From Newsgroup: alt.tv.star-trek.tos
From Address: David@block.net
Subject: Re: IDW Does Harlan Ellison

On 7/15/2014 9:23 AM, A Friend wrote:
> In article , Daniel
>  wrote:
>
>> On 15/07/2014 12:30 PM, A Friend wrote:
>>> In article , Jim G.
>>>  wrote:
>>>
>>>> A classic revisited, just as Harlan envisioned it...
>>>>
>>>> The City that Never Sleeps or Goes Away: Harlan Ellison and Star Trek,
>>>> Again
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> http://www.tor.com/blogs/2014/07/the-city-that-never-sleeps
or-goes-away-ha
>>>> rla
>>>> n-ellison-and-star-trek-again
>>>> or http://preview.tinyurl.com/l4sppdm
>>>>
>>>> QUOTE
>>>> Adapted for the comics by IDWrCUs primary Trek writers Scott and David
>>>> Tipton, and with beautiful art by J.K. Woodward (who did slick work on
>>>> the Doctor Who/TNG crossover a few years ago) everything about this
>>>> release is totally legit. In the debut issue of this limited run (there
>>>> will be five in all) IDW Trek editor Chris Ryall writes fondly about how
>>>> this venture was his idea, and one that took some convincing of
>>>> everybody to go along with. In his words, over time rCRnosrC# turned into
>>>> rCRhmmmms.rC#
>>>> END QUOTE
>>>>
>>>> Okay, so how long until Ellison sues IDW over something about this?
>>>
>>>
>>> I read the original script about 35 years ago, and I don't remember
>>> anything about a Bizarro World Enterprise.
>>>
>>> The article asks the question, "And yet, now nearly 50 years later,
>>> with numerous Treks behind us, the question still nags: would EllisonrCOs
>>> original script for rCLThe City on the Edge of Forever,rCY have been better
>>> than what ended up on screen?"  I don't think so.  The story is not
>>> about Beckwith, it's about Kirk and Edith Keeler, and Kirk's duty to
>>> history and the future.  The story didn't require Beckwith or anybody
>>> like Beckwith.  Accidentally overdosing McCoy gets things rolling quite
>>> nicely.
>>>
>>> Ellison's ending -- with Beckwith stuck in a time loop getting
>>> annihilated every few seconds inside a nova -- is beyond melodramatic.
>>> In the show as seen, Kirk's final line, "Let's get the hell out of
>>> here," is powerful, especially in a day when saying "hell" on U.S. tv
>>> was a very rare thing indeed.
>>>
>>> BTW the really confusing thing about City is just how history was
>>> changed.  Everybody thinks McCoy saved Edith from getting run over by
>>> that truck, and that wasn't the case.  The creepy little guy at the
>>> rescue mission (his name in Ellison's script is Rodent) eventually
>>> rapes and murders Edith.  He doesn't do so in the changed history
>>> because he fiddled with McCoy's phaser and disintegrated himself.  The
>>> significance of this was purposefully obscured, but that's why the
>>> phaser scene is in there.  What's also not explained is why Kirk and
>>> Spock simply didn't take Edith with them into the future, which would
>>> have effectively "killed" her in 1930.  Neither story ever explains why
>>> Edith's death was necessary.
>>>
>>> Also, Clark Gable didn't make a movie until 1931.
>>>
>> Hasn't the Edith Keeler story line been mentioned here as a possible ST
>> 13 re-do storyline??
>
>
> Not a chance.  Nobody's going to touch it.  They don't need the almost
> certain litigation.  Even the Pocket Books novels and various comics
> don't use or refer to City.

You DO know that this whole thread is about a comic book adaptation of 
the original script, right?


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