14-18 Exploring Gene Roddenberry's Star Trek: The Motion Picture Novel Preface

About this episode

Mike Sussman and Larry Nemecek explore the meta preface of Gene Roddenberry's novelization of Star Trek: The Motion Picture.

Writer/producer Mike Sussman returns to The Trek Files with a personal favorite: the creative and very meta preface to Gene Roddenberry's novelization of Star Trek: The Motion Picture . In it, Gene (writing as himself and as Admiral Kirk) casts the original Star Trek series as a fictionalized dramatization of real events. Wait… what? Join Mike and Larry Nemecek as they unpack Roddenberry's playful (and possibly defensive) retcon of Trek canon, written at a time when Gene was emerging as a sci-fi thought leader in the post- Star Wars , post-lecture-circuit era. It's Roddenberry as revisionist historian, spinning group consciousness, mind control revolts, and alternate human evolution… all in the introduction to his own movie tie-in novel. You may never look at the "real" Kirk, or Trek canon, the same way again. Documents and additional references: Admiral Kirk's Preface , Star Trek: The Motion Picture novelization by Gene Roddenberry (1979) Reference: Star Trek: The Motion Picture novelization – Memory Alpha The Trek Files Season 14 on Memory Alpha All episodes and documents: The Trek Files on Memory Alpha Visit the Trekland site for behind-the-sc enes access and exclusive…

People in this episode

Host: Larry Nemecek

Guest: Mike Sussman

Topics covered

• Gene Roddenberry
• Star Trek
• novelization
• retcon
• sci-fi
• creative writing

Keywords

• Gene Roddenberry
• Star Trek
• novelization
• Admiral Kirk
• retcon
• sci-fi
• creative writing
• mind control
• human evolution

Mentioned in this episode

Books & works: Star Trek: The Motion Picture, Star Trek: The Motion Picture novelization, Admiral Kirk's Preface

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