Today in Star Trek history: Wil Wheaton's Memories of the Future, Volume 1 released in 2009

Memories of the Future, Volume 1 by Wil Wheaton

In 2006, Wil Wheaton (Wesley Crusher inStar Trek: The Next Generation, as if you didn’t know) was asked by an editor at Weblogs, Inc. (a now-defunct blog network owned by AOL, which you probablydidn’t know) to write a series of reviews ofTNG from the unique point of view of a child actor working on the show. Wheaton enthusiastically began writing, going episode by episode, but by the time he had made his way to the halfway point of season one, AOL cut Weblogs’ budget and his column got the axe.

But this is Star Trek! Spock came back from the dead. A temporal anomaly returned Tasha Yar to life. Heck, Harry Kim was killed and resurrected four times during the course of Star Trek: Voyager. Surely Wheaton’s column could find a new life. Fans had suggested he compile them into a book and it’s that book, Memories of the Future, Volume 1, that was released on October 13th, 2009.

The book takes a humorous look at the first 13 episodes of TNG, from “Encounter At Farpoint, Part 1” through “Datalore.” It reads like an episode guide, written with extreme sarcasm, occasionally taking breaks from the snark to give some interesting behind-the-scenes recollections, quotable lines and his favorite technobabble from each episode. What makes the book stand out from others of its ilk is Wheaton’s voice, which can clearly be heard as you read each episode synopsis. His memories, including a particularly racist director of a particularly racist episode (I’m looking at you, “Code Of Honor”), his relationship with his “space mom” Gates McFadden and his complete awe at stepping onto the bridge of the starship Enterprise, help to illustrate what it was like growing up in that environment.

The book sold reasonably well and Wheaton planned to do a second volume, covering the back half of the first season. In 2016, a Tumbler user asked Wheaton, “Will there be a Memories From the Future, Volume 2?” to which the actor replied, “It’s in my queue, but there are a bunch of other projects that are currently ahead of it.” No Volume 2 has been released in the ensuing five years, and since Wheaton’s list of projects has gotten noticeably longer of late, it seems unlikely that it will materialize any time soon. But then, Scotty, believed dead, was merely stuck in a transporter buffer for 75 years, so who knows?

If you’d like to read Memories of the Future, Volume 1 for yourself, it’s available now from Amazon.com.