By Sally Deering
Writer Will Stape watched the original STAR TREK series on a black & white TV back when he was a kid and the experience left a colorful imprint in his psyche that later inspired him to write two STAR TREK episodes, the STAR TREK ESSAYS eBook and his new eBook STAR TREK SEX.
“I can remember being 3 or 4 watching STAR TREK and my little 3 year-old brain is thinking, what is this?†Stape says. “That was a little fate. It was imprinted on my brain and it was speaking to me. I always wanted to explore. I never wanted to be a pirate, I was into comic books. I’m a total Geek.â€
Years after writing two scripts for STAR TREK that were turned into episodes, Stape was listening to a sexy STAR TREK bit on THE HOWARD STERN SHOW on Sirius XM Radio and it hit him that sexually-charged situations like inter-species sex; bondage, and S&M ran rampant through the plot lines and sometimes between the lines. So he did his research and in just two months, Stape wrote his second eBook STAR TREK SEX, where he highlights, analyzes and sometime chuckles at alien couplings and other Sci-Fi sex play.
“I’m trying to inject something new into the STAR TREK equation,†Stape says. “I try to be funny. I try to be light I’m a STAR TREK fan and a writer.â€
Stape says there are many sexual situations played out in the first season of STAR TREK. First of all, Captain Kirk (William Shatner) was handsome and all the girls were hot for him and many beautiful actresses were his love interest like Joan Collins and Mariette Hartley. Then there’s Mr. Spock who is child of inter-species coupling – his mother is a human; his father is a Vulcan. Stape also mentions S&M scenes where a shirtless Kirk and Spock are whipped.
“You have to have a good body to take your shirt off and get whipped,†Stape laughs. “In the episode ALL OUR YESTERDAYS with Mariette Hartley, she goes through a time portal with Spock and he begins to devolve slowly; he starts to become more human. It’s very sexual and very human. There’s a love there. That’s one of the most special and uniquely sexual episodes.â€
 Another sexy episode is ON THE EDGE OF FOREVER, Stape says, with Joan Collins. It’s also shows how the main characters have to time travel to find love.
“They can’t find love in their own world, so they go back in time which frees that character to do something they wouldn’t normally do,†Stape says. “The new shows and the new movies are flashy and philosophical, but there’s something about the 60s and the open frontier. You’ll never get more of a raw fun, tasteful sexuality.â€
Back in the mid-1990s, Stape submitted two scripts on spec to the STAR TREK franchise. In 1993, he sent in a script to STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION and the producers optioned it and turned it into episode HOMEWARD which aired in 1994. Then, Stape submitted a story for STAR TREK: DEEP SPACE NINE, which the producers optioned and aired as the episode PROPHET MOTIVE.
“I found out about the show having an open spec script submission when I read it in ‘The Next Generation Companion Guide’ and I thought, I can do this,†Stape says. “Thinking they’d say thanks a lot kid, I got the call two months later. They took the core idea and changed a lot about it. Mine was a little bit more family-oriented; they opened it up and expanded it. They brought in the aliens, I’m such a huge fan I couldn’t wait to see Patrick Stewart say my words. That was very satisfying. Your first published work is so special.â€
In his book, Stape gives other examples of heated sexual situations, like when the first pilot was rejected. The censors said it was too cerebral, but Stapes thinks it was the plot line: aliens kidnapped the crew to make them breeding sex slaves housed in cages. Then there was the episode PLATO’S STEPCHILDREN which Stape says was banned in England because of sado-masochistic undertones.
Stape published STAR TREK SEX in early February 2014 and he’s already been interviewed about the book for a podcast. He says he would like to get on The Howard Stern Show on Sirius Radio XM because Stern is a huge STAR TREK fan and it was a sketch that Stern’s sidekick Robin Givens did about having phone sex with Captain Kirk that inspired Stape to do the book.
“The universe doesn’t have to poke me more,†Stape says. “It just poured out and in two months I had a book. Howard you’re a reason I got a book.â€
So does that make Stape a Trekkie? He says: “I prefer to be called a Trekker.â€
He’s also a Jersey guy, born in Jersey City and raised down the shore in the Toms River area. He attended Ramapo College of New Jersey and Rutger’s and now resides in Bayonne where he works as a freelance writer for Yahoo.com and other internet sites.
Stape says writing science fiction isn’t that difficult, you just have to love the genre which has a broad spectrum these days, like the film HER directed by Spike Jonez.
“I love Sci-Fi,†Stape says. “If I was on a desert island and I had to take one book, it would be Sci-Fi. Even Woody Allen, he did SLEEPER, PURPLE ROSE OF CAIRO, ZELIG – he’s a frustrated Sci-Fi guy.â€
STAR TREK SEX is available on Amazon.com for $4.99 as a download to iPad, iPhone and, of course, the Kindle and already it’s received a rave review:
Rexton E. Kuchinsky calls STAR TREK SEX, “A fun romp through the Star Trek universe†and gives it five stars. He writes, “Fond memories of old Trek episodes are explored in a clever and unique way. The author’s analysis is spot on, forcing a die-hard Trek fan to go someplace new. I can’t wait to revisit the noted episodes with fresh eyes.â€
 To purchase a copy of Will Stape’s eBook: STAR TREK SEX, go to: http://www.amazon.com/Star-Trek-Sex-Will-Stape-ebook/dp/B00IEA3GTA
Â
Here’s an excerpt from Will Stape’s STAR TREK SEX
In Chapter One, The Cage, Stape analyzes STAR TREK’S pilot episode from 1966 where actor Jeffrey Hunter plays Captain Christopher Pike. (NBC rejected the pilot because it was too cerebral, too slow and too intellectual and ordered a second pilot.) The episode involves Captain Pike visiting a planet where a group of human male survivors lust after a female alien:
“…The sex capades of The Cage get even more raw and raunchy when the Talosians dial up their telepathic mojo and zap Pike with a near pornographic illusion. They conjure up a den of playful delights where Pike sits at the center of a group of horny men leering and admiring a dancing girl. Vina, slathered from head to toe in jade green skin make-up and dressed in an eye popping, revealing outfit, now whirls around seductively as an Orion slave girl. Her part belly dance, part teasing strip show still smolders as one of the more erotic moments in all of broadcast television. Too cerebral? Too slow? Too intellectual? Really NBC? Or was it all just far too full of sex for your conservative sponsors of 1966?â€