A Brief Guide to Star Trek

screenplay from his story, while he dealt with strong objections to the storyline from Gene Roddenberry.
    Bennett was obliged to treat Roddenberry’s input in good faith. ‘I would estimate that about 20 per cent of the points that he made were included in some form in the next script draft’, recalled Bennett, although the central storyline and approach formulated by the new producer changed little. Bennett believed that the death of Spock would up the ante for the
Star Trek
film series and prove to be an irresistible draw to fans and a wider audience.
    Another reason for including that story development was tosecure the participation of Leonard Nimoy one more time. The actor had made it clear that following
Star Trek: The Motion Picture
he was once more done with the series. He refused to come back for the sequel, until Bennett said to him: ‘How would you like a great death scene?’ The promised death of Spock was enough to make the actor reconsider his position and sign on to star in the new film.
    The surprise plot development was leaked to wider
Star Trek
fandom (almost certainly by a disgruntled Roddenberry) and was quickly distributed through a network of fan groups and fanzines (this was, of course, long before the days of the internet when such information is communicated so much more easily and widely). As a result, Paramount faced a ‘Don’t Kill Spock’ letter-writing campaign run by
Star Trek
fans. Roddenberry seized on the outcry he had more likely than not created (after all, the producer did have form) to back up his argument that killing off such a pivotal character would be a mistake. Bennett continued to resist, arguing in favour of the drama of the scene and its consequences for the
Star Trek
universe, and concluding that he would not allow fans to dictate the dramatic development of
Star Trek
. The one concession he did make – now that the ‘secret’ plot point had leaked – was to move Spock’s death to the climax of the film.
    Hired to direct was Nicholas Meyer, whose only previous directorial credit was
Time After Time
(1979), which saw H. G. Wells (Malcolm McDowell) travel to modern San Francisco in pursuit of Jack the Ripper (David Warner). He would later direct the controversial nuclear holocaust TV movie
The Day After
(1983). Meyer was initially brought onto the project to write a further draft of the Bennett–Sowards screenplay (he’d started his career as a novelist, and had written a screenplay based on his own Sherlock Holmes novel,
The Seven Per Cent Solution
, made into a movie by Herbert Ross in 1977). Within twelve days Meyer delivered a reworked screenplay that was better organised dramatically and seemed to meet the needs of all the interested parties at Paramount. He was then confirmed as the director of the second
Star Trek
film.
    Meyer recalled the writing process in his memoir,
The View From the Bridge
. ‘I worked, juggling the plots, subplots and characters we had all agreed on – materials first imagined in bits and pieces by five disparate authors – trying to weave them into a cohesive whole. I was not burdened by reverence for the series. I was of the opinion that
Star Trek
could stand some fixing. I made up the rules as I needed them and wrote my own dialogue. I was writing the movie I wanted to see.’
    Meyer combined the action-adventure requirements of a populist
Star Trek
movie with some thoughtful themes about ageing and death. ‘This was going to be a story in which Spock died, so it was going to be a story about death, and it was only a short hop, skip, and a jump to realize that it was going to be about old age and friendship’, noted Meyer.
    He confronted head-on something that those involved in
Star Trek
could all see, but were reluctant to acknowledge – the 1960s cast was beginning to visibly age, despite their various Hollywood attempts to appear timeless and unchanging. By the early 1980s, none of the original
Star Trek
cast looked the same as they had in the 1960s, and Meyer felt it important to acknowledge what would be staring movie audiences clearly in the face on giant cinema screens. He opted to make that part of the theme of the film, a driving force for various characters’ motivations and decision points. Meyer noted: ‘The second
Star Trek
movie revolves around a training cruise aboard the
Enterprise
, supervised by a reluctant Kirk, who, promoted to Admiral, is now a depressed desk jockey, brooding about his age.