Over at con-news.com there is some evidence that the huge success of the new Star Trek movie is resulting in a greatly increased interest in science fiction convention. Go look.
And before people start whining about how “they’ll all be Trekkies, they won’t know anything about fandom, they’ll just want to be entertained” and so on, and start concocting schemes for keeping all of these newcomers away, just remember what became of some of the people who came in on the first surge of Star Trek fandom. Some of them are still here and running Worldcons.
It occurs to me that Montreal ought to be getting in touch with the Star Trek people right now. It may not come to anything, because Hollywood is still Hollywood, but you never know.
It occurs to me that Montreal ought to be getting in touch with the Star Trek people right now. It may not come to anything, because Hollywood is still Hollywood, but you never know.
Why? By the time Worldcon comes around Star Trek will be old news to the studio, and they won’t be promoting a second yet….
V:
Because I hope by now that the studios have learned the value of creating and maintaining vibrant fan community. If August is a quiet period for them, so much the better, because other people won’t be competing for their time.
They may be starting to promote the DVD release and to get the guys from Lost at Worldcon would help attendance. It won’t happen because Worldcon’s first thought is mostly literature.
Is 4000 big enough for them to metaphorically “get out of bed”, though? Remember, these guys are used to massive media cons and working with paid staff members…
Not saying it isn’t possible–ignoring mindset for the moment.
In pinchy times they may want to put their stuff where more people will see it–their eye for numbers is different than ours, I imagine (I saw ours, meaning in fandom).
At least promoting a Star Trek track on one day (like Saturday) would be a good idea for them. Worldcons usually have roughly enough people to do that anyway, they could just make it “formal” if they can get some “special guests” that would be even better.
Three panels in the morning, a break, three in the afternoon and then a showing of a couple things. Maybe get some of the animated series to cross-feed the animation fans (there were a couple episodes of that that included Kzin, so that could be cross promotion).
Lots of possibilities.
And btw, I disagree with Tom S that Worldcon is mostly literary, but that’s a different discussion.
Bob:
It would be nice to see a Star Trek Track, but I have a feeling that most of the panel topics have been decided from reading Anticipation’s website. They are mostly looking for people to fill the panels at this point from reading the website.
I suspect that Tom is right, it is way too late to add an entirely new program track. However, Anticipation does have staff allocated to “media” programming (one of whom is Roz Kaveney who has written books on Buffy and the like). They are certainly not a “literature only” event.
I should also note that getting some involvement from Paramount need not necessarily mean creating panels, or inviting actors to the convention. It could equally be an exhibit, or sponsorship of part of the event, or something else.