Archives: Star Trek

When the Moment Passes

I got to thinking about the Simonson run on Thor yesterday, as regular visitors probably noticed.

I missed the whole Simonson Thor run when it was on-going, discovering it about five years after it was over when my friend Bruce and I traded favorite comics series. That was, of course, long before the days of Thor: Visionaries and other graphic novel collections, AND I was a poor college student, so I had my hands full trying to track down copies of all those issues (as well as the Baldur the Brave mini-series).

Now I’ve got all the Thor volumes on my shelves, and all those carefully collected comics are in plastic bags in the basement. Sometimes, you just need to be patient.

Star Trek Continues with “Lolani”

Despite the fact we’ve just returned from a vacation to the Virgin Islands, here at Jones central my children are most excited by the local convention, EvilleCon, which they’ve been attending for the last two days, one dressed as Maes Hughes (from Full Metal Alchemist), and the other as Aloise (from Black Butler). Apart from hanging out with friends and others who love the industry, I think they’ve both been most excited to chat with Vic Mignogna, who they’ve found warm, personable, and passionate about artistic pursuits.

I happen to be a fan of Mignogna’s work myself — he gave voice to Edward Elric, my favorite character in the best anime I’ve yet watched, Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood, acquiring the  American Anime Award for Best Actor in 2007 for his performance. But as if that wasn’t enough, he’s one of the guiding forces behind Star Trek Continues.

Regular readers of the blog may recall the last time I blogged about Star Trek Continues and how much I enjoyed seeing what felt very much like a lost episode from the original series of my favorite show. (I likewise blogged about it over at Black Gate.) Well, when my son returned from EvilleCon last night he told me he’d seen part of another Star Trek Continues episode, “Lolani,” which was released in February. Somehow I had missed the release!

Music for Rocking

Whew! It’s been a busy week. The snow has melted here near the Sea of Monsters, though, and the weather is about as nice as you can expect for Indiana in the winter.

Unless you’re interested in a blow-by-blow of day-to-day activities, I don’t have much to report this week. What with shopping for presents and picking a high school kid up half way through the day (finals week), writing has been pretty sporadic.

An English composition student burned a CD of music for me back when I was teaching some years ago. He turned me on to a group called The Hush Sound which I always liked, but upon revisiting, have decided that I extra plus like. Even better, it looks like while I wasn’t paying attention they got back together and are preparing to release a new album.

Anyway, if you like guitar power pop — sort of Jellyfish crossed with Fountains of Wayne — you can visit here, or check out this great song. And as always, Captain Pike is ready to answer your questions with sage wisdom.

Links to Astound and Amaze PLUS Captain Pike!

Last night I had a running dream that I had been an extra on Firefly. Apparently I’d been  a crewman named Ryre who mostly stayed in the background, but had a few sentences in one episode. Of course there WERE no crew  extras on Firefly, and I suppose I knew that at some level, even while dreaming, because I had to get out the e-mails between me and Joss Whedon’s production assistant to show my suspicious friends to prove I had been on the show. Sigh. Turns out it was all a dream. That ending always sucks, doesn’t it?

I’ve got some interesting observations on the craft of writing, but I also have some good links today, so I’ll talk about writing later. Now, some neat places to visit.

 

Writing Star Trek Pastiche

It’s not as though I have a whole lot of free time. And it’s not as though I don’t already have enough projects. For instance, I’m working on a new trilogy and I intend on having at least one and a half written before book one goes to press. I’m brainstorming some new Paizo Pathfinder books as well, and at some point I’m likely to be working on both series at the same time.

Yet after that extended look at the original Star Trek the other week I had a doh! moment and wondered why I’ve never considered writing a Star Trek novel.

I suppose I should rephrase… since becoming a professional writer, why have I never considered writing a Star Trek novel? I used to write Star Trek fiction all the time and I know the original series like the back of my hand. If I could talk to the series editors (a little simpler now that I have a proven track record) I bet writing Star Trek could be a lot of fun and earn me some money.

Weekend Trek

It was a busy weekend. The family drove to St. Louis Friday night so I could wake up Saturday morning and fly to Minnesota to hear my son’s performance at a music composition camp, then fly back with him to St. Louis and drive home. My son’s composition was brilliant (and so too were those of many of his fellow camp members).

I had a lot of down time, but I also had a lot of really bad sleep. I’m still pretty exhausted, actually. I did have a few observations, though.

1. The security personnel at the Minneapolis airport were some of the best humored I have ever dealt with. Two thumbs up for them for being professional, courteous, and good spirited. The bonhomie actually seemed to permeate the entire staff. (And here’s a mildly curious aside — as my son and I were lining up for the security check I passed a gentleman getting in line to check his bags, and danged if I didn’t do a double-take. He wasn’t some guy who vaguely resembled Al Franken… he was Senator Al Franken. I suppose that it’s not at all remarkable that Al Franken should ride planes, or that he should be in Minneapolis, seeing as how he’s a senator from Minnesota, so perhaps it’s not actually that interesting an aside…)

Trek Week, Part 5

This week, the week of my birthday, I’ve been indulging myself by sharing all my thoughts about how I’d approach my dream job, being story editor on a reboot of the original Star Trek series. Yesterday I wrote about how I’d update the principal characters. Today I’ll talk about the rest of the characters and wrap things up.

Mr. Scott

I think the writing of Mr. Scott is pretty straight forward in some ways. There’s not as much nuance necessary as there is with the principal characters. I love that line from the series bible about Scotty thinking of the ship as his and Kirk as merely the driver. He’s a gifted engineer and is constantly tasked with pulling off the impossible. I like the suggestion I’ve seen in various fan literature that he was there when the ship was being refitted, and that he might have served on the ship under a previous captain as well.

Trek Week, Part 4

As threatened earlier this week, I’m going to keep imagining what I’d do given the chance to fulfill an old dream: reboot the original Star Trek show as a TV series.

Today I’ll be talking about the main characters, but before I get into depth about any of them I want to address two things.

First, it’s true that Kirk and Spock are best friends. A lot of writers seem to think that’s where it ends. They miss something crucial, and that’s McCoy — they don’t seem to know what to do with him aside from having him snark at Spock.

Here’s the thing. All three form a greater hero.

Trek Week, Part 3

I was so inspired by Star Trek Continues that I decided to dedicate the week of my birthday to talking about my first great fictional love, the original Star Trek. Today I’ll start rambling about all the things I’ve always wanted to do if I got to be the executive story editor of a rebooted Star Trek TV show. Yeah, I know, it’s pretty self indulgent, and I’m ashamed to say I’ve spent way too much time over the years thinking about this. But my birthday’s coming up, so you’ll forgive me, right?

Trek Week, Part 2

Trek week continues on Jones central for the whole week of my birthday. Regularly scheduled posts will resume next week. Be warned: if you’re not a fan of the original show, your eyes may glaze over.

I’ve spilled any number of kilobytes of data about how much I’ve been influenced by writers like Leigh Brackett, Harold Lamb, Robert E. Howard, Roger Zelazny, Fritz Leiber, C.S. Forrester, Saki… the list could go on. Yet I’ve seldom discussed the influence of my first great fictional love, the original Star Trek.