Insidious. That’s the nature of the threat to all life in the trilogy of novels called Star Trek Coda, which winds-up in David Mack’s character- and action-packed novel Oblivion’s Gate, coming to bookstores tomorrow. Star Wars gave us the Death Star, but at least you could try to negotiate with the Empire. The enemy here is more like a virus, where resistance may–this time–actually really be futile.
For every effort worth fighting for, somebody will stand in the way, attempting to thwart actions even when they are aimed to benefit everyone. In this tale that role falls to Will Riker, although readers will find a different twist, different from doppelganger Thomas Riker but also similar, more Tuvix actually. And despite the twist this Riker is as brilliant as ever. As with Coda book one, Dayton Ward’s Moments Asunder (reviewed here), and book two, James Swallow’s The Ashes of Tomorrow (reviewed here), Mack pulls some of our favorite supporting characters in for a swan song of epic proportions.
Earlier this month here at borg I reviewed Moments Asunder, Dayton Ward’s first act in a trilogy of books that are intended as a major shift in the tie-in novel universe of Star Trek. The story is a giant convergence of many major nexuses of the Star Trek television series’ casts of characters from the original series to Voyager, with an older and wise Wesley Crusher as experienced Traveler (see TNG: “Journey’s End”) at the heart of the tale. The book is an engaging read and fun-filled start to the trilogy full of great throwbacks and surprises. The action doesn’t let up in the second novel, James Swallow’s The Ashes of Tomorrow, which digs deeper into the futures of all the key Deep Space Nine characters, and it pits Jean-Luc Picard against an old colleague and friend.
It may seem a long time coming, but the Star Trek tie-in novels and the new era of Star Trek television series are finally becoming one. On the heels of Disney discarding decades of Star Wars stories written after the original movie trilogy into a bin called the Expanded Universe, Star Trek’s novel writers have embarked on a shoring-up of the franchise’s decades of novels with a single trilogy of novels. Titled Star Trek Coda, the novels lean into what Star Wars can’t–it’s sci-fi multiverse. As discussed last week in my review of Rizwan Virk’s The Simulated Multiverse, lots of science fiction relies on the multiple timeline, parallel universe, alternate history tropes to expand opportunities for storytelling, something Star Trek fans have known since 1966. In the first novel of the Coda trilogy, Moments Asunder, author Dayton Ward takes the crews of Star Trek: The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, and Voyager there and back again, to places that will be both familiar and new to television audiences, while continuing stories–and characters–that fans of the novels will know well. But the future for some of your favorite Federation heroes is dicey, so take heed.
Ancient philosophers have discussed the concept for millenia: What is the nature of life? Are we part of the plan of an architect of all things or do we have a say in our future? The latest exploration of this subject uses science fiction stories as analogies to these unanswered questions in The Simulated Multiverse, by Rizwan Virk. Virk skips over the scientific method to dabble in ideas of pseudoscience like Erich von Däniken or an episode of In Search Of…, blending bits of the history of science with the “what ifs” of a Dan Brown novel, James Rollins’ The Last Odyssey, or the Wachowskis’ The Matrix. It’s an interesting trip full of elements that are integral to understanding much of pop culture fiction. The book’s impetus is an obscure postulate by science fiction’s own Philip K. Dick, and the conversation interconnects everything from Sliders to Star Trek.
What many don’t realize about movie concept art books is that, from the best of them, you can learn more about the filmmaking design process from the accompanying text than from the images selected. Make no mistake–The Art of Rogue One: A Star Wars Story is chock full of many stages of concept artwork. But what unfolds over its more than 250 pages is a rare peek behind the scenes at director Gareth Edwards, Lucasfilm executives, and the art design team as they figured out what story to tell in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.
We learned last year in Roger Christian’s Cinema Alchemist: Designing Star Wars and Alien (reviewed here at borg.com), that George Lucas knew immediately he wanted to create the look of Star Wars as a sort of documentary, a historical account of a long ago event. To that end he tapped Christian to create environments made from real world components. As explained in The Art of Rogue One, director Gareth Edwards knew he needed to emulate that style of filmmaking and overall look, and his route was using a readily available team of concept artists to create the visuals of Rogue One from day one, even partnering with artists to create the ideas for the film’s story elements in advance of a completed story. These elements included featuring a female lead, a rebel strike squad like that in Force 10 from Navarone, a key droid team member, a battle reflective of Vietnam, a battle reflective of Paris during World War II, and a dark planet for the home of Darth Vader. Edwards wanted to create an echo of Luke Skywalker’s hero–who wished he could join the far away war–with Jyn Erso, a heroine raised in a life of war who only wished to escape it. The proof of the efficacy of Edwards’ process is in the result. Has Edwards begun a new way of making movies, and will future filmmakers take this tack?
“I look at Star Wars as a real historical event that took place in the universe, and George Lucas was there with his crew to capture it. And now we’re there with our cameras and our crew, filming as it passed through us,” Edwards says in Abrams Books’ latest film art book, The Art of Rogue One. “When you look like you’ve come in with a plan, it can feel too prescribed and a bit false–but when it looks like you’re capturing the images, like you’re watching them unfold in real time, it just feels more real. I’m always trying to find that little thing that knocks you off your path–the idea or the ingredient that we didn’t come in trying to create, the curveball that makes the story feel unique.” Edwards directive was similarly unique: How the artists remembered the images of seeing Star Wars for the first time became a more important focus than copying the look of the environments exactly from the original Star Wars source material.
