrown his Data role.

Then when trying to find the novel version of this movie, I happen to find the book about the movie in the making and then I stumbled upon the part where it talked about Data's destruction and then I learned that Spiner DID write that himself!

How come Brent Spiner wasn't interested in playing Data? Because he was older? In that case, I wonder why he went on to reprise his role in "These Are the Voyages..."? Well... it was just a voice-over role. My guess is probably that Spiner didn't feel like going through that makeup stuff.

If Spiner didn't want to play Data anymore, and that was supposed to be the final film, then I don't see the point in destroying Data?

Just a thought.

How did Spiner write himself out/ If they did another film, I suspect we'd have seen him in the role of that awful, pointless character rehash (IE Lore II - what if Lore were retarded?) that was "B4".

Spiner didn't write himself out of anything. What I can't believe is taht he and John Logan were actually paid for that garbage script in the first place. -- Yes, let's design a Rolulan ship with corridors large enough to fly a fighter through and give it a picture window large enough for said fighetr to crash through. then we have BOTH the 1701-E crashing into the Scimitar IN SPACE (you know; no gravity); and ploghing through it -- THEN you have the Scimitar using revese thrust IN SPACE again afterwards; and easily pulling away.

There was a time when Star Trek storys were somewhat thought provoking; not utter jokes.

 

[JarodRussell]

then we have BOTH the 1701-E crashing into the Scimitar IN SPACE (you know; no gravity); and ploghing through it -- THEN you have the Scimitar using revese thrust IN SPACE again afterwards; and easily pulling away.

Hm, there's actually nothing too stupid about that.
The Enterprise didn't crash into the Scimitar because of gravity, but because the Enterprise flew into it.
And reverse thrust works in space, too. The Enterprise has mass, and inertia causes her to stay in place because she was only loosely attached to the Scimitar, so the Scimitar was able to break free.

 

[22 Stars]

^ Yeah I agree, the physics of Nemesis is the least of its problems.

 

[Rarewolf]

Yes, let's design a Rolulan ship with corridors large enough to fly a fighter through and give it a picture window large enough for said fighetr to crash through.

It is a small fighter though.

We'd never seen the ship before, no reason it couldn't/shouldn't have wide corridors. It's not like they suddenly made the Enterprise's corridors wider and flew down there.

Besides, I rather like that bit, I used to play computer games where you'd get a vehicle half way, so I used to get then go backwards!

Data was NEVER as important as Picard. Spiner should have been paid as much as the other six actors not named Patrick Stewart.

I think Marina was saying as far back as 1996 they knew Picard and Data were the stars of the show, maybe even earlier.

 

[Therin of Andor]

I think Marina was saying as far back as 1996 they knew Picard and Data were the stars of the show, maybe even earlier.

Wil Wheaton got the most fan mail in the early days, but Brent Spiner soon took over, IIRC.

 

[Newton]

An interesting write-up of a live webchat with Brent Spiner about this topic, if anyone hasn't seen it: http://trekmovie.com/2011/06/29/brent-spiner-talks-typcasting-death-of-data-bringing-back-soong-for-star-trek-sequel/

 

[Uxi]

CGI faced younger Data could be cool.

 

[Ln X]

I think the REAL question should be WHY did Spiner get so much money and control of the writing in the later TNG movies?

Data was NEVER as important as Picard. Spiner should have been paid as much as the other six actors not named Patrick Stewart.

Personally I thought Data was the second most important character. Though Riker was the first officer, he seemed to be left in the dust in later seasons, whereas in every season there were at least two or more Data-centric episodes. Spiner must have known that he was the character that TNG fans fawned over, so a) he wanted more money for the TNG movies, and b) he wanted to control the fate of his character in Nemesis, so he co-wrote it.

He bumped off the character, but ensured that Data lived on through Lore. So I think he wanted some sort of special ending for Data, because he knew due to his age and appearance he wouldn't be playing Data again.