# Ruin-a-Series! **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 13, 2006, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruin-a-series/360615 "2006-06-13T21:40:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![anyrose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/54ee81/32.png) [@anyrose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/anyrose)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2006, 1:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruin-a-series/360615/81 "2006-06-16T13:17:27Z")
> [@Aesiron](#): > > Are you honestly trying to say that _Star Trek_ or \*The Next Generation \*had more character development than _Deep Space Nine_? That Geordi was fleshed out more than Jake? Or that Chekov was more fully realized than Nog, Rom, Leeta, Zek, Ishka, Brunt, Damar, Weyoun, the female founder, Dukat, Winn, Shakar, Bareil, Martok, Vic, or any of the the other semi-regulars that were given more lines than anyone on the original series not named Kirk, Spock, or McCoy combined? Even Morn, a character that never speaks a word during the entire series, has a backstory to rival Uhura’s. no, I’m saying they thru all that nice character developement out the window when they spent the entire last season on the War with the Dominion ---
**Author:** ![anyrose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/54ee81/32.png) [@anyrose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/anyrose)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2006, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruin-a-series/360615/82 "2006-06-16T13:18:47Z")
> [@jayjay](#): > > Make your television series very good and very funny, but also make it very quick-witted, deadpan and subtle, so that the Small-Canid Network that runs it will cancel it after the 2nd season because the public just doesn’t get it. or, the network doesn’t cancel it right away, just keeps changing its time slot so that the folks who_do_ get it, can’t find it. ---
**Author:** ![Shalmanese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2006, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruin-a-series/360615/83 "2006-06-16T15:33:17Z")
> [@Speaker for the Dead](#): > > I think there are two ways to interpret the OP, and since most people have taken one, I’ll try out the other just to be contrary. > > Imagine the Foundation trilogy, if you will–the first three books, which are the only ones I’ve read at this point. In filming it, they’d cut out any mention of the history of the Mayors, the Merchant Princes, and the rest. Instead, they’d skip straight to the plot of Foundation and Empire, but contrive it so that it immediately follows the death of Hari Seldon. No, that’d be too good. How about they make him survive as a lecherous-but-oh-so-funny old-man-hologram, who accompanies the hero and his love interest (“wife” is too boring–they’d barely know each other, and so a romance could develop over the course of the story) throughout the movie? > > Any mention of Seldon’s Plan, of course, would be out–on one hand, it would make those who believe in free will uncomfortable, while simultaneously alienating those religious people who believe that meddling with fate is only to be done by God–and probably replaced with a flawed machine that could fail in the end, allowing everyone to go home happy. Free-willers would think “see? You can’t predict the future!” while the religous folks could say “see? God’s will is the only way.” Everyone’s happy! Except, that is, people who have read the books. > > Oh, and of course the actual books are far too dull, action-wise, for movie audiences, so there would be a lot of fight-scenes added in. The defeat of [the Bad Guy whom I won’t mention] will be altered to include explosions, sweat, tearing of clothing, and a protracted emotion struggle where the hero (the fight must include the protagonist) realises that he’s related to [Bad Guy] and thus cannot kill him casually. > > Brilliant! I’m going to be rich! Well, seeing as you shat on my childhood dreams, I might as well shit on yours: Big Hollywood Executive: Ah, welcome Mr Card, take a seat. As you know, ever since that whole lord of the flies thing… Orson Scott Card: Rings… BHE: Right, whatever, anyway, my point is, movie spinoffs of science fiction is hot at the moment and my assistants have told me that your hot property. Anyway, we want to option the rights to the Speaker for the Dead book. OSC: Uhm… Wow… great! BHE: I haven’t read the book myself but I’ve received an excellent synopsis of it from my staff so I feel perfectly qualified to tell you how we’re going to adapt this. OSC: Well, actually, I had a few ideas myself… BHE: Nonsense, you don’t know the first thing about the movie business. Anyway. as I understand it, this ender fellow… he goes around the universe trying to figure out how people died right? Sort of like a detective type character… in space! OSC:… BHE: Yup, I can definitely see this working. So he gets this call from this… whatisthis… Portuguese planet? I think we should change that to Italian, Italy is hot right now, so he gets called to this Italian planet to investigate the murder of this old man. Now, I’m sure one of my assistants made a typo here because it says he gets in after 30 odd years but I think we can cut that bit out. OSC: Actually, that was quite an integral part of the story. You see, the passage of ti… BHE: Nah, you can’t do 30 years on film, confuses people too much. Anyway, no such thing as a really “integral” part of any story. Every story has to undergo some modifications to fit the conventions of the genre. Anyway, this ender fellow character lands and gets right down to business. OSC… BHE: So these sidekicks you have him hanging around with. I like the 3, 3 is definitely a hot number right now. So it’s him, this Jane woman… oh wait, computer woman and his sister Valentine. Let me just say right off the bat that I love Jane, Jane is a compelling character and we want to preserve as much of her personality as we can. But I think we can liven her up a bit, inject a bit of fun into her. She can be the wisecracking one of the party, always the one with a joke on hand. And she’s completely digital right? Let’s take advantage of that and give her some nice breasts and a skimpy outfit. Best thing about digital actresses is you can put em in nude scenes and they don’t demand extra! Haha Am I right? Of course I’m right. OSC:…! BHE: Valentine though, I’m not so hot on. 2 female sidekicks doesn’t test well with our viewers, I think we could change the she into a he. How about… Vazza… Yeah, that fits. Vazza is the tough, follow-no-rules rebel of the bunch, but with a heart of gold or course. He might occasionally get into some amusingly embarrassing situation because of his antics but he’s always got Enders back. Yeah, I can see this shaping together nicely. OSC:…!?! BHE: Anyway, so this intrepid trio are off to figure out this murder right? And it says here they meet a bunch of friendly pig people… Nah, that’s not going to work at all. You can’t make sympathetic pig characters, god knows people have tried. Nah, if you want pigs they have to be evil, stupid and authoritarian. Yeah, that’s how we do it. So this pig empire has assassinated this… oh heck, lets just make the guy who got killed a aid worker, killed this aid worker who was only tried to help them. There’s only 1 man in the universe capable enough to take on this case and that’s Ender. He comes in, blows up some stuff, goes into the enemy fortress and kicks some ass. Throw in a love interest and this is starting to really shape up. OSC:!!! BHE: Oh, right, there’s this bugger… lets change that to bucker, standards board would have a fit with a word like “bugger”, this is a family movie after all. So this bucker is some sort of insect alien. So this bucker… nah, this can’t be right. What were you thinking? Everyone knows insect like aliens are just plain bad. They’re all about mind control and world domination. Hey… I got it! So what happens is that REALLY, this bucker thing has taken over the mind of the head pig and he’s forced the pigs to kill that dude. And so Ender and his gang are fighting through the pig palace and Vazza also gets taken over somehow. So they reach the final chamber and Ender is all like, “your doomed now Bucker” and the Bucker is like “Aha, but here is my secret movie plot twist” and then Vazza is all like “Screw you alien scum” and shoots the heck out of it because his loyalty to Ender is greater than any form of mind control… and wow, so these pig dudes are actually not evil after all, they were just misguided… so I managed to make them sympathetic after all! How do you like that huh? OSC: \ BHE: Yeah, let’s get production on the phone and greenlight this baby. Orson… I just made your dreams come true baby! ---
**Author:** ![Push\_You\_Down](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/push_you_down/32/9095_2.png) [@Push\_You\_Down](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Push_You_Down)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2006, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruin-a-series/360615/84 "2006-06-16T16:08:09Z")
> [@anyrose](#): > > no, I’m saying they thru all that nice character developement out the window when they spent the entire last season on the War with the Dominion Huh… I think I will respectfully disagree. I think a lot of character stuff paid off in the final season. ---
**Author:** ![anyrose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/54ee81/32.png) [@anyrose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/anyrose)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2006, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruin-a-series/360615/85 "2006-06-16T16:37:01Z")
> [@Push You Down](#): > > Huh… I think I will respectfully disagree. I think a lot of character stuff paid off in the final season. I respect your right to disagree - even tho you’re wrong 😉 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Ephemera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8baadc/32.png) [@Ephemera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ephemera)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2006, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruin-a-series/360615/86 "2006-06-16T16:58:33Z")
> [@anyrose](#): > > no, I’m saying they thru all that nice character developement out the window when they spent the entire last season on the War with the Dominion No. Ezri was introduced and fleshed out pretty thoroughly for only having one season to get to know her and using just the characters I’ve already named: we got to know Vic so well that some fans were screaming bloody murder, Rom grew more confident in himself to the point where he was given the opportunity to become Grand Nagus and accepted when Zek abdicated due to his own growth under Ishka’s influence, Nog became horribly depressed and fought through it to become a better officer in one of the best episodes of the series, Damar finally got sick of the Dominion and led the Cardassians in a civil war against them with the help of the Bajorans, a species he formerly despised, Dukat slipped further and further into his insanity and vendetta against Sisko and the Bajorans, Winn’s thirst for power grew so unwieldy that she wound up literally destroying herself in the quest for it, and the female founder sacrificed the entire war effort just so that her son and brother, Odo, would come back home. Excepting Ezri, that doesn’t even include the principal cast. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruin-a-series/360615.md?page=4)