Here’s how the ratings game works for late night shows: You book a listing of shows in your time-slots every night of the week, and that schedule hinges around a strong showing in the prime-time slots in order push your audience to continue watching the local news and subsequently the late shows.

Four things drive ratings for any given show:

1. Scheduling
2. Advertising
3. Brand Loyalty (Legacy)
4. Fans

Let’s discuss each of these areas individually.

1) Scheduling:

This is a game that has been going on since the time of RADIO broadcasting.  The majority of ratings are based on time slot and lead-in programming.  NBC did something absolutely retarded by cancelling ALL their prime-time shows and moving a SINGLE show to run every night of the week during prime-time as the lead-in for the local news and the Tonight Show.

That show (The Jay Leno Show) had moderately decent numbers, but compared to the actual dramas that used to be slotted in NBC prime-time, the Jay Leno show was a complete and total failure.  On any given night the Leno show was down from previous years as much as 10 million viewers in his time-slot.  It failed to keep NBC’s ratings in prime-time competitive to the other networks.  Thus, the lead-in that both the local news and The Tonight Show had enjoyed thanks to good prime-time programming was gone–thereby resulting in a significant drop in ratings based on the show programming schedule alone.  Whose fault is that? NBC Executives and Leno for not walking away.

Leno HAD that buffer.  Conan did not.  Conan had LENO as his buffer, and Leno’s ratings were lower than LIPSTICK JUNGLE’s rating last season.  Lipstick Jungle… a show NO ONE watched… and he’s doing WORSE.

2) Advertising:

Because Jay decided he didn’t want to leave the air, and was moved into the prime time slot, NBC had to promote Jay’s prime-time show significantly harder than the Tonight Show with Conan.  NBC was competing against ACTUAL SHOWS that people watch EVERY NIGHT with the same shit, from the same guy every night.  They were hoping Jay would be enough to compete with the right advertising, and he wasn’t.  So not only did Conan not have the same schedule strength as his predecessor, they weren’t advertising for his take-over of TTS with the same market penetration they would have if they hadn’t had to invest so many ad dollars in Leno’s show.  Essentially all this accomplished was Leno muddying the water for Conan and Jimmy Fallon’s take-over of Conan’s old time-slot.

Here’s some note worthy statistics for you: Leno taking over prime-time slots on NBC resulted in 500+ people losing their jobs to accommodate for Jay’s desire to stay on a show.  5 nights a week, times 5 shows with approximately 100 people working the show including cast and crew = 500+ people out of work because of Leno and the stupidity of NBC Executives.

3) Brand Loyalty:

When Jay Leno took over TTS, he was bolstered by the fact that his predecessor was the most successful late night talk show host in the HISTORY OF THE GENRE.  Leno didn’t even have any real competition in the time-slot for more than a YEAR while Letterman was working with CBS to get on the air.  It took Letterman YEARS to compete with the legacy of the Tonight Show and draw viewership away.

Conan O’Brien was going to have a fight on his hands for ratings even if he had come into a time-slot that was scheduled along-side big ratings shows in prime-time.  Letterman has an established fan-base and a lot of loyalty in his time-slot.  Attrition was bound to happen due to the gamble NBC was taking by having Conan helm TTS, which has historically been a bigger draw for an older market.

I think NBC made a smart gamble on Conan.  In a normal year, ( when prime-time ratings hadn’t completely tanked due to the Leno show), Conan might have had a better chance at drawing a new, perhaps younger,  audience to TTS.  Realistically the older audience members would flock to Letterman because he offered something they understood.  This strategy is actually a really good way to get the NEXT generation of late night viewers USED to watch TTS with Conan so that as THEY age, Conan remains their staple over the long haul, and eventually NBC get’s TODAY’s young viewers and TOMORROW’s old viewers.  Eventually this would result in NBC drawing ratings over time back from CBS.  It’s a logical plan.

4) Fans:

This is simply a continuation of Brand Loyalty, but it represents something that is less specific to any given show.  Fans represent a significant portion of the base-line ratings for any show.  Fans are the people who will follow a specific performer to any time slot and show regardless of time or content.  In all likelihood the ratings numbers that Conan was winning for TTS were probably based around the viewership he had from his fans of his show prior to TTS.

The problem was that NBC compromised Conan’s chances for success by not offering him a good lead-in line up.  They muddied the water by advertising too much for Jay, and diluted the buzz that should have drawn big numbers to TTS when Conan premiered.  Conan was working an up-hill battle because the Tonight Show brand wasn’t nearly as strong under Leno as it had been under Johnny and thus resulted in a more head-on battle for ratings with an established program in the same time-slot, (Letterman).  NBC also didn’t consider the possibility that their older viewers might simply decide to tune into Jay in prime time then go to sleep, thereby negating their older viewship by offering them an earlier bedtime with Jay’s new show.  The irony of it all is kind of hysterical.

Even though the fans came out to support Conan, and stuck around after some of the initial allure wore off, it wasn’t enough to counter-act all the measures that NBC had taken to set up Conan O’Brien for failure on The Tonight Show by sabotaging their line-up.

Who’s to blame?

1. NBC and the executives responsible for screwing up the contract negotiations for the stars of their late night line-up.  NBC made bad business decisions, and allowed this problem to perpetuate itself into the media frenzy that it has become.
2. Jay Leno has to take a portion of the responsibility for this mess.  He had the right to renegotiate his contract with an extension to hold onto The Tonight Show until he was ready to leave, but he didn’t do it.  Instead he pushed the network into letting him into prime-time.
3. NBC Executives for listening to Jay Leno, and not simply showing him the door.

I place more of the blame on Jay Leno than anyone else for this entire mess.  If he had simply negotiated a contract extension, and requested that Conan wait a few more years until he was ready to walk away for good this mess never would have happened.  Johnny Carson took his final bows and exited stage right PERMANANTLY.  Jay Leno waffled so much on the matter that it resulted in NBC having to make special concessions for him in order to please one of the networks biggest stars.

I don’t know what happened behind closed doors, if this was a force out on Leno then I think there is significantly less blame to be placed on his shoulders.  But the fact that NBC gave him a prime-time show suggests to me that his involvement was pretty key to the shit storm NBC is living through right now.  Conan on the other hand is a victim of this entire mess.  Conan moved across the country to take of a job he’s wanted his whole life.  (For that matter so did the majority of his cast and crew.)  Conan didn’t force out Leno.  He doesn’t have the clout.

Suggesting that Conan is responsible for screwing up the legacy of the Tonight Show is not only short-sighted, but just wrong.  I keep coming back to the old saying, “You made your bed, now you’ve got to sleep in it.”  NBC made their proverbial bed… then they lit it on fire, and now they’re surprised by all the smoke?  I don’t envy Jeff Zucker right now.

“Saw Joan Didion’s play, “The Year Of Magical Thinking” this afternoon. It was a very interesting show that demonstrated a wealth of love.”

“Love and loss are so intrinsically linked as to be inseparable–one defines the other. Didion’s play looks at the result of that relationship.”

“I am bothered by the play’s conceit that the audience can not know what it means to grieve, or the nature of loss. It’s a bit presumptuous.”

My twitter account populates every social networking site on the planet, and thus one of my friends on Facebook responded with the following:

I’m not sure I agree with that, I’ve felt love and loss without the other being involved.”

I thought my response was worth sharing in this forum as it captures my feeling on the matter of love and loss.  I think it also effectively addresses my friend’s sentiment without treating him with any disrespect.  I honestly believe in the connection between these two experiences, and I hope the following demonstrates my perspective on the matter.

There are so many responses I could offer to that sentiment, but I’ll try to limit myself to only four.

1. Rational Response: To truly love a thing, no matter how small, you can rest assured that at some time in your life you will lose that thing. The list of possibilities is endless but I’ll use alliteration to express it most poetically: departure, disappearance, death.
2. Emotional Response: Love is a subjective thing that each of us defines every morning as the sun crests the horizon, but in the simplest of terms love can be reduced to the emotional response one experiences in the absence of a thing.To feel the loss of a person, pet, or favorite comic book is to understand the true meaning of love. Without that emotion, that connection, the loss would not be felt–it would lack meaning. Love might be a swooning rhapsody playing to a couple kissing on the deck of a sinking ship… but it is also the emotional response to the presence or absence of a thing.
3. Pissy Response: I’m an artist and I demand to be granted a certain amount of poetic license! But seriously, I’m not talking about losing your keys. In truth I’m talking about death. But to be fair to your sentiment, the loss of something even as simple as one’s keys or wallet may evoke frustration, fear, or even hysteria—but the fact remains that when you go select a new wallet from the store you will be reminded of the one you lost. Your memory of that loss lends itself to my point, even a simple thing has meaning when it’s gone. The same can be true of a set of keys. Love does not have to be confined by traditional norms; love is more than a feeling.And to close my pissy rant: when you “lose” something you truly care nothing about, it’s not really lost to you.
4. Cryptic Dramatic Response: One day… you WILL understand.

If you don’t feel the loss of something, then I truly believe it’s not lost to you.  I know that by restating this I’m being repetitious, but hopefully I’m also driving home my point: The connection between love and loss relies on the notion that the person who experiences either emotion must actually mean it. If you really care about losing something, then the connection is clear.  If you really love something, you will eventually lose it and, again, the connection is clear.  The interdependency of these two experiences are so intertwined they become difficult to distinguish.

I should also point out that sweeping generalizations gets me no-where fast with literal and logical thinkers, especially when it comes to highly emotional topics.  Of course there are going to be contradictory experiences to this line of thinking… but that doesn’t make it any less true.

The human experience is vast and varied.  We may all walk the same well trodden path in life, but no two people will experience that journey in exactly the same way. Some experiences are universal… I believe that the above is true for most people.

The following is my response:

Any one who grew up in the era of Thriller, red nylon  jackets, and remembers Michael Jackson once being black is looking on Michael Jackson’s death with mixed emotions.

On the one hand our generation has lost one of the greatest entertainers of all time. A man so prolific that his face made it on to lunch pails carried to school by my classmates in the 80’s, and whose music was at its pinnacle during our formative years.

On the other hand you have Michael post all the controversy, trials, plastic surgery, and slipping further and further into his own celebrity fueled craziness.

For those of us who still feel a kinship toward the "Man in the Mirror", we are a bit relieved that he can’t sink any lower. In truth, no one can really glory in the death of such a talented man.  His is a bitter sweet release, that came neither too early or too late.  People will be weighing the scales of his celebrity against his talent for quite a long time to come.

Kurt Cobain was a drugged fueled, grunge rock, suicide tragedy.  Talented for certain, but I don’t think he had nearly the universal appeal of Michael Jackson.  He is certainly remembered through his music, but I don’t think either of these two men will be remembered with the same reverence as John Lennon.

Kurt Cobain’s passing was tragic, but I am less inclined to be sympathetic of someone who took their own life while at the apex of their career.  I must admit that I have a personal distaste for suicide, but that doesn’t change the fact that such a death leaves a hollowness that can’t be filled with any amount of good music.  Suicide always leaves a vacuum in the place that was once occupied by the deceased. Kurt Cobain’s departure created a hole that, as time passed, was simply filled in by his contemporaries.

Unlike Cobain, Michael Jackson has developed such an enormous persona that I don’t believe that he can ever truly be replaced.  In that way he is very similar to John Lennon.  But the nature of each man’s death also shapes our cultural memory.  It’s hard to separate Michael Jackson’s death from his personal eccentricity.  One might argue that this character flaw has been guiding him down a path towards death at the hands of a medical practitioner for a good long while.  Can we really be surprised by the fact that his fascination with physical perfection ultimately lead him to another kind of completeness–one found in death.

After I heard of Jackson’s death I went back to my CD collection and listened to Michael’s anthology, released in 2001.  On the second disk in the “Greatest Hits: HIStory” the song “Childhood Theme” caught my attention with lyrics that spoke to the topic of his colorful life:

Have you seen my Childhood?
I’m searching for the world that I come from
‘Cause I’ve been looking around
In the lost and found of my heart…
No one understands me
They view it as such strange eccentricities…
‘Cause I keep kidding around
Like a child, but pardon me…

People say I’m not okay
‘Cause I love such elementary things…
It’s been my fate to compensate,
for the Childhood
I’ve never known…

Have you seen my Childhood?
I’m searching for that wonder in my youth
Like pirates in adventurous dreams,
Of conquest and kings on the throne…

Before you judge me, try hard to love me,
Look within your heart then ask,
Have you seen my Childhood?

People say I’m strange that way
‘Cause I love such elementary things,
It’s been my fate to compensate,
for the Childhood (Childhood) I’ve never known…

Have you seen my Childhood?
I’m searching for that wonder in my youth
Like fantastical stories to share
But the dreams I would dare, watch me fly…

Before you judge me, try hard to love me.
The painful youth I’ve had

Have you seen my Childhood….

~ Michael Jackson, “Childhood Theme”

Listening to this song, I couldn’t help but think of a young Michael Jackson prior to all the celebrity and thirty years of medical mishaps.  I may choose to remember Michael Jackson as that talented young boy with a lot of potential. Perhaps that’s what Michael always wanted… to reclaim a youth that was colored by a success that the rest of us could never truly understand.  I would rather remember the boy, than the shattered and socially disturbed man he later became.

I don’t know that one could compare Michael Jackson to John Lennon, but his death will certainly resonate with people of my generation.

In the coming weeks there will new content here for my 10 regular visitors. I will also be announcing the launch of a new website, (mentioned above).

More good news coming soon!

<<SPOILER ALERT>>

Just to be clear, I don’t think the new Star Trek was a bad movie. I think it was a bad Star Trek movie.  There is a difference.

As Science Fiction films go it was a bang up, knock out success.  It had an interesting story line, thrills and spills, wonderful special effects and an interesting villain.  Even if one were to go so far as to consider it an homage to the Trek universe it might be palatable. But as a Star Trek film it’s a completely atrocious, god awful, pathetic, train wreck, disaster of a film.  Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, let’s talk about why this film doesn’t measure up.

First a Little History…

The Star Trek universe, originally created and helmed by Gene Roddenberry, has always followed a basic set of rules that, over time, has become more vast and detailed thanks to approved contributions to the universe’s mythology in the form of user manuals, ship guides, and other paraphernalia not commonplace to most fiction.  The Star Trek genre has inspired scientists and science fiction authors alike to compile books analyzing the functional limitations of the science used by the characters within this universe.  Star Trek is governed by this set of principles that act as the operating manual for this universe.

Over the forty plus years that this fictional universe has been in existence these rules, principles, and documents have become canonical code of conduct for people seeking to create new content within this universe.  The Star Trek universe is so vast and varied that it needs these rules so that there is a consistency of theme, message, and focus between all the many disparate parts that make up the tapestry that is Star Trek.  The franchise as a whole has generated TV shows, movies, books, comic books, RPG’s, video games, card games, table-top games, action figures, and various other merchandise that are all interconnected through a common bond. 

Initial Response… Temporal Prime Directive? Anyone??

So you understand that what we’re dealing with here is a 40 year old multi-faceted franchise with a huge fan base.  Right… What strikes me as completely absurd, is that in one swift moment, through the decision of a single content contributor to this genre, the entire legacy of the Star Trek universe has been completely and utterly annihilated, and no one seems to be complaining.  No one is even questioning the decision… and I’m confused.

One the key components of the Star Trek universe, the rule of law that governs all characters actions is something called, “The Prime Directive.”  Or, as it pertains to the newest Star Trek move, the Temporal Prime Directive.  See the reference materials available on the web for this term: 

“The Temporal Prime Directive is intended to prevent a time traveler from interfering in the natural development of a timeline. The TPD was formally created by the 29th Century, and was enforced through an agency of Starfleet called the Temporal Integrity Commission, which monitored and restricted deviations from the natural flow of history.” Wikipedia – "Prime Directive"

“The Temporal Prime Directive is a fundamental Starfleet principle.  All Starfleet personnel were strictly forbidden from directly interfering with historical events and were required to maintain the timeline and prevent history from being altered. It also restricts people from telling too much about the future, so as not to cause paradoxes or alter the timeline.” Memory Alpha, Star Trek Wiki – “Temporal Prime Directive”

According to the above information on these directives, the entire concept that predicates the supposed “parallel universe” created in the movie, “Star Trek”, should not be allowed to persist as it damages and alters the existing (proper) timeline.  This directive is already in existence in the future when Spock fails in his attempt to save the Romulan home planet, creates a black-hole, and is subsequently pulled back into the past.  All actions taken by Spock, and Captain Nero, should be reconciled by Spock prior to the conclusion of the film.  Restoring the proper time-line is the logical course of action.  It protects the universe from any number of unknown, and possibly disastrous, variations in the future that could now occur due to the destruction of the planet Vulcan. 

This decision, made by the writing, directing, and producing staff, to leave the broken time-line as it is and create a new story-line for existing characters in a “rebooted universe” is absolutely counter-intuitive to the 40 years of existing canon in this universe, and begs the question: What the fuck were they thinking?

What the Hell is a Reboot Anyway?

The term “Reboot” has been bandied about by the production staff, and director JJ Abrams, to make sure that existing fans, and prospective new fans to the Star Trek universe understand that this, “Isn’t your Father’s Star Trek.”  The concept of “rebooting” the Star Trek universe to garner new fans is a perfectly reasonable and welcome method to introduce new fans to an existing  science fiction universe that hasn’t generated a lot of new fans in the past ten years.  The managers of the Star Trek brand were desperately looking for a way to inject some young blood into this universe and attract a new breed of fans to the universe. Again, this is all perfectly reasonable and acceptable in order to preserve and maintain the Star Trek universe.  So the next appropriate question is obvious: What is not acceptable?  That too is simple:  It’s not acceptable to make the decision to create a story-line that breaks one of the most basic tenets of the Star Trek universe, then leave it broken in order to make it possible to create new content without the limitations that are imposed by existing canon doctrine.  This is what people “in the business” refer to as a “Cop-out.”

Rather than embrace the existing canon, and rebooting the universe using the rules that pre-exist the new film, the production team of “Star Trek” made the decision to completely toss everything that came before this new film, and move forward uninhibited.  Why is this a mistake?  The answer is simple enough, but requires a little analysis of what has kept the Star Trek franchise going for the past forty years:  Trekkies, Trekkers, and Fan-boys.  The true life-blood of the Star Trek franchise has always been the fans.  They are the guaranteed selling base for every new franchise decision.  New movies, TV shows, books, comics, you name it… they buy it.  But there’s a condition to the relationship that dictates how the existing fan-base operates.  You can’t screw with a good thing and not expect repercussions.  Specifically, you can’t make the decision to throw out everything that the fans know and love simply because it makes the process of developing a new movie within the universe easier.  This decision, while it may have garnered new fans, will ultimately result in existing fans, (the die-hard hardcore lovers of the Trek universe), to be less inclined to support future franchise endeavors because they don’t feel that their interests are being represented by those helming the new content being created within the universe they knew so well.

When Does a Reboot Work?

Let’s take a look at some examples of reboots that took existing franchises and improved on them in a way that supported the existing fan base, and had the potential to garner new fans.  Ever heard of a guy named Bruce Wayne?  How about Clark Kent?  The DC Comics, “Batman” and “Superman” franchises were created in 1939 and 1932 respectively.  They have been depicted in countless comic books, TV shows, movies, cartoons, lunch boxes, action figures… you name and these two characters have done it.  Most recently these two franchises made the decision to “reboot” and start a new series of films using new actors, with the intent to show a new side of these dynamic comic book folk heroes.

In June of 2005 we saw the release of, “Batman Begins”, a reboot to the Bruce Wayne chronicle starring Christian Bale.  This film scored huge success with both existing fans of the Batman franchise in addition to garnering new fans.  It was a success because it struck a balance between the old and the new that resulted in an effective and exciting film.  In June of 2006, DC Comics followed up their previous year’s success with the release of, “Superman Returns”, a reboot to the Clark Kent saga using an unknown actor to play the iconic American hero in a film that was met with tremendous success, and huge accolades from the fans.  Both of these movies did things within their respective universes that were new, different, and challenged some of our existing understanding of these characters and their world view.  But in the case of each of these films, the production teams made the decision to conform to existing canon enough that their strong fan-base was not alienated by changes that would result in an entirely new set of rules for these well known characters.  Batman did not develop the ability to fly, or use sonar to see in the dark unaided through bat-eyes.  Superman did not suddenly have green skin, or gills, or live under water.  The basic rules that govern how these characters conduct themselves remained the same, because their history is well known and documented.

Why is it, that the above is true of both the Superman and Batman franchises, but the people who manage the Star Trek universe think it’s okay to make the decision to completely throw out everything that the Federation, and Starfleet, have done.  Why do they think that it is acceptable to throw out everything that defines the universe in favor of making a (supposedly) more interesting, unique, or exciting film?

Simply put: Destroying the planet Vulcan is just as absurd as giving Superman green skin and gills.  It doesn’t make sense, it doesn’t accomplish anything good within the story-line, and ultimately contaminates everything that comes after such an ill conceived decision.

The Star Trek Legacy…

Many of the existing fans of the Star Trek universe like to believe that Gene Roddenberry had a very specific vision for the Star Trek universe.  His vision was principled based on an ideal of how the future should turn out.  Were he alive today, it is my argument that he would not support some of the decisions made in this new film.  Here’s a list of some of the things that I imagine would seriously bother the creator of this universe:

1) Creating an alternate time line due to a scientific miscalculation, then allowing that timeline to persist rather than simply going to the point in time when things went wrong and fixing it. Allowing an entire planet to be destroyed because of a time-traveling incident is unacceptable. When the Federation knows that time has been altered, and that has resulted in an entire planet being destroyed they fix it.

2)  Not fixing the above outlined scenario is a violation of the Temporal Prime Directive.  No amount of interesting story-line or new franchise opportunities can make up for the destruction of Vulcan.  It violates the Prime Directive.  It’s as simple as that.  It may be true that Kirk, Picard, and Janeway were okay with bending the rules here and there when it comes to the Prime Directive, but when inaction results in the destruction of a planet, and the near extinction of a race… they don’t simply throw their hands up in the air and say: "We must now be living an alternate reality, or parallel universe.”  Arguing that the story now taking place is within a new time-line, or a branch-point is not a valid argument.  If the Federation is aware that a change in the time-line has resulted in a serious change in the universe they would take whatever action necessary to resolve it.  

The Federation makes the decision to violate the prime directive for Earth, (SEE STAR TREK IV: THE VOYAGE HOME), but somehow it’s okay to bring whales back from the past to save future Earth, but it’s not okay to save the planet Vulcan from total annihilation because of one crazy Romulan?  Here’s an interesting point for you: to fix the timeline so that the previous history is restored would only require Spock to travel to the point in time where he failed to save Romulus from the super-nova.  Saving Romulus fixes the entire universe.  Why wouldn’t they do that?  What motivated that decision?  There’s no reason NOT to do that.  The answer is that this “Isn’t your Father’s Star Trek.”  I would take it one step further and argue that what happened in this movie is not Star Trek at all… It doesn’t follow existing canon on time travel.  This film took audiences into a non-Star Trek universe, one that I’m not particularly interested in seeing anything more from.

3) For the sake of argument, let’s play along with JJ Abramms’ vision of the Star Trek universe… Let’s pretend neither of the two above arguments are reasonable, and I’m simply geeking out like a fan-boy… Done. Explain this to me: The Planet Vulcan has been destroyed, the Vulcan high council has been reduced to 4 of its 10 members… and the remaining Vulcans in the universe are refugees without a home world. FINE. The time-line in this new alter-reality universe is now screwed up to the point that none of the future that we know from The Original Series, The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, and Voyager can or will ever happen. We’ve now so thoroughly screwed up the universe that none of the future histories, (the legacy on which this film is supposedly based,) will EVER TAKE PLACE. So effectively, JJ Abramms single handedly took the entire Star Trek universe, crumpled it up, and dumped it in the garbage. Am I the ONLY Trek fan that has a problem with this?

4) Here’s something to ponder: The planet Vulcan has been destroyed, and the action was taken by the Romulans; who’s to say the entire Trek universe and the Federation specifically won’t shift gears, and focus on the annihilation of the Romulans and the Klingons? Let’s take a closer look: Nero’s ship reportedly destroyed 43 of the Klingon Empires war-birds.  Would this not incite the Klingons to a harsher position within the universe?  Who’s to say the NEW future won’t result in a completely Militaristic Federation dedicated to conquering rather than exploration?  In this vision of Star Trek, the Klingon Empire will NEVER reach a functional peace with the Federation.  Gene Roddenberry would never allow this to happen in his universe.

One could argue that this film could be the source of the alternate reality from the "Dark Mirror" episodes and books from TOS and TNG. This universe is so tragically backwards from the ones we know from the films, TV show, and books that it might as well be the branch point that spawned that Dark alter-reality. A reality where the Federation doesn’t seek out new life and civilizations based on the prime directive, but rather based on the concept of conquering and occupation. There’s a reason why they called it DARK Mirror.

5) No amount of cool nostalgic moments can make up for the fact that the most significant message that we’re left with at the end of this film is that nothing is the same, and everything we knew is gone. The Butterfly Effect doesn’t even apply here… the Star Trek universe lost the Planet Vulcan… the future as we knew it is GONE FOREVER.

Final Analysis…

I am not interested in supporting, endorsing, or furthering any film that suggests the time-line for the entire Star Trek universe should been completely scrubbed. Consider the implications… I’ll give you one… I’m sure you can come up with more on your own: 

Who’s going to be humanities ambassador to Q now that we can no longer guarantee that Jean Luc Picard will be 1) Born, 2) Join Star Fleet, or 3) End up on the future Enterprise D at Far Point?  We already know that simple decisions, minor changes in action can have far reaching implications within the universe.  (See ST:TNG Episode, “Tapestry”).

In the Star Trek universe many things are inevitable.  It is only a matter of time until the Federation will have to face off against Q, The Borg, the Nexus… the list goes on and on!  Frankly, I’m not interested in a new time-line where we figure all of these things out a different way with new people.

Like every other pure blood Trek fan out there I enjoyed the Original Series… I enjoyed TNG… I put up with DS9 and Voyager… but those universes are fully developed and they were successful. Ignoring the future implications this movie has in the Star Trek universe is short sighted at best, and disastrously stupid at worst.  Again, “Star Trek” is NOT a bad movie.  Simply put: it isn’t a Star Trek movie at all… and that’s particularly ironic considering the title.

There’s nothing wrong with enjoying this film, or with taking a lot of joy from the references to all the Original Series characters.  This movie was a lot of fun.  Unfortunately it also fell victim to such an enormous blunder that I don’t think I’ll be interested in seeing any future movies that follow this one… I just don’t see any point in continuing in a universe that, based on existing Star Trek doctrine, simply shouldn’t exist.

I’m very excited about how well this play has come together thanks to some very important break throughs and character revelations recently. It’s a wonderful surprise when a project you’re working on takes you in direction you didn’t expect. It’s what makes writing worth it for me. I outline and plan out how a work will progress before I sit down at the keyboard to write a single line. It’s so refreshing to have unique moments come out unexpectedly.

I’m also working on a revision to “An Army of One” that is bringing the story up to date. All told there has been a lot of work happening at my desk after I wrap up my daily work obligations. I’ve had so many good ideas lately that I’ve been doubling up on projects.

This is all good news for me but bad news for the blog. I intend to keep updating the site so please continue to check in, it just may be a bit slow here until I finish these two big projects.

I’m more than fifty pages into a new full length play that’s really coming together, and is practically writing itself.  I finished a new ten minute play that I’ve had stewing in the back of my mind for quite a while, and finally put words on paper last week.  I’m in the process of finishing a major overhaul on “An Army of One” that I feel really brings that play together, and will mark the last major revision I do to that play for a long time.  And I’m working on something that could potentially be a screenplay, comic book, or dynamic digital web show using flash and animation… I don’t know.  The past three weeks I’ve had so many good ideas rolling around in my head I’ve had a hard to finding ways to focus on any one project. 

I figure that this is a good problem to have, and it’s not hurting any of the things I’m working on, so I can’t really complain.  The only thing it has really hit hard is my ability to sit down and write up my response to Beckett. Frankly I don’t want to derail the good thing I have going in my own writing, so I’m going to post-pone a write up until this current writing streak cools down a bit, and I need something to stimulate myself.

The irony here, is that maintaining this website, and posting reviews of works I’m currently reading is meant to be the fuel that burns my creative fire, and I guess the good news is that it’s working.  The bad news is that I’m not keeping up on new posts.

I have a fairly small readership on this site, and of those readers, 98% of them never respond to what I write, so I don’t really feel like I’m letting anyone down but myself.

In the meantime I’d like to share a few tidbits about Endgame that you might enjoy, and I’ll do a proper write up when I come down off my play writing high.

Youtube videos of scenes from Beckett’s “Endgame”

If you’re in Minneapolis, you should absolutely check out this production of “Endgame” by the Ten Thousand Things Theater Company.

When I have the chance to do a proper write I’m going to discuss the above theater’s decision to do runs of this show for free in housing projects, homeless shelters, and prisons.  These people are doing some amazing things with classic theater works to communicate with people in difficult situations.  Hopelessness, the cyclical nature of life and living, and fining meaning in routines is so difficult when you’re broke, or living off the state, or at the state’s mercy.  This play really speaks to that type of living, and with the proper talk back session can make an impact in those peoples lives.

Take a look at the press kit that the folks from Ten Thousand Things put together for the show (links to webpage):  Press Kit Website

Also, I’m going to host a copy of their PDF here on my site so that you can review the details of this production once they’ve updated their site and moved on to other works.  This is really great stuff that these people are doing.  (Link goes to PDF file.)  Press Kit PDF

Lastly, I’ve always thought it’s good to start any discussion of a work by looking at what someone else thinks, (even if they’re wrong), here’s a link to the spark notes analysis of this play:  It’s only marginally useful

Realistically speaking, I would suggest that the Ten Thousand Things production is as close as I’ve even seen anyone come to my interpretation of this work.  How do we find meaning in life when we have no control, when the world seems to have conspired to determine all our actions for us and we’ve lost our ability to choose.  Free will is a luxury that many of us take for granted simply because we have the means to choose.  The characters in this play are acting out their parts in a script certainly, but their paths were chosen for them by a hand less sympathetic than Beckett’s.

The idea that the world these characters live in is inescapable, and that they are doomed to repeat the cycle only serves to make this show something of a fable.  Are we doomed to repeat the mistakes of our fathers?  Can Clov turn his back on the boy outside, or is he doomed to Hamm’s fate?  In a world of gray bleakness and repetition is the only real escape in death?  Can you really die in the world Beckett created?  Or are you condemned?

I hope you enjoy the bits I’ve shared with you thus far, and I hope to return in earnest to talk about this work in greater detail when I can spend more time and think about what I want to say.  So far the above is all that I have. Enjoy!

I’m a huge fan of Beckett so this should be as much fun as it is educational.  I actually had considered making a trip to London this spring to see Ian McKellan and Patrick Stewart star in a new production of Waiting For Godot.  Unfortunately with our current national economic crisis I have decided to hold off on international travel for a while.

Ironically I’ve already learned something about “Endgame” simply by reading the table of contents.  In many modern publications of this work, or collected volumes of the play, some publishers and editors have chosen to exclude Beckett’s original ending.  In fact, I was not aware that this work was originally staged in London, and immediately following the conclusion of the play was an “Act Without Words: A Mime for One Player”.  

My original reading of this work was conducted from a collection of works by many authors.  Needless to say the additional Mime piece was excluded from the version I read and I am looking forward to getting a little additional exposure to Beckett’s intended night of theater.

I consider this as good an opportunity as any to link to my good friends from The Mime Company.   Eliot Monaco and Amanda Brown are the artistic directors of this wonderful little gem of a theater company specializing exclusively in the production of mime theater.  They are based in Chicago, and  I have had the great fortune to see two of their shows.  Based on this minimal exposure alone I can honestly say: you have never seen good Mime before.  

You need to visit Chicago.  You need to see what these two amazing artists are doing.  It will change how you watch theater.  More importantly it will make you appreciate what a group of talented actors can do on stage for 90 minutes without words.  Check out their website.  Watch some videos.  Understand that this is only the tip of the proverbial iceberg.

This weeks reading series will be on time, and is worth checking out.  I’ve already read this play once before so I will aspire to approach this work from a new angle in an attempt to provide some fresh perspective on a well known work.

If you are interested in reading with me… or you would simply like to tell me how much you disagree with me (and why), feel free to pick up a copy of the book!

ISBN: 58-5532
Amazon: Buy it!

My latest book analysis is late, but I assure you that this post required the proper amount of time to figure out what I am now capable of sharing with you.  I mentioned in my initial post discussing mnemonic that I had never done collaborative theater, and that I was intrigue by the possibility and promise this work represented as a learning experience for me.  What I discovered in the past two weeks extends far beyond the pages of this interesting and multi-faceted work.  This past week I had the great pleasure to participate in a workshop at the American College Theater Festival titled simple: Alternative Forms.

The concept of this workshop was to pair playwrights with actors with the intent of staging a show in four days, then simply wait and see what happens.  Unlike with the 24 hour playwriting model, where there is an very tight time frame that requires the generation of SOMETHING in less than 8 hours, this workshop encouraged writers and actors alike to experiment with different styles of theater, and to collaborate on the final product that ended up on the stage.

One of my fellow playwrights participating in this workshop wrote a Lincoln Douglas style debate on the inherent qualities of pie. (The dessert, not the mathematical sign.)  Another gentleman wrote a poem on how choices effect the path our lives take, and had a single actress act out the imagery as she recited the piece.  I ended up taking a page out the Complicite handbook from my recent reading of mnemonic, and approached the workshop as a collaborative writing opportunity to better understand just how this process can possibly work and whether or not I would appreciate the quality of the product without having the ability to completely control what ends up on the stage from start to finish.  The answer to these questions , and more, follows…

The Review…

In my initial post introducing this work I posited the idea that a collaborative work, by its very nature, may lack the focus and consistency that comes from a single writer expressing his ideas on the page.  In fact, collaborative theater represents the creative conception of many different individual’s personal experiences culminating into something that is greater than the sum of its parts.  Having never done this type of theater in the past I was very put off by the text.  My initial reading left me feeling dissatisfied and some what confused by the message that was left after the curtain fell.

Here are some of the things that I took away from the initial reading:  the play discusses the nature of life, and the interconnectedness that we as a species share amongst one another.  Through the use of symbolic theatrical devices the Complicite company evokes a sense of history and solidarity in our collective pasts.  This is accomplished by discussing the nature of memory, and how the human brain goes about creating and retaining memories.  The text of the play describes the process of the human brain triggering synapses and building bridges between different pieces of tissue and cells in order to develop a structure of synaptic pathways that connect our consciousness to our memories.

The play presents memory as a thing that continually grows over time through a series of branch points that results in an ever expanding series of connections that resemble the veins in a maple leaf.  (This description was very theatrical and struck me as an interesting explanation.  As a result of reading this play I am inspired to discuss this topic in greater deal with my good friend Dr. Craig Bennett who is a cognitive neuro-scientist doing his post doctoral work on this topic at the University of California in Santa Barbara.)

Following on this theme of interconnectedness, the play goes on to suggest that there is a connection between each and every person living and dead on the earth.  This metaphorical connection laid the ground-work for a relationship between humankind today and a 5,000 year old corpse of an Ice Man discovered in the Alps near Bolzano Italy in 1991 by a group of hikers.

Using the Ice Man’s experiences as a model for human behavior, the company takes the reader on a journey of discovery that connects each of us to the struggle for survival that is depicted through the analysis of the Ice Man’s collected remains.  Complicite employs the scientific and news media discourse on the Ice Man discovery through out this work to connect each of the disparate characters to one another by suggesting that if we can understand the Ice Man, we are able to learn more about humanity and the way we live.  This is the through-line that holds the show together.

The major themes covered in this play include the importance of understanding humanity’s place in the world, and recognizing how we’re all connected: past, present, and future.  The play spends a great deal of time analyzing the importance of ancestry and knowing where we come from.  In the course of expounding on the relationship between the two major characters in this piece, Virgil and Alice, we come to understand that despite the difference in time, place and experiences of Alice, her father, and the Ice Man… we see that the journey’s taken in life by these three individuals are in many ways connected, and represent all of us.

Many of the important themes included in this play are universal by nature.  The broad sweeping concepts that are discussed in the text result in the play feeling like it lacked a sense of purpose.  During my initial reading of the script I was turned off by the lack of a cohesive message.  As a collaborative work you can see the devices used to hold together the many pieces that act as the heart of this play.  The question one must ask, as you read, is whether or not it holds up.  Has the company has found a way to strike a balance between the theme of human interconnectedness and the many unique stories that are told in the course of the text?  It is my contention that this is a very theatrical work, that on stage would showcase a very interesting set of ideas and make for an interesting evening of theater, but on the page it feels like it’s missing something.

It took me two weeks to come to this conclusion.  My initial reaction was that this play had no soul, rambled, and ultimately left me feeling unfulfilled after the introduction of so many powerful ideas.  I’m sharing this with you so that you can appreciate how much a writer can be changed by participating in a collaborative writing process, and staging the product of such an event.

ACTF and Collaborative Writing…

At the American College Theater Festival for region five, held this year at the University of Kansas, I participated in the “Alternative Forms” workshop.  In the course of this experience I was giving the opportunity to work with a group of actors in order to create something non-traditional to be put on stage for our showcase night on Thursday, 1/22/09.  It was a three day event that really changed my perspective on this play, and on the process of collaborative development.  I had two important realizations: 1) You can’t fully control the product of what ends up on stage if there isn’t one person completely in control of the script, and I really don’t like being able to completely control what goes into something that has my name on it. 2) It was a lot of fun to feel out of control for a little while.  (This is particularly difficult for someone who is just a little bit O.C. to admit and mean it.)

I may end up choosing to do something like this again because it was such a unique experience, but I did feel out of my element, and had to adjust my approach to the writing process around what others had given me.  In our groups collaboration I tried to steer us away from a 24 hour play fest style script writing and actor staging situation.  I took input from the group, had them write stories from their lives, and we discussed the concept that was to act as the central theme of our piece.  I took copious notes during out development meeting, collected the actors written stories, then went off to create a composition that included all of these components into something worthwhile.  It was really challenging, and the initial reading of that work was stale, stilted, and really didn’t work.  I took notes during the reading, had a follow-up meeting with the cast, and we made some hasty decisions on line delivery and organization of the dialogue.  I then went away again with news notes, ripped apart my original draft and turned it into something that flowed better and felt like a unified experience that had the potential to connect with our audience more effectively.

I wasn’t entirely happy with the final product… but what writer is ever completely satisfied?  Once our piece had it’s moment under the lights on stage I felt like we had done very well under the circumstances.  My actors were very talented, and did a great job of contributing to the development process, and gave impressive performances after little to no rehearsal time.

Participating in this workshop certainly opened my eyes to the challenges of collaborative theater, but it also help me see how these shows challenge audiences, and offer a truly theatrical experience that is designed for the stage, and not for the page.  As a playwright it’s good to be reminded every once and while that theater is collaborative even if the writing process usually is not.  This was a wonderful experience and despite my misgivings I would recommend it to anyone who brands themselves a playwright.