What would Gene think of Star Trek: Discovery? Or Ronald think of Rings of Power? Or Frank think of Bijaz of Dune? I was musing on this and other existential life conundrums the other day when news came out that the second season of Rings of Power will premiere later this year.
I happen to think the answer is pretty easy, even though Gene’s kid is listed in the credits of the latest batch of Star Trek spinoffs as a producer. And Ronald’s kid, who created a thriving cottage industry cribbing stories from dad’s notes, signed off on the multi-million-dollar deal giving Hollywood the rights to the various other Middle Earth tales besides Bilbo’s and Frodo’s. And Frank’s kid was the (putative) author of about a thousand progressively sillier Dune sequels after daddio went to the great spice vault in the sky. (I’m sensing a trend here of children robbing their parents’ lucrative literary corpses. And I’m being very charitable --- one meme I saw referred to it as children raping their parent’s literary corpses.)
(As an Interesting-If-Thoroughly-Irrelevant Aside, I actually met Gene Roddenberry once and had coffee with him. It’s true, I swear on my copy of the Federation Charter. He was booked to speak at my university, and the student union vice president in charge of programming was an acquaintance of mine --- I can’t really say ‘friend,’ because he sorta stole my girlfriend at the time from me. Long story, which we can discuss another time if you really want the sordid details. Anyway, I chanced on him as he was heading to the airport to pick up Mr. Roddenberry, and he invited me along. Despite the source, I needed no second invitation, so we went. Although the airline had misplaced the Great Man’s luggage, he was incredibly gracious, inviting a couple of stumbling, nerdish university students i.e. us up to his room for coffee and conversation… which was the second time that day I needed no second invitation.)
Anyway. This sequel-upon-sequel-upon-sequel-ad-nauseum thing is a relatively recent phenomenon, I think… and by recent, I mean the last few decades. After all, you don’t see too many people writing sequels to Hamlet or Alice Through the Looking Glass or Pilgrim’s Progress. It is, I believe, an outgrowth of the fact that most of us, in our modern narcissistic, if-less-is-more-just-think-how-much-more-more-will-be philosophy (thank you, Dr. Frasier Crane, for that pithy but accurate summation of our society) subscribe to the notion that when we like something, we tend to like it a lot. And we want more of it. Lots more. Studios and authors (or their rapacious children) are only too willing to oblige, because, let’s face it, sequels come with a lot of the groundwork already done. Characters? Check. Settings? Check. Background detail about the worlds concerned? Check. In fact… even stories? Check, if daddy was thoughtful/planned enough to leave behind copious notes, as Tolkien and Herbert apparently did.
Now, I need to add a disclaimer at this point, because it may sound like I’m trashing these three (extremely lucrative) franchises: I’m not. I love Star Trek in all its incarnations. Have done since I was a tadpole in elementary school --- though, to my annoyance, my parents wouldn’t let me watch The Original Series as episodes initially aired, because Star Trek was on way past this then-third grader’s bedtime. And Tolkien is my literary demi-god --- reading The Lord of the Rings for the first time at the tenderly precocious age of 12 was life-changing. And the first two Dune books were amazing. (After that, they got increasingly, perplexingly ridiculous. I quickly decided Frank was starting to believe his own press releases, and stopped lining his and later Brian’s pockets with money they clearly didn’t deserve.)
But these sequels… augh, these sequels, he wailed with varying degrees of anguish. Here’s the answer to the question I posed at the beginning: Gene, Ronald, Frank… I think they would have collectively been appalled. Aghast. Amazed (but not in a good way). Angst-ridden. And a host of other alliterative descriptors. The first season of Rings of Power was… okay. (Although as I age, I become more and more impatient with characters who clearly can’t see threats which are plain as the ring on your finger. Yes, I’m talking to you, Galadriel, because there’s clearly something off about this Halbrand guy, and if I can tell he’s likely Sauron, why can’t you? Haven’t any of you ever read works or watched films in your genre? Well, the answer is: apparently not. It’s akin to the characters in horror stories who decide to split up while searching the haunted house, because they can cover more ground that way. Like… really, guys? Seriously?!)
So, yeah, Rings of Power was okay. But it wasn’t Tolkien, not really: it was yer standard swords and sorcery template, inserting names of several Tolkien characters. Yeah, I know, these series all say ‘based on the works by’ which means all they have to do is make nodding acquaintance with the original works to make us all wistfully believe we’ll be seeing the originals miraculously resurrected. Kind of like Tinkerbelle, I guess.
But, he whispered, glancing furtively over his shoulder… maybe… maybe… we should be leaving these beloved, deceased authors alone and not keep trying to milk yet another megabuck from their literary oeuvres. Maybe we should be boldly going where no writer has gone before.
Or at least trying to.
I happen to think the answer is pretty easy, even though Gene’s kid is listed in the credits of the latest batch of Star Trek spinoffs as a producer. And Ronald’s kid, who created a thriving cottage industry cribbing stories from dad’s notes, signed off on the multi-million-dollar deal giving Hollywood the rights to the various other Middle Earth tales besides Bilbo’s and Frodo’s. And Frank’s kid was the (putative) author of about a thousand progressively sillier Dune sequels after daddio went to the great spice vault in the sky. (I’m sensing a trend here of children robbing their parents’ lucrative literary corpses. And I’m being very charitable --- one meme I saw referred to it as children raping their parent’s literary corpses.)
(As an Interesting-If-Thoroughly-Irrelevant Aside, I actually met Gene Roddenberry once and had coffee with him. It’s true, I swear on my copy of the Federation Charter. He was booked to speak at my university, and the student union vice president in charge of programming was an acquaintance of mine --- I can’t really say ‘friend,’ because he sorta stole my girlfriend at the time from me. Long story, which we can discuss another time if you really want the sordid details. Anyway, I chanced on him as he was heading to the airport to pick up Mr. Roddenberry, and he invited me along. Despite the source, I needed no second invitation, so we went. Although the airline had misplaced the Great Man’s luggage, he was incredibly gracious, inviting a couple of stumbling, nerdish university students i.e. us up to his room for coffee and conversation… which was the second time that day I needed no second invitation.)
Anyway. This sequel-upon-sequel-upon-sequel-ad-nauseum thing is a relatively recent phenomenon, I think… and by recent, I mean the last few decades. After all, you don’t see too many people writing sequels to Hamlet or Alice Through the Looking Glass or Pilgrim’s Progress. It is, I believe, an outgrowth of the fact that most of us, in our modern narcissistic, if-less-is-more-just-think-how-much-more-more-will-be philosophy (thank you, Dr. Frasier Crane, for that pithy but accurate summation of our society) subscribe to the notion that when we like something, we tend to like it a lot. And we want more of it. Lots more. Studios and authors (or their rapacious children) are only too willing to oblige, because, let’s face it, sequels come with a lot of the groundwork already done. Characters? Check. Settings? Check. Background detail about the worlds concerned? Check. In fact… even stories? Check, if daddy was thoughtful/planned enough to leave behind copious notes, as Tolkien and Herbert apparently did.
Now, I need to add a disclaimer at this point, because it may sound like I’m trashing these three (extremely lucrative) franchises: I’m not. I love Star Trek in all its incarnations. Have done since I was a tadpole in elementary school --- though, to my annoyance, my parents wouldn’t let me watch The Original Series as episodes initially aired, because Star Trek was on way past this then-third grader’s bedtime. And Tolkien is my literary demi-god --- reading The Lord of the Rings for the first time at the tenderly precocious age of 12 was life-changing. And the first two Dune books were amazing. (After that, they got increasingly, perplexingly ridiculous. I quickly decided Frank was starting to believe his own press releases, and stopped lining his and later Brian’s pockets with money they clearly didn’t deserve.)
But these sequels… augh, these sequels, he wailed with varying degrees of anguish. Here’s the answer to the question I posed at the beginning: Gene, Ronald, Frank… I think they would have collectively been appalled. Aghast. Amazed (but not in a good way). Angst-ridden. And a host of other alliterative descriptors. The first season of Rings of Power was… okay. (Although as I age, I become more and more impatient with characters who clearly can’t see threats which are plain as the ring on your finger. Yes, I’m talking to you, Galadriel, because there’s clearly something off about this Halbrand guy, and if I can tell he’s likely Sauron, why can’t you? Haven’t any of you ever read works or watched films in your genre? Well, the answer is: apparently not. It’s akin to the characters in horror stories who decide to split up while searching the haunted house, because they can cover more ground that way. Like… really, guys? Seriously?!)
So, yeah, Rings of Power was okay. But it wasn’t Tolkien, not really: it was yer standard swords and sorcery template, inserting names of several Tolkien characters. Yeah, I know, these series all say ‘based on the works by’ which means all they have to do is make nodding acquaintance with the original works to make us all wistfully believe we’ll be seeing the originals miraculously resurrected. Kind of like Tinkerbelle, I guess.
But, he whispered, glancing furtively over his shoulder… maybe… maybe… we should be leaving these beloved, deceased authors alone and not keep trying to milk yet another megabuck from their literary oeuvres. Maybe we should be boldly going where no writer has gone before.
Or at least trying to.
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