Playtrek Gazette Special Edition January 1999 Contact us at: playtrek@hotmail.com As the regular monthly issue of the Playtrek Gazette is being assembled, we bring you this special report. We sent intrepid correspondent Charles Apple into the snowy wastelands to investigate the Chicago phenomenon known as the Viacom Store. This, the flagship of a proposed chain of Viacom stores, was to Trek as the Warner Brothers stores were to Daffy and Bugs. Mr. Apple was to bring back the whole story on this merchandising mecca. Unfortunately, though, it had already closed. And so this issue was born. Herewith is the definitive story behind the death of this midwest beacon of Trek stuff. Please be aware that the subject of this story is not pretty, and Mr. Apple's acid poem of urban blight on the mean streets of the windy city is as gritty as a handfull of Lake Superior sand in your underwear and contains material intended for mature audiences. A PLAYTREK GAZETTE SPECIAL REPORT: THE CLOSING OF VIACOM By Charles Apple Along Chicago's North Michigan Avenue, where the cold north wind comes screaming in from across the great lake and whips your chilly ass like a cheap Southside whore, tourists and locals alike flock to window shop at a multitude of fancy shops, stores and other retail opportunities. You can find the very rich at Cartier's and at Tiffany's. A new Banana Republic scores big with the yuppie crowd. Sports nuts hang out in the crowded and confusing NikeTown. Folks whose first sexual experiences were with either their own family members or various farm animals congregate at Eddie Bauer. But one of the best-known and best-loved stops along this bustling shopping mecca is no more. Viacom has closed its doors. Open only a year-and-a-half, Viacom has suffered greatly at the fickle flying finger of fate, as have the scores of fans and shoppers who frequented its noisy confines. Nick at Nite lovers no longer have a place to call their own; a place where they can buy an "I Love Lucy" cookie jar and an actual Jefferson High School letter jacket from "Happy Days." Niles Craine wannabees no longer have a supplier of the ultra-chic "Frasier" T-shirts and bath robes that all verbose, stuffy coffee shop loiterers secretly wear around their apartments. And the Star Trek fans. Dear God, the Star Trek fans... The Trekkies—or, as they prefer to be called, "Goddamn Trekkies"—have been devastated by the loss of their local supplier of Tribbles, cheap pewter key chains in the familiar shape of the Starfleet "delta" and rubber Spock ears. The geeky freaks can now be seen wandering the streets of Chicago in a daze. Some have taken to sleeping on the uncovered steam grates on lower Wacker. Others have made a half-hearted attempt to switch allegiance to the Warner Brothers store, about an eighth of a mile to the north in Water Tower Place shopping mall. But despite their Batman-ears caps and the Pinky and the Brain T-shirts, you can still tell they're Trekkies. You can see it in their eyes. It's the same look you see in the eyes of a heroin junkie who's quit cold-turkey. Except the heroin freaks generally smell better. Oh, the humanity. ---------- I. FAR-REACHING CONSEQUENCES It's not just the Trekkies, you know, who've been body-slammed by the closing of Chicago's Viacom store. John Bali-Bali, a poor, teenaged unemployed artist sits on the edge of his cot in the thatched hut he shares with his ten brothers and eight sisters on the tiny, Pacific island of Maui Maui Holy Cowi. Bali-Bali—we'll call him John from here on, because frankly, Bali-Bali is a real bitch to type—has been employed since he was eight years old at a small factory on the edge of an inactive volcano, by the island's only airstrip. That small factory was where Star Trek plastic action figures and porcelain "Latinum edition" figurines were made and shipped out to the nearby Chinese mainland, where they were then shipped, in turn, to the states. John is a worried young man. He doesn't know how he'll manage to feed his share of the family. For seven years, his mother has counted on the seven dollars and thirty eight cents John brings home each Friday night to buy milk and bread for the family. But the food will be hard to come by this week: No Viacom store equals decreased demand for action figures. That equals a closed factory. Which results in growling bellies for John and his siblings. John is a talented guy. His job at the Star Trek factory—he grins and refers to it as the "Klingon homeworld" and to the Viacom store as "Feringinar"—was to paint the tiny little action figures as they rolled slowly past him on a conveyer belt. A little dab of blue here, a smudge of yellow there, a few quick dots of black... and there you have it: Paris in P.J.s. But John made a boo-boo on the job a few months ago. One rainy Thursday evening—it was during monsoon season, John recalls—he was in his fifteenth hour of the day's shift, when suddenly, it occurred to him: He was painting the wrong colors in the wrong spaces on the new shipment of transporter figures. He double-checked the paint specs he'd been given earlier that day... no, no problem there, he was painting the figures just the way he'd been told. John hit the large red button to his left, which was the "stop conveyer" button. Viacom, ever sensitive to the needs of its employees—and, after all, they DID own the entire run of "I Love Lucy" and were familiar indeed with the dessert factory episode—had installed "panic" buttons on all of its assembly lines. When the boss came running, John showed him the figures and tried to explain that the colors as specified on his paint specs were reversed—this red area SHOULD be black, and this black area SHOULD be red, see? The boss shook his head, chewed John's ass out and, with a stab of his chubby finger, set the assembly line in motion again. "Who cares?" John remembers the boss telling him. "Those crazy Star Trek fans will buy anything! Get back to work! And just be grateful you don't have any BEVERLY CRUSHER figures to paint!" Now that Viacom—and John's factory—have shut their doors for good, John feels guilty. He thinks he should have gone over his boss' head, in hopes of finding someone who would listen to him. Perhaps if he had, Viacom would be open for business today, John says. Perhaps he'd still have a job. Perhaps his younger sister would still have a job. Amy, 16, had a much cushier job than did her brother; she was responsible for painting color arm band stripes on six-inch figures. Their even younger sister, Kitten—age 12—still has her job, over on the next island. He paints Chekov's hair on Target exclusives. She has her own horror stories to tell about the time her factory ran out of the correct color of paint. But that story will have to wait for another day. As despondent as he seems, though, John hasn't given up all hope. He has put in an application to the island's only other employer, the same factory where his mom works. What do they make there, we ask John. John smiles ruefully. "AirJordans," he says. Oh, the humanity. ---------- II. WHAT WENT WRONG IN CHICAGO In our quest to uncover the REAL reason a successful, cool store like Viacom could run itself out of business smack in the middle of one of the planet's busiest retail avenues, we tracked down one of the executives who was responsible for running the day-to-day operations of the Viacom store. James Tiberious Matt Jeffries Solow Roddenberry Justman—perhaps not his real name, we neglected to ask for identification—was a vice-president in charge of sales, promotion, marketing and turning up the thermostat whenever it got cold. Justman agreed to talk with PlayTrek Gazette. Q: So, Mister Justman... what, exactly, happened to Viacom? Why did you have to close your doors? A: Simple. We couldn't make any money. Q: You couldn't make any money? How is that possible? You're right there on Michigan Avenue, you've got the coolest stuff for sale... A: Have you ever had to pay rent, Mr. Apple? Q: Well, yeah, sure, but... A: Our rent was too high. We couldn't pay our bills. Q: But your store was ALWAYS busy... A: Ah, yes. But were we making a PROFIT? Q: You weren't? A: Nope. You've got to understand: Michigan Avenue is an expensive place to rent a storefront. Especially one as highly-visible as our storefront. Q: So why didn't you open the store in a mall, instead? Or in a cheaper location? A: Hell, don't ask me. I just MADE the decisions. I didn't have to EXPLAIN them to anybody. How come you expect ME to make sense? Q: Well, I figured... A: You figured there was common sense behind the decision, right? Q: Uh... A: Of course you did. But tell me something, mister smarty-britches: Did you see "Insurrection?" Why didn't the Enterprise [spoiler deleted] at the end of the movie? And why didn't [Deep Space Nine spoiler deleted]? Or, for that matter [entire plotline of a recent Voyager episode deleted, not because of a spoiler, but because it truly sucked]? Huh? Explain THAT to me? Q: Well, I can't. Obviously. They don't make sense. A: And those shows were made by Viacom. And this store was Viacom. So why should we be any different. Q: Point taken. Tell me, what happened to all the folks who worked here in the Viacom store? A: Most of them have been taken care of. Tommy Pickles and Chuckie Finster, for example, now head up our research and development program. Marcia and Greg Brady are vice-presidents in charge of VH-1. The Salt Vampire who was up in the Star Trek department is a new V.J. on MTV. And Lucy Ricardo will be joining Adam and Dr. Drew as hosts of "Loveline," also on MTV. Q: What about Blue, the dog from "Blue's Clues?" A: *SIGH* Blue gets my old job. Q: The bitch! A: Precisely. Q: Oh—Beavis and Butthead. What happens to them? A: Ah, you, ah, don't really want to know that, do you? Q: Sure I do. A: They're the new Viacom executives in charge of Star Trek action figures. Q: Oh, the humanity! A: Precisely. ---------- III. SAD LESSONS LEARNED As you walked in the revolving doors at the front of the Viacom store, you were assaulted immediately by noise—the noise of kids playing in the Nickelodeon section, just to your left. A series of oversized toys and props were interspaced among the sales merchandise, which gave you the impression of the Batcave on school field trip day. Hey, Mister Wayne, where's the stuffed dinosaur and the giant penny? Further back and on the right was the Paramount movies and television section. There, they sold the "Frasier" stuff, the "Forrest Gump" items and a virtual mountain of other memorabilia. Beyond that was the Nick at Nite section, tastefully decorated in pale green Formica and a black-and-white tile floor. Along the back wall ran a long escalator. At the top, you could turn left and head past even more Nickelodeon garbage, though a needlessly expensive and, despite the proprietor's best intentions, decidedly untrendy coffeeshop, and into the chaotic MTV room, beyond, which was decorated very much like you remember your teenaged older sister's room was, years ago. But when you headed right off the escalator, you walked into Trekkie heaven. The Trek department consisted of three distinct areas. First, was a sort of vestibule, decked out in stainless steel, plastic and blue neon. A number of items, priced for all sorts of budgets, lined the walls and the racks. Among the shelves were life-sized mannequins of some of Trek's most endearing creatures: The Salt Vampire of M-113. A Romulan. The Gorn captain. A borg. Locutus, who was actually for sale, assuming you had three thousand smackers burning a hole in your pocket. A smaller, circular, room laid behind that room and to the rear. Trek T-shirts of all styles and sizes were stuffed into every corner. A giant bookcase contained virtually every book, CD-ROM and videotape in print relating to the various incarnations of Star Trek. In the center of the circle stood a giant green screen. For a few bucks, an employee would snap your picture in front of the screen and carefully assemble a composite print which, when printed on their high-resolution imager, would make it appear you were beaming down with Beverly Crusher and Geordi LaForge. Beyond these rooms laid an even larger room. It was here that several large, professionally-constructed models hung by wires from the ceiling. The original Enterprise—of course it was there; don't be silly—carried an additional note: Made from the same mold as the Enterprise miniature in the Deep Space Nine tribbles episode, this one could be yours for only $1,200. Touch a back-lit Okudagram on the small control panel on the guardrail, and you could hear the voice of Mrs. Gene Roddenberry describe each ship and its history. Along one wall was a set of shelves and pegs, on which were assembled an assortment of Star Trek action figures: 4.5-inch, nine-inch, two-packs... anything that wasn't too old or an exclusive could be found at Viacom. Along another wall was a glass case which contained higher-end items: Expensive sculptures, replicas of props; replicas that stretch the meaning of the word "realistic"; signed and numbered "Latinum Edition" items. The Huntsville Scotty and Sulu figures. Figures, manufactured by Ertl for the third Trek movie. Figures made by Galoob for the Next Generation. On the way out, you'd walk by the largest, flattest wall in the entire suite. There, hung the limited-edition, signed prints. The animation cells. The artwork. All gone. But to where? Some of the items will, undoubtably, wind up at the Star Trek Experience in Las Vegas. Some will possibly be sent off to the on-line store at Star Trek-dot-com. Much of it may possibly be vaporized via phaser (see, I TOLD you those props were realistic!). And why the loss? Poor marketing. Poor sales projection. The same kind of checkbook-keeping that would get YOUR sorry ass thrown in jail simply bounces Viacom off of Michigan Avenue and back to Hollywood, where flaky thinking and a singular lack of common sense is not only acceptible behavior, it's also considered a job qualification. These, after all, are the same clows who gave us the Warp Factor Ten speed limit. And turned the character who broke that limit into a Budweiser lizard. And created Wesley Crusher, in all his metaphysical glory. And they're the same clowns who give thumbs up and thumbs down two what novels we'll read, what comics we'll buy and what action figures we'll chase all over eBay. They're the same outfit that told us Janeway never wore a move-style uniform. They're the same ones who rubber-stamped the plan to put Keiko, Trelane and Mirror Kira into a permanent crouch and turn Kang into a character from the Animated Batman cartoon. They're the same guys who thought it would be a GOOD idea to sell us some six-inch figures. Oh, the humanity. [End. Finally.] [Note: This article is satire. Any resemblence to any actual person or company is not intended. Hey, we like Viacom. And PlayMates. And Paramount. Really, we do... ]