|
Post by Finarvyn on Feb 10, 2015 5:08:52 GMT -6
I see that there is a new book about Harlan Ellison's City on the Edge of Forever, which as everyone probably knows is considered to be one of the greatest Star Trek TOS episodes of all time. Anyone read this book? Is it worth my time?
|
|
|
Post by talysman on Feb 10, 2015 10:53:01 GMT -6
Haven't read it, but in case you didn't know, this is going to be *nothing* like the episode that aired. I read about the background to this in one of David Gerrold's books: Harlan Ellison wrote a Star Trek episode that was (a) great, but (b) veered way far away from the established characters, and the episode would (c) cost too much to make, and (d) would be 90 minutes or more. So they had to do an extreme rewrite. But Ellison's original teleplay won a Hugo or something, because it was still great, even if it wasn't quite Star Trek.
|
|
|
Post by geoffrey on Feb 10, 2015 11:55:54 GMT -6
|
|
|
Post by Stormcrow on Feb 10, 2015 14:11:47 GMT -6
"City"? On THIS forum? How did I know it was going to be about Ellison's original?
|
|
|
Post by Finarvyn on Feb 10, 2015 14:39:06 GMT -6
"City"? On THIS forum? How did I know it was going to be about Ellison's original? I'm not entirely certain what this is supposed to imply. Is there a reason why I might not like Ellison's version? In fairness, I haven't read Ellison's original screenplay or anything else that he has written. I've heard that his screenplay was really different from the filmed version, etc, but I don't know much more than what Talysman stated earlier so I'd be interested in your take on this.
|
|
|
Post by Stormcrow on Feb 10, 2015 14:57:31 GMT -6
I'm not entirely certain what this is supposed to imply. That this forum is far more interested in early drafts than finished products, especially if that early form gets forked into something relatively unknown. For any given topic X, the earliest form of X is always the most considered. I haven't read Ellison's original. His attitude about the whole thing—outraged self-aggrandizement—turned me off from ever reading it.
|
|
|
Post by talysman on Feb 10, 2015 15:57:38 GMT -6
What I recall from David Gerrold's account:
(1) The city was huge, not just a couple pillars around a donut. (2) There were numerous statues uttering prophecies of doom. (3) Someone commits suicide. (4) The crew mutinies.
Gerrold's connection was that he was initially approached to do the rewrite, but Ellison threw a fit and Roddenberry promised he would be the only one to do the rewrite as a compromise. Gerrold cites #1 and #2 as cost concerns -- that episode would have cost more than they spent on an entire season, if not the entire series. #3 got a response from the Standards and Practice. #4 seemed completely out of character for what had already been established (the crew being extremely loyal to Kirk.)
This is all what I recall from Gerrolds "Making of The Trouble with Tribbles" book, which talks about how he got involved with Paramount, his interactions with the cast and crew, and other things that happened, like the "City" incident. Not sure how close Gerrold's description is to the actual screenplay, and I am probably forgetting some things, because I haven't read that book in about 30-35 years.
|
|
|
Post by geoffrey on Feb 10, 2015 18:44:13 GMT -6
What I recall from David Gerrold's account: (1) The city was huge, not just a couple pillars around a donut. (2) There were numerous statues uttering prophecies of doom. (3) Someone commits suicide. (4) The crew mutinies. I don't remember stuff like that. That said, it's been a few years since I read the screenplay.
|
|
|
Post by Finarvyn on Feb 11, 2015 11:28:26 GMT -6
I'm not entirely certain what this is supposed to imply. That this forum is far more interested in early drafts than finished products, especially if that early form gets forked into something relatively unknown. For any given topic X, the earliest form of X is always the most considered. I haven't read Ellison's original. His attitude about the whole thing—outraged self-aggrandizement—turned me off from ever reading it. I gotcha, and I certainly agree. I guess we're the archeologists of RPGs. I've heard that about Ellison. I thought perhaps you had some additional insight about the original and whether I'd like it.
|
|
|
Post by Finarvyn on Feb 15, 2015 6:12:41 GMT -6
I had planned on reading the book referenced by Geoffrey a couple of posts back, but while visiting Barnes & Noble (with 20% off coupon in hand) I happened to see the graphic novel and it blew me away. Most adaptations of movies, etc, are drawn so that you have to struggle sometimes to decide which character is being drawn in which scene, but the art for this book is fantastic. Not quite photo quality, but the artists clearly were working from photos of Shatner and Nimoy and Collins and they really nailed it.
I haven't finished the whole thing yet, and haven't noticed as many differences in the plot as I had expected, and so far I highly recommend this book!
|
|
|
Post by Finarvyn on Feb 28, 2015 15:31:47 GMT -6
I bought the teleplay that Geoffrey suggested and am 80 pages into it. (1) Clearly, Ellison is still bitter about the way things worked out. (2) Ellison provides lots of evidence that his viewpoint is a lot closer to truth than the Roddenberry viewpoint. (3) Ellison likes the F-bomb. The "intro" essay is around 75 pages long so I've just started reading the actual teleplay, but I'm enjoying the book so far....
|
|
|
Post by ritt on May 24, 2015 11:45:16 GMT -6
The original script is fascinating and goes off in weird directions that the TV show never could. The Enterprise has it's own drug dealer, Beckwith, who gets junior crewmen hooked on alien crystals that sing a song so beautiful it's addictive. There's also a GREAT scene with a homeless, alcoholic WWI vet that's really tragic.
Definitely worth seeking out if you're fan of Trek, Ellison, or just trippy space-opera in general.
|
|
|
Post by scottenkainen on Jun 17, 2015 18:34:37 GMT -6
I happened to see the graphic novel and it blew me away. Most adaptations of movies, etc, are drawn so that you have to struggle sometimes to decide which character is being drawn in which scene, but the art for this book is fantastic. Not quite photo quality, but the artists clearly were working from photos of Shatner and Nimoy and Collins and they really nailed it. [snipped] Most Star Trek comics are drawn that way; all but the original pilot's cast had contracts that allowed Paramount to license their likenesses.
|
|