At least in the short term, Paramount has been shown to be receptive to ideas presented in mass mailings (extending TOS one more season).
Why not send a mass letter (email) regarding the benefits of having advisors on the 'board' who are expert in the mythos/technos of Trek - thus keeping can from becoming cannon-fodder.
M*A*S*H had medical doctors as advisors. Other shows have done similr things - and I believe that early Trek movies had science advisors.
I'm talking about Trek-hostory and Treknology advisors.
Worth at least a few stamps/emails, don't you think?
I think I'd nominate Bernd & Mr. Neutron to start.
-------------------- 'One man's theology is another man's belly laugh.' - Lazarus Long
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I remember we discussed this very idea about, ooh, five and a half years back on about the original incarnation of these Forums. I had a really good argument as to why it wouldn't work: damned if I can remember it now!
quote:Originally posted by Treknophyle: Just throwing out an idea here...
At least in the short term, Paramount has been shown to be receptive to ideas presented in mass mailings (extending TOS one more season).
That wasn't Paramount...that was NBC.
quote: Why not send a mass letter (email) regarding the benefits of having advisors on the 'board' who are expert in the mythos/technos of Trek - thus keeping can from becoming cannon-fodder.
To quote John Adams in 1776: "Benefits? What benefits?" Benefits for hardcore fans, maybe, but how would it benefit the average viewers or, more important to Paramount, ratings? What would be Paramount's incentive to do it? They would have to spend more time (=money) on the scripting, etc. without seeing any practical upside for them (it is a business after all). Don't get me wrong, I hate it when fictions violate their own continuity, but I don't see how to make a compelling case for this to Paramount.
I think a better case to Paramount is that they've got massive creative burnout on their Trek shows and that the ratings get weaker show after show, so the answer is not to "reinvent" the franchine one more time (they seem to lose more audience the further they get away from the source), but to get fresh blood in there and bring a fresh approach to the proven value of the franchise.
Hell, if they gave me the chance to make a Star Trek show I'd piss off everyone here because I'd start over and remake TOS with new actors and updated stories (and damn continuity with everything made before because I'd start it over at square one and make sure it established its own internal consistency and rules and stuck to them)! Just as they remake and recast Sherlock Holmes stories and even James Bond. The value in a franchise is in the known, the established, and that you don't have to educate the audience. That's in part why people still go see James Bond instead of other no-name spy flick, etc. Given this marketing reality, it's remarkable that Paramount even let's Berman, etc., throw out Kirk, Spock and company -- literally iconic and known the world over. Why not do like most other film franchises on Earth and recast and remake and build on what you know works instead of making up an endless stream of forgettable misfire characters like Sisko, Janeway, Kim, Neelix, et al (with apologies to any fans of them)?
Oh, I'm, gonna get it for that paragraph...
quote: M*A*S*H had medical doctors as advisors. Other shows have done similr things - and I believe that early Trek movies had science advisors.
The problem with "advisors" is no one listens to them anyway. Most people in fields like that take the "license" part of "creative license" a little too literally.
Heck, these are the same shows that can't even get the orientation of the Golden Gate Bridge right!
quote: I think I'd nominate Bernd & Mr. Neutron to start.
Thanks, but, oh, they'd hate me! I'd yell at them to use real science and stuff (horrors)! (In 1989 I wrote a TNG spec script featuring hulk of the ol Doomsday Machine, where I got the mathematical formula for neutronium density, figured out the volume of the device, and figured out it's gravity alone would destroy planets, deactivated or not (the story originated from that)! I should just toss that script on my website...)
-------------------- "Well, I mean, it's generally understood that, of all of the people in the world, Mike Nelson is the best." -- ULTRA MAGNUS, steadfast in curmudgeon
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I WAS IN THE FUTURE, IT WAS TOO LATE TO RSVP
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1986
Star Trek: The Promethean Prophecy, on 2 5.25 floppys
from even earlier, who can forget the rollicking good times of STARTREK.EXE and the 10 by 10 galaxy. it came on the same floppy as Return to Kroz * *
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you brats are spoiled
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Shik
Starship database: completed; History of Starfleet: done; website: probably never
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1978.
At the prompt, run BASIC.EXE
At THAT prompt...LOAD "STARTREK" RUN
I remember the may nights spent honing my BASIC skills majorly modifying that game to allow for thinks like promotion, sounds, & actual time dilation. Not to mention TNG speeds & lots of weaponry. LOTS,...of weaponry.
-------------------- "The French have a saying: 'mise en place'—keep everything in its fucking place!"
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I WAS IN THE FUTURE, IT WAS TOO LATE TO RSVP
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i believe that was a modification of the same game that later became the EXE file, cuz i had a few BASIC variants too.. if i recall correctly, its also the same game that, before monitors were commonplace, was played at a naval computer lab to the extent where all of the men were prohibited from using STARTREK because it would print a report for every move and was literally wasting reams of paper weekly. (this sordid story was told to me by the grizzly old man (of the type who sells software) who sold it to me at the flea market when i was 6 or so)
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