will tell, but Star Trek sure as Gre'thor isn't going away anytime soon. In just a ....
We speak to the award winning Deep Space Nine art director and production ...
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rom Christopher Pike [gotta love a captain named Chris!] to Jonathan Archer, by way of Kirk, Sisko, Janeway, then back to Kirk again (albeit one that inhabits an alternate timeline), it’s been an astonishing voyage through space and time for Star Trek. We’ve seen the show cancelled, saved, revived as a cartoon then promoted to the silver screen, revived again, spun off (twice), prequeled, rebooted and… what next? Time will tell, but Star Trek sure as Gre’thor isn’t going away anytime soon. In just a few years, the show will pass the half-century mark, now existing in a world where the franchise’s futuristic hallmarks – swishing doors, personal communicators and PADDs – have become real-world essentials we couldn’t live without. When Star Trek makes it back onto TV screens, it could all seem startlingly contemporary! Talking of the real and the Trek worlds coming ever closer together, we’re well on track to play out some major events from Trek’s future history: space probe Voyager 1 recently became the first ever human-made object to leave our solar system, venturing into the space between the stars – we already know that’s going to cause us a whole pile of trouble somewhere down the line, right? And we’d better start taking care of our oceans, too. I’d hate to think what would happen without at least a couple of Humpback Whales around to take care of us. Thankfully, we appear to have side-stepped Trek’s Eugenics Wars of the 1990s, and avoided the exploits of Khan altogether. Either they happened in an alternate timeline, or there’s been a huge conspiracy to cover them up (is there an Admiral Marcus in the house? Actually, yes – we interview Into Darkness villain Peter Weller in this very issue!). So what makes Star Trek a unique masterpiece of modern science fiction? That’s what this special issue sets out to reveal. It’s your essential guide to the history of Star Trek, as told through a collection of classic cast and crew interviews, and a host of fascinating features. We take you through A Brief History of Trek, and take a peek at what might have been as we reveal the unseen aliens of the J.J.verse, and discover the strange new world into which Star Trek: Phase 3 might have taken us. Prepare for 148 pages of unadulterated Star Trek magic. Engage!
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CONTENTS FEATURES
06 A BRIEF HISTORY OF STAR TREK
Star Trek has benefited from any number of second chances, as we find out in this essential guide to the history of the franchise.
30 BY THE FANS, FOR THE FANS
A love letter to Trek fans past, present and future, from one of a new breed of socialnetworking Trekkers.
74 UNSEEN TREK: GHOST SHIP – STAR TREK PHASE 3 The inside story of how a bold new Trek comic book series almost made it out of space dock.
134 UNSEEN TREK: ALIENATED The forgotten aliens of J.J. Abrams’ alternate Star Trek timeline.
46 A NEW BEGINNING
In 1987, Star Trek: The Next Generation took the crew of a new Enterprise on ever bolder missions, changing the face of television in the process.
67 FOUR COLOR FLASHBACK
Explore a strange alternate universe of splash panels and word balloons, as we examine the history of Star Trek in comic form.
80 UNDISCOVERED COUNTRIES
Replacing a shiny starship with a gothic space station is far from the biggest difference between Deep Space Nine and the other Treks.
114 SUCH SWEET SORROW
Revisiting the swan song episodes of every Star Trek series.
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“WE ALL WALKED OUT VERY PROUD OF J.J. AND OURSELVES, BECAUSE IT WAS SO BEAUTIFULLY DONE.” 140 REALITY BITES
To hell with the temporal prime directive! We explore Star Trek’s diverging timelines, temporal incursions, and alternate realities.
CONTENTS
INTERVIEWS
14 WILLIAM SHATNER
The original Captain Kirk invites us to enter Shatner’s World.
22 ROBERT JUSTMAN
A fascinating interview with one of the driving forces behind Star Trek and The Next Generation.
34 PETER WELLER
A brand new and exclusive talk with Kirk’s true nemesis from Star Trek Into Darkness.
38 & 128 LEONARD NIMOY
14
38
In an extensive two-part interview Leonard Nimoy looks back at life as Spock, and how busy retirement can be...
52 JONATHAN FRAKES
The Enterprise-D’s Number One talks about how Star Trek pushed his career in exciting and unexpected directions.
60 JOHN DE LANCIE
Join the Q, as we speak to the amazing Professor Quadwrangle and star of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic!
74 HERMAN ZIMMERMAN
We speak to the award winning Deep Space Nine art director and production designer.
80 ARMIN SHIMERMAN
The Deep Space Nine and Buffy star on Quark, an actor’s life, and Shakespeare.
94 BRYAN FULLER
The Deep Space Nine and Voyager scribe discusses his work, and the future of Trek.
100 KATE MULGREW
60 108 MANNY COTO Enterprise showrunner Manny Coto discusses what might have been, had the show continued.
A classic interview with Voyager’s formidable Captain Janeway.
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F O Y R O T S I A BRIEF H
K E TR FROM THE O T D R I B T A E R G E L O H K C A L THE B
d: if Hollywoo e rare in pilot or your r a s e c n ha our Second c your pitch or y r Trek’s story ta ith S w t e il Y fa . g with e u n yo u’re do chances, startin o y , lm fi . d n n o fir s t o ti c c r y of se s produ is a histo arliest days of it ayes the e ddard H By K. Sto
1966-1969
TO BOLDLY GO Gene Roddenberry’s first pilot for his new science fiction series, “The Cage,” was rejected as being both too brainy and too pessimistic. Getting a second pilot was unprecedented, yet Roddenberry got his second chance, and the result was a different tone and a new crew. He had pitched the series as “Wagon Train to the Stars,” thanks to the dominance of Westerns at the time. The show became much closer to classic stories of life on a naval vessel (the Hornblower series; Master and Commander; Run Silent, Run Deep), portraying a crew of highly professional officers with very human qualities, facing challenges that often seemed insurmountable. Though Star Trek earned a respectable audience and critical praise, it never had the ratings NBC wanted. Each year, renewal came down to squeaking by with the numbers, plus intense fan letter campaigns. The decision to move it to late Friday night was a death sentence for a struggling show. Even with today’s post-broadcast watching via DVR, discs and streaming, networks still prize real-
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time viewing. In 1969, real time was the only viewing, and Friday was the worst night of the week. The Friday time slot combined with budget cuts and declining quality killed Star Trek with hardly a whimper.
1969…
INTO ETERNITY Star Trek would have faded like any other cancelled show, except that it had just enough episodes to make it valuable in syndication (today, 100 episodes is considered the minimum). Its weekday evening syndicated timeslot was highly visible, and again, compared to today, had little competition, as even the largest US cities offered only three network channels plus a few local stations. Syndication saved Roddenberry’s masterpiece. The audience grew steadily, attracting new fans and securing old ones, until the first Star Trek convention in New York in 1972 was attended by 3,000 people, with convention attendance doubling a year later. Roddenberry himself told the audience that, thanks to their numbers and enthusiasm, he now believed a Star Trek movie might someday happen.
Gorn but not forgotten.
A BRIEF HISTORY OFTREK
CASTING THE CAPTAINS While each of Star Trek’s Captains seem inevitable casting now, only Scott Bakula actually landed his role without the intervention of fate. The very first captain, Jeffrey Hunter, was unavailable for the second pilot, opening the way for William Shatner. It’s impossible now to imagine Star Trek without Shatner’s largerthan-life screen presence and comic timing, or the chemistry with Nimoy and Kelley that created a legendary on-screen trio. Patrick Stewart was also a long shot, with Roddenberry refusing to consider a British actor to play his French Captain. Only after tireless lobbying by Rick Berman was Roddenberry finally convinced that no other actor could fill such commanding boots. Although Deep Space Nine’s producers wanted an African-American for the role of commander, they didn’t insist on one. They auditioned many actors of Hispanic, European, and South Asian descent as well as AfricanAmericans, before they found Avery Brooks. Fans were happy to learn that Star Trek’s first female lead, Voyager’s Janeway, would be played by big-screen star Genevieve Bujold. But when Bujold abruptly quit after a single day of production, Kate Mulgrew stepped in at the last minute and made Janeway her own. Chris Pine, Star Trek’s youngest Captain, is also the only one to audition solely for a film role, not a series. When he was offered the part of Kirk, he nearly turned it down in favor of a role in a George Clooney film. Pine’s choice proved especially serendipitous for his career, since that other film remains unproduced.
1973-74
RE-ANIMATION First, though, Roddenberry took Star Trek to a new frontier – an animated series. It was produced under his control, with many now celebrated Star Trek writers and actors contributing to its 22 episodes. Animation allowed them to introduce non-humanoid aliens and large-scale effects for little cost, and the quality of the stories won Star Trek its first Emmy. While the series has never officially been designated as canon, so many of its details have been re-used by later Star Trek productions (notably Kirk’s middle name, Tiberius) that it might as well be.
1977
A SECOND PHASE
Pike Mk1, Jeffrey Hunter
The explosion of fan interest in the ‘70s led Paramount to propose a second TV series with the same cast – another unprecedented second chance, as spinoffs even from successful shows were still relatively rare. Sets were built, scripts were developed, and a broadcast premiere was scheduled for early 1978, when Paramount’s network deal fell apart. But 1977 was the summer of Star Wars, and Paramount decided to recoup its
investment by converting Star Trek: Phase 2 into Star Trek: The Motion Picture.
1979
THE VOYAGER RETURNS Anxious to ride the wave of Star Wars’ success, Paramount was frantic to get the first Star Trek movie into theaters. The rush was especially frustrating to director Robert Wise, who found himself, for the first time in a long and distinguished career, starting a movie production without a finished script. Under enormous studio pressure to hurry up and finish, he was not given adequate time for finished editing, sound mixing, special effects, or previews. Never happy with the rushed theatrical version, he would have the opportunity, two decades after the original release, to put together the polished version of the film he had always wished for, with the Director’s Edition DVD. Yet despite the rush, and despite weaknesses in the script and the pacing, the movie was a great financial success, thanks mainly to fans’ hunger for any new Star Trek material. The film franchise was launched. STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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1982
THE NEEDS OF THE ONE The second Star Trek film, The Wrath of Khan, began inauspiciously with a series of rejected script drafts. Producer Harve Bennett, joining the franchise in 1980, suggested to director Nicholas Meyer, who was starting from scratch, that the next movie should bring back a memorable villain from the series - Khan. Meyer himself did an uncredited rewrite to produce the final story. Meyer also remembered Montalban’s Khan as having “a Lear-like grandeur. The arrogance and the pain walked hand in hand.” While Montalban sometimes deprecated his Hispanic accent for the role, Meyer considered it irrelevant: “His enunciation… was perfect.” Montalban’s performance, a solid script and the heroic death of Spock made The Wrath of Khan one of the most successful and highly praised Star Trek films ever.
1984
I AM NOT THE RESURRECTION We owe the subsequent Star Trek films to Meyer losing an argument with Bennett. Meyer insisted that Spock should stay dead; Bennett, having seen the devastated audience reaction at the second film’s first test screening, realized the ending needed to leave hope for Spock’s return, in yet another second chance. Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, written by Bennett himself, may be less beloved, and less financially successful, than the two films that bracketed it. Yet it still has many iconic moments, including some awe-inspiring shots of Vulcan, the loss of the Enterprise, and some film best moments for the supporting cast (“Don’t call me tiny!”). Most
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important, of course, it resurrected Spock. No one could have guessed in 1984 that the beloved Vulcan’s return would lead to the longest-lasting portrayal of a Star Trek character by one actor.
1986
THERE AND BACK AGAIN With the crew still in exile on Vulcan at the end of Star Trek III, another installment of their story was mandatory. And whether you prefer II or IV as your favorite original series film depends on whether you favor tragic drama or comic action. Either way, Star Trek: The Voyage Home was among the most successful of the original cast movies, and remains perhaps the most beloved, thanks to considerable character humor and an uplifting story. Its biggest revelation may be the teaming of DeForest Kelley and James Doohan in a masterful con; their collaboration is so practiced, so effortless, that this writer is convinced McCoy and Scotty must have a long, unseen history of pranking their fellow officers.
1989
HARD TIMES Harve Bennett recalled that part of the problem with the decision to carry on past the “trilogy” of II, III and IV might have been that everyone was so exhilarated by the success of The Voyage Home, they felt they couldn’t possibly do anything wrong. Unfortunately, they could. William Shatner’s directing debut Star Trek V: The Final Frontier became the least successful of the original cast films, both financially and critically. Its production was beset with all kinds of problems, including budget cuts that gutted the special effects, plus a crippling teamsters’ strike.
A BRIEF HISTORY OFTREK
WRITING STAR TREK ’S WOMEN
Roddenberry described his original first officer, Number One, as “almost glacier-like in her imperturbability and precision.” He probably thought making her an emotional icicle was the only way to get a 1966 audience to accept her rank and competence – yet both NBC and the test audience detested her! While Uhura, Janice Rand and Christine Chapel play rather stereotyped supporting roles in the series, the first six movies saw them and other female characters become more visible. The 1990s proved a decade of rapid evolution for women on television, and Star Trek was no exception. The writing team that initially struggled with Tasha Yar and Deanna Troi was soon writing complex, fascinating characters like Kira, Dax, and the women of Voyager. Now, well into the 21st century, few audiences would accept a female character playing an old stereotype, meaning Zoe Saldana’s Uhura does far more than just “answer the phone.”
1987-1995
A NEW GENERATION After years of toying with various ideas for returning Star Trek to television, Paramount finally committed itself to a new TV series, to be distributed in syndication. Many of the new series’ concepts, and even some of its stories, were recycled from Star Trek – Phase 2; but the big innovation was setting the story a hundred years after the original series, with an entirely new crew. Rick Berman, brought in early on to help develop the show, became the day-to-day showrunner, initiating a new generation of Star Trek leadership. Despite uneven quality, especially at first, Star Trek: The Next Generation’s production values, its splendid cast and above all its success in capturing the spirit of Star Trek for a new era, made it a solid ratings success. It gave the Star Trek franchise – and indeed, all television science fiction – a much needed infusion of life. The strongest proof of The Next Generation’s success is that it remains the only Star Trek spin-off series to have moved from television to the big screen.
1991
THE END OF THE BEGINNING
Denise Crosby in The Next Generation.
After the disappointment of Star Trek V, the director’s chair was handed back to Nicholas Meyer, along with the script. The first Klingons and Romulans had reflected Cold War tensions
of the 1960s; and Meyer, mindful of the recent collapse of the Iron Curtain, took the KlingonFederation cold war into the future as well, in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country. He wrote Chang as a deliberate opposite of Khan, an antagonist who is more head than heart, immersed in politics, rather than personal revenge. He also wrote the part specifically with Christopher Plummer in mind, though he had no idea whether he could even get Plummer for the role. Thanks to its focus on Cold War style realpolitik, the film farewell for the original cast has an unusually world-weary tone, as the old warriors Kirk and Chang contemplate their place in a universe where war threatens to become obsolete.
1993-1999
LIFE ON THE EDGE The success of The Next Generation guaranteed that Paramount would venture yet another syndicated series. The seed was Paramount Chairman Brandon Tartikoff’s suggestion, “Let’s do The Rifleman in space,” providing the widowed father and son at the heart of the story. Berman worked closely with Michael Piller to create a storyline that would stand apart from The Next Generation. They conceived the wormhole, the broken-down space station, and especially the non-Starfleet crew, to create more character conflict and to avoid the sleek, deus ex machina efficiency of Starfleet’s ships. STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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ALL IN A KISS
While the kiss in “Plato’s Stepchildren” is famous as the first interracial kiss on US network television, the presence of Sulu and Uhura from the start of the series was far more revolutionary. When black and Asian actors appeared on US screens in the 1960s, their roles were nearly always defined exclusively by their race. So it’s impossible to overstate the importance, in 1966, of George Takei and Nichelle Nichols portraying senior officers whose competence was taken for granted, and whose ethnicity was merely one element of their individuality.
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine was the only spin-off never to be on the air by itself. It may also be the most controversial series, with some fans considering its focus on war a betrayal of Roddenberry’s utopian vision; while others insist that its gritty realism, its remarkable ensemble cast, and its many-threaded story arc make it the best of Star Trek.
1994
CHANGING UP Paramount announced a Next Generation movie well before the series had finished airing, and gave it to Berman to produce. While he was delighted with the movie’s larger budget, coming up with the story was more challenging. He knew from the first that he wanted a “passing the torch” story that would feature both original and new cast members. While Nimoy declined a role for creative reasons, Shatner was happy to play Kirk one more time and bring the legendary Captain to a heroic death. The cast and crew may best remember the shooting of Star Trek: Generations as an exhausting marathon. They started work on the film almost immediately after finishing the final scenes of their series, which was notorious
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for its grueling production schedule. While not a blockbuster success, the film did please most fans, and earned enough to encourage Paramount to greenlight a second film.
1995–2001
DELTA FORCE Meanwhile, Paramount had already approved a third new series, featuring Star Trek’s first female lead as the ship’s captain. Writer Bryan Fuller recalled the biggest difference between writing for Deep Space Nine and writing for Star Trek: Voyager was that Paramount had made a reactionary choice on story and character arcs. “At the end of the episode, there was a history eraser button and we moved forward to the next adventure.” Unfortunately for Paramount, American television was already embracing serialization, especially in character development. Viewers had come to expect beloved characters to change and grow, and the most frequent criticism of Voyager was always its “reset button” characterizations. Yet Voyager was a success in many ways, running for seven seasons, introducing Star Trek’s only female lead and other memorable characters, and above all, making the Borg definitively its own big bad guy.
Kirk and Uhura get friendly.
RED SHIRTS
As early as the first broadcast of the series, attentive viewers realized that a landing party’s red-shirted security officers were generally doomed. The term “red shirt” gradually became Star Trek fan shorthand for those unlucky extras. Nearly five decades on, it is now a widely accepted term for disposable characters in any action story.
"Remember, men - let's be careful out there!"
A BRIEF HISTORY OFTREK
WHERE NO MERCH HAD BEEN BEFORE Today’s catalog of Star Trek merchandise seems almost endless, from action figures to production quality replicas, to knick-knacks and even a doggie poop bag dispenser (yes, really!) But in the 1960s, fans had to do some serious scrounging for Trek swag. There were a few model kits, a handful of books (notably James Blish’s classic episode adaptations and The Making of Star Trek), a series of comic books, and a Fan Club offering scripts, insignia and a newsletter. Action figures were unknown, while uniform replicas were strictly do-it-yourself. Star Trek merchandising had its first boom with the release of Star Trek: The Motion Picture, when licensed movie tie-ins appeared everywhere, including the first McDonalds movie-themed Happy Meal. Since then, both licensed merchandise and fandom have multiplied exponentially, and Star Trek goodies have more than kept pace.
1996
MAKING CONTACTS For the production of his second film, Star Trek: First Contact, Berman felt confident enough to go with what he knew best. He gave scripting duties, again, to Ron Moore and Brannon Braga, and offered Jonathan Frakes his first big-screen directing credit, thanks to Frakes’ success at directing a number of Star Trek episodes. Perhaps most important, the creative team chose two story elements that The Next Generation had always done with distinction – the Borg and time travel. The result was a production which Berman remembers as a joy to work on, and a film which remains the best box office performer of any in the franchise, and one of the most popular Star Trek films ever made.
1998
INTO INSURRECTION Eager to capitalize on the success of First Contact, Paramount immediately greenlit a third Next Generation film. Insurrection found heavyweight guest stars, and Michael Piller’s thoughtful script explored some old-fashioned Star Trek ideals. Yet the film faced an almost insurmountable obstacle – living up to its predecessor. Saving Paradise from the bad guys just isn’t as much fun as saving Earth from the Borg, or watching the Borg Queen seducing Data. Insurrection was far from a flop financially, yet fans greeted it with the most damning of movie spin-off criticisms: it felt like an overblown TV episode, instead of a movie. STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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THE VIDEOTAPE REVOLUTION Commercial videotapes of original series episodes and movies began appearing about the time the first movies were released. By the late 80s, the full series was available in VHS format, along with movie box-sets and re-releases. For the first time, fans could watch the entire series, uncut, whenever they wanted. Fan fiction, and fan quibbling, would never be the same! In 2006, Paramount announced a 40th anniversary remastered release of the originall series, with new digital effects and score. Distributed first to syndication and then to recording media, the remastered series has become the default on services like Netflix, allowing effects-heavy episodes like “The Immunity Syndrome” and “The Doomsday Machine” to be seen in high-definition digital detail. The commercial success of VHS in general, and Star Trek VHS in particular, led to the later series getting their first video releases while they were still in production. By the time DVDs, Blu-ray discs and streaming arrived, Star Trek was a solid video moneymaker, whose distribution on these new media was assured.
2002
2001-2005
Paramount took four years to get around to releasing the next and final Next Generation film, Star Trek: Nemesis. By then, franchise fatigue was clearly setting in, both with audiences and with the cast and creative teams. Paramount was already considering a franchise reboot, and the cast, who by then had many other pots on the fire, never seemed at home in their characters. Director Scott Baird was completely new to the franchise, and creative conflicts between him and the cast and crew were widely reported during and after production. The story aimed for Shakespearean grandeur, and fell to the level of including a car chase. Worst of all, Nemesis killed off one of Star Trek’s most beloved characters, Data. While Rick Berman still believes that his last Star Trek production was a solid film, its commercial and critical failure put the Star Trek film franchise on ice.
The last Star Trek television series to date, Enterprise (later re-christened Star Trek: Enterprise, as if viewers had been in any doubt what they were watching), made a major story departure from its predecessors, shifting its setting to the earliest days of human interstellar exploration. While the showrunners may have hoped to capture a sense of pioneering adventure, they were instead captured by the weight of established canon. Promising story ideas could not be explored without altering Star Trek’s future history, and die-hard fans pounced on the smallest contradictions. With constant shakeups in the creative staff, and thanks in no small part to the aforementioned “franchise fatigue”, Enterprise never really found its dramatic identity, nor the audience it needed to become a ratings success. With its premature cancellation after only four seasons, Star Trek appeared to have finally ended its voyage of discovery.
THE FINAL FRONTIER
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A NEW ENTERPRISE
STAR TREK: THE ACADEMY YEARS
Star Trek (2009) was not the first time someonee proposed a story about the Enterprise crew meeting at Starfleet Academy. After The Final Frontier, Paramount invited Harve Bennett to develop his premise for an academy-set story into a film starring younger actors. Several script drafts were written before Paramount canned the idea in favor of a sixth film with the original cast.
A BRIEF HISTORY OFTREK
2009 20
REALITY 2.0 RE Param Paramount’s announcement that J. J. Abrams would take the reins of a new Star Trek movie franchise, crucially with an entirely new cast, caused both excitement and consternation among fans. Writers crucia Alex KKurtzman and Roberto Orci (a lifelong Star Trek fan) seized on the origin story of Kirk’s crew because it had never been told. Leonard Nimoy’s willingness to bring Spock back to the screen gave becau them a way to relaunch the Star Trek universe while still connecting it with the original. Though some ffans fa ns ((inevitably) rejected the new timeline, the resounding box office and critical success of the 2009 film brought Star Trek back in a big way.
2013 20
THE NEEDS OF THE MANY TH Plans for the second film in the rebooted Star Trek universe began the moment the first film’s success was aapparent. Thanks to the usual tight security for blockbuster film productions, the secret of which villain Benedict Cumberbatch would play survived the furious speculations of the Internet right up uuntil un til tthe movie’s premiere. The production’s second biggest secret may be Leonard Nimoy’s cameo, about which there was not even a whisper in advance. Fans remain divided on whether the franchise shoul should go gritty and political, and even more on the merits of repeating so many elements from the origin original Khan storyline. However, the film’s financial success, while not as great as its predecessor, still gguarantees a third film with this cast. W With so many false dawns, glorious re-births and tragic finales across five decades, one thing rem remains emai undeniable: Gene Rodenberry’s Star Trek endures.
STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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FIRST APPEARED IN ISSUE #44
It may be two decades since William Shatner hatner last officially played the role of James T. Kirk, r but it’s rk, the role he’ll forever be associated with th h – and these days, he’s fine with that. With his one-man m show man Shatner’s World: We Just Live in It currently rr rently touring theaters, Shatner tells Tara Bennett en nnett why he now has an understanding of the he e unity of the world.
A
ctor, writer, director, singer, documentarian, horse breeder… Most people would aspire to become proficient at just one or two of those pursuits during their lifetime, but William Shatner (who turns 82 this March) juggles and intermixes all of them, often at the same time – if his daily schedule demands it. Of course, it’s still the role of the confident, courageous, and brilliantly strategic James Tiberius Kirk which defines his career, with Shatner standing on the deck of the U.S.S
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Enterprise for over three decades in the original Star Trek series and subsequent films. These days, despite the fact it’s been 20 years since he last formally played the Federation Captain (and later Admiral) in Star Trek Generations, Shatner seems happy to
WILLIAM SHATNER: INTERVIEW
STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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SHATNER SINGS!
Kirk takes command of the U.S.S. Enterprise
accept that he and Kirk will forever be synonymous. It appears that the man who caused consternation in an infamous 1986 Saturday Night Live sketch by bellowing “Get a Life!” at a convention hall full of (fictional) Trek geeks, has come full circle. Shatner now exudes an almost Zen-like peace about his colorful life, and the once albatross-like weight of the Kirk role has certainly diminished with a quarter century of other successful creative pursuits. In those years, Shatner’s won two Emmys playing Denny Crane on The Practice and Boston Legal, and headlined the short-lived sitcom $#*! My Dad Says. He’s hosted the series Shatner’s Raw Nerve and Weird or What?, and executiveproduced two feature-length documentaries about Trek and fandom – The Captains and Get a Life! In 2012, in keeping with the reflective place in which he seems to be dwelling now, he put together a one-man show called Shatner’s World: We Just Live in It, for Broadway. He’s now touring with it throughout North America.
“I keep branching out into areas that either interest me or I have the opportunity to do,” Shatner says about his eclectic array of current pursuits. “I think I have a knack for making these documentaries... They’re an exploration of subject matter that interests me. It’s partly curiosity about the people. And it’s partly the adventure of making a documentary, and seeing it on film.” A progressive user of technology to connect with people, Shatner has been video blogging (or ‘vlogging’) on YouTube since 2007. He tweets regularly, signing off each tweet warmly with the tag MMB (My Best, Bill). Last year, he launched his first Shatner-branded app, which allows users to creatively play with words and sentences that are then read aloud in Shatner’s distinctive voice. “It’s called Shatoetry,” he says proudly. “At the time of its launch it was a best-selling app, something like 700,000. I loved it when we were talking about it, and then when it came out, I thought it was really great. I hoped other people would like it, and that’s the case, so I’m delighted.”
The erstwhile Captain Kirk isn’t just a talented actor, director, and author – he’s also a unique musician and spoken word artist. Shatner’s most celebrated musical endeavor remains his 1968 debut The Transformed Man, which introduced the world to his unorthodox vocal style (closer to speaking than singing). The album saw him mash together poetry readings and Shakespeare soliloquies with bonkers covers of classics such as “Mr. Tambourine Man” and “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds”. The result was bizarre, campy, and unforgettable. There were further soliloquies in 1978’s live double-album Captain of the Starship. Meanwhile, Shatner’s rendition of Elton John’s “Rocket Man” at the 1978 Saturn Awards was a performance few could forget – not least Seth MacFarlane, who lampooned it in a Family Guy episode. Shatner doesn’t always take his musical career too seriously, as witnessed by his cover versions of the Best Song nominations (including “(Everything I Do) I Do it For You” and “I Wanna Sex You Up”) at the 1992 MTV Awards. But his audio work can’t simply be dismissed as a joke: his 2004 album Has Been, produced by Ben Folds, earned serious acclaim. He followed this with the typically offbeat live album Exodus, which saw him reading Bible passages to the sounds of the Arkansas Symphony Orchestra. Following a string of memorable live performances (including a version of “My Way” at the AFI’s tribute to George Lucas, complete with dancing Stormtroopers!), Shatner returned with his third album, Seeking Major Tom, in 2011. Its all-star line-up, including Sheryl Crowe and David Gilmour, highlights Shatner’s transition from novelty act to serious artist.
Kirk, Spock, and McCoy reunite in Star Trek: The Motion Picture
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WILLIAM SHATNER: INTERVIEW MIRROR, MIRROR On this particular day, Shatner is relaxing in his office in California, where he’s decompressing after a weekend of Shatner’s World performances in his native Canada. The time off is well-deserved, as demonstrated by a side-story about the weekend. “On Saturday in Hamilton, Ontario I did an afternoon matinee, and an evening performance of the show, which, you can imagine, is quite tiring,” he says. “At the same time, we were shooting it all for a film. So I was filming and acting in the one-man show, and in addition to that, I decided to call the restaurant chain, Tim Hortons [the sacrosanct Canadian bakery/coffee house that fuels the citizens of the Great White North]. I talked to the CEO, and told them we were coming to the city and would like to put on a party prior to the show. I asked if he would help me put on the party. He said yes, and that their headquarters is in Hamilton! All of the Tim Hortons executives came to see the show, and put on a happening party!” Circling back to his show, Shatner explains that Shatner’s World grew out of his current interest in digging deeper into many of the experiences and people that have shaped his life. “I sort of made an arc, in which I thought it would be fun to talk about saying ‘yes’ to life, and plunging into life,” he explains. “I tried to find stories in my life that followed that track.” He says he covers topics such as horses, love, death, comedy, acting, and of course, Star Trek. He’s honed the show since it premiered on Broadway, and says he’s happy with it as a piece. “The show is pretty much the same thing every night. I have a lot of visuals in the show, and they need cues to hit the button so they come up on the screen,” he laughs. “There needs to be definitive things that happen, so that makes the show less of an improvisation and more of a set.”
METAMORPHOSIS The one-man show also dovetails nicely with his current documentary work. Through The Captains and Get a Life!, Shatner says he’s been fascinated by delving into life’s universal
“I FEEL CLOSER TO THE AUDIENCE, NOW THAT I HAVE A MORE PURE UNDERSTANDING OF WHY THEY ARE THERE.”
William Shatner as James T. Kirk
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Kirk faces the press in Star Trek: Generations
questions through the prism of the Star Trek fandom, and his Trek acting peers. “The problem is there’s no answer to any of the questions,” he chuckles. “For the questions that are the most profound, there are no answers. Either you accept the fact, and the terror, that there is no answer, or you seek an answer that may be more based on faith or wish-fulfillment than factual.” I ask if getting to know the fandom that surrounds Star Trek more profoundly through Get a Life! has at least provided him with a new kind of understanding of human nature. Shatner mulls that over for a moment before saying, with consideration: “That’s a terribly interesting thought: trying to strive for an understanding, against getting an answer. Yeah, I think you are right. When you put it that way, the exploration is part of the understanding, and whether it’s the mystery of life and death, or whether it’s why a person did a certain thing, or how did an event take place, it’s the talking about it. And then if
“IT’S BEEN SO LONG, WHENEVER I CATCH A GLIMPSE OF ME IN THE SERIES, IT’S LIKE ANOTHER PERSON.” you have a camera on, it becomes a documentary. But trying to understand it, at least the ways and the whys, as against having a specific answer, are equally interesting – as long as you can accept there is no real answer to the riddle of human nature, and the riddle of existence.” The films have given him the opportunity to connect differently. In The Captains, for the first time Shatner sought out, and interviewed, each actor who played a starship Captain in the Star Trek universe. The film documents his insightful
and funny talks with Patrick Stewart (Jean Luc Picard), Avery Brooks (Benjamin Sisko), Kate Mulgrew (Kathryn Janeway), Scott Bakula (Jonathan Archer), and even the rebooted filmverse James T. Kirk (Chris Pine). Together they make up a very exclusive club of people who can truly understand what it means to be at the epicenter of Trek devotion. “The essence of what I took away from talking to those people was how beautiful they are, how much I admire them, and how bonded I feel to all of them,” Shatner says of the experience. “I suspect, from later conversations and being with them, that they feel the same way. In the short moments we had together, we became friends; all of us.” There is a touch of awe in his voice as he adds, “Isn’t that something? And I feel closer to the audience, now that I have a more pure understanding of why they are there. I see in them a fulfillment of a need that we all have, and that they are more purely enjoying. It’s thrilling, actually.”
Kirk bids farewell to Spock in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan
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WILLIAM SHATNER: INTERVIEW Since Shatner is a lifelong horsebreeder and enthusiast, I wonder whether he equates his feelings towards horses to the way Trek fans feel about Gene Roddenberry’s universe? He chuckles at the idea. “I don’t know if I would put them as ‘my Star Trek’, but I would say horses, for me, have led to an understanding of the unity of the world, and the way that animate and inanimate objects relate. Even to those beings that are somewhere in between, whether it’s a crystal that reproduces itself, which is one of the definitions of life, or a tree that gives off pheromones as signals to other trees, in effect talking to other trees. Plant DNA has enough similarity to ours to make us realize that we are kin to every living thing – plant, animal, or vegetable.” It sounds like, in his seven decades of traversing the globe, boldly going where few have gone before him, that the brash side of William Shatner has been tempered with the very Buddhist outlook of living in the moment. Shatner is a little startled by the observation, but replies warmly, “Well, the Buddhists are borne out by scientific research.”
THE OMEGA GLORY
Kirk meets Picard in Star Trek: Generations
He’s also looking into revisiting his popular TekWar science fiction novels (written with Ron Goulart), in a new medium. “It might come back in animation,” he reveals. “It would probably be based on fresh stories. There are
only 10 books, so they would be new detective stories. Actually, there are a couple of book series that I think would make a great series in some manner, either live action or an [animation] series.”
William Shatner as Kirk in an early publicity photo for Star Trek
On the brink of celebrating 60 years as an actor, Shatner says that when it comes to deciding what roles to take next, he does spend more time considering whether or not to commit to long-term projects with demanding hours. “But, on the other hand,” he laughs, “going away for months at a time is not attractive either. If something comes up that is really interesting, I will do it, no matter the medium. The medium is less important than what is interesting. And right now I’m in the middle of selling a new television series.”
DISCOGRAPHY
The Transformed Man (1968) Captain of the Starship: William Shatner Live (1978) Spaced Out: The Very Best of Leonard Nimoy and William Shatner (1996) Has Been (2004) Exodus: An Oratorio in Three Parts (2007) Seeking Major Tom (2011)
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BRAND SHATNER
Kirk and Uhura
Considering his recent work playing Denny Crane, working in sitcoms, and even mugging outlandishly in his cult favorite Priceline commercials, you might think that Shatner has made a conscious decision to gravitate more towards comedic roles of late. Yet Shatner says this isn’t the case. “I realize that there’s very little difference between comedy and drama. There is a comic sensibility, without question, and some people have it and some people haven’t, but it’s almost indefinable. The best possible of all worlds is to go from one to the other very quickly.” Looking back at his most identifiable roles – Kirk, T.J. Hooker, and Crane – Shatner says they have all remained so popular because they embody that principle. “I admire them all,” he reflects. “As an actor, I took an aspect of what I am and enlarged it in them. The aspects are the awe and wonder of Captain Kirk, the anger of T.J. Hooker, and the desire to understand and communicate of Denny
Kirk and crew sign off in The Undiscovered Country
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“THE OLD ADAGE OF ‘YOU CAN’T DO ANYTHING ABOUT THE PAST, AND YOU DON’T KNOW WHAT THE FUTURE IS’ – I TRY TO ABIDE BY THAT AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE.” Crane. All of those are admirable human traits, so those are the through lines that I tried as an acting exercise with them.” With the imminent release of Star Trek Into Darkness, many have speculated about whether Shatner will have a part in the sequel, or if he’s even interested in playing Kirk once more. “Well, it’s hard to figure out how to put me, at
James T. Kirk may be an all-American hero, but Shatner himself was born in Montreal, Canada in 1931. After studying economics, Shatner begun acting on stage and screen in the early 1950s. Highlights from his early career include star turns in Alfred Hitchcock Presents, the Broadway production of The World of Suzie Wong, and the drama The Brothers Karamazov, alongside Yul Brynner. Shatner’s 1960s career took in numerous TV series, including the classic sci-fi shows The Outer Limits and The Twilight Zone, where he starred in the unforgettable “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet”. But his most iconic role as the suave Starfleet captain came in 1966, and Star Trek continued through to 1968. Following the show’s cancellation, Shatner struggled to find decent roles: his 1970s work took in the likes of the silly but fun Kingdom of the Spiders and Roger Corman’s Big Bad Mama, as well as voice duties on Star Trek: The Animated Series. Trek’s syndication success led to 1979’s Motion Picture – and a career renaissance. The Trek movies kept on coming, while in 1982 he took on another classic role: T.J. Hooker. Shatner also presided over the insanely popular Rescue 911 throughout the 90s, and co-starred in TekWar, based on his novels. More recently, he’s won new fans thanks to his role as Denny Crane in Boston Legal. Shatner hasn’t been afraid to poke fun at himself along the way: aside from cameos in Airplane II and Police Squad, he gamely played along in 2006’s Celebrity Roast. And he’s also found time to carve out a parallel music career [see box-out on page 19].
WILLIAM SHATNER: INTERVIEW my age and physicality, into a new movie,” Shatner sighs. “They are fun movies, and it would be great fun to be in them, as long as they could figure out how to do it. And if they should want to do it, I’d be there, no question about it.” Considering how many years it’s been since he last wore the uniform, he says watching Chris Pine’s Kirk hasn’t been difficult. “It’s been so long, whenever I catch a glimpse of me in the series, it’s like another person. You know, your cells regenerate every seven years, so that’s seven times me removed. It’s another person upp there on the screen, who I vaguely identify with. And I’m in a really great place in my life, so I don’t wish I were younger… but I don’t want to get any older!” he laughs. “I wonder if I could strike a deal of some kind? I’ll bottle it and put it into a commercial.”
THE WAY TO EDEN In his one-man show, Shatner is hhonestt andd forthcoming about his own mistakes, but he’s also a staunch proponent of always trying, even if you fail. Asked what failures he learned most from, Shatner self-deprecatingly blurts, “Marriages.” Having gone down the aisle four times, he says he is very fortunate to be with his current wife, Elizabeth Anderson Martin. Looking at the big-picture of the other speed bumps in his life, Shatner says he’s come to know “there are failures that don’t have to be abysmal. The ship doesn’t have to sink before you realize that the design is wrong. Maybe the ship is rolling too much, or the passengers are uncomfortable, or it doesn’t steer well, but it doesn’t sink. There are failures that are unnoticeable to other people, other than yourself. It may go from as small a thing as the reading of a line that doesn’t work, to a relationship that isn’t quite as successful as you wish it to be, and you learn to accept failure, because the idea of either stopping the show or destroying the relationship is worse than the acceptance of the failure.” Now William Shatner says he’s grateful that he’s learned how to let go of regret. “I don’t really think in those terms,” he says frankly. “It’s gone. I live in the present. The old adage of, ‘you can’t do anything about the past, and you don’t know what the future is’ – I try to abide by that as much as possible, because it’s the only way to live.” With a smile in his voice, he adds, “That’s very Buddhist, isn’t it?” STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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FIRST APPEARED IN ISSUE #42
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ROBERT H. JUSTMAN: INTERVIEW
GIVING THE WAGON ITS WHEELS In this previously unseen interview, the co-producer of the original Star Trek looks back at his part in creating a legend. By Joe Nazzaro.
I
t could be argued that without Robert H. Justman, the original Star Trek could have been a very different series. As the show’s co-producer, Justman (who died on May 28, 2008 at age 81), was involved in just about every aspect of production, from casting to story ideas; a function he performed again two decades later on Star Trek: The Next Generation.
During production of the original series and for quite some time afterward, Justman largely kept a low profile, allowing more outspoken voices, such as series creator Gene Roddenberry, to lead the behind-the-scenes narrative. It wasn’t until he teamed up with former production executive Herb Solow for their 1996 memoir “Inside Star Trek“ that the full scope of
his contribution was spelled out. During the conversation that follows, which was conducted during promotion for that book, Justman looked back at his long and sometimes turbulent association with the franchise. For Bob Justman, a career in show-business began as a lowly production assistant in the early 1950s, quickly moving up the ladder to STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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Justman was responsible for suggesting that a Klingon be part of the Enterprise-D crew
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ROBERT H. JUSTMAN: INTERVIEW assistant director in features. “I actually started in motion pictures,” he recalls, “and the very first film I did was A Letter to Three Husbands. I was a production assistant, a gofer. That was followed by The Scarf, directed by the famous hoofer director E.A. Dupont, and the most interesting thing I possibly ever worked on – not the best, but most interesting – was a remake of M [Fritz Lang’s 1931 thriller about the search for a child killer in Berlin], which starred David Wayne, and was directed by Joseph Losey.” Other early credits included Red Planet Mars [“My first science fiction credit”], Lady in the Iron Mask, The Moon is Blue, Abbott and Costello Meet Captain Kidd, and The Moonlighter, which was shot in 3D and starred Barbara Stanwyck, who nicknamed the young Justman ‘Killer.’ “I didn’t want to do something the associate producer wanted me to do and he got a bit pissy about it, so I tore off my glasses and said, ‘Okay, you throw the first punch!’ Barbara Stanwyck heard about that and from then on, I was ‘Killer.’” After logging dozens of films as PA and second assistant director, Justman moved into television as a first assistant director, thanks to veteran director Robert Aldrich with whom he’d worked as a production assistant on several early films. “In those days, I always had the philosophy of ‘Take the first thing that comes along!’ and I was never out of work. So when Bob called me and asked, ‘Did you want to do this?’ and I said ‘sure’, that was the first thing I did. Don Siegel was the other director, and they were both doing television because they weren’t into features yet. “From that, I went on to the Superman series, and did a full season of that, episodes of several
Justman wanted the new Enterprise to have families on board
“WE WERE NEVER ABLE TO FIND A HOME, AND WERE MOVED TO A TIME WHEN HALF OUR AUDIENCE WASN’T AVAILABLE” different weekly series, and some pilots. I also did four episodes of One Step Beyond, six episodes of The Mickey Mouse Club, and a thing called Man on the Moon for Disney, where we took a spaceship to the moon, orbited, and then came back to Earth. It was a very interesting experience. Then I did a series with Leslie Stevens called Stoney Burke, and both
seasons of The Outer Limits. That’s where I first met James Goldstone, who directed the second Star Trek pilot. Although The Outer Limits couldn’t have been more different from Star Trek, it was Justman’s first real foray in 1960s SF television. “There wasn’t a lot of money on Star Trek,” he elaborates, “so in a way, [The Outer Limits] prepared me with resources that I could tap. The assistant director’s tenet is, ‘How can we make this as good as possible, as cheap as possible?’ I didn’t exactly learn to save money on The Outer Limits, but I learned things about optical special FX and certain resources. On Star Trek, I was able to hire Wah Chang, who I knew from my days on The Outer Limits, and I knew Fred Phillips the make-up man from my days on Stoney Burke and the other shows.”
MISSION IMPOSSIBLE?
The Enterprise-D boldly goes “Where No One Has Gone Before”
Justman originally turned down an invitation to work on the original Star Trek pilot but, as luck would have it, NBC had reservations about “The Cage”, ordering a second pilot that they hoped would address their concerns. When the opportunity to work on the new show came up again, he was keen to accept the challenge. “As an assistant director in television, you know how long it takes to get a set-up shot and the seat of your pants tells you how long it will take. The amount of work you have left to do will just fill up the amount of time you have left to do it in, so we worked as hard as we could on the second pilot. “On the last day of production when we were a day over, we did two day’s work in a day. That’s the day that Lucy [legendary comedienne and owner of Desilu Studios, Lucille Ball] came STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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on the stage, because we were supposed to have an end-of-picture party and we were still shooting. So in between set-ups, she helped Herb and me sweep out the stage and get the sand out of the way of the camera dolly. I think she just did that for effect, because she wanted to get the party started, but we worked hard, and we wouldn’t have done the second pilot in that short a time if Jimmy Goldstone and I hadn’t worked so well together before on The Outer Limits. We had a method in our madness. I always knew what set-ups Jimmy had planned to cover the work we had to do that day, and I’d arranged them so that no time would be lost, so if we’d point the camera in one direction and lit in that direction for the most part, we would shoot everything that needed to be shot that day in that direction before we turned around and shot the opposing angle.” Star Trek may have subsequently been picked up as a series, but as Rodney Dangerfield probably would have pointed out, it never really got any respect. Ratings were never very high and the budget was relatively low for the kind of material that was being produced. Meanwhile, Mission: Impossible, the show’s neighbor on the Desilu lot, was winning awards and being recognized as a compelling drama series. “It wasn’t their fault that they got the Emmys, and we didn’t,” Justman reflects, “so there wasn’t really a rivalry between us. There was kind of a wistfulness at times, a ‘Gee whiz, you’d think we’d get something!’ but we didn’t get anything, ever on the original series – make-up, special FX, we had the most complicated sound FX, which had to be created and built – and we never got any recognition for them. “To this day, no one from any of the Star Trek series has won an Emmy for acting. Patrick Stewart never got one, and I don’t think he even got nominated. To me, Patrick was the best actor on nightly television at that time, but Star Trek: The Next Generation wasn’t shown on a major network. It was syndicated, and wasn’t considered a major prime-time show, so he didn’t get any of the respect to which he was so richly entitled. “The regret about the original Star Trek versus Mission: Impossible is that I knew what both shows cost, having been heavily involved in each of them. Each of the three seasons that Star Trek was on, it made its series budget; it never went over its average budget. Mission: Impossible was constantly over-budget, and it cost a lot more than Star Trek did, but CBS was a different beast than NBC; they made some extra money, and they were more tolerant of their hit show,
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Robert H. Justman (center, second from left) stands with Gene Roddenberry, Rick Berman, and the Star Trek: The Next Generation cast
“I WANTED TO SHOW THAT WE COULD MAKE STAR TREK SUCCESSFUL RIGHT OUT OF THE BOX” but we were on Thursday night at 8:30 for the first season, Friday night at 8:30 for the second season and 10:00 for the third season. We were never able to find a home, and were moved to a time when half our audience wasn’t available to watch the show.”
A PASSING PHASE When the proposed Star Trek: Phase II was abandoned in favor of a feature-length motion picture, Justman found himself excluded from the project, and admits he had mixed emotions about starting it up all over again for Star Trek: The Next Generation. One of his strongest motivations for returning was to prove that a successful Trek series could be made. “I wanted
to work with Gene again because overall I was still his friend, but it was still stuck in the back of my mind, and I did bring the subject up. Ed Milkis was our associate producer in charge of post-production, and was working with Gene as they began to prepare Star Trek: The Next Generation, and I told Ed of my disappointment with Gene, about the time that he had called me when he was just about to do that first feature. I told Eddie, ‘Gene broke my heart,’ and he told that to Gene, who as Herb has said, always found it difficult to take responsibility or to tell people things they didn’t want to hear. I don’t think that he didn’t want me to work on the movie. The challenge that gripped me so hard was that I wanted to show that we could make Star Trek successful right out of the box, and that we could make it better. I was inspired to prove so many things. That’s where some of the creative ideas for the new show came about.” Just as he had a couple of decades earlier, Justman produced countless memos covering just about every aspect of the series. “There were certain things I suggested, such as having
ROBERT H. JUSTMAN: INTERVIEW families on board, for instance. I wrote an impassioned memo to Gene about that. I also created the back-story for Captain Picard and Dr. Crusher and what had happened in the past between them. “I talked Gene into going with a Klingon, and he was utterly opposed to it. I remember him saying, ‘No, we’ve done all that, and I don’t want to repeat myself,’ and I said, ‘But Gene, think of the possibilities, think of what it means!’ He thought about it, and the next thing you know, we had a Klingon on board. “There were a number of things I created on The Next Generation, and in fact during that first season, Gene’s business manager Leonard [Maizlish] came to me and said, ‘We want you to know that we appreciate everything that you’ve done on this show, and we’re going to see to it that you get a piece of the show.’ Well, I’m still looking for that piece.”
MAKE IT SO There is one contribution of which Justman was justifiably glad to have made, and that was the ‘discovery’ of Patrick Stewart for the lead role. “I’ve told this story before and Patrick would confirm it if you ever corral him, but my wife and I were attending a UCLA extension class on humor, where there was a class every couple of weeks and there would be guests who discussed their kind of humor, whatever that was. One night, there was going to be a cold reading by two actors who were going to read from Noel Coward and the Shakespeare comedies. There was a woman and a man who came out, and that man was Patrick Stewart. He looked familiar, but I hadn’t placed him from I, Claudius or Tinker, Tailor and shows like that. “Patrick sat down, pushed up his jacket sleeves to display his massive forearms and commenced to read, and after just a few sentences, I was thunderstruck. I turned to my wife Jackie, and I said, ‘I think I found our new captain!’ “That was November or December of 1986, and I’d been back at Paramount preparing the show for a month or two at the most, but I was so impressed with what I saw and heard that night, I called SAG [the Screen Actor’s Guild] the next day and found out who Patrick’s agent was here in town, and made arrangements for Patrick to visit with Gene and me at Gene’s house the following Monday. Patrick came in his rental car, and we sat around for 30-40 minutes, and then he made his goodbyes and left to fly back to England. “After he drove away, Gene closed the door and turned to me – and I will quote him exactly
Kirk faces off with old friend-turned-godlike being Gary Mitchell in “Where No Man Has Gone Before”
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Patrick Stewart: definitely not a hairy frenchman
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ROBERT H. JUSTMAN: INTERVIEW – he said, ‘I won’t have him!’ No matter what I said, he was adamant, and the reason was because the character he had created in his mind was a hairy Frenchman. So, we embarked upon a campaign that lasted for some months, and when Rick Berman came on the show and became supervising producer with me, Rick jumped all over it too and said, ‘He’s perfect!’ Our casting director was for it, everyone was for it except Gene. We went through everybody in town, and in foreign countries, trying to find the right person to play the captain and couldn’t. “Finally, our last candidate came in, read for us and after he left, we were sitting there – the casting director, Rick, Gene and myself – and Gene finally turned around and said, ‘All right, I’ll go with Patrick,’ and that was it. I’ve never been surer of anything in my life, at least in the business, than casting Patrick in that role. He was everything that a captain ought to be.”
NEW FRONTIERS Justman stayed until the end of The Next Generation’s first season before deciding it was time to move on. “I was suffering from hypertension, overwork; I wasn’t as young as I had been, I was still working 16-hour days, and it was taking its toll on me. My blood pressure rose, because I was having problems with Gene’s business manager, who was interfering in what Rick Berman and I considered to be our producer functions, and it just drove me crazy. It was the only time I ever had harsh words with Gene. “One day, I drove over to his house after Leonard Maizlish fell asleep in the middle of a casting session, right in full view of the actor who was reading for us. I was furious, and
The Ferengi make their debut in TNG's “The Last Outpost”
Starting Star Trek anew with “Encounter at Farpoint”
“I’VE NEVER BEEN SURER OF ANYTHING IN MY LIFE, AT LEAST IN THE BUSINESS, THAN CASTING PATRICK” stopped the casting session, jumped in my car and rode over to Gene’s house and screamed at him. It wasn’t long after that I decided, ‘Wait a second, I can’t let this happen!’ I knew the show was going to be successful, it was a terrific show, but I was lucky that I didn’t have to remain at work there. I gave away a lot of money by not
coming back, but I think I also kept some hold of what little sanity remains to me, and physically, it was my salvation. I just decided to be happier and have less.” That final season marked the end of Bob Justman’s participation in the franchise, and while he had mixed feelings about the various Trek spin-offs that followed over the years, he’s proud of the foundation he helped create. “I thought Deep Space Nine was a very good show, but I think there were casting problems, or there weren’t necessarily cast problems, but a role problem; Sisko was a role that really didn’t make anything happen. It’s a tough role, and [Avery Brooks] was an actor who displayed such flash and fire in [Spencer: for Hire] when he played a guy named Hawk. He’s a marvelous actor, and has a lot of power and energy and anger, but he was playing against himself, and the character wasn’t as proactive as, say, Bill Shatner had been. I felt there was a problem there, but some of the other casting choices were very good, and I thought the show was excellent. With Voyager, I never really watched. I kind of felt that they were over-milking it, and they never should have overlapped the series. They should have done one and then gone on to the next one. Certainly I considered The Next Generation one hell of a show, and every time I saw any part of an episode in any of the succeeding seasons, I was mightily impressed. “I think the reason why Star Trek became popular after they started ‘stripping’ it, running it five nights a week, is because of its inherent message: it’s a really neat thing to live a proper moral life, and to do unto others as they would do unto you, to do the right thing.” STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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BY THE FANS FOR THE FANS BY THE FANS, FOR THE FANS
A love letter to Tr Trek fans past, present and future, from one of a new breed of social-network social-networking Trekkers. By Samantha Darragh Darrag
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ugust 2013, and I’m in Memphis, Mem Tennessee. It’s Elvis Week, and as I walk through town I see ‘Elvi’ everywhere, in all shapes, sizes, colors and creeds. Each of tthem united by a passion – their love for The King of Rock ’n’ roll, Elv Elvis Aaron Presley. For a moment I catch mys myself thinking it’s all a bit over-thetop, that they’re all slightly bo bonkers… and then I remembered that their fan worship is akin to my own. You see, I am a member of the world’s most notoriously enth enthusiastic fan group – The Trekkies. Before you cry “Trekkers” “Trekkers”(though some still call us geeks or nerds), the fact remains that w whatever label we go by, like the droves who have flocked to Me Memphis in support of their hero, we are a very special bunch of peo people. Klingons believe understa understanding our ancestors, and where we’ve come from, helps us und understand who we are. Trek stars Denise Crosby (The Next Gene Generation’s Tasha Yar) and more recently William Shatner (Captain… oh oh, you know!) both ventured on jjourneys ourneys of discovery into Trek fandom, seeking out fans from across the world and finding oout what makes us so passionate and dedicated to the series, in all its forms. Not only did they discover diversity in infinite ccombinations, but also a deep-rooted similarity amongst the cohort, a sense of optimism, hope and humanity. It wasn’t until I was in my twenties that I sought out other fans and became involved in th the phenomenon that is Trek fandom. Until then it had been just me and my best friend Carole. At school we were referred to dismissive dismissively as “those Trekkie girls.” We were such outcasts we made Reg Ba Barclay look like the life and soul of the party, so it was a huge rrelief when we ventured out into the wider fan community and ddiscovered that other like-minded people were out there. People just like us. And they had been out there for a long time!
THE BIG BANG
Star Trek and its Trekkies have become so embedded in popular culture that you don’t even need to have seen an episode to know the Vulcan hand salute. Our reputation as fans has changed in recent years. No longer must we suffer the stereotype of the single guy living in his parents’ basement. We’re now so fashionable that CBS even has a toprated sitcom, The Big Bang Theory, featuring a group of lovable Trekkies. Nowadays, being a Star Trek fan is cool, thanks to celebrity Trekkies like Mila Kunis, Seth MacFarlane and even U.S. President Barack Obama.
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THE TROUBLE WITH TRIMBLES Our very existence could not have been achieved without the passion of early fans like Bjo and John Trimble. It was they who organized the famous letter writing campaign that kept Star Trek on our screens when it first faced cancellation. They inundated NBC with letters and petitions, and the studio was overwhelmed by the response, barely able to cope with bulging sacks of mail delivering day after day after day. It resulted in the first big win for Trekkies when Star Trek was renewed, and this victory has motivated us ever since. With the philosophy from the show to guide us and a record of taking action, our Trekkie forefathers went on to name a Space Shuttle, become scientists, philanthropists and engineers, eager to turn this fantasy future into reality. When Star Trek was eventually cancelled, fans still wouldn’t give it up. If they had, I’m
certain there would be no more Trek as we know it today. Trekkies were not going to let go of the show so easily, and in lieu of new episodes they began to organize their own Star Trek conventions. What started as get-togethers for fans to discuss their favorite episodes evolved into professionally mounted events, hosting packed-out venues, guest actors, autograph queues and merchandise sales. The format has since been replicated across a multitude of popular TV shows and movies, but we were the first. Twihards and Whovians, you’re most welcome. It was the persistence of the fans, their passion for the franchise that grabbed the attention of studio execs. Eventually the prospect of lining pockets with Latinum was too good to ignore, resulting in the return of Star Trek in the form of feature films and four massively successful spin-off series.
Fans gather to break the costume record at Vegas 2013
“WE WERE SUCH OUTCASTS WE MADE REG BARCLAY LOOK LIKE THE LIFE AND SOUL OF THE PARTY.”
A SHOW FOR ALL SEASONS
Fan-produced Trek spin-offs feature franchise alumni like Alan Ruck.
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I was very young when The Next Generation first aired, but I recall my parents having serious reservations before they watched it. They informed me that there was only “one true Enterprise” (no bloody a, b, c or d!) and only “one real captain.” Their sentiments towards the original series are ones I would later share – only my ship was the Enterprise-D, and my captain one Jean-Luc Picard. This seems to be an immutable fact for all Trek fans. Scotty had it nailed when he compared your first starship to your first love – there will be others, but none quite like the first. With each new series or movie, our collective has grown and evolved, but fans have approached every new pilot with the same worry my parents experienced when they first watched The Next Generation – that this will be the series that “ruins” Star Trek. This has never been truer than with J.J. Abrams’ alternate take on Star Trek, or the ‘JJ-Verse’ as it has become known. The extreme views of love and loathing towards this latest iteration of Star Trek is reminiscent of some reactions towards Rick Berman and Brannon Braga’s helmsman-ship of the franchise. I recall comments on forums in the late 90s that are almost identical to the feedback that Roberto Orci recently railed against via Twitter. Trekkies enjoy discussing what makes the perfect Star Trek, and which series is truer to Gene Roddenberry’s vision than all others. I have met fans who like every series except… [insert any series here]. There are also those who feel [Series X] is the only real Star Trek. In a sense, such debates are at odds with the accepting ethos of our collective. The truth is that your individual interpretation of Star Trek is as valid as Roddenberry’s original vision, and we should all accept and embrace that diversity, whichever timeline you’re a fan of.
BY THE FANS, FOR THE FANS
“WE DON’T SIMPLY LOVE A TV SHOW, WE LIVE IT.”
Trekkie Girl Sam Darragh
DATACORE Two years ago Sam Darragh and Carole Maslan started Trekkie Girls (thanks school bullies for the name!) a blog where they discuss Star Trek and share their adventures in fandom. You can follow them at trekkiegirls.com and on Twitter @TrekkieGirls.
ADAPT AND PROSPER Trekkies are also forward looking, and keen to embrace new media, so it was inevitable that we would take to the internet like Risan Sea Turtles to water. The ability to communicate cheaply and easily has rendered the boundaries of distance – and even time – irrelevant. Regional clubs set up websites, only to find their membership expanded exponentially as geographical boundaries no longer held any meaning. From these online interactions many deep and lifelong friendships have formed. It’s a United Federation of… well, the Star Trek fans of this planet at least. When Enterprise was cancelled in 2005, and with no new movies on the horizon, life for Trekkies could have looked bleak. But like Klingon warriors we drew on the survival instincts we inherited from the likes of Bjo. Star Trek lived on in each of us. It is our Unimatrix Zero. Once again fans adapted to new circumstances, becoming authors, bloggers, podcasters and filmmakers. In a more complex media environment where fans cannot exert the same influence over a network as we did in the 1960’s, we came up with new ways to keep the series alive. There’s the Star Trek: Enterprise Season 5 Netflix campaign, for example, and assorted online fan-produced series like Star Trek: New Voyages serving to keep the flame
alive. And while fans are keen to obsess over “canon,” that hasn’t stopped them writing their own new adventures, in the form of fan-fiction. Some have become as popular as the TV series that spawned them. Alongside the TrekkieGirls blog, I’ve attended many conventions and met with many fellow fans, and through this engagement with fandom I’ve come to discover how much friendship and human relationships matter to me. I’ve met so many others doing something fun and worthwhile with their hobby, such as the crew of Starbase 24, who every year raise money for charity by dressing up, partying and hunting tribbles, and the crew of the U.S.S. Fortitude, who hold their own conventions to celebrate First Contact together. Then there’s Zombie Riker who... well, he dresses up as a zombified Riker! This is what I love most about Trekkies. We don’t simply love a TV show, we live it. Data once said that the meaning of life is to “contribute in a positive way to the world in which we live”, and Picard told Lily Sloane in First Contact that citizens of the Federation work to “better themselves and the rest of humanity.” That ethos has driven Trekkies consistently since the 1960s. Trekkies, I salute you – Live Long and Prosper! STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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HEART DARKNESS OF
You have to be a heavyweight in stature and delivery to trump the Klingons as the biggest badass in a Star Trek film, but actor Peter Weller did just that in Star Trek Into Darkness with his intense portrayal of Starfleet zealot Admiral Alexander Marcus. By Tara Bennett
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true believer in the necessity of might and firepower to neutralize the impending threat of a Klingon war, Admiral Marcus’ path to peace may be the antithesis of Starfleet’s exploration mandate, but he does make a remarkably clear case that gives one pause as he barks out his personal ideology. It takes a strong actor to make that kind of big antagonist real and far from caricature, which is why J.J. Abrams convinced Peter Weller to bring his incredibly persuasive persona into his rebooted Trek fold. The duo met in 2010 when Abrams enlisted Weller to guest star on Fringe, where he played a scientist tampering with time in the seminal episode, “White Tulip.” Two years later, Abrams came knocking again asking Weller to take on the heavy lifting of Admiral Marcus, the man whom Kirk would have to face down in the final act of the film.
A PhD student, actor, and television director, Weller already had plenty on his plate when he was approached, but the actor says he couldn’t resist working with the director again. Star Trek Into Darkness also represented the actor’s second foray into the universe, as he had done a two-episode stint on Star Trek: Enterprise as John Frederick Paxton, another zealot with similar thematic ties to Marcus. As Weller helped promote the DVD/Blu-ray release of Star Trek Into Darkness, we had an exclusive chat with the actor about the fun of working in the Trek realm, his defense of Marcus’ convictions, and his other creative endeavors. STM: In 2005, you appeared in two episodes of Enterprise, “Terra Prime” and “Demons.” Did you ever intend to return to the franchise, or was Star Trek Into Darkness a surprise?
PETER WELLER INTERVIEW No. I gotta tell you, I did [Enterprise] as an homage to Leonard Nimoy. Leonard is one of the oldest acquaintances I have in the business. The third job I ever did was a play with Leonard, so we’re old friends. Manny Coto, who was writing for Star Trek: Enterprise, convinced me to do it. Manny is very seductive and an old friend too. He said, “You have to do this homage to Leonard.” I was not really ever a Trekkie. I watched the original series as a kid; I watched some of it, but I didn’t know all the ins and outs. For all of the science fiction that I have been part of, I admire science fiction for its invention and its alternate realities but I’m not a science fiction guy. I’m an Art History/ Roman History guy. So I was conned into that and I had a great time. Whether or not Star Trek was going to come back [into my life], I have to tell you, I didn’t care. But when it was resurrected brilliantly by J.J., I marveled that this thing is never going to go away. This thing is in perpetuity. STM: Was there a moment that really clarified the scope of Trek to you personally? Nothing showed it more to me than when I was directing Longmire, a wonderful series for A&E, and I got the day off to present about 45 minutes of my dissertation in front of about 150 art professors and it was also the same day as the Star Trek Into Darkness premiere. So there I am doing the art academic thing and this limo comes to pick me up to go to the premiere. We are coming down the street and I see thousands and thousands of people. Now listen, I’ve been nominated for an Oscar, an Independent Spirit Award and SAG award, so I’ve done the red carpet, but I’d never seen anything like this. The Paramount representative said, “It’s a cult. It’s never going away.” There were people older than me and younger than me and it really hit me. Star Trek is forever, so there you go. You heard it here first. [Laughs]
“MARCUS’ POINT OF VIEW IS THAT THE KLINGONS ARE NOT GOING TO COME TO THE TABLE.”
STM: And that’s certainly a good thing in our book. It is good. It has a moral theme in it, which all great science fiction has. It has a social, political and moral theme of how to treat people.
NOT A SCI-FI GUY?
STM: Switching topics to characters with more of a hawk-like point of view, your character Admiral Marcus is a man who really represents the antithesis of what Starfleet is supposed to be about. [Laughs] I do want to defend Marcus. He is saying I want to sacrifice these guys, but everything Marcus says is true. The war with the Klingons is coming. We do need special weapons. Marcus did wake up Khan in order to use him, and he did admit his mistake. So everything Marcus said is right, it’s just too bad he was going to sacrifice the well being of the Enterprise. But yeah, there is a morality to Marcus too. STM: Do you have to believe everything a character like Marcus spouts to play him, because you are completely authentic with his message on screen. You have to agree with everything he says. You read it and you get it. The only character that truly doesn’t have a point of view is Iago in Othello. He says in the end when asked why did you
In a long and varied career, Peter Weller has notched up a fair number of science fiction and fantasy credits: The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension (1984)
A madcap sci-fi comedy adventure starring Weller as unorthodox genius (and rock musician) Doctor Buckaroo Banzai. RoboCop & RoboCop 2 (1987 & 1990)
Paul Verhoeven’s bloody and insanely satirical thriller starred Weller as cybernetically enhanced cop Alex Murphy. The actor handed in his badge after the first sequel.
Screamers (1995)
Cult adaptation of Philip K. Dick’s dystopian short story “Second Variety,” which sees Weller as Colonel Joseph A. Hendricksson fighting his way through alien enemy lines. Odyssey 5 (2002-2004)
Manny Coto’s TV series about a group of astronauts who survive the destruction of Earth, then go back in time to try to prevent it. Weller portrayed space shuttle commander Chuck Taggart. Batman: The Dark Knight Returns (2012)
Frank Miller’s seminal comic book saga brought to life in animated form, with Weller donning the caped crusader’s cowl.
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do this, he says “My lips are forever sealed,” so you don’t know why he does it. Jealousy? But everybody else has a point of view, and Marcus has a very strong point of view, so it’s very easy to tap into that, even if it’s not my point of view. Look, Marcus’ point of view is that the Klingons are not going to come to the table. They’re not going to handle things with grace; they’re not graceful people. Osama bin Laden was not a graceful guy and you were never going to get that guy to sit down and negotiate, so that’s substitution there. What they say in the Method is substitution is a personal invention or personal replacement of what the script says that you can’t really do. I’ve never been a General, but I have been a leader. I’ve never been in a spaceship, but I have been in an airplane. I’ve never been to war, but I’ve been in a bar fight when I was a kid, so there you go! STM: Marcus is in a position of being a father figure for Pike. But I wonder if you thought Marcus also saw himself as a better father figure to Kirk, especially after Pike’s demise? I felt like a father figure for Pike. I guess Marcus felt fatherly towards Kirk up to a point. When Kirk lets loose and stops believing him, then no. It’s a really hard call and really good writing for Marcus. STM: One of the most interesting twists for Marcus was his relationship with his daughter, Carol Marcus. Do you feel it humanized him and gave you something to work with in terms of the audience’s sympathies? Yeah, I think the most magnificent thing they did for Marcus was put the daughter in,
because se he had something to lose – family. It heightens ghtens the stakes for Marcus and makes it personal sonal when she is on the Enterprise. It’s great stuff that he’s ready to blow off a whole set of circumstances and people on a ship, but then his daughter is on the ship and confronts him. It’s t’s great stuff! To give an antagonist that many facets of life is wonderful. STM: At age 66, you are busier than ever in so many ny different arenas. Are you enjoying playing ng in several different sandboxes, or do youu find yourself leaning in one direction more than others? Everything thing changes, but I love the balance I have now. I have a two-year-old son and a wonderful wife. I have to finish this PhD. She said to me, “Finishh that damn PhD, because I’m sick of it,” so I am. m. I am probably teaching a course on directing ing actors for film at UCLA. I might teach another er class about Hollywood and the Roman Empire. e. They accepted the one course and are now reviewing eviewing the other course. It’s a way of being of service. I like that, giving back, which is satisfying. sfying. I also love directing. I’m going to go off and direct Guillermo del Toro’s new show, The Strain. rain. I have a very rich life. I don’t ever intendd to retire. I intend to be in the movies until I’m ’m 102 doing something... or looking at the Mediterranean editerranean going peacefully on to the other land. So yeah, it’s a combination of the PhD, acting, cting, teaching and directing remarkable shows like Sons of Anarchy, Longmire and now returning ing to Roberto Orci’s Hawaii 5-00 again. I love directing for television. There’s a time limit, a drive to it, an immediacy and a patience, if you will, to it that is really rewarding. I can’t complain. ain. I have a great life!
Peter Weller hits the red carpet.
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Alice Eve as Carol Marcus
® & © 2013 CBS Studios Inc. Star Trek and related marks are trademarks of CBS Studios Inc. CBS and related marks are trademarks of CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. TM, ® & © by Paramount Pictures. All Rights Reserved.
FIRST APPEARED IN ISSUE #40
A FASCINATING MAN THE LEONARD NIMOY INTERVIEW PART I From “The Cage” to JJ Abrams’ blockbuster 2009 movie, Leonard Nimoy’s portrayal of Spock has been a unifying force in the Star Trek universe. Despite announcing his retirement last year, the actor, director, and photographer finds himself as much in demand as ever. Tara Bennett talks to the Trek legend about his life and career.
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ever say the universe doesn’t have a sense of humor. Across the tapestry of human life and experience on our fair planet, there are infinite examples of the playful irony the cosmos serves up which are infinitely fascinating and diabolically amusing. Take for instance, the case of Leonard Nimoy. He’s an exemplar of the contemporary Renaissance man, having spent his entire life relentlessly exploring his artistic voice through acting, photography, and poetry. Yet 81 years into his extraordinary life, the character to which Nimoy will forever be most inextricably linked – Star Trek’s beloved halfhuman/half-Vulcan scientist Mr. Spock – is one that exemplifies a life devoid of emotional, impulsive, and illogical pursuits. Fascinating, indeed. Luckily for the universe, Nimoy is a man who can see the humor in such a dichotomy, especially as it applies to his own life. But then he knows that the great contradictions that have shaped his career and artistic legacy have afforded him an incredible array of fortuitous opportunities, once-in-a-lifetime experiences and real kinship with an entire planet of fans that truly credit him, and Mr. Spock, as a life-changing influence on their own lives. Sitting down for an exclusive voyage down memory lane with Star Trek Magazine, Nimoy
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discusses with us the disparate influences on his life, career, and artistic expression, and how a little television show called Star Trek spun his life around on its axis for the better.
THE TREK EFFECT
“I ADMIRE HIM AND I RESPECT HIM. I WOULD RATHER BE IDENTIFIED WITH SPOCK THAN ANY OTHER CHARACTER ON TELEVISION.”
“When I was 17,” Nimoy intones in his extraordinarily warm voice, “I made the decision that I wanted to be an actor, not only to entertain people but to offer some kind of enlightenment to help people understand their lives and the world we live in. Being involved with Star Trek has accomplished that with an exchange of ideas and enlightenment that I’m very proud of.” Now, 46 years into his close involvement with Gene Roddenberry’s seminal science fiction franchise, Nimoy has never had the love/hate relationship with the series that some of his fellow castmates have struggled with over the decades, regardless of what some may have heard or come to understand. Nimoy explains, “I made a big mistake in the early ‘70s when I wrote my first book about my Star Trek experiences. I wrote a chapter in that book about how I was identified in an airport by a lady who introduced me to her child as Mr. Spock. This child looked at me and did not see Mr. Spock,” he chuckles. “So I wrote a chapter about the difference between myself and the character in an effort to give
LEONARD NIMOY: INTERVIEW
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“STAR TREK, THE FRANCHISE, OFFERS A VERY BROAD CANVAS AND THE QUESTION IS: WHAT DO WE WANT TO PAINT ON IT?” the readers some insight into how an actor goes about building a character. It’s partially from him or herself and it’s partially from using elements of other people we may know. I called that chapter, ‘I Am Not Spock,’ meaning simply that I’m an actor who portrays Spock and this is how I go about doing it. “In the same book,” Nimoy continues, “I said if I was given a chance to identify with any character on television, I would choose Spock. I admire him, I like him, and I respect him. I would rather be identified with Spock than any other character on television. But the mistake I made was in using that title, ‘I Am Not Spock,’ as the title of the book. People assumed I was rejecting Spock and Star Trek but they didn’t read the book. If you read the book, you’ll find quite the opposite.” The proof of that is in how closely attached Nimoy has remained to all the various iterations of Trek over the decades, even most recently lending his voice as Spock Prime to the Star Trek Online MMO. Nimoy attributes that steadfast connection to the fact that the franchise has remained true to Roddenberry’s original intent, providing hope to humanity even in our darkest times. “I think it’s terribly exciting to sit down and watch the Enterprise slip its berth and leave its dock into the sky. If there’s a problem out there, we’re venturing out there to find out what we can do about it. I think it’s so exciting for people to view that experience.”
THE BURDEN OF COMMAND Star Trek hasn’t just provided Nimoy with an acting outlet for close to half a century. It also served as a creative springboard allowing – and pushing – him to explore his skills as a screenwriter and a director even when those weren’t avenues he ever intended to explore. Nimoy admits accepting the call to helm both Star Trek III: The Search for Spock and Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home represented a period of great creative and professional evolution in his life. “Interestingly enough, I never, never set out to be a director,” he explains. “I only set out to be an actor. But when they offered me
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LEONARD NIMOY: INTERVIEW would ever be able to understand any communication with aliens because of the inherent chasm of evolution between us. That in turn sparked Nimoy’s creative focus to our own communication disparities between species on Earth, like the enigma of interpreting humpback whale songs, which would then become the cornerstone of Star Trek IV. “I spent an awful lot of time researching humpback whales and talking to people about how whales live and function and connect to each other,” he says. “Environmental issues were on my mind in terms of my concerns about endangered species and what was happening to our planet in terms of the physical concerns, so all of that found its way into the script. “I was also dedicated to the idea of finding some humor [in that film],” he adds. “In the two previous films, we dealt with a lot of conflict, anger, hostility, and with people dying. I thought it was time to have a lighter touch and the only way I could do it was taking on the responsibility of command. When you talk about the burden of command, I thought at the time I am now totally responsible for developing a Star Trek movie that wasn’t the chance to direct, I thought I would be short-changing myself if I didn’t at least put my hand in there and try it. I did two or three episodes of various TV shows first, and then Star Trek III and IV.” Reminiscing on those experiences, Nimoy says, “The first time I directed for Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, we knew exactly what had to happen at the end of that movie, which was to resurrect the Spock character. I think it was done creatively and I think it was done respectfully. Others might have found some more interesting or exciting way to do it, but we did the job that had to be done. Having done that and with the film having opened successfully, when Paramount asked me to do another Star Trek movie I took it very, very seriously to find some ways to expand the idea and expand the audience’s experience. I spent the next two years almost exclusively working on that movie. I took very little other work during that period. The first two months were spent developing the ideas and we took trips to Massachusetts to talk to various scientists at Harvard and MIT, including [Professor of Physics Emeritus] Philip Morrison.” Of that meeting with Morrison, Nimoy says they talked about the realities of humanity interacting with superior life-forms from space and Morrison explained to him a little exasperatingly that there would be no idealistic exchange of technology and science. Morrison said it would be unlikely humans
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LEONARD NIMOY: INTERVIEW
“GENE RODDENBERRY HAD A VERY STRONG BELIEF IN THE POTENTIAL OF MANKIND, AND WHAT WE CAN ACCOMPLISH IF WE PUT OUR MINDS TO IT, AND I THINK STAR TREK IS STILL ON THAT TRACK.”
classic Star Trek so that’s the way I approached Star Trek: The Voyage Home. Star Trek, the franchise, offers a very broad canvas and the question is: what do we want to paint on it? At that time, I had very strong feelings about what I wanted that movie to be. I was extremely pleased with the result,” Nimoy reflects. The massive box office and critical success of those two Trek films provided Nimoy with more directing opportunities, including The Good Mother, Funny About Love, and Three Men and a Baby. Of Baby, Nimoy says, “I loved making that movie. I had a wonderful time. The cast and crew were wonderful. We had a talented bunch of people that really enjoyed that movie.” Some assumed Nimoy would leave acting behind, but he admits that was never the case. “Suddenly, I had a successful directing career but at the same time my personal life changed. I was in a new relationship with my [now] wife Susan and enjoying my children and grandchildren more than I ever had, so I decided I did not want to do more of that work much longer because it was totally consuming. I admire people that can do it year after year after year, but I found it so totally consuming to do it, the way I wanted to do it, that I wanted to withdraw gradually from all of that work to spend more time in my personal life.” He did take on some producing, which he did for Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, since it was based on a story that he helped develop. “I was able to capture something from the news that was useful. It was shortly after Chernobyl, and I went to Frank Mancuso, who was the head of Paramount at the time, and I said to him, “Look, the
Klingons have always been our stand-ins for Communist Russia and the Russians have now had a serious problem and, in their own way, have had to reach out for help. I said, wouldn’t it be interesting if the Klingons had a similar problem and for the very first time were willing to open themselves up and have others come into their culture. That was the genesis for the story, and I told it to Frank and Nicholas Meyer, who then wrote a very good script.” In the almost 20 years since that film, Nimoy has gone back to just being a performer in the Trek-verse, as well as an interested observer of its continuing evolution via new creative talents. But he says he hasn’t felt the need to help chart how the franchise evolves anymore. “I don’t know that I feel responsible for other people’s interpretations of Gene’s vision,” he muses. “If people ask me a specific question about what Gene had in mind, I’m happy to discuss it. But I don’t go about contacting people and saying you are or not following Gene’s vision. I think a lot of talented people have picked up the mantle and have gone on to make some wonderful projects under the Star Trek franchise.” In particular, he says he has “great admiration for J.J. Abrams. I think he’s extremely creative and respectful – respectful of what Star Trek is. My very first meeting I had with him, years ago when he first contacted me about the possibility of me acting in his first Star Trek movie, I was very touched by his sense of awe and wonder for Star Trek and the Spock character. I think he understood what Gene was trying to accomplish and what I was trying to accomplish with the character. I immediately said I would do the film if he directed it. Gene had a very strong belief in the potential of mankind, and what we can accomplish if we put our minds to it, and I think Star Trek is still on that track.”
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THE SCIENCE OF SPOCK Having played a character over the span of five decades gives one a special perspective, both creatively and culturally. Arguably, there is no other character in modern popular culture that has impacted the field of science more than Mr. Spock has. Asked why he thinks Spock has become such a unifying figure, not only in the franchise, but also amongst scientific professionals, Nimoy opines, “He’s so reliable, isn’t he? You can always count on him to look at a situation critically, intelligently, and rationally and not fly off the handle. He’s a very useful guy. “The most gratifying impact that Spock has had on me,” he continues, “has to do with people talking about how Star Trek and Spock have been positive influences in their lives, particularly young people who found him useful in balancing their own emotions and logic, discipline, and intellect. A lot of people have been encouraged to go into the sciences because of Mr. Spock. It’s terribly important to our country and our culture for young people to go into the sciences. We need that very, very badly, and to hear about that impact has made me very proud.” In all truth, Spock has essentially evolved into the poster boy for scientific achievement
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and merit to generations of current research explorers. Mr. Spock is revered by the likes of Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak to the character of theoretical physicist Sheldon Cooper (played by Jim Parsons) on the hit geek sitcom, The Big Bang Theory. Yet even now, Nimoy is surprised at the iconic stature Spock
has attained in those circles. “I can’t honestly say I anticipated the kind of identity you are describing,” he muses. “I did feel, when we were doing the series, that because it was so connected to future ideas and future science that it could have a very long life. I wasn’t clear about the scientific attachment, but I did believe it would take a long time before the series might become dated because the ideas were so futuristic.” In early 2012, Nimoy was invited by Steve Wozniak to speak at DEMO about his own experiences with science and he laughs when relating that, “I mentioned in my talk that I flunked chemistry in high school. I am not by any means a chemist.” Even with his photography, Nimoy says alchemy and chemistry remain a vast mystery to him. “Photography is based on concept rather than my execution of the chemistry. I have the tool that I need to be able to take a picture and go into a darkroom and make a print. But if you were to ask me the chemical process that is taking place on the paper through the chemicals, I would not be able to tell you. There are some photographers who are very invested in the chemistry of the work, but it’s never been my interest. My interest was to know what I needed to know to do a job I was trying to accomplish. People come up to
LEONARD NIMOY: INTERVIEW
“IT’S TERRIBLY IMPORTANT TO OUR COUNTRY AND OUR CULTURE FOR YOUNG PEOPLE TO GO INTO THE SCIENCES. WE NEED THAT VERY, VERY BADLY.” me and ask what kind of camera do I use, as if there was some secret with the camera to get the right picture. The camera doesn’t make a difference. You use the tool to get the job done.” Despite his lack of proclivity in the sciences, that doesn’t mean he’s not intrigued by what it’s wrought or by those that conjecture about its impact on our lives. Nimoy says he’s had some wonderful scientist friends, including Morrison, that have enriched his own creative life deeply. “I had some wonderful conversations with Isaac Asimov and Harlan Ellison. Harlan wrote one of our most famous episodes called ‘City on the Edge of Forever,’ which was a beautiful script with a beautiful idea. Harlan became a friend and I had some conversations with Asimov, who had a very large vision obviously in science fiction that was very helpful. The meeting with Philip Morrison was a mindopener. It really expanded my thinking of what
Star Trek IV could really be about. I was very grateful for that experience.” Today he admits he relies greatly on the technology that’s come to pass, some of which was inspired by Trek. “I’m very, very attached to my computer,” he laughs. “I use it mostly for email and research.” But there’s still some Trek tech he’s hoping science will make real hopefully sooner than later. “Traveling has become so difficult and so draining – to go
through the process of getting on an airplane and going someplace – so I’d like to step on a transporter pad and move from Los Angeles to New York without all the security hassle at the airlines,” he chuckles. Part two of our special interview with Leonard Nimoy – in which he discusses his photography, retirement, and plans for the future – begins on Page 68.
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A NEW BEGINNING
FIRST APPEARED IN ISSUE #41
The next generation of explorers
A NEW BEGINNING If you hadn’t realized already, 2012 marks the 25th anniversary of the return of brand new Star Trek to television screens across the planet. John Ainsworth and Lee Mansfield examine how The Next Generation redefined Star Trek and changed the science fiction TV landscape forever...
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n 2012, it’s hard to imagine a Star Trek universe that consisted of just one TV series, with one captain, one crew, and one starship. But from 1966 until 1987, that’s exactly what it was. For those who watched, loved, and lived it, the unique appeal of Star Trek wasn’t so much the often-quoted ‘Wagon Train to the stars’ adventures of the starship Enterprise in the far future, but the characters aboard that ship and their relationship with each other. In short, as far as most Trek viewers were
TWENTY YEARS AFTER ITS FIRST BROADCAST, THE ORIGINAL SERIES WAS STILL THE SINGLE MOST WATCHED DRAMA SERIES IN SYNDICATION.
concerned, Kirk, Spock, McCoy and their extended ‘family’ of semi-regular characters were Star Trek. But in 1987, that definition was challenged with the arrival of Star Trek: The Next Generation – and nothing would ever be the same again... With the cancellation of the original Star Trek in 1969, fans had to wait 18 years before a new live-action Star Trek series was back on their TV screens. It seems strange then to recall that The Next Generation didn’t receive a universally warm STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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welcome from long-time Trek fans. Many were at least suspicious of the new series and some were even hostile towards it. The reason was of course that these would not be the new adventures of Kirk, Spock, and McCoy but an entirely new crew on a new starship – even a new Enterprise! These days, ‘Iconic’ has a tendency to be a rather devalued compliment, attributed far too readily, yet there can be few people who would disagree that James T. Kirk, Mr. Spock, and Dr ‘Bones’ McCoy are pop culture icons of the 20th Century. So it’s perhaps not too difficult to see that the concept of Star Trek without them was, at least, a little controversial. Many Star Trek fans felt that they had ‘kept the faith’ in the years since the original TV series had ended, and had firm ideas about what was and wasn’t Trek. Far from being ‘wilderness years’, as they might be viewed from today’s perspective, 1969 to 1979 was a period in which the fans themselves Gene Roddenberry takes the Enterprise into the 24th Century
took ownership of the series, promoting and celebrating the adventures of their heroes in a variety of creative endeavors, including fanzines, fiction-writing, costume-making and even composing songs. Through regular conventions, the Star Trek fan community prospered, despite (or perhaps even because of) the absence of new TV episodes. Making appearances at these fan-organized conventions were the Star Trek actors who had played the show’s memorable characters, and they became known and loved by their fans. Professionally published novels, comic books, and a short-lived animated TV series (featuring the voices of the original cast), plus of course regular re-runs of the 79 live-action episodes, helped keep Star Trek alive in the 1970s. The news of a new Star Trek series – Star Trek Phase II – was announced in 1977, but there was disappointment when it became clear that Leonard Nimoy would not be returning to the role of Spock. Instead, a new Vulcan science officer would be taking his place along with other new regular characters. However, this all became academic when plans for the new TV series were dropped, to be replaced by a theatrically-released big screen adventure.
THE LONG WAIT Released in 1979, Star Trek: The Motion Picture may not have received universal praise, but it did at least feature the entire original cast of the TV series – including Spock, with Leonard Nimoy having reconsidered his position when the project moved from TV series to movie. Star Trek was back at last, and with the highly successful release of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan in 1982, its future
Data is reunited with Spot in Star Trek: Generations
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RODDENBERRY HAD HAD TIME TO PONDER AND REFINE HIS VISION OF THE STAR TREK UNIVERSE. as an ongoing movie series seemed assured. But, as good as the movies were, three years seemed a long time to wait for each new adventure. What fans really wanted was a weekly TV show. By 1986, Paramount, who owned the Star Trek property, decided that they also wanted a new Star Trek TV series. Twenty years after its first broadcast, the original TV series was still the single most watched drama series in syndication and the movies were box office sensations. Star Trek was big business, and Paramount reasoned that they could capitalize on its popularity by producing a new TV show. The only stumbling block, however, was the regular Star Trek cast. With Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home about to hit movie theaters, the actors were by now used to receiving movie star salaries. A TV series couldn’t hope to match those salaries and remain profitable. There was also a fear that a TV show with the same cast might harm demand for future films. The simple but brave decision that Paramount made to address these concerns was to have an entirely new cast. Recasting the roles of Kirk, Spock, McCoy and the rest was inconceivable – at least in 1986 – so the new cast would play a completely new starship crew. After initially declining to be involved, original series creator Gene Roddenberry joined the production team of the new show as
A NEW BEGINNING
Transported to a different tomorrow
executive producer. Much loved by Star Trek fans, Roddenberry’s appointment went some way to reassure fans that the new show would still be genuine Star Trek. With the passage of time since the demise of the original show, Roddenberry had had time to ponder and refine his vision of the Star Trek universe and the future of humanity as he saw it. Although not a ‘re-boot’, as we have seen with the recent Battlestar Galactica series, Star Trek: The Next Generation would definitely be an evolution of the concept whilst retaining the essence of optimism and self-betterment. By cleverly setting the new show in a time period some 80 years after the original series and
SQUARE PEGS So much of Star Trek, in all of its various incarnations, has been about exploring the human condition. How better to do that than by allowing the audience to examine humanity – and thereby themselves – through the eyes of characters that are not human but are forced to co-exist with humans. The aloof and logical Vulcan Spock was the only alien aboard the original Enterprise and was the first to fill this role. Although we learn that he himself was half-human, he had clearly adopted the Vulcan approach to life and was frequently puzzled by illogical, emotional human behavior. In Star Trek: The Next Generation, the android Data, who was devoid of emotions, became determined to understand what it was to be human. Running throughout the entire seven seasons of the series and on into the following movies, this thread eventually reached something of a conclusion when, thanks to a tiny computer chip, Data was actually able to experience emotions first-hand.
movies, Roddenberry gave himself room to make a variety of changes to the Trek universe without contradicting what had gone before. Prior to 1986, the Star Trek universe felt very open – limitless and pioneering. It was essentially the story of three archetypes – the Warrior (Kirk), y) the Priest (Spock), and the Healer ((McCoy) w worlds” on a dangerous exploring “strange new ountering “new life and new frontier together, encountering p ng to improvise a kind of civilizations” and having nst the hostile or ‘gunboat diplomacy’ again against thouugh this was still an dangerously alien. Although eration, many element of The Next Gene Generation, episodes would focus on tthe internal ederation of problems of the Unitedd Fe Federation Planets and Starfleet withh stories hnologies, revolving around new tech technologies, cy, aand set on politics, and diplomacy, worlds already within the Federation’s uch more boundaries. This was a mu much eration, one that had developed and stable Fed Federation, expanded its borders and was now buffeting against the territories of tthe other ‘known’ ld often powers. Captain Kirk woul would have to make his own decisions, with Starfleet Command several dayss io. away by subspace radio. rise On the U.S.S. Enterprise of Star Trek: The Nextt Generation though, Captain Picard would frequently be obliged to iorss consult with his superiors uch who were only the touch of a button away.
that, in the future, interaction between humans and other intelligent civilized peoples would be far more harmonious, and individuals would not be motivated by baser desires. Perhaps one of the most significant developments in Star Trek: The Next Generation over the original series was the sense that this was much more of an ongoing story. Although each episode was a self-contained adventure, there was also an additional level of appreciation to be found by watching the series episode by episode. Empires rise and fall, relationships begin and end, familiar characters make recurring appearances. ‘Soap opera’ series such as Dallas and Dynasty had broken the mould of prime time U.S. TV drama in the 1980s by daring to tell an ongoing story that required the viewer to watch each week. Although Star Trek: The Next Generation couldn’t be described as a soap opera, it certainly took a step in that direction. The success of the series proved that the format could work in a science fiction drama series and the idea would be employed by other genre shows in the future. Today, 25 years later, it is the norm for genre shows to have quite g q complex, ongoing story ‘arcs’ and The Next Generation is, at least in part, responsible for this. That Star Trek: The Next Generation was a huge success – both for Paramount and, ultimately, in the eyes of the fans – is now a matter of record. Although there were a few
PASS THE SOAP The depiction of personal relationships ps had also evolved, based on Gene fs Roddenberry’s beliefs STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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fans who did part company with Trek, unable to take to the new crew and the new look of the series, for the most part even those that had doubts came to embrace the new show and the three spin-off series that were born from its success. Star Trek: The Next Generation proved to be a whole new beginning for the Star Trek franchise, attracting many new fans too young to have seen and enjoyed the original series on its first broadcast. What is perhaps less well recognized though, is that The Next Generation proved to be a turning point in the history of U.S. TV broadcasting as well as in Star Trek history. Having decided to produce their new Star Trek series, Paramount attempted to sell it to the ‘Big Three’ television networks – NBC, ABC, and CBS. However, despite Star Trek’s continued success as a syndicated TV show, none of the networks were willing to commission an entire series – NBC and ABC wanted to see a pilot first, and CBS requested a mini-series. Fox was just about to launch its own network and were keen to have the series on their new channel, but were only able to commission 13 episodes. With a firm belief in the strength of Star Trek, Paramount was unwilling to compromise and wanted to retain total control over its new show. So it took the unusual decision to broadcast Star Trek: The Next Generation in first-run syndication on independent stations and affiliate stations of the Big Three networks that could choose to opt out of network programming. The show was given to these local stations for free, but in exchange, Paramount would receive a share of the advertising revenue generated from its screening. As an added incentive, re-runs of the still popular original series would only be made available to channels that took the new
What once was old is new again... Star Trek (2009)
WITH A FIRM BELIEF IN THE STRENGTH OF STAR TREK, PARAMOUNT WAS UNWILLING TO COMPROMISE. Make it so
show. In 1986, this was a virtually unheard of way of selling a new drama series, but it was a strategy that worked with the revenue from advertising actually proving greater than the typical fee that the networks would have paid for the series. Star Trek: The Next Generation attracted an average audience of 20 million viewers, regularly beating the ratings of other top syndicated and networked shows.
A NEW WORLD Such was the success of Paramount’s pioneering approach to the sale and broadcast of Star Trek: The Next Generation that other shows soon followed, adopting the same model with similar success, and by 1994 there were more than 20 hour-long shows in first-run syndication. Many of these were genre shows including Friday the 13th: The Series, Freddy’s Nightmares, and War of the Worlds – all of which were based (however loosely) on existing movie properties. Star Trek: The Next Generation had spectacularly demonstrated that not only was there life in Star Trek but in the science fiction genre as well. A wealth of new sci-fi shows, both in first-run syndication and on the networks would premier over the next few years. Some would not last but others became huge hits, including The X-Files, Buffy the Vampire Slayer,
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A NEW BEGINNING Kirk and Spock Prime meet a young Scotty
Hercules: the Legendary Journeys and its spinoff show, Xena: Warrior Princess, Babylon 5, and Forever Knight. Star Trek: The Next Generation had set a ball rolling and it’s still rolling today, with a crop of new sci-fi and fantasy shows debuting every new season. Of course, The Next Generation would give rise to its own spin-off series that would further explore the ever more diverse Star Trek universe with new characters in new situations. However, although Deep Space Nine, Voyager, and Enterprise enjoyed varying degrees of success, none ever quite reached the heights attained by their ground-breaking progenitor. With no new Star Trek show having aired since 2005, we have once again entered another comparatively quiet period. However, much as The Next Generation did in 1986, J.J. Abrams’ 2009 Star Trek movie has both reinvented and reinvigorated the franchise whilst maintaining a direct connection with its illustrious past. And this time it has come full circle, returning to the iconic characters of the original series, Kirk, Spock, and McCoy – now played by a new young cast. The long and complex fictional history established in the preceding series and movies has been deftly set aside, while being neither contradicted or ignored. Everything is new again, and the adventure continues...
PASSING ON THE TORCH To help underline the connection of Star Trek: The Next Generation to the original series, the very first episode – “Encounter at Farpoint” included a one-scene cameo appearance by Doctor ‘Bones’ McCoy. With the help of make-up and prosthetics, actor DeForest Kelley played the now very elderly Leonard McCoy and was seen to give his blessing to the new Enterprise and her crew. Further crowd-pleasing appearances by the show’s original stars were to follow with engineer Montgomery Scott – or ‘Scotty’ – appearing in the episode “Relics”, while Spock featured in the two part “Unification” story. History was to repeat itself with the cast of Star Trek: The Next Generation making occasional appearances in the spin-off Trek shows that followed it. The Enterprise’s head of security, Worf, became a regular character in the latter seasons of Deep Space Nine; Deanna Troi and fellow Enterprise crewman Reginald Barclay made semi-regular appearances in Voyager; and both Troi and William Riker were seen in new flashback sequences in the final episode of Enterprise. As well as being popular with the fans, each of these crossovers served to emphasise that Star Trek was now one big, interconnected universe. The most recent such handover was in the 2009 Star Trek movie, where the Spock of ‘our’ universe is seen to travel into his own past at a point where the timeline diverges in an alternate direction. The presence of both Spock and the actor who plays him, Leonard Nimoy, united the The real McCoy, “Encounter at Farpoint” origins of Star Trek with its exciting new future, making them one.
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FIRST APPEARED IN ISSUE #41
NUMBER ONE THE JONATHAN FRAKES INTERVIEW As first officer of the Enterprise-D, Commander Will Riker was always at the center of the action, and behind the scenes so was the man who portrayed him. Jonathan Frakes took time out of his busy schedule for an exclusive interview with Star Trek Magazine’s Tara Bennett, to talk about the impact Trek has had on his creative life, what he admires most about the Riker character, and how he feels about where Star Trek is headed now.
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n the pantheon of Star Trek characters, William Thomas Riker has always managed to stand out from the Starfleet pack as a reliable officer, a brash strategizer, and a loyal friend. Even assessing him on shallower terms, Riker’s got a smile that rivals Captain Kirk’s on the charm-ometer and, frankly, no one’s rocked any Enterprise Bridge with a beard as badass as his. Of course, the smile and beard are just two of many, many assets that actor Jonathan Frakes brought to his portrayal of Riker over the span of 18 years, four different Trek series, and four Star Trek: The Next Generation films. But playing Riker also shifted Frakes towards a new career as a director, where he made a huge impact on helping to successfully transition, and then keep, epic Star Trek stories featuring the Next Generation cast viable on the big screen. Now a frequent director on the TNT dramedy series, Leverage, Frakes took a break from prepping his upcoming episode to reminisce with us. Recently back from a Star Trek convention appearance in Australia, Frakes opened with genuine warmth and surprise in regards to the reception he and his fellow Trek colleagues received Down Under. “I was just in Adelaide, Australia where there were 19,000 people at a comic book convention for the first time there ever,” he says with awe. “My show is 25 years old! The original show is 45 years old! It’s just insanity. It’s fabulous!”
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Jonathan Frakes as Commander William T. Riker
“WE WERE GOING INTO A WORLD WHERE EVERYONE WAS SO SKEPTICAL ABOUT US.”
Frakes says this with the benefit of hindsight, remembering when the idea of a new Star Trek series appearing on television wasn’t welcomed with open arms by critics or fans. “We were going into a world where everyone was so skeptical about us because of the success of the ‘Kirk, Spock, Bones’ Star Trek. I’m not sure they wanted us to succeed, or let anyone else into the family,” Frakes muses. Already a successful TV actor for a decade when he auditioned for Star Trek: The Next Generation in 1987, Frakes says no one in the cast was prepared for how Trek would affect their careers and lives when they first signed up. “The only people who really knew Star Trek were Michael Dorn [Worf] and Wil Wheaton [Wesley Crusher],” the actor admits. “And the only people who were famous were LeVar Burton [Geordi La Forge] and Wil Wheaton. I don’t think we were aware until we got into it and then we were lucky to become this phenomenon of pop culture that’s the world of Star Trek.” Playing Commander William Riker, the first officer to Captain Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) on the U.S.S. Enterprise-D, Frakes’ character started the show as a fresh-faced, confident, ladies’ man. While Picard was the steady, erudite Captain, Riker initially got to fill the quasi-Kirk roll, going on away missions and being more aggressive with off-book strategy. Asked if the producers nudged him to
JONATHAN FRAKES: INTERVIEW
Photo courtesy of Paradigm Agency
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Introducing Will Riker in “Encounter at Farpoint”
the same energy because I knew that when I got there, not only were we going to do some great storytelling, but we were going to have a ball. It was the most wonderful, funny, irreverent, clever group of friends.”
URBAN LEGEND
put more Kirk in his character, Frakes affably demurs. “No, they didn’t put that pressure on me. Part of Kirk’s charm was that he had an alien in every port and they tried that for a while with Riker, which was great fun, but I was never Kirk. Also with Marina [Sirtis] and me, it was established in the Pilot that Riker and Deanna Troi had a relationship, even though the writers chose to neglect it until we convinced them otherwise – or maybe they saw the light,” he laughs. “We got married during Star Trek: Nemesis, and that relationship informed the way the two of us behaved with each other and other people. Neither of us was as free as Kirk to just go out and have these affairs, although both characters sort of did.” Frakes says the bond between him and Sirtis is indicative of all the relationships he formed on TNG, a very rare thing in Hollywood. “As Great beards of the galaxy reunited, in Star Trek: First Contact
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“IT’S NO SECRET THAT BEING A STAR TREK ACTOR IS A DOUBLEEDGED SWORD.” you’ve read and probably know, we’re all still friends. We’re so fortunate. Other shows are not like that,” Frakes explains about the tensions that eventually arise on most long-running shows. “I’ve done a lot of shows since Star Trek, and I see what the cast feels like in the fourth season or the sixth season or the fifth season. But my memory of the 182 episodes and the seven seasons that we did – and I don’t know if it’s shaded by distance – but my memory is that I looked forward to going to work every day with
It’s been seven years since Frakes last played Riker on-screen, but he admits that certain topics still come up often when he speaks to fans. “The beard!” he laughs. As fans know, Riker came back in season two with a new beard and it immediately became a signature look for Picard’s “Number One.” Explaining its birth, Frakes says, “It happened that [Gene] Roddenberry liked it very much. He thought it would be great for the character to have what he referred to as a ‘nautical and decorative beard,’ so that’s why the beard became so distinctly shaped. I still have it, even though it’s white now,” the actor chuckles. He continues, “You know, I got the greatest news from one of our writers on Leverage. There’s an Urban Dictionary reference that says Riker’s beard is equivalent to the opposite of ‘Jumping the Shark’ when you’re making a TV show. It means when you make a cool choice, it’s a ‘Riker’s Beard’. Come on! What kind of privilege is that?” he enthuses. A regret the actor has never had is being a part of the Trek world in the first place. While the support of the Trek fandom can be incredible for actors, close association with the Trek franchise itself can be tough on actors trying to move on to other projects in their career. For that reason, plenty of actors have walked away from Trek and declined to return. However Frakes has never distanced himself from Trek, and in fact he’s appeared as Riker on four
JONATHAN FRAKES: INTERVIEW
New voyages beckon for Captain Riker in Star Trek: Nemesis
different series: TNG, DS9, Star Trek: Voyager, and Enterprise. “I always said yes, because by that point the die had already been cast, for better or for worse,” Frakes explains about his choices. “It’s no secret that being a Star Trek actor is a double-edged sword. Patrick seems to
DATACORE
have dodged a bullet, and Shatner has reinvented himself to a certain degree, especially in the last few years. As actors, when we’re dead they’ll say, ‘You knew him best as Riker’ or ‘You knew him best as Data’ and that’s great. But still it’s another reason I feel so lucky
to have learned another craft, because now I’m flat out [booked] until the end of the year.” That other craft he speaks of is directing; a calling that didn’t manifest itself until Frakes was working on TNG. He reveals to us the reasons why he started to look outside of acting for creative fulfillment: “I hated waiting around in my dressing room at Paramount, and that feeling started to motivate me. So I looked around the set for the most interesting and engaging job, and that was obviously the director. It felt like something I knew about because, as an actor, I knew how to communicate with other actors and break down the beats of a scene. You learn a lot about that in drama school, and that applies to a lot of directing. By voicing an interest, I’m sure my friend [Star Trek producer] Rick Berman just cringed and he said, ‘No, you have to learn more than that.’” Instead of walking away, Frakes says he jumped right into on-the-job training. “I went to what we refer to as Paramount University, where I was able to shadow all the directors on the show. I spent about 300 hours in the editing room with all the editors, who were very generous with their time, and where I learned
Will Riker continues his tour of duty aboard the Enterprise-D in the fourth season of Star Trek: The Next Generation
Not content with his duties as Starfleet’s number one Number One, Jonathan Frakes took command of 16 Star Trek adventures as Director:
STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION “The Offspring” “Reunion” “The Drumhead” “Cause and Effect” “The Quality of Life” “The Chase” “Attached” “Sub Rosa”
STAR TREK: DEEP SPACE NINE “The Search, Part II” “Meridian” “Past Tense, Part II”
STAR TREK: VOYAGER “Projections” “Parturition” “Prototype”
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what you need to give an editor to put a scene together. I did a lot of post-production in terms of the mix, the sound, and the scoring. And then I got involved in pre-production where I learned about casting and budgeting. Oddly, by virtue of Rick being reticent and my lovely wife, Genie Francis, encouraging me to persevere, by the time they finally relinquished a TNG episode, I was so over-prepared it was insane,” he laughs.
THE A-LIST In 1996, Frakes earned the opportunity to direct Star Trek: First Contact, the first to feature just the TNG cast. It was his first major motion picture directorial effort, and Frakes chuckles when he admits, “I was naïve enough to be confident. Also, it became clear that the A-list sci-fi directors were not going to do Star Trek 8. The Ridley Scotts of the world were not interested. Sherry Lansing, who was running [Paramount] at the time, said to Rick [Berman] that she didn’t understand Star Trek as well as everybody else. She told him to make the decisions and make the movie the way they had been, which was very generous. So we put our hats in the ring [to direct] and I was the lucky guy who won the lottery with that one.”
“I LOOKED AROUND THE SET FOR THE MOST INTERESTING AND ENGAGING JOB, AND THAT WAS OBVIOUSLY THE DIRECTOR.”
Jonathan Frakes directed the hit TNG movie, Star Trek: First Contact
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A final visit to the Enterprise, in “These Are the Voyages”
JONATHAN FRAKES: INTERVIEW Captain Picard (Patrick Stewart) congratulates Will Riker and Deanna Troi (Marina Sirtis) on their marriage in Star Trek: Nemesis
Star Trek: First Contact ended up being a very positive experience for Frakes all around. The film was a critical and a commercial hit, earning $146 million worldwide, the best international box office performance by a Trek film ever until 2009’s Star Trek. In 1998, Frakes was back to direct Star Trek: Insurrection, another solid hit for the franchise. Frakes says he learned about directing a TV episode as opposed to a theatrical film. “The real difference is in the size of the toys and the amount of time. You can do all those things on TV if you have the time and the money to do them. Also, I was lucky enough to get this big brother figure in Matthew Leonetti, who was the director of photography on First Contact. He’d worked with a lot of first-time directors before, and he was so generous and fabulous with his team. Matt helped me discover what it took to make a movie. Also there was Terry Frazee, who was the special effects guy who blew everything up for me, and he made the scope of the movie huge. What I really learned was that you’re really as good as the people you hire to work with you. Those guys were part of the team that included the brilliant Herman Zimmerman, the production designer, and the brilliant Michael Westmore, who was the king of make-up. Another part of the Star Trek movies was that we had John Knoll, the Academy Award winner from ILM, who did special effects for First Contact, and then we had Jim Rygiel, who ultimately won the Academy Award for The Lord of the Rings, who did Insurrection. We had the cream of the crop.” He pauses, then adds with glee, “I’m so blessed. I’m so friggin’ blessed!” Now a respected and in-demand television drama director who moonlights occasionally as an actor, Frakes admits he’s really comfortable now assuming command of any show that hires him. “It’s something I enjoy, and as you do it, you get a little more confident with it. When you do the shows that I do, which are established television shows –when you do the Burn Notice,
the Leverage, the NCIS: LA, and Castle, your responsibility is to make their show. You don’t go in and reinvent the wheel. You don’t go in and shoot it in a style the audience is uncomfortable with. I do try to inject small things, keeping an ing and keeping the pace and eye on the acting ry clearly, so I’m thrilled when telling the story nd to my directing.” people respond Asked whatt it is about directing that appeals to his creative self, Frakes considers his answer for a moment. “That’s a really good question. I really activelyy like shooting much more than prep. I like to go to work in the morning, shoot all day and at the end of the day you know you shed, let’s say, eight pages of the have accomplished, story you wantt to tell. I like being in the factory working with other people making something en I was an actor, you really just together. When wait. There’s a famous old quote that says, “They pay me to wait. I act for free.” That’s really what happens,, especially if you’re not the lead.”
ultimate goal is to become a director/executive producer on a series where he guides the visual aesthetic for the entire series and mentors guest directors that come to the show. “I’m still looking for that job!” he exhales wistfully. “It gets harder and harder because there are so few of them, because there are so few scripted shows. Plus, there are so many movie guys making television now. It used to be that people who made movies didn’t think about making television, but now everyone is making the move, and especially with pilots. So I’m actively looking for my own show, but in the meantime I’m very happy to have the places where I can hang my hat for a few weeks at a time.” Frakes admits the closest situation he’s had to that dream director job was at the helm of TNT’s popular The Librarian adventure TV movies starring Noah Wyle (ER, Falling Skies). “I feel great ownership of those with Dean [Devlin] and Noah [Wyle]. I think we are joined at the hip with The Librarian movies and
DREAM JOB Since watchingg TV is now research for a possible next gig, or at least a potential add to his directorial wish-list, sh-list, Frakes now has a whole host of currentt shows which he admires. “I think Homeland is the he best show I’ve seen in five years. Genie and I would wait with baited breath for it to come on, and I haven’t felt that way about television evision in a long time. I just watched some Sons of Anarchy, whichh I think is spectacular. We watch Modern Family, y, which I think is genius. s. A friend of ours turnedd us on to Downton Abbey. ey. And the sense of humor umor on Leverage is fabulous. bulous.” In the near future, Frakes says hiss STAR StarTREK Trek MAGAZINE
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Riker hunts down the enemy in Star Trek: Nemesis
“LEVAR BURTON WILL GO INTO A TOWN AND ANNOUNCE HE IS LOOKING FOR A PLACE TO HAVE A BEER, AND 70 FANS WILL SHOW UP.” we’re hoping to do another one. I think [the delay] is a function of timing, because even TNT would like to get the team back together again. I love them, and I love Noah.” Bringing the conversation back to fandom and Trek, we talk about how the world has changed incredibly since Frakes started on Trek, especially in regards to the Internet and social media engagement directly with fans. Frakes has a Twitter account (@jonathansfrakes) but he admits, “I’m a reluctant Twitterer. I had my arm twisted by Jeri Ryan, who is a massive Tweeter, and Beth Riesgraf, who plays Parker on Leverage, pressured me when we were doing a show together. Then friggin’ Beth signed me up on my iPhone without putting any screening on, so when I got back to my hotel room there were thousands of f*****g emails! I had to delete
The Enterprise-E crew depart the planet Ba'ku in Star Trek: Insurrection
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Commander Riker in Star Trek: Generations
thousands of emails and put the filter on so I didn’t get email notices,” he laughs. Still uncomfortable with how much to engage or not, Frakes chuckles that social media “goes from the mundane to weird. It’s a good tool to promote what you’re doing but, interestingly, I get the impression that that’s not what Twitter followers want. They don’t want to hear that you’re doing another episode of Leverage. They want to hear where you’re having a drink or what your favorite foods are. I just don’t roll that way. Wil Wheaton is a great Tweeter. LeVar [Burton] will go into a town and announce he is looking for a place to have a beer, and 70 fans will show up and join him in a pub. He’s got like a million seven followers! Yet Brent [Spiner], who also has a million five followers, is as shy as LeVar is out there.” As for Trek, it’s been seven years since
Enterprise was canceled, and there’ve been no serious moves towards developing a new television series. Asked if he thinks it’s time for a new show, Frakes answers with a smile, “It’s still on TV every night, somewhere, and the fans watch it with the same loyalty. Really, the fact there is no new Star Trek, from what I’m told, is a very conscious effort on behalf of J.J. Abrams, CBS, and Paramount. What happened with Star Trek: Nemesis was that greed drove them to the well too much. It really did.” With lessons learned, Frakes thinks Star Trek on the big screen is enough for now. “I’m a huge J.J. fan, and he’s been great for the franchise. J.J.’s reboot was so sensational. As a matter of fact, I was just on the set [of Star Trek 2] where Benedict Cumberbatch (Sherlock) is the bad guy in the movie, and he’s spectacular!” Rounding out our conversation, Frakes says William Riker will always remain a character near and dear to his heart. “One of the things that Patrick and I always said about both Picard and Riker was that we wished we could be as clever, diplomatic, appropriate, and intelligent as those two characters were. I think the character that the writers gave me to play is the man I wish I was able to be.”
© 2013 Lucasfilm
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JOHN DE LANCIE: INTERVIEW
FIRST APPEARED IN ISSUE #41
JOIN THE
Whether you think of him as Picard’s arch-nemesis or humanity’s enigmatic shepherd, John de Lancie’s colorful Q is one of the most loved bad guys in Star Trek history. Bryan Cairns spoke to the actor about Trek, computer games... and My Little Pony?!
W Q visits Quark’s Bar in the DS9 episode “Q-Less”
“IT OCCURRED TO ME THAT Q WAS OMNIPOTENT, BUT TOO STUPID TO KNOW IT.”
hen John de Lancie descended on Hollywood, clearly he had a message in mind: Resistance is futile! With a body of work that has now spanned 35-plus years, the busy actor conquered the film world with credits that include The Hand that Rocks the Cradle, The Fisher King, Crank 2, and Reign Over Me. De Lancie didn’t slow down in TV-land either, racking up appearances in shows ranging from Breaking Bad and The West Wing, to The Six Million Dollar Man, Legend, Stargate SG-1, and recent stints on Torchwood: Miracle Day and The Secret Circle. He’s voiced video games such as Assassin’s Creed III and Interstate ’76, as well as animated projects including My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Duck Dodgers, and The Real Adventures of Jonny Quest. Then there’s his stage work, the operas he’s directed and, well, the list goes on and on and on. Regardless of his impressive resumé, it’s the almighty Q that remains his most recognizable, and beloved role. Looking back to those early Trek days, de Lancie obviously brought a certain energy and intensity to the Q audition that impressed the casting directors.
“At the time, I was playing Roald Amundsen, who is the Arctic explorer,” says de Lancie. “I had a sense of that in my body. I had also played Lord Byron, who was from Mad, Bad and Dangerous to Know. It was sort of a combination of these two characters.” Back in 1987, all eyes were on Star Trek: The Next Generation’s premiere, “Encounter at Farpoint.” Viewers were introduced to Captain Jean-Luc Picard commanding the U.S.S. Enterprise and a crew of fresh dedicated faces eager to complete their first mission. That almost didn’t happen since en route to speak with the Bandi, the ship came across an enigmatic super being named Q, who decided to put humanity on trial. “Patrick [Stewart] and I had rehearsed a little before I left to go to Japan,” recalls de Lancie about shooting the pilot. “I was gone a month before coming back to be on Next Generation. I arrived Sunday night from Japan and was on the set at 6am for Star Trek. I was mostly jetlagged. I remember there was a lot of attention to detail. It was an unusual situation because most people do not have the opportunity to get a second chance, as it were. Gene [Roddenberry], some STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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of the producers and the original costumer were there. Everybody was really excited to be back, so there was all of that going on. It was an exciting time is what I remember.”
GOOD Q/BAD Q The closest thing to an intergalactic prankster, Q originated from the Q Continuum and often demonstrated a crazy amount of power. Mysterious and mischievous, Q’s motives for interacting with the Enterprise have never clearly been defined. “I don’t know if I spent a great deal of time asking that,” offers de Lancie. “I do know that there’s a technical issue when you play certain characters – not least the kings, wizards, and the all-powerful – and that is that after you’ve sort of strutted around the room a couple of times, being very kingly, there isn’t much else to do. That goes with being omnipotent. In this case, it occurred to me that Q was omnipotent, but too stupid to know it. Or that he was allpowerful, but with clay feet, and he was needy. He was really needy, which is something I think makes someone more interesting, rather than just being kingly.”
Q puts humanity on trial in “Encounter at Farpoint”
An instant fan favorite, Q was to have sporadically plagued Picard and friends throughout the first season. That was the game plan, but was not how things worked out. “After the first week, Gene came up to me and said, ‘We’re going to bring you back six or seven
times per year,’” reports de Lancie. “Then he came up to me on the lot and said, ‘We can’t do that because the audience is going to wait for The Trickster.’ There’s nothing else for me to say. It’s like somebody else’s dinner party. You’re either invited or you’re not.”
Q plays “Qpid”
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JOHN DE LANCIE: INTERVIEW De Lancie subsequently appeared in season two’s “Hide and Q”, where Q grants Commander William T. Riker immense powers to tempt him to join the Q Continuum. Next up was “Q Who,” where an irate Q transports the Enterprise light years across the galaxy, before vanishing himself. It was in this unchartered territory that the ship runs into the lethal Borg and barely manages to escape unscathed. For many Trekkies, Q’s actions branded him a villain, a notion de Lancie does not share. “Well, what I get is, ‘When I first saw you, I really hated you. Then I really loved you. Then I saw you were really on their side,’” he laughs. “There’s a whole arc there. You have to understand it was an arc that only lasted eight episodes in Next Generation. Of course, the material is important. I tried in each one of those episodes to bring out some sort of new facet. The best episodes invariably are the ones of a more philosophical nature.” “Deja Q” found Q stripped of his powers and stuck on the Enterprise during a crisis of gravitational proportions. Learning a lesson for a change, surely playing a humanized Q was a welcome shift in pace. “It was sort of a comedic turn,” says de Lancie. “The episodes that incorporated everything were ‘All Good Things’ and ‘Tapestry.’ You actually see him try and work with these people. In ‘Tapestry,’ in his own asshole-y way, he’s trying to be a nice guy. In ‘All Good Things,’ you see in a way, he has really shepherded and protected these people and wishes them well.” Speaking of “All Good Things,” de Lancie seemed thrilled to bookend the series and watch it come full circle. “Yeah, very much so,” he confirms. “It was something I appreciated and took seriously.”
Q and Picard face off
Recurring over seven seasons also put de Lancie in the unique position of being able to observe the show grow and evolve. “Jonathan Frakes [Riker] used to sit me down and say, ‘Tell me everything you see,’” explains de Lancie. “I don’t remember what I said anymore. I’m sure in my own way I was blunt and hopefully accurate.”
Q & A-TYPE Even after The Next Generation wrapped in 1994, de Lancie was recruited for one episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and three more of Star Trek: Voyager. “The Q and the Grey” was an awkward episode where Q approached Janeway [Kate Mulgrew] to be the father of his child. She declined, but ultimately became the godmother of his son instead. Evidently, Q had a different relationship with Janeway Double trouble in the Voyager episode “Death Wish”
“WE WERE JUST TWO MEN WHO WERE VYING FOR WHO WAS ON TOP. IT WAS ALL VERY A-TYPE PERSONALITY.” than with Picard, so did de Lancie favor one captain over the other? “They were written for different dynamics” he counters, “The relationship between Picard and I was uncluttered by the potential for romance. We were just two men vying over who was on top. It was all very A-type personality. The Janeway situation had the potential for some romance. But they were so concerned she not play it that she was in any way tempted, infatuated, or in no way affected in a relationship/sexual level, I think they missed a big opportunity. That was the 800-pound gorilla in the room. We should have gone down that road and then have the rug pulled out, mostly from under me. It gave us so many possibilities, but we had to turn a blind eye to it. That dialogue, that experience, was just not as fulfilling.” In “Q2,” Q arrives on the U.S.S. Voyager to introduce Janeway to her godson, Q Junior. Unfortunately, power corrupts, and the youngster was a bit of a hellion and wreaked havoc by instigating wars and pitting the Voyager against Borg vessels. If Q Junior bears an uncanny resemblance to his dear old TV Dad, there’s a pretty good reason. Junior was played by de Lancie’s real life son, Keegan. STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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Captain Q on the bridge
One of the projects de Lancie is most proud of is Alien Voices, which he formed along with Leonard Nimoy back in 1996. The endeavor involved various Star Trek actors performing great science fiction literature for audio. Recently released as digital downloads, people can finally hear that series again. “I was delighted,” de Lancie says of the development. “I worked hard to get them back up there on a website at a reasonable price. They can hear them all.”
Q IS FOR QUADWRANGLE
“My agents called me and said, ‘By the way, I don’t know if you know this, but they are casting for the character of your son. Do you want me to submit Keegan?’” explains de Lancie. “‘I don’t know. Let me ask him.’ I said ‘Keegan, would you like to be in Star Trek? Obviously, you have to audition for it.’ So he went in, auditioned and got past station number one. He had to audition two or three times and I believe they hired him because he did a really great job. I had nothing to do with it.” For de Lancie, the episode wasn’t exactly a fitting final goodbye for Q, but it still must have been a pinch-me moment to have your son costarring next to you in a Trek episode. “Yeah, it was both great and… a lot of actors will understand this, but while part of acting involves being very attentive to the other people and what’s going on, you have to keep some of your power for yourself, to do your job and maintain your presence,” explains de Lancie. “In the case of my son, the majority of my attention was, ‘How’s Keegan doing?’ If I go on a regular job, where someone might have a cold or an actor doesn’t feel well or there’s just an upset in their family, I am very sympathetic. But when we were acting, it’s real tennis.”
Father and son cause trouble for Janeway, in “Q2”
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For some reason, there was never any discussion about beaming Q over to the Enterprise series and the TNG feature films. That’s okay, though. De Lancie’s career still hit warp speed and upon inspection, is chock-full of fascinating genre roles. “It was the thing that started me out as a kid,” says de Lancie. “The best movie was a sci-fi movie. The second best was a war movie and the third was a western. After that, I just didn’t go. All of a sudden, I was doing sci-fi. The first book I ever read was a sci-fi book. I just liked it. I have to say, this was at a time when sci-fi films were few and far between. If you liked that stuff, it was considered edgy or avant-garde. Now, it’s become the canvas, whereas westerns used to be the canvas. I am delighted.”
De Lancie is also returning to the realm of video games with the Quantum Conundrum, where he tackles the wacky character, Professor Quadwrangle. “I have not played the game yet,” states de Lancie. “When I asked other people about it, the guy who did it, and my sons knew this as well, is a very famous game designer. He created a thing called Portal. I had asked my kids about it, who are now 24 and 27, and they were like ‘Oh yeah, yeah! He did Portal, Dad! That’s a big deal!’ Same thing with Assassin’s Creed, which I just did. That one I had seen. Quantum is a puzzle game and it’s very clever. In the game, my rambunctious nephew comes to this extraordinary crazy mansion that I own. I am the scientist and have created all of these strange things and we, the audience, are making our way through the house. It’s fun. “Once I did a game about 15 years ago,” he continues. “I go into the studio and was knocking off the lines. After about 20 minutes or so, I go, ‘What’s this game? I feel like it is drive-by shootings.’ And the guy goes, ‘Yeah, it is.’ I went ‘What?’ Of course, I knew I was stuck. I couldn’t say I wasn’t going to do it. From then on, I’ve always asked about that type Q demonstrates humanity's drug-induced military past
JOHN DE LANCIE: INTERVIEW of stuff. ‘We’re not shooting people or killing people?’ “Oh, no, no, no. This is a fun puzzle game.” To this day, the Star Trek fandom demonstrates unparalleled dedication to that mythology and the intergalactic exploits of the Trek characters. There are many Star Trek conventions, comic books, novels, this very magazine, and the next movie installment is scheduled for 2013. However, given his extensive and diverse resume, that doesn’t mean de Lancie hasn’t experienced other properties with devoted aficionados. “Do you know anything about Bronies?” he asks. “I dare say they have as much presence at these conventions of late. I don’t do that many conventions, but I did some Torchwood episodes, and they asked me to go to a convention in Los Angeles. I was up there with the whole cast and the first question out of somebody’s mouth was about My Little Pony. It’s like somebody asked an inappropriate question at dinner. I was on the stage with people going ‘What’s My Little Pony? I thought this was for Torchwood!’” On April 28, 2012, the nine principal TNG cast members, including Stewart, Frakes, Brent Spiner, and Marina Sirtis, assembled at Calgary’s TNG Exposed event, a full-blown reunion that had attendees in a frenzy. As an added surprise, an unscheduled de Lancie rushed on to the stage to help his friends and former co-stars celebrate the show’s astounding 25th anniversary. Naturally, such a rare reunion made it easier to reflect and reminisce about some treasured memories. “There are so many,” says de Lancie. “I remember the opening sequence once I got back from Japan and started filming. I remember the specialness of the last show. I remember a scene I did with Jonathan, Kate [Mulgrew], somebody else and I, and we laughed and laughed and laughed.” “I’ve also had some very intense experiences with fans, where a father brought me his son, who was going to have a very serious operation the next day. You have to go, ‘Wow! This is a lot of responsibility.’ I enjoy meeting them. I made a whole group of them laugh the other night. I felt people would ask me about these shows and it was like asking about a dinner party I had hosted and cooked the dinner for and everyone still wanted to know about what the menu was. Now we’re so far beyond that. It’s been so many years that you know all the guests, you know the wine we drank and the food we ate. Now you are asking me to go back to when I went to the grocery store and started picking out the potatoes. And you know it so well that when I say, ‘Well, okay, I got the potatoes,’ people go, ‘No, no, no! It’s not that you got the potatoes. Remember! You picked that first potato up, you looked at it and it was perfect.’”
“DO YOU KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT BRONIES?” STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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FIRST APPEARED IN ISSUE #40
FOUR COLOR FLASHBACK A Universal History of Star Trek Comics
Since 1967, the crews of the various Enterprises, Deep Space Nine, and Voyager have been featured in hundreds of comics and newspaper comic strips telling the ongoing adventures of Starfleet’s finest, their missions ranging from the exceedingly faithful to the frighteningly fanciful. Andy Mangels explores a strange alternate universe of panels, word balloons, and pulpy newsprint, as he examines the history of Star Trek in comic form.
T
he four-color world of comic books has long been a home to the sky-flying fisticuffs of super-heroes, the dystopian adventures of science fiction lawmen, or the less-animated adventures of beloved cartoon characters. Licensed characters from film and television have made the leap to comics since before World War II. But what is likely the longest-running and most popular Hollywood franchise ever to appear in licensed comics — as will surprise few readers of this magazine — is Star Trek.
THE GOLD KEY ERA Having previously packaged content for Dell Comics, Western Publishing began its own comic book line in 1962, crowning it Gold Key. Western had previous immense success with popular children’s books known as Little Golden Books. As in the book line and with Dell, the Gold Key line published quite a number of licensed titles, primarily series based on properties from Walt Disney Studios or Warner Bros.
Gold Key licensed the Star Trek show to present as a comic, and debuted the first issue in July 1967. It featured a photo cover and several photo pin-ups, a trend that would continue until issue #10, when the traditional Gold Key cover style — a painting with small inset photos— would be the norm. The series was published two to three times a year beginning with issue #2 in 1968, increasing frequency in the mid-1970s, and appearing almost monthly from 1977 to its 61st and final issue in March 1979. Several of the comics reprinted earlier issues, and were themselves reprinted in early trade paperback collections called “Enterprise Logs”. Gold Key also published some issues after #9 with a Whitman logo on them, a Western sub-imprint for retail shops instead of newsstands. The Gold Key Star Trek series is best remembered by fans for its sometimes wacky stories and inaccurate details of the Trek universe (such as incorrectly-colored uniforms, or sometimes making Scotty a tall blond), but fans today remember them fondly. The tales found Kirk and crew facing pirates, wizards, voodoo, mummies,
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miniature people, psychocrystals, and even George Washington! A few stories sequelized TV episodes, including “I Mudd,” “Metamorphosis,” and “The City on the Edge of Forever.”
THE BRITISH STAR TREK ERA Concurrently with Gold Key, a series of British Star Trek adventures were published in a succession of weekly magazine-sized comics. The strip debuted in Joe 90: Top Secret, beginning January 18, 1969, six months prior to the debut of the series on British television. Perhaps that would explain why the first two double-page full-color strips refer to the Enterprise’s leader as “Captain Kurt.” The mistake was rectified for the third installment. Joe 90 ceased publication on September 6, 1969, becoming TV21 & Joe 90 three weeks later, and retaining Star Trek,
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which eventually proved popular enough to gain a third page of story… on the cover itself! On October 2, 1971, the magazine again morphed titles to become Valiant and TV 21, with Star Trek continuing until the December 29, 1973 issue. Additional strips and content appeared in various annuals and specials, including late material in 1978 and 1979. The British stories actually totaled 638 pages, making them a significant part of Trek history. The British run, however, has not been reprinted… to date.
THE POWER RECORDS ERA Having delighted children with its records since the late 1940s, Peter Pan Records began a new program in the 1970s, licensing content for an older audience. Under a new imprint, Power Records, adventure stories with full voice casts and original music were released for super-heroes from Marvel and DC Comics, as well as for TV shows such as Kojak, The Six Million Dollar Man, Planet of the Apes, and Star Trek. The adventures were released in a multitude of formats, including 7-inch vinyl singles, standard 12-inch vinyl albums, and book-and-record sets that featured comic book stories that followed the recorded plots relatively faithfully. From 19751979, 11 total Star Trek tales were created, released and re-released in a multitude of styles. Six of them were released as “Book-andRecord” sets, with several featuring art by comic superstar Neal Adams, and scripts by Star Trek Logs author Alan Dean Foster.
The talent of the creators did not mean that the works were without fault, however; in four of the comics, Sulu is shown as an African-American in a blue science uniform, Uhura was shown as a blond Caucasian, and the animated series’ M’Ress is a blue-skinned, green-haired woman instead of an orange cat-woman! In another story, the Enterprise crew meets Konrac the Barbarian… an axe-wielding savage drawn by Conan artist John Buscema to look exactly like Conan (another licensed character Power released). The final two Trek tales released in “Book-and-Record” form were in 1979, and although they returned Sulu to his proper heritage, they removed Uhura entirely, and awkwardly attempted to utilize the new movie uniforms.
THE FIRST MARVEL ERA One of the comic industry’s “Big Two” publishers is Marvel Comics, which began in 1939 as Timely Publications, and which specialized in superheroes. Marvel had enjoyed success with licensed titles such as Conan the Barbarian, 2001, and Star Wars, and in December 1979, they released “Marvel Super Special #22”, a magazine-sized comic that adapted to comic form Star Trek: The Motion Picture. That extra-length story was reprinted as a paperback by Pocket Books in March 1980, and split into the first three issues of a new monthly Star Trek comic series debuting in April 1980. The series that followed was both helped and hampered by its ties to the movie. Trek fandom was reinvigorated, meaning stronger sales, but the Paramount agreement meant that the comic creators could only use characters and situations from the film; they could not reference the original series or animated series! Thus, they had to mark time with stories about a haunted Enterprise, sphinxes, and
STAR TREK COMICS
space gnomes. Many fans considered the cancellation of the series — with issue #18 in February 1982 — a mercy killing. A curiosity that appeared during this same time period was a comic that only partially adapted the first Trek film. In December 1979, it appeared on six packages for fast food franchise McDonalds’ Happy Meal boxes, and on Video Communicator toys inside!
THE NEWSPAPER COMICS ERA Even as Marvel published the adventures of the Enterprise crew in the comic books, the Los Angeles Times Syndicate began offering a daily newspaper comic strip in syndication. The Monday through
Saturday strips were black-and-white, while the third-of-a-page Sunday strips were in color, and recapped the plot details from the preceding week. Thus, readers got to see two versions of the same storyline. The Star Trek strip was set immediately following Star Trek: The Motion Picture, and was initially written and drawn by Thomas Warkentin; later stories saw comic scribes Gerry Conway and Martin Pasko and a variety of artists producing the work. The plots contained a familiar mixture of traditional ships-in-peril and civilizations-withsecret devices, and included appearances by Klingons and Harry Mudd, while a memorable fourmonth arc in 1982 was co-produced with writer Larry Niven, and co-starred the Kzinti invaders,
which had appeared in both his own novels and the Star Trek: The Animated Series episode, “The Slaver Weapon.” The series ran from December 2, 1979 until December 3, 1983, for a total of 1400 individual strips. Ironically, the final storyline found the crew alternate-world-hopping to a 20th Century Earth, where they found that they were characters in a TV show called “Star Trek,” and must team up with two excited young boys who were big fans.
THE DC COMICS ERA Founded in 1934 as National Allied Publications, DC Comics is the longest surviving comic book publisher, and the other industry titan. With a long
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history of licensing Hollywood concepts for fourcolor adventures — ranging from Bob Hope to Tarzan to Dale Evans — it surprised few when DC picked up the Star Trek license in February 1984, shortly after the film success of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. The DC run still had some restrictions, but in addition to following up on movie-related material, new characters began to appear alongside the original crew, and canonical material and characters from the series were referenced. A variety of writers worked on the series, but one of the most popular was Peter David, who produced #48-55 in 1988. The series was canceled with issue #56 in November 1988, although three annuals were also produced, along with movie adaptations for the third and fourth Trek films, and a two-issue encyclopedic “Who’s Who in the Star Trek Universe” series. There was also a five-issue mini-series for the new kid on the block, Star Trek: The Next Generation, in 1988. Star Trek was relaunched in September 1989 with a new series, and the following month, Star Trek: The Next Generation was launched as a monthly companion series. The pair of series would feature the most amount of issues for either
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franchise: both ended with their 80th issue in February 1996. Also appearing were six annuals each, three movie adaptations, multiple specials and mini-series, and two graphic novels, as well as a cross-over with Malibu’s Deep Space Nine series. Of special note is that Michael Jan Friedman wrote all but two issues of the monthly TNG series, while Howard Weinstein wrote the lion’s share of the Original Series tableaus. Actors William Shatner, George Takei, Walter Koenig, and John “Q” de Lancie also guest-wrote stories for the various series! The DC era is largely viewed by fans as one of the best comic strip versions of Star Trek to date, with the original 1992 graphic novel, “Debt of Honor” — by writer Chris Claremont and artist Adam Hughes — cited as perhaps the run’s shiniest gem.
THE MALIBU COMICS ERA Launched in 1986 as an independent comic publisher, Malibu Comics originally published creator-owned titles and a few licensed titles up until 1992. Infused by a boatload of money gained from publishing and distributing the initial titles from Image Comics in 1992 and 1993, Malibu
expanded their line considerably with a line of super-heroes known as the Ultraverse, and more licensed titles, including one based on TV’s new Star Trek: Deep Space Nine series. Following industry fanfare — which made a great clamor that the Trek franchise had been split between two publishers — the new Deep Space Nine series debuted in August 1993, complete with promotions with national convenience store Circle K. As was the custom at the time, when comic speculators were hoping to strike it rich by buying comics for re-sale, the first issue had variant editions, including foil logos, gold foil covers, and polybagged issues with free posters inserted. Malibu published 32 monthly issues of Deep Space Nine, as well as a crossover with DC Comics, and a variety of one-shot specials and annuals, and mini-series. Of particular note was their “Celebrity Series” line of specials, written by Trek actors Aron “Nog” Eisenberg and Mark “Sarek” Lenard. Actor Tim Russ, who played Tuvok on Star Trek: Voyager, also co-wrote two issues of the series, in which a Mirror Universe version of his character appeared. Having set up characters and situations in the pages of several of their comics, Malibu announced plans to publish a Star Trek: Voyager comic, and
STAR TREK COMICS
even promoted it to the comic press in 1996. But Deep Space Nine #32 — and a Worf Special and an Ultimate Annual — in December 1995 would be the last Trek project to appear under the imprint, which was finally and officially absorbed by Marvel.
THE SECOND MARVEL ERA In late 1994, Marvel Comics had begun the purchase of Malibu and slowly brought its titles into their fold. This enabled them to gain a foothold against DC Comics when the Star Trek license came up for negotiation. Thus it was in 1996 that Marvel published Star Trek for a second time, along with Mission: Impossible — under a new imprint called Paramount Comics. For the first time, the entire Star Trek franchise was opened to one publisher, and with changes behind-the-scenes in Paramount’s licensing department, unprecedented allowance was made to allow creators freedom to explore all aspects of Trek… past, present, and future. Marvel’s debut for the line was in November 1996, with a new Deep Space Nine series, an adaptation of Star Trek: First Contact, and a new double-sized series called Star Trek: Unlimited, which told stories from the Original Series and Next Generation eras. The following month, Marvel
surprised fans with a one-shot crossover, Star Trek/X-Men, uniting the original Enterprise crew with the company’s top-selling mutants! Diving into the new Trek line wholeheartedly, Marvel launched the first Voyager series, a retro pre-Kirk series called “Early Voyages”, a Kirk-era mini-series called “Untold Voyages”, and a popular series with a younger cast called “Starfleet Academy”, one issue of which was published in both English-language and Klingon-language editions. A second mutant special joined The Next Generation with X-Men, in a story that continued in a Pocket Books novel. Marvel used a variety of creators on the various series, including the author of this article who co-wrote many Deep Space Nine stories and an “Unlimited” issue, as well as others who had written for the Malibu or DC lines, or Pocket Books novels. By early 1998 however, Marvel was struggling to justify the costs of the Paramount license to their corporate owners, and most of the Trek regular series were canceled, to make way for sets of mini-series, which could be collected for trade paperback sales. New ideas were developed as well, including an alternate reality “What If?” style series called “Star Trek: Realities”, and a
“black ops” series called “Star Trek: Phase Three.” But after full issues were completed of some of these, Marvel canceled the Trek line completely in the early fall of 1998.
THE WILDSTORM ERA Launched in 1992 as one of the publishing studios that made up the collective known as Image Comics, Wildstorm was headed by superstar artist Jim Lee. In 1999, the company and its properties were bought by DC Comics, whereupon it became a separate imprint for the publisher. Although it had previously published mostly super-heroes, the DC-led Wildstorm now became home to a number of licensed properties, including World of Warcraft, Nightmare on Elm Street, and Star Trek. Unlike all previous publishers, Wildstorm made no attempt to create a cohesive publishing timeline or monthly series, instead — beginning in January 2000 with a Star Trek: Voyager special — putting out a seemingly scattershot series of four-part mini-series for Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, and Voyager, as well as one-shots and cross-overs for those titles, and solo issues for both the
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original Enterprise crew and the first-ever comic appearance of Peter David’s popular Pocket Books series, “Star Trek: New Frontier”. Wildstorm ceased publishing Star Trek comic periodicals in May 2001 with the ending of a Voyager mini-series, though a Next Generation hardcover graphic novel by David Brin actually ended anything original for the line in October 2001, and some stories were collected for trade
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paperbacks through October 2002. The Wildstorm run would be the shortest of all of the Trek licenses.
THE TOKYOPOP ERA By the mid-1990s, the comic book world had fully discovered the diverse range of titles being published in Japan, where comics are collectively known as manga. Many American companies were
translating those works for American consumption; while the practice was not new, the popularity of manga was immense. Originally created as Mixx, to publish manga anthologies for America, one US company eventually changed its name to Tokyopop. In October 2004, they stunned the comic world by announcing plans to publish Englishlanguage Star Trek stories created in the storytelling and artistic style of manga.
DATACORE STAR TREK COMICS: THE NUMBERS! TO DATE, THERE HAVE BEEN 662 (AND COUNTING) STAR TREK COMICS PUBLISHED IN THE UNITED STATES. BUT WHICH PUBLISHER TAKES THE TITLE OF TOP OF THE TREKS?
STAR TREK COMICS Tokyopop eventually released four anthology volumes at around 192-208 pages each, beginning with “Star Trek: The Manga - Shinsei Shinsei” in September 2006 and ending with “Star Trek: The Next Generation: The Manga – Boukenshin” in April 2009. Some of the volumes featured stories by Wil “Wesley Crusher” Wheaton, Original Series writer David Gerrold, novelist Diane Duane, and writer Mike W. Barr (who holds the distinction of having written for almost every Star Trek comic licensor to date), but most of the other names in the credits were unknowns to Trek fans. The sales of the books were slow, as manga popularity was on the decline in America, and Tokyopop never again launched an Enterprise story.
THE IDW ERA Shortly after Tokyopop had published their first Trek anthology, IDW Publishing, a San Diegobased publisher since 1999, announced that they had negotiated the rights to traditional color comic books for American audiences. Because so much of the comic industry’s sales are now based on trade paperback collections sold in bookstores and online, IDW has chosen to exclusively publish either mini-series or thematic one-shots which can be collected. Their first title was “Star Trek: The Next Generation: The Space Between”, debuting in January 2007. In the time since, they’ve gone through a diverse publishing program, telling stories from the Klingon and Romulan points-ofview, showcasing events of the Mirror Universe, and featuring stories set in both the Original Series and the Deep Space Nine continuities. Their “Star Trek: Assignment: Earth” series showcased the tales of Gary Seven, while in 2009, they adapted for comics Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, the sole original cast film that had not previously been adapted for the form. More recently, IDW has begun publishing their first regular Trek series, set in the continuity of the 2009 feature film relaunch (that film was also the subject of a six-page comic story in Wired magazine in May 2009).
INTO THE FUTURE
PUBLISHER DC IDW MARVEL GOLD KEY MALIBU WILDSTORM POWER RECORDS TOKYOPOP WIRED MAG.
ISSUES 271 130 111 61 50 29 5 4 1
What does the future hold for Star Trek in comics? Will we ever see an Enterprise series, or the fan-favorite novelistic Titan series? And how will we read the new comics when they appear? After all, as electronic media has risen, the delivery venues of comics have changed, and most companies now offer digital downloads of their series, as IDW does with their Trek series. And the majority of Star Trek’s comic history has been archived in a DVD-Rom set by GIT Corp — “Star Trek: The Complete Comic Book Collection” — and is available for purchase internationally. Now fans everywhere can enjoy Trek comics on their smart-phones or iPads… not too far off from reading them on one of the Trek universe’s padds, is it?
SOURCE: WWW.STARTREKCOMICS.INFO STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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HERMAN ZIMMERMAN: INTERVIEW
FIRST APPEARED IN ISSUE #43
FAR BEYOND THE STARS From Days of Our Lives to life on the final frontier, Emmy-nominated Art Director and Production Designer Herman Zimmerman looks back at his work on Star Trek. Interview by Ian Spelling
H
erman Zimmerman’s input into the look and feel of the Star Trek universe cannot be underestimated, and ranks alongside the contribution of original series designer Matt Jeffries in defining the iconic look of the show. Between 1987 and 2005, as Production Designer and Art Director, Zimmerman lent his talents to every Star Trek film from The Final Frontier to Nemesis, as well as the television series The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, and Enterprise. He also worked on the longrunning Las Vegas and touring attraction Star Trek: The Experience, and co-wrote The Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Technical Manual. Along the way, he earned four Emmy nominations for his work on DS9. Star Trek Magazine recently tracked him down to his Los Angeles home, to find out more about his work. Star Trek Magazine: What was it like for you to see Star Trek return to the forefront of popular culture, as a result of the J.J. Abrams film, with a whole new look? Herman Zimmerman: I think he did a good job. Every couple of generations, a good idea gets
“BRILLIANT IDEAS DON’T ALWAYS MAKE IT TO THE SCREEN, AND THAT’S OK.” resurrected, no matter whose idea it is. Sherlock Holmes has been resurrected a bunch of times. Star Trek got resurrected again with The Next Generation and passing the torch on to J.J. Abrams is not the worst thing that could happen. I know there are people that aren’t thrilled with his approach, but I personally found it very entertaining. I found it refreshing. I think the casting was terrific. The production designer was good. There was nothing really to criticize, from my point of view. There were a few sour grapes in that the studio didn’t want anybody that had worked on any of the other Star Trek shows or motion pictures to have anything to do with the new film. That bothered a lot of people. It didn’t bother me, because I was already on my path to something else. The J.J. Abrams approach, it’s a very all-wide or all-close-up kind of approach, and it’s non-stop action. By the seat of your
pants, you’re led down the path to the tunnel, and you don’t look at the details much and you don’t have time to consider the philosophy much. That probably upset some of the more ardent fans of the traditional Star Trek, but I think, all in all, it was the right thing at the right time, and probably will continue to be. I know they’re making another film now. Blessings and good luck. I have nothing but good things to say about it. Let’s go back to the earliest days of your career and what brought you to Star Trek. I started out doing recorded and live television in 1965. I started a new show with my mentor, John Shurm, at NBC in Burbank. The show was called Days of Our Lives, and it’s still on the air. I learned to transfer what I knew from the theater, because I had studied theater design, to television. What I learned from John was to make use of stock units in order to make it possible to handle the hellish schedule that you have when you’re doing a daily show, and that sometimes, in addition to being daily, was done live on the air. Days of Our Lives was a good way to cut your teeth if you were an art director, and to find out STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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how the vision meets the reality. It’s still the old adage, “90 percent perspiration and 10 percent inspiration.” We’d start Days of Our Lives at 5 in the morning with an empty stage, put all the lights in place from a floor plan that was taped onto the floor, then roll in all the sets and set them up on the tape. The lights were then raised and then roughly focused. Then, when the sets were in place, of course, they got it lit as people would come in for a table reading at 7am. Then, they’d do a live walk-through, sometimes with pages and sometimes without, depending on how good the actors were, and then do the show right after lunch. After the show was taped, they would strike all the sets again, making way for a musical variety show that would be on that stage in the evening. Some of the stages were big enough that you’d have two sitcoms working back to back. They wouldn’t tape at the same time, but they’d be rehearsing at the same time and setting up their sets at the same time. So all that was very intense. I went to Paramount in 1980 and did situation comedies for seven years before I was asked to do Star Trek: The Next Generation. Once again, I was charged with doing something very intense in a very short time. That training was what really became my reputation — “If you really want to get it done, ask Zimmerman.” That’s entirely why I got the job on The Next Generation, because Mike Schoenbrun, the executive in charge of television at Paramount, said, “I want you to go meet Gene Roddenberry. I’m putting you up for this job. Don’t blow it.” (Laughs). Mike wanted me because, as much of an artist as I was, I was also a very practical guy.
DS9's glorious Ops set
O'Brien shows Sisko his new office
“IT ONLY TOOK US ABOUT A WEEK TO COME UP WITH WHAT EVENTUALLY BECAME DEEP SPACE NINE.”
You couldn’t fool me and tell me that something could be done when I knew it couldn’t. So, part of what happened with The Next Generation is they hired two illustrators, one of whom was intensely practical, Rick Sternbach, a very good artist, and Andy Probert, who was an exceptionally creative artist, but couldn’t tell you in feet and inches how to make anything that he drew. So I was the guy who had to come in and make that all happen. I also had to put reins on the creativity that couldn’t be afforded, and to afford every possible thing that I could, that I thought was innovative and in the right vein for the scripts. After all, everything has to come from the written word. What you do is you pay homage to the ideas in the script and make as believable as possible the environment you’re creating as a designer.
The iconic Enterprise-D bridge
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HERMAN ZIMMERMAN: INTERVIEW A preliminary design for DS9's promenade, complete with monorail
DS9's promenade as seen in season one…
… and with a brighter look from season three
Talk us through what you were shooting for with The Next Generation look. Some would say that this show is vitally important because it set the template for much of what followed in the films and on TV. I’d inherited a bunch of sets from Star Trek: The Motion Picture that were still on Stage 8, including the Enterprise Bridge, which was brilliantly designed, but not terribly well photographed, in my humble opinion. It had a ceiling, and the ceiling in the original Bridge was one of the most complicated and just magnificently designed sets. And because directors of photography and actors and directors are interested in what’s in front of the scenery, I don’t think there was more than one decent shot of it in the whole picture. Unfortunately, I couldn’t keep it, because it was
too difficult to light the Bridge on an episodic television series. It was too bad, because it was really gorgeously executed, and a brilliant idea. Brilliant ideas don’t always make it to the screen, and that’s OK. I learned a long time ago that all the drama is in front of the scenery. But I took the basic sets that were left over, which were more or less the corridors, sickbay, and quarters that were variously used for either Kirk or Spock on The Motion Picture, and I tried to work within the floor plan that was there, as much as anything to save having to move scaffolding. All of the sets kind of fell into place, because Hal Michaelson’s design for Star Trek: The Motion Picture was so elegant; the curved aluminum walls on the corridors. I expanded the width of the corridors. I changed the shape because it was supposed to be a new ship, 150 years in the future from the original series. So, even though I had a lot of stock, used sets to start with, I had to turn them upside-down and make something entirely new out of them, while retaining the economy of re-investiture of existing elements. You joined The Next Generation six weeks into the earliest pre-production. They’d done sketches of sets and were bouncing ideas off each other before you arrived. I’m guessing that Deep Space Nine was a unique experience, because you were there from the first conversation. I had three months of nothing to do but take blank sheets of paper and empty stages, and work them into something that would be valuable to support the stories being told. And, yes, it was very freeing, Deep Space Nine. I think it is still the most challenging thing that I did, at least in episodic television, because of
The more militaristic Enterprise-E bridge
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Herman Zimmerman
Good old pushable buttons on the original Star Trek series
those empty stages and blank pages. The art department was given a lot of time. Three months is an incredible amount of time to come up with ideas, and daily we’d give Rick Berman new ideas. And, daily, he’d give us back criticism and more requirements because the show didn’t just spring, whole, from Michael Piller’s head. It did evolve, as everything does when you’re doing story after story after story. But the beginning was so well conceived, script-wise. On the other hand, there was an initial request/ demand to have the space station be a multicultural station, that evolved over many years, with different cultures not necessarily speaking each other’s language, having created it. So, in your mind, you’d say it was a hodgepodge of things that don’t really fit.
Knobs and levers make a comeback for the console designs in Enterprise
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Square pegs, round holes. Oblongs and triangles. Circles that don’t necessarily fit because they’re not the same size. It was kind of like a Tower of Babel idea that was being presented. We tried to do that on paper and we didn’t really get anything that anybody liked. I certainly didn’t. Rick finally didn’t. You scrapped it all, right? By this time, we’d already wasted maybe six or seven weeks. Rick said, “Why don’t you just scrap all that and give me the most elegant, high-tech alien thing that you can?” So we started working on that premise, and it only took us about a week to come up with what eventually became Deep Space Nine. We started with a gyroscope and we started taking
“WORKING WITH THE ORIGINAL CAST WAS A LOT OF FUN.” elements out of the gyroscope, and we invented a philosophy. I’ve said this over the years, but we made up our own little Gene Roddenberryesque bible for the art department. The Cardassians built it with slave labor from the Bajoran planet. It was used originally as a mining/refining station, refining the elements that they were taking out of the earth of Bajor. It was built by these very militaristic, anal Cardassians who seemed to have exoskeletons, which we were developing with Mike Westmore and Bob Blackman, the make-up and wardrobe. A lot of the structure of their physiognomy was visible on the outside. So we used that as a metaphor for what the station should look like, that it should have smooth and elegant lines, but within each plane there would be depressed
HERMAN ZIMMERMAN: INTERVIEW areas where it was just open, where it was like tank parts and very utilitarian elements, but all with a very alien flavor. So it didn’t look like anything you’d ever seen before. We said that the Cardassians liked things in sets of threes, that they preferred ovals to circles, that they liked dark, shiny things rather than bright, matte-finished things. They were like intergalactic Nazis, in a way. They were tremendously good engineers, but immoral at the core. All of that just translated beautifully into DS9, and when the Brazil fabricators made the 6-foot model, I was absolutely blown away by the skill with which they interpreted our drawings and made this thing a reality. I distinctly remember Rick saying, “I want this station to look like something that, when the music comes on, and you’re in the kitchen, and you’ve walked from the kitchen to the den or the living room to catch the show, the first thing you see is this little element that gets bigger and bigger and bigger, and you see everything working around it, and it has life and form and it’s in space, and it’s the most elegant alien thing you’ve ever seen. I think we delivered on that. You worked on two original series features. What do you remember about those shoots? Working with the original cast was a lot of fun. I particularly was close to DeForest Kelley. He somehow thought we were the same age, and he kept saying, “Why do you look so good, and I’m getting old?” It meant nothing except we were always jabbing each other a lot. And he was looking better all the time. He had it tough on The Voyage
STELLAR TRIBUTES
The engineering set for Star Trek: The Next Generation
A sketch of USAF DS/9 from 'Far Beyond the Stars'
Home, and on The Final Frontier he really looked like he was ill. By the time we did The Undiscovered Country, he was in much better health. All those moments we were together, and there weren’t all that many, we were just very friendly. I really enjoyed his company. Of course, I’d worked with
As Production Designer on Deep Space Nine, Zimmerman was honored with four Emmy nominations for “Outstanding Individual Achievement in Art Direction for a Series”, starting with the premiere episode “The Emissary”, in 1993. Nominations in the same category followed in 1997, for “Trials and Tribble-ations”, in 1998 for “Far Beyond the Stars”, and for the 1999 episode “Prodigal Daughter”. For “Trials and Tribble-ations”, a Herculean effort was made to recreate the original Enterprise bridge, turbo-lifts, Jefferies tubes, and corridors, exactly as they had appeared in the original series. Contemporary footage, shot with genuine 1960’s lenses and film stock, was matched seamlessly into original film elements from “The Trouble with Tribbles”, using techniques developed for “Forrest Gump”, to insert the Deep Space Nine cast into the action. Another historical setting (albeit within a dream that was the result of wayward neural patterns in Benjamin Sisko’s mind) was recreated for “Far Beyond the Stars”. This tale of overcoming racial and sexual prejudice was set in the 1950’s offices of Incredible Tales, a science fiction magazine about to publish a futuristic account of life on space station USAF DS/9 – a sleek, gleaming re-imagination of the familiar Deep Space 9 design!
Bill [Shatner] on The Final Frontier, and so I was pretty close with him, too. I still occasionally talk to Bill. He asked me to do an interview for one of his documentaries, and I did that a few months ago. I’d always admired the combination of Kirk and Spock, and it was a pleasure for me to get to know the cast while working on The Final Frontier and The Undiscovered Country. You skipped Voyager because of your day-to-day involvement on Deep Space Nine. When that finished, you started on Enterprise. How freeing was it to go back into the past? Oh, I loved it. Being able to go back rather than forward, being able to have buttons and levers and things for the actors to actually interact with, instead of just flat screens and touch-screens, you were actually creating another layer of the Star Trek saga and were going back from Kirk and Spock, and going back to Zefram Cochrane. The whole idea of going back to a ship that could only do warp five and creating that back-story, I thought it was brilliant. Also, the ship itself, I think, was brilliant. It looked like a Lockheed P-38 from WWII, and that appealed to me greatly. If you could live on one of the ships you created, which would it be and why? Oooooh, I don’t know. That’s a tough one. I liked each of those ships that I was able to imagine in different ways. Can’t I live on all of them? At the end of the day, what would you like to think your contribution to Star Trek has been? I think I was able to take a lot of good ideas past and present, from colleagues gone and still around, and make a cohesive visual statement that supported the drama. That’s what you’re supposed to do. STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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FIRST APPEARED IN ISSUE #43
A HEART OF
LATINUM THE ARMIN SHIMERMAN INTERVIEW ‘Quark’s Bar, Grill, Gaming House and Holosuite Arcade’ (to give it its full name) was the beating heart of space station Deep Space 9 – whichever galactic power happened to be running the station at the time. As the Ferengi with his name above the door, Armin Shimerman proved he had the lobes to create an unforgettable Star Trek character. Interview by Ian Spelling
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eep Space Nine was never a job to me. It was always a delight.” explains Armin Shimerman, who spent seven years playing the Ferengi barkeeper Quark on the Star Trek series. “I was always a Star Trek fanatic. I wanted to be part of the franchise, and it was always important to me that I was part of the franchise. At times, if you spoke with me when we were making the show, I may have made it seem a little bit more like a job, because I had lines to memorize, and makeup STAR TREK MAGAZINE
“I WILL BE VERY HAPPY TO HAVE ON MY GRAVESTONE, ‘HERE LIES ARMIN SHIMERMAN, WHO PLAYED QUARK.’”
to put on, and episode after episode after episode to complete. Even then, I was always thinking about how much fun it was.” Shimerman’s Trek days may seem long behind him, but the show is still an indelible and current part of his life. The actor remains a favorite on the convention circuit, spinning great stories on stage and taking the time to chat with fans and sign autographs. Plus, of course, 2013 marks the 20th anniversary of Deep Space Nine’s debut, meaning he’s in
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demand for even more conventions, appearances and interviews than ever. Shimerman doesn’t turn his back on fans, or such opportunities. He’ll often attend conventions in the company of his wife, actress Kitty Swink, who twice appeared on Deep Space Nine, though never alongside him. Their table at conventions usually ends up in a row next to those of his Deep Space Nine supporting actor friends, Max Grodenchik, Aron Eisenberg, and Chase Masterson, who, respectively, played Rom, Nog, and Leeta. His current projects include writing a new novel, and taking on various roles – including actor, board member, associate artistic director, show director, and goodwill ambassador – for The Antaeus Company, a notfor-profit theater company in Los Angeles. By the time he’d auditioned for Deep Space Nine, Shimerman was no stranger to Star Trek. He’d already portrayed a Betazoid Gift Box in the Next Generation episode “Haven”, and Trek’s very first Ferengi, Letek, in the episode “The Last Outpost”. He also appeared as another Ferengi, Bractor, in “Peak Performance”. Despite his previous Trek adventures, Shimerman did not take it for granted that the producers would pick him for the role of Quark, regardless of the fact that he had an inside track on portraying a Ferengi. “I was definitely on pins and needles,” Shimerman says. “When I first heard that they were looking for a Ferengi for this new Star Trek show, I thought, “I
Quark and Odo – an interstellar bromance
played a Ferengi. Why shouldn’t I play this part?” I beat my agent over the head to get me an audition, which he did relatively quickly. I believe I was one of the very first people to be seen for Quark. I went in and read, and got some laughs at the audition. Two months went by, and I kept hounding my agent to inquire about whether there was any possibility of my coming back for a second audition. He couldn’t get any word on that, so I just assumed it was dead. I licked my wounds and slunk off somewhere and said, ‘Well, I tried. I The new Klingons (TNG's “The Last Outpost”)
did the best I could.’ Lo and behold, about two months after that first audition, I got a callback and went in. There was a roomful of suits there, including Rick Berman and Michael Piller. They asked me to read again. I did, and I got most of the laughs I’d gotten the first time. I felt pretty good about it, and then had the great experience of spending an hour after I’d auditioned talking to this actor that I’d recognized from other Star Trek shows. I got the role, thankfully, and here we are, 20 years later.”
ACTING CLASS
Born in New Jersey, Armin Shimerman’s family moved to Los Angeles, where the 16-year-old joined a drama group, ostensively to meet new people and make friends. Bitten by the acting bug, he graduated from UCLA (University of California), and served an apprenticeship at the Old Globe Theatre in San Diego, before touring in regional theatre and landing his first role on Broadway, in The Threepenny Opera. Returning to LA, he made a name for himself with numerous guest roles on television, soon securing a semi-regular part as Pascal in Beauty and the Beast.
A right Herbert (DS9 “Far Beyond the Stars”)
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ARMIN SHIMERMAN: INTERVIEW Fans quickly came to embrace Quark. The character was selfish, but not entirely without heart. He was all about the money, and not above deceit, but, on occasion, recognized the merits of compromise, or offered some philosophical food for thought. He often provided laughs, but also moments of seriousness, and every once in a while he got in on the action as well. Of particular note was the Quark-Odo relationship, with its tension, humor, and veiled affection, which became one of the most memorable on the series. Shimerman acknowledges that the writers revealed more colors and shades of Quark than he’d ever imagined possible. “I was surprised, actually, at how far he became less Ferengi,” the actor says. “I thought I was always playing the Ferengi. I always thought that there wasn’t much difference from the first season and the seventh season, as far as my character was concerned. Then, when they gave me the scripts for ‘Dogs of War,’ I read it and thought, ‘Oh, my God, I really have changed quite a bit, haven’t I?’ That was a total surprise to me. I didn’t notice it so much as we went along. Really, I learned that when I read that penultimate script. “He’d gotten to do a lot more than I ever did expect him to do,” Shimerman continues. “Also, for the seven years, I was trying to fulfill something that Brent Spiner told me when I did my first episode of The Next Generation. Brent had been a friend of mine from years before, and we were sitting around on the set. It was the show’s first season. I asked him what he wanted to do with this character of Data. He said, and I quote, ‘I want to take the character with the least amount of potential and make him the character with the most amount of potential. That always stayed with me, and that is what I strived to do.” Consider it mission accomplished. Deep Space Nine ended in 1999, and Quark remains as popular as ever. Post-Star Trek, Shimerman embarked on the next phase of his career, which has encompassed voiceovers for games and cartoons, stage work, and the occasional film or TV appearance, as well as writing novels and teaching. “Teaching has become an important part of my life,” Shimerman says. “As people may or may not know, I’ve devoted a lot of time in the past few years to a theater company near us – Kitty and I do it together – called The Antaeus Company. I just finished doing a production of Macbeth for Antaeus and, before that, a production of The Seagull. What recent TV have I done? I was on the show Perception when it debuted. I did a cartoon show called The Regular Show, that airs on The Cartoon Network. I recently did a small movie
The Way of the… Warrior?! (DS9 “Looking for par’Mach in All the Wrong Places”)
“WHEN THEY GAVE ME THE SCRIPTS FOR ‘DOGS OF WAR,’ I READ IT AND THOUGHT, ‘OH, MY GOD, I REALLY HAVE CHANGED QUITE A BIT, HAVEN’T I?’”
called Sublime and Beautiful. A friend of mine did that in Kansas, and I play a guy who’s drunk, hits a car, and he kills a mother and two children. Her husband spends most of the movie coming after me.” Shimerman’s greatest passion right now is The Antaeus Company. He acts there, as well as teaching and directing. He and Swink – “Miss Kitty” as he lovingly calls her – are associate artistic directors, and on the board. “I hooked up with Antaeus seven or eight years ago,”
The way to a Ferengi’s heart is through the lobes
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Ferengi spa treatment or the horror of the make-up chair?
Quark has one of his regular run-ins with Kira
Armin Shimerman
Shimerman says. “They were developing a new piece, based on Charles Dickens. I had a lot of friends in the company, Tony Amendola being one of them, and he asked me to come and take part in the project. I’d heard about Antaeus years ago. It had been started by a man named Dakin Matthews, who is perhaps the greatest Shakespeare dramatist in the country. I was intrigued by the work and, shortly after I did the Dickens projects, they very nicely asked me if I wanted to become a member. I said yes. “About a year and half later, they also asked Kitty if she wanted to be a member,” Shimerman continues. “Membership isn’t all that easy in this company, and we were both very flattered. The primary criteria for being a member is that you have a classical background, which both Kitty and I have. We’re thrilled to be a part of this company because it’s involved in keeping the spoken word alive, and because we’re interested in the thoughts and themes of classic material. It’s interesting, but many of the actors in our ensemble have been on Star Trek. That makes sense because, from the beginning, starting with Mr. Shatner, so many Star Trek actors have been classically trained. Tony Amendola and Dakin Matthews, I just found out, were on Star Trek. Also, we’ve got Linda Park, Harry Groener, Greg Itzin, Richard Herd, Lawrence Pressman, Joe Ruskin, and Kurtwood Smith, who are with us at Antaeus and who I know were on Star Trek. I’m sure others were, too.”
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ARMIN SHIMERMAN: INTERVIEW
No actor likes to be put into a box. (Shimerman as the Betazoid Gift Box in TNG episode “Haven”)
A PERFORMER WITH PRINCIPLE
Armin Shimerman is proud of his work on Deep Space Nine and considers the experience of doing the show among the highlights of his life. However, in the arc of his career, it’s but a single credit. “Principal Snyder on Buffy the Vampire Slayer was a very important role, and it’s another one I’m very grateful for having had the opportunity to play,” the actor says. “That was a role that lasted longer than I ever thought it would, just given the nature of what happened to principals in that school. A lot of fans still talk to me about Buffy and ask me to sign photos, so it had some impact on people. I am of the impression, and I may be wrong, that I get recognized more for Buffy than I do for Deep Space Nine. I am sure that’s because I had no makeup on when I was on Buffy. Some people may know that I played Quark, but they probably actually recognize me first for Buffy. Also, within the business, it’s more likely that a producer or casting director or director will know me more from Buffy than from Star Trek. So that’s one I’m very proud of.” The actor has also leant his voice to numerous computer games. “Ratchet & Clank is a lot of fun,” he continues, “It may not be the most artistic endeavor in the world, but it’s a great deal of fun for me and a lot of other people. I’ve also enjoyed BioShock, which was an artistic endeavor. I did two of the games and played the character Andrew Ryan, and those speeches he had were incredibly delicious. I’m very proud of that. Of my theater roles, I’m proud of Richard, from The Seafarer. That was an incredible, incredible experience. The Broadway shows, some of the shows I’ve done with Antaeus, I’m proud of them, too. It’s a trite expression, but they’re all my children, and I’m proud of all of them. Now, there are some things I’d like to forget, but fortunately we haven’t mentioned them. So that’s good.”
Happy Families. Quark, Rom, and Nog in DS9's “Little Green Men”
So, was it Shimerman’s long run on Deep Space Nine that afforded him the luxury of being able to concentrate on stage work, and his efforts on behalf of Antaeus? “That’s an enormously important question, and I’m at a stage in my life where I’m readily happy to answer that,” Shimerman replies. “I can devote more time to theater because I don’t have to work anymore, and for that I thank Deep Space Nine and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It’s a nice place to be. Eight percent of the country or more is unemployed and they’re desperately trying to pay their bills, but because of the enormous good luck I had in my 40s and 50s I don’t need to work anymore. So that allows me to do practically volunteer theater. I can spend as much time and effort as I like doing it, and I don’t have to worry about, ‘Oh, my God, if I spend all my time here, then I’m not focusing on getting more film and TV work.’ I am in a very good position that way. So the answer to the question is, Yes. In theater, you tend not to focus on the things that make you popular with the majority of the people in the world.” Right now, this very minute, Shimerman is sitting at a desk in his Los Angeles home. He’s pulled himself away from his computer to speak with Star Trek Magazine. Since there’s no next play, movie, or TV on the immediate horizon, he’s been at the computer, tapping away on his latest project: a novel. “People may or may not know that I’ve had four novels printed, and this will be my fifth one,” Shimerman says. “The other ones were all science fiction, and this one is a period mystery. I’ve always been interested in Shakespearean themes, and this story takes place in 1583-1584, in England, and it involves a great deal of historical characters, and Shakespeare as well. After eight years of gradually writing it, in the last two or three months I have been hot and heavy at it. It should be, for all intent and purposes, done around Christmas. Right now, the title is “The Toadeater”, which really has nothing to do with the story, but I like the title. I’m very happy to be doing this. I’ve always liked writing. It is a very lonely process, but you don’t have to audition for it!” Shimerman looks back at his work on Star Trek, and his infamous Ferengi alter-ego, with gratitude. “I will be very happy to have on my gravestone, ‘Here lies Armin Shimerman, who played Quark.’” He smiles. “Without it, I couldn’t be doing many of the things that I’m doing today. It has given me some celebrity, which is nice to have, but not enough celebrity to make me feel as though I’m boxed in a cage. It’s just the right amount of celebrity. I enjoyed the years on the show, I enjoyed the character, and the writing, and the people I met. I will always think fondly of Deep Space Nine.” STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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“FOR THE FIRST TIME, WE SEE CENTRAL CHARACTERS… WHO DO NOT ASSUME THAT THE GOALS OF STARFLEET AND THE FEDERATION ARE BEST FOR EVERYONE.”
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UNDISCOVERED COUNTRIES
FIRST APPEARED IN ISSUE #43
UNDISCOVERED
COUNTRIES DEEP SPACE NINE ’S DARK LANDSCAPE It’s been twenty years since the launch of what some consider to be the black sheep of the Star Trek family… K Stoddard Hayes delves into the past, and explains why Deep Space Nine stands proud as one of the franchise’s greatest series.
Inside the wormhole: While Dax sees beauty…
O
ne of the most memorable scenes in “Emissary,” the Deep Space Nine premiere, is the arrival of Sisko and Dax inside the Bajoran wormhole. Dax steps out of the runabout and sees a paradise: green lawns, blooming gardens, bright, warm sunshine. Sisko sees a Hellscape of tortured stone blasted by lighting. If the writers had done it deliberately, they could not have come up with a better illustration of the difference between Deep Space Nine and its predecessor, The Next Generation.
…Sisko …Sisko sees sees Hell hell
In The Next Generation, the bright sunshine of the peaceful Federation is the norm, while each problem is a passing cloud to be dispersed by the end of the episode, or at least by the end of a multi-episode story arc. In Deep Space Nine, the harmony of the Federation is far away, and Starfleet’s representatives see nothing but trouble everywhere they look. The station itself reflects this difference. The former Terok Nor’s Cardassian design, with its dark walls and claustrophobic spaces, is the STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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antithesis of Starfleet’s sleek starships and gleaming white interiors. Even the station’s sharpened, angular verticals look as if they are made of bones and claws. And nothing works properly. A malfunction on the Enterprise-D is a warning that some alien entity or malicious software has invaded the ship. On Deep Space 9, malfunctions are the norm. O’Brien spends much of his time, especially at first, just trying to repair the Cardassian technology and get it to function alongside Starfleet systems. And sometimes the technology is a threat even when it’s working properly, as when the crew accidentally activates a Cardassian security protocol that locks down the whole station (“Civil Defense”).
THE GALACTIC MELTING POT Replacing a shiny starship with a gothic space station is far from the biggest difference between Deep Space Nine and the rest of Star Trek. Deep Space Nine is not only the first to include non-Starfleet characters in its cast, it is the only series in which most of the major characters are not even human. Though all Star Trek series pay homage to racial diversity, only Star Trek: Voyager approaches Deep Space Nine in representing non-humans equally with humans in its cast. But when you add Deep Space Nine’s throng of important recurring players, nearly all of them from non-Federation species, it becomes the only series that truly portrays the diversity of Star Trek’s universe. This is a critical change of perspective. For the first time, we see central characters like Quark, Odo, and Kira, who do not assume that the goals of Starfleet and the Federation are best for everyone. To the Bajorans and the Maquis, the Federation often seems just another superpower Maintaining law and order: Odo
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The first season cast of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
getting pushy with its smaller neighbors and arbitrarily drawing borders that divide colonies from their homeworlds. To the Dominion, the Federation looks even more extreme: a lawless trespasser invading a sovereign territory, like Cortez overrunning the Aztec empire. While these new perspectives may not reflect Star Trek’s traditional idealism, they provide a far more interesting dramatic environment. Stories are much more entertaining when everybody doesn’t get along; and in Deep Space Nine, conflicts can arise just as easily between main characters as between the crew and the guest villain of the week. Deep Space Nine’s diversity also creates a paradoxical counter-effect to the conflicts: nowhere else in Star Trek can you find a more entertaining assortment of odd-couple friendships and romances. The cocky young genius doctor becomes close friends with a cynical middle-aged engineer, and with a former Cardassian spy. The law-and-order Constable and the corrupt Ferengi businessman are all but inseparable in reciprocal aggravation. The former Bajoran freedom fighter becomes the protector of her former conqueror’s daughter. The station commander’s closest friend is both a young
“DEEP SPACE NINE HAS BECOME THE STRATEGIC CENTER OF THE GALAXY, NOT JUST TO OUR CREW, BUT TO EVERYONE.” woman and an old man who once mentored him, while his exemplary son takes up with a juvenile delinquent Ferengi. The romances are even odder: a Ferengi romancing a Klingon widow, a Trill marrying a Klingon, a Starfleet officer falling for a Maquis agent, and strangest of all, a Changeling carrying a lifelong torch for a Solid.
THE CENTER OF THE UNIVERSE Deep Space Nine shifts not only our cultural viewpoint, but also our geographic one. Star Trek and Star Trek: The Next Generation look to Earth as home. From that perspective, Deep Space 9 is located at the remotest wild frontier of Federation space – but when Bashir describes it this way in “Emissary,” local girl Kira smacks him down hard, and we sympathize with her, not
UNDISCOVERED COUNTRIES
Sisko receives a fiery welcome from Major Kira in “Emissary”
with him. In that instant, our Star Trek roots are literally torn up and planted elsewhere. For Deep Space Nine, the center of the universe is not Earth and the Federation. It’s the Bajoran wormhole. The crew’s visits to Earth always seem like a distraction from the decisive events here at the gateway to the far side of the galaxy. When Sisko returns to Earth in the middle of the war (“Image in the Sand”) he is not taking a shore leave or a rest; he is literally running away from his duty and the central role of his life, as the Emissary of Bajor. The arrival of other major Star Trek races – the Klingons, the Romulans – emphasizes the importance of the geographic shift. Deep Space 9 has become the strategic center of the galaxy, not just to our crew, but to everyone.
THE CALL OF THE PROPHETS
THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS
Known to the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance as Terok Nor, the Deep Space 9 of the Mirror Universe was a dangerous place to live. Over the course of five stories (“Crossover”, “Through the Looking Glass”, “Shattered Mirror”, “Resurrection” and “The Emperor’s New Cloak”), many familiar faces, albeit twisted by hate or quaking with fear, would meet a violent end.
ODO – DECEASED
ant Changeling was killed by the Fascistic officer of the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance, this unpleasant ’s ore processing ocessi center. prime universe’s Julian Bashir, during a daring escape from Terok Nor’s
In other Star Trek series, religious beliefs are often treated as a matter of superstition, especially when they belong to “undeveloped” races, while the gods of these little worlds usually turn out to be aliens or super-computers. With the exception of Klingon spirituality, other Star Trek series almost always see religion from the outside. It’s something for other cultures, not for Federation officers.
QUARK – DECEASED
cuted for his crimes by the Timid bar owner and occasional Terran sympathizer, he was executed violent and ruthless Terok Nor Intendent, Kira Nerys.
JADZIA DAX – DECEASED
ter, renegade loner Julian d, lat A soldier of fortune, Jadzia became lover to Benjamin Sisko and, later, ance. Bashir. She was killed in battle during a confrontation with the Allia Alliance.
BENJAMIN SISKO – DECEASED
Space pirate and instigator of the Terran Rebellion, Sisko was killedd while trying to turn his wife, Jennifer, to the cause. Terran slave turned freedom fighter “Smiley” O’Brien survived man manyy battles, and lived on to ashir... an BBashir... fight the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance alongside the erratic Julian ver ttoo venture into the The Next Generation crew (excluding Worf and O’Brien) were never parallel reality of the Mirror Universe, first discovered by Kirk’s crew in “Mirror, Mirror.” han our o familiar The Mirror Universe reveals a very different political evolution than inee’s less ce N continuity, and seems far more plausible as an echo of Deep Space Nine’s able Federation. F certain galaxy than it did as a counterpart of Star Trek’s comfortable orld, we el w Indeed, when we see Deep Space Nine’s version of this parallel world, nvestigate is “in can’t help wondering how the urbane and cerebral Picard and his “investigate miley” first, take action later” crew would have coped with players likee “Sm “Smiley” nt. Surely S O’Brien, the rebel leader Ben Sisko, and especially the Intendant. ily with w you’d need the experience of Sisko and his crew, confronted daily r fractious Bajorans, duplicitous Cardassians, fanatical Maquis, and ruthless Changelings, to know how to negotiate the treacherous currentss of this r-torn universe. The Mirror world is indeed an apt doppelganger of thee wa war-torn corner of the galaxy guarded by Deep Space 9.
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Deep Space Nine, for the first time, treats faith, religion, and spirituality with the depth and gravity they deserve as an almost universal aspect of human nature. All kinds of people in Deep Space Nine have religions, good and bad. The subjects of the Dominion regard the Founders as gods; the Klingons maintain their reverence for Kahless and their belief in their afterlife. Most important are the gods of Bajor, the Prophets, whose relationship with Sisko, Kira, and Kai Winn takes us on a journey through the many facets of human spirituality. The Bajorans see the Prophets as their benevolent protectors, whose spiritual light guides profoundly wise religious leaders like Kai Opaka and Vedek Bareil, as well as many ordinary Bajorans like Kira. To make things even more realistic, we have Kai Winn and her
Nog deals with losing a leg in the war with the Dominion
“MOST EXTRAORDINARY OF ALL IS SISKO’S RELATIONSHIP WITH THE PROPHETS.” Major Kira
followers, religious fundamentalists who feel justified in attacking anyone who diverges from their own view of the Prophets. Winn provides an insightful portrait of the fundamentalist of any creed, who genuinely worships the Prophets, yet uses their authority to serve her own thirst for power. Convinced that she deserves their special favor as a “true” follower, she even turns against them to punish their “failure” to recognize her devotion. Most extraordinary of all is Sisko’s relationship with the Prophets. A typically rationalist Starfleet officer, Sisko is at first profoundly uncomfortable with his role as Emissary. He is not Bajoran, he doesn’t share their faith, and he sees the Prophets as “the wormhole aliens,” with powers and intentions largely unknown. His spiritual struggle with the Prophets resembles that of a reluctant Old Testament prophet, Jonah running away to sea to escape his God’s command. But as events unfold, the beliefs of the reluctant Emissary evolve, until Sisko believes, in defiance of Starfleet orders, that the Prophets are the true protectors of Bajor, whose guidance he ignores, not at his peril, but at Bajor’s. Through Sisko’s spiritual evolution, Deep Space Nine makes religion fit with both reason and metaphysics. Science fiction provides rational explanations for everything, including gods, and so the Prophets are indeed powerful alien entities. But when we hear stories about prophecies and miraculous powers, some part of us wants to believe. So it is when the Prophets start telling Sisko what to do for Bajor. Yes, they are non-temporal beings who can “predict” the future because they see time differently. But they are also mysterious, vision-granting, godlike creatures; and somehow, even in this rational, science fictional universe, we want to know that the Prophets really are Bajor’s gods. We want them to be good, and right, and worthy of our characters’ faith in them. And so they prove.
THE AGONY OF WAR One could make endless thematic comparisons between Deep Space Nine and all the other Star Trek series. But now let’s take the show on its own terms, as if it stood alone. If you sat down to watch Deep Space Nine without knowing anything about Star Trek, the first episode would tell you exactly what this new TV series is about. “Emissary” opens with a catastrophic battle; its protagonist is an officer who has never recovered from the trauma of that battle; and his new command sits at the frontier between two
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UNDISCOVERED COUNTRIES Sisko runs from his destiny in “Image in the Sand”
WELCOME ABOARD
Visitors from one part of the Star Trek universe often turn up in another. Deep Space Nine had its share of VIP guests and, as always, some visitors fit in better than others… Picard, seen mainly from the perspective of Sisko’s hostility, shows us immediately that the new leading man is far from the usual cool, got-it-all-together Star Trek captain. (“Emissary”) pulation doesn’t work on Q makes only one appearance, and it’s not a success. His brand of manipulation a commanding officer who punches first. (“Q-Less”) Lwaxana Troi is comfortable everywhere she goes, and Deep Space Ninee iss no exception. The m emotionally real fun here is seeing how quickly her warm heart embraces the show’ss most vulnerable character, Odo. (“The Forsaken,” “Fascination,” “The Muse”) Kor, Koloth, and Kang, the original Star Trek Klingons, are a perfect fit forr this warlike mportant Trilluniverse. Their friendship with Dax lays the foundation for a much moree iimportant re Unto the Breach”) Klingon relationship. (“Blood Oath,” “The Sword of Kahless,” “Once More rials and TribbleArne Darvin, the Tribbles and the digitally edited original cast make “Trials theer Star Trekk series. ations” a fan favorite, though more often among fans who prefer the other m to be much bigger em Deep Space 9’s crew, true to the rough and tumble of their universe, seem fans of TV’s first Enterprise than were the crew of the Enterprise-D.
races who have only just ended a long and bitter war of occupation. Deep Space Nine is a story about war and the consequences of war. From the start, the horrific cost of war for the conquered is everywhere we look. It’s in Kira’s memories of her childhood under a brutal occupation, the torture of her father and the sacrifices of her mother. It’s in the violence that became part of all Bajorans’ lives as they fought for their freedom, and it’s in the enduring hatred between Bajorans and Cardassians, that destroys the innocent along with the guilty. And if that weren’t enough, soon we begin to see the cost of conquest in the Gamma Quadrant as well: worlds destroyed by disease, by bioengineering, by military assault, just for defying their overlords, the Founders. As the war in the Alpha Quadrant escalates, we also begin to see how war affects the warriors, who are our own characters. In episode after episode, we see them suffer stress, loss, the extremes of battle, the guilt of good men and women who do terrible things just so their people can survive. Kira begs the Kai for the Prophets’ forgiveness (“Battle Lines”); Sisko sacrifices his cherished integrity to bring the Romulans into the war (“In the Pale Moonlight”); Bashir enters a precarious relationship with black ops Agent Sloane; and all the characters endure the daily stress of war: battle briefings, loss and casualty reports, changing alliances, the horror and fatigue
Tom Riker, who lost his futuree tto his he transporter twin Will, steals th the ause. Defiant to help the Maquis cause. In Deep Space Nine, even a straight arrow like Riker can ve. believably shoot off on a curve. (“Defiant”) Voyager’s EMH doesn’t visit, but his human template and inventor, Dr. Zimmerman, shows up to study Bashir as a possible model for another EMH. (“Doctor Bashir, I Presume”) It’s notable that most of these guest appearances are earlier in the show’s run. As Deep Space Nine matured, its writers had little need for stunt casting, with so much story material in the show’s own rich mine of characters and relationships. It is also the only Star Trek series after thee gh original which never had a Borg episode. The crew had more than enough adversaries already.
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Kira and Odo part in “What You Leave Behind”
One last farewell… The closing scene of Deep Space Nine
“THESE ARE NOT STORIES ABOUT THE GLORY OF BATTLE, THEY ARE ANTIWAR STORIES.” STORIES.
The seventh season cast of Deep Space Nine
of combat (“The Seige of AR -558”), and even crippling injuries (“It’s Only a Paper Moon”). Most subtly, and most exceptionally, Deep Space Nine even shows us the cost of war for the conquerors themselves. Who would want to be a Founder or a Cardassian like Dukat, a Vorta or a Jem’Hadar, to give up compassion, humility, mercy, love, and peace itself, in the belief that this is the only way they can preserve their people? Many fans of Star Trek have objected to Deep Space Nine’s focus on war, as the antithesis of Gene Roddenberry’s belief in a universe where people have outgrown war. But step back to the first season of Star Trek. Roddenberry and his writers understood the horror of war perfectly well, or they could not have written those exceptional war stories “Balance of Terror,” “A Taste of Armageddon,” “Arena,” or “Errand of Mercy.” These are not stories about the glory of battle, they are anti-war stories. And like these classic episodes, Deep Space Nine’s Dominion War arc takes the view that war is something to be avoided at all costs. Then it spells out the
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reasons in full and tragic detail, episode by episode, character by character. Yes, there are moments when we rejoice in our ability to vanquish our enemies, such as the recapture of the station. That’s because we, as the audience, are deeply involved in this war through the characters; it’s only natural that we feel the partisanship of the soldier reclaiming lost territory from the enemy. But even the victory celebrations are shortlived in the face of the heartbreaking costs. Finally, Deep Space Nine resolves its wars by reaching to another of its central themes: building friendships across differences. Those odd friendships mentioned earlier have laid the foundations for something much more important and universal: the possibility of peace with former enemies who are so different that conflict has always seemed inescapable. Bajoran and Cardassian, Federation and Romulan and Klingon, even Solid and Changeling, political alliances begin to seem possible to people who have already learned how to build these friendships with each other. So Deep Space Nine comes to rest, after a long journey through darkness, with the original Star Trek ideal of unity forged from diversity.
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FIRST APPEARED IN ISSUE #44
FULLER SPEED
AHEAD Bryan Fuller owes a lot to Star Trek. After all, the iconic sci-fi franchise gave the fledgling writer his big break into the world of Hollywood. He started on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine before moving on to Voyager, and since then he has become one of the industry’s busiest, most unpredictable talents. Fuller has re-imagined Stephen King’s Carrie for the small screen, and created such quirky gems as Dead Like Me, Wonderfalls, and Pushing Daisies, recently putting a fresh spin on the beloved Munsters with one-off special Mockingbird Lane. The writer and producer spoke to Bryan Cairns about his work on Star Trek, and what he thinks the future might hold for the franchise.
Star Trek Magazine: What is your earliest Star Trek memory? Bryan Fuller: I was probably four or five, and my oldest brother, Brad, had a Klingon battle cruiser model that he had built and fixed up with a light. He shut off all the lights in the house, and flew this Klingon battle cruiser around in the dark. I could see the photon torpedo port cruising through the hallway, and I was like, “What is that? Where is it from? How do I get one?” The Klingon battle cruiser was really my gateway drug to Star Trek. Growing up, what captivated you about the franchise? It’s the same thing that fascinated me about The Twilight Zone. I was so used to seeing entertainment and storytelling that was
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grounded in our reality, but with Star Trek and The Twilight Zone, I got to see something that ignored the boundaries of reality, and went beyond. It was so liberating and inspiring to see unfettered storytelling. I loved to be transported to something that wasn’t in our own reality.
Bryan Fuller
“THE KLINGON BATTLE CRUISER WAS REALLY MY GATEWAY DRUG TO STAR TREK.”
When you look back to your baptism-by-fire on Deep Space Nine, what is your strongest memory? The kindness of Ira Behr, René Echevarria, Robert Hewitt Wolfe, and Hans Beimler. You would be going in and pitching stories to them, and then selling one, and then getting invited to the writers’ room to participate in the storybreaking. Sitting in there, as a young man of 26, with these people I had tremendous respect for, and having them listen to my ideas – and having
BRYAN FULLER: INTERVIEW
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Janeway gets assimilated in “Unimatrix Zero”
“SHE WAS ALWAYS DESCRIBED TO ME AS ‘MEL GIBSON FROM LETHAL WEAPON, IF HE WERE A STARSHIP CAPTAIN.’” FULLER ON JANEWAY
Fuller's first job on Voyager was to write out Kes
me listen to their ideas – was amazing. Having them teach me how to work a writers’ room, and how to listen, and to call me out when I wasn’t listening... One time, Ira was like, “Yeah, I said that 10 minutes ago!” I remember them being very kind, very inclusive, and I felt amongst my own people. They were like-minded fellows who had great affection for the genre, and great affection for the franchise. It was a really special experience. Once you came on-board Voyager, which characters did you gravitate towards most? I joined at the same time as Seven of Nine was introduced. As they were wrapping up the third season, I was able to write a script and was pulled in. I would drive up to the Paramount gates and tell them I was a courier, and then I would slip story ideas under Brannon Braga’s door for Star Trek: Voyager. Every other day, I would churn out story ideas. Finally, he was like, “OK, come up with a bunch of ideas to kill off Kes.” I came up with several of them, and worked on that a little bit. That became “The Gift”, that Joe Menosky ultimately did, but it was kind of cool to be included in the writing-off of the character. I initially really bonded to Kes, because I spent so much time thinking about how does this character go away and leave the show, and make room for another character? Then I felt a real attraction to Seven of Nine and Tuvok. But really the character I loved writing for, and really responded to, was Captain Janeway. I love that she was a bit of a rogue. She was always described to me as, “Mel Gibson from Lethal Fuller wrote DS9's “The Darkness and the Light”
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BRYAN FULLER: INTERVIEW Bryan Fuller and friend
Weapon if he were a starship Captain, because she has no rules to back her up.” She’s on her own. She has a morality. She is cut off from a chain of command, so she really had to be her own judge, jury, and executioner. Captain Kirk was a bit of a rogue, but he had a cowboy diplomacy. Captain Picard was very rigid and by the book. Commander/Captain Sisko has his own kind of Wild West approach to leadership. I remember at the time, there was a lot of criticism about Janeway’s inconsistency. I always found that authentic, because we, as human beings, are so incredibly inconsistent. What sticks out about your inaugural Voyager episode, “The Raven”? It was my first episode, and it’s so surreal to look back at it. As a staff writer, there are chunks of me in there. Whenever you see a writing credit, it’s so deceptive, because so many people participate in the writing of any one television episode, that you can’t accurately reflect the credit. Looking back, it was an amazing lesson in imagination, funneled through the rigors of television production. What was originally going to be this big, broad, episode became smaller and more intimate. It was such a dramatic
Go ahead, punk – Make it so!
evolution. Whenever I’m doing a show, and I see how much things evolve from concept to execution, it’s so dramatic. They become such different beasts. To look at that episode and see how it started, where it was going and ended up, is to see three different journeys. Your earlier episodes, “The Raven” and “Drone”, explored facets of the Borg. What was so compelling about this villainous alien race? For me, I’ve always been fascinated by the contagion quality of family. I’m the youngest of five, and I never felt quite connected with the way the rest of the group thought. I identified with Seven of Nine, being connected but disconnected.
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Kes ascends to a new level of existence
like a much more personal, specific story for Voyager than the finale we had. Now, I loved the finale that we had. It turned out really satisfying. But I thought the other story would have been a little more original to us. Upon reflection, what worked best about Voyager for you? The dynamic between Janeway, Seven of Nine, and the Doctor. One of the things the show did best was the idea of this woman leading a crew, and finding this wild child in Seven of Nine, and the Pinocchio character in the Doctor. There seemed to be a great sense of humor and wit between those three actors, and characters. I love the relationship between Janeway and Tuvok. I always thought there could be something rich and interesting between those two. There’s been some buzz lately about you and Bryan Singer possibly bringing Star Trek back to the small screen. Is that premature fan euphoria, or could that become a reality? That is going to be firmly in the hands of J.J. Abrams or Bob Orci and Alex Kurtzman. That’s probably going to fall in their domain, because they’ve all been working so hard on the movies. As much as I would love to participate in it, I really think it’s under their guidance. But if they are throwing a party and they want to invite me, I will show up!
That appealed to me. The Borg was a fascinating villain, because it really was a bad family – not that my family was bad, but I was definitely the “other” in the family. It has always been interesting for me to look at these aliens and ask, “What is the metaphor of the Borg?” And the metaphor is, “You belong to this group”. It wasn’t just the perversion of the family unit, which is very scary because you trust your family to support and love you. Then you take a step back, and it’s a horrible, oppressive entity that you can’t get away from. There are all sorts of complexities with the Borg that fascinated me. Saying goodbye and wrapping up a series is always difficult. Was “Endgame” the kind of fond farewell you were hoping to give Voyager, and Janeway? The original ending we had was a little bit cooler. For me, it felt a little too reminiscent of “All Good Things...” That was an amazing, powerful, epic conclusion to The Next Generation. It felt like our finale was trying to do “All Good Things...” again. There was an idea we had, that got cannibalized for another episode, which had Janeway, in a bold move, allowing Voyager and its crew to be assimilated. That would become a poison pill for the Borg. As we were assimilating the Borg ship from the inside, and re-assimilating ourselves, we would use a Borg trans-warp conduit to get back home. The idea was this great final image of the Borg armada approaching Earth, and then out of the belly of the lead ship came Voyager, destroying all of the other Borg in its trail. It felt like an epic conclusion to Janeway’s journey with the Borg, and freeing Seven of Nine. That got abandoned somewhere along the road, and it felt
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Do you envision this overhaul as a dark and gritty world? Is it an action-packed Abrams universe, or is it something campy? I don’t think it’s campy. I think the time for camp is gone. I love the tone of the reinvention. I love the cast. It was spot-on. The spirit of it was just right. When you go to a summer movie, that’s the movie you want to show up to. It should be in the spirit, vein, and tone of that world, but it has to be its own thing. You’re going to the movies to see that, and want something else in your living room. I think it should be within that universe and that world, otherwise it gets a little confusing. It’s Star Trek, but it’s not the Star Trek that’s a movie.
Voyager arrives home in a blaze of glory in “Endgame”
“TELEVISION IS CHANGING SO MUCH, AND PART OF THE HOOK IS WANTING TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENS, WEEK TO WEEK.”
BRYAN FULLER: INTERVIEW Could Star Trek stand a serialized, heavymythology series, or would that be a mistake? No, it could totally handle it. Television is changing so much, and part of the hook is wanting to know what happens, week to week. I do think it could benefit from it, but I do also love the idea of those stand-alone episodes. It probably has to be some sort of hybridization of an episode with some stand-alone element of “You’re going on an adventure every week, and you’re meeting new aliens and new cultures and new species.” But I want to see a serialized component to the characters,, as theyy evolve and learn and ggrow through what encountering. gh wh hat tthey heyy are en he ncounteering. encounte What’ss be been een en rewarding rew about putting updated spins on CCarrie, The Th Munsters (with the recent Mockingbird special), ingbbird Lane spe peciall), and the upcoming Hannibal iball TV series? There is a big fan ele element much lement nt to it. I’II’m m very very m uchh a fa uc fann of all tthese opportunity reinvent. h sse things I get the he he op pportunity to rei einv nvent. With Carr Carrie, something rie, there wa was som metthing ssoo interestingg about tell telling meant ing that story ry ppost-Columbine. ostttos t-Columb mbine. It m me antt something With hing different than it di did in 1976. W ith Mockingbird Lane, inngbbird Lane e, I wass lillike, ke,, “There should be a family monsters television. am ly of mon amil nsters onn telev evision.” There are so many metaphors what ny ggreat metaph hor ors for wh haat family is, and what these are. Frankenstein’s hesse monsters are e. There’s’s Franke enstei e n’s Monster, walking corpse, ter, who is essentially a walki king co orpse, and in a constant state nsttaant stat te of decay, and in llove with th a womann w who doesn’t like ho doesn n’t age. It felt lik ke iit wass rrich ich for storytelling. Hannibal, what ellinng. And An now w with Hann niba ibal, w hatt is the new angle? What the that nglee? W hat is th he story th hat hasn’t h ’t bbeen een told?? In Hannibal, we’re chapter nnibbal, we’ ’re telling the cha haptter that wasn’t in any of tth books, the book ks, that was hhinted at but covered very loosely recollections. ooseely l in re ecollections. JJ Abrams amss and Joss Whedon started their careers on TV. Sin Singer nger is credited as setting the bar high for superhero perrhero movies. You’ve worked on Heroes. What are your thoughts on tackling feature films or superheroes perhheroes again? I wouldd lo love Wonder ove to do Wond n err Woman or Aquaman. always mann. I’II’ve ve alw ways been fascinated with Aq Aquaman, quaama m n, bbecause ecaus usee there’s the ever-adorable Doolittle quality ado doorabl rab e Dr. Doo olitttle qual ality of being abl able to communicate with sea le o commuunicate creatures. There’s also something uress. ’s so g so untapped, as of yet, in that pedd, of thhat realm of super superheroes. would rheroess. I w wo uld love too doo a Wonde Wonder Woman er Wom o an movie.. I w would lovee to doo something true thinng that was tru ue too the spirit of why she piritt wh h was created. reatted. Wonder Woman er W Woma an was created reatted ass a
Voyager's “Drone”
women getting involved ve in direct response to wo omen ge etting invol the war effort in World War II. It soundss sso about ou cheesy, but I’d love to do something ab honoring the power of women. about After all this time, what is so enduring aab the Star Trek legacy? I think it’s a legacy that is all-inclusive. IIt’s a human world that promises an evolution of the hhu hate te and condition; that had moved on beyond hat fear, and embraced true Christian values oof thy neighbor, ig tolerance, aacceptance, ccepta tance, and lloving oving th hy ne neighbor. There and being iinspired nspiredd by thy ne eig ighborr. The erre is a purest o sstrange st range Christian quality, in its pu ra pure rest st fform, ttoo tthe he Roddenberry universe. Thesee aare evolved eev vol o ved people, whoo do nott have hhate, spite, rampant ugliness ssp pite, and the ram mpant ug glinesss of politics still in their blood. One of po sti tillll in th OOn the things the writers on Next Nex th thinngs the writers N Generation bo is Genera Ge ati tion on complained aabout that “Everybody is so evolved th evvol now th that can’t any hat we ca an’ n t have an drama.” On One of the things ne f thing that Gene Rod Roddenberry was very odde denberry w insistent on was that innsisten entt thaat these are evolved human n bbeings, arre so they didn’t have so the heyy di havve conflict with they with each other, th have confl ict outside. have ouuts team. m. There TThey hey ey are re a team iss someth something hing sso wonderful about ou wondderful abo knowing you aare knowinng u ar going to be accepted, cc going to acce and annd Star TTrek rekk is i a universe tthat hatt promises acceptance. prom pr omises acc ceptaan STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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FIRST APPEARED IN ISSUE #42
FANTASTIC
VOYAGER
THE KATE MULGREW INTERVIEW Back in 1995, Star Trek: Voyager was generating plenty of buzz, curiosity, and even some skepticism, by introducing the franchise’s first female captain, Kathryn Janeway. Over the next seven seasons, Janeway proved every bit as formidable, resourceful, and intelligent as her male predecessors, while introducing a new vulnerability and compassion to the Captain role. Bryan Cairns spoke to Kate Mulgrew about those Voyager days, crafting such a respected character, and life after Star Trek.
STAR TREK MAGAZINE: Looking back to the beginning, what were your initial thoughts when you heard Star Trek would be introducing a female captain? Kate Mulgrew: I think I wasn’t a Star Trek aficionado at that point. I may not have taken it as seriously as I learned to take it. What I probably did well during the audition process is I approached Janeway as I would have approached any other role. That was with the same seriousness and attention to win the role. And beyond that, to endow her with the attributes and nuances and subtleties that I would any character I consider complex and interesting. Perhaps that’s what won the final day for me.
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Kate Mulgrew bids farewell as Admiral Janeway in “Endgame”
What kind of stories did Janeway being female allow them to tell? There’s a certain license when a staff is writing for the first time in a franchise of this success and size, about an iconic female character. I think there’s a certain license to examine her emotionally. In fact, probably an imperative. They tried, and succeeded in many ways, to deconstruct her and look at Janeway not only as a scientist or the captain of a starship, but what makes up the woman. There was an engagement to a man and we all know she loved her dog. There was a humanity going in that I think they were probably less free with regarding the male captains.
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Janeway makes her entrance in “Caretaker”
Did they play around with your signature hairstyle or was it perfect right off the bat? No, they fooled around with it until the cows came home. It was endless. It was understandable, because they were nervous about my being a woman, so they were working a lot on the cosmetic stuff. A lot of the superficial things they went over were for my hair, my bosom, my costume, my shoes, my hands… all of it. When you’re dealing with millions of dollars, Paramount Studios and a demographic of young males between 25 and 35, you’re concerned about how these men are going to respond to a female of still childbearing years. I’m not quite old enough to be their mother and not quite young enough to be their girlfriend. It was a difficult thing for them. I just said to them, “Why don’t you just leave it alone and let the audience decide for themselves if I’m worthy of this hair? I will develop my own sense of command. That’s why you hired me anyway. And let’s do this thing together.” At the end of the first season, that’s where we were. Back then, did you keep up with all the fan feedback about Janeway? I didn’t. I could barely keep up with the two hours of sleep I was getting every night. I was raising two small boys and working almost to capacity the first season. I was on my feet 85 hours a week. If it wasn’t shooting, it was press and if it wasn’t press, it was something else. I thought if I started to read the comments, I would only be riveted by it and I didn’t have the time. How much input did you have on Janeway’s journey and development? A good actor – an invested actor – has a lot of influence, because it’s the essence of the actor coming through the character into the television. I think they looked at me after a season and said, “Let’s just let her go. She has a very strong sense of command, of fairness, of depth, of humanity and of discipline. Let’s try and marry the actress to the role and see what happens.” That’s what happened in the second season going forward.
The season one cast of Star Trek: Voyager
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Were you ever forced to fight for Janeway? I had to fight on certain things. For her sexuality, not to be confused with her sensuality, I said, “I don’t think Janeway should be having an affair. Seriously, I think I will lose a lot of the audience if I start that nonsense. What’s good for the goose isn’t necessarily good for the gander and we have to play by new rules.” They listened and heard that. Even now, looking back, I think that was probably the smartest decision I could have made.
KATE MULGREW: INTERVIEW
Janeway takes to the skies with Leonardo da Vinci in “Concerning Flight”
Did you prefer episodes that examined Janeway’s military, action, or human side more? Funny thing is, as it evolved and I became increasingly immersed in her, I loved her military being. I loved her military sense of honor and courage and mettle. I loved that she was increasingly very brave. I loved the physical Janeway who was unafraid to annihilate if she had to. That was very freeing for me for some reason. Her captaincy was lonely. There was a wonderful episode called “Loneliness” where they examined what it must be like to be a woman alone, in an unknown quadrant of space and in charge of 165 people on a starship. I think she had a particularly lonely command. I could not rest in the camaraderie of my male colleagues because that could have been misinterpreted. Although we were great friends, I had to really live with a certain kind of loneliness and I did. Not withstanding that, I loved the physical. Just like Janeway, Mulgrew would say, “Time travel gives me a headache.” I even loved all the special effects, the green screens and learning how to do it. I loved the stuff with the Borg and the Borg Queen.
it had been further enhanced. There were nine regular characters and it’s hard to find the time to do all of this. To answer your question more poignantly, I would have liked a lot more relationships. I had it with the person of my dreams, which was Bob Picardo, as the Doctor. I had a relationship with Seven of Nine, so I’m not really complaining, but I loved them all. And if you want to know the scariest part of this whole ride, it was the technobabble. That was daunting. Not only did I have to memorize it, I had to understand it in order for it to make sense. And it took me a while to understand it and I didn’t have that time. I had to go home, learn lots of dialogue, and I only had a few hours to learn it. I had to get up at 4 a.m. Every day was like walking a tightrope that first season, until I understood what all the technobabble meant.
“I LOVED JANEWAY’S MILITARY SENSE OF HONOR AND COURAGE AND METTLE. I LOVED THAT SHE WAS INCREASINGLY VERY BRAVE.”
Speaking of challenges, was Janeway’s costume comfortable? Divine. Loved it. Just loved it. I’m one of those odd actresses. Give me a costume like that, which is one piece. I just chucked myself in it and that was it. Put on my boots and walked onto the sound-stage. It was absolutely great. My boots were high because all of my male co-stars were very tall. I’m 5’5”, so they had to build me these man-made Italian boots, which added about four inches.
great friends, as colleagues and cohorts, in their agreements and disagreements. The relationship with Tuvok (Tim Russ), which I think was always very special and very deep, was there, but I wish
After seven seasons, was “Endgame” a worthy series finale? You could look at this 100 ways. I had a hand in “Endgame.” First of all, there was no way we
The Voyager crew have a “Year of Hell”
Was there anything you didn’t get to explore with Janeway that you feel might have been a lost opportunity? Many things. Seven years may seem like a long time, but it’s not enough time to fully explore a character of her dimensions. I would have loved to have chosen a relationship on that ship. I know I had one with Seven of Nine (played by Jeri Ryan). They developed that very nicely, but I would have liked to further explore my relationship with Chakotay (Robert Beltran) as STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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were going to please everybody. Seven years is too long. You fall in love, you have certain rivalries and the audience is fully engaged in all that. They want it this way or that way. I said, “I think Janeway has to go down with the ship, but not at the full cost of her being.” We had to figure out how to do that. I thought it was splendid. The admiral went down with the ship and Janeway went on.
Janeway and Chakotay see to some unfinished business in “Resolutions”
The Borg Queen makes her presence felt in the Delta Quadrant
“I SAID, ‘I THINK JANEWAY HAS TO GO DOWN WITH THE SHIP, BUT NOT AT THE FULL COST OF HER BEING.”’ Do you have any fond memories of those last few days of filming? Mostly how hard it was to say goodbye. Actors love to complain, as much as they love not to complain. They love to let everybody know how hard they worked and what terrible hours they had to suffer through. Patrick Stewart said something to me in the first week of the first season that I will never forget and that I actually thought about on the very last day of shooting. He said, “If you do this well and approach it with vigor and discipline, this will be the work that will make you the proudest of any work you will do.” And that’s exactly how I felt the last days, with tears running down my cheeks. It was almost impossible to do that last scene with Picardo. It was very difficult to do that Alzheimer’s scene. But they kept me alone for about a week to do a lot of pick-ups on my Captain’s chair and on the Bridge. It was “Cut. Print. Thank you very much, Captain.” I remember thinking how foolish human beings are. We think it’s long, but it’s nothing. It’s a moment. I was very proud. The Five Captains event in London has everyone buzzing. What’s it like getting together with the four other guys?
Janeway tests out one of her hair-dos in “Caretaker”
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KATE MULGREW: INTERVIEW We’ve done it at Wizard World. It was an understated affair, to be frank. This should have been heralded as something very unique. The first time all the captains were together, but that’s the nature of a Comic-Con. It’s not a Star Trek convention; it’s a multi-genre convention. I think in the UK, it’s going to be great and we’re so looking forward to it. We want to present ourselves as a very unique, exceptional unit of people who have done what no one else has done. From my point of view, being the only woman is going to be great. Wasn’t it about time something of this magnitude happened? Yeah, I don’t know why they didn’t do this before. Probably the viability or possibility of it was nil. Five people with five very different schedules and trying to get them together… Timing is of the essence. Is it strange being so closely connected through Star Trek, but never having really worked with any of these four actors? No, it’s not strange. I’ve known them for years, except for Scott [Bakula]. I know [William] Shatner very well and Patrick [Stewart] quite well. Even Avery [Brooks]. So no, it’s not an unfamiliar feeling. It’s a good feeling. Do the five of you talk shop or reminisce about the Star Trek glory days? We do swap stories. There’s always fun and games about who was the most popular captain. That’s very real. Whose captain was the most popular? And you know Shatner is so shy and withholding (laughter). He’s a funny guy and as Janeway severs Seven of Nine from the Collective in “Scorpion, Part 2”
It was only a matter of time before the Voyager crew bumped into the Borg
we’ve come to realize, Patrick is a really fine actor in his own right. I think Patrick worked hard to make Picard a wonderful captain.
So on each of their own respective ships, which captain would win in a battle royale? I would, of course! Why are you asking? That’s a rhetorical question. I told them that. I said, “I may be a woman and considerably smaller than you, but watch out!” You must have had some interesting fan interaction. Is there any particular conversation or encounter that stands out? The young girl from M.I.T. (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) coming to see me at the White House at the end of the first season. Mrs. Clinton is a big Star Trek fan, and when Janeway took over, she invited me to come speak to Women in Science, a group of women culled from scientific communities all over the world. In that group was a small pocket from M.I.T.. I remember these girls surrounding me at the end of the evening and saying, “Our fathers encouraged us to go into research, for the office work, because that’s the best we could do. And then your series came on and now we look at our fathers and say, ‘Sorry, Dad, we’re going into the field. In other words, we’re STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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going up.’” I remember tears coming to my eyes and thinking, “Don’t cry.” If I can have any measure of influence in this regard, then I’ve done something wonderful. And so has Paramount and UPN. Viewers have been enjoying you as Pete’s secretive mom, Jane Lattimer, on Warehouse 13. How has the sci-fi genre moved on since Voyager? I don’t really know. Warehouse 13 in itself is so unique. The whole idea of artifacts and using history as a means of tying the future to the past, and the past to the future, is very clever. I think sci-fi has advanced. There’s no question about it, as science and technology have advanced. It’s sort of breathtaking what they can accomplish now.
After an intrepid journey, Voyager makes it back to Earth
How much fun was it flexing your comedic muscles for the parody television series NTSF: SD: SUV (National Terrorism Strike Force: San Diego: Sport Utility Vehicle)? I just did a second season of that. It’s unspeakably fun. These guys are absolutely wild. Nothing is out of bounds. They do whatever they want. Most of them are from the Upright Citizens Brigade, but some of them are from Saturday Night Live. They are all sought-after comedians. To let my hair down, if you’ll pardon the expression, and play the straight man among these lunatics is very liberating for me. My character is so weird with her eye patch.
“I’M VERY PROUD OF THE FRIENDSHIPS THAT WERE BORN ON THE VOYAGER SOUND-STAGE.” What other projects do you have on tap? I’m going to do a wonderful play in the Spring that I’ve been working on with the playwright, Jenny Schwartz, called Somewhere Fun. I’ll do that in New York. I think I’ll do some more Warehouse 13, although I’m not entirely sure. I just did a movie called Drawing Home, an independent movie with Rutger Hauer and Peter Strauss. The work comes. It was a very good year and I’m looking forward to many more.
Seven years on… The cast of Voyager
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How have you enjoyed focusing on the stage more, and has Star Trek allowed you the freedom to realize that passion? I’ve always been a theatre actress. And, like Patrick Stewart, I had been acting for many years before I got the role of Janeway. What it did, which is what I think you are asking and is a fair
KATE MULGREW: INTERVIEW
Kate Mulgrew makes a cameo appearance in Star Trek: Nemesis
question, is it was a very generous and profitable part. I have been very lucky to have assumed from that profit a kind of life, and lifestyle, that has allowed me to be the actress that I want to be. Alzheimer’s disease is a subject very close to your heart. What advancements have been made since you became actively involved in that cause? Did you read the New York Times yesterday? There’s been a breakthrough in the understanding of the genetic mutation. They had to go so far into genetic material and the understanding of the brain before they can even think of finding a cure. We’re far away, I’m sorry to say, for a number of reasons. Foremost among them, we don’t fully understand about the protein, the plaque, that is causing this damage to the brain. We don’t understand who gets it or why. We understand it’s partially genetic but, beyond that, we don’t know what other components are serving this monster. Star Trek saw a reboot with the J.J. Abrams film in 2009. Do you feel it’s snared the interest of a new generation and re-energized the franchise? I do. I think there is a certain mind that loves Star Trek. There is a certain kind of imagination that is captured by this idea Gene Roddenberry understood all those years ago. These are people who have scientific brains, these fans, but who love to explore the dimensions of science with their imaginations. And Star Trek allows for all of that. Little ships lost in space are a metaphor for life. It will never change. Space is infinite and we’ll never explore it in its entirety. So did it re-infuse a new energy into it? Probably, but I think the mind is always questioning.
If they continued to spotlight the characters in their younger stages ages of life and wanted to incorporate Janeway, way, which actress should step into her shoes? God, has it come to that? What about the old fogeys? Do you know who would make a great Janeway? Carey Mulligan. And Ellen Page is another choice. We need somebody smart and a little funny. You and I are going to do a little casting session. I’m sending notes es to Paramount as soon as we conclude this interview. erview. (Laughter) First,, they have to do a movie with Picard and me about bout how we died, right? Lastly, what are you most proud of regarding Voyager, er, r and what did the series add to the Star Trekk legacy? I’m so proud of the he personal discipline that was as exercised on that set. I’m not really ashamed to say that. I’m very ery proud of the friendships that were born on that sound-stagee and that have persisted. I love Bob Picardo. He’s a dear friendd of mine. Love Robbie McNeill. Neill. Love Tim. Love them all. I’m m proudest of how we came together gether and did our best to present nt to this already very strong ng legacy, the idea of a woman man captain and what her crew w would be like. I would say Voyager gerr stands out for its imperative, e, and that’s its humanity. STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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FIRST APPEARED IN ISSUE #40
RUNNING THE SHOW Joining the writing team of Star Trek: Enterprise during its third season was a dream come true for lifelong fan Manny Coto, but that was just the start of his adventure. Bryan Cairns talks to the Executive Producer of the show’s final season, and asks what might have happened next...
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MANNY COTO: INTERVIEW
V
eteran television writer and producer Manny Coto has no trouble whatsoever pinpointing when his love and affection for everything Star Trek first began. “Growing up, my original favorite sci-fi show was Lost in Space,” recalls Coto. “As a kid, I really responded to the robot and Dr. Smith. When I got a little older, in my teens, I started watching Star Trek. Here was a science fiction show that actually tried to make you believe the science fiction elements were a real and unified universe. Obviously, there were shows that tried to do that, but Star Trek was the first coherent sci-fi universe on television I had encountered. It had the military jargon and the idea these were actual functioning vessels and people behaved logically. It was inspirational and it drew you in and made you believe this was possible. On top of that, there were characters like Captain Kirk, who was just a great hero figure.”
Coto’s passion for the show only grew over time, and you know what they say about good things coming to those who wait. Coto started racking up genre credits on Dr. Giggles, Strange World, The Outer Limits, and Odyssey 5, before landing the plum assignment as writer and
co-executive producer on Star Trek: Enterprise’s third season. Then, it got even better, when he was subsequently promoted to showrunner in the series’ fourth year, a position his name is still strongly associated with. “That’s very flattering, because I’m very proud of the stuff we did on Enterprise,” says Coto. “I am surprised people still talk about it. It was a really fun dream project for me, to be able to do season four, and especially to do the touchstones to the original series, which was my favorite series of Star Trek.”
“HERE WAS A SCIENCE FICTION SHOW THAT ACTUALLY TRIED TO MAKE YOU BELIEVE THE A STARSHIP ADRIFT SCIENCE FICTION ELEMENTS WERE A REAL AND UNIFIED UNIVERSE.”
Despite his inner fanboy doing flips and cartwheels, things were not looking rosy for the show. Enterprise had been struggling in ratings before Coto even beamed on board. As a result, UPN almost blasted the show right off their schedule, until moving it to the dreaded Friday night slot – more or less the waiting room for
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cancellation. With Coto now in charge, there was an optimistic hope amongst long-term fans that viewership would somehow increase, perhaps allowing UPN to keep this beloved legacy alive and running. With those kinds of expectations, Coto began to feel the weight of the Star Trek world on his shoulders. “It was a lot of pressure, although we all kind of knew season four was going to be the last one,” admits Coto. “Also, I kind of felt that no matter what we did on the show, or how good it got, once the ratings declined in the way Enterprise did, they weren’t going to go back [up again]. That doesn’t happen on television. It’s very, very rare. My feeling was, ‘This is going to be the last season anyway, so do the best you can do, have as much fun as you can, and don’t worry too much about the ratings.’” Thankfully, story-wise, Enterprise gained some strong momentum due to the epic, critically acclaimed Xindi arc, which saw the alien race almost destroy the Earth. Going into season four, there was no denying Coto’s enthusiasm and excitement translated into a renewed energy for Enterprise’s untapped frontier.
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“MY FEELING WAS, ‘THIS IS GOING TO BE THE LAST SEASON ANYWAY, SO DO THE BEST YOU CAN DO, HAVE AS MUCH FUN AS YOU CAN AND DON’T WORRY TOO MUCH ABOUT THE RATINGS.’” “I had my own feeling about what I thought the series should be,” explains Coto. “I wasn’t going in trying to correct something. I was using what was there and getting in what I thought was an interesting direction. For example, they had set up the behavior of Vulcans, which was a little different than the behavior of the Vulcans we were used to. The Vulcans in this universe were a little more emotional – they lied and
were a little more inconsistent with the Vulcans of previous Treks. We created a story where Vulcan has to return to its original roots that were set up in the early days. I actually looked at the series as an opportunity to bond what was there closer to the original Star Trek series.” “There was no mandate,” he continues. “I pitched to them what I thought would be fun for season four, doing prequel stories to the original series and doing three episode arcs. The only thing that really tied me down was at the end of the Xindi arc, they had Captain Archer wake up in a Nazi camp. I had to get through that plot first. That was it. After that, I’m not saying they gave me free reign, but they approved what my ideas were and we went forward from there.”
A QUESTION OF MONEY With a diverse ship crew that included Captain Jonathan Archer (played by Scott Bakula), science officer T’Pol (Jolene Blalock), chief engineer Charles “Trip” Tucker III (Connor Trinneer), tactical officer Malcolm Reed (Dominic Keating), communications officer Hoshi Sato (Linda Park), and helmsman Travis Mayweather (Anthony Montgomery),
MANNY COTO: INTERVIEW
servicing such a large ensemble cast was no easy task. “Oh my gosh, Anthony’s character was challenging because I felt it was a little bit thinly drawn in places,” reports Coto. “There was not a lot to figure out for the guy to do. Most of the other characters I found a lot of fun to work with.” In an effort to whip up some much-needed buzz, Star Trek: The Next Generation’s Brent Spiner guest-starred in multiple episodes as Dr. Arik Soong. The true coup-de-grace would have been nabbing TOS legend William Shatner himself, whom the producers were actively pursuing. Needless to say, things didn’t pan out, but not from a lack of trying. “That episode with Shatner was going to be where the Enterprise finds a pocket universe and in it is Tiberius Kirk from the Mirror Universe,” reveals Coto. “In the original series, there was a device in the ‘Mirror, Mirror’ episode that would make people disappear. It was never really explained where they would go or what happens to them. What we were positing is that they are
“I’VE ALWAYS SAID THAT TERRA PRIME AND DEMONS WERE THE ACTUAL FINALE OF ENTERPRISE AND THAT THE FINAL EPISODE WAS MORE OF A FINALE FOR THE ENTIRE FRANCHISE.”
“It was a very cool idea. We had lunch with William Shatner, pitched it to him, he thought it was terrific and was really on board. It ultimately came down to a question of money. Paramount had a certain amount they were going to pay. Paramount was looking at this being the last season and didn’t want to spend a lot of money. They went off and did an analysis about how much they can increase the ratings by bringing Shatner in. Ultimately, they decided they weren’t going to pay him the amount of money he wanted, which was a lot, but it wasn’t crazy. Paramount just decided it wasn’t worth it to them, stupidly, by the way. It would have been a great event.”
actually transported to this pocket universe. In this universe were all the people zapped by this device and Tiberius Kirk ultimately met the same fate. Here he is, and Archer and his crew stumble on this pocket universe. Kirk wants to steal this ship to get out of this place.”
In the end, declining ratings resulted in Enterprise being axed, although that decision never informed the back half of the season. “I can’t remember where we were in the series the day we found out we had been canceled, but the season had pretty well been
THE FINAL FRONTIER
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figured out,” explains Coto. “We just proceeded along. At that point, it wasn’t a big surprise. I had the final two episodes in mind and that we were building towards the end of the series. We were able to do a season closer, then that became the series closer, and then was followed by an episode by Rick [Berman] and Brannon [Braga].” Unfortunately, that final-finale episode was not well received. Meant to be a love letter to the Star Trek franchise, “These Are the Voyages…” brought in Commander William T. Riker (Jonathan Frakes) and Counselor Deanna Troi (Marina Sirtis) instead of focusing on the existing Enterprise team, a move that angered fans and critics. Many viewers simply regarded the previous two episodes, “Demons” and “Terra Prime”, as the official swan-song to the series. “Well, that’s how I envisioned it,” says Coto. “I’ve always said that ‘Demons’ and ‘Terra Prime’ were the actual finale of Enterprise and that the final episode was more of a finale for the entire franchise. After 18 years, we knew the franchise was going off the air, so this was a finale for the entire franchise, which is why we went back to The Next Generation group. To me, ‘Demons’ and ‘Terra Prime’ felt like bringing it back to Earth. The greatest challenge in conquering space and meeting alien species was overcoming our own
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“I PROBABLY WOULD HAVE RESURRECTED [TRIP], ALTHOUGH THEY MIGHT NOT HAVE LET ME. I STILL WOULD HAVE FIGURED OUT A WAY TO DO IT.” THE RETURN OF TRIP TUCKER
“We didn’t have a lot of discussions about it,” states Coto. “It was something Rick and Brannon wanted to do. I remember thinking it was probably not a good thing, because it was kind of a cheap shot to kill off a character people love in the last episode. We did a lot of it [when I worked on] 24, where characters died, but it was in the middle of the season and the series can continue and that character can be mourned. In the last episode, to knock someone off, seemed unnecessary and you don’t win. You don’t get anything out of it.”
internal prejudices, which are still lingering around. Or that the final enemy that the Enterprise was going to face was going to be someone from our own world who did not want this future. Enterprise started with exploration and the cosmos, so I thought it was fitting to end with having to defeat someone who felt this was not something humankind should do.” Pouring salt on the open wound was Trip being killed in an explosion in “Terra Prime”. Again, many fans felt the death was forced, rushed, and pointless, with little time left to explore any emotional fallout among his friends aboard the Enterprise.
Nonetheless, viewers weren’t quite ready to say goodbye and organized a “Save Enterprise” campaign. Letters were written, funds were raised, and an ad was even taken out in the Los Angeles Times, all to no avail. “It was very flattering and fun to be part of,” acknowledges Coto. “It meant people really liked what we had done and were out there to bring it back. I didn’t feel it was going to work because Paramount had decided ‘this is it’. They had decided it was time to redo the whole franchise. I don’t know if they were thinking J.J. Abrams at the time or probably just someone new. I felt it
MANNY COTO: INTERVIEW was kind of futile. At the same time, it was fun and one can always dream.” If that’s the case, what if Enterprise had been picked up for a fifth season? Were there certain elements Coto wanted to further explore? “I remember two things,” he says. “I wanted to get into the Romulan War, if not get into the actual war, then really start ramping up for it. Maybe something that could be picked up in the movies, because that was a big pivotal event that was a natural dramatic point for the Enterprise universe to go with. And I remembered I wanted to do an arc set on Stratos, the cloud city, and see the construction of that and their society. I also planned on doing more episodes centered in the Mirror Universe. If we had a 24-episode order, and we could do four or five episodes in the Mirror Universe, and almost have it a miniature series within a series, that would play along the regular series. I really enjoyed exploring the aliens from the original Star Trek like Andorians, the Vulcans, and I probably would have done something with the Tellarites. I’m obviously talking broad strokes here. “And, if we had continued, Trip would not have died,” he adds. “But if he had, I probably would have resurrected him, although they
might not have let me. I still would have figured out a way to do it.” Reflecting back, Coto cites a few of the creative highs and lows during his Enterprise tenure. “For me, the high was the Mirror episodes,” says Coto. “Those were just a joy to do with the original Enterprise design. That was a blast. I felt our characters really came to life in those episodes and the actors had fun playing their Mirror counterparts. In that year, I particularly love the Vulcan trilogy. It’s a fascinating culture in Star Trek and I thought it would be fun to explore more of it. Vulcans are such a big part of Star Trek and we actually see so little of them throughout all the series, so I was proud to do an arc based almost entirely on Vulcan. The one episode that got away from me was ‘Daedalus’, when the guy who created the transporter came on board. It was an interesting idea to meet the inventor, but I just don’t think we pulled off a compelling story for it.”
LIFE WITHOUT TREK These days, Coto has been keeping busy entertaining the TV community with compelling heroic and villainous characters. He helped torment Jack Bauer for 24’s last four seasons
and is currently the executive producer on the dark series, Dexter. It may seem like a stretch going from the fantastical to the more grounded spy or serial killer world, but Coto doesn’t see it that way. “Well, 24 was almost science fiction,” he counters. “It was interesting because the tech-speak delivered at CTU was very much the same as in Star Trek, where we just made stuff up. In reality, the stories, especially in 24, are about heroes and villains. 24 was a little bit heightened and a little bit exaggerated, so I always looked at it as quasi-science fiction. And Dexter is also very heightened, although I wouldn’t go so far as to call it science fiction. None of them are hyper-real, they’re all a little exaggerated, and I think my mind works best that way.” As for whether Coto is hoping that somehow, someday, he will have the opportunity to chronicle more Star Trek adventures, his answer is immediate. “Oh, absolutely!” he enthuses. “I would love to revisit the franchise in some way. I love Star Trek. Working on Enterprise for a couple of years was the highlight of my Hollywood career. I certainly hope I can go back to that universe.”
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SUCH SWEET SORROW FIRST APPEARED IN ISSUE #39
As a coda to our journey through the history of Star Trek, we examine the final tales of each generation and ask whether they were a fitting summary of all that had gone before...?
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FINALES
STAR TREK: “TURNABOUT INTRUDER” BROADCAST: JUNE 3, 1969
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nlike its later, live-action successors, the original Star Trek never benefited from having a “series finale” to close out its broadcast run. Relegated to an unglamorous time-slot on NBC’s broadcast schedule and plagued by falling ratings, Star Trek completed filming on “Turnabout Intruder,” the final episode of its third season, in early January 1969. Though cancellation rumors abounded during this period, official word on the show’s fate wouldn’t come for another month after production had concluded, with sets dismantled and cast and crew looking for new jobs. Just as Gilligan
remained on his Island and the Jupiter 2 stayed Lost in Space, so too would the U.S.S. Enterprise sail off to its next, unknown assignment, lacking anything which might be definitively viewed as “Star Trek’s last episode.” Today, it’s common for popular or wellregarded television series to receive a “proper” or even intended conclusion. Through no real fault of
mission for Kirk and the Enterprise crew. It’s not even a particularly interesting tale, as the captain is confronted by an old flame who employs alien technology to swap bodies with him. She wants revenge for Kirk having placed his career before their prior relationship. Fifty or so minutes later, everything returns to normal, and everybody gets back to work.
“THROUGH NO REAL FAULT OF ITS OWN, ‘TURNABOUT INTRUDER’ FALLS WELL SHORT OF BEING A SUITABLE FINALE.” its own, “Turnabout Intruder” falls well short of being a suitable finale. That said, it doesn’t even really serve as an adequate representative for the series. No strange new worlds are explored; no new life or new civilizations are sought. The episode presents no epic story bringing full circle a key plot element driving the show from the beginning. There’s no harking back to some basic tenet which defined the series and characters. Instead, “Turnabout Intruder” is just another
As with many television programs of its era, Star Trek had no long-running story or character arcs which were left unresolved in the wake of the show’s cancellation. Still, one cannot help but feel as though the series was cheated by having “Turnabout Intruder” end up as the original series’ swan song. Thankfully, it turned out that the swan started singing a tad too early. Dayton Ward
STAR TREK MOVIES: STAR TREK VI: THE UNDISCOVERED COUNTRY RELEASED: DECEMBER 6, 1991
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eleased in 1991, the franchise’s 25th anniversary, Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country was marketed as the final voyage of the Enterprise 1701-A. An early teaser for the film showcased clips from the original series and
the previous movies with a moving tribute in voiceover by Christopher Plummer: “Their ship… has become legend, her crew the finest ever assembled… they have been our guides, our protectors, and our friends.”
That sense of closure for the original crew was sadly underscored by the death of Star Trek’s creator, Gene Roddenberry, just three days after he attended a pre-release studio screening of the movie. The dedication to Roddenberry at the Continued overleaf STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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THE ANIMATED SERIES: “THE COUNTER-CLOCK INCIDENT” BROADCAST: OCTOBER 12, 1974
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hen Star Trek ended production for the second time in its history, no doublelength episode was produced, no tribute magazine published, no organized response from fans. Actually, the show’s producers were hoping that the show’s intended audience might not notice at all. When NBC-TV affiliates aired “The Counter-Clock Incident,” it brought to a close the six-episode second season that concluded the run of the animated version of Star Trek. Filmation, the animation house responsible for producing the series, did nothing to differentiate this final episode from any of the previous 21 – and with good reason. Network programmers hoped that the show might continue to air indefinitely on the inertia of episodes rerun in front of young viewers, who did not mind watching the same adventures of Captain James T. Kirk and the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise repeatedly. And run it did throughout the following year. While “The Counter-Clock Incident” did nothing to summarize the animated Star Trek
beginning of the completed film sets a melancholy tone, and the story itself has many somber elements: disasters and betrayals, endings and assassinations. The characters speak
“AN EMOTIONALLY SATISFYING FAREWELL TO THE ORIGINAL CREW AND A TRANSITION TO WHAT COMES NEXT” of retirement and final voyages. Spock asks Kirk if they have grown so old and inflexible that they have outlived their usefulness.
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series nor celebrate its achievements, the episode in its own way underscored a few reasons why Star Trek merited a continued life on television as well as the big screen.
“NETWORK PROGRAMMERS HOPED THAT THE SHOW MIGHT CONTINUE TO AIR INDEFINITELY”
Still, it is not a sad film, but a hopeful one. Far from being beyond their usefulness, the crew saves the universe once again, and the torch is passed on a number of levels. Sulu is the captain of his own ship. The treaty with the Klingons leads to a future when a Klingon named Worf, played by Michael Dorn, will serve on the bridge of a new Enterprise, emphasized by a cameo from Dorn, apparently playing Worf’s grandfather. Kirk even changes his classic “where no man has gone before” to the “no one” of Star Trek: The Next Generation, already at the peak of its run on television. Ordered to Spacedock for decommissioning, Kirk instead gives a heading
The Star Trek universe had a rich history worth exploring. Appearances by Commodore Robert April, the first captain of the Enterprise, as well as his wife, Sarah, hinted at the promise of unchronicled adventures predating not only Kirk but his immediate predecessor, Christopher Pike. Budgets might not limit creativity so severely. The animated episode’s plot device of a negative universe in which time ran backward and reduced the starship’s crew to children would have been much too expensive to depict in live action. But advancing special effects and make-up techniques could make alien-looking sets and actors more achievable and affordable as time passed. Star Trek continued to appeal to creators, audiences and critics. Not only did the animated series attract performers and writers from the original series, but audiences, too, and of all ages. And in 1975, the animated series did something that no Star Trek series had done before or has since: win a best-series Emmy award. Kevin Dilmore
of “Second star to the right, and straight on ’til morning,” and the Enterprise rides off into the sunset. It’s an exciting adventure on its own, as well as an emotionally satisfying farewell to the original crew and a transition to what comes next. It’s as if the film itself is telling the audience, “Don’t worry, Star Trek is still here. The king is dead. Long live the king.” Scott Pearson
FINALES
THE NEXT GENERATION: “ALL GOOD THINGS...” BROADCAST: MAY 23, 1994
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t once deeply reflective and forwardlooking, “All Good Things…” – one of only two TNG episodes to win the prestigious Hugo Award recognizing excellence in science fiction – is a joyous celebration of Star Trek: The Next Generation, bringing the voyages of the Enterprise-D not merely full circle, but also propelling the ship and its crew optimistically into the future. The episode aims high with an interstellar mystery of apocalyptic proportions that defies the crew’s understanding: a time-distorting anomaly that extends from the future into the past to retroactively destroy life on Earth. To resolve the crisis, Captain Jean-Luc Picard must confront it at three different periods in his life: his earliest days aboard the Enterprise; his present reality, seven years later; and a possible future long after the crew have gone their separate ways. Braiding these
time periods together toward their climactic convergence is Q, the representative of a Continuum whose persistent testing of humanity has challenged Picard since he first took command of the Enterprise. It’s Q who reveals near the episode’s end that Picard’s acceptance of the paradox he faced is what enabled him to successfully resolve the crisis – that his willingness to open his mind to possibilities outside his narrow experience won the day for his ship, his crew, and all life in his region of the galaxy. But as uplifting and intellectually appealing as this message is, we must acknowledge that TNG’s success with its fans came from the way its stories balanced head with heart. It’s therefore no accident that in “All Good Things…” the application of Picard’s breakthrough moment is made possible only through his bond with his crew
– the potential he recognizes when he first becomes their captain; the tight-knit family they became after seven years together; and their shared willingness to set aside any bitterness and tragedy of later years, and sacrifice everything they have left out of love and loyalty for the man who once led them across the stars.
Nowhere is that core message more effectively driven home than in the episode’s final scene, when Picard joins his senior staff’s regular poker game for the first time, acknowledging the deep connections he has made with this group, and embracing the possibilities of shared adventures yet to come: “Five card stud, nothing wild… and the sky’s the limit.” Marco Palmieri
STAR TREK: DEEP SPACE NINE: “WHAT YOU LEAVE BEHIND” BROADCAST: JUNE 2, 1999
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any qualities set Deep Space Nine apart from the other incarnations of Star Trek, but one of the most important aspects of this groundbreaking series was its producers’ willingness to upset their show’s status quo. Whether it was revealing Odo was a member of the race that controlled the Dominion, exposing Bashir as a genetically enhanced human “passing” for normal, transforming Nog from a juvenile petty criminal into a Starfleet officer, or plunging the Federation into a years-long war, DS9’s writers never feared to “kick over the table” in order to tell compelling stories. The series’ finale is no exception. In its 90 minutes of screen time, Ezri Dax and Julian Bashir inaugurate a new romantic relationship;
the Cardassians rebel against the Dominion and see their homeworld laid waste as a consequence; the Federation and its allies win the war against the Dominion; Worf becomes the Federation’s ambassador to Qo’noS; O’Brien takes his family home to Earth and becomes a professor of engineering at Starfleet Academy; Sisko “fulfills his purpose” as the Emissary by defeating Gul Dukat and the Pah-wraiths, only to be taken from his son and pregnant wife to go live with the Prophets for an indefinite period of time; and Odo leaves Kira, the woman he loves, so that he can return to the Great Link, heal his people, and lay the groundwork for peace between the Founders and the “Solids.” Also vividly on display in this episode is the morally ambiguous worldview that was a
“VIVIDLY ON DISPLAY IN THIS EPISODE IS THE MORALLY AMBIGUOUS WORLDVIEW THAT WAS A HALLMARK OF DS9 ”
hallmark of DS9. After Cardassia is razed and nearly a billion of its people lie slain, Chancellor Martok of the Klingon Empire remarks to the brooding Sisko and Admiral Ross that the Bajorans would call the Cardassians’ bitter fate “poetic justice.” I make no secret of the fact that I think DS9 is the best Star Trek series to date. Because its finale perfectly epitomizes everything the series stood for, I’ll double down: I think it’s far and away the best Star Trek finale of them all. David Mack
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VOYAGER: “ENDGAME” BROADCAST: MAY 23, 2001
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ndgame” gives us everything that was best and worst about Voyager. In the “best” category, we have the glimpses of our crew many years later, stunning and brilliant effects sequences (see: extremely cool ablative armor), the return of Alice Krige as the Borg Queen, and some truly stunning character work by the entire cast, but most notably Mulgrew portraying both the captain we all know and the 27 year older Admiral Janeway who is, in some ways, unrecognizable. As for the “bad”, the absolute out-ofthe-blue romance between Seven and Chakotay is near impossible to swallow. Much worse is the notion that we watched these people struggle to get home for seven years
“SOME TRULY STUNNING CHARACTER WORK BY THE ENTIRE CAST” while maintaining their Starfleet principles, only to have them tossed out the window when this particular chance to get home came up. Admiral Janeway’s case is that the losses she and others suffered during the original 23 year mission were too great to accept, so she dedicated herself to getting her ship home earlier to avoid them. It’s too sad to think of Kathryn Janeway as a leader who not only dedicated herself to getting her people home, but once she had done it, spent the next 10 years figuring out how to do it better. The episode attempts to justify it, particularly in the heartbreaking case of Tuvok, but even that doesn’t mitigate the extremes to which Admiral Janeway went here, or the lines she finally crossed.
But perhaps the worst of the bad here is that, once again, we beat the Borg. By now, this had become so commonplace that it’s amazing that the Queen didn’t just destroy Voyager the minute they entered that nebula when she had the chance. It’s hard to take a villain seriously who didn’t know better by then. In the end, we got the moment we had been wanting for seven years and on a purely emotional level, it delivered. But in the final analysis, “Endgame” didn’t really earn that moment. It’s almost worth it for that final shot of Voyager approaching Earth. Almost. Kirsten Beyer
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hatever the flaws of Star Trek Nemesis as a film, it did serve as a fine coda to Star Trek: The Next Generation, in part because it was deliberately written as such. Nemesis sets about sending the crew off in various directions. Riker and Troi get married, a move many in the fan base considered long overdue, and one that was set up in the previous film. Riker finally accepts his own command, heading over to the Titan, with Troi accompanying him. The script had called for Beverly Crusher to leave the Enterprise to head up Starfleet Medical once more (a post she held during the second season of the TV show), though this was cut from the final film, and
FINALES
ENTERPRISE: “THESE ARE THE VOYAGES...” BROADCAST: MAY 13, 2005
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t’s fair to say that Star Trek: Enterprise’s final episode, “These Are The Voyages…,” met with a mixed reception from fans and cast members alike. Intending to connect Enterprise with the wider Star Trek universe and treat fans to a cross-series event, producers Rick Berman and Brannon Braga constructed the final episode as a holodeck re-creation being watched by Commanders Riker and Troi on the
Other decisions in the scripting of “These Are The Voyages…” also met with less than enthusiastic reactions. The death of Commander Charles ‘Trip’ Tucker was felt by many to be an unnecessary ploy to bring emotional depth to an episode that very literally reduced the characters to holographic simulacrum. Many of the conversations that Riker had with the
“BERMAN AND BRAGA ROBBED THE CHARACTERS, AND THE AUDIENCE, OF THE CHANCE FOR REAL CLOSURE” Enterprise-D. Unfortunately, far from pleasing fans of the show, many viewers felt that the inclusion of a Star Trek: The Next Generation storyline stole the limelight in what should have been Enterprise’s grand finale.
there are welcome cameos by her son Wesley and the Enterprise’s former barkeep, Guinan.
“THE MOVIE CELEBRATES THE PAST GIVING WAY TO THE FUTURE” The movie celebrates the past giving way to the future. The very first scene sees the Romulan Senate wiped out, signaling a major change in one of Star Trek’s oldest empires. B-4 was a prototype that led to Data, and Picard was, in many ways, the prototype for Shinzon. Shinzon is trying to move his adopted people
Enterprise crew in his role as Chef lacked conviction because they begged the question of how there could have been any record of such private exchanges. By rendering all the characters as nothing
forward from their time as slaves, just as Riker and Troi are moving their own lives forward. Plus one of the main characters moves on to the “undiscovered country,” as Data makes the ultimate sacrifice. The film also makes an effort to touch on all five iterations of onscreen Star Trek – fittingly as it is the last time this timeline will be seen on the big screen for the foreseeable future. Riker calls for an evasive maneuver named after James T. Kirk, the briefing on the Remans includes a mention of their role in the Dominion War, one of the Starfleet vessels en route to aid the Enterprise is the U.S.S. Archer, and there’s an appearance by now-Admiral Kathryn Janeway.
more than historic records of themselves Berman and Braga robbed them, and the audience, of the chance for real closure. However, “These Are The Voyages…” did neatly tie the show back to its roots and underlying theme – to chronicle the beginnings of Starfleet and the United Federation of Planets. By ending the series with the signing of the coalition treaty and the conclusion of the Enterprise NX-01’s time as an active ship of the line, the episode brought to a close the journey the characters had started in the pilot, “Broken Bow.” Any television show that is canceled as suddenly and prematurely as Enterprise was is going to struggle to find a satisfying conclusion. This is particularly true of Enterprise because it was in its final season that the show really began to find its feet and thus its cancellation was particularly disappointing. Unfortunately, despite the best of intentions, “These Are The Voyages…” didn’t give Enterprise the sendoff it deserved. Bernice Watson
Best of all, though, is the movie’s ending, with the Enterprise about to head off into space once again. Just because the story ended doesn’t mean the journey’s over. Keith R.A. DeCandido
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UNSEEN TREK
U N S E E N
Developing any new Star Trek can be fraught with complications and dead ends. When Marvel Comics and Paramount Pictures teamed up in 1996, Marvel was given the unprecedented opportunity to explore and expand the Star Trek universe. Timothy J. Tuohy tells the inside story of how a bold new Trek comic book series almost made it out of space dock.
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T R E K :
hat the hell was that?!” I apologized for my outburst to those in the darkened theater who, like me, were intently watching Star Trek: First Contact. It took a few moments to collect my thoughts after what I had just seen. The newest incarnation of the U.S.S. Enterprise-E – sleek, beautiful, and seemingly victorious against the Borg – was truly a sight to behold… but my eyes had been captured by something else, something small, fast, and unmistakably Starfleet that had given Picard’s flagship such sterling support. What was that ship?! It would take another six months before I would find out. In 1996, the Star Trek comic book license moved across country, from Malibu Comics in California back to Marvel Comics in New York, who had previously published 18 issues in 1979, following the release of Star Trek: The Motion
Picture. The new Marvel Trek comic line would be produced under the watchful eyes of editor Bobbie Chase and her assistant Polly Watson. Marvel’s publishing plan grew, eventually becoming more than one office could properly manage, and to spread the workload I was given stewardship of the “likeness” books, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Voyager and Star Trek: Unlimited. As editor, I had a direct line to Paramount at my fingertips, so perhaps now I could get an answer – but the time was not right. There was a lot of work to be done, and my obsession would have to wait. After more than a few bumps in the road, and some writer and artist changes along the way, the teams and books started to come together. New ideas and concepts would be tossed around, and I began to realize there was a way I might finally discover the name of the ship that had vexed me these many months. STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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ROCK SOLID CREWMATES Horta On The Bridge Phase 3 would not have been the first time a Horta was depicted as a member of Starfleet in a comic book. That honor goes all the way back to DC Comics’ legendary first Star Trek series. In 1986, author Diane Duane’s two-issue tale “Double Blind” (Issues 24 & 25), introduced Dahai Iohor Naraht to comic fans. Naraht debuted two years earlier in the Pocket Books paperback, “My Enemy, My Ally” which was also written by Ms. Duane. Hortas continue to be a favorite of authors and have appeared in multiple novels, such as the Titan series and most notably in Star Trek: The Next Generation’s “Dyson Sphere.” That book featured an entire starship crewed by these popular silicon-based life forms.
The fruits of Marvel and Paramount's collaboration.
THE ALPHA SHIFT The likeness books were exciting to work on, but I wanted a little more. Bobbie had created her own niche with the excellent Early Voyages and Starfleet Academy comics, and Pocket Books had begun publishing Peter David’s popular series “New Frontier.” I saw an opportunity and wanted to try creating an all-new Star Trek crew. What better way to start off, I decided, than with a new ship? At this point, as far as I knew, the ship I’d seen in First Contact had no name, no class designation, and you could barely make out her registry number. However, thanks to an early Trek website that had posted a video grab from E! Entertainment Television, I at least had a grainy image of the ship that had impressed even more than the flagship of the fleet. On April 15th 1997, I began to hammer out the basic series premise, but most importantly I worked on the crew that would populate that ship. There were two character concepts I thought would be exciting, not only for comic fans but also for Trek die-hards: a water breather and a Horta. Between discussing the intricacies of Deep Space Nine, Voyager, and Unlimited, Chip Carter, Marvel’s Paramount liaison, and I would occasionally discuss the new series, now dubbed “Phase 3.” The title was an intentional homage to the proposed Star Trek Phase II television series. After about a month of writing and revising – and sometimes completely starting over – I finally had something that my assistant, Julio Soto, and I both liked.
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UNSEEN TREK The Alpha Shift team was set. Captain Kevin Madsen and his First Officer Marta Segusa were both Terrans. The Conn Officer, Steve Hoffmann, was a human who had been born on a Bajoran colony and had suffered a traumatic injury resulting in the loss of his legs. Chief Randall Thomas was another human not born on Earth, but instead on the Martian Colony Guantanamo II. Unlike other Trek engineers, he was not an easy person to get along with. Ensign Virea Coptasinian was from Babel and had recently graduated from Starfleet Academy. As communications officer, her 100-language fluency would prove invaluable. The ability to push the boundaries of character design, as was achieved on The Animated Series, would be highlighted with the next three characters. Tactical officer Lt. Mhos Andex was, to all intents and purposes, a dinosaur. Ops officer Lt. Kern Honrer was from Pacifica, an ocean planet. Although he’d trained himself to breathe air for six hours, Honrer would rather wear his water containment uniform while on duty. Finally, Medical Officer Horta-217 was a juvenile Horta who’d joined Starfleet in honor of Dr. McCoy, who had saved the guardian Horta’s life after she had become mortally wounded in the original Star Trek episode, “Devil in The Dark.”
“THE TITLE WAS AN INTENTIONAL HOMAGE TO THE PROPOSED STAR TREK PHASE II TELEVISION SERIES.”
"The Devil in the Dark"
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INTO THE THIRD PHASE I had my proposal, but now I had to decide what to do with it. Julio and I knew that I would be unable to write the book and still be the editor, so we had to find a writer. Phone calls were made, feelers were sent out, but it was difficult to find someone who wanted to take the mission on – writing for a franchise as famous as Star Trek can be intimidating, even for an established writer. I had mentioned Phase 3 in passing to a writing team working on our Star Trek: Deep Space Nine comic, Andy Mangels and Mike Martin, and once they’d seen my proposal they agreed to take a shot at it. While they toiled away in Oregon, I worked to fast-track the series before I even had a single scripted page. I had a logo designed by letterer extraordinaire Chris Eliopoulos, and on August 12th, 1997, Andy and Mike faxed their 12-issue overview to me. I was overwhelmed with their skill at taking my rough concept and making it something special. Phase 3 began to take on a life all its own. What was originally conceived as an extension of the original series mission statement instead
became Mission: Impossible, Trek style. Having christened the starship Roanoke (finally, a name!), the ship would engage in special covert operations, visiting worlds on which the Prime Directive had not been followed resulting in unintended consequences. Their ongoing mission: to lessen the impact of such damage while at the same time keeping their involvement secret. This was high-concept material. Their overview even said so! But how did they settle on revisiting Prime Directive infractions? “I remember thinking about Marvel Comics’ series Damage Control,” says Martin, “a team of specialists dedicated to cleaning up the wreckage generated by the Marvel Universe’s constant superhero/super-villain battles. I’ve always liked the idea of a Starfleet crew fixing the damage inevitably caused by the countless Prime Directive violations we’ve seen committed throughout Star Trek’s long history.” “I liked many of Star Trek’s later installments, in Deep Space Nine and early Voyager, when it became a bit grittier and there were implications of fallibility among decision-
Marvel's 1997 promotional 'ashcan' issue.
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“THE WORD HAD COME DOWN THAT NO MORE NEW CONCEPTS WOULD BE DEVELOPED OUTSIDE OF THE TV SHOWS OR FILMS.” makers,” says Mangels. “If some of those bad decisions had to be ‘fixed,’ certain people at the top of Starfleet Intelligence might create a secret ‘black-ops’ operation to do so.” Martin adds, “The idea of using a black-ops crew that’s officially considered dead came out of a careful study of the Starfleet ships that went up against the Borg at the beginning of Star Trek: First Contact. We decided that the ship survived the engagement but was officially listed as destroyed by order of Starfleet Intelligence, who consequently had a crew of ‘ghost operatives’ at their disposal.” “The Roanoke name was inspired by the 16th Century Roanoke Colony in North Carolina,” says Mangels. “The mystery behind the disappearance of an entire colony has fascinated me for years, which I thought would be cool to combine with a ghost ship like the Flying Dutchman or Mary Celeste.” “Besides the political and sociological stories we could tell in the Trek milieu,” continues Mangels, “an entire crew who were thought dead and who couldn’t contact their families or exist in ‘reality’ anymore makes for a fascinating concept.” Things were looking good, so good that I sent Andy and Mike’s overview to Paramount and received positive feedback. Encouraged by their tacit approval, I took Phase 3 to the next level. Marvel had been producing “ashcan” comics as a means to promote new projects, and in 1996 announced its Star Trek line with one of these, publishing another a year later with updated material showcasing further new projects. At the 1997 San Diego Comic-Con, hundreds of those little editions handed out free to fans teased Phase 3 on the final page. At the Con, I participated in a panel discussion about Marvel’s future plans for Trek and enthusiastically pushed the Phase 3 project.
UNSEEN TREK
WAR OF THE WORLDS From Roanoke to Thunderchild
The question arose during this article’s research of exactly when the Roanoke became the Thunderchild. In Andy and Mike’s overview, the ship was still called the Roanoke. However, by the time Deep Space Nine: Dark Emissary’s artwork was commissioned, the name had been changed to Thunderchild. This occurred before the publication of an updated edition of the Star Trek: Encyclopedia, which included information on Star Trek: First Contact, so the name was obviously given to Marvel directly by Paramount. But how did the Thunderchild get her name? “Rick Berman, Ron Moore, and Brannon Braga called the art department looking for names.” Doug Drexler – First Contact’s Designer/Scenic Artist – provides the origin story, “Thunderchild was the warship that defended a ferryboat full of people against a Martian tripod in H.G. Wells’ ‘War of the Worlds.’ It seemed like a perfect match.”
IF ONLY AND NEVER WAS Meanwhile, another spin-off was being developed simultaneously with Phase 3, which also derived its inspiration from Marvel Comics history – the much loved “What If?” series. Star Trek: Realities would retell key events in Star Trek history with significant plot points altered. The first of these was titled Deep Space Nine: Dark Emissary, with a story that would take place months before the Battle of Wolf 359. In a cunning piece of cross-promotion, the book’s writers (Phase 3’s very own Andy Mangels and Mike Martin) placed the Roanoke in the midst of the action, as this quote from their plot outline testifies: “On the battle bridge of the Saratoga, Sisko and Dax watch the Romulan fleet as it enters the wormhole, but they can make no tactical sense out of this maneuver (also watching are Commander Shelby on the bridge of the Odyssey, and Captain Evelyn Hoffman and Commander Kevin Madsen on the bridge of Star Trek: Phase 3’s U.S.S. Roanoke ; a couple of lines of dialogue between Hoffman and Madsen will reveal that the Roanoke has just tried and failed to make subspace contact with Earth, the significance of which will be revealed in the last panel of this issue. For now, everyone is simply too busy to worry about this.)”
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Seeing this as a golden opportunity, some editorial changes were made and I asked the book’s artist, Rod Whigham, to specifically draw that page first. The page then went to Phil Moy to ink, giving us a great piece of art to show how seamlessly our new ship could fit right in. All of the pieces were falling into place, then – as quickly as it begun – I received a call from Chip that I’d never expected: “Stop working on Phase 3.” The word had come down that no more new concepts would be developed outside of the TV shows or films. Everybody involved was devastated, but it would be a moot point anyway. A few months later, Marvel wouldn’t be producing any Star Trek comics at all. The license would not be renewed and Phase 3 would fade away as if it had never existed. Or would it? There was life in the ghost ship yet. In 2001, Pocket Books released Star Trek: The Next Generation “Rogue,” part of their Section 31 crossover storyline. Section 31 first appeared in the Deep Space Nine episode “Inquisition,” and would be retroactively featured in Enterprise before cropping up again in the alternate timeline film Star Trek Into Darkness. “Rogue,” written by Mangels and Martin (you guessed it!) featured some familiar faces. “The appearance of the U.S.S.Thunderchild,” says Mangels, “was drawn from the unpublished Star Trek: Phase 3 we proposed for Marvel Comics.” Mike Martin adds, “I guess losing Phase 3 on the very eve of its launch was still an open wound while we were writing ‘Rogue.’ We figured that the crew of the Thunderchild deserved a walk-on role in one of our books, since we’d invested so much time and energy in that project.” The allure of the Thunderchild was not easily diminished. She appeared in two more novels and in role-playing game supplements. She was even scheduled to be brought to life as a model kit from manufacturer Polar Lights. Sadly, just like the comic, the kit was advertised but never released. Whether Phase 3 and its Thunderchild ever see the light of day, or remain an unseen gem on the peripheries of Star Trek history, only time will tell, but it’s certain the concept’s architects would be up for the challenge of making it so.
The original pitch document for Phase 3
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LEONARD NIMOY: INTERVIEW
FIRST APPEARED IN ISSUE #40
LIVE LONG AND PROSPER THE LEONARD NIMOY INTERVIEW – PART II
Star Trek Magazine’s exclusive interview with Leonard Nimoy continues! Here, the actor speaks about his photography, retirement, and his plans for the future… Exclusive interview by Tara Bennett
VIRTUALLY RETIRED
A
s Mr. Spock, Leonard Nimoy has virtually traversed the far-reaches of the galaxies, sacrificed his life for the greater good, was resurrected, and even spent a brief amount of time with a younger, alternate version of himself. That’s enough to exhaust anyone, so it’s no wonder that in April of 2010, Nimoy announced he was ready to retire from the acting and convention appearance portions of his life. However, that’s easier said than done, especially when your talent, face, and voice are still in such demand. “It’s all very flattering,” Nimoy chuckles about his ever-ringing phone. “I am being contacted almost daily by people about how I might be useful to their project. I did announce that I would not be doing any more convention appearances. However, I may pop up on an occasional TV show or film. I may pop up there, but I cannot say when or how. Again, it’s very flattering, but I consider myself retired.” Aside from doing vocal work for the Star Trek Online MMO, Nimoy often gets a lot of current sci-fi TV fans asking if his Fringe character, William Bell, could return in the flesh one last time instead of just vocally as he did in the show’s third season. Sounding open to the possibility, Nimoy says warmly, “I admire the Fringe company very much. The actors, the writers, the producers and all the craft people involved. It’s a great company.
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Below: Photo from the ‘Shekhina’ series by Leonard Nimoy; Main photo: ‘Hands’ by Leonard Nimoy.
“MY MOST SATISFYING EXPERIENCES HAVE BEEN THOSE WHERE I’VE THOUGHT OF AN IDEA AND SEEN IT ALL THE WAY THROUGH.”
They have wonderful imaginations and they’ve surprised me with how they have used me. I feel very comfortable with them. It’s entirely possible that we’ll find some way to have Bell come back.” In the meantime, Nimoy says he’s enjoying his more open calendar to work on his philanthropy endeavors with his wife Susan, spending time with his family and immersing himself in his beloved photography projects. Nimoy’s reputation as a respected contemporary American photographer has grown exponentially in the last four decades
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as his work now hangs in many art museums around the world. He was mentored in the 1970s by Robert Heineken and has gone on to explore many intriguing subjects, from landscapes to the human form in all its natural glory. Today, his photographic work is one aspect of his creative life that many of his mainstream fans still know little about, so Nimoy’s been remedying that by showcasing his work in some outstanding exhibitions at the R.Michelson Galleries in Northampton, Massachusetts. Talking about his creative process, Nimoy says that he prefers to work around a specific theme that ignites his imagination and spurs his thinking. “I don’t carry a camera when I go out and about,” he shares. “I wait until an idea presents itself that I want to explore. If I was a writer, I’d be writing about these ideas. But
I’m a photographer, so I shoot pictures about these ideas so it’s all abstractbased. I don’t use Photoshop a lot. I use film and do straightforward printing just exactly the way I shot the picture.” He admits to keeping a collection of ideas that have sprung into his mind over the decades when looking for a muse. “Sometimes I go back and revisit the ideas and if it’s still alive, I might go up and do some camera work for it. Or sometimes the idea might be great, but I can’t see myself spending the next year working on it organically. Once I make a commitment, like when I was making a Star Trek film, I have to spend a lot of time researching and doing the work to be sure that my interest is enough to sustain itself. My most satisfying experiences have been those
LEONARD NIMOY: INTERVIEW
where I’ve thought of an idea and seen it all the way through.” As to his latest photographic endeavors, Nimoy says he just finished collecting a journey into his archives for R.Michelson Galleries. “The most recent project has been rediscovering some earlier work in my files. I have thousands of images in my files that have never been seen. Rich Michelson is putting together a box collection of about 25 images that have never been seen and the title is ‘Eye Contact’. In my earliest work with female figures, I told most of my models not to look at the lens. Look away, look down, look sideways; it’s called the averted gaze. Eventually, I started to change, so more work was about the model herself as an individual and I would ask them to look at the camera. This particular collection of work is a comment on that process I went through.”
In the meantime, Nimoy and his wife Susan spend a lot of their time supporting causes in the arts that are near and dear to them. “We have a very broad range of philanthropic interests.” He notes, “Susan and I are extremely grateful for what we have been given in the way of opportunity and lifestyle. We try constantly to be aware of that and to try and be helpful to others. We have made commitments to organizations that try to help the arts because we believe that art in culture helps people live satisfying lives. We are interested in conservation and space exploration. The Griffith Observatory [in Los Angeles] is one of our pet projects.” Pausing for a moment, he adds with quiet sincerity, “It’s interesting the issue of public philanthropy. We tried to work privately for a very long time, but then we were educated to the idea that if people know that we are giving support to certain ideas and organizations, it encourages other people to do the same. While I don’t on one hand like to talk about what we do publicly, it is helpful for people that we are doing it, so other people will do it as well.” He smiles, “You want to be private but you also want to encourage.” And that also extends to helping new artists realize their
own forum to inspire and challenge. Nimoy explains, “We collect contemporary art and have a very serious collection. We live very happily with it and we are constantly looking at new and exciting art. In any city we go to, we work with the local museums there. There is also an organization called America: Now and Here [http://americanowandhere.org] that we support which puts out traveling art shows. They take truckloads of art and set up displays. I think art is such an important part of life,” he enthuses.
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By pushing his own comfort zone through the arts, Nimoy says he’s discovered many things inside himself that he may never have had the courage or perspective to really pursue. He reflects, “When I was a young actor I took work very, very seriously and never thought I would be in comedy. I was always interested in straight drama. But when I started to explore comedy, I discovered that I enjoyed making an audience laugh, and to hear them laugh. It became a very important part of my work. Three Men and a Baby was the highlight of that and it was a wonderfully buoyant time and we were laughing all the time making that movie. Some comedy also found its way into Star Trek IV, where we had some wonderful humor and I enjoyed that a lot. I gave up being so, so, so serious and tried to enjoy it all a little more. It was even a joy and pleasure to discover with the Spock character I could make people laugh just by lifting my eyebrow,” he laughs proudly. Asked what creative outlet has given him the most satisfaction and pleasure, Nimoy thinks for a moment and offers, “Obviously, I’ve been happy and gratified with my acting and directing career, but I’ll
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“IT WAS A JOY AND PLEASURE TO DISCOVER WITH THE SPOCK CHARACTER I COULD MAKE PEOPLE LAUGH JUST BY LIFTING MY EYEBROW.” go all the way back to 1971. I was under contract at Universal Studios doing occasional TV shows. I was studying photography at the time at UCLA and I wanted to see my work published for the first time, so I was encouraged to write some words to go along with my photographs. I published a book called ‘You and I’, which was a book of poetry and photographs. It was published by a wonderful, small company in San Francisco. The book became enormously successful and well
received, so I was encouraged to write more poetry. I think I probably published five or six poetry books and I was very touched by the response that I got. People wrote me wonderful letters about what my poetry meant to them. I had some people asking permission to use my poems in their wedding ceremonies. I was delighted to know I could touch people in that way as well, and it also encouraged my photography. “But at the root of all this is my acting career,” he reflects, as we wind down our conversation. “Star Trek and the Spock character really opened up so many other venues for me creatively that I am an eternally grateful guy,” he says with all sincerity and a smile in his voice. As to what he would like to share with his creative brethren out in the world, as they too muster the courage to share their creative visions with the world, Mr. Nimoy returns to the tech that Mr. Spock is so synonymous with as the conduit for his simple message, “On my Twitter account [@therealnimoy], I recently shared the comment, ‘Love the art in yourself, not yourself in the art.’” And with that he adds, LLAP.
LEONARD NIMOY: INTERVIEW
This spread: Photos from the ‘Shekhina’ series,by Leonard Nimoy. Photographs reprinted by kind permission of Leonard Nimoy & R. Michelson Galleries.
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Photographs courtesy of Don Lanning and Joel Harlow
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UNSEEN TREK
U N S E E N
T R E K :
ALIENATED Forgotten Aliens Of The Alternate Timeline
Aliens have always been woven into the DNA of Star Trek, from the salt-sucking M-113 creature of early episode “The Man Trap”, right through to the re-ridged Klingons of Star Trek Into Darkness. Director J.J. Abrams’ 2009 reboot earned an Oscar for outstanding make-up, yet many outlandish and exotic creature designs never made the final cut, remaining unseen – until now... By Joe Nazzaro
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any of the creatures for 2009’s Star Trek were designed and built during a period of pre-production at LA-based Proteus FX, where prosthetic make-up designer Barney Burman had enlisted a number of the industry’s top designers, sculptors and makeup effects technicians to create a wide array of aliens that could be presented to Abrams for his approval or rejection. That group of people included veteran sculptor Don Lanning and Joel Harlow, who went on to take over a big chunk of the film’s make-up effects work, including the Romulans, Vulcans and briefly-glimpsed Klingons (consigned to a DVD deleted scene, before being re-realized for Into Darkness). As Lanning recalls, “I got hired as the key sculptor, so Joel and I did the lion’s share of work, as far as doing drawings, designs, sculptures, maquettes [small-scale threedimensional models] and that kind of stuff. We sat there for two and a half months, drawing and sculpting as fast as we could and filling the walls with maquettes.” Lanning was working for Burman’s father, Tom, doing sculpting work for TV series Nip/ Tuck, when the senior Burman called him into the office. “I had spent the past year and a
half sculpting the most intense surgeries in realistic detail,” he remembers, “but my first love is sci-fi, so when Tom called me in and said, ‘My kid just got a show and it’s going to be a big deal; I want you to go over and help him. It’s a re-boot of Star Trek!’ I grabbed my equipment and went over there right away. “At that point, Barney [Burman] said he didn’t know what the build list was going to be,” continues Lanning, “but he was open to the re-design of some of the classic characters, so we started making plans. I immediately wanted to revisit the Gorn from ‘Arena,’ because I had just spent a lot of time sculpting realistic stuff, so I was ready for some hard-core fantasy!” “Don is wildly creative and a fantastic artist,” says Joel Harlow of his colleague. “We sat right next to each other, and I don’t know if we directly borrowed anything from each other, but certainly that creative vibe was there and that fuelled everything that was going on. “I think we were just trying to come up with interesting looks. At one point, I remember thinking, ‘I’m not even going to use the word alien; I’m just going to come up with whatever mutant or demon I can think of,’ and STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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that opened me up to do some more interesting stuff for myself. By removing those labels, it really opened things up, and who says there can’t be an alien demon?” Having vowed to let anything go, the team were soon producing some arresting designs, as Harlow explains. “There was one character I came up with that was basically two faces fused together. It utilized the actor’s own eyes, with a face on the side of his face. After I left, Barney took that design and did a make-up version of it that I think wound up in the outtakes in the Klingon prison sequence. “This was the first time I had worked with Don. We had a blast together, and I’ve brought him on to other projects since. I remember at one point he did something I really loved, which was a guy who had half a head that was a book or something like that, and I thought it was really cool but I was also thinking, ‘What the hell?’”
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UNSEEN TREK A PINCH OF SALT With a virtual clean slate to work with during the early design process, Lanning found the perfect opportunity to start re-vamping some of the classic characters for possible inclusion in the new film. “When Joel and I came in, we literally started by just doing drawings all day, and since I was put in the role of key sculptor I said we were going to do the Salt Vampire and the Gorn, so whenever I got some down time I worked on those sculptures.
“The Salt Vampire was a real challenge, to take something that was maybe a bit hokey and turn it into something really organic, but we certainly gave it a real try. In the end, it never made it into the movie, but to tell you the truth, I’m kind of glad. “On the other hand, the Gorn was our best effort to revisit the original material and I think it was very successful, but again, I think there was a certain tone from J.J. and the production as to how many original aliens should be spotted in the film, and maybe they should be exploring something new.” Another candidate for possible revival was an alien that would have looked suspiciously like one of the Talosians from the original Star Trek pilot. “There was one amazing idea,” confirms Lanning, “for some large-headed aliens with little necks. They would have been played by women, because we wanted to revisit the aliens from ‘The Cage.’ I did a drawing that was pretty much a straightforward make-up, where the actor’s real neck would be painted green for digital removal, leaving this little spindly neck sculpted onto the front of the actor, and the body would be worn like a Bun Raku puppet. It was a fully realized make-up that was actually rendered out by Joel, and it was a fascinating idea.” “What I did was sculpt the head extra-large with a thin neck on top of his real neck,” adds Harlow, who ironically built a character not too dissimilar for Green Lantern a few years later. “We just assumed that when they shot it, his own neck would have been green-screened out, leaving a giant head on this tiny little neck. I think it would have looked really cool, but it ended up just being a mask, and all the body stuff, which would have been a rod puppet, was sort of neglected at that point.” STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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SEEN BUT NOT HEARD One of Lanning’s most memorable creations was Keenser, the diminutive alien played by Deep Roy, who appears in the first Star Trek film and reprises the role in Star Trek Into Darkness. The character came about by way of a series of free-form sculptures on a day when Lanning and Harlow were left alone in the shop to come up with some new characters. Starting with an unfinished half-scale sculpture he’d started the previous day, Lanning first thought of a character living on a deserted outpost and had an image of a forlorn Maytag repairman sitting alone in a room, waiting for the phone to ring. “I did a study of an old man, but that didn’t satisfy me because it wasn’t alien enough, so I dressed it with pieces of glass and metal. I then took the old man concept, cleaned up the eyes and changed the mouth to something that wasn’t so dramatic. I also added Andorian tendrils to the top of the head, so we were back in the neighbourhood of the old show. “After lunch, I was thinking about Superman and the Fortress of Solitude,” Lanning continues, “so I came up with something that looked like wood bark or crystal growing out of the head, with a giant device over the eye, for no reason other than it looked good. At this point, the design was interesting, but a bit convoluted.
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“So we got to the end of the day, and I’m feeling proud of myself, because I’ve done three heads and I’m getting ready to do another one. Joel and I had started talking about seashells, so I tore off the ‘wooden’ part of the third head and started sculpting again. What I did was literally put in the shape of the Shell gas station sign, and turned the eyes into deep recesses. I took a metal cap with a rhinestone and put it on a stem and stuck it down into these eyes. I still wasn’t quite happy with the shell head, so I was looking through a book on rainforests, and found a picture of a weird fungus or mushroom, that grew up the side of a tree like steps, and that became the neck of my final sculpture.” “When J.J. saw photographs of the four sculptures, he said, ‘No… no…no…YES!’ The thing I was really proud of was it was a rough sculpture done in a couple of hours, but in the movie they retained the idea of these little appendages on the end of the moving stems. They really stepped up the character’s appeal as an alien, so I was really happy about that.”
UNSEEN TREK The evolution of Keenser.
CHOP AND CHANGE As the start of production drew nearer and it became obvious that a relatively large number of background aliens were going to be needed, Burman began bringing in technicians who could turn the clay sculptures into prosthetic make-ups and pull-over masks. Other masks would be chopped up and reassembled to create new characters. “I remember watching Jenn Rose coming to work every day and building alien after alien,” recalls Lanning, “by cutting pieces of one creature and sewing it to another. I would look over and see new characters every other day.” “There wasn’t enough money to make all of our background masks from scratch,” admits make-up effects lab technician Ray Schaeffer, “so we put a call out to shops around the valley to rent existing moulds. These castings would be painted and haired in new ways to fill in the background scenes at the Academy and the Klingon prison sequence. “So we had loads of these moulds in the shop and ran up lots of castings. Vincent Van Dyke, who was only 17 at the time, brought in some molds he made for Halloween as a kid. Production selected a dozen castings from these moulds from all over Hollywood, and six were Vincent’s. The kid was a prodigy.” “I was working for Barney’s dad at the time,” remembers Van Dyke, “and I think it was hiatus time for Nip/Tuck, so I went over and started working on Star Trek. At that point, almost everything had been designed and sculpted, so it was time to pump out multiple runs of silicone prosthetics. I started working with an old friend, Hugo Villasenor, to start casting some very complex and big pieces. Some of those characters worked many times, even though you only see them once or not at all.”
While most of the Proteus team moved on once Star Trek moved into production, Harlow continued to work on some of the key alien races, eventually winning an Oscar for his work on the film. “I never think about things like that,” he insists. “Once it left my hands as a sculpture, whatever happened to it from that point on was out of my hands. But any time you can sit around with your buddies and sculpt whatever you want, it’s fun. I think people deliver their best work when they don’t have too many confines to what they’re doing, and that was certainly the case.” “It was an amazing experience, that I will always cherish,” adds Lanning. “Whether or not a sculpture got into the film didn’t matter. I think when a lot of us technicians and creative people went to see the film, we were very excited, because it was not mishandled or misunderstood by its creator. We all walked out very proud of J.J. and ourselves, because it was so beautifully done. It’s a marvellous franchise.” STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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REALITY BITES
FIRST APPEARED IN ISSUE #44
The original Star Trek series' “The City on the Edge of Forever”
Voyager's “Future's End”
Star Trek: The Next Generation's “Parallels”
REALITY BITES TO HELL WITH THE TEMPORAL PRIME DIRECTIVE: MESSING WITH TIME IN THE STAR TREK MULTIVERSE By K. Stoddard Hayes “Time travel. Ever since my first day on the job as a Starfleet Captain, I swore I’d never let myself get caught in one of these god-forsaken paradoxes. The future is the past, the past is the future. It all gives me a headache.” Janeway, “Future’s End, Part 1”
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ince the day the Narada emerged from the singularity in Star Trek (2009) there have been two main timelines in Star Trek continuity: the one we know from all the TV series and previous movies, and this new one in which Kirk was not born in Iowa, Spock and Uhura are lovers, and Vulcan has been destroyed. If it seems radical to rewrite time in the Star Trek universe – to start the whole story over from the beginning and give the beloved characters of the original crew entirely different lives – well, it’s not really. Star Trek is littered with dozens of diverging timelines, created by scores of temporal incursions by Starfleet personnel, by aliens of all kinds, and sometimes just by accidental encounters with temporal rifts and wormholes.
In any classic Star Trek time travel story (from any series), the crew discovers that something or someone has altered their past, and they spend the rest of the adventure trying to change time back to its original course. McCoy saves Edith Keeler, and 300 years of history – including the Enterprise and her crew – are wiped out of existence, until Kirk and Spock succeed in changing Edith’s fate (“The City on the Edge of Forever”). When the Enterprise-C’s escape through a temporal rift triggers a catastrophic Federation-Klingon war, Guinan convinces the officers of both Enterprises that things could and should be different (“Yesterday’s Enterprise”). Young Jake Sisko is orphaned when his father is trapped in subspace by a temporal inversion, STAR TREK MAGAZINE
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The arrival of the Narada marks the start of a new timeline in Star Trek (2009)
driving the adult Jake to sacrifice his entire existence to save his father (“The Visitor”). The Krenim Annorax uses his time-ship to target Voyager and countless worlds and species, rewriting time over and over again, all to restore the Krenim Empire and save his wife (“The Year of Hell”). 31st Century temporal agent Daniels enlists Archer’s help to preserve the integrity of the timeline in a Temporal Cold War whose different factions cross and recross the centuries, rearranging the past to their own advantage. In times like these, we naturally root for our heroes to put things right and restore time to the familiar status quo. Yet it takes only a shift in perspective to turn even a Federation time-meddler from a hero into a villain. In “Children of Time”, the crew of the Defiant accept that they must allow the
“IT TAKES ONLY A SHIFT IN PERSPECTIVE TO TURN EVEN A FEDERATION TIMEMEDDLER FROM A HERO INTO A VILLAIN.” ship to crash 200 years in the past, to preserve a thriving colony of their descendants, and are aghast when the ship escapes the crash after all. Kira’s perception of Odo – and ours – is forever changed when he reveals it was his older self who reprogrammed Defiant’s course, erasing 8,000 people from existence to save his beloved Kira.
In “Timeless”, future versions of Harry Kim and Chakotay plan to rewrite their own past so they can save Voyager from a catastrophic crash caused by Harry many years earlier. Captain Geordi LaForge, sent to stop them, admits that he is sympathetic with their desire to change the fate of their lost comrades. Yet he can’t let them succeed, for fear that the present will be changed or wiped out of existence. It’s a question that all of the characters in this episode grapple with. Chakotay wonders if saving Voyager is worth giving up his relationship with his lover Tessa, whom, if they succeed, he will never meet. And the EMH asks Harry how he can be certain that changing the past will not create a more unhappy present than the one they are now in.
Guinan senses time trouble in “Yesterday's Enterprise”
Tasha Yar returns from the dead in “Yesterday's Enterprise”
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Captain Jean-Luc Picard of the Warship Enterprise
REALITY BITES These questions are based on the assumption that time works like a complex domino race of causes and effects: rows of dominoes falling one into the next, creating a specific pattern. If you could go back and alter the direction of one domino’s fall, the rest of that row of falling dominoes will also fall differently, including the row you are in, and the pattern will be different. And this is where theoretical al physics makes things interesting. What if, att the moment you redirect that first domino, a new ew set of dominoes appears and tumbles away in the new direction, while the dominoes in your row, w, which have ttern? already fallen, stay in their original riginal pattern? Enter the multiverse theory off quantum mechanics m (see sidebar), first introduced too the Star Trek Tr Parallels”. universe in The Next Generation episode “P “Parallels”. ing In that episode, Worf finds his world changing orld changi around him incrementally, until the reality he is in i andd barely matches his own memories ship es off his hi shi hiip comrades. Finally, Data (but not our Data) discovers d that Worf has come loose from his is original quantum q arallel universe and is traveling throughh closely pa parallel universes, each one created by a different choice c made by himself or those aroundd him. k The multiverse theory could put all of Star S Trek’s time meddlers out of work. Going ng back in time t to that change the past does not correct ct or undo things t re lost, have gone wrong, bring back lives were ves that we or erase the meddlers’ existing timeline. Changing C m, a new the past simply creates a new time-stream, me-stream quantum reality, which divergess from the familiar reality at the moment of interference. erence. How do we know the new continuity ontinuity hasn’t h replaced the old one, but onlyy diverged from it? oned notio on of the Because of the now old-fashioned notion ext page),, which, “grandfather paradox” (see next
Odo saves his beloved Kira in “Children of Time”
Spock finds himself in ever” “The City on the Edge of Forever”
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in multiverse theory, turns out to be no paradox at all. Those who try to change their past don’t blink out of existence the moment they succeed, because the timeline they came from has not been erased after all. In “Year of Hell”, Annorax appears to have created and erased more timelines than any single individual in Star Trek, yet his banquet of vanished races, as well Voyager’s encounter with one of them, is proof that those timelines all did, and do, exist somewhere in the quantum multiverse. So the Voyager that leaves Krenim space at the end of Part 2 is not the Voyager that flew into it in Part 1, because that Voyager, limping and abandoned by her crew, was destroyed along with her Captain in the collision with the Krenim timeship. And if we apply the multiverse theory, we are left to wonder what happened to the rest of Voyager’s crew in that original timeline? Most of the crew had abandoned ship months before Voyager’s immolation. One can imagine a series of Star Trek: Voyager novels in which the surviving Bridge crew beg, borrow, and
Voyager lands with a bump in “Timeless”
“THE MULTIVERSE THEORY COULD PUT ALL OF STAR TREK ’S TIME MEDDLERS OUT OF WORK.” The Intendant causes trouble in DS9's “Crossover”
steal transport to find their comrades, then try to decide whether the whole crew should keep trying to get home somehow, or simply accept that they must live out their lives as a human colony in the Delta Quadrant. In “Twilight”, the parasitically infected Archer sacrifices himself to destroy his parasites and thereby save Enterprise and Earth from destruction by the Xindi. But it’s not his own Enterprise or Earth he has saved, it’s a different Enterprise in a new continuity he has created by changing his own past. The Archer infected with parasites had to exist in order to destroy the infection in the Archer who survives in the new timeline. When Sisko is released from his subspace prison in “The Visitor”, we don’t know that the adult Jake’s reality ceases to exist at that moment, because the story is following Sisko, not the elder Jake. We only know that Sisko escapes the energy bolt at the moment before he would have left normal space-time in the adult Jake’s continuity. In that other timeline where the orphaned adult Jake lived and died,
The Voyager crew come under time attack in “Year of Hell”
Annorax meddles with time in Voyager's “Year of Hell”
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REALITY BITES
TIME AND RELATIVE DIMENSIONS IN SPACE
Multiple Enterprises in TNG's “Parallels”
Time moves on, and so do theories about the nature of time and the possibility of time travel. At the start of the 20th Century, Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity introduced the idea that time is not a constant, and since then, physicists and science fiction writers have propounded endless theories about the possibility of time travel. Theoretical travel into the future has always appeared relatively simple: accelerate to nearly the speed of light, and relative time slows to a crawl, so that a year passes for you while centuries may pass in the rest of the universe. Travel to the past is more challenging. It might be accomplished by going faster than light (if that is possible; many physicists believe it is not), or by using either a cosmic string or a wormhole, two theoretical means of bending space-time which have gained respectability among physicists in recent decades. The big obstacle in traveling to the past – and especially in changing the past, as fictional time travelers so often do – has always been the problem of causality. This is best expressed in the “grandfather paradox”: if you travel to the past and kill your own grandfather before he has children, you will never be born to travel back in time to kill him. The whole loop of events negates itself. Star Trek writers have usually treated the “inconsistent causal loop” of the grandfather-type paradox as just that: a paradox that still allows their characters to rewrite time, correct it, change it. But we don’t have to wrestle with causality paradoxes anymore, because of the multiverse theory of quantum mechanics. The multiverse theory, first proposed by Hugh Everett III in the mid 20th Century, was initially discounted by most physicists. By the end of the century, though, advances in the study of quantum mechanics supported the possibility that multiverses could in fact exist. Here’s an extremely simplified explanation of how it works: Quantum mechanics theory proposes that the state of a quantum particle isn’t known until it is observed, and that the act of observation itself determines the particle’s state at any given moment. Everett’s multiverse theory goes a step further. It suggests that every possible state of a given particle actually exists in a parallel universe which comes into being at the moment the particle is observed to have a specific state. If you apply this on a larger scale, every event in the Newtonian universe (the one that we perceive and experience in everyday life) also has many possible choices and outcomes. Each time a choice is made, a different parallel universe comes into existence in which the other outcome has in fact occurred. It’s important to note that all of this – time travel, wormholes, cosmic strings, and multiple universes – is still in the realm of purely theoretical physics, because at the moment, we simply don’t have the technology or the scientific knowhow to prove or disprove any of it. But only last year, the Higgs boson particle was purely theoretical. Who knows when the next great discovery in quantum mechanics might give us a glimpse into the multiverse?
the entire Federation might be mourning the sudden death of one of their great writers. In Star Trek: Generations, Picard uses the Nexus to travel from his original timeline, in which Soran destroys the Enterprise-D along with the Veridian system, to a timeline in which Picard and Kirk succeed in saving the planet and the ship. If you apply the multiverse theory here, the crew Picard rejoins at the end is, once again, not his original crew, and he has left behind him a universe in which James Kirk is still in the Nexus, while the Enterprise-D and all her crew have been killed. Even more interesting, Picard arrived in the new timeline several minutes before the Nexus reached Veridian III. So you can’t help wondering, what has happened to the Picard who belonged to the new timeline before “our” Picard arrived from the Nexus to replace him? Since we in the 21st Century know about multiverse theory, it’s safe to assume that all of Star Trek’s characters (or at least those versed in temporal physics) are also familiar with it. Yet the urge to undo a tragic past, to fix a damaged timeline, seems irresistible even to Starfleet personnel. Every time the crew discovers an altered timeline or finds the temporal technology to undo a past tragedy, they go to great lengths, even sacrificing themselves, to restore the “proper” course of history – the status quo of a stable Federation and a ship (or space station) and crew continuing on their original mission. This is why it’s such a surprise that Spock Prime makes the unprecedented choice to leave things as they are. Once he and the new Enterprise crew realize that time has been altered, no one suggests that they try to steer it back on course. For some, perhaps, it’s enough
An alternate Enterprise Bridge in TNG's “Parallels”…
… and one Riker talks to another
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Wiping the time slate clean in Star Trek (2009)
that things could be different. Cadet Kirk asks Spock Prime what happened to his father in the reality that the elder Spock came from. Spock replies that George Kirk lived to see his son become Captain of the Enterprise. And young Kirk nods and lets it go. He’s content, for the moment, to know that in another reality, a
different version of himself and his father had a long and happy relationship as father and son. Even if the young cadets and officers of this Enterprise don’t know that altering time is a possibility, Spock Prime certainly does. So why doesn’t he push for a correction? Perhaps he now understands that trying to change the past
“SPOCK PRIME MAKES THE UNPRECEDENTED CHOICE TO LEAVE THINGS AS THEY ARE.”
The Borg pay a visit to Enterprise in“Twilight”
Archer survives in an alternate timeline in “Twilight”
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would do no more than send him back to his own timeline, while this new continuity continued on its own course. Even if he went “home”, nothing would change for these younger versions of himself and his friends. And perhaps, typically of Spock at any age, in any universe, he’s curious about the unknown. In his original reality, he is near the end of his life in a rich, safe and secure universe. Here, he has suddenly become one of an endangered species, and among the very last of the Vulcan elders. He’s needed more than ever. And by staying in the new continuity, he gets another chance to see the friendship of a lifetime unfold.
The big change in Star Trek’s use of multiple timelines, then, is not that the 2009 movie creates a new continuity, a new timeline. The difference is that in previous divergences, the characters have always returned to the “normal” timeline, the one that preserves the status quo of the universe we were traveling in before the divergence. With the 2009 movie, a crew aware of a change to the timeline does not hit the temporal reset button to return us to Star Trek status quo. For once, we are following the timeline that has changed the most. From here on out, for the writers and the characters and for us, the sky’s the limit.
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