Not to be melodramatic... but I'd dared hope for this. And to have my gut guesses borne out. In the Venn diagram of "practical Hollywood outcomes" intersecting "available Trek veterans" concerning a hands-on show runner for the new "Star Trek" series, I had seen one obvious option …but thought naaawww, it'll never happen.
So, consider today's news "faith restored":
Bryan Fuller Named Co-Creator of New Star Trek TV Series
Bryan Fuller, who launched his career writing for Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and Star Trek: Voyager, will return to the television franchise as co-creator and executive producer of the new CBS Star Trek series. …
That's this guy—seen here in 1995 during our original interview in his Voyager rookie days!
After the internal divisions surrounding the Paramount/Bad Robot staffing and vibe, would CBS actually reach out to a Trek veteran(s) to helm the new streaming series? Especially, a writer with Trek DNA and bona fides, AND showrunner cred AND not tied up in a deal with another studio?
And, as it's turned out, Alex Kurtzman's linkage was mostly as a CBS-family nameplate, to launch with. To all appearances, Bryan will "co-create" but be the hands-on showrunner.
Bryan was about the only who who fit all those criteria on my bill… criteria I was hoping for, way back in 2006 in my pre-blog Star Trek Magazine column … so today's news is Just. So. Invigorating. He combines the best of available Trek DNA with a dose of reality about today's TV landscape and market.
And somehow, when it's a guy who you've sat down and shared Trek minds with, and watched evolved professionally from roots IN Trek…it's pretty reassuring.
Believe me when I say, given all the practical Hollywood hoops... this is about as good an outcome as we could have hoped for, Trekland. I'm so jazzed! And happy for Bryan as well—he's in a place where this challenge is a win-win, career-wise, for him. It would not have been so for everyone.
Now, of my original five clarity-seeking questions posed after the November announcement, we still don't know where filming will occur, or even the number of episodes. Maybe that news will fall in short order. But this is a HUGE start.
Bryan's come a long way through all his other series, most recently Pushing Daisies and Hannibal. Here's a quote back from my original 1995 interview with the Voyager staff rookie after his first full season on Star Trek, much less as a TV professional:
“Not a minute goes by that I don’t realize how lucky I am, just to be here and have all these mentors,” he enthuses. “We will be in story meeting and it sounds like we’re all raving lunatics talking about the aliens coming, and they’re coming from a different dimension and they’re going to be doing this ... We sound like crazy people, but then we stop and think, ‘Wow, this is Star Trek, and it means so much to so many people’ -- and it‘s very special to be a part of that."
Good for you, Bryan. And good for all of us.
9 comments:
Definitely fantastic news.
But we still don't know in which timeline this serries will be
Welcome home, Bryan. Welcome home.
This was just about the best of all (current status ) worlds.
No, but I'd say--again--as a CBS production where Prime is a prior investment and the.boss is fond and experienced... Things lean about as well as they can.
Great article Larry! I'm cautiously optimistic about this news, mostly because I don't want to be disappointed once we get more information. Like many, I'd like the new series to be in the Prime Timeline.. so we'll have to see what happens.
I am looking forward to this more now.
I cant say this enough--this is the best news we possibly could have gotten.
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