dear santa bryan fuller
Jul. 23rd, 2016 09:49 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rivendellroseDear Santa Bryan Fuller:
I've been a very good girl and I have been a loyal viewer of your shows (we can talk later about my reasons for only having actually seen a few episodes of Hannibal, but suffice to say I was a devoted fan of the show anyway, and did everything I could to support the social media campaigns and whatnot to save it), and I can't wait for American Gods, but I have a few requests, sir, for when you get around to the new Star Trek series, which I'm told is now officially called Star Trek: Discovery. These are, of course, only my personal opinions, but since they're based on watching the entirety of TOS, TNG, and DS9 at least once as well as watching about half of VOY and, well, eleven episodes of ENT (I'll come back to that in a minute), not to mention a good portion of the old and new movies, I think I know whereof I speak when I talk about this franchise. So.
- Please dear god holy Bryan Fuller you wonderful man, have some undeniably, canonically GLBTQIA people on this show, and let them have normal on-screen relationships including PDA with their partners. Please do not kill off said partners for no reason or for Plot or whatever. (I mentioned I've seen Babylon 5, too, right?) Please do not pass off said relationships as some kind of weird and shameful alien angst thing (*coughs*"Reunion"*coughs*) or cut out the kisses (I'm looking at you, Star Trek: Beyond.)
- Women. I have seen the good things you do, Bryan Fuller, and I have noticed that you do not neglect the women. Please to be continuing with this marvelous trend of understanding that just because a character was originally written to be a man, that does not mean they need to be a man. Please to be continuing with your usual awesomeness of women being important, varied characters who fill your worlds with brilliance.
- Minority actors. You understand that they are important and not just window dressing and that, as previously stated with women, characters who were originally written as white do not need to be white. Please remember to cast your minorities as humans as well as aliens, especially your black actors (because we all remember how awkward that got sometimes with the Klingons, right?).
- Aliens. Please include lots of aliens. If I could make up a song and dance to perform for you about how important the aliens are to me, I would do it and record it and put it on YouTube and tweet it at you three times a day for a week. This is important to me. Big aliens, little aliens, canon aliens, new aliens, Actual Alien aliens and aliens that are just people with interesting latex appliances and colors painted on them. ALIENS. Please make sure all your aliens have cultures that make sense. Please read up on the meaning of the Planet of Hats trope and avoid it whenever possible. Please do not make aliens who look exactly like humans unless there's a really, really good reason. Please remember the Horta. And if you could fit in some Andorians and some Sentient Space Octopi, I would be very very very grateful, thank you.
- Don't let the Klingons take over the whole thing. You remember the latter seasons of DS9. They will try. They're a fine seasoning, but too much pepper will make even the greatest pepper-lover ill.
- As an addendum to that, however, feel free to hire J.G. Hertzler for pretty much anything, including reprising the role of General Martok. In fact, please just do that, if you can. He was awesome and I miss him.
- Please hire Jeffrey Combs for something. It's a fucking tradition at this point, I'm pretty sure you can't actually have a Star Trek TV show without him. It was in his contract somewhere, I'm sure of it. I know, I know, TOS and TNG and possibly VOY were somehow exempt from this rule, but come on. He's awesome. And he's not getting any younger. No, this really is not just me trying to somehow see Shran again. It might partially be me trying to see Shran again, just a little bit, I'm still kind of going through withdrawals, but I understand how utterly unlikely that is and will seriously accept any appearance of Jeffrey Combs as pretty much anything at all, thank you.
- I know the Cardassians are kind of persona non grata now due to DS9 having been the red-haired stepchild of the franchise, but... come on, you know you loved them. You know you want to bring them back. Yes. Do that. And don't forget where we left them.
- I'm pretty sure Andy Robinson would be available if you asked him really nicely. Just sayin'.
- As a general note, when people are from, say, an ice planet, and they go aboard your ship where you've stated flat out that it is significantly warmer than the, just pulling this out of the air, -28 degrees (C or F? We don't know. Spoiler: I am not pulling this out of the air...) place where the people are coming from, please be sensible enough to have them take off their goddamned coats or something when they arrive. Do not have them wandering around the ship for the rest of the episode, taking part in battles and having long conversations in observation rooms, while still wearing furry coats and big winter boots. It makes me uncomfortable for them. The same goes for people from hot stifling tropical planets. There's gotta be a coat closet in the transporter room or something, right?
- Related to this, please deal with the fact that different species are coming from different climates and will probably not all find the 75 F that the ship is kept at equally comfortable. DS9 is seriously the only Star Trek that ever so much as mentioned this fact, and I find that very confusing and troubling. Are people on every other series just, like, dealing with the fact that they're constantly cold or hot or too dry or running a de-humidifier in their quarters without mentioning it and then being miserable while they're on shift, or what?
- Whatever happened to the Benzites? I loved that design. They were so neat with their little catfish whiskers and their breather units. (I didn't have to look that up, and that worries me.) Oh, and can we do the fish-head aliens again? I'm sure they'd look much cooler with modern technology at your disposal. And, just to remind you again, the Horta. Please. There was a Horta ensign in some novelization a million years ago and I thought it was the cutest thing ever and okay I'll shut up now but come on, you know you want a living sleeping bag made of silicon on the crew. It would totally fit with your drive for real diversity.
- No Q, please. That plotline's been played to death, and, really, he hasn't been the slightest bit impressive since Sisko solved his ass by just decking him. Less said about the whole fiasco with him and Janeway the better. Although...
- Suzie Plakson. Another that I just don't think you're allowed to get on without. You know you want a bad-ass warrior chick played by her. Or, heck, somebody's mom. I'm not picky. ...Just really devoted and possessed of a very long memory for actors and actresses...
- So help me god, if there is a semi-nude decontamination scene anywhere in the first season it had damned well better just be the men who are stripping down. I have disowned series for this bullshit before, and I am not ashamed to do it again. Yeah, I came back, but only after fifteen years and only for eleven episodes (see above re: Jeffrey Combs).
- Leave the Borg at home. I think we've had enough of them, at least for a while. Surely you can come up with something scarier. Like, I don't know, a presidential election.
I've been a very good girl and I have been a loyal viewer of your shows (we can talk later about my reasons for only having actually seen a few episodes of Hannibal, but suffice to say I was a devoted fan of the show anyway, and did everything I could to support the social media campaigns and whatnot to save it), and I can't wait for American Gods, but I have a few requests, sir, for when you get around to the new Star Trek series, which I'm told is now officially called Star Trek: Discovery. These are, of course, only my personal opinions, but since they're based on watching the entirety of TOS, TNG, and DS9 at least once as well as watching about half of VOY and, well, eleven episodes of ENT (I'll come back to that in a minute), not to mention a good portion of the old and new movies, I think I know whereof I speak when I talk about this franchise. So.
- Please dear god holy Bryan Fuller you wonderful man, have some undeniably, canonically GLBTQIA people on this show, and let them have normal on-screen relationships including PDA with their partners. Please do not kill off said partners for no reason or for Plot or whatever. (I mentioned I've seen Babylon 5, too, right?) Please do not pass off said relationships as some kind of weird and shameful alien angst thing (*coughs*"Reunion"*coughs*) or cut out the kisses (I'm looking at you, Star Trek: Beyond.)
- Women. I have seen the good things you do, Bryan Fuller, and I have noticed that you do not neglect the women. Please to be continuing with this marvelous trend of understanding that just because a character was originally written to be a man, that does not mean they need to be a man. Please to be continuing with your usual awesomeness of women being important, varied characters who fill your worlds with brilliance.
- Minority actors. You understand that they are important and not just window dressing and that, as previously stated with women, characters who were originally written as white do not need to be white. Please remember to cast your minorities as humans as well as aliens, especially your black actors (because we all remember how awkward that got sometimes with the Klingons, right?).
- Aliens. Please include lots of aliens. If I could make up a song and dance to perform for you about how important the aliens are to me, I would do it and record it and put it on YouTube and tweet it at you three times a day for a week. This is important to me. Big aliens, little aliens, canon aliens, new aliens, Actual Alien aliens and aliens that are just people with interesting latex appliances and colors painted on them. ALIENS. Please make sure all your aliens have cultures that make sense. Please read up on the meaning of the Planet of Hats trope and avoid it whenever possible. Please do not make aliens who look exactly like humans unless there's a really, really good reason. Please remember the Horta. And if you could fit in some Andorians and some Sentient Space Octopi, I would be very very very grateful, thank you.
- Don't let the Klingons take over the whole thing. You remember the latter seasons of DS9. They will try. They're a fine seasoning, but too much pepper will make even the greatest pepper-lover ill.
- As an addendum to that, however, feel free to hire J.G. Hertzler for pretty much anything, including reprising the role of General Martok. In fact, please just do that, if you can. He was awesome and I miss him.
- Please hire Jeffrey Combs for something. It's a fucking tradition at this point, I'm pretty sure you can't actually have a Star Trek TV show without him. It was in his contract somewhere, I'm sure of it. I know, I know, TOS and TNG and possibly VOY were somehow exempt from this rule, but come on. He's awesome. And he's not getting any younger. No, this really is not just me trying to somehow see Shran again. It might partially be me trying to see Shran again, just a little bit, I'm still kind of going through withdrawals, but I understand how utterly unlikely that is and will seriously accept any appearance of Jeffrey Combs as pretty much anything at all, thank you.
- I know the Cardassians are kind of persona non grata now due to DS9 having been the red-haired stepchild of the franchise, but... come on, you know you loved them. You know you want to bring them back. Yes. Do that. And don't forget where we left them.
- I'm pretty sure Andy Robinson would be available if you asked him really nicely. Just sayin'.
- As a general note, when people are from, say, an ice planet, and they go aboard your ship where you've stated flat out that it is significantly warmer than the, just pulling this out of the air, -28 degrees (C or F? We don't know. Spoiler: I am not pulling this out of the air...) place where the people are coming from, please be sensible enough to have them take off their goddamned coats or something when they arrive. Do not have them wandering around the ship for the rest of the episode, taking part in battles and having long conversations in observation rooms, while still wearing furry coats and big winter boots. It makes me uncomfortable for them. The same goes for people from hot stifling tropical planets. There's gotta be a coat closet in the transporter room or something, right?
- Related to this, please deal with the fact that different species are coming from different climates and will probably not all find the 75 F that the ship is kept at equally comfortable. DS9 is seriously the only Star Trek that ever so much as mentioned this fact, and I find that very confusing and troubling. Are people on every other series just, like, dealing with the fact that they're constantly cold or hot or too dry or running a de-humidifier in their quarters without mentioning it and then being miserable while they're on shift, or what?
- Whatever happened to the Benzites? I loved that design. They were so neat with their little catfish whiskers and their breather units. (I didn't have to look that up, and that worries me.) Oh, and can we do the fish-head aliens again? I'm sure they'd look much cooler with modern technology at your disposal. And, just to remind you again, the Horta. Please. There was a Horta ensign in some novelization a million years ago and I thought it was the cutest thing ever and okay I'll shut up now but come on, you know you want a living sleeping bag made of silicon on the crew. It would totally fit with your drive for real diversity.
- No Q, please. That plotline's been played to death, and, really, he hasn't been the slightest bit impressive since Sisko solved his ass by just decking him. Less said about the whole fiasco with him and Janeway the better. Although...
- Suzie Plakson. Another that I just don't think you're allowed to get on without. You know you want a bad-ass warrior chick played by her. Or, heck, somebody's mom. I'm not picky. ...Just really devoted and possessed of a very long memory for actors and actresses...
- So help me god, if there is a semi-nude decontamination scene anywhere in the first season it had damned well better just be the men who are stripping down. I have disowned series for this bullshit before, and I am not ashamed to do it again. Yeah, I came back, but only after fifteen years and only for eleven episodes (see above re: Jeffrey Combs).
- Leave the Borg at home. I think we've had enough of them, at least for a while. Surely you can come up with something scarier. Like, I don't know, a presidential election.
