Review: Star Trek: The Galactic Whirlpool by David Gerrold #SciFiMonth

After James Blish’s adaptation of most of the original Star Trek episodes and the first published original novel, “Spock Must Die!”, Star Trek novels entered an interesting era. Many of the books that made it to the market were one step removed from glorified fan-fiction.

But as publishing rights were shifting to Pocket Books with the release of Star Trek: The Motion Picture, one glimmer of respectability hit shelves with David Gerrold adapting his initial story pitch for the original series for the printed page. The result was “The Galactic Whirlpool.”

I read “The Galactic Whirlpool” during my intensive Trek novel phase during my teenage years. The only thing I recalled about it was the opening featuring Kirk reflecting on the nature of his middle name and what that means about his character.

Picking up it close to three decades later, I was struck by how my memory had confabulated this sequence a bit and how little else I recalled about the novel as a whole.

Given that Gerrold was part of the writing team for the original series, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that he’s got a good grasp on writing for the regular crew – and that he even brings in a few recurring characters as well, including Lt. Kevin Riley who was seen twice in season one and then vanished off-screen. (I guess if you take over the engineering section and demand ice cream for dinner, Kirk takes a dim view of things).

The Enterprise encounters a large vessel in the depths of space on a course for destruction between two interstellar phenomena. Once the crew has entered the ship, they find a group of colonists that left Earth a long time ago, divided into factions. Can Kirk and company convince them they need help before a course change is too late and their ship is destroyed?

Audiobook Review: Doctor Who and the Genesis of the Daleks by Terrance Dicks

Thanks to a myriad of media releases and repeats, “Genesis of the Daleks” is a story that’s never been very far from the zeitgeist of Doctor Who fans. Regarded as one of the finest installments in the series long run (classic or new), it’s one that many fans (including this one) can recite key moments from (especially those on the abridged LP released in the ’70s and re-released on every possible format since).

Knowing the key dialogue from these moments only makes the differences between what we saw on-screen and what Terrance Dicks adapts to the page stand out a bit more. It’s clear that Dicks is working from an earlier draft of the script since the cliffhangers are moved about and fall in different places than we see on-screen. (The lore has it that the cliffhanger to episode five was supposed to be the famous “Do I have the right?” speech and not the Dalek battling an uncased Dalek mutant). But while minor moments are different, Dicks is still able to do justice to this undisputed classic when it comes to translating it to the printed page.

Dicks is able to condense a bit of the running back and forth between the Kaled and Thal cities (it’s a six-parter, so there’s a lot of running about) and he even makes the three corridors sets that double as both cities on-screen seem more expansive than they are on-screen. And while Dicks can’t quite capture how great Michael Wisher is in creating Davros, Dicks is still able to convey the menace and tragedy of the character here.

While this script is Terry Nation’s finest hour for Doctor Who, it isn’t necessarily Terrance Dicks’ finest hour in the Target line. But you can still tell that Dicks has put some care and time into crafting this story for the printed page. It’s certainly miles better than many of the adaptations to come during the fourth Doctor’s tenure.

The audiobook of this one is quite good. Jon Culshaw does his usual great work at imitating Tom Baker. Wisely, Culshaw doesn’t try to sound exactly like the screen versions of each character and his performance here continues to cement him as one of the better readers in this range. And, of course, Nick Briggs is on-hand to give us authentic Dalek voices.

All-in-all, this is another solid audiobook in this range and I find myself beginning to become nostalgic as the end of the range looms nearer.

The Best of Terrance Dicks

Earlier this year, iconic Doctor Who writer Terrance Dicks passed away.   To memorialize the man who molded and developed the series on-screen and on the printed page, BBC Books is planning a hardcover release of fan-chosen Target adaptations by the prolific author.

And it’s almost as if BBC Books knew it was #SciFiMonth and a great time to celebrate all things Doctor Who.  (Oh yeah, the big 56th anniversary is Saturday, November 23!)

Starting on Monday, November 18th, fans can cast their votes for their favorite Target novels.  Dicks’ sixty-four novels are being broken into brackets and then the stories will face off.

I know I will be voting.  And I know which of the iconic adaptations I hope wins the whole thing.  ::cough::cough::Day of the Daleks::cough:::cough:::.

If you want to vote, set your browser coordinates for the BBC Books official Twitter feed next Monday!

 

Remembering the Star Wars Radio Drama

Like many, Star Wars was an entry point into my love of all things science-fiction.  At one point in my young life, if a show or movie looked anything like Star Wars, I was all-in.  That included such things as The Black Hole, the original Battlestar Galactica and the 70’s version of Buck Rodgers. 

So, in the early 80’s when I heard there was a radio show based on Star Wars, I was all-in.

Originally airing on NPR, the radio show adapted and expanded the two-hour movie into thirteen half-hour episodes.  I’m fairly certain I didn’t hear all thirteen when they initially aired, though I did manage to record an episode or two off the air on my dad’s fancy stereo.

I recall listening to the episodes using a seat of headphones and marveling at the immersive nature of the sound experience.  Sure, it isn’t the surround sound we have today,  but it was mind-boggling back in the day.  It was even more mind-boggling that Mark Hamill and Anthony Daniels reprise their roles from the movie for the radio drama.

Star Wars was such a hit that NPR adapted The Empire Strikes Back for radio as well.  There were plans in place to adapt Return of the Jedi, but they fell through.   That movie eventually got adapted for radio years later when the radio shows were commercially released on cassette and CD.

As the movie version was an entry point into the larger world of sci-fi, so was the radio radio show an entry point into the world of audio dramas — specifically old time radio shows.  My NPR station followed-up the broadcast of Star Wars with a three-hour block of old radio shows called “The Big Broadcast” each Sunday evening.

I’ve had the full run of the radio shows thanks to the commercial releases in the early 90’s.    I had Star Wars and Empire, though it took me a long time to get around to listening to Jedi. (I finally checked it out of my local library and listened to it).   I’ll dust off my CDs every once in a while and listen to them while commuting or doing stuff around the house, taking a trip down memory lane and hearing the expanded story of these iconic movies.  (Though, Jedi is probably the least expanded and most straight-forward retelling of what you see on screen).

Last week, my good friend Barry sent me a link to a podcast that delved into the history, impact, and influence of the radio shows.  It was a trip down memory lane and underscored just how cool the Star Wars radio dramas were.  (It also gave me a new respect for them since the podcast tells us there were only 28 minutes of dialogue in the original Star Wars and yet writer Brian Daley found a expand that to six and a half hours!)  It also made me wonder (as I think Barry and I did twenty or so years ago) what it might be like if they adapted the prequel trilogy for radio.  It might be interesting to see what might happen if they adapted the new trilogy for radio as well

If you haven’t listened to the radio drama, I highly recommend them.  They’re available for digital listening and might be a fun way to get into the spirit for the upcoming Rise of Skywalker.