With TMP, you had a strong Hollywood name (Robert Wise) in the director’s chair and state of the art special effects. Sound famiiar? Hmmm.

I know that Abrams is not as accomplished as a director as Wise, but add to the TMP formula an excitingly modern story-telling style and fantastic action sequences, and the potential for the current project is eerily similar (I would argue that Abrams has more draw amidst the target audience than Wise did at that point in his career). TMP dominated for three weeks at the box office. I don’t expect that from this film, but the terrain is much different now than it was 30 years ago. One dominating performance the week of its debut, along with a strong showing in the following two weeks, and STXI is home free, IMO.

‘Wolverine’ takes the first week in May, STXI takes the second, and ‘Angels And Demons’ swoops in in the third week. If STXI can hold at second place in that third week in May (its second week at the BO), and remain in the top 3 the following week, it will be fine. Abrams will have succeeded, IMO, and Star Trek will be in good shape for the forseeable future. The key is a strong performance opening weekend.

Even if only every established fan (Worldwide) shows up and brings a friend that weekend—that’s probably $30 million right there, before a single average moviegoer even makes a decision on his/her own to buy a ticket!

I think that those of us who stayed home for the last few movies will show up for Kirk/Spock/McCoy…and I think the likes of popular names like JJ Abrams and even Zachary Quinto will be enough to convince a friend to go with us. I already have a crew of 8 (including myself) for May 8th—4 Trek fans, 2 kids (of mine) who like action movies, and 2 spouses (who love “Lost” and “Heroes”, but have never gotten Trek).

It’s going to be okay.

Well it grossed over $100M on a $35 M budget which is pretty amazing for the time. However, Paramount was looking for Star Wars grosses — the only reason they greenlight the film to start with — and that was incredibly unrealistic on their part in my opinion. As much as I love Trek, it just is never going to have the crossover appeal that SW had. That movie was unique in 1977. Additionally, a lot went wrong in STTMP that I think made Paramount gunshy – the whole drama with the special effects problems cost them time and $$. Paramount was smart in reigning in the following films’ budgets and bringing in Harve, etc.

What hurts TMP (which I love— it’s actually #2 on my ST list of personal favorites) is its enormous budget in today’s dollars ($35 million 30 years ago was a huge sum of money). As any businessman/woman will tell you, it is not the “gross” which ultimately matters…but the “net” profit. TMP still made money, but after failing to do as well as the studio hoped, the Star Trek film franchise was relegated to lower budget projects which had much lower expectations (until now, of course).

Great word!

STTMPactually made a lot of money and leads if you adjust for inflation. STV made $70M which surprised me to be honest since it’s usually written off as a total failure. (I didn’t like it either — I refer to it as STV:POS) First Contact made $150M. What amazes me with these numbers is the budgets back in the 80s!!! It costs a fortune to make even small films today.

ST:TMP — $139,000,000 Gross; $35,000,000 budget
ST:TWOK — $96,800,000 Gross: $12,000,000 budget
ST: TSFS — $87,000,000 Gross; $18,000,000 budget
ST: TVH — $133,000,000 Gross; $24,000,000 budget
ST: TFF — $70,200,000 Gross; $30,000,000 budget
ST: TUC — $96,900,000 Gross; $27,000,000 budget
ST:G — $120,000,000 Gross; $38,000,000 budget
ST: FC — $150,000,000 Gross; $46,000,000 budget
ST: I — $117,800,000 Gross; $70,000,000 budget
ST: N — $67,313,000 Gross; $60,000,000 budget
TOTALS — $1,078,012,826; $360,000,000

http://www.the-numbers.com/movies/series/StarTrek.php

Adjusted for inflation, STTMP is #144 on the all time list of films with $225,473,376; STTVH is #197 with $200,758,634.

http://www.the-numbers.com/movies/records/inflation.php

I could be mistaken, but I’m not sure that would be true after accounting for inflation (about 10 years worth, I think). I’m fairly sure that when all is adjusted for fair comparison, TVH is the most profitable Star Trek feature film.

Someone actually posted a link not long ago to a site which does that very thing.

In any case, of the original films, only TFF (Shatner’s Great Trek Turd Of ‘89) did poorly. Even TMP did well, just not well enough in the studio’s eyes to justify any more “big-budget” Star Trek films (until now, at least).

TWOK and TVH both showed that ST movies featuring TOS-era icons can have crossover appeal.

Even my most “mainstream” friends know “KHAAAAAAN!” and “the one with the whales”. I don’t know anyone who isn’t at least a closet geek :) who knows anything about a TNG-era film. Of course, the World does not revolve around who and what I know, but that has been my experience.

Those TNG-era years were so weird for me as a con-goer and TOS fan. I was thrilled to see the Trek franchise invigorated and able to support so many cons during the 90s but I did feel odd person out because TOS was completely dismissed for the most part by TNG fans. They weren’t being mean or anything, it’s just they were young and couldn’t get past the production values of 60s Trek. (Much like how many folks today can’t watch B&W movies and miss so many great classics!)

As for the TNG movies, the first 2 were actually very successful. First Contact made more $ than any Trek film. The last 2 though were the first to lose money in the franchise. (Even STV broke even and may have made a tiny profit, as bad as it was.)

I’m teasing you because this is a fun conversation… unless your comparing DS9 to your dying friend was meant seriously. So don’t take a comment on your strained analogy personally. We’re comparing television shows for goodness’ sake.

The later shows and movies clearly put the franchise on life support. Figuring out why, beyond the issues of budgets and marketing, in a way that provokes and informs the Supreme Court is worthwhile.

The problems with DS9 and VOY were very much the problems of enforced multuculturalism–as if there any inherent drama in a black captain, a Native American commander or an endless run of crinkly forehead aliens…. like the insufferably banal Torres.

The creators of these shows were ticking off checklists rather than creating dynamic characters and introducing new science fiction.

The problem with ENTERPRISE was Scott Bakula and Diane Warren. SB was too corny, too self-aware, not an ounce of character or edge.

Diane Warren’s song was a crime against science fiction–pathetic, loathsome, cloying and totally not something I’ll ever get used to.