Galactic battle: ‘Crime 101’ writer defends ‘Star Trek’ producer after ‘Project Hail Mary’ author calls new series “shit”
Andy Weir, the original author of Project Hail Mary, has come under fire from fellow writers after he called the latest iterations of the Star Trek franchise “shit”.
The film adaptation of Weir’s 2021 sci-fi novel, starring Ryan Gosling, has become the highest-grossing movie of the year so far. To this end, the author appeared on a livestream with YouTuber The Critical Drinker last week, where he shared his thoughts on other similar franchises.
Discussing the newer spin-offs of Star Trek, Weir said (per Deadline): “I like Strange New Worlds… It’s pretty good. I didn’t hate Enterprise – I thought it was kind of weird. Lower Decks I thought was entertaining and fun. All the others, they can go.”
He then revealed a slightly more personal reason for his dislike of Star Trek, explaining he had pitched an idea to the show’s executive producer, Alex Kurtzman, which was turned down.
“I pitched a Star Trek show to Paramount and I was on Zoom with the showrunners with all the shows and spent a lot of time talking to [Kurtzman],” Weir said, before adding, “He, as a person, is a really nice guy. But at the same time, those shows are shit. He is a nice guy, but they didn’t accept my pitch so, you know, fuck ’em.”
As such, his comments have sparked controversy within the literary community, with Don Winslow, the author behind the novella based on the recent film Crime 101, making a series of posts on X coming to Kurtzman’s defence on March 30th.
Winslow wrote in his first post: “Congrats on the success of Project Hail Mary and The Martian. I’m a real fan. But when you have your moment don’t use it to crap on other writers’ work. For the record, Alex Kurtzman is a visionary writer, creator, producer and you owe him an apology… writer to writer.”
Then, responding to a reply under the post, in which a user criticised Winslow for coming to Weir’s defence, he replied: “Writers stand up for other writers. It’s how and why the Writers Guild was formed. And you don’t take your moment in the sun to attack another writer because they didn’t buy your pitch.”
Despite the social media backlash, Weir has enjoyed a wealth of success recently, with the movie of Project Hail Mary, directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, having grossed over $300 million at the box office.
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