Star Trek, Babylon 5 style: Concept pitch revealed
FOR WHAT IT’S WORTH | Bryce Zabel: Spaced Out: Hawking Colonies & Re-Booting Star Trek
Bryce Zabel (Dark Skies, Lois & Clark) and J. Michael Straczynski (Babylon 5, Crusade, Jeremiah) were sitting around in 2004 talking about the poor turnout in the Star Trek franchise and came up with an idea to reinvigorate it. And they wrote it down. And now, with J.J. Abrams named as the head of the next proposed Star Trek offering, their ideas will never be filmed—so they’ve released their treatment proposal to the public.
They wanted to “re-imagine” the Original Star Trek—the same Kirk, Spock, and McCoy, but with more up-to-date situations, motivations, and relationships, and a cohesive story arc. It’s the same kind of idea that has been accomplished so well with Battlestar Galactica.
I was one of the ones who hated the idea of re-imagining Battlestar Galactica, and I now think it’s one of the best shows on TV, so I’m not going to dismiss a “re-imagining” idea out of hand. That’s not to say that it would be easy to see this kind of thing happen, but I’d at least give it a chance (if it were to get one).
(I did find it funny that in their listing of Universe A, they left out Star Trek: Insurrection. Am I the only person who thought that was a worthwhile movie? Certainly not the best, but I’d put it above Generations, for sure.)
Interesting stuff, anyway. I’m glad they released it.
Tags: babylon 5, jms, star trek, tv
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July 12th, 2006 at 9:49 am
Rebooting Star Trek is a long time coming, and there probably isn’t a hand better suited for the job than JMS. That is, the JMS who retains the passion and ability to wring out everything from a simple space opera, not the one whose hubris and public acclaim turns everything he touches into an event of some magitude. It’s still Spider-Man, no matter whose name is atop the masthead, and you still have to be willing to work your butt off, as JMS did to create the best science fiction since, well, Yar was sucked into a pile of tar (was this the forerunner to Spidey’s black uni, which damn near ate him alive?) and Wesley went . . . wherever Wesley went. JMS damn near killed himself with the stress of keeping B5 mostly on course; it would take that effort to the power of 10 to get people to buy into a new ST.
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