JMS/Bryce Zabel Star Trek Treatment

[Shr'eshhhhhh]

I must admit I don't like the treatment, it sounds too much like new Battlestar which is great but you can really only do the thing once. They thought about doing the something simular with Doctor Who before the television movie came out.

And too many of the elements in the treatment sound rather like reheated Legend of the Rangers (which I hated).

Enterprise had alot of unrealised potential.

I hoped that it would start off pretending to be a straight prequel but turn into something more interesting.

The pilot was great but the first two seasons just played out like tired copies of stories that had happened before.

The Temporal Cold War story thread could have been a conduit into really shaking up the Star Trek universe by altering it's history and pulling the franchise into wonderfully new and weird areas. I thought the Xindi attack would have been the beginning of this but the time war elements just fizzed out .

If a new series took up the idea of the Star Trek universe literally being tinkered and churned up (rather than just being rejigged by writers) and a group exploring and trying to repair the changes. Now that would be a show I'd watch everyweek.

[JDSValen]

Amazing. I never knew that it went so deep. Can you find the SW thread and post some examples? I am getting excited about the original trilogy being released in a few months.

Yeah . . . It may not be right away though . . . I haven't watch Hidden Fortress in a while and I want to get everything straight before I post.

[Dr Maturin]

The influence Hidden Fortress has on Star Wars goes beyond just the Hero's Journey. There are whole characters and scenes/situations that are taken, and in some case shot for shot, and put into Star Wars.

Amazing. I never knew that it went so deep. Can you find the SW thread and post some examples? I am getting excited about the original trilogy being released in a few months.

[JDSValen]

Well, who did Kurosawa steal it from? It's the Hero's Journey...

The influence Hidden Fortress has on Star Wars goes beyond just the Hero's Journey. There are whole characters and scenes/situations that are taken, and in some case shot for shot, and put into Star Wars.

[Dr Maturin]

I've read Joseph Campbell. He's tripe. Screw him.

Is he supposed to be one of JMS' big influences?

He's everyone's. Well, really, he put everyone's influences in print.

[Karachi Vyce]

I've read Joseph Campbell. He's tripe. Screw him.

Is he supposed to be one of JMS' big influences?

[Dr Maturin]

Lucas stole the plot of Star Wars from Kurosawa's "The Hidden Fortress."

Seriously, it's right there.

Well, who did Kurosawa steal it from? It's the Hero's Journey...

You must check out this book some time.

[JDSValen]

Originally posted by Karachi Vyce
Lucas stole the plot of Star Wars from Kurosawa's "The Hidden Fortress."

Yup. Infact, if I remember correctly, Lucas was at one point considering paying a story fee to Kurosawa for it, but then changed Star Wars enough so that didn't have to.

Originally posted by Z'ha'dumDweller
B5 was successful because he took an old -- really, really old -- idea and added other elements to it such as action, suspense, conspiracy, political intrigue and love. Much like George Lucas did with Star Wars in 1976. To be successful, JMS would have to return to the B5 formula, and this treatment sounds awfully similar to it in many respects.

I completely agree.

Originally posted by Z'ha'dumDweller
I think ST needs something more reality based. Something dealing with more contemporary issues in a direct, not subtle, way.

I agree again, but I think that JMS could/would have accomplished this in his version of Trek, just using all that other stuff about the ancient race as a reason to tell those little social comentary stories.

[Karachi Vyce]

Much like George Lucas did with Star Wars in 1976.

Lucas stole the plot of Star Wars from Kurosawa's "The Hidden Fortress."

Seriously, it's right there.

[Dr Maturin]

I think you're reaching awfully far there. The essence of drama is conflict. If you insist on seeing Shadows and Vorlons as the conflict in everything JMS writes, then you'll miss the actual story. The conflict of Chaos vs. Order have been around far longer than JMS and while one might consider Daniel's forces in 'Jeremiah' to being Order, I really don't see that the Thunder Mountain force could be considered Chaos...especially since they were the Good Guys.

I'll grant that there are several themes that JMS includes in his stories, like creating your own future and the power of the individual and being kind to one another but that hardly makes each story he writes the same. Considering that some (most?) of those themes go back to He-Man and She-Ra, Twilight Zone and others, perhaps you should compare everything he wrote afterward to those, not to B5.

You misunderstand me. When I say that JMS is a one trick pony, I don't mean creatively. I mean in successfully telling a good story. B5 was successful because he took an old -- really, really old -- idea and added other elements to it such as action, suspense, conspiracy, political intrigue and love. Much like George Lucas did with Star Wars in 1976. To be successful, JMS would have to return to the B5 formula, and this treatment sounds awfully similar to it in many respects.

I think ST needs something more reality based. Something dealing with more contemporary issues in a direct, not subtle, way.

A humanistic spiritual quest mixed with the thinly-veiled messages of the original series topped off with a let down of a payoff on the level of "God" at the end of Star Trek V: The Final Frontier isn't the way to go.

[vacantlook]

It just impresses me how many minutes can go by so easily without me realizing it while I preview and revise my posts on both here and other message boards.

[Jan]

I think you've beaten me to the post before, Vacantlook, not to worry.

Jan

[vacantlook]

It has long been said that there are no new stories, just new ways of telling them.

And I'm just not surprised at any forms of parallel to fighting two sides a la Vorlons and Shadows; they were constructed as a new telling of the old story of order versus chaos, after all. But just because there are two sides to fight doesn't automatically equal "oh look at the Vorlon and Shadow substitutes". And the idea of some ancient civilization as a story construct has been around long before jms incorporated it into Babylon 5.

EDIT: And of course I get beaten to the point while I obsessively revise and rerevise my post as usual.

[Jan]

I think you're reaching awfully far there. The essence of drama is conflict. If you insist on seeing Shadows and Vorlons as the conflict in everything JMS writes, then you'll miss the actual story. The conflict of Chaos vs. Order have been around far longer than JMS and while one might consider Daniel's forces in 'Jeremiah' to being Order, I really don't see that the Thunder Mountain force could be considered Chaos...especially since they were the Good Guys.

I'll grant that there are several themes that JMS includes in his stories, like creating your own future and the power of the individual and being kind to one another but that hardly makes each story he writes the same. Considering that some (most?) of those themes go back to He-Man and She-Ra, Twilight Zone and others, perhaps you should compare everything he wrote afterward to those, not to B5.

Jan

[JDSValen]

Originally posted by Jan
I'm puzzled. Exactly what about the description for 'Jeremiah' sounded like B5? Because I can't think of much about the Jeremiah end product that resembled B5. For that matter, what about the Trek treatment does? Surely you can't be talking about the five year storyline/literary structure? Because that's a style, no different from the fact that most hour dramas are a teaser, four acts and a tag. I'd suggest that whatever resemblance is being seen is due to the expectations of the reader.

Babylon 5 was about making your own future, not letting others do it for you.

With Jeremiah, Jeremiah, Marcus, et. al in their base of operations (B5)battled both Valhala Sector (Vorlons) and Daniel's forces (Shadows) to create a future worth living in.

With the Star Trek pitch, Kirk would be out in the galaxy searching for this ancient race (Vorlons), and he also alluded to a dark ancient race (Shadows) that they would come across. They were also going out there to establish a human presence in the galaxy.

The settings are different, but the plot and themes are all the same.