“An Open Letter to the SyFy Network” [Self]

Kyle Brady — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 07:25:07 +0000

Not many people will publicly admit this, but I will: there’s a soft spot in my heart for the SyFy Network (formerly “SciFi”), and always has been. But just because I’m sympathetic to the cause doesn’t mean I unilaterally support your decisions, which is why this is being written.

Go check it out.

Why I Won’t Be Seeing the New “Star Trek” Movie(s) [Old Content]

Kyle Brady — Mon, 18 May 2009 16:49:45 +0000

First, let me say this: I am a Trekkie. I was born in '87, and grew up with TNG... between it and the original Star Wars movies, my nerddom was cemented for life.

Voyager was fun, and so were the bits of DS-9 that I watched on occasion, but neither matched the greatness of TNG. Until a few months ago, if someone were to say "ship's captain", I would automatically respond "Jean-Luc Picard". Nowadays, I might hesitate between Admiral Adama (the "captain" of Battlestar Galactica... a show I've recently fallen in love with) and Picard, but the point is that Picard was amazing in ways Kirk never will be. Not even Janeway (Voyager) could compete, and she was pretty cool in her own right.

Ok. Can we move forward now that I've verified my pedigree? Great.

JJ Abrams

If you watched the first two seasons of Lost, loved it, and then hated it as it slowly devolved into "how can we make this show more randomly complex for no real reason, since we make it up as we go", you know why I don't like Abrams. He's also responsibile for Alias (the crappy "OMG SHE CHANGED HER HAIRCOLOR!" spy show), Fringe (the "fake science so fake it's annoying" show), and Cloverfield (the overly hyped monster movie made for $3 and a candybar).

Oh, and Mission:Impossible III. Do I need to continue? The man's work is just plain annoying.

Casting

This should be a quick and easy point. We're really supposed to believe a psycho superhuman serial killer (Sylar) is now an intelligent, peaceful Vulcan (Spock)? That's really difficult since Zachary Quinto really only has one claim to fame prior to Star Trek. Also, Captain Kirk (Chris Pine) is a Zac Effron wannabe? Not to mention that porky British guy who only plays in bad comedies, or the guy from the "Whitecastle" movies.

Please.

Edit: I'm not saying we should judge the cast based on prior work, but that alot of them are already stereotyped in the minds of the viewers at the moment, for one reason or another... that makes for difficult believability.

Captain Kirk

Like I said before, I'm a Picard guy. Always have been, always will be. It's often been said that in the minds of many fans, Kirk has long since been dead... Why revive him?

I have no interest in his storyline, and I know I'm not alone.

Timeline

If you're going to do a "reboot" of Star Trek, why would you revisit one that already exists? There is a rich tradition of extending the universe with entirely new characters and plots, and it would have been better to create an entirely new branch than to wedge in some crappy prequel story.

They're talking about starting another TV show... which would make more sense if a new branch had been created, but as of now that's pretty dumb. Also keep in mind these are Trekkie fans you're dealing with - anything that changes the continuity/canon will piss off the people that root for you.

Which means a true "reboot" is impossible.

Edit: Abrams himself has called this a reboot, and has expressed his intentions for a sequel to this, and beyond. Look it up, it's a fact.

The Movie

I've read reviews, talked to people who saw it, and watched all the trailers, trying to decide if I was being too harsh. But no matter how much you may or may not have loved the movie, there is one inescapable fact: this is not a true Star Trek entity.

Star Trek is about social commentary, intergalactic politics, interspecies tensions, morality, humanity's future, imperialism, and a whole bunch of other concepts/values that tend to be rather high-brained. Every version of the show, and the movies, had this fact at its core, regardless of who they were trying to appeal to.

Abrams, on the other hand, took an action movie and wrapped it in Star Trek lore. Yes, all the characters are there, and there's "spaceships and stuff"... but what is the movie really about? Skydiving, rebellious teenagers, nonsense military decisions ("let's give teenagers a ship!"), Cloverfield monsters (more on this below), getting laid, and random in-fighting.

Does that sound similar? At all? I didn't think so. Because those are the makings of a generic action movie.

You can update many aspects of Star Trek without changing it at the core: updating for modern times ("the Cold War is over!"), better special effects, more space battles, less cheesy acting, newer technology, less "all white people, all the time", etc. But you need to follow the basic, intrinsic values of the franchise.

I imagine Abrams (and the studios) said "let's do a Star Trek movie, but make huge amounts of money!", to which the obvious solution was to not actually make a Star Trek movie, and just pretend enough for the fanboys to drool.

The Cloverfield Monster

Let's compare...

Click for larger

It's a pretty obvious case of monster reuse, but in case you were still skeptical, they were "designed" by the same person - Neville Page.

More and More

There's probably a few more points I could get into, but these are the major ones. I wish this weren't the case, because I love Star Trek as much as the next guy, but what a crappy way to introduce the franchise to a new generation. A semi-popular-cancelled-after-a-few-seasons-because-it's-on-FOX TV show would have been a better choice, even if Abrams was involved and they named it Star Trek: The New Lost Alias of Khan's Felicitious Leather Fringe Jacket.

What we, as devoted fans, need is someone who actually cares about the franchise. If they want to actually do a TV show again, I'm all for it, as long as it's a branch that extends into the future (aka post-Voyager and post-DS-9 in the timeline), and they stick to the principles that make Star Trek, you know, Star Trek.

Make it so.

p.s. Lens flares.

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Update (5/18/2009 10:50am PST): Added clarification to the chasting and reboot remarks. Marked as edited.

Musings on SciFi Book Length [Self]

Kyle Brady — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 00:34:17 +0000

There's been some discussion recently about the length of books in SciFi, both past and present... along with the details of who/what/why/when/how/where, and whether or not having longer books is a good idea.

I posted a lengthy response on an io9 overview of the "debate", and thought it was re-post worthy:

Who said that longer books are bad?

I prefer the well planned, thought out, and complex lengthy SciFi novels of today to alot of the shorter "wham, bam, thank you mam" stuff that was seen previously.

If you're a good author, then you write until your story is done. As much as people pretend it isn't true, the originators of SciFi were not very good authors- they had good ideas and great imagination, but had trouble with plot, dialogue, and the idea of a character as an individual. If you need examples of this, just thumb through any of the "original greats".

People like Stross, McDevitt, etc. are good examples of great and far-fetched SciFi ideas that are turned into not only great novels, but novels of epic proportions. Some of the greatest novels of modern times has the same "feel" of scope that is found in Tolkein's "Lord of the Rings" series, with all the best parts of SciFi.

And this is supposed to be a bad thing? Please.

I'm not even going to get into the current state of Fantasy's book length. Completely different... story.

Kyle Brady: Blog » SciFi

“An Open Letter to the SyFy Network” [Self]

Why I Won’t Be Seeing the New “Star Trek” Movie(s) [Old Content]

Musings on SciFi Book Length [Self]