Kirsten Beyer Interview - The Oracle of Starfleet

[00:00:00] This is Kirsten Beyer and you're listening to Open Pike Night, the podcast equivalent of a first draft. Is this thing on? Hello, hello. Welcome to Open Pike Night, the Strange New Worlds podcast where your calls are the prime directive.

[00:00:38] I'm your host John T. Bolds here tonight with our amazing guests and our wonderful callers on stage. To help us welcome the woman who has literally written so many of the books when it comes to Star Trek.

[00:00:49] But first, let me introduce my co-hosts. The man who knows exactly who he is but will still ask the computer what his role is in moments of doubt. Jesse Bailey. My name is Jesse Bailey. I watch the Star Trek.

[00:01:05] And the man who's had a pretty rough forgetting so he always appreciates our listener calls to remind him of his purpose. Host of green shirt and newbie's trek through the next generation, Cameron. Hey guys, what are we doing? What's going on? Just check your arm tattoo. Remember?

[00:01:24] And tonight we have a fantastic guest on stage. I am just going to read off her credits because they are so amazing. Consulting producer, co-producer, staff writer on Star Trek Discovery. Wrote a Star Trek short track, co-creator and executive producer of Star Trek Picard,

[00:01:40] co-executive producer and writer on Star Trek Strange New Worlds. That is just the TV side of new Star Trek. She's also written numerous novels, books like I said, all kinds of stuff. And man, how many of our previous guests have said,

[00:01:56] Kirsten is the one who answers the questions? Like it is amazing how many times we've heard your name and so we're psyched to have you here on Open Pike Night. Please welcome Kirsten

[00:02:08] Beyer. Hello fellas, it's really great to be here. It's great to finally have you on. Like John said, we've heard your name bandied about so much. It's time. There is one more credit you should add

[00:02:19] to that list. Oh okay. Yeah, co-executive producer Star Fleet Academy. Excellent, excellent. I was going off Wikipedia so it doesn't have future projects on there. Yeah, it doesn't have that. Yeah. Yeah, we just found out today that Odette Fair will be back as Admiral Vance for Academy,

[00:02:39] Tilly will be there, Mary Wiseman and big surprise Robert Picardo as the Doctor. I have goosebumps. I'm excited. Yeah, absolutely. Well, we're going to go back in time a little bit before all those credits and actually to return to your Wikipedia

[00:02:59] page very early on it says and I quote, little is known of Beyer's career prior to her involvement with the Star Trek franchise. Now Kirsten, I'm not saying you're a vampire or a lanthanite

[00:03:13] but if you were a vampire or a lanthanite your Wikipedia would definitely say something along those lines. Isn't it easier to just assume I was in jail or something? I mean, I love that we go straight to the supernatural but you know. Well, so the

[00:03:30] thing is I started out in this life thinking I was going to be an actor and before that I thought I was actually going to be a dancer and what I realized when I was in my mid-20s after I got

[00:03:43] out of graduate schools I got a master of fine arts and acting from UCLA was that writing was in many ways more satisfying if not equally satisfying as performing because at the end of

[00:03:57] the day all this stuff is really just storytelling. We're using different parts of ourselves to do it but the thing that was sort of central to who I am and how I process my life and how I

[00:04:09] enter the universe is just telling stories so it was a very natural transition to writing and then it took a long time before somebody would agree to pay me to do it. Which is unusual obviously but yeah, I hung in there.

[00:04:25] Have you had a chance to geek out about dancing with Gates McFadden? Have I had a chance? No, did I? What? She's a dancer. That's her background too. Yes, no, but I actually was not on set for any of that so I have never met Gates.

[00:04:41] Oh, that's too good. They keep me locked away doing many, many, many things and well, you are a vampire. The last time I was on set for, well yeah, well yeah, and the nighttime thing, that's difficult

[00:04:54] but I think the last time I was on set for Picard was season one. Oh wow. Yeah, well because we were doing Strange New World season one at the same time we were doing season two and then there was COVID.

[00:05:09] I mean it was all just, you know, yeah. You've been busy. Yeah, it's been a lot fellas. It's been a lot. I think it's like 13 seasons of television in the last eight years. Wow. Yeah, that's impressive. That's amazing.

[00:05:25] Well, how did you get the acting bug or the dancing bug whichever came first? How'd you get into that? Well, the dancing thing was my parents' fault. They put me in dance classes and I loved it.

[00:05:35] I mean, I started when I was like two and then when I was, got into high school, I sort of realized that my body was changing and I really no longer was going to look like a classical

[00:05:47] ballerina so I sort of transitioned to acting and never looked back. Although I, you know, continued doing musicals and things like that and the dance training was awesome but yeah, acting was more fun.

[00:05:59] So I continued that all the way through high school and college and then went straight into graduate school. My undergraduate degrees were English literature and theater arts and then the masters was in acting and then I got out of school and got married and a few months later,

[00:06:16] my husband had the nerve to get cast into play that I was not cast on. So I found myself, you know, at home alone at night with nothing to do right around the time Star Trek Voyager premiered on television and Voyager was actually the very first

[00:06:31] Trek show that I ever watched on television as it aired from beginning to end. I knew the original series really well because my brother and I watched, you know, reruns of it growing up and I caught a bunch of next generation. I had seen hardly any deep space

[00:06:47] nine at that point but yeah, Voyager was the first full series I ever watched all the way through. That's cool. We don't actually talk to a lot of people who Voyager is their first one. And I really did fall in love with it, you know?

[00:07:00] Yeah, we that is something we did hear probably probably don't talk to a lot of people who say that. Oh, they were McDonald's favorite, right? That was her home track. Yeah. Oh yeah.

[00:07:10] So I'm glad you mentioned Aaron McDonald because I do have a question about something she confessed later on. So we'll, oh, later on. Oh, okay. I'm sure we'll get more into the Voyager of it all

[00:07:25] shortly too but should we play Zo's clip? Yeah, let's start with Zo. Here is our good friend Zo from the Backluck Cinema podcast. Open Pike Night. This is USA Cinema. Do you read? Working on a tournament. Can you read me? Sorry, this is the USA Cinema. This is

[00:07:49] Zo Richardson, Captain Commanding, also host of Backluck Cinema, the podcast. We've been shunted into some kind of pocket dimension using our experimental warp job as something went awry. I don't know exactly what's going on but here we are. I got my engineers

[00:08:07] and scientists working on it trying to get us out of here. In the meantime, I'm just twiddling my thumbs. However, I have heard that you have the amazing Kirsten Beyer on your show.

[00:08:20] Now, I know Kirsten that you are base writing for one of the greatest sci-fi franchises that ever was but are there others that you might be interested in reviving? We've seen successful revivals of

[00:08:36] shows like Lost in Space or Battlestar Galactica. I'm kind of vying for shows like Buck Rogers or Flash Gordon or even Space 1999. Those look like they're ripe for revival. Are there things in the ancient archives that you are interested in kind of reviving? Let us know. Hopefully,

[00:08:59] you'll get this transmission. Richardson out. Transmission received, Richardson. The Zo Lore is getting very deep. Yeah, I think that's the first one with multiple characters in it. That was good. I like that. Wow. Are there things I would like to reboot classic sci-fi wise?

[00:09:25] I don't know. I'm going to say, well look, I would have said Battlestar Galactica if it had an already breathtakingly brilliantly been done. Right? That was an awesome one. My friend, Dayton Ward would be all over the space 1999 of it all. I remember that show as well. Yeah,

[00:09:46] I can see that being super cool. I got to tell you though, when I think about writing other things, I'm way more interested in the worlds and the universes that I'm building in my own mind.

[00:09:58] There's a piece I've been working on for a couple of years now that is coming into shape that began in my mind as a Star Trek story, but I realized very

[00:10:08] quickly it didn't have to be. So that's out there. And then the other thing that I draw a lot of inspiration from, quite frankly, is history and historical fiction. That's what I'm reading when

[00:10:18] I have time, which is sadly never these days. But there are a lot of stories from our history that I very much would like to tell it to find modern ways to tell because there's some

[00:10:30] extraordinary stuff that has happened in the past. I like that. Yeah. Yeah. And that's the second writer in a row that we've spoken with who said there is room for a new big sci-fi franchise. And I really hope that we get to see that someday. Absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely.

[00:10:48] Yeah. And Zo was really brave to bring up Lost in Space. They did a fantastic job with that. Matt LeBlanc was bad ass. I was going to make a SeaQuest joke around. I think the Lost in Space says the better.

[00:11:08] Here is our friend Melanie from Germany. Hi guys and hello Kirsten. Here's Melanie calling in again. I start right off with the question, how do you pronounce your name Kirsten or Kirsten?

[00:11:21] It's quite a common name in my home country, which is Germany. So do we have German relatives? Just wondering. Anyway, it's great of you to drop by. You wrote Among the Lotus Eaters,

[00:11:32] which is a favorite episode of mine. I admit I'm a big fan of Anson Mount and I enjoy every chance he gets to have some badass action scenes in a great episode. So I love this one.

[00:11:44] I liked how you did the memory loss and everyone's personalities and expertise shown through. And here are some more questions for you. I hope you don't mind. What's it like to write for Star Trek? Have you been a fan before writing for the franchise?

[00:11:57] How does it feel to develop the characters further? Do you have any advice for hobby writers? Have you ever experienced writer's blog and again, do you have any advice on how to tackle

[00:12:08] it? And now the last one. What software do you use for writing? Let it for now. Thanks for being on the show and take care. Long and prosper. Wow, Melanie. Well, so first off, I pronounce it Kirsten. You're with a K.

[00:12:25] And I believe on my father's side, the relatives are from Poland and the Bavaria. So I'm not, I think actually on my mother's side there's some German about my mother's primary is Italian. She was Pellegrino. And I think it was

[00:12:41] my grandfather who actually came over from Italy. So well, the software one's easy. I use Microsoft Word for my novels and I use final draft for the scripts because that's standard for our shows. Any advice for hobby writers? I mean, I think the best advice, well, there's two

[00:12:57] things. The first one is a very common piece of writing advice. I think it was probably made famous by Han Lamont, which is never be afraid to write a shitty first draft.

[00:13:07] Writing is rewriting. Oftentimes, the desire to make it perfect can get in the way of getting it done. So give yourself permission to let the first version suck and know that you're going to be

[00:13:20] able to make it better as you go along. But you need to have something to work with. In terms of writer's block, it's just not something I've ever really had. I was going to say the luxury to have deadlines are deadlines are real things and they are

[00:13:38] they are tough. And part of being a professional is making sure that you hit them. One of the best early strategies is kind of choosing the same time to write in any given day if that's possible. For me, that used to be the end of the work day.

[00:13:54] I would sit down and take my last few hours of the night to write. And just the process of doing that every single night sort of gets your brain into the place where

[00:14:02] it knows what's expected of it and what you're going to do. If I sort of find myself not knowing exactly what I'm supposed to be doing at any given moment, I just try something. Literally try anything and see where it takes you. And in that way, oftentimes,

[00:14:20] I found unexpected things that were pretty awesome. So yeah, I hope you find some of that helpful. That's fantastic. And I will I won't make you wait for the question referencing Erin McDonald.

[00:14:33] She it was Aaron, Dr. Aaron Wright who admitted she had some anonymous AO3 accounts out there. And do you have any non like completely anonymous stories out there floating in the ether that just you had to get out and get let people read without them

[00:14:52] knowing it was you? I don't have a story out there. I have one piece that I wrote after the Dobs decision came down because I absolutely had to get it out. And it is out there,

[00:15:04] but there's very, very few people who know about it. Excellent. Yeah, excellent. Yeah, that's the worthy one. Yeah, we're going to get into Star Trek where Star Trek podcast and you are a Star Trek writer. Let's do it. So usually our first question is what's your home

[00:15:18] Trek and you've already told us it's Voyager, but we like I said, we don't get to hear a lot about that. So give us the pitch. Tell us what it's like having Voyager be the trek that got you to be

[00:15:30] the Trek person you are. When I started watching Voyager, this thing happened that had literally never happened to me before, which is that five or six episodes into the first season,

[00:15:42] I had an idea for a story I wanted to tell. And I didn't even I wasn't I'd never written anything before. I mean short things for like whatever, but I'd never really tried to write anything

[00:15:54] script wise before that moment. And I and I, you know, I had this idea and I told my husband about it. And he was like, Well, what are you going to do? Write it? And I was like,

[00:16:03] yes, I think I will. So from that point on, I was watching Voyager, but I was also kind of studying it in a very, very basic way. I sort of taught myself how to write television,

[00:16:18] particularly Star Trek for television by watching and studying Voyager. How did it work? What's the scene? What's the length of a thing? How many people are in this? What's that, you know, the whole thing? And so like it became kind of like irrevocably intertwined

[00:16:34] with my brain creatively from the very beginning to the point where so often throughout the series, I would have an idea for something and it would show up within a week or two. Which I used to think, okay, are they reading my diary? Like what's happening here?

[00:16:49] But I sort of realized ultimately that all that meant was that I was actually very in sync with what they were doing. This happens to a lot of people who write fan fiction, a lot of people

[00:16:58] who are trying to develop stuff around shows like this. And and it's actually a good sign. It means you're actually on track with what they're trying to do. The love of it

[00:17:08] was very much not just like an emotional reaction to it as much of a deep dive into the craft of it. And then of course by season four, I was actually, well so okay. So at that time,

[00:17:23] when I first had this crazy idea, Star Trek had this open submission policy. You guys have probably heard of this, right? Where unrepresented, unsolicited writers could send in a script.

[00:17:32] Actually two. And as long as you signed a legal release, they would read it. So I wrote my very first episode of Voyager, signed that release and sent it off. And it came back and then I did

[00:17:43] a second one and it came back. And what I didn't realize at the time was that the point of those scripts was not actually to sell a story. Like I can probably count on one or two hands the

[00:17:51] number of people who ever sold an episode of Star Trek that way on any of the shows. The point was to get pitch meetings. And I didn't know what those were at the time.

[00:18:00] So I didn't get it. But you know, I kept writing after that. I mean at that point the writing bug was just there. So I was like, I did an adaptation of my favorite novel. I did my very first television

[00:18:12] pilot. I did another feature and you know, like around season four, there was an episode of Voyager that came on that was so bad. It made me angry. So I ended up writing a

[00:18:26] very snotty letter to Jerry Taylor, who was the executive producer at the time, telling her all of the reasons why I was supposed to be writing for her. And she wrote me back and said, well, great,

[00:18:36] come in and pitch. And I was like, great, what's that? So then I had to figure out what that was. And this is the early, early days of the interwebs. And what was awesome was at that time there

[00:18:51] were actually folks who had had a lot of these meetings and had taken the travel to go online and publish accounts of like what those pitch meetings were and what they talked about it now

[00:18:58] at all work. So I studied all that. And I talked to every friend I knew who, you know, knew anything about anything. And I put together my first set of stories and I took them to Paramount.

[00:19:10] And the first person I ever pitched to was a very patient, very kind, very enthusiastic Brian Fuller. Wow. And that began my sort of professional journey on that side of Voyager. I ended up going back four or five times. And by the last time I pitched to him,

[00:19:26] which was in the early part of the last season, he was like, we have to get you on the writing staff. And I was like, well, that'd be great. Didn't happen then, but it did happen about 15 years

[00:19:35] later or so. You didn't get all the writing staff for that, but you did start writing a bunch of novels for Voyager. I did. Yeah. It's very well documented. Can you give us a quick version for our listeners who aren't familiar with your journey through continuing the Voyager

[00:19:50] story? You mean how I got, how I got the job? Yeah. Yeah. I had become very good friends online with a woman named Heather Jarman. And we talked to Star Trek all the time.

[00:20:00] And she was invited based on a website that she had created. I think it was called Confessions of a Voyager Virgin where she would do these sort of very thoughtful essays about the show

[00:20:10] and what they were trying to do and what have you. So she was invited by the editors over at Pocket to do a Deep Space Nine novel, which meant I had to watch every single episode

[00:20:19] of Deep Space Nine if I was going to help her tell that story, which I did and was extremely grateful for because at that moment I realized, well, Deep Space Nine may be the best thing

[00:20:27] Star Trek ever did. So that was a joy to discover in that way. And once she had that contract and was doing that work, she was kind enough to introduce me to the folks

[00:20:37] at Pocket who were doing the Voyager novels. And it got off to a shaky start, but eventually I met Marco Palmieri who was taking over the editing of Voyager at a Shore Leave convention.

[00:20:50] He asked to read my work and then he called me and offered me a novel and a short story on the same day. And that was the first day that I was ever told I was going to be paid to write anything. So

[00:20:59] that was a really good day. Nice. I did two pieces for this was all around Voyager's 10th anniversary, my very first novel, Fusion and the short story is about shirt for the anthology

[00:21:09] collection that they did. And then I went off and I wrote, I cheated. I wrote for Alias and I wrote for Buffy. And then they brought me back in to start to redo the Voyager relaunch.

[00:21:20] There had been four books that started the series. And then this sort of massive upheaval in the literature world, a project called Destiny by David Mack trilogy that was a massive crossover event, but also in so many ways changed the nature of Star Trek books kind

[00:21:39] of forever was happening. And so I was brought in while that work was still in progress and started consulting with Mack and four or five other writers who were all like working for their

[00:21:48] respective series around Destiny and figuring out how we were going to move forward after that. So my first Voyager relaunch circle was very much born of that destiny story and the collaboration around it, which was exciting. I mean, for those, I guess it was 10 or 12

[00:22:06] years. It was literally the most exciting time to be writing Star Trek books that I can imagine because we all were sort of like this weird extended writer's room. We were always talking and helping

[00:22:16] each other and figuring out cool things that we could do and making sure it wouldn't screw up what anybody else was trying to do. I don't know, we were just trying to do something quite different. These were no longer just, Hey, here's an episode you might have missed,

[00:22:29] you know what I mean? Which is what a lot of the older books amazing as they are felt like. We were trying to sort of hold this whole massive universe together with our bare hands

[00:22:41] and there was no other Star Trek at the time other than probably comics and stuff, but there was no TV. The film didn't start back up until 2009. So it was us and it was awesome.

[00:22:56] I really like these sort of running theme in your Star Trek writing career of kind of creating your own space. You decided this is what I want, I'm going to make this happen and then you do it. It's very, very cool. It's extremely inspirational. I hope our listeners

[00:23:17] are excited to know that we're getting you on the show and here's another great caller. We have Michelle. Hey, open pike night. First, a big thank you to Kirsten Beyer for all of her awesome contributions to the Star Trek fandom from the novels featuring Captain now Admiral,

[00:23:36] Catherine Janeway to your contributions to the Star Trek series that are currently on or have just ended. I am so grateful to have your voice in the onscreen mix and I'm wondering

[00:23:48] what that journey was like because I love that we have more women involved in the creative end in the writing end of Star Trek as well as onscreen. And I'm just wondering what that journey was like

[00:24:01] and if there's obviously there is a difference between writing novels and writing for television or film. So if you wanted to share anything about that, I'd love to hear it. Also wanted to say

[00:24:11] I adored your short Trek Children of Mars. It just gripped me wide away. It was such great storytelling. Do you think that we're going to get more short trucks in the future because

[00:24:22] I would love them. Finally, I would love to get your thoughts on what Prodigy has done with Admiral Janeway. What did you see it yet? I was super excited. Spoilers for Prodigy

[00:24:37] because I always make a crusher connection here on open pike night. We did actually get our first scene on screen between Catherine Janeway and my personal favorite character Dr. Beverly Crusher

[00:24:51] who also sat in the captain's chair. So I would love to see more of that. Love to see what you think of where Janeway went and where Prodigy went in season two and also what are you up to next in

[00:25:04] Star Trek? Thanks so much for coming on and answering fans questions. Live long and prosper. Wow. Oh my god. Well, I just got to tell you just hearing that kind of enthusiasm is really

[00:25:18] really amazing and heartwarming. And I appreciate it so very much. That's incredible. There is a huge difference between writing novels versus writing television. And when I started in my very first writer's room on Discovery, I had no idea what that difference was. And the process of learning

[00:25:38] how to break stories for television which you do long before you actually get to start writing them hurt my brain a lot at the very, very beginning because I couldn't see then all of the things that

[00:25:53] were affecting the choices that people were making. I was just sort of seeing the choices and then being like, well, why would we do that? But there were certain phrases that sort of kept coming

[00:26:02] up over and over in the room that I started to realize were super important. Things like let it suck for a minute, which is sort of the code for yes, I don't care if in episode 19 of

[00:26:13] season three of whatever somebody said this, like the idea is what's important and let's get at what dramatically we're trying to do before we just say no, you can't do that. Right? So that's part

[00:26:26] of it. And the other piece of it though is that especially in Discovery, which was the first one, we were very consciously looking at a serialized format, right? So and most of the

[00:26:36] other writers in the room were used to holding one episode or two worth of story kind of in their head at the same time, maybe three like what came before where you are now and where you think

[00:26:45] you're going. But if you're going to do a 10, 12, 13, 15 episode story, like for me, you got to know the end. Like you've got to know where you're going, which is not to say that in the

[00:26:58] writing of my novels, it always worked out exactly the way I thought it was going to do is the further I got into it, the more I felt free to make changes on the fly that I felt

[00:27:06] were going to work better. But at least I had a target I knew I was going to hit. Right? And for television, these guys are like, nah, if we can find three or four ways that we think we

[00:27:15] could solve this thing that we're about to leave hanging, we'll call it good and we'll go for it. And that just scared the hell out of me. That was like flying without a net, you know?

[00:27:22] But that was the way they did it. And that was the way they saw it. Whereas for me, I was always trying to like hold the whole thing in my head. It was a difficult,

[00:27:33] tough transition. I was supported by very, very talented, very, very smart and for the most part very patient people in those early years. And I think the reason they were so good to me or one

[00:27:45] of the reasons is that there was a ton of value I was adding for them on the other side in the sense that, you know, these are people who didn't know what a warp drive was, let alone

[00:27:54] how it worked. They didn't know, you know, they didn't see the whole start, the whole of the Star Trek universe as this massive sort of living thing. They couldn't understand how a simple choice that they thought would be nothing would actually ripple out in effect 15 different episodes,

[00:28:09] you know, that I, that for whatever reason, well, I know why they all just live in my brain. And all of that just simply has to do with having written novels for 15 years.

[00:28:19] My editors were hardcore about the canon and about not breaking anything. So I was just trained to see how everything that I was doing could, and if I didn't know it or somebody brought something

[00:28:33] up to me, I'd have to go back and rewatch it and look it up. So I've seen like all of these episodes so many times now. And my brain is kind of freakish and weird and things just sort of

[00:28:45] stick there. So even if I don't off the top of my head know something, I know where to go find the answer to a question that something might have. And all of that was so additive to not

[00:28:53] have to be in the room and have a question and be like, well, somebody will go look that up and we'll talk about it again tomorrow for me to be able to just sit there in the moment and

[00:29:00] in the flow and be like, Oh no, this is this and that is that. And here's what you're trying to do meant a lot. So it was very difficult at first. It has thankfully gotten much easier

[00:29:11] over time to the point where now it feels like second nature. And I love it. Like, I wonder what it would be like to go back and try to write a novel now.

[00:29:21] That would be pretty tough, I think. As far as the short track because I mean that piece is very, very important to me too. And I'm really glad that you enjoyed it. For me,

[00:29:32] I think the thing I still long for in track more than anything is to explore different narrative points of view. I understand the comfort zone of the captain and the first officer and the engineer

[00:29:43] and the pilot and doctor. But for me, the universe of Star Trek is a is a massive real place where there are civilians who have nothing to do with Star Trek or just living their lives.

[00:29:57] But what does it mean to have been raised in this place where there is no I mean, setting the money issue of it aside, which gets complicated, being raised with no want or need

[00:30:11] or disease or poverty or getting to get up every morning and just figure out what you want to do based on what you're excited about. And I imagine for some people that is still going

[00:30:21] to be playing video games all day. Like, I get that. But I just think it would so fundamentally change who we are as people. And those are the kinds of stories that more and more I start

[00:30:31] to gravitate to. So I was super excited when I pitched the idea for Children of Mars and Alex was in me like, oh, yes, we're doing this. Absolutely. Like that was, that was pretty exciting. And I

[00:30:42] love how it turned out. It's so good. That was very, very good. Thank you. I'm going to out myself now as a very bad Star Trek fan at the moment. You would be amazed at how little

[00:30:53] Star Trek I get to watch anymore. Because the hours in the day simply do not exist. So I have only seen the first half of the first season, and I cannot speak intelligently yet to

[00:31:04] what they did in the rest of season one or in season two with Janeway. But I'm excited to see it at some point. I mean, I'm sure I will get to it. I just, I haven't yet. So sadly, I can't

[00:31:17] opine on any of that for you, Michelle. I'm sorry. I understand having two Star Trek podcasts. I don't have time to watch anything but Star Trek. Yeah. I'm like, I'll get to the boys. David Reed, I'm sorry. I'll get to the boys eventually,

[00:31:29] I promise. Yeah. As will I. I mean, Jesus. It's on the list. You've talked about writing for TV and writing for novels, and the novels followed a series that was already over with something like the Illyrian Enigma where you have to write a parallel story.

[00:31:47] How is the approach different to that knowing like, there's got to be constraints. So like, no, you can't kill a main character. No, you can't have any major series affecting plot points happen in this two-way certain extent. What is that process like?

[00:32:05] Well, so that's always the joy and the terror of tie-in writing period, right? What you're looking for is a very, very small piece of a puzzle that is missing.

[00:32:16] Your job once you find that piece is to actually go as deep as you can into the people who are experiencing whatever the thing is rather than trying to add a lot of like plot and history.

[00:32:27] Right? These are always ultimately stories of characters, and all of my work has always been extremely character driven. You know, for something like that, it's very easy for me because I've been a part of all of the conversations in the room about all of these

[00:32:41] characters, and I know exactly what we're going to do with them. So I know where the red flags are and where the boundaries are. So it just sort of becomes a fun almost game of so,

[00:32:51] so how far out can we go without creating a situation where people who are reading the story will suddenly feel like, wait, I can't track what I'm reading with what I also know to be true

[00:33:02] because that's the quicksand, right, of all of this stuff. You need these tie-in stories to add value to the experience that the people who love the universe are already having.

[00:33:13] And so if you can find a cool way to open something up, to break it open that they've never thought of before, like that's the sweet spot. But even if you can't, as you're moving along,

[00:33:27] you need to make sure I hold myself to the standard of making sure that even if you have to squint real hard, it's still not going to destroy something that you understood previously, right? Now, I don't have the power on the TV shows

[00:33:41] to always hold them to that standard, but that's my personal standard, right? But you know, but I will say like another thing that I have learned that came as a big surprise

[00:33:52] to me through the years is that there are times when for the sake of a really, really good story, break the canon. You know what I mean? Like it can't be the thing that holds you back

[00:34:08] to the point where you can't do good work. It also doesn't mean that, you know, you're like, whatever, none of this is real. It doesn't matter. Just do whatever we want. It's not that either.

[00:34:18] There is a place in between where you understand the work you're trying to do. You know, in particular, I'm thinking about like the season two Oona episode with her whole Illyrian storyline. And we had been talking about her as an

[00:34:32] Illyrian from the very beginning of season one. And that's a course of concept that we had pulled from some of the beta canon. But there is this misconception that the people who live in the Star Trek universe are perfect. And oftentimes when we are trying to find stories

[00:34:48] that resonate with our current day, we are looking for imperfections. And the whole idea of the sort of racism against genetic engineering, which has become this recurring theme now and freaking everything I am writing these days is an interesting one. But boy, was it a hard

[00:35:02] one to break without also feeling like we were breaking the universe, you know? When you're writing novels or comics, do you try to tell stories that are uniquely suited to those

[00:35:14] formats to the print over screen? Or do you just kind of tell the story you want to tell and let the format take over? You have to conceive from the very beginning of a story, especially if you're talking about a novel that's going to be big enough.

[00:35:26] And if you're talking about a comic that's going to be small enough in some ways, which is not to say that one is necessarily easier or harder or better or worse, they're just different forms. Poetry is a lot harder to write than prose because you've got a lot

[00:35:41] fewer words, you know what I mean? And the thing about the screenplays is that it's really a question in my mind constantly of what am I seeing? In a novel, I can go as deep as I want to

[00:35:55] into any character's mind, thought by thought moment by moment about how they are getting through or to the next idea. On screen, I don't get to do that, right? I have to write the words around

[00:36:11] those things that an actor is going to be able to inhabit. But also, I just have to constantly be in my head running the episode like I'm watching it and make sure that what is on the page

[00:36:21] is enough of a guide for the people who will be putting all the various pieces together down the road to accurately show what it is that I saw in my head. Because in a lot of ways, a script is a

[00:36:35] work order, right? It's a blueprint for a thing that doesn't exist anywhere except in my head when I'm writing it, which is weird. Speaking of keeping things in your head, you had mentioned trying to keep a whole serialized story in your head for Star Trek

[00:36:53] Discovery, which was new for Star Trek outside of some chunks of Deep Space Nine. Is that in any way related to your credit on Discovery as executive story editor? I was recently rewatching

[00:37:05] Season 2 and your name popped up as that. I was like, well, that's got to be a writing position. What does that mean? There is a long tradition in writing of just a very, very simple track

[00:37:19] of credits that you begin to move through as you become a professional writer and as you move through various jobs in the writer's room. The first position is staff writer and then story editor and then executive story editor. Then you move into assistant producers, co-producers,

[00:37:35] straight up producers, and then co-EPs and executives and all of that. Now over the years, some new credits have sort of come and gone depending on the show and what the person

[00:37:44] is doing but the executive story editor credit was simply, well, okay, so it was weird because I was a staff writer in Season 1 and then I was going to be a story editor in Season 2.

[00:37:57] Outside my office on my door, I had one of those cute little signs that they always put up every year that is your name and your title. So it said, Kirsten Beyer, story editor.

[00:38:07] But by the time we got to the end of Season 2, I had already co-created Picard and was going to be working on that which meant that I had to have a whole new deal put together. And as part

[00:38:19] of that deal, I was actually promoted to executive story editor for Season 2. So I skipped a level between Seasons 1 and Season 2 of Discovery. So I never held the story editor job but for

[00:38:29] a long time I still had the sign from my door that referenced a thing that had never happened. But yeah, it's just simply the next, it's just simply a new level. The work that I have done

[00:38:41] in these rooms apart from taking on more responsibility in terms of the writing and beginning to mentor younger writers and things like that hasn't really changed since day one. It's you know, you're in the room as a writer, you're all wrestling with story and then

[00:38:54] you're all taking your signed episodes and trying to make them as great as you can. Very illuminating. That's a big thing about Open Pike Night is we're learning a lot about the business and how it functions. Well, I'm glad I can help. Thank you.

[00:39:12] We do have another call here from our good friend, Abby. Hey, hey, Open Pike and Kirsten. This is Abby from the First Flight podcast. Kirsten, since you have done such incredible work across so many shows on this franchise,

[00:39:25] my question for you is what do you hope that your lasting impact, your legacy, your touch on the franchise will be? I mean this could be something huge, something tiny, something silly, something nebulous. But since you have had your fingers in lots of different pieces of the pie,

[00:39:41] I'm wondering if there's something that you really hope sticks with people for the long term. I love your work. Thanks for all that all of you do and we'll talk soon. That is such an interesting question. The thing that comes to mind is that

[00:39:59] it goes back to that thing I was talking about earlier in terms of narrative points of view. I would like to someday, and I feel in some ways we have, but even more so,

[00:40:11] take Star Trek to places it's never been before and do it in a way that is extremely satisfying for the fans, which means it has to continue to resonate not only with the Star Trek

[00:40:22] that we all grew up loving but also our present moment. The thing about Star Trek for me has a lot to do with the aspirational element of it showing us at our best or what we imagine to be

[00:40:38] our best but also like the thing that they always skip is how did we get there? I don't know that I have the story completely of how we're going to get there but

[00:40:51] I would like to be able to illuminate that a little bit more at some point in time. She asked about being a woman on these shows and what I started to immediately remember was the fact that in the very first Discovery Room with Brian and the fellas,

[00:41:10] I was one of two women in that room and the other woman Gretchen was half of a writing team, Gretchen and Erin. They very quickly became showrunners. She was out of that room a lot.

[00:41:22] So in the early days, there were many, many days where I was the only woman in that room and I felt it, which is not to say that my fellow writers were insensitive to anything

[00:41:34] in particular but I just all I can say is that I felt it. And then Gretchen and Erin got busy hiring Bowie and Erica and Lisa Randolph and lo and behold near the end of season one,

[00:41:51] which was the season that lasted forever. Like I think we were doing that for 18 months or at the end of that season a day came where everybody else was either on set

[00:42:02] or on script and we were getting ready to break an episode and I looked in the room and it was just me and Gretchen and Bowie and Erica and Lisa and I said to myself, I would not be amazed

[00:42:14] if this is the first day in the history of Star Trek where an episode has begun to be broken only by women. And it was like such an amazing thing to be able to be a part of.

[00:42:26] I don't think much of it now. Most of the rooms that I have been in since have a really great and interesting balance of men and women and all kinds of different diverse voices. But yeah,

[00:42:38] at the very beginning it was kind of me and that was a load to carry. How do you feel we've noted on Strangest New World specifically there are many times when Pike is the only man on the bridge surrounded by women.

[00:42:55] It's the ship of the Valkyries, isn't it? It's amazing. I mean having watched Star Trek from back in Voyager and before, like I mean do you feel that difference? Oh gosh yes. But I also in some ways don't feel it makes a difference at all,

[00:43:09] which is the best part. That's what all the actors have said who asked that too. They're like, oh yeah, I guess. Yeah. And I guess that's where we want to be, right?

[00:43:19] Yeah. I mean look, yeah like I will never be able to get out of my mind the moments in the original series where you know, Bones turns to Kirk and he's like well yeah it's great now but you

[00:43:31] know she's just going to find some guy in Merriam and then you're going to be out a crew member and I'm like what the fuck. But that you know it's that is all there. It is all a product

[00:43:42] of its time, right? And to be playing in that same time period but looking at it through such a different lens is so joyful. So yeah I mean I notice it but I also am like yeah well that's

[00:43:58] a way it probably should be. So you know like there is I mean there's 900 hours to Star Trek fellas like for whatever your thing is I promise you it already exists and we're making more

[00:44:09] you know. So if for some reason that's going to be your hang up I really yeah I'm sorry but there's plenty of Star Trek for you out there, right? Most of us yeah.

[00:44:22] You know I actually had a fella this was before Discovery came out this was before the first season aired. I was at a con in Vegas and we were signing comic books. The comic books were

[00:44:34] released a little bit before the show came out and there was a gentleman who had clearly been waiting in line for a while when he finally got to me wanted to tell me in great detail all the

[00:44:42] reasons why uh Giorgio couldn't be a captain on the Shenzu this had been announced but nobody had seen it. Because you know according to the last episode of the original series women couldn't be

[00:44:51] captains and blah blah blah blah and I just looked at him and was like that's the hill you came to die on? Like really? Like I don't care. Yeah. You know like this is what I mean about

[00:45:03] canon can be a cage, right? Yeah yeah. You know it's like yeah I don't think so. Reminds me of the Garrick meme weird hail to Dianne but at least you're dead. Yeah I think that's right. And I'm totally gonna go watch that Q episode of Voyager

[00:45:20] Now just hearing you say Ship of the Valkyries was like okay I gotta watch it. That's all there is to it. Yep. Well so how I mean how did you get involved in Strange Worlds? It sounds like

[00:45:33] they just put you on all the new shows. Is that how it's working now or? You know Keevan I were doing Picard at the time and it was COVID had happened and I just remember I got a phone

[00:45:42] call from him and he was like okay so Strange New Worlds is happening you're gonna come into the room and I'm like okay all right I guess we'll figure out how that will all work.

[00:45:51] Excellent. And it did. As he was writing the pilot he did you know reach out to me from time to time. I'm sort of when I first started the first nickname they had for me was the Oracle.

[00:46:04] It's a good nickname to have. We've heard that. I do want you to go into detail on this because like we said we've heard from a lot of people that it's like oh yeah Kirsten sets us straight

[00:46:14] or tells us if this is a thing that can or can't happen and like I would love to hear about that. Yeah well it I mean you know in the early days it was a lot of the most basic questions and

[00:46:25] a lot of them were coming from Toronto right from the various productions departments as those got stabbed up even people who were like hard hardcore Star Trek fans and knew a bunch realized that there is a difference between knowing the facts of things that happened in an episode

[00:46:40] and being able to extrapolate that into what should be happening now. Like what it would mean to change the color of a phaser fire. What the various ranks mean what the various colors mean

[00:46:50] and like we were changing a bunch of stuff and we had to be super thoughtful about what it all looked like right and how it affected things so I was sort of the first and last phone call on

[00:46:59] a lot of sort of factual matters that needed to not just be like if it's something they could answer from memory alpha even though I always like memory alpha is amazing you can't always

[00:47:09] believe it so please don't. It's always more the questions of like what does it mean if we do this what does it mean to the whole like system of Starfleet and the Federation

[00:47:19] and like whatever you know like even introducing like the Vance character in the books I knew there was a CNC of Starfleet command but that had never really been presented you know as a as a figure

[00:47:30] within Starfleet. There are so many things that we take for granted in terms of the way Starfleet has modeled on the American system but there are a lot of critical ways in which it's different and then thinking about the Federation as an entity and this is so

[00:47:43] much of what I do it's really about having a sense of if somebody asks the question like what is the role of the president of the Federation vis-a-vis Starfleet you know these are the

[00:47:59] kinds of conversations that I'm having with folks which is not to say this is what I would do therefore do it it's to say these are the kinds of if you go this way this is what it means

[00:48:08] and if you go this way this is what it means so which story do you want to tell so all of that was just sort of to say that whenever these shows are being developed I haven't done hardly anything

[00:48:20] on the animated shows but I have had conversations from time to time with Mike or with um the Ann and Kevin about very very specific issues that will touch multiple series and anytime that's

[00:48:34] going to happen a lot of times people will ask me to weigh in just because I sort of have a sense of all of them whereas the guys can get real focused on whatever it is that they are specifically doing

[00:48:44] and they can also get very protective of their toys which is interesting you know boys and their toys yeah yeah so so for Kiva to like call me and be like hey do you

[00:48:56] think we can have a horror on the bridge of the enterprise at this time and for me to be like yeah but you probably need to be a cadet um you know and the end the whole thing of

[00:49:05] the the final training year of the cadets in Starfleet Academy like having like an internship on a ship I mean we made that shit up for discovery for the Tilly character right

[00:49:15] but it made sense to me that that Starfleet Academy would do that in your final year I mean why wouldn't you put kids out there you know starting to experience the various departments

[00:49:24] and and shadowing the folks who actually do the job just for them to get a sense of what they might actually want to do with the rest of their careers um God it's weird I forgot I made that up

[00:49:35] but I did so there's your legacy right there speaking of boys and their toys David Reed gave us a little gave us a little insight he said you know some of us we all have our our

[00:49:50] home trek and some of us will defend to the death why our choice should be like DS9 or why our choice should be like Voyager you know or it should pull from there I have to know is there

[00:50:05] anybody in any of the writers rooms who's like that but with Star Trek Enterprise I feel like my friend Kat who works on Strange New World um has a lot of love for enterprise

[00:50:20] very cool especially because of the moment when Strange New World is set she will always be like well you know this person's probably still alive you know um which is true usually but she

[00:50:34] may be the only one I will also say that in our rooms often as not half the people there have no particular expertise in Star Trek their their expertise comes in other ways and as much as

[00:50:47] I questioned that choice in the very earliest days of my work I have come to realize that um you know we as deep deep nerds can get very far up our own assholes very quickly and if we want the

[00:51:01] stories that we are telling to be of you know accessible to people who have never seen an episode before and we do um it's often to have a perspective of somebody who doesn't know it inside me out

[00:51:13] and you can sit there and go I don't know what the fuck you're talking about can we possibly make that clearer you know what I mean um it keeps us honest in an interesting way I think it's

[00:51:23] ultimately it's a big value add I am the exception not the rule in the writer's room just put it that way that's fantastic you need both ends of the spectrum yeah yeah I like that

[00:51:36] but also speaking of boys and there's toys here's Newman here's Newman hi open pike night Newman the space hippie here recording very early in the morning I am very excited to heap lots of praise upon this fantabulous writer for this marvelous episode

[00:51:52] among the lotus eaters this episode hit at a very crucial time for me and my experience watching season two for me it was at that time my favorite episode of season two it felt like

[00:52:08] we were getting back to some really great proper to s energy but also the emotional places that this episode goes to spoke to me so much you know when we as people have to deal with something

[00:52:20] really awful and next level there is that temptation to shut down to forget to just push it away and if we could just go to sleep and forget everything maybe we would but everything that

[00:52:33] has happened to you good bad and everything in between makes up the fabric of who you are but the other thing I loved about this is how there are certain things at least it feels like

[00:52:43] the episode is saying there are certain things about us that are core to who we are everything about this was just so fucking star trek and I loved it and I feel like season two went on to

[00:52:56] have so many big sweeps like the musical episode like the lower decks crossover episode like we took some huge swings as the season progressed and I worry that among the lotus eaters gets

[00:53:09] forgotten a little bit it's still one of my absolute favorite episodes of the season so love to you love to the whole open pike night crew Newman the space hippie out

[00:53:20] oh what a sweet and kind thing to say and you are not wrong we took some huge swings in season two I loved it and loved it I mean we we had set the bar for ourselves actually

[00:53:35] pretty high with season one I felt yeah and and I started season two going are we gonna be able to top that I mean like is this gonna and we just blew right the hell past it and I yeah I don't I

[00:53:52] I didn't even need to know how we did it but just we just put our heads down and worked our asses off and and got where we got to it's very very nice to hear someone say it feels like Star Trek

[00:54:01] because if I have a sort of overarching goal every time I approach this material it is always that that always underpins everything what that that I'm trying to do I like to I like to break form

[00:54:17] I like to look at things from interesting new perspectives but whatever it is that I'm doing at the end of the day it sure needs to feel like Star Trek and and I and I hear that often enough

[00:54:30] about the episodes that I've been able to write that I feel like I'm continuing to to just to meet that standard which is nice um the trick of that one

[00:54:41] had a lot to do with the character of Pike he is such a good boy and this is where it's hoping you would go with this finding moments where he was less than his best self um it's difficult

[00:54:58] right but it's also like Numan was saying every single experience we've had all the good and the bad makes us who we are so getting to take him to a place where you are stripping away

[00:55:11] so many of the things that you might on the surface assume are his identity in order to reveal what is deepest and truest about him it's just super fun and then we spent I don't know how

[00:55:26] many hours arguing about how the memory loss specifically would work because as much as we think we know about the brain we're still just starting to scratch the surface of all of this

[00:55:38] stuff and and how memory works is as much of a theory as is anything else but the idea when we came across the whole intrinsic and extrinsic sort of extrinsic formulation right uh things that live in one part of your memory tying your shoes brushing you're not

[00:55:54] going to forget how to do those things but that you could forget literally every every other experience you ever had because that's sort of a part of your brain that you can no longer access

[00:56:02] that was that was the key for us because we did need them to be able to you know speak the language and do math and like you know perform certain kinds of functions but we also

[00:56:15] needed for them to take away a bunch of stuff from them and for me finding a scientific theory or scientific underpinning for that is crucial like I really can't take the story forward unless

[00:56:27] I know in some way it's actually possible that this thing could happen right I mean I don't know what the weird exotic particles are they're going to do it to us and I don't give a shit about that stuff

[00:56:36] I just need to know that in the structure of of a human being or whatever alien we're talking about that this feels like a realistic possibility otherwise you're going to lose the audience right mm-hmm yeah you know like there's you can't screw around with people like that so

[00:56:50] so yeah I have to ask specifically because you're talking about how the memory loss works we have we have the scene where a spock looks at his pad and he says I can't read this yeah

[00:57:02] and a lot of folks went well why would he forget how to read if he you know remembers all this other stuff and I as you know a a diehard Trekkie and as somebody who was reminded by a good diehard

[00:57:17] Trekkie our friend Sophia who we met in Portland at Fan Expo she said well Spock was dyslexic as a child that's so this this was him unraveling that is that what you guys were pointing to with that

[00:57:29] yeah also pointing to the intensity of the exposure to the particles in that moment like the like there was sort of a standard range that of functionality that existed on the planet

[00:57:42] but our ship was right up next to those fucking rocks where that ship so it was actually more dangerous for the people on the ship they they lost their memories faster once they were

[00:57:52] exposed and they regressed further was the idea but yeah the dyslexia the dyslexia as well plays into that yeah that's the kind of continuity you get from the oracle I do just want to echo Newman because I was just saying to someone on on Twitter the other day

[00:58:14] that yes I think other episodes in season two took big swings with format but I really do think among the Lotus Eaters took some big swings with character and yeah what you did with Pike and

[00:58:25] Ortega since it was all really great stuff and yeah I mean just kind of going back to Rigel 7 what was your intention to do with the characters as it spoke to the whole season because I think

[00:58:36] a lot of people were like oh well you don't need that episode for the season but I mean what it does with the characters is just in my mind so great damn important that's really the if

[00:58:45] you either have a choice to make up a a mission in the past that went badly or to use a mission in the past that we know of that went badly right and the the upside of using the the previous mission

[00:59:00] is that you actually have a lot of very cool visual references and you have some sort of tantalizing facts about how those people live and then you get to build the whole world around

[00:59:10] it right using that as your as your sort of guide and you know like at the end of the day I think it's more powerful that we were able to tie it to a known fact about Pike's life that he had he had

[00:59:23] led this disastrous mission and then that the worst thing you could ever imagine as a captain happening happened to him which is he left a guy behind you know that is so counter to

[00:59:37] who he sees himself as that it was going to be incredibly rich you know territory for story and then and then tying it as well to the point he was at in terms of his relationship with the

[00:59:48] town I got to write those scenes and I was that was a lot of fun but also just like I mean that that is some of my most favorite work right exploring these kinds of relationships

[01:00:00] that also don't get a lot of play in Star Trek these deep long-term committed relationships where with people who have very hard complicated jobs you know who aren't going to be able to live in any sort of traditional way when we where we see those relationships but still

[01:00:13] are totally committed to each other and want to make this work but the reality is that's got to be difficult you know so finding the sort of things that would hold them together

[01:00:24] was fun to explore yeah I really like that in a single episode you managed to address and I'm just gonna say fix two big points from the original pilot right you've got

[01:00:38] pike thinking well maybe I don't even want to be a captain anymore because this Raijul 7 thing was tough and he also has that disastrous line of I'll never get used to a woman on the bridge

[01:00:51] and it's like no this this pike is dating a woman who runs a bridge like this is not 1968 anymore right like yeah yeah it's magic in that area I give all credit to Henry Myers

[01:01:06] who is our brilliant share runner co-share runner along with the Kiva if I've heard it once I've heard it a thousand times from him with things like that with issues like that he's like yeah

[01:01:15] we're just not gonna do that we're just not gonna you know like like we had a knockdown drag out in season one about making chapel a doctor instead of a nurse and there were people who

[01:01:27] were sort of like well of course you should be a doctor she you know women and I'm like yeah but nothing wrong with being a nurse being a nurse is an incredibly profoundly cool job to have

[01:01:40] so let's not denigrate that sort of like in reverse by somehow saying that this should be everybody's ultimate goal right it's guys we think about this shit real deeply

[01:01:53] we appreciate it you know we talk about it from we talk it all to death from as many ways as we can so that hopefully the result will be something that that works on a lot of different levels

[01:02:04] okay well then I'm going to consult the oracle and as we brought up chapel I have a question from subspace rhapsody she says somebody is in sickbay for a splinter mm-hmm how do you get a splinter on the start on the start how's that happening I gotta know

[01:02:25] well you must have seen all the knickknacks in folks quarters right there's a lot of knickknacks a lot of knickknacks like like I'm guessing it was from something that somebody picked up somewhere else some piece of wood or like whatever I wouldn't I mean obviously it didn't happen

[01:02:40] like on a door or a deck or you know a console but I think there's plenty of natural thing also like I'm trying to remember no it's the it's the enterprise the little trophies from rice at

[01:02:55] our beta would write the oh yeah but the horde I have one of those it was given to me by one day oh yeah I know I know that's awesome it's sitting right here on my shelf right now

[01:03:10] also a legacy there my own headcanon is that it's Sam Kirk because I'm like who would he just be why do you even ER for splinter is Sam Kirk it was clearly whichever ensign pulled

[01:03:27] firewood duty for captain in quarters fireplace I want to believe that that's like my fireplace at home where there's no real wood in it but I don't know for sure Kirsten I'm filling your dreams

[01:03:43] I get it I know no we are hologram or not is is an open pike night long running discussion oh yeah we I think we ended up getting our answer and it was definitely couched in but hey if you

[01:03:55] want it to be a hologram sure yeah well I mean I will I will tell you this was also this was Toondi and I had a knockdown drag out on Discovery season three episode 307 because we're in the

[01:04:10] the mass haul that has been redone and we're doing this very Vulcan ceremony and he really he and the director really wanted torches and I'm like you're not doing open fucking flames

[01:04:22] on a star ship what are we actually talking about here fellas and and the and the ultimate resolution is there we will see them appear as holograms and then we will see them disappear or as matter synthesized I said you know whatever yeah because they couldn't be real

[01:04:41] yes you can't you can't have open flames on a star ship like what are we talking about so this is how you feel about fire yeah Jesse you're killing Jesse's dream yes all right Jesse

[01:04:51] I don't need it to be real fire I just I need people to not worry about pike's fireplace yeah if they're worrying about the fireplace we are definitely not doing our job so

[01:05:04] well I mean I think my guess would be that mostly the nitpicks for things like that in strange new worlds probably come from having you know 10 episodes to watch for two years and then 20

[01:05:18] watch for two years like it I mean as a strange new worlds podcast it could be rough between seasons it really can but there's so much there like we we still find things to talk about we still

[01:05:31] find folks to talk to and you know I'll just play this part of my role on this show right now and say thank you for the magic that you do because strange new worlds rules oh thank you

[01:05:43] I I am inordinately fond of this one I I have lived through and felt and fully support and believe in the struggles that we have been through on discovery and on

[01:05:55] Picard but it was there there is a feeling in working on strange new worlds that that I'm home and that we have found the sweet spot and it's a delightful place to be

[01:06:08] it is a delightful place yeah and it's you know and it's made by some of the most amazing people I've ever worked with and uh to a man they they love it and they give their all to everything

[01:06:18] that we do it's it's incredibly inspiring to you and they take such big risks like that's so rare it's so rare that when you're talking about projects of this size with this kind of

[01:06:30] an investment you know the the the tendency is to play it safe and you know Henry walks into that room every day has does akiva and is like no no it's not you know how how how far can we go

[01:06:43] you know akiva today just today at comic con indicated they are maybe work being done on a strange new worlds stage musical so I have heard that as well I it's I don't know anything more

[01:06:58] about it but I'm in I'll go see it yeah when you say big swings you are not understating it no no I mean and like I knew that one was gonna work because like I had all of the songs that were

[01:07:10] recorded long before they did the final mixes and the final recordings of them um in this little file on my phone and I played them for my daughter who at the time was like 12 and um

[01:07:21] for a good like three or four months it was all she wanted to listen to on the way to school every morning she would grab my phone put in the same put in um uhura song and then put in

[01:07:31] christie song and like we were off to the races and then there was like chapel song and then sometimes yeah I did like it all you know it varied but all she wanted to listen to was that music

[01:07:40] for like four months right I was like yeah we we we're gonna be fine then so we're talking about big swings uh when we spoke with akiva and henry we can't tell if this is 100 true or if it's

[01:07:55] you know like part of the like you know tell them how it works but don't give them all the ingredients but they were saying you know at the start of the season you'll make pitches for episodes

[01:08:06] everybody you know they'll pick out the pitches they like you break the stories and you go from there but if a story idea gets discarded they don't go back to that like I think they had

[01:08:17] mentioned uh wanting to involve uh jason isaac's captain lorca and they couldn't figure out a way to do it so they said okay so we're not gonna do that story um are there any pitches for strange new

[01:08:28] worlds that didn't make it that you really wish had hmm so here's what's tricky it's not that they were lying to you when they said that because it is true that when you really work an idea

[01:08:45] for example the how could we bring lorca back and you looked at it every different way and you know yeah it's probably not gonna work um it does go away but we have this board in the room

[01:08:56] filled with index cards of ideas that didn't quite that ultimately didn't make it into the mix of the top 10 but are still solid story possibilities um and that board grows every year you know

[01:09:13] I don't I don't want to tell you about the one that no spoilers no that I am most um hardcore about but um I will say and I guess this is so so this will be one of those things if the

[01:09:28] episode ever ends up happening uh you will think back to this moment and you will remember and you will know this is what I'm talking about um and if the series ends and it never happens

[01:09:36] you can ask me and I'll tell you but um excellent but but there is a I have been inordinately preoccupied through much of my writing and this goes back a good 15 years with certain issues

[01:09:51] about our world today and who we are and how we have sort of segregated ourselves into these weird bubbles of information in fact and stuff and I did a whole trilogy meant to explore that

[01:10:04] and was very much hoping by the time I got to the end of it that I would find some answers and I found a few but not as many as I wanted and so that preoccupation um it feels like it

[01:10:18] would be such a good episode but we just haven't quite broken the right form for it yet because a lot of times it's like there used to be this old rule it was literally a bible of information

[01:10:30] that they would send to aspiring novelists or you know the people who would be submitting scripts to the shows and you know one of the thing was we do not involve ourselves in other people's

[01:10:39] civil wars so creating a situation like this where it actually has a lot of meaning for our characters is the trick because it feels very much like somebody else's problem right right yeah so but yeah that's sort of the broad strokes of it that's you guys I think

[01:10:59] that's our first ever conditional exclusive scoop I like that a lot yeah absolutely I'm just hoping we're gonna get cited on Wikipedia earlier when people fill in what Kirsten was up to yeah if we end up with the memory alpha page we're there guys

[01:11:19] didn't exist I was born uh before we wrap up I mean we do have to ask uh we are the official podcast of mortagus we are big fans of ortega when you were writing among the lotus eaters where I mean what were you aware

[01:11:36] you were writing the ortega episode of the first 20 episodes or where were you with her character we do love the I fly the ship line I need to show off for that yes I was aware and I was very

[01:11:49] excited um it's a funny thing because like on discovery we made the very conscious choice which in some ways I feel strongly about is still a good idea but I think over time kind of

[01:12:05] bit us in the ass to not focus the show on the bridge crew right viewers definitely have their opinions on that yeah we were gonna have bridge crew that we were gonna see all the time

[01:12:17] who we were not going to go deeply into as characters and I think I'm not sure what akiva's original intention might have been I think once Melissa became ortegas it was inevitable

[01:12:31] that this character was going to have to be developed a lot more deeply um but I think you know initially it's like we got to deal with pike we got to deal with spock we got

[01:12:43] to deal with uno we got to deal with lawn we got to deal with you know uhura we got it's like there's there's no it is an embarrassment of riches the characters of this show right um and so

[01:12:56] but there's melissa just taking every single moment that she has and making it go right so yeah I mean I was very Davey did a lot of the heavy lifting on the planet stuff

[01:13:09] and I did the heavy lifting on the ortegas storyline in the ship stuff so I was going to ask if you broke it up that way yeah we did we did we don't you don't always break it up that way

[01:13:17] but in this case we did make sense and yeah and that work for me has continued in the sense that she is always a character now who um when we're talking about how we're gonna continue to

[01:13:32] develop her I'm very very protective of she's amazing and uh and that storyline was great to do yeah yeah all right guys so kirsten buyer official godmother of open pike night I'm comfortable with that if you guys are got got a oracle there yeah we'll workshop this

[01:13:56] as it come with a t-shirt you know what yes it absolutely can if you have if you're uh if your folks will send us a p.o box or something yes it comes with a t-shirt and probably some uh we've

[01:14:08] sent melissa some t-shirts one question I always like to ask our writers is there a favorite single line you've written in a book a screenplay an essay a favorite line of yours that you've written

[01:14:21] one that stands out can also be unpublished we've had that as an answer as well I I yeah I mean like the one that I'm thinking of I don't want to misquote it because it's kind of long but do you

[01:14:35] want me to grab it sure all right hang on a second where are my copies uh season four scripts yeah let's see here it says don't you die on me or take us don't you dare not oh you're not limiting it to because it's not actually in a

[01:14:55] tell no no no no no no no no no no it's not active contrition oh are they back here no oh come on I'm just I'm picturing you on like a giant ladder scrolling through a library

[01:15:11] yeah just books flying over your shoulder beauty in the beast style yeah no I I have a bookshelf back here because you know when you write books they give you multiple copies of the first editions this

[01:15:24] is probably the most concrete answer we've gotten to this question I'm on the edge of my seat very excited it's it's it's long and I'm sorry about that but you're getting a reading here

[01:15:35] this is exciting this is a conversation between Janeway and chicote who if you have not read my books I will spoil for you the fact that they end up finally entering into the relationship that many

[01:15:49] fans while watching the show wish that they had so there's a moment in this book this is the second to the last book of the series where they're talking about the issue of getting married

[01:16:03] and what that means for their relationship she says that she's afraid of the idea of marriage and he says this he says you and I have been together too long and seen too much to ever lie

[01:16:19] to each other about that set aside the reality that every long-term relationship that has ever been is subject to disagreements tragedies and unforeseeable events that can do great damage to its foundation forget the fact that all relationships live and die not by any single

[01:16:36] choice but by the countless daily choices they contain the myriad moments where kindness patience and understanding prevail over our most base drives of selfishness and self-preservation the deepest personal betrayals bear within them the seeds of grace and forgiveness

[01:16:54] I don't care if we ever marry for me nothing can change the fact that your happiness is indistinguishable from mine that's it that's good that's a great line put that in a card to my wife

[01:17:07] for an anniversary or something wow that is amazing fantastic I'm glad you liked it does your husband read your books and go why don't you talk to me like that yeah you say it's because of that play that you booked that I didn't yeah exactly right

[01:17:28] I'm still holding that against him um no my husband has the uh exquisite joy or or horror I'm not sure which sometimes although he says he loves it of listening to my writing

[01:17:42] before anybody else ever sees it or reads it so for most of the things that I've written I'll work for a few hours and then he'll come sit with me and I'll read to him what I did and

[01:17:55] he'll tell me what he thinks and there have been times when his reaction to something was so strong that it's been like oh I think I have miscalculated here and my need to course correct so

[01:18:07] he's my first best audience that's great yeah I love it is there anything else you want want the audience to hear before we we close up the interview I think only that

[01:18:21] the the work that you guys are doing is such an integral part of Star Trek and of this universe and I hope you're aware of that I mean I'm sure it brings you joy to do it

[01:18:35] um because obviously this is a lot of fun um but it's very very important uh Star Trek exists the way it does and endures the way it does because of the passion of people like you

[01:18:48] and um I am very grateful for you well likewise thank you Dave yeah thank you Kirsten you've let on that you are working on season three uh which we're all excited about

[01:19:01] we've seen the the clip from Comic Con this past weekend but beyond Vulcans can you give us one word that uh won't mean anything right now but when we watch season three we'll go Kirsten

[01:19:15] that's what she was talking about okay okay it just has to be two words okay so it's called it Chappals flowers all right oh I like that okay I don't know if we've ever had a possessive one yet

[01:19:31] I like that yeah yeah yeah but the character like a chapel oh my my gears are working no I just you want you wanted something to play with so you play with that

[01:19:41] absolutely that's and that's exactly if we're gonna be wondering about that till the season comes out yeah good work all right well Kirsten Beier open pike night is an open mic night themed

[01:19:52] podcast and so we do ask all of our guests to tell us a joke at the end of their interview do you have a joke for us tonight I do and I will give half the credit to Jonathan breaks because

[01:20:04] this is actually one of the very first conversations that we ever had the day that we met he came up to me and I'm gonna modify it just a little bit and he whispered in my ear where does the captain

[01:20:16] pee in her ready room where does the captain bathroom room anywhere she wants she's the captain there's a mental image but you have to understand like the pressure of that moment is like I had never met him

[01:20:42] yeah and I he's like oh you're the one who knows everything about star trek and I'm thinking to myself there is no universe in which I know more about star trek than you do but all right

[01:20:51] and then he asks me this question somehow that's the answer I came up with I love that I feel like is this a test very nice all right wow thank you Kirsten thank you for being here with us this has been

[01:21:06] everything we hoped for and more in an interview with you we really appreciate it I'm so glad it's been a lot of fun too I appreciate you guys taking the time thank you thank you thank you once again to Kirsten Beier here with a k fantastic to

[01:21:21] have the oracle here on open pike night and thank you to all of our collars and all of our patrons especially our 25 minute set patrons Pam Steve and Mark you are amazing all of you supporters

[01:21:32] we are excited about speaking with Kirsten we're excited about the new content that's been dropping with Comic Con and we love hearing your voices so Jesse if we want to hear people's voices and if they want their voices heard how could they do that

[01:21:48] the easiest way to get on to open pike night is to go to open pike.com there you'll see a tab that says join us you can add your voice to the show you can record directly on the website

[01:21:59] or you can send an mp3 attached to an email whatever is easiest for you and you can go to open pike.substack.com to get signed up for our free newsletter so that you will be among the first to know when we have a new guest

[01:22:12] scheduled to stop by the stage and of course you can follow us wherever you do your social media ying at open pike. And Cameron where can people follow you and find you?

[01:22:23] I just want to say that I'm glad that the Star Trek oracle couldn't see into my soul and see that I didn't feel I was worthy enough and zapped me with her laser eyes that was a never

[01:22:31] ending story reference for you all you can get more deep cut references like that over on green shirt a newbie's trek through TNG where John and I and a couple others are watching currently the last season of TNG it's pretty exciting over there and dipping our toes

[01:22:45] into DS9 as well at green shirt 87 green shirt wherever you listen to your pods and before I let John continue which I would love to do I'm just going to have to implore

[01:22:56] you to go check out my recent appearance on the it's got star trek podcast it's no secret that I'm a big fan of those gents and what they do over there and I recently joined them to discuss

[01:23:06] discoveries through the valley of shadows from season two which the astute among you will know is the time crystal episode I could not help myself they gave me my choice and I took it so

[01:23:19] check that out right now because it's available right now as you're listening to this stay in your podcast app look up it's got star trek and listen to my appearance I had a ton of fun with the guys

[01:23:29] I hope to be back someday but I fully understand if I'm not it's fantastic episode and Kim have you guessed it on anything recently if you're feeling some trimmers under your feet that might

[01:23:39] be my appearance over on movies for days with Newman the space hippie who you heard today me and he talked all things trimmers one of my longtime favorite horror films and his first

[01:23:50] time watching it really got deep into some grab boy philosophy so go check that out over at movies for days that was I was excited when I heard that and and very I'll spoiler alert he loved it

[01:24:02] and I was very glad to hear that I might have to watch that movie and then listen to that episode there you go yes wait you still haven't seen tremors to this year also

[01:24:14] tremors and die hard double feature coming up soon folks John McClain versus grab woods man well it's been a long night and we need to go send kirsten by our arpidge for

[01:24:29] John McClain versus grab woods and see if we can get some of that strange new world's magic on that story so be sure to clean up after yourselves be sure to tip your servers you can go anywhere you want but you can't stay here you you