Wonky World Building and JJ
All storytellers have different strengths and weaknesses. In telling a story, they’ll play to their strengths, and hopefully that compensates for their weaknesses. But what happens when a storyteller’s weakness is storytelling? I can’t fault director JJ Abrams’s ability to make visually stunning movies (lens flares and all). But his storytelling is terrible, which is born from his appalling world-building. Word-building is paramount to me. Get it right, and you can sell me anything. I’ll believe immortals are living among us who can only die if they lose their head; I’ll believe an eccentric inventor builds a time machine out of a DeLorean; I’ll believe an archaelogist is retained by…
Credit Where It’s Due: The Orville
Let me admit: I’m a mega-nerd. Love Star Trek: The Original Series (1966 – 1969). Waited anxiously for Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987 – 1994). Waited eagerly for Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1993 – 1999). Sought out and got invested in Babylon 5 (1993 – 1998). Gave every possible clone – like Space Rangers (1993 – 1994) – a chance. Come Star Trek: Voyager (1995 – 2001), I recognised some stagnancy in the franchise, but I still offered a lot of leeway. I was Leeway Les. Never watched all of Star Trek: Enterprise (2001 – 2005) when it first screened, but saw a lot of potential squandered, and…