The City on the Edge of Forever

Since I'd bought the 'Six Science Fiction' plays containing HE's bare bones account of the differences between his script and the end product, I wondered what he could possibly add to a new edition. It would seem that "City" remains HE's favorite child; and if his new introduction occasionally has a touch of Ahab after the whale, the unrevised script has a rich, strange delicacy that the televised version only faintly suggests. The script is dramatically tight, where the film version is looser; and while Trek, in the Trek-mythos, took on 'tough' topics, the original has takes on drug use in the military, poverty in America, anti-Asian bigotry, feminism, and the real fate of war veterans, any one of which would have caused network executives to faint, much less all five in a single episode. And it's quite possible that all that was a little too close to the reality on the streets and too far from the starry idealism which, after all, was the show's primary appeal.

For more than thirty years now, controversy has raged over the fan favorite Star Trek episode, "City on the Edge of Forever." Here, Ellison gives us the story of his script, how it was written, then rewritten numerous times, finally to the point where he disavowed it, trying to put his nom de plume, Cordwainer Bird as author. The book, which starts as an interesting piece of, if not Trekker lore, television behind the scenes, quickly becomes a (likely justified) character assassination of Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry. Plenty of evidence is presented to prove the claims of dishonesty by Roddenberry against not only Ellison, but other creators. "City" is not the first tome to assert Roddenberry's credit stealing or lack of writing ability (although it has never been put so succinctly as when Ellison says Roddenberry, "couldn't write worth sour owl poop.") In three separate interviews printed here, Roddenberry claims that Ellison's script was unfilmable for two reasons. One, he had several crewmen acting out of character and two he was over budget. Taking these one at a time, Roddenberry was actually quoted as saying, "He [Ellison] had my Scotty dealing drugs!" Scotty does not appear on the script anywhere. Several times Roddenberry had apologized for his mistake, but he never seemed to stop making it. Although Scotty was not dealing drugs, another character created just for this episode, Lt. Beckwith, is dealing in Jewels of Sound, a sonic narcotic. Roddenberry objected to having any of his perfect crew showing such poor character. Perhaps this was Roddenberry's complaint, and not defamation of Scotty, but Starfleet officers in general, whom Roddenberry never wanted to show with conflicts or flaws. As for the second issue, budget reports reprinted here show Ellison did go over budget $66,000, which is a negotiable amount. Ellison proved he was willing to rewrite to accommodate expenses; he did so three times without pay, something that is against the rules for producers to ask writer's to do, according to the Writer's Guild of America. Roddenberry's claim of being $300,000 over budget is ludicrous and, I would hope, just a result of bad memory and not a willful lie. No one else is safe from Ellison's legendary wrath, either. He recounts an incident with William Shatner, who had requested to be the absolute first to read Ellison's completed script for "City". Ellison invited Shatner into his home (after Shatner wipes out his motorcycle showboating in his driveway.) to examine the script. And examine it he does-for several hours. Thus we had the first request for a rewrite, because Shatner had counted the lines he had, and realized that Leonard Nimoy had a handful more. Such were the egos involved here.What exasperates the point to almost unbearable levels is that the original script, unfilmed and owned exclusively by Ellison, won a Writer's Guild of America award, while the filmed version ("a thalidomide baby version of my script", accordin

I have read Harlan Ellison's books since I was 14, and I started watching Star Trek even before that. One of the things that I enjoyed about about the original Star Trek series that I think fell apart in the Next Generation was it's portrayal of a grittier Federation. You had smugglers like Harry Mudd, and "guru's" and many other representatives from the darker side of civilization portrayed.Harlan Ellison's original script for City On The Edge Of Forever showed that darker side in a way that I personally would like to have seen filmed. In addition, this book also shows you the darker side of real society in his documentation of the way that his original script was handled. Given that Ellison is the darkest, yet most talented writer I've ever had the privilage to read, this book is a testament to the grim reality of everything he's written over the past 35+ years.City On The Edge Of Forever has always been my favorite Star Trek episode, long before I ever knew that Harlan Ellison had written it. However, reading the history behind the making of this episode is truly fascinating, whether you like the original script or not. It's a great glimpse into the troubles that many writers, not just Harlan, have to face in a world where they aren't considered to be the stars of the show and others take credit for their hard work.

Long before I knew of Harlan Ellison, The City on the Edge of Forever was my favorite Star Trek episode. Somewhere along the way, Harlan became my favorite author. When I finally learned that he'd written that old Star Trek classic I rewatched in detail and could see Harlan's writing and personality peeking through the rewrites that eventually killed other genius's like Rod Serling (along with smoking that is...). If you love Star Trek, Ellison, or are simply a fan of behind the scenes television, this is a GREAT book. I heartily encourage you free up some hard earned cash. You won't regret it!

With his original script for the _Star Trek_ episode named in the title, Harlan Ellison takes us into an alternate universe--one in which the familiar officers of a spaceship named _Enterprise_ actually behave like real men (and women) with real problems. When one compares this version of _Star Trek_'s most popular episode of all time, with the show as it actually went on the air, one realizes at once that Harlan Ellison's universe is the real one, and Gene Roddenberry's universe was the false--false because of Roddenberry's foolish insistence that "my people are perfect" and don't have any problems. Here, for the first time, you will see that Captain Kirk's crew had at least one bad apple on board--quite likely aboard a real ship with a complement of 430 people, as any U.S. Navy captain--or for that matter, any U.S. astronaut--could tell you. And also that Captain Kirk himself is a flesh-and-blood human being with human failings, and, like many a real-life warship captain, needs his XO, Mr. Spock, to brace him up when he would otherwise commit a serious lapse that in this case would destroy his whole civilization as he knew it. Here is _Star Trek_ as it might have been, _Star Trek_ as it should have been, with a realistic portrait of a future in which man takes all of his imperfections with him into the stars. Because what Roddenberry failed to see, and what Harlan Ellison tried to show him, is that the imperfectability of man does not preclude the doing of great deeds, either individually or collectively. What matters is what do you do with the bad apples once you discover them, and what checks and balances do you put in place to handle the occasional lapses that occur even at the level of command. Read this script--and ask yourselves how much better _Star Trek_ would have been as a series, had Harlan Ellison, rather than Gene Roddenberry, been at its helm. Or at least, had Gene Roddenberry truly meant what he said when he called his series "science fiction for adults."